New Release from Silver James

If you've been around here long enough, you know how much I love Silver and her books.  (Actually, part of the reason I love her is her books.  Not sure how I could like a person when I don't like their books, but that's another blog post.) 

Anyway...

Silver had a new book release yesterday - FIGHTING FOR ELENA.  Of course, I one-clicked it over at Amazon and then started reading it.  (Pushing another book aside which I will get back to after I finish FFE.)   I'm only a chapter in (because life, not because of the book), but it's darn good so far.  Natch.

It's a romantic suspense with some ties into her other books and ties into this series with ties into another series.  It's pretty tied in there. 

I'm really looking forward to inhaling this.  Silver's books usually only take me a day, if I'm not having life stuff and the creek don't rise.  Yesterday, I spent so much time working on clearing the woods that my hands were claws and holding my Kindle was problematic.  Anyway...

If you're into romantic suspense, snag a copy of this book, read it and love it, then leave a review.  Then, if you've got the fundage, read the rest of the series and then Silver's other books.  You won't be sorry.  I'll post my review on Saturday's Reading Wrap-up because it would take a major event for me to not finish this by then. 

Oh, and I just remembered that when I read the Acknowledgements in this book, she mentioned me!  Yay!  :blushes:

Okay, back to your regularly scheduled lives... And don't forget to go one-click this book.  Seriously. 

I Suck At This

The other day I had someone ask me which of my books I'd recommend to someone who'd never read any of my books.  You know, which one should they start with?

Argh.

I hate that question because I am really bad at answering it.  Which of my books would I recommend to a first time reader?  Gah.

I don't know.  I don't know what any given person would like to read. 

One would assume the easy answer would be Dying Embers, because it's my first book and why not have people start at the beginning, right?  Except I don't know if the person in question likes suspense.  Or revenge.  Or female MCs.  Or female villains.  What if I recommend a title and the person hates the premise behind that particular title?  Then it would be a total let down and my recommendation would be the cause.

If I'm out in public and face-to-face with the person, I can hand them a bookmark and we can talk about what they like to read.  If it's online, it's sort of... Gah.

This is why I was never any good at telemarketing.  If I can't show the product and put it in a customer's hands, demonstrate its awesomeness, I can't sell it.  I mean, I love all my books and I want everyone to read them all, but all readers are not eclectic like me.  I'll read any genre, pretty much.  But other people generally stick to one genre or two.  So how do I know which book to recommend?

Ugh.

My answer was ultimately to say 'it depends' and then offer them Dying Embers and list the other genres of the books I've written with a link to my author page so they could go check out the offerings for themselves.  Not sure what they did after that.  I hope I didn't chase them away with my waffling.

This was all so much easier when I sold screwdrivers.  Slotted or Philip's Head?  And how long?  And how skinny?  Magnetic?  Want the whole set?  They're ergonomic, doncha know.  How many can I put you down for? 

Even better when they were looking for resistors or capacitors.  They already knew all the parameters they needed.  All I had to do was show why mine were better than the competitor's and write the freakin' order.

Double ugh.

What do you do when someone asks you to recommend a book?

Monday Stuff and a Series Recommendation - Part 2

Hey all.

Yesterday I finished the round of edits so I could ship Accidental Death off to my editor for proofreading and junk.  Then I went to the convenience store and bought a half-gallon of overpriced ice cream, two bags of chocolate covered stuff (raisins and peanuts) and two Choco-Tacos.  That's how I roll, baby.

Now I have a boatload of other stuff to concentrate on - cover stuff, marketing stuff, newsletter stuff, etc.  But I'm cool with it.  Life as a self-published author and all that.  It means you have to do all the things a publisher would normally do without the hassle of them telling you how you should do it.  ;o)

It can be a hassle, but it's still more freeing than drudgery, so I'm cool with it.

If you want any more information about the upcoming release of Accidental Death, please sign up for my newsletter.  I expect a maiden voyage on that thing May 1st.

Now, for the series recommendation thing.  As you have all probably guessed, I love Silver James like a sister.  And not just because she writes awesome novels - which she totally does.  Today, I'd like to recommend to you all her Moonstruck series.

It's sexy supernatural romantic suspense action adventure political intrigue.  Yeah, that's a lot of genres there, but Silver rocks them all.  You see, there are these werewolves who work for the government in a secret military group - well, until the government screws them over and then a clandestine agency is tracking them, and another super-sekrit company tries using them for experiments.  It's wild.  And in each individual book, one of the Wolves finds his mate for life.  So, the intrigue and the action and explosions are woven tightly with a romance plotline.  (Yes, there are explosions.  Woohoo!)

Silver manages to wrap each book up by the end and provide us with a happily-ever-after for the main characters of the book, but still leaves a thread so the books all tie together into one cohesive storyline.  There's fun stuff and happy stuff and shocking stuff and heart-rending bits.  Silver hits her readers with the full gambit of emotions, but she doesn't let them down. 

And... What?  You thought it couldn't get any better? ...  Well, she's getting ready to release a new series about Wolves - with cameos from the Moonstruck characters.  This time, they're biker Wolves.  And they kick ass.  They're the Nightriders MC. I've seen the cover for her first installment - Night Shift - and it totally rocks  So keep an eye on her page for updates as to when that will be out.  Sometime this month, but not sure of exactly when.

Monday Stuff and a Series Recommendation

Hey all!

It's Monday and I'm guessing since I didn't put a line in here about who won the contest, I haven't had enough coffee to think properly yet.  I'll draw a name shortly and post it at the bottom of this post as an ETA (Edited To Add).  Thanks to all y'all who signed up for my newsletter.  I expect to have a maiden flight around the first of May - when I'll have a better idea of a release date for Accidental Death.  You'll hear it there first, so sign up now.

Speaking of Accidental Death, I'm in edit mode.  In fact, I'm taking a break from the laborious, but oh-so necessary task of finding every instance of the word 'just', determining whether it is necessary where it is, and replacing it or deleting it when it isn't.  I should've done that before I sent it to the editor, but I forgot.  Derp.

Of course, being in edit mode means I'm out of interesting things to say about me, so you get to hear about another series I think deserves some attention. 

Way back when, and don't ask me to go look it up now, I won a contest for the first four books in Debra Webb's Faces of Evil series.  She sent them to me signed and I loved every one of them.  That was about the time that her publisher decided they'd published enough of those, thank you very much, and Ms. Webb was on her own to finish out the series.  Well, she did it.  And I bought every single one of the rest of the series in paperback.  They do look so lovely on my shelves all cuddled up next to each other.

They're about this disgraced FBI profiler who goes back to her hometown and gets embroiled in a serial murder.  Meanwhile, the serial killer who made her look like shit with the FBI is still stalking her, and he has evil minions willing to kill for him, and... OMG, the tension over the course of the series is delicious.  Add in the fact that her old boyfriend is the chief of police and he still loves her, but there's all this tension, and yes, folks, we have a winner!

Now, I don't know why the publisher decided to stop publishing this series.  It irritated the crap out of me as a reader because I wanted... no, I NEEDED to know what happened, dammit.  Thank goodness, Ms. Webb decided to help her readers out and find a way to publish the rest.  Hallelujah!  Now the series is finished and I got the HEA I was after, plus the justice I desire, and some good old-fashioned suspense along the way.  Totally yummy.

So, if you're looking for a series with a few ongoing plot lines and story ARCs - like one big long book, only not as heavy - check out The Faces of Evil.  I had to wait for each book to come out, but lucky you, they're all out now, so no waiting. (I hate waiting, but this series was worth it.)

ETA:  Okay, I'm up and even if the coffee isn't quite enough yet this morning, I drew a name.  The winner is Deb Salisbury!  Shoot me an email, Deb, and let me know how you want it signed (to you, to someone else, etc.), and give me your address.  I'll get that out in the mail sometime this week.  Congratulations!