GtPGKogPYT4p61R1biicqBXsUzo" /> Google+ How #HoldOnToTheLight Happened - Gail Martin Day of the Dead tour | I Smell Sheep

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

How #HoldOnToTheLight Happened - Gail Martin Day of the Dead tour

How #HoldOnToTheLight Happened


What happens when 100+ Sci-Fi/Fantasy authors join the conversation about depression, suicide, anxiety, PTSD and self-harm? A world-wide blog campaign called #HoldOnToTheLight, that’s what.


#HoldOnToTheLight was inspired by #AKF #AlwaysKeepFighting, a campaign from the Supernatural TV show fandom (http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/index.php?title=Always_Keep_Fighting) I’m especially thrilled to see the #SPNFamily Crisis Support Network creating a fandom-based peer counseling training opportunity http://www.randomacts.org/programs/crisis-support-network/ (Yeah, I’m a huge fan of the show.) As Bobby Singer said, “Family don’t end with blood.” In other words, your true family is the one you gather around yourself.

#AlwaysKeepFighting #AKF showed the reach media stars have when they talk about issues, and I wondered what would happen if genre authors opened a similar conversation. I recruited my usual partners in crime—John Hartness, Misty Massey, Jaym Gates, Jean Marie Ward, Emily Leverett and my husband, Larry N. Martin—as the steering committee, and we started asking our colleagues and author friends to join us.

We asked authors to talk about how depression, suicide, PTSD, anxiety, self-harm or other mental health issues had affected them, their characters, their books or the worlds they created. What happened next is extraordinary. We not only had more than 100 authors agree to participate, but the blog posts they have written are heartfelt, candid, and life-changing.



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Participating authors include:
Robin Hobb, Jody Lynn Nye, Cat Rambo, Seanan McGuire, Laura Anne Gilman, Chuck Gannon, Kameron Hurley, Catherine Asaro, Gaie Siebold, Karen Miller, Rowena Cory Daniels, David B. Coe, Marc Tassin, Jonathan Oliver, Jeanne Adams, Nancy Northcott, Aaron Rosenberg, Jennifer St. Giles, Mark Van Name, Juliet McKenna, Jennifer Brozek, Darynda Jones, Christopher Golden, Clay and Susan Griffith, Gregory Wilson, Josh Vogt, Darin Kennedy, Jon Sprunk, James Maxey, Karen E. Taylor, Justin Gustainis, Misty Massey, John G. Hartness, Gail Z. Martin, Jean Marie Ward, Jaym Gates, Laura Taylor, Weston Ochse, Ron Garner, Kathy Lyons, Mari Mancusi, Leanna Renee Hieber, Davey Beauchamp, Cheryl Wilson, Rod Belcher, Travis Heermann, Cara Santa Maria, Michael J. Allen, Trisha Wooldridge, Alyssa Day, J. F. Lewis, Joshua Palmatier, Keith DeCandido Mindy Mimudes, Emily Leverett, Nicole Givens Kurtz, Tera Fulbright, Tamsin Silver, Stuart Jaffe, Danielle Ackley-McPhail, Eric Asher, Rick Gualtieri, Chris Kennedy, Ken Schrader, Samantha Dunaway Bryant, Valerie Willis, Alexandra Christian, Jake Bible, Matthew Saunders, Jay Requard, Vonnie Winslow Crist, Kelly Harmon, Sascha Illyvich, Kelly Swails, Bishop O’Connell, Sherwood Smith, Peter Prellwitz, Tracy Chowdhury, Trevor Curtis, Leo Champion, Alma Alexander Natania Barron, Bryan Thomas Schmidt, Addie J. King, Joelle Reizes, Gabrielle Faust, Selah Janel, Whitney Evans, Tom Leveen, Deborah J. Ross, Tally Johnson, Calandra Usher, Jada Diaz, Harry Markov, Brian Rathbone, Robert Greenberger, Linda Robertson, Leona Wisoker, Dianna L. Gunn, Emmie Mears, Lyndsey Harper, Tom Wells, Wendy S. Delmater, S.H. Roddey, Jeri Smith-Ready, Delilah Dawson, Phil Giunta, Myke Cole, Diana L. Gunn, and Amy Bauer.
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We believe fandom should be supportive, welcoming and inclusive, in the long tradition of fandom taking care of its own. We encourage readers and fans to seek the help they or their loved ones need without shame or embarrassment.

This past summer, ConCarolinas added a panel on coping with mental illness. The panelists were either authors who were medical professionals and/or authors who had personal experience with depression, etc. Not only was the panel standing room only, it ran over, and spawned a Facebook group. That’s one reason #HoldOnToTheLight is reaching out to convention organizers to encourage adding, promoting and expanding programming on mental wellness issues. ConCarolinas, Atomacon, Capricon, GenCon, Imaginarium and ContraFlow are all planning new panels, and we hope more cons will join in.

Links to all of the author blog posts are available at


Please—read the posts, share the posts, and change a life.


My Days of the Dead blog tour runs through October 31 with brand new excerpts from upcoming books and recent short stories, interviews, guest blog posts, giveaways and more! Plus, I’ll be including extra excerpt links for my stories and for books by author friends of mine. You’ve got to visit the participating sites to get the goodies, just like Trick or Treat! Get all the details about my Days of the Dead blog tour here:

Let me give a shout-out for #HoldOnToTheLight--100+ Sci-Fi/Fantasy authors blogging about their personal struggles with depression, PTSD, anxiety, suicide and self-harm, candid posts by some of your favorite authors on how mental health issues have impacted their lives and books. Read the stories, share the stories, change a life. Find out more at


Book swag is the new Trick-or-Treat! All of my guest blog posts have links to free excerpts—grab them all!



Trick Or Treat with an excerpt from my novel Deadly Curiosities

Trick Or Treat DoubleDragonSampler#1

Have you seen the Vendetta video? https://youtu.be/u72GIQlBAoU

Treat! Use your free Audible trial to get my books! Try The Summoner https://amzn.com/B0032COUQS

Enjoy a free excerpt from Steve Ruskin’s new A Deal With the Devil’s Broker
http://bit.ly/2etNsy7



About the Author:
Gail Z. Martin is the author of Vendetta: A Deadly Curiosities Novel in her urban fantasy series set in Charleston, SC (Solaris Books); Shadow and Flame the fourth and final book in the Ascendant Kingdoms Saga (Orbit Books); The Shadowed Path (Solaris Books) and Iron and Blood a new Steampunk series (Solaris Books) co-authored with Larry N. Martin. A brand new epic fantasy series debuts from Solaris Books in 2017.

She is also author of Ice Forged, Reign of Ash and War of Shadows in The Ascendant Kingdoms Saga, The Chronicles of The Necromancer series (The Summoner, The Blood King, Dark Haven, Dark Lady’s Chosen); The Fallen Kings Cycle (The Sworn, The Dread) and the urban fantasy novel Deadly Curiosities. Gail writes three ebook series: The Jonmarc Vahanian Adventures, The Deadly Curiosities Adventures and The Blaine McFadden Adventures. The Storm and Fury Adventures, steampunk stories set in the Iron & Blood world, are co-authored with Larry N. Martin.


GIVEAWAY
One winner gets a copy of The Summoner (Chronicles Of The Necromancer Series Book 1) and a copy of The Shadowed Path: A Jonmarc Vahanian Collection.
US only

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