Author Announcements:
Today, I wanted to share some important updates, mainly because it includes changes here right on ShannonAThompson.com, but it also includes an opportunity for your name to be mentioned during my next video on my YouTube Channel – Coffee & Cats.
So here’s the first bit of the exciting news!
I’m creating an interactive poetry collection. Every Friday, I’ll be posting a new poem on my Wattpad page, which you can visit by clicking here. My goal is to pick at least one of these poems per month to read on my YouTube channel – Coffee and Cats. That’s where you come in. Let me know which one you want me to read, and I might chose you to mention during my video. So far, I have three posted:
To the thunderstorm I used to love,
I hope you check them out and continue to help the collection grow every Friday. If you want to let me know which poem you enjoyed – or if you have questions about one – feel free to comment or message me on Wattpad or right here on ShannonAThompson.com.
Speaking of ShannonAThompson.com, you might have noticed the slight construction going on.
Since I hit 40,000 words in book 3 of The Timely Death Trilogy, I figured it was about time to create a Death Before Daylight page. I also created a page for my recently published short story, The Pink Scarf. Other changes include my “Tips” page. It has been taken down. It has been replaced by “Services” provided by The Author Extension Community, an open group run by AEC Stellar Publishing, Inc. We are now providing personal assistant work, content editing, and more to anyone interested, so click here to check out our services.
I hope these changes are as exciting to you all as they are to me, and I look forward to reading a poem chosen by you. I did want to take one moment to thank all of you – my publisher just gave me the news that my paperback sales are increasing more frequently, and I also got to see my top areas: So here’s a shout out to New Orleans, Atlanta, and Nashville. Keep on reading. :]
~SAT
Shannon A. Thompson 
I think my habit of being made dizzy by foreign languages is making the first poem easier for me to understand. Though I like the idea of samurai crabs. It’s very unique and eye-catching.
Thanks for the vote, Charles! You might be interested to know that “Fukushima Daiichi” is based off of a true story. I was in “History of the Samurai” class the day the nuclear meltdown happened in 2011, and my professor truly did tell us about the samurai crabs legend as he asked us to sign up to go over to Japan for relief efforts.
Here’s more about the samurai crabs if you’re interested: http://arthropoda.wordpress.com/2010/01/26/samurai-crabs-transmogrified-japanese-warriors-the-product-of-artificial-selection-or-pareidolia/
~SAT
Here I thought they were connected to the ninja turtles. Though I do think I’ve heard something about this before. I have a friend who is obsessed with Japanese legends, so he may have mentioned this one.
I’ve been working on a poetry series that is much like “Fukushima Daiichi” and “The French (History) Teacher” – where I take real stories from the classroom and blend it with other lessons I’ve learned. Kind of an exploration of education in and outside the classroom. The samurai crab was the very first lesson I thought of. It was fascinating to me. Japanese culture has many interesting legends, but perhaps I find them so interesting because they are very different from Western legends. Who knows? I’ll definitely have to explore more in the future.
~SAT
That sounds like a fun and unique poetry series. Kind of biographical and teaches a lesson. Good luck with that.
I like the thunderstorm one. Everyone can relate to the rain and its need to blanket the world for as long as it sees fit.
Thank you for the vote, Jonas! I will keep that in mind. :]
~SAT
I really like the Fukushima Daiichi poem. I’m not too bright about poetry but I read this one over and over again. I love the last line and thought it would be great to hear aloud.
BTW, I joined Wattpad recently because of your blog and had to check it out. I didn’t realize you were on there until a week ago but I’m following you there now too. Wattpad is a pretty amazing place and I’ve gotten some great tips from it.
I like the new additions to the site! The Services AEC Stellar is offering is a great idea. Especially the assistant to contact different reviewers. That can be an incredibly time consuming task!
I’m so glad you liked it! I actually just explained the story behind Fukushima Daiichi to Charles above, but I’m copying the message below this as well. I’m glad to be connected on Wattpad. I love it over there. 😀 And yes, that is a time consuming task, which is why we thought we would start offering it to authors. We’ve had three customers so far during the beta stage, and it went over really well. I was glad to see how much the authors and the bloggers enjoyed it and how much stress it took away from the entire ordeal.
~SAT
“Fukushima Daiichi” is based off of a true story. I was in “History of the Samurai” class the day the nuclear meltdown happened in 2011, and my professor truly did tell us about the samurai crabs legend as he asked us to sign up to go over to Japan for relief efforts.
Here’s more about the samurai crabs if you’re interested: http://arthropoda.wordpress.com/2010/01/26/samurai-crabs-transmogrified-japanese-warriors-the-product-of-artificial-selection-or-pareidolia/
I have nominated you for the One Lovely Blog Award. http://booksforfun1.com/2014/09/04/one-lovely-blog-award/
Thank you! I will be sure to mention you and share it around during my next blog post.
~SAT
Reblogged this on theowlladyblog.