Time To Write

I looked at my writing log--the place where I record my goal totals for the day and actual words written--and saw that there have been nine days this month when I wrote nothing at all. Not good. I'll never reach my goal at this rate. Besides all the distractions there have been lately in my personal life, the internet and the social media are just too much of a temptation for this recluse to while away valuable time each day. So, I've decided to unplug until I get this book finished. I call it a book and it isn't even that yet and won't be unless I stick to the program.

Happy writing, all! See you on the other side.

Devon

Evil Computer Is Back

Yes, he's back and in fine form today.

The day started off fine. More than fine. We got the very good news that our house closing is scheduled for Wednesday. We haven't bought a new house, it's the same old one we've lived in for the past twenty-two years. We're just refinancing at less than half the interest rate we're paying now, which means lower monthly payments. Yay! And even with the lower payments, the term of the loan is the same as the remainder of the original, which means the house will be ours, OURS in just a few more years. But I get ahead of myself.

So, the morning started off great. What with the house news and our recent adoption having gone so smoothly, I was beginning to think maybe our rotten luck had started to turn. After hubby went to work this early afternnon, I came in here and sat down at the keyboard, jazzed to write. Yes, things were looking up!

I read through a few paragraphs I'd written yesterday to bring myself up to speed on where I left off, stopping now and then to change a word or add a line. I got to where I stopped last outing and I continued with the story. The writing was going fine, smooth even. I was making progress, getting the words down in the manuscript. Then, BLINK. My screen goes to black. The air stops running and an unearthly silence settles around me. But not before I hear the boom of a transformer blowing up somewhere down the road.

After a few choice words, I got up and set about doing something to pass the time, cause I got a bad feeling about this. And what is there to do when the lights are off except, ewww, housework. Resigned to waiting, I folded some towels and loaded hubby's lunch dishes into the dishwasher. After an hour, I ended up sitting in my armchair, staring out the window to see if I could spot the Jackson Energy truck.

The electric finally came back on at about a quarter til eight tonight. First thing I did was rush in here and boot up the computer to see if the additions to my document survived. They didn't. Vanished. The document looked the same as it did when I opened it earlier today. I thought Word had an autosave feature. In fact, I know it does, but it sure didn't save my work today. Must go check those settings.

I guess this is my comeuppance for bragging just yesterday to someone about how meticulous I am about saving my work.

Devon

p.s. - I just went and changed my setting in Word to autosave every 5 minutes.

Social Media and Politics

I'm straying from my comfort zone for this post but I feel this needs to be addressed. Actually, it should never have to be addressed. You'd think people would have a clue by now. Social media and politics, they just don't mix.

I'm sure it's been said thousands of time, but let me repeat it just once more. If you're an author, or any person who depends on the general public to buy your product, please don't get on a public forum like Facebook and spout off a bunch of political crap. Here's the thing. No matter what your political views are, no matter which way you swing, you're bound to piss off roughly half the people who see your message.

I have very strong political views. I keep abreast of what's going on in the political theater (and lately it's come down to that). I don't need or want to see posts from my "friends" that hit my buttons seven ways from Sunday. During the past several days, it's been especially bad for some reason. Maybe because we've had so much flirting with catastrophe during the past two weeks. If I want to know what's going on in the world of politics, I watch the news and I turn to my favorite political pundits, knowing they'll bring me up to speed. I go to Facebook to wind down, hopefully see a cute video or get a laugh from some comment. The last thing I want to see is a post from a friend that makes me not only question her intelligence, but also her sanity. It isn't funny, people. And please stop jumping on the latest, loudest bandwagon that shows up on the radar. Use your head. This is our future you're rolling the dice with.

End of rant. But let me end by saying that I came close to deleting a couple of people from my friends list today. I really didn't want to do that. Then I found that if you hover your mouse over the right hand side of their posts, you can "hide" them. Voila! Problem solved.

Peace,

Devon

The New Face of Romance

Remember when Fabio was on the cover of nearly every romance novel ever published? Well, maybe that's an exaggeration, but it seemed like he was on the cover of every one I picked up. Then came John DeSalvo. Man, was he ever a cutie. Both those guys have now faded from favor but they'll live on forever, as long as there are old romance novels floating around.

Now, with the tidal wave of self-publishing and e-pub/small presses, there's a new guy in  romance town. His name is Jimmy Thomas and his image is on more than 1,600 romance novels, at last count. He's keeping track and keeps all the covers on bookshelves on his site and the number changes daily by leaps and bounds. How did he end up on so many covers, you ask? Well, you see, Jimmy has a web site called RomanceNovelCovers.com where cover artists (and those playing at creating covers--like me) can purchase stock images--featuring him and a variety of female models in cover-ready poses.

So, in case you were wondering, who's that guy on all the romance covers all of a sudden, meet Jimmy Thomas, the new face of romance. :o)

Two of my future books were added to Jimmy's shelves today. I had a lot of fun making these covers. And the stock images of the couples I found on Jimmy's site made it so much easier to add that special touch of romance. ~~~Devon

New Cowboy Philosophy

"If you've got work to do, stop lollygaggin' and palaverin' over at the bunkhouse. Just get on your horse and get it done."

This is my mantra and I can't seem to stick to it. So, instead of following the latest publishing controversy via internet, or trying to preach to the choir, or worrying over whether any readers at all can find my book (soon to be books) among the vast, confusing miasma of the self-publishing stampede that's taking place as I write this, I'm following my own advice. I'll be back when I have something of substance to say and/or more stories to offer. Meanwhile...

Happy reading and writing!

Devon

Do you like angst and an occasional dash of misery in your romance? If so, read on. The following tidbit is from pages 237-39 of Angel In The Rain.

*****

     Deep detonations of thunder rolled across the land. Behind him, the windowpanes rattled in their frames. The sound roused Rane from the state of oblivion he had worked so hard to achieve. With a muttered curse, he coiled his hand loosely around the neck of the whiskey bottle he’d been nursing and stood. Weaving an unsteady path to the window, he shoved aside the heavy drape.
     Lightning slashed through the night’s velvet blackness. He squinted against the sudden brilliance. A heller of a storm was lashing the border country and he’d been oblivious to it.
     He let the curtain fall into place and staggered back. The closed-in room felt stuffy, suffocating. On the unmade bed, rumpled linens bore evidence of spilled food and drink. ¡Mierda! How long had he been holed up here?
     The stagnant air threatened to choke him. He felt for the top button on his skirt and yanked, sending it flying, and then the next one. It wasn’t enough. Still keeping his hold on the neck of the whiskey bottle, he crossed to the door, wrenched at the handle and lurched through the opening.
     Outside, cool dampness washed over his fevered flesh. Runnels of rainwater poured from the tiles overhanging the edge of the roof. Beyond, rain slanted down at a hard angle and danced against the onslaught of a fretful wind. Rane braced against the rough adobe wall and leaned out. The deluge streamed over his uplifted face, drenching him down to his trousers in a matter of seconds.
     Nature’s cold dash was a shock, but at least he felt it. He’d lost count of the number of days and nights he’d numbed himself with whiskey and felt nothing at all. Now, the violence of the storm awakened him from his prolonged apathy, stirred to life the dormant wildness in his soul. Like a drunken demon, he threw back his head and laughed, taunting nature’s fury.
     A spectacular series of forked lightning licked through the blackness, throwing his surroundings into vivid relief. His rented room opened onto the plaza of the tiny border town, the name of which he’d forgotten. Before him yawned the emptiness of a deserted circular road. At its center stood a fountain, a shallow aboveground pool made of mortar and stone. An angel, spectral in the flickering light, her slender arms uplifted to the Heavens, stood to her ankles in the watery basin.

      He braced his back against the wall and waited. The next flash was closer and hung on with a deafening crackle as it ripped through the sky. He had eyes only for the angel. She seemed to mock him with her cold, marble stare. The angel of mercy, her delicate wings glistened with a sheeting cascade of wetness...an angel in the rain.
     Rane clutched at the rough wall behind him, feeling the bite of the grainy clay beneath his nails, and surrendered to memory. The winged angel dimmed before his bleary eyes as he envisioned another. His Angel, standing in the pouring rain. His nostrils flared as he again smelled the fire and brimstone of that long ago stormy night. Like a dim echo, he heard her calling his name. An ephemeral sense of her arms around him, the taste of her rain-washed skin, sweeter than creation’s finest nectar... he remembered.
       God help him, would he never forget!
     A strangled sound of raw torment slipped from his throat. The lightning flashed again with a stuttered cracking that might have been the sound of his own heart ripping from his chest. The angel, remote, unmoving, stared with her indifferent eyes.
     Rane shoved away from the wall and staggered into the downpour. “¡Vaya infierno!” he shouted at the lifeless statue. He drew back his arm and flung the bottle in his hand with strength bordering on madness. The vessel sailed into darkness and shattered explosively when it struck stone.
      He waited, half expecting the wrath of God to strike him down in the mud and streaming water. But there was nothing, only the soft rushing sound of the rain falling around him.
      “Why don’t you stop feeling sorry for yourself and do something about it.”
    Slowly, he turned toward the voice. Benito stood in an open doorway, a dark figure silhouetted by wavering lamplight. Rane dashed the water from his eyes and shook his head at the irony of having his own words thrown back at him.
      “I can’t,” he said.
      “So, what will you do if you do not try?” Benito asked. He lifted his hand. “It’s cold. It’s raining. And you are a sorry sight, amigo.”
     When Benito faded back inside his room and closed the door, Rane hung his head. Battering rain pounded the back of his skull and streamed from his face. If only it could run through his burning heart and cleanse his soul with such ease.
     He turned and lifted his eyes to the angel once more. Mercy, he silently cried. But the lifeless seraph would not be moved to grant him any boons. There was only one living, breathing angel who could help him now. She was far away and tonight he was more undeserving of her than ever.

*****

Cowboy Philosophy

Andrei Claude

It's the man that's the cowhand, not the outfit he wears.

You can judge a man by the hoss he rides.

Any hoss's tail kin ketch cockleburs.

Polishin' your pants on saddle leather don't make you a rider.

If the saddle creaks, it's not paid for.

Tossin' your rope before buildin' a loop don't ketch the calf.

It's sometimes safer to pull your freight than pull your gun.

Only a fool argues with a skunk, a mule, or a cook.

There ain't no hoss that can't be rode.

There ain't no man that can't be throwed.

Brains in the head saves blisters on the feet.

The bigger the mouth, the better it looks when shut.

Man's the only animal that can be skinned more'n once. 

The man that always straddles the fence usually has a sore crotch.

You can never trust women, fleas, nor tenderfoots.

**(from Cowboy Lingo by Ramon F. Adams)

Covers, Flowers, and Rabbits

My prickly pear bloomed over the weekend. Here's a shot of one of the beauties that's growing right next to the back of the house. They're a month late this year. They've always bloomed for me at the end of May or the beginning of June. I think all the gloomy, rainy weather we've had delayed them. I love the prickly pear blooms, but they usually only last one day. My plants are all transplants from east Texas, where my mother lives.

In my upcoming western historical, the title, Wild Texas Rose refers to both my heroine's name and the prickly pear that grow wild in Texas. There's a scene where my hero makes up a story for the heroine about the prickly pear being the true yellow rose of Texas. It's a sweet moment and leads her to think there may be more to the rugged cowboy than a tough as leather view of the world.

Hubby was home all three days this holiday weekend, so I got very little writing done. Every time I opened my document and got into it, he came to the door and said, "I hate to bother you, but..." and pulled me right out again. Since today was the last day he had off, I gave it up and spent the rest of the afternoon and evening with him. We sat on the back porch this evening and watched rabbits out in the yard. For the longest time, we've thought we had three resident bunnies living in the brush just across the property line. Then this evening, we had seven in the yard at the same time. Must be mating time.

For the past several days I've spent part of my writing time editing a Regency Historical novella I wrote earlier this year. Part of my problem with being a prolific writer is that when I do finish something, I have to let it get completely cold before I can go back and spot the no-nos. I mention this because I've had my eye on a cover shot for the novella over on Hot Damn Stock for several weeks. Then, today, I received a notice that they were selling all their stock photos for 50% off, today only. So, I hopped over there and bought the shot. Got it in low res--which is all that's needed for an ebook cover--for only ten bucks, and you can't beat that.

Hope you had a safe, happy holiday weekend.

Devon

Pirates Ahoy

I just ran across something strange. A site called The Pirate's Realm, devoted to all things piratey (their word, not mine) has lifted my blog post titled Before Pirates of the Caribbean... and posted it on their site. The word pirate put me on the alert and caused me to investigate. But I found nothing to complain about. They've attributed the post to me and in order to read it, they've linked it back to the original post here. Here's a link to the "piratey" site, if you want to take a look. Makes me wonder what else is out there, and maybe whatever else is out there is the reason I have so much traffic to my blog but no comments. Avast all ye lurkers! I'm onto ye! Aargh! Sing it with me now -- Fifteen men on a dead man's chest, yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum...

Devon the landlubber

The Good News Is...

Thanks to Smashwords, Angel in the Rain is now up on Kobo and Sony. I'm sure it's showing up in other places, too, if I took the time to go look.

I have my office back! Can't tell you how thrilled and relieved I am. Now I can write again. A solution finally occurred to me two nights ago. I could move mother to my son's room and run the phone cord from her heart monitor through the wall into our bedroom. So that's what I did yesterday. I punched a hole through the wall and problem solved. Hey, what's a little hole in the wall compared to writing time.

For the past nine months, we've been involved with my dear hubby adopting my daughter from my first marriage. She's always been with me, and then with my husband since we were married twenty-three years ago. But because she's an adult (33) with Angelman's Syndrome, it's been more of an involved process than we anticipated. But an end is now in sight! We have a court date for the second week in July. Wish us luck. This is long overdue, folks.

For the past several days, sales have nearly flatlined. I was beginning to get a little down in the dumps over it. Then, last night when I checked email for the last time before turning in, I had a lovely note from a reader who told me I'm now one of her favorite authors and she's eagerly awaiting my next book. Doesn't get much better than that. Thank you, Ashley, wherever you are, for giving this old gal a much-needed pick-me-up! :o)

Hope all your news today was good news.

Happy reading and writing!

Devon

Falling Skies

Tonight, hubby and I watched the 2-hour premiere of Falling Skies on TBS. What can I say, I'm a Noah Wyle fan and there's a real dearth of entertainment on tv these days.

Overall, I was disappointed. I expected more from Steven Spielberg and Dreamworks but this was nothing but a knockoff of The War of the Worlds with a plot that is too familiar and tired. Noah Wyle is still playing his Librarian character, the brainy professor who is a warrior. Like Tom Cruise in WOTW, he has children he's dragging around with him while running from and battling aliens who've taken over earth. He belongs to a group of survivors who call themselves the Massachusetts Resistance. Toss in a pediatrician love interest (though this has yet to develop)--who treats all wounds and is the voice of reason--add to that a counter movement led by a long-haired bad boy (think Sawyer in Lost), two hot militant blondes, an overbearing ex military man who heads up the resistance, the requisite African-American and Asian secondary characters, and the old, wise couple and you've pretty much got the entire cast.

There's nothing new here. Same old aliens and their robot counterparts roaming around looking for humans to kill while the mother ships hover over all majorly populated cities. I don't look for this one to last long because there aren't even any interesting cast members or characters like there were in Battlestar Galactica. For myself, I'll give it a couple more weeks to get interesting before I completely give up on it. Only because of Noah.

Devon

Edit Anxiety



I loved this the first time I saw it on DA.



Today, everything ground to a screeching halt. Our anniversay plans, everything. Yes, today was our wedding anniversay. Twenty-three years. Not bad, when everyone in the family bet it wouldn't last six months. LOL! What do they know. Instead of celebrating, hubby and I spent most of the day at the hospital, in the ER. He developed some pretty severe and scary symptoms last night, so we were off to the hospital this morning. He has prostatitis and a severe urinary tract infection. Hopefully, the antibiotics will do their magic and he'll be fine in a few days.

Tomorrow, I plan to get back on track with the manuscript. When I checked email tonight, I had yet another reminder that I need to get this book finished and out there. A reader and a couple of fellow western romance authors were saying that very thing on one of the Amazon forums. They wish I'd write faster because they want to read the next book!

This brings me to a bit of a pickle, a problem that's been floating around in the back of my mind for quite some time. Even when I do have this book finished to my satisfaction, there's NO WAY I would ever publish it without putting it through some kind of an editing process. I'm a decent editor and my writing is pretty clean, if I do say so myself, but no one can edit her own work and catch all the typos, logic errors, etc. etc. that are found in any newly finished manuscript. No one. I'm going to need help. Dear hubby has offered to read for me, which is fine because there are some things he can catch. But when it comes right down to it, he doesn't know squat about craft of writing.

I need a crit partner. Or a group. But I have no idea how I'm going to get hooked up again. Over the past four years, I've drifted away from all my old crit pals. It's going to be difficult because a critiquing partnership is almost like a marriage. There are trust issues, and there are skill level issues, and then there are familiarity with the western genre and its tropes issues, and so on and so forth. Ack! Trying to critique with someone new would be almost like going out on a blind date. Actually, when I think about it, the best crit partner I ever had was a blind date. A mutual acquaintance hooked us up and we clicked immediately. But how often does that happen?

So... tell me, please. How did you find your crit partner or group?

Devon

Baby Steps

That's what I feel like I'm taking right now--baby steps. With my mom here, the relatives are coming and going so much, I might need to install a revolving door. Plus, it seems like we take an awful lot of impromptu trips to town for whatever. Then there are the functions. Nephew's graduation, huge family gathering at the cemetery to decorate graves (people drive in from out of state for this), birthdays (hubby, mom, and my niece), and a first time ever family reunion next weekend. I know I've said this before but, I am NOT a social person. I just want to be left alone so I can write, not to mention THINK. I guess that makes me an old stick-in-the-mud (or so I'm told).

Would you be surprised if I told you, progress on the current manuscript is going painfully slow? No? Didn't think so. I recently read someplace that if you want to do something badly enough, you WILL find a way. So, that's what I've been trying to do. Find a way. To write. Even if it's only a few lines a day. I want to get this second book out there. I'm tired of being asked when the next book is coming out and having no answer except, "I'm working on it." 

Meanwhile, even with everything around me in chaos, I've been trying to get my name out there. Trying to network. Very time consuming. Time I should be spending working on the ms., I suppose. Like now, instead of writing this blog post. But it's so much easier to click a few buttons on Facebook than write sparkling dialogue when it's 3:00 in the morning and my mental faculties turned to mush an hour ago. Speaking of Facebook. I got a friend request from some porn queen tonight, complete with racy photos. I declined, but thought it was interesting because that's never happened before. Heh. And now I'm rambling...

It was my intent tonight to get on here and give you a progress report. Even though I've had a few twinge moments for one reason or another, (lots of despicable author shenanigans from the self-published on Amazon forums) I'm still happy with my decision to publish on my own. I'm not burning up the rankings, but sales have been a steady trickle. The key word here is "steady" and I can now report that since publishing on April 26th, I've already surpassed my royalty earnings that I made for the entire year of 2010 while I was under contract with a small press/epub. WITH THE SAME BOOK. THAT'S ALREADY BEEN ON THE MARKET FOUR YEARS. I think that's pretty remarkable. It gives me hope for the future. And that's a good thing. :o)

Sweet dreams, and my apologies for the occasional shouting.

Devon

A Little More Time, A Little Less Conversation

I thought it was time I posted something, since it will soon be a month since I was last here. For the past three weeks, I've been a fly-by observer of the internets and not much of a participant. My mother is here from Texas for an extended visit and we've had people dropping by from here, there and everywhere. Some of them only stay for a short visit. Others spend an entire weekend. Plus there have been functions to attend. My nephew's graduation, a family reunion, family cookouts, etc. Social butterfly, I am not, so I'm ready to pull out my hair.

My computer time has been nearly nil and this is really driving me nuts. I have a book to finish!!! I've already announced that it will be out by the end of the summer. What was I thinking?

What's the cover, you ask. It's one of the prototypes I was playing with for the aforementioned unfinished book before normalcy was snatched away. Seeing it here in miniature, I can tell some more blending is in order at the top where the dark area meets the lighter background. Finding stock images is a challenge. I think these look just a tad too contemporary for my historical, but there isn't much choice. I also have a couple others in the works and will probably post them later and ask for feedback on which I should use. I think rational decisions about anything right now might be beyond me.

So, how's the summer going for you so far? At least we've gotten a break from the rain.

Happy reading and writing!

Devon

Publishing The Book

At some point this morning, Angel In The Rain went live on Barnes & Noble. Yippee! So now I have it up on Amazon, B&N, and Smashwords, who will eventually distribute it to Apple, Sony, Kobo and others.

I'm done. At least I've done all I'm going to with publishing this title. Now I can fully concentrate on getting the next book ready for publication.

This publishing stuff is time consuming, but I like the hands-on aspect and being the one in control of my own work. Control freaks, ahoy. This Indie author stuff is definitely for you. ;o)

Devon

If You Can Read This...

...you can read an ebook.

Did you know that? Until recently, I didn't. For a while I began to get frustrated because some of the books I wanted to read were only available as ebooks. Then, after buying my husband a Kindle for his birthday, I discovered I could download the Kindle app. from the Amazon site to my computer, and it's free!

Both the Kindle and the Nook have free apps for all your gadgets--PC, iPhone, Blackberry, iPad, and Android and they're absolutely free.

I like my PC version of the Kindle better than my hubby's actual device because I get a larger page area and instead of a bland list, I get icons of the beautiful covers in color.

So, if you haven't tried an ebook yet because you thought you needed one of the expensive readers, go ahead, try an ebook on your PC. You might be surprised how much you enjoy it.

Happy reading!

Devon

Quality Control

I had intended to save this topic for a later date, but something just happened that prompts me to bring it up now.

On the recommendation of a Facebook friend, I downloaded a western historical by an author I'm not familiar with. I thought, oh, good, a new author with a whole list of books I haven't read already. Eagerly, I opened to the first page and started reading. The first brief paragraph was in the hero's point of view. The second paragraph was in the heroine's. What? That's where I stopped, and I won't be returning to this book. I refuse to read a book written by someone who ignores the rules of craft that I've had drummed into my head for the past fifteen years and that I abide by at all costs. How much easier it would be to whip out the pages if I didn't have to follow even the most basic rules, such as NO HEAD-HOPPING. This book was not self-published, nor was it from a small press. I find it hard to swallow that such blatant head-hopping is still allowed by the big pubs in this day and time. I mean really. First two paragraphs of the book!

End of rant.

Now, to the real topic of this post. Quality control.

A year ago, one of the reasons I wouldn't have considered self-publishing was the issue of quality control. With Amazon's Kindle program, B&N's Pubit, and a whole host of others, anyone out there, even down to their siblings and cousins, can publish any old thing they whip out on a word processing program and it doesn't cost them a dime to do it. How are the book buying consumers supposed to wade through all the crap to find books worth reading? It seemed there was no answer because the vetting process, the gatekeepers, had been taken out of the equation. This lack of any kind of quality control was the one aspect of the self-publishing stampede that troubled me the most.

Then, the ebook retailers provided the solution, and it was so simple. It's called sampling. All the major ebook retailers have sampling on their sites. You can try the beginning of any ebook before you commit to buying it. The sample depends on the book length. I checked and the sample of my book is something just over the first two chapters. Shorter lengths may only be the first chapter or so. Plenty enough material to tell whether or not a book is well written--or not--and if it's something we want to spend time reading. I even sample the books from the big NY pubs and I've run across quite a few clunkers that I decided not to waste my time or money on, and this after the blurbs made them sound so good. Thank goodness for samples. Now we don't have to rely on reader reviews, which may or may not have been posted by the author's friends and family.

Samples are definitely our friends.

Have you tried sampling yet?

Back From The Edge

Hi, all! I'm back. After many months of woolgathering and deep introspection (is there any other kind?), I've decided to return to the land of the living.

As some of you already know, or may have guessed, I've joined the Indie revolution, which is a rather pretentious way of saying, I'm self-publishing. And guess what. I'm loving it! This was a decision I didn't make lightly. And, yes, I've spent a lot of long nights trying to figure out how to do this and that. There's a big learning curve between writing the book and actually publishing the book. In the coming weeks, I hope to share with you some of the things I've learned during this process.

The most fun I had was making my own cover. I think it turned out fairly well, insofar as it reflects the two main characters and one glance lets you know, you're looking at a western historical. What do you think?

Just a year ago, I never would have considered going the indie route. (Ack, the horror! Only people who can't write self-publish. The stigma, the stigma!) But times have changed, and they continue to change, sometimes on a daily basis. After spending four years with a small press/epub, I can tell you with certainty, there are more advantages to putting my work on the market myself. At least, that's true for me.

So, what are your thoughts about the self-publishing frenzy taking place in the publishing industry? Would you ever consider becoming an Indie author? Or is the stigma that's long been associated with it still too real for you?

Devon