In these last two weeks of the year (pause to wonder where the hell 2009 went) blogging will be scarce. You can still see some occasional daily mutterings from me on Twitter , if you're so inclined, because that doesn't require complete sentences. In fact, most of the time, complete sentences are prohibited on Twitter ;-). December is a big birthday month in my family, plus of course there's the holiday, and on the 19th, it's my wedding anniversary. Gifts need to be procured for all these things, and don't even ask me if I've tackled my Christmas shopping yet, so some mall time might be on my plate very soon.

In writing-related news, I'm happy to report that my editor liked the revisions on ETERNAL KISS OF DARKNESS and the book is now winging its way to a copyeditor. I'm also happy to say my editor liked the first several chapters of the next Cat and Bones novel, which I sent her at the same time as revisions for EKOD. So at the back of ETERNAL KISS OF DARKNESS, look for an except from Chapter One of the as-yet-untitled next Cat and Bones novel. My editor and I agreed that we couldn't excerpt much deeper into the book or there would be too many plot spoilers. Yes, you can take that to mean things hit the ground running with the next C&B book. Hey, Cat and Bones have had some time off, so they should be up for it, right? *wink*

In non writing-related news, I've discovered a deep love for peppermint-flavored coffee and Godiva dark chocolate macaroons. One of these things I'll still be able to enjoy after The Great Sad Day of the Beginning of My Diet on January 2nd. I leave it to you to guess which one, heh. Until that Great Sad Day, however, in addition to the macaroons I will also indulge in a favorite holiday treat - eggnog. Yes, if you think about the ingredients, eggnog is revolting, but I love it and it's so rabidly unhealthy that I can only justify having some during the last two weeks of December. Therefore *checks calendar*, pumpkin spice eggnog, here I come! :)

Another holiday tradition, aside from Artery Abuse caused by my consumption of lots of high-sugar, high-fat yummies, is watching Christmas movies. Not necessarily the ones appropriate for small children, either, lol. Here are a few Christmas movies that make me laugh and feel better about my own loving, dysfunctional family:

The Ref

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation

Santa's Slay

Bad Santa

Scrooged

Gremlins

My favorite "child safe" Christmas movies are probably A Christmas Story (young Ralphie's tendency toward profanity - edited by the movie - cracks me up), A Nightmare Before Christmas, and It's A Wonderful Life. I don't think I'll have time to watch all my favorites this year (deadlines, deadlines), but I'll try to sneak in a few.

I intend to blog again before the end of the year, but just in case I don't, happy holidays, whatever you celebrate, and Happy New Year to everyone as well! Let's hope 2010 sees an end to the recession, lost jobs, home foreclosures, and some of the other crappy things that 2009 had way too much of.

No, I'm not bursting into Christmas caroling (though I do like that song ;). I'm happy to announce that audio rights for the first two books in the Night Huntress series, HALFWAY TO THE GRAVE and ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE, have been sold. So, one day in the future - sorry, don't know exactly when yet - those books will be available to listen to on tape. Approximately every fourth email I've gotten over the past year has asked "why aren't your books on audio yet?" Well, I'm thrilled to say that they will be soon!

A little detail behind why this has been a long process. When I sold my first five novels, audio rights were included in my contract to my publisher. So only my publisher had the rights to produce audio books. They did not, however, elect to exercise those rights. *shrug* That's how it goes sometimes. When I got a new agent (Nancy Yost), she informed me that I could get the audio rights back for my first two books and try to sell them myself. Apparently there was a clause in my contract that stated if x-amount of time had passed since the books were published and the publisher still hadn't elected to make audio books, I could request to have the rights revert back to me. So that's what I did, and eventually the rights for my first two novels reverted back to me, whereupon Nancy sold them to an audio publisher. Here I will pause to sing Nancy's praises, because without her examining my old contract to find the fine print about the audio clause, I would never have known I could get those rights back.

What about the other books in the series, you ask? Well, I'm in the process of requesting the rights back for my third and fourth novels, because the contractually-allotted time period has again passed for my publisher to produce audio books themselves. Once I have those rights back, hopefully Nancy can work her selling magic again so the rest of the series will be out on audio. Cross your fingers for me :).

In other news, I've been busy writing Cat and Bones #5, plus doing revisions on ETERNAL KISS OF DARKNESS, so blogging has been scare. I will, however, very soon be holding contests giving away ARC's (advanced reading copies) of FIRST DROP OF CRIMSON, so consider this your head's up to check in on my blog in the coming days if you want a chance to win it.

Happy (almost) Friday, folks!

For a few minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed. Then suddenly there was total quiet. Not a peep was heard for over a minute. Fearing that he'd hurt the parrot, John quickly opened the door to the freezer.

The parrot calmly stepped out onto John's outstretched arms and said, "I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions. I'm sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate transgressions and I fully intend to do everything I can to correct my rude and unforgivable behavior."

John was stunned at the change in the bird's attitude. As he was about to ask the parrot what had made such a dramatic change in his behavior, the bird continued...

"May I ask what the turkey did?"


Have a great holiday!

I know it's usually Thursdays that get the "thankful" posts, but what the hey, I'm jumping ahead ;-). First, thanks to all the veterans out there, current or prior, because I can't even imagine all the sacrifices you so willingly made. Next, and thanks to everyone who responded to my call out for music recommendations. I'm punching in the songs/bands on iTunes and coming up with a playlist for Cat and Bones, book five. I don't listen to the radio, which means I miss out on a lot of new bands/songs, plus I'm terrible at keeping up with knowing when bands I do like have new albums coming out. So, your recs are much appreciated!

Getting everything off in the mail from the contests I ran for Halloween. Yes, I'm a little slow, so please forgive me. The total prizes ended up being 45 books and 10 cover flats given away. Thanks so much to everyone who participated! I feel sad when I get emails that say, "I never win in any of your contests!" but there are far more entrants than prizes available, so all I can do is continue to run contests and hope people's luck changes. Speaking of that, I'll have another contest in December for ARC's of FIRST DROP OF CRIMSON, which is Night Huntress World book one. Hey, maybe some of you have been saving up your luck for this one ;-).

And speaking of thankful, I received an email from my editor that really made my day. She wrote to give me an update on reprints for my series. As it stands, HALFWAY TO THE GRAVE is in its 10th printing, ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE is in its 8th printing, AT GRAVE'S END is in its 6th printing, and DESTINED FOR AN EARLY GRAVE is in its 4th printing (considering DESTINED has only been out for four months, I'm kinda speechless by that). Initial print runs reflect what a publisher expects to sell combined with what book stores preorder, but to me, reprints are all about reader word-of-mouth, which makes them extra awesome. So thank you SO MUCH, readers! Without you spreading the word about my series, none of these reprints would have happened. Please consider yourselves smooched! :D

First, Happy Halloween! May all the candy you eat miraculously have no calories, lol. Meant to do this post earlier, but, I slept in. And of course, nothing comes before coffee, needless to say.



Well, lots of entries for the giveaway of 10 signed copies of HALFWAY TO THE GRAVE. 200, to be exact. Because I can never bring myself to choose, Randomizer was once again consulted and this is what it said:

So, those entry numbers turned out to be SusiSunshine, Brenda Hyde,  Elizabeth Holland, Erin Lindsay, elaing8, timothy.rowe3, Daj8700, Megan Fuller, Zoe Zygmunt, and van pham. Congrats! I'll send you an email shortly asking for your shipping addresses to send you a signed copy of HALFWAY TO THE GRAVE.


But wait! There's more!

Because it's Halloween and there were so many entries to the contest, I wanted to throw in a "wild card" contest. Out of those 200 names, removing the ten winners above, I consulted Randomizer to pick ten more entries. This is what it picked:

Set #1:

7, 26, 49, 53, 75, 127, 147, 152, 161, 188


And those entries turned out to be J. Anderson, Brenda White, onyxciel HA, AF Stone, michelle rubalcado, Faith Imholt, Bethan West, Dr. Kay Johnson, Cassie H, and Kristen Sanders.




For the "wild card" winners, I will send you a signed copy of AT GRAVE'S END. Can't give more copies of HALFWAY TO THE GRAVE because I don't have any more. Also, AT GRAVE'S END is very Halloween- appropriate, since that novel is probably the most spooked out of my series (contains not just vampires and ghouls, but also black magic! wraiths! ghosts! and zombies!) Of course, if any of you ten "wild card" winners don't want a copy of AT GRAVE'S END, just reply to the email I'll send you with a no thanks and I'll draw another winner.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Halloween! I'm not quite done giving out blog treats. Look for an Instant Winner contest here and on MySpace sometime today :-).