AWESOME GIVEAWAY!

So you all need to go check out the awesome giveaways going on at the YA Highway blog! Tons of great stuff...

Can We Guess Your Character's Age?

**WINNER!! (3rd place!)

*SEMI-FINALIST!!! YAY!!!

So the lovely and fab Brenda Drake is hosting a really fun contest! It's all about guessing your MC's age after reading the first 250! Sounds fun, right? Of course, I had to participate! Check out her blog and contest info here.

She's also got Gabriela Lessa as a guest judge, which is awesome and special because one of Gabriela's contests was what got me starting this blog with my very first blog entry. Check out Gabriela's website, too!

Directions say to leave out any information like title and genre so I'm just posting the first 250...

...Enjoy and thanks for reading...

My knuckles slam into the head cheerleader’s perfect little nose. It feels great. Real great. Well, inside it does. My hand burns like hell.

It’s halftime, and the gym reeks of boy—sweat, bad breath, and cheap cologne. Silence drums in my ear so loud it hurts. There are hundreds of faces on the bleachers, and then there’s the basketball team. All staring. At me. Oh, God.

The fluorescent lights buzz, telling me to run, but I can’t. Not yet. Instead, I admire how the blood drips from her nostril, over her ivory skin, and soaks circles into her uniform. It looks great next to the matching red stripe crossing her chest. The white stripe matches her pale face. And the blue matches the developing bruise.

My fist aches like broken bones, and my heart pounds hard enough to bust ribs. But who cares? I may have ruined Cambelle’s face. Completely worth it.

The other cheerleaders freeze—something that doesn’t happen very often. Half of them awed, half angered. Probably fake anger, though. Even her clones have got to hate her, right?

“Eeak!” Cambelle shrieks, shaking everyone back to life. Now, there is noise, and it’s even louder than silence. With one last glare, I turn and bolt, my ponytail bouncing like my skirt and automatically making me appear one hundred percent peppy.

So not me.

I shake my tail better than I walk, but all this cheerleader crap really bugs. It’s shamefully lame, but here I am.

Ugh.

Thanks again for reading! All comments welcome!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just wanted to drop in and wish everyone a Happy Turkey Day! And also a great Black Friday if you are brave.

So, anyone outlining/writing/revising/editing/polishing today?

Me? Well, my hubby wouldn't be very happy if I did, BUT I may try to sneak in a bit of outlining for some revisions I want to make to my current MS.

How about you?

Writers LOVE their pets!

Writers love a lot of things. They love kissing scenes, chocolate, twitter, stalking literary agents on the internet, spending money on newly-released books, contests, the month of November, and adverbs...to name a few.

When I joined my fellow writers in the web-o-sphere, one of the first things I learned was that we love our pets, CATS specifically. On the Query Tracker forums you'll find many an avatar with a cat picture. And yes, I too, at one point had a cat picture. It was my kitty, the late Pepper Paws, using the potty. YES, indeed, he liked to tinkle in the potty, and NO I did not teach him to do that.

I've since changed my avatar to my own face.

Here is my kitty, Mr. Snuff. I've had him for almost seven years, and he was a great friend of Pepper Paws. He has been a loyal late night writing companion on several occasions. BTW, he doesn't know how to use the potty. Thank goodness.

He is, in fact, lying on my ironing board. Don't worry, I never use it. :)

So, in celebration of writers (and anyone else in publishing) and the pets they LOVE so dearly, here's a little video that just cracks me up every time.




Now, it's your turn to TELL ME about YOUR PET! I'd love for you to share in the comments section.

Thanks for stopping by!

Blog SWAP!

Follow me and I'll follow you back! Thanks!

Get it right!! (with funny video example)

Okay, so maybe you've seen this before, but it's definitely worth seeing again if you have. If you haven't, your in for a real hoot! BTW, these are really short.

This is a good example of how important it is to GET IT RIGHT as a writer. When do you need to get it right? How about when you hit that glaring send button before submitting your precious manuscript to that agent you've been web-stalking for the past year.

Just like this girl has been preparing and obsessing over THIS very important moment, so have you with your writing and querying and researching. Right?

Exactly.

But guess what? You're on stage, and your only time to get it right, is right now! Of course, this is easier said than done, and we can only do our best. But don't query before you're ready. Take it slow. Get it right. Then send that finished, revised, edited, POLISHED manuscript to that agent who just might fall in love with it and you.

Okay, you get it. Now watch what happens when you don't GET IT RIGHT:



Yeah, I don't know what she's talking about either. Don't let that be YOU. Don't let an agent read your work and think, What the heck was that?

**For the record, I actually feel really bad for her and completely understand how nerves can really mess up a person! At least when we mess up it's not in front of the world, right? Thank goodness!**

The next one is worth watching too! It's a remake of the first one. It's great because it makes it look like she was PREPARED and thought she did GET IT RIGHT.



Thanks for stopping by! HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND!

Can you leave us breathless? Blogfest Contest!

(If you are checking in to see who won King and Queen of literature, scroll below.)

Here is my entry for this super fun contest on Brenda Drake's blog!

This is from my newest YA novel, which is a romantic thriller. Any and all comments welcome. Thanks for taking a peak!

The lid closes. It’s just the spiders and me. I rest my forehead on my knees.

The small ones are fast and already run my arms and around my neck. My skin prickles, and tremors shoot through me. With my nostrils pinched shut, I barely part my lips and take shallow breaths whenever I don’t feel scurrying legs near my mouth. My hair moves as it fills with the nesting creatures, and a slow crawler with a furry belly sneaks onto my ankle and under my jeans.

My entire form shudders and shakes, wanting to hyperventilate.

Breathing slow is torture. I need to distract myself. I try to forget the constant movements and itching and think about Treston. He’s watching me. Has he decided I’m not worth his love? The thought sickens me more than the spiders, and my heart swirls down my chest, landing somewhere near a kidney.

The big spider scaling my chin brings me back. There must be hundreds crawling along my flesh now. On my arms, my neck, my face. Down my shirt. Ugh.

More shallow breaths—controlling my panic hurts.

I try to think about Emerson. His kiss, his feelings. The way we grew up together. But I can’t stop thinking about the haunting creatures.

I bang on the lid. Cool air rushes in, and I stand, keeping my eyes and mouth closed while I’m brushed off.

“I think you’re good. Just shake your legs before you step out,” says Luke. “Now go clean your clothes out in the private area. You’ll get your score later.”

In the curtained area, I undress to nude and shake everything out twenty times. When a spider falls, I grab my shoe and crunch it. Maybe that will help me sleep tonight. But I doubt it.

I’ll be feeling spiders for the next year.

Thanks for reading!