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Accidents Happen by Kitty Bucholtz

July 9, 2014 by A Slice of Orange in category Archives tagged as It's Worth It, Kitty Bucholtz, time management

John buying his new motorcycle

You may know that my husband John was in a motorcycle accident four months ago. He broke his leg badly but, as I’m fond of saying, his brain and internal organs are all in their original packaging. He’s alive, and that’s all that really matters to me.

That being said, I was on a major writing roll when the accident happened, and I’ve written very little since. I had my year planned out with my production schedule, speaking schedule, etc. all posted on my calendar in color-coded sticky notes. Those of you who have taken my goal setting and time management class know what I’m talking about. And you also know what I have to do now – hit the restart button and move all the stickies to new dates.

The thing is, that’s not the only hard thing that has happened this year. John’s current project ended (he works in the entertainment industry); we’re packing up our apartment in preparation to move to the next job even though we don’t know when or where that will be; our car decided it can’t go on any longer; and we had another death in the family so we had to put plane tickets on a credit card. There are days when, as blessed as you know you are, life just sucks.

But then one morning as you’re lying in bed trying to figure out how to juggle the day’s tasks, you remember that despite not having been on some of these roads before, you do know what to do. You accept that accidents happen in life – life happens – and you hit the restart button.

You remind yourself that you only have to move through the now. You don’t even have to be sure how you’re going to handle the afternoon. You only have to decide the first thing to do today. Maybe even the first three things. You tell yourself that you choose to be positive in spite of life’s difficulties – because we all know that going through difficult times with a bad attitude only makes it worse.

You keep doing the next thing that needs to be done. On a To Do list that feels a mile long, when you don’t know which is the most important thing to do next, you just choose one. You keep moving. You remember to be grateful for the things that go well, no matter how small. And before you know it, you’ve made it through another day. Not just survived, you had a few moments of thriving – you smiled at a stranger, had a short but nice conversation with a friend or neighbor or family member, you got a few things done that needed to be done.

And soon, you realize that a week has gone by, a month, four months, and you’re still standing. The things that haven’t gotten done, including the book that was to be published months ago that still isn’t finished, they will be done eventually. Life has ebbs and flows, sunny days and storms, accidents and accomplishments, and you have what it takes to get through them all.

You do.

Kitty Bucholtz decided to combine her undergraduate degree in business, her years of experience in accounting and finance, and her graduate degree in creative writing to become a writer-turned-independent-publisher. Her novels, Little Miss Lovesick and Unexpected Superhero, and the free short story, “Superhero in Disguise,” are now available at most online retail sites. Superhero in the Making will be released this summer.

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Time Passes

July 6, 2014 by Linda O. Johnston in category Pets, Romance & Lots of Suspense by Linda O. Johnston tagged as Harlequin Nocturne, Linda O. Johnston, Midnight Ink, Pet Rescue Mysteries, Supersition Mystery

Hi. This is Linda O. Johnston.

It’s July already, and I’m a bit obsessed about how quickly time has been passing this year. Not that it hasn’t in other years. But I also blogged this week on the same topic at one of my other blogs, Killer Hobbies.

I didn’t blog here at a Slice of Orange last month, unfortunately. I’d mentioned in my May post that I had family coming to visit, and their delightful presence not only prevented me from doing much writing for a couple of weeks, but it erased some of my concentration. I didn’t get to the OCC meeting at all, and I neglected to even write my blog.

And now it’s July 6. The year is a little more than half over.

I still have a lot to accomplish in 2014. I have several important writing deadlines to meet, as well as editing stuff I’ve written, some before I turn it in and some after getting feedback from editors.

Then there’s promotion. I’m delighted to say that I have a new Harlequin Nocturne being published next month, LOYAL WOLF, my second this year. And October 2014 is the publication date of my first Superstition Mystery for Midnight Ink, LOST UNDER A LADDER. I want to make sure the world knows about both of them! Plus, I recently self-published my first story, a novella in my Pet Rescue Mysteries, CHIHUAHUA CHAOS.

One thing that I hope will help is that I now have a street team. It only started a couple of weeks ago and I’ve lots to learn, but so far it’s been fun.

I’ll be at OCC this month. And at the end of the month I’ll be at RWA National in San Antonio, which should also be fun.

How about you–will you be at RWA National? What do you have to accomplish by the end of this year?

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Wonder

June 24, 2014 by A Slice of Orange in category Archives

Isn’t that a remarkable word?

I was sitting with a writer friend–a literary type–and we were talking about things in general, delving into personalities, actions, motives, assumptions…speculating on scenarios. And in the midst, she noted, “Perhaps I wonder too much.”

Hmmmm. Well for her, in many ways wondering was her job, as it is for most writers.

And I have to admit, I wonder too. Life is filled with so many mysteries, so many different perspectives, so many different layers of truth. Such richness. Indeed, such wonder. Can there be too much?

Well…it depends how much time you have to spare wondering. Because it can be a fairly time consuming habit! Indeed, it can expand to encompass all time.

Here’s my most recent wondering experience (alas, not a nice one):

Yesterday, I had the unpleasant–I think almost entirely female experience–of going to the Womens’ Room in a restaurant and sitting on a wet toilet seat (lighting was low).

Now I have spent years wondering why a woman who clearly is overly obsessed (in my opinion) about GERMS would decide the right thing to do is urinate all over the toilet seat such that someone else may sit on a seat they have fouled.

Really? You couldn’t lift the seat with your foot and hover over the bowl? It’s excellent for tightening those flabby thigh muscles! Or just use the often available toilet seat cover?

The good news is that urine is almost always sterile, so as disgusting an experience as it is, the likelihood of any harm (aside of rather strange wet spots on the back of one’s pant legs) is minuscule.

But the hypocrisy of this germ-phobic human dumping her waste so that others may sit in it just boggles my mind.

Perhaps it’s an aggressive act? Like a hacker sending a computer virus just for the fun of messing up strangers’ lives? That at least offers me some logic. Perhaps the world is filled with angry souls, acting out in small ways. Perhaps, as I wipe myself, I should send a silent pitying prayer to the offender, rather than a not-so-silent curse! Perhaps….

Though I have to admit, I am, in general, very pro-germ. If I pause to reflect (yes, OK, wonder) on where obsessive cleanliness will get you, it is not a place I want to be. I want my body trained–like an athlete–to handle germs easily, without breaking a sweat.

Hey, I eat things I’ve dropped on the floor, and I’m still alive. No, I’m not allergic to anything–my body is a finely tuned germ-ingesting instrument! For me, the germ phobia road leads to a version of becoming David, the bubble baby.

I celebrate a world filled with good things and bad things. And I wonder….

Isabel Swift

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emaginings: e-Books Older Than You May Think @LyndiLamont

June 16, 2014 by Linda McLaughlin in category The Romance Journey by Linda Mclaughlin tagged as Amazon Kindle, e-books, emaginings, history

A few weeks ago, a blog I was reading mentioned something to the effect of “when e-books were new back in 2007-2009” which left me both amused and nostalgic.

News flash: e-books have been around since at least 1971 when Project Gutenberg started digitizing public domain works. The US Declaration of Independence was the first document chosen. Check the Wikipedia page for more early e-book history.

I started reading e-books in 1999 on my laptop. I’d gone to the Romance Writers of America conference in Chicago and signed up to moderate a panel. By sheer serendipity, I was assigned to moderate the e-book panel presented by Janet Lane Walters and the late great Jane Toombs, two true e-book pioneers. I came away with an interest in e-books and a couple of samples on 3 1/2 inch diskettes. (Remember those?)

Back home, I read the books on my laptop using either Adobe Acrobat or an Internet browser, depending on whether the format was PDF or HTML. I’m a voracious reader and book buyer, and the house was already full of print books. The idea of being able to store book on my computer seemed like a godsend to me. A way to buy and hoard, I mean, store books without cluttering my already cluttered house. I was hooked!

Commercial e-books were in their infancy, but dozens of small publishers sprang up, most of them no longer in business. Ellora’s Cave is the best known of the early small e-book houses. My publisher, Amber Quill Press, started in 2002. Romance readers got hooked early, and small presses deserve credit for reviving the paranormal romance genre, which NY had lost interest in, for feeding the erotic romance craze and for pioneering gay erotic romance.

While e-book readers were a tiny minority at first, the growth was explosive, often 50% in a year. The numbers didn’t start to hit critical mass until Amazon got into the game with the Kindle 1 in late 2006, though Sony gets the credit for having the first available e-ink reader. There were commercial e-readers available before the Sony Reader and the Kindle: the original Rocket e-book reader, its successor the RCA Gemstar 1100, using my stylus to make selections. (You had to press a lot harder than on a tablet.) Also, books could be read on the little PDAs, like the Palm Pilot and Pocket PC. I read a lot on my Sony Clie and on my RCA Gemstar until it quit on me. By then, Amazon was about to release the Kindle, so I ordered one and never looked back.

In 2006, Janet Cornelow and I took pictures of each other reading on our e-book devices for a contest at Fullerton Public Library. We thought it would be cool if tow of the photos showed people reading electronically. Needless to say, I did not win. The picture above shows Janet reading on her RCA eBookwise.

Sony produced the first e-ink reader, beating the Kindle, but Amazon’s real innovation, the one that made it the leader in the industry, was the one-click purchase followed by wireless delivery directly to your device. No more having to buy from the publisher’s site–with different accounts at each site, were we dedicated ebook readers or what?–download the books to your computer and then side load your e-books using the USB cable. This step took e-book reading beyond the limits of the technologically proficient among us. The ability to download a sample before buying was (and still is) another popular feature. I was an early adopter of the Kindle 1 and still have my device, though it’s no longer in use. I’ve moved on to a Kindle Keyboard and the iPad.

Do you read e-books? If so, when did you start and what device(s) do you use?

Linda McLaughlin / Lyndi Lamont
New website: http://lindalyndi.com
Blog: http://lindalyndi.com/reading-room-blog/
Twitter: @LyndiLamont

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Sew Up Your Novel

June 15, 2014 by A Slice of Orange in category Archives tagged as inspiration, patterns, sewing, writing

It is true. I began writing on a crazy dare.

I was an account supervisor in a large advertising agency in San Francisco. My client was married to Danielle Steel. When I was told she was one of the most successful, most prolific authors of the day I uttered those ridiculous words, “I bet I could do that – I bet I could write a book.”

Well, my colleague dared me to do it so I dug in with both heels. At the very least, I would get a rejection and prove that I had tried. Maybe then she would stop laughing at my ridiculous boast. I tackled this challenge in the same way I tackled a marketing plan: by asking questions. How was a book published? Who did I have to talk to in order to get a book published? What kind of book had the greatest chance of being published? Finally, does one actually write a book?

The first three questions were easily answered. Even without the Internet (or computers) I was able to find out exactly how, who, and what. All the answers led to Harlequin. No agent needed, a synopsis and a partial submitted to editors directly and editorial guidelines were offered for each line. The only problem was that I had no idea how to write a book even though I had read hundreds. I could think of only one thing to do.

I would learn to write a book the same way I learned to sew – by studying and following a pattern.

It seemed appropriate that the pattern would be based on one of Danielle Steel’s novels. I can’t remember which book I chose, but I clearly remember three nights spent in front of a fireplace with that book, wine and a yellow marker. I read each page and highlighted the ‘seams’ of her work.

Â· When was the reader introduced to the main characters
Â· Where were the dramatic plot points
Â· When and where were the emotional reveals
Â· How many pages were there of expository
Â· How many pages were there in the book, for that matter
What role did secondary characters play and how often were they mentioned

When I was finished I had a simple, working plan – a pattern, if you will – and I was thrilled. I wrote for months and when I was done I had exactly the right number of pages, all the characters came in on cue and the plot was revealed appropriately.

Yawn!

Writing my book was like making a plain dress. Even I knew that, while I had meticulously followed the pattern, my work was lacking. My book was in dreadful need of buttons and bows to make it unique, to make every editorial head turn when I walked into the room via my novel.

When I understood this, I had the final piece of the pattern. Every book needs the right foundation – the proper pacing, a solid cast of characters, the right setting – but it also needs style. Style is what sets an artist apart from a painter, a fashion designer from a seamstress and a writer from an author.

I am writing my twenty-ninth book and I have learned a great deal but I still follow the pattern I created years ago after analyzing one of Danielle Steel’s books. Now I add on my own unique buttons and bows that are expressed through my voice, my observations and my personal inspiration. I can only hope that someday a writer will take one of my books, sit in front of the fireplace with a marker and ask, how did she do that? If she pays close attention, she will be able to see my pattern and then she will add her own buttons and bows.

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