*Insert Medieval Trumpet Sounds Here*

My friend, Gina Welborn, has started her own blog! There was much kicking and screaming involved but she's done it. Gina writes a column for us at Romance Divas and it's always a winner. She is also writing a fabulous historical. You may have even read some of her musings on Deidre Knight's blog recently.

Anyway, go check her out and add her to your links - I promise many interesting postings to come.

Now, I must away! I have about 50 people headed to my house for a cookout in roughly an hour and a half.

Have a great Memorial Day weekend! If you know a vet or see a person in uniform, thank them for the job they do. You'll make their day and feel pretty good yourself! GO AIRFORCE! (Love ya, honey!)

The In-Betweener Blues

I finished the first draft of Out Of The Ashes last week. It was a great moment, because it proved that I had more than one book in me. Not that I ever doubted that, I didn't. But so many people never even finish the first one.

So the polishing process has begun - I go through the chapters on my own, adding, correcting, layering, etc - then I turn them over to a crit group to be eviscerated and the polishing begins anew. So far, it's working like a charm. There's much polishing left to be done, too. At least a month's worth (maybe less).

Meanwhile, the next book waiting to be written is completely plotted out. An utter anomaly in the world of a pantser but thanks to Judi McCoy (chaptermate and diva in her own right) and her plotting workshop, it sits ready and eager on a stack of green post-its. Staring at me. Write me, it whispers...I'm going to be great...

I even had a flash of inspiration about this new story last night. Up until this point it was a traditional contemporary (which didn't truly blow my skirt up) but a way to throw in a paranormal element came to me in the drowsy twilight moments just before sleep takes over. Good stuff. Fun stuff. And completely different than anything I've written before.

So am I sitting down today to get that first chapter started? No. I'm not prepping to write any of the seven - wait, just thought of another, make that eight stories currently torturing my brain.

Why? Because like a bad breakup, I'm still in love with the characters of Ashes. I'm not ready to let them go and get into the heads of another hero and heroine. I'm not ready to fall in love again. It's too soon. What if the next hero isn't as studly as my last? What if this new heroine starts whining and I don't like her? What if, what if, what if.

I've got the in-betweener blues. I know it will pass. After all, I started Ashes when I was still editing Heart of Fire and that worked out just fine. I guess I'll know when I'm ready.

Do you get the in-betweener blues too?

Obsess Much?

Pics are up on the RWA site to accompany the names and titles of the Golden Heart finalists. Sigh. Ick. Sigh.

I hate pictures of myself and having this one taken was especially painful due to the mouthful of metal I currently sport on my grill. I insisted on no open mouth smiling. I just didn't want my braces immortalized for this particular event, know what I mean?

Click here to see the pic: Photos.

One good thing...I'm at the top. At least you don't have to scroll to see me. And I know the picture will look better when it's blown up on the big screen during the actual awards ceremony but right now it's rather pixel-y. I wonder if I was the only one barefoot during their photoshoot?

All I can say is I write much better than I photograph. Thank heavens for that.

CONGRATULATIONS, BABE!!!

Check out either of Deidre Knight's blogs for further info:

http://knightagency.blogspot.com/ OR http://www.deidreknight.blogspot.com/

Tag, You're It!

Total number of books I own: Uncountable. Seriously.

Last books I bought: Gena Showalter's Awaken Me Darkly, PC Cast's Goddess of Spring, Handbook to Life in Ancient Rome and Life, Death, and Entertainment in the Roman Empire. (If you hadn't noticed, ancient Rome figures prominently in a book I'm plotting.)

On the 'To Buy' List: Judi McCoy's Wanted: One Sexy Night, Sherrilyn Kenyon's Sins of the Night

Last Books I Read: I reread Karen Marie Moning's The Hightlander's Touch then started Stephen King's On Writing

Most Influential Authors: Shakespeare (don't laugh, I think he's the bomb), C.S. Lewis, Judy Blume, Forrest Carter (If you haven't read The Education of Little Tree, you need to.)

Tag Victims: Jax, Michelle, A.D. Roland, Sela Carsen, Lynn Daniels

On Writing

I was up past 1am last night reading Stephen King's On Writing. I read 116 pages in the first sitting. Actually, I was in bed, so it wasn't a sitting so much as it was a lying. Anyway, great book. I can't believe how interesting it is! I've owned it for a least a year and decided last night was a good time to start reading it since nothing on my TBR shelf looks that appealing. Besides, I'm sure Awaken Me Darkly will be here today or tomorrow and then I'll have something interesting to read.

What's your favorite book on writing?

Gonna Party Like It's Yer Birthday!

Today is my birthday!

Send all presents, gifts, trinkets of varying value, sparkly things and assorted male slaves to my home address. :o)

Thanks!

Why Kristen Can't Read

I can't read. I'm trying to, I really am but everything I pick up lately is just, well, dreck. (And how often do you get to use that word? Not nearly enough.)

Book One - A paranormal I took with me to Spain and read through only because I had nothing else to read. Seriously. If the potato chip bag had been in English, I would have pitched that book into the Mediterranean. As it was I left it in Spain. Reading this book was like swimming through nettle-embedded mud, a long painful process. The characters were so poorly drawn and lacked any depth of personality that by the mid-point I was routing for the bad guys.

Book Two - A historical I picked up when I got home from Spain, ready to sink my reading molars into something juicy. The opening scene was a very hot, sexy description. Of two horses mating. ICK! Get real! Even in my most desperate reading moments, I wouldn't read that. It totally skeeved me out. That book is now marked for the yardsale.

Book Three - A regency that I am still reading. But not for long. The book features a rape scene between the hero and heroine. Yes, a rape scene. I'm trying to read a little further, just to see how it's handled before I make my decision whether or not to mark up my wall by pitching the thing into it. So far, neither the hero or heroine have endeared themselves to me. He's a boorish clod, she's a ninny. Not really my kind of book.

Where have all the good books gone? They are not, I assure you, on my TBR shelf where the rest of these winners came from. Fortunately, most of these books have either been given to me or won. I haven't paid for most of them. Small comfort, really.

I guess I'll have to wait for my next Amazon shipment of tried and trues. Or June, when Gena Showalter's Awaken Me Darkly finally hits the stands. (Actually, I've preordered it from Amazon so it may come sooner. I love when they surprise me like that!)

And will someone please pick up Catherine Spangler's new series? I need something good to read!

Sigh. I guess I'll go write...

Hear Ye, Hear Ye!

A new Mega-Blog is about to be unleashed and if you write or read paranormal, you need to know about it.

All hail Out Of The Blogosphere featuring authors Catherine Spangler, C.J. Barry, Robin D. Owens, Gena Showalter, Jaci Burton, Marianne Mancusi, MaryJanice Davidson, Angela Knight, Morgan Hawke and super agent/author Deidre Knight. Check it out at www.outoftheblogosphere.blogspot.com.

Don't forget where you heard about it!

The Ebb and Flow

I know I said I was going to write about my trip to Spain, but I lied. We did a lot of lounging poolside, site-seeing, shopping and eating. There, now you know everything. Oh and I had my wallet pickpocketed by a short, lying, pregnant Spanish girl. Now you really know everything.

Moving on...

We travel frequently (last year we went to England, Germany, Australia, Hawaii, Texas, Florida and Nevada) so I've developed the discipline necessary to write on the road. I've written violent scenes surrounded by the hubbub of a busy airport. I've written tender scene in the dark cabin of a redeye flight. I've written in hotel rooms, by resort pools, even jotted notes at a sushi bar. I can write anywhere. And I do.

But not this time. I wrote very little while we were in Spain. It was almost as if my muse decided to take a vacation too. Frustrating, because I desperately want to finish this book and start polishing. This is the book that will get me published. I know it. I can feel it. I've even had others tell me this. The premise is truly unique. At least I think it is. (Those of you who've read snippets would probably agree, no one else is writing this story at the moment.)

So, we're home. And I'm finally recovered from the jet lag/time change. And I'm writing. Not just in dribs and drabs but in half-chapter chunks. Twelve pages one day, fourteen the next. And I'm editing too. One hundred ten pages in a single day. Then thirty on another day. WOOHOO! I'm back and so is my muse. Apparently, the vacation did wonders for her.

If I keep this up, the rough draft will be finished next week and the first few chapters (which a lovely agent is currently waiting on) will be polished and in the mail. I'll have this manuscript shiny and sparkling, ready to pitch in Reno. Of course, that's if I don't sell it or get an agent before then.

It could happen. And if does, you'll be the first to know. Well...right after my husband and my mom and dad and my best friend and my brother and my chapter and all the divas at Romance Divas and...

Temporary Blog

Well, I'm back from Spain. What a trip! I promise more details once I've recovered a little more. Now I'm off to my RWA Chapter Meeting.