If you haven't already seen it, Dame Jenna posted about changes in cover art today, including several before-and-after examples. And she's giving away her new release! Click here for details.

I hope everyone had a great Halloween. Mine was miserable, except for the steady stream of children demanding candy. This was the first year we've gotten a single trick-or-treater, and they were awesome! (In Oklahoma, we didn't live in a neighborhood, and we weren't in Louisiana over Halloween--that's right, we were there less than a year.)

Other than that, I was sick--I completely lost my voice for almost three days--and my kitchen faucet sprung a fantastic leak at 8:30 pm on Halloween night. I got soaked before I realized I should turn the water off. ;-)

Number 1 replaced it the next morning (I got to pick out a new one, and it's pretty!) but when he got ready to install it, he discovered that it had come with the wrong built-in sprayer. It didn't fit the rest of the unit. He took it back, only to discover that every single one of them had been packaged the same way! I've never heard of such a factory mess up. So he picked out a very similar faucet and got it installed in short order. And it's pretty too. ;-)

Also this weekend, we ordered new recliners. My old one (my writing chair for the past five years) will go in my new office once the new one arrives. Yes, except for my chair, the office is finished! I can't wait to show pictures. It's a very cat friendly office. I didn't realize I had so many black cats! I also have a model of the car that one of my heroines drives--complete with bullet holes and cracked glass--but it occurs to me now that I don't have any bean sidhes (banshees). Anyone know where you can get a stuffed bean sidhe? Or a bean sidhe doll, or something?

I'm just not sure my office will be complete without one... ;-)

Revisions for SHIFT came in yesterday, and five chapters in, I'm having a blast with them. It's always nice (and a huge relief) to read through a book you haven't even looked at in months and realize that you love it!

SHIFT is very fast paced and full of action of a sort we haven't really seen before. Faythe and crew are facing something they don't know how to fight, but they can't back down from, and watching them struggle and learn is... well, it's fun. ;-)

And, if you read Prey, you know that Faythe's personal life is in a bit of turmoil right now and working through that has been... Well, maybe not fun, exactly. At least, not for those actually involved. But I'm enjoying it.

In other news, I've been nominated for the massive "Favorite Paranormal Author" poll at Bitten By Books, and I keep forgetting to announce it here. This is round one of four rounds, and the preliminary winners will be up in the final round later this month. If you want to vote (even if not for me), click here and scroll down. The poll is on the left. You can vote for two authors.

And that's all I have for today, other than these two LOLwerecats posted by one of the members of my discussion group. Enjoy!

 

I'm not really sure where to start this morning, on this blog and in my work. I'm 75,000 words into ALPHA, but just got word that edits on both SHIFT and MY SOUL TO KEEP are... needed. But I don't have revision letters yet, so I'm preparing myself to set everything aside and get lost in books I've already written as soon as the letters arrive. Which is usually pretty fun. Seriously. ;-)
 

 

My website redesign is finally almost done! We've been loading it a few pages at a time for the last couple of weeks, but now most of it is up and running, so I feel half-confident actually announcing it. It still needs a couple of tweaks--some of the link fonts and hover-overs are wonky, some of the link colors blend into the background and will have to be changed, and one page still has to be updated. But... it works!

If you have my site (or any page on it) bookmarked, you might want to check your link to make sure it still works. Some of the urls have changed.

The first two Soul Screamers books pages are up, and the Stray page now has a short video commentary from me. Don't laugh. Okay, you can laugh. I look like an idiot. It's the video I did for Mira UK, introducing Faythe and the books to the sales force. But if you're new to the Shifters series, it's a decent intro.

In other news, the Soul Screamers online prequel now has an official title. It shall henceforth be known as: My Soul to Lose. Available for free on July 1.

In other other news, I realized today that I leave for NYC in less than a week. How did that happen?

Yesterday I saw a draft of the cover copy (back cover blurb) for Shift, and it feels really, really weird to be working on copy before I've even finished the book. This is the first time that's happened. And the first time I've ever even been close to having a cover before the book is done. This will also be the first time I've ever turned in a book less than a year from its release. My other books have all been due 15 to 18 months before their release dates, so I'm feeling really behind. Even though I'm not really running behind.

In fact, this one's actually been written pretty quickly.

Still, I prefer to be ahead, so I'm glad my YAs are all already written. And I'm dying to see the covers. ;-)

In other news, we downloaded Pearl Jam's album Ten for Rock Band last night, and as it turns out, I can't sing Pearl Jam. Not on expert, any way. Okay, I'm not bad on Alive (which we already had, of course) and can fight my way through Black and Jeremy, but there was really no hope for me on Even Flow and Why Go.

So I switched to guitar. ;-)

Writing progress: The work went better than I expected yesterday and I only stopped writing when I did because of another migraine.



 

Interview: First, there's a short interview with me posted at Star-Crossed Romance today. I think we're giving something away, but I'm still waiting on clarification on that, and will update this when I know for sure.

Writing progress: I made pretty good progress on Shift yesterday, after a week spent working on edits for My Soul to Take and a few other things. Chapter eight is done, and chapter nine is up for today. And I'm now a quarter of the way through the manuscript. Yea!

28,587 / 115,000 (24.9%)

There are two opportunities to win a copy of Pride today:

First Chandra Rooney will be hosting a sort of because-Rachel-is-an-idiot contest for an ARC of Pride. But there's a catch. Because Rachel is an idiot. ;-) So, that should be good for a couple of laughs-at-the-author. ;-)

Also, my agency-mate Jen Hayley has posted an interview (with great questions!) and a contest today, so definitely check that one out too.

And... the Deadline Dames site has gone live! Dame Devon's first post is up, along with the first giveaway in a two-week prize binge. You can check that out here.

The werecat trivia contest has now closed (There's a new one up here!), and the winner has been notified. I was very pleased with the turnout (125 entries), considering there was a little bit of work involved in this one (less if you picked up on my hint!). I have a new, non-Shifters contest up today, then in a couple of days, I'll have another fun werecat scavenger-type contest up, with a bigger payoff than last time.

And because I'm a total dork... My Rock Band band hit 10,000,000 fans last night! I couldn't close the post without mentioning that. ;-)