Harley Q. Turner (Author)

Tonight is going to be a busy night. My family has exactly 90 minutes to take five children to two different school to meet the teachers of four different students. We will start the night in the kindergarten hallway with my step-daughter. I have no idea who her teacher is this year, but after having 3 other kids in school before her, I know several of the teachers. I know who I want her to have. I know who I don't want her to have. Now we just have to wait and see who she gets. Then we venture to the 1st grade hallway. My son has the same teacher that my oldest son had when he was in first grade, but I wasn't thrilled with her (although she was better than my daughter's first grade teacher, who informed the class that Santa Claus wasn't real). This teacher is real strict about children who talk during class, and with my Collin being the class clown, I already know this will be an issue. Hopefully we can get through the year. After this classroom, we get to pack a...

First of all, I promise this post isn't as depressing as my blog posts were last week. I did not intend for both posts to be about suicide, but it happened. These last few weeks have been pretty busy leading up to the start of school. Saturday, Joker and I took three of the kids to our local fire department's corn boil. All three kids got mad. All three kids ended up spending the night at someone else's house, so we got to go have some fun. It isn't often that my husband and I go out just the two of us. Being the karaoke junkies that we are, we started out the night at our usual bar where Batman was running karaoke. The place got too busy too fast, so we moved on.  Our second stop of the night took us to the place where we met. Complete opposite of the first packed establishment that we were at, this one only had two other customers when we walked in. However the bartender (who was also the person running karaoke) was more worried about those other customers,...

Since I started this blog back in April, I have generally been really good about posting at least twice a week, usually on Tuesday and Thursday. Until this week. Thursday was an emotional day for me. A very dear friend of mine committed suicide on August 20, 1998, just six days before I started my freshman year of high school. Does the story sound familiar? It is the person who inspired the First Love series. I have been hard at work on finishing my Self Inflicted saga, but I will never forget my first books. My heart and soul went in to Summer Love and Autumn Goodbye. I shed too many tears to count while writing them and even more during the editing process. Suicide is not a solution to any problem.  It may seem like an easy way out, but think of the people that are left behind. How many blame themselves for a loved ones early death? I know i spent many years blaming myself before I realized it wasn't my fault. Suicide seems to be the topic of all my posts this week, an...

A few years ago, I lost a really good friend to suicide. Wade was one of those people who always cared more about the people around him than he did himself. He didn't care how bad of a mood he was in, if you were around him, you would have a great time. He was the drummer of my favorite local band. Since he death, I have had the opportunity to become good friends with the lead singer and bassist of his old band. The band had a benefit for him (two actually, but it's just the second one that I want to talk about today). A night of loud, angry music while we all mourned for Demon. Very few people knew, but I was actually considering not attending the benefit. In the eighteen days leading up to it, I had a bit of a crisis of faith. The problem is, my faith is music. Music heals. Music is what will always be there for you. Music had failed me, and I wanted nothing to do with it. I spent eighteen silent days. If I was in the car, the radio was off. If I was at home, ther...

I was on facebook this morning (as I always am), and in one of my author groups, an author was asking if it was appropriate to write a book in which a 16 year old girl falls in love with a 19 year old counselor in summer camp. Many of the comments were against it, however, I don't see a problem with it. Especially when the author explains more of the story. The counselor is not interested, but the girl keeps trying. A 16 year old boy watches this transpire and in the end, he falls in love with the girl, but she only has eyes for the counselor. This happens every day! In the First Love series, Marissa is 13 years old when she falls in love with Chad (17). While most people would frown on the relationship (which is why they keep it hidden), this kind of thing happens. Marissa and Chad never have a sexual relationship. A year and a half later, Marissa is 14 years old, and faces her boyfriend's suicide just days before she starts high school. When I was younger, I personall...

I was shopping the other day, and came across the seasonal aisle. It is already filled with Halloween candy. There was an older lady complaining that it was too early for Halloween. I had to walk away before I said something. It is never too early for Halloween! In a perfect world, I would start planning for Halloween on November 1 every year! It has always been my favorite day of the year, and just because I'm an adult, that doesn't have to change. It's not just October 31 either. It's everything to do with Halloween. I spend months picking out the perfect costume (although I am seriously torn between Jessica Rabbit and Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas this year). I put a lot of work into my costumes. Last year, I made Elsa, Anna, and Olaf costumes for my youngest three children. I also put together an amazing Chucky costume for my husband and spent hours figuring out exactly how to do his makeup. His costume (which was seriously bought at Goodwill for under $...

Sorry I didn't get this up yesterday. I have been a bit on the busy side, and completely spaced out posting this! Just a reminder, you can get the entire novella of Before the Scars for free. All you have to do is sign up for my reader's group! There are several ways you can do this. There is a signup link on my website , on my Facebook , or you can email me at harleyturner.author@gmail.com I had to delete the ending to Aislynn's story because it included some major Scars Fade spoilers! Get the full book to see how it ends! Aislynn It was the first day of my freshman year. I didn’t mind school, but not being popular or even having friends made getting through the day difficult. Band was the last class of the day, and easily my favorite. I started playing the flute in third grade, and I was good at it. All through junior high, I was the best. I was the one with all the solos. It was the one thing I was proud of. Now I was in high school. I didn’t expect to b...

I haven't been doing much work with Summer Love and Autumn Goodbye lately, but Marissa's story continues in the Self Inflicted Trilogy when she makes her initial appearance in Scars Fade. Every time I think of the titles of my first two novels, a song jumps into my head. Instantly I feel like I am fifteen years old again because that's when Britney Spears released "Autumn Goodbye." It was not a very well known song. It was not on any of her albums (I don't think). It was released solely as a bonus track on the Baby One More Time single, which I was lucky enough to get as a gift from a boy all those years ago (Thanks Mike!). Still to this day, lyrics from that song come flooding to my head whenever I think of the Summer Love series. Things have been a little busy around Arkham these last few weeks. Classes for work are starting up again, and I just can't seem to wrap my head around income taxes during the summer. The kids are getting ready to go back to...