A Weighty Award of Great Merit (and me rambling)

The Liebster Award goes like this:
1. Thank the blogger who presented you with the Liebster Award, and link back to his or her blog. (Big thank you to the lovely Erin!!!)
2. Answer the 11 questions from the nominator; list 11 random facts about yourself (NOTE: I have done the 11 facts thing a few awards ago, so in the interest of space, I’m eliminating those. But let me tell you, I am a FASCINATING person - PS Erin wrote this but magically enough, same here), and create 11 questions for your nominees.
3. Present the Liebster Award to 11 bloggers, who have blogs with 200 followers or less, whom you feel deserve to be noticed. Leave a comment on the blogs letting the owners know they have been chosen. (No tag backs.)
4. Upload the Liebster Award image to your blog.


Ze Questions:

Who would win in a staring contest, Harry Potter or Percy Jackson?

HARRY POTTER. Because once you've actually died, staring contests seem slightly less intimidating. 

You’re out of black ink on deadline day, in which color do you print your manuscript to send back to your (perhaps hypothetical) editor: Cyan, Magenta, or Yellow? Why?

Magenta, because it's the most readable and I'm boring like that.

Tell us about your book.

Well, there's an official blurb over on the right, so I will let that speak for itself. Mostly.

My personal feelings about the book: DETECT ME is a mix of my love for detective noir heroes, artists of all different kinds, and women that are just as smart and capable as the men around them.

An asteroid is screaming toward Earth and only one dance craze is allowed in the hidey-hole that saves humanity: Gangnam Style, The Electric Slide, The Macarena, or The Harlem Shake. Which one do you save? (And you’re not allowed to say none) Also, if you are brave enough: Post a video of you doing said dance. THAT’S RIGHT. AN OPTIONAL CHALLENGE!

NONE OF THEM. THEY ALL DIE. Oh crap you anticipated me. Uh... Fine I guess The Macarena can stay. Fun fact - that was my first dance with a boy, because both our parents were around at the middle school dance and he was too embarrassed to ask for a slow dance.

What book are you currently reading?

Violence: A Writer's Guide by Rory Miller. He is the man.

Who is your favorite author? (I give you permission to cry that you can't only choose one and then I’ll let you choose, say, two or three if you must)

Immediately throwing my hands up and crying. Three is still too few! But if you twisted my arm I guess I'd say Steven Brust, Mary Renault, and Victoria Holt/Jean Plaidy/Philippa Carr/whatever she felt like that week.

What inspired you to become a writer?

I can't say that I was ever inspired to become a writer, exactly. I always wrote. Probably a lot of this is due to the fact that my Dad (a very, very accomplished writer) noticed and encouraged me to keep going, even when I was six and writing crap like, "The wind feels like waterless water on my skin." (That's right. COPYRIGHT: ME. Try not to be too jealous.)

What’s your favorite eReader?

Kindle App on my iPhone or iPad.

Favorite internet distraction?

ALL OF THEM. Er... Yeah, that sounds about right.

Favorite fictional boyfriend?

Aragorn.

If you write drunk and edit sober, name the drinks for each. (Like mine would be wine and coffee)

I don't drink because I'm a boring person, but I do consume completely unhealthy amounts of coffee. Only, all the time.


Here are my questions!
1. What does your favorite mug look like?
2. What are your five desert island books?
3. Do you prefer movies or TV shows, and why?
4. What was the inspiration for your current book?
5. If you could force everyone to read ONE book, what book would it be?
6. What's your guilty pleasure music?
7. Favorite dessert?
8. Most common spelling/grammar error?
9. What's your go-to funny story?
10. What kind of cell phone do you have?
11. Tell me what your writing process is like.


And the lucky(?) tagees...
1. Thea Landen!
2. Sara Wolf!
3. Karla!
4. Diane!
5. Krystal Rose!
6. Rachel!
7. Mel!
8. Dawn!
9. Empowering Alina!
10. Kathy!
11. Dana!


There is at minimum a zillion% chance I will forget to comment and tell y'all I tagged you. So check for yourselves, and if you're not on there, do it anyway and comment with a link! I promise I'll come on your blog to ramble at you if you do. :)

Creativity and the Art of Wasting Your Time

There's a quote out there that says something like, "Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep."

I apply it to writing, but it applies to painting, or music, or even engineering - anything that takes passion, creativity, and drive to accomplish.

It's easy to tell ourselves to take chances, but it's so much harder to implement. If I know that I can get, say, 1000 words a day by sitting my butt in the chair and doing nothing else for an hour, why switch it up? If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

But even when you have set methods that work for you, I think there's a lot of value in doing something new every once in awhile, if only for the sake of it. Stretching your creative mind can be a huge waste of time. It can also push you to think differently. And even if it never shows in your work, it's valuable for your mind. It's like travel - sure, you could live a happy life without ever going five miles from your hometown. But do you want to live like that?

One time I sat down and forced myself to try freewriting for 30 minutes. I filled up five notebook pages with complete nonsense that I immediately threw away. Another time I did an "interview" with the main character of my WIP. It did nothing for my WIP, but that interview made me think about how some of the answers I gave the character didn't make sense... And how I wanted to write a book with a hero those answers would make sense for.

And then I wrote it.

What are you going to try?

Surviving the (Romantic) Suspense #3: The Freeze

As a romantic suspense author, I spend a lot of time writing about ladies in peril. And by that token, I have to get them back out of it. So I'm going to use one day a week to talk about self defense and protecting yourself in various ways.

When you are attacked, you will freeze.

This is true no matter your level of skill or experience. If somebody attacks you when you weren't expecting it, your brain will stop for a moment and struggle to figure out what's going on. It's called the OODA loop:

Observe
Orient
Decide
Act

You can get stuck on any one of these, but many people who are completely inexperienced with combat freeze up on Observe or Orient. Remember, your brain isn't working the way it usually does when you're attacked. It's very easy to seize up on "There is a person hitting me" or "Why is this person hitting me?"

Professionals are able to train themselves to go directly from Observe to Act. They see a punch coming at them, and that's their "go" button (something we'll talk about later). But unless you plan on becoming a violence professional of some kind (and unfortunately, even then, it's not an exact science - police officers and martial arts experts who have only ever trained, and never experienced real violence, often freeze up too in a real scenario) the best thing you can do is to be aware that the freeze exists.

Why does that help? Well, most people don't even realize that this will happen to them. That means that they don't have the opportunity to remind themselves, "I'm frozen. I need to act. I need to do something." Don't underestimate how helpful doing anything can be in a fight, particularly against someone who has perceived you as easy prey. Many criminals will back down if you show that you're willing to put up any fight at all. So repeat it to yourself and save it somewhere in the back of your mind: You will freeze. Break the freeze. Do something.

All about the anticipation

Reading a thousand romance novels is so much better than going out on a thousand dates. Not just from a time management standpoint, but also because you get to experience that delicious anticipation of a developing relationship without the actual fear of losing the guy.

I've heard that butterflies in the stomach is exactly that, and I suppose sometimes that's true. But it's fun anyway.

A great slow-build of tension as things heat up between our hero and heroine is my very favorite thing. To me, the first kiss is the best part of the novel. That's the most passionate and real part, the first time our protagonists throw caution to the wind and take a chance on each other.

Speaking of chances, there is a definite possibility that I watched too many Disney movies as a child.

You would not believe how many results there are
when you google "Disney true love kiss".

What do you think? Is the first kiss really the best part, or do you like watching the characters grow together and really learn each other?

In the end, it's all fun!

Poetry and Coffee

Sounds pretty good for a Monday morning. I'm not usually all that into slam poetry, but this guy proved me wrong. Here's a written version of the poem, which has become one of my favorites - particularly the end.

We Were Emergencies - Buddy Wakefield

A poet can stick anything into the fog and make it look like a ghost.
But tonight 
let us not become tragedies.
We are not funeral homes with propane tanks in our windows
lookin’ like cemeteries. Cemeteries are just the Earth’s way of not letting go.
Let go.
Tonight, poets, let’s turn our wrists so far backwards
that the razor blades in our pencil tips
can’t get a good angle on all that beauty inside.

Step into this
with your airplane parts
and repeat after me with all your heart:
I no longer need you to fuck me as hard as I hate myself.
Make love to me
like you know I am better than the worst thing I ever did.
Go slow.

I’m new to this
but I have seen nearly every city from a rooftop without jumping.
I have realized the moon did not have to be full for us to love it.
We are not tragedies stranded here beneath it.

If my heart really broke every time I fell from love
I’d be able to offer you confetti by now.
But hearts don’t break, y’all, they bruise and get better.
We were never tragedies.
We were emergencies.
You call 9 – 1 – 1.
Tell them I’m havin' a fantastic time.

Thanks a latte, have a grande!

I think I may have to officially give up my coffee snob status, because I really like Starbucks.

Yeah, I know the espresso is watery and the coffee tastes burned. It does, I'm not even going to lie to you. The new Blonde roast is a little better but I'm fairly sure they import Pike directly from Hell.

But... but the customization...

That's the reason I go to Starbucks. I can order my triple wet venti cappuccino with a minimum of both shame AND effort! That is cutting so much work out of my day!

What about you? Do you have the baristas greeting you by name, or do you go to a great little place that you'd love to recommend to me, only I won't have heard of it? Or do you save at least 15% of your income and make everything at home?

Ten Little Things

1. I've broken my nose, my tailbone, several toes, and most of my fingers. Riding horses is a lot like BMX - if you do it often enough, you get hurt.

2. My top five favorite movies are Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet, Hot Fuzz, Small Soldiers, The Eagle, and I, Robot. (I'm told I have eclectic taste.)

3. I'm a huge classics fan, partly because I read so many as a kid (danger of being a fast reader - you run out of material. There's only so many times your parents are willing to take you to the bookstore). Some of my favorites are The Iliad, The Tale of Genji, The Frogs, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, and The Brothers Karamazov.

4. I think that Jane Eyre is the most romantic book ever written. Yes, Rochester is a little crazy, but he owns his crazy.

5. I wrote my first novel when I was 13. It was impressively terrible.

6. Drizzling rain is my favorite type of weather.

7. Gray is my favorite color. I like it in all its incarnations - charcoal, silver, slate, whatever.

8. I really love animals. Everything from cats to dogs to snakes and even spiders. I pretty much like everything - except pigs. They eat people and are evil. Pigs are the devil.

9. I love hyperbole more than anything in the entire world ever. I think hyperbole is hilarious.

10. My celebrity crushes are Will Smith (forever), Channing Tatum (he seems like the nicest person, also, abs), Martin Freeman (yes I know he looks like a middle school geography teacher and I DON'T CARE), and Jeremy Renner (be in more movies, plz). Robert Downey Jr. can come too.