My new historical novel, The Depth of Beauty is now out in the world (on sale for just 99 cents here!) and already it's gotten great feedback. I love the story because, apart from the romance, it contains a lot of fascinating material about the time period around the turn of the twentieth century. I've been sharing tidbits on my FB page and I thought I'd collect them in bunches and share them on my blog: A IS FOR ANTIBIOTICS AND ANTISERUM The Depth of Beauty tells the story of a wealthy ... VIEW POST
WHAT I GOT FROM KINDLE SCOUT
First, let me be clear about what I didn’t get: a contract with Kindle Press. Nope, I didn’t get enough votes to have my novel, The Depth of Beauty, promoted by that entity. Was I disappointed about that? Sure. For a while at least. I put a lot of effort (or so I thought) into the thirty-day campaign, and there’s no getting around it: when you set a goal and don’t reach it, that’s a bummer. But here’s what I did get out of the experience: A marketing email that will be sent directly to ... VIEW POST
Five Ways Novelists Are Just Like Poets
A very good friend from my years in northern California is the poet Lauren Scott. (lscotthoughts.com). We are both writers, but while she writes pieces with minimal words, I write full-length novels. Not much overlap, right? Wrong. The truth is, long-form writers and poets have quite a bit in common: We both love words. I mean love them. I know that even though she may write a first draft intuitively, Lauren considers every single word that goes into every single poem she writes. ... VIEW POST
What does an Authentic Italian Wedding Look Like? (Part Two)
The wedding I include in The Lair is small, family-centered and casual. But, like everywhere else in the world, Italian weddings vary by size and opulence, depending on the budget and mindset of the bride and groom (and often, their families, whether the couple likes it or not!). Here are a few more elements to a real Italian wedding: Arriving at the church. In traditional Catholic weddings, the bride (who hasn’t been seen by the groom, remember) is usually walked down the aisle by her ... VIEW POST
The Many Challenges of Writing The Lair
My latest contemporary romantic suspense novel, The Lair, now available for pre-order, stands on its own, which means you don’t have to have read my other books to immerse yourself in the story. However, the main characters and part of the plot are connected to the other volumes in my far-reaching “Sinner’s Grove” series. Writing a multi-faceted, even genre-crossing story whose books are independent yet interwoven, poses a whole host of challenges, but for The Lair, that was only the ... VIEW POST
Yes, You Still Need an Editor … and here are five reasons why
[portions of this post were originally published as a guest blog for donnacookauthor.com in 2014. Check out Donna’s award-winning fantasy novel, The Gift of the Phoenix http://donnacookauthor.com/book/gift-of-the-phoenix/ ] I had just finished the manuscript for book number four. After going over it several times, I was feeling pretty darn good about my work. My best one yet, I thought. I’ve got this novel-writing thing down. I turned it over to my editor, thinking she’d probably ... VIEW POST
