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Real Fortune Cookie Wisdom
Sunday, February 13th, 2011

On Friday night, I ate Chinese food with the fam. Not my favorite cuisine. I like a lot of spice. However, it’s always fun to get to the end of the meal and open those crunchy shells to read the fortunes inside. This time, mine made me smile.

Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it.
Autograph your work with excellence.

How strange and appropriate was that? I’m not one to dwell on what’s not real. Yes, I did stand in the dark during that last eclipse at 2:00 AM, hoping to soak up a little magic. Yes, I have been known to do a “hand spell” when I can’t sleep because I’m waiting for something to happen. Heavens, I’ve even been known to talk to the air, hoping some entity is listening and will grant me solace or a wish. What I don’t do is put too much stock in anything other than my own strengths.

However, every now and then, I get those little wake up calls. Those little coincidences that surprise, amuse and make me wonder. I told you about the feral cat I met and befriended on the night of that lunar eclipse. The last time I did a hand spell, I got a contract with Berkley. My confidence has been a little shaken lately, but now, I have an answer from the ether. Autograph my work with excellence.

Catch me at Access Romance!
Friday, February 11th, 2011

Today, I’m blogging at Access Romance about, what else? Vikings!
Join me if you can. I’d love the company.
Access Romance

Ass-sitting
Thursday, February 10th, 2011

“The biggest sin is sitting on your ass.” ~ Florynce Kennedy

I’m hoping she meant that figuratively or I’m screwed.

It’s the day after Snowmageddon. We got a paltry five inches. Not that five inches isn’t enough to halt all traffic (including school buses!). Yesterday, I had the hellion and her kids here because they were “bored”. Like I’m the entertainment? Little high-pitched voices screaming, “She hit me!”, “No-ny! No-ny!” (she can’t say Nina), and the sounds of things crashing to the floor, sent the muse into hiding. I should have unpacked the Pack ‘n’ Play and given them both boxing gloves.

Still, no excuses. Today, I will pay the price with double the pagecount to make up.

I’m sure what Florynce meant was that the greatest sin is doing nothing. Doing nothing when it’s time to speak. Doing nothing when it’s time to act.

Well, I’m acting now. Just on my ass. 😛

Why my vampires are never bats…
Wednesday, February 9th, 2011

Yeah, disturbing, huh? But wait, if you look long enough you… No, never mind. I don’t know why that picture seemed to call to me today.

I’ve been back in my vamp world the past few days, writing a quickie for Moses Brown from the My Immortal Knight series. No bats there either. The story’s coming very naturally. It’s fun, it’s sexy. I’m hoping to get to scary, but sexy might be all that Moses has. Poor man’s been waiting a long, long time for his Happy Ever After.

Snowmageddon’s supposed to be happening right now. Forecast keeps saying 6-8 inches, and that’s surreal for this part of the state. I’m hoping we keep our power, because being cooped up due to bad roads is bad enough. Being cooped up without Internet or TV—with two little ones—well, just shoot me now.

Guest Blogger: Nikki Duncan
Tuesday, February 8th, 2011

Small Town Charm

By Nikki Duncan

Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.
Sometimes you want to go where no on knows your name.
Sometimes the “where” doesn’t matter as long as one particular person knows your name.

In the Whispering Cove anthology, that place is the same for all our characters. It’s the small town of Whispering Cove, Maine where a group of friends shared good times and bad before splitting up to build their individual lives.

A couple of our characters never left that small town where old men sit on a street corner gossiping, where the town doctor still makes house calls, where the waitresses know the favorites of all the customers, and where secrets are non-existent. Others escaped to the “big city” with zero, or limited, intentions of returning…until three scheming granddads use a high school reunion to get their runaways home.

A fun part of this anthology was seeing the transformations the different characters made. In WICKED, my heroine Danica left Whispering Cove as an awkward girl wrapped in shyness. With a desire to return to her roots and raise a family with the values she grew up with, she’s returned with her medical degree, bought the town practice and has gotten a new look that’s helped her build a new confidence. When the plans for the ten year reunion get started, she gets excited about the prospect of seeing old friends…especially her high school crush Braydon Mitchell.

Braydon never suffered low confidence or for a lack of female companionship, but he really thrived once he left town, bought a sailboat to travel and live on, and became a regular fixture in the water sporting world. Extremely comfortable in his bad-boy image with a strong penchant for no-strings relationships he’s returned home for the reunion and a visit with his favorite grandparents. The last thing he expected was finding a knock-out doctor with the shy girl he’d barely known in school wrapped inside, or that she would remind him of the adventures a small town offered.

Planning and writing about Whispering Cove reminded me of my youth and growing up in a small town. So, when you’re reading stories about small towns, what’s the appeal for you?

Chat with Nikki and be entered in a drawing to win a digital copy of her backlist (winner’s choice). WICKED is currently available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords. And at Smashwords, it’s on sale 50% off until the 13th when you use this coupon code: SM42G.

Check out more about Nikki by visiting her website at www.NikkiDuncan.com. You can also find Nikki on Twitter at www.Twitter.com/NDuncanWriter.

Sunday Report Card
Sunday, February 6th, 2011

A view of the pond in the back yard…

For a week that played out the way it did, I was surprisingly productive.

I spent two days driving the folks back and forth to Little Rock for surgery appointments, in not so great weather. However, I brought along pen and paper and scribbled out two proposals for new anthologies. Clever ones, I think.

Then the weather turned worse and we had our second snow storm of the season. The red-headed hellion’s pipes burst, and suddenly, I was covered up in children 24/7. That should have been it, but somehow (maybe because it was a mental escape!), I managed to get nearly halfway through a new novella. So for those writers out there—there really are no excuses!

Summing up my accomplishments:
* I completed two proposals for short story collections to follow up Girls Who Bite and shipped them.
* I revised a synopsis and shipped it to an editor at her invitation.
* I brainstormed a fresh idea for a Kindle novella and am 42% through the manuscript.

The weather thawed enough yesterday that my daughter was able to get her pipes fixed. Hopefully, the repair will hold. This next week I want to finish that short novella, finish a free short story, and begin a new novella for Ellora’s Cave. If my wordcount meters don’t start filling in quickly, give me a nag!

Need fortune cookie wisdom…
Thursday, February 3rd, 2011

Here’s something we haven’t done in a while. A question. Just for us. And purely for our own pleasure.

What thought or sentiment would you like to have copied
and put into one million fortune cookies?

My personal favorite would be, “You snooze, you lose.” What’s yours? Doesn’t have to be cute or clever. Fortune cookie sayings rarely are. 🙂