In honor of Inauguration Day...

Our Presidents!

I'm a geek: I watched it twice... the second time to see when neckties became popular to wear. Apparently bowties were the fashion before Roosevelt, who stepped out of the box and wore a regular necktie. What a rebel.

Then if you notice, Jimmy Carter is the first to smile for the portrait, then they all did! Way to start a trend, President Carter!

Quest in Saving the Contemporary!

With paranormal still hot and going strong, and with the lovely comeback of historical novels with notable thanks to Sherry Thomas and Courtney Milan, it seems that the basic of contemporary is on a horrible downward spiral. Considering I write contemporaries, this is not a good thing at all.

The ladies over at Smart Bitches are campaigning to save the contemporaries with a fantastic free book offer. They recently did a review for Jill Shalvis's novel called INSTANT ATTRACTION and loved it so much that they're offering to give away copies if you post on their comments (I highly recommend you read the review too. They really liked this book and it shows in the review and gives you a bit of insight as to what the novel is about.)

So help spread the word! Help save the genre that's so very close to my heart.

The Best Book Review EVER!

I'm not kidding. I just read the entire thing aloud to Shan so we could both crack up laughing. I'm warning you though, it's a review about an erotic novel, so keep that in mind. But, rest assured, it's totally worth it to hold your sides as you roll laughing at how the SMART BITCHES break it down.

By far the best line from the review (and probably the book over all): "I'm in your ass. Saving your life."

I didn't make that up.

A World Away

Today I made the comment that I wanted to run away... if just for a little while. One great friend mentioned Tennessee, but she has a hidden agenda (we haven't seen each other since we were little kids!). Another simply asked me where I wanted to go, and ya know, I had no answer.

As writers, we're always creating worlds, this being especially true for paranormal/sci-fi writers since they have to create vastly different worlds with different rules and everything.

But all writers do it. The location, sometimes a city even... or just a job, an apartment or house. Decorate it. Live in it. BE in it to have it come to life on paper. And then the cast of thousands. All in this new world created in one's imagination.

But where is your world? That personal, just-for-you place? If you were creating a place for a fictional you, where would your story take place that isn't the reality you currently live in? A mountain top with snow-capped ridges, filled with the scent of cold and purity that only snow can create, mingled with the heavy scent of the pine trees. The air so frigid you're afraid of freezing from the inside out, but you have to inhale deeply anyway, a visceral need to swallow the cleanliness of it into yourself. The crunch under your feet with each step you take. The whispers of whomever is with you, who knows that only softly spoken words fit in this particular environment. The smoke rising from the chimney of a cabin, the fire inside beckoning you into its comforting warmth.

Or do you prefer a beach? The salty, briny air you can smell and you can taste on the tip of your tongue. The gentle breezes lifting your hair from your face as you watch the firey sunset meeting with the endless blues as it darkens. The individual grains of sand sifting through your toes, the water lapping up to greet you a little at a time as the tide comes in to say hello, depositing small gifts of shells and pebbles for your pleasure of exploring. A bonfire at night, the crackling wood, the colors of the flame as it licks the salted wood, the warmth of a blanket and the person you want with you to keep the chill away.

Where's your world?
What do you create?
Where would you run?

As for me, I'm not really sure, but I'm definitely going to think about it and create it, not to be shared in a book someday, but to be treasured by just me for those moments when I crave the escape. And I'll know it'll be there, waiting to greet me.

Hero

I am in love with this song so I thought I'd share it with you.



Would you dance if I asked you to dance?
Would you run and never look back
Would you cry if you saw me crying
Would you save my soul tonight?

Would you tremble if I touched your lips?
Would you laugh oh please tell me these
Now would you die for the one you love?
Hold me in your arms tonight?

I can be you hero baby
I can kiss away the pain
I will stand by you forever
You can take my breath away

Would you swear that you'll always be mine?
Would you lie would you run away
Am I in to deep?
Have I lost my mind?
I don't care you're here tonight

I just want to hold you
Am I in too deep?
Have I lost my mind?
Well I don't care you're here tonight

You can take my breath my breath away
I can be your hero

3 out of 4 children wish you...

A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Dawning

I sat here for a moment and wondered what to label this particular blog entry. The I-wish-I-wrote silly girl in me always likes to to attempt to come up with something fun and different, but my mind grew blank. I vaguely knew of what I wanted to write, but as usual, I opened blogger without any exact idea in mind. As usual, my brain vomits in eruption of chaos and spews out of my fingertips. In less than 30 seconds, the title slammed into me.

The time is 7:10am on Saturday, January 3rd, 2009. This is my first blog entry for the new year. Anyone who knows me at all is probably sighing at the time of the writing. No, I'm not waking up at my usual morning time. You are correct, for those who attempted a guess: I have yet to sleep.

My initial thought is, as usual, to blame someone else, and in this case, it would be the ever delightful and disgustingly talented Susan Elizabeth Phillips. For those who have not yet had the honor of reading her book, AIN'T SHE SWEET, you should be flogged on general principle, however, once you do read it and question why you've been granted life to continue for such a blatant oversight as to have not read it sooner, I shall save my beatings. Even though this is by far the first time I've read this novel, once again, I read it to the end. Once again, I laughed. Once again, I cried. And once again, I sighed as it was over. Sugar Beth -- I know thy soul all too well.

As I finally turned out the light to sleep and rolled over, I noticed the odd smokey blue of the sky. My room faces east. Sunsets are more my thing than sunrises as I'm usually very much still asleep at this time of morning when the sun graces us with its appearance. But those few times I catch a sunrise, I cherish them. Not enough to arise early every day, but just those special accidental occasions such as this.

I don't miss sunrise-kisses as much as I thought I would. And there was a time in my not-so-recent past that I never thought I'd be able to proclaim that sentiment.

In a weird act, I gathered up my laptop and headed to the backyard, and climbed up onto the new trampoline Santa brought the kids. I hadn't even been back here since it was set up -- why? I mean, after all, I can see it from my bedroom window.

I see lots of things from my bedroom window.

I don't live them. I see them. From the enclosed sanctuary I've made for myself.

So... I'm out here now, sitting on this new trampoline, and since I live in the country, imagine this: a flat pasture, ten acres, the tallish grass brittle and brown, fall leaves gathered high along the cyclone fence that separates the backyard from the field. There are no buildings out here in the country save two very old, tinroofed barns, the boards gray and white with age, and tin tops rusted to a dull reddish brown, sagging in the middle, missing boards in the outter walls. Just a flat landscape turning softer blue as I type. In the far distance, the tree line looks almost like that of a sketch, the trees having no defining lines. Barbed wire pulls and leans on old pieces of wood, almost sticks really, something some old rancher somewhere thought would serve as fence posts. Along that fence, dividing this property from the neighbor's land, Scout, my black cat with white socked feet scampers along, probably wondering what I, of all people, am doing in the back yard, much less this time of day. I wonder where she's been overnight and what all she saw and played.

I'm watching the sky turn to fire. The pink that begins the sunrise. There's a very mild breeze. It's January 3rd, but it's Texas, and although it was bitterly cold with winds in December, now it's mild, maybe 55 degrees with this tiny breeze. A canopy of leafless branches of the huge old trees are above my head as I sit cross-legged in the middle of a black trampoline and realize what I coward I have become.

The sun winks shyly above the treeline in the distance.

And for the first time in a long, long time, I'm awake.