Spring is coming. The weather's turning warmer, but it still contains a touch of the cold. Our few mandatory days of freezing rain are gone. But my favorite time of the year is Autumn, and always will be. I don't know why. Maybe it's because my most favorite holiday, Halloween, is during that time. Maybe it's because the harsh, hot days of summer are over (I'm not a fan of 100+ degree days). Or maybe it's because of all the warm colors in the leaves - in direct contrast to the cooler weather. (My dad always called the fall "cuddling weather".)
I don't know. I can't explain why, but I guess that's what makes everybody different.
My family thinks I'm strange. Well, that's a given. But I love cinnamon and raisin bagels with strawberry cream cheese for breakfast. Don't say "eww" until you try it!
I'm thinking about having a half-hour, once-a-week show where all I'll do is read from one of my books. People can listen in, or call in to discuss the book, the plot, the characters, my motivation for writing the book, etc. I'll also read excerpts from the book releasing that week.
Congratulations! Your book MY STRENGTH, MY POWER, MY LOVE has just been named the 2009 Bestselling Torrid Title Of The Year! Furthermore, in recognition of all your success, we have also named you the Whiskey Creek Press Torrid Author Of The Year!
You join some outstanding previous Bestselling Torrid Titles Of The Year, including THE MISSION by Michelle Marquis (2008), A SLAVE’S WAY OUT by C A Salo (2007), WHAT HE WANTS by C’ann Inman (2006), and THE HIRED HAND by Melissa Schroeder (2005).
We will be announcing these two awards for you on the WCPT Home Page March 1, 2010, our 7th anniversary. In promotion and recognition of your success, we will also be featuring all eleven of your current WCPT titles on sale at 25% off during March, a promotion we believe should bring you even more readers.
Congratulations, Linda, on all your success, and here is to more in the future, from all of us at Whiskey Creek Press!
Great news! Red Rose Publishing has contracted HEALER OF THE HEART, my "medieval fantasy" erotic romance novel!
On a parallel world, a woman with extraordinary healing powers, and a man who would be the next ruler of his country, are thrown together to save their lands from warring nations and to solve the mystery of two brutal deaths within their fortress, despite the danger to their own lives.
Through it all, they find a love that defies all odds, and becomes the symbol of hope for the future of their world
Today's the day! Once a month I treat myself to a massage. Although it's not in the kind of surroundings you see to the right, the room is dark, there's soft music playing and candles burning, and the sound of water trickling over rocks. My masseuse is phenomenal, and by the end of the session I'm oiled up and limp as a rag.
If you're into horror, you could win a copy of my latest horror book, EIEIO (written under the name of Gail Smith). Simply read the blurb here, then send me the name of the poor soul who went to work for farmer MacDonald. Email it to me here. Put EIEIO in the subject header.
I am blessed with having great editors at both of my publishers. Not only do they understand my voice, but they allow me to suggest compromises on anything they change/correct that I might have a problem with.
I was notified yesterday that Book 1 of my Thunder Trilogy, LORD OF THUNDER, is up for a CAPA (Cupid and Psyche) Award from The Romance Studio for Best Erotic Fantasy!
Jim and I have had 27 rocky but wonderful years together. We've survived layoffs, strokes, a heart transplant, emergency appendectomy, a move to another state that nearly cost us dearly, and more pitfalls than you can shake a stick at. Yet here we are, still together, and still managing to find the magic.
I have a stack of old suitcases that I found here and there in antique stores and flea markets. Most of them are on the small side, but that's good! I keep my print books and all my book signing paraphrenalia in them. They're roomy and dry, and being small means they're not that heavy to carry. Plus they stack well.
This way when I need to pack up to go to a book signing, I have everything all "packed" and ready to go!
I often get asked if I read or watch anime. To be honest, I tried some, but I was often put off by the story lines and the actual graphic art.
That was until a friend of mine sent me the first video of Crying Freeman.
OH MAN OH MAN OH MAN!
I've since bought the graphic novels, as well as the "live" version of the story (which isn't as poignant as the anime version, IMHO).
For one thing, look at the graphic art on the left. Does it look like any anime art you've seen in the past? No? Well, let me assure the first story of this series is also like nothing you've ever seen before, either.
If you love romance, action, and a HEA that'll blow you out of your seat, go rent this video.
Old MacDonald had a farm, E I E I O And on this farm he had some pigs, E I E I O With a hack hack here, and a chop chop there, Here a shriek, there a scream, Everywhere the blood streams... Old MacDonald had a farm, E I E I O
In rural Georgia in 1931, a man was lucky to get any kind of work. Which was why Cletus Pink felt he'd been blessed when an old farmer named MacDonald offered him a job. But what was making the horrific sounds coming from the main house? Worse, why was there always fresh blood oozing out from underneath the kitchen's back door?
* * *
Cletus half-ran to the pen behind the barn after accepting the loop from the farmer’s outstretched hand. The sows they’d caught a couple of days before were still asleep, so his job was not as difficult as he’d first thought it would be. He chose the pig nearest the fence, easily slipping the hemp under its snout and trailing it down until it was around the neck. That done, he quickly fashioned a slipknot to prevent the animal from wiggling out of it.
However, getting the reluctant sow up to the farmhouse was a bit more of a task. It took Cletus a full half hour to drag the reluctant animal up the slope to the back of the farmhouse, then tie the rope securely to the clothesline pole.
His forehead dripped from exertion. His mouth felt parched, his throat burned. He had not had the chance for a quick breakfast, and this headache was getting worse. Back at the barn MacDonald had disappeared back into the structure. The pump was between him and the barn—it shouldn’t be a problem to grab a quick handful of water before heading back downhill.
Cletus side-stepped the sow that was now rooting around the crawlspace underneath the farm house. He walked past the back step, casually glancing at the piled boots he knew were always there. A small detail flashed to him, a detail he could easily have forgotten if the seed of it hadn’t already been planted. Cletus paused, took a step back, and took another good look. Then another.
Yep. No doubt about it. That was dried blood on the back steps—blood that had seeped out of the kitchen floor in thin rivulets and dried in streaks down the hewn stone steps.
Morbid curiosity made Cletus run a finger over the dried blood. It was tacky, not yet at the flaking point. He stared at the smudge on his finger for a second until disgust washed over him and he furiously wiped it on the dry grass.
Getting back to his feet, he started to head for the pump again when he glanced back at the boots lying haphazardly by the steps. In the morning light there was no denying that one pair, one boot lying on its side and the other propped at a slant on top of another set, bore the unmistakable wetness of undried blood. It was embedded in the ridged soles of the footwear, oozing slowly, very, very slowly, along the patterned bottoms as though traversing a maze.
Cletus glanced down at the barn to see if MacDonald had emerged yet. Seeing the coast was clear, he reached over to the boots and again wiped the same finger along the heel. To his utter amazement, the stuff not only was fresh, but warm.
Well, it's happened. That beautiful century-year-old oak tree that had to be cut down so the city could widen the street at the corner of our school is gone. Here are the final pictures.
I've been reading and watching the slow downslide of NY publishing like Nero watched Rome burn. Or maybe that's a bad comparison. But every time I grit my teeth and strike out to find an agent to represent my dark urban fantasy romance novels (there's 2 now), I come to a screeching halt and wonder... why?
What is there about being NY pubbed that I'm not getting with my epublisher?
Okay, so I don't get an advance on my books. Look at how advances have diminished drastically for the NY authors. They also get an abysmal percentage in royalties, compared to 35% for the average epubbed author for ebooks, and 7% for print. And let's not forget NY authors have to pay their agents off the top first.
NY authors get little if no input on their covers. Epubbed authors are allowed to fill out cover requests AND (or at least in my case) I get to "tweak" the cover once I receive it from the artist.
So what do NY authors get that I don't get now? They're at Amazon, and so am I. Fictionwise/OmniLit/ARe - check. Inevitably it comes down to mass market distribution in brick and mortar stores, and that's about it, as far as I can tell. Yes, but that mm distribution means a LOT when it comes to sales, I know.
So I guess the final question is this...is it still worth "the dream" of being NY pubbed, considering the slow decline being felt by the Big Six in NY?
For anyone who's never attended a fan convention, particularly one that's about sci-fi and fantasy, one of the best parts is the costume contest. I grabbed a few people who were in the dealers room prior and just afterwards. Here's some of my favorites.
To begin with, a Victorian Steampunk...
Poison Ivy...
The security guards dressed up like the Mutant Chronicles...
My favorite Dr. Who, complete with red sneakers and a sonic screwdriver...
Here's my table, all set up and ready to go. Note the huge bottle of vitamin water.
This dealers room has anything and everything fan, anime, fantasy, and sci-fi related. Just take a gander at this man's stall.
Anyone need a fancy knife or kitana?
Of course, one of great things about fan cons is the costuming. I've seen everything from Star Wars (natch), Ghostbusters, Firefly, anime characters, Dr. Who (I need to get the shot of the one running around. He looks like a dead ringer!), and this young man.
I'll be at AGGIECON 41 in College Station, TX from Feb. 5-7.
"AggieCon is the longest-running student organized Sci Fi/Fantasy convention in the country. We invite you to attend, this year due to the MSC remodel it will be held at the College Station Hilton Hotel on University Dr, February 5-7 2010."
I'll keep you posted on what's going on. Stay tuned!
I love it when I'm reading on the loops or on a blog about a problem an author is having, and then read a very easy and sensible solution.
Take for instance Google alerts. I have an alert set up for Linda Mooney, but I may get a ton of responses, some for just Linda, some for only Mooney, but not that many with Linda Mooney.
Here's the tip. Put your alert words in quotation marks like this: "Linda Mooney". From then on you will get alerts ONLY for those words, and in that order.
Spring is coming. The weather's turning warmer, but it still contains a touch of the cold. Our few mandatory days of freezing rain are gone. But my favorite time of the year is Autumn, and always will be. I don't know why. Maybe it's because my most favorite holiday, Halloween, is during that time. Maybe it's because the harsh, hot days of summer are over (I'm not a fan of 100+ degree days). Or maybe it's because of all the warm colors in the leaves - in direct contrast to the cooler weather. (My dad always called the fall "cuddling weather".)
