Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Ebook Giveaway - "The Most Important Catch" by Jaclyn M. Hawkes

Book Description:
Run or die!

She knew too much, and she'd seen too much.


And the police refused to help.

Knowing that she was to be the next scheduled death, Kelly Campbell hid under head to toe black leather and a tinted motorcycle helmet and ran for her life. When the weather turned cold, she turned south. She ended up in North Carolina, home to one of the most famed and eligible NFL football stars in the whole league; only she didn't know that. She thought he was a businessman. Not being a huge fan, all she knew was that he was incredibly attractive, kind, generous, and that she was safe with him.

Or was she? His brand of fame proved to be all but deadly, but his fame wasn't nearly as lethal as his attraction. He kept her safe and protected. All except for her heart.

This book is definitely targeted for the LDS market, so there are religious references. If they don't bother you, I think you'll enjoy it.

I loved the development of the two characters, Kelly and Robby, as they got to know each other. My favorite parts were the scenes where they just worked together fixing up his house and learned to care for each other. I loved how comfortable they were together and how comfortable that made me feel. Their similar senses of humor made me smile, and I felt like I would like to know both of them--even if they were both gorgeous. Hawkes kept giving me enough references to how much Kelly missed her family so it was believable and the snippets about the bad guys still hunting her maintained the suspense.

There's a point where my heart just broke for both Kelly and Robby. We're told as writers to hurt our characters and then hurt them some more. And then some more. If you want them to have a happily ever after, they're going to have to earn it.

I've read three of Hawkes' books now, and each one gets better than the last.

So, I'm going to be giving away an ebook copy. It's simple and painless. All you have to do is (1) note in the comment section that you're interested; and (2) include your email address.  I'll let random.org choose the winner first thing on Friday morning.


Monday, May 28, 2012

Thank You

Source
Source
The above photos are from my City's cemetery. Every year the American Legion does the little crosses and flags in honor of the local veterans who are buried there. I drove my husband--a Vietnam vet--there a couple of years ago. When he saw all those flags, he cried.

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

My Epiphany

Ever have one of those days? You've been plugging along, learning new things and trying to find ways to apply what you've learned with your writing. I had one last week, and it made me want to leap out of my seat. I don't know about you, but one of the things I struggle with is the whole Show, Don't Tell thing.

When I first heard about it, it was hard to get people to spell it out, define it for me. They'd quote me Anton Chekov's "Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass." And that's lovely. But as a new writer--who sucks at description--getting my hands around that imagery so I could apply it to my own little scenes was like expecting me to suddenly be able to handle the women's uneven parallel bars.

Um, no. 

Aware of my shortcoming, I've been diligently seeking to understand it, so I can use it. I talked about the Show, Don't Tell class taught by author/editor Annette Lyon at the 2011 Storymakers conference in my blog post here.

The R&R input has shown me some kinds of telling I hadn't recognized as such. I pulled out Annette's PowerPoint, and printed out some key slides to remind me of things--like senses. For example, she suggests that each page should have include at least one other sense besides sight.

So, last week I'm plugging away, evaluating the comments provided by the small publisher while going through my copy of The Emotion Thesaurus, published by the awesome ladies over at The Bookshelf Muse

Smack!

It was like someone had whacked me up side the head. I connected some dots! 

One of the things Annette says is to trust your audience, that when we "tell" them what to feel, we're insulting the reader's intelligence. Instead, let the reader experience it with the character.

Emotions. Duh. 

Sitting in front of me was a single paragraph that identified three emotions. Three! In one paragraph. Where I told the reader how to feel.

You guys are probably sitting there and thinking, "I already knew that."

Shut up. Because I didn't. 

So, I sought out a list of emotions and printed it out, adding it to those nifty slides. I've been busily evaluating each time I've used one. I ask myself if there's a way I can show it with body language. Since this project is in first person, I can show internally or externally.

I'm not necessarily good at the showing yet, but at least now I'm better armed at identifying the places that need attention. This is huge for me.

What about you? What's the hardest thing for you with the showing thing?

Thursday, May 17, 2012

I Love Life . . . and Motherhood (in its many manifestations)

I love my book. 

 I better. 
I'm its mother.

No one, not even my sweet hubby who's been so supportive of my journey, is as deeply invested in it and my characters as I am. Friends and family try to be good sports about it. There's a lot of eye rolling, but I'm used to it. I went through that with them about Harry Potter, too.

They love me me anyway.

With this R&R, I'm on the 13th edit/rewrite. I've spent so many hours in my characters' company that I know them really well. Better than some of my dearest friends--because real people don't spill all their guts.

My life changed when I had my first child, a son. Until that moment, I'd never truly realized the depth of human love. Of a mother's love. It worried me as I prepared for the birth of my second child if the love I felt for my son would be diminished, divided, with the new addition. Or if I might not be able to love the new baby as much.

Stupid woman.

The love for my son didn't lessen with the coming of my daughter, and the love I felt for my beautiful daughter was no less than what I felt for my son. I discovered an important lesson.

Love defies mathematics.

I'd been operating on the assumption that my capacity to love was a finite thing.

Wrong!

With the addition of each child, I found that my capacity to love increased. It grew so I not only had a greater ability to love all these wonderful little people I had the privilege of mothering, but that I had more love for everyone else as well.

So how does this relate to my book? My other baby?

It means it's okay to fall in love with new projects, new characters, new worlds.

*sigh*

I love being a writer.


Have a wonderful weekend. Summer is almost here. 

 Life is good.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Everything Hurts . . .

Yup. This about says it all.
Hubby and I are both ill, and it looks like we shared it
around on Mother's Day.

And that's on top of trying to work through the suggestions on the revise and resubmit. It's interesting that some of the scenes I'd shortened or removed, are being suggested to be embellished. Looks like perhaps I should have followed my original instincts.

Monday, May 14, 2012

Random Acts of Kindness BLITZ


Kindness ROCKS!
Each day people interact with us, help, and make our day a bit brighter and full. This is especially true in the Writing Community.

Take a second to think about writers you know, like the critique partner who works with you to improve your manuscript. The writing friend who listens, supports and keeps you strong when times are tough. The author who generously offers council, advice and inspiration when asked.

So many people take the time to make us feel special, don't they? They comment on our blogs, retweet our posts, chat with us on forums and wish us Happy Birthday on Facebook.


To commemorate the release of their book The Emotion Thesaurus, Becca and Angela at The Bookshelf Muse are hosting a TITANIC Random Act Of Kindness BLITZ. And because I think KINDNESS is contagious, I'm participating too!

I'm selecting two amazing authors today who went out of their way to help me out with my current book that's in submission.

One is Dianne Salerni, author of We Hear the Dead and Caged Graves. When I was struggling with conflicting advice for my query, Dianne emailed me with some suggestions that really helped me see what I needed to do with it and be confident about it.

The other is Laura Josephson, author of  Confessions from the Realm of the Underworld (Also Known as High School) and Rising, Book 1. Laura was also kind enough as she watched me struggle with my query to offer help. She also voluntarily critiqued my full manuscript.


My gift to each of these awesome ladies if an amazon gift card. If you have a minute, please stop by their blogs and tell them how awesome they are.

If you know someone special you'd like to randomly acknowledge, please don't be shy--come join us and celebrate! Send an email, give a shout out, or show your appreciation in another way.

Kindness makes the world go round. 



I know Becca and Angela over at The Bookshelf Muse don't want any attention on themselves during the Blitz, but I need to thank them, too. Because their Emotional Thesaurus blog--now a book as of today--has been a fabulous resource for me. I can't tell you how many times I've run to them to trigger my old lady gray matter. Kudos to you both!


They have a special RAOK gift waiting for you as well, so hop on over to to pick it up.

Have you ever participated in or been the recipient of a Random Act of Kindness?

Do tell!


Sunday, May 13, 2012

That Other Blog

Yep, I'm posting over there today and talking about Mother's Day.

This is my mom (and dad and brother). She died when I was 14.
Happy Mother's Day, Mom.

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Storymaker Conference Report - POV

I think, for me, the most insightful thing I learned came the day before the conference at the Publication Primer--and it came about because of something I'd noticed after I sent in my first chapter of The Swap for review by my group. It had to do with point of view. My instructor was Clint Johnson.

We need to be very careful when we're writing MG or YA that we don't try to view our mc as an adult would. We really need to be IN our MG or YA character's head and see how their adolescent view of the world impacts what we show and how we portray their thoughts.

He gave an example of showing a character sitting at a table in the room where we were gathered. If a woman entered the room and the character at the table noticed she had on red stiletto heels and even what brand of shoe they were, what would that tell us about the character? That she's a woman (or a gay guy into shoes). If the character looked at the woman's chest first, we could assume the character is a guy.

Clint then suggested we consider that the character was a woman who'd given birth to a baby a few weeks ago and was suffering from severe postpartum depression. He asked how differently she might see the room we were in compared to someone who was just happy to be there and whose life was good at that moment.

When we describe what our characters see, it should reflect their life experiences, their current emotional state. What in a busy room draws their attention is important. In fact, it's a great way to show their emotional state without telling the reader what it is.

Clint asked me why my character in the chapter that was being critiqued was acting the way she is. He suggested that if the reason I gave was all there was to her motivation, then she was two dimensional. It really gave me pause. I think I may need to give a little more thought to the internal motivations and finally break down and do up a character bible for each one.

What kind of information do you put together on your characters? Where do you keep it?

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Grammar Wednesday - Lay and Lie

I know. Now that A to Z is finished I had promised to get back to my personality series. However things have been nuts AND I'm going to the Storymakers conference this week--Publication Primer is tomorrow!

Instead I decided to share a little tidbit I found from some work grammar notes. There are some grammar rules I latch on to and don't forget. There are others that I can't get to stick to save my life. The proper usage for Lay and Lie fits into the latter category. I usually let Word's grammar checker tell me which to use.

I know. Scary, right? Your professional creditably left to Word?

*shivers* 

I hope this helps you--and forces this dang rule to stick in my brain.


LAY
A transitive verb (meaning it is always followed by a noun or a pronoun that receives the action of the verb).

It means to put or place.

Forms: lay, laying, laid, (have) laid

LIE
An intransitive verb that does not have an object.

It means to incline.

Forms: lie, lying, lay, (have) lain

Did you spot that? Lay appears as a form for both words! No wonder so many of us are confused! It's a conspiracy, I tell ya!


And look what's coming out this weekend. 

Anybody planning to go to the opening?
Hubby and I'll have to go next Monday.
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