#MovieReview - Twilight

Opening weekend, Twilight's box office numbers were somewhere in the neighborhood of $141 mil.  OMG!  I can't believe it.  I still can't believe that I watched all five movies.  Yep, all five.

When the mad blur began, I read Meyer's four books before the first movie because I wanted to know what the hype was all about.

I enjoyed book one and book four, tremendously.  When I watched the first couple of movies, I believe I was just as wrapped up in them as every teenager out there.  I really analyzed this phenomenon.  Why was I as anxious to watch the first movie?

I guess no matter what age you are, maybe, we all have a secret hope that we find that one breath-stealing unbreakable love.

By the time we reached book two, I felt like it was a little like...hmmm, am I the only one who felt like it was a long suicide note.  Then the whole imprinting thing turned me off.  (I'm an aunt and for some reason I couldn't let it go.  I kept wanting Meyer to change that part of the story.)

So, here we are now with the final installment.  I read the books so long ago that  I can't match it up to the book, exactly.  But, I enjoyed the movie.  Acting aside.  It was fun and fast-moving.  The books didn't necessarily move at the same pace.

Kellan Lutz...wtf!  BEAUTIFUL!  Did you guys see his shoulders and arms.  Come on.  No fair.

Does it matter who's right?

I've tried to distance myself from every news store regarding the loss of the beautiful young children of Newtown.  Why?  Because I have young nephews and a niece, it broke my heart to hear of the loss.  I don't have children, and I can't remotely begin to imagine how the children's parents feel or what they're going through at this time in their lives, so close to the holidays.  A time when children are filled with so much joy and happiness that it hurts my heart to imagine the emptiness in those homes or the sadness that forever more will drench this holiday season for the affected families.

I read First Lady Michelle Obama's open letter to Newtown.  I've watched CNN, Fox News and local news reports.  And I guess, I'm tired of the debates.

Why does it seem we (as a country) still can't find common ground?  So many lives were lost.  It's not a party debate.  It should be a "humanity" debate.

How do we not allow the loss of these lives, and those lost every day in similar violent situations, not be in vain?  How do we change it?  Does it begin with us as individuals, or do we continue to sit back and listen to ridiculous debates that eventually resolve nothing?

Below is one of my favorite holiday songs, remade by CeeLo Green.  My heart and prayers are with Newtown.

#BookReview - Angels' Blood by @NaliniSingh

I fell in love with Nalini Singh's writing when I read her Psy-Changeling series.  But, I hadn't read her Archangel series.

I sat in on Nalini's discussion at RT 2012, and you guys know I became a true fan at that moment.  She was so incredibly warm and open.  The fans and authors in attendance all spoke of her angel series, and I felt like I couldn't be a part of the discussion.  So, I wanted to be sure to read as much as possible before RT 2013.

I stood in line to purchase a copy of Angels' Blood directly from Nalini, and, of course, I had to have it autographed!

I read Angels' Blood in two days.  Until I read J.R. Ward, I was never really a fan of series.  Then, all of a sudden, I thought it was the best thing in the world next to Netflix.Why?  Because when I finish one, I can push a magic button on my Kindle and boom there's another lovely book.

Nalini twisted the mythos of angels and vampires and dropped it on its head.  Angels become god-like creatures that put more fear than hope into those that love them.  The relationship between angels and vampires was for me the "touch" of Nalini that was all her own.

There have been so many treatments of vampires and angels that you become a little bored with it all.  I'm glad that I've found this series because it made it fresh for me.

My love affair with Jeaniene Frost's Cat and bones isn't over.  But, I am definitely enjoying the ride with Elena and Raphael.

Raphael the immortal that's lived so long, his heart is silent.  Elena, human--hunter-born, thrown away by her father left to to her own devices.  How do you love someone that you fear?  Sometimes, that can go both ways :-)



Nalini and me @ RT 2012!

Guest blogging @FTHRW Voices from the Heart blog

Instead of just once a month, I'm now blogging twice a month on the 12th and the 27th over at Voices from the Heart!  A blog from From the Heart Romance Writers!

Who knows what I'll talk about each month :-)  But, whatever it is...why don't you join me, and stay for awhile.

And while you're there, take a look at some of the great posts from other members of FTHRW.

Rules for writing fiction

As written for The Guardian by Rose Tremain, author.


1 Forget the boring old dictum "write about what you know". Instead, seek out an unknown yet knowable area of experience that's going to enhance your understanding of the world and write about that.

2 Nevertheless, remember that in the particularity of your own life lies the seedcorn that will feed your imaginative work. So don't throw it all away on autobiography. (There are quite enough writers' memoirs out there already.)

3 Never be satisfied with a first draft. In fact, never be satisfied with your own stuff at all, until you're certain it's as good as your finite powers can ­enable it to be.

4 Listen to the criticisms and preferences of your trusted "first readers".

5 When an idea comes, spend silent time with it. Remember Keats's idea of Negative Capability and Kipling's advice to "drift, wait and obey". Along with your gathering of hard data, allow yourself also to dream your idea into being.

6 In the planning stage of a book, don't plan the ending. It has to be earned by all that will go before it.

7 Respect the way characters may change once they've got 50 pages of life in them. Revisit your plan at this stage and see whether certain things have to be altered to take account of these changes.

8 If you're writing historical fiction, don't have well-known real characters as your main protagonists. This will only create biographical unease in the readers and send them back to the history books. If you must write about real people, then do something post-modern and playful with them.

9 Learn from cinema. Be economic with descriptions. Sort out the telling detail from the lifeless one. Write dialogue that people would actually speak.

10 Never begin the book when you feel you want to begin it, but hold off a while longer.