Anyone familiar with the PI Elvis Cole novels of Robert Crais knows that Joe Pike, Cole's shadowy partner, is one of those fictional "Competent Men." You know tha type -- exhaustively trained, intensely experienced, and in any and all situations...competent (like Ian Fleming's James Bond or, more currently, Lee Child's Jack Reacher). So we know that a man like Joe Pike, ex-Marine, ex-L.A. police officer, ex-mercenary, is more than capable of getting out of any trouble he finds himself in.…

Managed to squeeze in the first pass through my HagsHarlotsHeroines (http://www.hagsharlotsheroines.co.uk) interview today, as well as having a good look through later on and sending it to Laura (http://www.myspace.com/lauracwilkinson) for comment. I hope she likes it – or most of it – I’ve tried to be as honest as possible, but am…

I've had a sinus infection for a week. This has been very detrimental to my writing. I'm sitting at about 53,000 words and 25,000 snot balls. Going to take another crack at it today.

In other news, my check for the Teacher Miracles anthology arrived from Adams Media. $50 bucks. Now I feel like a pro! As Brian Thornton suggested, think I'll take a color copy of it and keep it my scrap book, or maybe frame it. Personally I'd like to place it next to first novel advance check... still…

posted by Doranna

I've been a listmaker since before I knew what listmaking was. Even as a child, I had a tiny little pocket notebook, and on it I made my endless notations in exacting Lilliputian print (hey, a kid's gotta do something during those endless homeroom announcements). You'd think a youngster just wouldn't have that much to stick on a list, but mine was never lacking for items.

Over the years the lists have varied in form--experimentation with…

There is no sense of immediacy with books. Think about it. You can read a book tonight, tomorrow, next week, next month, next year. This is the double-edged sword. The same thing that makes books so convenient for taking on holidays (or reading on a bus or in a waiting room) is what makes it easy to put them off forever. They aren’t bound by a sense of urgency.

Unless you participate in a book club, read listservs and forums that push a book to the point where you can’t stand it…

Ruth was back at work today, which was great as I’d missed her last week. It was rather quiet. She brought with her tales of gorgeous weather in Mull, peculiar fishing trips and chocolate ginger biscuits. Hmm. Lovely. Good for my circulation and my hormones – what more could one want?



This morning, I have made more phone calls from work than I normally do in a year. I rang Marian (golfing partner) to give her the name of the new National Trust property that Lord H and I visited last…

DEAD BOYFRIENDS (Unlicensed Investigator, Rushmore McKenzie, Twin Cities, MN, Cont) –

G+

Housewright, David – 5th in series

St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2007, US Hardcover – ISBN: 9780312348304

First Sentence: The dream came back to haunt me the night they threw me in jail.

Former policeman…

There are a couple of things that I found interesting about this story (if I do say so myself…). First, it came out of me pretty much the way you see it. I think I may have changed a couple of words here or there, but really it was one of the easiest stories to write that I’ve done. I figured out later that it was in the second person, present tense.

The title, took more time. This story is about Elena Kojcic, Viktor Petrenko’s wife. It didn’t start out that way. It was written before…

Posted by Lorraine

I have a lot of books. I'm talking a REAL LOT of books. Many, many, many books. Fiction and non-fiction. Mysteries, cookbooks, how-to books, travel books, women's fiction, and even a few romances. I love books. I have books in just about every room in my house. (Okay, not the bathrooms. We're just not bathroom readers.) When we moved in 14 years ago, our movers cursed all our book boxes (and us), and we've accumulated at least triple what we had since then.

I…

I've always wanted to write a historical...

It was 124 BC, and I was on my fourth dead body of the week. The first three were routine Christians thrown to the lions, but this one was different - the death of a young man wearing the purple robes of a senator would need to be investigated carefully and the obvious solution of…

Almost every writer I know works his/her tail off trying to court new readers (and to keep current readers interested and coming back for more). Most writers have websites, and I've always thought the fact that "web" is part of the word is, albeit unintentional, prophetic. While it may be an unflattering image, writers spin their websites with the sole intention of catching readers.

My webmaster and I are always trying to come up with new ways to have vistors come by, and as a…