Tag: Family

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What I Inherited from My Estranged Mother

Maggie Hemlock

I’m taking a day off today from writing. I’ve said it was to take care of filing my taxes online. I said it was because Saturday I wrote emotionally challenging scene. Both of those things are true, but there’s something else too.

Mother’s Day is a bitch for me. My mother never really was a mother even when she was around. I mean, in my early years she was there physically, but a combination of mental illness and drug addiction left her anywhere but actually there.

Full disclaimer: At the time my father wasn’t much better. He’s somewhat better now, but we don’t connect. Not really. This coupled with various drama throughout my family leaves me making my own family with my friends. I love them.

It also leaves me feeling lonely. I spent years wondering why I couldn’t connect with my father? We have nothing except blood and a caffeine addiction in common.

So if I’m not like him or any of my aunts or uncles where did I come from? I mean, yeah, I partially raised myself. Sometimes I joke that books raised me and they did in someways.

Where did those books come from? My mother. It’s a mixed bag. I remember her buying me books during her clean periods. I remember her reading them to me sometimes. I think this is why I don’t remember learning to read like a lot of people do. I think it’s wrapped up in my early childhood abuse/neglect memories and my PTSD programed mind protects me from it.

But the books were there. I remember one traumatic reading experience. We were reading Disney’s Aristocats (Spelling?) I loved those stupid cats and watched the movie and read the book a lot. Sometimes she read it to me. By the time of this memory I was probably 5 and preferred not to be read to, but I mean I was 5 any attention was good attention, right?

Well, she was reading it to me and she skipped half of the middle. I wasn’t going to stand for it. So, she went back and read it inserting her own crude language. I wasn’t having that either – this was my book. My story. I often imagined myself an extra kitten in the story. Well, that went over about as well as you expect with an addict. She whacked me across the face, ripped the book apart, and continued to beat me with it. Gone was my favorite book of the time.

After that I hid my books from her. I hid a lot of my things from her. Hell, at some points I hid the baby from her. The literal baby. My brother.

I continued to read, though. At school. At my grandma’s. Anywhere I could find books. Then we didn’t talk about reading again until I was 9. We were snowed in and I ran out of library books. She tossed me a book of mommy porn – basically one of those romances from the civil war era. I can’t remember the name of the book and I’ve tried. I’ve searched and even asked around Reddit, but apparently I don’t remember the right details.

I don’t know that my love of reading came from her. During her short clean periods she did read her romance novels. What I gained from her was the ability to escape into books – I had to. And sometimes in there I wrote my little stories. The first one was writing an episode of Flintstones to add myself in. Yep. Seven year old Maggie wrote fanfiction for The Flintstones. Yep.

So from all the things I inherited from her – trust issues, relationship complications, PTSD, scars, years of therapy, and more. What can I take away from all of this?

I became a writer and a book lover. They were my friends when she and her long line of abusive boyfriends chased off real people from my life. That love of story telling and immersing myself in a good story was the sole thing I snatched and kept for myself.

I’ve been asked why there’s not more moms in my stories. I usually answer with ‘Well, I write Mpreg!” lol And that’s part of the truth. The other part is I’m afraid my own mother would creep in there. I mean there are obviously some mom’s in my stories. (RIP Miriam)

I’ve always wondered what my life would have been like if my parents supported me during my early years. I got good grades until my last year of high school when I just stopped trying for the most. I’d sleep through class because sleeping at home wasn’t an option for me. I wondered what would’ve happened if my mother had read the book and hadn’t torn it to shreds.

I don’t know honestly. Maybe I would’ve still become a writer. Maybe my stories would be LGBT lit mainstream. I dunno. I love what I write now. I don’t think I’d be the person I am today. I loved stories because they were all I had. As an adult my life still circles them and I wouldn’t change that for anything.

 

 

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Reader Q&A

Maggie Hemlock

It’s that time again! I love getting questions and comments from readers. Interacting with all of you really makes my day. Writing is by nature a solo profession. You have to sit at the keyboard and ‘see’ and then translate what you ‘see’ into words and sentences that make sense to other people. It’s not always easy. Some days getting words on the page is like getting blood from a turnip. Other days it’s like I get to play with my imaginary friends all day and they’re nice to me. At the end of the day , though, it’s  about the stories I tell and how they can touch my readers. Without you guys, I’d be a kook with a wild imagination. Okay, maybe that’s exactly what I am, but you guys help me make a living from it. lol

I have three questions I’m going to answer today,. They’re simple questions, but the answers may be long and winding. I’ve touched on some of these in other Q&As, but I think I can expand those answers and really give you guys a look into how I started writing my Hemlock Wolf Pack Saga.

Question: How did you come up with the names for your shifter families?

Answer:

This one depends on which family/pack/flight you’re talking about.

Hemlock Academy came to me before the pack did. It started in a dream I had, but was nothing like you’ve read in the books. In the original dream it was an all girls boarding school where I taught that had been invaded by zombies. I’m a huge Walking Dead Fan and my dreams often get zombies if I watch the show too much. The school in the dream was not Hemlock Academy. It has a name that sounds sort of close, but I’m not disclosing here. I always knew I was going to turn that dream into a book. I still might. Not in Mpreg, because I don’t think babies and zombies mix. Maybe I’m wrong. Let me know in the comments if you think Mpreg and the zombie takeover go hand-in-hand and would make for a good read. The pack ended up named after the school once I got to know Darian in Omega Studies.

I’m not saying what the school was called in the dream, because who knows. If I ever switch genres in the future I still might write the book in the original way I saw it.

The West Appalachian Wolf Pack were just named after the area they come from. I was born in West Virginia and just sorta tacked on West because of that. I love the nature and mountains of the region. Yes, Monta’s pack in part is based on some people I knew growing up. No one was killed from their crimes against their families. So, it’s really loosely based, but it’s there.

The Moonscales are the tricky ones. The name just came to me while I was writing a standalone which is yet to be released or finished. I’m hoping to finish it one day, but it won’t be until after the Hemlock vs. Raven Hallow War. It’s given us the characters of Clarence and Medwin and all of the Moonscales, though. They first showed up in that book that’s half finished. One of the MCs of that standalone novel is still a hatchling at the moment. So, for the sake of the timeline I won’t be worrying about that book just yet.

The Raven Hallow Wolf Pack is a bit more complicated. I could say it just came to me, because a lot of them do and it did. It came from their lore of being connected to ravens and crows. Though, they have heavy elven influence too despite it not being represented in the name.

I think I’ve covered all the main ones I’ve actually introduced this far. There are others on the map, because I needed to mark them because I knew they were there. If I’ve left anyone out drop me a message on FaceBook and I’ll include it in the next Q&A.

Question: What got you into writing MM?

Answer:

Do you want the short answer or the long one?

The short answer: Harry Potter.

That doesn’t make sense unless you were part of the 2000s HP fanfiction communities. The first story I ever wrote to completion on a computer was when I was 14 and it was a  Draco/Harry slash fanfic. Yep. The real reason I turned into a writer was because my young teenage self thought Harry and Draco should get together. I guess I liked tension even back then before I could explain it.

It probably has something to do with my gender identity too, but I’ll touch on that in the next question.

Question: What made you decide to write MPREG?

Answer:

This one’s complicated too. I’ve touched on a lot of these things in my previous Q&A, but I’ll expand here since the question is what made me decide to write MPREG. I’m nervous about this one, because though a lot of my friends know and are super supportive I’ve never really talked about it in a professional setting. This is very personal to me and it’s taken me a long time to be comfortable talking about any of it in a public forum.

Since I was little gender has confused the hell out of me. Not just gender stereotypes, but gender itself. It’s like umm…. so there are two boxes and I have to stand inside of one?  It’s not that I don’t like the boxes. It’s that neither box is for me. I identify as gender non-binary despite being born AFAB (assigned female at birth.)

What I love about Mpreg is being able to explore different ideas about gender roles and gender expression. Being able to not have to write inside those boxes. Yes, some of my omegas are what my dad and uncles would call ‘pretty boys’ (Hence, why the Appalachian Wolf Pack got it’s name and attitude.) but I’ve always admired men who are softer and gentler and love things that aren’t inside that box we’ve labeled “Masculinity.” And of course, vice versa. One of my favorite characters from the series is one who has only been mentioned. I hope to get her on screen soon.

I’ve been accused of having inadequate female representation in my books. I don’t think that’s quite true. Sure, male characters out number female characters, but I write gay romance. I need a pool of side characters to pull from and play matchmaker with.

I’m also very aware of how strong women can be perceived. I didn’t have my first female Alpha on screen until The Sleeping Omega Prince. Mostly, because I wanted to avoid the question of ‘How do female Alphas get their mates pregnant?” Many people have given their thoughts on this and if you don’t understand it, want to know, and are old enough to read my books – send me a message. I’ll tell you in the cleanest way possible. lol I write sex scenes, but I’m not that comfortable discussing anatomy publicly.

What actually lead to me writing Mpreg was a number of things. First, as I mentioned in my previous Q&A my early roleplay years had a lot of mpreg in them. Then mpreg fanfiction. I never knew it was a thing until two things happened very close together. A good friend introduced me to the genre on Amazon. Then an old ghostwriting client (yep that’s what I did before I went indie) e-mailed me and asked if I’d be interested in ghostwriting some Mpreg for her. I don’t do ghost work anymore and didn’t at the time. But I was mind blown that this was a thing in actual books now.

So, my little fanfiction heart had some original characters of its own to share with the world and on December 9th, 2017 I penned the first few chapters of what would become Omega Studies.

Thank you so much for submitting your questions. If you have more feel free to send them my way on Facebook to be included in the next Reader Q&A blog.

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Writing, Book Covers, and the death of my last nerve

Maggie Hemlock

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Because I should be working on the book cover for Omega Rebellion ((AKA Cody and Micah’s story), but my last nerve has just died.

If you haven’t caught up with the Hemlock Wolf Pack Saga they are all free on Kindle Unlimited. If you haven’t checked out the program they’re always running some first month free or some sort of promotion. If you read a lot and haven’t checked it out yet, it’s a great source to save you some money on your reading habit. I swear by it which is why my books will remain in it for as long as it works.

Like a lot of people, my adult life has been one big ball of anxiety. Not always the normal sort either. Today is the two month mark since I was attacked by my intoxicated brother. That’s not what killed my last nerve, though. It wasn’t moving across the country while recovering from injuries or the mental aspects of recovery that are still ongoing.

It was tornado sirens last night. Here I was getting ready for bed thinking about what sort of cover Omega Rebellion called for and the next thing I know I’m in a closet pretty sure I’m going to die. Sure, the city I live in is rarely affected, but it only takes one. I see another move in my future, because I have no nerves left. Just none. Zilch. Zero. I know life is never 100% peaceful. I lived here before and knew it was a possibility, but I didn’t know how bad my nerves had gotten.

So, today I’m running way behind schedule and feel like crap. As a writer, I’m pretty good at filling in the blanks in life of what could happen. It’s great for storytelling, but sucks when my brain tries to apply it to real life. I haven’t asked other writes, but I can’t be the only one who thinks like this. lol

Either way, the coffee is ready and I need to go stare of screens full of sexy stock photos to make the cover for Omega Rebellion.

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The Real Tea Behind Saving Cinder & Omega Rebellion (AKA Micah and Cody’s Story)

Maggie Hemlock

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I absolutely should be writing on Chapter 13 of Omega Rebellion right now. Everyone keeps asking what comes after Claiming the Shaman and I do plan to tell you all – eventually.

Omega Rebellion uncovers the secrets of both main characters: The playboy drummer from the boy band Grim Howlers and Cody, an omega who’s constantly found himself in tight spots.

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To be honest, before writing this book I knew next to nothing about these guys. Yes, really. Only I didn’t know it until I started writing. That’s how it usually goes with me and characters.

I knew from the moment Lee Knight walked onto the page he belonged with Bane Hemlock. I just didn’t know how the hell to bring them together. Then I did. Some readers loved it others not so much. Eh… That’s the way of life and I’m okay with that. I’m happy with how Healer’s Oath turned out.

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Micah Gilmore and Cody Denton are my distraction and my obsession right now. I’m in love with both of them for different reasons that reads will discover soon. With war looming on the horizon for our beloved Hemlock Wolf Pack they’re going to need all their skills and the aces they’ve hidden up their sleeves.

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But what are they distracting me from?

Nothing important. Maybe I shouldn’t call it distracting me as much as I should call it healing me. A lot of you know I unexpected moved across the country at the end of August. Some days I’m still sad about that. I miss my pup more than anything or anyone. Without him I feel like part of me is missing and I don’t know that the feeling will ever go away.

I miss the members of my extended family sometimes, but I’m completely off from them by choice. It was a tough call to make, but it had to be done. In August, a family member who struggled with addiction for years violently attacked me. I’m okay now – physically. Mentally it’s just more baggage to lug around. You know how that goes. I cut ties with the family who continued to support him knowing he has no intentions of getting clean and staying sober. I won’t get into the debate of addiction choice vs. disease, because at the end of the day it doesn’t matter. When someone is a danger to themselves and others, to your personal safety, you have to cut ties. Just because they’ve strapped a ticking time bomb to their chest doesn’t mean you have to die trying to disarm it while they’re batting your hands away from the control panel.

If you or someone you know need help with domestic violence please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline 1-800-799-7233

Writing Saving Cinder was really hard for me. I knew the moment I chose Seth as the next main character (or he stepped forward for the job I should say) it would be difficult and that was before the night everything exploded. I almost scrapped the book after what happened but I decided I needed to tell the story more than ever. I’m not the only one affected by an addiction of those they love. Not everyone gets a happy ending, but I felt I owed Rhett that ending with his brother. It wasn’t Rhett’s story to tell, but he was part of it. Seth’s story affected his in ways that changed him forever. Saving Cinder is the ending I wanted in my life and writing it for my characters helped me more than I could ever say.

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Yeah, some days I’m still sad, but I’m moving forward a bit more everyday.

If you see me posting silliness on Facebook when I should be writing or writing without posting just know I’m healing and finding a way forward.

Now that’s off my chest for a bit it’s time to write. Thank you all for you support and love of my book characters. It means more than I can ever say.

P.S. I haven’t forgotten that I still owe you guys a readers Q&A post. It’ll likely be out closer to Halloween.

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Where Have I Been? (Life, Book, and Publishing Updates.)

Maggie Hemlock

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Over the past few weeks some of my friends, followers, and readers  have accused me of playingCarmen Sandiego as the title character. I understand why some of you were worried. I’m usually a planner with a pretty predictable schedule. I post on Facebook a lot and am always working on one book or another. Life just got in the way. Things got exciting in all the wrong ways and then in the correct ways. Either way  on August 29th I posted this gem to Facebook.

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Yep. I moved 726 miles without telling everyone ahead of time. Sure, I made a quick post in my FaceBook group for readers and told a few close friends, but I didn’t stop to blog or think of my brand when I did it.

Since the tail end of December 2017 when I started Omega Studies I’ve thought of little outside of my books and my author platform. I love what I do and story telling runs in my veins. I’m notoriously bad for not taking time off unless a medical condition knocks me on my ass. So what the heck happened?

Those who follow the blog and all of my social media accounts know I’ve dealt with a toxic family member for sometime now. I’ve even posted about it here on the blog and made posts about not enabling toxic family members. Well, push came to shove and my give a damn broke. Yep, I quoted a country song. #Noregrets I still adore that Jodee Messina song. He’s my brother and not my ex, but it’s busted so bad not even Gypsy from Gilmore Girls could revive it.  I’ve just finished rewatching the series for I don’t know what time, but “GET A NEW CAR!” I stuck in my head now. Thanks a lot, Gypsy!

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I know the exact date my give a damn expired and the warranty ran out: August 21st. Then in 8 days I rehomed my furbaby, shipped what I needed, and a hopped a Grey Hound bus half way across the country. Some days it still feels like I’m not far enough away. I miss my baby like crazy, but we’re both better off away from the toxic donkey.

This means I didn’t finish my N.E.W.T.s Magical Readathon. That’s okay. There’s always next year.

So, what everyone is probabaly wondering is what does this mean for the Hemlock Wolf Pack Saga and the Hemlock Fairy Tales Series.

Not much really. I’m in a new apartment. I’m still me. Writing and stories still flood my brain. What it does affect is my timeline for publishing this fall. I hoped to publish book 6 of the Hemlock Wolf Pack Saga on September 6th. It’s now September 11th and the book still isn’t live. I’ve lost 3 weeks of writing time and now my editor and I have been working around the clock since Monday afternoon when my internet was officially turned on at the new apartment to finish the edits. We’re almost there and the book should be live soon. Claimingtheshamanpdf.jpegOnce edits are finished I’ll resume working on the second book in the Hemlock Fairy Tales and then onto a Holiday novella to ensure it can come out the day after Thanksgiving. (That’s when it’s appropriate to start celebrating the winter holiday. 😛 )

I’m behind where I wanted to be, but I enjoy playing catch up. I hope to publish every book listed here by the end of the year. My editor is going to hate me or love me, depending on how you look at it.

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Family: A Definition

Maggie Hemlock

This blog is going to be a little different from most of mine. Usually, I plan them out ahead of time and they set on a to-do list for a while before they see the light of day. This one has been brewing in my mind for years not as a blog, but as a concept.

Readers of my books will know family is something I examine and work with a lot. My Hemlock Wolf Pack Saga circles around the Hemlock Wolf Pack and their struggles to hold a large territory safely together while looking for their true-mates. It’s not always easy and there is a lot of drama that can and does happen. Families aren’t always perfect and I get that.

That’s not the sort of family I want to talk about today. Fiction families are easier to deal with. I assign their traits and give them their complicated back stories. I’m talking about flesh and blood today. That’s what most people mean when they say family. I live in a region where this is supposed to be more important than anything else. You’re supposed to be willing to do anything for your family no matter what they do. I’ve called bullshit before and I’ll do it again, because I know I’m not the only person who deals with this.

Before anyone says but what about X? X is usually cancer, disabilities, mental illness, etc. I’m not talking about things people can’t control. If someone I loved got hurt or cancer or something I’m a ride or die bitch, okay? But there’s a difference between those X arguments and someone who is a constant toxic presence in your life. That family member who’s an addict that refuses to get help and shows up high at 3 AM looking for a place to crash and steals from you when you let them stay. That aunt who puts you down for everything. The parent who always finds fault in everything you do even in your successes. That abusive partner, parent, sibling, grandparent. No, we don’t owe them anything because we share a blood line.

I know there’s a lot of talk about being the bigger person, but that doesn’t mean you continuously put yourself in those situations out of some abstract family obligation. This comes from tribal days where being alone meant certain death in a harsh wilderness. Sure, we still need people, but we can choose not to let those we’re born with drag us down. We don’t owe them our happiness or our sanity.

Family isn’t defined by bloodlines. It’s defined by those who lift us up, call out our bullshit, and want to see us succeed in life. It’s those who are there in our darkest moments and never hold it above our heads. Family is the group of people you can’t wait to tell good news to. It’s those you want to see win and they want they same for you. Keep those people in your life and never live down to a toxic person just because you happen to be related.