Hey, it’s all for a good cause! No, seriously. That’s the only reason I want this calendar…. 😉
Tomorrow is OKRWA’s Christmas Party and Dirty Santa. We each bring a book that means something to us and when someone picks the book we brought, we explain why we brought it. And then the dirty Santa fun begins as books get stolen! 🙂 Have a great weekend!
I know I’m late today. Yesterday was busy with life and family and by evening, I was dragging so I headed to bed. I didn’t even read. Early to bed, early to rise, and this tidbit from the Universe was in my inbox this morning. It struck me hard.
My dad taught me a lot of lessons in my life. As I approach the 20th anniversary of his passing, I’m sure more of “him” will appear here. So today, when I read this, I knew it was the right message for today. See, Dad gave me a little poster one time, back when I was in college. It showed a kitten curled up sleeping with the caption “Set aside some dreaming time.” That’s a lesson I’ve strived to follow my whole life. Dreaming renews me, feeds my imagination, helps me sort out life. So…
You eat to nourish your body. You sleep to rejuvenate your spirit. You study, work, and apply yourself for emotional gains. You exercise to tighten your muscles. You listen to music to entertain yourself, Silver.
You’re not at all adverse to investing time and energy for the rewards you seek. So how about you spare just a few minutes every day to visualize the life of your dreams? Because nothing else you could ever do will make such a profound difference in your fortunes and misfortunes as working with your thoughts and beliefs.
You can start now,
The Universe
© http://www.tut.com ®You are so worthy of all you dream of, Silver.
Dream the good dreams, my friends. Now I’m off for another cup of coffee and some dreaming time…
Today’s #1lineWed theme is Memory. Since I don’t really have a WIP going at the moment, but I did have the Nightriders file open, I did a quick search for the word. And these two bits showed up. The first one is from Gravedigger’s story. Or at least, it’s about him, in his POV. It’s gleaned from a passage about twice as long.
My nose flared as more scents wafted in the closed air—frustration, its acrid sulfur reminiscent of matches struck and blown out, and the hot pepper sauce of determination. Every man in this room was an Alpha Wolf. Not one of them would hesitate to fight to the death.
Another fragrance tickled my consciousness, a teasing memory not even ten years could repress. Violets and brown sugar. I shoved thoughts of her away. I had no time for what-might-have-beens. My brothers and I were in a life-and-death fight. Too many innocents had already been hurt. Even if I knew where to find her…I severed that train of thought, grimacing as the stench of rotten eggs—my own guilt—washed over me.
Easy’s gaze cut to me, his brows pulled together. I gave him a headshake to divert his focus. Carolina. She might as well be dead to me. It had been my fault. All of it.
The Russian caught my attention. Time to do my job as club enforcer. I raised my fist. “We ride. We hunt. We kill. Nightriders forever. Forever Nightriders.” A hundred voices echoed my challenge.
My name is Gravedigger and I come by it honestly.
And this one, which is just a bit of flash fiction that I’m not sure in which book or to which character it belongs, but I’ll admit I think it’s a nifty bit of writing. 😉
Anticipation shattered my concentration, a cold, wicked master fisting my psyche, squeezing, wringing, sucking out life until only dust was left behind to scatter on the wind.
Fear, stinking of ammonia and fevered sweat, fogged the room. My lungs labored to fill, nothing but sluggish bellows in the fetid air.
Sooner. Later. Time didn’t matter.
Creeping in on kitten paws or stomping on shattered hopes in hobnail boots, they would come, demanding sacrifices from the weak, the innocent, the foolish. Inescapable as death, as age, as sleep itself. No place to hide. No refuge from the relentless, roiling amorphous shadows of memory.
Dreams would come.
Morpheus would see to it. The bastard.
And those are my Words for Wednesday today. How ’bout y’all? Any words to share?
There are 11 shopping days left before Christmas. You know, in case you didn’t remember.
I have the tree up. Still no ornaments. LOL I’ll get on that today. Maybe. I still have presents to buy though Amazon is my friend. I need a trip to B&N, though.
I have discovered Audible (and audio books). This is a departure for me. I’m normally not very aural. But with the right narrator, I’m hooked. I ended up using my free credits to get all 3 of the Others series books by Anne Bishop. If I keep my Audible subscription, I’ll have to save a monthly credit for the next book coming out in….uhm….March. I’m really looking forward to it. Anyway, I also broke down and bought Nalini Singh’s ANGELS’ BLOOD after checking the audio book from the library. Really enjoyed it too. And while there was no SLAVE TO SENSATION from Nalini’s Psy-Changling series available from the library, it was on sale at Audible so I snagged it even though the narrator was different. After sampling lots of books, narrators really can make or break an audio book. At the moment, I’m listening to EIGHTH GRAVE AFTER DARK. I’ve tried a couple of times to read the book and kept getting distracted so I’m trying the audio. And yes, I borrowed from the library.
Writing is still a non-starter at the moment. Doing some flash fiction but nothing very long or any definite project. I need to remedy that. Did I mention that THE BOSS AND HIS COWGIRL (RDR#3) releases on June 7th. No word on the cover yet but the blurb is awesome. I can’t wait to share it. I’m really hoping they go with my suggestion for the title for RDR#4, THE BILLIONAIRE’S INCONVENIENT COWGIRL. 🙂
SyFy has a new series, “The Expanse,” that starts tonight. On ad called it “Game of Thrones in space.” Dude! I’m all over that. I’m set to DVR tonight. We’ll see.
Sports are done for me until New Year’s with the bowl games, and baseball in the spring. I’m not big on the NFL or NBA. So anyway…
What else is going on? Uhm…not much. Weekend was gray and rainy–warm and spring-like on Saturday, chillier on Sunday. I sent out a December newsletter, but messed up a little. Ah well. It does contain a Moonstruck Christmas story snippet. I hope people open and enjoy it. Plus there’s a new contest.
Are y’all ready for Christmas? Who’s going to fun parties? Who’s doing the Christmas Flail(tm)? Yup. Me, too.
Evidently, doing mashups of people dancing to the song “Uptown Funk” is a thing. Well, Michael Binder went a whole bunch of steps further, gleaning scenes from the Golden Age of Cinema with the likes of Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, and a whole host of others. Take the five minutes to watch. I guarantee it will make your day. And I’m betting you’ll be toe-tapping all day long! Have a great weekend!
What do writers do first and foremost? We pretend. We pretend to be our heroines, our heroes. We pretend to be here or there, wherever our stories are set. We pretend to talk to try out conversations, make sure they sound real. Because isn’t that what pretend is all about? Trying things out to make them seem real? Yeah, that’s what I think. And dude, if time and space has coffee and dark chocolate, handsome heroes can’t be far behind, because…yeah. I write romance. 😆 So anyway, still convinced the Universe is a writer.
Silver James! What are you doing back in time and space?
A-ha! I see. Pretending.
Is it true that the illusions are soooooo captivating, the coffee soooooo rich, and the chocolate soooooo dark, it’s easy to forget you’re just making it all up? And that if you don’t like what you’re experiencing you can make-up something else, act “as if” it’s true, and move towards it with baby steps, to change absolutely anything?
Yeah, I already know…
Cream and sugar?
The Universe
© http://www.tut.com ®Pretend, Silver… it’s what you do in time and space.
I’m pretending today, after I meet my CP for coffee this morning. What are y’all up to?
Today’s #1lineWed theme is SOUNDS. And as always, I’m cheating by posting a snippet. Since I’m not really working on a project currently–I’m still deciding what comes next–I went back and pulled this snippet from my files. It will appear in a future Penumbra book. Promise. In the meantime, enjoy some vintage Sade and a touch of sexy dragon goodness.
****
Ghouls. He was kidding, right? “There hasn’t been a ghoul infestation since 1915.”
“There’s blood everywhere.” The cop dug his toe into the wet mulch of leaves.
Sade swept the cemetery with a practiced eye. Something had rampaged through the grounds, toppling gravestones and digging up coffins. “Ghouls.” Saying it aloud didn’t ease the nausea offering up the chili dog she’d wolfed down in sacrifice to the Gods of Gross. “Hell.”
The cop glanced toward the storm clouds on the western horizon. Sundown wasn’t far away, and darkness was helped along by the distant rumble of thunder. “It will be if we don’t get outta here.”
Sade trudged to her government-issued sedan and yanked out a state-of-art flamethrower. “Yeah, you’d better hit the road. Me? It’s time to barbecue.”
Moans swirled around her riding a cold, autumn wind strong enough to kick up the wet leaves underfoot. The cop took off like he’d been shot from a carnival cannon. Flamethrower ready, she waited. Sade heard them first. Shuffling, growls, high-pitched screams. Then the stench hit. And that chili dog made a bid for freedom.
She swallowed bile, squeezed the trigger, and the night lit up with a hissing whoosh. “Where the hell is that freaking dragon when I need him?” she groused.
Flames erupted from the sky. Ghouls blazed like marshmallows over a campfire. A silver blur the size of a Ryder truck landed beside her and morphed into a handsome man.
“Took you long enough.”
Nikos Constantine, Drakon of the Kholkikos dragons, watched the burning husks, popping and sizzling like fat dripping on green wood, then offered a charming smile. “I brought marshmallows. Along with chocolate and graham crackers.”
****
I’ve finally learned to put smells and tactile “feels” into my writing. I really need to work on layering in sounds, too. What about y’all? Any words to add?
These things are so freaking yummy AND easy. I cam across the recipe on Facebook, and I admit to baking them a little bit longer so they’re a darker brown but that didn’t affect the taste! When I munched after they’d cooled, I wrapped one in a paper towel and zapped in the microwave for about 20 seconds. Eating them warm is The Best!
PECAN PIE MUFFINS
Ingredients:
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups chopped pecans
2/3 cup butter, softened
2 eggs beaten
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease cups in muffin pan generously. Crisco butter-flavored spray worked great. Do grease the the cups well or the muffins WILL stick.
In medium bowl, stir together brown sugar, flour, and pecans. In a separate bowl, beat the butter and eggs together. Stir in dry ingredients just until combined.
Spoon batter into muffin cups about 2/3 full. Back for 12-13 minutes for mini muffins or 15-17 minutes for regular size muffins. Run a knife around the edge of each muffin and pop it out. Store in air-tight container.
My full-sized muffin pan makes a dozen, and that’s what these measurements made. You can also place a pecan half in the center of each muffin before baking which makes them look pretty. 😉 Now I need to go make another batch of these.
Not. Enough. Coffee. In. The. World. My brain is still suffering Deadline Meltdown. The thought of sitting at the keyboard and writing more than a few hundred words makes me run away in full *FLAIL* mode. Ah well. This too shall pass.
I plan to be back in social media mode this week. Last week, due to circumstances and on account of because, I figured I might better stay away.
Writing: THE BOSS AND HIS COWGIRL (RDR#3) has its blurb but I don’t have official authority to unveil it. The blurb is AWESOME!!! Since the climax of THE BILLIONAIRE’S INCONVENIENT COWGIRL (new working title of RDR#4) is set at the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo, I’ve been watching the early go-rounds. I was pretty darn close on most things, but have a couple of “facts” to correct when revisions come back. No idea what my next project will be. Sales tell me to work on the next Hard Target book. Iffy is more interested in the Nightriders, if my flash fiction challenges have been any indication. Business says get the darn proposal book written and sent off to fulfill the agent request. My brain just wants to remain jelly and not think at all. I’ve written what…five(?) books this year? I can’t even count them my brain is so befuddled.
Sports: OSU is headed to the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, against Ole Miss. Go Pokes! OU ended up ranked #4 in the play-off rankings. They’ll play #1 Clemson in the Orange Bowl and if they win, play either #2 Alabama or #3 Michigan State for the national championship. Go Sooners! There’s only 74 days until pitchers and catchers report. My Cardinals didn’t re-sign John Lackey, one of the best pitchers in their rotation this year. I sure hope John Mozeliak, Card’s GM, has something up his sleeve.
Reading: Did a lot of that last week. I’ve blazed through the updated versions of Jen Lyon’s Wing Slayer Hunter series. By the time y’all read this, I’ll most likely have finished CAGED MAGIC, her most current. I think it might be her best one. I also squeezed in a read of our own B.E. Sanderson’s BLOODFLOW. I got it on Kindle Unlimited, and once I post my review, I’ll buy a copy because I want it on my keeper shelf!
TV: Haven’t done much TV watching. Still keeping up with NCIS and CODE BLACK. The rest are languishing on my DVR. I’ve indulged in the Hallmark Channel’s back-to-back Christmas movies on a few occasions. Yes, I’m a sucker for the sappy HEAs. What can I say? I write romance and even my darkest stuff has HEAs.
This week’s schedule: Posting here every day. Keeping up with FB, and responding to other people’s blog posts. Decorating for Christmas. Did I mention we’re retiring the Cactus Tree? With Stormageddon so active, we don’t want to take the chance he’ll pull it down on top of him. One, it’s really light and mostly unstable, and two, uhm…barb wire! I spent all day Friday shopping for a new tree. Found one Lawyer Guy and I both liked (I texted photos 😆 ) and I have hopes I can leave it decorated, put a cover on it, and store it in a closet. We’ll see. Now I have to find the box with the ornaments we haven’t used in 20 years, get it set up, and decorate it. Whoppee. I did get some of the outdoor lights up yesterday–on the front porch. And I got the partially dead lights on Nessie replaced. I also started the annual Stocking Stuffer Hunt(tm). 😉 Oh, and a Christmas edition of my newsletter composed and sent. And maybe some writing. Hopefuly Iffy will cooperate.
One last note, today is “Pearl Harbor Day.” It was truly a day that lives on in infamy. That’s it for me. What’s up with y’all?
Yeah. That would be today. Last day of the month. Last day of NaNoWriMo. Day my completed manuscript is due in my editor’s inbox. Thank goodness Harlequin uses digital now instead of the old snail mail method. I would be up that nasty creek with no paddle. I did win NaNo a few days ago, if I included the non-current WIP words. Using those I have almost 60K words. At the time I was composing this last night, I had just over 51K words and headed into the last chapter. The end of the book is done. As sometimes happens, I had a light-bulb moment on the epilogue, including the perfect ending. And I’ve also retitled the book. The working title has been LAST COWGIRL STANDING. I’ll still submit that one as a possibility. In my head, though, I’m calling it THE BILLIONAIRE’S INCONVENIENT COWGIRL. Which really fits–on several levels.
So, anyway. Weekend. There was one. A long one. Thanksgiving was nice. Our mixed “clan” met for lunch at my BiL/Sil’s house. She had a stroke last summer and is still rehabbing. The BiL did turkey, her side of the family and the James Gang did the rest. Lots of good food, Stormageddon time, and I adore both my BiL and SiL. Friday, the weather moved in. Rain. Then Ice, and I mean Ice with a capital I, lots and lots of it. Our power died at 6:30 Saturday morning. It came back on briefly mid-afternoon, then snap/crackle/pop. The utility guys–who are absolute heroes in this weather!!!–got it back on permanently about 7 p.m. We stayed warm because the folks who built this house were Czech refugees. Our storm shelter is more like a bomb shelter and they added natural gas wall heaters in four of the rooms. They can keep the house comfortable and pipes from freezing. I also have a gas stove so…food. And COFFEE!!! Yay for drip grind, a gas stove that boils water, and coffee. We lost a bunch of branches. Luckily, they didn’t break anything important. Like the roof. Or windows. The fence. Clean-up will be fun. Not.
College football. We got power back in time to watch the Bedlam game–OSU vs. OU. Yeah. My Pokes lost. Sad about that but OU should now be in the top 4 to make the National Championship playoffs. That’s good. At least we’ll have an Oklahoma team to root for and OSU should get an invite to a great bowl game. I need to figure out how days it is until Pitcher/Catcher for MLB. 😉
TV. It’s Hallmark Christmas movie time. I’m sucker. In between writing bouts, that is.
Reading. Still working through Jen Lyon’s Wing Slayer Hunter books. I’m on SINFUL MAGIC. Key and his dragon! *swoon* Didn’t read much because–dark, no way to recharge my Kindle, and uhm…this pesky deadline.
Which is what my whole life has boiled down to. Deadline. So…I may have been up all night. I may be editing today. I may have gotten lucky, the book wasn’t as ugly as I think it is, and it’s winging it’s way to Mr. HQEd and I’m back in bed, drinking coffee, watching Hallmark, and reading. Or not. Yeah…I’m working. Trust me.
Anyway, who had wicked weather? Who did the whole after Thanksgiving shopping thing? Who simply lapsed into a turkey coma and is just now waking up?
OH!!!! Deadline brain, d’uh! I forgot. I have books on sale. MOONSTRUCK: SECRETS and SEASON OF THE WITCH are all on sale at a reduced rate of $2.99. You know, just in case some of you read them on Kindle Unlimited for free and now want to have your very own copy. And THAT OL’ BLACK MAGIC and CHRISTMAS MOON are on discount at $1.99 because…CHRISTMAS!!! As Liam said, “Dad, it’s like a Die Hard movie!” And finally, THE DEVIL’S CUT goes on a Kindle Countdown Deal starting today. Don’t wait because the price goes up until the end of the sale on December 4th.
NEW RELEASE
NEW RELEASE
NOW AVAILABLE
