Free Book Friday - MY Edition

So, I've been doing FBF for about two years now. Given away a lot of books. Good times. But today is probably the bestest version of FBF evah. Why? Because today, I'm giving away a copy of MY book. :)

As you know, a box showed up on my doorstep February 28th. It was filled with these beautiful little copies of the book I wrote. I've sent some to reviewers, some out for basket donations, and one copy is going to one of you lucky commenters today. Win it before you can buy it! :)



WHAT LIES BENEATH
by Andrea Laurence
April 2012, Harlequin Desire #2152

She’s Awake. So Why Can’t She Remember?

They say she’s Cynthia Dempsey, fiancée of media mogul Will Taylor. But try as she might, she can’t recall their high-society life or the man sitting by her hospital bed. Though her body certainly remembers him. Even as she senses the distance between them, the electricity when they touch is undeniable.

Will can hardly believe Cynthia’s transformation. Gone is the ice queen who betrayed him, and in her place is a woman who seems genuine and warm. But can he risk his heart again, not knowing what might happen when her memory returns?

I've been looking forward to this for so long. It's just awesome. To enter, comment with the phrase "You never forget your first" and tell me about the first time you did something that really stuck with you... The first time you saw the ocean? First time you held your baby? The first time you saw your husband?
SP

Spring Cleaning

Yeah, I know the Playfriends are all fainting from surprise at the title for this blog. Cleaning is my least favorite thing to do. Really, I only know a handful of people who like it. I'm a bit of a procrastinator which means if I don't like doing something I'm going to put it off as long as possible until I just can't ignore it anymore.

I can no longer ignore the mountain of clutter that has become my house.

I've gotten spring cleaning fever, an affliction I don't believe I've ever caught before. Zilla has adopted an intelligent 'stay out of her way' policy. I'm organizing. I'm throwing things away. I'm letting things go that I'll never need/use again. It's liberating. And tiring. And damned expensive! Who knew organization could cost so much?

My project this week involves making an organizer for our mail so that I can actually see the end of our kitchen table. Currently, it's the repository for absolutely everything - mail, school papers, shopping bags, my bread-maker. And, frankly, I'd like to use the table for it's intended purpose - eating together as a family.

I've instituted a de-cluttering policy. My plan is to tackle one small area every day and one large project every week. I figure eventually I'll cover the whole house and might avoid becoming overwhelmed. We'll see. I have to admit that I've already missed a couple days this week because of PTO meetings, work, children commitments... But I figure any progress is good progress so I'll keep plugging along.

Do you have any tips for organization that you'd like to share? Any nifty gadgets/gizmos/whatever that streamline your life and help keep you in order?

Instigator

P.S. Here's a link to the mail organizer I'm going to make (in a smaller version since I can't find the folders she used).

Guest Blogger - Emmie Dark

The Playground welcomes debut Super Romance author Emmie Dark today. Emmie hails from Australia, where the weather is just opposite ours (and since we've been having unseasonably warm weather here, I wonder what it's like Down Under). Please make room on the swingset for Emmie!


An Affair to Remember

Thank you so much for inviting me to blog with you!

Today I thought I’d talk about one of my favourite old movies – An Affair to Remember. Can you beat the combination of Deborah Kerr and (swoon!) Cary Grant?

Their character names are more than a little confusing: Nickie and Terry – that’s Cary as Nickie and Deborah as Terry! I don’t think those names would work in a book – as a reader I’m sure I’d be far too confused about who was who to keep things straight!

I remember hearing once that Cary Grant was apparently terrible at remembering his lines. In the final scene where Terry is sitting on the couch and Nickie finally realizes why she didn’t meet him on top of the Empire State Building, apparently Deborah Kerr had to keep feeding Cary Grant his lines. I don’t know if that’s true, but even knowing this doesn’t spoil my enjoyment of the story at all.

Like any good romance story, we go into it with a fair idea of what kind of ending we’re going to get – Nickie and Terry, “happily ever after”. The suspense, the reason we keep watching, or keep turning the pages, is to find out HOW. (Especially after what happens to poor old Terry!)

That’s the trick we have to master as romance authors – getting readers connected to our characters quickly, ensure they care about them (Will Nickie follow his passion and become an artist? Will they both find the courage to end their current relationships so they can be together?), and then we must maintain the tension and drama as the hero and heroine find their way back to each other.

In an Affair to Remember, Nickie and Terry face many obstacles along the way to happiness. And I – like many of you, I’m sure – cry along with them!

What’s your favourite classic romantic movie? Tell me about it for a chance to win a copy of Cassie’s Grand Plan.


CASSIE'S GRAND PLAN
Four steps to a brand-new life

Cassie Hartman knows what she needs to do to get her life under control. First, she’ll get herself promoted. Then she’ll update her appearance. Steps three and four—marriage and family—well, those will have to wait.

Then Ronan McGuire shows up. The too-sexy, too-polished business consultant has the power to derail Cassie’s plans before she’s even really started. If he doesn’t approve her promotion, she’ll be back to square one—and that’s not an option. Cassie needs to keep her focus on that first step, no matter how much Ronan tempts her to skip ahead to the third and fourth ones….


After years of writing press releases, employee newsletters and speeches for CEOs and politicians – none of which included any kind of kissing – Emmie Dark finally took to her laptop to write what she wanted to write. She was both amazed and delighted to discover that what came out was sexy, noble heroes who found themselves crossing paths with strong, determined heroines. And plenty of kissing.

Emmie’s overnight success has taken about five years to achieve. She began fiddling around with story ideas when the urge to write fiction became overwhelming. In July 2011 she sold her first book to Harlequin SuperRomance and she’s not looking back, with her second sale in September. Both books will be out in 2012.

Emmie lives in Melbourne, Australia, and she likes red lipstick, chardonnay, sunshine, driving fast, rose-scented soap and a really good cup of tea. Like, a really good cup of tea. She’s particularly fussy about it, and has been known to pack her own teabags when she travels. Most members of her family are too scared to make her a cuppa, in case they get it wrong.

Emmie will be giving away a copy of her book and there's a $50 Amazon gift card for names drawn from people who follow her around her blog tour. More info can be found here.

Writing Essentials

When I hunker down for a serious bout of writing (as in “OMG deadline is looming, I must write like the wind” writing), I try to get all my essential writing tools in place before I start. I’m not sure how all of these things came to be so essential to my writing time and space, but I never argue with process and this is just part of my process.

Drinks: Either Diet Coke (w/Splenda) or hot tea. Sometimes both are on my desk at the same time and I’ll alternate between the two. I go through a lot of Diet Coke and tea. A lot. It’s almost embarrassing. I do switch off to decaf tea after the first couple of cups, but I don’t do any of that herbal stuff. Black tea (English Breakfast, usually), splash of milk, no sugar. The Diet Coke needs to be over heavy ice and in a glass, not a plastic cup.

Snacks: I’m a snacker, and it needs to be something small so I can get them by the handful. Kashi’s TLC crackers are good when I want a savory snack, but usually we’re talking jelly beans. Specifically, Jelly Belly Very Cherry jelly beans. (I don’t eat the cheap, nasty jelly beans. DG learned the hard way not to show up with those.) Every blue moon, I’ll be in the mood for some cinnamon ones, but Very Cherry is my go-to jelly bean for writing.

Music: I usually listen to instrumental music. The Pandora.com “New Age Instrumental” is quite good. I also listen to John Bayless a lot. He does Bach-style interpretations of music by the Beatles and Elton John. It’s very good for my brain to work to. (I know it sounds weird, but click on those links and give it a listen.)

I also listen to Enigma a lot. It’s not instrumental, but it’s very meditative, so it seems to work.

Other essentials:

Lip balm. I have tubes of the stuff everywhere in every imaginable flavor and type. Chapped lips bug me and I can’t think.

Lotion: Brand is not important, but it must be unscented. I have very dry skin, you see.

I think there’s something very meditative and relaxing about the motions of putting on lip balm and/or lotion – plus, it feels good, so there’s instant gratification.

My desk is cluttered with general office debris like staplers and such, and there’s always a notepad and pen in the middle so I can write down ideas that come to me that aren’t immediately useful, but it’s not like I need good luck charms or totems in order to write.

Just the essentials. ~grin~

What are your essentials?

PC

Changing Times

The teenage years have officially arrived at our house. Drama Queen turned 12 last week. As many of you surely know, it’s a precious, frustrating time of extreme moodiness, surprisingly mature choices, lingering childishness, and lots and lots of growing. Like I said, precious and frustrating.

But this birthday, the thing I mourned most was the shopping. You see, I used to go to the store and pick out all these cute things that I thought she'd love – clothes, toys, girlie stuff. And she did. Present opening was one surprise after another. Now, not so much.

She's become extremely picky about her clothes, so I didn't even bother shopping before her birthday. We simply went together and spent 5 frustrating hours picking out 7 shirts (half of those were multiples of a type of shirt in various colors), 2 shorts, 3 tanks, and 1 jacket – and various lip glosses, perfume, and accessories. I'm not allowed to pick out the girlie girl stuff anymore either.

The things that I'm allowed to buy are gift cards, books (she keeps a wish list, so this really doesn't count), and well, that's about it.

Sigh… I'm seriously longing for the good ol' days. But I guess if shopping is our major issue, I should count myself lucky, huh?

Angel

Makeover Time

Those of you that have seen my roots or worn out sneakers lately are probably itching to work me over. I'll admit I could use a bit of a style revamp, but alas, that is not the makeover I'm talking about today.

Today I'm talking about my website makeover! I've been working with Laron at Ninth Moon Designs for several weeks. It started out with me wanting a new header. Something a little snazzier than I could do myself. By the time we came up with something I loved... it didn't match anything else I had on the page, so we did a complete site overhaul. I love it. It's purple, gray and black. Its sparkly and kinda moody. DB called it 'washed out' but I respectfully reject his assessment. His idea of a great color palate is the lime green and black on his dirtbike.

Here's a sneak peek.

To get the full effect, you'll need to view the whole thing. Pop on over and tell me what you think!

SP

P.S. Congratulations to pjk, Instigator's winner from last week. Please email her with your snail mail address to claim your prize.

I Shouldn't Laugh

I shouldn't laugh, but I sorta have to. And share with y'all because this was just too dang funny not to. Just don't tell Zilla I did because he'll kill me.

I was sick at the beginning of the week. I tell y'all this so that you'll understand why Zilla volunteered to take the girls to school on Tuesday morning. I went into work, but only for a couple hours so I wasn't in my normal rush mode and he wanted me to take it easy. Wonderful!

I kissed the girls goodbye, sighed a little as the house went silent and continued to get ready for work. Several minutes after I thought everyone had left Baby Girl came running into the bedroom yelling, "They left me!" I was shocked. But the girls had actually gotten ready early for a change so I just thought maybe Sweet Pea and Zilla had gone to the little house to do something to kill the five or ten extra minutes they had. no big deal. I told her that. She countered with, "Nuh uh. The truck's gone."

I jogged to the other side of the house and verified that indeed, Zilla's truck was gone. Trying desperately not to laugh, I picked up the phone and dialed his cell to ask him if he'd forgotten something. It went to voicemail. For those of you familiar with my life, this shouldn't come as a surprise. Our cell coverage is spotty around the house. I asked Baby Girl if she had everything together for when her daddy showed back up at the house - either because I got ahold of him or because he drove to the school to drop Baby Girl off only to realize that she wasn't in the car. She proceeded to tell me her book bag was already in the car. Which is where this whole thing went wrong.

I called Zilla again, holding my sides because it hurt so hard not to laugh. But Baby Girl was just so affronted that she could be FORGOTTEN that I knew if I laughed it would not end well. About the time Zilla answered his truck pulled back into the driveway. Turns out he made it all the way to the church at the end of the street before realizing Baby Girl wasn't there. What tipped him off? It was too quiet in the car. His exactly comment to me was, "I knew something was wrong, by then she'd normally have been chattering on about something." Oh so true.

Apparently Baby Girl loaded her backpack into the truck and then ran back inside to go potty. Somehow Zilla missed the dash back inside and thinking she was in the truck, closed the door. Good outcome - both girls made it to school on time. What I find the most hilarious is Baby Girl's response when Zilla picked her up from school later that day. Without saying anything else to him, she got into the truck and said, "You forgot me!" I feel sorry for whoever she marries. That girl can hold a grudge.

We did have a nice discussion about what she should have done if I hadn't been there. Wonderful opportunity to go over our emergency procedures. Which was a good thing considering her first response when we asked what she would have done was, "Call 911." Not altogether a bad answer, but probably not the first choice. Especially because Zilla would have eventually figured it out and come back for her. She's old enough (and responsible enough) to leave home alone for a few minutes.

But this did bring up a question. What age do you think is appropriate to leave kids at home alone for short periods of time? Sweet Pea will be 11 in a few months and Baby Girl will be 8 soon. They're both pretty mature and I trust them not to kill each other or burn the house down. My main worry is them being able to handle an emergency should one arise.

Instigator

Might as well face it, I'm addicted to...

For months and months I've seen Facebook posts about it. I had no interest in the least in even seeing what it was all about. Then I got Netflix and there it was in the "Recently Added" section. Still I had no interest. Why watch it when I could catch up on old episodes of Bones and see the golden days of Saturday Night Live with Gilda Radner and Jane Curtin (who is now playing the medical examiner on Unforgettable).

Then a couple weekends ago when the weather was dreadful and I was still in a cast and confined to my recliner, I thought, "Why not take a peek and see what all the hullabaloo is about."

And that's when it happened. I became addicted to...



The show is set in the fictional home of the Earl and Countess of Grantham. It depicts the lives of the Crawley family and their servants -- an upstairs/downstaris view of life. Season one opened with the news of the sinking of the Titanic, an event which affected the inheritance of Downton, and ended with learning Great Britain was at war with Germany. Season two took viewers through the war years and ended in early 1920. Each season has only 7-8 episodes, so there's not a lot to watch really. It's not like the 5 seasons of Bones I watched in a two-and-a-half week period last summer so I'd be caught up when the new season started. Talk about a marathon! But I digress.


The cast is brilliant, and the MOST brilliant is Dame Maggie Smith as Violet, the Dowager Countess of Grantham. The plots involve an entail, world events, aristocratic life, valets, ladies maids and footmen, a dead Turk, a cowardly soldier, cover-ups, scandals, crime, forbidden love and more, more, more.

While I'm not normally a fan of British period pieces, this one captivated me, especially the above-named Dowager Countess. PBS has even compiled a video of great Maggie moments.

Watch Downton Abbey: The Best Maggie Moments on PBS. See more from Masterpiece.

Sadly, season 3 will not air in the U.S. until next winter. But they've given us something to look forward to: Shirley McLaine as the mother of the American-born Lady Grantham. Woohoo! I can already guess there will be fireworks between her character and the Dowager Countess.

Are you a Downton Abbey addict fan? Who's your favorite character? Your least?

P.S. We're participating in Barbara Vey's 5th Anniversary Party over at Beyond Her Book. There's lots of fun, hunky cabana boys and some great prizes. Pop over and say hi!

Blogger hates me

This was not the topic I planned to blog about.

Then I tried to log in to Blogger to blog.

I entered my password five different times. It wouldn't accept it. Then it started giving me a word verification along with my login info, and I swear I've never seen such difficult captchas in my life. Not only are they nonsensical words -- which are very hard to type because your fingers just don't want to do that -- they twist and color the letters to the extent that it's impossible to decipher. It took me so long to get logged in that I lost all desire to blog. By the time I landed on the Compose page, the only thing I wanted to compose was my letter to the Internet telling it to shove it someplace dark and smelly.

And I had a strong desire for wine.

I suck at technology as a whole. I admit that. I got FaceBook figured out, but Twitter still causes me problems. I refuse to even investigate Google Plus or some of those other social media sites because I have enough hassle in my life without trying to navigate another login/password combo with a capcha and a site-specific set of commands for usage.

Oh, and lets not even talk about password requirements... I have a standard set of passwords (I'm sure you do, too.) All meaningful and easy for me to remember, but nonsense to anyone else. (None of them are "password.") But that's just not good enough for some sites. They put restrictions -- must be 8 characters long, containing at least one number or special character, or no special characters, are , in some cases -- but not all -- case sensitive, etc, etc. Hell, there are sites I can't use because I can't remember my stupid password, because I had to design it to their specifications and now I can't log in. I also can't re-register because the email address already exists in their database. But the minute I try to reset the password, all those restrictions come back into play, meaning there's no way I'll remember it next time. (But yet techie types tell you not to keep a notebook of passwords. How the hell am I supposed to remember them all?)

Sometimes I think it would be easier to just become a luddite. Forswear all online socializing and move into a cave. But, at the same time, the internet has brought some really great people and opportunities into my life. I'd miss it. (I'd probably get a lot more accomplished if I lived off-line, but I'd miss it.)

I wouldn't miss the hassle of logging in, though...

PC

Is Honesty the Best Policy?

I recently read a blog post on Writing Honestly on the Daily Post at WordPress.com that struck me in a vulnerable spot. Erica V. wrote,

"I often feel a lot of anxiety before publishing a post. Why?... I worry about my tone, whether or not what I'm saying could be misunderstood, and if I will offend anyone. It's embarrassing to admit that I can feel that self-conscious when writing, but it's true… Do you ever feel like you're holding yourself back?"

I often think twice before posting most of my blogs, because I reveal a lot about myself over the course of them. Some blogs I've completely scrapped. Not because I have a problem sharing – I'm more likely to open my mouth than to shut it! – but because I fear the reader either couldn't care less, or would judge me for those open, honest moments.

I know I'm not perfect. Anyone reading my blogs for any length of time knows I am moody, picky, uptight, perfectionistic, and pessimistic… on a good day. :P But I like to think all that is countered by the good I try to do for those around me, my commitment to my responsibilities and my belief in love. But you never can tell how others see you.

I've found a similar fear of judgment in my resume clients. They often come to a professional writer because they have difficulty articulating their talents and experience. Many also fear readers will think they're bragging or boasting, rather than simply stating their accomplishments. That's a hard thing to overcome.

The same can be true for my fiction writing. I second-guess myself there too, but I'm getting better about trusting my instincts, setting aside the worry over what others will think and just listening to what my characters are saying to me.

Now I need to learn to do the same for myself with non-fiction.

Have you ever tried to write something about yourself for public viewing, or even just for one special person to see? Was it hard or easy for you to Write Honestly?

Angel

Good Things Also Come in Moderately-Sized Packages

They're here! They're here, they're here, they're here. My author copies arrived.

The last few weeks have been agonizing. Knowing they're coming soon, but finding my porch empty night after night. Then I went out of town. Of course they would arrive while I was gone!

Fortunately, they came the day I was driving back, so I only had to wait a few hours to hold my baby in my hand.

Everyone has asked how it was. The answer... weird. I'd nearly worked myself into tears before they arrived, imagining how amazing it would be to hold one for the first time. As I sliced into the tape and pulled out the first copy, it was just kind of surreal. Maybe I got all my excitement out of the way when DB called to say it arrived and I shrieked so loudly, I deafened him, Angel and PM.

When I finally picked it up, there was just a weird curiosity. What blurb did they pick out of the book? Who's advertised in the back? Did my dedication come out right? Does my Dear Reader letter still sound as cool as it did when I wrote it? Flipping through it and noticing how small the margins are... I think it may still be sinking in, days later. I sent a tweet to my editor that said having it in my hand meant Harlequin couldn't change their minds, now. She laughed and told me there was no way they'd change their mind. But a part of me had really held back some of the thrill of selling until now.

It's real. Really real. And it's awesome.

Since everyone got their whine on yesterday, let's swing to the other end of the spectrum. March is here, spring is on it's way. What are you looking forward to? I can't wait for my release day and getting to see my next cover for my July book, More Than He Expected.

SP

Whine About It Thursday

Ever have the kind of day where you just wish you'd stayed in bed? Yeah, that was my day yesterday. The girls were late for school, I was late for work, I got a speeding ticket, Sweet Pea and Zilla were both sick, I ended up working until 6:30 last night and then witnessed an altercation at Panera Bread when I finally stopped to pick up dinner at 7:30. By the end of the day I couldn't help but just laugh. And be grateful I had on clean underwear for the car accident I just knew was going to happen on the drive home (it didn't).

I'm not telling y'all this just to whine, although I have to admit it does help. At some point yesterday I saw an article on MSN that I thought would make a really great blog (it was about using dogs to 'massage' people by letting them walk across your back). Complete with videos. I thought it looked cute and funny. I clicked on the link so I could read the article and post my blog...but when I went to check the link about forty-five minutes later it hadn't loaded correctly. And the story was no longer up on the main page. And a google search provided me plenty of links to massage techniques to use on dogs...not quite what I was going for. So y'all don't have a blog about animals today. If anyone else read the article feel free to share.

Yeah, I'm hoping today is better. It really has to be. Feel free to whine about whatever's going on in your life. And to make everyone's day better, I'll be giving away a signed copy from my backlist to one commenter.

Instigator

If You Can't Say Anything Nice...

All my life I've heard, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." I think it's a pretty good philosophy and I try really hard to stick to it. However, it's an election year and apparently many of the politicians didn't have that phrase pounded into them like I did. Political barbs, personal attacks and downright lies abound. Since we don't talk religion and politics on this blog, I won't go into any details. You can find them for yourselves in any newspaper, online and on television.

What I will go into is how saying something nice can pay off.

Back in the summer of 1998, the ex and I had reason to fly to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. After looking at airfares, we decided it would behoove us to drive to Nashville and fly Southwest Airlines. We'd never flown with them before so we had no idea what to expect. But as long as they got us to our destination, we didn't care what color uniforms the flight attendants wore or whether we got peanuts or crackers as an in-flight snack.

Boy were we in for a surprise! The flight attendants wore casual attire; one was even in nice shorts. And talk about friendly! On the return flight from Ft. Lauderdale, we had one who was a wannabe country singer and she entertained us with her singing while the male attendant who was nicknamed "Bingo" told us to wait until the seatbelt sign was off before getting up, to make sure we took all our belongings with us and said, "If you are connecting to an airline other than Southwest, we really don't care." It was THE most fun I'd ever had on a flight, and by the time we'd reached Nashville, we knew all our neighbors on the plane and had practically exchanged addresses and phone numbers.

I was so impressed that I decided to write a letter to Southwest and tell them how much I'd enjoyed not only their flight crew, but also the level of service we'd received.

So color me very surprised when I received an envelope from Southwest Airlines with the following letter:



I didn't get a free ticket or a t-shirt. Even better (well, not better than a free ticket but...) they actually appreciated that I'd written to them and responded in kind. Also included was a copy of a Memorandum for the personnel files of each of the three flight attendants.

"The product is basically the same from one airline to the next -- it's the type of service received that makes the difference. Thanks, gang, for always giving our Customers terrific CRACKER JACK service -- we LUV you for it!!" the memo said.

I thought it was cool that Herb had written me. Then I took a closer look are realized Herb was the Chairman of the Board, President and Chief Executive Officer of the whole darn Southwest operation. This busy man took time to send a personal letter in response to my compliments of his company. That's service too, and I've never forgotten it.

Sure, I'm quick to complain when I feel it's necessary (and sometimes when it's not), but I also try to be quick to say please and thank you, to open doors for folks and to just smile at people. We're surrounded by crap and I believe those little acts of kindness can make a real difference. Random Acts of Kindness week was week before last, but you don't need a "week" to do nice things.

What RAK have you done lately? If you haven't, go do one!

P.S. Happy Leap Year! It's not often I get to blog on February 29th. Any of you celebrating a birthday today? Know someone who is?

P.P.S. I saw this after I'd written my blog post but it just seemed to fit, so here it is as a post postscript.

Today I bring you videos to make you smile:

How Hollywood Says "I Love You."

40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes

This Kiss:

Some people have time and talent that I just don't. I appreciate their efforts, though!