I'm both excited and terrified about tomorrow. I've already decided to go see a movie tomorrow after work. I can't be around the TV or social media. I am the world's most impatient person. I want this election to be over. If I was running for office, I would campaign with cute dog, goat or kitten videos the last week leading up to the election because everybody is tired of all of this mud slinging and fighting. This has been the ugliest campaign I can recall. So, do your thing and go vote. Having lived overseas for several years of my life, I know the importance of voting and what a privilege it really is. Democracy isn't everywhere. Exercise your right to vote. Be proud. Be American. Be with her.
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I'm a lucky girl. Taste has been in the top 25 since its release on Amazon almost three weeks ago. I've learned to cyber stalk myself. Not that it's a good thing. Turns out, that's very time consuming. I like to see if what I'm doing is well received. I want to know if the characters I create make as big of an impact on readers as they do on me. Writing is a vulnerable sport. In order to pen our thoughts and feelings, we need to bleed ourselves. I love my characters. I think about them all of the time. I wonder if I'm done with their stories. I wonder if Ali and Bethany have more to say. What about Tristan and Kate? Did Amber and Finn get married and did they have the same comical problems or was the wedding flawless? I have new characters that you will read about - Kerry and Grace in Forget Me Not and Emery and Lily in my erotica Shameless.
As I mentioned, reviews are always appreciated. If you don't feel comfortable leaving one, send me an email. I met a sweet woman in PTown last month who promised to reach out to me after she read Taste. And she did!! It was such a sweet email, I shared it with some of my other writer friends. It's affirmation. It gives us hope. It encourages us like you have no idea. Truly. So watching my book bounce around has been fascinating. Thank you if you bought my book and enjoyed it. I had this much fun with Jolt. I hope that Taste does better only because I feel it's a tighter book and my characters are just normal people like you and me. I'm so excited that Taste will be released in a few short weeks! I will also have it up in PTown during Women's Week. I know I keep saying this is my favorite, but it really is! I try to cover different things in my books and this is the first time I've tackled a character with a child. I posted on FB that this is a real thing. So many couples have children from other relationships and it's important to cover everything about our lives. This little girl, Olivia, is so delightful. Really. She's the kid I never had.
I do hope you take the time to read my book. Feel free to reach out to me after you've read it so we can discuss. As writers, we can only talk to one another and our friends about our books for so long before everybody plays possum and are done listening. Readers make us. We write for ourselves, and we write for you. We love to talk about our novels, our novellas and blogs. We are super shy, but not about our writing. Above all else, please enjoy the stories we write. It takes us at least a year to write, edit and have our books published. It takes a reader a few hours, maybe a few days to read our books. Feedback is great - especially reviews - and we listen to you and make changes if we feel you've made a valid point. We aren't going to write everything you like and some reviews are less than pleasant. You will always be associated with a bad review, and so will we. We need to support one another and if you feel strongly about a book that we've written (strongly unfavorably), write us. Talk to us. Tell us why. Two of my writer friends recently got reamed because readers didn't like the story line. The writing in both books was great. Editing was great. Just the story line didn't go as the reader wanted. That happens. And Taste actually got dinged for a student/teacher relationship even though the student is 27 the teacher 36 and it's a culinary center. Yes, somewhat of a red flag, but happens all the time. Somebody called it taboo, I call it life. Some people call our lifestyles taboo. I call it life. It's all about opinions. We all have them. Let's support one another the best we can. We have enough obstacles out there to face every single day as lesbians. Stepping off of my soap box now. Thanks for listening! Enjoy the read. Kris So every weekend I struggle with two things - writing and getting the house ready to sell. Writing is so much easier. I still have several rooms to go through and divide up into piles - keep, donate, garage sale and trash piles. Sometimes I mix them up and have to start over. Writing is so much easier. This weekend I need to shop for wedding attire (not mine), but I know that's going to take FOREVER because I know what I want and will have to comb the city in order to find it. Wish me luck.
And I'm starting to roll on Forget-Me-Not. I love Irish women. And I love accents. My character Taryn in Taste has an accent. And Kerry has an accent. So the plan is to work on the house for a few hours and then write for the rest of it. Writing is so much easier. So I'm thinking of offering Tshirts on my site. I don't know how popular that would be so any feedback would be great.
Tomorrow, February 15, 2016, is the day when Whirlwind Romance is live everywhere! For the last few weeks, it's been available at boldstrokesbooks.com. Now it's at Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Walmart, Overstock and a ton of other places. Yipee! I like this story because it's fun. Storm chaser Tristan and her bff Hunter head out for the season. They meet up with rival school storm chasers, Gage and newbie Kate. Tristan is immediately attracted to Kate, but receives the cold shoulder every time she tries to get to know her better. Their journey is fun. It's a typical hot and cold, does she like me? And then BOOM. The distrust. The second half of the book is about building a relationship and finding out if it's worth it. It's a simple story about finding love, losing it, and trying to get it back. And it has a dog in it. I adore this dog. It's a good read. Do you have a few hours you need to kill? Well, pick up Whirlwind Romance. I would appreciate it. And if you really like it, a review would be greatly appreciated as well.
I wrote Whirlwind because I'm fascinated with storms. Not in a good way. I'm scared to death of them. Living in the Midwest has its good points, but every spring we have to hunker down never knowing if the weather will be pleasant or horrific. And it's not just tornadoes. We get straight line winds that blow trees down and thunderstorms that seem out of this world. WR was a simple story about love born from people who are obsessed with weather and aren't afraid of going out there and getting the job done. It's not a life changing story, but it's a fun one.
The good news is that I've been monitoring sales at all the different Amazon locations around the world. I do it because I really want it to succeed and I want it to be as successful as Jolt. It takes awhile to find out how many I sell off of Bold Strokes' website, so I have to obsess about Amazon. So far WR is climbing the charts in Australia. And Canada. I know this is only my 2nd book, but I still appreciate each and every purchase. A review is the icing on the cake. I have a blessed life. I love writing stories and sharing them with the world. Literally. The world. As a writer, one would think I never shut up. Not so much. I'm actually very quiet. I struggle with a blog because I don't know that what I have to say is life-changing or really all that important. There are some very clever bloggers out there, but I'm not one of them. If I have a story to tell, it's usually in ten words or less OR in a book.
Right now I'm trying to get my character out of the skies and onto land. Writing first person is hard for a lot of people and I totally get it. You have to be very specific and have zero assumptions. At least in third person, you can write the characters into the next room, scene, whatever. First person, you have to hold their hand and get them from point A to point B. Once my character gets to the airport, I will be writing up a storm. Right now I am trying to kill time with her up in the air. The flight from Philadephia to Ireland is quite long. So, now I am struggling with what to say. One of my good writer friends always tries to introduce an alien into my books. While the possibilities are endless with the addition of an alien, the romance kind of dies. I really like romance and building up the tension of my characters. Think back to the last relationship you had or the one you are in right now. Remember in the beginning how fantastic it was - the emotions, the butterflies, the amazing sex? That's my favorite thing to write about. Unfortunately, I have to write the before and after as well. That's when I struggle. Plot development isn't my strong point. Relationship struggles? Oh yeah, I'm totally there beside my characters feeling and recording their angst, emotions, etc. So, as a writer, I spend a lot of time being quiet. The voices inside my head are screaming and trying to get me focused, but it doesn't always work. So if you see me with a complete blank look on my face, know that on the inside I'm having a ton of conversations with all different characters and trying to get them where they need to be. First of all, Happy New Year! Secondly, I am sorry that I haven't posted anything since PTown. I took the app off of my phone to free up space for more pics of Molly, and completely forgot about my blog!
2016 is going to be quite the year for me. Last year's hard work will pay off (hopefully!) with 3 releases this year. Whirlwind Romance is just around the corner - Feb 1, 2016 boldstrokesbooks.com release date and Feb 16, 2016 everywhere else. This is a quick, fun story about storm chasing, trust, and making a relationship work. The entire book isn't about chasing - only the first 1/2 is so it's not too overbearing. I've had 2 proofreaders reach out to me and tell me how much they enjoyed the story. I'm excited to see how it is received! If you do pick it up or download it, I would love, LOVE a review on Amazon, or if you have your own review website, a shout out would be great. When writers get constructive criticism, we do listen and make adjustments if necessary. Just Say Yes is my first attempt at a novella and it's due out in July. I struggled with it because novellas are approximately 25K words whereas novels are approximately 70K. I have to make a believable story in a fraction of the time. My favorite book, Taste, will be out in October - just in time for PTown. I will beg Carsen Taite to put me on as many readings and panels that she can so that I can introduce as much of my work as I can. I am starting book #4 which takes place in Ireland and some in Texas. I'm still working on the details and hope to have a proposal to Sandy by February. I'm not sure what direction the story will go in, but I'm anxious to find out. I'm still molding the characters and they aren't 100% there yet in my mind, so I might actually have to create an outline. GASP! Well, a character one at least. So, to sum it up, have a great year, wish me the same, and if you have time to read my books, please do. If you don't want to put yourself out there and leave a review, please just send me an email and let me know your thoughts. Cheers to a fantastic 2016! |
AuthorAll of my books are available at the Bold Strokes Books' website and other retail stores including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc. Archives
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Meet Molly ---> You'll hear about her a lot in my blog. She pretty much rules my life - and I'm 100% fine with it! My true love...
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