Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush

I do not like to write – I like to have written.  ~Gloria Steinem

By: Stacey Purcell

Monday 6:30 am- Wake up, dress, eat cereal, drive to train station, wait on platform, and sit on train for an hour.

Monday 5:30 pm- Leave office, walk to train station, wait on platform, and sit on train for an hour.

Rest of Week- Repeat above steps over and over and over…

This doesn’t sound like a lot of fun. Unfortunately, this scenario is practiced by countless millions, maybe even billions, of people around the world. So what does this have to do with writing?

Before I answer that question, I have a story to tell you about what a group of my friends and I have been doing. We meet every Friday at the best coffee shop ever (Drew’s Pastry and Coffee). It’s an open group, but there’s a core of four. Writers will stop in to visit, share their latest victory or defeat, brain storm or sit and stare blankly while the rest of us chat. It’s a wonderful time and every Friday is different.

The core of four consists of Melissa Ohnoutka, Jennifer Bray Weber, William Simon (Will Graham) and me. We call ourselves The Usual Suspects and have supported each other’s writing and careers for over 3 years. One Friday, Will had an unusual idea.

“Let’s write a mash-up.” He received silence as none of us knew what he was talking about. The accepted use of the word “mash-up” has to do with blending different genres of books into one.

That’s not what he was talking about!

He wanted us to try writing a collaborative piece. We’d mash up all of our entries into a cohesive story. The ground rules were easy. He’d start it off and we’d each take a successive turn, adding to the characters and plot. Once we’d been around the group twice, he’d finish it up. We were not allowed to talk about it with each other and there was no general direction the story had to go in. Who knew whether it would turn out to be romance, mystery or even steam punk!

Hmmmmm. Sounded fun. Sounded easy. Sounded creative and quick. My kind of project. I was in, as were the others. The merry-go-round of writing began.

We’ve just finished the story and it was a blast to be a part of something so creative. Just when you thought you knew where the story was going, BAM! It took a hard left and you were running down a different rabbit hole. The experience forced you to keep on your toes and get the character out of situations you had never thought of happening. Whew, what a workout for those writing muscles. Now what?

The story is very rough. Great ideas and great writing flow through the thing, but we have some plot holes you could drive a bus through! Since, we’ve never done this before, we’re making up the steps as we go along. Emails are flying between our group members. It looks like we’ll put together a list of items that needs to be corrected or tweaked before we meet to seriously edit. Sounds reasonable. After that we’ll get together with laptops and spread out across my dining room table for a “rip it apart” party.

So what does this have to do with the poor person sitting on the train for two hours every day?

Once again, the digital world has opened another avenue for writers. Almost all of those commuters, or anyone else who must wait around, have cell phones. Those cell phones have the capability of downloading stories. Traditional novels can be read, but it might be overwhelming to open up War and Peace on a tiny screen. Voila, the short story.

We’re all running around the mulberry bush in some form or another. Moms wait for their kids in carpool, waiters have 30 min. breaks, kids wait for the school bus and on and on. Why not make that time a bit more delicious? There’s a burgeoning market out there for stories that are short and well written, perfect for the phone. We’re creating our version of a mash-up and will sell it soon.

Stay tuned for next week. I’ll share an update on how we’re doing with our project and I’ll discuss the business side of stories for phones and other venues.

What about you? Have you done anything new lately? Tried a new genre? A new writing ritual? Come on now, you know you want to share!

Paying the TimeKeeper – Blogger’s Debt

Song of the Day: Paparazzi by Lady Gaga

So, let’s talk about author blogs. Commentaries, musings, chronicles, running narratives of a writer’s life, there are a bajillion out there. But are they effective in bringing in sales and new readers? Or are they another time sucking black hole?

The answer I’ve come up with – yes and no.

Blogs are great tools in developing a web presence, especially when following a few tips. Blogs should reflect the blogger’s personality, be entertaining, and offer something (education, advice, links, prizes, a good knee-slapping laugh, etc.) to readers.  Length can be whatever the blogger is comfortable with, but shorter is sometimes better, especially when blogging often. (Not today. Sorry.) The blogger should make every effort to reply to every commenter. Personal touches go a long way, showing the blogger is not a cold, unapproachable, one dimensional being.

There is no question blogs are important to writers, whether they write them or not. Commenting on blogs regularly is an easy way to gain name recognition. They (whoever ‘they’ are) say it takes seven times for a person to see a name before that name becomes recognizable. That’s what we want, right? To be recognizable? Okay, maybe we won’t walk outside and be blinded by dozens of paparazzi flash bulbs. But we do want people to remember us.

Let’s go back to my original question. Are blogs another chupacabra sucking us dry of our precious time?

A question to ask yourself is who is the target market for your blog? For many of us, our circles of followers are other authors. This is great because writers tend to form supportive, tight knit communities. And in this industry, we need to each other’s back. But how far will that go in terms of sales and readership? It goes back to becoming active in the blogosphere.

We want to expand from the bubble of friends. We want to draw in readers near AND far.

Many authors do blog tours. Any way you slice it, blog tours are time consuming. Consider the time spent looking for and corresponding with other bloggers for a guest spot. Also consider that the content posted will need to be fresh and unique for each site. Don’t forget the time spent replying to every commenter to your post.

If you have time for a blog tour, I say go for it. Got a couple of tips for you, too. Keep the blog tour to a manageable amount, be that 10, 25, or 50 stops. Offer prizes. People will likely ‘follow’ you (think Grateful Dead’s Deadheads) on your tour if they have a chance to win something. Have a boilerplate about yourself and your book’s information already prepared. The boilerplate can easily be copied and pasted into each blog written. Don’t just hit up all your writer buds for guest spots and interviews. There are endless blogging opportunities out there. Expand on blogs that have content you may be interested in. For example, if your book is about a dragon-slaying pastry chef who falls in love with a racecar-driving homicide detective. You might consider looking for blogs about Renaissance festivals, Nascar, baking, and law enforcement and write a blog relevant to those topics. And if you have a boilerplate at the end, you’ll be slipping in that PSA on your book, upcoming release, or YOU the future best-selling author.

Need help finding blogs to appear as a guest? You might try Myguestblogger.com to get you started. Or try Googling ‘guest blogging sites’ or ‘guest bloggers wanted *topic*’. There is also The Cheap, a blog for authors and readers who welcome guest bloggers. Then there is MuseTracks.  That’s right. Want to do a guest blog here, contact one of us!

If tours aren’t your cup of ale, you can still use these blog tips to your advantage and at your leisure. Keep at it regularly and you will likely pick up a few loyal followers. That translates to readers and sales.

Just as with keeping up with the Joneses (damn you Jones- shaking fists in frustration) on social media sites, it goes back to managing your time to fit in a couple of blogs a day/week to visit, comment, and write.

For me, I recognize that my plate is full. I don’t have the time to do a blog tour. I will gladly do interviews, and I always try to put a fun spin on each one. But I am human and I know I can’t do more at this moment.

What about you? Do you blog? Love it? Hate it? Any advice to share? Let’s hear from you!

Eat Humble Pie And Die!

Writers are not just people who sit down and write.  They hazard themselves.  Every time you compose a book your composition of yourself is at stake.  ~E.L. Doctorow

By: Stacey Purcell

I had another article I was going to write today, but I ran across a series of emails that I felt compelled to share with all of you. Sit back and watch me eat humble pie and die!

It’s a doozie.

No, really- it was beyond embarrassing.

Background information: I’m first vice president of my writing chapter where I live. It’s a fairly time consuming and challenging job, but one I think that I handle fairly well. I bring in speakers every month from around the country to share their knowledge about writing or their particular profession. For instance, this spring we’ve had an ordained voodoo priestess, a literary agent teaching us about pitching, and a celebrated author (C. C. Hunter) sharing her inside knowledge of the YA market with us.

We’ve also gone on field trips and I’m in charge of our annual conference. Alexandra Sokoloff will be our key speaker this year, and we’ll have three agents plus an editor taking pitches as well. (If you’re in the area, it will be an awesome event and you won’t want to miss it. www.nwhrwa.com -Shameless plug, I know.)

Anyway, one of the hurdles I have to face is getting industry folks to commit to coming. This year, I set my sights on a particular agency. They have a wonderful reputation and both of their top agents are well liked. With high hopes I fired off my email requesting their attendance.

Things were going great. The first agent said she was already booked but would be happy to ask her associate. Yay! I loved her too. Then I waited. And waited. I sent a gentle nudge to see what was happening. And waited.

At this point, my nerves were getting frazzled. I knew I couldn’t ask another agency until I heard from this one. That would be rude. Little did I know that I would take rude to a whole new level!

Finally after two months, I got a response. It was not the one I wanted to read.

I would love to be there, but unfortunately I also already have a commitment that weekend. I hope you have a wonderful conference, though, and perhaps we can plan for 2012.

It was a perfectly lovely decline to our invite. She obviously had manners and responded with grace. What did I do? I decided I needed to let off some pent up anxiety over planning this shin dig. I wrote an email moaning over this new development with a snarky flair. I then sent it to the president of our chapter. (Hi Jenn)

Wow- they are just now getting back to me. Glad I wasn’t counting on them!!

Unfortunately I pushed the wrong button! Instead of the forward icon, I chose the reply one. OMG!!! I knew my mistake as soon as my mouse rolled over the little envelope with the arrow wrapped around it. How could I be so stupid?

Her response came quicker than I could say, “I’m moving to Siberia.”

I think this may have gone to the wrong person.

Wow. Really? Just slit my wrists and let me bleed out. I think my cheeks burned brighter than the sun that day. There was only one thing to do. I had to pull on my big girl pants and grovel like there was no tomorrow. Sigh.

After offering my first born child and apologizing until there were no words left, I waited for a response. I don’t know what I was more afraid of -getting one or never hearing from them again. I didn’t have long to wait.

No worries–I think we’ve all had that kind of email snafu. For the record, though, I responded within an hour of XXX”s email. I believe she was in Italy in when the invitation came through and then we had travel for a sales conference. We certainly try to get back to everyone as quickly as possible, and we really do appreciate the invitation.

This agent will forever be my hero. She could have raked me over the coals for my comment, instead she let me off the hook. I also made it a point to catch her in New York and introduce myself as the moron who couldn’t tell the difference between reply and forward. I apologized again and we had a good laugh. Thank goodness for folks with a sense of humor.

Hump Day Kick Start

Song of the Day: Trade Yourself In by Shinedown

Your writing prompt this week. Oh, the possibilities.

Tell me about him. Who is he? The MacGyver type? A motorcycle mechanic? Pro Wrestler?

Where is he? Why the intense stare? Is he angry? Frustrated? Upset that he was interrupted during his Billy Blanks Tae Bo video workout?

Come on. I’d love to hear from you.

I’m Mad As Hell And I’m Not Going To Take It Anymore

It is impossible to discourage the real writers – they don’t give a damn what you say, they’re going to write.  ~Sinclair Lewis

 

By: Stacey Purcell

 

Well, that’s not exactly true.

Now that I’ve got your attention, I want to share something with you and I want to issue a challenge.

It’s six o’clock in the morning on the day that I need to post my blog. Normally, I spend at least an afternoon prior to “going live” working on my article, researching, polishing and re-writing bits that I think are lame. (Trust me when I say there are usually many lame bits.) This week is different!

This week I was a writer. Shocking I know!

I’ve been so immersed in learning about all it takes to be a writer with a career, I forgot the first part…you have to write stuff to be a writer. Let me explain.

I’m a perpetual student. If I hear about something, I’m compelled to study it until the cows come home. I know- a total geek. Anyway, I’ve spent a massive amount of time learning about marketing, publishing, contracts etc. and avoided sitting down with my computer to create. Even at the National  RWA Conference in NYC, I chose a lot of workshops around those topics. I did exactly what Jenn was talking about in her article yesterday. I lost my balance.

Life bombards us with grenades of trouble, responsibilities, worries etc. Those are hard enough to combat without adding my little problem to the mix. I know I’m not unique, there are a lot of you that aren’t writing for many different reasons. I used my love of learning to run away from myself.

I am mad. I got so far away from my stories, I thought about giving it all up. It was much easier to write blogs and go to workshops, right? The teacher in me would like to lay out neat little steps for all of us to take to get back to writing. Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. Everyone is different and all I can do is share with you what I did.

The hardest part was the first step. I finally understood that I needed to put my first manuscript away. I’d been mired in it for so long and it spanned through some very difficult years for me personally. It was like telling a child, you no longer believe in them. It broke my heart. I know I will go back to her one day, just not today.

I pulled out the second novel in the series that I began this last NaNo season. I had written about 55 pages so it wasn’t overwhelming. I edited the prologue and was hooked. This week, I participated in a progressive story with three other authors. We each took a thousand words and the story line changed with each person! Fun! I also called an old critique partners and asked for help. (This part is key.) It made me accountable. I’m meeting with one of them in about two hours so I had to prepare twenty pages for her to go over last night.

Am I perfect now? Am I all cured from the crap that runs around in my head? That’s a resounding, no. But for this week, and I am determined for many more weeks, I am a writer.

Well, that was the sharing part, now comes the challenge part. I’m going to give you a writing spark and I want you to create a paragraph around it. Just a few sentences- come on you can do it!  Do it just for the fun of it, do it just to create.

1)      An orange cat out in a stormy night

2)      A lonely woman in her house

 

Paying the TimeKeeper – Social Media Debts

Song of the Day:  Breathe into Me by Red

I know I’m not just speaking for myself when I say time is at a premium. Whether you work full time, manage a household, volunteer, rear children, or all of the above, finding time to write is a challenge. Sure, I have all sorts of tricks I use to squeeze in some writing time. With young children, including a much too smart, much too active toddler, this is no easy feat. Still, the stories get written, albeit slower than I’d like. Darn it all. (raises arms above head and shakes fists in frustration)

But my job as an author doesn’t stop there.

With so little time on our hands, when, and how, do we make our presence as authors known to the outside world? What’s with all the social media? Shouldn’t time be spent writing instead of hanging out on the internet? I’d say yes. But unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way, darn it all. (raises arms above head again and shakes fists in frustration) Published, unpublished, traditionally published, e-published, or self published, we still have to market ourselves, our name. We have to squeeze a little more blood from the turnip, er, I mean, time from our day. I admit, I’m still working on this one.

Conundrum.  But here are some tidbits I learned that I hope are useful.

First, foremost and the most obvious, every author should have a website, a place all your own, a little slice of the internet pie. (Boston crème pie, if you please)  It doesn’t matter whether or not you are published. If your goal is to someday be published, you need a website. The website should fit your personality or the theme of your books. It should be kept up to date, not left to stagnate. Share news, links, and/or blog.

Now what?

It is essential to develop a presence in the world of social media. The two most popular social media sites are Twitter and Facebook. I will specifically address these two mediums. Many swear by these sites, and many favor one over the other. But these sites can be time sucks, especially when getting involved in a juicy conversation. (raises arms above head yet again and shakes fists in frustration)

So how do you manage them? I have picked up some advice and listened in on workshop over the matter.

Twitter is immediate. It’s like watching the ticker rolling at the New York Stock Exchange, complete with the excitement. The feed continues. What’s being tweeted now will be replaced by the next tweet.  Keeping up with and sharing in conversations, news, articles, and links can be distracting. One way to manage Twitter is to dedicate 30 minutes a day in 3 chunks. Twit, I mean, tweet, read, and comment for 10 minutes in the morning, 10 minutes in the afternoon, and 10 minutes in the evening. This will help keep you in the know and an active participator without bleeding you dry.

Facebook is also a constant stream of communication. It can also be the site a writer can reach more people and exchange interactions. A good rule for Facebook users is to add at least 4 bits of content per day. Don’t be afraid to let your personality shine. You can follow the same time guidelines as Twitter. Allow yourself small blocks of time to browse and comment on other people’s wall, links, and posts. And always respond to those who comment on your pages. This is important when building relationships with readers or potential readers. Also, and this goes for any social media network, don’t blatantly self-promote yourself or your product. Yup, this is equivalent to telemarketing callers.

These tips can work for the many, many other sites, such as Goodreads, MySpace, or Kindle Boards, as well.

When time is lacking, you may not be able to visit all the networking places daily. Perhaps, allot yourself time every other day for the sites you may not visit as often. Only you can decide where your time is better spent. (raises arms above head…wait…I have control of this)

Do you Tweet or Facebook? Love them or hate them? How about other social networking sites? Which tool do you prefer to use? Let me hear from you.

Next up … blogging: essential or erroneous?

Dealing With Rejection by Adrienne Giordano

Dealing With Rejection

by Adrienne Giordano

Rejection.

It’s a nasty little word isn’t it?  As writers, we face it. A lot.  I personally have never gotten comfortable with it. Then again, rejections no longer send me wilting to the floor in tears.

Two years ago, a writer friend told me an agent “chose to resist” her work and it was an aha moment for me.

Chose to resist.

How fabulous is that?

So much better than rejected.  From that point on, when I received one of those dreaded rejection letters, I simply congratulated myself for sending the manuscript out (again!) and moved on.  Sure, there were times when a particular dream agent’s or editor’s resistance hit me a little harder than say a non-dream agent’s or editor’s rejection would, but on those occasions I allowed myself a pity party for the remainder of the day.  That was the deal with myself. Whether it was first thing in the morning or late at night when I received the rejection, I allowed myself to feel horrible until I went to sleep.  For me, anything beyond that was counter-productive and suppressed my creativity.

And I hate that.

So, let’s talk about an action plan for when someone chooses to resist your work.

Step 1

Feel awful about it, but set a deadline.  You cannot make it open-ended or your creativity will be zapped.  Even if you have to write it down, force yourself to set a time limit.  Repeat after me, “For the next (insert however many hours) I am going to allow myself to feel really crappy about this agent/editor choosing to resist my work.”

Step 2

Pull out that chose-to-resist letter and see if there are any nuggets you can pull from it.  I once received a rejection from an agent that said (and yes, this is verbatim because I still have the letter.): “I really, really loved all of your characters and thought your pacing and dialogue were working overall, but it just didn’t stand out enough in the already crowded romantic suspense subgenre. I think you are very talented and would be happy to look at other projects in the future.”

At the time, that letter sent me to my knees.  When reading it, all I saw was that I’d done a good job and it still wasn’t good enough. Luckily, that very night I was having dinner with my critique partner and we had a joint pity party. I cried, I moaned, I felt sorry for myself. I had a martini. J It was a world-class pity party.

The next day, after my allotted pity time, I pulled the letter out and analyzed it. Yes, it was a rejection, but she talked about my strengths, told me I was talented and that she would look at future work. As rejections go, this was a darned fine one. A class-A rejection. I kept the letter on my desk for a long time. As other rejections—maybe not so nice ones—came in, I went back to the class-A one to remind myself that a top agent thought I had talent.

Bottom line here, find the nugget that will sustain you.

Step 3

Keep writing. Take any nuggets you receive and build on them. If someone says your plotting is fabulous, try and improve it. Whatever it is you are good at, keep doing it and try to make it better.  Conversely, if there are areas you need to improve on, work on them. Study craft books, reach out to writer friends for advice, do whatever you need to because if an agent or editor says your dialogue needs work, they’re helping you. They could be sending you a form letter, but they took the time to give you specifics about areas to improve on and that means you connected with them on some level. Think about the vast number of queries agents and editors must receive.  If you connect with them, you’ve done something right.

Step 4

Surround yourself with people who will support you through the tough times.  I have the good fortune to have wonderful critique partners who are all too willing to talk me off ledges.  And they have.  When someone called one of my characters an a**hole, my critique partners were the first ones to tell me how much they loved him.

And by the way, that character is the hero in the book referenced above in the class-A rejection from the agent. Even better, that book was acquired by Carina Press last fall and released this week.  Man Law saw its share of rejections, but some of them were promising rejections and they kept me motivated to find a home for my challenging hero. 

 So, you see, just because an editor or agent chooses to resist it doesn’t mean the book won’t get published.  If you stay the course, improve where you need to, make adjustments as necessary, you will find the editor who loves your story.

Adrienne Giordano writes romantic suspense and women’s fiction.  She is a Jersey girl at heart, but now lives in the Midwest with her work-a-holic husband, sports obsessed son and Buddy the Wheaton Terrorist (Terrier). She is a co-founder of Romance University . Adrienne’s debut romantic suspense, Man Law, will be released by Carina Press on July 4, 2011. Her second book, A Just Deception, will be available from Carina Press on September 5, 2011.

For more information please visit www.AdrienneGiordano.com.  Adrienne can be found on Twitter and Facebook

 

Man Law available at: Carina Press, Amazon, Barnes & Noble

 

Can’t Never Did Anything

The wastebasket is a writer’s best friend.  ~Isaac Bashevis Singer

By: Stacey Purcell

My apologies to all of our readers- This article was to be published while I was attending the RWA National Conference in New York. I discovered free internet wasn’t offered anywhere in the hotel! I’m far too cheap to pay so poor William has had to wait an extra week for his article. Without further ado, I give you William Simon who writes under Will Graham.

One of the most frustrating things about writing is facing the fact the project you believe in, the project you’re over the moon about, the one you just know is going to blow the socks off everyone who reads it…. just…. isn’t….working….

Short version:  Many years ago, I wrote a spec script for a TV series.  It was a piece I was particularly proud of, but could not get in the front door.  Or the back door.  Or any door.  A few years later, it was heavily revised and submitted to another series, with slightly better results.  Ultimately rejected, the feedback and comments were invaluable, and it remains the nicest most constructive rejection I’ve ever received.

Last year, I heard about a new anthology looking for mysteries with a Christmas theme.  Kicking around some ideas, the brain flash came; this could easily be adapted into a novella set on Christmas Eve.  The starters  gun went off in my brain, and we were off to the races.

After six weeks of intense daily work, changing this and editing that, revising here, creating there, it hit me like a ton of bricks I’d left out a third character who, while on the fringes of the action, plays a very important part in the last third of the story.  Without this character, the heroes cannot do what they need to do to uncover the mystery.

I spent one entire day trying to re-work, re-write, streamline, edit, and make this happen.  The frustration level was mounting, so I stepped back for the night and thought it through.  Spent the evening with the Macbook Air in my lap, working Scrivener to death, arranging and re-arranging, making notes, revising dialogue.

One day, I realized it just wasn’t going to work.

Not in this incarnation.  The final nail that sealed its doom is that the Big Mystery, the Solution, the ‘snap’ in the tale, the Lost Ark, the MacGuffin, the Major Shock…. well, it was horrifying ten years ago, but today wouldn’t get more than a ‘ho-hum, this old chestnut again?’

Okay.  There is no shame in graceful surrender.  Not everything works the way we plan it.  Sent a private email venting to certain people, all of whom came back with “Don’t throw it away!” and some terrific words of encouragement (this is why we have friends, and if they are writers too, they understand the frustration of it all.)  This one isn’t working, archive it, move on, think of something else.

About two weeks after I’d surrendered on this one, Jenn (aka J-Bray, or The Pirate Lady) was listening to me vent about it.  I was frustrated beyond words, because this project was special, it was important, it was something I was personally proud of, and I couldn’t make it work.

Jenn and I tease each other without mercy, can argue for hours on end, but she is one of the smartest people I’ve ever known.  (Don’t tell her I said that, her ego’s big enough as it is.)

Jenn listened politely, then nailed me dead square between the eyes.  “You’re thinking like a thriller writer,” she said.  “This audience is not thriller readers.  They will be shocked, they will be horrified, they will come out of their chairs over this.”

And the light dawned.

That very afternoon when I got back to my office, I opened it up again and looked at it not as a thriller writer, but as a writer.  I read it not as someone who grew up on Ian Fleming and Alistair MacLean and Agatha Christie and Ellery Queen, but as a regular, everyday, ‘hey this might be interesting’ reader.

I saw the flaws almost instantly.  Another two weeks of effort, and it was done.  I was happy with it.  And now, at last, SOMETIMES, THERE REALLY ARE MONSTERS UNDER THE BED is available for Kindle and Nook.

Frustrating business, this Writing Stuff.  There are times I tell myself I’m still a young man, I could get into something decent and reasonable, like selling used cars, or condo time-shares to retirees, or maybe television evangelism.

But then, the words flow, the plot holds, it all comes together, and, to quote Freddy Shoop in SUMMER SCHOOL, “This sh** works!”

A Little Conference, A Little New York

Song of the day: Rock This Town by the Stray Cats

A visual display of my RWA National New York trip anyone?

I promise I won’t make you sit through an endless array of slides while I chatter on about my nasty run-in with a New York cop, near death taxi rides,  bomb threats,  and elevator mishaps. Nor will I bore you with bemoaning my choice of shoes while trekking across block, after block, after block of the city,  or how I cried during the Broadway show Wicked, or how nervous I was to meet members of my new publisher, Carina Press (oops…did I let that slip?).

I won’t mention the amazing workshops and parties, either. Well maybe, I will.

So without further ado . . .

People, lights, and animation everywhere you turned. Sensory overload!

By the looks of those sun-deprived skinny legs, I'm thinking this cowboy is a stand-in.

NY celebrated my arrival Monday night with fireworks. Did I mention I'm terrified of heights?

Don't honk. $350 Fine. One way the city makes lots of money.

Central Park, who knew it could be so big? And peaceful? And big? And beautiful? And big? Damn flip-flops.

My sight-seeing compadres, Stacey and Ruth. Thanks for not throwing me overboard.

Hard to believe I was part of a workshop panel.

What do you do at the end of a long day at conference? Go to a Harlequin PJ party and wear a silly hat, of course.

Traded PJs for chic at the Carina Press cocktail party.

The Wicked stage curtain. Yes, we had wicked seating.

Must. . . resist . . .donning . . .the ears.

Where's your sword, Zorro? You might can guess his answer.

Hamming for the camera on a tiny slab of red carpet.

Happy 4th of July

 

Never take for granted the freedoms bestowed upon us by our founding fathers and maintained by our military.

From all of us here at MuseTracks, have a safe and festive holiday.