Vixenwriter

I didn’t do a writerly type post yesterday but I did manage to break 40K on Coming Undone and all this backstory about who Elise is is coming to me. Why she’s the way she is. So I can flesh her out. I’m coming up on a big story moment, I’ll most likely write that today if my kids will let me.

Yes, it’s “mid-winter break” week here. I’m pretty sure we didn’t have all these breaks when I was a kid. We had a break at winter, one in spring, usually around Easter and then the odd day here and there for Thanksgiving and President’s day, etc. IN MY DAY THEY DID NOT HAVE THIS!! AND WE LIKED IT! Sorry, I figured since I was thinking like I was old, I should write like it too, LOL. GET OFF MY LAWN. I’M KEEPING YOUR BALL! PULL YOUR PANTS UP!

Okay I feel better.

My oldest, my sweet boy who wears his heart on his sleeve and is so kind to everyone is turning into a tween. Every once in a while now he’ll be attitudinal for no reason or he’s not as nice to his siblings. His voice cracked yesterday. He’s growing up, gah!

Cold/flu, whatever this is, is still with me but not as bad as the weekend. My chest is all congested and I go hot and cold, but the headache has passed, thank god.

I need to get back to work. Y’all behave.

First, the very lovely Ciara Lira has a DIK interview with me up at her blog. She took the footage at the booksigning this weekend at Emerald City.

Second – on my way back from dropping the wee monster off at preschool, I listened to Adam Carrola interview Tom Morello on his morning show. I’m a huge Rage Against The Machine fan so I already knew Morello (an amazing musician) went to Harvard, had a Kenyan father and an American mother who raised him in Chicago. But what I hadn’t really heard before was the story of how he decided to be a musician.

See, he came out to LA in 1986 to start a metal band. Only at the time, it was all Poison and hair bands on Sunset Strip. Hair was WAY more important than talent (and I was there at that time, that’s the truth). So he came out and wanted to create a combo of hardcore metal with rap (which hadn’t been done so much at the time) but he had, in his words, a Lionel Ritchie mullet and everyone wanted long, pretty hair and he was even asked to wear a wig!

He’s such an awesome guitar player but he was talking about being at some show with the pretty haired guys and thinking, “I may never make this”

But he didn’t quit. He got knocked down over and over. He got fired for not having good hair! he lost jobs to people who weren’t nearly as talented as he was because of things that shouldn’t have mattered.

And finally, in 1991, Rage was founded. FIVE years of living in a squat on Normandy and Santa Monica (those who are from LA shudder at that neighborhood, LOL, I did when he said where the apartment was). In 1992 their first and hugely successful self titled record came out and he made it. Like triple platinum made it. In all this time he knew what he wanted. What he wanted was NOT popular (very political lyrics, hard rock sound with rap). But he stuck with it for years and he created something that changed the face of music.

If you’re a music freak like I am, the above video is great because he goes through his style step by step so you see all his equipment and how he makes all those signature riffs.

Anyhoodle, just listening to the interview made me so happy. Not that he had to struggle for so long. That part sucks. But so many people lose hope when they fail over and over. When they dont’ sell over and over. It’s easy to after a while because it is hard to pick yourself up after so much rejection. But when everything was right – things worked for him (like triple platinum worked). All those things you can’t control – right person (agent, editor, AR rep, whatever), right time (trends shift, eveyrone is in a good mood and wants to take a chance, whatever), right piece – all worked together and he made it.

I guess the moral of this rambling story is: Don’t quit.

Like whoa am I glad it’s Friday.

For your perusal – Dane/Hart discuss pr0n while we watch it so you don’t have to…

I’m talking about sex and writing at Chicklitgurrl’s All the Blog’s a Page

I’m going to be putting up all sortsa reviews tomorrow! All three Alien Huntress books by Gena Showalter, Ann Aguirre’s insanely good Wanderlust, Cindy Eden’s most fabulous story in Everlasting Bad Boys and there might be more. I haven’t put up reviews in a while so I’m guessing there will be more.

Oh! And the ever so lovely Anya Bast’s Strands of Sunlight is now available!!!

Blurb: Rhiannon always thought she was just a lowborn peasant. When a mysterious lord buys her contract of servitude and brings her back to his keep, she finds out she’s actually the bastard daughter of a great lady. She also discovers she’s prophesied to kill the man responsible for her mother’s undoing.

And prophesied to die while doing it.

At the keep, Rhiannon is caught between two men. Tristan is the severe and sometimes brutal lord who introduces her to erotic bliss and binds her there, helplessly addicted to his every whim. And Gareth is the shining, handsome knight who treats her like the lady she never knew she was. In competition, Tristan and Gareth tempt her with physical pleasure beyond her imagination. Both of them stake a claim on her body, but only one of them will win her heart.

I’ll be chatting about Fated at the Romance Reading Ladies this evening at six pm pacific. So if you’ve read it and you’d like to pop in, please do. Also, it’s a great group and have some excellent books up next to read so if you’re looking for an online book group, this one is a good one!

Now that Laid Bare is off my desk and on my editor’s I’ve turned to Sweet Charity to get that one done and off to Angie’s desk instead of mine. I’ll be done with the first draft by the end of next week so I’m happy about that. I also have a release date – December 23!

I highly recommend heading over to Anya Bast’s Blog because she’s doing a hella huge contest celebrating the upcoming release of The Chosen Sin (which is made of awesome!).

Nothing else much exciting going on here in my neighborhood. Just lots of work!

Here, gratuitous Gerry pic to brighten any day….mmm…Gerry…..

Summer has given pretty much her last gasp in my neighborhood. The weather has turned cooler, it’s getting dark earlier and the leaves are already starting to turn. School started last week although it was a typical first week so they’re not actually on a real schedule until this week. My oldest will be doing fifth grade orchestra, the middle kiddo seems to be settling into first grade nicely (knock wood) and the wee monster is in preschool a few hours a day. Suddenly I went from a chaotic, insanely noisy house to actual silence for two hours a day. Two hours. Like many moms, I haven’t had time to myself in over a decade. I’m not quite sure how to handle it, LOL.

It’s bliss but at the same time, it ends up getting filled with all the tasks better done without children around like grocery shopping and going to the post office. I’m hoping that in a few weeks I’ll be used to the new schedule too and I can zealously guard those two free hours for writing at least three days a week. Tough talk I know, LOL.

Anyway, let’s see, otherwise life continues apace. I’m done with Laid Bare, a contemporary erotic romance for Berkley Heat, and I’ll be sending it to my editor today or tomorrow. I’m now busily working on Sweet Charity, a contemporary follow up to last year’s To Do List – this one features Raphael’s brother Gabriel and releases from Samhain in December.

I finished a partial for something I’ve wanted to write for two years. I can’t wait to hear what Laura Bradford thinks about it!

I’m planning promo and contests for Undercover, which holy moley, releases in 85 days! Wow, okay so December 2 is way closer than I thought. Anyway, keep an eye out for contests to win ARCS (right now until noon pacific I’m running a contest at my blog to win an electronic ARC). I’m excited and right now I’m so busy I don’t have much time to be nervous but that’ll come, LOL.

I’m promising myself to finish all holiday shopping by mid-November. When I do this, my life is way easier at the end of the year! And with so much stuff going on in December through May, it’s a good thing if I work ahead. Gah!

Release wise: If you live in Britain, my and Megan’s Taking Care of Business releases in the UK in October. Yes, in a month OMG. Stateside, it comes out March 31.

Holiday Seduction – a print anthology with my To Do List and Jaci Burton’s Unwrapped, comes out November 25. The cover is pretty scorching!

Undercover – futuristic erotic romance, menage with BDSM elements releases from Berkley Heat December 2

Sweet Charity – contemporary red hot romance comes out in digital from Samhain in December at some point, I don’t know the date yet.

January and February – Cascadia Wolves: Wolf Unbound and Standoff come out in trade print

March – Taking Care of Business from Black Lace – contemporary erotic romance co-written with Megan Hart

April – Always – a contemporary romance will come out in digital from Samhain

May – Relentless – futuristic erotic romance set in the same world as Undercover but not a sequel, comes out from Berkley Heat and the second Vegas anthology releases from Spice as well.

Anyway, that’s just a glimpse into my next whatever many months. You can check out covers and excerpts as well as other release dates and all that jazz at my website.

Have a great Monday!!!

Lauren

BTW, I say Dream Man but I meant Mr. Perfect!

Two of my friends have really wonderful books coming out at the end of this month – Cynthia Eden has Everlasting Bad Boys releasing on August 26 (an antho with Cynthia, Noelle Mack and Shelly Laurenston) and Ann Aguirre has Wanderlust, the follow up to Grimspace, also coming out on August 26!

In honor of that, I’m going to choose two winners, one to win a copy of Wanderlust and one to win a copy of Everlasting Bad Boys. I’ll have the copies pre-ordered to ship direct from Amazon.

ATTN: here are the rules! All you need to do is respond to any of the the posts about tropes (there’ll be a few, starting with lone assasins on August 14th) with some of your own favorite tropes/storylines and an example of that (because I always want to find new books!) and I’ll toss your name in and choose a winner via randomizer on Thursday August 21 at noon pacific.

Good Luck!!

I’m knocking right on 52K words on Outshined! I’m a happy camper, I gotta tell you. I’m also happy that I now have just less than a month until school starts again. My kids are driving me nuts. All day long with the bickering and the arguing and the “he got more time on the Wii than I did” or whatever. I am DONE with it.

But despite the agitation this has been a very productive summer so far so I can’t complain really. Relentless is finished and submitted. Outshined is over halfway done and should be finished up (first draft) by the end of August.

Then in September I’ve got a revision to look at, I will most likely see a revision letter for Relentless sometime in the fall along with notes on Sensual Magic and I need to finish up Sweet Charity for Samhain by mid October.

I’m busy but really, I don’t think I’d have it any other way. If I had the time to sit and think about things I’d only obsess about them. Because I’m that way.

I did spend an hour this morning video chatting with megan about cliches we love. That’ll be going up over at BRING ME MY HOOKAH so don’t forget to check in over there.