My Muse's Musings

Recently I returned to a reader's list I was a member of on amazon some time back. I went there as a reader, not as an author.  I always enjoy trolling the lists and seeing what books readers are discussing.  There was even one list that I checked in on to make certain no one was trashing my book as they were doing several other---much better known authors. I cringe every time I think of that. But I did learn the habits writers get into that set readers off and thus learned what not to do in my own writing. I've actually laughed out loud at some of the things posted and thanked God I'd never put them in my books. I wasn't laughing when I suddenly became the object of a reader's hostility. Self promotion is not permitted by Amazon, except in the Meet Our Authors forum. Link to the rules on Amazon These are what they are. What should I post? Please share thoughts that you think will add to the discussion and help other customers interested in the pr...

I was challenged by Robyn Peterman   and Jennifer Madden to participate in this blog hop. And of course I had to do it because I love to blog. Robyn's Book   How Hard Can It Be? is due out January 17, 2013. But it's already available for preorder if you'd like to check it out. And Jennifer's newest The Embattled Road just hit Amazon and other stores a couple of weeks ago.   The Next Big Thing 1. What is the working title of your book? Breaking Away.    2.Where did the idea come for the book? I love military guys and the idea for the series first hit me three years ago. Since my Dad was in the Marines I knew how military guys behaved and had some idea how they thought and hid how they felt. I wanted other people to understand what their families went through when they were deployed home, injured, doing training---the works. I wrote the first book, Breaking free   and started submitting it to editors while I finished another...

In one week I will have finished teaching my last college class and I am so excited!! Teaching can be rewarding and challenging, but my writing is where my heart is. And I'm really looking forward to devoting my time completely to my next book, Breaking Away. When I'm writing I'm neck deep in my character's world and at this moment my character is learning to drop out of sight and survive off the radar, something I had to do a ton of research for him to do. I feel as though I've done that myself for the three last months because of the classes. As soon as they end, and I post my grades, I'll be jumping feet first into the story and writing 10 hours a day. Butt on chair--fingers on keyboard. That's the only way to make headway. Here's my blurb for Breaking Away: --> When Navy SEAL Harold "Flash" Carney agrees to act as an undercover operative for the FBI in an international smuggling sting, he revisits a past he hoped to leave ...

  Writing Timeless my Cross Genre-Paranormal- Science Fiction book Timeless I’m quickly learning that writing things out of the norm makes it difficult to sell books. My book Timeless sold 442 copies in the month of October.   And I’m proud of that. It’s a book that took me three years and a trip to Scotland to write. And I think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever written. But it hasn’t sold as well as my Navy SEAL romances. I know that military romance is BIG. And I love my Navy SEALs. They’re all alpha, macho, tough hot, and OMG handsome ---well you get the gist.   But Quinn Douglas is all those things and then some. He works in a specialized, very dangerous field of deep salvage diving. He plays the flute in his off weeks, because when you are saturated to a specific depth you usually work up to a month living inside the pot and going down as deep as you’re saturated. In my minds eye he’s Gerard Butler mixed with a little Adrian P...

On November 28th my children's book, Willy C. Sparks: The Dragon Who Lost His Fire, was released in ebook and print at Amazon. Willy C. Sparks   Willy C. Sparks is a grumpy dragon and when he unexpectedly loses his fire, he rushes to the dragon doctor. The doctor's explosive cure teaches Willy that a grumpy attitude may have some serious consequences and that laughter is often the best medicine. I hope to have it available at Smashwords and Barnes and Noble next week.  This has been a month long project. Getting the color just right in the print edition was  a learning experience. The color of a JPG image prints differently in each process. So it took some time, but I'm very thrilled with the images.   Here's a few I've shared on Amazon. It took me three months to draw the illustrations and get them just as I wanted them. Also to release the book in ebook format took some manipulating, thanks to my formatter...