Friday Fun Facts: 10 Things You Didn't Know About Idaho

I know, I know, you're wondering: why on earth is she talking about Idaho today? Well, I happen to be here. Right now. Yes, I'm visiting my sister who lives in Sun Valley, a lovely, if remote, town in the southern part of the state. Maybe you've been here; maybe you haven't. It's beautiful in the summer and has amazing skiing in the winter, in case you're wondering. And here are 9 other things you might not have known about the great state of Idaho:

It's the 13th largest state in the Union.

It has 3100 miles of river, more than any other state.

Its state bird is the bluebird.

 

 

It's the largest producer of potatoes (okay, I'm pretty sure you might have guessed that one).

 

Ernest Hemingway is buried here.

 

Movie star Lana Turner was born here.

 

The state dance is the square dance (bet you could have guessed that one too).

 

Poet Ezra Pound was from Idaho.

 

And finally...

 

The amazing female force behind American explorers Lewis & Clark, Sacagawea, was also born in Idaho. Let's hear it for great women! And great states. Hey, visit Idaho if you ever have a chance.

And enjoy your weekend :)

 

 

 

Writers' Wednesday: Welcome Lynn Cahoon!

Hi, folks! Today I'm happy to welcome fellow Lyrical Press author Lynn Cahoon, who's celebrating her July release of Return of the Fae. Check out this beautiful cover!

A witch in training, a hunter on the prowl, and a world in jeopardy.

Learning the rules of being a witch takes years, but Parris McCall needs to master them in only weeks. Ty Wallace is going mad with his desire for Parris, but she’s a distraction in his quest to find Coven X before they take The Council and everyone he knows down.

The couple searches for Ty’s mentor, but he’s disappeared. Their only clue comes from a banished witch. When they return, not only are their own lives threatened, but a new life hangs in the balance...

This ebook is on sale RIGHT NOW for only $2.99 at Amazon.

Want to know more about the author?

Lynn Cahoon is a contemporary romance author with a love of hot, sexy men, real and imagined. Her alpha heroes range from rogue witch hunters, modern cowboys, or hot doctors, sexy in scrubs. And her heroines all have one thing in common, their strong need for independence. Or at least that’s what they think they want.  She blogs at her website www.lynncahoon.wordpress.com

Monday Mentionables: After the Fourth

Happy Monday, everyone! What's worth mentioning today? Let's see...

I finally finished the sequel to Beacon of Love, another contemporary romance set in the coastal town of Lindsey Point, Connecticut - called Inferno of Love. If you've read Beacon of Love, I can tell you that this book is Finn the bartender's story. Here's part of the blurb/query, to give you an idea:

Aubrey Anderson is a pediatric occupational therapist from Boston who’s spent the last twelve years rebuilding her life, after a horrific car accident near Lindsey Point killed her boyfriend and crushed her legs. A series of strokes on the way to the hospital left her with no memory of either the accident or the days leading up to it, so when she starts having nightmares she can’t explain, she decides to return to the scene of the accident to see if she can piece together her past.

Finn Cavallo is Lindsey Point’s resident playboy, owner of the popular bar the Great White, and hero of the Cove Fire twelve years earlier, when he pulled seven people from a burning building. But Finn’s laidback, flirtatious personality hides the heart of a man who lost his soul mate the night of the fire. When Aubrey walks into his bar with no memory of who he is or what they had, he’s stunned – and it takes everything he has not to tell her about the summer they spent falling in love.

 

As the days unfold, others in town start remembering Aubrey as well, including Finn’s brother-in-law, who has a connection to the Cove Fire that no one suspects. While Finn struggles with how much to tell Aubrey, and how soon, she finds herself inexplicably attracted to him, and it’s only a matter of time before bar conversation turns to passion on the beach and more. But when a series of events raises suspicion that Finn himself might have started the Cove Fire, Aubrey is forced to do whatever she can to discover the truth about both their pasts, including going back to the spot where it all began and confronting the one man who wants her out of the way for good...

I leave for vacation tomorrow BUT I will be blogging the rest of this week, so make sure to stop in for Writers' Wednesday and Friday Fun Facts! I'm also blogging on Thursday this week over at The Romance Studio, all about ebooks vs. print books - and I'd love your thoughts.

Have a great day!

Writers' Wednesday: All About Promotion

Hellloooo writers! Today's post is all about YOU. You know you have to promote yourself and your books, right? You know that even if you write the best story in the world, if people aren't reading and talking about it, then you won't sell more than a handful of copies, right? I'm sure you already do a lot of the typical: a Facebook and Twitter presence, blogging, maybe taking out ads on various sites. But check out these helpful links as well:

The Romance Studio is having a fantastic sale through July 7th: Buy 1, Get 9 Free. Yes, a total of 10 ads for the price of only 1! If you write in the romance genre, this is a great deal for you.

(I also want to mention that The Romance Studio is a great place for members to post news, because members' posts go straight onto the main page, which means as soon as you post, anyone clicking on TRS will see your news at once. That's great bang for your buck, esp. when membership costs only $15/year. Even if you only paid for that, and not a single other ad through them, you could still post announcements on their main page whenever you wanted to and hit a great target audience.)

Hercules Editing and Consulting will produce trailers for anything you want to sell, for only $35! That's a huge bargain - and you don't even have to do any of the work. They'll look over your product/book/blurb and reviews and then make the trailer for you. Any genre, any length - actually, any product at all. It doesn't even have to be a book you're selling! Check out their sample work right here.

Pay With a Tweet looks to be an interesting, non-traditional way of marketing your work. Using social media is a huge YES in today's world, and this website lets you "sell" your book to any consumer who tweets about it. Considering many people have Twitter followers numbering in the 1000s, news about your book could exponentially reach 10s of 1000s of people.

There are many other ways to promote yourself, but keep in mind to do what you're comfortable with and what you can afford. And always remember, above all, to keep writing! The best promotion of all is talking about your next book :)

Monday Mentionables: Celebrating Digital Books!

Happy Monday, and happy July 1st! Can't believe we're already well into summer (it doesn't seem like it with all that rain out there, at least in our neck of the woods!).

Had a lovely vacation in Bermuda last week with hubby. We had gorgeous weather and ate and drank like kings, so now it's back to the gym and the diet for me! We took a cruise ship out of Cape Liberty, NJ, which gave us a day and a half of sailing time on either side of visiting Bermuda...and I finally got a chance to catch up on my reading!

Even better, I loved seeing that so many other people were doing the same, and in a variety of genres (yes I peeked at book covers when I could - wouldn't you?) I saw everything from romance to biography to suspense to horror to young adult to military. And interestingly, readers were about evenly split between those who were reading actual paper books, and those who were reading on an eReader or tablet.

Which brings me to my big mention of the day: it's time to celebrate digital books! Yes, I know many of you still prefer to have a book in hand when you read. Many times, so do I (and so did I, on the ship!...because I forgot to charge my Nook before we left. But anyway...). But it's worth mentioning a couple of things today:

1. More books than ever are released in digital format first, before they go to print. Sometimes they're released in digital format only.

2. It's super convenient to load your digital reading device with 100s of books and carry around something that weighs, oh, less than a pound. Think about how much 100 books would weigh if you tried to bring them all to the beach!

3. Digital books almost always cost less to purchase than paper books (and many of them are also available for lending through your local library, if you're not a book buyer at all)/

4. Some presses contract that books will go to print depending on digital sales...which means if you really, really want to see your favorite authors' books on your shelves, go ahead and buy their digital book when it comes out first, to help boost sales and make it to print. (I say this in shameless self-promotion because Beacon of Love is contracted this way. I have a sales threshold to meet before it will be released in print. So can you help me out?)

5. July is officially being heralded as Digital First Read-a-Thon Month by The Book Binge and some of its fellow blogs. What does this mean? The folks over there are encouraging readers to try and read as many digital-first books (see #4, above) as they can during this month, to raise awareness about all those great books and authors who are digitally published but perhaps not yet print published. And what's even better? Every single day, you have multiple chances to win books and prizes!!! The link is right at the beginning here of #5, but I'll try to repost it on a regular basis so you can remember to stop by.

And...I'm the featured author TOMORROW at Tracy's Place, so please stop by, check out my excerpt, leave a comment, and generally support this great effort, would you?

Thanks and have a great Monday!

I'm On Vacation!!

Hi, everyone! I'm on vacation this week, so no blogging :)

See you next Monday!

Friday Fun Facts: Happy Summer Solstice!

Happy Friday, everyone! It's the official first day of summer - what a great day! Even better, it's my last day of teaching school for this year. Hubby and I will be going on vacation tomorrow to celebrate and start our vacation right :)

It's kind of neat to think about today as the longest day of the year and what the summer solstice has meant over the centuries to cultures who celebrate it. For example:

 The ancient Egyptians built the Great Pyramids so that the sun, when viewed from the Sphinx, sets precisely between two of the pyramids on the summer solstice.

The Inca of South America celebrated the corresponding winter solstice with a ceremony called Inti Raymi, which included food offerings and sacrifices of animals, and maybe even people.

 Recently, archaeologists discovered the remains of an astronomical observatory in a long-buried Maya city in Guatemala in which the buildings were designed to align with the sun during the solstices. During such times, the city's populace gathered at the observatory to watch as their king appeared to command the heavens.

 And perhaps most famously, Stonehenge in the United Kingdom has been associated with the winter and summer solstices for about 5,000 years.

So...what are YOU doing with the longest day of your year?

Writers' Wednesday: Libba Bray on Writing - No Holds Barred

Had to share this blog post with you all today. Writers especially will (should?) appreciate this, though it's worth reading no matter who you are, just to have a glimpse into a writer's world. Because it's, like, completely true. At least from my perspective. I told one of my writing friends the other day that I really needed to finish Inferno of Love because I was on the 5th draft and she said, "Oh, you have so much patience!" I don't know if it's patience or insanity, but I'll tell you what, author Libba Bray hits it squarely on the head here. Fair warning: it's long, so fill up your coffee and get comfortable!

Monday Mentionables: In Person Appearances!

Happy Monday, everyone! Just wanted to mention that I'll be at the Holiday in Homer (NY) Craft Fair on Saturday, July 20, all day, and would love to see you. I'll have copies of my re-release, The Promise of Paradise, as well as my older titles AND a few other goodies for you to choose from. So find my booth & stop by and say hi :)

I'll also be at the Indie Romance Convention in Lebanon, TN, October 4-5, chatting with other romance authors, selling and signing books, and generally trying to learn more about the ins, outs, pros, and cons of independent publishing through Amazon and other sites. Haven't decided yet whether I'll go that route again, but I figured it would be helpful to hear others' journeys.

So...if you live in or near either area, maybe we'll see each other in the next couple of months. Happy reading!

Friday Fun Facts: Random Comments, Random Videos, Random Thoughts...

TGIF! I know, I know - I missed my Wednesday blog. And I have no good excuse except that I'm fighting an end-of-year cold and am trying to pack up my entire classroom and 8 years of teaching since I'm moving to a brand new building next year and, well........Oh, and trying to finish up Inferno of Love as well. Want to see my favorite line from the section I'm working on right now?

In front of the window, in plain view of the cop standing outside, he grabbed her and kissed her. She winced at the contact, her bottom lip still swollen and sore, but the pain made it real, and she loved the sensation of touching him. Of tasting him. Long and hard he kissed her, hands in her hair and tongue inside her mouth, without words and without breath, desperation and passion mixing until she couldn't tell one from the other. I want this. I want you. I've waited for so long. She could hear the words as clearly as if he were speaking them aloud.

Last night I watched the "Master of My Domain" episode on Seinfeld. And still laughed. That is one of the best written episodes on one of the best-written shows. And one of my favorite scenes? This one:



Finally, I love the fact that Darius Rucker, who I loved when he was in Hootie and the Blowfish in the 90s, is now making a name for himself as a country star. I don't listen to a lot of country music, but I do tune in every now and then, and I love his sound (and his look, too...sexy!). An older song but one I love:




Enjoy your weekend!

Monday Mentionables: Truth is Stranger than Fiction

Happy Monday, everyone! I had a crazy busy weekend, which actually started last Thursday, as I went on a road trip and visited 3 good girlfriends from my past. They all live within 2 hours of each other, though they're all from different points in my past. I decided to take a few days and make a long overdue trip to see them all. Breakfast with one, lunch with another, dinner with a third. Whew!! I'm exhausted now...

I loved catching up with them all, talking about the good old days and also filling each other in on all the new developments in our lives, but I was also left with the striking thought that truth really is stranger than fiction. Each friend has her own path, her own life, all very different (one's a single mom of 2 who lives with her parents; one's a married mom of 3 who's lived in 5 different states over the last 10 years; and one's a never-married Shakespeare professor). And yet they all had these fantastic stories. You want to know why writers never have a lack of story ideas? Here, in no particular order, are real-life plots and characters taken from my girlfriends' lives...

~Next-door neighbor invites all the neighborhood kids (sans parents) on a limo ride which ends up including the  neighbor's impromptu wedding before the ride

~Husband and father of 7+ years turns out to be gay and having an affair

~Child returns from a visit to her father's house with an evil spirit attached, which prompts the need for an exorcism to get rid of said spirit

~Independently wealthy man moves in next door, turns out to have Aspergers Syndrome, but is also one of the city's most philanthropic men and thus has women wondering how manageable a marriage to him would be

~Local midwife is pregnant and prescribed a "potato-only" diet, which leads to her husband calling various people in the neighborhood whenever they run out of potatoes

~Former lover who now lives on the other side of the globe proposes an affair of convenience whenever the two of them are in the same country

And believe me, the list goes on. Great fodder for books, right? How nice when catching up with friends can also inspire my Muse LOL :)

Friday Fun Facts: Writing Spaces and Flashbacks to the Past...

Happy Friday, writers! I forgot to mention one of my fun blog stops earlier this week, over at Welcome to my World of Dreams. I'm talking about one of my favorite writing spaces in the house - picture included!

This weekend, I'm on a road trip, reuniting with 3 good friends from wayyyy in the past. One I haven't seen in 18 years, one in 12 years, and the other - well, the other is one of my best friends from high school, so I do see her just about every year, even though we live far apart. Can't wait to find out what they've been up to :)

I'll share reunion pictures next week!

Writers' Wednesday: Welcome Debut Author Marianne Sciucco!

Happy Wednesday, everyone! I'm super-excited to welcome author and friend Marianne Sciucco to my blog today for Writers' Wednesday. She's talking all about her brand new 5-star Amazon rated women's fiction title, Blue Hydrangeas. Isn't the cover beautiful??

A nursing facility is everyone's solution for what to do about Sara, but her husband, Jack, can't bear to live without her. He is committed to saving his marriage, his wife, and their life together from the devastation of Alzheimer’s disease. He and Sara retired years ago to the house of their dreams, and operated it as a Cape Cod bed and breakfast named Blue Hydrangeas. Jack has made an impossible promise: He and Sara will stay together in their beautiful home no matter what the disease brings. However, after nine years of selfless caregiving, complicated by her progressing Alzheimer’s and his own failing heart, he finally admits he can no longer care for her at home. With reluctance, he arranges to admit her to an assisted living facility. But, on the day of admission, Sara is having one of her few good days, and he is unable to follow through. Instead, he takes them on an impulsive journey to confront their past and reclaim their future. In the end, he realizes that staying together at any cost is what truly matters.

And here's an excerpt to whet your appetite even more:

Sara, an amateur photographer, had chronicled her children’s lives with an old 35-mm camera she’d picked up at a flea market. In the photos, David and Lisa were young teenagers, gangly, smiling, and full of life. Sara sorted through pictures of them playing on the beach, building sandcastles, flying kites. She rummaged aimlessly through the stacks of photos, but one in particular captivated her and she studied it for some time.

Lisa sat on the beach, her long auburn hair floating in the breeze, her bright eyes and glowing skin forever sixteen. She wore a flowered bikini. Her lanky legs were lean and tanned. Sara rifled through the pile of pictures but kept returning to this one. She laid it down and picked it up again several times, struggling to find the right words to express her thoughts. Her facial expressions changed rapidly, showing a spark of recognition, replaced by bewilderment, and then the thread was lost. She held the picture up to the light and spoke with trepidation.

“Do I know this girl?”

“Of course you know her –” Jack started to explain, but stopped, tripping over his words. He took the picture from her and cradled it in his palm, gazing at the girl who was once his greatest joy. He glanced up at the mantel over the fireplace where pictures of Lisa blended in with the family photos. Choked with emotion, he turned away to catch his breath and pondered how to respond. Had Sara forgotten this girl was their daughter? Had her illness robbed her of even this most treasured memory? It was unthinkable, unbearable. He debated telling her the truth, but, uncertain of her reaction, simply said, “She’s a girl we used to know.”

“At Corn Hill?” Sara asked, still staring at the picture.

“At Corn Hill,” he replied. “We have lots of pictures of her, see?” He pointed to the photographs scattered across the table.

She gave no sign of recognition. A moment passed, and she yawned. “Put all this away.” She rose from the sofa and stretched her arms high over her head. “I want to go to bed.”

Jack left the photographs where they lay and escorted her upstairs to their bedroom. After tucking her in, he headed back down and gathered the pictures into neat piles, storing them in their boxes. His hands shook as the boxes filled.

He went to the mantel and removed the pictures of Lisa, hiding them away in a cabinet. Better to keep them out of sight in case Sara noticed them and started asking more questions, or, even worse, stumbled on the truth. A sudden revelation might be devastating, and he was determined to spare her any angst.

He turned out the light in the living room and made for the stairs, but overcome with emotion, he dropped into an armchair and let out a strangled sob. The clock struck midnight as he mourned their daughter in isolation, crying in the dark for Lisa, his wife, and himself. Gone was any possibility they might speak of her, recalling the good times and special memories, or comfort one another as they grieved. It was as if she had never existed.

Jack sat up deep into the night, and wondered how much time remained before Sara forgot him as well.

***********************

Marianne Sciucco is not a nurse who writes but a writer who happens to be a nurse, using her skills and experience to create stories that bear witness to the humanity in all of us.  A lover of words and books, she studied the craft of writing as an English major at the University of Massachusetts at Boston and worked for a time as a newspaper reporter in New England.  She later became a nurse.  In 2002, she put the two together and began writing about the intricate lives of people struggling with health and family issues.  When not writing she works as a school nurse at a community college in New York’s Mid-Hudson Valley, where she lives with her husband, Lou, and daughter, Allison. To follow her visit:

Marianne's Blog  

Marianne's TOS Life Blog 

You can also find her on Facebook or Twitter, or drop her a line at MarianneSciucco@gmail.com

***********************
And go buy a copy of Blue Hydrangeas!!

Monday Mentionables: Last Stops on the Blog Tours!

Hi folks - I'm a little late posting today, but better than not at all, right? Two last blog posts on my virtual tours for The Promise of Paradise and Beacon of Love - which means two more choices to win Amazon gift cards!

Long and Short Reviews is featuring what I've learned about publishing, my tips to you :) Stop by and visit!

And Read Your Writes is featuring a character interview with Sophie and Lucas, the heroine and hero from Beacon of Love. I love writing character interviews just because it's fun to let them take over :) Join me...and them!

Friday Fun Facts: Two Websites You Must See!

Happy Friday, everyone! Can you believe tomorrow is the first of June? Where did the spring go?? Here in the lower part of New York, it's been hot and steamy weather, with more promised today and over the weekend. I do love all the green leaves, but WOW! Have to get used to sleeping with the air conditioning on at night...

First website you must visit today: Brenda Novak's Online Auction for Diabetes Research. Today's the very last day that you can bid on items, so take some time and browse...there are a lot to choose from! And there aren't just items for writers or readers, but things like vacations and handmade jewelry and ties and even life coaching sessions. Check it out - all the proceeds go to an awesome cause!

Second website you must visit today: Teaching the Hudson Valley Blog. Featured right now is one of my students and the winning essay he wrote as part of a contest earlier this year. We worked through so many drafts of his work, and I was thrilled when he won. The writing isn't perfect, but the voice is great and really conveys the picture of his favorite spot and why it's "home" to him.

Read, enjoy, bid on auction items, and have a fantastic weekend. And stay cool!

Writers' Wednesday: A Run-Down of the Latest Writer's Digest

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Time for my run-down of the July/August issue of Writer's Digest. I love this magazine, folks, and if you're a writer, it's worth the annual subscription. It has content for writers of all kinds, all genres, at all steps of the publishing journey. Definitely worth its weight in information!

5 Things Novelists Can Learn From Screenwriters talks about focusing on dialogue, tension, and cutting out the non-necessities - this from the screenwriter of Life of Pi whose first job was reading books & then abridging them for audio.

What "High Concept" Means in Any Genre dissects 7 key qualities that make a book that elusive "high concept" that editors and agents are looking for. Among them: high entertainment value, originality, highly visual, highly emotional, and possessive of mass market appeal. (Sure. Easy, right?)

"New Adult": The Next Big Thing looks at this new YA+ genre, what it includes plot and character-wise (18-24 year olds and their dating/first jobs/first apartments/money issues/identity/self-sufficiency issues), why readers like it, and why it's more than just sexually amped-up YA. The article also mentions 4 agencies currently seeking NA works (check the websites first to see which agents to target!):

Foreword Literary Agency
Nelson Literary Agency
Jean V. Naggar Literary Agency
New Leaf Literary & Media

How to Write and Sell the Cross-Genre Novel is a great look at how many successful authors are blending genres and targeting multiple audiences, following their own hearts and interests in doing so. Charlaine Harris's best-selling Sookie Stackhouse novels (inspiration for the TV series "True Blood") combine paranormal with traditional romance and mystery. Advice from agents in this article included focusing on your strong genre first, and then adding in a second and creating characters that don't fit the typical genre stereotypes. Sounds interesting but challenging...but filled with potential, right?

Be inspired, folks - and write on!

Monday Mentionables: The Next Three Big Things

Happy Memorial Day, for everyone observing it in the U.S. It is certainly a day worth honoring :)

In other thoughts, the next book I want to read is And the Mountains Echoed by Khalid Hosseini (author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, both of which I loved).

The next movie I want to see is Before Midnight (did anyone see the first two in the trilogy, Before Sunrise (18 years ago) and Before Sunset (9 years ago)? I love the concept of following love in "real time" over 2 decades...




And the next TV show I want to try is Mistresses on ABC, just because it looks dishy and dirty and perfect for summer. Anyone else??

Friday Fun Facts: Reasons to Smile

Happy Friday, everyone! It's the beginning of Memorial Day Weekend here in the U.S., and while that usually means days off from school and pools opening and backyard get-togethers, it also means that it's time for us to remember why we have a Memorial Day, to honor and remember those who have served and lost their lives for our country:

 

While you're taking some time to relax and reflect this weekend, here are a couple of videos that are well worth watching, if you haven't seen them already. We love our animals and the way they make us smile, don't we?

 



Monday Mentionables: A Litte Catching Up to Do...

Happy Monday, everyone! First off, congrats to winners of two recent giveaways:

Karen H from NC won the $50 Barnes & Noble gift card for commenting during my Beacon of Love review tour!

And Sherry Strode won the $10 Amazon gift card from The Romance Studio's Release Party on May 9th!

Congrats to both readers - and thanks, as always, for following along on my cyber world adventures. If you haven't yet entered my latest giveaway through Black Lion Tours, another $10 Amazon gift card PLUS any of my back ebooks, make sure to click on this link right here and do so before the end of the day today: Allie's Black Lion Tour Book Blast

In other news, it was a rough weekend here, as one of our beloved cats passed away unexpectedly :( It's always tough to lose a pet, and she was young, only 4 years old. I do find comfort in the Rainbow Bridge poem - have you read it? It's worth posting here, if only for my own solace.

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge. When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind. They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster. You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart. Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together....  Author unknown...

Have a wonderful week, everyone.

Friday Fun Facts: In-Person Appearances Coming Up!!

Happy Friday, everyone! There's still another week left to enter my Black Lion Tour giveaway of a $10 Amazon gift card + your choice of any ebook from my backlist, so here's a link if you haven't entered yet: Love in a Book

I'm happy to welcome a whole bunch of new followers on my author Facebook page, so THANKS if you're one of them! I admit to still favoring Facebook over Twitter when it comes social media - it just seems more personal and manageable. Whenever I check into Twitter, I'm instantly overwhelmed by the news feed there. I know other people - other authors - who love it, but I've never warmed up to it the same way. Do I use it? Yep. I figure it's yet another way to reach out and connect with people, but it's not my favorite. What about you? Do you have a preference?

I do believe writers should use the medium that feels best to them, whether it's blogging or FB or Twitter or their website or (gasp!) in person. And speaking of in person connections, I have a couple appearances coming up in the next few months. I hope you'll be able to join me, if you're in the area(s)!

July 20, Holiday in Homer - Homer, NY -This one's definite

These next 2 are tentative:
September 20-21, SOAR Conference - Vernon, NJ
October 4-5, Indie Romance Convention - Lebanon, TN