Dirty Business Out Today!

My first ever book trailer! Taglines courtesy of the talented Jeff Mariotte

The Storm is Comin'

Woohoo! Going to see Don't Be Afraid of the Dark with the girls tomorrow! I'm STOKED! I can't wait! I LOVE scary movies, and this one looks really creepy, eerie and spooky. Awesome!

Gorgeous day out there. At least I have a window at work I can gaze out of :)

Plyometrics kicked my butt night before last. Paying now for taking some time off when the heat and humidity were ferocious here in Upstate NY.

Had one good parking lot writing session this week. Not great but I'll get my momentum back. Mind over matter. Hectic lately. Makes it harder to squeeze everything I need to do in. But I'm plotting the story in my mind. This is good.

Yikes. Everyone who is in the path of this storm, please take care. These things are devastating.

Author Interview and Giveaway!

I'm being interviewed over at Book & Dimension, and we're giving away a copy of Repo Chick Blues!

Come see us!

Repo Chick Blues Winner!

Cassandra! Thanks for commenting!

Giveaways!!

I'm giving away 2 books today. One ecopy of Repo Chick Blues and one copy of a novella I wrote under the pen name TJ Element. Why the new name? Because it's a different genre than I usually write in.

For the copy of Repo Chick Blues, just comment and I'll use a random name selector and announce the winner on Friday a.m :)

For the novella, go to Camilla and enter the coupon code TY85N

The code is good until Friday :)

Conversation Snippet

A co-worker and I were having a rather morbid conversation yesterday about wakes. She mentioned that a friend had passed away a few months ago, at only 27 years old. We'll use the name Bill for the purpose of this blog:

Kara: "People don't look the same at all when they're lying in a casket. Bill looked completely different."

Me: "Oh, I know. People always say, "Oh, he looks so peaceful. Just like he's asleep. No. People don't look asleep. They look dead."

Kara: "Right? And they did his hair all wrong. They parted it on the side. He never parted his hair on the side. And he was all clean cut and clean shaven. He was never clean cut and clean shaven. He just looked ridiculous!"

By this point I'm laughing so hard I'm almost choking.

Kara: "I'm serious! Somebody should've reached in there and messed his hair up a little bit. Or put a Red Sox cap on his head. Something."

But she has a point. I do my make-up and hair a certain way every day. I wouldn't want somebody to do it wrong and then everyone looking in on me like that.

Neither would Kara. We find this all very disturbing.

Friday!

Friday. Wow. The weeks fly by so quick I can't even keep track. It's a gorgeous day here in Upstate NY. No humidity. Sunny. Mid-seventies. I wish it could be like this forever.

I've been dreaming about editing and formatting manuscripts. Obsessed? Yes. This always happens to me. When I'm deep into a project I tend to not want to let them go and no matter what, some part of me is still attached to it some how. I could actually see the words on my laptop screen. So realistic.

Have you all heard of Amazon's new Booklending program? Excellent idea! Fantastic! If you haven't, go check it out! No pun intended :/

Great source for getting books and also a wonderful resource for those wanting to post reviews :)

Tues Fly-By

Working on a secret project that I'm really excited about. Just in the outlining stages right now so it'll take some time but I plan to really begin after I finish Vault, my YA paranormal. We'll see how it turns out.

Managed to bang out 4 pages today. 2 during half hour parking lot morning session and 2 during half hour lunch. Training the muse to show up when I do. So far so good.

Finding that I'm happiest when working on something. This isn't news to me, but sometimes I forget it. When I'm not working on a writing project I tend to get cranky and a little down. So I need to keep at it.

P90X. I'm woefully behind. I'm going to start all over from scratch in a week or so, when this cold is completely gone.

Back to work before I get canned! Sssshhhh!

Summer Cold and Writin' Stuff

*Sniffle* *Cough* Don't you just love summer colds? My little guy is getting over one, and usually I can avoid them, but not this time. *Sigh* Ah well.

Having fun with the current work in progress. Have decided to self-pub this one, and a novella I wrote three years ago. I'm finding that the story is flowing much better not worrying about what a publisher is going to think. I can think of writing the best story I can write without those boundaries. It's so liberating.

Writing in a different genre, one I've never written in before (Paranormal Young Adult Mystery, yeah, it's a mishmash)is turning out to be a lot of fun, too. I have to write before work and on my half hour lunch but I get two pages done each session and it works.

Knowing that I don't have a lot of time helps me to just get down and write. I don't have time to ruminate or whine. This seems to work for me. Most of Dirty Business was written during Nano two Novembers ago. Just pushing through and blocking out all the self-doubt and inner talk really worked well for me. So I'm kind of doing the same thing here.

If you just shut up and write, you allow your characters to talk to you because you're not blocking them or drowning them out with your own inner dialogue. Worries and self-doubt or creativity killers for me. I'm learning to block it out because I just don't have time for it.

Early in the morning the parking lot sessions are good because it's not too hot to work yet. Autumn is good for outdoor car sessions too. But come winter, I'll have to figure something out. My little guy doesn't nap much for me anymore. So I have to make time while I'm out of the house.

Aside from working the day job, spending a lot of time staring into space trying to clear my cottony feeling mind.

Not workin' so hot today.

Finding Chloe Release Day!

Release day!

Blurb:

An exotic dancer vanishes from the underbelly of the city. Repo agent and reformed car thief Leah Ryan has a knack for rescue, and she's a sucker for a lost cause. Unable to turn away from helping find a stripper whose disappearance many are indifferent to, Leah soon discovers that there are those who would keep Chloe Nolan from being found, and that there is far more to her disappearance than meets the eye.

Leah and her friend Jackson Quick soon find themselves in a deadly game of obsession and corruption, where the line between innocence and guilt is blurred, and where nothing is as it seems. Added to the chaos is a hot ex-boyfriend and a steamy reporter, neither of whom Leah can't seem to get enough of.

L.A Banks

L.A Banks passed away yesterday morning. She was very ill, having fought a brave battle with adrenal cancer. She was an amazingly talented writer, who wrote in many different genres. She was a lady who held herself with poise and grace, and brought joy to her many fans and I'm sure to all who knew her.

It's a very sad day for me.