News! Updates!

Hello, Beautiful People!

I have been busy with all kinds of things these past few months. I have been knitting, spinning, and quilting as well as reading and writing. And of course, I’ve been working the day job. I can’t wait to retire! But that’s still a bunch of years away. Sigh…

I am working my way through Ruby Dixon’s backlist. It is extensive so it is taking some time. If you haven’t ready Ruby Dixon I recommend her. Her heroes are frequently rough and even brutal but never, ever to the heroine. To their ladies, they are big protective teddy bears. Someone once told me she thought I was like Ruby Dixon. That is a huge compliment to me. I’m also enjoying Ann Aguirre, Michelle Diener, Sharon Lee & Steve Miller, and Emma Hamm.

My next big thing coming up is Lori Foster’s Annual Reader & Author Get Together. It takes place near Cincinnati, Ohio in a few weeks. The book signings are open to the public. I will be signing on Saturday June 11 from 3:00-5:00pm. If you are in that area I would LOVE to meet you! For the location, click the link above.

One thing they always do at the RAGT is a wonderful raffle. SO MANY people donate terrific raffle baskets. The proceeds go to Cancer Free kids. You can imagine that as a Stage 3 cancer survivor, I am all on board with donating to this wonderful cause. My cancer treatments were challenging. It was a year of pain and exhaustion. I honestly did not know if I would live to beat cancer. Really, can you say Not Fun? I cannot imagine going through that as a child, or what a horrible thing it would be for the parents of a young cancer patient. I plan to buy LOTS of raffle tickets. I would love to win something, but knowing the money goes to helping juvenile cancer patients is well worth it. And I decided to donate something too. I took old T-shirts from the event and made them into a quilt. I sent it off to be professionally quilted and I chose the Hearts and Cancer Ribbons quilting pattern. I thought it was appropriate. I just need to add the binding. What do you think? I hope this raffle quilt will raise a bunch of money for Cancer Free Kids.

Writing News!!

You may know that I am working on the first book in a fantasy romance trilogy called The Lords or Erabir. I’d decided to write it in first person from the heroine’s point of view. I was all excited and writing along very speedily for the first 30,000 words. Then… Well, I don’t know what happened. I started to be a little dissatisfied with it. I forced myself to keep going, but it was hard. I brought it to my local critique group and we discussed it. Some of them suggested that maybe first person wasn’t for me. I was stubborn though. I already had 30K words! I didn’t even want to THINK of re-writing so much. So I kept plowing on, but it became harder and harder and slower and slower. Finally, at 50,000 words I admitted defeat. 1st person just isn’t for me. Two months ago I began my re-write.

I am happy to report that I am back on track. I still have 2300 words to review and re-write and then I will be writing fresh stuff. At 57,000 words I am about 3/4 done with the first draft. It feels good to be back on track. I have added three scenes from the hero’s point of view. I think that is one of the things I was missing in 1st person. In all my other books I have several scenes from the hero’s point of view. It lets the reader know what the hero is thinking and how he feels about his lady.

So, that is my update! I hope everyone is enjoying a lovely May. Wishing you all many lovely hours of summer reading!