Terescia's thoughts and such.

I received a copy of Into the Crossfire last week from Avon Red. This one appears to be an action-packed, sexy romance that starts a new series for Lisa Marie Rice and Avon Red called Protectors.

Into the Crossfire will be released on July 27, 2010 but it’s available for pre-order right now.

About the book

Former Navy SEAL Sam Reston keeps to himself. His world is dangerous, uncertain, violent…and there is no room in it for the helpless and weak. Then the most beautiful woman in the world moves in next door to him….

Nicole Pearce’s life is complicated enough–with an ailing father and a new business to worry about–and the last thing she needs is to get involved with a secretive, hard-bodied, hardheaded neighbor. Yet Sam leaves her breathless–her body tingling with erotic desire–and it takes every ounce of her fabled control to resist offering herself to him, no strings attached. What she doesn’t know is that Sam Reston is on an undercover assignment…and she’s about to step into the crossfire.

Never has Sam ached for a woman so badly, and he’s never fallen in love before. Now that Nicole is in grave danger, he will become her shield, and guard the tempting body he longs to touch and taste. Because a terrorist plot hatched half a world away is heading to their doorstep–and it can only be derailed by one man and one woman.

Preorder Into the Crossfire by Lisa Marie Rice

You can see more Lisa Marie Rice books on the Lisa Marie Rice booklist at The Erotic Reader and more Avon Red books on the Avon Red page at The Erotic Reader.

Tessa Adams is a pseudonym for Tracy Wolff, a popular Harlequin Superromance and NAL Heat author. Although I have never read a Tracy Wolff book, I decided to give Tessa Adams’ new book a try because it was a paranormal romance about dragons and I’ve developed a soft spot for dragon romance after reading a few. I posted my review of Dark Embers on The Erotic Reader, my site about sexy romance books and erotic romance.

This was one of those books that I can’t quite make up my mind about. I liked it, but then again, I didn’t like all of it.

Dark Embers by Tessa Adams is a book about dragons, romance, magic, and a deadly disease that’s killing the people of the Dragonstar clan. Dylan and Phoebe come together when Dylan seeks out a scientist specializing in autoimmune and nervous system disorders. He wants her to work with his clan’s doctors to discover the cause of and a cure for the disease that’s killing the members of his clan.

Dark Embers has a strong story propelling it forward, with writing strong enough to overcome a few big issues I had with the book. Read the review for Dark Embers on The Erotic Reader website…

The thing is, this was a good book, but it just wasn’t my kind of story. Although I enjoyed the hero, I didn’t enjoy the heroine’s character as much. She seemed…inconsistent…in her actions. I would still recommend the book specifically to readers who enjoy dragon tales, but watch out, because there’s one big "it just so happens…" plot issue that kept me from adding this book to my recommended reading list on The Erotic Reader.

I wrote a review of a really good book I just read. Emma Wildes has just become an author I’m going to have to read more of in the future. Her book, Seducing the Highlander, was very appealing and I truly enjoyed the three stories in it.

In Seducing the Highlander, Emma Wildes introduces three Scottish heroes who can’t help but come to the rescue of three damsels in distress. The included stories are Seducing Ian, Seducing Robbie, and Seducing Adain, and although each story is a stand-alone novella, this anthology is actually made up of three connected stories that make this book hard to put down. Read the review for Seducing the Highlander on The Erotic Reader website…

She has a few other books that are currently on my bookshelf, including Lessons from a Scarlet Lady and An Indecent Proposition. I’m thinking Lessons might be the next one I pick up. :)

Several years ago, Simon Haynes, author of the Hal Spacejock series, and creator of fabulous software for writers and readers including yWriter, declared November 3rd to be International Backup Day. Since I completely agree that I, like most people, never back up as often as I should, I decided I would promote the day as widely as possible.

It’s important to make regular backups. I’ve lost work, although never so much that I couldn’t recover gracefully, but I know people (and of people) who weren’t so lucky.

Make a backup of every book you’ve written and every book you’re working on. Back up your research. Back up your financial data.

Back it all up because the day will come when you’ll be thankful you have those backups!

As for me, I back up to DVD, Flash Drives, a partitioned drive, gmail, google docs, and my laptop. I always make sure to include my appdata so I get copies of my Outlook and Thunderbird email and other files it’s easy to forget about.

Do you do your backups?

Character strengths are what draw us, as readers, to the characters we love, but without flaws characters cannot be the multi-dimensional people we need them to be.

Giving a character a flaw is about more than making them physically or emotionally imperfect. Flaws must be thought out to show opportunities for growth and development, to give us something to hope for or to show us something that will lead to the character’s ultimate downfall.

It’s not usually a good idea to sit down and randomly pick a flaw to give your character. Fleshing out your characters might start with physical appearance, but the substance of your characters’ traits will come from what they’ve done or dealt with in the past. Flaws that are the direct result of a character’s past are the most powerful flaws to give your characters.

Your heroine was burned by a good deed in the past, so she’s developed a certain amount of cynicism that the hero can’t quite understand until he gets to know her better. Take it a few steps further and you can create strongly driven characters who have something of a dark side to them.

Creating character flaws is an important overall part of your character creation. Without their flaws, their strengths won’t mean very much.

In the June 2008 edition of Scientific American magazine in the Neurobiology section, the article “The Healthy Type” by Jessica Wapner brings up the link between expressive writing and health when it states “…besides serving as a stress-coping mechanism, expressive writing produces many physiological benefits. Research shows that it improves memory and sleep, boosts immune cell activity and reduces viral load in AIDS patients, and even speeds healing after surgery.”

This got me to thinking about all the benefits I get from writing, whether I’m blogging, composing articles, or writing fiction. I do experience an almost euphoric sense of well-being when I’ve written something. Is the euphoria a result of my satisfaction of having completed something or a result of my having expressed myself? Some of this might be related to the phenomenon of being in “the zone” but I don’t only write when I’m on a roll. Sometimes I work at it and yet I still feel good after having done it.

I can’t say much more about the physiological effects of writing, but there are some benefits that are easy for me to define.

• Blogging makes me feel connected to other people. Even if no one comments on a post I’ve made, there’s a sense of community whenever I put something up on my blog. I never feel like I’m writing to a void. I always imagine someone reading what I’ve written and this gives me a sense of well-being that sticks with me for a while after I’ve posted.
• Writing boosts my creativity levels. Once I begin writing, I gain momentum. Ideas come to me like rain to earth and the creative energy spreads to other parts of my brain. I start to think creatively on many different planes, solving problems and questioning assumptions.
• Using a keyboard keeps my fingers limber. This might sound like I’m trying to be clever, but I truly believe that keeping my fingers moving is a way to fight off stiffness in my finger joints. Now, I’m many, many years (I hope) from having issues with things like arthritis, but one key to relieving symptoms of this inflammatory disease is to keep your joints limber by using them.

I’m sure there are other benefits to writing that I’ve missed. Consider sharing your own ideas about how writing benefits you and your health. Does it help you fight off illness?

Resources:

• Scientific American, June 2008

I’ve found a new tool to shave a bit of time off my internet rituals. I’ve discovered Flock, a web browser based on the Mozilla Firefox browser I currently use — but am now weaning myself from. Flock has a feature that lets me set up multiple blogs and post to them easily. In fact, I love the blog editor built into Flock. I don’t have to log it to a bunch of different interfaces to post. I was using w.bloggar, and it was great, but frankly most of the time I would forget to use it. I don’t do that with Flock because the blog editor is built into the browser. Because of that, it’s just harder to forget about it. Read the rest of this entry »

So, I attended the Lori Foster Reader Writer Get Together this past weekend in Ohio. I surprised myself by actually talking to people and enjoying it. Yeah, I like writing because it’s a solitary pursuit. However, the time comes occasionally when I really need to get out and talk to other writers face to face. Body language is important to a writer. How else will I portray my characters’ emotions in those instances when I’m in another character’s head? So, I have to mingle every once in a while to remind myself of the nuances of body language.

I did all that and more. I met many great authors, got to chat about and discover new books I would love to read, and spend time with friends I haven’t had a chance to see in a while. All in all, it was a wonderful trip. Best of all, I found the entire get together/conference to be highly motivating.

I must say, reading makes me want to write so bad I can taste the words in my mouth. I get this sensation in my stomach that feels like nerves but has more in common with a heart attack than an upset stomach. My chest feels tight and my breathing turns shallow. It’s a very physical sensation and I love it and I hate it. The spring winds up and I’m torn between the desire to keep reading or to just set my book aside and go at it on my own computer with my own work. I know some authors say that they avoid reading other people’s work when they’re writing but if I did that, I might lose some of my best motivation for creating my own worlds. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been on a self-imposed hiatus from writing for the last several months. I did this for several reasons I’m not going to go into right now. The thing is, I’m losing the battle. I’ve been wanting to write so badly the last few weeks that I feel like a loaded spring (forgive me for the cliche). I’ve been wound up and I’m trying to remember all those wonderfully compelling reasons WHY I’m not supposed to be writing. Other work? It’s not that important. It’s only important when the deadline hits and it isn’t done. Then I start to freak out a little.

Anyway, the point of this post?

Write when you feel like writing (despite the fact that I’m not doing it). Everything is easier then. When you’re struggling to get anything out onto paper, you’ll hate yourself for resisting the urge when you had it!

I give myself another few hours and then I think I’m going to give in. I don’t want to be the person holding myself back. And I certainly don’t want to regret not writing when I had the desire to do so. ;-)