Live Your Favorite Things! Advice and Insights Designed for Any Artistic Individual!

 Check out this really fun interview with Actor, Teacher & all around gifted lady Kate Glasheen! In this interview I talk about a life in the arts and everything that has made me tick as a writer, performer & creative individual. Tips & insights for any and every artistic person! 

On the Many Possibilities of Ghost Stories...

 

As we gear up to A SUMMONING OF SOULS on 7/21, One of my very favorite blogs, THE GOTHIC LIBRARY, hosted me for a discussion on the many possibilities of ghost stories and why I choose to write ghosts in the manner in which I do. I've seen reviewers for this series enthusiastically support my choice to write a different kind of ghost story through the course of THE SPECTRAL CITY series. Here are insights into why... 

Check out the post "On the Many Possibilities of Ghost Stories" via The Gothic Library...

Amazing press for THE SPECTRAL CITY!

Hello dear readers! It's been a great week for THE SPECTRAL CITY, my new Gothic, Gaslamp Fantasy / Supernatural Suspense series! I'm SO thrilled that THE SPECTRAL CITY has been resonating with my steadfast readers familiar with my work as well as new kindred spirits; welcome!

Some lovely SPECTRAL CITY praise so far:

THE SPECTRAL CITY was named an editors pick in Supernatural Suspense by the site BookBub! BookBub joins the sites i09 and Smart Bitches in naming THE SPECTRAL CITY as a book not to miss this season!

Read The Gothic Library's full, rave review: "A New Generation of Gothic Heroines"

"The Big Apple loves its haunts, and Hieber’s work is both haunted and haunting, her spectral characters as developed as those of flesh and ink." - Jaden Terrell for International Thriller Writers

"Personable cast, snappy prose and intriguing premise.” —Publishers Weekly"The product of Leanna Renee Hieber's fascination with the spiritual world and the nooks and crannies of the city that never sleeps, The Spectral City is The Alienist with Ghost Detectives. You get 1890s New York rendered in fine detail, from the sconces around the lamps to the one and only Teddy Roosevelt, but the book also features a smart heroine working with a team of tragic, believable ghosts. There is texture on every page and it's a delight to read." —Jason Henderson, author of the Alex Van Helsing series

"You can tell that Hieber has written a number of paranormal books because her world building was excellent. I loved the amount of historical research and facts she added into this story." - The Lit Bitch

Over at Unbound Worlds I'm really proud of this essay I wrote about how my theatre training informs my fiction. I write about how throwing yourself off balance can create a visceral and incredible character arc, realized and put in practice from my classical and avant-garde theatre training, read my craft insight and advice here!

Interviews:

I had an incredible media tour speaking with radio outlets around the country about the new series, inspiration, my hopes for this series and also sharing some writing advice. One of my favorite interviews was with Travis on Boston's WPKZ radio, you can listen to the interview here.

I'm featured on this month's cover of International Thriller Writers' magazine! What an honor to be next to these industry titans like David Baldacci! In this interview, I discuss craft, inspiration, 19th century issues and more! Read it here.

You can see launch party photos, my favorite quotes from the book and more over on my Instagram.

Tantor Audio has THE SPECTRAL CITY, narrated by the acclaimed, award-winning narrator Tavia Gilbert, available for a wonderful download price of only $6.99! The eBook across platforms is only $3.99!

Cheers and Happy Haunting!

Support The Spectral City via

Barnes and Noble
Audio book via Tantor Audio
Amazon
IndieBound
Kobo

Leanna's 2018 Commencement Speech for Edgewood High School

Edgewood High School staff, Leanna at center: To left, Becky Simpson and right, Sue Combs: Influential Teachers

Hello My Dears! This past weekend I had the honor of addressing my Alma Mater, as I was asked to be this year's Commencement Speaker. In addition to offering brief words of wisdom and encouragement to the graduates, I was asked to honor two influential teachers who have been a part of my success as an actor, playwright and multi-published author. It was an incredible, meaningful, unforgettable experience. As promised, here's the speech. I hope it inspires you! Blessings!

Saturday, May 26^th, Edgewood High School Class of 2018 Commencement Speech, Millet Hall, Oxford Ohio, Leanna Renee Hieber

It’s incredible to be back here, in this space, in front of Edgewood graduates. In 1997 when I was Edgewood’s Valedictorian, this was the biggest audience I’d ever had. Thanks for giving me another chance in front of a stadium crowd! 

Since growing up in Ohio, attending Edgewood, then Miami University, I’ve been all around the country. In 2005, I landed in New York City to pursue theatre and writing. In 2009 my first set of novels, called Strangely Beautiful, were published. Now with over ten novels under my belt for various publishers and more on the way, I wear lots of hats. I remain an actress, I’m also a tour guide, artist and a speaker around the country. I’m blessed to say I make my living exclusively in the arts in the big city. As you can guess, I could never choose between performing and writing, so I chose both. That’s why, when I was asked to honor one of my Edgewood teachers today, I couldn’t choose just one. 

Becky Simpson, English teacher, writing teacher, head of our Drama club and also often a director of plays, and Sue Combs, choir teacher, Choralier teacher, also a director of plays and musicals: You both were utterly foundational in fostering my well-rounded career in the arts. 

You each had a unique way of teaching that came from your individual voice and passion This ignited ours. You approached your classes like an invitation, inviting us to find, in your lessons, a common ground with our own interests, an enjoyment and an excitement. You didn’t demand we love literature or music as much as you did, you invited us to. Those of us who chose to really show up at the table where you’d set a feast; we were nourished by your enthusiasm, your commitment, and your quirky ways of making learning fun. My freshman year was bookended by both of you as my directors for the fall play and the spring musical, and we all went from there. All the seeds you planted grew healthy and strong. Those of us who joined you in extra-curricular activities got the chance to expand on what you fostered in the classroom. These invitations of yours became my professions. I am so grateful. I’m so thrilled to present each of you with this Influential Teacher award.

***

Now, Edgewood High, class of 2018, my goodness, is this moment exciting or what?! When I’m asked to give a bit of advice from my own experience working in fields I love, the core lesson really is to follow your dreams. I know, it sounds so trite and worn out, but the core of what makes you- just you, original, unique you, is priceless. A group of writers could each be given the exact same writing prompt and all of us would come up with completely different stories. Don’t worry about being any other voice but your own. Cherish diversity and uniqueness within yourself and in others. Foster your own individual strengths. Take moments along the way to lift up others around you as you grow, learn, develop new insights and become more well-rounded. A mind that’s constantly learning is the healthiest. We’re all individuals, but no one makes it in the world alone. Everything ‘takes a village’ as they say, and because of everyone’s inherent uniqueness, everyone has something special to offer. 

Because the world is full of unexpected twists and turns, I encourage everyone to foster not just one dream, but a few. Opportunities don’t come via just one channel, or in the ways we expect, and certainly not on a time table we can predict. Industries are constantly shifting. Mine have changed radically and I’ve raced to try to keep up. If you’re adaptable, and good at not just one thing but several, and can redirect your focus where its most advantageous, you’ll fashion a rewarding life rising to challenges and opportunities accordingly. You’ll set an example others can follow when they don’t know what to do next. Try a few things next.  

Seek out things you don’t hate doing. Whether you’re going into further education, taking time off, going right into a trade; whatever makes your heart beat, matters. Getting stuck in any kind of work or study you hate is really difficult. Often, it’s unavoidable, but it can be temporary. Personally, and no offense to the profession, I hated my temp-job as a paralegal. Again, no offense to the corporation, but I hated working at Starbucks. Once a talent agency I worked for put me inside a Pillsbury doughboy suit at the General Mills headquarters. Not my finest day, but that one paycheck paid me far more than the Tennessee Williams play I was starring in that night, so I did those temporary things for the larger goal. Sometimes you have to do absurd things to get by, while you try to get in somewhere you don’t hate. Keep your spirits up in the meantime. Laughing about it helps. That day in the Doughboy suit? I wrote about that ridiculous day and it turned into my first professional writing gig for Dramatics magazine. Who’d have thought? 

I’m very blessed to have jobs where I create characters and take them on fantastical adventures, to work behind the camera and in front of it, to write for the stage and speak at comic-cons and conventions. But the long, winding road to get here continues to twist and turn as the industries I’m in face constant change and uncertainty, so the advice I’m giving is one I keep taking. 

You’re at such an important time, but I know it’s a spooky one too. Big changes are difficult. Not knowing exactly how the next phase of your life will play out can be very stressful. I think it’s part of the human condition to worry, but change is just as equal a reality of the human condition. There are always questions to be asked and doors to open. It’s hard to think of life being a series of unresolved questions, but a question mark is also an invitation. An opportunity for innovation. A chance to let good, new, exciting things in. 

My favorite poet and philosopher Rainer Maria Rilke has a quote from his collected Letters to a Young Poet that I think of nearly every day: 

“Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.”

I invite you to live boldly, creatively, adaptively into your answers. 

Thank you, blessings and good luck.

(The End)

If you like my style and spirit, I bet you'd like my books! If you've enjoyed my words here, support my novels! 

My award-winning fiction is available wherever books are sold, in digital and print!

Book list via Barnes and Noble - Indiebound - Amazon

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Cheers and Blessings!

Writing Process Blog Tour! Eterna Files, YA and more: In which Leanna explains why she does what she does...

Thanks to YA author Lynne Kelly for getting me involved in the Writing Process Blog Tour! Here we answer some basic questions about our process. The questions may be basic, but writing a book is far from it, and every author's process is as unique and as individual as the array of books throughout history. I love talking shop, so here goes....

1.      What am I working on:

Book 2 of The Eterna Files, a Gaslamp Fantasy saga set in featuring two rival teams of secret agencies between New York, each tasked with finding the ‘cure for death’ on behalf of their respective governments. A teaser novella for the series launches this fall and book 1 launches February 2015. Close on Eterna’s heels, my acclaimed, award-winning and bestselling Strangely Beautiful saga (also Gaslamp Fantasy in nature) re-releases. Both series are with Tor/Forge. I’m having such fun with The Eterna Files, which takes and runs with all the themes I’ve been working on throughout my career; the spaces between life and death, the fine lines between faith, belief, spirituality and doubt, the arcane, the magical and the unfathomable mysteries of the human heart. I’m so in love with infusing the paranormal into a ‘realistic’ Victorian world and I’m blessed to have had the opportunity to do so book after book. Some of my Magic Most Foul characters will appear in Eterna, and in the finale of the series, The Double Life of Incorporate Things, I introduce two of Eterna's stars. I love weaving all my characters through different series to show them all from different angles.

2.      How does my work differ from others of its genre:

I love this question because it’s in my particular brand of Victorian Gothic Fantasy that I truly hope to make a lasting mark. Readers and reviewers tend to compare my books to 19^th Century Gothic authors rather than contemporary authors, mainly because my style borrows so heavily from my Gothic forefathers and foremothers. While I don’t utilize the density of 19^th century style, between my themes, interests and the bent of my language, my work is entirely entwined with a dark, dramatic, dare I say ‘strangely beautiful’ tradition.

What I attempt, while honouring and valuing my Gothic forefathers and foremothers, is to allow for my female characters to have a broader range of experiences and agency in my work. Most women in the traditional Gothic are victims and/or trapped by their material confines of the age, of expectations, mores, roles and more. The women of my novels are tasked with saving themselves and others, rather than being a less dimensional plot device. 

3.      Why do I write what I do:

This is closely tied to how my work differs from others of its genre. I feel called to voice the Victorian Era that I love so deeply, but to do so via a modern lens, and allow for voices that would have been marginalized by the constraints of a classist, excessively patriarchal society. I do so not because I think our society ‘knows better’ than the Victorians (we have just as many skeletons in our modern closets as they had in theirs, in some ways more insidiously considering the pervasiveness of modern technology), but I do have current freedoms and platforms a Victorian version of myself would have chafed heartily against. So much of the freedom, laws and safety we take for granted today were changes born of the constraints, injustices and traumas of 19^th century pedagogy, changes that people fought and died for.

And yet, we live in a new gilded age in terms of income inequality and the rapidity of technological advancement mirrors the industrial revolution in an uncanny way. There are beautiful ways to parallel the past and the present and those connections keep me coming back time and time again to the themes of my work and the fascinating complexities of the Victorian era and the resilient human spirit throughout time.

4. How does my writing process work?

*Chortle* I am entirely haphazard. Such a pantser. While I have to know a general arc and trajectory of where I'm going, every book is as mysterious to me as the last. Every book is new, every book's process feels like I'm back to square one and every time I wonder if I can cobble a book together out of the quilt pieces laid out before me. The only common theme is that I write non-linear, out of order, I write the scenes that compel me and keep me up at night. (Beloved characters are the anti-sleeping-pill).

I write what I want to write first, daydream about all the things the book needs, and eventually I put in all the connective tissue, which is the most exhausting part of the process, making all those pieces make sense. That's when it feels like work. The initial process of the book is like taking a vacation into a foreign land and I'm seeing it through the eyes of my characters, it's rather magical, really, but then the connective tissue is where the muscle comes in, and the editorial part of my brain needs to make the hard choices about making sure none of my characters have run away with the storyline too far off the core course, which has happened a few times in my career. That's where critique partners and editorial staff come in so handy, as a book that's only seen your eyes and mind alone just isn't as capable of a story as it is when it's gone through multiple revisions and some trusted viewpoints.  

All in all, writing books is what I love most in life and feel is my purpose in life, and so writing process, for me, isn't just something I do, it's something I live. And I hope you'll enjoy my books!

DARKER STILL (Magic Most Foul book 1: http://tinyurl.com/darkerbn  )
THE TWISTED TRAGEDY OF MISS NATALIE STEWART (book 2: http://tinyurl.com/twistedbn )
THE DOUBLE LIFE OF INCORPORATE THINGS (book 3: http://tinyurl.com/tdloitaz )

I tag my darling Alethea Kontis, award-winning, NYT Bestselling author and certified Princess on this tour, catch her responses next Monday on her blog!