Secrets to Synopsis Writing, Upcoming Interviews and more!

I'm back from RWA Nationals in San Antonio and I have to say that I had a fabulous time. Stay tuned for a post on Nationals complete with pics in the next few days! In the meantime, I have two new writing related posts up:

Secrets to Synopsis Writing - over at Kelly Steel's Chasing Happy Ever After blog and...

Muse-Jogging Tips & Alternatives - over at Romance Book Paradise

Also, I'll be interviewing some fabulous authors over at USA Today's Happy Ever After blog in the next few months, starting with the incredible and lovely Catherine Lanigan, the real author behind the character, 'Joan Wilder', who wrote the famous Romancing the Stone and The Jewel of the Nile. Look for the interview on August 1st (I'll post the link here or check out the right column when it goes live). Check out my 'upcoming interviews' in the right column to see who'll be in the spotlight in September and October!

EDITED TO ADD: READ CATHERINE LANIGAN'S USATODAY HEA INTERVIEW HERE!

And if you can't wait to see at least a few of the upcoming pics, check out the one's I tweeted from Nationals @RulaSinara but I'll post even more here soon :).

I hope everyone is having a fab summer! I'll see you soon :).

Where in the world have I been?

Big apologies to all for disappearing on you, except for the very occasional tweet. The bottom line is that one of my kids recently had major surgery...one that required a week in the hospital and a painful recovery that is still underway at home. He's doing well and getting better on a daily basis. Spring break has given him extra recovery time without missing more school, but we've also had a lot of family visiting (he's loving the attention ;). Needless to say, I've had to put a lot of things aside in order to focus on the family front. And I'm exhausted.

I am, however, slowly re-surfacing :). I have a post up at Revising & Editing on 'A Writer's Hindsight and the Secret that Sold' (thank you, Nas Dean of Romance Book Haven, for the blog tour!). Plus, author Kate James interviewed me recently and you can check it out HERE.

On the chicken front...they're growing really, really fast! I ended up with 18. Yes, they're addictive. With everything that has been going on, we're behind on coop building, but it is happening (because it has to ;). I'll post pics when it's done.

I've missed you all! :)

Senior Editor Victoria Curran is at Romance University!

We're closing in on Halloween and do I have a sweet treat for you! Victoria Curran, Senior Editor for Harlequin Heartwarming, is over at Romance University talking about conflict and raising stakes in clean romance. Check out her post titled Fifty Shades of Sweet. She makes excellent points, explains in a way that clicks and gives examples of critique comments she has given in the past.  It's truly a must read for any writer, regardless of genre.

Also, a heads up, I'm working on a website and plan to make this blog match...so if you pop by here in the near future and things look different, don't worry, you're in the right place :).

Monday is Columbus Day in the US and Thanksgiving Day for my Canadian friends, so Happy Friday, Happy Thanksgiving and have a great long-weekend!

Post-call Tip #1

I know many of you have already been through the publishing process and know the ropes, and others are where I was just a few weeks ago, waiting on submission responses and dreaming of the call, but I thought it would be helpful either way, to share specific tips as I experience the post-call journey to that first book release. As for non-writing readers out there, you may enjoy the glimpses of what goes on behind the scenes with authors.

My first tip revolves around Art Fact Sheets (AFS), the infamous, detailed questionnaire completed by authors and used by publishers to plan everything from cover art to book blurbs. I had to fill mine out shortly after The Call. I won't get into every aspect of the AFS, but there is one tip that, had I known, would have saved me tons of time. Pictures.

Now, I had read plenty of blog posts about writers using picture collages in their office as inspiration for their books. Some even used Pinterest or other online photo share sites to collect pictures of models or actors that 'looked' like their hero or heroine, photos reminiscent of their setting etc... What I picked up from what I read (and of course I may have missed something) was that the purpose of these collections was inspiration. Well, I'm very visual, and I do search the internet during my research phase for pictures that jog my muse, but I've never saved them. I kept them in my head. My mind's eye is so vivid, I saw no need for cork boards or the internet equivalent. Unfortunately, when it came to completing my first AFS in less than 24 hours and on 3 hrs of sleep, I couldn't download my brain to my computer.

I ended up spending several hours scouring the internet for those images in my head, or similar ones, so that I could copy the links to my AFS. I desperately wanted to be sure the art department could 'see' what was in my head when they came to designing my book cover. The entire time I scanned the internet, I wished that I had kept a file, dedicated to the book, that had photos or photo links organized by hero, heroine, setting etc...so that I could have simply uploaded it to the AFS form.

So my tip of the day...those picture collections are not just for inspiration. You're going to need them, and not simply tacked on a cork board in your office. Keep a file, on your computer or on a share type site, label it for a specific book, and keep it updated as you write. I'll be doing that from now on. It'll save you a lot of time and stress when AFS time comes around.