Oh goody...beta blogger

Since about 15% of me is possessed of a child's fascination with anything that promises to be easier and spiffier, when Blogger offered me--little old me--the chance to upgrade this morning I took it. This despite the other 85%, the Luddite part, who knew no good could ever, ever come from all this messing about. I mean, come on. I'm the girl who freaks out for weeks when Yahoo decides it needs yet another "new look". And no matter how many times they promise it will be easier to navigate, it isn't.

So why then, did I fall for Blogger's promises that changing templates and stuff would be oh so much easier with the new Beta Blogger?

I believe it was for much the same reason poor Charlie Brown tries to kick the ball again and again...because I thought, "Maybe this time..."

Alas, no.

"Rounders" still sucks for customization (witness the dumb little white triangle thingies around all the boxes, even the ones I made invisible) and Beta Blogger seems to have even less available templates. I did manage to make the blog title box a really cool, dark gray.

Unfortunately, for some reason the html codes for Technorati, Library Thing, and my little hit counter, all of which work perfectly well in this template, were all "unacceptable" to Beta Blogger's "edit html" screen.

So I gave up. I'm still stuck with Beta Blogger (Shiny! New! Awful! Begone, instruments of evil!) but at least I have my sort of old look back and didn't lose my links.

Speaking of which, the background here has been changed because I'm planning to do away with the deadjournal and embed Blogger into my website. The website blog looks so pitiful--nobody ever comments there--whereas this blog is of course a hotbed of fascinating discussion and freindly chatter. Okay, maybe not a hotbed. But I'm working on it. More rants coming soon! Thanks (or no thanks, as the case may be) to Bam, I have been forced to view images of Britney Spears' ladyparts. I plan to rant about said ladyparts, along with the whole "cult of celebrity" and how it relates to writing, either later today or tomorrow.

But first, note to self: New does NOT equal better. Ever.

We had quite a weekend. Friday was the Faery's second birthday. Princess's school had its Christmas Disco and we went. My new friend (remember! I officially have friends here now!) and I decided we were going to avoid the buffet of egg salad sandwiches and cold pizza, and so brought wine (everyone brought wine), Chinese appetizers, olives, hummus, crackers, and pretzels, and we all had a special little picnic on our table way in the back. It wasn't far enough back to get away from the cavalcade of shitty pop music ("Barbie Girl", for example, and they didn't even play any good shitty pop music like the Spice Girls, which is at least kitschy), but we tried.

Saturday those same friends came over for dinner. I'm telling you, we are social lions.

And yesterday we put up our tree, drank sherry, and watched the Patrick Stewart version of A Christmas Carol which is IMO the finest version ever.

So busy busy busy.

**Note: Ah. I see I can no longer copy my unposted posts for easy pasting into the dj. Nice. So I get to go back and rewrite all my html tage over there. Good thing I didn't include any links in this post. (shakes fist at Blogger)

News, news, and...stuff

Okay! Item One:

The Black Dragon will be released on 15th December. So my contests and stuff will be announced either that morning or the following afternoon, as the 15th is the evening of hubby's big work do and I will be away most of the day. At the hotel spa, btw, ladeda.)

Item Two:

Personal Demons is my query. So get over to EE and comment. Feedback me, feedback me. All night looong.

Item Three:

This morning I got an email about a project I subbed way back in February, recommending I send it to a couple of other people in the same company. This is, I am tentatively hoping, a Good Sign. So my little fingers are crossed.

I am hoping my cold stays at bay for the next couple of weeks, because of teh busyness. But it is cold and miserable outside, oh yes indeed. There was a tornado in north London today! Which is several hours away, but my goodness! Our power flickered a few times. So I did not walk to pick up Princess. We took a cab.

Okay, sorry for the dull. I'm stopping now.

Some thoughts

Well, after the non-event that wasn't my book's release on Friday (I still have no idea when it will be released), and after the non-event that was my chat on Saturday, in which I had to explain several times that I don't know when the book will be released and be bombed by promos from other authors who hadn't bothered to check the calendar and note it was a scheduled author day (which means you shouldn't be posting your own promos, really), and after planning several contests relating to the book's release which now must be delayed, and after realising that most ebook buyers check the websites on the first of the month, pick the new releases they want, and don't check back until the beginning of the next month--which means the entire month is now effectively a wash as far as this book goes, and after the advertising I arranged months ago and paid for with two separate sites hasn't appeared on either of them and my emails are going unanswered...

Let's just say I'm a tad discouraged.

Which makes this the perfect time to answer another question!

But I've also wondered how ebooks earn compared to mass market ppb. What kind of sales does a good author get? The difference in the average royalty rate for ebooks (35-40%) and mass market ppb (something like 8-10% if you're lucky) is quite glaring. Does that mean ebooks don't sell well? I'm actually all for not having an advance--I'd always feel a little guilty if I didn't earn it out, and woe betide the author who doesn't and ever wants to be published again. I guess what I'm asking is what constitutes, in your words, decent monthly paychecks?

Probably really jumping the gun, but I am curious. Not about your numbers specifically, but just a general idea. Also, have you found that agents are at all interested in selling to epublishers? Are the earnings high enough to make it worth their while, especially with no advance?



Okay, I'm not an expert on this by any stretch. I can only report what I've heard. The EREC site (links to the right) is currently working on a survey for earnings and sales for epubs, so hopefully they'll be a good resource in the months ahead.

No, ebook sales in general are nowhere near mass-market sales. But I believe the earnings can be close, and the reason is because of the much higher royalty rate. 10% of a mm paperback that sells 1000 copies for $7 each would be $700. 40% of an ebook that sells 1000 copies for $4 each would be (this is a total estimate and math is not my strong suit, okay?) $1600. So if you have an ebook that sells well vs. a mm paperback that doesn't, you're doing okay.

Of course, a mm paperback that sold that few copies would be a huge failure, whereas an ebook that sold that many would be doing pretty well.

In essence, though, you need to sell half as many ebook to make the same amount of money. So if you develop a loyal readership you can do very well from ebooks--one reason why my fantasy plan has me continuing to write ebooks, because the royalty rate is so much higher (I'd consider even $500 a month as "decent", although not liveable, because my husband works so whatever I earn is gravy. For him to quit--our ultimate goal--we'd need to earn at least 8 times that--remember the lousy conversion rates for pounds & dollars just now--so don't look for that one happening anytime soon). I've seen in several places that some of the top EC authors are earning about 80k per year, which is nice money no matter how you look at it. (That's at EC though, which is still the highest-earning epub).

Really, epub is just like any other publishing. A good author can make good sales. A not-so-good author would make not-so-good sales. Get in with a big, reliable publisher whom the readers trust and you can do very well for yourself.

As far as advances, I think it's pretty rare for a book not to earn out an advance, because publishers and agents are pretty good at guesstimating a book's future earnings. I certainly wouldn't feel guilty about accepting one, as it's a sign of your publisher's faith in your project. (Which isn't to say pubs that don't pay advances, i.e. epubs, don't have faith in their authors. I'm not implying, nor do I ever think, anything of the kind.)

True, if you don't earn out your advance you could have problems. But that doesn't mean you automatically will. Another publisher might be perfectly happy to take on a different project.

And earning out your advance is no guarantee either--remember the girls who wrote The Nanny Diaries? Decent advance, huge best-seller, and their next book was so bad and their behavior so diva their publisher made them give back the advance for book 2 and cancelled the contract?

Every project is a new project, and every project could be the one that makes us or breaks us. The key is to keep going--and let go of the old ones when it becomes obvious they'll never get where you wanted them to be, no matter how much you love them.

It's all about letting go. At least today it is.

Chatting at FAR

Come join me today at Fallen Angel Reviews Chatters Yahoo loop for a chat! I'll be there all day and I'm doing a contest too...

The prize for the contest was going to be a free download of The Black Dragon, and I know you were all expecting me to announce the release yesterday. However, apparently Triskleion is having some issues with their website or something, and so The Black Dragon is not listed as one of their new releases. In other words, it is not yet available, and I have no idea when it will be made available. I know they are working very hard to solve the problem.

So I am offering an Amazon gift card as a prize today instead.

And I will announce my Black Dragin-related contest here as soon as the book is available.



I bought my gown today for the hubby's Christmas party. It's very, very pretty. Dark gray satin, form-fitting with a flare at the knee--a mermaid skirt--and the bust is white tulle with silver and grey embroidery. So now I just need jewelry and shows! (Sorry, no corset--to have the matching skirt would take too long. Next year!)

A Question!

Okay, first, you all still have to congratulate me on finishing my book, still, and go read my FAR interview linked in the below post. Because I'm afraid I sound like an idiot. So stroke, stroke, stroke my little ego please. (You don't really have to, of course.)

I ripped out one scene and rewrote it last night, and I think it works much better--it advances the plot now, yay! And I'm about 1k words into the big 6k section replacement, so that's good too. I don't know if it will end up being as many words, but the book is long enough, I know I'll add in editing, and less is sometimes more.

So.

I was wondering, how has erotica as a genre treated you, DQ? Do authors find it difficult to get out, once they're in? Or are you happy enough that you never want to break out into the "respectable" (society's opinion, not mine) genres?


It's actually so funny this question came up now, because my just-finished book is NOT an erotic romance. Oh, there's some sexy bits, of course. There's a sex scene I'm immensely proud of and a hero who I think is pretty damn hot. But the book isn't exactly a romance--there's a sort of "happy for now" ending which, if the book goes somewhere (pleasepleasepleaseplease) will continue on in the sequels--I have the whole arc of the relationship planned, and it'll get pretty interesting, believe me.

Anyway, the book is an urban fantasy. It's the first book I've ever written with a Happy Enough ending. It's the first book I've ever written entirely from the heroine's POV (with a couple of exceptions, but no major character in the book gets a POV except Heroine.) (It's still 3rd person, though, not first. I don't think I could write a sex scene in first.)

And now, I'm dreaming of writing an erotic romance again. My CP and I have been working on ideas--we're eager to collaborate again, just like the French (oh come on, it's a joke I couldn't resist)--and I can't wait to get going on it. I love writing romance, especially erotic romance. I love the total emotional satisfaction of writing two different people who find love and happiness together. I also love writing them doing wonderfully nasty things to each other. It's fun.

It isn't all I ever want to write, though. As much as I love erotic romance, and I do, I admit I get a little bored after writing three or four in a row. I want to branch out. I want to write more action, less sex. It's really the sex. I find after writing a few books in a row my sex scenes get very flowery or very stark. Either I shy away from the physical description, or it sounds like something old men in porno theatres whisper while the movie plays.

Ideally, I'd love to do both. I don't think it's difficult, necessarily, for a writer to "break out" of erotic romance--if they want to. Most of the ones I know don't seem to. They love what they do, and want to stay there. Me, I like to move around a little. My medieval (releasing tomorrow) isn't an erotic romance, although there's definitely some hot scenes in there--I never close the bedroom door on my readers. My January book is erotic, and intensely so. I love writing paranormals, but I can't wait to do another historical too.

My ideal career, in my wildest dreams, is to produce one or two mass-markets a year in the series whose first book I just finished (pleasepleasepleaseplease). Then one or two erotic romances per year as well, possibly staying with ebooks and small press for those. There's no advances, but the idea of decent monthly paychecks for those is very appealing (although most of them pay quarterly as well, EC doesn't.)

Because the new series (pleasepleaseplease) is sexy, and contains sex, but I don't want it to go down the road a certain author went down when she turned her books into nothing but sex, I want to keep writing erotic romance to get it out of my system. Because I get burned out writing nothing but sex, I want to have something else I do. The readership will hopefully cross over, but if they don't, they don't--I figure probably 60% or so will. Because I can write an erotic faster than the book I just wrote--it took me 4 months, basically, but my eroroms average about 2--and because I get antsy if I'm not working on anything for more than a couple of weeks at the most, I think I can build up a good list in a few years. (I hope, anyway. keep in mind this is all my fantasy career.)

It's not, emphatically not, a matter of "respectability". I've never bought that "romance is crap" stuff and I've never felt the need to justify what I write to anyone. If they don't like it, or want to look down on me for it, I don't give a shit. Romance is just as good as any other genre, or anything non-genre. I love it, and I love writing it. My desire to do something else is just because I like other stuff just as much as I like romance, and nothing more. If people don't think I'm any good because my work is "just" romance, that's their small-minded problem, not mine, and they can, as we said in childhood, go jump in a lake.

I think the trick to breaking out of a genre is pen names. Seriously. If the series sells, it won't come out under DQ (unless the publisher [pleasepleaseplease] wants it too, of course). I'd come up with a new name for it, but not hide it either. So people know my DQ books are erotic romance, but my Other Name books are urban fantasy.

Did that answer your question, or did I just blather on?

Basically, I think the only thing holding writers back from "breaking out" of a genre is themselves--either because they don't want to, or because they aren't willing to do the work it would take in order to. Which isn't to say any one genre is worse than any other, it just means they don't take the time to explore their writing and the conventions of where they are and where they want to go. And I hope that doesn't sound shitty, because I don't mean it to at all. I just mean it's hard to unlearn things. I had to struggle on a few occasions with this book to keep some emotional things ambiguous. I had to struggle to make sure my characters didn't suddenly start behaving the way they would in a romance--big "I love you"s etc., because they really weren't ready. It was me who wanted that, automatically, because that's what my endings usually are.

Will it work? let's cross our fingers. But I think we can do whatever we want, if we work hard enough.

Quickie Update!

The book is DONE!! 94,509 words. Wheeeeeee!

Also, my FAR interview is up, here.

Is it Ethical?

So...

My WIP crossed 91k this morning. I've just finished writing the climax and am starting on the whole aftermath wrap-up.

But. There's a section in the middle--about 5500 words--that needs to go and be replaced. I actually left a chapter unfinished because it was so not working.

So, when I write "The End"...I know it isn't really the end. Not just because there's editing to do, there always is. But because there is actually an unfinished section in the book. The end of the book might be done, but the book won't be done. Not even in a "Read my first draft" kind of a way.

So can I still say it's done?

Also. I'm thinking of sending my query to Mr. Evil. Partly for fun, partly to see what kind of response it gets, and partly as payback for all the queries I've had so much fun with.

But I'd love to sub to the COM as well. So what do I do? Is it ethical to sub to both? Doesn't that feel a little like overkill?

But then, I probably won't get picked for the COM either.

I thought I had another ethical question to ask everyone, but I don't remember now what it was.

The Black Dragon releases in a couple of days. I'm pretty excited. I'll be chatting at Fallen Angel Reviews all day Saturday, on the Yahoo loop.

And I guess that's it. I thought I had some interesting things to say. I guess I was wrong. Sigh. I'm so wrapped up in writing this last chapter or so, everything else is just gone from my wee head.

Tell me about something you consider unethical. Not in a stealing kind of way, but something you've seen that felt a little...wrong.

Why Can't We All Just Get Along?

I've been seeing sentiments of this sort a lot lately, in various writers' groups and blogs. The idea that it's somehow shameful and wrong to be jealous of another's success in any area, that we should all feel nothing but joy when someone else does well, seems a permanent fixture these days.

Well...

While I agree that we should be happy for our friends when they do well--and I have no trouble being so--the fact is, if you're a writer, and you think people shouldn't feel envy, despair, anger, or sadness when other people make it in the world, I wonder about your actual writing.

The fact is, people are, well, basically shitty. We try to be good people. Most of us succeed. But how many people have you ever met whom you honestly and truly believe have never felt envy or anger? Who've never watched a TV show about the homes of rich people and felt that little pang of jealousy or dissatisfaction with their own lives? Or seen a friend of their get promoted and, even under the true happiness they undoubtedly hold for that friend, still think, "Why couldn't it be me?"

That's human nature. It is human nature to envy, to covet. It wouldn't be in the ten commandments as something we all shouldn't do if it was something people didn't do to begin with. You don't feel the need to warn people, for example, to eat food if they want to live. Because they do it anyway. They feel hungry and they want to eat. Hunger isn't something most people can control (they can ignore it, sure, but not control it). Neither are our more negative emotions.

And if you want to be a writer, if you want to create realistic characters, you need to accept and acknowledge that people can be nasty little creatures. Even the best of us can't be good all the time. And even if we behave well, we still feel it. Those negative emotions seethe and writhe beneath the surface of our cheerful smiles. "Congratulations" comes out of our mouths through gritted teeth. Not all the time, no. But a character who, like Melanie Wilkes, only ever truly feels joy and pride in the accomplishments of others either has no ambitions in life at all, or is a Mary Sue. A spineless, dull, loathesome sort of cypher swirling through the pages of our books.

People don't identify with such characters. Okay, some people might, but I worry about their mental health. It's the flaws of our characters, as much as their strengths, that make them interesting to us and our readers. Their false pride, their arrogance, their jealousy, their lust and anger. These are universal emotions just as much as happiness and love.

If you only show the good side of humanity, and ignore the bad, you're not creating humans. You're creating bland space-fillers.

People feel badly about things sometimes. Let them feel it--whether it's people on a message board or people in your books.

Whose characters are they, anyway?

Seems I've heard a bit about this topic again, lately. Which led me to re-read Thomas Harris's Hannibal Which works because he's got a new Lecter book coming out soon, although I don't know that I'll bother to get it in hardback.

Everyone familiar with Silence of the Lambs? The book, or the movie?

See, here's the thing. When Hannibal came out, ten years or so ago now, there was this big uproar from a lot of people because of the ending. I don't know how to do that nifty invisible writing thing in case there's someone out there who hasn't read it, but honestly? It's been ten years. If you were going to read it, you would have, right?

So in the ending of Hannibal, Hannibal Lecter and Clairce Starling end up together. As in, together, like a romantic, sexual relationship.

Personally, I thought it was a great ending. I thought it was perfect. I thought the signs were all there in Silence and in Hannibal. It was a perfect progression of character.

But it seemd a lot of people thought it was terrible. Jodie Foster, for example. She refused to do the movie of Hannibal because of the ending. Then the producers of the film changed the ending, anyway. Why? Because Jodie didn't think Clarice would "do that".

Ummm...Jodie? Clarice isn't yours. You didn't invent her. You interpreted someone else's words. You interpreted what Thomas Harris chose to reveal about his character.

The only person in the world, the only existing person, who truly knows what Clarice Starling would and would not do is Thomas Harris. Clarice belongs to him.

No, we can't make our characters do things they don't want to do. We can try, but it feels forced. It reads wrong. We don't invent people and take them through their little imaginary paces, hitting points A and B as the story dictates. They grow and change on their own.

But the fact is, they're ours. We know those little characters better than anyone else in the world. Sometimes we hold things back from the reader, because they don't need to know it, but we know it. I know the heroine in my current WIP once had a guy in high school pretend he really liked her, and she knew it was a lie, but she went along with it for a while simply because she wanted to see what it was like to actually have people talk to her like she was a person and not a freak. Maybe I'll decide to let the readers know. Maybe it won't come up. But I know it. She told me, and now I keep her secret, and if later she sees one of those kids and decides to have her bodyguards beat the hell out of him--well, some might say it's out of character for her.

But I know some cuts don't ever stop bleeding.

What secrets have your characters told you? And what do you think about people who claim some characters "wouldn't do that"?

Juvenalia

So, first, thanks to everyone. I didn't reply to any comments personally, mainly because I would have sounded like a flight attendant ("Thank you...thanks...thank you...how kind of you, thanks...")

I am feeling much better now. Back to my old bitchy little self, thanks in large part to you guys, in part to a good laugh on EE yesterday, in part to having one of the Smart Bitches laugh at one of my dumb jokes, and in part to a particularly irritating hour or so spent with one of, in my opinion, the world's worst magazines...

Rolling Stone.

It isn't just the criminally biased opinion pieces masquerading as journalism, or the complete and utter lack of imagination in its coverage. Although all of those things bother me. (Hey, Rolling Stone--I read your magazine on occasion in the 80's. Don't try to pretend to me you guys were all into Minor Threat and Bad Brains. I know you weren't.) Now they'll act like punk was all their idea, but at the time they were doing cover stories on Glass Tiger. (I'm not knocking Glass Tiger--does anyone but me and maybe one or two of my Canadian friends still remember them? But they weren't exactly on the cutting edge. Which is fine. Nothing is wrong with being a catchy, enjoyable pop band.)

No, what bother me the most about Rolling Stone is how fucking juvenile it is. What a little boy's club of thirteen-year-olds the staff writers are.

Take, for example, one of the most pointless and stupid things I have ever seen anyone speculate about: the meaning of the euphemism "London Bridge" in some song by that woman from the Black-Eyed Peas (who, sorry, don't get them at all.) I've never heard the song, but I know the line: How come every time you come around/My London, London Bridge wanna go down.

Why, it's as mysterious and fascinating as The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam! What could she mean? Does she mean something--giggle, snicker--dirty? Like sex? Tee-hee! When she says it, I feel like I do when Mrs. Science Teacher says "ovaries"!

I am not joking here. I have now read two consecutive issues of Rolling Stone where speculation on the meaning of a somewhat clever piece of doggerel is given as much weight and page space as stories on...well, okay. Stories on other useless wastes of time and energy. It's Rolling Stone, after all, not US News and World Report. But even then! Even then, the obsession with the meaning of this stupid lyric--which, even if most of us can't look at the line, get an idea of what it means, and move on with our lives, is fairly unimportant. (Gee, what did Duran Duran mean by "night is a wire"? But, what does it meeean, man?)

Last month (my husband, for some reason, buys this last bastion of shit monthly), not only did they also wonder just how dirty the lyric actually is, and giggle about it with the same enthusiasm with which Regency fops would snicker about seeing a girl's ankles, but they wrote a review of some movie directed by the guy who directed Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Which was not really a bad film, but the underlying premise was so stupid it ruined it for me. (Nutshell-Hedwig is a transsexual--he was forced to be to escape East Germany. Anyway, Hedwig has always wanted to be a rock star. In the film, she is chasing after this guy who now is a rock star, who stole her songs to get to the top. Okay...but as the movie unfolds, we see that lots and lots of people knew she wrote the songs, and saw her perform them with this guy. So why on earth has she not been able to mount a successful lawsuit, with that many witnesses? Come on!)

So the movie is a sex movie. Literally. Apparently it's a large, filmed orgy. Rolling Stone says it's an amazing film, because it lets us see what sex really is, how it encompasses the human experience, and so teaches us something about ourselves. I've noticed this sort of thing a lot lately, with people doing extremely graphic films and claiming it's because they have something profound to say about sex. Like there's something profound to be said about sex that any grown-up doesn;t already know.

Okay, dude? If you need a movie to show you how sex can show us as we truly are, or how we can run a gamut of emotions before, during, and after it...you haven't really been having good sex, have you?

Or you're simply an emotionally stunted third-grader. So, yeah, a Rolling Stone writer.

(Yes, I write very graphic stuff. But you know what? I'm not pretending it's supposed to show you anything about yourself. It's supposed to turn you on. It's supposed to give you a good reading experience, by letting you get two know two people who fall in love and have adventures, and it's supposed to turn you on while doing so! Point blank. The day I start talking about sex as the "universal human experience" as though I've come up with some profound new idea, shoot me.)

Okay, I've ranted enough now. But I'm happy.

Bleh and Grrr

You know, I'm in a bad mood.

Actually, I've been in a bad mood, off and on, for a few weeks now.

Ever have those times where it just feels like you can't do anything right? Like everyone hates you? I hate that.

No, this isn't a whiny whine. I'm just venting and being grumpy.

The other night we had dinner with some lovely new friends. Great food, great company, great...wine. Too much wine. I spent all day Sunday barely able to move, and I really hate it when that happens. It isn't just feeling physically bad that bothers me, it's the mental bad. The "I am soooo irresponsible and a horrible person, what is the matter with me, how could I do that to myself" mental bad. And worse, even, is the suspicion that most normal proper adults don't ever drink too much and get hung over, or if they do, they just feel bad and maybe beat themsleves up for drinking too much, but don't spend the next week cursing themselves for being assholes and wondering why they can't be like everyone else. I suspect they just say, "Yeah, oops!" and sort of giggle and get on with it.

It seems, also, that I am constantly offending people these days without meaning to. I made a jokey comment on another blog a couple of days ago which apparently some people took personally, and I feel horrible about it, really really awful. It (the comment) wasn't really that bad, I guess, but I feel like a complete ass and like everyone is talking about me. I tried to clarify but have no idea if anyone read it.

Hubby's back at work. The days are long and dark and cold.

Is this just a fall malaise/Mercury retrograde thing?

Of course, all the spam I've been getting lately might be the answer. Apparently if I am "tired with weak penis" there's a pill out there just for me! Generally, if I'm tired, weak is the way I want the penis to be. Maybe that's just me, though.

Then there's the amazing, mile-long spam message I got on the blog yesterday, or the day before. I wasn't online much Sunday or yesterday so I don't know for sure which day it came in. But it was seriously the longest bit of nonsense I've ever seen. Why do I keep getting this anonymous spam? There's no freaky, fun links to check out. I get anonymous Bible verses, or that idiot who told me my back hurting was punishment for exposing myself to children or whatever the hell semi-literate shit they'd gotten in their pea-sized brains, or yesterday. Which was this enormous, nonsensical diatribe about vengeful gods and the US being a blight and Artificial Intelligence or some shit like that, written in a literary style so turgid it almost gave me cyctitis.

So there you go. I'm sure I'll be back to my happy little self tomorrow. The good news is, hubs and I have gotten back into watching The Dead Zone--we're only on Season 2--which is awesome. Such a good show, and we're having a really good time. We love the movie, too. "The ice...is gonna break!"

It's Recommend-a-book day!

Okay, technically, any day could be recommend-a-book day, and usually is, since I never shut up about books. But I decided to have one again here, and I decided to do it today.

So. I have two recommendations today. First is specially for Bernita, because of her post the other day about sppoky stories set in the woods. I'm just over halfway done with The Farm, by Scott Nicholson, and it's pretty good and definitely rural. There's some ghostly stuff happening, some old-time religion (read: blood sacrifice), man-eating goats, and all sorts of other things. It's a little slow--I've heard it picks up in the second half, and we'll see, of course, since lots of horror novels let me down in the home stretch, but so far I'm enjoying it.

My other recommendation today is Night Woman by Nancy Price. Ms. Price wrote Sleeping with the Enemy, which I never read, but that unfortunately seems to have relegated her to the "chick book" section of the store, with people buying her work because Julia Roberts was in that movie, wasn't she, and gee, she's so sweet, so sure this will be good (the Amazon reviews will give you some indication of what I mean). This totally ignores the beautiful writing, the drama of the story, the clean calm of Price's words.

Honestly, of the two books, I can't say which is more the real horror story--Nicholson's bloodthirsty livestock or Price's woman trapped into hiding her own talents. Her protagonist, Mary Quinn Elliot, is the wife of a famous novelist, Randall Elliot. Randall, a literary genius, "writes in a trance". Unfortunately, what Randall writes in his trance is a bunch of scribbles. Mary writes the novels sold with his name on the covers, but to save her husband's sanity (what little there is left of it) and her children's opinion of their father, she's been lying for years--telling Randall he dictated the books to her.
When Randall dies, Mary tries to come forward, only to be told by her husband's agent that she should stay quiet. She meets a new man, a devoted Randall Elliot fan, and falls in love with him--not just because of who he is, but because he loves the books--her books--so much.
I won't reveal the ending (and ignore the dumb lines in the Amazon description), but suffice it to say that if you are a writer, or dream of being one, this book speaks on a whole different level. I think it's a must-read for writers, I really do.

So go read it.

Now...recommend a book to me! I've recommended two books that are scary in different ways, so recommend a scary book! Tell me what you read when you want a little horror or suspense.

One Year

Wow.

One year ago today, our plane had just landed at Heathrow. We were on our big adventure--moving to England!

We had an enormous amount of luggage (4 people, 2 suitcases [large suitcases] and a carryon per person). We had to get it all out of the airport, onto the train to Paddington station, then onto the train to Devon, then off the train and into 2 minivan cabs to our friends' house. It's still a blur.

But we did it! Within two weeks we'd finalized the sale of our house in Florida, found a place to live, bought some furniture and new mattresses for the beds...oh, man, I never want to do anything like that again.

More importantly, this time last year I'd written two novels and sold three short stories. As of today, I've written almost eight novels (finished four on my own, cowrote one, halfway through one, over 2/3 of the way through another), and have sold three (including the cowritten one). One is waiting on submission still. One comes out next month, the other the following month. No date on the cowritten yet. I anticipate finishing my UF by the end of the month. I've also got some scraps--a few thousand words of this project or that, including another historical, and a very loose outline (but with scenes already taking shape) for a sequel to the vampire book on submission now, because if it sells (please!) I'd like to be able to get in with the proposal for the sequel right away, and I miss that world.

So not a bad progress report. My older daughter can read and write now (she's one of the best readers in her class!) My little one walks and talks and is as demanding and grumpy as Napoleon.

I wouldn't say life is perfect--England is outrageously expensive. Nothing is ever open when you need it to be, and even if they are they probably don't have what you need. If someone offered me a Wendy's hamburger or some of those frozen appetizers from Target I used to love I'd probably give them a pint of my blood in exchange, and I really miss Mountain Dew. And, of course, my family.

Also, my best friend had a baby last night and I'm not there, which hurts. A lot.

But overall...it's been a good year.

What have you accomplished this year? What changes have you made? Yes, I know this is just like a New Year's Eve post, but I'm getting it in early. :-)

Also, what do you think you've learned?

Urban Fantasy Thoughts

First, does anyone know any urban fantasy novels not written in first person? I really enjoy UF, (of course, since I'm working on one now), but man, I am sick of first person. I don't like first person sex scenes. I'm tired of the automatic sense of selfishness first person narrative brings to the story.

I don't mean selfishness in terms of the heroines being selfish--although, let's be honest. As I have yet to read an urban fantasy without a "kick-ass" heroine, most of them are monstrously self-centered, to the point that they miss valuable information because they're so busy pulling out their weapons (remember when that was the hero's job? Heh heh) or casting spells or telling everyone else they're wrong, wrong, and Our Heroine is the right one because...well, because she is.

What I find interesting is the contrast between today's Urban Fantasy and yesterday's Gothics. In both, the heroine was in jeopardy from a Bad Guy whose identity was unclear. In both she couldn't be sure who she could trust and who she couldn't. But while the Gothic heroine used her wits, and maybe didn't discover the truth until it was almost too late, the UF heroine just hurts people physically. And if she learns the truth a little late, we get mad, because she's been presented to us as this all-powerful ass-kicker, so we expect her to know what's happening at all times.

I enjoy violence as much as the next girl. (Actually, I probably enjoy violence a lot more than the next girl, as evinced by my love of John Woo films.) But I also like characters who use their brains as well as their weapons.

And something else bothers me about UF, too. We never seem to see the world being created. We're always stepping into an already-done world, and we have to play catch-up. There's always a line in there somewhere like, "After the Tremor (or the Turn, or the change in laws, or whatever), hunters/psionics/supernaturals came out of the closet" or whatever. I want to read about what happened during that Turn! I want to read about the people who first realized there was a whole 'nother world they didn't know about!

It's one reason why I so enjoy Kelley Armstrong's books. Yes, they are in first person, but they're set in a separate world within our world. I don't have to memorize a whole bunch of new terms or picture myself on the set of Blade Runner in order to get into them. (And what a bleak view of the future it always is, eh? We never see a world where the presence of supernatural beings has aided humanity instead of feeding off them and turning cities into cesspits.)

Like I said, I really do enjoy the genre. But they're starting to feel same-y to me. The heroines are all terrifically powerful and tough. The heroes...well, they're not as tough as the heroines, which you all know is an issue for me.

And this is why I wonder about the first person. So many of these voices sound just the same. When most of what the MC thinks about are weapons and maybe the Friend Who Died And The MC Feels Responsible, it's hard to make me feel like I'm not in a book by a different author I just read, you know? Or the one before that, or the one before that.

What do you think? Of UF, or first person, or futuristics, or whatever?

Happily Ever After?

So my hubby has this great new job, and we're thrilled about it. Me especially, since the compnay throws a big fancy Xmas party every year at a beachfront hotel for employees and their "partners". They've reserved us a room for the night, and I get to buy a new dress, and it's all very exciting (It would be even more exciting if I wasn't dieting like a fiend now to try and look good in said dress. I've got 15-20 pounds to lose. I won't get there, but if I can get close I'd be happy. Anyway.)

So of course, hub's new boss asked if his "partner" would be going. And I think hubby just said yes, instead of what he would have liked to say which is, "No, but my wife will be."

See, I find this immensely irritating, this British habit of calling everyone "partners". The reasoning being, they don't want to assume people dd something so declasse as get married, so rather than insult the unmarried, we'll just say "partner". Won't everyone be happy then?

No. Everyone will not be happy then. We didn't spend $10,000 on a wedding so we could be treated like an unmarried couple, thank you very much. He is not my "partner". We didn't sit down one day and decide to form a corporation. We got married and started a family, and I really resent the implication that I don't deserve any respect for that but instead should be demoted from my legal and social status as a wife to some loose, we-can-get-out-anytime relationship.

It occured to me last night, though, as I was stewing over this, that very few romances have a "Happily Ever After" where the H/h decide to just move in together. They get married. (Unless they are married, in which case they're very happy to be married.) Or at least they get engaged. Or, even, sometimes in paranormals someone has a psychic vision of them later in life, married with kiddies.

I find this a really interesting dichotomy. If romance novels can be said to be the true, secret fantasies of women, and the overwhelming majority of Happily Ever After endings include, marriage...then how many women out there really, truly don't ever want to get married? In other words, while "partner" is all well and good, it seems to me I'm not the only woman who would rather be called "wife".

This may be a bit of a stretch, saying romance novels are fantasies. But really, honestly, how would you feel is you read a romance and the ending was, "Baby, we don't need a piece of paper, let's just live together, okay?" Bit of an anticlimax, wouldn't it be? (Besides, if it's "just a piece of paper", what's the big deal about getting it? I never understood that.)

Marriage is commitment, and we want our H/hs to commit. We don't want them to live together for a while and hope it works, we want them to commit. We want to know they've looked at each other and said, "You're really the one, and I want everyone to know it", not "Hey, I really like you but I'm not entirely certain this if forever so let's try it and see" or "I love you but I need my space" or even "I love you, but I love my alimony too".

So if we won't accept less in romance novels, why are so many women accepting less in real life? Has something really changed, and women no longer want to get married, or are they being told their fantasies and desires are silly or foolish, and they should grow up and accept that just living together is as good as marriage? After all, aren't romance novels foolish and silly? Isn't it a good thing to make fun of them and their readers, as women stupid enough to believe that there really is someone for everyone, and that they can get that happy ending? That they deserve that happy ending, with someone who'll do whatever he has to do to make that happy ending happen for her? (Now I'm repeating "happy ending" so many times it sounds like I work at a cheap massage parlor.)

Maybe this is on my mind a lot too because for the first time, my WIP does not have a HEA. It has a "we'll see", because it's planned as the first in a series. So it's a little wierd to think of wrapping up a book and not having that final kiss and fadeout.

But I really believe women today are being encouraged, are being forced, to settle for less than they want. And I think that's horrible. And that's why, although my current book may not end with a wedding, you can bet if the series pickes up there will be one at some point--even if it isn't with this book's hero. (I know what will happen, of course, but I'm so not telling.)

What do you think? Are romance HEAs weddings because it's what women want, or is it to cater to more conservative elements of the readership? Can it be a truly satisfying and believable HEA without marriage? And how do you feel about "partner"s?

Yuck!

So the other night, little Miss Faery decided at about 2 am that she'd had enough sleep and she wanted to get up and play. So I ended up on the couch with her until about 5:30.

There's not much on TV in the middle of the night, but I did find something--a fascinating show about food and germs. I don't remember what it was called, but man! I was stunned.

Not by the amount of bacteria etc. you may find in your food--believe me, I'm so paranoid about that I used to wash out my Thanksgiving turkeys with a very, very weak bleach solution before cooking (followed by gallons of clean water). I'm so paranoid, apparently, that when I told hubs about the show, he said, "I know you don't do that--you treat raw chicken in the kitchen like toxic waste, and every time someone comes in the room you shout, 'Don't touch that! It hasn't been washed!'"

Which is true. I do obsess about it. I practically wear a Haz-Mat suit. It's true that I make careful note of what I've touched with raw chicken hands, and even wash the sink taps as I wash my hands. It's true that it's not unusual for me to do so five or six times before I put the chicken in the oven, because I can't touch the refrigerator handle or the cupboard handles until my hands are clean. There's a reason I keep a super-intense moisturizer by the kitchen sink.

But the people on this show...first we have the raw chicken woman. She didn't even rinse her hands after touching the chicken, but went straight to the ham to slice it. She touched her kids and handed them cookies. She touched loaves of bread. She touched her husband's suit. She touched plates and dish towels and cabinets and pens and...*shudder*. It was horrifying. Especially when they used a blue light to show all the places she'd touched glowing with salmonella.

Far worse, though, was the woman who didn't wash her hands after using the bathroom, then started setting out cookies for her friends.

But the ultimate, and by this I mean the ultimate in "Are you insane?", was the guy who ordered take-out, ate half of it, then fell asleep on the couch--and in the moning finished the take-out. Which had been sitting on his coffee table all night. Who does that? Who among us, having reached the age where we have our own homes, really thinks it's okay to eat food that's been sitting out all night? Did that even look appetizing, or taste good? The curry sauce had a grimy skin on it! Who eats that?

Who is dumb enough to take home the wedding buffet food that's been sitting out for ten hours? I'm not talking about tortilla chips or anything, which would be stale but edible if you were really hungry. I'm talking about pork pies, or chicken breasts.

What's the yuckiest food thing you ever heard?

(BTW--Blogger's refusal to allow me to post yesterday means I missedmy chance to dance around and celebrate the Cards' World Series win. But YAY! I grew up in St. Louis, I remember their '82 win soooo well, and it was very exciting to see them finally win again!)

(BTW again--tomorrow evening I will list the answers to any unsolved quotes in the movie quote game below, so get your guesses in!)

Because Everybody Else is Doing It

Okay, it's this quiz thingie going around, where you pick your sixteen favorite movies, and choose a quote from each one, and now you guys have to guess the movie from the quote and I'll write your name next to it when you guess it. When I see that you've guessed it, anyway, and if Blogger cooperates, which it hasn't been. (And still isn't--I'm having to make three or four publish attempts every edit.)

Most of these I've tried to pick slightly-more-obscure lines from minor characters. But a few, like the first, would have been virtually unguessable had I done so, so I've gone with the one you'll know.

1. "To crush your enemies, to see them fall before you, and to hear the lamentations of the women." Conan the Barbarian--Jenn

2. "I could be home right now, drinking this monster eggnog my brother makes with lighter fluid!" Better Off Dead--Cherie

3. "I wrote my phone number on it, in case you feel like dockin' at my moonbase some night!" Free Enterprise

4. "And I'm Gary Cooper. But not the Gary Cooper that's dead!" The Sure Thing

5. "Is being an idiot like being high all the time?" The Machmaker--Cherie

6. "They took the little ones..." Lord of the Rings (this is from Fellowship but I love all three films equally)--Robyn

7. "I'm gonna need two dragons." Starsky & Hutch

8. "She's not keen on him! She's only keen on me!" About A Boy--Isabella

9. "You don't whack guys! Look in your heaaart!" Miller's Crossing--Evil Editor

10. "I'm talkin about working for a living! I'm talkin' about sharkin'!" Jaws--Robyn

11. "We neither of us perform well for strangers." Pride & Prejudice--the good Colin Firth version, not that Keira Knightley travesty

12. "I apologize. I always thought you were a cold, calculating sort of officer. But you're really...quite emotional, aren't you?" The Dirty Dozen. It was even #12 to give you a hint!

13. "It's Christmas. It's the time of miracles." Die Hard

14. "I've known loan sharks more forgiving than you." The Ref--Cherie

15. "Well, that's the big trick, isn't it?" Star Wars. You should all be ashamed of yourselves for not getting this one.

16. "Are you sure? Because it looks like he's...leaning." While You Were Sleeping--Robyn

So there you go. Guess away.

We're going to Cardiff tomorrow, so hopefully I will have a couple of pictures to post on the blog. If we remember the camera. And if we don't get up in the morning and decide we don't feel like it after all.

WIP currently at 58k. October has been the most wasted of wasted months as far as work has gone. Between the laptop/juice thing, and the hubby's job interviews, and my friends expecting me to, like, actually talk to them and stuff...ugh. :-)

And I so have my fingers crossed that my hometown team wins the World Series...but I'm not talking about it because I don't want to jinx anything...please don't let them choke *again*.

Hysterical

The video for Wierd Al's "White and Nerdy".

Okay, guys? This is freaking funny. It's his best since "Amish Paradise", which was his best since "Eat It". In fact, I think it may actually be his best EVER.

My husband is a big Wierd Al fan. I'm not so much, but the above is genius. Pure genius, especially if you relate to any of it. Which I do. And I'll bet most of you guys do too. Just a guess. :-)

Also, that's Seth Green slapping his cute little ass in front of the action figures, and Donny Osmond dancing like a loon. I really like Donny Osmond. I'm not what you'd call a fan of Donny Osmond--I think my list of favorite bands tells you he's not my thing, musically--but the guy is always willing to make a fool of himself, laugh at himself and his image, which is rare, and always seems like a genuinely nice person too. So I like the Donster. Plus, of course, he's part of my childhood. Didn't we all watch Donny and Marie? And weren't most of us so young we totally missed the "brother and sister" thing and thought they were married?

Apparently the video's at number one on the VH1 request show thing. I wouldn't know, because we don't get cool VH1 over here. We missed "I Love the 80s Strikes Back" last year and haven't seen any of those specials since--they don't air them here. I miss them so!

I believe final edits for TBD are complete...I sexed up the sex scenes, I think pretty strongly. They're still not super-explicit, because it isn't erotic romance so the language must be tempered, which is really a shame because the loss of high-impact words takes a bite, it really does. I used "erection" a couple of times but that's as far as it went. However, I think they pack a pretty heavy emotional punch.

Can't wait to hear your opinions!

Oh, also...

Ihave thee (count 'em, three) releases to promote in December and January. I'm doing a contest in both months, but I'm not sure what to give as prizes, so any suggestions are welcome. Help a lady out, eh?

Oh My

So I Googled myself today, like you do, and on the first page...

this popped up.

I don't actually see a reference to myself on the page...but I was too chicken to click on the links.

It made me wonder, though. I write a lot of sex, and yet I'm not eager to look at online porn. Or, to be honest, any porn. The closest I come are those horrible movies they show late nights on the Sci-Fi Channel..."Femalien" and the like.

I think part of the problem is porn itself. Porn is not romantic. I've seen Debbie Does Dallas, I've seen Deep Throat--before I knew Linda Lovelace's story, and I will never watch it again. I've seen a few other porno movies whose titles I can't recall, even one that tried--and succeeded--to be amusing.

But I haven't seen any porno movies, true porn, that's romantic. None. I suppose it's possible that I simply haven't watched the right ones, but I make no apology for the fact that I refuse to start actively shopping for porn on a regular basis unil I find romantic porn.

It's always been my contention, though, that if someone made a truly romantic porno film--based, let's just say, on one of my books, maybe?--women would be much more likely to wach it. Imagine. Your husband (or boyfriend, or whatever) wants to watch porn wth you. You say no. He then pulls out a romantic film, a love story, but with graphic sex scenes instead of soft-focus fade-outs. Perhaps it's a medieval romance or one set in ancient Rome. Would you watch? I would!

Because heres how this relates to writing, and especially writing erotic romance. I think the reader needs to be emotionally invested in the characters, even a little, in order to enjoy the sex scenes fully. Otherwise, it's just clinical description. This is one reason why erotic romance presents such a different set of challenges to writing "regular" romance. One isn't easier or harder than the other, they're just different.

How do you think most authors do at providing both sexual heat and emotional intensity?

In doing edits for The Black Dragon, I was stunned to see how frankly lame the original sex scene I'd written was. Well, "lame" is rather harsh. It wasn't lame, it just wasn't very explicit by any stretch. Compared to what I do now, the physical detail was lacking. There was lots of emotional stuff, lots of thoughts and feelings, but very little turn-you-on detail. I added some, but I'm thinking in the second round of edits I'm going to add more. I want those sex scenes to leap off the page, espeically since there are only three of them. In some of my erotic works I've done the "short" scene--where they fall together and lose themselves, or whatever, and that's all that's said, simply because the scene follows another, graphic scene, or because a long scene would break the story's momentum. In TBD, though, where there are only three sex scenes in the whole book, I want to show off. :-) Plus, because that first scene occurs about halfway through the book, the reader is (I hope) quite emotionally invested. They deserve their big payoff.

What do you think? Do you think the longer you have to wait, the better it is, no matter what?

A Conversation at Madonna's Place

Scene: Madonna and Guy Ritchie are having breakfast and watching E! Entertainment Television on the Skye Satellite. Madonna is leaning forward, her brow furrowed. Guy is blowing bubbles. The children are, of course, nowhere to be seen.

MADONNA (turning off TV): Guy, we need to get one of those babies.

GUY: They're out with the nanny, I think.

MADONNA: No, not one of the children we already have, you idiot. They're too old to be any use anymore. I need a new baby. An adopted one.

GUY: Adopted?

MADONNA: Yes. Look how well it's working for that Jolie person. She's got two of them.

GUY: Wow...two adopted babies. Can I name them? Can they sleep in my bed with me?

MADONNA: Don't be stupid, you talentless fop. They'll sleep in the East Wing with those other kids we have.

GUY: Okay, who do we call?

MADONNA: Anyone who'll take our check.

GUY: I might know somebody, you know. I'm street.

MADONNA: If you're street, I'm a talented writer. Your stepfather was a lord. I keep trying to tell you that. Besides, I don't want some cheap-ass English baby. Anyone can have one of those.

GUY: Chinese?

MADONNA: What is the matter with you? Asian babies are so three years ago. I want to buy a black one.

GUY: But why not just get an English one, I mean, kids in England need homes and families, too.

MADONNA: This is why nobody lets you direct movies anymore, dipshit. I don't care about the kid. Somebody else is going to do that part. I just want to adopt one, so people will know what a great person I am and how much I care. I can't let Angelina Jolie eclipse me, for fuck's sake. My albums aren't doing well, I need all the exposure I can get. As long as there's lots of Vaseline on the lens, anyway.

GUY: We could get one of those English babies with special needs, like an autistic one or something, who really needs the help we could give. That would impress people.

MADONNA: That's not photogenic. God, no wonder your career's in the toilet. I need an attractive black baby, must look good and be healthy and normal, pronto. Make the calls. (She gets up.) I'm going to go screw the gardener, then I'm going shopping, and there better be a black baby waiting for me when I get back.

GUY: Okay. You're such a sweet person, such a good Mommie.

MADONNA (smiles): That's right. They can all call me...Mommie Dearest.

End scene

BTW...

There are new excerpts of The Black Dragon up at my site. So go check those out. (Don't forget to click on "Read More"!)

But still respond to the offical post below. This is just a note.

I Hurt My Back

I hurt myself!

I was picking up the Faery to put her in her high chair, and somehow I twisted my back or something but it hurts. I don't think the time I've been spendng at the computer in the cheap typists' chair we bought a couple of months ago has been helping it either.

But I'm pleased to say my WIP is currently at just over 53k words! I'm over halfway done, yay! And quite pleased with the progress so far. The other day I printed it out. Since I ended up taking just over a week off from it, through no fault of my own, I'd lost the flow of it a little and had started to feel like I was just writing a list of events. Does anyone else ever get that?

Anyway. I typed it out so I could read through it, make some notes, and get a sense of it as a whole, was it cohesive, etc. And guess what? I really think it's pretty good!

Of course, my CP has bee telling me this all along.

And oh, gee, speaking of her...her first EC novel was released a couple of days ago. You should all rush over to the EC site and buy Enchanted by Anna J Evans. Do it now. I'll still be here when you're done.

Aside from that there isn't much to report. The Princess was ill and it's getting cold. Our heater isn't working, either. We have radiators, and I guess it all works from the water heater. But our water heater fo som reason isn't as full as it should be. It wasn't a big deal when it was just the radiators, because although the temperature is dropping it's generally warm enough inside (plus we have a gas fire in the living room, which I hate. I mean, I love fires. I just don't like fake fires. So many homes here have them, and I don't get it. Although far worse are the old houses, with big huge fireplaces, and in the middle of them is a little metal box for a real fire. WHY? There's like a dozen square feet of empty space and this little one-by-one tray to build your fire on, and it's connected to the chmney so you couldn't build a bigger fire if you wanted to. I don't get it at all. I understand not necessarily wanting to fill the enitre fireplace with wood and having a bonfire in your living room [although I love fire so part of me thinks that would be really cool] but if you're going to build a separate thing for the logs, why not make it at least a little bigger? Say, three-by-three, big enough for more than one log at a time? It's one of the many things about homes in Englad that I just don't understand, right up there with why there are no electric outlets in bathrooms or why there aren't screens on the windows. Or air conditioning. But I digress.)

Anyway, today our water heater started refusing to heat water either. We switched on the backup one upstairs in the airing cupboard, so there seems to be hot water again, but I'm afraid to take a shower because I think the water will go all cold on me while I still have conditioner in my hair. And especially with a sore back, that would not be good.

So now you know. I'm filthy, my back hurts, and it's cold. What a fantastic post I've done today!

You know what's a lot more interesting than reading about my sad, hot-water-free existence, though?

Anna J Evans' book 'Enchanted'!

New Black Dragon Trailer!

Final version...I really miss the music, but this music is, I think, excellent too...it's actually from the soundtrack to a Star Trek fanfic movie called "Dark Armada", by a company called Edgen Animation. They had quite a few songs up on a free sharing site, listed as royalty free, and all of the songs were awesome.




This new verison is about 8 seconds shorter, too. I think shorter is better, though, personally. I just hope it tells enough about the book.


And speaking of books, I got word last night that my story "The Ice House from my book Torrid Teasers Volume One was one of the ten stories picked to be in the "Best of Torrid Teasers" anthology that Whiskey Creek Press-Torrid will be releasing in January!

So I now have two books releasing in January from WCP-Torrid! And to make it even more exciting, my beloved and talented pals Anna J Evans, Sherrill Quinn, and Kate Lang will be in the antho too!

I promise I will get back on track with the posts shortly, I know they've been alittle...dull?...lately. But I have more ranting to do, more heroes to sigh over, more books to talk about, a world of fun just waiting for you!

Okay...

Let's see what you guys think...






I will very likely change the music, but that song is so evocative of the book to me (it's what I listened to when writing, because it "is" Gruffydd) I wanted to at least share it this way first.

Be honest...is it terrible?

Tagged-and an extra validation of my coolness

Annie Dean tagged me to do th book quiz that's going around, and as I am always one to follow up on tags, and as we were just discussing books anyway...here it is.

#1 - One book that changed your life: Hmmm. This is really hard to answer, because I think every book I've ever read--or at least the vast majority of them--have changed me, even in some tiny way. They broaden our experience and viewpoint. But I think I have to say--and Annie will hate this--the book that changed my life was Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. (I had the British version from the beginning, as my hubs's stepsister gave it to me on our honeymoon). Not so much because of the book itself, but because of what it has represented to me ever since--someone who just wanted to write a book, who worked really hard, and who is now arguably the most popular and famous writer on the planet. Whenever I'm feeling down I think of that, and I'm inspired to keep working.


#2 - One book that you've read more than once: Um...all of them? I can't think of more than a handful of my books that I've only read once, but I'll go ahead and list an important one--I've read Gone With the Wind too many times to count.

#3 - One book you'd want on a desert island: I'm going to agree with Annie and go with the SAS Survival Guide: How to Survive Anywhere, on Land or at Sea by John Wiseman. It would be torture not to have anything to read, but I'd rather not die just so I can have The Caine Mutiny.

#4 - One book that made you laugh: Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady by Florence King. She's another of my absolute favorites.

#5 - One book that made you cry: The Reckoning by Sharon Kay Penman. I was depressed for weeks afterward. It's an excellent book-the third in a trilogy that starts with Here Be Dragons--but man...history is the saddest thing there is.

#6 - One book that you wish you had written: Oh, man. Almost all of them? I don't really know. I just want to write my own books and have people wishing they'd written them.


#7 - One book that you wish had never been written: Mein Kampf

#8 - One book you're currently reading: Potter again, I'm re-reading the series and am about to finish GOF. But I'm about to start The Devil Wears Prada, because it was on sale for half-price at Ottakar's. I'm also reading a book of love poetry because I have a romantic love interest in my WIP who has informed me he likes to seduce women by quoting love poetry. My heroine has indicated she finds that pretty hot, and as I only know a few snippets of love poetry, I'm researching.


#9 - One book you've been meaning to read: Hmmm again. I have a few history books I'm waiting on until I'm done writing this particular book. I've always wanted to read Jane Eyre. I've also always wanted to read The Once and Future King, and I have the first book in the His Dark Materials trilogy to start as well.


#10 - Tag Five People: Uhhh...SW, Robyn, Anna J., Cyn, and Isabella. Meme this.




AND...my author bio is up on the Ellora's Cave website!
Check it out. I'm all legitimate and cool and stuff now! Wheee!

Books, books, and books

Books #1: Remember how I said I didn't really lose anything in the Computer/Juice incident? Yeah. Somehow I managed to forget my erotic vampire romance, the one I finished back in March. The first three = last chapter are out on sub. The rest...disappeared into the peach juice. WELL, sort of. I have a hard copy. I can retype it if I have to. Please let those data recovery people be able to recover some data!!

Books #2: I have, in the last week, done ZERO on my WIP. Well, no. I've done about 1500 words but it's basically all crap and I know it will be edited out. And now I'm freaking out that by the time I've finished the thing urban fantasy will be glutted and nobody will care. It's been an insecure few days, to be honest, what with stress about the laptop and hubby probably going back to work soon thus leaving me all alone and...well, I guess that's it. I'm having an ebb in my biorhthym, dude. (And I'm aware I probably misspelled rhythm. Oh, wait, that's right, isn't it. Anyway, it's one of those words I can never spell. Another one lately seems to be occasion. Because hubs used to work by a florist's, and on their sign they said, "Great for all ocassions". Which used to drive me nuts every time I drove past it, until I drove past it so many times I could no longer figure out if it was really wrong or not. Now I always have to double-check it in my head.

What's your mental-block spelling word?

Books #3: Aimless internet wanderings led me to this site: Loganberry Books. They do a "Stump the Bookseller" thing and there's an enormous archive of solved and unsolved questions. Basically, you give them a plot or characters from a book you remember (children's/YA books) and they try to name the book. Other people can guess the book, too. I seriously spent like an hour there and can't wait to have enough time to go back and look some more.

Which reminds me as well. One of my favorite books as a youngster, The Diamond in the Window, has been reprinted. YAY! Last time I checked, which I guess was around '99, there were no copies to be had. I had no idea this was part of a series, I just remember not only loving the book, but loving to color in the illustrations, because everybody had red hair. Or maybe I just colored them al with red hair. I had a thing about redheads as a child. And coloring the illustrations in my books. Usually with markers that then bled through to the other side of the page. Anyway. You should order this book. It's exciting, it's spooky...I can't wait to reread it.

Now you recommend one to me. Today is YA--and please, if you can, recommend one from your childhood, not a modern one--but we'll do lots of different genres, at least I hope you guys want to.

Kids are Great!

So my MIL is in town, she arrived Saturday morning. I was in the kitchen when she got off the bus, making beakfast for the Faery who was in her highcair. Hubs was, apparently, on the laptop in the living room.

Hubs runs out with his umbrella to greet MIL (it was raining). I brought Faery's breakfast to her, and was greeted (of course) with "No! NONONO!" So I made a fce and took the plate back in the kitchen to eat myself, because I like buttered scones.

Hubby and MIL come in the house, and straight into the kitchen. We drink coffee. We chat. Faery wanders in and out. Princess wanders in and out.

Hubs and MIL are going to take the kids into town so I can work, because I haven't gotten much done in the last week or so and I'm just about to hit the pre-climax buildup scenes in what I think is the best, tightest work I've ever done. So I go upstairs to get clothes for the kiddies and the following words float up after me:

HUBS: What? Why is this...wet?...Oh my god...oh no...

MIL: What's wrong?

HUBS: I think Faery poured her...oh no, it won't turn on...her juice all over the laptop...



She sure did!

She poured half a cup of juice--sticky, sugary juice--into our nine-month old laptop. Fried it. It's gone. They couldn't restore the hard drive.


GONE.


We have the superspiffy protection/maintenence plan, so tomorrow it's going to the superspiffy repair place, where if they can't fix it they will replace it. Meanwhile we've bought a desktop.

Thanks to every holy being, last week I sent my best friend in FL everything I had one my one major WIP, and Friday morning my beloved CP agreed to look at all 40k words of my BIG project (the aforementioned best-ever-writing). So I'd sent that off. So both my major things were backed up.

But what I lost...story ideas synopses deleted scenes 3-5k beginnings of new projects. New edits and additons to some things I backed up ages ago and never re-backed.

All of our digital camera photos of the girls in England--or most of them, anyway, some we'd emailed to people.

All my icons and cookies.

All of our iTunes songs.

Half of my ebooks.


It was not a good weekend.

Hero Fridays!

So I thought this might be fun. Checking the stats from my website it seems I have the highest number of hits on Fridays. (I should have done this earlier today but I got distracted--it's been a very busy, running-around kind of day.)

Anyway, I decided that to coincide with that, I should do some sort of special thing on Fridays--like a Friday Five but...well...not. (Not that I don't enjoy Friday Fives, I just thought something else would be fun too.)

So here's what I'm going to do. On Fridays I will blog about heroes. Book heroes, movie heroes, TV heroes...the heroes I love.

I'm starting this off with what I think is a rather odd choice, but I'm going to try to mix in some odd choices.

So the first ever Friday Hero is...Kid Sheleen, as played by Lee Marvin in the 60's film Cat Ballou.





For those of you who haven't seen this gem of a film, Cat Ballou stars Jane Fonda (who I don't like, but she really is great in this and it's one of the only two films with her in it my parents would allow my brother and I to watch) as a young schoolteacher who goes to visit her father in Wolf City Wyoming, only to find that her father's life is in danger--the Wolf City Mining Corp. (I think) wants his water rights and they're willing to kill him to get them.

So Cat does what any girl would do--she hires a gunslinger. Enter "Steel-Eye" Kid Sheleen...falling, drunk, off the bag of a wagon.

He's a mess. He can't pick up his guns, he has the shakes, he's not very smart. He attempts to shoot a target on the broad side of a barn and of course misses the barn.

But the thing about Kid Sheleen is, it doesn't matter, He's still awesome. Watching him give a long, very intense speech (while drinking himself back to sobriety) about the life of a gunslinger ("because nobody don't make no fun of a friend of Kid Sheleen") is hysterical. He's honorable. He's tough. He fallas in love with Cat and when he realizes she doesn't love him back he threatens to kill the guy she does love if said guy doesn't go propose right that minute. And when it comes down to it, he sobers up, gets back in shape, and kills his own brother to keep Cat safe.

Plus he helps her rob a train.

And oh yeah, he's Lee fucking Marvin, too. So I don't even have to mention "sexy". In the hands of a less talented actor Kid might have been pathetic, cheap comic relief--a caricature. Lee Marvin, though, makes him fully realized. He's a rogue, he's a tough guy, he's vulnerable, he's noble and crude, all at the same time. He may not be a typical hero...but he's one of the first movie men I ever fell in love with as a little girl, and I think you all should go see the movie if you haven't seen it already.

(I'm also going to try to talk about favorite books on Mondays. So start thinking.)

How Far is Too Far?

So as you all know, lately I've been thinking a lot about promotion. Where to place ads, get interviews, do chats. What gives the most bang for the buck? What gives the best impression?

I worry a lot about what kind of impression I'm giving. I worry about readers seeing my name somewhere and thinking, "Oh God, not HER again, why won't she shut up?"

There's a feeling, I think, especially in the ebook and romance communities, that anything we do to promo ourselves is a good thing. And to some extent I buy into that, although I have over the last few years seen some techniques that obviously backfire--spam, either through emails or IMs or whatever. The recent brouhaha over spamming an editor's blog made me wonder if some enterprising writer out there hasn't had the idea already of going to random lj/Blogger/WordPress/Typepad/Vox/whatever accounts and posting comments about their books.

Of course, we've also had the "sockpuppet" discussions over at Miss Snark, coupled with some of the latest controversy about how responsible authors are for what happens in their online forums (my answer: pretty responsible, but I don't know the whole story, only one side of it, so can't say whether the author in question should be censured as she is being for it. At least some of the story is up over at Smart Bitches.)

But after my chat at FAR on Saturday (which was a lot of fun) I started wandering around cyberspace. I had a terrible cold--I'm still not feeling great--and couldn't sleep, so I was downstairs on the computer for hours, just looking at websites (authors and readers) and blogs, etc.

Something left...a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not sure if this is really something that would bother anyone else, or what, so I'm very interested to know what you think.

Author does a guest blog on a medium-popularity group blog (of which there are hundreds, and no I won't tell you who or which blog). Author's blog entry is in essence a little short story--very short, like 500 words or so. Author lets it be known far and wide that she has blogged.

Now let's be honest here for a second before I egt to the meat of it. We all blog as part of promotion. Yes, I have made some wonderful friends here, and that makes me happy. I would keep blogging even if I didn't have work to promote. But I do have stuff to promote, and my website and blog are part of that. So I do know that authors blog to garner readers. We blog to get attention (mainly because it's a way to get attenton without having to actually put some decent clothes on and meet people).


So I found the entry hours after it was posted, and there was an outstanding number of replies to said blog entry. I mean, really a stupid amount. How on earth did she get so many replies to such a short little entry? (I should mention here I'm not a fan of the story blog entry anyway. I read blogs to find out about what my favorite authors and friends think and do. I feel cheated when all I get is little fiction clips--which isn't to say I don't enjoy them once in a while, I'm talking about blogs devoted to stories.) Anyway.

I start reading the comments. And my interest quickly turns to...something else.

In essence, it looks to me like the friends of the blogging author showed up and started posting interview questions in the comments. The first ten comments were solidly other writers asking things like, "Wow, how did it feel to get such a great review at X site?" or "When is your next book coming out?"

A few readers (as far as I could tell) posted. One asked a question. Shortly after, more friends turned up to ask even more. The comments thread turned into one long interview conducted solely by buddies of the original author--making it look like there were hundreds of rabid fans out there. The blog post itself is not discussed at all.

Am I wrong in being bothered by this? In feeling this is somehow...I don't know..against the rules? A little tacky? Or am I being an idiot, and this is the way things are done these days?

I suppose in a way it's no different from me asking any of you guys to come over to FAR for my chat (thanks Jenn!) or to go read the latest installment of my short story at Indulge. I guess in a way it's no different from any other kinds of promo.

But I can't help feeling that something is different about it, and I just can't figure out what it is.

Any suggestions? What do you think of this type of promo? Have you ever come across something you found questionable, but weren't sure if it really was or not?

By the Way...UPDATE 9/23

I'm chatting over at Fallen Angel Reviews TODAY, from about noon Eastern Time until either everyone gets sick of me or I have to go to bed.

I'll have some excerpts to put up, too, and it will be a lot of fun!

So go sign up at FAR Chatters and come on by today!

The bombshell

So Silhouette/HQ has cut its Bombshell line.

There’s been some very interesting discussion about this over at Smart Bitches, basically relating to whether the demise of Bombshell—a line devoted to that favourite character archetype of mine, the kick ass heroine—means the readers are not interested in those heroines.

My answer? A resounding YES!

Who wants to read books with heroines who can solve every problem, defeat the bad guys one-handed, end world hunger and throw her Hero down on the bed for some female-superior lovin’ all without breaking a nail? Fie!

I know what you’re saying. Oh come on, December. Kick ass heroines aren’t like that! They’re just tough and capable and strong.

No…they’re not. Or, I should say, sure if done well, they are, but they’re rarely done well. Look at Anita Blake. The first couple of books were good. Anita was tough but with vulnerabilities. Now…Anita’s TEH MOST POWERFUL and runs around breaking balls for fun. She’s the alphiest Alpha who ever lived. Think maybe that’s why fan reaction has gone from hot to warm to lukewarm to outraged?

I admit it. In my (pretty rich) fantasy life, I’m Buffy. Aren’t we all? But Buffy, for all her kick-assiness, wasn’t so tough. She got all weepy over Angel. She let that Parker character use her at college, then got involved with poor Riley and was afraid to admit her feelings (although, she was more like the “kick-ass” heroine in that relationship than in any other, with the result that we all thought she was being a big old bitch.) She lost her Mommy. She alienated some friends. She got involved in a dangerous relationship with Spike (who could blame her for that one, though. C’mon, who wouldn’t have given Spike a tumble? Or two, or fifty?) In other words, Buffy had some major vulnerabilities. She needed the Scoobies to help her and support her.

Notice those vulnerabilities were introduced right away in the show. They needed to be. We wouldn’t have watched otherwise. And let’s be honest, didn’t most of us have a favourite Buffy character who wasn’t Buffy? Buffy was the show, but Buffy wasn’t half as interesting without the others.

The problem is, most of us don’t relate to the “kick-ass” heroine. Sure, we like strong heroines. We don’t want them TSTL or wimpy or whatever. But there’s a difference between being strong and smart and running around beating people up, or commanding empires. As we learned in my earlier post on this topic, that’s SFF territory. Not romance.

We romance readers want our heroes to be kick ass. We want our heroines to be a match for them mentally and emotionally.

Beth had an excellent post on this topic. I can only echo her point. With some of these heroines, we wonder why the hero is even there. She doesn’t need him. He doesn’t do anything. And I’m sorry, but a man whose woman is so much tougher and stronger than he is…just doesn’t interest me. I don’t fall in love with him, I don’t even really care about him at all. Do you guys care about any of those long-haired sycophants who follow Anita Blake around, or do you wish (as I do) that they would all fall into the chasm that used to be Sunnydale so we can get some interesting characters into those books? Even Jean-Claude, once the only reason to keep reading the books despite his terrible dress sense, is slowly turning into an idiot whose only purpose is to prove how great Anita is.

Who wants to read that? Do you identify with that? Do you read those books and think, “Wow, if I met (JulianTempleGreysonDaemonwhomever), he’d fall in love with me, too, because I have all the qualities Heroine X has”? No, of course you don’t, because obviously JulianTempleGreysonDaemon is only interested in women who can beat up bad guys and save the universe. So what’s the point?

We should be able to see ourselves in our heroines. Sure, she should be her own person, but she should also be Everywoman.

Everywoman is not generally capable of taking out a room full of bad guys in one go.

I don’t mean that every tough heroine in books is bad, or even in romance. But the Hero has to be stronger, which means we need to reign it in. Or women won’t read it. Why read a book that makes you feel inferior?

Next time, I’ll talk about the subspecies of annoying Kick-Ass heroines—the Horrible Historical KAH.

I'm Quitting

...smoking.


Ugh! I can't believe I even just typed that! How can I quit smoking? How can I say goodbye to my lovely cigarette friends?

I just have to. They're expensive. They're not good for me. Not in the casual, "I'm a little out of breath" kind of way I viewed it in my early 20s, but in an ever-more-serious "I have kids and want to be around when they grow up" kind of a way.

It's getting cold outside. Since we don't smoke in the house or around the kids at all, I'm facing another winter of huddling outside in the wind and cold to smoke a cigarette I'm not even enjoying because it's so damn freezing. When you force yourself to keep smoking because damn it, you lit the thing and you're not going to waste it, but you just want to go inside...it's time to just let it go.

I've quit before, of course. Six months here and there, ten months with my first pregnancy, almost a year with the second. But I always picked them up again. I missed them. I love smoking. I always have.

But I'm starting to not love it now, and I need to stop it.

I'm not quitting cold turkey, and I'm not wasting money on the patches or anything. (I'll tell a secret: I used the patch to quite twice. Each time I stopped putting the patches on after the first couple of days. My issue is the oral thing, not the nicotine.) Instead I'm cutting way down. I had four cigarettes yesterday. I'm about to go have my second today. I'll have three a day for the next couple of days. By the end of the week I'll be done.


GAAAH!

OMG--Queen Bam knows who I am (sort of)!

Ladies and gentlemen...


I've been snarked.


ROFL!!!! AWESOME!

Missing Miss

Okay, so before I get going, I have to make a confession. I am strangely obsessed with America's Next Top Model (which come to think of it, I might have mentioned before.) The hubs and I have also recently found Hell's Kitchen and are fascinated by it. We'll spend a really silly amount of time after the show analyzing who was eliminated and why, and how Gordon Ramsey is so damn funny or whatever.

So I'm watching an ANTM recap show. Season 2. They have the obligatory-in-the-first-couple-of-seasons "girl who cries and refuses to pose nude, and is sent home" episode. The Girl Being Sent Home in this episode is married and a mother, and "can't imagine anyone but [her] husband seeing that." She also used the word "cootchie" which, you know, is just tacky, especially in anyone over the age of about 22. Anyway. So she won't do the nudie rudie and is sent home, like all prudish cowards.

I turned to the hubby, planning to give him a little speech about how if I had been in that situation, I would hope he would have been okay with the nakedness because this is My Dream (modeling isn't, but you get the analogy, I hope) and I Will Not Be Denied! "I would have done it," I say, warming up for the speech.

Hubby looked at me. "That's because you're a whore," he said.

That's why I love him. He's so darn funny. It was a joke, of course. No, really, it was.

Yes it was!

Hey, some of us did what we had to do to survive, okay?

(NB-That's a joke too.)


So now someone's apparently calling Miss Snark some kind of anti-feminist or something for wanting to be called Miss, and Isabella blogged about this a while ago anyway, so I'll go ahead and mention it quickly. I don't really care if there are ladies out there who want to be called Ms. There's nothing wrong with Ms., and it is nicely all-purpose and always correct (unless you know the lady in question has a different preference, of course.)

But I am so tired of Ms./Miss/Mrs. being frigging "feminist issues". I'm so tired of women who claim to be all for other women being catty and shitty about the terms of address they prefer.

Me, I prefer "Mrs." Neither of the others bother me. Usually reviewers call me Ms. Quinn and that's just fine. Socially I prefer Mrs. I'm a married woman. I didn't go through a wedding and putting up with a man to be called the same thing I could be called anyway. (And by the way, my husband is my husband. He's not my "partner" or "significant other". That's probably a rant for another time, but oooh that makes me mad, especially since "partner" is all the rage here in the UK. If I wanted a partner I would have gone out and found somebody with more money.)

Anyway, this is the kind of thing that bugs me. It's nitpicking, nitpicking by bitter, angry women with nothing better to do than to ridicule the choices and preferences of other women. As a stay-home Mom I've been dealing with this kind of crap for a few years now. It's all well and good for women to have choices, as long as they make the choices NOW wants them to make, or whatever.

I'm not anti-feminist. I'm just very tired of the hypocrisy.

Perhaps part of this rant comes from having just read the exrable I Don't Know How She Does It by Allison Pearson. Anybody remember the big stir this book made a couple of years ago? And there's all these reviews on Amazon from women saying how much they identify with the protagonist, Kate, and how much like her they are. Gods, I really hope not. Kate is an awful person. She whines about not being treated equally at work while simultaneously complaining that the men she works with are not sensitive to her needs, carrying on an internet affair with one of her firm's biggest clients, spending hours every day emailing her friends, skipping work to get her hair done, and wearing see-through tops. She spends the whole book moaning about missing her kids and being a bad mother. Fair enough, since she clearly cannot stand being in the same room with them and honestly, the reader can't figure out why on earth this woman actually had children at all. Every character aside from Kate is a cardboard cut-out person, and Kate is so loathesome and self-obsessed we wish we knew less about her.

Is this the woman all women are supposed to identify with? Is this horrible, selfish, whiny creature supposed to repesent modern woman?

I hope not. Kate's the kind of woman who would get in another woman's face about preferring to be called "Miss".

All of my heroines are called "Miss" by the way. You know why? Because all of my heroes, roguish as they may be, are gentlemen.

Bits & Bobs

I know my last few posts seem to have been just a collection of links and whines, but I swear after this one I'll be back on track. I haven't been replying to many people's posts, either. Sorry. My time has been disappearing in chunks that are not justified by the meager amounts of work I've managed to get done. My WIP only just crossed 30k and it's been like three and a half weeks since I started it. At least. Sad.

The third installment of my free Indulge story, Private Secretary, is up on the blog. It's here. This is a SEX-FREE excerpt, no need to worry about reading at work! I hope you enjoy it, and thanks to everyone who's commented on it so far.

I'm trying to write a good bio for EC. I have no idea what to say. I hate bios. I always feel like I'm being either too self-inportant or too flippant. Plus I've already used my best lines in bios elsewhere, so I'm fresh out of quirk for this.

Suggestions?

Excerpt-y Goodness

I've added two small excerpts from The Black Dragon to the website. You can find them here. The first was posted some time ago on Elektra's Crapometer, the second--which you need to click "Read More" to get--hasn't been posted anywhere before (it's from Chapter Three). I may go in and change them next month--they're each only one scene long, so I have plenty from the first three chapters to whet your appetites.

I've also made a little addendum to the cover post, so please check it out.


I'm setting up promo stuff for the book. I really, really loathe the process. I mean, don't get me wrong. I quite enjoy doing the promo itself. I have two interviews set up (one at Fallen Angel Reviews for November, plus two chats there--23 September and 2 December, and the other interview, also in November, at the Historical Romance Club) and I'm very excited about doing them all. I'm booking ads at Smart Bitches, Historical Romance, FAR, and The Romance Studio and most of those sites should be doing reviews as well. So I'm way excited about the months of November and December. I'm excited about January when the Prince of Death ads and stuff come out, too (the FAR interview, chats, and ads will cover both books, and the Romance Studio stuff will deal with both as well. Historical Romance is obviously just for The Black Dragon. I'm also placing an ad (along with other Triskelion authors) for The Black Dragon in the Romantic Times magazine, which I'm really excited about--if they give it a good review (please dogs) that's a real feather in my little peaked cap.

But I hate booking all the stuff. I never know what to say. "Hi, here I am. Please like me!" It's harder too because I use a pseudonym (you guys didn't think my real name was this cool, did you?) So I send all of this through my decemberquinn email, but some of the sites want my real name, so I never know how to sign my emails when I respond. Plus I have to send all Paypal stuff through my husba'ds Paypal account (because they won't let you hook up more than one email addy to a bank account) so I'm forever having to send extra emails to explain why they think they don't have my payment.

I always feel sort of silly and vaguely ashamed, begging to be allowed to feature my work. Maybe I still don't believe this whole writing thing is actually working. Maybe I think people are going to think, "Oh, man, why does she keep pushing that terrible book on us?" I have no idea. I have confidence in my work but not in myself, I guess? I think as my work gets more and more notice and I make more sales (not that I'm burning up those bestseller lists by any stretch, mind, but I know I have at least one or two actual fans out there, which is a huge deal for me) I'm aware that there's more to lose. Kind of pitiful, if you think about it, but true just the same. Nobody wants to be a one-hit or -book wonder.

Or I'm just unfamiliar with the process, which is entirely possible. I have a tendency to get snappish and wierd when I don't know what I'm doing. Luckily this is all done by email so I can get snappish and wierd in private. :-)

What promo works for you? What doesn't work? Do you read reviews or pay attention to ads you see? What about an ad or interview makes you think, "I want to read that book?"

And the hubs and I have just had a five-minute conversation about how weak the English Blue's Clues host is compared to the mighty Steve. How sad is that? A real, genuine, engrossing conversation about it.

So I think I'm done for the moment.

Cover

This is the cover Triskelion designed for The Black Dragon. I really like the medieval font they used for the title.

By the way, a comment elsewhere made me realize I need to stress something. Despite the nakedness on the cover, this is NOT an erotic romance. Yes, there are several fully consummated love scenes, and they are explicit (although not as linguistically graphic), but this is not erotic in the way some of my other work is-i.e. sex in every chapter. I hope that doesn't stop you from reading it, though! *grin*

The Big News--SOLD!

The erotic menage romance my critique/writing partner, Anna J Evans, ad I wrote together just SOLD to Ellora's Cave for their "Tarot" series!