I Forgot!
July 31, 2007
I forgot to post July’s book giveaway today. But here’s the news you’ve been waiting for. The winner of Mary DeMuth’s debut novel Watching the Tree Limbs is . . . Julie.
Congrats, Julie. For the rest of you, I have a great book by a new author for August’s giveaway. Stay tuned for info on that . . .
May the Force . . . Annoy You
July 30, 2007
I got quite a number of comments on last Monday’s post where one child asked me to make the other child stop using the force on them. And yes, that really was said to me in a most serious manner.
Want to know the story behind it?
We have a Legos Star Wars video game, and my kids were playing it together. One of them was Darth Vader whom we all know has force powers. Evidently “Darth” wanted to get into whatever Child Two was doing in the game, and so “Darth” used his force powers in the game to move Child Two elsewhere. This happened over and over and over until Child Two got upset and called for me to make him stop using the force.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but we’re not as talented as all that!
A Little at a Time
July 27, 2007
As you’ve probably guessed from my recent blogging (or lack thereof), life has happened at our house. I’ve suddenly found myself overwhelmed with everything that needs doing, with doctor appointments, soccer camp, and errands.
Typically, if I’m going to write, I like to have a 2 to 4 hour block of time. But that hasn’t been possible for a long time and won’t be for the next month either.
So how do you get things done when you’re coming and going and doing three chores at the same time?
Well, it’s not easy. I’ve learned this summer that you’ve got to take the little bits of time that you do have and work with them.
For example, I have a manuscript that I’m getting critiqued at this fall’s ACFW conference. I need to have it done in a couple of weeks, but as of yesterday morning, I had not one word written.
As of today, I have 817 words! All I had was half an hour, but that was enough time to get over three pages written. If over the next week I daily add that amount to it, I’ll have the fifteen page manuscript written and ready for editing. So that’s my goal — fifteen pages in whatever few minutes I can scrounge up.
What about you? Any time tips you can share?
- Next Monday–the winner of Mary DeMuth’s debut novel, Watching the Tree Limbs. Follow this link to learn how to enter.
Overheard in Our House
July 23, 2007
“Moooooooooooom! Make him stop using the force on me!”
Pick a Cover, Any Cover
July 20, 2007
Want to have some say in a future book’s cover? Follow this link.
Bethany House Publishers is doing a survey on the cover for a book they have coming out sometime in the future. They’re also giving away one book to ten people who do the survey so they’ll ask for your e-mail at the end for the book drawing which is in about two weeks.
This got me thinking about genre and branding and how the two go together and how important they are. In fact, ten minutes ago, my hubby and I were talking about what the Food Network and point of view have in common. And yes, it’s all related to this. Stick around. I think I’ll wax eloquent on that next week.
I’ve been ridiculously crazy over the past two weeks and life doesn’t look to be slowing down until July ends, at least. So for this week, I’m again going to skip our Friday Routines. I’ll do my bestest to get back to that next week.
Happy weekend, everyone!
One Step Over the Border by Stephen Bly
July 19, 2007
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Stephen Bly is a pastor, a mayor, an antique Winchester gun collector and a writer.
He’s mayor of a town of 308 in the mountains of Idaho, on the Nez Perce Indian Reservation. In his spare time, he pursues the three R’s of ridin’, ropin’ and rodeo…and construction of Broken Arrow Crossing, a false-front western village near his home.
That keeps him very western. And he collect old Winchester rifles, which reflects his love of historical accuracy. He’s also a fan of Jimmy Buffet music.
Stephen says about his writing, “I write about the West (historic or modern) from the inside. Born and raised on western ranches, I have both the heart and mind to describe things as they really were…and are. There are those who think the frontier has long passed and with it the ‘code of the west.’ The truth is, both are still around…and it’s fun to show that in a contemporary story. The West is so big, so diverse, so enchanting it’s a thrill to write about it in any era.”
Stephen is the author of ninety-five books and hundreds of articles.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Some call it CowboyLit. Rodeo cowboy Hap Bowman’s on a search for Juanita, the gal of his dreams, whom he hasn’t seen in 18 years. He seems stuck on 12-years-old and the enchanting girl he met then.”An idiot obsession,” his roping partner, Laramie Majors, chides.
But Laramie agrees to a final summer’s trek along the Rio Grande. If they don’t find Juanita during those months, Hap promises to drop the idea of the hunt for the mystery senorita. But if they find her, will she feel the same as Hap does about their years ago interlude?
In One Step Over The Border the time tested values of cowboys rub up against contemporary mores. It’s a crazy story that becomes more logical as the reader delves deeper into it. It will make you laugh and shed a tear or two.
Getting back to Hap’s pursuit . . . don’t we all have someone in the past, that we knew for only a short while, that we wish we could have known better, longer? Stephen Bly has!. So when Hap and Laramie ventured out on a quest for Hap’s Juanita, Stephen decided to invite others to go along too. Folks have been e-mailing Hap hapandlaramie@yahoo.com and asking for their own “Juanita Search Kits.”
They get a bumper sticker, magnet, bookmark, stickers, flyers, etc. It’s a whole packet of material that will equip anyone to join the fun of finding the Juanita with “the mark of God.” If they send Hap a picture of the places where they stuck their Juanita signs, they’ll receive a free copy of the book. It’s all there on the website at http://www.onestepovertheborder.com/
And there’s a very special feature on http://www.amazon.com/…some more adventures about Hap and Laramie that did NOT appear in the book, can be found on AmazonShorts in the story entitled, Aim Low, Shoot High.
I’m Late, I’m Late — July Giveaway
July 18, 2007
Yes, I’ve usually got my blogging for the day done by now, but my poor calendar’s been filling up far too fast. So this post is late.
A few days ago, I finished Mary DeMuth’s first book, Watching the Tree Limbs. I’d read it once before and enjoyed it so much then.
This time I was reading it for a contest. So it was more of a forced read, but I was amazed at how much I fell into the story again, at how much I STILL couldn’t put it down, at how well it was written now that I knew the ending that was coming. Mary’s words were so vivid and simple that it was like watching every page happen in front of you with a setting as real as my world (just hotter). The plot was so smooth and seamless that I couldn’t imagine this story working any other way than the way she wrote it. Watching the Tree Limbs, I’m sure, will be one of those books people are still reading ten, fifteen years from now.
Yet the topic scares so many off.
It deals with a little girl — who’s been abused.
I know the topic kept me from reading it when it first came out, but over and over I heard people talking about how good it was, how nothing was graphic or gratuitous.
So I read it. And loved it.
Yes, the topic is a sad one, but this is Christian fiction. Christian fiction gives hope. It gives answers. It does not glorify sin. The abuse was only a small portion of the book, yet the ramifications and the girl’s healing take center stage. I’d imagine for many it could be a book of hope.
That’s what I love about Christian fiction.
I’m giving away Watching the Tree Limbs this month. If you’d like to be entered for the drawing, please leave a comment on this post. I’ll draw the winners on July 30th.
After Almost Two Weeks of No Exercise . . .
July 17, 2007
. . . I didn’t gain weight! Wow, that was so exciting to see this morning. I’m still down the three pounds from a couple weeks ago, the last time I weighed in.
We had our Vacation Bible School every morning last week, and between that and trying to do everything else I normally do in half the usual time, exercise and eating healthy were pushed aside. I was sure that the weight I’d lost would be back when I got on the scale this morning.
So does that mean there’s no point in exercising?
No way. I think it means that because I’d been exercising pretty regularly before VBS hit, my body didn’t absorb everything I ate like it normally would have. It was stronger and maybe my metabolism was higher? Wouldn’t that be wonderful. And I spent 50 minutes on the elliptical yesterday morning, burning around 600 calories. I’m sure that helped, too.
How’s everyone else doing?
My Goals for This Week
July 16, 2007
Okay, I’m going to be stupid brave and post my goals for this week. Maybe if I put them in writing, they’ll happen.
Quit snickering.
So I’m finishing an edit for a client. I hope to get that done today, and it may take me all day. Then I need to brainstorm with my critique partners on a new book called Kept that I want to pitch at the ACFW conference in September.
I haven’t done a lot of reading this summer, and I need to get back into that. I’m going to concentrate on recent releases from the houses of the editors I’ll be meeting with in September. So at some point I’ll need to run to the library and use that gift card I’ve got to Borders.
It’s also time to start working, too, on pitches and one-sheets. Ugh. I hate that part.
Plus I’m seriously trying to lose about 15 pounds before summer ends. Okay, I’d prefer to lose it by next Monday, but I like to eat and feel energetic too, so . . . middle August would be absolutely great. I’m back to getting up early each morning and spending quality time with the park district’s elliptical machine.
Plus I’m in charge of ACFW’s Forty Days of Prayer leading up to the conference. I need to get that out to our e-mail loop this week, hopefully by Wednesday, so people can start signing up to pray on specific days.
We also just finished our VBS. Our theme was Rescue Zone, and for our Friday night closing program we had about eight different rescue vehicles (and workers associated with them) on our church’s front lawn — huge plow/construction vehicle, roadside emergency vehicles, army vehicles, and a fire engine that got called to a fire at one point. We got to watch them jump into their gear while their ladder retracted. They backed out of the driveway (that took a minute or so), and as soon as they made it out, the call was cancelled and they pulled right back in. Made for a great show!
All that to say that my kids and a couple other families are going to make cookies tomorrow to take to the fire department and some other places as a thank you for spending their time with us. If I get my editing done that is.
So I’m busy. What am I doing blogging??? Sorry, I’ve got to run!
- On Wednesday–July’s novel giveaway announced, one of my favorite books of the last year!
Fearless by Robin Parrish
July 11, 2007
is introducing
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Robin Parrish had two great ambitions in his life: to have a family, and to be a published novelist.
In March of 2005, he proposed to his future wife the same week he signed his first book contract.
Born Michael Robin Parrish on October 13, 1975, Robin’s earliest writing efforts took place on a plastic, toy typewriter, and resulted in several “books” (most between 10 and 30 pages long) and even a few magazines.
By the age of thirteen, he had begun winning local writing awards and became a regular in his high school’s literary magazine. In college, he garnered acclaim from his English professors and fellow students while maturing and honing his skills.
After college, he entered the writing profession through a “side door” — the Internet. More than ten years he spent writing for various websites, including About.com, CMCentral.com, and his current project Infuze Magazine, which is a unique intersection between art and faith which he also conceived of and created.
One of his more “high concept” ideas for Infuze was to return to his love for storytelling and create a serialized tale that would play out every two weeks, telling a complete, compelling story over the course of nine months. That serialized story eventually came to the attention of several publishers, who saw it as a potential debut novel for Robin Parrish.
In 2005, Bethany House Publishers brought Robin full circle by contracting him for the rights to not only that first book, Relentless — but two sequels. A trilogy, to unfold in the consecutive summers of 2006, 2007, and 2008. One massive tale — of which that first, original story would form only the foundational first volume of the three — spread across three books.
Robin is the Editor in Chief and creator of Infuze Magazine. He and his wife Karen reside in High Point, North Carolina. Karen works for High Point’s First Wesleyan Church, where Robin and Karen are members and Small Group leaders.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Book Two of the Dominion Trilogy:
The world changed after that terrible day when the sky burned, and now every heart is gripped by fear…
Earthquakes, fire, disease, and floods pummel the earth, and its citizens watch in horror.
But in the darkness there is hope — an anonymous but powerful hero whom the public dubs “Guardian.” He is Grant Borrows, one of a chosen few who walk the earth with extraordinary powers. But while Grant enjoys this new life, signs of a dangerous ancient prophecy begin coming true, and those closest to Grant worry he may be hiding a terrible secret.
A search for answers brings Grant and his friends to London, where an extraordinary discovery awaits that will challenge everything they thought they knew. With a deadly new enemy dogging his steps, Grant realizes that the world’s only hope may come from unraveling the truth about himself once and for all. But what he comes face-to-face with leaves even this most powerful of men shaken with fear.
Secrets will be revealed.
Friends will make the ultimate sacrifice.
And destiny will not be denied.
The story continues…
I Just Want to Be Bad
July 11, 2007
No worries, Mom. I’m talking about writing.
I’ve been in editing mode for so long that creating mode is really freaking me out. If you think writing comes naturally to writers, think again. It’s hard, hard work, and most often our rough drafts are nasty rough.
I’m still in the early stages of the first draft of my book Shelf Life. I love the story. It’s far more complex than the last book I wrote. I’ve even written a nine-page outline of the thing, but where I am right now in the story is a black hole. I don’t know how we’ll get from here to where the action becomes clear again, and each time I sit down to write, I remember that the laundry needs to be folded or that I haven’t checked my e-mail in about 3 minutes or that my kids probably need their glasses refilled.
Frankly, I’m scared to type. I know it’s going to be — gulp — horribly bad.
But lately the desire to write has been building, no matter how awful my rough draft might be. I just want to write bad if that’s what it takes to get it on paper. And sadly, that’s what it will mean — rough drafts that will never see the light of day. If they do, I’ll be absolutely mortified.
But that draft is the building block to the finished product. I know that once I get those scenes on paper, once I print them out and sit down with my red pen and bleed all over the thing, I’ll have a good idea of what I need to add, what I need to delete, and what kind of work I’m looking at in my rewrite.
I can’t wait to get to that rewrite.
I’ll never get there if I don’t glue myself to my laptop and write a pathetic first draft.
So, deep breath, it’s time to do it. Time to step away from the e-mail, set my timer for the dryer, and let the kids refill their own glasses.
I’ve got to write.
Badly.
Wedding Bell Blues by Linda Windsor
July 10, 2007
This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
(Avon Inspire 2007)
by
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Linda, a native of Maryland’s Eastern Shore, is the author of eighteen historical novels and nine contemporary romances for both the secular and Christian market. A Christy Award finalist, Linda has received numerous awards in both the ABA and CBA, including the Romantic Writers of America’s Beacon Award. She lives in Salisbury, Maryland. Learn more!
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Wedding Bell Blues is the first in a new series, The Piper Cove Chronicles, that follows four women who grew up as best friends in a small community on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. They have returned home from their successes and failures at college and life, determined to pursue their dreams in the town they’d once vowed to leave in the dust. True love has eluded the four friends until one by one they encounter their soul mate. Next in the series is FOR PETE’S SAKE, on sale from Avon Inspire in April 2008.
Alex Butler is a successful home decorator who hopes she has finally gotten her life together. But when Josh Turner, the man who ran away and broke her heart sixteen years ago, returns to Piper Cove to be the best man in her sister’s wedding, Alex can’t escape the butterflies in her stomach. But Alex has no time for distractions. Her family has enlisted her to make this the wedding of the century. To pull the event off, she pools the talents of her three best friends – Jan, who creates desserts to-die-for will help with the cake and catering, tomboy Ellen, who works at a landscaping business will handle the flowers and decorations, and Sue Ann, who can…well, Suzie Q can give Alex a much-needed reality check in the course of the wedding planning chaos.
But fate won’t be stopped in this small town as Alex and Josh keep running into each other at every turn. When sparks fly, Alex soon finds herself caught in a paralyzing battle of the heart between her old-fashioned Southern father, who fiercely resents Josh for breaking his little girl’s heart, and her feelings for the one man she ever truly loved.
As the wedding approaches, the Butler family faces a threat to their reputation that will shake this Chesapeake clan to their very core. In the midst of it all, can Alex and Josh resist the many forces that seem to be drawing them together?
Back Back Back Back Back
July 9, 2007
Yep, it’s Home Run Derby time, and I’ll admit I enjoy watching major league sluggers hit baseballs out of the park. I mean, that’s what we go to baseball games for, right? The action, the scoring, the homers.
I’ve been a faithful watcher of this event for the past five or six years, ever since I started working on my own baseball-related series. So I have a few Derbys that stand out in my mind.
My least favorite Derby was the one from two years ago (I think) when they had it divided up by country. Eight guys from eight different countries tried to hit ball after ball out of the park. In my opinion, it was the most boring Home Run Derby ever — names you didn’t know and all country-oriented. I mean, come on. Outside of the World Series and the playoffs, this is America’s big baseball event. We don’t need a mini-Olympics.
My favorite Derby was in ‘02 or ‘03 when White Sox Paul Konerko was robbed by Giambi Juice of a chance to make it to the final round and win the whole thing. (Okay, it wasn’t my favorite because he got robbed, but because a White Sox player did well. It’s always nice to see one of our own players in the national spotlight.)
This year, there’ll be no White Sox player in the derby, but I’ll still be watching. It’s in San Francisco’s very cool ballpark. I’m hoping they get most of the best home run hitters in the thing. And if they do, we’ll be watching ball after ball splashdown in the bay, listening to Chris Berman saying, “Back back back back back — gone!”
Island Inferno by Chuck Holton
July 5, 2007
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Chuck served four years in the Elite 75th Ranger Regiment–the same unit profiled in the movie “Black Hawk Down.” Chuck saw combat in Panama in 1989. After leaving active duty, Chuck flew helicopters in the Wisconsin National Guard while attending the University of Wisconsin.
In 2004, after ten years as a stockbroker, Chuck left that profession to pursue full-time writing. At the same time, he began working as the “Adventure Correspondent” for CBN.
He is the author of five books, including A More Elite Soldier, Bulletproof, and
Allah’s Fire, the first of three books in the Task Force Valor series.
Today, Chuck, Connie, and their five children live on a farm in Appalachia, where Chuck now pursues his varied interests of farming, writing, adventure travel and public speaking, among other things.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
As the global war on terror heats up, the U.S. deploys a team of highly trained special operators overseas to locate and neutralize threats, bringing EOD expertise to dangerous missions that have no room for error.
A DEADLY EXPLOSION
A new specialty explosive is on the black market: ITEB looks like water, but when it’s exposed to air, the effects are lethal! The United States government is frantic to keep it from our shores. Staff Sergeant Euripides “Rip” Rubio knows how destructive ITEB can be. He has already risked his life to thwart a horrific terrorist plot involving the chemical. Now Task Force Valor heads to Panama, on the trail of an arms dealer who plans to use ITEB to make a killing…literally.
AN ADVENTURE ABROAD
Fernanda Lerida is a University of Florida grad student who jumps at the chance to join a biological expedition to a mysterious former prison island. But the snakes, bugs, and crocodiles are soon the least of her worries as the group stumbles upon something they were not meant to see. To Make matters worse, Fernanda soon finds herself alone and being pursued by an unseen foe.
A RISKY RESCUE
When Rip’s path collides with Fernanda’s, they find themselves caught in the midst of a brutal turf war. Can they use the chaos to their advantage, or will one false step set the entire island ablaze?
“Island Inferno is a boy-meets-girl story. But in Chuck Holton’s world, boy meets girl in the middle of a jungle at 25mph. hanging under a parachute with an assault rifle strapped across his chest. You’d better plan on reading this in one sitting. And once you’re done, you’d better give yourself time for your pulse to calm down.”
—-TOM MORRISEY, Author of Deep Blue, and Dark Fathom
July 4, 2007
Have a great Fourth of July, everyone!