Leaving my desk to read definitely makes me feel a little guilty, but with Ty Gurney back in Hawaii, I don’t have much time to myself and almost no time to read, and reading grounds me.  Calms me.   I can’t think of anything I like doing more than curling up with a book and disappearing into a story.  I’ve been working my way through all of Georgette Heyer’s books and am on my next to last of her romantic fiction novels…and that isn’t a good thing as it means I’ve read all of them but one.  I don’t normally reread but I’ll have to as I’m so happy when I’m lost in Heyer’s Regency world!!

Someone else I absolutely loved reading was Eva Ibbotson…her Countess Below Stairs was fantastic.  Her Madensky Square and A Company of Swans were wonderful as well.  Many people know her as a writer of YA fiction but I love her voice and recommend her highly.  Ibbotson died in 2010 and I wish I’d written her a fan letter while I could have.

I’ve written other author fan letters…Loretta Chase, Mary Balogh, Christine Feehan, JR Ward, Kresley Cole, and Marian Keyes.  When I love a book I’m compelled to write the author and thank her.  A great book isn’t just entertainment, its an escape, a holiday, a comfort.  When reading I forget about the things I worry about—the kids, the dangers, the bills, the deadlines.  Reading makes me feel safe and secure.  Whole.

If you had an afternoon free, what would you do?  How would you spend your time?  (And please don’t everyone say exercise…I’m feeling very guilty for not getting enough exercise..)  Share with me and a number of you will win!  I’ve got a handful of prizes that include a Barnes & Noble giftcard to give away! My blog contest runs through Sunday night and I’ll announce the winners Monday morning.

Have a fantastic weekend and I’ll check back in with you all soon!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

It’s exciting to think that come Fall, Ty and I will be in one house, under one roof, more and more.  Even better, its a house we bought together so no more his and hers, but ours.  Ty will continue to operate his Oahu based surf school, but plans on opening a Southern California branch sometime in 2012 or 213.  He needs to find the right spot and it’ll happen when it’s meant to happen.

I have some serious tight deadlines in the next 6 months and will be writing really hard while preparing for our Bellevue realtor to show my house here.  I love this house in Yarrow Point with its stonework and big fireplaces and gorgeous library, but I am hoping that the right person will fall in love with it, too, and enjoy this house as much as I enjoyed building it.  It’s a reader’s dream house with bookshelves and cozy nooks everywhere!

Speaking of readers, I have a dream of one day opening a bookstore in San Clemente.  There is no new book store there and I’d love to have one that’s full of fun fiction and kids books, with both picture books, chapter books, and great YA literature.  I’d love for it to have a little coffee corner for lattes and iced mochas, and tables and chairs for writers, and comfy chairs and corners for readers.  We could host author events, children’s story hour, writing workshops and book clubs.  I see it as a community place to bring people together.  This is important to me but with my deadlines and writing schedule, I don’t know when I will make it happen, but one day–hopefully sooner than later.

Now I must get back to writing and making my next deadline.  I’m working on Kit’s book, the second in the Brennan Sisters trilogy and I’m enjoying it so much.  Love this story and hope you will, too!

I’ve got 3 great prizes with a London theme in honor of my UK publisher, Harlequin Mills & Boon, as they treat me so well and make me feel needed and wanted and that’s a great feeling for a writer to have.  For a chance to win one of these three awesome prizes, tell me what you think of my idea for an independent bookstore,  which in my mind I’m calling”Beach Books & Board Shop”, and tell me what you would like the store to have, or what you think would help it succeed.   Does it need to be huge?  Does it need certain hours?  Does it need to include all fiction?  I want your thoughts, big and small as I have no experience in retail, and have heard that it’s impossible to make money with a brick and mortar bookstores, but I LOVE bookstores and think every city should have one!

Contest runs through Monday night and I will announce winners on Tuesday!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

I’m lucky I have great help with little Mac as he’s made the most of his snow days, too.  While Jake and Ty have been hanging out with friends, Mac has gone sledding and tramping through snow and throwing snowballs with anyone that will play with him.

Late yesterday afternoon I’d just wrapped up my writing for the day and was starting to make dinner when Mac begged to go outside and go sledding one more time.  The weather was supposed to change over night so we all agreed to go out.  I dressed Mac in winter clothes while Ty Gurney changed, too.  Son Ty had just gotten home and he headed outside with us, too.  Soon we were running up and down the driveway, and then hauling the sled over an icy 92nd Ave. It was almost five and the streets were deserted and the twilight was just gorgeous.  Everything looked so magical–the sky, the snow, and the lake–they glowed lavender, white and pewter.

It was so good to be outside away from my desk.  I hadn’t gone outside to walk in the snow at all this week, too determined to get solid work done, but last night’s hour of play during the beautiful dusk made all my hard work worthwhile.

Now I head to Ohio for an all day writing workshop and fingers crossed my plane can make it out.  The airport is full of people stranded from cancelled flights.  What have you been doing this week?  Fill me in, and tell me what you’re reading.  It’s time I bought some books for my new Kindle!  I also have a prize for one of you that comments.   Contest runs through Sunday night and winner will be announced on Monday.  Good luck and I’ll check in soon!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

I kicked off January with a three day writing retreat in Palm Springs with pals Megan Crane, Liza Palmer and Elizabeth Boyle.  The photo below is me at my ‘desk’ outside on the patio, a table I claimed early on as I love working outside in the fresh air.  Over the weekend I did some plotting, wrote nearly 40 pages, and came home inspired to keep up my momentum and keep writing fresh scenes.  One of the cool things we did in Palm Springs was writing sprints.  I’d never done a writing sprint before but it was good for me.  The goal was to write 1,000 words in an hour, and we would do these 2,3, 4 times a day and while I never actually hit 1,000 words, by the time we came home, I was able to write 900 words in an hour.  Liza, Megan and Elizabeth were producing so much faster (1,500 words an hour from Liza!  1,200 from Elizabeth and Megan!) but I learned a lot about how I work and what I need to feel good about me working and momentum is part of that.

The retreat also helped me focus on me and some things I’ve been ignoring for awhile, like my health and my mood and my overall satisfaction with life.   I don’t like talking about it but I have a couple auto-immune things going on and I sometimes just feel crummy and pain’s no fun.  So I’m going to be more honest and realistic about what is, and what isn’t, and what I can do about it, and if I eat better, and get more sleep and more exercise I know I will feel better.  So I have to do it.  But with joy.   My goal for 2012 is to seize life– to throw myself into the middle of it, and savor it–all of.  Messy juicy exciting life.

What about you?  Anything you want or need?  Any resolutions you made, big or small?  Tell me!  I’ve got 4 New Years Resolution prizes here waiting to be won.  Share with me in the comment section and you have a chance to win one of them.  Contest runs through Saturday night and I’ll announce the 4 winners on Sunday.  Good luck and here’s to a brilliant new year and lots more messy juicy exciting life!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

But something happens in Hawai.  I unplug.  I write less blogs, visit Facebook more infrequently, and I read lots lots more.

Better yet, if I’m not on deadline, I have less childcare, or none whatsoever.  Which means I get to nap with Mac.  Every day.  It’s my favorite part of the day.  He can sleep for hours…I’m maybe out for 30 minutes, but then I wake up and read next to him until he wakes up.

I love sleeping next to him.  I love reading while he keeps sleeping.  Its the calmest, sweetest part of my day.  And I don’t do this at home, in Bellevue.  I only do it in Hawaii with the doors and windows open and the sound of the ocean outside and the wind in the palm fronds.

Ty Gurney took the picture above on New Year’s Eve day.  He came home early from work and snapped this of Mac and me napping.  The click of the camera woke me and I hated the pic, and then I loved its sweetness.  Not me, but the moment.  This moment of just living, breathing, resting near someone I love…that’s the real thing.  That’s the best part of life.

I’m home now and digging deep into my second book in the Brennan Sisters Trilogy.  It’s due February 15th so the next 6 weeks will be very intensive writing, but it’s exciting, too.  I’m so eager to find out about Kit and what happens when you don’t trust yourself and rely too much on others opinion instead of your gut. But I’d also like to hear from you.  I know it’s been a long time since I posted a new blog.  Apologies.  I’ve been reading and resting and napping with my littlest guy and loving lazy days of just being a wife, a mom, a friend.

Tell me something that’s sweet…something that is real…something that’s one of your favorite things and you’ll be entered to win a contest prize.  I have 10 prizes to give away–two NewYears prizes and 8 (eight!!) bonus mystery prizes that have gone uncollected.   Contest runs through Sunday night, and I’ll announce the ten prize winners on Monday.  Talk to me and I hope you win!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

Sending love to you and wishes for a very merry Christmas!

Yours,

Jane

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

Yesterday after seeing the doctor I stopped by Barnes & Noble at the Kahala Mall and bought a stack of books.  A big stack.  Three Georgette Heyer’s, three Larissa Ione, an older Mary Balogh, an older Kresley Cole, and Nora Robert’s newest.  I am so delighted by my stack of books.  I like looking at them.  I like knowing they are there, waiting to be read.  I like the possibilities that exist within their covers.

Barnes & Noble must think I’m a real writer because at the Kahala store, they had one of each of my women’s fiction titles in the fiction & lit section.   I even took a picture of the shelves with my books (see below) to remind myself that this is real…and that in 2012 I will have three new books out, two new Harlequin Presents in North America and the September publication of The Good Woman from Berkley.

Do you ever feel like an impostor?  What do you think its from?  I wish I knew.  One of my friends said it was a fear of failing, or a fear of disappointing.  That makes sense, because I do worry now about letting my readers down.  I hate the idea of disappointing them, or you.  Maybe it’s inevitable that we worry about what others think when we care about those people.

Speaking of caring, my heart is very happy that my friend Megan Crane will soon be here for a week with her husband Jeff.  They arrive Christmas Eve, and then my two big boys arrive on the 27th for New Years.  I love it when the house is full of friends and family, especially over the holidays.

Hoping the holidays are treating you well.   Talk to me and fill me in if you have time.  I’ve got three prize boxes for three of you.  As always I will draw the winner’s names from the comments below.  Contest runs through Christmas Eve and sometime on Christmas Day I’ll pop in to announce the winners.

Until then, stay warm and dry and know that I am so very lucky to have friends in all of you!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

Fortunately, I (mostly) finished packing for Hawaii yesterday and am nearing the end of addressing Christmas cards so those can go out by end of the week.  Hopefully.  Fingers crossed Ty will manage Mac on the flight this afternoon and I can sleep, or read.  Or sleep.  That’s actually all my little eyeballs feel like doing right now.

I haven’t been to Hawaii since mid-late August and it’ll be great to get back to the beach house and see Ty’s elderly bulldogs–Rupert and Mabel–and get the white flocked tree up in the living room and put all the sea ornaments on it.  We haven’t had a Christmas tree yet this year and I miss it.  I miss playing carols, too.  Need the holiday spirit!  Happily, in just a half hour I’ll be heading to Mac’s preschool to hear him sing in the Christmas program.  I can’t wait to hear 2 1/2 year olds sing Jingle Bells and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.  Mac’s been singing in his carseat all week and he definitely knows the songs…at least his version of them.

This week over at Facebook I asked readers on my author page if covers mattered when buying a book, and it did to most of them.  I’d say 90% of those that responded (and 57 people responded) said covers did matter, especially if the author was new to them.  I’m the same.  Covers are what catch my eye.  Covers are meant to.  I haven’t seen cover art for my new book, The Good Woman, yet but thought I’d share with you covers from my backlist.

Check out the two covers (and titles) below.  They’re the same book.  Two different titles, and two different versions of cover art for Tiana Tomlinson’s book.  There were more, but these two were part of the evolution of Tiana’s book.  Her book went through more covers and titles than any of my others.  I loved the title of Faking Beauty, but sales people didn’t, so the title didn’t stick, nor did the cover art.  They said the Faking Beauty cover art made the book look too much like “women’s fiction”, or literary fiction, which apparently I’d never be.

So.  I got the cover and title to the right.  And Easy On The Eyes is my worst selling book by far.  Hands down.  Terrible sales.  But it’s a book I really loved, and a book I still believe in.  I think I could have made different choices in places in writing the story, but they are small changes, not big.  So just out of curiosity, check out the two covers, and tell me which version (if any) of the book would you pick up?  Which version do you think you’d buy?

Tell me what you think, talk to me about cover decisions you make and if they do influence you in any way, and you’re entered to win a prize.  I have 3 mystery prizes here, and they are all good and fun and perfect for opening in December.   Contest runs through Saturday and winners names will be announced on Sunday.  Talk to me and the happiest of holidays!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

Later today I will be heading to Munich with my son Ty to celebrate his 13th birthday.  We come home Sunday so its a very short trip, but Ty didn’t want to miss school and I wasn’t thinking, so we’re traveling all that way to spend two full days in Germany, but hey, I’m the intrepid traveler, and the Christmas Markets will be gorgeous and I’m hoping we’re going to take the train to Salzburg for one of those days, too…

Surfer Ty is coming with us, and Mac and Jake will be staying home with my wonderful nanny/assistant, Jamette.  I’m lucky to have someone like her, who has known me for over 15 years, to manage things while I’m gone.  I’ve caught a bit of a cold, though, and am taking handfuls of zinc and vitamins and Tylenol to help me weather the trip.  And once we return Sunday, I’m only home a few days before Ty, Mac and I head to Hawaii for the holidays.  I really need to get back to writing but that might not happen until January when all the holidays are behind us and I can focus on nothing but the book.  If it sounds like a rush, it is.  I’ve been on the road every weekend for the past couple weekends and wasn’t thinking when plans were made, but what’s done is done and January and most of February are devoted to work.

I do have three fun holiday boxes sitting here for three of my readers.   Tell me which is your favorite Christmas Carol, or favorite thing to make for the holidays are you’re entered.  Contest will run through Saturday and I’ll announce the three winners on Sunday. Be patient with me, though, as I’ll be posting from the airport so it might happen early in the day, or later, depending on time zones and travel.

Have a wonderful few days and I’ll check in with you soon!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.

The backcover copy that we’re playing with right now:

——————

Is it possible to leave it all behind?
Meg Brennan Roberts is a good woman…a successful publicist, faithful wife, and doting mother
of three.  She is also the eldest daughter of a large Irish-American family and takes her role as
the first born very seriously, priding herself on making the right decisons.  But the years of being
‘good’ have taken a toll.  While her career at Dark Horse Winery is thriving, Meg’s tired and
empty, and her husband has never seemed more distant.

After an emotional weekend with her mom and sisters during their annual Brennan Girls’ Getaway
at the beach house, Meg returns home with a desperate need to connect with her husband but
he’s distracted and pushes her away. Lonely, Meg accepts the opportunity to attend the London
Wine Fair with her boss, the ruggedly handsome vintner, Chad Hallahan.  In London, Chad
confesses that he’s attracted to her.

Shocked, Meg can’t believe someone like Chad would want her, and returns home questioning
her life and marriage.   Suddenly Meg wants to escape…but for more than a weekend this time.
When one risky decision leads to another, Meg’s world comes crashing down.  Meg’s sisters are
horrified, unable to believe that virtuous, do-gooder Meg would do so wrong.  Now with her
marriage in tatters, and her sisters shunning her, Meg must make the choice of her life.

——————-

Now what I need from you (and everyone that makes a suggestion gets entered to win a Regency Escape prize, which includes Mary Balogh and Elizabeth Boyle histoical romance novels, 2 Jane Austen movies, and more wonderful goodies) is a tag-line that could go on the front and back of the book that says something about sisters, since this is a sisters trilogy…and I’m so bad about this sort of thing.

Are any of you clever?  Want to pretend to be clever for my sake?    Here’s my best attempt:

Sisters…can’t live with them, but can’t live without them

You can suggest one, or three, or three hundred.  Anything and everything that might have something about being a sister in it, or being a Brennan sister will be added to the list.  Suggest something and you’ve got a chance to win the Regency Prize. And if this isn’t your thing, I get it.  It’s not my strength but I’m trying…I’m trying!

PS  This is a super short contest–just a day–as I’d like to compile a list to send to my editor by Friday afternoon!

©2012 Janeblog. All Rights Reserved.