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Dragonisms Part 2 – NSFW (Probably)

Thursday, April 28th, 2011

I’m continuing to fix the errors Dragon Naturally Speaking created in my novella. If you remember, I mentioned trying to read it into the computer as an experiment. It was a major fail and I sent my backlist novels to be scanned. I continue to persevere, though, on Kimi and Nic’s story. I finally hit the love scene. Depending on where you work and how stringent the filter is on the net, this might have language NSFW.

Here’s what Dragon did to my love scene:

Dragon: Shifting to her side, he returned to Kimi slips, delicately sucking on them.
Should Be: Shifting to her side, he returned to Kimi’s lips, delicately sucking on them.

Dragon: As the rows does he was
Should Be: As aroused as he was

Dragon: It only took a moment before Kimi’s Tom trailed over his lips.
Should Be: It only took a moment before Kimi’s tongue trailed over his lips.

Dragon: He pushed her shirt up and Tracy last waste of her panties.
Should Be: He pushed her shirt up and traced the elastic waist of her panties.

Dragon: her nipples were talked a Nic grinned  (Talked? Really, Dragon? Her nipples were talked?)

Should Be: her nipples were taut and Nic grinned

Dragon: She gasped and urged her hips. (Come on, hips, you can do it! (urged. sigh.)

Should Be: She gasped and arched her hips.

Dragon: he moved a bit farther down in sync is tied into her.
Should Be: he moved a bit farther down and sank his tongue into her. (What does Dragon have against a little tongue action? That’s the second time it balked.)

Dragon:  Kimi’s long hair trailed off the side of the pillow onto the bed. He wanted to feel it falling across his body, to have her tease him with her tresses. Next time. He could wait.
“Next!” Kimi’s voice was thick, her eyes heavy lid. (I don’t write erotic romance. Kimi did not say “Next.” Gah!)

Should Be: Kimi’s long hair trailed off the side of the pillow onto the bed. He wanted to feel it falling across his body, to have her tease him with her tresses. Next time. He could wait.
“Nic!” Kimi’s voice was thick, her eyes heavy-lidded.

Dragon: She sank her teeth into his biceps and neck was lost. (Wow, that’s quite some bite she has. Maybe she’s like a T-Rex?)

Should Be: She sank her teeth into his biceps and Nic was lost.

I think my personal favorite is when Dragon wanted Kimi to yell “Next!” Maybe Dragon is writing a different story than the one I wanted to transcribe.

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Darkest Night

Tuesday, April 26th, 2011

In the Darkest Night is a finalist for Best Paranormal in the National Readers Choice Awards!!! Woot!

I was so excited when I got the call, I kind of shrieked into the phone. And then I babbled. I hope the poor coordinator recovered from the experience quickly. Normally, I’m much more low-key when I hear one of my books finaled, but not this time.

Some authors talk about the book of their heart, singular, but I have the books of my heart. Plural. Maybe I fall in love too easily, but of my eight full-length novels, I’d call three of them the books of my heart. In the Darkest Night is one of them.

The story is Kel’s (the hero) and it’s about how he changes and reaches a point where he can accept help. You see, he has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and instead of getting help, he’s stonewalled everyone, including his twin brother who has always been his best friend. Kel was held captive and tortured (before the book opens) and he’s trying to lock that away, pretend it never happened, but he can’t suppress the memories or his guilt.

His heroine is Farran. She has her own issues, and in the months she’s been on the run, has developed new ones. She grows over the course of the book, too, of course, but it’s Kel’s story and he’s got the bigger changes to make.

I loved these two. They’re both emotionally wounded, and in each other, they find a kindred spirit, someone who can accept them as they are, baggage and all. This book wasn’t easy to write, not when the characters had such big issues, but I knew from the minute I met Kel that his story had to be told.

Of course, there aren’t only issues. There’s magic, action, adventure, and two people falling in love with each other even though neither one of them want that. I love adventure and romance, so those have to be there. :-)

It means a lot to me that this book is a National Readers Choice Finalist. Thank you!

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O’Shea Classic Mostly

Sunday, April 24th, 2011

After a week off from work, I head back tomorrow. We’re required to use our vacation or lose it by our company anniversary date now and I have another week to use up before May 9th, so there is another stay-cation in my near future. This time, though, I wasn’t on deadline and I had plans to get things done around my house. How did I do?

Not so great actually.

I discovered that I need a To Do List. It’s too easy for me to get distracted otherwise. I, um, never did write one up for this week although I should have when I realized how easy it was to go oooh, shiny.

The week wasn’t a total dearth of progress, however.

I got rid of my rusted out shower caddy and bought (and assembled) a new one. I also got a new shower head with both a stationary head and a hand-held head so that it will be easier to clean. 

I had my first four books scanned because my electronic files weren’t up to date and I did finish going through one of them and fixing what I saw. It goes to my mom next for another read through with the thought that if I missed something she’ll catch it. Hopefully.

The list does look pretty sad, doesn’t it?

What was kind of interesting about going through the first book I ever published was seeing how I’ve changed as a writer. And because I hadn’t read Ravyn in such a long time, I’d forgotten a ton of stuff. I realized, too, that it would be a drastically different book if I was writing it today as opposed to what I wrote back then.

It was also really, really, really, really hard not to edit as I went along.

I made the decision to not revise my backlist stories, that I’d consider them O’Shea Classic, but wow, I wanted to. A lot in some places.

I did revise a few sentences back to the way I originally wrote them because they’d been changed to things I didn’t care for a whole lot. The run-on sentence that made me grit my teeth? Gone. The added word that changed the meaning of my sentence? Gone.

Another sentence had words cut from it that didn’t exactly change the meaning, but did kind of change the shading of it. Those were added back. Also added was Alex’s correct rank. The fact that he was a lieutenant colonel and not a full colonel was cut, too. Oh, and I added in a mention of the pyramid, because it plays such a prominent role in Eternal Nights. The small fixes were actually pretty fun and it was a revelation to realize I could change a few things.

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Assembly Required

Thursday, April 21st, 2011

On Wednesday, I bought a new shower caddy to replace the rusted out one and decided to get a new shower head, too. I wanted one that was stationary and had a hand-held unit as well. It’s been a PITA to clean the shower since I moved into the house, and at times, I’ve even resorted to using my toothbrush cup to rinse cleaning solutions off the walls. Yeah, not too slick.

Both items claimed ten minute assembly. They lied.

We started with the shower head since it would be easier to maneuver without the caddy in the corner. And yes, you know my dad was over helping me. The old shower head came off easily, the new one went on relatively easily, but the adjustable spray functions on both heads wouldn’t work.

My dad suggested that maybe it took water pressure, and since that sounded logical, I pulled up my sleeve (It snowed here Wednesday morning, so we’re still wearing long sleeves in MN) and turned on the water. Then I reached up and over and tried to turn the ring to adjust the spray.

No go. And now I have water running down my arm.

After I turned off the water, I went online and did a search. No helpful information turned up. Apparently no one else in the world ever had trouble getting this shower unit’s sprayers to work. Sigh. I went to the company website, got a phone number, and called.

The woman I talked to said to force it. I finally got one to move, but not the other. She said to take the other head down and hold it. If I forced it and it broke, she’d send a new one. I had to pull off my socks and get in the wet shower to get the head down. It took a hell of a lot of force, but I did get it to move. As I went to tell the woman eureka! my wet feet slipped on the floor and I went down.

Since I’ve been a klutz all my life, this didn’t particularly faze me. I just went to the phone, thanked the woman and hung up. My dad, though, was all upset. Sigh. Guess he forgot all the bones I’ve broken, ankles I’ve sprained, and bruises I’ve acquired as I’ve fallen, walked into to stuff, tripped over stuff, etc. I wasn’t hurt, BTW.

Onto the next project. Assembly shower caddy with three baskets. This is where I really hurt myself.

It seemed like such a simple thing–use the scissors to cut off the tie wraps fastening the pieces to each other. Unfortunately, they were very sturdy tie wraps, and as I applied force (More force!), the pad of my index finger went between the scissor handles. I have a dark discoloration under the skin. I’m assuming it’s a small blood pool subsurface.

Adding the extension to the shower caddy was where we ran into problems on this project. It took a visit to this manufacturer’s website to find more detailed information that made everything clear. Also, my ceiling is marked up from the rubber foot. Some of it came off, but there’s more that I missed. Project for another day.

So basic breakdown: 2 projects each supposed to take 10 minutes for a total of 20 minutes. Actual assembly time: 2 projects, 1 hour per project for a total of 2 hours.

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Adventures In My Imagination

Tuesday, April 19th, 2011

Writers have vivid imaginations. We have to in order to tell a story, and most of the time I love it. I’m rarely bored because if I’m stuck somewhere, I just play a story in my head. Saved me countless times when I was a kid and my parents dragged me somewhere. There is a downside, though, to this overactive imagination.

Muscle soreness? It becomes the symptom of some fatal disease. Who cares if I raked the lawn yesterday? Someone I’m expecting is late? I’m picturing them involved in some horrific accident.

Which leads to last night…

I’m off from work this week, which means I can stay (and do) stay up later. Last night, after 11pm (while I was watching the Dodgers/Braves game), I heard a helicopter. They fly by all the time and I hate it, but usually they don’t linger. Last night, he hovered nearby. For a really long time.

Immediately, thoughts of a fugitive on the loose leaped into my head. I live about a half mile away from a couple of gas stations/convenience stores and in the mile radius, there’s even more gas stations/supermarkets/small businesses. I’m picturing a criminal–maybe more than one–attempting to rob one of these businesses and then running. Into my backyard!

I become hyper-alert, listening for the sound of glass breaking in my basement. Should I get up and get the phone now or can I make it three steps to grab it before the wanted man (men) open the basement door and shoot me to stop me from making a call to 911?

The helicopter is still hovering. I expect the search light to illuminate my yard like daylight any second. I wait for my own motion-sensor light over my deck to come on.

I tweet about my potential adventure.

One of the responses I get back? Maybe it’s a tiger who escaped from the zoo or a cobra. Now my imagination has another path to explore. I don’t live anywhere near either of our zoos in the Twin Cities, but residents own exotic animals, too. What if someone’s pet tiger did get loose?

You’ll notice I’m not too concerned about the snake. There’s two reasons for that. First, it’s still cold in MN. Really cold. They’re predicting three inches of snow here this afternoon and into tomorrow. Snakes are cold-blooded creatures and cobras in particular aren’t going to function well here since they’re from Egypt. Second, I figured even if a snake was capable of moving in the cold, he wasn’t going to break my window and slither into the house.

Unless of course, it’s a huge, mutant snake with genetically altered brain cells…

Um, but I didn’t think of that last night. I did consider whether or a not a tiger had the interest in jumping through glass to get into my house.

At last, the helicopter left. Instead of relieving me, I started thinking, well, what if the criminal/tiger is still out there and the police in the helicopter just didn’t see him? They didn’t turn on their search light and there’s handy foliage around to hide in. Maybe I’m on my own against this threat.

After it stayed quiet for a little while, and after the Dodgers and Braves ended, I decide to go to bed. And the helicopter returned!

It’s not easy having an overactive imagination.

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Dragonisms, Part 1

Sunday, April 17th, 2011

Here are some of the more interesting turns of phrase that Dragon’s speech recognition software came up with as I transcribed Dark Awakening. Some of this stuff is almost as good as Damn You Auto-Correct. Among my favorites:

  • She even put spiders outside when she found them in her apartment instead of squishing them, and she wolves at those things.

    It’s supposed to be: She even put spiders outside when she found them in her apartment instead of squishing them, and she loathed those things.

  • Kimi realized Mika and Nic were headed for the door, and that should occur out of her paralysis.

    It’s supposed to be: Kimi realized Mika and Nic were headed for the door, and that shook her out of her paralysis.

  • how much time had passed balls she’d been filing

    It’s supposed to be: how much time had passed while she’d been filing

  • when someone stepped out of the goodness

    It supposed to be: when someone stepped out of the dimness

  • The man’s voice was a rich baritone, animated and some pleasant, even attractive, they raise goose bumps on Kimi’s arms and she backed up a step.

    It’s supposed to be: The man’s voice was a rich baritone, and it made him sound pleasant, even attractive, but it raised goose bumps on Kimi’s arms and she backed up a step.

  • Calling it forward, she surrounded herself, leading ticketing and roll until it would be impenetrable.

    It’s supposed to be: Calling it forward, she surrounded herself, letting it thicken and grow until it would be impenetrable.

  • As she ate a bag out of her desk for, she realized she needed help.

    It’s supposed to be: As she yanked the bag out of her desk drawer, she realized she needed help.

The last one is my personal favorite. :-)

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Five Years Distant

Thursday, April 14th, 2011

I mentioned in the last post that I used Dragon to transcribe my novella so that I’d have an up-to-date version. One of the things that ended up surprising me was that it felt as if I was reading someone else’s work.

Once, I regularly reread my work because I love my characters and liked revisiting with them from time to time, but lately, as in the last few years, I haven’t had enough time. The novella I transcribed? I probably haven’t read it since it came out in 2007.

Maybe the 4 years without reading it is why it felt like someone else had written it. Or maybe it was the weirdness of reading it aloud instead of reading quietly. Either way, it was a surreal experience.

What was nice about it was that I didn’t try to edit it. I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from rewriting my backlist stories even though I vowed I wouldn’t. I did change one word. I used happening twice in one paragraph, but other than that, I had no urge to fiddle. Definitely a plus since I’m a perfectionist leaning toward anal perfectionist.

I hope this holds true as I go through the scans of the books. The novella was written closest to my current writing style/ability and the books are earlier. I’d like to not feel any desire to tinker beyond fixing a few things that got changed that I didn’t care for–a clunky, run-on sentence, a sentence that had a few words cut out of it that made it less musical and changed the meaning slight. Things like that.

I also am going to add the missing pyramid to Ravyn’s Flight. No one ever called me on that, but, well, ouch! I didn’t know there was a pyramid when I wrote the first book, but learned it was there in the second Jarved Nine book. I guess Ravyn and Damon didn’t care about the pyramid. ;-)

Stay tuned for more exciting backlist book action. :-)

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Learn From My Fail

Tuesday, April 12th, 2011

I have the rights back to my first four books and novella. Because this publisher had me do a lot of work on hard copy, my electronic files don’t match the finished version. I thought about adding in my revisions–I have them in separate files–but there were still changes made at the galley stage and hunting those up would be time consuming and difficult.

On Friday, I priced out scanning the work and balked a little at the cost. I thought about heading to a pirate site and downloading my work from there, and I did search one title, but I literally became physically sick to my stomach just looking at my book being stolen. I knew I couldn’t do this just because of the emotional price.

Saturday I came up with a scathingly brilliant idea, though. I have Dragon speech recognition software, and while it’s not perfect, it can’t be worse than OCR scanning. I’ll just read my books aloud and get the final version that way.

At least I was smart enough to start with the novella.

I started out at first correcting Dragon paragraph by paragraph, but that was slow, so I did it every few paragraphs. Still slow. After expanding a few more times, I finally decided to just go through it at the end.

Some issues I expected. Like the hero’s name is Nic so I expected to see Nick from Dragon. I wasn’t disappointed. What did surprise me was when I said Nic’s, I got Knicks. Um, some basketball fan programmed this? I also had Dragon continually putting my sentences in present tense. I would say was and Dragon would type is. I’d say had, Dragon would change it to have. And on and on. Sigh.

Other things were unexpected and I’ll be going through the hard copy, book in hand, a few times to find all the errors.

I was still reading aloud on Sunday, late into the afternoon. As I wrapped up the novella, I realized there was no way I was doing this for a full-length book. I bought the scanning package for my four books.

Now, I need to get covers made, write some back cover copy, and when I get my scans back, proofread and format for Kindle, Nook, and other ereaders. Watch this space for release information.

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Evil Plot Bunnies

Sunday, April 10th, 2011

The plot bunny is evil. Seriously. I say it like there’s only one of them, but that’s not true. Like real bunnies, they multiply like crazy and leave authors going, oooh, shiny. Yes, we are your poster children for short attention spans.

It’s not like we want to be distracted from our current Work In Progress (WIP), truly, but well, um, shiny!

And let’s face it, the WIP is work–that’s why it’s called the WORK in progress. New plot bunny is shiny. There’s that word again, but it’s the most accurate. Writing is hard. Really hard. Ideas are fun. Ideas aren’t work. Yet. Ideas can be gazed upon in their shiny magnificence and make a writer orgasmic.

For these reasons, the new plot bunny is always more appealing than the WIP.

Years of hopping around (no pun intended) and never actually finishing a book (add anal perfectionist in there, too) taught me a few things about tuning out the new shiny.

Some writers can work on multiple ideas/projects and do just fine, but I’m not one of them. I sink so deeply into my characters that switching around leaves me making little progress on any story. I had that problem on the project I sent to my agent a few weeks ago. I had so many ideas I was in various stages on (some just planning) that I was unable to write the WIP.

Finally, I realized I hadn’t changed enough to be able to multitask stories. I had to focus on one, the WIP, if I wanted to write it. I did. It took weeks of forcibly dragging my mind away from other ideas and forcing it back to the job at hand, but it worked.

And just as I was finishing revisions to the proposal in preparation for sending it to my agent, a new plot bunny arrived. Ooooh, shiny!

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Blood Feud

Friday, April 8th, 2011

Blood Feud is available now in multiple formats at Smashwords! And is still available at Amazon for Kindle and Barnes & Noble for Nook. I hope to have the story in the Sony Store, Kobo, and Apple among others. I’ll update when it’s up. Now on to Troll Bridge!

Blood Feud cover

Blood Feud at Smashwords


Blood Feud at Amazon


Blood Feud at Barnes & Noble

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