Reviews and Flatulence

Stephen King in his excellent book On Writing, wrote about his flatulent childhood babysitter who would sit on his face. “She would throw me on the couch, drop her wool-skirted butt on my face and let loose…I remember the dark, the sense of suffocating and laughing. Because while it was sort of horrible, it was also sort of funny. In many ways she prepared me for literary criticism. After having a 200 pound babysitter fart on your face and yell POW! The Village Voice holds few terrors.”

As I get reviews for my books, I really want to develop Mr. King’s sense of humor. Fortunately, not all of my reviews are bad, and many of my favorite reviews are never published on Amazon. They’re private. (Well, they were until now.) 

Thanks Kristie, not much for romance readers, but I have to admit to really enjoying all of the Rose Arbor (Oak Harbor) stories. Mercy is becoming my favorite of the 3 so far. Her life might have been so much easier had she swung just a little harder. lol Keep writing these stories. It's so fun to know the author

I always love it when guys like my books. Actually, I love it when anyone likes my books, but I think it's especially great when someone like my cousin, who is so far off of my target audience reads my books. I just wasn't thinking about the 65 year old outdoorsy type guy when I was writing my chick books, although, one of my heroes, Alec from The Rhyme’s Library, is fly-fisherman and all of my books have dogs.

And here are two that are more.

BTW, I just read Stealing Mercy. Super book! I loved it. Such a great time in our history and with a feisty heroine who crossed the established lines for feminine behavior to stand up for her friend and against the men who treated women with little respect. Great writing and a real page turner!

Hey Aunt Kristy, I fiiinnnnally read 'Steeling Mercy' (oops.. it took me a while to get a copy of it), and oh my goodness! I was hooked on it! I literally spent all Sunday (minus church) laying in bed reading it. When ever I was forced to put it down for one reason or another I was always so anxious to get back to reading it! Such great characters, such a great story!! I can't wait to read your other books! :)

There are more, but I’m sure by now no one is still reading, because this is boring to anyone but me. Sorry for the shameless self promo. It’s just sometimes when the world is smelling like a flatulent, 200 pound babysitter, I need to be reminded of why I’m writing.

Catfish Campaign, Day 22, Newsletters

Newsletters. Subscribe to others and create your own. Recently I subscribed to All Mystery E- Newsletter http://allmysteryenewsletter.com/ because I’m so excited about my soon to be released mystery, THE RHYME’S LIBRARY.

 And because I tried to pattern my books after Debbie Macomber, I subscribe to her newsletter. It was in her 20^th of March newsletter that I read the knock my socks off news that Ms. Macomber was beginning the Rose Harbor series. Here’s the blurb that sent me into hyperventilation.

My Dear Friends,
I'm blessed with an abundance of good news— The first tidbit is that I've just had my first peek at the lovely cover Random House has designed for my launch book with them, The Inn at Rose Harbor, which goes on sale under the Ballantine imprint on August 14. Their talented art department did a stellar job capturing the essence of this story, which launches my new Rose Harbor Inn series.

For those who don’t know, I published A GHOST OF A SECOND CHANCE, the first in my Rose Arbor series, which like Ms. Macomber's series is set in a small town in the state of Washington, on March 7, 2012. If Ms. Macomber had published her newsletter a month earlier, I would have changed the name of my series, even though I mention the town of Rose Arbor in my 2011 published novel, STEALING MERCY and I have two more partially completed Rose Arbor books.

So, yeah. I think newsletters are important.