Sunday, August 17, 2014

MEET MY CHARACTER Blog Hop!


I was invited to participate in a blog hop titled: “Meet My Character Blog Tour” by the lovely and talented Regina Kammer – thank you Regina!! This blog hop highlights a main character from an author’s work-in-progress (WIP) or recently published or soon-to-be-published work. Regina Kammer introduced Joseph Phillips from her Historical Erotica, Disobedience by Design, which I am currently reading and thoroughly enjoying! In this book, which takes place mainly in England in 1860, Joseph is a very experienced and quite gorgeous 21 year old American from NYC. Read more aboutJoseph and Disobedience by Design! More links can be found at the bottom of this entry.

The Character from my Destiny Series that I will briefly discuss here is… dun dun dun... LIZZY

1) What is the name of your character?  Is he/she fictional or a historic person?
Her full name is Elisabetta Moretti but everyone calls her Lizzy. She is fictional but please don’t tell her that. She may come after you.

2) When and where is the story set?
The story is set in modern day Sicily, Italy.

3) What should we know about him/her?
Lizzy grows up, the only daughter of a hard working fisherman, in a small Sicilian fishing village some 77 kilometers from the capital of Palermo. She has no mother but she does have a brother that she's never met.

Lizzy becomes a trained thief possessing the paranormal abilities of telepathy and mind control. She's endowed with at least 2 other abilities that are not fully realized until much later. In book 1 Lizzy is a young girl, growing up in Sicily. In book 2 Lizzy is 23 years old, while traversing the Atlantic, aboard a vast ocean liner. In book 2 Lizzy is introduced to her soul mate Vincent. Lizzy, is a stunning Sicilian female of course, who, though well versed in all areas of self defense and other criminal underground activities, is naïve in the ways of love and life.

4) What is the main conflict? What messes up his/her life?
In Book 1 - Lizzy’s main conflict is that she doesn’t fit in. She has no friends as a young child and feels like an outsider looking in. All she wants is to belong… so when she finally finds a place where she does feel a part of - she becomes internally torn because this place is teaching her the prowess needed to be part of the criminal underground. These new skills and new friends come with a price she’s not sure she can pay. In order to truly be a “part of” Lizzy must abandon her father and ultimately relinquish her own integrity.

5) What is the personal goal of the character?
She wants to be loved and accepted for who she is not for what she can or can’t do. She spends a lot of time proving herself and trying to build up a family from a wild cast of characters all imbued with paranormal abilities, who are misfits just like herself.

6) Is there a working title for this novel, and can we read more about it?
The working title is Exquisite Destiny and it is now a projected 5 book series currently being called The Destiny Series. It took on a life of its own and sprouted babies.

7) When can we expect the book to be published?
That’s a good question and I don’t have an answer to that yet. I am currently re-writing book 2. The bulk of Book 2 was written during NaNoWriMo 2013. Book 1 will be written during NaNo 2014. My website will be updated with current information but I’m hoping for Spring 2015 at the latest.


More about the Meet My Characters blog hop!

I was tagged by Regina Kammer who introduced the dashing young Joseph Phillips in her Meet my Character Blog Post.

Regina Kammer is a librarian, an art historian, and best-selling, multi-published writer of erotica and historical erotic romance. She has been published by Cleis Press, Go Deeper Press, Ellora’s Cave, House of Erotica, and her own imprint, Viridium Press. She began writing historical fiction with romantic elements during NaNoWriMo 2006, switching to erotica when all her characters suddenly demanded to have sex.
You can follow Regina on:


I’ve tagged Kayla Hampton and Maya Goode who will be posting their blog spots on August 25th

Kayla Hampton has always been fascinated by the dark and sexy creatures that live in our dreams (or nightmares).  Bringing these characters to life in her books is what she wants to do when she “grows up”.  When Kayla is not writing passionate stories of love and war, she loves spending time with her husband and daughter on the Canadian West Coast. 
Follow Kayla:


Maya Goode is a short story author, novelist, and poet. Raised by an amazing mercurial woman who shared neither blood nor race, she lives on the edge of identities and writes deeply honest stories about the human journey. She is an alumna of Dominican University of California and resides somewhere between mountains and the ocean. Her first novel, Remigium Rising, will be published in Spring 2015. You can visit her at www.mayagoode.com








Sunday, August 3, 2014

RWA Conference Overview

I was, not only a complete newbie at the RWA (RomanceWriter’s of America) Conference the week before last in San Antonio Texas, I am a complete newbie in the world of novel writing altogether.

Quickly – the conference blew me away. It exceeded my expectations completely. There were workshops on everything I could think of from How to Write Faster and Better (Cindi Myers) to topics I hadn’t thought of, like Homicide (M.A. Taylor). There were fun workshops like BDSM and How to Write Hot Sex @ShoshannaEvers. There were serious workshops… oh I didn’t go to those :) And in between it all there were speakers like Sylvia Day @SylDay, book giveaways, book signings, and schmoozing! Lots and lots of schmoozing!

More in Depth:
I don’t know how many overall workshops there were, I didn’t count but they went on from 8:30am until 5:30pm for three straight days. For each time slot there were 3 or 4 different workshops going on at the same time. There were also tracks you could choose from like the marketing track or the craft track and for the first time this year there was a self-publishing track. I was told to try and mix it up a bit by going to different workshops in different tracks, which is what I did. Since I could not make them all, I bought the audio because most of the workshops were recorded! Did I mention the handouts? The workshops had handouts too and we got a flash drive with the handouts plus they can be downloaded from the RWA website if you’re registered for the conference. --- a handy dandy app was available with all of the handouts and workshops plus the ability to set your own schedule.

Here were the available tracks:

Another option is pitching. You are able to sign up to pitch an agent and a publisher/editor.  On the day of, you can pick up extra pitch slots as well. A lot of people were nervous about the pitching but this was one of my favorite parts of the entire conference. I love pitching! Disclaimer: I wrote and read my pitches, I did not have them memorized. It was exhilarating.

Now I have a 4 month deadline to finish and polish my novel and send out partials. The best part of the RWA conference is that it filled me up. I am re-committed, re-motivated and excited to put my plan into action. If nothing else, this is a reason to go… but there are so many reasons!

1.     EDUCATION – so much to learn!
2.     Free books and schwag
3.     Meeting your favorite authors and finding new favorites
4.     Pitching agents and editors
5.     Rekindling your motivation and passion for your craft

I cannot say enough about the awesomeness that is the RWAConference. Next year it’s in NYC and I will be there!!!