Contest Week At Murder She Writes!

Hop on over to Murder She Writes and enter! We are launching a redesigned blog with five new authors next week. Each day this week, we are giving five hints about the identity of one of our new authors. All you have to do is put your guess in the comments, and if your guess is correct, you are entered in the contest!

Can't Find My Marbles!

I usually try to blog here on Wednesdays, but suddenly, the days are getting away from me.

I'm just past the midpoint in my book. My brain cells are totally obsessed now. Weird thoughts wake me up at night, I keep worrying about what I'm forgetting, and obviously, I can't find all my marbles.

Good thing I have this kitty to help!

So when I write a book, I do three drafts. The first draft is a nightmare. My good friend, Maureen Child, gave me fantastic advice: Write the draft straight through. Maureen has written over 100 books, she knows what she's talking about.

I tried. I swear I did. I went back and put in notes for later revisions, and kept writing. When I hit the wall, I still tried to keep going.

Finally I gave in. I rewrote the first, I don't, 150 pages. Now I've passed the mid point and have a good feel for the book. I've come to realize my first draft is where all the heavy lifting is done. It's the way I work. The second draft is where I fix, move things around, flesh out conflict, turning points, etc. But while it takes me months to do a first draft, it usually only takes weeks to do the second draft.

My third draft is straight editing and looking for any problems I've missed. I can do that in a week or so, unless I find a Big Problem.

I'm rambling today, I know! So I'll come up with a better blog once I gather up all my marbles! Anyone else out there feel like they are losing their marbles?

A Few Pom Poms Short...

Did you all hear the story about the 33 year old mother who stole her daughter's identity so she could go back to high school and be a cheerleader?

Does this look like a high school cheerleader to you?


First off, SERIOUSLY? No one noticed this woman wasn't high school age? Okay, let's put a 16 year old girl and a 33 year old woman together in a cheerleading tryout and NO ONE NOTICED THE DIFFERENCE??? I think the judges need glasses, laser surgery and perhaps they need a nice stay at a drug clinic, because I think I would have noticed.

But the most incredible, unbelievable part for me? Why would anyone want to go back to high school?

Okay, maybe it's just me. I hated high school. I graduated a year early at 16 to get out of high school and I have never looked back. Wanting to go back to high school at 33 suggests this woman is a few pom poms short, or put more delicately, she's nuts. She has to be. Why would anyone want to go back to high school?

Not me! Would you all go back to high school if you had the chance?

Got Cat?

It took me a while to get onto the Cat bandwagon. Oh sure, I spend way too much time hanging out with the LOL Cats, but this is a whole different kind of cat.

I can't believe I didn't know about these books!

I picked up HOSTAGE TO PLEASURE by Nalini Singh while browsing in the bookstore. I put it down and then went back...her name was nagging at me. Where had I seen it?

Umm, EVERYWHERE evidently. How out of touch am I???

So I bought the book then started reading...love it! This is a paranormal about a Psy-Changeling world and I was captivated from page one. I loved the psi-heroine, and the changeling-hero who talked about his inner cat all the time and somehow made it sexy. His cat want to play, and oh boy, did I want to play with his cat! The book is sexy, and yet the sex (in this book) was fairly tame by my standards. I also was amazed by the world that Singh created. Fascinating!

Apparently this is book five, so now I have to go back and read the first four books.

Why am I always LATE to find these hot authors? I mean, how can I be so out of touch???

Have any of you read these Psy-Changeling books?

Laughter Made Me Do It

Blogger and AOL ate my first post. It was probably boring anyway! But this is why when I launch my new blog in January, it will be in WordPress!

Okay so I had a gift card to Barnes and Noble and I went book shopping this weekend. I didn't have any particular books in mind, I was just browsing. I picked up THE DEVIL YOU KNOW by Jenna Black.

I bought the book based on this cover quote by Kelly Armstrong "An exorcist with attitude..." That made me laugh and I bought the book.

I can't remember ever buying a book off a cover quote. It wasn't the name...just that I laughed. It caught my attention. I mean who doesn't want to read about an exorcist with an attitude?

I haven't read the book yet, so we'll see if it the book lives up to it. But I learned something about myself--if something on the cover makes me laugh, I'm going to buy the book!

What about you all? What made you buy the last book you bought?

Authors Pulling Their Punches

I finished a reading book this morning and was left feeling fiercely annoyed. This is the second book that did this to me and it's driving me crazy. The book I finished this morning was a romantic suspense, and the other one I'm thinking of was a contemporary romance. Both by well-known authors.

I am all for a happy ending. I love happy endings. But not when the author LIES to me.

Here's how it goes. Heroine has a deep secret, a secret so painful she doesn't talk about it. She just wants to live her life as best she can in spite of the secret. We admire her, we feel her vulnerability, we root for her! She's doing okay and along comes Hunky Hero. (I do love me a Hunky Hero!)

Nature takes it's course, and Hunky Hero gains our Heroine's trust, she's starting to believe she and Hero have a future. Maybe he can love her even though she has this dreadful secret.

The tension builds. We watch her struggle. Finally the Big Moment comes where she tells there hero the truth--she can't have a baby.

Hero is shocked, saddened, but he loves the heroine. We all sigh in relief. Look at that, two people can find love and happiness without perfection. Good, yes?

The author threw her punch and these two survived it!

Then comes the epilogue...and guess what? Suddenly, we find out it was all a big mistake and the heroine is pregnant!

Just like the kitten above, this is where I has a fierce! reaction to this. It's pulling your punch! It's setting up a conflict through three or four hundred pages, then in the last pages, saying, "Ha ha, just kidding, the conflict wasn't real."

I HATE THAT!

I believe in happily ever after. But I don't believe it pulling punches like that.

So what about you all? Does it bug you?

This and That

Yes, I did, actually. To put it bluntly, I fell on my butt on the stairs.

Such grace...

That was Sunday morning, I'm feeling much better now. Just sore...and umm...stupid.

I lost a couple days of writing too which frustrated the heck out of me. But what can we do? Life happens.

Let's move on to BOOKS! I've read the first two books Linda Lael Miller's Mojo Sheepshanks series. LOVE IT! Mojo just amuses me. The two titles I've read are DEADLY GAMBLE and DEADLY DECEPTION. Anyone else read them?

Have any of you seen the Author to Author videos? If you haven't, go visit and watch the videos, they are a hoot!

As for me, I'm icing my back since I was feeling better today, I decided to do a few things, like dust, vacuum, bring in the trashcans...I overdid it a little bit. But still, I am better!