Friday Five for May 30, 2014

1. I finished my revisions for WIP #1. It went through some major changes, but it's beautiful. Now I need to find the editor that thinks so too. I queried three publishers earlier this week. I already received one rejection. Yup, two days after I queried, I was rejected. Remarkably, I wasn't totally devastated. I'd love to get picked up by a publisher, but if the manuscript doesn't find a home somewhere, I will self-publish it. A few years ago, I wouldn't have been comfortable with that possibility, but I am now.

2. No word on any of the short stories or the novella I submitted. Waiting never gets any easier.

3. My son had his last day of school and now summer vacation begins. Unfortunately for the poor guy, it starts with him feeling sick. Yet he really wanted to go to his last day of school. I'm happy he loves it so much.

4. Did you see Annalisa Crawford's awesome new cover? Check it out.

5. There are two fabulous giveaways happening over on Untethered Realms. Mary Pax is having a Roadtrip Audiobook giveaway, and Cherie Reich is giving away a huge prize pack of several books including a signed print version of her new YA fantasy novel, REBORN.

Have a wonderful weekend!

An American Girl in Italy release day!

An Italian paradise is the last thing she wants... but the one thing she needs!

Surely any girl would kill for the chance to tour Italy’s most famous cities for the summer? To experience the warmth of the Tuscan sun, the culinary delights of the pizzerias and caffés and to stroll along the cobbled streets of the City of Love itself...

Any girl apart from ambitious oboist Carly Davis that is! For her, the Easthampton Civic Symphony’s latest European tour is one massive inconvenience. She can’t even put her smartphone down long enough to snap a picture of the Coliseum.

Only, there’s one Italian attraction that Carly hadn’t quite expected to be a part of the tourist route...

Tour guide Michelangelo is as dark and delicious as Carly’s morning espresso. And when she needs a few lessons in the language of love to land her an important gig, he’s a more than capable tutor.

But with her promising career back in Boston, can Carly really afford to lose her heart in Italy?

Now available for the Nook and Kindle!

About the Author

Aubrie Dionne is an author and flutist in New England. Her books have received the highest ratings from Romance Times Magazine, as well as Night Owl Reviews and Two Lips Reviews. She has guest blogged on the USA Today Happily Ever After Blog and the Dear Teen Me blog and signed books at the Boston Book Festival, Barnes and Noble, and the Romance Writers of America conference. Her books are published by Entangled Publishing, Harper Impulse, Astraea Press, Spencer Hill Press, Inkspell Publishing, and Lyrical Press. When she's not writing, Aubrie teaches flute and plays in orchestras.

Links-

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2964057

Twitter: https://twitter.com/authoraubrie

Blog: http://authoraubrie.blogspot.com

Wicked Wednesday - beards not sexy?

Today I'm just wondering out loud...

 

Why do so few PNR heroes have beards? Or even facial hair beyond the sexy scruff? And when does scruff become a beard?

I'm seeing more and more men these days with beards. Maybe it's a pirate thing, or even a Hobbit movie dwarf thing. My husband says it's a hipster trend. I see as many men with beards with a lovely woman on their arms as I do clean-shaven men.

I'm not a big fan of facial hair myself, but I could be persuaded.

(Alcide the werewolf from True Blood)

Oh yes. Surely Alcide could convince most women that beards are hot!

What do you think about beards: sexy or not?

WRiTE CLUB

First rule of WRiTE CLUB: talk a lot about it!

Here's DL to tell you about this awesome competition.

 

First off, I’d like to thank Christine for the opportunity to talk to you today about something near and dear to my heart…WRiTE CLUB. My modest writing contest has proven so popular that the DFW Writers Conference is now considering incorporating it into their agenda for 2015. 

For the newbies out there, let me explain what WRiTE CLUB is? It’s a modest writing competition whose inspiration was derived from the movie FIGHT CLUB. There are numerous versions of this concept around the internet, but nothing like we do it. Its essence embodies simple, good-natured competition, with lots and lots of fun sprinkled on top. 

Over the course of eight weeks I hold twice-weekly bouts in which the winners advance to the play-offs, which will ultimately lead to a single champion. Bouts between who…or what…you ask? Anonymous 500 word writing samples, submitted under a pen name by anyone who wishes to take part, that’s who. The writing can be any genre, any style (even poetry) with the word count being the only restriction. It’s a way to get your writing in front of a lot of readers, without having to suffer the agony of exposure. 

And the winners are determined by WRiTE CLUB readers!

To find out how to become part of the fun just head on over to DLHammons.com and click on the WRiTE CLUB tab. 

Submissions are open until May 31st. After that date a panel of a dozen judges will read all of the entries we received and pre-select 32 of the best writing samples to climb into the ring. Those 32 participants will then be randomly matched to compete over the next eight weeks, each of them hoping to make it into the play-off rounds and moving towards the ultimate goal – WRiTE CLUB Champion. No one (other than my wife)…not even the judges being used to pre-select the 32 contestants, will see the true identity of any sample. Unless you win, of course.

Again this year, the most exciting part is the winner of the final round will be chosen by a panel of publishing industry professionals! Judges include New York Times best-selling and multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning horror and thriller author Jonathan Maberry, Agents Katie Grim of Don Congdon Associates, Margaret Bail of the Andrea Hurst Agency, Sarah Negovetich of the Corvisiero Literary Agency, Brittany Booker of The Booker Albert Literary Agency. Also included is Candace Havens, Editorial Director of Entangled Publishing Covet line, Authors Les Edgerton and Lydia Kang, and previous WRiTE CLUB winners Tiana Smith (2011), Mark Hough (2012) and Tex Thompson (2013).

Are you willing to WRiTE for what you want? Then crack those knuckles and get ready to flex that imagination. And whatever you do, tell your friends!

WRiTE CLUB – The contest where the audience gets clobbered!

Shout Out to Author R. Mac Wheeler

Three cheers for Mac! A fellow writer and blogger-friend, he recently reached a monumental milestone: publishing his 24^th novel. I hope you'll visit his blog where he posts his photography and give him a congratulations or visit his home page and peruse his titles, read an excerpt, and help him celebrate. Message him and he’ll send you a mobi copy of book 1 of the series. 


About #24

This volume of the NEW ORDER APOCALYPSE series continues thirty-three years after an engineered plague shredded Earth's population. Chloe and Ginna Lee must decide whether to continue Jason's dream to unite survivors, or concentrate on surviving. Chloe hasn't the tact to play ambassador, and Ginna Lee is more likely to take heads than spread good will. Promises little hope they can build an alliance, especially if peace hinges on a cure for Jihad. Meanwhile, the landscape they must cross still writhes with roamers and desperate clans.

Mac spins tales around rich, gritty characters with a lot of baggage, and puts them through a bit more grief than they can handle. His tone leans toward the sarcastic, passive aggressive. He writes speculative fiction, fantasy, SF, suspense, and paranormal with a twist.

Please visit Mac at:

http://rmacwheeler.com/

http://rmacwheeler.blogspot.com/ 

Contact Mac…Kindle…Nook…GoodReads…Sunday Safaris…Mac’s Photos

Reborn is here!

To save a kingdom, a prophetess must challenge Fate.

On the day of Yssa’s death and rebirth, the god Apenth chose her as the Phoenix Prophetess.

Sea serpents and gods endanger the young prophetess’s journey and sour the omens. Yssa is cursed instead of blessed, and her duties at the Temple of Apenth prove it. She spends her days reading dusty scrolls, which does nothing to help her forget Tym, the boy back home. But the annoying yet gorgeous ferryman’s son Liam proves to be a distraction she can’t predict, even though he rarely leaves her alone for two sand grains.

Her boring temple life screeches to a halt when visions of her parents’ murders consume her. Yssa races across an ocean to stop the future. If she can’t change Fate, she’ll refuse to be the Phoenix Prophetess any longer. Fate, however, has other plans for her and the kingdom.

Yssa must either accept her destiny or fight to change Fate.

Now Available in Print and Ebook!
Print: Amazon /Barnes and Noble / Createspace
Ebook: Amazon / Google Play / Kobo / Nook / OmniLit / Scribd / Smashwords / Wattpad

Wicked Wednesday - new PNR couples

I've been hearing a lot of readers getting bored with the kick-butt heroines and Alpha males in paranormal romances. All the characters from various books blur together. The heroine and hero are becoming caricatures of themselves.

I still love a good PNR even when it has these same types of heroes, but I perk up when I find something new. I don't see these characters disappearing any time soon. Many readers still love the fantasy of a super possessive and domineering man and the beautiful warrior woman with a wit sharper than her blade. Yet there's room for different power couples out there.

Here are four trends that I'm seeing.*

1) The Alpha male beneath the surface of the "every day"** guy. You have the nice guy, usually smart and successful. He doesn't stand out in the heroine's eyes until he falls for her. He becomes driven to make her his. He might be smooth and savvy, but he gets arrogant and possessive.

2) The Alpha female and the Beta male. Many say this is the perfect match. Some women do fantasize about being in control. Just remember that the Alpha female isn't necessarily bossy and the Beta male isn't weak.

3) Geeky heroes. The girls who idolized Hermione Granger have grown up, and they prefer brains over brawn. A smart hero is better than one who muscles his way through life.

4) The "every day" woman emerges as the heroine. A woman with a crappy job, bad fashion sense, social anxieties, and/or obnoxious family members. The supernatural hero sees something special in her and falls in love.

Have you seen any new trends lately?

*I'm looking for new stories in PNR with different heroes, and I dig around all over the internet to find them. Are these books going to become the new big thing? I don't know, but I love seeing how romance novels evolve over the decades. (Check out this article on the evolution of the romance novel.)

**We are told these characters are every day folks, but it is fiction. Their lives have to be much more entertaining than ours!