I forgot to mention this! I guested over at the Paranormal Romance Blog. Come on over and read about how Demon Kissed went from idea to story.
Posts Tagged ‘demon_kissed’
Talking Demon Kissed
Tuesday, May 11th, 2010Demon Kissed Is Out!
Monday, May 3rd, 2010
Demon Kissed was released on May 1st!
Bree Molina is a demon slayer who finds herself outnumbered and injured one night. Then Andras shows up to help her. Bree has always felt the heat between them, but it’s so strong, it scares her and she wants to take things slow. This one night is going to blow slow completely out of the water.
This is a short story from Nocturne Bites and available in e-book formats only.
It kind of amazes me that I really enjoy writing short stories. My single title books routinely come in over 400 manuscript pages and I would have thought telling a story in something around 60 pages would be impossible for me. But then I was asked to write a story for a collection and I had a blast! I knew I wanted to write more and the world I created for that story, Blood Feud, interested me. A lot.
Demon Kissed is set in the same world as Blood Feud, but both stories stand alone.
I have more story ideas for this world, too. One of them lured me away from the Work In Progress (WIP) and forced me to write a rough draft of the first chapter. Really. I was just minding my own business when these two characters turned up, grabbed me, and made me start writing them. 
I’m resisting the temptation, though, to polish their chapter. They need to wait their turn; there are others ahead of them.
Last night, after I was done writing and in need of some vegging out time, I found this site that does tag clouds and put one together for Bree and Andras and Demon Kissed. Pretty cool, huh? I know the heart shape is a bit trite, but there weren’t a huge number of options available to choose from and a lot of what they had didn’t fit the book at all. Like the peace dove option.
Anyway, I thought it turned out cool enough to share. I love how Andras and Bree’s names are right there so nice and large and the word demon goes up vertically from Bree. That just worked out so perfectly and it was the program that did it, not me.
So if you’d like to pick up your very own copy of Demon Kissed, you can find it at these sites:
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
eHarlequin
Sony eBookstore
Books On Board
Diesel eBook Store
There probably are more stores, too, but these are the only ones I know about. I hope you’ll give the story a try, and if you loved it, let me know.
Research. Sigh.
Monday, April 26th, 2010Normally, I don’t mind research. I want to get everything right, and with the internet at my fingertips, I can usually put my hands on the information I need and verify it’s correct. Image search makes it even better because I can see places I’ve never been and the ground view in maps gave me a chance to trace the route my hero and heroine drove. How cool is that?
But I’ve run into a research issue that’s going to require I actually contact someone and ask my questions. It’s not that I’ve never done this before. I bothered people at work incessantly with questions as the need has arisen and I have contacted other people via email with quick, one-off queries. This time, though, I’m going to need a little more than that.
My hero is on the LAPD and he’s working at the new Police Administration Building. I can’t find pictures of the interior, and believe me, I’ve spent hours scouring online. The best I could come up with was the lobby. My guess is this is a security measure, but it sure makes it tough to write a scene in the hallway of the building when I don’t have a clue what that corridor looks like. Is it carpeted? Tiled? Are the walls white? Gray? Maroon? Are their posters hanging there? Are the walls blank?
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. I write paranormal and so my heroine does a few things normal people couldn’t do. I’m guessing the LAPD PAB is a completely secured building–I don’t know that for a fact, but without pictures and with people having to pass through a metal detector, I think it’s a good supposition. So how would the hero be trained to react to the heroine wandering around this secured area?
My one consolation is that the LAPD has to be used to strange questions. Hey, they deal with scriptwriters. But I have to sit down and formulate the bazillion questions I have. This is not my favorite thing to do. I’d rather be writing.
Demon Kissed is up for preorder on Barnes & Noble now! And don’t forget that you can find it on Amazon, too.
Still Trying to Learn
Thursday, April 22nd, 2010Demon Kissed is up at Amazon! This is my short story from Nocturne Bites and it’s available in ebook format. Right now, Kindle owners can preorder, but it should be available in many more places, many more formats on May 1st. I’ll keep you posted and if I miss an ebookstore that has my Bites, please let me know.
This week I’ve been listening to an Urban Fantasy (UF) story on my iPod. I’m really enjoying the story a lot (it helps that it’s in third person (she/he) rather than first person) and I’ve already gone and bought the second audio book so I can continue on as soon as I finish book 1. I could do a whole post on the experience of reading a book versus listening to one, but I haven’t figured out the whats and whys yet. I do know that when I listen, I have a much easier time turning off my internal critic.
But while I’m not studying the book/writing/plot (just enjoying it), I have been (in the back of my mind) trying to figure out the structure for a UF story.
To me, every genre or subgenre of fiction has a rhythm to it. I’ve read thousands and thousands of romance books, so I’ve internalized that tune, but UF is different and I haven’t been able to grasp this song yet. I don’t think of it consciously while I’m in the story. I’m too busy paying attention to what’s going on. But when I hit pause or quit listening for the day, my mind starts twisting itself, trying to grasp the structure.
I guess the best way to learn it would be to read many, many UF books–something I don’t have time to do. But I do want to figure out the rhythm of Urban Fantasy. Maybe it’s because writers are always students, but I like to pick up new things. And I like to understand (or at least get a grasp (I don’t think I’m ever going to understand String Theory or M Theory, but I was able to grasp the main bits)) on everything I come in contact with. So in the meantime, my brain will keep working on the puzzle of UF.
