Archive for January, 2009

SQUEEEE!!!  it’s finally here! Changeling Press released Moonlight and Magic, the first in the M&M series, today!!

Title: Moonlight & Magic

Genre/Line: Paranormal Erotica

Publisher: Changeling Press

Publisher URL: http://www.changelingpress.com

BUY LINK: http://www.changelingpress.com/product.php?&upt=book&ubid=1080

Blurb:

Moonlight and Magic isn’t your average club. Proudly marketed as a paranormal club, it boasts demon waiters and shifters as dancers, but none of these are as exotic as twins Daelas and Jaren, the club’s incubi owners.

Part fae, Sage is looking for a demon. Not just any demon though, she wants a sex demon. But she’s in for a disappointment, easily seeing through the glamour cast over the mainly mortal waiters. Then Daelas makes an appearance and decides, as soon as he lays eyes on her, that she is his.

However the twins share everything, even their women. If one demon lover blows her mind, how is Sage going to cope with both?

BUY LINK: http://www.changelingpress.com/product.php?&upt=book&ubid=1080

Ok, trying to figure out this feed thingimabob. At the moment I can’t get them into the same post!! Arrrggggh, this is the audio excerpt for Rockstar anyway (seems to crackle a lot at the beginning – can’t figure out why)

So, someone on one of my publisher loops mentioned podcasting the other day and after poking around a bit I decided to give it a try (never give me a new toy to play with, I’m like a kid on christmas day!!)

Now, I’ve got a weird accent, and I talk too fast for recording so I had to slow down a LOT but I don’t think this sounds too bad *grins*

more animals

Ok, someone’s stealing the days and weeks away!! I blinked and missed most of this week! Eeeek!!

I have cover art!!!

Moonlight & Magic is one of my favourite stories (Well they all are, but I particuarly like the idea of sex demon twin brothers!) and it’s almost here!! Sahara over at Changeling Press did a wonderful cover for me. Now usually I’m not fond of poser covers but I really like this. It doesn’t have the usual girl sandwich on the front and I really like the magical swirly thing in her hand

So I’m busily plastering the cover everywhere in preparation for M&M’s release at the end of the month (shameless promo)

Also!! Along with a great review from the Long and Short of it, they’ve put Moon Madness in for Best Book Honour this week *faints* So, if you fancy helping Moon Madness out with a vote, here’s where to go…

http://www.longandshortreviews.com/LASR/recentrev.htm

Ok, promo stuff over with now, I promise!! I realised that with fewer blog posts they’ve been getting longer. Sorry about that, I seem to blink and miss a couple of days then I have SO much saved up to say it’s unreal.

So… I’ve been thinking about freinds recently, and how much mine mean to me, particuarly my online freinds. Now the fact that, for the most part, I’ve never met and (unless I win the lottery or some such) am never likely to meet these people doesn’t bother me a jot. Freinds are freinds where-ever you find them. But the ones who I’m particuarly close to are the ones that share my passions, like writing and simming. My writer freinds are great, they don’t mind if I disappear for days on end, pop up with random and obscure comments or talk constantly about characters and plots. They get it, they’re in the same mindset. It’s great.

My simming freinds are the same. We talk plots, we talk characters. But in that case it’s slightly different, and concerned with a game we’re playing. Same sort of thing, slightly different focus.

But then there’s the ones that are BOTH writers AND simmers. To be these are rare treasures. They understand me in all my true geekiness because they share it!! They’ll happily chat or write for hours, HOURS I say, with me about anything we’re working on or playing in. Did I tell you I love to write with people? I do. I like writing alone as well but I love working plots with other people and writing together on stuff.

Which leads me to my next point. I have two collaborations in progress at the moment. Dirty Dream with Evey Meyer, which is a contemporary romance with two of our favourite characters Dayton and Caroline (aka Day and Rollie) we’re about halfway through that now so soon, pretty soon, we should have some snippets to share.

And secondly an un-named scifi romance (the battlestar one I was waffling on about). I’ve managed to persuade (arm up back) another writer/simmer freind to join me on that one *big grin* We have a plot, we have characters. The characters have chemistry! It promises to be a LOT of fun.

Anyway, less waffling, more writing!!

Oh wow! This last couple of days has been great! I haven’t known whether I’m coming or going but it’s been fantastic anyway!! Last night I got the cover art for Dark Embrace, my upcoming Cobblestone release and it’s FANTASTIC!!  I really wasn’t sure what I wanted on the cover for this one. Some I have a very good idea and some, well, blank screen comes to mind. But the very talented Bree (one half of Moira Rogers) pulled a miracle out of the bag with this one! I keep having to go admire it some more, I think it’s great! (and will no doubt harp on LOTS about it! You have been warned!)

“The action of the story kept me enthralled as I wondered what would happen next and I enjoyed watching things play out in what felt like a battle of good versus evil. Moon Madness was a good read that I happily recommend.”

The next great surprise was a wonderful review for Moon Madness by Lilac over at ‘The Long and Short of It’. I wasn’t expecting any more reviews for this one and it was a really great review

Read the review

And last but not least, I FINALLY finished up a corset I’ve been making. It’s a pretty floral coutil, single layer victorian corset with black satin bias binding top and bottom. It’s for my sister in law to be and because she intends to dance in it, I’ve boned it with spiral steels and left two of the side bones out for ease of movement. We’re going at in a couple of weeks so I’ll get a shot of her wearing it (because I can’t be bothered to go root through the chaos that is the back room – aka the junk room – for my dressmakers dummy to display it one)

I’ve actually started to document each step in the corset making process, which I’ll stick together in a pdf at some point. So if you’re interested in how to make a corset from start to finish, watch this space!

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I found this on Linda’s blog. It’s great!!

GREAT TRUTHS THAT LITTLE CHILDREN HAVE LEARNED

1) No matter how hard you try, you can’t baptize cats.

2) When your mom is mad at your dad, don’t let her brush your hair.

3) If your sister hits you, don’t hit her back. They always catch the second person.

4) Never ask your 3-year old brother to hold a tomato.

5) You can’t trust dogs to watch your food.

6) Don’t sneeze when someone is cutting your hair.

7) Never hold a dust-buster and a cat at the same time.

You can’t hide a piece of broccoli in a glass of milk.

9) Don’t wear polka-dot underwear under white shorts.

10) The best place to be when you’re sad is Grandpa’s lap.

Whoa, what a whirlwind things are turning into recently. I’m sorry I’ve not been posting as much as usual but, honestly, I think I need to give up sleep or something it’s that manic over here!

I finally finished Grace off and the first read from my beta’s is good They like Jaron and Grace. This is good because I really was at the ‘woods for the tree’s’ phase when everything seems wooden and those rocks are laughing at me. (As in ‘rocks write better than I do!’) But they like it Yay!!

Edits for Moonlight & Magic and Feral were sent back in short order. I’m one of those writers that actually likes editing. It’s always good to get some feedback on your writing and editors, whilst not evil as they’re often portrayed, can be ruthless. If you can accept the fact that they’re not being personal and trying to make your writing since, it’s a great learning experience! I luuuurves my editors!!

The Rockstar editing party is about wound up now, I just have one pass over the source file to go today and we’re all done I think. My bit is anyway. Then the wonderful people at Lyrical will go away and create ebooks from it I still think it’s amazing what the publishers do, there’s SO much more in the process than i thought!

So, where to go from here? I have a new contract!! Cobblestone Press offered a contract for Dark Embrace, which is one of my Kyn stories This one is Marak and Maria’s story and it gets a wee bit hot at the end. Might need to break out those fans!!

And, I started a new story!! This one is a scifi romance, about fighter pilots. Think the new Battlstar Galatica with sexy aliens! My hero is a wing commander, the heroine is a fighter pilot under his command. He’s got issues, she’s got issues and attitude. And they absolutely cannot live with or without the other! It’s already shaping up to be great fun as I write it!! I’ll post a snippet and some inspiration pics over the next few days!

Ok, need to stop waffling, feed brat something (or too something) and get some work done. Catch you on the flipside!!

Finally, finally my contracted story for Noble Romance Publishing, Grace, is finished!! Although I really liked this story I realise now that trying to write to a deadline over christmas was perhaps NOT the best idea. Sooo many distractions, then to add to it, my pc got wiped out with a virus at the same time I got hit with the flu!! (not a cold, serious ‘you are in bed for a week’ flu) So I ended up almost completely wiping my desktop, getting a new laptop when it didn’t work properly and writing when I felt like a wrung out dishcloth (still feel a little dishclothy still :S)

So Grace ended up being a long hard slog, like chipping each word from a block of granite. I’m pleased with the results though, with some editing and polishing I think it’ll be a cracking story!!

But for today I’m going to breathe a sigh of relief and relax. I have some fanfic writing with friends to catch up on (yes, I am a total geek.) I’m a total scifi addict and a new game just started up with a couple of freinds so I’m heavily into that at the moment. There’s a great subplot a freind and I are playing with that promises many hours of writing fun!

LOL, yes I said writing fun. I LOVE writing. Grace was hard but it was fun. But writing with someone else is an absolute treat. Some people prefer not to write with others but I actually really enjoy it. I find the key is to brainstorm extensively first, get a base plotline then go for it

However, simm and fanfic writing does serve another purpose for me. It taught me to write everyday. For new writers that’s a hard habit to get into. A five plus year veteran of star trek simms (yeah, admitting my geekdom outloud there) I’ve written probably about a thousand words across different games every day for years which has stood me in good stead for the writing. I just add another thousand on for the writing and in my mental schedule here, treat it like another game. If I struggle I’ve even been known to set up a mock forum and actually write the story IN the forum, as though it were a game. Anything to trick the brain into complying, I’m not proud, I’ll use anything that works.

I also find I can explore personality themes to a certain extent in games before I write them into a story. Not ever the same character as goes into the book, totally unrelated genre and storylines, but I can ‘play’ with certain ideas before I write them into proper fiction. (honestly this all does make sense in my mad little brain here)

Simming also helped with the confidence issue. Writing and more importantly, putting your work out there takes a lot of guts. Writing is very personal, it’s hard to expose yourself to all those people even if they are on the other end of an email. They’re still reading what you wrote. What if they hate it? What if they think you’re stupid? What if they think the rocks can write better than you can? (believe me, I have ALL these running around my brain when I show people writing!) and if you write erotica lets not forget ‘what if they think I’m perverted?’

But simming allowed me to write and loose a little of that fear. Of course I don’t put some of the stronger stuff in there but I can write and people read it. It’s not throwaway but it’s writing out there that people aren’t laughing at. And that helps.

Ugh, I’m not even sure I’m making sense anymore. I tend to start these posts and waffle a bit, usually forgetting the idea I started off with!!