I am so happy to see a new interview with our Southern Belle and award-winning Author, Cynthia Ulmer! An interview by/with Fiona Mcvie is always something “Special” … Cat
Hello and welcome to my blog, Author Interviews. My name is Fiona Mcvie.
Let’s get you introduced to everyone, shall we? Tell us your name. What is your age?
Hi Fiona, I go by Cindy and write under my legal name, Cynthia Ulmer. I’m 58 years old.
Fiona: Where are you from?
I was born in Newport News, Va and moved to Leland, NC when I was 8 years old and have lived in the area since then.
Fiona: A little about your self (ie, your education, family life, etc.).
I am married with three grown children, four grandchildren and one great granddaughter. I have five guinea pigs, 3 birds, three dogs and several fish. I’m never not busy. Life is always hectic, and I get stressed easily but I know I am blessed.
Now this one by Elizabeth Seckman sure sounds good, Readers! You need to come and visit my new FB friend and blog of “Up Against a Wall”… A wee bit steamy reads and more!
Sarah Andrews is one smart cookie. She’s a top-notch attorney, educated at Stanford and freshly fired from one the best legal firms in Indiana. Her love/win record is 0-3 and as she approaches her thirtieth birthday, she decides she needs a quiet, safe place to regroup. She decides to go home to Dodd.
But Dodd, Indiana is far from safe once she comes face-to-face with Richland Conrad Cooper. Rich and Sarah go way back to high school. Rich was teen-girl kryptonite—athletic, charming…persuasive—and Sarah was not immune. She fell hard, certain she’d found true love. But it turned out to be nothing more than the first of her love tries and fails.
She thought time had shored up her defenses, but one look at Rich makes her heart do flip flops. It’s like the moment where unrequited love gets a do-over, the only problem is…Rich doesn’t remember who…
AMAZING REVIEWSFOR THE CEDAR COVE CHRONICLES BY CYNTHIA ULMER A Christian Southern Fictional Drama At Its Finest. Review Courtesy of ‘On My Kindle Book Reviews’
//// Source: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Genre: Fiction, Christian fiction, Historical Fiction Format: eBook, Print Publication Date: December 1, 2013
Back Cover
Todd is a southern novel about family love, faith and endurance. In 1943, ten year old Todd Jansan lives with his family on a North Carolina tobacco farm. The Jansan’s neighbor, Horace Hammond is a cruel man who punishes his children by holding them over a well. The Jansans have to deal with his cruelty and with the mystery surrounding Todd’s uncle who is off at war.
Review From “On My Kindle”
Todd is set in rural North Carolina on a tobacco farm during the 1940s and is narrated by a ten-year-old boy, Todd Jansan. The plot revolves around two central themes: the conflict between the Jansan family and the Hammonds, and the conflict within the family between Todd’s father and Todd’s uncle who has returned home after being wounded in World War II. Both conflicts have the potential to tear the family apart as Todd’s father struggles to exemplify the merits of faith, love, and perseverance to keep the family together.
Like some readers before me, I was a bit concerned about the cruelty and abuse mentioned in the book’s blurb; however, my concern was unfounded since Ulmer did not discuss the subject in graphic detail.
In a world filled with gizmos and gadgets to help streamline life, it was a joy to read a heartfelt story that took me back to a time before life became a frenzied, frantic rat-race. The picturesque setting is the perfect backdrop to refreshingly unidealized characters who were so artfully crafted that I sometimes forgot they were fictitious.
The plot itself is brilliant and the dialogue is eloquent! Readers get a glimpse of life on a tobacco farm in North Carolina, as well as internal and external strife, through the eyes of a realistically observant ten-year-old narrator who idolizes an uncle who has served his country. The dialogue makes the characters endearing and imbues the plot with simple Southern flair.
Todd is an enjoyable, cozy read that has a profound and timeless quality to it. I highly recommend it to readers who enjoy historical and Southern fiction!
Rating: 5/5– Todd has a charming and quaint setting, it is filled with true-to-life and intriguing dialogue, and the protagonists exude old-time Southern Christian family values. It really is the embodiment of “Ole Southern fiction!”
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…… The Award-Winning Author, Cynthia Ulmer
Author, Cynthia Ulmer
I enjoy writing, reading, listening to music, being with my family and working in my church. Writing has always been my passion. Some people struggle with what they are meant to do in life and others just know it all along. I’ve known since I was a small child that I wanted to write–the stories were always in my head.
My series, The Cedar Cove Chronicles, is set in the fictional community of Cedar Cove, North Carolina and follows the lives of the Jansan family, their friends and neighbors during the 40’s and 50’s.
Maureen Scanlona Popular Life Coach, Empowerment Speaker, and Award-winning Author of her self-help book titled “My Dog is More Enlightened Than I Am”…
“I’m a spiritual, confidence, and relationship coach with a passion for helping you be your Best Self.”
Maureen Scanlon is the founder and CEO of Maureen Scanlon Life Coaching. She is an award-winning author, relationship expert, motivational speaker, positive change integrator, and spiritual coach who has successfully helped many people, from experienced professionals to young adults and couples. She focuses her tools and techniques on overcoming past negative experiences and making positive changes in our thoughts and lives.
Maureen has been featured on 3TV Good Morning Arizona, 3TV Your Life Az, ABC15 Sonoran Living, Voyage Phoenix Magazine, appeared on the cover and featured in Ultimate Women International magazine, USA daily times, as well interviews on radio shows like Mind Body Radio, Business Talk Radio, and Networking Arizona.
Her book “My Dog is More Enlightened Than I Am “ has now won a silver award from Author Shout and Top 12 book pick list from Spirited Woman, with a 5 Star rating on Amazon.
When Maureen is not working to change the world, you can find her at home relaxing in Mesa, Arizona, with her husband, Dennis. She enjoys scrapbooking, painting, traveling, and time with her furry baby doggies, Jade and Brodie.
She is also the mother of three adult children and grandmother to three grandchildren whom she adores.
You may learn more on her Official Website at https://lifecoachmaureen.com/ as she shares with you “how to unlock your purpose and build your best life the way you meant IT!”
“I’ve lived with dogs my entire life and currently have three furry kids as part of our family, so when I came across “My Dog is More Enlightened That I Am” by Maureen Scanlon I jumped on it. In it, I found a self-help guide to experiencing life through our puppies’ eyes. The premise is not about living like dogs, it is about applying the wisdom that exists in their simplicity to our complicated lives. The author’s point is founded on how most of us go through life, but life doesn’t go through us.
We all race each day without stopping to take in what surrounds us. We just go through routines step by step from sunrise to sunset, focusing on a future that we can’t grasp yet, oblivious of what really matters. Scanlon’s ideas are organized into 20 Chapters which consist of certain aspects of how our dogs live their lives, which we should adapt to our lives. From: ‘Relax Whenever You Can, ‘Take Care of Each Other’ and ‘No Regrets’, to ‘Transitioning.’
This book takes readers by the hand and guides them through the author’s own realization of what matters in life. Her voice is comforting and motivating enough to allow the reader to relax and open their minds to imagine living in the moment. To pause and to appreciate the beauty around us. To dare to be true to ourselves and consider, “What if I was spontaneous, what if I took a minute to relax just when I need to, what if I embraced simplicity when looking at the world around me and how I live?”
The author, in my opinion, did a great job presenting to readers her “out of the box” ideas on how our dogs can guide us to a better quality of life, as her voice is clear, her words flow, and the book’s format makes sense. As a lifelong dog owner and lover, I had been lucky enough to have looked up to them also as my mentors in life and enjoyed seeing their lessons presented to the world to discover.
“My Dog is More Enlightened That I Am” by Maureen Scanlon is a great simple little book that shares big, awesome ideas for a better life for all readers. A guide filled with expert advice based on our puppy’s wisdom! LOVED IT!”
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MORE EDITORIALS & REVIEWS:
“The wisdom courtesy of Maureen Scanlon laced throughout My Dog is More Enlightened Than I Am is sensational and actually awe-worthy. As I read Scanlon’s book, I was engrossed and wanting to know more…
The information and knowledge laced throughout “My Dog Is More Enlightened Than I Am” is impeccable, and I am impressed by just how much knowledge there is.
…a wealth of information, all the information is useful as well as relevant to the topics explored so do not worry readers that you will be bombarded with information as this does not happen in this book!
As My Dog is More Enlightened Than I Am is a book laced with incredible wisdom, it is also laced with phenomenal literature courtesy of the wonderful Maureen Scanlon; Scanlon’s words are incredible, and they will flow flawlessly from beginning to end.”
-Aimee Ann of Redheadedbooklover.com
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“I enjoyed how she wrote and laid out just “How” to accomplish each task. It is a unique personal growth book I have read while the author shares techniques involving our pets and her own life challenges. I have not read such an uplifting and motivational book like this one until now”
~Catherine Lyon of “Lyon Media Services.com and Cat’s Reading and Writing Den”
“This is a wonderful self-help book that takes lessons from our beloved fur babies on how to decompress Nd love freely. I found it very motivational and insightful. A must-read!”
Author, Maureen Nelson Scanlon has written a delightful and enlightening book that you will absolutely enjoy! I appreciate how she incorporates the importance of observing animal companion behaviors and incorporates how the human spirit benefits wherever their journey may lead especially when we are free in spirit as our beloved pets.
A keepsake gift in time for Christmas!🐾
A MUST VISIT FOR Writers and an Article Reshare About? “BAD REVIEWS”
Bad reviews! Any writer with a published book gets crappy reviews. How do we deal with them? ….. Here are ten tips:
…. 1 – Refrain from responding
As much as you might want to respond, either politely or with harsh words, don’t do it. Once you’ve left a comment or sent out a Tweet or posted to Facebook, your negative response will be out there for all to see forever. You might get a few fans to rally to your cause, but most will view you as the villain, not the reviewer. Even if you later delete it, the damage is done. Sending an email is a bad idea as well. So refrain from adding fuel to the fire and keep your grumblings private.
2 – Know that it’s part of the process
Guess what? We all get negative reviews. It goes with the territory. Remember, you created art. Art is subjective and not everyone will like your book. You can’t please everyone. (And if you do, then you really didn’t say anything of value.)
Shake it off and move on.
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3 – Laugh about it
What are you going to do—cry? Might as well laugh about it! Often a bad review is just as poorly written. So turn the tables and have a good chuckle about it.
4 – Remember they add validity to good reviews
What do you think when a book has nothing but five-star reviews? You start to wonder, don’t you? Friends and family of the author? Paid reviews? A couple bad reviews mean some readers were honest—which means the rest of the good reviews are probably honest as well. Plus sometimes people want to know if the book is really that bad and they read it!
5 – Look for constructive criticism
Often two and three-star reviews will offer constructive criticism. Look for it. Is there any validity to what they said? Can you see areas where you can improve or issues you need to address? (Several reviewers didn’t like the fact there were no women in my first book. I listened and made sure there were several women in the next one, including a female main character. That book garnered better reviews than the first.) Learn from the bad reviews and write a better book next time.
6 – Don’t focus on the negative
We tend to focus on the negative. We can have a hundred great reviews and one bad one. Which gets our attention? The bad one! Who cares? When doing averages, what do they always do? They drop the top numbers and the bottom numbers. So ignore that bad review and don’t even factor it into the equation.
7 – It’s just one person’s opinion
Everybody has an opinion. And they are just that—opinions, not facts. So one person didn’t like your book? Big deal! Out of millions of readers, that’s not even a drop in the bucket. (Unless all of your reviews are bad!)
8 – Don’t let it stop you
Yes, putting a book out there is scary. It’s a creative endeavor, which makes it a little more personal. We can’t take it personally though. We have to believe in ourselves and not let bad reviews stop us. Have you ever encountered a jerk at your work? Did it cause you to give up and stop working forever? No! So don’t let a negative review from someone you’ve never met stop you.
9 – Write the next book
This is the best thing you can do! Just hunker down and write your next book. Show those naysayers that you are a great writer. Take your experience from the previous book and pour it into the next one. Besides, you’ll be so busy writing, you won’t have time to worry about bad reviews.
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…… 10 – Kill off the reviewer in your next book If all else fails, then just put that reviewer into your book as a murder victim or monster that is slain by the hero!
….. “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”– Teddy Roosevelt
The most common question I am asked is, “What is a Life coach?”
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As a fairly new career “title”, there is much speculation about the effectiveness of Life Coaching. To add to the confusion, there are so many different niches in this category: Health, Business, Spiritual.
In our everyday lives, we encounter much of the same things as everyone around us. We are all trying to “do something” or “overcome” something.
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Here are the most common phrases I hear when clients contact me: ……
“I haven’t accomplished what I want”
“I’m just not happy with my life and need to find joy”
“Something happened and it’s affecting everything in my life”
“I feel stuck”
“I’m overwhelmed and can’t focus”
“Everyone tells me I should…”
“I want to make a change but I don’t know where to start”
…… Do any of these sound familiar?
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What I have discovered is that no matter what a client brings as an issue, there are so many more behind it. They think it’s just one thing and then discover through their coaching sessions, that it is deeper.
Many of my clients have been to Counselors and Therapists for years but just can’t seem to get to the goals and feelings they want. Finding the inner reasons are good, but I take it to the future rather than staying in the past.
A Life Coach brings more than psychological know-how,they bring empathy and their own life experiences to assist. To sit in front of someone who says, “I know how you feel, I’ve been there too” makes a much larger impact on the person trying to learn and change.
A good Life Coach will assist you in finding out the “why’s” and then give you the “hows”. Almost every person who has come to me says, “I know what I need to do, I just don’t know how”.
We are surrounded by friends and family who know us. When they give us advice or suggestions, we sort of tune them out. It’s old news, they don’t understand, I’ve changed, etc.
By going to a Life Coach, you get an objective, outside, emotionally detached person looking at what you are experiencing and feeling. The tools and methods that are used are “outside the box”. At least my coaching is… I am currently remote coaching a client via video, and after our session (which she does in her car between tasks), I asked her to roll down her window and yell “I am amazing”! She was SOOOOO uncomfortable but she did it and I could see the joy she got from doing that.
“Just a simple affirmation in an unconventional way. …….
I have found that the two most sought out emotions all of us are needing and wanting: Acceptance and Validation.
This is why we struggle so hard with others in our lives because we don’t get those often enough. Our well-meaning family and friends think that advice and lectures will help us to be better, but they don’t understand the wiring of our brains. We do not need to hear the same programming we’ve received over and over, we need new beliefs and ideas in order to succeed.
If the old ones worked, we wouldn’t be feeling negative about our lives.
I give my clients the acceptance they desire,(there is nothing I judge or criticize), with understanding and affirmations to have patience with themselves, and to take things one step at a time. I see the relief on their faces when this happens like they’ve been waiting for someone to just say, “it’s ok, you’re doing great”.
Today’s society puts so much pressure on achievement and action. The older generations are trying to keep up and the younger generations are constantly comparing themselves to one another.
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My goal is to bring everyone back to a place of joy, satisfaction, empowerment, and peace about their lives and their purpose. This life is to be enjoyed and experienced in every way possible so we learn and grow.
And this, my friends …. is Life Coaching
Love and blessings, Lifecoach Maureen
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BIOGRAPHY of Maureen Scanlon
Award-winning author, Maureen Scanlon is a Popular Life and Relationship Coach of her self-help book titled “My Dog is More Enlightened Than I Am”…
“I’m a spiritual, confidence, and relationship coach with a passion for helping you be your Best Self.”
Maureen Scanlon is the founder and CEO of Maureen Scanlon Life Coaching. She is an award-winning author, relationship expert, motivational speaker, positive change integrator, and spiritual coach who has successfully helped many people, from experienced professionals to young adults and couples. She focuses her tools and techniques on overcoming past negative experiences and making positive changes in our thoughts and lives.
Maureen has been featured on 3TV Good Morning Arizona, 3TV Your Life Az, ABC15 Sonoran Living, Voyage Phoenix Magazine, appeared on the cover and featured in Ultimate Women International magazine, USA daily times, as well interviews on radio shows like Mind Body Radio, Business Talk Radio, and Networking Arizona.
Her book “My Dog is More Enlightened Than I Am “ has now won a silver award from Author Shout and Top 12 book pick list from Spirited Woman, with a 5 Star rating on Amazon.
When Maureen is not working to change the world, you can find her at home relaxing in Mesa, Arizona, with her husband, Dennis. She enjoys scrapbooking, painting, traveling, and time with her furry baby doggies, Jade and Brodie. She is also the mother of three adult children and grandmother to three grandchildren whom she adores.
"CAT'S BOOK LIBRARY 4 READERS" 