Show Notes:
Today is part two of two where we are talking to Morrigan Gaines about her novels. After today you will have heard about dictating your first stories to your mom, getting support from your husband, who helped to encourage her to publish her first book, rearranging your books when your characters talk too much, ignoring bad advice, using reviews to help improve your story, and learning how to promote on social media.
Morrigan’s Facebook Page – Morrigan’s Facebook Group – Morrigan’s Twitter – Morrigan’s Instagram – Morrigan’s TikTok – Morrigan’s Website
Morrigan Gaines lives in the woods of Maine with her high school sweetheart. After pursuing her passions for wildlife sciences and nature education in college, she returned to her first love of creating fantasy worlds. When she’s not writing books or homeschooling her four kids, she can be found reading, hiking, playing video games, or chasing new hobbies.
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Transcript:
Speaker A: Welcome to Freya’s.
Speaker A: Fairy tales.
Speaker A: We believe fairy tales are both stories we enjoyed as children and something that we can achieve ourselves.
Speaker A: Each week, we will talk to authors about their favorite fairy tales when they were kids and their adventure to holding their very own fairy tale in their hands.
Speaker A: At the end of each episode, we will finish off with a fairy tale or short story read as close to the original author’s version as possible.
Speaker A: I am your host.
Speaker A: Freya victoria I’m an audiobook narrator that loves reading fairy tales, novels and bringing stories to life through narration.
Speaker A: I am also fascinated by talking to authors and learning about their why and how for creating their stories.
Speaker A: We have included all of the links for today’s author and our show in the show notes.
Speaker B: Be sure to check out our website.
Speaker A: And sign up for our newsletter for the latest on the podcast.
Speaker A: Today is part two of Two, where we are talking to Morgan Gaines about her novels.
Speaker B: After today, you will have heard about.
Speaker A: Dictating your first stories to your mom, getting support from your husband who helped to encourage her to publish her first book, rearranging your books when your characters talk too much, ignoring bad advice, using reviews to help improve your story, and learning how to promote on social media.
Speaker A: Echoes of Bellock memory is a gift.
Speaker A: It’s also a curse.
Speaker A: When Cyrus Arbitram refuses to marry the crown princess of Osmaria, his father disowns him.
Speaker A: He’s cast out into the world plagued by loneliness and memories of his troubled childhood.
Speaker A: He’s becoming the man he never intended to be, finding solace in drugs and alcohol.
Speaker A: His life is spiraling out of control.
Speaker A: It’s only a matter of time before he gets caught up in another dangerous situation, one that may cost him everything.
Speaker A: Tessa, a fiery woman with a passion for flowers, lights the spark of hope for a better future.
Speaker A: In his heart, she holds tight to her own secrets as she cares for her ailing father, secrets that may threaten their budding relationship.
Speaker A: Cyrus grasps his second chance, determined to move beyond the memories that haunt his nightmares.
Speaker A: His chance at happiness is within reach.
Speaker A: But a darkness is rising that desires the power Cyrus doesn’t know he possesses.
Speaker A: Will he survive to shine brightly?
Speaker A: Or will the darkness destroy him?
Speaker C: I mean, the past couple of weeks, I haven’t written anything because we’ve been having a lot of family stuff going on, and I come home at night, or I sit down at night and I look at the computer.
Speaker C: I’m like, I don’t have it in me right now, and I have to take care of myself first.
Speaker B: My husband’s computer decided to yeet his WiFi a couple of days ago.
Speaker B: There was no WiFi.
Speaker B: According to the computer, his computer had no WiFi connection available.
Speaker B: Not just that.
Speaker B: You search for networks and it couldn’t find one.
Speaker B: There was no WiFi at all to try to connect to it was gone.
Speaker B: So, like 4 hours later I fixed it.
Speaker B: But then my brain was so angry from it taking 4 hours of editing audio time so that I could have my weekends totally off to fix this computer.
Speaker B: I was like, I’m so mad I cannot write right now.
Speaker B: Because if I try to write right now, it’s going to be angry.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker B: Or I’m going to be staring at the screen going, what?
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: That’s pretty much where I’ve been lately.
Speaker C: Just like, sit down, stare at the screen, it’s not working.
Speaker C: So I just go and do other stuff.
Speaker C: That’s self care at that point.
Speaker C: Because if I force it, sometimes I do.
Speaker C: Sometimes I’ll join a word sprint on a discord, like a 15 minutes word sprint.
Speaker C: And sometimes that helps break me free from that.
Speaker C: But sometimes just a matter of taking time for you and self care.
Speaker B: All of my writing is I always write in, like so at the beginning of the year, I committed to like, ten minutes a day of writing.
Speaker B: So that’s essentially what all my writing is, is these ten minute, 15 minutes writing.
Speaker B: Just sprint it out.
Speaker B: We’ll go back and clean it up later, but just like, get it done.
Speaker C: I found those are really useful, especially when I’m stuck in a scene where things are just not working on the scene.
Speaker C: For me, it’s setting that sort of like time limit and just writing whatever I can.
Speaker C: And usually it just unlocks something in my brain.
Speaker B: Yeah, your brain is like, no stress.
Speaker C: Okay.
Speaker B: So there’s authors that I know set like a word count per day.
Speaker B: They have to get out.
Speaker B: And then there’s authors that are like, I don’t know, word count per day I think is the most common goal that I see.
Speaker B: But I was like, that’s not realistic for me because I’m narrating and I’m working full time and I’m having to prep other narration books.
Speaker B: I have so many other things going on that I was trying to say, like, oh, you have to write 1000 words a day or 5000 words a day or 10,000 words a day.
Speaker B: I don’t have time for that.
Speaker B: That so I’m like in my, like, ten to 15 minutes I write each day.
Speaker B: I can get like, two to 500 words done in that time period, depending on if my brain is working.
Speaker B: I had one day where I had to come up with the job for the main character’s dad.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I cannot think of what job would make sense for what I’ve set up for his life.
Speaker B: So far, it turned into 15 minutes of me and my husband, like, what would be good blue collar jobs that you could do this and that while you work?
Speaker B: I ended up Googling a list of blue collar jobs in case anyone needs ideas for how to find jobs for your characters.
Speaker B: Google it.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker C: I have so many things I saved in BOOKMARKS.
Speaker C: Just random things I’ve had to research.
Speaker C: I’m like, oh, that’s not useful right now, but maybe for later I’m going to need that.
Speaker B: And then keeping track of all the random.
Speaker B: What color eyes did I give that character?
Speaker B: Throw that into a Google sheet so that you can respond to it later.
Speaker C: I have a character spreadsheet of ages is my big thing.
Speaker C: I always forget what ages I gave my characters.
Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
Speaker C: And I’m like, instead of digging through, I like, I have it in a Google spreadsheet.
Speaker C: Okay, this is the character.
Speaker C: This is their age.
Speaker C: This is who they’re related to in the book.
Speaker C: Because otherwise I just lose it at some point.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker B: And names, too.
Speaker B: Names, because I am terrible with names.
Speaker B: So at the point that I’ve finally figured out what name to give, I have to keep track of that because I can’t figure it out.
Speaker B: So what would you say is the best and worst advice that you’ve gotten?
Speaker B: So what’s the best piece of advice you’ve gotten and then the worst piece of advice you’ve gotten?
Speaker A: I would say the worst pieces of.
Speaker C: Advice I’ve seen or gotten, because sometimes not directed at me, but it sort of ties back to high school.
Speaker C: I had one English teacher who was a new English teacher, and it was senior English, and he criticized my use of what he termed outdated language because I wrote with a lot of or.
Speaker C: I didn’t write a lot, but I used words like therefore or.
Speaker C: Whereas in my writing in high school.
Speaker B: Sounds like some personal preference thing, but.
Speaker C: Okay, crossed them all out and said, that’s outdated English.
Speaker C: No one uses it anymore.
Speaker C: Don’t use them.
Speaker C: Only English teacher I’ve ever had do that to me.
Speaker C: And I just remember being so mad because it was more of a personal preference thing.
Speaker C: And everyone has their own writing style.
Speaker C: So anytime I see anything on TikTok anywhere else where people are criticizing something that’s really just a personal preference, I get aggravated.
Speaker C: Because it’s so easy for young authors, I think, and young writers to fall into this.
Speaker C: I have to make my writing perfect grammatically.
Speaker C: It has to follow the exact expectations of people.
Speaker C: But then you start losing your voice.
Speaker C: Well, that’s all you have that are.
Speaker B: Like, books have to follow this exact plot scheme of stuff.
Speaker B: I’m like, how boring would books be if every book followed the exact same recipe the exact same way?
Speaker B: It’d be all the same book.
Speaker B: No one wants to read the exact same book over and over and over again.
Speaker C: And one time that this really drove it home for me is I home school all my four kids.
Speaker C: So we were reading some EB.
Speaker C: White and Stuart Little, and E.
Speaker C: B.
Speaker C: White is notorious for run on sentences.
Speaker C: I don’t show I’ve seen any children’s author of sentences that go on as long as his manages to do.
Speaker C: And as an adult as a kid, I never noticed this but as an adult, I’m reading it out loud and I’m not finding any place to pause.
Speaker C: And I’m like, okay.
Speaker C: EB.
Speaker C: White published.
Speaker C: Nowadays, some of the people that are giving their editing advice on TikTok they would not be happy with how he writes and his writing style.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker C: But he’s a well known children’s author.
Speaker B: He’s famous.
Speaker B: Charlotte’s Web.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker C: Charlotte’s Webb.
Speaker C: Stuart Little.
Speaker C: The trumpeter.
Speaker C: The swan.
Speaker C: All those.
Speaker C: And so that was really okay.
Speaker B: I don’t think I noticed it reading charlote.
Speaker B: I don’t really pay attention to that.
Speaker C: As a narrator, it’s a lot.
Speaker B: I have to find the pauses when I’m narrating because I do come across sentences where you’re like there needs to be air in here somewhere.
Speaker B: Where could I slow down for emphasis in this sentence?
Speaker B: I’m used to having to do that already.
Speaker B: I make my own commas and periods.
Speaker B: There should really be one here, I promise.
Speaker C: And there’s also another reason why I don’t feel so bad now about pulling a treachery of Ravens off the market and rewriting it.
Speaker C: Because I actually found out that Tolkien actually rewrote parts of The Hobit to better fit in with the whole series.
Speaker C: So there’s, like, a whole chapter.
Speaker C: He rewrote in it and then republished it.
Speaker C: So I feel like books are, in a way, sort of evolving and living where we can make changes and we can make them better.
Speaker C: And I know in traditional publishing, that’s frowned upon.
Speaker B: Well, it’s harder to do because it’s.
Speaker C: Harder to do as well.
Speaker C: You’re already set out 1000, 2000 books.
Speaker C: But as a smaller author right now, it’s nice to have that freedom of finding sort of my voice and being able to correct things I know aren’t quite right in order to make my work stronger in the long run.
Speaker C: So it’s a nice thing about being sort of a smaller author and a self published author is I have that freedom.
Speaker B: You can pull it and fix it relatively quickly.
Speaker B: As opposed to I’ve worked with a couple of authors that do work with not big publishers but, like, smaller, small press stuff.
Speaker B: And it’s a long process.
Speaker B: If they fix it, it’s like, I’ll fix it in the next iteration but that might take months to get the new version done.
Speaker B: Not a fast process if you’re with any kind of a publisher.
Speaker B: I have one author that’s constantly, like, do not sign with a publisher unless it’s a trad pub or, like, a big pub.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I have no desire to give away my royalties to anybody.
Speaker B: So unless you’re bringing some h*** of a promotion team behind it no.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: I will say I’m a control freak about my writing and the idea that a publisher would have a say in what my characters are doing and how they’re written and what I publish.
Speaker C: Even any series right now that I’m writing just makes me not comfortable, so it’s not really a way for me to do it.
Speaker C: But I definitely also see, like, I know back when I was younger, as a kid, it was like, oh, yeah, I’ll get signed on by a publisher, and they’ll be able to publish my books.
Speaker C: They’ll be all known all over the world.
Speaker C: Like, that idealized view of it.
Speaker B: Well, now, I mean, there’s authors that have done really well for themselves just based off social media and TikTok and all the other things available that don’t have their books traditionally published.
Speaker B: I mean, there’s tons of authors now that have their books in, like, Barnes and Noble that aren’t published through a publisher.
Speaker B: They did it themselves.
Speaker B: I think at the end of the day, as long as you’re putting out a professional product, whether you are able to do all the steps yourself and make it look professional, or whether with you, with your cover, knowing this is outside of my wheelhouse of being able to do it, I need to pay someone to do this, because I can’t.
Speaker B: Yeah, instead of putting out a cover.
Speaker A: That wouldn’t have been your favorite or whatever.
Speaker B: Now, I’ve seen some people very proud of their covers that they made themselves, and I’m like, OOH.
Speaker A: I would never.
Speaker B: Tell anyone that to their face.
Speaker B: Actually, to be honest, I did tell one author that, but.
Speaker C: I would tell them if they asked for honest feedback.
Speaker B: Yeah, it was an author.
Speaker B: I had a really good like, I narrated a bunch of books for them, and I was like, every single time they would ask me, what did you think of the story?
Speaker B: What did you think of this?
Speaker B: What did you think of that?
Speaker B: And so then I got an offer on another book, and I was like, but can we remake that cover, though?
Speaker B: Because it doesn’t fit with any of the rest of the books.
Speaker B: And if I were to just see this book up for audition, I would not have touched it.
Speaker C: And the thing about being a small author, I’ve found that I do need to rely a lot on that sort of feedback from other people.
Speaker C: Like my Beta readers, I had to be like, yeah, be honest.
Speaker C: And the ones who are really bluntly honest to me are the ones that have been, like, the most helpful in me saying, okay, this storyline isn’t working for the people.
Speaker C: Like, this person isn’t understanding it or this comment.
Speaker C: I need to really reevaluate it and see if it actually fits with the character.
Speaker C: And so it’s really great that we have the ability to reach out to all these different types of people and reach out across social media and actually make those connections with the technology we have nowadays.
Speaker B: Well, it’s even with, like, I get bad reviews on audiobooks that I’ve done or whatever.
Speaker B: I’m like, if it is constructive criticism, if you’re just coming on and you just say you don’t like my voice.
Speaker B: I can’t do anything about that.
Speaker B: My voice is my voice.
Speaker B: It is what it is.
Speaker B: People don’t like I have more like a newscastery way that I kind of narrate or that’s what I have been told.
Speaker B: A lot of people don’t like that, apparently.
Speaker B: Some people love that.
Speaker B: So I can’t change it because it’s differing.
Speaker B: Like, they can contradict each other.
Speaker B: But if I were to get something that was like, oh, my God, why does she I don’t even know what to give an example of.
Speaker B: But if there was something like in your book, for example, if you’re constantly getting comments about the editing being really bad, you should take that into consideration.
Speaker B: Do I think you should look at all of your reviews?
Speaker B: No, I think all of our mental health can’t handle that.
Speaker C: I have some friends who will not look at the reviews just because it does not help them out in any way in terms of mental health.
Speaker C: Personally, I like looking at reviews, and I love it when someone offers constructive criticism because it does help me as an author.
Speaker C: I don’t interact with reviewers unless they come in and interact with me.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: If they tag me, if I already talked to them before.
Speaker C: And I know that they’re okay with interactions because I’m a reader and an author.
Speaker C: So I understand that there needs to be a safe place for them to say what they need to say.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker C: And I’ve also had times where I’ve written long reviews about books that I didn’t like or maybe just didn’t quite work for me and then post them and been like, I’m really nervous.
Speaker C: I hope this author is, like, the nice type that isn’t going to come at me.
Speaker C: Because we all heard the horror stories of the authors just losing it on reviewers.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker C: Luckily, it doesn’t happen very often.
Speaker C: I found that most authors I’ve dealt with are great.
Speaker B: I think there’s a couple just repeat offenders that we see constantly.
Speaker C: I think on TikTok, there’s a big debate for a while about whether or not authors should ever interact with reviewers.
Speaker C: And some people are firmly in the authors should not be talking to reviewers at all.
Speaker C: And I find that difficult to understand because authors are often also readers.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker C: So we’re going to be interacting with other readers as well, and we’re going to be talking to them.
Speaker C: And if a reviewer like, I’ve had one person who’s reading my Arc of Echoes of Ballot and she messaged me, so she said, hey, I’m going to send if I notice any typos, because I know it’s an arc, but do you want my play by play reactions?
Speaker C: Do you want me to send those to you?
Speaker C: And I was like, yes, please do.
Speaker C: Because I love seeing that, and it’s not something I usually get to see because you send your book out in the world and you don’t really hear anything about it unless someone does a review about it.
Speaker B: Yeah, I feel like she sent me.
Speaker C: All her play by play.
Speaker C: It was amazing.
Speaker C: I loved it so much to see all her reactions and to know in my head what’s coming up in the next chapter as she’s reading.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker B: I came across one author who talked about when she sends to her I don’t remember if it was alphas or betas, three chapters at a time, and then she would send them kind of like a questionnaire, but it was more like, how do you feel about the chapters?
Speaker B: And if the ratings for it were under, say there was out of ten, if it was under a five, she would go back and rewrite that chapter because if they didn’t like it enough, something was wrong with it.
Speaker B: I thought that was an interesting way.
Speaker B: I don’t know, it feels a little tiny bit clinical, but also it seems like it would be a good idea in some instances.
Speaker C: Yeah, I can see how it remove that pressure of especially if it’s just a rating, remove that pressure of having to worry about writing out a comment or being able to say what you want to say about it, but not maybe knowing how to word it.
Speaker C: I do question though, what if it’s a chapter where the reader is not supposed to like it?
Speaker B: I think there was like a series of questions and how would you rate this part of the thing on a scale of one to five or whatever?
Speaker B: And if it scored under a certain amount, then she would read a book.
Speaker C: Recently and the book was fabulous, but the book made me so frustrated and upset for the main character.
Speaker C: And so I wrote my review.
Speaker C: I said, I think the author meant it to do this.
Speaker C: And later on she actually saw my review and confirmed, yes, I meant it to be that way, but it made me so frustrated as a reader for the character and what the character went through and the resolution at the end for the character.
Speaker C: It’s part of a series too, so obviously I’m going to have to read the series as it’s put out.
Speaker C: But it was what the author intended is she intended that to have that impact, to make a point about some societal issues in the book.
Speaker C: And it was very well done because it gave me that reaction that it was supposed to give.
Speaker C: So it’s interesting just sort of how that all ties together, emotions and everything and trying to find that balance.
Speaker B: At the end of the day, I think it’s write the book that you want to write and that you are happy with at the end.
Speaker B: Know what your strengths and weaknesses are as far as the process goes.
Speaker B: The author I just talked to talked about the first editor she worked with did her formatting for her, and then she had to do her formatting.
Speaker B: And so she’s like the learning curve of having to format her book on her own suddenly.
Speaker B: And now she’s helping other people format their books.
Speaker B: And I’m like, this is one of those things you just have to know.
Speaker B: I have three podcasts, okay?
Speaker B: And so I make a lot of graphics and stuff in Canva, but it’s like something that I’m like, I wish I had the funds to be able to pay someone else to do it because while I am capable of doing it, it takes time and it’s so annoying, that part.
Speaker C: Like being able to outsource what is just not your thing if you’re able.
Speaker C: I think some of the best advice I’d say, other than writing your own story, is also just being open to constructive feedback because sometimes it’s hard because it’s your baby.
Speaker C: Like, you write this and you work so hard on it, and then when someone says, hey, this character, this is offensive, or, hey, this just doesn’t make sense to me, and you keep getting the same feedback like you were saying, you need to be able to understand that they’re not coming at you.
Speaker C: They’re saying, hey, to make this book better, here’s some feedback ways to improve it.
Speaker B: Well, especially in situations like offensive stuff.
Speaker B: Now, sometimes I do realize that is part of the story, and other times that needs to not be part of the story.
Speaker B: But being aware of what you have in there that could possibly be offensive, I think is also very important.
Speaker C: Yeah.
Speaker C: In the second book, I have a character who’s purposely offensive towards a character who’s non binary, but I also address it with the other characters where they’re like, this is not right.
Speaker C: You can’t be this way.
Speaker C: And I haven’t gotten any negative feedback about that because it’s part of that character.
Speaker C: He’s not a good character, he’s not a good person.
Speaker B: Yeah, I feel like it’s all that’s slightly different.
Speaker B: I don’t know, I feel like I’m like so like, I don’t want to step on anybody.
Speaker B: So I posted a video.
Speaker B: I talked to an author a couple of weeks ago who talked about going through her followers and deleting ones that weren’t actively posting on TikTok and ones that didn’t ever post about books and all this stuff and removing them.
Speaker B: So I started doing that because I don’t know the way algorithms, to my understanding, work is they send it out to a percentage of people that follow you and then see how many interact, and then they’ll send it to more.
Speaker B: Well, if all the people they’re sending it to aren’t book people, they’re not going to interact with your book videos.
Speaker B: I start doing that and I post a video.
Speaker B: And the mistake that I think I made is mentioning what I was using because authors mention all the time that they’re cleaning up their feed.
Speaker B: They’re cleaning up their followers and stuff, but they don’t usually mention what they’re using as the how to get rid of people.
Speaker B: So I’m like, I think that’s where I went wrong.
Speaker B: I said what exactly I was looking for in accounts.
Speaker B: And I’m like, maybe we shouldn’t do that.
Speaker B: So I made the video private and have continued to remove followers.
Speaker C: But I’m curious to see what happens to my account if TikTok sticks around.
Speaker C: Because I had two videos that were not Booker related, get like 1.7 million views each the past couple of weeks.
Speaker C: Oh gosh.
Speaker C: Which is fabulous that they got that many views.
Speaker C: But I decided to post them as literally just a cap cut template over a song that came out recently and it hit and so my own little caption of my reaction to it and it hit a lot of nerves apparently.
Speaker C: And so I’ve gained over, I think I want to say about 2000 more followers in the past couple of weeks, I think solely because of those videos.
Speaker C: But I don’t know what their interests are if I’m going to get into reactions.
Speaker C: Because on my other videos I’ve seen a little bit more action, but not the amount that you’d see.
Speaker C: You’d think for that many new followers.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker C: So I’m going to see what happens because I don’t watch delete people, especially since a lot of people just like my husband, he just uses TikTok account.
Speaker C: He doesn’t post videos.
Speaker C: He has his picture in his name and that’s it.
Speaker C: So a lot of people, that’s what they do.
Speaker C: And so I hate to delete followers that are honestly interested in what I’m writing and what I’m doing.
Speaker B: So I post this video and it got quite a few views pretty fast, not millions.
Speaker C: It was controversial and TikTok and I.
Speaker B: Had four people comment on it.
Speaker B: Four people who had never been following me.
Speaker B: I’ve never seen their name before, but they were incredibly upset that I was removing accounts that I’m like.
Speaker B: If someone I’m like, for example, you four people who are very upset about this whole video.
Speaker B: If you four people were interacting with my videos, you’re liking, you’re commenting, you’ve talked to me before.
Speaker B: Like, I know who you are.
Speaker B: That is completely different from someone who is lurking and never liking and never commenting.
Speaker B: And I don’t even know you exist because all you did was follow me at one time and then never do anything ever again.
Speaker B: Now I’m kind of to the point where I’m like, I don’t even know how far down the list I am, but I’m like, I only have like 2000 followers total, less than 2000 now that I’ve removed a bunch.
Speaker B: But I’m like, it’s exhausting to have to go through.
Speaker C: It takes so much time.
Speaker B: I saw someone talk about they are going through right now and following all their mutuals on other social medias in case something happens.
Speaker C: I’ve been trying to do that, but it takes a lot of time.
Speaker B: I’m like, oh my God, I can’t even I just need to put up a video and be like, listen, if you want to stick with me forever, make sure you’re on my newsletter.
Speaker B: But otherwise I can’t make any promises because I just don’t have time.
Speaker B: One was like 6 hours in and I’m like, oh, I don’t have 6 hours.
Speaker C: That’s too much.
Speaker C: Yeah, I have so many other things I could be doing in 6 hours.
Speaker B: Including the stack of audio that I need to edit for the rest of today.
Speaker B: I’m like, no, I will not be doing that.
Speaker B: I do try to catch ones.
Speaker B: Like when I come across people that I like though, and I’ll go, the problem is that half the time I don’t see the people that I like.
Speaker B: Videos.
Speaker C: Yeah, I’ve had to go track them down pretty much and then go look them up on Instagram and try to add them.
Speaker C: It’s a whole process.
Speaker B: Now there’s clapper.
Speaker B: So like I downloaded yesterday, I downloaded a video from TikTok and put it on Clapper and it pushed it like it had been on TikTok for hours and it had like 50 views.
Speaker B: And I posted on Clapper and I get like 350 views really fast.
Speaker B: And then it suddenly stopped and I’m like, I think something happened.
Speaker B: And then today I get noticed like, we stopped pushing your video because it has a watermark from another app on it.
Speaker B: And I’m like, that makes sense.
Speaker C: Okay, yeah, I’ve been hearing some alternatives.
Speaker C: I haven’t tried any alternatives yet.
Speaker C: TikTok, I’m going to look at some stuff.
Speaker B: That’s the one that I’ve just seen.
Speaker B: It’s very similar to TikTok, like the videos and stuff, but they will not push stuff that has watermarks.
Speaker B: Now, TikTok has the ability now, like recently, where you can download the video before you actually post it and it won’t have the watermark.
Speaker C: There are some apps you can get that will let you download videos without the watermark as well.
Speaker B: I’m too lazy to do multiple videos.
Speaker B: For example, I’m on one of my podcasts.
Speaker B: I get paid for my reels for God knows what reason, because there’s not a lot of followers on that account.
Speaker B: But they pay me for my reels.
Speaker B: And on that one, it’s like the rules are like it can’t be posted on other platforms and blah, blah, blah.
Speaker B: And I’m like, I don’t have time.
Speaker B: I’m like, if you stop paying me, you stop paying me.
Speaker B: But I don’t have time to make separate videos for all these platforms.
Speaker B: You’re going to get the same video now.
Speaker B: I make it in Canva so there’s no watermark on there.
Speaker B: And then I download it and I post it to all the places.
Speaker B: And I’m like, if you decide to stop paying me because you decide to go search on TikTok and find it, that’s fine with me too.
Speaker B: And I post the.
Speaker B: Same videos to Facebook and Instagram, which are owned by the same company.
Speaker B: So I’m like, if you can’t even figure out between yourself that I’m posting the exact same thing that’s on you.
Speaker C: That’S your problem at that point.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker B: I’m like, if my very small, like, $20 checks go down to zero, I’m okay with that.
Speaker B: At least I got to have extra time in my day.
Speaker B: It is what it is.
Speaker B: All right, well, I hope you have a great rest of your Saturday.
Speaker C: You too.
Speaker B: Bye.
Speaker B: Bye.
Speaker A: As Morgan got older, she liked the Chronicles of Narnia the Chronicles of Narnia is a series of seven high fantasy novels by British author C.
Speaker A: S.
Speaker A: Lewis.
Speaker A: Illustrated by Pauline Baines, and originally published between 1950 and 1956, the Chronicles of Narnia has been adapted for radio, television, the stage, film, and video games.
Speaker A: The series is set in the fictional realm of Narnia, a fantasy world of magic, mythical beasts, and talking animals.
Speaker A: It Narrates, the adventures of various children who play central roles in the unfolding history of the Narnian world, except in The Horse and his Boy, the protagonists are all children from the real world who are magically transported to Narnia, where they are sometimes called upon by the lion aslan to protect Narnia from evil.
Speaker A: The books span the entire history of Narnia, from its creation in The Magician’s Nephew to the eventual destruction in The Last Battle.
Speaker A: The Chronicles of Narnia is considered a classic of children’s literature and is Lewis’s bestselling work.
Speaker A: Having sold 120,000,000 copies in 47 languages, it is believed that it may have been inspired by Celtic and Irish mythology.
Speaker A: Today we’ll be reading about Oisin and Tiernag from Irish mythology.
Speaker A: Don’t forget we’re reading LeMorte Arthur, the story of King Arthur and of his noble Knights of the Roundtable on our Patreon.
Speaker A: You can find the link in the show notes.
Speaker A: Oshin and Tiernag long ago, people in Ireland believed that there was a beautiful land in the western sea called Tiernag, the land of the young.
Speaker A: It was a place where the trees were always green, the flowers were always in bloom, and men and women never grew old.
Speaker A: This is the story of how Oshin, the son of Fion Makumail, leader of the Fianna, came to go to Tiernag.
Speaker A: One morning, the Fianna were hunting deer on the shores of Luflian in County Kerry.
Speaker A: As they rested on a hilltop, a beautiful girl came riding towards them on a snow white horse.
Speaker A: She was dressed like a princess, and her long golden hair hung to her waist.
Speaker A: As she drew near, FJOn called out, what is your name and what land have you come from?
Speaker A: I am Neve of the Golden Hare, and my father is King of Tiernag.
Speaker A: I have heard of a great warrior named Osheen.
Speaker A: I have come to find him and ask him to return with me to the land of the Young.
Speaker A: Fian was sad, for he feared that if Osheen went with Neve.
Speaker A: He would never see him again.
Speaker A: But it was too late.
Speaker A: Osheen was already in love with the princess.
Speaker A: He accepted Neve’s invitation and waved goodbye to Fion and his friends.
Speaker A: He jumped onto the horse behind Neve.
Speaker A: Away they galloped into the morning mist over the land and the sea.
Speaker A: The fairy horse ran, moving as swiftly as a shadow.
Speaker A: At last they reached the golden shores of Tyranag.
Speaker A: The king and queen welcomed Osheen and held a great feast in his honor.
Speaker A: It was a magical land.
Speaker A: Osheen hunted and feasted, and at night he told stories of FJOn and the Fianna and of their lives in Ireland.
Speaker A: Osheen had never felt as happy as he did with Neve, and before long they were married.
Speaker A: Osheen lived in Tirnanog for 300 years, but being so happy, it only seemed like three.
Speaker A: Then a great longing came on him to go back to Ireland.
Speaker A: Neve did not want him to go, but at last she agreed and gave him the white horse.
Speaker A: Neve warned him set foot even once on the soil of Ireland and you will never return to Tiernag.
Speaker A: When Osheen reached Ireland, he found that everything had changed.
Speaker A: There was no trace of his father or the Fianna.
Speaker A: As he passed through Glen the small the Valley of the Thrushes, he saw a group of men trying to move a large stone.
Speaker A: I will help you, he said.
Speaker A: The mighty O’sheen stooped down in his saddle and with one hand lifted the stone.
Speaker A: But as he did so, the saddle strap broke and he tumbled to the ground.
Speaker A: Immediately the fairy horse galloped away and a great change came over Osheen.
Speaker A: In the blink of an eye, the great hero of the Fianna became a withered old man, unsure of what to do.
Speaker A: Legend has it that the men brought Osheen to St.
Speaker A: Patrick.
Speaker A: St.
Speaker A: Patrick tried to comfort Oshine in his old age.
Speaker A: When Osheen learned that the Fianna and his father were long since dead, his heart was filled with sadness.
Speaker A: Oshin spoke of the old days of the Fianna and the many great deeds of Fion, when they hunted and feasted and listened to great stories.
Speaker A: He spoke of his time in Tiernag and his beautiful wife, Neve.
Speaker A: Although Osheen died soon after, the wonderful stories of Neve and Osheen have lived on.
Speaker A: Thank you for joining Freya’s fairy tales.
Speaker A: Be sure to come back next week for w l’s journey to holding her own fairy tale in her hands and to hear one of her favorite fairy tales.
Speaker B: You Sand.
