Tuesday, July 31, 2012

August "In His Eyes" giveaway!

To celebrate the release of In His Eyes on 7 August I'm having a special giveaway here on my blog.

Anyone who comments on any posts between 1 August and 31 August will go into the draw to win a pair of stunning Riedel wine glasses -- just the thing to taste one of the fabulous wines from Lawson Estate or Waterford (the two fictional wineries that feature in In His Eyes!).

Because chardonnay is my favourite tipple, I've chosen these amazing "Vinum Extreme Chardonnay" glasses as the prize:

In case you haven't heard of Riedel, they are widely purported to be the very best glasses for tasting wine -- and the various shapes they offer are designed specifically to match the bouquet and style of particular wine varieties.

The value of this amazing prize varies according to websites and stores, but it is around AU$90! That's about $45 per glass -- making them pretty super-special, I'm sure you'll agree.

To accompany the glasses, I'll send a copy of In His Eyes, too, of course! :)

Yes the competition is open internationally!

There are also going to be other special little prizes on offer all throughout August, so stay tuned for more exciting news. And don't forget you can pre-order your copy of In His Eyes right now from Amazon, Book Depository or Barnes and Noble.

Boring but compulsory small print: One winner will be chosen at random from all comments left on the blog between 1 - 31 August. Should postage or mailing restrictions prohibit sending this prize, a prize of similar value will be offered.

Friday, July 27, 2012

Inside a writer's head

As you probably know by now, I recently sold my third book to Harlequin SuperRomance. How this whole thing works is that I send them the first three chapters and an outline of the whole book to look at. They then come back to me and say, "we like it!", and I say, "yay!". And then they say "and now can you please send it to us by X", and then I say, "oh crap!". And then I write my little pants off.

April? I wish!
So I've been writing my little pants off. And even when I haven't been writing writing, I've been writing in my head. Words. Phrases. Ideas for character development. Little plot points.

There's this whole world going on inside me, pretty much 24/7.

It makes sleeping interesting, because as I'm lying in bed I will randomly say things aloud in a desperate attempt to sear them into my brain so I remember them the following morning. This doesn't work, as a general rule, but I've stopped bothering getting up and writing them down. Because for one reason, they don't stop. I write one thing down, turn off the light and roll over and then there's something else popping into my head. At a certain point you just have to get some sleep. For another reason, the next morning, the things I've written down are never quite as astonishing as I thought them at the time.

Because the book is in  my head all the time, everything I see and hear tends to become related to it. It's like when you're first in love with someone or something. You know, when your friend says, "I really like bacon" and you say, "What a coincidence, my sweetie-pie/celebrity crush/superhero likes bacon too!"

That obsessive time when any conversation not related to your love seems like a waste of time and you'll take any opportunity, no matter how awkward the segue to turn the conversation over to your favorite topic?

That.

Today I've been working on a scene where my hero, Dean, is interacting on Twitter with some of his readers. Dean writes graphic novels and darkly disturbing horror stories about vampires and demons and other creatures that go bump in the night. He's based very much on Neil Gaiman -- who's kind of niche and yet kind of not at the same time -- with a blend of Stephen King and Robert Kirkman and Dean Koontz with a dash of Stephanie Meyer and JK Rowling for good measure. He has a active persona on social media and a legion of uber-passionate fans. He's also movie-star good looking and has a drop-dead-hot bod (he is a romance hero after all).


I was doing a little research for the scene (or perhaps just wasting time on the internet -- sometime it's hard to tell the difference) and this comic from xkcd popped up:
xkcd very awesomely allow you re-publish their
comics anywhere, with attribution.
As I was reading it I was thinking how well it describes what has been happening for me this past week or two. A secret world inside, filled with a cast of characters and their joys and struggles. And then I got to the bottom right-hand corner and discovered where it came from: Neil Gaiman's Sandman graphic novels -- one of the graphic novels I've been reading to get my head into this whole world of horror fiction!

I didn't even need to find an awkward segue to connect this image to my current all-consuming passion! Not only does it describe what's happening for me, it's kind of part of it too. Whoa. Consider me meta-ed to the nth degree.

Whatever you secret world inside is -- magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing -- I hope you're having fun with it today. And now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go back to making up imaginary tweets from fans obsessed with vampires. It's so much fun.

Monday, July 16, 2012

Cassie goes to . . . Morwell!

Look what I found in the Morwell Big W today! I have to give kudos to the Big W book department lady who agreed to take my photo even though she was "terrible with camera things", and to the two nearby customers who took an interest in what was going on and decided to provide helpful styling tips including reshelving the books to a better position! I caused quite the fuss, I did! 


Aussies, get your hard copy now from Big W, Target, or Kmart. Or you can get a Kindle version now too. 

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Exciting news!

So I am very, very thrilled to announce that I have sold my third book to SuperRomance! It will likely be out in June 2013. No title as yet (as you know, I'm usually not so good at those) but I've referred to it previously as "Jess and Dean's story"I'll let you know when there's more news to share.


For now it's a brief moment of celebration: I may or may not be jigging around the house like this. But I probably am. 



After I'm done dancing, I'll be locking myself away to get some writing done...

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Sneak peek at the Aussie version of "In His Eyes"

Oooh, I just got a copy of the Australian "Blush" cover for the September release of "In His Eyes" (It's out in August in North America.)

It's pretty, um, well ... *fans self*

See for yourself:


Phew! I need a cup of tea and a lie down after that!

Monday, July 9, 2012

Titles

I'm really not good at them (see above for QED). I have to confess that the titles of both my books (Cassie's Grand Plan and In His Eyes) were created by others. Cassie's Grand Plan grew out of a suggestion from my lovely crit partner Louise, and In His Eyes was entirely the creation of my wonderful editor Megan.

But for my current WIP, I have a title. And it's so awesome, I'm not even going to tell you what it is. Every time I open the file to add to it, I see that title and do a little inner squee at how clever I am. It's proving to be a lovely bit of motivation and encouragement -- there's nothing like going into your writing time already convinced that you are rather a clever clogs.


Thursday, July 5, 2012

Winter: it's not you, it's me.

I'm really sorry winter, but this thing between us just isn't working out. You like dark, grey, icy mornings and I prefer sunshine and warmth (although I'll admit we're both fond of our slippers).
Source - some beautiful pics of Melbourne by Michael.
You like having the sun set halfway through the afternoon, whereas I like long, balmy evenings where I can walk around the streets of my city with my friends, seeking out brightly colored drinks and salty tapas.

You like icy, cutting winds that blow through even the sturdiest of coats -- even those ones designed for people who climb Mount Everest and clamor around on glaciers. I like light summery breezes that carry the smell of grass clippings and sunshine and that are just cool enough to take the heat from the sun.

Source - more beautiful pics of Melbourne by Stephen Wright.
You like stews, I like salads.

You like umbrellas, I like parasols.

You like cabernet sauvignon, I like chardonnay.

We both like naps, I'll give you that. And yeah, we both like my Jimmy Choo boots. But that's it.

I'm sorry winter, this just isn't working out. I'm afraid you're going to have to leave.