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My children do not fear the Bogeyman, good parenting or bad?

Hi everyone, another ‘re-run’. My hordes go back to school next week and I hope to get back into some serious and new blogging then! Today’s blog post was originally featured and the rather sultry and sensual VampChix blogsite. How could you not like a blog when they describe themselves as ‘Exploring new worlds, one bite at a time’? Seriously, go check them out.

My children do not fear the Bogeyman, good parenting or bad?

Besides being a fan of the supernatural, there is another genre I enjoy – crime fiction. And when it comes to TV crime fiction, it is a rare gem that blends both crime and supernatural together so well. One of these rare gems is the UK TV series Whitechapel where modern day detectives and their flunkies seek out the earthly, sane answers to some pretty weird and gruesome things happening in the heart of Whitechapel… that haunt of Jack the Ripper just a century or so before. It is a great series, shame it was eventually axed, but it was the right blend of spooky, creepy, crime, horror viewing I liked.

My only desire is that they didn’t put it on so late at night when I’m home alone with the kids in bed and all those strange noises outside. Yes, I am a bit of wimp too. But Whitechapel has that right edge that Doctor Who had when I was a child. I’ve not yet watched Whitechapel from behind the couch with a thrill of ghoulish curiosity… but I’ve come close.

So what has this to do with Bogeymen and my children some of you may be asking? If you’re still actually waiting for me to get to the point. Good question, thank you for asking.

The Whitechapel I was watching last week was about the Bogeyman and had the team reciting all threats and warnings they remembered from their childhoods about the Bogeyman and how their parents had used this fear to control them. And I realised something shocking… I’d never used this fear, this threat of the Bogeyman on my own children to ensure they behaved. Was that good, modern day parenting? Or losing some of our verbal traditions and tales?

All is not lost though as it’s not as if my children don’t know about the Bogeyman. Oh, trust me, having me as their mum they know all about all sorts of supernatural folk from the fae to the far out there. Dinner time discussions are about things like this all the time. A good example is the time I explained the after death rituals of the ancient Egyptians. I had them so hooked that night, as I was explaining the role of Ammut (crocodile headed god who weighs the heart of the dead before making judgement), that when I clapped my hands together as the snapping of his jaws… they leapt off their chairs in fright and I needed to check under their chairs for puddles. Yeah, I tell a good story.

So it’s not as if I’ve raised my children in a lack lustred world where what they see if all of what they get. No, I do my best to weave a little magic and unreality into their lives whenever I can. See my eldest’s pen pal – A faerie who looks after horses. Or the fact that the Christmas wrapping elf Bryony comes to see us each Christmas Eve. She leaves a special gift for my kids… as well as a card containing three strips of sticky tape. Magic happens, let it live on in others even if we may have forgotten its touch in our own lives.

Back to the Bogeyman and my children’s lack of fear. They know the Bogeyman exists, along with ghosts, zombies, spirits, djinns, demons and the whole kit and caboodle. But did you know the way to get rid of the Bogeyman is to lift off his hat and laugh at him? That’s what I was taught as a child, if he ever came for me, and it’s what I’ve taught my children too. And now he knows we know how to get rid of him, he doesn’t come here. Knowledge being power and all that.

Ghosts, djinn, spirits? Oh, the secret salt circle we have lining the outside of the house and the iron reinforcements in its very walls keep them out. Oh yeah! Zombies… well, we’ve had a bit of an issue with zombies for a while now with our eldest. But we have found the best fix for them is magical pixie dust. My eldest came up with that solution when she was five and still sometimes needs a little these days when she’s feeling unwell or a little worried. It’s a wonderful cure all I tell you! And it’s amazing what a few drops of yellow and red food colouring gently swirled in full cream milk can do too… if you know what I mean?

Then we have binding circles… my kids play with chalk out on our concrete verandah a lot. As well as the words to dispel demons and, all in all, I’m pretty sure I have some pretty well rounded kids. So they’re not afraid of the Bogeyman. They still believe in him and know he’s out there… so the narrative history will live on. But I don’t use him to scare my kids into being good; I use him to feed their hunger for knowledge.

It’s working too. Eldest, now nine, plans on being the world’s leading expert in Sifaka (a type of lemur – the primate, not Roman ghost). Middle child, seven and a budding artist, is undecided as to whether she’ll be a basic entomologist, a graphical entomologist (one who draws the bugs) or an archaeological entomologist… to study what part bugs played to ancient civilisations. My youngest, aged five and a little… special… Well, right now I’m pretty sure he’s going to be a farmer, a gardener or Sheldon Cooper. He’s five, he has time to decide.

So, should we keep our children in check by passing on a fear of the unknown? Or should we use these old myths to train them into being fearless explorers of the unknown and then letting them loose on the poor unsuspecting world? I know which one sounds more fun to me!

Until next time,

Janis. XXOO

 
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Posted by on January 21, 2015 in Writing

 

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Welcome to my world and what lies within.

This week’s blog post is going to be a little bit different as it’s a sort of a sneak peek into my new eBook coming out later this year. Yes, Isis, Vampires and Ghosts – Oh My! will be available for you all to read soon!

Now, before my Publisher has a panic attack over the term ‘sneak peek’, please don’t panic as I’m not sharing the book… just the world it’s based in. 🙂

Basically, this post has come about as I was asked recently what the vampires in my world were like… and as I’d had to explain Isis for the cover design, that really only left ghosts, right?

And, in a low key shaking my assets moment, this post gives you a preview of my imagination and writing skills. Yes, I’m not just going to waffle on about being an awesome Writer and a not so well known Author, I’m going to show off my wares and my world… hmmm, not too sure if I have were creatures in my world… but there’s a thought. 😉

I will admit now though, that on saying this is my writing skill… I’m worried it’s going to come across as crap! Oh dear.

Okay, and so here we go, what are Vampires, Ghosts and even Isis herself like in my world? Am I just another cookie cutter paranormal adventure writer? Or is there something a little bit different here, like there is in my world of blondes and mathematics. Let me know what you think!

We’ll go in title order and start with Isis… within my world Isis is the Mother Goddess of Pagan belief more than she is the ancient Egyptian Goddess. And, yes, she is real… aren’t all Gods and Goddess real?

Isis has been revered throughout the centuries since ancient Egypt and each generation has created their own image of her. The Greeks, Romans even through to Victorian England folk have worshipped her. And I don’t just mean the hokum revival of all things Egyptian that happened in the Victorian era. Some of those educated and cultured people still followed the ‘old ways’.  — This is a true fact by the way, not just part of the story… actually it is this worship of Isis that helped make the story what it is.

But getting back to the story, my Isis is the Goddess that epitomises motherhood and being a strong woman. In looks, she is a pale skinned, dark eyed and dark haired woman of unknown years. I describe her like this:

‘…she was beautiful. And not in the way of a supermodel or how modern culture expected us to see a woman’s beauty. She held the flawless beauty that a young child only sees, through eyes clouded by love, in its mother and giver of life.’

Yeah, pretty much feel I nailed it with that one. 😉

On to vampires… if any of you like my author page on Facebook you would have seen this description earlier in the week as it really did instigate this blog post. No, I wasn’t in need of a blog post idea, but it inspired one all the same.

Vampires in my world do not sparkle or smoulder. They are a parasitic beast that lives on, not by dyeing young and staying beautiful, but by existing in blood stained by the banishment of a demon eons ago. They possess a person body and soul, turning them undead to prolong the suffering and feed off their very essence until they are an empty husk and their soul writhes in purgatory for the evil deeds and horror their body has inflicted upon the world while possessed.

You can destroy the host with burning or beheading, but as long as there is a sample of blood left, the vampire can live on. If the host is killed in this way, their soul is still lost to purgatory. It can only be saved within the first cycle of the moon from the point of said possession, but you are saving them in soul only. And you will require the crucible of the Vampire possessing them to achieve this goal.

My vampires do not sparkle, and smoulder, they glower, manipulate and cause harm for pleasure. All good girls need a blessed silver dagger of Isis, a decent prayer book, a splash of holy water and the vampire’s crucible if seeking to rid the world of them. The gloves are optional.

Onto the Ghosts of my world. They don’t clank chains, slime you or even lift a penny up and slide it along a door to pretty music. No, they are the everyday people trapped between the world we know and their next life by a dark ritual. They were people who did a bad deed in front of the wrong person, got caught in the act and were then bled to the point their lives wavered between one world and the next. They are then bound to an item of their making, whether it be a wooden box they’ve carved, a scarf they’ve knitted or a flower they have grown. Ghosts then become tools of the person they are bound to; they become an extension of their power. A ghost is simply the remaining life force energy, the aura, of a person and the item they’re bound to merely the storage device they are kept in. When extra life force energy is required for a ceremony, spell or for protection, the ‘owner’ of the ghost simply draws on their life force to back up their own. Vampires and other Other World creatures of Darkness often have a collection of ghosts to add to their own powers as needed.

Who a ghost is bound to can change, possession taken or given in trade or ceremony. Although a ghost is the image and personality of the person they had been before death, their monotone appearance changes colour to match the aura of the person they are bonded to. In a way, it is also a show of power as it shows the world exactly what sort of person their ‘owner’ is through the colour of their aura.

Ghosts can be destroyed by the vessel they are bound to being burnt, but their souls are then trapped in purgatory with no chance of moving on to the next life. To save a ghost you must find the right ritual, heavily linked to their culture’s religious rituals. Once a ghost is freed in this manner, it moves on into the Light until the time of their rebirth.

As to the Oh My! part of the title… oh there are so many moments in my world that need an Oh My! to explain them. The BirdFolk of Wroth, Earthed demons, women in long white robes that look as if they’ve just taken the sheets and curtains down and put them on… it’s all there.

I will mention that this world of mine has many sides to it. There’s the ‘normal’ world up against the Other World. The people who walk in the Light against those who walk in the Darkness… and then all those fascinating people who have learnt to walk in the Grey in between all these sides.

And so, there it is! A sneak peek into my world. Now, I do hope you realise this is just the world within my next series of books. It starts with Isis, Vampires and Ghosts – Oh My! but there are at least another five books in my head to get out to continue the journey. My actual real life world is far duller and consists more of horde wrangling, Haus Frauing and magic tricks that make money come from nowhere and cover all the bills and outstanding debts. Then, of course, there is the hot chocolate. 😉

Until next time,

Janis. XXOO

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Posted by on January 25, 2014 in Writing

 

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