Its that time that we are all thinking about goals and resolutions. All the things we say we want to get better at and we do for about a month and then we slip back into our usual ways and say, maybe next year. So, I'm not pledging to get that pesky 10 pounds off. I've been trying for about two years. Each time I lose 5 of it, I get excited then I go back to my ways and I gain it back. Maybe next time. ;o) But, this year I'm starting January 1st as an author. I'm no longer just a mom and housewife. So I thought, maybe I need some goals for the year. Things I want to improve on. 1. Quit checking my dang amazon rank so much. I must admit, I've gotten better with the release to Fool Me Once. When Amber's Muse released, I checked it hourly almost. I try to limit myself to once a day now, but I sometimes find myself there twice. I want to eliminate that need. I'm an author, not a rank watcher. At that, I'm a brand new author. I need to be concentrating on my writing, not that pesky number. 2. And since we are talking about amazon ranks, I'm no longer going to check other books to see where they are compared to mine. I find I get unwanted feelings each time I do it, so I'm stopping. Perhaps amazon should just get rid of that crazy number. 3. Promote my fellow authors more. I try to be my best at this, but sometimes a day goes by and I releaize I haven't shared the love. So, I'm making a point to do this more! Especially on my facebook page. I often use it only for myself. 4. And lastly, work on my word count. I write novellas mainly. They are typically 18,000-20,000. I set out to write a full-length recently for a new series, and I only got to 30,000 before it was over. But, that was an improvement. I already have a higher word count goal on book 3 in the Hot Bods series. So, here is to 2012. It will be here once I open my eyes tomorrow morning. I wish you the absolute best year at achieving your goals. Happy New Year!
Today I have Cassandra Carr on the blog and she has a hot book out right now called Caught. Its a BDSM romance. I just finished it and man, it was hot. Don't miss out on this one. How to Write a Sex Scene with Life by Cassandra Carr When you read a sex scene, do you ever think to yourself – how did that writer bring that sex scene to life? If you’re squirming in your seat or feeling the urge to fan your face, the writer has probably made the sex scene leap off the page (whoa, there’s a visual!). So how do we do it? Well, first of all, writing sex scenes involves much more than insert tab A into slot B, and if your sex scenes read like that you’ll soon have your reader either throwing the book across the room or falling asleep. Take this example: He pulled her panties off and then spread her legs.Not very titillating, right? Now let’s try this: Trailing the pads of his fingers up the sleek muscles in her thighs, he reached for the waistband of her navy silk panties. He started to pull ever so slowly, working the material over her hips and now her legs, reveling in the vision he was uncovering with every downward inch of the material. The scent of her arousal wafted to his nose.Now, yes, I used more words in general in the second example, but what else did I do? I added senses – he’s feeling the sleek muscles, he’s seeing her body revealed, he’s smelling her unique scent. I also added details – what color panties she’s wearing, where his fingers are, etc. It’s this “layering” – the adding of senses and details that really make a sex scene come alive. So the next time you read a great scene, ask yourself – how did the author weave this story so effortlessly and how long did it take her to make it sound effortless? About The Author: Cassandra Carr is a multi-published erotic romance writer who lives in Western New York with her husband, Inspiration, and her daughter, Too Cute for Words. When not writing she enjoys watching hockey and hanging out on Twitter. Her debut novel, Talk to Me, was released by Loose Id on March 22, 2011. Head Games, Buffalo Intimidators book 1, released on November 2, 2011 from Siren Bookstrand. Caught released December 6, 2011 from Loose Id, and Impact is coming in early 2012 from Ellora's Cave. For more information about Cassandra, check out her website at http://www.booksbycassandracarr.com, "like" her Facebook fan page at http://www.facebook.com/AuthorCassandraCarr or follow her on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/Cassandra_Carr. BUYING INFORMATION: http://www.booksbycassandracarr.comPlease click the read more for and excerpt to Caught
1. Tell us a little about yourself Ella Jade.
I'm a SAHM to two active boys who keep me really busy. Now that they're in school full-time I'm able to devote my days to writing. Its something I've wanted to do for a long time. The stories have always played out in my head but I never knew what to do with them. That all changed when I discovered the eBooks industry. I live in NJ with my husband and kids. When I'm not writing I like to scrapbook, kick box and spend time with my family.
2. What genre or genres do you write?
Mostly Contemporary Romance.  3. Your newest release Embracing The Unexpected just released yesterday, tell us about this book. I fell in love with the idea of this book. It practically wrote itself. Its a story of two people who find they have a deep emotional connection and very much need one another. Here's the blurb... Sometimes love can be found where we least expect it.When Parker Phillips, a successful attorney, has a confrontation with his friend Ava's abusive boyfriend, he finds himself facing assault and battery charges, and he's ordered to attend an anger management course. Parker, who has never been attracted to a man, is drawn to Dr. Jace Cross, the psychiatrist leading the class. But how can that be, since Parker is straight? Jace accepted the fact that he was gay many years ago, and he's comfortable in his sexuality, but he's been single for some time now. He throws himself into his work to fill the lonely void. Although sparks fly whenever they're together, Parker's reluctant to embrace these feelings he has for another man. Can the sexy doctor help him discover who he truly is? 4. This is your first M/M book. What part of the book was the easiest to write and what parts were the hardest.The love story was the easiest part to write. These characters felt very deeply for one another so giving them their HEA was easy.The hardest part... blushes... the intimate scenes. I almost didn't write the book because I wasn't sure I could write m/m. Once I started writing it all seemed to work itself out. 5. What does your husband think about you M/M story?He doesn't get it. lol But I have a feeling he'd get it if I wrote an F/F. 6. As you have mentioned in past posts, you really enjoy writing in the male POV and I must say you do it wonderfully. Can reader's expect more of this genre from you?Thanks! I do enjoy writing from the male perspective. I like being able to make the guys do and think what I want. lol I am working on a new m/m and hope to have it completed in January. 7. What is a must have to eat or drink while you write?I like to have a Starbucks Iced Tea while I write. I usually put my last one of the bus in the morning and then head to Starbucks before starting my writing routine. 8. A holiday tradition you and your family have.We have many, but one of our faves is decorating the tree, lighting a fire and watching Elf. 9. If you had to choose one, which book that you've written is a favorite of yours? I love them all, but Embracing the Unexpected has a strong lead. I simply adore Jace and Parker. 10. Is there anything else you would like to share today?I would just like to say thanks for having me and I look forward connecting with you all. Come see what I'm up to at ellajadeauthor.blogspot.com. Happy Holidays. Buy Links: Amazon / Nook / Beachwalk Press / AllRomance
Oh happy release day! Fool Me Once is now available for purchase! Read a blurb and excerptBuy Links: Amazon / Nook / Beachwalk Press / AllRomance / BookstrandHappy Reading! And don't forget, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Please feel free to leave a review on amazon, goodreads, or nook. Or send me an email laceywolfe (at) live (dot) come.
Congrats to EveP! You've won a copy of Amber's Muse! I will be emailing you shortly. I hope you enjoy it.
Thank you to everyone who entered. I hope everyone found something good to stuff their stockings with.
Welcome! I'm happy you have stopped by. Today I have six sentences from my newest novella Fool Me Once, which is the first book in my Hot Bods series. It officially releases on the 19th, but its already on Amazon.  A quick background before this six. Drew has just stopped by unexpectedly at Skylar's apartment, and she just happens to be getting out of the shower and she is only dressed in a towel. "Just sit, I'll even move all the way over." Drew scooted to the very end of the couch. "See, I can't even reach you." When she didn't sit, he added, "I think maybe you're worried that you can't behave yourself around me."The heat rose in Skylar's cheeks. How dare he think she couldn't control herself?To see more great authors and their six sentences, visit www.sixsunday.comBuy links: Amazon / Nook
Welcome! I'm Lacey Wolfe and I'm a romance author. As part of the blog hop I'm offering the winner a choice of my debut novella Amber's Muse or my novella that is being released on December 19, Fool Me Once. Simply leave a comment for your chance to win. Please let me know which you'd prefer in your comment and include your email. To see the other's who are participating click the picture or HEREThanks for hopping by!
Today I am excited to have these two very talented ladies visiting with me. CL Raven is a duo of two sisters who write together. Come sit back and get to know them just a little better and see what they have going on.
 1. Your sisters and you both write. Let's start out by sharing how the two of you write your stories together.For novels, we write about 1000 words each per chapter, or to the nearest stopping place. One writes the first 1000 words then we switch. We take it in turns to write the first half of the chapter. For short stories, we usually write a page each then switch. Once the chapter or short story is completed, we'll each do a couple of separate redrafts of it, until we can't remember who wrote what. We never sit at the computer and write together, so we never know what we're going to find in the chapter until the second person takes over.
2. Will you guys always write together or do you think you will branch off?We started out writing separately then redrafting each other's novels, until 2007 when we started writing short stories. We realised it would be too heart breaking for only one of us to get published, when we'd both worked so hard, so we decided to put our separate novels under one name then we started writing together. We'll always write together now. We make a good team and it helps having someone to take over when you get stuck. They can take it in a direction you might not have taken by yourself. Plus we can share the blame and the glory. Or just blame each other. The Hydra did well with more than one head. Til it got burned by a sexy hero in a loincloth...must stay away from sexy heroes.
3. You ladies have several publications under your belt. Tell us a little about them and where we can find them. We've had nine short stories published and one poem. Two years ago we even did some performance poetry. Nobody was sure how two people could perform poetry together until they saw us do it. A couple of our stories are in obscure places that are probably lost, such as The Pages anthology. Our first short story, End of Innocence, was published by Legend Press, in their Eight Hours anthology. It's available on Amazon. We had to do a book launch in Waterstones for that, which was fun. We've had two published by Dark Fire Fiction, 'Til Death us do Part http://usersites.horrorfind.com/home/horror/darkfire/march11_2.html and Deadly Reflections http://usersites.horrorfind.com/home/horror/darkfire/july11_4.html The Black Kiss and Field of Screams were published on Draven Ames' blog http://dravenames.blogspot.com/2011/10/black-kiss-by-c-l-raven.html and http://www.dravenames.blogspot.com/2011/11/field-of-screams-by-c-l-raven.html Field of Screams also won Writing Magazine's magazine's ghost story competition and was published in their August 2010 issue. Our tenth short story, The Ferryman, is due out in issue 6 of Dark Moon Digest, which is available through Amazon & Barnes and Noble.
4. Can you choose a favorite?Field of Screams and The Ferryman are our favourites. Field of Screams is a paranormal comedy so it's totally different to our other stuff and we really enjoyed writing it. It still makes us laugh. We wrote it 3 weeks before Writing Magazine's deadline. We like winging it. We've never been good at working well before deadlines. The Ferryman's funny and we really like the characters. It's an updated version of Chiron, set on a train. We mostly remember our stories by the characters.
5. Scott The Zombie, I follow him on facebook and he's been complaining lately about not getting a lot of attention. Any plans for him in the future? Scott the Zombie is always complaining we don't pay him enough attention! We were in the middle of redrafting his book when NaNoWriMo came so once we've finished writing that novel we'll go back to him. If he hasn't eaten our brains by then. In the novel Scott works in a supermarket. At the time one of our mates worked in a supermarket so he gave us inside knowledge in exchange for a part in the book. His character is Tyler, Scott's best friend. We plan to self epublish Scott the Zombie and release merchandise with it. I ♥ Scott the Zombie t-shirts with his Facebook and Twitter account addresses on the back. We might produce mugs, keyrings etc. We've already got an order from a Writing Magazine writer, Margaret James, who plans to feature him in the April issue of the magazine. A 300 word extract from the novel got a great critique by author James McCreet in Writing Magazine. But we've had no luck selling his short story. He blames us for this.
6.What you are currently working on?We're currently working on our NaNoWriMo novel - Field of Screams. We hit 80,000 by the time NaNo finished but we're not done with the book yet. We loved the short story and characters and they wouldn't stop nagging us to turn it into a novel. Same thing happened with Scott - he started out in a short story. We've just sent another novel Soul Asylum to an editor in America (we worked with him on The Ferryman). That one's set in a North Wales asylum. We used an abandoned asylum in Denbigh, North Wales for the inspiration but they're demolishing it. We visited it in November and were promptly escorted out for trespassing! Whoops. We wanted photos for the front cover. Another novel, Majesty of Darkness is with a publisher but we're waiting to hear back, though it just got rejected by 5 agents.
7. What is a must have snack while you write?Red Bull. Vegan chocolate. Red Bull. A bigger Red Bull.
8. Is there a genre that you one day hope to write that you haven't yet?We like dabbling with erotica, we often put it in our stories and would love to be able to write an erotic short story or novel.
9. Is there anything you guys would like to share?Our aim was to steal Stephen King's horror throne from him by the time we were 30. We'll be 29 in February and it hasn't happened yet. Hope he doesn't read this. We love ghost hunting and recently spent the night in an abandoned haunted jail. We plan to turn the experience into a short story. But with added ghosts. The only unusual thing that happened was when we were locked in the Dark Cell with our mate, the K2 meter kept lighting up every time we asked if the 'ghost' was executed or if we mentioned murder. We probably should've been scared but we just chastised the ghost for lighting up the machine when we were talking. We blame our family of teachers. It's rude to interrupt. We'd love for Tim Burton to turn Majesty of Darkness into a claymation. We've even planned the action figures. Which is probably creepy. So if anyone knows him, Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter...The photo was taken this Halloween. Lynx is Freddy Kreuger, Cat is Jason Vorhees.
Welcome Heather Wardell. I am super excited that you have stopped by today.
1. Tell us a little about yourself.
Here are a few things not everyone knows about me. 1) I have four tattoos, one of which features prominently in my free novel "Life, Love, and a Polar Bear Tattoo". 2) Before becoming a writer, I was a software developer and then an elementary school computer teacher. 3) I am a natural speed-reader, regularly clocked at around 1200 WPM. 4) I am obsessed with crocheting and am nearly always wearing something I've made. 5) I never wear pants unless I'm running. I'm a skirt girl all the time, even in the Canadian winter!
2. You have had an impressive year in 2011. How many books have you released?
Four! I set that as a goal in December 2010 and I'm thrilled to have managed it. "Stir Until Thoroughly Confused" was officially launched in January, "A Life That Fits" in May, "Live Out Loud" in September, and "Blank Slate Kate" in December. I'd love to manage four again next year but it might turn out to be three. Still, that's not bad. :)
 3. You actually just released Blank Slate Kate. Give us a little info on this.
Poor Kate wakes up, naked, in a strange man's bed and can't remember her name or how she got there. As if that weren't bad enough, she and the man (Jake) quickly realize she has lost fifteen years of her life. She and Jake work to figure out who she is and where she comes from, but as time passes and she still can't remember she begins to wonder whether she'd be better off starting fresh with Jake instead.
It was an interesting book for me, because I didn't know how it would end when I started! (I usually do.) I had several ideas, but I wrote the first draft until it was about 75% done and all of my ideas were possible and then planned out the ending. It's more of a mystery than I usually write, as Kate struggles to find her history and how and why she ended up in Jake's bed, and that was neat for me too.
4. I follow you on Facebook and you always nickname your work while you write it. I do this too. Do you wait until its finished to name it?
I generally do. I work on more than one book at once (at the moment I am in the second draft of Flying Squirrel and also planning Hippo) so the nicknames help me keep everything straight. I don't usually know what to call a book until it's done and sometimes not even then! (I wasn't sure I wanted to use "Blank Slate Kate" but the feedback of my buddies on my Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/heather.wardell.author) made it clear it was the right title.)
5. What is a must have snack while you write?
Tea and a glass of water so I have a choice. I work at Starbucks once or twice a week, to get me out of the house, and there it's nearly always a cinnamon dolce latte. I generally don't eat when I work because it's bad for the laptop and the waistline. :)
6. Is there a genre that you hope to write one day that you haven't?
So far, I'm very happy working in women's fiction. If an idea in another genre hit me and wouldn't let me go, I would go for it but would likely publish it under a different name so as not to confuse my readers. But at the moment all my ideas fit with what I've already written, which isn't a big surprise since I write what I love to read: stories about strong smart women getting control of their lives.
7. If you had to choose one, which of your books that you've written is your favorite?
This is such a hard question since I love them all for different reasons. Today I feel like it's "Seven Exes Are Eight Too Many", my story of a woman who signs on for a reality dating show but instead ends up on an island with seven of her exes, because it taught me how to juggle lots of characters and I need that for Hippo!
8. What are you working on now?
This is the first week of planning for my book Hippo, which involves a woman showing up for her cruise-ship wedding and meeting her fiance's brothers only to realize that one brother broke her heart and she broke the other one's heart. She's going to be trapped on the ship for two weeks and her mother-in-law-to-be and her own mother are insistent that the wedding go ahead, but I'm not sure she feels the same way. I'm excited about it and I think it'll be a lot of fun to write!
I'm a little ways into the second draft of Flying Squirrel, which features a "do everything for everyone else" woman trying to overcome this damaging tendency by becoming a marathon runner. It's tough for me because the main character is quite unlike me but I am enjoying it for the same reason.
9. Anything else you would like to share.
Just that my books are available through my site at http://www.heatherwardell.com and that "Life, Love, and a Polar Bear Tattoo" is always a free download. Oh, and also thank you so much to Lacey for letting me chatter away on her blog! :)Buy links for Blank State Kate: Amazon / Smashwords
Welcome! I have a new release on the 19th of this month and I wanted to share six sentences from the first book in my Hot Bod series, Fool Me Once.
****  Drew stood, closing in on her. As he stepped toward her, she found herself once again flat against the wall. Shit, how does this keep happening? His mouth was too close for comfort. Her eyes drifted to it for just a second, knowing it was a mistake.
"This is not a good idea," Skylar whispered as desire stirred.
****
Thanks for stopping by. To visit more, please go to www.sixsunday.com
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