Vixenwriter

This is potty training central. Sigh. Time number three. This one a girl so I don’t have to constantly redirect penises, which is nice and far less messy. (Again, I know, so glamorous!!). I find myself giving praise for bodily functions, which is, um odd outside of sex, LOL, and no, I don’t give my dude stickers or clap for him, even when he’s got his A game working. She likes to bring her barbie in with her and put her on the back of her seat. Whatever. As long as she doesn’t fall in, I’m game with whatever will get her out of pull ups because after what seems like an eternity of changing diapers (and my oldest will be 10 in November so yeah, a looooong time, each time I get one trained I ended up having another)

I’m in that “in between books” stage. I’m trying to settle in and work on something. I just figured out the opening to dirty/bad/wrong last night and this morning. My husband always listens to me so patiently when I pelt him with my ideas, LOL. And he’s a great sounding board and helps me plot too. I’m also revising something so that’s a task which uses a different writerly brain muscle.

Chased is out in print today! Wheee! I don’t see it listed at My Bookstore and More yet though, grr. It is however, now shipping from barnes and noble!

Even more good news? To Do List will be in a print combo with Jaci Burton’s Unwrapped in September of next year. How freaking thrilled am I? More details as they’re worked out.

It’s Saturday once again and despite the cold from hell, I had a pretty productive week last week. I finished and fed exed off my revisions for Stripped (whew, big weight off my shoulders). I’m 98% finished with my last run through of To Do List to send to Angie, who is on vacation anyway. Then I’ll work on some chapters for my story, dirty/bad/wrong which is part of a dual author anthology called Risky Business with my buddy Megan Hart. We came up with the idea while in line for some dinner or other at RT in April. Then I have a free month to choose from a few things I need to do (so, um, not actually free, LOL) and I think I’ll work on Second Chances - expand it, tighten it, etc, before I get started on Standoff, the last Cascadia Wolves book coming out April 1.

Vengeance Due is finally up for sale at Amazon.com but not at Barnes and Noble. Chased is up for pre-order at Barnes and Noble but not at Amazon. Sigh. Whatevah, I roll with zee punches, LOL.

Genre bashing is stupid. Insulting readers is suicidal. Duh. I say duh again and also, an ear flick for making fun of the intelligence of my most fabulous readers.

First, I got a fabulous 4 1/2 star review from RT for Tri Mates. Gail says in part: Dane’s intricate world of werewolf culture and pack politics only gets better with each book. Her fans will love revisiting familiar characters and new readers will be hooked. The Warden family is so real that they jump off the page. Their teasing, bickering and overprotectiveness is endearing, but there’s plenty of heat as well. This story focuses on Tracy, who finds love with not one but two hot alphas. Their sexual encounters, whether as a couple or a threesome, are very erotic and tremendously arousing, and a glimpse of sexual interaction between the two alpha males is tantalizing. The secondary characters play important roles as well and fill in any back story. Readers will be panting for more.

Wow! I’m so excited and happy about this review.

And I also got a review for Chased from PNR that was unexpected but no less wonderful. Jan said in part: Chased is a great story. Liv and Marc’s relationship builds to such a peak that every woman will identify with. The characters are great. Liv is so sweet and her emotional battles are ones that I identified with right away. Marc would be any woman’s dream. He’s so thoughtful and watches the little things. The supporting characters of Marc’s family are great too. The changes that Liv and Marc go through pull the reader through this book by their heartstrings.

But best of all? One of my dearest friends finally met her daughter and she and her husband have completed their family. How wonderful is that? When I saw the pictures this morning when I got online I cried for them - they look beautiful together and it’s been a very long wait so their journey is just beginning. All my love goes to them!

OH! And speaking of dear friends and love - Today is Megan Hart’s birthday. I first met Megan online gosh, nearly three years ago and in person two years ago this June. Megan is just a wonderful person and an extremely talented writer. She’s been a wonderful friend, a fabulous crit partner and someone who makes me laugh on a regular basis. Happy Birthday, Sparkles!

Titilating Tuesday excerpts up at my messageboard, by the way!

Have a great day folks!!

So yesterday was aggrivating during the early part of the day. First my webhost’s servers went down for several hours so I couldn’t get to my email, messageboard or any other part of my website including the blog. But we had a sitter coming and four hours to ourselves (happy sigh) so that wasn’t going to stop me - even after the espresso machine went wonky and died.

On the trip out, my dude and I went to Waldenbooks at the Southcenter mall. There aren’t enough words to express my joy in a bookstore that’s welcoming to local authors and authors of all genres in general. They went out of their way with me, their manager, Beth, went above and beyond the call in working to help me set up signings there and was just really wonderful. Contrasted with the comment that my books and readers weren’t consistent with “shared community values” of a certain other manager and chain, this experience was really heartening and I left with several books I’d been looking for and a spring in my step and tentative plans for two signings - one this summer and one in November.

I also got two new dresses, one for RT (which I need to get shoes for) They’re going to be perfect for summer - or April in Houston. We also got a new espresso machine with a coffeemaker along side. It’s ginormous but really cool.

We wanted to get out and see The 300 but the lines were so long we wouldn’t have been able to see the showing during the time we had a sitter. Next time though! Still, we came home, had dinner, got the kids ready for bed, I wrote and later in the evening we watched Dresden and BSG - all in all, yesterday was a very good day!

I’m working on figuring out what I’m going to read for tomorrow’s reading at Babeland. I’m not sure just yet.

Got a review of Chased from Talia at Joyfully Reviewed! It’s totally wonderful so thanks to JR and Talia both. She says in part: Chased is extraordinary. Completely different from the previous two installments of Ms. Dane’s, Chase Brothers series, I found myself enthralled with Marc. A total ladies’ man to the core, I was at first as unsure of him as Olivia. Charming to the core, his wooing of Liv was exquisite.

Happy Monday all! Don’t forget you’re all invited to my reading tomorrow night at Babeland!

Chased is now available from Samhain! I hope you all enjoy Marc and Liv’s story.

Hey everyone, I’m over at the Samhain Cafe today doing the List Mom thang, come by and say hello! I’ll be giving a few more ARCs of Chased as prizes over the course of the day.

Also - I’ve been fortunate enough to have already received two lovely reviews of Chased - one from NJ Walters and the other from Lori at I Just Finished Reading.

Not a bad Monday at all!

I’ve got my author copies of Chased (releases Tuesday!) Wanna win an ARC? I’ll pick two winners by day’s end from comments here and and at the Dynamic Trio blog and myspace, etc. I’ll pick the names by 4 my time(pacific) so get commenting.

Yesterday was an excellent birthday. I had a chocolate cupcake with vanilla buttercream frosting for breakfast and then later, my dude busted out chocolate cheesecake. Yeah. Had Thai for dinner and today I’ll be adding some time on the exercise bike for my sins. Still, totally worth it.

I also finished edits for Chased and finished a partial and synopsis for my fantasy themed erotic romance and sent both to my editor at Samhain. (BTW, I was so relieved she liked Chased! It went in a direction I hadn’t anticipated and I was worried).

Today we’re celebrating my husband’s birthday. It’s not for a few more days but he’s got a hectic week at work so we decided to have today be his day. He’s currently sleeping in and I’m trying to keep the kids quiet - yeah, right.

I’m going to get started on Making Chase today, and also work on a proposal for the next Vegas anthology novella.

More freaking snow! I tell you, I am DONE with snow. I want my mild Northwest winter back please. And I want my children back in school.

I’m halfway done with my synopsis for The Others. I hate writing synopsis but as I was just discussing with Anya that writing them helps me see the book like a machine. Helps me focus in on what’s truly important and how to work those elements and forget about the little stuff. It also helps me get focused on the story pacing. These are things I don’t see with such ease when I’m pantsing it. But when I’m pantsing, I’m more open and the story can sneak up on me. I like that.

There are plusses to both approaches I think and as I go on, I learn more and can use more tools to write better books, which certainly doesn’t hurt!

Anyway, I want to be done with this synopsis so I can clear the partial out of my computer and get it to my agent. I know Chased edits will be hitting soon and Threat of Darkness edits are due tomorrow and FLE will be coming for Ascension too. All sorts of stuff! I need to get to Wolf Unbound as well and also write a proposal for the next Spice anthology and do my edits on Stripped and write Making Chase all very soon.

I hope to see you at the chat tonight!

I’ve got the go-ahead to post the cover for my next Chase Brothers release from Samhain, Chased. It’s purty!

This one comes out March 6 and is Marc’s story.