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Writer on the Verge

August 18, 2008 by in category Writer on the Verge by Kate Carlisle tagged as , , ,

More Conference Talk!

Everyone’s been sharing their conference and post-conference experiences, so I thought I’d join the crowd. And I brought photos–mostly of me, I’ll admit. But ya know, it’s my camera. 🙂
For me, this year’s conference was all about networking with fellow writers and I think I succeeded. Well, I partied a lot, anyway.
I was thrilled to finally get a chance to visit and party with my fabulous blogging group, Romance Bandits, and even had a few chance encounters with the Golden Rooster. (A long story, but visit the blog a few times and you’ll catch on!) Here’s a picture of the Cheeky Chook with Romance Bandit and Kensington debut author Jeanne Adams. Don’t they make a cute couple?
Here’s a shot of me with another Bandita and double Rita finalist, the lovely and talented Avon historical author, Anna Campbell.
Here are a few familiar OCC faces. This was taken the night of the Rita awards. It’s me, with Jennifer Apodaca and Michele Cwiertny. Don’t we all look fabulous?
And here I am with yet another Bandita, Sourcebooks Casablanca author Loucinda McGary. Her first book, The Wild Sight, is out in October and she’s already starting to garner wonderful reviews! We’re showing off our first sale ribbons!
I’ve got lots more photos but an alarming number of friends have threatened me with death if I post them here. I won’t mention any names … but some people are so touchy!
Hope your conference experience was wonderful!



Kate Carlisle’s Bibliophile mystery series from NAL debuts in February 2009 with HOMICIDE IN HARDCOVER.

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The Write Way………

August 17, 2008 by in category Archives, The Write Way by Maureen Child tagged as ,

Ahhhh………another year, another conference!
Hard to believe National has already come and gone…….But here we are. We’ve mostly recovered, we’ve filed away all the notes and tidbits we picked up in San Francisco, and we’ve finally finished dissecting every conversation we had, looking for the ways we screwed up or said the wrong thing!
Time to move on. And what does that mean, you ask??
It means it’s back to work. Back to writing. Back to racking up the daily page count and meeting all of those deadlines. Whether they’re self imposed or set down in contracts, meeting those deadlines counts.
Did you get a request for a partial from one of the editors or agents you met at conference? Then don’t just sit there, get it shined up and out the door. And while your baby is sitting on that desk, tapping its proverbial toes, waiting to be read, you should be sitting at YOUR desk, working on the next proposal. Don’t sit there fingers crossed, hoping for luck.
Build your own luck.
I’m not sure who said it originally, but I heard a great quote in one of the workshops at conference……..If you want to succeed, double your failure rate………
Makes sense. You’ll never succeed if you’re not trying. So get those proposals out there. Take a shot. Make your dreams come true while you’ve still got time!
Maureen Child is the author of more than 100 romance novels and novellas. Right now, she’s typing crazily, rushing to meet those deadlines………
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Time: Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?

August 15, 2008 by in category Java Plots by marianne h donley tagged as

By Marianne H. Donley
I love clocks. I have wind up analogue clocks that chime every fifteen minutes, a KitKat Clock with red sequined eyes and a moving tail that acts like a pendulum, battery clocks that are boring but accurate, atomic clocks that know when to change to daylight-saving time without me telling them to do so, and, of course, digital clocks on the microwave, cable box and computer screen. With one or two exceptions they all report different times.
It starts in my bedroom where we have matching digital clocks on matching night stands. The old guy’s clock reads ten minutes faster than my clock. He sets it that way on purpose. Every morning when HIS clock says 6:30 and mine says 6:20 he shuts the alarm off BEFORE it rings. Then he goes back to sleep.
I poke him and say, “Time to get up.”
He says, “No, I can sleep for ten more minutes.”
I say, “Why do you set it early?”
He says, “So, I can sleep for ten more minutes.”
This makes no sense to me. He knows the clock is ten minutes fast. Why doesn’t he set the clock for the correct time and then set the alarm for ten minutes early? As much as I like math (and I really do–be careful I’ve been know to prove the square root of two is irrational with little provocation!) I don’t want to do arithmetic at 6:20 in the morning. In addition, he is legally blind without his contacts on, no joke. So he can’t even see the clock until he gets up and gets dressed. And, not to belabor the point, he turns the alarm off BEFORE it rings, so why does he even need to set the alarm?
Moving down to the family room we have the mantle clock, an eight-day, key wind, Westminster Chime, Seth Thomas, my sister, Rosemary, gave to me as an engagement/Christmas present. No matter how many times I set it or fiddle with the +/- lever in the back, it runs about two minutes slow. This doesn’t really bother me. The clock is thirty something and has survived my kids, my nieces and nephews, and now my grand kids trying to see how it works. I figure it’s entitled to be a little slow. This drives the old guy nuts. He complains about it nearly every day which is why I keep fiddling with it.

In the dinning room we have an eight-day, key wind, Westminster Chime that my brother, Michael, made for my son, David’s wedding. We hung the clock when David and his family moved in with us. It doesn’t work because someone (I’m not naming names, but it wasn’t me) set the time by moving the hands counterclockwise. We’ve taken the clock to a variety of clock repair guys who have told us a variety of tall tales as to why it doesn’t work, including one guy who said it needed to be cleaned to the tune of three hundred dollars and one who wanted to replace its expensive movement with a cheap battery operated one.
My KitKat Clock didn’t survive the move from California whole. One of the mover guys misplaced his tail (on purpose I suspect as I had to take the clock off the wall twice and hand it to the guy when he said everything was packed). I hung KitKat in the solarium anyway, and his red sequined eyes still move with the time. But without his tail, he doesn’t have quite the noble bearing he did before. He keeps pretty good time as long as he is perfectly balanced. Dust his pretty face and he’s likely to stop ticking completely until I get the level out. My five-year-old grandson would like the clock to completely disappear because KitKat has scary little eyes. When he visits, I think poor tailless KitKat will have to live in the basement for a while.Now here are two time related tasks for you.

Task One: Go look at an advertisement for clocks or watches. You can use a newspaper or even the Internet. What time is it in most of the ads? Do you have any idea why?Task Two: A Westminster Chime clock, chimes four times at quarter past the hour, eight times at half passed, twelve times at quarter to the hour and sixteen times at the hour PLUS one extra chime for each hour (so at 6 am the clock will chime twenty-two times). How many chimes will that be for this whole year? (I warned you about the math.)

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RWA Forever!

August 6, 2008 by in category Pets, Romance & Lots of Suspense by Linda O. Johnston, Writing Conferences tagged as , ,

Linda O. Johnston
www.LindaOJohnston.com
www.KillerHobbies.blogspot.com

I’d imagine I won’t be the only OCCer to blog on the Slice of Orange about how great the Romance Writers of America National Conference was last week! I, for one, had a wonderful time.

When I registered, the block of rooms in the conference hotel was already booked, so I found a hotel across the street. The Mosser Hotel room had charm but not a lot of space, but since I shared it with my husband things worked out just fine.

These days, most of what I do at an RWA conference involves networking and promotion, and I had a blast with both–not to mention all the parties I attended, including a couple at the OCC suite!

I also had fun making sure that my keychains, bookmarks and excerpts were available in the Goody Room as long as I was around. People must have liked them, since I always had to add more.

I admit I didn’t attend many workshops. I did go to the opening session of the PAN retreat and enjoyed the motivational speaker, and I also popped into some other workshops when I had time. That was one regret, since I know I missed some fine talks. And I also had to leave early, so I wasn’t around for the presentation of the Golden Heart and Rita awards.

I’m already making my plans to attend in Washington , D.C. , next year… and you?

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A Fantasy Life

July 28, 2008 by in category A Fantasy Life by Janet Cornelow tagged as ,

By Janet Quinn Cornelow

Gideon is the hero in my Augeas story that is part of my Whiskey Shots Vol. 17. He is a warrior set against Dorjan in a battle to save the Ancient Ones from annihilation in “The Betrayer.” He is also a human in a world of magic and a member of the Lord’s Guard.

When an editor sends you the edits on a book, it is probably the least enjoyable part of writing. Usually, you have time to work on it and do a last check. However, when I found out on July 15 that Amber Quill wanted to release Betrayals on August 3 and could I get the edits back by July 25 if I got them by the 19th, what was I suppose to say, “No.”

I got the edits on the 19th, returned them on the 22nd and emailed back and forth on the 23rd to clear up the last few problems – except for the one both the editor and I missed. The galley arrived on the 24th with a request to have it back within three to five days. I am on day four with 109 pages to go.

Besides eyestrain from staring at the computer screen and working on the edits and galley around my other two jobs, life is wonderful. Isn’t this what being an author is all about?

And just to make the weekend more interesting, the neighbors decided we needed a new fence. It was a little rickety after twenty some years. When do the fence men arrive? Four o’clock on Saturday afternoon. Came back on Sunday. Of course, this means I am locked in with Chewbaca, my 75 pound dog. He is spending his time guarding me from the men who might sneak in and attack and barking ferociously at the men in his backyard. Unfortunately, Chewbaca does not understand the fine art of walking so he can potty. After all, he has a dog door and uses the backyard whenever it suits his purpose. I’m waiting for a very large accident since he hasn’t been “out” for 24 hours.

Art work by Jasmine Tanner – http://veildandy.deviantart.com

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