Feels Like the First Time

This week on the Lady Smut site, I'm talking about how writing the next book always feels like starting the first one...and why my current new project in particular is different.

Read to the end for a smexy excerpt from my current work-in-progress: THRILL ME

But wait! There's more! My detailed recap of this week's U.S Syfy Channel. run of Lost Girl episode Of All the Gin Joints is up on the Heroes and Heartbreakers web site.

Already watched the full season on Canada's Showcase channel? We're still processing all the crazy from that wild Lost Girl season finale on the Heroes and Heartbreakers discussion forum. Come obsess and speculate with us.

Aphrodisiacs That Fail to Arouse

It's Cravings Week over at LadySmut.com.


Today I'm taking a look at food aphrodisiacs that fail to float my boat.


Head on over and see why...

Going Against Type

A fine man in a suit is everyone's type...
especially when he's Hugh.

It's Monday, which means it's my turn to be witty and wise over at the Lady Smut blog...or at least my turn to fake being witty and wise until you lot figure me out.

Today I'm rambling on...and on...and on about type. We all have a type, a set parameter of qualities that we look for in a romantic other. But when we go against type...story happens.

Come on over and take a gander. Leave a comment! Go wild!

Give Me the Wolf

Over at LadySmut.com this week, I'm talking about a few of my favorite supernatural wolves in the paranormal genre of TV and books...and why they're so much better than any vampire.

  And yeah, it includes him:

And you know it includes him: 


Come on. Did you think I'd write a post about werewolves and wolfshifters and not include my wolf? 

Silly readers. 

Are We Losing the Fun in Fandom?

Over at LadySmut blog, I'm talking about the most recent dust up over fan disappointment with the end of the Divergent series as it's third installment, Allegiant, hit the shelves last week. Are fan entitlement and an unprecedented access to authors and showrunners causing us all to lose the fun in fandom?

Come over and discuss!

Music Be the Food of Love...and Writing

I'm talking about music and writing today on LadySmut.com and how the one can inspire and feed the other. 



Come on over and share some of the music that inspires you.

The Lost Pornographic Age of the Dinosaurs

No doubt, paleontologists across the land are wondering how they miss such a salacious era while Michael Crichton is probably rolling over in his grave that he didn't think of it first.

Over at Ladysmut.com, I'm taking a disgusted look at dino porn.

Yeah, you read that right. Unfortunately.

Bet You Thought, "Now Why Don't She Write?"

I'm delighted to announce that I am the newest addition to the staff at LadySmut.com.

"Lady Smut is a blog for intelligent women who like to read smut. On this blog, we talk about our writing, the erotic romance industry, masculinity, femininity, sexuality, and whatever makes our pulses race."

While I write smart, sharp, and sexy romantic suspense novels that yet do not fall into the erotic romance category, I do enjoy the savvy voice and intelligent, frank discussions these ladies have displayed on their blog this past year. I'm excited to add my off-kilter perspective to their ranks.

Head on over to read my debut post "A Poor Kind of Hero" and find out why I think some "classic" heroes fail to make the grade.

Always Remember

I Lurked On The #RT13 Twitter Feed

#Bittercon is real, it’s here, and it’s fueled by fond, good-natured jealously for all the romance (and other genre) writers and readers who attended the RT Conference last week in Kansas City, MO. RT stands for the RT Book Reviews magazine (formerly Romantic Times). I was a constant presence (real or imagined) at #Bittercon  as I was not able to attend “RT” this year. To avoid wallowing completely in freakish misery, I avidly followed the nonstop nearly 24-hour Twitter feed for hashtag #RT13. I lurked, I admit it, I have no shame. Here are but a few of the not-entirely-surprising revelations my lurking uncovered about #RT13.

Romance writers love their funky shoes (I APPROVE) and are not shy about posing in them, which is good because Angela James, Editorial Director for Carina Press, was there to take their pictures. That’s probably how I know that Karina Cooper has the most fantastic shoes on the planet (though I hear Smart Bitch Sarah Wendell runs a close second). Karina's peacock shoes especially turned me several shades of blue green with envy. (UPDATED at 8 PM with a link to the peacock shoes!! Thanks Karina!!)

The costume parties make me glad for the time I spent on a theatre’s run crew that made me a whiz with the quick change (usually when there’s a man involved). (I’m kidding.) (Maybe.) They also brought home the fact that I don’t have nearly the sufficient budget or creativity required for the costumes for all the parties at this conference. Imelda Marcos wouldn’t have the budget for the costumes for all the parties at this conference. Though she would have the shoes.

I’m gonna need some tats applied before I attend RT14 in New Orleans or lose any and all cred with these tricked out, bad-assed writers. They will be fake because I am a wimp. Also, I have a hard time deciding on  a lipstick color, I’m hardly going to be able to choose an image with which to be painted for eternity without years of planning first – and likely therapy.

Author E L James of Fifty Shades infamy attended incognito (I had “came” as the verb there first, but then this is an RT list, so…) She declared herself in a panel but without rancor or fisticuffs, revealed she was only there to support a friend, re-registered under her real fake (i.e. pen) name, lost her badge in the men’s room, and has had an identity crisis ever since.

Larry Kirshbaum, publishing legend and current head of Amazon Publishing, does a mean striptease. On a dais. In front of hundreds of women. As you do.

The craft workshops never end. Even late in the evening at the hotel bar, you can still find erotic romance authors who are all to willing to demonstrate...techniques.

Holy crap, TEENAGERS READ!!! Brace yourselves: they can be so keen to see a favorite writer that they will bypass the escalator and RUN UP THE STAIRS to be sure to get the signature of their Fearless Leader. Then, overcome with the sauce that is awesome, they will comp squat right there on a hotel lobby floor (no, it’s not a misdemeanor) and START READING. FROM A BOOK EVEN.

The RT Book Fair is MASSIVE. Authors are trapped at their tables for hours, signing books and meeting lovely fans. Fortunately, some people are happy to resupply the belabored authors gamely battling hand cramps with coffee, water, penis-shaped candy, and, if you’re author Cara McKenna, a bottle of Smirnoff Ice.

Andrew Shaffer is everywhere - sometimes trotting around with Jill Shalvis' skull (she was mobbed at the book fair and thus stripped of her skin) and occasionally wearing a horse's head though thankfully not in the Corleone style. Seriously, the guy is like the inadvertent mascot of the RT twitter feed, which would offer one explanation for the horse's head...

In her acceptance speech for winning the RT Book Reviews Reviewers Choice for Best Steampunk Novel of 2012 for Tarnished, Karina Cooper revealed that her husband had sold his Magic cards to help pay for her trip to RT13. Tiffany Reisz tweeted in response that her father paid for her first RWA National Conference, and Olivia Kelly added that her dad paid for her trip to RWA Nationals in 2012 and reads all her stuff. Conclusion: our heroes do not only exist between the pages of our romance novels. We dig the good (live) men. They are real and amazing.

Everyone fangrrls over Jude Devereux and Julie Garwood. Everyone.

Given that I was a far-off observer of said goings-on, below are but a few of the more memorable tweets from #RT13. WARNING: Don't be drinking anything when you read them or it'll come out of your nose for sure.

One last thing for those who still inexplicably doubt or poo poo the impact of Twitter. If there could be anything to solidify my certain attendance at RT14, it would be the RT13 Twitter feed. That's grassroots, first-person, hand to hand, free marketing and publicity generated there for anyone and everyone to see for both RT Book Reviews and every single person mentioned and/or tweeting. Turn your nose up at that unbelievers. I dare you.

*crying* @victoriadahl @laurendane and me demonstrating cowboy hand job pantomime in the bar. #rt13
— Alyssa Day (@Alyssa_Day) May 4, 2013

@victoriadahl No Spanx at #bittercon.
— SonomaLass (@SonomaLass) May 4, 2013

Tired teens with tons of books from YA Alley. #RT13 twitter.com/RT_Magazine/st…
— RT Book Reviews (@RT_Magazine) May 4, 2013

OH at RT: oh god I'm sorry we've had this conversation before. That's ok you were probably drunk
— Lauren Dane (@laurendane) May 4, 2013

"when I sucked on it, I realized it wasn't mine." #nocontext #RT13
— Diana Rowland (@dianarowland) May 4, 2013

Did I just crawl acros a table? Maybe. #RT13
— Kiera Cass (@kieracass) May 4, 2013

What do you do after the book fair at #rt13? You find a corner and read of course. twitter.com/SmartBitches/s…
— Sarah Wendell (@SmartBitches) May 4, 2013

Yet must... Keep... Tweeting.... “@badnecklace: I am falling asleep sitting up. #RT13”
— Soap Opera 451 (@SoapOpera451) May 4, 2013

Having an interesting conversation about cow shifters in the lobby of #RT13
— Crista McHugh (@crista_mchugh) May 4, 2013

Overheard: "Stay away from his buttocks." *Snort* - @riewrites #rt13
— Kendall Grey (@kendallgrey1) May 4, 2013

@loreliebrown Are you sure you weren't trying to free a house elf? #RT13
— Mala Bhattacharjee (@badnecklace) May 4, 2013

"The secret is fresh orphans." #RT13
— Kiera Cass (@kieracass) May 4, 2013

Overheard @ #RT13 "I know what Amazon is doing. They're building the Death Star."
— Valerie Bowman (@ValerieGBowman) May 4, 2013

OH at #RT13: "Don't look at me, I gave up panties years ago." --NYT best selling author
— Louisa Edwards (@LouisaEdwards) May 4, 2013

The fans mobbed @jillshalvis and she ran out of books and also skin. #RT13 twitter.com/andrewtshaffer…
— Andrew Shaffer (@andrewtshaffer) May 4, 2013

OH at #rt13: “There’s no juice in there. It’s hard as a rock.” Who said it? Three guesses, and the ones without @victoriadahl don’t count.
— Karina Cooper (@karinacooper) May 5, 2013

@scalzi is spouting gems of wisdom like: "some kids go to Hogwarts, some kids get home schooled." #TaoOfScalzi #RT13
— Leanna Renee Hieber (@Leannarenee) May 5, 2013

I'd take the boob over the bootOverheard at #RT13 Rotflol
— Kat (@The_Book_Tart) May 5, 2013

And then @andrewtshaffer trotted in wearing a horse head. #rt13 twitter.com/jayewells/stat…
— jayewells (@jayewells) May 5, 2013

OH at #rt13: "I'm the boob whisperer."
— Sara Brookes (@Sara_Brookes) May 5, 2013

I just watched @tiffanyreisz ride @andrewtshaffer while he wore a horse mask.
— Sierra Dean (@sierradean) May 5, 2013

The world would be a really sad place if we could only have one book we could loveOverheard at #RT13 @sylday <3 her!
— Kat (@The_Book_Tart) May 4, 2013

Oh, God. This is some weird shit. #RT13
— Victoria Dahl (@VictoriaDahl) May 4, 2013

Writer's Kiss of Death

Always keep reading. It's a stalwart mantra, one that's been drummed into me - and rightly so - by published writers, colleagues, agents, and editors on multiple platforms in the last four years. You'd think this would be a no brainer for the woman who, as a girl, would walk home from grade school nose deep in a book. And who, present day, has been known to snatch a paragraph or two at a red light. Yes, I pay attention to red lights. Occasionally, I even wave at them as I go by...

Books. They do a body good.

I was the kid who read by flashlight long after my parent's patience had ended and Light's Out! echoed down the short hallway from their bedroom to mine. In the fifth grade, I stacked The Outsiders upright behind my textbook to read during Mrs. Luxembourg's class. Oy, what a harridan. In the eighth grade, I hid the burgeoning covers of my old skool romance novels face down on my stack of books to, unsuccessfully as it turned out, avoid getting mocked for my reading material. If I start reading a book at 9 o'clock with the avowed intention to ONLY read for an hour, I know I'm deluding myself, right up to the 2 AM mark when I turn the last page. I will fight sleep, snap at loved ones, ignore my cats when wrapped up in a good book. I always have something on me to read, usually more than one item too, and to leave my house sans a book or magazine is equivalent to going out without my girdle - if I was a 1950s housewife.

Here is my shameful confession: I haven't read a book since April. Hello, my name is Kiersten, I am a bookaholic who has not read a book in three months.

Oh. The horror.

Reading is essential. Yes, all right, it's fundamental too. Yeesh. But for a writer, not reading is the kiss of death. Reading enriches writing; by experiencing the excellent - and occasionally seriously crappy - writing that is out there right now, particularly in romantic fiction (the excellent part, not the crappy) (tho I guess that's there too), one hones and shapes one's craft. I whole-heartily subscribe to this philosophy.

And yet. See above.

The Leaning Tower of TBR

I read a review today on Heroes and Heartbreakers for Loretta Chase's upcoming new release Scandal Wears Satin and realized to my chagrin that despite my mad worship of her writing and books, I have yet to read Silk Is For Seduction, her first novel in this series. It teeters on the top of my leaning tower of TBR along with Carie Lofty's Flawless, Zoe Archer's Devil's Kiss and Roxanne St. Claire's debut contemporary Barefoot in the Sand. I salivate for these books. Not to mention that an unbroken binding is like the wag of an accusing finger from the publishing world. What is my dang problem?

Well, there's the fact that I'm gutting the center of the WIP and restructuring the arcs all of which must be done by RWA Nationals. As you can see by the ticking countdown clock to the right, that outstanding event is coming lickety split, hence my impending aneurysm. And then there's the Internet, specifically social media. I'm never not hooked up to something, even if it's only the caffeine-fueled IV in the crook of my arm that goes by the name of Twitter. Sleep. Sleep comes into play from time to time. I gots skillz, baby. Mad skillz. But even I need to sleep or so I'm told. I should just have my sleep removed and be done with it, but then my Id might manifest in the form of a green oversized demon who could then kill and destroy everything in its path, except - no, wait - dammit, Whedon already beat me to that. Of course, there's Lost Girl and my recapping duties therein, but really, when I think about it, it actually helps infuse what sleep I get with lovely, wolf shifter related dreams....what?! Finally, there's guilt. Oy, da guilt. Every time I plan to read a new book, I think of all the things I should be doing instead, like, say, one and two and three above.

What really sux is that I am deeply missing out. Missing out on excellent stories and storytelling. Missing out on juicy word choice and complex characters. Missing out on honing my craft by examining the paths of those who go before.

Is there something you like to do, something you not only enjoy but is also essential to your work in one way or another, that you're not doing? How do you deal? Leave a comment. Win a book. It's that easy.

Standard disclaimer applies. They make me say that. Images courtesy of Google Images.

Not Polish for Nothin'

Summer has slammed into New Jersey like damn and wow with all three Hs - hazy, hot, and humid - in full account. All I have to do is take one step out of my personal wind tunnel created by cross-posted fans and I'm awash in a perpetual coating of sweat. Lovely.

It's better in October!

Thus I enter the hair dryer-free portion of my calendar year when I pin up my bangs and roll down my windows and let nature and 75 mph on route 287 dry my hair for me instead. But the rest of me still has to get out of the apartment in a reasonably presentable state for the day job.

Yesterday morning, I grabbed my necklace and sandals and immediately plopped myself in the wind tunnel to cool down from that massive exertion. Needing both hands for sandal wrangling, I put the necklace on the bed behind me. I mean, how far could it go?

Pretty dang far, because the irksome thing vanished. Poof! Like some pissed off brownie swept in and snatched it. Honestly, I was so baffled, I spent about .5 of a second seriously considering that possibility. Hollis, perched on the end of the bed purring as she does during my morning ablutions (how did I wind up with a morning cat?!), couldn't be bothered to care, though she was not happy when I shifted her to see if perhaps her ample belly had smothered my necklace when I wasn't looking.

Commence ten frustrated, increasingly sweaty minutes of looking for the stupid thing. I had to decamp without it as I needed to hit the grocery store on my way in to the office for the week's provisions. I went to the store, got to the day job, and proceeded through my morning set up routine. En route to the office kitchen to toast my bagel, I felt something dangling down my leg.

Yup, it was my necklace, which had managed to hook itself on and around the button of my trouser pocket. The back pocket. On my butt cheek.

This means that I sat on it whilst driving, walked around the store with it dangling from my rear, and ditto during the long walk from my car to my desk.

I am not Polish for nothin'.

My boss bravely performed de-butting duties, laughing like a loon all the while. When relaying this story to my friend, she stopped me to point out that somewhere along the way, I'd also lost an earring! (Later found on the floor of my office.) If ever there was a day a should've stayed in bed...

Maybe this is the beginning of a new jewelry line - charms and jewels to adorned the buttocks. Dangling chains to shape and accentuate the gluteus maximus. 'Cause that's the part of my anatomy to which I really want to call attention!

I ended up in the office kitchen guffawing as my bagel toasted, wondering what the rest of my day would bring, how it would ever top this, and whether I'd survive if it did.

Honestly, you can't make this stuff up.

Social Media Links and Tips

This past Saturday, I had the pleasure of converting my organically grown know how of social media into a workshop and delivering it to my local RWA chapter, the New Jersey Romance Writer's of America. No one threw tomatoes or called me a fraud, so result!

I promised to provide them the links I showcased during the presentation. But should they alone have all the fun and brain-aneurysm inducing infodump?

Perish the thought.

Below are listed a few places to find some of the tips and information from publishing professionals that helped guide me to be the social media goddess of all I survey that I am today. OK, so maybe just a demigod. All right, fine, compared with these people, I'm barely a sidekick, but even the sidekick gets a showcase episode once and a while.

A broad tip of the fashionable hat to author Caridad Pineiro for leading me to some of these links in the first place. She absolutely has her own chair in the social media pantheon.

Links to Social Media Tips for Writers

Tweeting 101:A Cheat Sheet

Tumblr Tips for Writers

How to Develop a Routine to Manage Social Media

Pinterest: 13 Things Writers Should Know by Rachelle Gardner, agent

The Ultimate List of Pinterest Tips

  

Ten Things I Wish Authors Knew About Twitter by Angela James, Carina Press Executive Editor

Who to Follow?

Here are several places to find the handles of publishing peeps who you may wish to follow on Twitter grouped by categories.

Bookstores: 

http://wefollow.com/twitter/bookstore 

Literary Agents:

http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/best-literary-agents-on-twitter_b17189

Digital Publishing List:

http://futurebook.net/content/digital-publishing-twitter-list

 

Libraries:  http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/best-library-people-on-twitter_b11945

http://lindybrown.com/blog/2009/01/libraries-on-twitter-updated-list/

Twitter Book Trade Directory

http://www.highspotinc.com/blog/2008/12/a-directory-of-book-trade-people-on-twitter/

Good Twitter Hashtags to Follow

#amwriting

#amediting

#editreport

#askagent

#pubwrite

#womeninpublishing

Feel free to add your own social media suggestions and recommendations in the comments below.

 

Overcome by Obsession

Obsession.

Overwhelming. Overpowering. Overheated.

No, I don't mean the fragrance.

We all have it, that one (or two or three) thing(s) that we can't let go. That habit, that object, that one kind of food, that quirky behavior that stretches the bounds of reason and makes our inner id chortle with glee.

I have an addictive personality. Not that you become addicted to me (though, come on, admit it, you really do), but rather that on the rare occasion when I truly latch onto something obsessively, I am a total goner. No half way mark, no moderation. Complete and total blow out. Though I do wonder why my obsessions can never be about something good like exercising regularly or writing 10,000 excellent words a day.

Because I am who I am, most of my bat-crap crazy levels of obsession occur around media - movies, television shows, and books. We have a term for it in Romancelandia - to glom or glomming. I glom, you glom, he, she, it, gloms. (Sidebar: speaking of conjugation, five years high school Latin and the only verb I took with me is efficio: to make out. I make out. You make out. We make out....)

Glomming is what occurs when one discovers a new-to-you author whose writing hits all your happy spots and that's before you find out he/she has a lengthy back list of work for which you must now set aside your entire life and glom onto these titles in order to immediately read them all back to back to back. When glomming, one loses all sense of time and place outside of the obsession. I call this the James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser effect.

In television, this translates into lost time watching marathons of a show's DVDs, which can span multiple seasons back to back to back if so available. Ditto movies. And that's before we get to the Internet communities that dish and squee and generally happily lose their collective shit over a found mutual love for a shared obsession.

I am nearly gone and absolutely lost in Lost Girl as my newest obsession. You may have noticed as subtlety is not a virtue I tend to cultivate. When I stumbled on the show's U.S. debut in January, I was not prepared for how quickly I would get sucked under its spell. And while not perfect (this is me managing expectations, but if you like urban fantasy genre, you should totally go watch it), it hits my empty Whedon spot on multiple levels and that makes me only too happy to shrug eh - whatever at those glitches and move on.

There is no zealot like the newly converted and boy howdy, did I tell the world about my new obsession, warning my friends and family that I was/am totally aware of how absurd I sound and yet I could/can not stop it. One night during the LSFW conference last month, my friends pulled up pictures of the show on an iPhone so they'd know what I was yammering on about, and collectively burst out laughing at the manic expression that came over me at the sight of sexy, sexy wolf shifter Dyson in situ.

You gotta be able to laugh at yourself, guys, and I excel at it.

I gotta say, I was not prepared for the emotional black hole that arrived after I watched the Lost Girl Season 1 finale in January. I was in mourning for nearly two weeks and an absolute nightmare to to live with, I promise you. Huzzah, show, for turning my insides out with emotional turmoil. I managed to limit my downward spiral to a total Twitter meltdown after the finale aired for U.S. audiences this past Monday night. Personally, I think that shows growth.

It's been a long, long time since I went this far down the obsession rabbit hole. Not like this level of madness can last for long without a restraining order eventually coming into play. By that point, real life is (hopefully) already on the job, dialing me back from the abyss. Yes, I realize how ridiculous it all may sound to someone who doesn't quite Get It, but that's the point. Obsession is ridiculous. Ridiculous and crazy and consuming and often inescapable.

Here's the thing - I freaking love it.

Hot tattoo alert!

I love writing my stream of consciousness recaps for Heroes and Heartbreakers as though there are 300+ people sitting around me laughing and snarking along (plus it lets me write off all my Internet data mining as research. Win!) We're having the best conversations in the recap comments, deconstructing character and motivation, laughing at the sharp dialogue, deep pathos, and shallow digs, reveling in the woman power that is Bo and the sexual frankness the show promotes through her character, not to mention the greatness that is Kenzi and her wicked sharp words, while marveling over Dyson, the big bad wolf boy who hits all my hero hot spots, and his smokin' back tattoo.

I love having passion for something again and the inspiration it breeds in me. I love the romance and the fantasy and converting my friends to the show so they can go mad with me. I love meeting and chatting with other fans (dear Lord, I am a fan) in the great online community that's developed on Twitter (holla!). I love that this is a media savvy cast who not only greatly appreciates their faedom, but interacts with them online and occasionally in person at events. I love the strong, true work they are bringing to this show every single week and that thrill that sparks my veins and makes me silly grin when one of the actors who has entertained me so well in and made me care so much for this show and these characters follows me on Twitter.

I seriously dig the crazy.

Because that's what it takes, what's required in order to create art in any and every incarnation. It takes crazy obsession - with your medium, with your content, with your characters, with your craft, with the voices in your head and the images and word pictures they evolve into on your screen, on your page, on your canvas, or on your stage. We need to dive down the rabbit hole to find the weird rooms with strange food and, OK, sometimes slightly perverted or off-kilter characters in order to produce something magical.

We need to be overcome by obsession in order to create greatness.

By the look of things, I am well on my way.

Tis the faeson. Today's detailed recap for Lost Girl episode 12, (Dis)Members, or as I call it, The Rich and Succubus, is up at Heroes & Heartbreakers. How did I react to the super spoilerific love scene embedded below? "I am a puddle on the floor." There is beaucoup romance tonight between the big, bad wolf boy and the sexy succubus, all of which left me with a ridiculously giddy grin on my face on every re-watch. Check out the clip, or even better, go watch the episode on SyFy channel, then come read the recap and chat with us about what's sure to be fleeting happiness for our heroes.

Once you go fae, you never go back.

Lost Girl - Faetal Justice: Succubus on a Mission

Another week, another post about Lost Girl. Today's post facto detailed recap for Faetal Justice is up at Heroes & Heartbreakers. We're already chatting mightily about the goodness that is a shirtless Dyson, a snarky The Morrigan, and deep, if perhaps lightning fast, relationship progress on the Bo and Dyson front, making me a happy, happy recapper.

Look! A clip!

Lost Girl - Fae Day: Judge, Jury & Succubus

Some day soon, I'm going to have a non Lost Girl post on this site again, but until then, go to Heroes and Heartbreakers for my detailed recap on the latest episode Fae Day. Bean sidhes and goblins and trials - oh, my!

See a sneak peak of the episode below, which thankfully includes some hot wolf this time...not that that's a deal breaker on anything - but it helps!

Lost Girl Recap - Vexed

Vexed is the best episode of Lost Girl yet, a game-changer, and I may have got a tad overzealous recapping but day-am. Filmed as the original pilot to sell the series to the network, it also had the hottest cold open I've ever seen that wasn't on pay cable, emotionally charged, integral to the mythology of the show, and seriously sizzling. The recap is live at Heroes and Heartbreakers so click on over...and you can start with the preview below.

Still Happily Lost in Lost Girl

It's Tuesday morning, and you know what that means - my Lost Girl recap for last night's episode Arachnofaebia is up at Heroes and Heartbreakers.

Check out the tense clip below and then head on over for the recap!

A Jersey Girl Went to Texas...

 
I went to Texas. Seeing that in print makes my eyes squint and my head tilt. It's weird. Innocuous, Out of place. Me. In Texas, which always sounds in my head in William Shatner's voice from Miss Congeniality: TEX-ASS!!

I went to Texas because, as I *may* have mentioned before, I was a finalist in the West Houston RWA Emily Awards in the romantic suspense category. This is the first time I've finaled in a writing contest and I wanted to enjoy the experience to the hilt. Since I came home a winner - I did!

We made a weekend of it, the four of us: historical romance writer Vicky Dreiling who had pushed me to enter the Emily in the first place, myself, my conference wife Anne Baker, (who brought me this great push me button that says things like "Go for the gold! But not in a mean way! Go for it in a character-building way!" and the magnet to the right, which I think we all can agree is deliciously apropos), and Harlequin writer Kristi Gold, whose North Texas accent had a blast with my Jersey ears. We laughed, we talked, we ate and drank and talked about the publishing business and writing and then laughed some more. Good friends are the things that get you through the hard times - but it's a blazing joy to have good times to celebrate with them too.

Emily Pin

The members of West Houston RWA were utterly warm and welcoming, rolling out the Texas and romance hospitality all at once. I had such a lovely day among them, meeting new people, talking about romance, and pitching to agents. Such warmth and instant camaraderie is a unique aspect of romance writers. We're not perfect and any time you get a bunch of women together, the claws almost always will come out eventually whether in private...or, with us, usually in print. But on the whole, the support and generosity in the romance community is one of its finest and most enduring traits.

I love to fly. I love being above everything, as though the whole world has stopped, all the dramas that fill my life pausing while I'm in the air. I love having the unknown ahead. When I drove through Ireland in '99, I didn't even have hotel reservations anywhere.Wherever I landed was where I stayed (made for some interesting nights, I'll tell you). There was a freedom in that, fear sometimes, utter and total panic once or twice, but excitement and liberty above all.

The trip out

I haven't flown anywhere for a few years now, but this short trip to Houston was enough to spark my wanderlust. I'll be in California this summer and Arizona after that and I can't wait to get going.

World's above

Sure, I dread those evils of flying we all live with these days: the boarding and the squishing and the bag fees and the dark thrill of being crammed into a tiny metal tube and propelled into the air 30,000 feet above the earth. I actually love take offs and landing, the thrust of power, the success of wheels touching down again. Once I'm settled in my seat and the window shade is up and the air is clear to the horizon - ah. There's a whole 'nother world up there.


Still, I could never be an astronaut. My rampant imagination would work overtime on all the ways I could die before ever breaching the atmosphere and I'd hyperventilate at the first glimpse of a space suit. But when I'm on a plane, I fully understand the passion astronauts have for space travel, the driving need to return to space almost from the moment they land. It must be an extraordinary thing to look through one of these tiny windows and see the entire world laid out before you in celestial banquet.

There's an oil platform...somewhere

I had the rare treat of being able to meet up with a wonderful Internet (and now real-life) friend that Sunday. She drove us down to Glaveston and the Gulf Coast in seriously crappy weather and we had a great time babbling away to each other. Our sunny moods defeated the cold and cloudy day and we parked and walked along the shore line as I snapped shots with my reluctant Canon camera until in desperation, I finally reverted to the phone cam. What an absolute treat it was to see a visit a new body of water and pick up unique rocks and shells, like I was a kid again at Sandy Hook.












I went to Texas. And I won the contest. And I saw the Gulf. And it's not even March yet. Who knows what else 2012 has in store for me?

Stay tuned.