Teaser Tuesday

If you haven't seen it yet, I put my short story "Time Stops Here" up at Killer Chicks today.

The Next Big Thing

Last week over at the Killer Chicks, JB Lynn tagged me to participate in The Next Big thing and AlexiaChamberlynn tagged me a while back, so here goes nothing...

...ahem, before I begin, let me just say that I don't feel like anything I write is 'the next big thing' - well, not since my first book and you can guess how that went.  So, rather than think of this as 'the next big thing', I'm just going to think of this as 'the big thing taking over my life right now'.  Hope that's okay.


10 Questions:

What is the working title of your book?  
Sleeping Ugly

Where did the idea come from for the book?
I woke up, wandered into the bathroom and while I was sitting there, this popped into my head.  I can't think of any reason why it would.  Nothing connected to anything.  One moment it was just there, so I finished what I was doing and came out here to write the idea down before I forgot it.

What genre does your book fall under?
I haven't decided if this is a paranormal mystery, a paranormal romance, or just some supernatural thing I cooked up.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie?
I never think of actors who'd play my characters.  They're their own people and no actor I've ever seen has matched who I have in my head anyway.

What is a one sentence synopsis of your book?
When model Jeni Braxxon sleeps with the wrong man, she finds herself under a curse where she wakes up every morning ugly as sin and has to track down the witch she pissed off before her life falls apart.

Will your book be self published or represented by an agency?
It's too early in the game to know that.  Could go either way - or even the third option where I'm not represented by an agency but still traditionally published.  Ya never know.


How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
I've only written 2400 words so far, but these things usually take 2-4 months depending on my level of commitment and the laziness factor.


What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
I'd like to think it'll turn out to be a little like Carolyn Crane's Mr. Real or Brownies and Broomsticks by Bailey Cates

Who or What inspired you to write this book?
I have no clue.  Things just pop into my head sometimes.  I can say, though, that without my husband's encouragement when we were courting, I never would've stuck to writing.  I spent too many years beginning novels and never finishing them.  After he read the first chapters of what would become my first finished novel, he told me I needed to write - nothing else, just write.  And he's been beside me ever since.   

What else about your book might interest the reader?
Jeni is a pretty likeable gal under the cutthroat model but like many girls, her self-esteem is low enough to make her sleep around - which is how she gets into this mess to begin with.  Or so she thinks.  ;o)

Mini Excerpt:  
:Disclaimer:  This is the roughest of rough drafts since it's barely begun and I have no idea where the hell I'm going with it.

It was morning and I was ugly.

Near as I can figure it, I pissed in the wrong witch’s pool at some point.  All I know is one night I went to Spanky’s, drank a lot, danced a lot, and went home with the first available hottie.  The next morning, I woke up cursed.

And ugly.  Did I mention ugly?

Not the best outcome for a twenty-two year old fashion model, let me tell you.  I had a photoshoot the following week.  I had an agent who kept promising me the cover of Vogue if I kept going the way I was.  Sure, twenty-two is a bit old for a modeling career to take off, but I had hopes.  It had to take off.  It wasn’t like I had skills to do anything else.  Even on a good day, I’m not fit for fast food or retail sales.  Like this, I’m not fit for even that. 

Who wants to buy food or clothes from a hag?

I spent the first twenty-four hours of my ugliness trapped inside my apartment with the drapes drawn and the door closed.  After the initial shock of seeing myself, I threw towels over all the mirrors.  It was like someone was sitting shiva in there.  Until I tried to get ready for bed. 

With nothing and nowhere to go, I opted for an early bedtime.  Brushing your teeth is an interesting experience when you can’t see yourself.  So I sucked it up and pulled the towel down.  Prepped for a glimpse of gruesome, I got the second shock of the day when a nearly normal me stared back.  Other than looking like I had the roughest day of my young life, I was me again. 

Chalking it all up to the worst hangover ever, I swore off booze and went to bed, confident in my beauty.  I didn’t remember falling asleep.  I don’t even remember dreaming.  I closed my eyes in the dark one minute and opened them the next in the soft light of dawn.

I wish I could say I felt a tingle or a twitch.  Even a burning sensation in my nether regions would’ve been preferable, because it would’ve provided a warning.  Nope.  I got nothing.

Except ugly.  Overnight ugly.

At first I totally doubted my sanity.  Nobody gets ugly overnight.  Then again, no one gets pretty throughout the day either.  Either a person is always pretty or they’re always ugly. 

Psychotic break now or one earlier in my life—neither option made me feel any better about myself.  Of course, the only other answer seemed just as crazy.  Magic isn’t real.  Curses don’t happen in real life…

Unless they do.

Content might change during edits. Copyright 2012

Now I guess I'm supposed to tag some other people to talk about their Next Big Things.  I don't usually do this part, but what the hell - the more the merrier, right?  The people I tagged are:

J.S. Corcoran
Natalie Nicholas

and Silver James but she has a deadline looming so she had to bow out.  Go visit her blog anyway - just because. 

Look for their answers to The Next Big Thing next week.  =o)

Also, speaking of Alexia Chamberlynn, she's the latest guest poster over at The Unpublished Writers' Guide to Survival this morning.  Stop on by and take a look at her post on entering writing contests.

Trying Something

As if life wasn't busy enough - especially this time of year, right - I decided to try something else new.  I don't know if y'all have ever stopped by my branded blog - http://besanderson.blogspot.com (aka Tabula Rasa) - but I started something new over there. 

I shamelessly borrowed an idea and twisted it to suit myself.  Yeah, I'm that kind of person.  Can't just come up with blog ideas on my own.  Have to borrow and twist. 

Anyway, I'm calling Lucky Sevens Sunday Snippet.  If I can manage to keep up with it, I'll be posting a short snippet from one of my books every Sunday.  The only rule is it has to be from some page ending in 7.  This week I picked a snippet from pg 87 of Dying Embers. 

If you want to play along, let me know in comments over there.  And please, if you like the place, become a follower.  Follow me here, follow me there, follow me at The Unpublished Writers' Guide - it doesn't cost anything and it lets the industry people know I'm not out here in blogland talking to myself.

My Baker's Dozen Submission

A friend of mine told me in a private email that I was allowed 24 hours to wallow over my not making it into the Baker's Dozen, so I did.  Now that the proscribed hours are up, it's back to life.  And with a return to reality comes showing what I sent that didn't quite make the cut.

Here's how it would've looked if it made it onto the site:

Title: Djinnocide
Genre: Urban Fantasy

Jo Mayweather vowed years ago to free her fellow genies from those three little wishes that enslave them, but after a murderous being starts tormenting and killing her brethren, she learns there are worse things for an unlucky djinn to face—like an ungrantable wish.

No one ever asked me if I wanted to be a genie. I never even thought such a thing was possible. I was a modern woman living in the Roaring Twenties. Against my mother’s wishes, I wore my hair and my skirts short. I drank at speakeasies. I danced with gangsters. Hell, I even smoked for petesakes. After surviving for almost two whole decades, I had certainly aged too far to believe in fairy stories anymore.

My father, Reggie, he was the dreamer in the family. He was the one always looking for the next big thing and if he could steal it? Well, even better. Me, I spent years looking for the next big party. In fact, I’d been prepping for my own birthday extravaganza when the package arrived. The shipping label said ‘Constantinople’, but whether my thief of a dad could still be found there was anyone’s guess. Odds were he’d moved to the next port of call and his next score. At least he’d bothered to think enough of me to send a gift. After all, it’s not every day a gal turns eighteen.

“Marriageable age,” my mother mumbled at me that morning in lieu of a more sentimental greeting. She’d meant ‘well past the age of finding a husband’ if her previous birthday greetings were any indication. She wanted me married and out of the house before I could graduate high school.

The first paragraph is the logline and the next three represent the first 250 or so words of the book (less because I didn't want to stop mid-paragraph).  

If you're going to comment on the quality of the above, please remember 'If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all'.  I'm willing to put my work out there on MSFV for public shredding, but I don't need to get kicked in my own house.  Besides, mean comments don't make it past my internal nastiness filter to post to the blog.  So there.  =op

Snippet Posted at Tabula Rasa

Since I'm going to be working on Nano for a while, I thought I'd post the beginning of it over at Tabula Rasa.  The whole thing is fairly rough, but I'm going to be working on this manuscript until I'm either ready to start something new or it's ready to make its way into the world.

Enjoy.

Excerpt over at Tabula Rasa

This morning I posted an excerpt from one of my previous works over at my other blog.  It's the blog I set up in my name and the one I created to post bits and snippets of my writing.  But like so many other things, I created it, was all excited about it and then forgot about it.  As I said over there, I'm going to try and post to that blog more often. 

I hope if you head over there, you enjoy the snippet I posted.  =o)

Contest Entry

This morning I entered Janet Reid's latest writing contest.  The contest is to write a story in less than 100 words that has the following five words in it: Even, Tramp, Shuffle, Lair, and Epic - with extra points fro using the phrase 'Til death do us part' somewhere in it.

My entry isn't up yet (ETA: It's at 8:58am.), but here's what I came up with:

“Til death do us part.” I couldn’t believe the tramp kept a straight face. Death would part them soon and she knew it. After the ‘kiss the bride’ thing, they’d race down the aisle – him to his epic fail and her to merry widowhood. The guests would shuffle to their post-wedding debauchery. But her? Her plans left no room for partying. Not until after. Her prey might even enjoy his last minutes in her lair. The others did. If I had my way, this was her last conquest. No more dead grooms for her.

Not bad for first thing in the morning, if I do say so myself.  I'm probably not going to win, but it was a good exercise for the ol' writing muscles.  

Have you ever entered a spur of the moment contest like this?  How'd you do?  You've got until midnight tonight to enter this yourself.  If you do, leave a comment so we can check out your entry, too.  =o)

Sneak Peek

Okay.  I'm taking the leap and posting the first page of DLN (my designation only and not the real title - I'm still keeping that somewhat of a secret).  So here goes nothing.  I'm still angsting over it, which means it's not exactly where I want it.  (No angst means it's finished, right?)

My only question is: Does it grab you and make you want to keep reading?  If not, and if you don't mind saying, why?  (I promise not to go all freakazoid on anyone as long as everyone promises to play nice.  As always any rude comments will not be allowed to post.)

Enjoy...

DLN - Chapter One, Page One

Something in my gut told me this rescue wasn’t going to be a bundle of fun, even before Basil’s wish went haywire.  Nothing like being plopped on my ass in a mound of kudzu to confirm my suspicions. 

About a hundred yards ahead of me stood the derelict warehouse mentioned in the alert.  After verifying everything was still intact, I pulled my hair back into a ponytail while I made a mental note to chat with my assistant about his aim.  No matter how urgent the circumstances seemed, losing focus in the middle of a job wasn’t kosher.

I took a step toward the building, cursing the plants tangled around my ankles and wondering how any Djinn could get misplaced in this locale.  Maybe the alert was wrong.  I created the alert system to help my brethren.  For the most part, they were dead-on, but every once in a while an alert did come back false.  Even the best system isn’t foolproof.

I didn’t struggle through more than a few feet of noxious vines before I sent a silent apology to Basil for doubting his aim.  If the crackle in the air was any indication, his wish wasn’t the problem.  The power emanating from within was more than enough to mess with any long-range magic.  Hell, it was making the little hairs stand up on my arms.

Whichever one of the Many was inside, his emancipation would be well worth my clumsy landing.  The sooner I released this brethren, the less chance some human could use him for those three little freebies all captive Djinn are required to grant. 

And three wishes created with the power I was feeling would generate more chaos than any of us needed right now.

------
And now the real angst can begin. Be gentle. ;o)

Excerpt Monday

Brought to you by Romance Divas. Hey, it was their idea. I'm just going along for the ride. And after reading some of the excepts, I'm so glad I did. I'm proud to be in such good company.

So, here's an excerpt from Dying Embers - a suspense I wrote and queried last year. It's just a nibble of the first scene, but I think you'll get the picture.

Dying Embers
Chapter 1

As she approached the twisted Mercedes’ wreckage, its cracked side mirror winked at her like they shared some unspeakable secret. The wind blew through her mousy-brown hair, making the leaves of the grand old trees waver and the moonlight dance across the pine straw. All around her whispered the soft hush of the forest and faint noises from the road. So peaceful. She could almost forget what she’d done, if not for the sickly, wet gurgle.

Standing beneath a tree a few yards above, she couldn’t tell if the sound emanated from the vital fluids dripping out of the engine, or from her husband and his mistress. Maybe it was the tree as its sap oozed from a wide gash where the metal had ripped away the bark. The car was dead. The other three would die soon enough.

She only felt sorry for the tree.

Her intention had only been to send them down the embankment to the gully below. If she’d known a tree would stop them partway down, she would’ve planned the whole thing better. If she’d planned the thing at all, this would’ve gone so much smoother.

Whatever Will had done, the tree didn’t deserve to pay for it.

“Hello?” a harsh voice rasped in the night air. It was filled with pain and the wet sound of too much spit or too much blood. The noise was so soft anyone else wouldn’t have been able to tell who survived the impact, but she knew the cadence deep inside her, even before her brain had time to register it consciously.

“Hello, Will,” she whispered back. With a slow deliberateness, she nudged a rock down the steep hillside. It bounced off one of its many brethren with a loud clack, and her smile widened. Except for the poor tree, she picked the perfect spot.

“Hello?” he said louder, his terror filling the air and echoing off the jagged crags. “Is someone there?”

Her lips curled into a sneer as she bent to pick up a rock. With a deftness born of many summer softball games, she tested the weight of it in her hand and then hurled it against the one unbroken pane of glass left.

The sound of its shattering came only an instant before Will screamed like a little girl. Or maybe it was his cheap hussy.

If she was lucky, they were both alive. Their heartbeats would mean her plan hadn’t completely failed after all. Oh, she wanted them dead, but not too quickly. If she was going to spend the rest of her life suffering from their betrayal, the least they could do was spend a little time suffering themselves.
....

Anyway, the idea here is to also post links to other Divas' excerpts and maybe generate some buzz for everyone. Please understand, I haven't read all these excerpts and some of them are more along the lines of spicy, steamy, or sexy than my work. Read at your own risk (RAYOR is beside some I thought were too spicy for me, but I'm not a fan of spicy).

Here goes:

Bria's Page
Sue's Random Ramblings
Disenchanted Doc
ShandaLear
Vivienne Westlake
Jeannie Lin
Kinsey W. Holley Excerpt Monday
Becca Sheridan-Furrow
Kirsten Saell, The Chancellor's Bride (RAYOR)
M. Bertier's SilentDreamer
Scenting Cinnamon - A novella
Evie Byrne: Bound by Blood, Book 2 of the Faustin Bros. Trilogy.
Kate Willoughby
Eden Bradley
Gina
RF Long
Stephanie S
Inheritance by pixiedust
Stardust (RAYOR)
Jamie Babette
AJ Chase
Toni Sue
Isabelle Santiago
Annie Nicholas
Kaige