"Any change, even a change for the better, is always accompanied by drawbacks and discomforts." ~ Arnold Bennett
Any friend or family member of mine would wholeheartedly agree with the statement that I am not a creature of habit. I don't like to continually do things the same way, I embrace change at every opportunity.
I don't see it is as being a personality flaw or as being "flighty." I see as more as being optimistic that a new way of doing anything might be better than the old. That roads fork for a reason - and temptation to try something new isn't always bad.
One of the workshops I attended at the RWA National Conference was on "Twitter, Facebook and Websites" with Jayne Ann Krentz (I adore her, btw!) I sat with my trusty notebook and checked off my list. Website - yes. Blog - yes. Twitter - yes. Facebook - yes.
While I have all the ingredients for a successful online persona, I'm not getting the most bang for my bucks.
Which brings me here to my very own blog.
If you've been to my website before and are a frequent reader of my blog - you may skip the rest of my website and come straight to the blog. If you do happen to land on my homepage, you'd notice a change. My latest release is now front and center, with an excerpt and buy link easily spotted! You also might notice my sidebar has a Facebook widget - a suggestion I heard several times during that workshop.
Facebook seems to be a great tool for an author to connect with readers and it's easier for them to comment and connect with authors by being logged into their own facebook account. If you haven't "liked" me yet - please take a minute and click on the yellow facebook button on the top right of the blog sidebar!
And now on to the toughest part for me - the blog. Having my own blog is fun and has given me an outlet to vent and stretch my fingers in the early morning hours when the coffee is just beginning to flow through my veins. But it's time for me to admit it might not be the best use of my creative time.
I am NOT shutting down the blog, but I will not be blogging as often as before. Instead, I've decided that the best thing for me might to be share the blogging experience with other bloggers on the same path with me. Fellow authors. I already blog once a month at the Otherworld Diner (a paranormal romance author group blog) and now I will be blogging more on two other group blogs - Dunes & Dreams RWA and Passionate Critters.
I'll be adding links to all the blogs into my navigation bar across the top of my website, so my readers will always know where to find me.
To my faithful readers, I'll still be here. And thank you for reading.
Welcome to Writing Inspiration Friday with my guest blogger, Kaily Hart! Thanks to Kaily for stopping by today to spread a little bit of inspiration with readers of the Saucy Scribe! As usual, there's a contest after the post for commenters, don't forget to come back Monday to see if you're the lucky winner!
Inspiration. It’s a funny thing, for me anyway. Sometimes it’s difficult to say where it comes from. Sometimes it’s really hard to pinpoint the birth of an idea, a concept or a premise. Sometimes when people ask me ‘how did you come up with that?’, I just have to say I have absolutely no idea. LOL.
I can certainly pinpoint specific things in the story and know where they originated from. It’s usually from my own background or history, it could be something I’ve seen or heard, something I’ve read about and it layers itself in somehow. But it’s the feel of the story, the characters and the tone of their journey, that really stumps me because they’re not anyone I’ve ever met or come across before. Often their struggles are not mine. They’ve been developed solely from my imagination.
Picture This, my first book from Ellora’s Cave was like that. I can highlight very specific things in the book and know exactly where I drew them from, but the premise? I don’t know. It just ‘formulated’ in my head somehow. The characters? I’m not sure, they just came to me and started talking. Actually, they insisted I write their story (in very loud voices) and I had no choice. I’m not nuts. Really! I’m not one of these people who always knew deep in their hearts or their souls that they were meant to be a writer. I’m not one of these people who have always been driven to write, often from when they were children. I was on a very different path, both personally and professionally when I found myself taking a ninety degree turn and ended up writing a hot and steamy romance.
That was only just under two years ago. Now, it lives in me, the need to create and craft and shape the stories I have clamoring in my head and I couldn’t imagine doing anything else. I guess it might have been there all the time, just very successfully masked. Where ever the heck it comes from? I just hope it continues so I can keep doing what I’ve come to crave and to love!
Picture This
Desperate and young, Jillian Moore did something she knew would one day come back to bite her in the ass. She’d posed nude. For money. Years later, and on the fast track to a successful career, she’s still haunted by her mistake. She can’t help but wonder when her past will catch up with her.
Samuel Steele is not short on female attention, but the women who warm his bed pale in comparison to the fantasy he’s created of the seductive temptress in the painting hanging prominently in his bedroom. A fantasy that has ruined his once satisfying sex life. When he discovers that her exact likeness works in his building—for him—things get…interesting.
Kaily is giving away a free download of her book, Picture This, randomly to a commenter on this post. Contest is open through midnight Sunday August 8. (For extra chance to win, subscribe to the Saucy Scribe blog by email and/or GoogleFriend me on the sidebar!)
Welcome to Writing Inspiration Fridays! Today I'm proud to have David Bridger as my guest. He's here to share some of what inspires him to write romance. Thanks for being here David!
My grandmother's name was Mary. I called her Nan. She was a twinkly-eyed rogue, and for many people that's all they ever saw of her. But she was deeper than that. A lot deeper.
Nan came from an Irish Catholic family who moved from Cork to northwest England before her birth in 1914, and when she married into my grandfather's English Protestant family she left her church behind. Or so it seemed, to most people I guess, and certainly to me when I was a boy.
But she never did leave it behind. She simply took it underground and expressed it occasionally in the form of mild superstitions. I remember her doing that, and I joined in the fun with her.
There was never any unpleasant edge between us. I honed my youthful wit on her, and she gave me back as good as she got. We used to laugh a lot, often to the point of near incontinence. But I also remember that some others weren't so gentle about her religion, and I'm sure that's why she kept her beliefs close to her heart for most of her life.
After Grandad died, she returned to her church. I was still only a young man when she died, and although I was away at sea for most of her final years in retirement, I know she remained independent and active and very happy.
Nan inspired me to write.
She was a wonderful storyteller. She held me spellbound, effortlessly, with tales of big family childhood days involving all the siblings and cousins I knew as grown-ups, and of Saturdays and school holidays helping in the dockland café her family ran; of long hard hours when she entered "service" as a maid straight from school; and of how she'd worked her way up to the position of cook by the time she was twenty-five.
She used to grin and wink when she reached the bit where she got the job of Head Cook in a big hospital just as the Second World War started, which always suggested to me that there'd been a degree of blagging involved.
Because she was a blagger, and proud of it. She'd definitely kissed the Blarney Stone, which no doubt helped her move on from the hospital to a better job in a posh school after the war, and then helped her move up the ladder again a few years later to the position of Catering Manager in a big maritime manufacturing company on the banks of the River Mersey.
That was where she was when I came along. She stayed with that company for the rest of her working life, overseeing a scarily busy commercial kitchen that served hundreds of employees in the working men's cavernous café, a smarter café for the office workers, the managers' quiet restaurant, and the directors' luxurious dining room.
When I say she was a blagger, I don't mean she couldn't do her job. I remember how not only her personal office but also that whole huge kitchen and all the restaurants were filled with her personality. She shaped the place, and there was no blagging involved in that.
What I mean is that in her early life, she never let anything prevent her from shooting for her dreams. She would assure the appropriate someone that a task was well within her capabilities, and then she'd make sure it was. Somehow. Always. She was like a swan, all smiling capability on the surface while she paddled like hell under the water. That was a big part of her storytelling skill, too.
Thank you, Nan. I still hear your stories in your lovely voice, all these years later, and I still smile. You've never left me. I love you.
Bio:
David Bridger and his wife settled with their three daughters and two monstrous hounds in England's West Country after twenty years of ocean-based fun, during which he worked at various times as a lifeguard, a sailor, an intelligence gatherer and an investigator. He writes paranormal romance and urban fantasy.
Blurb:
Saul the Bastard is a fallen angel who works as a bounty hunter for powerful urban demon families. Rebecca Drake, a modern day demon princess, is being hunted by dangerous desert demons. When Rebecca’s family hires Saul to protect her, they are both unhappy with the arrangement, but before long sparks fly as they try to resist their strong mutual attraction. For the first time in living memory, Saul has someone to love; someone he is scared of losing; someone the desert demons have marked to be their next sacrifice.
Visit David at his website for more information on him and his books.
CONTEST: David has graciously offered one free download of his book to one lucky commenter! Comment before Sunday, Aug. 1st at 11:59pm to be entered to win. *Get an extra chance to win by subscribing to The Saucy Scribe by email and/or by GoogleFriending me - both found on the sidebar*
Welcome to Writing Inspiration Friday here at the Saucy Scribe Blog! Today I'm pleased to have Angelika Devlyn in the house to talk about what inspired her to take up the pen and write erotic romance!
For as long as I can remember I’ve always been a voracious reader, passionate about everything from fantasy to horror to crime. And then I discovered two things I’d never even looked at before - e-Books and erotica. Well, what can I say? Just like that all important first line in a book, I was hooked. I devoured books as though they were going out of fashion. Clearly, e-Books are a relatively new thing here in England and slow to catch on, but out of fashion they are not.
What surprised me most about these erotic stories was my own attitude towards them. After I’d shaken off the ‘dirty old-man mag’ mentality (because in my town all the paperbacks are on the top shelf) I began to realise that there was much more to these sensual stories than at first it would seem. They had a plot! They could be just as suspenseful as a mainstream adventure, but the sex was better. It wasn’t just added in there as a contender for the worst sex in a book award, these authors had taken the time to use sex to move the plot forward and create a story which more-often-than-not pushed the boundaries in a tantalising and erotic way.
The realisation of what a good erotic story contained represented a crossroads in my life, and I made a pact with myself to get my arse moving and just do what I’ve been thinking about for years - write.
The rest, as they say, is history, but with the tenacity of a hungry tiger, a “take-no-prisoners” attitude, some very supportive friends and many hours and words later, I finally sent my manuscript off and had my story accepted.
Since I’ve not had many reactions to it yet I cannot say what readers will feel about my maiden novel. Nor can I share with you any reviews at this stage. The road to future publications may be a rocky one full of obstacles, unexpected interruptions and hidden black ice. It might even be a fun sleigh ride, like those Calvin and Hobbes go on - only less dangerous - who knows? What I can say, however, is that whatever the future holds, I am determined to keep going; to crack on and break through the ice casing barriers of my mind and just do it!
I want to learn, improve and move on to bigger and better things. I can’t promise myself that will definitely happen or see into the future like the Birds of Doom that have escaped Raven’s Passage in my book, but I do know that to write a story you have to write! Anyone can dream, write lists (which I do a lot) and make goals, but to achieve them is not easy. To stay focused, take action regularly and above all never give up is hard work. You too can smash down that wall of ice which separates you from achieving your goals. And without a pick-axe in sight. All you need is a steely determination and the willingness to see it right through to those last all important words- THE END.
Black Ice: The Dark Kingdom Chronicles is my debut book and the first in the series of the erotic adventures of Ronnie Weaver - a girl transported to another world where the Pandora witches are after her blood. Ronnie will leave behind her safe and comfortable life for one of high adventure, steamy sex and exotic mysticism.
My question to your readers is - If I could snap my fingers and grant you an adventure of a lifetime, what would you ask for?
I will be hanging around to check for comments today. So please do drop me a line. I love to chat.
Angel
Thanks Angel for being here today!
CONTEST! Angel has graciously offered a free download of her first erotic novel to one lucky commenter! Winner will be drawn from comments made before Sunday July 25th at 11:59pm and the winner will be posted on the blog Monday morning - so don't forget to come back and check!
*Email subscribers and GoogleFriends - both found on my sidebar - get extra chances to win each week when they comment*.
Welcome to the newest blog feature here at The Saucy Scribe Blog! For at least the next few months, every Friday you'll find a post about what inspires writers to write or what inspired their latest release. Be sure to check out the sidebar for a list of guests!
Today, I'm going to kick the idea off and tell you a little about what inspired my first novella, The Kandy Shoppe. If you stick around to the end of the post, and comment, you could win one of two prizes. Winners will be chosen at 11:59pm est Sunday evening and announced Monday morning, so you have all weekend to comment!
I'll be honest, I never thought about writing a novella. All my plots and books up to that point were novel size. I had just finished a book that was pretty emotional for me and during the period of "letting it sit and stew" I flipped through my notebook of ideas.
Nothing was strking enough of a cord to make me want to dive in and write that story - you know that feeling of "OMG I have to write this before I bust open!" - Nope not happening.
Being between books is NOT the most inspirational time for me, it's when I doubt my ideas, it's when I wonder if I'll ever have another idea good enough for a whole entire book.
In the middle of a funk I found myself in the local grocery store - in front of the ice-cream freezer making the earth-shattering decision of what flavor ice cream I would drown my sorrows in - when inspiration struck.
At that moment all I could see was a little old-fashioned ice cream palor, a broken freezer and one hot-damn sexy freezer repair man!
And even though I was NOT an erotic writer - this was an erotic story begging to ooze from my fingers - and it was a short story. (Honestly, that fact alone surprised the heck of me - I'd never considered trying my hand at a novella until that day.)
After a little bit of convincing from my critique group and few trial runs flexing my erotic muscles (on paper!) the story took on a life of it's own.
Not only did it sell quick - it was the debut book for a brand new ePublisher, Blade Publishing.
I can now honestly say that I never know where the inspiration for my storylines might come from or what direction they might take.
Do all ideas that are born in crazy places like the frozen food section of the local grocery story often turn into stories? No, they don't. But I do keep my eyes, ears and heart open at all times, with a pad at the ready - in case that inspiring moment does come along!
I hope my story inspires you to go out today and write something different than your "normal" story - explore a new idea, a new direction or simply take a different path!
Thanks for reading! Since this is the debut of Writing Inspiration Friday's, I'll be giving away two prizes today. Chosen randomly by an uninterested party (my daughter!) one commenter will win a free download of The Kandy Shoppe (pdf or mobi, which can be read on kindle if you prefer) and the other will win a pkg. of acid-free scrapbook stickers in, of course, an ice-cream shop theme!
(Want to increase you chances of winning every Friday? Subscribe to my blog by email - put your email in the box to the right and submit - and your comments on every Friday post automatically count twice! "Friend" my blog with Google Connect - also on the sidebar - and you add another chance every Friday you comment!)
"Advances in computer technology and the internet have changed the way America works, learns and communicates. The internet has become an integral part of America's economic, political, and social life." ~ Bill Clinton
As a published author I've found myself a minion in the Google army and their attempt take over the world. Yes, I am addicted to the "Google Alerts!"
Never heard of a Google Alert?
Let me enlighten you. From your Google account (and don't tell me you don't have one - doesn't everyone have AT LEAST one gmail account?) you can set up an alert for just about anything you want to track on the web. I've got things like the titles of my books, my publisher, my name, etc.
Through the wonders of Google, I get an email everytime one of those things I've got an alert set for - gets Googled or is written about somewhere on the web! Reviews - I don't miss them! Blog posts with my name or book title - I see them! So, I don't need to mention that if you mention me in your blog post - I'll found out and be able to comment.
For me I think of it as another marketing tool in my box (or maybe it's just another way for me to procrastinate?)
So the question is, if my alerts all relate to me - am I really stalking myself? Or am I just being are narcissistic? (Who me? Nah...)
So here's the question for you to ponder over the weekend - do you have Google Alerts? How do you use them? Plan on trying it out? (Okay, that's more than one question - but I'm allowed - it's my blog )
At 9 o'clock Saturday morning, dressed casually (some of us in PJs!) and armed with food and laptops - the ladies of Dunes & Dreams Romance Writers descended upon fellow member Kathy's home. Kathy greeted us all with mimosas in gorgeous champagne flutes!
Our first annual "writing in pajamas" day started off with an assortment of croissants, fruit and bagels (and coffee!!) while we hosted a quick meeting.
After the business was completed, we ate some more (and drank more coffee!)
We brainstormed and critiqued.
We dispersed around the house to find a quiet place to fire up the laptops and netbooks and spent time writing. (Okay, there was some texting going on between myself and Trish who was sitting on the other side of the room from me, but it was writing related, I think. )
We met again over lunch and dessert (more coffee and chocolate!)
More brainstorming, more ideas and several minutes of tossing out book titles.
By the time I dragged my ass home (around 4pm!) I was re-energized about my current story, happy knowing I have found one of the best group of writers to share my journey and pumped up about my choice of agent/editor appointments for the upcoming RWA National Conference in July.
The drive home may have been short for me (about 10 minutes) but I didn't need that long to come to the realization that this is exactly what a writing group should be. It's about the honesty, the friendship, the leaving of all egos at the door to put yourself out there for a fellow writer - no matter where they are on the publising food chain.
Kathy G was a wonderful hostess and I think we left her with enough food to feed an army!
The Saucy Scribe, proudly serving up the Sauce since June 2005! One bold writer telling it like it is.
Thanks for stopping by the blogging home of romance author Debora Dennis! I'm a wife, mother of three great kids (one on the autism spectrum) and a writer. This is the place I hang my hat to let my hair down and ramble on about my life.
Grab a chair and drink and get ready to Dish with Debora, saucy style. All comments, rants and raves contained in this blog are strictly my unvarnished opinions or delusions that are alive and well in the vast recesses of my own wild imagination.
I love comments, but lurkers are welcome too! Just know I'm glad you found me and hope you come back again soon!
From your Google account (and don't tell me you don't have one - doesn't everyone have AT LEAST one gmail account?) you can set up an alert for just about anything you want to track on the web. I've got things like the titles of my books, my publisher, my name, etc. 
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