I ain't dead yet

As I fumble through the last few chapters of the first book I've actually finished in over four years, I question my arrogance in thinking anyone will want to read anything I put out after being invisible for so long. Perhaps this is why I'm so consistent in starting books but never finishing them. The fear of not just rejection but total dismissal is a powerful one. Safer to set aside and start anew than finish what I start.

My husband jokes that he is going to take a cue from the men in my books and spank me until I finish something. We laugh, but I'm not entirely sure he's joking these days.

Little Nikki's picture stares back at me from my screen, begging me to finish her story so she can share it. She's quite a precious kitten, and impossible for me to say no to for very long. I've already missed my self imposed deadline to get her wrapped up and sent to the publisher by a couple of weeks, but she and I can smell the ending now and she's giggling with glee.

Thanks guys

From an early age I was always drawing. If there was a pencil or crayon or bleeding thumb available, rest assured I'd put it to use sketching. The majority of my work consisted of horses in various poses, though I'd draw any animal if the fancy struck. As I got older I began entering my best pieces into local art competitions, mostly 4-H and state fair ones. Why I don't know, because I was always extremely protective of my art. I wasn't drawing for ribbons and I certainly wasn't doing it to hear criticism. Perhaps I wanted to hear serious approval; the best I ever got from mom was "cute" and that always set my teeth on edge. After all, I wasn't drawing fluffy fucking bunnies with rainbows and unicorns.

Over the years I wound up with boxloads of ribbons, lots of seconds and thirds, but never that damn blue. The blues and best of shows always went to full color pieces. Mine were always charcoal and chalk, or pencil. For some reason color eluded me, and back then (or at least where I was entering) the divisions weren't broken up that far. They simply lumped it all in by age group. So, I did what any arrogant, yet slightly insecure artist would do when faced with the realization that their best will never be good enough for others.

I quit competing.

Oh I didn't quit drawing. I just quit showing it to others. And eventually I learned how to handle color. Case in point. :)

My writing goes along the same lines. I do it because I have to, not for the ribbons. My best may never be good enough for others, but sometimes it's good enough for a handful. If it weren't for you precious few, the ones who leave lovely reviews and who buy my books, I'd quit competing once again. So thank you. You have no idea how much I appreciate you.

Pink

Growing up I hated the color pink. Much of this was a result of having Flo "Kiss Mah Grits" Castleberry from Mel's Diner as my only source of pink-wearing-redhead inspiration. The "pink is for girls" mentality of the day also turned me hard against the shade. Determined to hang with my three older brothers, I denounced pink and all it's incarnations and declared blue to be my favorite color.

It wasn't until many, many years (ok a few decades) later that I began to embrace the hue. It started with a pair of pink stilettos that went oh so awesome with my faded, torn jeans. Then a set of pink rhinestone bangle bracelets came on board. A pink ankle bracelet. A pink ostrich purse. Pink sweaters for my dogs. I even have a pair of pink tinted glasses for those days I don't feel like dealing with my contacts. Even then, I limit the color to easily manageable accessories. Images of gum smacking, blue eyeshadow wearing waitresses kept me properly wary of otherwise adorable things like midriff baring pink cashmere sweaters or fluffy pink scarfs.

More than once someone has told me I'd look lovely in pink, but they've never seen me sweating it out in 112F Texas heat. My normally ivory skin turns an alarming shade of magenta in such circumstances, and adding a pink blouse to the mix would be criminal on the felony level.

I will, however, happily slap one of these on my Samsung Note 3 phone.

Confessions of an Unfit Blogger

Having a blog wasn't my idea.

Upon learning I'd had some books published, a friend of mine demanded I get a blog up and running at once. Never mind I have the attention span of a diabetic hummingbird, she insisted I needed a blog so I could keep people updated on my every move. Because you know, maybe some day my travels will extend further than the well worn path between my desk and the refrigerator. And gosh darn it, people will want to know!

Or so she claimed. I rarely check my stats but I'm fairly certain the number of people I've helped overcome insomnia barely requires the usual number of fingers and toes to keep track of.

I read other people's blogs and am quite impressed. Blog hops! Guest authors! Excerpts from their books! Free short stories! Competitions! Just looking at all the work they put into their blogs makes me swoon for the comfort of the couch and a glass of Disaronno on ice. I'd blame that on my corset being too tight... but I generally write in the buff so there goes that excuse.

I didn't start writing books so I could spend hours pimping them on social media. That isn't the adult way to look at it I know, but tweeting endlessly about my literary hack jobs just ain't for me. I write stories because if I don't, they'll conspire to pack one side of my skull with tannerite and blow themselves a hole to freedom. Sometimes the sheer number of stories and characters clamoring in my head for release keeps me from writing a single word, because the cacophony drowns out the single voice I'm looking for.

So I'll apologize in advance if my blog sends you straight to sleepytime. I have nothing else to blather about beyond my dogs, our occasional road trips, or some character that's in my head refusing to shut up. If I post at all, it's to share my personal bits with you, and though that's rarely entertaining at least it's real.

Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to introduce Miss Abby Willis

Jesus I thought this day would never come!

Much like I was at her age, Abby proved to be exasperatingly difficult to deal with. One minute she was in my head, the next, who knows? Probably off stealing a car or flashing a fake ID in hopes of scoring some beer for the weekend.

Love the cheeky cover Stormy Night Publishing came up with!

In other news I have neglected this blog for over six months, partly because I've been lazy but also because I forgot how to get into it. I have too many passwords and email accounts to keep up with these days. With over six inches of snow on the ground (yes it does snow in Texas) I decided it was time to park butt in chair and do a little dusting around here. Thirteen passwords later, I'm in!

And now that I'm in, I realize I have nothing to say. How appropriate.

Josey spawns a series

As I watch Disciplining Little Josey hold on to the Top 100 Erotica ranking on Amazon, I am dryly amused at how far little Josey has come. The original manuscript was a mere 15,000 words, written on the spur of the moment and submitted to a new publisher to see if they would have any interest. When they came back and said they did like it, but requested I build it up a bit, it was like the dam between Josey's voice and my keyboard burst. I did a complete re-write, adding over 7000 words and a whole new chapter. 

In retrospect I probably could have added twice that, but it wasn't until I came to the final page that it occurred to me I'd just barely scratched the surface of the world of Mr. Green and the mysterious organization he works for. The addition of Abby Willis in my head (I'm becoming very United States of Tara these days) brought a much larger scope to the agency than I'd previously thought.

There's also the fact that while Josey was innocent and childlike and fairly simple, Abby ages into her teens, and like most teens is complicated. She's not only trying to discover what it means to be a little, but trying to discover who she is at the same time. That's hard enough for anyone, but when you're confronted with a drop dead gorgeous Greek guy that you'd do anything to please, it's nearly impossible.

Three chapters and over 15,000 words in, Abby's story is only a third, maybe a quarter written. Already the next girl has shown up, patiently waiting in the wings while I deal with Abby. For now she's faceless and nameless. I feel her in the back of my head, urging me to put off watching Kitchen Nightmare reruns for another day so that I can finish this book up and finally begin to tell her story.

For those who have said they wished Josey's story went on further, I'm sorry. I don't know where she is right now, but I do know she'll be back. Not in this book, or the next, or possibly the one after that, but I know Mr. Green's organization has a special event held every year, that she'll be there to fill us all in on what her life has been like, and that I'll be along to record everyone's stories along the way.

For those of you who responded so wonderfully to Josey, thank you. 

I resurface momentarily

I've been very AWOL lately.

A close family member and her husband had a motorcycle accident at the end of last month that broke a few bones on her and paralyzed him from the neck down. We are grateful that he survived; he was shattered pretty badly and had a lot of complications afterwards.

Buried my dog of 10 years.

And other assorted unpleasantness.

However, some good news arrived last night. My latest novella is out. We finally decided on Discplining Little Josey for the name, and I love the cover design that Stormy Night Publications got for it!

And now we're off for a Memorial Day family gathering to remember those who served, those who lived, and eat bar-b-q.

Begin Again

Next book to come out is a novella, part one of a series of three, that deals with age play. New for me, but had fun writing it. I'm working with a new publisher as well and am eager to see how the cover turns out. Hopefully it will be available early next month. The tentative title is "Mr. Green's Girls", subtitled "Josey Tate" for the main character, but my editor may have a better idea for it.

I took a few days off from writing, partly to let the screaming in my wrists die down to a low whimper, but also to clear my head. I'm going from age play Daddy babygirl back to Dark Angel and need time to switch gears. Dark Angel is about to get reworked as well, going from first person to third in order to allow Joshua's POV to come into play, as well as a few of the other characters that insist they be more prominent in the story. It would be easier to leave it as is, and have it finished by the end of the month, but my gut tells me it will be a superior story if I make the change.

Of course this means I have to go back to the beginning and essentially rewrite the first four chapters that I'd written, re-written, edited, and wrapped up. A painful sacrifice to be sure, but I know I'll be glad I did it in the end.

STFU!

I don't write well with distractions. I don't know if I'm ADD or just unfocused, but when people keep popping up asking me idiotic questions, or banging pots and pans around, or mindlessly blathering at the dogs, I CANT. FUCKING. WORK!

I have a book that a publisher wants. It needs some changes... actually I've gutted it since they said they were interested. You would think that I'm lucky in that I no longer do the 9 to 5 thing. I'm home all day, I got plenty of time to write, right? 

FUCKING WRONG!

You may not know this but if you are home all day, you are obviously doing nothing important. Never mind the ad you've got to get to your boss in 2 hours, or the report that has to be turned in within thirty minutes. You're doing _nothing_ as far as everyone else is concerned, because you're not in some stuffy office somewhere choking in a tie or Spanx. Everyone wants to stop by and bs the time away. The kid wants to yammer endlessly about how fat so and so's hips are getting and how such and such was mean at lunch. Fifty texts come in, one every five minutes, to entertain you with whatever image your husband just saw on Chive.

When the exchange student finally goes back to Czech (6 weeks, 2 days, 9 hours, 28 minutes) I am moving my office into her bedroom, and I am not allowing the phone in there, and I am disconnecting the fucking doorbell. I will hang a sign on the door that says STFU ALL WHO COME NEAR.

And the rabble will still allow me to get nothing done.

Coming Soon - My Dark Angel

My first love has always been the wasted landscape of post apocalyptic fiction. The tribal societies that arise, the laws that fall to the wayside, and the general degeneration of mankind in its fight to survive. The brutality and carnage, the misery and suffering, it's like being in high school all over again.

I don't have a release date yet but am expecting My Dark Angel to be available in late April. It's a throwback to the old school bodice rippers, except Nadine murders a few assholes and there are no quivering flowers of womanhood in need of proud warrior spears.... here's a few snippets.

Funny thing, standing on a stage while people bid on you. Do you stand tall or cower? Do you glare defiantly or accept the hand you’re dealt and try to look appealing? I watched a lot of luckless folks make those decisions that day, and I still don’t know the answer. For the men, squared shoulders and defiance usually resulted in a one way ticket to the arena, but sometimes the puling and cringing found themselves in line for the ludus as well, slaves to more respected slaves for now, punching bags and training tools for later.

For the women it didn’t matter. I saw scratching, screaming girls fetch as much as seasoned whores who stood with hips tipped forward and fingers spreading lips wide before the slobbering crowd. Except for very old, the destination was almost always the same. Not even the little girls were immune to the bids of the whoremasters. For now they could serve as maids; in time they would serve in a different capacity.

Domestic Discipline and Peeps

The Hickory Switch is now available through Blushing Books! This Christian domestic discipline romance is a departure from my usual work, and follows Doris de Vris from The Evolution of Emma Adler after she leaves home and marries a preacher who introduces her to the hickory switch.

The old man has been ill lately, as old dogs are wont to do. Blind, nearly deaf, and now with some horrible stomach illness no doubt resulting from gobbling up something foul that he sniffed up in the yard, he does little more than lie in bed groaning or rushing to the back door (or refrigerator or washer and dryer depending on which direction he gets himself going) and begging to go outside lest he embarrass himself horribly on the kitchen floor. The first night of his misery, our exchange student suggested I put him outside because he was gross. It was 32F with snow on the horizon. Needless to say I pointed out I'd had him ten years, and her seven months, and if anyone was going to be sleeping in the yard it would not be my sick and blind and arthritic buddy.

The house is blissfully silent at the moment, thanks to her being on a senior class trip and him being over his projectile defecation. This is good news in more ways than one, although I fear I have discovered the source of Old Man's misery.

We had an early Easter egg hunt for some kids and I succumbed to the cheery yellow sugar coated marshmallow bunnies more than once. Now I'm the one groaning in the corner and begging to go out.

Damn you sugary marshmallowy bastards!

The Rising Yangtze

This is from my Sex and Honey collection. I'm a total documentary freak, and saw one about a young girl living on the banks of the Yangtze as the waters rose and her family was forced to leave. Her story stuck with me, and then one evening this story came from her. 

The Rising Yangtze

  

Xue silently picked her way through the tall reeds along the bank of the river, her tiny bare feet leaving only faint impressions in the soft, sucking mud. Yesterday the river had been much further down the steep hillside but today it lapped the edges of the worn trail she and her friends had spent the past fourteen years making. She was saddened to know by tomorrow it would devour their secret trail entirely, only allowing the tallest of the reeds another day to taste sunlight before they too were submerged.

The Three Gorges Dam was a source of pride for most of the Chinese people but Xue hated it. The completion of the dam meant the waters of the Yangtze would rise over ninety meters, and as it was drowning the grasses and trails so too would it bury the home she had spent her whole life in. Even now her parents were busily dragging their pitiful belongings up the steep banks to the new apartments the government was relocating them to.  Xue knew she should be helping them and that she was being selfish, but today was the last day she would have to see her best friends and spend time in the spot they had called their own since they were small children. Dragging her spoiled little brother’s bed up the steep hillside held little appeal.

It isn't because it sells

The other day a friend of mine said something that rather pissed me off. She said she very much liked my writing, but wished I wouldn't insist on putting "so much sex in it."

"But I write erotica," I pointed out.

"Exactly, and I get it you know, I mean it's like they say, sex sells and you're just writing what sells."

Um, no I'm not. I don't write a story and then try to cram as much sex in as possible because I think it will help it sell. I write a story and my characters cram in as much sex as they can convince me to include. (and in the world of erotica my characters are friggin prudes if you ask me) If it were up to me I'd be writing stuff like the Walking Dead and Mad Max, but these characters that get into my head are horny little bastards and they aren't shy about it. They want to screw, a lot, and they want you to hear all about it.

Sorry Dawn

Blushing Books will be publishing "The Hickory Switch" yay! So I thought I'd get onto Dawn the Vampire Fucker but no. I should know better than to make plans.

Instead I'm working on post apocalyptic erotica this time. Which makes sense actually, if you know me. I'm one of those crazy survivalists, except since I don't have the gay hate, anti-choice, and religious issues I'm kind of an oddball in the realm of gun toting, food and toilet paper hoarders.

Speaking of which, I need to get more TP.

Tentatively named "Dark Angel". Or my dark angel. Or a dark angel. Or yellow 0163. I just don't know right now.

Where the hell did YOU come from?

A funny thing happened on the way to Dawn's novel. I got sidetracked by Emma Adler's nemesis, Doris de Vris. Out of nowhere, a new book emerged. I'm already a quarter of the way done with it and clearly see every chapter laid out before me. Did not see that coming at ALL.

Wanna know what else I didn't see coming? It falls under the genre of Christian Inspirational/Domestic Discipline. You know, the kind of books where the women are all spanked like children by all the men in their lives as a means of discipline only, no sex or BDSM or none of that sticky, icky business whatsoever.

Part of me is just peachy fucking keen about this development, because I hated Doris de Vris. I went to church as a kid with stuck up spoiled bitches like her, and the idea of her getting hooked to a paddlin' man suits me just fine. The story is good too, plenty of tension and drama and both Doris and her spankin Sparky grow a lot by the end of the love story, and it IS a love story, from me, who has spent the last few days fretting that I don't have any romance in me. It's just, well it's so .... unexpected.

The other bizzaro part is that I'm atheist. I grew up in a very religious home, but I haven't been a believer since I was oh, ten or twelve. If you'd told me two days ago I'd ever, in my lifetime, write a Christian Inspirational romance I'd have laughed until my Diet Dr Pepper snotted out my nose.

I kinda feel like a sell out for writing it, but it wasn't by conscious choice that it's happening. The story gurgled up from some back corner of my brain, all finished and ready to go and wrapped up in a pretty yellow bow... I can't resist yellow bows... and it demanded to be written.

So, I'm writing it, and screaming carpal tunnel be damned. I expect it to be all down by Friday evening. Maybe then I can get back to Dawn, the orgasmic vampire slayer.

Dawn's Dilemma

The question of the day is, can I write a romance? It's not my bag of tricks you see, not that it would be any leap of logic to come to that conclusion if you've ever read any of my scribblings. My girls are love 'em and kick 'em to the curb sorts. Chloe may have loved Chuck but when he failed to stand up for her, she was out the door and fucking up his car before you could say wet shifter. Emma Adler is about her evolution from downtrodden, cringing doormat to the sort of girl who will kick your ass and steal your boyfriend.

And Dawn? Dawn is the ultimate black widow, the one the wannabes bow before and offer up gifts in hopes of getting to hang with her on Friday night. She fucks vampires to death for pete's sake, and I know it sounds horribly comic bookish to write it like that but Dawn is a weapon designed to kill the undead and there's nothing comical about her deployment. If anything, it's a bit gross. She isn't Buffy who kicked their asses while delivering witty quips just before plunging a wooden stake into their hearts. Dawn's power is triggered by a lust for revenge, and rather than fight her enemies she draws them helplessly to her like moths to a trailer park bug zapper. 

Vampires are not sparkly, benevolent beings who help angst riddled teens cope with high school. Fucking hell. They are the evil undead, think David from Lost Boys and Angelus from Buffy, or Ann Rice's Lestat, or Camilla and Goth of the Nosferatu clan. Ugly, giddily vicious, and unrepentant, delighting in the torment and torture of their victims. Sorta like Dawn is, actually.

The story before me is that a horrified Dawn finds she has fallen for one, which is problematic in two ways. One, she despises vampires for the destruction of everything she has ever loved, and two because sex between them would be the end of the twisted romance. 

It's a GOOD story, and I love Dawn as a character. I just hope I can do it justice. Doing my research this week on medieval Bulgaria circa 1300 to better understand where Dawn was born, and reborn; the migration of the Romani out of India and into Europe during the High Middle Ages; and getting to know Dixon Kane, the young vampire who turns Dawn's world upside down.

Signed, Sealed, Delivered

Emma Adler just headed to the publisher. Now comes holding my breath for a couple of weeks while they look it over.

She came to me in a snippet of a dream. I saw a girl, sometimes standing before me and other times I looked through her eyes, peering through the window of a tar paper shack at an entire family dog piled atop a single, full sized bed. The parents had their heads at one end, along with a couple of the kids, and the others had theirs at the other, with feet and arms all tangled up in the middle.

Suddenly I was in the room, standing quietly next to them as they slept. Reaching out I gently woke up a boy, putting my fingers on his lips to keep him quiet and then taking his hand. We were young, sixteen maybe, and clad in threadbare clothes with dirty, unkempt hair. The home was a hovel, dirt floors and barren walls and a tin roof that let in more moonlight than it kept out.

Then we were outside. She/I touched his chest, and stroked his arm, and then he pulled her/me to him and we began to grope and kiss.

That's when the 44 ounce iced tea I drank before going to bed woke me up and sent me scurrying to the can.

The Evolution of Emma Adler is set in the 1930s, during the Great Depression and in the middle of the seven year drought known as the Dust Bowl years. I did a surprising amount of research on it; slang, prices, automobiles, typical meals, and thanks to Emma's obsession with the sirens of the silver screen, endless reading about and studying the photos of 1930s starlets. I have developed a new appreciation for Mae West back in her heyday, and a rabid dislike of the plucked and painted on half circle eyebrows that somehow managed to set the style back then. Anyhoo...

Sending Emma off to be weighed and measured is like sending a child off to college. You've done all you can, now all you can do is sit back and watch and hope it all turns out ok.

All Hail Twitter Babylon

"You don't understand Twitter"

Said a friend to me the other day after reviewing my tweets. According to her Twitter is for networking and promotion, not for boring people silly with accounts of my weekend or the fact that I consider my satin cheetah print with pink trim pajamas to be suitable every day wear around my house. a fact yet to be tweeted about, but still she worries

"Look here, see how this one does it? She constantly puts out snippets of her book, along with links to her blog."

"BORING" I protest, and she rolls her eyes at my mulish behavior.

"Seriously what do you hope to accomplish by telling people the dog is asleep on your chest? You write sex. You need to be sexy. Dog hair in your bra? Not sexy."

I know what she means, I do, but seriously, yawnfest. I freaking hate reading tweet after tweet of self promotion, thanks for shopping here, and endless snippets of titillating and sexy phrases that, without the accompaniment of photos or more details, are more awkward than panty wetting. I suppose this is why some hire a PR person to handle their tweets and blogs; otherwise the feed would disintegrate into endless Ashton Kutcheresque babble that reveal us all to be ignorant fucks when limited to 140 characters or less.

Except I *like* Babylon, the he said she said tit for tats and spats that make up the vast majority of tweets. I like knowing that Marci's dog came home from the vet without complications and Ray's ex girlfriend is a "stank ass skank ass ho" and that G Busta be pimpin@9th and wondering where his hos at, and I like knowing that the people I follow are real people, not some shill in an office somewhere pimping for a paying customer.

Small wonder I'm not in sales.

Pass the vodka please

"I hate it here. Why don't we ever go anywhere? This place sucks!"

Seventeen in a small town. Need I say more? The exact phrasing changes from day to day but the overall sentiment is unyielding and harsh. Boring. Stupid. Hate.

She says we are old and boring and lame and stupid and a half dozen other unflattering adjectives, usually when she thinks we are out of earshot but not always. She cannot and will not comprehend budgets and bills because she's never had to fend for herself, and refuses to accept that vacations are more than just loading in the car and heading down the road. After all, her parents go on holiday at least once a month, to places like Italy or Switzerland or the Black Sea. Her parents have regular parties with wine and friends, and her parents would not be caught dead in a town like this.

The Old Man

I have a blind dog. He wasn't always this way, but he's pushing fourteen now and his eyes are more grey haze than brown. We try to keep everything in the same position so he can find his way around the maze of chair legs and couch corners, but he spins in circles when he gets excited and then loses his place in the world. I have learned to shuffle my feet when I walk so he can follow the sound, and wait until he is directly lined up with the steps to call his name, rather than when he is coming around the corner. The other day he tried to turn around on the couch and fell off.

I got him almost ten years ago from the dog pound, death row inmate due to skin allergies that left him looking like a scabby newborn rat. We really don't know how old he is; he acted like an old man then but the vet guesstimated him to be around four then.

Despite his failing vision there is nothing wrong with his nose, as it reliably leads him to the most wretched spots in the back yard. I have a neighbor whose sinister cat scales our fence every evening to murder dove and grackles in our apricot trees. Sometimes the vicious bastard is thoughtful enough to carry his victims back home, but most of the time he flings their decapitated bodies to the ground for the old man to find. Of course he only finds them after they've turned to a rotted, reeking mess at which point he must enthusiastically and with great vigor roll and rub every inch of his tiny body in the remains.

Only then is he ready to come back inside, and if he is lucky and I am not mindful, he will beeline without bump or bobble to the nearest bit of furniture and proceed to share his newly donned aroma with it as well.

Nothing like the smell of four day dead dove ground into my blanket to start the morning off right.