May 2012
7 posts
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What Really Matters - One Mother's Story
Yesterday, I was at my daughter’s school. One of her teachers nicely asked about my forthcoming book. Here’s what I said: “The book is set in the 14th century - the Middle Ages - it’s about a former nun who has lived in secret for 10 years. Then her son is killed, and she goes on a terrible journey to find out the truth about her life, and prove that her son’s life...
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Review: Sinful Folk exciting, great writing
Really enjoying this book — I thought it would be slow, moving back into the middle ages, but instead this is really fast moving, exciting and interesting. I keep wondering how this woman kept herself hidden for all these years, and how in the world she managed to keep herself alive. Every other chapter, I’m wondering how she isn’t dead yet. But she’s smart, inventive,...
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“As long as I can do my work and continue to enjoy myself working on words … I...”
– On today’s Fresh Air, poet Donald Hall reflects on aging, writing and his life. (via nprfreshair)
April 2012
5 posts
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Review: Sinful Folk fascinating, great read!
Reading this book prior to release…. great read! Interesting story, fascinating medieval landscape, and amazing characters. If you liked Pillars of the Earth or Year of Wonders, you’ll like this book. Also, seems a lot like The Red Tent, for people who loved that interwearving of history and ideas and women’s stories. — Ed Wheeler on GoodReads...
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“Ten years ago, Michaelmas. Summer hours fading into dusk, day dying slow. I had...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
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“A fog of pain overwhelms me, the world is turned all wrong. I will discover who...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
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“Any man among us has seen so many die over the years, the wave after wave of...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming 2012)
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March 2012
8 posts
“White men’s bodies turn green under the billows of the sea
I have been...”
– “Transfiguration” From the book of poems Glossolalia: Speaking in Tongues (2009), by Ned Hayes
(Poem appeared previously in The Mid-American Review )
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"Sinful Folk" - a 2012 Amazon Breakthrough Novel
Sinful Folk just hit the “2012 Amazon Breakthrough Novel” short list (the quarter-finals)!
You can get two FREE chapters right here on SinfulFolk.com (over to the RIGHT here —> or at Amazon)
Posting a review on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Sinful-Folk-2012-Entry-ebook/ would be GREAT — the judges use these early reviews to help decide what novels will progress to...
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“In the end, I listen to the fear that keeps me awake, that resounds through the...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
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“In the early hours of the night, I tell myself that the sound I hear is frost...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
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“Always, I must hide my true face. As my fingers work, I grip hope to me, a small...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
“Each time I told my story, I lost a bit, the smallest drop of pain. It was that...”
– Alice Sebold, The Lovely Bones (via bookmania)
“Every sentence has a truth waiting at the end of it and the writer learns to...”
– Bill Gray, the reclusive novelist in Don DeLillo’s novel Mao II. (via mills)
February 2012
9 posts
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“It had not been a long journey, but the memory of it filled her like an...”
– ― China Miéville, The Scar
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“Sinful Folk is a well-paced historical mystery that kept me turning pages way...”
– Peter Heinrich, GoodReads — http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12401599-sinful-folk
Review: A Vivid Picture
All it took for me to spark my interest, was the historical note in the beginning of the book. It was hard to put this book down; I wanted to uncover the mystery behind these boys dying in a fire and why this women is pretending to be a man, hiding her identity from everyone in this medieval village. The characters in the book set out on a journey to find the truth; the path they take reveals more...
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Review of Sinful Folk: An absolute "Must Read"!
I read it without stopping as soon as I got it loaded on my Kindle! What a terrific read, and this from a person who is not a fan of historical fiction, mainly because it often has so many inaccuracies. For me, too, the measure of a compelling read is that I continue to think about it long after I have closed the book, and in this case, I have thought of it often. There were parts where I thought...
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“For most of history, Anonymous was a woman.”
– ― Virginia Woolf
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“For this moment, this one moment, we are together. I press you to me. Come,...”
– Virginia Woolf, The Waves (via bookmania)
“For me writing is like breathing. I could not live without breathing and I could...”
– Paris Review interviews Pablo Neruda, Spring 1971
“The city is peopled
with spirits, not ghosts, O my love:
Though they crowded...”
– H. D., from “Cities” (via the-final-sentence)
January 2012
11 posts
Chapter PREVIEWS (PDF, Kindle, Nook)
The novel Sinful Folk is narrated by a desperate mother who carries a hidden secret and a terrible grief. This story of a winter pilgrimage begins in terror and heartache, and ends in triumph and redemption.
Read the first 2 chapters of the novel as an e-book here:
Amazon Kindle E-book Nook E-Pub Format Adobe PDF format
Posted here for your reading pleasure is an early...
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“April comes to us, with her showers sweet. I wake to the cries of little birds...”
– Sinful Folk, by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
“I remember the fire, it burns bright, always around me. I close my eyes, and...”
– Sinful Folk by Ned Hayes (forthcoming in 2012)
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Interview with Ned Hayes: My Novel SINFUL FOLK
(from Dorothy Dreyer’s great writing blog — “We Do Write” )
In the meantime, let’s meet another writer. This time we’re talking to Ned Hayes. Ned has graciously allowed me to take a peek at his newest novel, and I was quite intrigued by his story.
Welcome to We Do Write, Ned. Tell us a little about yourself.
I’m interested in everything from...
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All the Words... in Sinful Folk
here’s a wordle of all the words in the novel…
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Chapter 2 - PREVIEW
Read the first 2 chapters of the novel as an e-book here: Amazon Kindle E-book Nook E-Pub Format Adobe PDF format
chapter 2
The day is almost upon us. Small houses emerge from the darkness, silhouetted by that faint blue light in the east. The burned croft is a smoking wreck, the embers steaming in the dawn.
The wind dies. The crowd slows...
Chapter 1 - PREVIEW
Read the first 2 chapters of the novel as an e-book here: Amazon Kindle E-book Nook E-Pub Format Adobe PDF format
chapter 1
In the end, I listen to the fear that keeps me awake, that resounds through the frantic beating in my breast, the dry terror in my throat, the dread that comes with the pricking of the rat’s nervous feet in the...
Historical Note
HISTORICAL NOTE
“A curious incident is brought to our attention from the year 1377. In December of that coldest year in the medieval records, the village of Duns in the northeast of England suffered a great tragedy. Five of its young boys were burned to death in a house fire near the center of the village.
As was common with many tragic events in that century, it was supposed the Jews were...
Sinful Folk - About this novel
The book’s title comes from this quote from Chaucer:
Pray for us, we sinful folk unstable
….
My child is dead within these two weeks
Soon after that, he went out of this town…
With many a tear...