Margay Leah Justice | From Conception to Birth, Or One Book’s Journey to Publication

Ah, the first blush of romance. The first time you see the idea, sitting there in the corner of your mind, trying to get your attention in that inconspicuous manner these ideas sometimes adopt. You look away, convinced that there is no way this idea could possibly go anywhere. It’s just a fluke, a fling. Surely, you’ll forget it by morning. But when you look back, the idea is still there, sitting in the corner, flirting with you. So what’s a harmless little flirtation? You approach the idea cautiously, in a manner you hope is suave and sophisticated, but as you get closer, your excitement rises. Your heart begins to race. You lick your lips in anticipation. It’s even more exciting up close. So you flirt with it, spend the night with it, take it home with you. In the morning, you’re surprised that it’s still with you. After two months, you begin to believe this idea has a future. So you cultivate it, give up sleep for it, nurture it as it grows within you. Soon, what began as a nugget of an idea in your mind blossoms into a full-blown creature. It grows within you, like a fetus in a womb, becoming bigger by the month, more substantial. You can almost feel it move within you; you carry it everywhere, wherever you go, it’s there with you. All of your energy is devoted to it.

After a suitable gestation period, your little nugget of an idea, which you have affectionately begun to call “the book” while you search for the right title, is ready to make its appearance. Your months of labor are about to pay off as you prepare to deliver your book into the capable hands of the publisher who will introduce it to the world. But wait, his assistant has to help you clean it up a bit first and you are struck by the niggling thought, What if my baby’s ugly? What if I put this out there and no one likes it? But with the reassurances of your publisher, you clean the book up and send it back, maybe with a prayer or two, and you wait. Now it’s time for your baby to prove its worth.

As you can tell from my whimsical tale above, writing and publishing, to me, often mimic conception and birth. The stages of both are remarkably similar. There is the courtship period when you are first introduced to the idea that will one day take over your life. Followed by the get-to-know you period during which you decide whether or not the idea has longevity and you want to commit to it. Once you make that commitment, there is the gestation period – I think you can guess what happens here. The idea grows and grows, taking on a life of its own, convincing you that you are mad, suffering from a hormonal imbalance, or both. But in the end, it’s worth it because you deliver a rollicking, three hundred page epic that someone is bound to love – and not because they’re related to you.

So I guess you could say that Nora’s Soul is the first of my literary babies. She is almost two months old now, having made her debut in November, and growing stronger every day. Bringing her to the attention of the public is similar to the care and nurturing of an infant, requiring constant vigilance. Yet the pay off is that people are noticing her, some are cooing over her, and others even want to take her home with them. She may just be crawling now, but soon she will gain her legs and walk on her own – and I will sit back in amazement like any proud mother, thinking, Wow, I can’t believe I created that! And in the grand tradition of mothers everywhere, I will want to create another one, forgetting all of the pains and labor involved in the process. Keep your eyes open for the debut of Nora’s brother, Dante. Thank you for riding along with me on this whimsical journey into my take on writing. I hope you enjoyed the trip as much as I did.

Margay Leah Justice is the author of Nora’s Soul, from Second Wind Publishing, LLC. Nora’s Soul is currently available on Amazon.com. To read more about Margay and her writing, visit margayleahjustice.com.

Click here for a chance to win a copy of NORA'S SOUL -Today only.

Jan Brogan | Addictive Personality

Reviewers often refer to my protagonist, Hallie Ahern, as both “feisty,” and “troubled,” as if this combination is something of a surprise.

But to me, these traits go hand in hand. Hallie is an investigative journalist, a recovering gambling addict who has to struggle with herself to stay away from the online poker sites. But because she isn’t really addressing her addiction, she still craves the action of a hot table. To get her adrenaline fix, she pushes whatever investigation she’s working on farther than it should go.

In Teaser, Hallie discovers that local teenage girls are featuring provocative videos of themselves on the local social networking site. Hallie discovers this is more dangerous and far reaching than just a teenage whim. When teenage girls start disappearing, Hallie’s story becomes a mission.

Although I’ve never been addicted to anything --except maybe FreeCell-- I’ve had a lot of experience with the addictive personality. People I’ve loved have had to come back from the precipice, and I’ve suffered along on their journey. But I’ve also been fortunate enough to learn that when in recovery, the same personality trait that drives these loved ones to their addictions, also drives them to success.

A compulsive personality is a double-edged sword. The useful side of that sword is a single-minded drive can cut through a lot of obstacles the rest of us just wouldn’t take on.

In truth, a lot of thrillers never made sense to me. Most well-balanced people simply wouldn’t creep through a vacant warehouse or board a drug-dealers boat to try to bring down a child pornography ring. They’d give the information to the cops and let them take the risk.

But in the newspaper world, it’s bad form to give information to police. And if a reporter is terribly ambitious for a story, compulsive by nature, and in need of an adrenaline fix, then all that risk-taking begins to make sense.

To be honest, most super-hero sleuths bore me. I know I should be impressed with their skills, but they seem so one dimensional. And if they are so darn terrific, OF COURSE, they’re going to solve the crime. Where’s the suspense?

In every book, I want the reader to wonder: Will Hallie be able to overcome her own obstacles? Will she wreck her relationship with Matt? Will she go too far this time and ruin her career?

More than anything else, I strive to make Hallie human: fallible, complex, dedicated, compulsive, vulnerable, and self-depreciating. She’s got a good sense of humor and pokes a lot of fun at herself. But she never gives up. The books are about her struggle, not just with the clues of the puzzle, but with herself.

To check out Teaser, go to my website www.janbrogan.com/ and download a first chapter. Or take a look at this trailer:

Sandi Shilhanek | My Reading Resolutions for 2009

I want to start by wishing everyone happy healthy new year! I hope that 2009 is a great year for all.

Every year there’s discussion in my yahoo groups about resolutions. Some people make more personal resolutions about things such being more fiscally responsible, getting healthier by exercising or watching their diets. Some are making resolutions about their TBRs and/or potential reading choices.

Last year I attempted to do an alphabet challenge. This was to have had me reading at least one book by an author whose last name started with every letter of the alphabet. I was doing fairly well at this, and even had been told who to read for X and Z, but then I lost my list of what I had read and gave up. This year I’m going to attempt it again, and can use those authors from last year’s X and Z challenge, because I haven’t read those books yet. I knew procrastination was good for a reason!

This year I’m also going to attempt to join in the challenge the same group is doing and read the selected word of the month. This means picking a title that has a certain word in it. To assist in that I’m currently reading NOT SO SNOW WHITE (snow is the January word) by Donna Kauffman.

Lastly I’m going to work really hard at reading the book for our the DFW Tea Readers Book Group. For January the author is Laura Griffin, and while I won’t read her current book I will be attempting to read her first book ONE LAST BREATH before our meeting.

So, now you know what I’m going to attempt with my reading. I want to know what your reading resolutions are. Would you also like to share your personal ones as well, and perhaps we can form a little support group and cheer one another on during the year.

Sandi
DFW Tea Readers
Readers 'n 'ritas... celebrating literary obsessions

Gwen Reyes | 2009 Goals, Movies and Blathering...

2009 is going to be my year! I've set my goals, realistically of course, and already brainstormed how this is going to happen. I’m looking forward to it no longer being 2008, one of the most difficult and stressful years of my young life, however I’m more looking forward to 2009 being the year of Gwen. I’m ready to leave my comfortable shelter and venture out into the big, bad world.

But honestly before I start anything crazy or at least different, I still have some beefs to address. Yes, one of my goals this year is to stop getting dramatic over silly things (like celebrity gossip and my imaginary boyfriends), but that does not mean I can stop giving my opinion about bad movies and the ever overhyped “Awards Season.” I say that with very dramatic air quotes.

So far only the Golden Globes and a handful of Critics Associations have doled out their opinions and awards. The only one that matters to me is Independent Spirit Awards. You were thinking I was going to say the Oscars, but after watching half of the movies up for consideration, I vote no for the Oscars in 2009. I enjoyed THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJIMAN BUTTON when I saw it under the name of FORREST GUMP or FRIED GREEN TOMATOES. REVOLUTIONARY ROAD lost my interest after I saw the preview before MILK. BUT, that brings me to my favorite studio movie of the year (not counting DARK KNIGHT), MILK.

MILK is a beautifully detailed, however inaccurate some people will say, biography of San Francisco’s first openly gay elected official Harvey Milk. Sean Penn transforms himself into the title character. He completely loses his usual toughness and embraces a tenderness rarely seen from the actor. I could not stop leaning over to my movie buddy to announce how amazing I found the movie and how much I didn’t want it to end.

Just like in TITANIC, we know what happens at the end. Milk foreshadows his own brutal murder in the opening monologue, but by the end of the film you still can’t believe such an influential and prolific figure left us so young. This film unintentionally mirrors the current Proposition 8 controversy in California as Milk battles to stop Proposition 6—the right for companies, leasing offices, and schools to discriminate based on sexual orientation—from affecting the homosexual citizens of California. As the film spans 15 years of Milk’s life, we experience all his ups and downs, pleasures and pratfalls, and his eventual and untimely death. This is the best movie of the “Awards Season,” and I could not think of a more appropriate “thinking film” for 2009.

Gwen Reyes
DFW Tea Readers Group and FILM club

Kate Douglas | Will I get them all written?

I’ve been working on Wolf Tales IX for the past couple of months which, counting the novellas in anthologies, is the seventeenth title in my erotic tales of the Chanku. It’s due for release in January 2010. I remember wondering when I signed the contracts for the third set of novels and novellas if I’d ever get them all written. Now, all of a sudden, the stories I’m contracted for are almost done and I’m waiting to hear from my publisher about plans for more of the series. Characters who were new to me less than four years ago have now become old friends. I know their secrets, their loves, their needs and their fears. I wonder what the future holds in store for them, and I worry about them as if they’re real flesh-and-blood people who matter to me in the way of those I love in real life.

I’m either desperately in need of a good therapist, or totally involved in my imaginary world...and I’m hoping it’s the latter, because it’s such a great world to hang out in. For one thing, it’s filled with fascinating (to me, anyway!) characters with a strong sense of family and a natural code of honor that appeals to me. And, it’s a matriarchal society. Women, quite literally, rule. It begins with their ability to control reproduction and extends to an innate sense of leadership the males are genetically programmed to recognize. While the men are physically stronger and think they’re in charge, when it comes down to a final decision, the women have the last word. For some reason, I find that terribly attractive!

The latest in the series, Wolf Tales VII, has just released. For readers not familiar with the story line, this book might be a good place to begin, as there’s enough backstory to bring everyone up to date. I write the series like an ongoing soap opera, where it’s possible to jump in at any time, but it’s definitely more gratifying to start at the beginning. The one I’m writing now has been nothing but backstory—all the Chanku shapeshifters have gathered for the birth of a new baby, and during the course of the long night, they’re telling the stories of how they first discovered their shapeshifting birthright.

I’m learning things about my characters I never even suspected, so it’s really been a fun book to write. That’s the joy of not plotting. When I sit down to write, every story is a surprise to me. Even more fun, in this particular book I’m telling the stories my readers have asked for—the members of my newsletter were invited to request the stories they wanted to hear, and the response was phenomenal. Wolf Tales IX will be a direct result of their wishes. If you’re at all curious about the series—and if you’re eighteen or over—I have the first chapters of all my books posted at www.katedouglas.com/eroticromance.

Thanks to Fresh Fiction for giving me the chance to blog, and thanks to my readers, who are the only reason I have the privilege of writing my series. I want to wish all of you the very best in the coming year, and don’t forget to make time to read a good book! To help you along I am giving away a copy of Wolf Tales VII on my ONE DAY ONLY blog contest.

Kate Douglas
http://www.katedouglas.com/
www.myspace.com/katedouglas_wolftales

Sara Reyes | Starting a New Year ... in books

Well, Happy New Year!!! It's the beginning of a new year, a new slate, new opportunities and best of all, new books to read!

I always like that bit -- new books -- and there are a bunch to read in 2009. Some of the ones I'm waiting for include: KISSES LIKE A DEVIL the 5th "Devil" book by Diane Whiteside in February, RUNNING HOT by Jayne Ann Krentz, MAYHEM IN HIGH HEELS by Gemma Halliday, JUDAS KISS by J.T. Ellison, THE TEMPTATION OF THE NIGHT JASMINE by Lauren Willig, and for the "voyeur" in me, MEN OF THE OTHERWORLD by Kelley Armstrong. Just a short list off the top of my head to get the year started. Can you tell my tastes are ALL over the spectrum?

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But I think I'm very similar to other readers...I just love to read...and I'm always looking for a new book, a new author, something different. Of course, I also have my comfort reads, thus explains my six copies of LORD OF SCOUNDRELS by Loretta Chase, one of which I just finished re-reading for the upteenth time this past week. And yes, I got a new copy with the current re-issue because you can never have too many "classics" in my ever-so-humble opinion! Another set of re-reads are MEMORY and A CIVIL CAMPAIGN by Lois McMaster Bujold. The new year wouldn't be complete without my Miles shot! And there is a new Miles out soon...well late 2009 or 2010 .. she's been reading chapters I've heard. But until then, I can get my Miles fix with the new VORKOSIGAN COMPANION with complete timeline, essays and more! Who knew I'd be reading a book about books I read? What a concept...

So, what are you looking forward to reading in 2009? Something you'll be re-reading? Or breaking out of your box and trying something new? And are you one of "those" who likes to count books read, pages read? Let us know!

And as a special New Year's prize...I'll give away a brand-new copy of something in our treasure trove of new arrivals! Just enter here or better yet, leave a comment!

Make that a BUNDLE of books, why only one!

Happy New Year...
Sara Reyes
DFW Tea Readers Group
Join us at Readers 'n 'ritas in 2009!

Jeaniene Frost | For love or money?

When I was twelve, I was bitten by the reading bug. It wasn't long after that when I decided to write my own book. I'd already written lots of poetry and short stories, so the idea of making the leap from those to writing and selling a novel seemed easy.

Yes, I had a lot to learn.

Fast forward around fifteen years to the day I told myself, "quit procrastinating and do it already." And so I finally did take one of the many ideas churning around in my head and wrote a novel from it. What I found out after I'd typed The End was twofold: one, I'd accomplished something I'd dreamed about by finishing that novel. Two - and equally important, in my opinion - was that I loved writing.

That doesn't mean pursuing a career as an author was as easy as finally writing that first novel. In fact, if I could rewind the clock and talk to former self on the day I'd finished my first book, I'd say, "Great! Now comes the hard part."

Huh? you might think. Isn't writing a book the hardest part of pursuing a career as an author? Well, for me, it was the easiest and the most fun part, actually. In fact, I've heard several authors say (and I've been guilty of this myself at times) that if they didn't love writing so much, they'd pick another career. There's a lot more to writing than finishing a book. That's where it starts, of course, and if you don't have a completed manuscript, you're reducing your odds of publication to about zero. Yet there are some people aiming for a writing career who say they don't love writing. To me, that's like saying you want to be an artist, but you don't like to paint. Or you want to be a pilot- except you hate to fly.

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Writing is fun for me. I get lost in the worlds I create, and I am happy when my fingers are busy on the keyboard. Without that, the challenges of breaking into publishing would have been too much for me. For starters, most aspiring (fiction) authors have to get a literary agent before they can shop their novel. The reason is that many of the large publishing houses don't accept unagented manuscripts. Rejection is a common part of the agent querying process and yes, it can hurt. Expect rewrites, too, or writing a new book and trying to break in with that if the first one doesn't make it. It's not uncommon for a writer to finally get published on their third, fourth, or fifth book, instead of their first one. Once an agent is secured, you go through the submission process with editors. If you achieve the Nirvana of a publishing contract, then you bite your nails and wait to see if your book is a success or a failure – all while not making very much money to start out.

*grin* Sound dismal? Don't despair, if you love to write, the joys outweigh the challenges.

I know writers who've been trying to get published for well over a decade, yet it hasn't happened. Have they quit writing? No, because it's what they love, so their happiness isn't predicated by a contract.Are there quality writers who may never get published? The harsh answer is yes. I don't believe that compared to every book rejected in publishing in 2006 when my novel was sold, mine was better than all those rejected. Instead, I think mine was put in front of the right editor at the right time.And even though I've been lucky enough to have success with my series, I don't think everything from now on will be champagne and roses. But whatever may happen, I'm investing my time and effort into something that makes me happy, which, when the rough patches hit, makes the whole process worthwhile.

So there's a lot of work involved in a writing career that goes well beyond writing that first book. Without the magic of loving what you do, it's just a job, and one that may or may not ever pay you back the time you put into it. But if you love writing, the good news is that you'll be happy no matter how things turn out, and that, to me, is something worth investing in.

Jeaniene Frost
jeanienefrost.com/