This week on Romance Writers Weekly, Leslie Hachtel asks: What is the writing project you’re thinking about doing next and why? If you joined me from Leslie's blog, welcome! It was cool to find out what her next project is! For me, my next project is a few months away (I'm a very slow writer) but it is always there, niggling away at the back of my mind. The reason for this is that the book I am currently writing is the second in a trilogy, so my next project will be the third in the series, and ties in very closely with this one. This is the first series I have written, and keeping everything straight through all three books is proving a challenge. But since the first hasn't been published yet, I can make minor changes to it as I go along, thank goodness! The working title for the series is "It's a Man's World." I wanted to write stories about women working in non-traditional jobs, so I created Bendixon and Sons Construction. The thing is, there are no "Sons" working there. Instead, it is a grandfather and his granddaughters. Camryn, Mattie and Jo are the Bendixon sisters. Mattie (Book 1) works with her grandfather and is a hands-on construction worker. Jo (Book 2) is a computer programmer who helps the company with state of the art residential technology. And Camryn (Book 3) is a business woman who has to step in and save the company when it is facing financial ruin. I'm excited to be writing a series, but I am definitely finding it different than writing a stand alone. Fingers crossed I can make it all work out! I wonder what Tracey Gee is up to? Check out her blog here! But before you go, tell me about a project you're working on. Anything at all - arts and crafts, a business goal, a new hobby or travel plans. Let's see what our future holds!
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I've been quiet on the blog the last couple of weeks, but it's great to be back! The Romance Writers Weekly kicks of 2017 with a Lyra Parrish topic: How did you spend your New Years? What literary goals have you made for 2017? Mr. C. and I are notorious for not celebrating New Years with too much fanfare. When the kids were younger we'd play games until midnight and then hit the sack. That was more for my sake than anyone else's – I'm a grouch much past 10 o'clock at night! This year, however, we attended a fundraising event called Boogie with the Stars. Local celebrities and business owners pair up and take part in a dance competition. It's all in good fun, because no one is a professional (although they do have great instructors). The "winner" is the team that raises the most money for our local hospital foundation. We really enjoyed the performances, and then danced to a live band for the rest of the evening. It was a lot of fun! 2016 was both a good and bad year for my writing. I made my first venture into self-publishing, made a lot of new connections, and was asked to submit a full manuscript to Harlequin (still waiting on the verdict for that one). But I did not start a new story last year, spending most of my time revising and marketing. This has been weighing on me quite a bit. Since my first book was published, I've managed to complete a first draft of a new manuscript every year except for 2016. I feel like I've fallen behind my own self-imposed schedule. So for 2017, my goal is to complete a new manuscript. I would love to be mostly finished by the end of May, but that might be pushing it a bit. I have got a start on it, and I think I have a good handle on the story, so I'm feeling fairly confident. It is the second book in a series so I know the world – it's just a matter of sticking with it and not letting my inner editor bog me down. Other goals in 2017 will be to keep networking and marketing, of course. I have a new release launching on January 20th (No Life But This - read an excerpt here!) that I'll be promoting. As well, the rights to my first book, Mountain Fire, will revert to me this fall. I plan to self-publish it, but I need to decide whether to revise it first or simply relaunch it. It looks like 2017 is going to be busy, doesn't it? Maybe I should get to it, then! As for you, be sure to hop on to A.S. Fenichel and see what her goals are for the new year! And I'd love to hear what your goals are - leave them in the comments below. Check out the January Preorder Super Sale & Giveaway! 25 Romance Authors (including me!) are sharing January Preorders! Most of them are on sale for a limited time. It's just our way of thanking our loyal readers. Even better, we've pooled our funds to offer an awesome giveaway! Enter to win a Kindle just for subscribing to our newsletters or following us on social media. Just click here to see all the authors and enter the giveaway! This week on the RWW Blog Hop, Lyra Parish asks: How many words have you published or written? Wow! That's a really interesting question! Let's take the easiest answer first. I have published about 215,000 words, if we are talking strictly my three romance novels. That may sound like a lot, but it less than one Diana Gabaldon book in the Outlander series! But I still remember how amazed I was when I finished my first book. It was 55,000 words, and I had sweat over every single one. I was (and am) still so proud of it! I am hoping to bump up that published total soon, as my fourth romance is just about ready to be published. It will add another 80,000 words to my total. Now, if we move on to the second part of the questions – how may words have I written? – I don't think I could even calculate the answer. For every word that makes it into a finished manuscript, I've probably written or re-written at least that many. And then when you take into account the job I held for most of my professional life – a TV commercial writer/producer – well, then you've got to had hundreds of thousands more. How many words has Leslie Hachtel written? Find out here! The awesome Jeanne McDonald has brought us back to the origins of the Romance Writers Weekly blog, with three challenging questions. If you’ve joined me from Betty Bolte, welcome! 1. Describe that moment you first felt like a true author (not just an aspiring one). I truly believe anyone brave enough to put their thoughts on paper, whether for a private journal or for all the world to see, is an author. So the very first time I felt like an author was when I actually finished my first manuscript, MOUNTAIN FIRE. While I’ve been writing most of my life, I had never actually completed a novel length work. Too many had died around page 70, suffocated through lack of craft, inclination and imagination. When I stared at the screen knowing I’d written the last word of the manuscript, I almost couldn’t believe it. Even if that work had never been published, I would have considered myself an author just for finishing the damn thing. But to answer the question in the spirit it was intended, I first felt like a “true” author the day I received a contract offer to publish MOUNTAIN FIRE. I was at work, and just happened to check my personal email, and there it was. I had to read it over and over again. I was thrilled, to say the least! Of course, getting published is just one step on the ladder, and while I may consider myself an author, I am not as successful as I would like. Achieving one goal just pushes you on to the next – and after all, isn’t that what life’s journey is about? 2. Name three authors who you inspire you. Nora Roberts: Not only do I enjoy her novels, I am in awe of her work ethic. She publishes 4 or 5 full length words a year. I don’t care that she has assistants to help with the marketing and social media and other obligations. The act of sitting down and writing around half a million words a year is up to her. It’s amazing. Susan Elizabeth Phillips: SEP’s writing is brilliant. It’s emotional and engaging and funny and heartbreaking and everything in between. The connection I feel with her books is something I aspire to give my readers. Trust me – I’m still working on it. Jennifer Crusie: If you want a lesson on how to write dialogue, pick up any Crusie novel. Her characters talk a lot, but it is never “soap opera” dialogue. The story unfolds in the conversations, and sometimes her books read like stage plays. The pace of her writing is breakneck, but so crisp and clean that you are never lost. I devour her books in one sitting when I can. 3. Describe your favorite fan moment (either you as the fan or one of your readers approaching you as a fan). In October 2013 I attended the Surrey International Writers Conference. If you ever get a chance – go! It’s not just for romance writers, but all genres. One of the founding presenters of the conference is Diana Gabaldon. She could have joined the list of writers who inspire me (she’s another whose work ethic humbles me). I sat in on one of her presentations and really enjoyed it, then had my picture taken with her. She is the ONLY author I have ever done this with, as I’m not “that kind” of fan. But I couldn’t help myself this time. As for myself, the first time I was asked to autograph one of my books was my biggest fan moment as an author. A group of very supportive ladies at work purchased print copies of my first book and had them delivered to work. Signing those books was an out-of-body experience. This week’s blog post idea comes from Kim Handysides. Kim writes: “Every New Year’s Day, I make my family write down goals/aspirations for the coming year and put them in a shoebox. Before they write the New Year letter to themselves, they read the previous year’s letters. Usually out loud to each other. We talk about each other’s achievements, trials and hopes for the future. How do you (or how would you like to) celebrate New Year’s?” If you’ve joined me from Katie O'Connor, welcome!
I’ve never been much for New Year’s resolutions. Setting goals is a good thing, I know, but mine are often doomed to disaster if I make them arbitrarily, instead of when I feel a strong commitment. But it is certainly a good time to look back and see how things went, what we should change, where we need to focus our energies. I wish everyone a pleasant and productive 2015! Hopefully Dani Jace has something more interesting for you. Hop on over! Dani Jace http://www.danijace.com Let's give a warm welcome to my fellow Romance Writers Weekly member, Gemma Brocato. Hello, Brenda. Thank you for inviting me to visit you today. I can't wait to share a little about me and Exposed To Passion, my new release from Kensington Books/ Lyrical Press. I’ve existed in a flurry of activity for the past few weeks as I’ve prepared for release day. I think I’ve muttered under my breath at least once a day that no one had ever told me this was part of the job. Or, maybe I just didn’t listen when they did. So, I’ve decided to share a few of those surprises with you.
Now I’m wondering if anyone else discovered something about their job they weren’t expecting. Leave me a comment and let me know. While you're thinking about the parts of your job that surprised you the most, here's a peek at Exposed to Passion. They walked through the shadows individually. Will they emerge into the light together? Leading a vagabond life as a curator for a traveling photography exhibit translates to a lot of bad days for Rikki Salerno. But her trouble doubles when a careless high school student shoves her into a marsh. Being rescued by teacher Sam Kerrigan should have made things better, but Rikki’s inability to confess her true identity casts a shadow over their budding affair. When Sam refuses an overly aggressive parent’s marriage proposal, she’s determined to ruin him. Not only does she doctor photos to make it look like Sam’s behaved inappropriately in front of students, she hacks the foundation website to reveal Rikki’s true identity. Faster than the blink of a shutter, Rikki’s focus changes from pursuing her full-color future to the black and white necessity of clearing Sam’s name. To celebrate her new release, Gemma has an amazing giveaway! You could win: - One Digital Copy of Exposed To Passion - One Leather Brighton London Flat Pouch - Assorted Picture Frames - $25 Amazon Gift Card - $15 Starbucks Gift Card. (Prize package valued at $185.00. Sorry to all my Canadian readers, but valid to US residents only.) Enter the Rafflecopter Draw! Discover more about Gemma and her other books at www.gemmabrocato.com. Buy links for Exposed to Passion: Amazon Barnes & Noble Kobo Kensington It will be my turn to visit with Gemma, tomorrow on her blog. Why not stop by and leave a comment for your chance to win a copy of my newest release, Chef d'Amour!
If you like to read romance novels of all genres, join the writers of Romance Weekly as we go behind the scenes of our books and tell all...about our writing, of course! Every week we'll answer the same questions. Once you've read my blog, the link below will direct you to another. Tell your friends and feel free to ask questions or make comments.
There are only a few weeks left before our blog tour will be six months old. On July 29th, join us as we celebrate our first milestone, and give back some of the love. We have incredible prizes on offer, including a Kindle Fire and multiple romance libraries. Enter for free HERE! If you're joined me from Carrie Elks , welcome! Here are today's questions. How often do you write? The Catholic guilt answer to this question is “Not as often as I should.” But the I-have-a-family-and-a-full-time-job-and-need-some-down-time-too answer is “As close to every day as I can.” It's so easy to find excuses not to write. But if I do that too often, I get cranky. I start to berate myself and get down on myself and generally wonder why I ever thought I could do this writing thing in the first place. Which makes it even easier to not write. So I do my best to write every day, even if it is only a couple hundred words. My daily goal is only 500 words, so once I get about half way there I can usually flog myself into finishing. If I can write 6 days a week, I am happy. Do you think it’s important to your craft to write as much as you can, and as often as you can? The more practice, the better, of course. That's why I try to write every day. But everyone needs a break. Saturday I spend most of the day driving (we're on a short holiday right now) and while I didn't write, I did manage to work out what was wrong with the pacing in one section of my work in progress, so I was happy with that. Sometimes you need to step back and just look. And besides – while most people consider writing the act of putting words on paper, those words wouldn't be worth much if we didn't do the thinking and plotting and planning part, too. So really you could say I write almost 24 hours a day (wink-wink). What is your opinion on the saying “if you don’t write every day, you’re not a writer"? Can't say I've ever heard anyone say that. Can't say I agree with it, though. I suppose it depends on your definition of writer. Some say you're not a writer if you're not published. Some say you're not a writer if you write romance. To all those, I say – blehhhh (imagine me sticking out my tongue). One of my favourite writing books is “Telling Lies for Fun and Profit” by Lawrence Block. One of the chapters is titled “Sunday Writers” (or something like that – I don't have it in front of me right now) where he discusses why amateur painters and sculptors and crafters are often proud to share their work, while amateur writers shove their work in a drawer (it's an old book – now we just hide in on our hard drives) and don't tell anyone they've even attempted to write. Maybe it has something to do with how words communicate our thoughts in a way other artistic endeavours don't. But we should be encouraging anyone brave enough to give this writing gig a try, whether it's for cash or creativity Now head on over to visit Sarah Hegger! If you like to read romance novels of all genres, join the writers of Romance Weekly as we go behind the scenes of our books and tell all...about our writing, of course! Every week we'll answer the same questions. Once you've read my blog, the link below will direct you to another. Tell your friends and feel free to ask questions or make comments.
Our blog tour will be six months old on July 29th. To celebrate our first milestone, the authors of Romance Weekly are giving back some of the love. We have incredible prizes on offer, including a Kindle Fire and multiple romance libraries. Enter for free HERE! If you've joined me from Dani Jace, welcome! Now on to the questions! When writing your novel, do you know how it’s going to end before you write, or do you write from start to finish? I think this question is asking am I a plotter—a writer who plans out what is going to happen before she starts to write—or a panster—a writer who just starts writing and sees where the characters take her. I am definitely a plotter. I have spreadsheets that list each and every scene from the very first to the very last. This gives me an overview of the whole plot—and a false sense of confidence that I know what I'm doing, which gives me the courage to actually start to write the damn thing. I say a false sense of confidence because I have found in the three novels where I've used my scene spreadsheet, the finished book is often much different than the original plan. Characters take over, plots twists appear, minor characters take on bigger roles, etc. Also, I often find that, when the words simply aren't flowing, it's because I've kept too strictly to my scene spreadsheet, and I need to rethink where I'm going with the whole beast. In order to have a novel that “lives” it's important to be open to new ideas, new paths, so I try to open myself to spontaneity. How do the people you know impact your writing? Are you influenced by friends and family for your characters? I think it is impossible for a writer to NOT be influenced by friends and family, when it comes to making living, breathing characters. Just as every character has a little bit of the author, every character will share traits and talents with people we know. The only way to create sympathetic, believable characters is to study the people around you, see how they react to certain situations, and then use that information to make your characters real. Describe the hero in your current WIP in three words. Physical, taciturn, loyal I can't leave it at that, however. Nearly two decades ago, Justice Cooper survived a horrific bus crash that killed two hockey teammates, including his best friend. He now subconsciously atones for surviving the accident by taking care of others, including his paraplegic father, ex-wife and stepson. When he meets Charlotte Girardet, a vivacious, career-driven woman, his first instinct is to leave her to her goal-oriented life. However, he realizes much of her ambition rises from her own loneliness - and he recognizes her driving need to succeed is just another way of dealing with a loss similar to his own. So he sets out to fix her life—and in doing so, discovers his own healing. Now it's time to move on to Collette Cameron, Romance Weekly's award winning, Amazon best-selling, and multi-published historical author! If you like to read romance novels of all genres, join the writers of Romance Weekly as we go behind the scenes of our books and tell all...about our writing, of course! Every week we'll answer the same questions. Once you've read my blog, the link below will direct you to another. Tell your friends and feel free to ask questions or make comments.
Our blog tour will six months old on July 29th. To celebrate our first milestone, the authors of Romance Weekly are giving back some of the love. We have incredible prizes on offer, including a Kindle Fire and multiple romance libraries. Enter for free by CLICKING HERE! If you've joined me from Mischka Jenkin's blog, welcome! 1. How much of yourself do you write into your characters? Or do you write characters completely opposite to you? I think the only answer I can give to this is “a little bit of both.” I can only write from my own perspective as a person, so no matter what, my characters will be coloured by my personality. But that certainly doesn't mean I write clones of myself (for one – I'm not a guy). If I look back on the four heroines I've written (or am writing) I can certainly see some similarities, but a lot of differences. For example, June (MOUNTAIN FIRE) is very athletic and comfortable spending time alone in the wilderness. Definitely NOT me. 2. Has your writing helped you see events in your own life clearer? Not in the sense that I've written a scene and then realized I'd written something that happened to me, but from a different angle. What writing has done (and what I am consciously, continuously working on) is made me SEE my life. It's so easy to let each day blur together, without taking the time to experience it. I'm a pretty focused person – when I'm going somewhere, I'm going there, and often forget to pay attention to the journey. To bring my stories to life, I have to pay more attention to my own life, in order to include the details and emotions that make good writing great. 3. Have you written a character with more of your personal characteristics than any other? Who are they? I'd have to say Jemma from my upcoming release, CHEF D'AMOUR, is pretty close. If I had her background, her situation, I think I'd react very similarly. She is fiercely loyal to her family, smart and a hard worker. She is also sarcastic, doesn't accept fools gladly and while she has dreams, often puts them aside in order to deal with “real life.” Now it's time to move on to J.J. Devine. Have fun! My second novel, a contemporary romance titled CHEF D'AMOUR, will be released by The Wild Rose Press on Friday, August 29, 2014!! The blurb is here, and an excerpt here. When MOUNTAIN FIRE came out about a year and a half ago, I was starting from scratch. Loyal friends and family supported me, and it was an amazing thrill when someone I didn't know posted a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Over the last few months I slowly built up my Facebook Author Page, worked hard on this blog, and most recently, joined the Romance Weekly Writers on their Tuesday blog hop. I'm hoping all of this will help launch CHEF D'AMOUR, and by connection MOUNTAIN FIRE, even higher. I have blogged before about the theory that true success rarely happens until Book #3. It makes a lot of sense to me, so I'm not holding out for a National Bestseller, but a girl can dream, can't she? After all, having one book published was a dream that, for years, I thought would never come true. On the eve of launching Book #2, my goals have grown, along with my skills and experience. Can't wait for what the future will bring! |