I have no content today, so here is a snippet. I sat in a rocking chair on the top floor balcony and sipped my iced tea. On my left, Martin rested on a blanket in the Lotus pose. His eyes were closed. He said meditation helped him with the Bison rage. It was the golden
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Texas Storms
Had a horrible night last night. First, I had a nightmare that I was being chased by a giant monster through some ruins. I woke up because I was breathing too hard and looked at the clock. I’d only slept for a couple of hours. Then Sookie, the elderly bulldog, starts hyperventilating and craws onto
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Covers, Costs, and Artists
Happy Monday! Thank you for all of your coffee grinder suggestions. I pulled the trigger on a more pricy conical grinder which should be great for drip coffee and will report on the results. I’d love to hear about HA’s cover design process. What determines whether you use one of your cover artists and whether
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Friday Tea and Coffee Grinders
A few days ago, Gordon said, “Look at these pretty cups.” I came to look, and indeed the cups were very pretty. That’s where it ended except that said cups now arrived in the mail and were presented to me by my husband as a surprise. I’m drinking Zhang Autumn Oolong from Verdant Tea, brewed
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Clean Sweep Nominated for an Audie!
Hi everyone, Mod R here with fabulous news! The Graphic Audio adaptation of Clean Sweep, the first volume of the Innkeeper Chronicles by Ilona Andrews, has been nominated for an Audie award in the Best Audio Drama category! The Audie Awards are granted each year by the Audio Publishers Association to honor the best titles
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Agent Query and Rejection Follow Up
I’m so glad that several of you found the previous post useful. After reading the latest article on writing, I would like your take on some specific areas in the querying letter process. I do have sales figures on my original book I published in 2003. The genre is Chinese Silk Embroidery, its ancient developmental
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Agent Queries and Rejections
Have you got any good hints for agent query letters, or how to find one? I’ve self-published eight books on Kindle, and with my new series (that isn’t self-published yet), I’d like to try traditional publishing, but all I’m getting are rejections. My self-published books get decent reviews, so I think my quality can’t be
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Busy Week of Writing
We have a week of digging into writing up ahead. I’d decided to poke around the next chapter on Sunday and once I finished it, I realized that I had forgotten to do what I originally planned to do with it. Instead I got distracted by pretty monster descriptions. One drawback of working in a
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Crafting and Other Weirdness
What kind of crafting projects are you working on? Magic Claims, grumble, grumble, grumble. Things I have made recently: a sweater/T-shirt for Kid 2. I don’t have a picture of it finished, but it is. Here is in progress picture. I wanted a very simple pattern, like idiot proof, because my brain was very fried
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Poorly and Stupid
In 1861 Charles Darwin wrote a letter to Charles Lyell, a Scottish geologist, who besides his many scientific contributions, also advocated the use of geological surveys and explained the cause of earthquakes. Darwin, of course, brought us the first version of the theory of evolution, fundamentally altering the entire field of biology and irrevocably influencing
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How We Become Our Parents
I’m having a really frustrating day. SPF/DCIM authentication is an evil torture, created to make people go nuts, and I’m sticking to that story. I think I might be getting dumber. Braining seems to be more difficult, especially when it’s something that’s not in my typical wheelhouse. Or maybe it’s just the lack of sleep.
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Title Typos and Many Apologies
Apparently, there was a typo in the latest Kate Daniels novella announcement. We are so sorry. Here is the new cover for your enjoyment. This is in reference to several readers mistakenly typing Magic Clams into the search bar of their retailers and then being puzzled why they couldn’t find it. A surprisingly large number
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