New Year Changes

For those of you who know me or who follow me on social media (or I may have even discussed it here previously), you know I'm not a fan of New Year's Resolutions. To me a resolution says I'm going to do (or not do) __THIS__. Problem with that is, as soon as you slip up, you've failed. I'm not a fan of setting oneself up for failure. So I don't do resolutions, I do goals. 

For instance, I have two writerly goals for 2014:

1) 300,000 new words. (In fairness about 240,000 of those are already contracted or "scheduled", but I wanted to add a little more to push me to write something new too.)

2) All projects in on time or early. This has never actually been a problem for me, but some life-stuff happened that had me pushing deadlines right up until the last hours recently. I'm not a fan, so I want to do my best to keep that from happening anymore. 

That means getting a better handle on life-stuff. Granted, some is completely outside my control, but other parts I'm responsible for. I've just rounded out my first three months post-divorce and come to the conclusion that I need less stress in my life. This means letting go of things that once brought me joy but don't any longer. It also means letting go of people who drain the energy from me. 

And in a very specific instance it means lightening the amount of work-that-feels-like-work. When I first started out, I loved blogging. I got excited about it. And, as I'm sure my regular readers have noticed, I have been doing less and less of it as time went on. The reason is that it no longer brings me joy. I sit down to blog and think of a hundred other things I should be doing. Not to mention the hundred other things I'd rather be doing. This isn't good for me or for you. 

To that end, I'm stepping back from my personal blog. I will still use it to announce blog tours and appearances and to do cover reveals and whatnot, but that's going to about it. Instead, I'm going to focus new content on those blog tour posts and on the group blogs I'm part of (Evil League of Evil Writers, Here Be Magic, and any others to come). Maybe I'll do a monthly update here on where you can find me throughout the month, but I'm not sure yet (mainly because I don't always know.)

I'm going to try to post more frequently to my author page on Facebook (though with the new logarithms, I'm not sure how effective that is anymore), tweet more, pin more, tumblr more (is that a verb?), and give more energy to my street team, The Renegades (also on Facebook, feel free to send a request to join if you're up for helping with book promotions in exchange for my undying love and devotion…and early sneak peeks). 

I'll also keep doing the newsletter when there's news. (I'll be doing one some time this month.) So, if you haven't, be sure to sign up for that. 

In short, thank you for your support, and I hope to chat with you elsewhere online or maybe even in person at a convention. 

In Defense of the Clitoris

Sorry for being AWOL. Life and other stuff took over and blogging fell by the wayside, but I'm back to discuss something very near and dear to the hearts of most women.

The clit.

(WARNING: Cussing and pervy sex talk commencing as soon as you click play.)

Okay, fun is over. This is serious business. So last night I was working and typed the word "clit" into my manuscript. (For WTF purposes, what I'm about to tell you just happened again when I typed it in the previous sentence.) Scrivener autocorrected it to "clot." No. I'm not kidding.

Considering what I write, this is a word my computer should have learned by now. I'm a fan of the clit and use it frequently in my work. (Gods, that sounds so dirty. I'm an author, not a prostitute. I swear.) So, one would think it'd either have been auto-added to the dictionary or I would have added it at some point myself. Obviously I did not, which means this is a new thing.

That's right. I would have been correcting "clot" in edits for years now if this had always been a problem. But my heroes have not, in fact, ever massaged the heroines' clots. Mainly because...ewwww.

So I decided to see if this was some weird sex policing thing. Oddly enough, dick, cock, glans, hard-on, jack-off, and many other male-centric words don't have any issues. Now one could argue some of those have other, non-sexual definitions or that glans can refer to male or female genitalia. However, I've never heard it used for a woman. We don't talk about the glans of her clitoris. We just talk about her clit. Also interesting? The word cunt is obviously okay too, because derogatory terms for lady bits are just fine and dandy.

 I don't know. Somehow it just seems strange that this word--perfectly good word, I might add, and one that is more commonly used than its longer, clinical-sounding form--is suddenly an issue. Especially when it is in the dictionary already for the program being used.

Whoever is in charge of the stupid autocorrect of the world, fix this shit. Or should I say caca? Because apparently that doesn't need autocorrect either. My two-year-old nephew will be ecstatic.

Seducing Her Rival Blog Tour!

I totally forgot to tell you all about this yesterday! I have a short blog tour going on for this release, and there are prizes! Other than today's post, I don't have direct links to stuff yet. I'll try to update through the week, but the links may just take you to the main blog page until I get to fixing them.

Anyway...

I'm giving away a Nook Simple Touch as well as two amazon gift cards, so get thee touring, people!

Tuesday 10/29: Fade Into Fantasy
Thursday 10/31: Margay Leah Justice
Friday 1/1: What I'm Reading
Saturday 1/2: A Bookish Escape
Monday 1/4: Simply Ali
Tuesday 1/5: (Change of plans here...) Herding Cats...Burning Soup
Thursday 1/7: Toot's Book Reviews
Friday 1/8: Nina's Literary Escape

That's it. Easy Rafflecopter entries. Get touring!

It's Here!

OMG! It's here!

*muppet flails and panic*

Yep, it's that day already, Seducing Her Rival is out in the big, wide world.

What? You hadn't heard about this one? New marketing plan. Blah blah blah. I will save you the boring details and just give you this...

When cruise ship turbulence sends children’s charity guru Mercedes Vega—and her tropical cocktail—flying into a mysterious stranger, she’s convinced her free vacation is a dream-come-true. But Lucas Bellamy isn’t just sexy as sin and richer than God. He’s her business rival, determined to outbid her charity for the land she desperately needs…a fact she doesn’t learn until after a night of mind-blowing, toe-curling sex. Unwilling to give up, she formulates a plan to make the charming playboy fall in love with her and back out of the property deal.

Lucas is drawn to Mercedes, but he won’t stand down—after all, he has promises of his own to keep. But one scintillating night with the enigmatic brunette leads to another, and before long, it’s unclear who’s seducing who, leaving Mercedes wondering whether the man she’s supposed to hate is the only salvation from her past.

What better way to beat the fall blues than escaping on a hot, sexy cruise?

I knew we were on the same page.

And so it's easier for you to sink into the pages of this one, here are links to most of the bigger ebook retailers:

Amazon.com
Amazon.ca
Amazon.co.uk
Barnes & Noble
iTunes
Kobo
All Romance

If you buy someplace else, feel free to hit me in the comments with where and I'll add it to the list :)

Also, if you happen to read Seducing Her Rival, I'd love it if you left reviews all over the internet.

Now I'm going to go finish panicking, because I excel at that.

NEWS!

So, a while back, I sold this quirky little book called Gaming for Keeps to Entangled Publishing. When asked, I described it as Chuck meets The Hulk. My editor described the series potential as The Big Bang Theory meets The X-Files. Needless to say, it wasn't your typical romance.

The path forward from that wasn't a super-smooth one. The challenge of keeping things quirky and geeky and romantic all at the same time while still remaining fresh took a lot of mental twisting.

That's why I'm super excited to announce that Entangled has signed me for not one, not two, not three, but FOUR new TRAIT novellas. (Yes, officially the series is called For Keeps, but I still call it TRAIT.) I can't say a lot about what happens next yet, but I will say the mash-up for book 2 is a little different. This time around, we're going a little more Leverage meets Dollhouse meets Warehouse 13.

Like I said, it's a quirky series, and I am so appreciative that Entangled is as excited about this as I am. And my new editor makes me squee. So keep your eyes peeled for news regarding the release of book two in the For Keeps series, Conning for Keeps! 

New Chapters

As I recall, a few weeks ago I promised an explanation for my absence from blogging this summer. Basically, I was waiting to discuss it publicly until all the Ts were crossed and all the Is were dotted.

None of it's been secret exactly. In fact, most of the world that pays attention to me knows that I relocated to the other side of the state in June. What I've talked about a little less is the reason why.

Next month would have been my 17th wedding anniversary. Yesterday, my divorce was final.

So yeah... I've been dealing with all the feels--good and bad--this summer in addition to moving. I've been doing my best to stay on top of all my upcoming projects, but something had to give and it ended up being the blog. I'm going to do my best to get back to it now, but I wanted my readership to understand I wasn't disappearing for no reason. I just didn't want my moodiness to rub off more than necessary.

On to good news.

If all goes well, I should have two books out before the end of the year! That's right. No hard core promises yet, but I think it's going to happen. Keep everything crossed. Just a reminder (since I haven't been around for a while) that I do have a street team. We gather on Facebook, and they get snippets and news before anyone else. So if you really want to be on top of everything I do, please send a request to join the Renegades: Outlaws of Romance. We supply the virtual booze; you supply the charming personalities ;-)

*raises glass*

Here's to new chapters in both writing and life. Let the adventures begin.

I'm Late

No. I am NOT pregnant, thank you very much. I meant late with my post. And...other things. But not that thing. *shudder*

I realized something during my blogging hiatus this summer. I hate forced blogging. That whole "oh no, it's Tuesday, I have to post something!" Not a fan. Especially since my best ideas tend to come say...the day after I post, but by the time it would go live the following week, it'd be old news.

As much as I'm trying to organize my life (and believe me, I am), I think I need to make a return to disorganized blogging. I'll be starting back up at the Evil League of Evil Writers as soon as I get a nudge on when, but for here, I think I'm just going to blog when I have something to say. I know that goes against all the rules of blog-building. But let's be honest for a minute...a lot of people have moved on from regular blogs. They're pinning and tumbling and whatever-elsing. And I'm doing all of that too...when the urge strikes.

That's the aspect of Pinterest and Tumblr that I love. No one gets in a huff if I miss a day or whatever. No one cares that I'm mainly just posting things I find pretty or inspiring. And it never feels like I'm standing around shouting, "Buy my book!" ...even when I mention my books. I love that.

I'm not saying I won't blog here. I built this place, damn it. I'm going to use it--in fact, I'm still planning to strive for 4-5 posts a month. However, it does mean that it won't be consistent. It means I'm going to post when I have something to say (whatever that might be), but not worry about the day of the week or if I already posted the day before. I won't worry about "talking" too much or too little. I'm just going to be.

So, in case you want to comment on something....two big casting announcements have come out in the past week. Team Charlie & Dakota (50SoG) or Team Sam & Caitriona (Outlander)?