Voices from the Heart

Don't forget to drop by Voices From the Heart on the 27th to read my latest post.

Truly, Madly Deeply Romance Authors

Don't forget to drop by Truly, Madly, Deeply Romance Authors for the chance to read FREE romance stories by some of your favorite authors! Every Saturday!

And of course, for the opportunity to win some fabulous prizes!!!

Erotic vs. Mainstream Romance?

What is the reader really expecting when they make the decision to purchase an erotic novel instead of a mainstream romance novel?

Author, Rachel Leigh discusses this, and how it affected her as she wrote her first erotic novel.

Blurb: Laura Markham needs to forget – just for awhile. Be someone else for change – live as her parents will never have the chance to. And for Laura, that means leaving the City for the English countryside and doing just what the hell she feels like…wherever she feels like doing it…

British stockbroker, Stephen Cambridge knows by going home to his country retreat two days early, he’s likely to surprise his contracted interior designer. And when he finds out she’s the woman who performed the solo masterbation show for him on the inward bound journey, Stephen will do anything to further convince her to miss the outward bound train and stay with him forever…

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Character Inspiration

Jared Padalecki, "Sam", television's Supernatural

What happens when you just can't take any more?

Charlie Costigan has a secret. Home life gone from bad to the worst when she protects her mother from another vicious attack by her drunken father. Midnight. Clothes thrown into an old suitcase, she races for the bus with a letter to an unknown aunt and uncle. “This is my daughter. Embrace her as if she were your own.”

Determined, Charlie begins again. Alone with her secret.

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Leave a comment @ Romancing the Pen, and get a FREE download of LOVE & CHOCOLATE-a collection of short stories and recipes by eleven Vanilla Heart authors.

Truly Madly Deeply Romance Authors

Twenty-six authors representing various genres and publishing houses have come together to bring you Truly Madly Deeply Romance Authors just in time for Valentine's Day! Every week of the year, you'll be able to read a FREE read by one of TMDRA's fabulous members. Of course, there will be an opportunity to enter contests and win prizes! Visit today, and sign-up for TMDRA's newsletter...you don't want to miss a thing.

Rules for writing fiction

As written for The Guardian, by Margaret Atwood, poet, essayist, and novelist.


1 Take a pencil to write with on aeroplanes. Pens leak. But if the pencil breaks, you can't sharpen it on the plane, because you can't take knives with you. Therefore: take two pencils.

2 If both pencils break, you can do a rough sharpening job with a nail file of the metal or glass type.

3 Take something to write on. Paper is good. In a pinch, pieces of wood or your arm will do.

4 If you're using a computer, always safeguard new text with a ­memory stick.

5 Do back exercises. Pain is distracting.

6 Hold the reader's attention. (This is likely to work better if you can hold your own.) But you don't know who the reader is, so it's like shooting fish with a slingshot in the dark. What ­fascinates A will bore the pants off B.

7 You most likely need a thesaurus, a rudimentary grammar book, and a grip on reality. This latter means: there's no free lunch. Writing is work. It's also gambling. You don't get a pension plan. Other people can help you a bit, but ­essentially you're on your own. ­Nobody is making you do this: you chose it, so don't whine.

8 You can never read your own book with the innocent anticipation that comes with that first delicious page of a new book, because you wrote the thing. You've been backstage. You've seen how the rabbits were smuggled into the hat. Therefore ask a reading friend or two to look at it before you give it to anyone in the publishing business. This friend should not be someone with whom you have a ­romantic relationship, unless you want to break up.

9 Don't sit down in the middle of the woods. If you're lost in the plot or blocked, retrace your steps to where you went wrong. Then take the other road. And/or change the person. Change the tense. Change the opening page.

10 Prayer might work. Or reading ­something else. Or a constant visual­isation of the holy grail that is the finished, published version of your resplendent book.

How does communication affect a relationship?

Blurb:

Author Delaney Diamond discusses communication, and its affects on relationships at Romancing the Pen. She also discusses how this helped her to develop her plot for her debut release, The Arrangement.

Brazilian millionaire, Leonardo da Silva, is still seething from when his African-American wife, Alexa, walked out on him four months ago. Now she’s in his office asking for a business loan to help her brother. Instead of a loan, he’s willing to give her the money, but only if she resumes her role as his wife for the next two months. She reluctantly agrees, and she soon finds herself wishing their arrangement was permanent. But when she finds out about Leonardo’s betrayal, there may be no way for them to mend their broken marriage.

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