Title: The Legend of the Light Keeper
Series: The Light Keeper Series
Publication Date: March 25, 2015
Publisher: Booktrope
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Summary: After a hurricane destroys her home, Lily Jordan is ready for life to get back to normal. That would be easy if her mother’s recent engagement hadn’t landed her in a house along Southeast Texas’ most haunted ghost road.
The secluded scenic road is steeped in rich history and legends, but when Lily is given an old diary on her birthday, will she find that those legends hold more for her future than she’s bargained for?
With the help of new friends, Hunter and Owen, and forbidden love, Talon, will she uncover dark secrets from the past and find the key to her own gifts? Is it fate or circumstance that brought her to her new home?
Normal gives way to the paranormal in book one of the Light Keeper series where mystery and suspense will keep you guessing until the very last page.
Guest Post
Tips for Choosing the Right Names for Your Characters
One of my favorite parts of writing is choosing my character’s names. I love creating characters with strong, distinct personalities who are memorable. I love the names I chose for my characters in The Legend of the Light Keeper, but I will admit, those choices taught me a thing or two. So here are some things to consider when naming your characters.
Spell Check: My first issue was spell check. I had chosen names like Lily, Hunter, and Talon that would not pick up on spell check since lily, hunter, and talon are nouns and perfectly acceptable not capitalized. I had to keep a close eye on those words. What I finally did was use my Find feature in Word to go through and double check and make the corrections. I’m glad I kept the names I did, because after writing four more books using those character names, they’ve kind of grown on me. I couldn’t imagine them named anything else, but choosing differently from the start would have saved me a ton of trouble.
Spelling: Choose common spellings. Throwing in a ton of extra letters, changing the common Y to EE or adding in a strange Z and a silent G, H, or X is only going to create more work for you and your reader. I’ve read so many books that had some really memorable names that were spelled ten kinds of crazy, and I didn’t ever, not once think they were awesome names or that the author was extra clever or creative. I thought it was unnecessary and too much of that in one book makes me give up and move on to another. Consider your readers. Give your characters that beautiful name that suits them, but keep it simple.
Avoid confusion: One thing I did with The Legend of the Light Keeper, that didn’t survive past the editing process, was name Lily’s grandmother Grammy. That alone would have been great, but with Owen and Hunter’s grandmother being named Granny, it kind of made for confusion, not only for me, but for my readers. So in the end I changed Grammy to Gram. Make sure that your readers can distinguish who you are talking about with ease. Having to pause to figure it out only slows a reader down.
In closing, I’ll remind you to write what you want. These are only suggestions to help you make easier decisions. The most important advice I can give you is to simply write.
About the AuthorKelly Hall was born and raised in Southeast Texas, and lives in a small town just a stone’s throw from the ghost road where her Light Keeper series is based. When she’s not busy writing, or spending time with her husband and two sons, this self-proclaimed creative junkie dabbles in many different forms of art, including cake decorating and mixed media.
