December is Here

December 1, 2008 | Contests, Living Lies, NaNo, The Curse of Culcraig, life

Only twenty-four days until Christmas. 

We put the tree up this weekend and watched Christmas Vacation for the first of what will inevitably be many, many times. I even did a little Christmas baking on Sunday. I must admit, Christmas is my favorite holiday. For someone who is not terribly sentimental, this love of all things Christmas is an odd contradiction to the rest of my personality. (Or perhaps I’m more sentimental than I realize.)

So I wound up 8k away from my 50k Nano word goal. I know I said I was giving up, but I was still kind of hoping. Oh well, I did better than I thought was going at the beginning of last week. As to the quality of the writing… Like any first draft there are some good parts and some, well, rough parts. Sigh. That’s what rewrites are for. Today, I really noticed the characters are not well fleshed out. So I’m debating whether I’ll go back to earlier chapters and dig a little deeper, or just keep going forward and fix it on the rewrite.  Hmm. Decisions, decisions.

I should finish up with Living Lies this week (hopefully, tomorrow) and I’m moving through edits for Curse fairly quickly.

And since I’m in such a Christmasy mood and Living Lies takes place at Christmas time, I’m thinking about putting together a contest. I’ll announce it next Monday so check back.

Mood: Happy.

Music: Winter Wonderland - Annie Lennox 

Good News!!

November 20, 2008 | The Curse of Culcraig, Writing

I’ve just signed a contract with The Wild Rose Press for The Witch’s Stone. (Though, looks like the title will be changing to The Curse of Culcraig.)

Here’s just a quick blurb to let you know what it’s about:

After a devastating personal tragedy cost history professor, Hillary Bennett, her job and her marriage, the promise of journals detailing the facts surrounding an apparent twentieth century witch-hunt could be exactly what she needs to rebuild her life. But when she arrives at Glendon House in the small Scottish village of Culcraig and finds her hostess, Agnes Douglas, dead at the bottom of the stairs, all of Hillary’s hopes come crashing down around her. Until Agnes’s attractive and infuriating heir offers her a deal she can’t refuse.

The last thing suspense writer, Caid Douglas, needs is a decrepit old manor house to look after, but he does need the money selling the house would bring. He offers to honor his great aunt’s arrangement with Hillary. She’ll pay him to stay at Glendon House and view the journals, and he’ll have the money to fix up the house. An ideal situation–provided he can ignore the heat igniting between them and keep his hands off of her. But Glendon House harbors a sinister secret behind its great, stone walls.

And a killer will stop at nothing to keep it.

I’ll post more details as I get them.

Music: Bulletproof - Blue Rodeo

Mood: Pretty Darn Good!