Romance so hot...it melts your Heart

As the Page Turns

What makes you read a book? I don’t mean, why read books at all. But why that book? Did the cover originally intrigue you? Did you pick it up because it’s your favorite author? There are any number of reasons we choose one book title over another.

Before I go on and in the spirit of full disclosure, I’m going to admit I read books differently now that I’m an author. I used to pick up a book and travel along the plot blissfully unaware of all the rules and tricks writers use to move the story forward–to pull the reader into the next chapter if you will. And though I haven’t lost the joy in reading, it’s now part of my “job”. I read now to learn. A very different way of enjoying a book.

It’s hard for me these days to find a real page turner. But the last book I read, Susan Collins’ The Hunger Games not only has kept me up at night, but rolled around in my thoughts making me wonder about the characters even when I wasn’t reading.

And it got me thinking about what makes a book a real page turner.

In the case of The Hunger Games not only was the setting intriguing, being some post-apocalyptic United States with an overbearing government, but the characters, young adults just working to survive the harsh realities of their lives, made me care what happened to them. For those of you who don’t know the premise, the government wants to remind its citizens of a failed revolt and so they send 24 teens into a large arena once a year and have them fight to death, rewarding the victor with both individual riches and food and rewards for their sector…a very interesting premise.

Now, mind you, this is a young adult novel, which means the author had to carefully select how the protagonists of her book would survive and yet not come across as murderers and therefore unsympathetic in the reader’s eyes. May I just say, she pulled it off brilliantly!! I couldn’t read fast enough to find out how the competition would be eliminated especially after the young lady became allies with some of the competitors. And those she did have to kill had become horrible villains for the reader and therefore, deserved to die. Susan Collins’ skill in manipulating my emotions was admirable. By the time the hero and heroine emerge victorious (I don’t think I’m giving anything away since these are romances of sorts) I was thrilled, relieved and wrung out from worrying about their well-being.

These days it takes a lot to keep my attention. I’m finding fewer and fewer books make me want to read them. It may be because I’ve been caught in a genre loop. I’ve been reading a lot of paranormal and fantasy type stories. I’m not sure. The current book I’m reading, Lori Foster’s When you Dare, a contemporary undercover operations story, definitely has me intrigued. She’s holding onto a secret that propels me forward and makes me want to know who is after the heroine and what their motivation would be to kill her (at least I think that’s what they want in the end). The suspense is definitely propelling me deeper into the story. (Of course the budding romance isn’t hurting my enjoyment of the story either. *g*)

But that’s just me and what keeps me up at night reading. What about you? What pulls you into a story and makes you burn dinner or stay up into the weeeee hours of the night? If you have any reading recommendations I’d love to hear them!

The Changing Author

Cigarette hanging from her mouth, the ash long and dangling. Smoke circle her head as fingers peck out a rapid tattoo on the the old Royal. Papers balled and crumpled near the waste basket as her characters chatter incessently in her ear, but not loud enough to get it juuuuust right. And as the final pages add up on the corner of her desk, she renews her efforts to finish that manuscript and get it out to a publisher.

That’s how I picture my favorite author’s careers in the past. It was all about the writing. All about receiving that boxed manuscript from an editor with redlines and arrows indicating editing suggestions. Editors and publishers had time to put time and energy into a book, to groom the author and create an image and a marketing plan for her and her books.

Sadly, those days are gone.

An author no longer has the the luxury of just sitting down at her computer and pounding out a new best seller. There are so many hats she must wear. Writer, editor, marketing guru and in many cases, publisher.

Publishers now want to see manuscripts that have had the bulk of the editing done. Beta readers and critique groups are now working with an author to find unforgivable flaws with a hero no reader can love. They’re helping fill in those small plot line holes that an editor used to discover. If a manuscript hits an acquisition editors desk with any of those problems it will no doubt receive a form email rejection. If the author is fortunate, there will be some explanation as to why it was rejected, but often there isn’t time for an editor to explain in detail why a book “doesn’t fit”.

With the advent of digital books authors are no longer receiving advances. Advances meant an author was compensated up front for months of being bent over the keyboard. Without the advance, the author now depends only on royalties from sales to make her money. (I don’t even want to speculate my hourly rate of pay for the books I’ve written.) Without the backing of a marketing department from the good ‘ole days, it also means she has to go out and pound the pavement to let readers know she has a new book out there. Spending time on Facebook and Twitter shouting about her book, which equals time away from writing the next book.

Now, Amazon and Barnes & Noble among other venues, have made it possible for an author to actually publish her own book without going through an agent or publishing house. And as exciting as this has become for authors to have full control of their books, it’s also a heck of a lot of work. It becomes the responsibility of the author to find her editor and cover artist. To make sure the book is formatted correctly for all digital platforms. And as you can imagine, this means more time away from writing.

To keep up with this changing world many authors are hiring assistants who can help with the extraneous work load. Of course you need to have the sales to justify this expenditure. Ah hem, I so am not there … yet. And there are publicity companies who are hired by authors to go out and do some of the pavement pounding. But as a reader I find them very annoying and they become white noise in the thrum of all the book marketing. Since I delete these announcements from my email and ignore them on Facebook, I haven’t bothered with any of the companies.

I keep saying this year I’m going to figure this whole thing out. To set a schedule of some sort that not only allows time for all of these things AND writing. Of course before all that happens I do have to get my personal life to slow down juuuust a little.

As a reader do you see these changes effecting your buying habits or has it all happened in the background unnoticed by you? If your an author, are you happy with all the changes in publishing or would you like to go back to the days before digital books? Because you know me, I’m curious like that.

Where’s the Sense in That?

This is just a little rant about something that is in such short supply these days it’s nearly extinct … common sense. Yeah, you remember that? The part of your brain that tells you not to cross the street when traffic is moving or not to spend money you don’t have or hold the door for someone with their hands full. I’m not sure what’s going on, but it seems fewer and fewer people are using this part of their brain.

It seems every day there’s another example of people in the news that win some court battle because the judicial system especially has lost its commmon sense. A woman who spills coffee in her lap and gets a huge settlement because she got burned and no one told her it was hot. The stories of inmates suing victims, prisons, and states for unlawfully keeping them behind bars could fill several wastebaskets. Stories of student victims who speak up and get punished while their bullies walk away without any repercussions seem to fill the news every day.

Recently in a public high school near where I live, a student stepped forward and said a framed copy of the school prayer gifted to the school by the graduating class of 1963 was offended by the wording (because she’s an atheist) and asked the courts demand it be removed from the auditorium wall. The judge ruled in her favor. Families are flabbergasted that this is happening. It’s not that they don’t understand people with other faiths are now attending the school, they just feel this banner is part of the school’s history and it should be preserved for that reason. I tend to agree with the majority on this one.

I’m just wondering when we’ll find our common sense in the midst of one person who feels their wants are more important than the majority’s needs. Can we save it from total extinction in a world filled with people who feel they’re entitled to have everything whether they’ve worked for it or not? I’m beginning to wonder.

Come On Over!

Today I’m hanging out over at SLINGWORDS.

I’m talking about one of my favorite subjects … heroes. What’s a romance without a hunky guy for the heroine to save?

Come on over and join me!

Fighting for What’s Right

I feel very fortunate for who I am and where I grew up. I haven’t known hardship. I haven’t had anyone hate me just because my skin was white. I haven’t felt less or been denied a job because I didn’t look like 90% of the work force. I’ve never worried that someone could think me stupid simply because I fall into a particular ethnicity.

I don’t know what it’s like to grow up as an African-American. I won’t even pretend I can truly comprehend what a huge group of people have had to endure because they were different. But Martin Luther King, Jr knew and fought the good fight. Not only do I admire what he did to advance the equality of so many but my heart aches that he layed down his life for what he believed in.

This is so much more than a day off from work/school. It’s a chance for us to celebrate a wonderful man’s legacy and remember all he gave so others could have more.

Sunday Six 1/15

Welcome to another Six Sentence Sunday where I choose six of my favorite lines from one of my works. This week for the first time I’d like to share something from my WIP. A romantic suspense that I hope to release this year titled “NO BED OF ROSES”.

The seedy establishment on the outskirts of Portland seemed like the kind of place the Black Widower would frequent. Rainmaker had scoped out the place on a trip to a men’s room so disgusting, no sober man, no matter how desperate, would use. Fortunately for him, years of undercover work had given him a bladder of steel.

The blue haze of cigarette smoke mixed with the scent of stale beer and bodies added to the dingy feeling of the joint. Like the tavern’s clients, the scarred bar before him had seen its share of action. The country music filtering out from the back room where the pool table sat was loud—-the patrons louder.

Click HERE to check out other authors participating this week.

Islands in the Stream

There are stories in every marriage that get told over and over again. This is one of those classics that Mr. Nina and I still laugh about … well, he laughs and I give him the hairy wife-eye! Anyway, this happened four years ago this weekend and I just thought it was worth sharing again. Enjoy …

Okay, so Baby Girl goes off to work, Little Boy Blue hops on the bus for a basketball game and DH asks… wait for it… “wanna go snowmobiling?” Not what I was expecting, but heck, we just got another foot of snow, it’s above 10 degrees F and the sun is shining. I figure what the heck. We’ve gone around and around about how much I enjoy staying on the trails and if he could please follow the map, I might enjoy myself.

Sure. Sure. No Problem.

First… (and this is where I should have jumped off the sled, thrown down my gloves, and stamped back into the house… obviously I didn’t) First, he’d like to swing over to a buddy’s camp and check out what he’s up to.

“Is it waaay off the beaten path?” He can see I’m ready to bolt. I’m not really interested in breaking new trails in the middle of the northern Maine woods–again.

He laughs. “Now honey. Would I do that to you after our last ride?” At which point he jumps on the sled, sending us hurtling into our next adventure. 

My first inkling that something had gone wrong was our trip down a very long road a couple towns over. Now, the police are pretty lenient here. You can cross the road, you can even travel a short distance on a road to get to the trail, but the law clearly states a sled may not use the road as a throughway. Fifteen minutes at 50 mph (you do the math) and we’re still on a major road, I’m thinking something’s wrong. But hey, if the cops stop us… it’s his license and being lost in civilization works for me.

Why I didn’t ask him to turn around at that point is beyond me. I knew, I mean, I knew nothing good was going come of this. Finally he turns off the road into the woods. I’m not freaked yet, he’s not going through fresh powder, at least one sled has come this way. Besides I’ve been to this guy’s camp… it’s nice… lots of well groomed trails. But then the trees close in on us. The sled’s wobbling here and there, but I’m not panicked. DH has assured me he can control the sled. I worry too much.

But then we’re really dragged off the trail. He compensates, only to be pulled the other way. I’m not panicking, he’s only dumped me once. (Off a snowbank in front of people coming out of church… but hey we managed that unscathed.) So as the sled continues to bounce from side to side I keep thinking he’s going to pull out of it.

Nope.

Next thing I know I’m being dragged off the sled as it catapults forward on its side. My foot is caught under the sled and for a moment I worry about refracturing my pelvis. But then all is still. DH hits the kill switch and tells me to get up! Now! Did I mention I have MS? Even under the best conditions nothing about my body moves fast. So he hauls my butt up and out of the brook we and the machine are laying in. A brook! The song “Islands in the Stream” took on a whole new meaning at that point.

Now, trust me when I tell you that gurgling mountain brooks are only pretty in the summer or on video tape. Seeing water running through the engine of the only thing transporting you out of the middle of hell nowhere is a little frightening even for the hardiest souls. Undaunted, DH manages to get all three of us at least out of the water. But now there is a brook and a 3 foot drop between the sled and the trail.

This is so not looking good.

“How far from the camp are we?” I ask, realizing there is no way I can walk.

“Between 1 and 4 miles.”

“You’re not leaving me here alone.”

“If you think I’m dragging your cute butt down this trail, you’re sadly mistaken. I can go faster alone.”

“At least leave me the cell phone.” I say, knowing there are no towers and it probably wouldn’t work anyway, but it might give me some comfort.   

“I didn’t bring it. Really. It won’t be long. Sit here in the trail. You’ll be fine.” And he turns and walks away.

Have you heard silence? Because snow is an insulator and it swallows all sound. There’s an eerie stillness in the middle of nowhere.

This quiet allows my vivid imagination to conjur up all sorts of wild stories. Not the least of which is the lead anchor of the local news cast reporting on the corpse of local author found frozen to the seat of her snowmobile mired in mud. 

So I sit and wait. Trying to remember all the stages of hypothermia. No, I’m not shivering, yes my fingers still move. And I wait some more wondering if I should start walking. (Mind you, I can barely get myself standing from this sitting position in the snow… but perhaps I should just give it a try.)

Then I hear another sled. And there they are, my knight in shining armor… and the @$$hole of a husband that told me we’d go for an uneventful ride.

Lots of lifting and maneuvering of a 650 pound snowmobile and some digging with a shovel and they had the machine back on the trail. I chose to ride with my knight and left DH to find his own way back to the camp.

Friday’s Favorite Lines

This week I received a 4.5 STAR review from DARK DIVA REVIEWS for the second book in the XTC Resorts series, Invitation to Ecstasy. *see me snoopy dancing around the house*

Jae said …

“A roller-coaster of emotion and some of the most emotionally dramatic BDSM scenes I’ve read in quite a while are contained within Invitation to Ecstasy by Nina Pierce. Ms. Pierce’s writing is very enjoyable. There’s a terrific balance of down-to-earth narrative, humor, and intensity that draws the reader along from the very first page.”

So glad you enjoyed it, Jae! This book came out last August and I think it sort of got buried in the busy-ness of the summer. So I thought I’d share some of my favorite lines from the book. In no particular order…

1. But heartache? Heartache ripped at the soul, leaving gaping holes of emptiness that nothing could fill—-not even pain.

2. Something had triggered Sara’s retreat, and it was his promise as her Master to let the pain shatter the walls surrounding that fear and release the darkness clouding her eyes.

3. Though she worked out regularly, thirty-seven years of gravity were working hard to sink the parts of her body Sara was trying to keep afloat.

4. It was the purgatory of memories that Sara had intended to purge when she’d left the main lodge. All she had to do was go into the cabana, slay the dragons causing her nightmares and close the book on one ugly-ass chapter of her life.

5. “It’s a rough gig, living here in paradise with beautiful men and women running around half naked.” Ethan shrugged. “But hey, someone’s got to do it, and I’m willing to take one for the team.”

6. He leaned close, overwhelming her senses with the spicy scent of him. “Keep it up, Sara,” Derek whispered, his breath feathering heat across her cheek. “Punishing you for your defiance will be entirely my pleasure.”

7. Derek’s instincts had been right about this wounded bird, the one who made his heart race and his libido scream for mercy. The scars on her heart had been inflicted by a man who had promised to love her.

8. A cold rush of fear slid down her spine, pulling her back from the tenuous edge of trust.

9. The tranquil ocean had become a maelstrom of chop. The wind whipped it into a foamy frenzy that seemed intent on drowning her.

10. Spreading open her robe, Derek laid his palm between her breasts. “Here. It’s going to hurt here.”

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Books on the Move

I don’t know if Hollywood is getting lazy or if there are just so many cineplexes with 8 and 10 movies running, but it seems like more and more books are being brought to the big screen. Of course it may be the phenomenal successes of the Harry Potter and the Twilight series that are fueling the frenzy. I’ve read a few of the books that have been made into movies and seen a few of the movies without reading the book. Since there’s always the question of whether the book is better than the movie or vice versa, I’m never sure which way I want to go. But let me just share a few of the book/movies that have come out recently or are soon to be released.

Water For Elephants
This is a movie I saw, but didn’t read the book. The movie was well done in that the violence toward human and animal is intimated, but done off-screen. I’m not sure how they handle it in the book, but even in writing, violence is very hard for me to handle. I enjoyed the movie, but the ladies sitting in front of me from a bookclub enjoyed the book so much more.

The Help
My mother read this book last summer and highly recommended it. And though it was on my TBR list, I hadn’t gotten around to it by the time the movie was released. My daughter and I saw it. I haven’t cried so much in a movie in a long time. What I liked best is the story of these african-american maids was told through the eyes of a caucasian author who is simply trying to share the trials and tribulations of their lives in a book she is writing. It is so well done and I have no doubt the author of the book, Kathryn Stockett based the stories on a lot of research. Thankfully, it’s interspersed with lots of humor and the movie is very enjoyable despite its difficult subject matter.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
I read this book. Correction … I tried to read this book. But I was part of that 1% that just couldn’t get into it. And I did something I don’t usually do, I forced myself to keep reading, convinced that if so many people enjoyed it, surely I would get to the good parts. It never happened. I abandoned the book with a mere 50 pages left. Really, I couldn’t get through it. I will however, go and see the movie. I desperately want to know what the “mystery” was around the story. The missing girl? The murder? I’m not sure. I did read into it enough to know what happened (or didn’t happen) to the girl … yeah, well I figured that out the first time she was mentioned. Anyway, I’m hoping I’ll enjoy the movie, though my son already told me the ending stinks. His girlfriend, who loved the book, said it was true to the story, which is not surprising since there are two other books in this series.

Hunger Games
I’ve been hearing so much about the book that when the trailer showed at a movie I was watching I knew it was time to check it out. I’m currently reading the book and the premise of 24 young people battling to death is intriguing. I’m only half way through, but since I can’t put it down, I expect to finish it in the next day or so. Since I’ve just admitted I don’t like violence, I’m wondering how the author will handle the visciousness that will be the killings. I really don’t want the heroine of the story to commit any horrible murders even if it is to save her life. Anyway, this is one of the few times I’m actually reading the book with the anticipation of seeing the movie.

One For The Money
This is another example of a genre I just couldn’t get into. I listened to one of Janet Evanovich’s stories on audio books, but wasn’t moved to read any others. There’s such a huge following for Stephanie Plum who find the books laugh-out-loud funny that I have no doubt I’ll drag Mr. Nina to the movie when it comes out. I’m sure it will translate well to the big screen.

So what about you? Do you enjoy book to movies? Are there any movies that you’ve seen or books that you’ve read that you would recommend?

Blind Her With Six – Jan 8

Welcome to another week of Six Sentence Sunday

Last month was a wonderful month for my sexy romantic suspense story, ”Blind Her With Bliss“! Thank you everyone who went out and purchased it (and it’s still on sale for $.99)! I thought I’d do a little happy dance and give you another six from the first book in “The Tilling Passions” series.

It was a wonder the man pouring his soul out through the piano keys didn’t simply collapse; an empty husk of a body, sacrificing everything to give life to the passionate strains of music filling the auditorium. Surely nothing so poignant could come from anywhere other than the heart. As melancholy notes penned by some dead composer plucked at her heartstrings, Julie could feel Damon’s sorrow filling her and resonating through every molecule of air.

As the emotional melody pulled her along its river of notes, she thought of her family. As much as they aggravated her, they also anchored her—gave her a sense of belonging. Damon had no one.

Thank you for your comments you leave week to week, they mean a lot to me. And don’t forget to go HERE to check out other authors participating in Six Sentence Sunday this week!

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