The 2024 elections in the United States are devastating to all who believe in freedom of expression and freedom of speech.
Censorship is coming to the United States. Censorship of the books you want to read. Prepare for the censorship apocalypse now.
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This re-post of an interview I did with The Smut Report is the fifth in a series of blog interviews I’ve done over the years. The first post explains my purpose.
Today’s post is from a 2023 interview I did for The Smut Report with the goal of promoting my Harwell Heirs series. At the time, I had just released Book 4, A Delicate Seduction, and so applied to The Smut Report for a review of Book 1, The Pleasure Device. They said they would review The Pleasure Device later, but in the meantime, I could do this promo interview called “My First Smut”, so I did. By the way, The Smut Report hated The Pleasure Device. It seems my Victorian erotic romance was too smutty for a website with “smut” in the title! Continue reading
I have a story to tell. The first year I participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), 2006, I told a computer programmer friend of mine about the event. If you don’t know, NaNoWriMo is a seat-of-your-pants, self-motivated challenge where you write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days. By writing 50,000 words, you become a NaNoWriMo “winner”. My programmer friend said she could write a script in a few minutes that would repeat a word 50,000 times, so would that make her a winner?
Um, no. Continue reading
This is my Discovering Her Delight inspiration post. Warning! There are spoilers ahead for the book. If you don’t mind spoilers, read on. If you don’t like your romance spoiled, read Discovering Her Delight first!
I started the notes for Discovering Her Delight way back in 2014 (then known as Discovering Her Desire). I knew it was going to be a story centered on an archaeological expedition, I just wasn’t clear on the specifics. An archaeologist friend of mine had a bizarre idea: what if the hero had to write on the heroine’s back?
So I held on to that thought, and it continued to inspire the story. Why would he need to do this? Under what circumstances? And how would he do it in 1881? Continue reading
I have participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) since 2006. So this November, 2023, will be my 18th NaNoWriMo.
Holy Wow. That’s a lot of novels.
No, really, it is. I have nine (yes, 9) unfinished novels. And they are really good novels. Eight are related to existing series. (The standalone is 2021’s Super Sekrit Steampunk novel.)
So I came to the conclusion that I really, really, REALLY need to finish these novels. And I really, really need to spend my NaNoWriMo November writing time to achieve this goal rather than starting more new novels. Continue reading
In 2018, I was on a Seasoned Romance panel at the Emerald City Writers Conference. My topic was “Sex and the Seasoned Romance”. I was recently reminded of this presentation when another author posted a rather shocking comment in a seasoned romance author discussion group I am no longer a member of:
“I would not write an erotic romance about an older couple…simply because there’s a level of maturity that makes their sexual relationship much deeper and more meaningful, because of all they’ve been through.”
Uh…that’s exactly why an author can write a seasoned erotic romance! Or even just sex scenes featuring seasoned characters.
I’m still trying to get my head around what this author might have meant. Does she think “erotic romance” means lots of vacuous, meaningless sex? Because that’s not what an erotic romance is at all. In fact, the “maturity that makes their sexual relationship much deeper and more meaningful” feeds into what an erotic romance is: a sexual journey leading to a happily-ever-after. Continue reading
This year has been a difficult one. My mother died unexpectedly. My father continues to live under hospice care. So I’m taking it easy with my 2022 National Novel Writing Month November effort. Which means I’m going to, yet again, be a NaNo Rebel.
What’s a NaNoWriMo Rebel you might ask? Someone who bucks the NaNoWriMo tradition of writing 50,000 words of a brand new novel during November. The team over at National Novel Writing Month has FAQs in their discussion forum. Continue reading
It’s October and once again time for NaNoPrep. “Preptober” is the time when authors all over the world prepare their National Novel Writing Month novel. This year my novel is called The Sooper Sekrit Steampunk Story. Yes, it will be Steampunk! Yes, there will be romance! But, I only have sort of an idea of what’s going to happen! Continue reading
This re-post of an interview I did with romance author Betty Bolte is the fourth in a series of blog interviews I’ve done over the years. The first post explains my purpose.
Today’s post is from a 2020 interview I did for Betty Bolte’s blog to promote Resistance. Betty is one of the authors who participated in the Common Elements Romance Project, and she generously offered space on her popular blog for her colleagues. Continue reading
In one of my writers’ groups the subject of heat levels in romance came up, and how to describe romance novel sexy times (or lack thereof) on some sort of scale.
You probably think this is an easy discussion, right? Ha!
There is literally no industry standard for heat levels, and yet romance readers constantly want to know what to expect sexiness-wise between the covers.
Having no industry standard means everyone has their own opinion including one particular retailer which randomly puts romance books into their “Erotica Dungeon” even if said romance book is not erotica (plus erotica is not a heat level — more on that below). Continue reading