From the Staff of Clash of the Titles...

Please enjoy this sampling of New Releases from the staff at
Clash of the Titles 

The Last Detail
by Lisa Lickel
Hope, love, and loss meld two polar opposite personalities. How long can they keep passion for their ministry and each other after the wedding? Merit ushers in new life; Amalia ushers it out. Love? Obviously. Marriage? Check. Dealing with the family closet? Step back…When tragedy strikes, they must learn to rely on each other in ways they couldn’t have prepared for.
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Lea's Gift
by Delia Latham (& Tanya Stowe)
A victim of a house fire during infancy, Lea Dale’s severe facial disfigurement pales in comparison to the scars Laren Meadows carries inside...and his painful secret could destroy their chance at true love. For the first time ever, an emotional Lea questions her special connections with Heaven even as she investigates cruel pranks
at her father’s ranch for disfigured teens and tries to deal with her roller coaster heart.
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A Cowboy Christmas
by Delia Latham (& Tanya Stowe)
A mom on the run; a special child and her “imaginary” friend; a cowboy; and God. Shy horseman Dex Beckett longs to help lovely Layne Mabrey and her daughter, but Layne's lack of faith and stubborn refusal to relinquish her distrustful heart could get in the way of even Heart's Haven's heavenly residents.
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  Stopped Cold 

by Gail Pallotta

Margaret McWhorter lives in tranquil Mistville, North Carolina, but there’s no peace in her life since her brother, Sean, took a steroid and nearly died. Margaret and Sean’s father demands excellence in sports, but Sean fell short. Margaret’s still hustling to win at swim meets at Meriwether Christian High, where Sean was the number one quarterback for the football team. In quiet moments she asks God to heal Sean. She’s angry at her father for pushing Sean, but hate for the drug dealers drives her to find them. A clue overheard at a teen hangout sends Margaret and two friends to the edge of this dangerous sub-culture.   

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A Tournament of Champions & Snappy Dialogue

Coming Up at Clash of the Titles, October 10-November 4, 2011

The first annual, Tournament of Champions!

Over a FOUR week period, SIXTEEN previous COTT champs will face-off in EIGHT different mini-Clashes.

Only ONE will take home The Laurel Award.

With Clashes, games, and prizes galore, you won't want to miss this month-long celebration!

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*Guest post by Lisa Lickel

Dialogue lets your characters be heard. It’s their voice; their conversation amongst themselves. It’s how they tell their story. Dialogue is talk. Discussion. Arguments. Jokes. Questions and answers. Foibles. Mystery. Mesmerism. It’s the muscle on the skeleton of the story.

The writer’s ability to conquer natural dialogue comes out of how well we know our characters. The reader’s ability to hear natural-sounding dialogue comes from the depth from which he is drawn into the story.

Using dialogue in a book helps readers see that characters spend time with each other for a reason, even if they’re stranded on desert islands. Tom Hanks had Wilson in the move Cast Away, after all. Dialogue is more than internal mutterings or their revelations to the reader. It needs to be heard, not just read. The words need to translate immediately to sound in the reader’s inner ear, and thus be natural, no matter the setting.

What can we deduce from these two small pieces of the excerpts in this Clash? Are you in time, in story, in the character’s emotions? Can you cheer for them? Figure out exactly what will happen next, or are you eager to turn the page for more?

“Would you mind if I walked with you?”

“As long as we’re not together.”

“All right.” He strode into the street and spread his arms as wide as his grin. “There. We’re not together.”

“Jack!” she cried…. “Get back up here.” Ruth motioned frantically. “Don’t make me fix you up again.”

OR

“Perhaps you cannot wait for the wedding night?”

Her brown eyes simmered. “Why you insufferable cad!” She raised her hand to slap him.

He caught it and lifted it to his lips for a kiss, eyeing her with delight.

She studied him then released a sigh. “You tease me, sir.” Snatching her hand from his, she stepped back. “But what would I expect from you?”

In a novel, talk must have a purpose. A conversation shouldn’t be talk for the sake of filling time or space. Readers have only until the last page to spend with people in a book, so writers must not waste time. Dialogue is meant to reveal something useful, important to the story line—passion, motive, or confession.

Why Snappy? Characters must speak true to their nature. While snappy it might not describe the personality, it implies action, tension, perhaps a slip of the tongue or a revelation that might even surprise the character, but certainly should surprise the reader.

Clash of the Titles hopes you are intrigued by these little snippets of story and want to find out more about the books and authors. Stop by and you’ll get that chance! Meet the authors and leave comments to enter the drawing for a free book.

*Lisa Lickel is a Wisconsin writer who lives with her husband in a hundred and fifty-year-old house built by a Great Lakes ship captain. Surrounded by books and dragons, she has written dozens of feature newspaper stories, magazine articles, radio theater, and several inspirational novels to date. She is also the senior editor at Reflections in Hindsight.