More fun to come and you must read...

Thank you everyone for the congrats and good wishes on my book sale. I could spend an hour writing about how amazing this is and how I wanted to write novels ever since I read Little Women in third grade, but that would be boring. I needed to send my agent a one liner about the book and this is what I came up with:

A deaf skater chick moves to a new school and uses her amazing lip reading ability to infiltrate the popular crowd, bust up an exclusive secret sorority, and tame the school rebel.

Pretty cool, huh? Now I'm thinking about a tag line. Something catchy that I can put on all my signatures. Something like: Watch what you say- you never know who might be reading your lips. Or something like that... Any ideas?


I met my editor yesterday. She called and introduced herself on the phone and I just lurve her. I can't wait to get the revision letter. She says it should be here in about three weeks, which only leaves me about five weeks to get the revisions done and sent back to her.

And now... for the book you must read... STRAY by Rachel Vincent. Go. Get. This. Book. Now. It is so incredible that I read it in two days and then couldn't touch my TBR pile because I kept thinking about the book. So I picked it up and started reading it AGAIN! I have never done that with any book. It's amazing and sexy and filled with tiny revelations of a world I knew nothing about. And don't try to tell me werecats don't exist because I know they do! I can't even imagine the thrill of excitement Miriam Kriss must have felt when she started reading this book. No wonder an auction ensued. It's that good, people. And it has the greatest cover ever. Check it out.



Isn't it the most fab cover ever??

Secret Revealed... Honest!

I SOLD A BOOK!

Read My Lips has been acquired by Simon and Schuster's YA line Simon Pulse. Eight months after it had been subbed! Eight months! Michelle Nagler left and Caroline Abby, who replaced her, happened to come across the manuscript and loved it!!!

So I am officially a contracted author!!

Must go celebrate by doing more yard work! Spring waits for no woman, even a contracted author!

And the Secret Is....

I'M PREGNANT! .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

NOT-- I'm just fat (wink)

Actually, just got the word that the secret cannot be revealed until next week. Because of some damn holiday or another.

Holiday? What holiday?
GAH!

Possibly.

I should be able to reveal the secret today or tomorrow. I thought it would be sooner, but what do I know? I hope I can reveal it because, quite frankly, my head is going to explode all over my computer screen if I don't. (Sorry for the graphic visual image, but it is!)

Have to run mom home today after her docotr's apt. Radiation is done and she needs to help dad pack up. Then another five hour trip this weekend to load up and move her here. GAH.

Those articles? The ones that have to be done by the end of the month? Maybe not so much.

On the up side... dh and I will actually get to see each other for five straight hours! On the down side, my mum will be there. Snort. Ah well, you can't have everything!

Trying to work

I'm still plugging away. It's difficult to work when you are holding your BREATH! No word on secret yet. But my deadlines don't CARE that my entire professional life is on the line. No, deadlines just keep marching on, demanding ATTENTION! I have two articles due this week and two due the next. Which, considering Mom's radiation schedule, moving parents entire home 250 miles and my dh's vacation, (during which he wants to get our entire yard done,) is going to be somewhat challenging.

Then there is DASH, otherwise known as the book that would not get finished. Well, actually it's done, but it's crap. I was revising chapter six and seven when I realized that my hero and heroine CANNOT have sex yet. They wanted to and I let them, but it is far too soon. They need more electricity before they do the deed. So I may have to write a brand new chapter and stick it in there. GAH.

I thought characters were done telling their story when the book was finished, but now I'm finding that they are just as unruly as ever during the revisions. Who knew?

I Have a Secret

That I cannot share...not only can I not share it, but I am sort of afraid to, in case I jinx it.

So la la la la la la la la la!

Monday's To Do

Got a promising email from my agent. Seems that an editor found one of my manuscripts that the former editor had left behind. She's "really enjoying the read" and wanted to know if it was still available. Of course, I don't know how much she's read, could be a couple of pages or it might be a couple of chapters. She does have the full, though, so who knows.


Long weekend. Had a nice Mother's Day, though. Have to get started on this week's work. I hate being behind.

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Rewrite chapter four and five in DASH.
revise chapter seven in Dash

I was up to seven in DASH, but a CP pointed out that chapter five lacked conflict and I should change a couple of things in chapter four to get the ball rolling there. Not sure I am going to do as much as she suggested, but I am definitely going to have to ramp things up a bit. I hate snags like this, but since I need to add wordcount, this will help.

American Idol, apartment hunting and Oh, yeah, writing.

American Idol

We all knew this would happen. Jordan, Blake, and Shrek. I mean Melinda Doolittle. I am sorry, but my the first time my son saw her he whispered in a stunned voice, "Oh My God, It's Shrek." Now I can't look at her without thinking about that. Great voice... but... Shrek. I think Jordan will win. Incredible voice. Lurve Blake Lewis. So funky and original and I love the sounds of his voice when he is straight singing. Would love to see the both of them in the finals.

Apartment hunting

Must. Find. Apartment for Mom and Dad. Now. They have to be out of their mobile home on the first of June. The problem is they need the following:

Washer and Dryer hook up
Ground floor (mom has cancer, dad is 90! nuff said)
Takes cat
Move in ASAP
Is cheap.
Is not scary

The apartment also has to be close to me since I am the designated caretaker.

And they really need to move out. Cause evidently I don't use enough vegetables when I cook and I don't cook three meals a day. WTF? Does anyone cook three meals a day anymore?

Writing

My writing is actually going pretty well., I am caught up with critiques and am moving right a long with DASH. Am more than ready to be finished with that one and move on. I really do want to write more than two books a year. GAH!

Getting some sleep

With the girls gone, my family and I decided to participate in the first Brown family sleep-in-day ever. Is there anything more lovely in the entire world than waking up and knowing you don't have to get up so you go back to sleep? To wave stuff off for one blissful morning of snoozola? To snore instead of chore?

Then to top off the morning, my brother came and took mom to breakfast while my son and I ate german pancakes alone. Then I stayed in my pajamas till past noon. And I worked all day on fiction. Not a spec of nonfiction.

Not enough adjectives to describe the day. Today it's back to work, but I'm not overloaded this week... just busy. Need to find my mom and dad an apartment close by and get her through radiation and take her home to help dad to pack up his stuff.

I have a bunch of non fiction stuff to work on, but not going to take on a lot of new assignments this month. I want to finish DASH and start on FAT. So that is my main goal for May... finish the revisions on DASH.

And sleep in at least two more times! Good for the soul!

A burden lightened and other happy thoughts

After dropping the children off at my best friend's house yesterday I called her on the phone.

"Don't trip on the weights in the driveway," I told her.

"What weights?"

"The ones falling off my shoulders on my way to the car."

She officially has the girls now. My baby KK and my Zoe monster will no longer be living full time in my home. Those weights. Not that I didn't love and adore them. But having a very needy three year old and a 20 month old in the house with two teens, my dh, my mother and my mother's cancer was just too much for me. My friend Ann, God bless her bones, has turned out to be more like family than our real family. She ended up loving the girls as much as I did and applied to be their foster mom. Good thing, because if they hadn't given them to her, they would have been separated. Unreal. They have already been separated from their mom and their brother and now us and each other? GAH. The system sucks, you know that? This way, they will be able to stay with us often and as they are already used to staying at Ann's home, the transition won't be as traumatic.

Now I can concentrate on the other big things in my life. Namely, my family, my Mom and my career. That's enough for one person.