Sunday, August 23, 2015

All Day #Romance Party #giveaway! #giftcards #prizes #raffle #amreading

Mark your calendar!  You're invited to an all-day event featuring 12 romance authors, plus additional author guests, all giving away prizes, free reads, and giftcards throughout the day on Tuesday, August 25th.  Best part?  It's a virtual party, on Facebook, so you can attend wearing anything, from anywhere, as long as you have an internet connection.  The fun begins at 11:00 am Eastern Time, and wraps up at 8:00 pm.  Anytime from the start to about a half hour after the ending, you can stop by and enter the prize raffles at your leisure!  But if you have time, try to visit throughout the day for more chances to win, plus the opportunity to chat with authors and find some great new reads!

All genres of romance will be represented: historical, paranormal, romantic suspense, western, etc.  The featured titles have all been purchased by Amazon's traditional publishing house for the Encore Imprint, which re-releases previously published successful books with new marketing.  So we are celebrating!  Here's the link to join the party - click and hit "Join", and invite some friends!




Now, I get to go shopping for some prizes to give away!  Hope to see you there :)

Thursday, August 20, 2015

#99c SALE! Steamy #Romance + Haunting #Suspense ~ a #Kindle Bestseller!

I have a busy week ahead!  Friday kicks off a 99c SALE on GULL HARBOR...have you read it yet?  If not, grab it while it's discounted!  A dangerous ghost and an ex-boyfriend with secrets await psychic medium Claire Linden in Cape Cod's Gull Harbor...

Amazon Link           B&N Link


If you enjoy Gull Harbor, you may want to Pre-order SILVER LAKE on Kindle - this title is re-releasing from Amazon's Encore imprint and it will be downloaded to you automatically on 8/25...Will Rain and Jason get a second chance a first love before a desperate spirit tears them apart again...forever?


                       Amazon Link


To celebrate the re-release of Silver Lake, I've teamed up with 12 other authors whose novels are also re-releasing on Tuesday...we're having a virtual party on FaceBook from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. EST.  Click the link below and "Join" the party, and even invite some friends, because prizes will be offered ALL DAY LONG!  Gift cards, jewelry, e books, print books, etc.  Plus chat with authors and discover new great reads!  You can stop by any time during the day and join the fun and enter to win the prizes:





Hope to see you there - Happy Reading!

Monday, August 17, 2015

#Dog Rescue at Sea ~ My Hubby is a True #Romance Hero! #IronMan #Triathlete

In one of my past Friday Fitness posts, I wrote about how my husband was training for a Half Ironman - a triathlon comprised of a 1.2 mile swim, a 56 mile bike ride, and a 13.1 mile run.  He's completed several at this point, and he is now training for his first marathon.  So this summer, he's been doing more running than swimming.  But years of laps in the pool and the local ponds really paid off this weekend, when he was able to rescue a lone dog in the ocean.

We are lucky to live on beautiful Cape Cod, and on Friday night, we decided to go down to our town beach to enjoy happy hour at a little beach bar.  Suddenly, a bunch of people began getting up off their chairs and pointing out toward the ocean.  My immediate thought was "shark", because great white sharks have made a significant reappearance here since the seal population has exploded.  Then I thought, no, probably just dolphins, and went over to join the small crowd to have a look.

That dot out there is the
buoy the dog was trying
to get to.

It was a dog, way out in the water, by himself, clearly struggling. He was trying to get to a buoy floating in the water that marks the line where swimmers should not pass.  Presumably, he was looking for a spot to climb on to, but the buoy was just a floating ball.  People began whistling and calling, hoping he would turn toward shore.  Several women, including myself, were starting to panic.

Then the dog, unable to get on to the buoy, turned the wrong way and began paddling out to sea.  A young man who had been walking along the beach with his mother started to go in after the dog.  But the dog was moving quickly past the buoy out into open ocean, and the pup was clearly growing tired.

I knew my husband would have a shot at catching him.  After all, he swims miles, training for triathlons.  Despite the fact that he was fully clothed, he took off his shirt, handed me everything in his pockets, and went in.  He's a strong and fast swimmer, and he closed the distance quickly.  He cut the dog off and sent him in the right direction, toward the other man who had entered the water.  Then the two of them towed the dog in, toward shore, where the crowd had gathered.

Happy Ending...back with his owner :)
Eventually, "Rebel", a 7-month-old puppy who apparently lives up to his name, was reunited with his owner, and the story has a happy ending.  Well, the belt my husband was wearing has seen better days, but that's okay.  I'm so proud of him, first for being the kind of guy who would do such a great thing, and secondly, for training so rigorously he was able to save the day!  He's my real life hero...and I wouldn't be surprised if this scene shows up in one of my future novels!


Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Two Weeks of #TechHell ~ #techfail #amwriting #needhelp

My old laptop was my favorite color,
red, but this was clearly a problem
I wrote recently about how I was lucky enough to take ten days off in mid-July for a family vacation that involved four states plus the District of Columbia in ten days.  Not super relaxing.  Before we left, my well-loved but slightly ancient laptop began crashing regularly.  Add to that a screen that was physically broken off the hinges (which would have proved quite inconvenient while traveling) and a battery that wouldn't hold a charge for even five seconds...it was time to bite the bullet and buy a new one.

This fortune was in my cookie at
a very challenging time for me

I didn't want to. And not just because of the expense.  My loyal laptop has been with me since around 2010.  I've written four novels on it.  There is a fortune from a Chinese restaurant taped to the keyboard stating "Real courage is moving forward when the outcome is uncertain"...something I drew strength from as I began the process of a lengthy revise and resubmit to the publisher that would eventually contract my debut novel SILVER LAKE.  That laptop and I have been through a lot together.  But my old faithful friend was clearly on its last flickering legs.

Miraculously, the new laptop arrived before we left.  Which was excellent, because I knew I had to prepare my last three-hour presentation for the fiction class I teach for the local college.  It's a pain to set up a new computer, in my opinion anyway, but I set about personalizing it, transferring files, saving favorite sites and passwords, etc.

Every chance I got during vacation, I worked on my slide show.  I had to have it done by the Monday prior to class for printing.  I managed to finish, powered back up that night to send it in...and discovered the keyboard of my new laptop no longer worked.  Well, the left side, specifically.  And I could not actually log in without letters from the left side.  Cut to me, having a panic attack.  Not pretty.  There were tears.

Thankfully, I realized this new-fangled laptop has a touch screen in addition to the physical keyboard.  I was able to log in and send my presentation--and quickly save it to a thumb drive. But I sure couldn't do any real work with a touch screen.  After numerous calls to tech support lasting well into several nights, the company finally sent a repair person to my house to replace the keyboard.  "B" is still quirky, but I'm back in business anyway (a lot of "B"s in that sentence...sigh).

Then I made the mistake of moving our internet modem/router at the request of my teenage son, who would like a wi-fi connection in his room.  I don't blame him...it's frustrating.  We have an amplifier and he still doesn't get a signal, despite the fact that we don't exactly live in a mansion. Well, touching the stupid thing knocked down the entire precarious house of cards.  Somehow, we lost internet, cable, and the landline phone.  Even when I put it back where it came from...radio silence.

Calls to support.  More calls.  Desperate pleas.  A visit from a tech.  An appointment with an electrician.  New equipment.  Finally, we have internet and cable again...but not in my kid's room still, which began the whole mess.  Maybe I will worry about that in the future, but for now...if I have to wait around one more day for someone to show up at some point during a prolonged window of time and tell me I need to call someone else, I will lose it.  

Now, I realize these are not tragic problems, thankfully.  Merely inconveniences.  But I can't do my job--writing--without a keyboard, and I can't do the other part of my job--staying connected with readers and working with other authors--without the internet.  And of course, I'm the one organizing a big virtual party for a release event (Join here on Facebook - lots of prizes and gift cards to be had!).  So, at least for the immediate future, I'm not going to touch anything with a power cord.  And I'm going to ignore the niggling suspicion in the back of my mind that one of the ghosts from my novels is having some fun with me...

Friday, August 7, 2015

My #Kindle Book Disappeared...and I'm So Excited! #amwriting #romance #ghosts #NA

Last week I announced some exciting news...my debut novel, SILVER LAKE, was purchased by Amazon's traditional publishing house for their Encore imprint, which acquires "extraordinary" previously published books with untapped sales potential.  Amazon is a reputable publisher with fantastic marketing, and I'm thrilled to be a part of this line dedicated to "hidden gems".

My second-chance romance is getting a second publisher!

I have a release date--August 25th--but I just noticed yesterday that the Kindle version of my book has disappeared.  Now, I admit I panicked for a moment, and then I realized what was going on.  Amazon will now own exclusive rights to the book; as a result, it will no longer be available in any other competing format.  Plus, they make a few changes to the "new" books before putting them back up for Pre-Sale under Encore's Imprint...for example, a new ASIN will be assigned.

So panic turned to excitement once I figured out this was a sign things were moving forward! And since a number of romance authors from the former publisher were also selected for this program, those of us with the same release date have decided to celebrate with a big online Facebook party on 8/25!  Ten authors will host an all-day event, chatting about books, writing, romance, suspense, and giving away tons of PRIZES!  Raffles every hour, all day long...and you can come in and comment at any point to enter.  So come Join the party!  Here's the invite page, hope to see you there!  LINK

Monday, August 3, 2015

SILVER LAKE Sold to #Amazon Publishing! #amwriting #romance #ghosts #suspense


Amazon Encore:
Rediscovered Works
Exciting news: I'm pleased to announce the sale of SILVER LAKE to Amazon’s traditional publishing house!  Amazon Publishing’s Encore imprint focuses on acquiring successful small press books with decent sales and reviews and improving their exposure and sales potential.  Books within the Encore imprint will benefit from Amazon’s phenomenal marketing and promotion efforts, as well as be included in programs such as Kindle Unlimited.

A few months ago, Amazon contacted my publisher with an interest in purchasing the rights to my debut novel.  To have such a big name willing to back my book was – and continues to be – thrilling!  I decided to move ahead with this fantastic opportunity, and the contracts have been signed.  While the print version of this title won’t change, the electronic version will soon be re-released exclusively to Amazon.  At that point, it will no longer be available in e-format from other online vendors.

A haunting, an old flame, and secrets from the past...

My haunting suspense/second-chance romance is slated for release with Encore on August 25, 2015, and I’m so excited to share Rain and Jason’s story with more readers.  To celebrate the occasion, I’m joining several other romance authors whose books were also chosen by Amazon for an all-day Facebook event!  We’ll be chatting with readers, raffling off prizes, and giving away copies of some of our other books…so come join us and discover some great new reads!  To receive a reminder, just click the link below and “Join” the event; then visit the page when you have a chance on the 25th and enter any raffles you’d like to win.  Hope to see you there!



Check out the SILVER LAKE storyboard on Pinterest!