Thursday 13: Thirteen Books I Brought Back from RWA Nationals

1. The Unfortunate Miss Fortunes, Jennifer Crusie, Eileen Dryer, Anne Stuart (and signed by the latter two, plus they gave me a Dogs and Goddesses bumper sticker! Squee!)
   
2. Betrayed, Jamie Leigh Hansen
   
3. Night’s Rose, Annaliese Evans (ARC) (a person I was in line with convinced me to get it—all they had to say was “erotic fairy tale” and I was so there!)
   
4. Eve of Darkness, S.J. Day
   
5. Night Keepers, Jessica Anderson (why didn’t I think of writing a contemporary fantasy about the Mayan end of the world in 2012, oh why?!)
   
6. Dark Needs at Night’s Edge, Kresley Cole (yeah, it’s a vampire novel, but it’s also got the ghost of a famous ballerina from the last century)
   
7. A Little Bit Wicked, Victoria Alexander (I don’t “get” Regencies, but I’ve been saying that I’d be willing to read a good one, and this was a freebie, and she was a great speaker)
   
8. What a Lady Wants, Victoria Alexander (see #7)
   
9. Skinny Dipping, Connie Brockway (Phaedra took one look at the title and said “Oh, a book for you!”)
   
10. No One Heard Her Scream, Jordan Dane
    
11. The Undead Next Door, Kerrelyn Sparks (another vampire one, but it looks funny, so I ‘ll give it a try. I know there are good vampire books out there…I just don’t always know how to find them)
    
12. Silent in the Sanctuary, Deanna Raybourn
    
13. The Hollow, Nora Roberts (okay, technically I’m cheating with this one, since I bought it beforehand to read on the trip. But I brought it back with me, too, and this is Thursday Thirteen and I needed a 13th book. ::gg::)
    

If I had more time/energy/wherewithall, I'd post links and covers, but...nah!

July stats

8 stories subbed
8 stories rejected
1 story sold

9 novel submissions (for 2 novels)
2 novel rejections (same novel)

Sale! For a good cause!

It's a reprint sale, but still one to be delighted about! "Just Be" will appear in the Phaze Books charity anthology Coming Together: At Last. All proceeds of the Coming Together anthologies go to a charity or relief fund, including breast cancer research, the 2007 Southern California wildfires, HIV/AIDS, and more. Coming Together: At Last is a collection of interracial erotic fiction and will benefit Amnesty International. I'm proud to be a part of it!

The anthology will be out in 2009; I'll post ordering information when I have it.

* "Sale" is something of a misnomer, as I will only receive some comp copies. Normally I don't write for no pay, but this was for a really good cause!

Photos from RWA Nationals

My photos from RWA Nationals can be viewed here. No telling when I'll have the brainpower to write up the experience (today was mostly a washout) but rest assured it was fabulous!

Writers in some of the photos:

Teresa Noelle Roberts (one of my coauthors and best friends)

Phaedra Weldon (the other half of my brain)

Christine Ashworth (my travel buddy and dear, dear friend)

Portia da Costa

Madelynne Ellis

Eden Bradley

Jax Cassidy

The cat from Wales

Home from RWA Nationals. Dead tired, yet somehow floating. Maybe that's the wine. Or the information and experiences swirling in my brain.

More when I'm coherent again!

All the ways of my life, I'd rather be with you

Ten years ago today, my beloved and I ran off to Gretna Green, Scotland, and eloped.

It wasn’t our first plan, not by far. We’d gotten handfasted in California as an engagement ceremony before we moved to Wales, and intended to move back in a year and plan a big SCA wedding. But the British government had other plans. Apparently my plan to stimulate their economy by being supported by my husband and spending lots of money on tourist travel and antiques and whatnot was only feasible to them if we had this particular piece of paper.

(They lied, by the way. We didn’t have to be married for me to get that damned visa. They lied and took away my lavish ceremony. Two husbands, three ceremonies [four if you count the handfasting], and I still haven’t had what I’d consider the perfect ceremony. I’ve come to terms with that. Goodness knows two of the ceremonies are such great stories, nobody would believe them if I wrote it in a book. Large ceramic ALFs. A drunken Scotsman trying to beat down his new bride's door. That's just the tip of the iceberg.)

But I digress. The point is, if we had to get married, in Britain, this was the place to do it.

Our attendants were Elizabeth and Chris Flagge, SCAdians we’d met only twice before. When they heard at our second meeting that we were running off to elope, they asked who our witness were, and we said, “Erm, we were just going to grab someone out of the chip shop across the street…” They brought something old, etc., as well as a bouquet for me, which was so unexpected and sweet (I still have the pence for my shoe). They also brought Elizabeth’s (I think) mother, who took pictures and was just lovely. (Sadly, we’ve lost touch—if you’re reading this, guys, send me an address or phone number!)

We were married in the Registry Office in the room for 20 people (remember, there were only 5 of us, and 4 of us were standing up) because the room for 8 was already booked. Our Registrar, Donna, had a delightful Scottish accent.

Afterwards, we had our picture taken over the historic anvil, took our entourage out to lunch, then hopped on the bike and spent the weekend in the southwest of Scotland.

It’s strange…we don’t usually celebrate this anniversary, because it’s just not the important one for us. The day we moved in together (February 25, 1996) was really the day we made our commitment to each other. Our handfasting (March 14, 1998) comes a close second. This one, not so much.

Today is our 10th, though, and we have to celebrate it apart, and that’s making me feel maudlin and droopy.

So I’m looking at pictures of that day (except I can’t find the one of us and the anvil), and quietly celebrating that even if we can’t be together, we are together. 983 miles means nothing to the heart.

So tell me something about the person (or persons) of your heart. About your ceremony (any kind) or your favorite memory. Help me celebrate this day….

I broke down...

...and joined Facebook. Drop by and say hi!

(I'm already on MySpace here.)

LoJ 2008 photos!

Labyrinth of Jareth photos finally uploaded—you can view them here!

Submit or perish!

Pooh. Realms of Fantasy passed on “Oroflex (Patent Pending),” saying “this is a cute fairy tale variant, but I’m trying to cut back on those a bit.” Just my luck to get an editor who’s on a literary subgenre diet!

But I had a stack of returned stories to send out today anyway, so here’s what happened:

• “Soulsearching” to Coyote Wild
  
• “Hell’s Belles” (reprint) to Clonepod
  
• “The Queen’s Gardener” to Doorways
  
• “Matchmaker” to Serpentari.us
  
• “A Familiar(’s) Tale” to Renard’s Menagerie
  
• “Oroflex (Patent Pending)” to F&SF
  

I have no idea where to send “A Father’s Blessing” right now, but some markets open up on 8/1, so I can wait a week or so.

---

Currently Reading: Heaven Sent, Christina Jones
Lately Listened To: 7 Deadly Zens, Tommy Shaw
Recently Watched: Graham Norton, The Middleman

Onslaught...brace yourself!

I just added back posts from 7/4, 7/6, 7/7, 7/8, 7/9, and 7/11, in case anyone's interested.

Now I have to catch up about Labyrinth of Jareth, my talk at the Alternative Lifestyles Group, the latest Styx show, Meg's visit…but right now, I'm off to the gym!

Important note to self

It's perfectly acceptable to stay up until 3 a.m. Thursday night when you've gotten home from a Styx show at 1:30 a.m. and you're still buzzed from all the love your boys showered on you (it was, after all, your 75th show. And you did put a light stick in your cleavage.).

It's entirely acceptable to stay up until 3 a.m. Friday night because Meg is visiting and you can't stop talking to each other.

It's not acceptable to stay up until 3 a.m. tonight, because you have to be on the road to the LARA meeting at 8 a.m.

This is your only reminder. Pay attention…

Fabulous Whitby is finally here!

Great news! The anthology Fabulous Whitby, which contains my story "Proof of Devotion" (which I wrote all the way back in 2002 at the Oregon Coast Writers Master Class!), is finally available!  ::squee bouncity::

Right now, amazon doesn't seem to be supporting it well: amazon.com doesn't list it at all, and amazon.co.uk and amazon.ca are listing it as out of stock or whatnot.

The good news is, you can order it from a place called York Publishing Services out of the UK.

The better news is, they charge only $3.99 to deliver to the US, which is the same as what they charge to deliver in the UK (using the current exchange rate). That's right—international shipping is the same as UK shipping!

Click on the link above to go to the Fabulous Whitby order page. I'm soooo excited about this one. I'm in an anthology with Liz Williams and Esther Friesner and Cherith Baldry and Jay Lake andandand…!

Haunted Hearths: more great reviews!

Rainbow Reviews called my story the "the unexpectedly romantic heart-wrenching 'Some Old Lover's Ghost.'"  ::beam::

Queerhorror and Bay Windows also have lovely things to say about the anthology as a whole. Yay!

Everything, all the time

Rejection from Intergalactic Medicine Show for “Matchmaker.” For anyone keeping score, that’s four rejections in six days.

However, I think I forgot to mention a sale! Teresa and I sold “Food for Thought” to Best Lesbian Love Stories 2009. We brainstormed that story on a drive from San Jan Capistrano to Westminster, and first subbed it in 2004.

~ ~ ~

You know you’re an Eddie Izzard fan when all someone has to say is “penne all’arrabiatta” and you start to giggle.

~ ~ ~

I spent almost an hour at the chiropractor’s today, trying to get my body back into alignment because every. single. part. of. me seemed to have gone walkabout. I have to admit, after a few weeks of feeling “energetic” (which I realized really was “normal” for most people), I’ve been rather despondent by this turn of events.

~ ~ ~

Dave arrived safe and sound from the UK, although the shuttle trip that took 1.5 hours in May took 3+ hours today… Then again, it included two cushy gated communities, one of which Britney Spears is allegedly moving to. We went out for dinner at Armando’s because I’ve had no brain or impetus to gather food to actually cook.

~ ~ ~

My faerie skirt is done donity done done done! (Well. Unless I add little flowers to the dags in front. The jury’s still out on that. And bells. It might need bells.) Morgana’s outfit is done. Brian only needed to do his leafy bits, and they’re done. Tomi is still phutzing, but she came into this late—she’s buying Ken’s ticket and is mostly just using her Russian, but she wanted to add to it.

~ ~ ~

Tomorrow we collect 9 sweet kittens and their mama and deliver them to Morgana’s friend Michelle for fixing and shots and whatnot, and then we’ll have dinner before heading off to the Masquerade. Finally! We’ve been wanting to do this for years, and I’m gobsmacked that it’s actually going to happen…

Wait...what day is it?

Apologies for the recent silence. My back has been acting up, resulting in me taking half a muscle relaxant on two separate evenings, which resulted in the day between those pretty much disappearing in a fog. I'm now behind and confused.

Plus, I've been violating my cardinal rule of costuming by working on my Labyrinth of Jareth costume this week—and paying for it. Plus I've been helping Morgana with hers, because it's a project she wouldn't have undertaken (redoing her utterly gorgeous wedding outfit, a cream velvet German) if I hadn't said I would help. The good news is, my skirt is done except for covering the grommets (which isn't required for actual wearing, but is nice and prevents anything getting snagged). The better news is, it looks beyond awesome! But we still have to get together tomorrow night to finish up hers…

Plus our friend Dave from the UK arrives tomorrow, and LoJ is Saturday, and I've got a speaking engagement on Sunday that I'm not yet prepped for and then taking Dave to Pasadena for his conference. Did I mention our cleaning lady has essentially retired to care for her ailing father? And the house is a mess?

Ah well. It's not like anything tragic has happened. And once I have a moment to breathe, I'll finish up all the partial journal entries I have written and inundate you all!

Descent into...meh

A double-whammy of rejections:

• GUD passed on “A Father’s Blessing.”
  
• Podcastle nixed the audio rights to “Hell’s Belles,” which I still think would be great as an audio piece. Hmmm…
  

~ ~ ~

Today was…meh. Whether it was the lingering effects of the muscle relaxant or the precursor of my now-elusive period, all I know is that I was grumpy, tired, unmotivated, unfocused, and still uncomfortable even after my chiro adjustment. My chiro said I could work out, but at a fraction of what I usually do, and it didn’t seem worth the time to drive to Bally’s.

Whee

My back/hip’s been bothering me for a couple of days now, and my massage therapist, who for several weeks has been struggling to fill the time because I’ve been in such good shape, could’ve spent hours on the muscles that were essentially making it hard to find my spine. =8-0 So I popped half a prescription muscle relaxant, took a long bath in Epsom salts, and generally called the day a bust. Hopefully tomorrow the chiropractor will put things back where they ought to be (and the relaxed muscles won’t pull things back out of whack 0.2 seconds later), and all will be well with the world.

For now, though: whee.

You can never have too much glitter and lace

Today Morgana, Tomi, Elizabeth, and I got together for a rare Girls’ Day Out. Elizabeth needed lipstick from The Body Shop, so we all trooped to the mall for lunch (California Pizza Kitchen, where three of us had salads and one of us had a Asian-wrap appetizer) and shopping. (Which is rare because most of us shun the mall for the most part!) Everyone but me bought lipstick (they didn’t have any shades that were good for me, and I like the brand I’m using anyway), and we came away with a few other products as well (moisturizers, under-eye-circle cream, etc.). Then it was off to Hot Topic and Torrid, where I loaded up on purple hair extensions, purple glitter eyeliner, body glitter (silver and a peacock mix), and purple glitter nail polish, all for Labyrinth of Jareth this weekend.

Afterwards, Morgana and I hit a couple of fabric stores and I picked up lace trim for my faerie skirt. I may not have time to put it on before Saturday—the skirt has to be wearable, and can survive without the extra bits if I run out of time. I hate working on any of it this late, but it is what it is. I’ve been so focused on work that costuming has taken a back seat these past few months.

Still, it’s going to look fucking awesome, and yes, there will be pictures!

~ ~ ~

Woo hoo! It’s been confirmed that I’ll be signing at the “Readers for Life” Literacy Autographing at RWA Nationals this year! Last year Teresa and I were there (as Sophie, natch) but our books weren’t. This year I’ll be there as Sarah Dale—fingers crossed that I’ll actually have things to sign this time ‘round!

Glowing

Feh. Rejection from Lace & Blade for “Soulsearching.” And here I thought that was a perfect match. But since I think Lace & Blade is an awesome anthology theme, I’m just going to have to write another story before the deadline!

~ ~ ~

Spa Day was über-fabulouso! We had eight ladies, although two left early due to other commitments or whatnot, so we had two tracks: facial and hand/foot. Plus massages done by my own amazing therapist, Melanie. (Six ladies got massages. I was the floater and ended up passing because Melanie was exhausted…but I was scheduled for my regular massage on Tuesday, so I soldiered on. ::gg::)

For me, I looooved the facial steam. Must do this more often. Perching on the edge of the tub was perhaps not the best thing for my back, but the foot scrub was deliriously wonderful. I put on a lavender nail polish when I got home, which made me even more happy.

So, six months of planning and prep went off famously (Morgana and I were the sole guild members at the first meeting in January and, I believe, for several thereafter; other folks came to later meetings for some prep). Not only did I have a fantastic and restful time, but another friend (not involved in the SCA, much less Spa Day) told me my skin looked good today!

~ ~ ~

Another Sunday, another Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf with the local RWA ladies. Ellenie and I were prolific. Go us!

A supernova born of our bliss

I am still so messed up. I’ve been pretty much a day off in my brain since last Friday when we went to the Fashion Institute. Now today felt like a Saturday, too, because Morgana came over this afternoon and we watched Eddie Izzard’s Definite Article as well as Hunting Venus (gods I love that movie! I miss the 80s! Wah!) and went out for Indian food at Bollywood.

So I keep thinking tomorrow is Sunday and CB&TL with the other writers, when in fact it’s Saturday and Spa Day. Good grief.

I’m a bit grumpy because I love the 4th of July and its attendant fireworks, but I end up hating the 4th of July here, because many of the Hispanics feel the need to be setting off illegal fireworks here in the dry desert (Goleta is burning, have you heard?) for days before and after the actual holiday. I’m happy to say that today has been the quietest since we moved here, although a loud bang just startled me so much I jumped. (It’s after midnight as I type this.) Grrr.

~ ~ ~

Oh, and before I forget…June stats:

6 stories subbed
3 stories sold (!!)
10 stories rejected

11 novel submissions (all the same novel, though)
1 full novel subbed by request
2 novel rejections (same novel)

Another exciting evening...

Well, that was interesting!

So I’m sitting here working this evening, and outside I hear a few loud bangs, of the sort that signify that a car has hit something. As we’re along a fairly main drag and at an intersection that really, really, really needs a four-way stop, this is not an uncommon occurrence. Eostre is looking all startled out the window, and I get up to join her. I peered out to my left and saw a red pickup swerving a bit, then picking up speed and racing off down the street.

And, at the same time, the fire hydrant across E Street (the smaller street) shooting water in the air higher than the light pole next to it.

I grabbed my phone and ran downstairs and outside, and dialed 911 for the first time in my life. There was a nice gentleman on the sidewalk (he said we had a beautiful house ::beam::), and between the two of us we were able to describe the make and color of the pickup and the direction it was headed. There didn’t seem to be any other damage, no other cars involved, etc. The spray was strong enough to mist my face as I stood across the street. Cops came, fire trucks came, and it seemed to take forever to turn the water off. The nice gentleman said the truck had blown at least one tire (accounting for one of the bangs I heard) so he shouldn’t have been able to get far. I’ve yet to track down any news about the incident online, which is mildly annoying. I suspect he was drunk, on an illegal substance, or illegal himself.

Such excitement for a Thursday night!

~ ~ ~

Rejection from Fantasy Magazine for “What Price Beauty?” It’ll go out on Monday to Cemetery Dance, since they take only mailed subs. (Is there mail service on Saturday, since it’s a “holiday weekend”? I have no idea.)

Squeak

Rejection from ASIM for “Soulsearching.” Once again, a story there made it through the first two rounds of cuts before not quite squeaking in. Ah well. I wanted to send the story to the Lace and Blade anthology, and if I can’t have a sale at ASIM, at least I got the rejection before the other anthology deadline.

~ ~ ~

Oh, feh. I accidentally put non-dairy creamer in my Earl Grey at Coffee Bean, and now my tea tastes like soap. Bleah!

Kudos!

Not an official review, but it's so incredibly wonderful any time someone takes the time to post a positive comment about something I've written... This is from two folks on Goodreads.com, about my story in Haunted Hearths:

"Some Old Lover’s Ghost by Dayle A. Dermatis – Definitely a light-hearted read – kind of a lesbian Ghostbusters. What makes this story stand out is the strong narrator – she’s smart, funny and definitely opinionated. For some reason or other, the word “sassy” comes to mind when I think of this story - and that’s a good thing."

I was definitely going for voice in this story and this tells me I succeeded!  :-)  Thank you, Megan and Deanne, whoever you are!

(And in case anyone's wondering, although the protagonist is a lesbian, this is a contemporary fantasy story and anthology, not erotica.)

…or not.

The Saratoga Styx show has been postponed. After all that… Sheez.

But, it means that I have two days of my life back, and I really need them right about now. I’ve got a bunch of work (two novels to work on, three novels to send queries for, etc.), plus I’ve barely started my skirt for Labyrinth of Jareth, and I’d like to make a simple mask, too. (No time for a leather one, but I was thinking of buying a basic cloth mask and gluing peacock feathers and other sparklies on it.)

Plus there’s working out, Spa Day on Saturday, and all that fun stuff!

~ ~ ~

Okay, this is just too funny.

Yesterday, Ellenie, Tanya, and I were all lined up on the sofa at the coffee shop, and some other woman was in the chair kitty-corner to us (the chair forms the lower part of the L arrangement). We all had laptops. No fewer than four people commented on us, on how great we looked, stuff like that. Some asked what we were working on. (“Are you all taking the same class?” Why, do we look like students?) Somehow, we’d become the coffee shop’s entertainment.

So I was in the coffee shop today with Ellenie (I was in the chair, she was on the sofa near me) and a young man sitting at the next table suddenly said “I like your shirt.” I was wearing the one that says “Careful or you’ll end up in my novel” (because it’s seems like an appropriate thing to wear while writing in a coffee shop).

But what is it about us sitting here that makes us so interesting and popular to the point that people can’t help but talk to us?

Maybe it’s because we’re so damned hot. And clever. Yeah, that’s got to be it.

Why yes, I am crazy. Why do you ask?

So, this coming Tuesday is my first Styx concert in 5 months, and as you can imagine, I’m a bit twitchy from the lack of Live Stygian Goodness. Not to mention the fact that the Tuesday show is actually a Boston concert with Styx opening, and while I like Boston well enough, I’d rather have it the other way ‘round. (And reports from previous shows indicate that many concert goers have felt the same way after experiencing the show.)

So I was at a point of weakness, you see, when friends posted that they had extra tickets for sale to the show in Saratoga, CA (just south of San Jose), on Wednesday night. Ken’s on his way home now for the Tuesday show, and would be riding back up on Wednesday; thus I had a ride there. All that was left was sorting out a place to stay and a way back home. Amtrak was about $60 door-to-door (the Oxnard station is…counts on fingers…four blocks from our house). Granted, it would be a 9 hour ride, but have laptop, will travel.

Then, serendipitously, another friend posted that she was driving to the Saratoga show and her husband couldn’t make it after all, and she had space in her car… And so it was arranged that I would ride up with Ken, share the hotel room with said friend, and ride back with her on Thursday (a 5.5 hour drive). See, it’s a Styx headlining show, and it will be my 75th Styx show, and…it’s Styx.

All of which made for a crazier-than-expected week for me, what with sorting out appts with my trainer and massage therapist and finalizing products for our Herbal Guild’s Spa Day on Saturday, not to mention, oh, work.

And then tonight it comes through the grapevine that someone talked to Styx’s merch guy last night and he said the Saratoga show was cancelled, although we can’t yet find confirmation of that. Bguh. I try to be organized, and the universe conspires against me.

We’ll see what happens when we call the venue tomorrow.

~ ~ ~

Due to a variety of random reasons, I decided not to join my fellow Herb Guild members in a trip to the Lavender Festival in Ojai yesterday. Instead I focused on various projects and had a reasonably productive day. I’d told Morgana that if folks were going out to dinner, I’d be happy to join, and it ended up being just Morgana and Brian, which was fine. We tried Olive Garden (Brian’s choice) but the wait was too long, so we came back and hit Armando’s, a local Italian place that’s awesome. I had pan-fried ziti with meatballs, and brought half of it home. That was lunch today. Yum!

Today I wrote in a coffee shop with friends (whereupon I hit an annoying road block in the novel, which I have to suss out), worked out, made a lovely cobb salad for dinner, watched the first episode of Xena: Warrior Princess from Netflix, and caught up on e-mail and other various little projects.

~ ~ ~

Well, Ken just called, and he’s about an hour from home, so I can’t go to bed just yet. (Yes, he left Oregon this morning. Yes, he’s at least as crazy as I am. We do make a fine pair, don’t we?)

---

Currently Reading: Circle of the Moon, Barbara Hambly
Lately Listened To: Eurythmics’ Greatest Hits
Recently Watched: Law & Order: SVU

Rock me, baby

Two more rejections, one for a solo story and one for a Sophie story, both from the same best-of anthology. Sounds like editors are cleaning off their desks in preparation for the holiday!

I’m feeling a little confused this evening, since I took most of the day off—thus it feels like it’s Saturday, and I don’t understand why the rest of the world doesn’t agree with me.

After my chiropractor appointment and a fruitless trip to a local fabric store, I trotted over to Morgana’s and she and Brian and Tomi and I headed to downtown LA where the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising was showing “Aesthetes, Bohemians & Craftsmen: Artistic Dress, 1880s-1920s.” Traffic was horrendous (how do people drive in that crap every day?) but we had no set time to be there, so we were still in good spirits. The exhibit was gorgeous, but they didn’t have a book about it nor postcards, which made us pouty.

On the way home, we stopped at Cho Cho San and now I’m stuffed full of sushi. I had, among other things, my absolute favorite: a Rock-and-Roll Handroll (scallops, avocado, and rice with their mayo sauce, wrapped in soy paper), which Tomi also had a pronounced tasty. I tried something new and very nummy, although also not very good for me: the Hot and Creamy Jalapeño Bomb (crab and cream cheese in a jalapeño covered in fried crunchy goodness, in a spicy sauce). Oof. Too much food in the end!

So now I have to somehow wake up enough to work on Ghosted and write a shiny new synopsis for Waking the Witch. There’s a fresh-cut rose in my writing office waiting to inspire me. Wish me luck!

There is no "try"

On the heels of the latest sale, a few rejections:

• “What Price Beauty?” almost made it in to the Terrible Beauty anthology, but didn’t make the final cut.
  
• I’d also sent solo story “The Queen of Christmas” and Sophie story “Don’t Move” to Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Vol. 8 (both as reprints), and neither of those made the cut. But since they’re reprints, it doesn’t sting nearly as much!
  

And so I sent three stories out today

• “Giving to the Night” to Love Stories Magazine
  
• “What Price Beauty?” to Fantasy
  
• “Heaven Has Eyes” to Baen’s Universe
  

I am nothing if not stubborn.

Mouthwateringly good news!

And another sale! The Sophie story "Behind the Masque" will be in The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Vol. 8! It first appeared in the Wicked Words anthology Sex With Strangers.

Oh, it was such a fun story to write. How can you go wrong with jewel thieves?

The Lucchese Star. Sixty carats of sapphire, as big as your fist. Makes your mouth water just looking at it. Makes you think of Caribbean seas, the summer you were ten, the eyes of the lover that got away.

Inside my turquoise doeskin gloves, my palms itched. They didn’t sweat, not a drop; I wasn’t nervous. It was all about the anticipation, baby. The lead-up. The foreplay….

Fly away home

I had the neatest random encounter yesterday.

Despite the fact that the hotel restaurant advertised, on its door and on in-room paperwork, that they were open from 6:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m., when I went there at 1:30 p.m. for lunch I was told that no, they were closed. Another woman had stopped there for lunch and was also dismayed, and got directions to the nearby IHOP because she wanted eggs, etc. As she headed to her van, she offered me a ride. Yeah, she could’ve been a serial killer. But I listened to my gut, and my gut didn’t give me any warnings. I knew the IHOP was close enough to walk back from if I needed to, too. So I went.

Kelly turned out to be a delightful, fascinating person and we ended up eating lunch together. She was from Colorado, but in the summer works as a commercial fisherperson, and was on her way to Astoria, OR, to do just that. When I said I was from southern California, north of LA, she hesitated and said, “Oxnard?” Turns out that’s the only place she’s been to in CA (she’d been there for fishing work).

We had such a great conversation. She’s someone I never really would’ve encountered and chatted with in any other circumstance, you know? But we talked about travel and life and writing and motorcycles, and it was just lovely. There are so many horrible, mean, depressing, nasty people in the world. It was a joy to spend time with a random stranger who made the world a more positive place.

Plus I walked nearly a mile back to the hotel, getting my exercise for the day. :-)

~ ~ ~

accomplished yesterday:

• good chunk written on Ghosted
  
• all e-mail (work and personal) answered or deferred to Après Trip folder
  
• new sale info logged in spreadsheet and website updated (had to install Firefox on Afalwen to do it…)
  

~ ~ ~

I’m trying to not be depressed about heading home and missing Ken. I’m just going to focus on hoping he’ll get the time off to come home next week for the Styx/Boston show! So there.

~ ~ ~

Home safe, although I had a particularly horrid homecoming with a dead rat in the garage (which was not the problem—I can deal with a small dead furry thing in a trap) that was infested with maggots (and that was the problem—I cannot deal with maggots, especially giant maggots who squirmed their way back towards the garage after oozing out of the dead rat’s eye sockets when I flung the rat out onto the sidewalk). Thanks to our tenant (who joined me in spraying every household cleaner possible at the maggots as well as bashing them with a shovel) and most especially Morgana (who had no problem picking up the maggot-infested rat carcass and bagging it and depositing it in the garbage), the world is a safer place. Although I took a very, very, very long shower after the incident.

Really, it’s all okay. There are fuzzy cats who want to curl up with me, and all sorts of possibilities awaiting me tomorrow. G'night!

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Currently Reading: Circle of the Moon, Barbara Hambly
Lately Listened To: I couldn’t decide
Recently Watched: Doctor Who (augh!)

And with a kiss I pass the key

Celebrate! “The Heist” has been approved by Cleis Press and will appear in the anthology Frenzy (formerly entitled Flash Fucking). Oh, I’m so chuffed. I love this fun little story. “And with a kiss I passed the key…”

So, to celebrate, I’m spending the day writing whilst Ken’s off at work. Writing, as well as hitting the gym and doing a few business-related things that writers must do.

(Note to self: Always bring cordless mouse on trips. You will thank me later.)

Yesterday and today

Yesterday we had a leisurely morning in the hotel, then finally dragged ourselves out into the world…straight to The Old Spaghetti Factory, home of pasta with mizithra cheese and browned butter. Oh, they have other dishes, too, but they’re just not worth mentioning.

After that we went to the Pittock Mansion, which we tried to see in late November last year, but they’d closed that day to decorate for the holidays, despite no mention of this closure (on a Saturday, no less) on their website. The place is tremendously wonderful, and I would’ve loved to stay longer and wander the extensive grounds, but (a) it had become hot and muggy outside and I was wearing riding pants that don’t breath, and (b) we had somewhere else to be.

That was visiting Ernie & Pauline, some motorcycle friends. We four went out to dinner at the Stone Cliff Inn, where I had the most amazing salad with assorted baby greens, medium rare steak, locally made bleu cheese, and a vinaigrette good enough to make one moan aloud. We also celebrated Pauline’s first time on a bike after her hip surgery a few weeks ago.

Unfortunately, I’d been fighting off a low-grade headache for most of the afternoon, so we said our farewells and headed back to the hotel for an early night.

I still had a headache this morning (it went away and came back), so I fought it off with Ibuprofen and Drenamin and PG Tipps. I was so successful that I went off to the hotel gym. Half an hour on the elliptical flew by since I was listening to last year’s RWA Nationals session with Nora Roberts, and she’s really funny. On the downside, I saw three spiders in the tiny gym room, and it was stuffy and humid and smelled a wee bit funny. But hey, I worked out, and it chased away my headache for good.

The ride to Lincoln City was gorgeous as usual, and it was fantastic to hang out with everyone at the regular Sunday lunch. Got some good advice from Kris and Dean, and was reminded that I often don’t celebrate the successes nearly enough (not something they said; something I figured out on my own. I love these cosmic two-by-fours!)—I mean, I got a request for a full manuscript, and why did I not jump up and down and eat a nice little square of Green & Blacks? Damned if I know. Anyway. Had some nice little epiphanies on the way home, too (long bike rides are good for that sort of thing).

Back in town, we saw Iron Man because it’s fabulous and Ken absolutely had to see it, and then, because it was just across the street, ate at The Old Spaghetti Factory again. You get one guess what I ate. Only one. Use it wisely.

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Currently Reading: Circle of the Moon, Barbara Hambly
Lately Listened To: various Styx
Recently Watched: There’s no DVR here. How can I watch live TV? I don’t know when anything is on!

Random bits and bobs

Happily and safely in Oregon, although I got about 4 hours’ sleep last night and actually managed to nap this afternoon (it was a requirement if I was going to make it through dinner and hot tubbing with Lev & Gayle tonight!).

~ ~ ~

I find it rather amazing that my gmail account, which I haven’t given anyone the address for, gets 95% more spam than my regular account (which has an alias link on my website, even). This is not, I must point out, an invitation to spammers.

~ ~ ~

There is a fairly new housing development here called…wait for it…Q Condominiums.

Please tell me I’m not the only one who giggles hysterically about that.

~ ~ ~

I’m happy to report that I did not, in the end, come down with a cold; the sore throat was some temporary fluke that was over by midday. In fact, I feel better right now than I have in a while. On Tuesday my massage therapist had to stretch to fill two hours—she simply couldn’t find problems to work on—and on Wednesday the chiropractor was delighted at how little she had to tweak. All this doesn’t mean I’m not still in constant pain, but I’m clearly stronger and healthier.

~ ~ ~

So Ken picked me up at the airport this morning and we rode out to Hillsboro, and had lunch before he headed off to work for a bit. He came back earlier than I expected, which allowed us some time to frolic in the hotel pool and relax in the spa before showering and heading back out.

Gayle made turkey and veggies and salad with a dressing from a local Japanese restaurant, and we provided chocolate cake that made us all go nomnomnom. We ended up not sitting in the hot tub because it was pretty warm out, but we had an utterly delightful evening just hanging out. And watching “Once More, With Feeling” (aka the Buffy musical episode). In English; then in French, for one song, just to be silly; then in Spanish, but it kept flipping back to English…

~ ~ ~

I have to say, it’s interesting to get a form rejection and a request for a full manuscript on the same day. For the same novel. :-)

~ ~ ~

Blessed Solstice, everyone!

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Currently Reading: Circle of the Moon, Barbara Hambly
Lately Listened To: Jay Leno in the background
Recently Watched: Ghost Hunters

Oh for crying out loud…

One thing I haven’t had the chance to mention is that Ken’s doing a “rush” job in Oregon—he dashed out to Korea to broker the deal for the machine in May (arriving a few days late at my parents’ as a result) and he’s been in Oregon since the beginning of the month (although he rode back down for the Fish show and will do the same for two Styx shows and Labyrinth of Jareth next month). And I’m going up to visit him for a few days, leaving this Friday and returning a week from today.

So what did I wake up with this morning?

A sore throat.

I know just who gave me this cold, and I’m going to have to hurt her…

Hopefully I can pop enough Echinacea and chewable vitamin C and sweat it out at the gym before I fly north!

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Currently Reading: Just finished One for the Money (the first Stephanie Plum book), Janet Evanovich; not sure what I’m grabbing off the stack next; will probably take Barbara Hambly’s Circle of the Moon to Oregon with me, since I reread the first book in NY in preparation for reading this one.
Lately Listened To: "A Gentleman's Excuse Me" by Fish, obsessively, over and over…
Recently Watched: Inside the Actor’s Studio with Matt Damon (great source of inspiration and commentary about the creative process)

Because you've waited so patiently...

...tattoo pictures!

Happy Father's Day, Dad

I wish I'd thought of doing this for Mother's Day!  ::kicks self::

I note that I don't have nearly enough recent pictures of my father and I together. Must rectify this.

If you want to read "The Sultan's Sons"...

...then let me be the first to tell you that Carnifex Press is having a Clash of Steel Deal: you can buy all three volumes for a mere $14! That's right, three anthologies of fantasy stories for less than $5 apeice! And my story "The Sultan's Sons" is in volume 2, Clash of Steel: Assassin.

I'm telling you, it's going to be a collector's item someday. Strike while the iron's hot!

Okay, shamless promotional efforts are over. Thanks for listening.  ::gg::

The work thing

Hey, I made a sale without doing a darn thing!

Alison Tyler remembered a story I’d submitted to her ages ago that she rejected for whatever project I’d subbed it for, and asked if she could include it in an upcoming anthology (pending publisher approval) and also excerpt it in a nonfiction book she’s writing (I’d get some compensation and a credit). Plus she wants to quote a comment I made on a Lust Bites post eons ago!

Acceptances are always fantastic. But there’s something a little extra when an editor approaches you, remembering something they saw from you a year or more ago.

So, things are finally settling out into normalcy again after me being away from home for more than half of May. I’ve got tons of things to talk about, so let’s make this the writing post, and catch up by theme.

This past weekend was a writers' fest! On Saturday, the local RWA ladies and I got together for high tea (5 out of 6 of us! a record!), and then three came over so I could show off the house, and we chatted for another few hours. After that, Ellenie and I grabbed our laptops and went to a local coffee shop and wrote for a couple more hours.

The next day was practically more of the same! Ellenie and I carpooled to the LARA meeting, where Sylvia Day and HelenKay Dimon spoke about the fears that keep us from writing. After that, five of us (including Christine, whom I hadn’t seen in ages—we couldn’t stop hugging!) went to Versailles and moaned our way through Cuban food, and then some of us repaired to Lulu’s for an afternoon of writing.

There’s been a fair amount of ins and outs over the past few weeks, including…

• A sale! My story “In Flight” will be reprinted in Best Lesbian Romance 2009! It’s a fun story. It’s got birds of prey in it! What’s not to love?
  
• I received, signed, and returned the contract for Flash Fucking, which will include (pending publisher approval) my story “The Heist.” The story is one of my personal favorites, so I’m quite chuffed!
  
• I also received my comp copies of Rubber Sex.
  
• Alas, I also received a rejection from Bane’s Universe for “Berengere.” It’s already been resubbed, of course.
  
• Alas, also a rejection from Clarkesworld for “Dreamseer,” which promptly got turned around to Æon.
  

My overall stats for April and May look like this:

Novel rejections = 3 (for 2 different novel ms)
Novel submissions = 3 (for 1 novel ms)

Short story submissions = 15
Short story rejections = 12
Short story sales = 1
Short story publications = 1

And that’s about it. This weekend I’m spending most of Saturday working, and Sunday I’m hitting the coffee shop early with Ellenie because of a birthday tea for two friends in the afternoon. It’s always an adventure!

Fish photos

Tuesday night we saw Fish (former lead singer of Marillion) at the House of Blues Sunset Strip with Fran & Thom and Nanci & Lenny and Mario. It was hard to get good photos, but here are a few from the evening. Enjoy!

Cover deliciousness!

Omigods this is so fabulous and I'm thrilled to be in this anthology! (Our contribution is a Sophie Mouette novella, "Hidden Treasure.") Swoon!

Minor rant

What is it with musicians these days not making lyrics easily available? I long for the days of albums with sleeves containing all the lyrics and info my little anal-retentive, trivia-loving heart.

I downloaded one…what do you call a collection of music that isn’t in a hard form? We’ll call it a CD for discussion purposes…one CD for which the band didn’t have lyrics available anywhere. Now, I’m listening to the new Fish CD (in preparation for Tuesday’s show!) and while the lyrics are available on his website, each song’s lyrics are in a pop-up box that goes away if you click on it. Well, what I’d like to do is copy them into a single Word file so I can print them out and read them whilst I’m listening to the bloody music! (Also, I can’t bump up the View size on the pop-up box, which would be helpful for my dreadful eyesight.)

Remember when we were teenagers and had the time to just listen to music? To buy a new album and sit with headphones on and read the lyrics and maybe start singing along by the third or fourth listen?

What was the last CD you did that with? (Seriously, I'm curious.) For me, it might have been Styx's Edge of the Century in (eep) 1990....

Too good not to share

JK Rowling's Harvard Commencement Address.

New publication!

I was delighted to arrive home from the trip and find comp copies of Rubber Sex, containing my story "Bathing Beauty," in my pile of mail.

You know, it's funny how easy it is to forget what I've written. I kicked back and read a couple of the stories, then flipped to mine. I remembered the basics (heck, part of the inspiration was a Penthouse Variations letter I read in the 1980s that somehow stuck with me), but I was surprised at what a sweet story it is. Pretty damn romantic—which most of my stories are, actually.

Another funny note: My mother actually did own the bathing cap described in the story. I had a different reaction to it, though…especially when I was once forced to wear the hideous thing!

Anyway, the anthology was edited by cupcake-cute Rachel Kramer Bussel and I'm in fine company, as there are stories by Teresa, Shanna Germain, and Alison Tyler, among many others. Rachel has set up a blog for the anthology as well—if you're interested, check it out!

Almost home

BTV airport has free wireless so I have a few minutes to check e-mail and whatnot before we board. I've had a lovely trip, spending a lot of time with my parents and seeing a few old friends as well. My wrist is feeling lots better; I worked some on a short story but otherwise iced my forearm a few times and played with a squeezy ball. I also ate way too much and got a bit of reading done.

Tomorrow I've got an appt with my trainer and Ken leaves for a rally. Friday I've got a chiro appt, the cleaning lady, and a friend from the UK arriving to spend the weekend. I swear I'll get caught up soon!

Hope everyone's been having fun whilst I've been away. Tell me stories—what have you all been up to?!

Off again

Right, so I'm off tomorrow to upstate NY to visit my parents for a week. Ken's currently in Korea but will fly to NY on Saturday. Whew!

My apologies for being so quiet since I got back from the workshop in Oregon. After typing 67 single-spaced pages of notes, plus assignments, I came home and worked out with my trainer using TRX bands, and the result of all of that was that my right wrist has been feeling wonky. Some tingling, some minor pain. So I've been trying to rest it and ice it as much as possible…which isn't easy when typing is one's job. Everything else has had to take a back seat.

I do plan to get some writing done in NY, but the rest of the time, I'll be icing my wrist, playing with my squeezy ball (no, that's not a euphemism!), and generally resting and relaxing so I can hit the ground running when I return.

Have a fabby Memorial Day Weekend!

Sale!

Sale! Just got confirmation that my story "Tigress" will appear in The Mammoth Book of the Kama Sutra, edited by the inestimable Maxim Jakubowski. It'll be out in September!

This one was a strangely fun story to write. Authors had to pick a position from the Kama Sutra and write a sexy "origin story" that explained why the position came to be known by that name.

From the book's description, it sounds like the volume is going to be utterly gorgeous!

Photos

Photos from the workshop.

More re: workshop

Dean and Kris talk about the Marketing Workshop in their blogs, if you're interested.

And we're home

It went something like this:

Sunday, 4 May 2008

Beach today! Walked with Brenda, whom I hadn’t met in a previous workshop. There’s huge chunks of driftwood everywhere—giant trees, some imbedded in the sand. It looks like an alien landscape. I imagine it was what a shipwreck looked like. It gave me so much energy, and Brenda and I had a fabulous conversation.

Monday, 5 May 2008

Feliz Cinco de Mayo!

Okay, it’s 2 p.m. I have two assignments to finish—both are close to completion, although one I’ll review again a bit later—before dinner at 5 p.m. with Karen and Brenda, and our next meeting at 7 p.m. So I’m going to work on a short story, too. I also have a story to submit now that the magazine’s reading period has opened back up. Not sure if a walk on the beach or some floor/band work is in my future; I really want to get the story done.

Oh, and note to self: Bring a hat next time. The wind and greater moisture in the air is giving me an unattractive explosion of frizz.

Rejection from Abyss & Apex for “Seeds of Hope,” which they said “was very well-received here, but…”

Tuesday, 6 May 2008

My friend Chris York just made a three-book deal with Berkley Prime Crime! WaHOO! Go Chris!

Wednesday, 7 May 2008

Meltdown.

Thursday, 8 May 2008

Better.

Friday, 9 May 2008

Mistakes happen. You learn from them, then get over them and move forward.

Went for a glorious beach walk today with Leslie; we also ran into Matt who walked the rest of the way with us. We saw baby seals and a bald eagle! It was just sitting out there on a log near the seals on a spit of land, and then it flew low over the water looking for fish, and then it perched again. And I didn’t have my camera. ::pounds head on desk::

Anyway, it was a beautiful day, cool and sunny, and I wish I’d had more time to spend down there.

Saturday, 10 May 2008

So Dean’s talking about his process and his blocks, which are much like mine, and he tells us his crazy plan for overcoming the problem, and I think “Holy crap, that’s exactly what I need to do,” and then there was this big sneaker wave of fear crashing over me as I then thought stupid things like “But I can’t” and “What if I fail?”

A better question is, “What if I succeed?”

A better response is, “When I succeed…”

Sunday, 11 May 2008

On the plane home. Um. Wow. After the Master Class (March 2002), this is by far the most valuable, most amazing, and most life- and career-changing workshops I’ve taken with Kris & Dean. (And I counted: including novel workshops, I’ve now taken 9.) I…I… Yeah, it’s going to take me a little while to process all this.

On Saturday, I think, Kris asked how we slept the night before and we all said “Awful.” She laughed and explained: They’d had us in critical brain up ‘til Friday, and Friday night our brains frantically downloaded all the new information into our subconscious before we lost anything. Devious. Effective, but devious.

So now I have to find a balance of recovery (tonight’s plan: wine, TV, and Ken. Not necessarily in that order) and getting back to work with new ideas, fresh energy, and an astonishing amount of new information to put into practice. Although this was a business workshop (about marketing, editors, the publishing industry and how it’s changed, and, um, a gazillion other things), I’ve come away with three new novel ideas in proposal form. One of which caused Kris to swear and say, twice, that she wished she’d come up with the idea. Bwahaha.

Plane descending. Must turn off laptop before it adversely affects that.

Oh, wait, one more thing. New sticky on Afalwen desktop:

It's okay to be afraid.

It's not okay to let the fear stop me.

On the coast again

So I’m happily and safely here on the Oregon Coast again, this time for a workshop on marketing and agents and synopses and all that fun stuff. We’ll be doing this for a week. You won’t hear much from me this week, though, because not only am I having trouble getting decent wireless in my room (I’m in kitschy cabin #5, and there will be pictures), but also because Kris & Dean have laid down the law:

First rule of Workshop: You don’t blog about Workshop.

I’m still frantically trying to finish one of the assignments we were given ahead of time, and I also need to hammer out a short story today… An editor I’ve worked with before is doing a sequel to an anthology I was in, and asked for stories on the theme ASAP to include in the proposal to the publisher. I don’t know if turning in the story tonight will be too late (I got her e-mail either late Thursday night or Friday morning, and she hasn’t responded to my query), but I figure, better to go ahead and write the story.

It’s 1 p.m. now. Dinner (optional, but I’ll be there) is at 5 p.m.; the workshop starts at 7 p.m. I have an assigment, a story, and a walk to the beach to add in there…

Later…Assignment done. Dinner greatly enjoyed. More work to do now. Kthnxbai.

Goodness and busy-ness

Another Sunday, another Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf writing afternoon. My last one until June! since I’ll be out of town three out of four Sundays in May, and Albra’s having her annual garden tea on the only Sunday I’ll be in town.

It’s been a busy few days… Thursday we had dinner with Morgana & Brian because our mutual friend Lev was in town (staying with M&B), and ended up staying rather late, watching the final ep of the Torchwood season (again for us, first time for M&B) and generally just enjoying good company.

Friday we headed up to Santa Barbara early to miss the weekend traffic. We wandered up and down State Street and had dinner at a hole-in-the-wall Greek place (nummy lemon chicken souvlaki!) before heading to the tattoo artist’s…only to find out I’d had my appointment time wrong by an hour. So we shared a chocolate shake at Coldstone Creamery, then strolled down to the beach, heading back via the Moreton Bay Fig Tree, the largest in North America. (The sapling was brought from Australia by a sailor in the 1870s and given to a girl… There’s a great romance story in there!)

Then I got my tattoo! Or, rather, I finished my 30th birthday tattoo! It was a different experience this time…different and in some ways the same. It was less of a major emotional/spiritual thing, and more of a peaceful thing. No stress, no great thought, just experience. The moment. I’m not explaining this well at all, but so be it!

Saturday we gathered up Morgana and went to Mission Park in Ventura, where Lev was playing concertina for his Morris Dance side. (A group of Morris Dancers is a side. A side of Morris Dancers. Don’t say I never taught you anything.) There were sides from all over, including one from England! We bought presents for my sister and Ken’s mom. We tried to follow Lev et al. to Channel Islands for their next performance, but we never managed to figure out where they were, so we headed off to Camarillo for their Celtic Fair. Our SCA group was doing a demo, so we ended up helping with that for a bit, and Ken and I shared a grape shave ice and I bought a silver spiral ring that’s actually appropriate for my 7th-C Welsh persona.

(Oh, and I’d like to put this out into the universe: I’ve misplaced my grandmother’s silver-and-diamond ring and my silver spiral ring from Avebury. Please think positive thoughts for me to find them!)

Anyway, then we went to the Victoria Pub because the dancers were there. We had dinner there, and I indulged in a cider and some vinegar-soaked chips for the first time in forever. Oh, Thomasina had joined us by then (we’d run into her at the Celtic Fair), so it was all quite pleasant. Then we came home and I took a much-needed shower because it had been bloody hot all day and I was a mess of sunscreen and sweat.

Tonight we’re going out to dinner with M&B&Lev, and having lemon cake and fresh strawberries afterwards, and I am greatly looking forward to it.

So now I’ve got to hit the ground running this week, because I have a ton to do before I leave for the Marketing Workshop in Oregon on Friday:

• finish a short story with Teresa
  
• finish three synopses for the workshop (I’ve read two of the three books and started the first synopsis)
  
• get as much done as Ghosted as I can
  
• pack for the workshop (printer, lap desk, and jacket already shipped)
  
• get a massage
  
• get my hair done
  
• work out with my trainer 2x
  
• lots of miscellaneous little fiddly stuff, like answering e-mail and cleaning off my desk and dealing with various SCA bits and bobs and mailing my sister’s present and buying contact solution and…
  

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Currently Reading: Mélusine, Sarah Monette
Lately Listened To: Ghosted playlist
Recently Watched: Lost; Battlestar Galactica

Cover goodness!

Endorphins!

Endorphins!

Sorry, I just got my tattoo worked on, so I'm buzzing. (Actually, since it was an hour's drive home, I'm starting to come down, but not entirely.) I finally got the phases of the moon around my right ankle, hanging down like charms from the Celtic knotwork band I had done for my 30th birthday. One of the reasons it took me so long to get them done is I didn't know how I wanted them connected to the band. The tattoo artist (Pat Fish of Lucky Fish Tattoo—she's fabulous!) suggested dots. I was curious to see how that would look, so she drew them on. Ohhhh! She meant gradiated dots, getting bigger as they go down. Perfect! And the spiral she put in the new moon (in the front) is just perfect.

Damn. Now I want more.  ::scurries off to start plotting and planning::

Pictures will be taken and posted once the redness has gone down.

Sleep good

Busy but lovely weekend! Saturday I slept in, then made sausage/cheese balls in preparation for a neighborhood ladies’ party. About 20 minutes before I was to leave, Ken arrived home, triumphant, from his trip! Hurrah!

Then Morgana and I trotted off down the street to the Smash & Get Smashed annual party, which involved making much strawberry jam (we got there late enough that the cooking was in full swing and we were not needed. Phew.) and drinking many strawberry daiquiris. They’re an interesting group of people.

But eventually I was itching to get home to my beloved, whom I found asleep, although he was mumbling about getting up so he could actually sleep that night. We had little food in the house and even less enthusiasm about cooking (I guess I hit my daily cooking limit with those sausage/cheese balls—although they have only three ingredients, and my rule is that three ingredients or less is not cooking, so there goes that excuse), so I ordered a pizza. That got him out of bed.   ;-)

So we ate pizza and watched the penultimate episode of Torchwood, sat in the hot tub, watched the final episode of Torchwood (holy season finales, Batman!), and then finally headed off to bed.

Today I wandered off to Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf where I was again without companions, but, despite some serious writing avoidance that included making a playlist for Ghosted, I managed to get just shy of 2K hammered out. Now I’m sort of stuck again, so I have to sit down again and work through it.

After that, Ken and I went for a walk on the beach so he could ceremoniously dump Atlantic water into the Pacific (he did the opposite in FL), and then we stocked up on groceries, at which point he decided he wanted to celebrate his successful ride with cow, so we went to Outback. Where I perversely had grilled shrimp.

And now it’s much later, and we watched more TV and I’m all depressed (thanks, Ron Moore! Sheez.), but I also sat down and broke my 2K for the day, so I can go to sleep at least knowing I hit my goal and can hit the ground running tomorrow. It’s going to be a busy week, and I have a lot to accomplish…

Right. Sleep….

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Currently Reading: The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot (for the workshop)
Lately Listened To: Ghosted playlist
Recently Watched: Doctor Who; Battlestar Galactica

Novels I Have Writ

So, I wasn’t going to participate in this meme because I really didn’t have the time, but I kept thinking about it, and finally decided it would be an interesting retrospective. I didn’t expect to have a major revelation about my writing when I finished….

Completed novels are regularly numbered; unfinished novels are in roman numerals. All are listed in a rough chronological order.

i. Although I’d “started” novels before junior high, they never went farther than 3 or 4 pages, so I count my first novel as the one I wrote in 7th grade (1978-1979). I got about 100 handwritten pages, so even though I didn’t finish it, that was a pretty damn good attempt. It was an appalling pastiche of Narnia (the heroes went through a magic mirror to another land) and LOTR with a sprinkling of Deryni, and thankfully it no longer exists. (I don’t even remember the title.) But it was fun, and it made me want to be a writer.

ii. and iii. Partial novels set in the Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica universes (anywhere from 1979 through 1982). Blatant Mary Sue fanfic (the BG one included myself and two of my best friends as pretty much us; the SW character was loosely disguised), but both had some interesting elements. Neither survives (also thankfully).

1. Sorcerer’s Successor, completed the summer between 11th and 12th grade (1983), involving a girl with the worst sense of direction ever, a prince stuck in the shape of a panther, and a very, very pale villain. During the writing, I had my first “I had no idea that was going to happen” epiphany while writing; plus I remember being so totally in each scene as I worked. I miss that. Anyway, a best-selling romance writer was my mentor at the time, and she wrote a letter for me to include when I submitted the novel, basically vouching for me (although I don’t think I admitted my age in my own cover letter). I sent it to three publishers and received three very nice rejection letters saying they liked my writing but the book needed too much work for them to commit to it. See, I was getting nice rejection letters even then. Beats the form letters any day. I believe I do have a hard copy (it was written on my first computer, an Apple IIe), and I occasionally wonder if it could be reworked as a YA, but probably not.

2. Fantasy. Probably begun my senior year of high school (1983–1984), it became my college project because I was in the Honors Program they’d just created. It was mostly abandoned when I went to law school (1988–1989), then left law school and got married and became a reporter. But while I was a reporter, I convinced the newspaper to send me to a writer’s conference in Vermont (1990), where I met my first agent. Let’s call her B, because that initial has nothing to do with her. I told B about Fantasy and sent her the first chapters or whatnot, telling her I was in the process of rewriting the entire thing from scratch. She asked for the full ms. I spent over a year writing it. (How did I not know it shouldn’t take that long?) She loved it and offered representation. Unfortunately, her boss didn’t think it was strong enough to stand on its own (which I’m sure it wasn’t) and told her to market it as a paranormal romance (as this was in the first wave of paranormals, late 80s/early 90s). Problem was, despite a male and female protagonist, there wasn’t a whiff of romance in the book (and, indeed, my planned sequel involved them hooking up with other people). According to B, everyone who read it liked my writing, but didn’t think the book fit their romance line. Well, duh.

iv. Somewhere in there (1991–1993), my husband at the time came up with a nifty idea for a ST:TNG novel. (We were big ST buffs and were already reading the novels.) He helped with plotting; I started writing See No Evil, Hear No Evil. I went to the same conference again, and again closed down the bar each night with a couple of friends, including another agent, L. L had sold ST stuff before, whereas B wasn’t at all interested in seeing it—not to mention B hadn’t really helped my career. I sent the partial of the ST:TNG book to L and she loved my writing, so I switched agents. Then a ST:TNG novel was published that had an almost identical theme, killing my project. I did revise the idea and submit it, along with another one, to the ST editor a couple of years ago after the Work-for-Hire Workshop, but now the entire publishing program is gone. Oh well!

3. What Beck’ning Ghost (1991–1994) was an actual paranormal romance with a ghost for a hero, a psychometric heroine, a scarred and somewhat crazy villain, a big ol’ gothicky castle in the Adirondacks…in short, a book of my heart. I love it. Everyone who’s read it loves it. (Seriously. People who critiqued it in 1994 wistfully ask after it, even now.) I sent to L, she pitched it heavily, and everyone said, “We love this author. We love her writing. We love this book. The paranormal romance market is dead and we can’t buy it.” Sigh. The only problem is that the book is kind of time sensitive, in that the mystery hinges on something that happened 40 years before the present day. I keep having to re-tweak the past dates and details, and the farther forward I pull the past events, the less they make sense. My plan right now is to wait ‘til I have another agent, and toss this in the pile with the “completed and future projects” list for an opinion as to whether it’s worth tweaking and submitted again. Or something.

4. House of Passion (1992-1993). Egads, I almost forgot about this one! I’d been copy editing for a swinger’s magazine publisher who’d branched out into erotic novels, and the manuscripts were so appallingly bad that I figured I’d knock out one of my own. By the time I did, though, the publisher’s sales were so bad that they’d dropped the project. In hindsight, I should’ve tossed it over to my Black Lace editor when I had the chance. It’s about 20K too short, but it had its moments. It may get hauled out someday if the right market comes along.

v. Jewel Tones. Since the paranormal romance market was gone, I turned my attentions back to my first love, traditional fantasy. Jewel Tones was written in response to two fantasy tropes that I could no longer abide. (a) The Lackey/McCaffrey “young downtrodden girl discovers she has powers and is swept off to learn to be the greatest [princess/sorceress/dragon rider/insert fabby job here] ev-ar.” (Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with this—stories like these are largely responsible for getting me through my own adolescence—but as an adult, I wanted to read about what happened after that. And ya gotta write what ya wanna read.) (b) Bad history research. Most fantasy at that time seemed to be written by people who read only other fantasy, not any history. I’d joined the SCA by this time, so I had a better handle on clothing, history, etc. I was sorely sick of generic taverns serving generic ale and generic stew, of men wearing “tunics and trewes” and women wearing “gowns”. So I started a novel in a world similar to Renaissance Italy about a master jeweler who’d been a young protégé and was now at the top of her talent and she was bored and didn’t care and wanted to hang out and party all the time. When her world is turned completely upside down, she has to regroup, figure out what’s really important, and take on greater responsibility than she’d ever imagined. During the writing of this book, I got heavily involved with the SCA, fell in love with someone other than my husband, got divorced, moved in with other person (now my husband—10 years in June!), had my job go crazy so I was working 50+ hours/week, and then finally moved to Wales (1998). I then returned my attention to the novel, but made the mistake of reading the latest Guy Gavriel Kay at the same time, so I fell into a pit of despair at not being able to write like him. My writing style was also undergoing a dramatic change (actually in conjunction with what was selling), so what I was writing sounded little like the beginning of the book. It’s been tabled for now; I finally tossed everything I’d written but kept the notes, and when I start from scratch, it will be a vastly superior book. When I get it on the list of Books to Write remains to be seen.

5. Waking the Witch (2000–2001). Started as something of a novel dare when we lived in Wales. Elevator pitch: “Four teenage boys confess to the rape and murder of a woman who died 100 years ago.” A paranormal romance (hey, they’re back!) involving another psychometric heroine who’s got some serious anger/trust issues towards men, a sweet and patient sheriff hero, a vengeful ghost, and all sorts of redemption and healing. Also around this time, it became clear that L was no longer working in my best interests as my agent, and indeed she had decided to get out of the business, so we mutually agreed to part ways. WtW is making the rounds of publishers and agents, and has garnered some lovely negative responses.

6. Blackwood House (2003). Another gothicky paranormal, involving a gorgeous Scottish restorer of historic homes, a heroine betrayed too many times by men, the heroine’s pregnant and slightly loopy younger sister, a crumbling Victorian on the cliffs near Santa Barbara, and the ghost of a woman betrayed by love. I wrote it for Silhouette, when their sweet line had a subline called Shadows. I pitched the idea, they loved it, and then it took me forever to write it because I am sooo not a sweet writer. I kept having to delete all sorts of cool subplots for length, plus I struggled with reasons why the hero and heroine shouldn’t just keep kissing…all the way to the bedroom (or the sofa, or the bathroom counter…) Ultimately it was rejected, which didn’t surprise me one whit. It’s also on the “someday maybe I’ll start this one over” list, although one fabulous and detailed rejection for Waking the Witch essentially said “vengeful ghosts are so yesterday,” so Blackwood House may never fly.

7. I’m not sure if I started An Ever-Turning Wheel before or after Blackwood House. (And I’m too lazy to dig through old journals to find out.) This is a paranormal romance that’s not erotic because I set up a pretty major conflict: a custody battle. Granted, the child—and her father, the hero—are Fae, and the mom was put under a geas to love and care for the child when the child accidentally fell through to modern-day Wales, but… You know what they say about never working with animals or children? Animals are much easier to write about! (For me, that should be obvious!) This novel is “done” and has been through a Novel Workshop, but that proved to me that it needs a big framing story set in Faerie, and I hate editing, so even though queries were sent out, I technically don’t have a “completed manuscript” to submit. I keep putting it on my “do after X novel is written” list, and then another project leaps ahead of it.

8. A Little Night Music (2003–2004). “Hey, Sarah, wouldn’t it be fun to write a novel together?” And thus the first iteration of ALNM was born, an erotic romance in which we could throw all of our fantasies and desires about our favorite rock stars. It’s a tough job, but somebody had to do it. We wrote it with Harlequin Blaze in mind, and they didn’t want it. We set it aside because it was too short for other markets (a big problem when you write a manuscript targeted at a category line.) But, see below…

9. Cat Scratch Fever (2005). You’ve probably already heard the story. Teresa and I submitted a short story to one of Black Lace’s Wicked Words anthology, and the editor said, “I’ve never worked with coauthors before, but you write so well together and this is a great story. Have you ever considered writing a novel? I’ve got a hole in my schedule.” We frantically hammered out the first 10K and a synopsis, got a contract, and wrote the rest of the novel (60K) in two months. While I was working full-time with a 3-hour total commute. (Much of my halfof the book was written in the back seat of the carpool.) CSF is an erotica set at a big-cat sanctuary and has been praised for its “cleverly unfolding mystery” element. Dude. We wrote a mystery novel! Who knew?

8 redux. So now Virgin Books had a new editor and a new erotic line, Cheek. I suggested to Sarah that we send ALNM. The editor asked for some reasonably detailed changes, so we rewrote the beginning and the synopsis, and got the contract. We thought we’d be able to use chunks of the later material, but in the end we rewrote almost the entire manuscript (2006).

vi. I was considering Angelika (2007) for Black Lace, but stalled at about 25K. Teresa and I have since come up with a nifty rewrite, but right now it’s not in the To Do List. The book also involves a Victorian mansion and a ghost, but the ghost isn’t vengeful and the book is definitely erotic.

vii. Designed for Love (2007), a contemporary erotic romance, also stalled, but at about 41K (wow, I hadn’t realized I’d gotten that far!). Sarah and I considered it as our next project, but her heart wasn’t in it (which is fair: it’s not easy to come into someone else’s manuscript project when it’s more than half finished). I’m finding that I don’t enjoy writing contemporary erotic romance on my own—I prefer doing it with a coauthor or writing something with paranormal and/or suspense elements. So we’ll see when this burps back up the chain to be finished. Oh, it’s about a woman who designs erotic rooms and a man who thinks the “trappings” aren’t necessary for good sex, and the next thing you know, they have a bet going to see if she can prove him wrong.

10. Out of the Frying Pan, Sophie Mouette’s second novel, was completed last year and has garnered some interest from one publisher (they requested a partial) plus a glowing rejection from another. This one’s “Emma Holly meets Jennifer Crusie in Rachel Ray’s kitchen,” with a zany cast of secondary characters. Everyone we’ve told about it wants to hear more about the dog….

viii. Ghosted. My current WIP. An urban fantasy about a former Hollywood party girl who survived a near-death experience to discover she can see ghosts. Only ghosts are for the most part nice, so when someone starts exorcising them, she has to figure out who and stop the person before all of her friends are ripped away from her. Oh, and with the ghosts’ help, she gives ghost tours around Hollywood, culminating in an Art Deco hotel she’s renovating.

ix. After Teresa and I finish various individual projects, we plan to write Caressing the Tiger, a paranormal erotic romance set in Victorian England, featuring a shapeshifting Indian demigodess/tiger and a English animal tamer fighting a dark-arts practitioner who’s using Indian animals in his black rites. We wrote the synopsis and first 2K as a novella submission, but it’s really a novel.

Wow. That…that was unexpected. I’ve completed more novels than I realized. I thought I was at 6 or 7! The number of partials is a little embarrassing until I discount anything written before adulthood; the ST novel, which had no future; and current and future projects. That leaves the unfinished at 3, which isn’t that bad. I’ve been laboring under the belief that I can’t finish a novel on my own any more (that I can write successfully only with coauthors), and that number sort of blows that theory out of the water. My brain is so stupid sometimes. :-)

Of course, my other revelation is that I have an obvious obsession with old houses, ghosts, and psychic/witchy heroines. I mean, I knew I did, but I didn’t realize how many novels contained them!

Yay Ken!

I'm thrilled to report that early this morning, Ken successfully completed his first 50CC—that's coast to coast on the bike in 50 hours or less!

He left Monday morning (along with a fellow LDR [long-distance rider]), and it happened so quickly I didn't even have time to mention he was gone! He should be back sometime Saturday; he's taking a little longer to come back so he can hit some specific sites for another ride on the way.

If you want to send him your congrats, his e-mail is ken.meese @ mac.com (remove the spaces)!

Dirrrrrty

I have the privilege of being part of a delicious anthology called Dirty Girls, edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel. The anthology guidelines called for “HOT HOT stories, as in, the hottest one you've ever written. … I want stories that blow my mind and take me to new places…”

I cracked my knuckles and dove in. Now there was a challenge.

What I ended up writing was “Party Favor,” one of the kinkiest things I’ve ever written. It’s a loose sequel to “On Tour,” which appeared in Sex on the Move. In “On Tour,” my unnamed narrator is offered a chance to be with the rock god of her dreams…only under his—and his wife’s—kinky terms.

I was already pushing some personal boundaries when I wrote “On Tour.” I’ve made no attempt to hide my fascination and lust for rockers, including one in particular.

And there’s the slippery slope. Erotica writers are the ones who constantly get the question, “Have you done everything you’ve written about?” The unspoken but obvious question is “Have you fantasized about everything you write about?” The belief is that if you write about it, you must want it (if you’re not writing from experience, that is).

I’m pretty sure Stephen King doesn’t want to experience everything he’s written, but I bet he doesn’t get asked the same questions, either.

So even though the rocker in the stories is a guitarist fronting his own band and his wife is an amalgamation of women, writing “On Tour” was hard for me, because I wondered with every word whether I’d be judged. Whether assumptions would be made about my personal desires, my personal fantasies.

Still, I wrote it, I had Ken review it for typos, and I mailed it, and I sold it. And somewhere between that and publication, I stopped caring what people thought. I write fiction; it’s my job to make things up. I make things up. Writing “Party Favor” was easy after that.

The premise of “Party Favor” was one I’d had in my head for years, but I’d never written it as a story until the Dirty Girls guidelines hit my desk. It was a natural progression from “On Tour,” and there’s a part of me that wants to put those story together with others and write a whole novel about the unnamed narrator and her adventures with the kinky rock star of her dreams and his even kinkier wife. (But that’s a subject for another post.)

The question is, do you think “Party Favor” fits the guidelines of “HOT HOT stories, as in, the hottest one you've ever written”? Rachel, the editor, did, but it’s reader response I really crave…

For more about Dirty Girls, check out the book’s blog, and if you go down to the April 8 entry, you’ll be able to follow links to the rest of the Blog Tour.

And hey, can I just say? I only just got my comp copy and haven’t had time to do more than skim the stories, but I think my hair caught on fire at least once. These stories sizzle, baybee!