Historical romance author Lavinia Kent and I wrote a series of weekly articles on the television series ARROW for USA Today’s “Happily Ever After” blog. (You can read them through the USA Today archive.) We started in the middle of season three, and plan to continue for season four. (As a side note, I’ll most likely also be writing about iZombie, my new favorite show!) The weak season 3 finale notwithstanding, I really love ARROW and it’s one of my favorite shows. This was really driven home to me this summer as I watched seasons 1 and 2 again with… Read More

Last month, Nora Roberts posted a blog entitled “Bite Me” where she took issue with two things and spoke her mind. I agree with every word she said. I posted the link on my Facebook page because I felt it was a valuable lesson in social media etiquette. The gist of the blog was about two things: 1) Readers who insult other readers 2) Who writers write for You can (and should) read the blog (it’s short) to get the backstory, but in summary, Nora’s assistant posted about Nora’s new trilogy on Nora’s Facebook page where, presumably, Nora’s readers go for… Read More

Ten years ago today was my last day working for the California State Legislature. Make no mistake, I used to love my job in the Legislature. I went in as a 22 year old idealist thinking I could affect change. Thirteen years later, I was cynical and bitchy. There are a lot of reasons for that, which I can’t get into without getting political. But even though I worked full-time in the Capitol, I still wrote. Because I loved writing. I’d been doing it my entire life, it seemed, but without a purpose or goal. It took me years before… Read More

On one of the writer’s loops I participate in, a loop with both published and aspiring writers, a conversation started about the pros and cons of writing not only fast, but releasing four or more books a year. Now, the primary focus of this conversation began with the discussion of indie books – self-published, primarily digital books – where the “conventional wisdom” is that you must have at least five books in your body of work before you can see a serious uptick in sales. I put “conventional wisdom” in quotes because some indie authors have broken out big with… Read More

I’ve been quiet for the last few weeks because: 1) I took my #2 daughter to college. College prep, then driving and getting her settled, then coming home and catching up … took time. Lots of time. 2) Writing! Yes, writing is keeping me very busy. Last year I didn’t have as many tight deadlines; this year they seem to have crept up on me. But I finished the edits on MORTAL SIN, have been writing the next Lucy book (and having great fun!) and am expecting the page proofs for COMPULSION, the next Max book, this week. 3) Sports… Read More

Call me a bad mom, but I am THRILLED that today my kids are back in school. Now … I can get back to a routine. I’m not organized, and I’m not a big planner, and everyone knows I don’t plot … but I need to have a regular routine to write the three (or more) books a year I write.

Author Stephen Blackmoore posted on Twitter a great quote:

It’s been over a week since I blogged — lots of things have been going on. Traveling. Writing. Moving my younger daughter into my oldest daughter’s bedroom. I finally have a breather to write this blog. There are plenty of recaps of Thrillerfest on the Internet, I don’t need to rehash it. Suffice it to say it’s my favorite conference for a lot of reasons. Though expensive (it’s in NYC), they have a plethora of panels and workshops for readers and authors of all levels. They have cocktail parties each night, an amazing banquet, and it’s an opportunity for me… Read More

Yes, I failed after only one week of promising a writer’s blog on Wednesdays. Why? Because Writer’s Write, and that’s what I was doing last night — writing fiction, not blogs. I had a draft blog for the day about reviews, but I have a lot more to say about that so am saving it for next week 🙂 But this brings up a good point for all of us: writer’s write FIRST. We need to remember that either writing is our career (and we get paid to write and meet deadlines and entertain our readers) or writing is our… Read More

I love baseball. Growing up only a few miles from Candlestick Park meant growing up a Giants fan. Though we didn’t go to more than a couple games a year, I loved being at the park. More, though, I loved listening to baseball on the radio. My grandma religiously listened to the Giants every day, and if they played when I was over there (which was often), I listened with her while we played card games. Those afternoons are some of my favorite memories growing up. Recently, I realized that I’ve incorporated a lot of baseball teams into my books,… Read More