Amarinda Jones

Goodliness…

2012-02-07T19:45:00.007+10:00

....I’m in the pursuit of it at the moment. No, it doesn’t mean I’m going to shut up and not say what I think or not do what I want nor do actual work during work hours. Come on. Get real. Let’s not get crazy. All that would kill me. I’m trying to transform my Greco-Roman ruins body into a temple that doesn’t have doom in the title. To this end I’m running and eating fish. Lots of it...no, not fried...the fish that is...as for the running? I'm mainly frazzled and sweaty.

No, not preaching at anyone. I’m just an ordinary yet fantastically, amazing woman who is making some changes. Benefits of eating fish? Cows grin at you. Go on. Make a cow happy.

I’m fascinated…

2012-02-06T18:00:00.004+10:00

…with these TV adverts where a bunch of yanks, usually with incredibly false smiles, appear on Aussie TV and try and tell me, a woman who has worn a bra since she was 11 years old that they have come up with this whizz bang phenomenal bra that will change my life and I can throw all the others away and live my life in harmony. If that’s not enough to make me want to buy it they then trot women who have supposedly bought what is effectively a sports bra to announce how this bra has changed their lives for the better and they are so much happier with their boobs. Here’s what I think. We send a load of Ah Bras and Genie Bras over to the various warring hotspots in the world and we dump loads of them out of helicopters because they seem to make everyone incredibly happy and fulfilled. I believe if they can make every woman on the planet happy with their boobs – massively huge undertaking that - then truly they should be used for world peace. Mr Obama? Are you listening? Probably cheaper than bullets and you get three different colours for one fantastic price…try it. If you’re not happy they’ll refund your money. Can you do that with bullets?

Of late...

2012-02-05T18:00:00.002+10:00

…I have been noticing a couple of things happening with ebooks. The first is the word ‘fuck’ is appearing in the titles of many stories. I find this interesting as it seems to have overtaken ‘wolf’ in the title. I also wonder why the word ‘fuck’ in a title is more acceptable than showing nipples on a cover. Both indicate sex yet only one seems to upset the ebook police. Why is that? Is it because ‘fuck’ is part of our common vernacular but for god sake keep your nipples to yourself?

The other thing that interests me is ebook pricing. $2.99 for a 3500 word story – and call it what you want in your own mind but under 20,000 words is a story. I find the prices authors/publishers are applying to their stories are ridiculous. Yes, yes, I realize you had to get someone to do a cover and edit and the author spent probably half a day writing the 3500 – 5000 word epic that was supposedly torn from their angst ridden soul but that’s your problem. Why does a reader have to pay $2.99 for what should be a 0.99 cent book and nine times out of ten they’re not even going to see the cover on their ebook reader? Hmmm?

Peace...

2012-02-05T09:20:00.003+10:00

I went for an early morning swim at the lagoon on the Cairns Esplanade then followed this with coffee, sitting on the wall watching the tide come in. It was overcast, humid but peaceful. So bloody peaceful. I thought once more how much my life has changed since I packed up everything I owned, chucked in my job and headed off to a new life. There is a measure of peace I hadn't ever imagined I would have. I owe nothing to no one and I answer only to myself. That’s priceless.

People are always moaning about how they’re "not lucky" and that others are. I say bollocks. Luck and peace is yours if you have the guts to take a chance. Stop whining. Start taking chances. You’re in charge of your own destiny. Get out there and take the risk.

Dirty Sexy Yours....

2012-02-04T14:52:00.004+10:00

...out now through Scarlet Harlot Publishing.

https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-dirtysexyyours-677431-144.html

Ah, Inspiration…

2012-02-04T06:45:00.001+10:00

Yesterday, at boot camp, I was lying flat on my stomach. I was dirty, sweaty, hot and the grass I was lying on was saturated because it was raining. On either side of me were two nicely built, hot gentlemen who was very polite and smiling and we chatted as we waited to launch into 10 push ups and then a sprint, that we would have to do ten times in a row. I thought to myself “This isn’t so bad…"

No birthday cake for you!

2012-02-02T19:23:00.004+10:00

So, the other day at work it was someone’s birthday and we forgot or didn’t know and everyone looked at me and I said what? They had this half arsed theory that I should have known because Tinkerbell, who used to be in my place and lasted two seconds before scarpering after doing a crap job, used to have a list of birthdays and she would produce cakes for these occasions and I expect people oohed and ahhed in appreciation. The question was then asked of me, had I made up a birthday list with the names of the people – who range in age from 25 to 50 – for birthdays. No. Was I going to? No. Why? Because frankly I’ll forget, I have other stuff to do – let’s face it if I have time to stuff around with a birthday list I’d rather use that on the work internet for personal business - and basically you’re all grown ups. I did advise that I was happy for someone else to make a list and take Tinkerbell’s place. This apparently ruins the surprise. How I’m not sure but I did point out that forgetting and not getting a cake was also a surprise so maybe we continue with that tradition. On further questioning I discovered that no one really cared whose birthday it was as long as they got something to eat. Ah. Of course. Offices – hot beds of intrigue? No – just greedy people sitting on their arses and contemplating what to eat next. No surprise there.

It's huge...

2012-02-01T19:25:00.004+10:00

So, I stopped on the way home from work and bought two huge pots of bamboo. Why? Because I could. They were so huge that as I was wheeling the trolley through Bunnings, mega Aussie hardware store, I couldn’t see where I was going cause I’m short and they were huge. I got to the check out and the check out dude said “They’re huge.” Correct. I wheeled them over to Verity, my non huge car, and stopped and thought about the follies of my life. Think big, buy huge then contemplate after the fact how to cart it small. I ended up putting the bamboo in the front passenger seat on the floor. It took up that, part of the back and the windscreen. But I live in Cairns and we drive like cowboys so what the hell. I’ll use the Cairns excuse. It was an interesting drive, me in my small, lime green car, peeking out through bamboo. I told my father about it over the phone. The ex-Viet Nam Special Forces man said “Watch out for Viet Cong.”

Life…it’s huge man.

2012-01-31T19:17:00.007+10:00

I was thinking today at work…yes, normally I do try to avoid that and no, it wasn't about work stuff because as I was thinking I was also searching the internet for weekend accommodation at Port Douglas…anyway my thoughts swung to short escapes, escapes plan and mad bust outs of doing random, weird things that people wonder why I’m doing them. See? I was incredibly busy.

So, there I was thinking about random schemes and I also stopped and considered the top 5 things I want in my life.

1. Win a humungus lotto prize
2. Learn how to run better
3. Get more sleep – oh god yes
4. Do something worthwhile – still working on what that could be
5. Find a man who will be besotted by my loveliness.

Hmmm…at the start of the year a man was at the top of my list and now he’s at the bottom. I like men. Really I do. We need them to lift and reach for things. But I was remined once more that I do not need a man to make me happy. Money and sleep will do it. Yeah….that works for me.

See how she runs...

2012-01-30T19:42:00.006+10:00

So, I went to my first boot camp this evening and I ran. A lot. I’m not usually a runner. I have to have some impetus like being shot at or being chased by a dinosaur to run. But, tonight I did. I like to think of my running style as a plucky jog – a lot of heart but no style whatsoever and like a train wreck you just have to watch it. So we ran and squatted and did tricep things along the Cairns Esplanade in the late, tropical arvo heat. I was sweating like a pig and was quite happy when we were directed to run to the Esplanade lagoon – that was until burpies were mentioned. What’s a burpy? It's the devils way of making you pay for excess carbs. It’s doing a push up and jumping up then going back down for another push up and then jumping up. Basically on the pukeability scale it’s a 15. After those we jumped in the water to run back and forward across getting in and out of the pool doing burpies continuously.

Will I do it again? Yes, I’m going tomorrow at 6am before work because I like to do things to excess. How do I feel? Crapacious – but as I always say cellulite rebounds and I’ll have another go tomorrow. It's hard to keep a good woman down...though, it depends on what she's going down for I suppose...

Very, very alert...

2012-01-30T05:00:00.004+10:00

I had the chance to relax in a spa bath. I was in there for two minutes and it occurred to me what an utter waste of time it was to be in water without swimming let alone be naked before an open window that apparently ‘no one’ can see in. The nudity thing? Fine whatever. It’s your eyesight. If I blind you then more fool you. The relaxation thing? I just feel some people should remain alert but not alarmed. Water? Wash in it. Swim in it. Marinade in it? Ah, no.

Relaxation? As long as I can keep one eye open…

End of the world scenario....

2012-01-29T08:28:00.007+10:00

So I spotted this off the side of the road, behind bushes, as I was walking along. One ponders what the red light means. And, if no one can see if it’s on or off, unless they’re a sticky beak like me, what happens when the light is on and no one phones it in? Is it the end of the world?

Wandering off here today…

2012-01-28T04:00:00.000+10:00

…Yungaburra - http://www.yungaburra.com/ - first stop the markets to buy fruit/veg, more than likely plants, books and assorted crap that I cannot live without. Then I’m hitting the trail to look at lakes, craters and waterfalls followed by some wildlife spotting and a stay in a local B & B. Life? Get out there amongst it I say.

Toughening up…

2012-01-26T18:42:00.003+10:00

I got an email from a friend that confused the hell out of me and frankly wounded me. Being misunderstood does that to you. Especially by friends. Some things just hit you from out of left field and it makes you realize how very little people know or understand you. Finding that out is a good thing. It toughens you up that little bit more. I need that every so often. I move on. Stronger, more wary but infinitely okay with who I am as a person.

‘Stralia Day…

2012-01-26T05:00:00.000+10:00

So, on January 26th 1788 this Pommy (English) bloke called Captain Arthur Phillip landed in Sydney with a mob of convicts and started the first known white settlement with a bunch of rule breakers and ne’re do-wells. The Jones family had a couple of ne’re do-wells of their own turn up in chains several years after that and I thank the cosmos that my ancestors had enough sense to either nick things and get transported or they made the decision to leave Scotland for a better life in a new country.

Australia day is about celebrating who we are. Aussies are unique, smart, charming and good looking. There’s nothing we can’t do. And the country? The best in the world. Ask us – we’ll confirm that.

Happy Australia Day from Cairns!

Cop out...

2012-01-25T05:53:00.004+10:00

When I read stuff where people blame the government for kids growing up useless and unable to cope with failure and life in general, I think bollocks. Yep, governments are a collective of stupidly, anal people who enjoy dumb arsed antiquated rules. I had a job with the government once. I didn’t last. I have issues with dumb arsed antiquated rules. However, blindly using Big Brother as a scapegoat for personal failure? For kids growing up useless and unable to cope with life? Get real.

When I look at women like my mother who married poor, whose kids wore second hand clothes from the Op shop (goodwill) and those kids accepted that as a fact of life without bitching about it, when my mother had no money for medical bills or food and often went without both for her kids, when she was injured but had to cope with three kids when her Army husband was away on exercises, when her youngest son was bipolar and self destructive – did she blame the government for bi-polar, injury, lack of money or loneliness? No. She soldiered on and made her kids do the same. She didn’t look for handouts. She didn’t over-indulge, spoil her kids or give them false illusions to compensate for life not being perfect. When we failed – we failed and we were taught to get up and on with it.

In my less than humble opinion, there are two types of people – those who will forge on no matter the cost or conquest because they will survive come what may. Then there are the ones who blame everyone but themselves because life is 'unfair.' Sure, blame the government for your own personal inadequacies if you don’t have the guts to take responsibility.

Couple of thoughts...

2012-01-24T05:15:00.005+10:00

- I read this job advert this morning. This phrase in the middle of a sentence made me smile ‘we have a no 1 in teamwork concept’. Yes. Exactly. I think that sums up nicely how workplaces are going. ‘It’s not me…it’s you…blame them…I adhere to the no one in teamwork policy.’

- I have been getting an email from a romance reader’s loop advising e-book authors over and over again what the rules are and they’re only to post excerpts or whatever once. That means one time only. Uno. Stick one finger in the air. That's how much we want to read your excerpt. Why do authors have to be reminded of this continuously? Possibly because e-book authors think everyone on the planet wants to read their story. No. No they don’t – hence the rule sweetie.

- Frankly, I don’t want a Mitt or a Newt or an Obama running the US. Get someone with a real name and let’s get serious about saving the world.

- “Experience is the name every one gives to their mistakes.” ~Oscar Wilde....exactly. I have experience to burn, baby.

Men and sex...

2012-01-23T05:23:00.003+10:00

I noticed a few e-books companies are branching out with lines that are targeting erotic books towards hetrosexual men. Frankly, I don’t see how they’re going to be successful especially when the majority of them seem to be written by women. Yes, I expect someone is stamping her dainty spiked heel – author speak for bare foot with chipped toenail polish – saying they are selling a million of them – author exaggeration for sales that are a couple of hundred. But a sale is a sale huh?

My thoughts on men. They’re visual creatures. Hence the advent of the archaic wolf whistle, porn magazines, porntube, strip clubs and that moment when you’re walking with a man and you know his dick has led his eyes off in another direction to lust after some long legged busty woman instead of listening to some riveting tale you’re telling him. That’s ok. I get that. I understand men lust after the impossible. It’s like when women buy that dress that is the next size down knowing that they will…probably…maybe…get into it…one skinny day…oh who are we kidding…no, I’m not taking it back yet.

I just don’t see men reading erotica. Women – yes – and I suspect many women will read another woman’s version on what they think a man will read to get his rocks off to get them excited into thinking that’s what a man wants. Crude and simplistic? Yes, but then romance e-book world has become like that. We equate an orgasm to love it seems. There’s nothing wrong with that as long as we’re honest enough to call it sex and not romance.

I would like to know how many men are reading the ‘men’s lines’ that the e-pubs are coming up with – and enjoying them?

Manhunt…

2012-01-22T06:43:00.003+10:00

‘Been thinking about romance, as writers do, and plots and how to get him and her together and how much sex should be involved and I stopped and thought about my own life and how I have no romance whatsoever in my life at the moment and how I have no ‘him’ and I really need to rectify that. So, my plan is this year, I will stop running around plotting world domination, working on the pursuit of money and I will get me a ‘him.’ I’m a very single minded person. Write a book? Done. Set up a publishing company? Done. Quit my job and move my entire life to the other end of Australia where I know no one and nothing is familiar? Done. I expect finding a man can’t be any harder. Do I think it’s too late to find romance? No. If you really want something you will get it. It’s all about determination.

I’m putting it out there. I’m on a manhunt.

Walking...

2012-01-21T07:31:00.004+10:00

…through the rainforest this morning, looking up at the old, old trees and the sheer mass of the 360 degree mountains around me and once more I wondered how piddly little human beings, with all our supposed power and intellect, manage to stuff up things as we do, yet the rainforest goes on forever.

Depravity…

2012-01-19T18:19:00.005+10:00

Adj. 1. depraved - deviating from what is considered moral or right or proper or good;

So a newbie writer asked me what a publisher meant when they listed ‘no depraved acts’ in their submission guidelines. My learned response was ‘I dunno.’ If I had to take a guess I would say the publisher – and not just that one – says that to make them look less like they are accepting porn even if they know they are. You know, it’s like don’t run with scissors but we could if we wanted to and no rule is going to stop us.

What is depraved in the book writing-romance business where the most popular e-books out there are about one woman having sex with 5 men who become werewolves at night? Is that depraved? Multiple partners? Is having sex with step-sisters/brothers/parents depraved? Is shoving ones fist inside a woman’s vagina depraved? Is tying up a woman to break her will into submitting to whatever her punisher wants depraved? Is mock rape as titillation depraved? They’re all been written about and published right now. I would suggest depravity abounds.

“We will accept no stories depicting acts of depravity”…oh bullshit. Depravity sells. Publishers know it. My advice? If you’ve written something considered depraved submit it anyway. I bet the publisher takes it.

Riiight....

2012-01-18T18:59:00.004+10:00

Cairns is a interesting place when it comes to the roads. No, they’re in good condition. Yes, it’s easy to get around. What’s the problem then? I haven’t been here long enough to drive like a local. To do that you must –

- never ever indicate if you want to change lanes. Just do it.
- if it’s a four lane street and you don’t want to drive in any of those lanes then hell yeah use the bike lane and make it your own or cross over the cement traffic island if you can’t be bothered waiting.
- pull out of all a sudden. No really, I just love surprises.
- drive really, really, really slow.

And it’s not just the drivers – it’s the pedestrians. There is a severe problem with jay-walking in Cairns. It’s a bloody laid back town. Add a bunch of stoned or dumb arsed backpackers who are invincible and you have a game of dodgems. A lot of people get run down exercising their democratic right to wander aimlessly across the road like Brown’s cows.

But the best one? That was today. I’m driving along and I pass a man on a bicycle. He’s holding a chainsaw in one hand on his shoulder and the other hand is gripping a lawn edger and one handlebar. Riiight. I rang a friend and said what I saw. He wasn’t surprised. Well hell, it’s Cairns after all. Any more laidback they’d be comatose.

Lovely man clone...

2012-01-17T19:14:00.003+10:00

I told a male friend today that he was a lovely man and he should be cloned and handed out to each woman. I see nothing wrong with that. We all need to feel good.

Yes, I’m responsible for the naked…

2012-01-16T19:15:00.004+10:00

…woman on Isobel Goddard’s Duct Tape and Feathers. It’s a Scarlet Harlot story. It’s full of sex and sin and all those good things. Oh, and she’s naked. Well, you can see that. As did others and it caused a problem. Yes, I take full responsibility and I have apologised to the good people at All Romance E-books for the naked cover. Why did I do it? Well, it was late at night, I was tired and I was setting up the story to be published. On the book sites, as you put in the necessary info to publish, you tick and flick boxes – how hot, how naked, is it active, what files etc. I ticked the wrong box when came to nudity. The story went live and all her bits were on display. Nudity has to be approved. She wasn’t approved. So, the story got suspended along with the account. Bugger. Yes I should have paid attention. Yes, I’m a bad girl. Good friend Isobel called me a ‘plonker.’ She’s a Pom (English). Plonker is like nonghead. So yeah, I’ve had to do some apologising today but mistakes happen and I take responsibility. We’ll see what happens with the account.

In the interim, Duct Tape and Feathers can be bought here – http://www.bookstrand.com/duct-tape-and-feathers

All three of Isobel’s stories - Forbidden Relations - can be bought here –

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B006XZ2CQQ

As for nudity – tick the right box...

Years ago….

2012-01-15T07:48:00.010+10:00

…there were these three writers who set up this Yahoo group so they could chat/bitch amongst themselves about writing, other writers, publishers etc. Nothing unusual there except they forgot to lock their posts and they went viral and the whole romance e-book community read a lot of stuff they weren’t meant to. Oh dear. Anyway, one of their posts I read had one of them saying something along the lines of she was off to ‘write porn.’ Yes. An e-book romance writer saying that. Shock. Horror. Ho hum. I remember that post, along with the many others I have filed away, because the writer chick who wrote it was at least honest. The more stories that get subbed to Scarlet Harlot Publishing the more I realize e-book land is equating porn for romance, in ever increasing amounts, and I’m not seeing that same parallel with established print book market. It asks the question - are e-book writers money hungry I-do-anything-for-a-buck writers? Yes. Are they pandering to women who are tired of ‘normal’ sex? I believe so. Are e-books, as one person pointed out to me, ‘corrupting the moral fabric of society’? My answer to that is for corruption to work, people must be open to temptation and you cannot corrupt without need or greed.

My point? As much as I have been thinking about the stuff that gets sent to me – and no, Harlot is not technically open for submissions because I barely have time to spit - I find I am led by business sense and the lure of $$ when it comes to publishing. Yes, I will and have published e-book porn/romance and make no apologies for it.

E-book land - Welcome to temptation.