Accidental Hiatus

I truly did not mean to just peace out the way I have, so I apologize. I think part of the reason I became so silent is because so much was going on and there is so much to say but not enough words to say them. So, this is my apology for that and thank you very much for sticking with me and by me.

The high points:

- I've been writing! As you know, I released Go with Your Heart back in August and the response for that has been wonderful. Beautiful Trouble Publishing is a supportive publisher and I appreciate them giving me the chance to tell that story and for trusting me to help format their books! I just finished this year's NaNo (still in the RJC universe, but this time it's about Henry's parents Lydia and Takeshiro Inoue!) and as exhausting as that experience was, I was grateful for the challenge. I really enjoy writing these two!

- I made a contact with an editor at Harlequin who was so giving of her time and dispensed very useful advice. The trick now is for me to follow it!

- Kwame Alexander has offered me wonderful opportunities this fall, including being part of his Kwame and Friends (including Marcus Amaker and Joanna Crowell) reading at the John. L. Dart Public Library at the beginning of October and being a panelist at the Capital BookFest in November, along with Heidi Durrow and Noni Carter. Both women are fantastic writers and wonderful people, so it was truly an honor to share the panel wtih them! I also met Carol Mackey, who was so gracious, and Ms. Dori Sanders, with whom I had a fangirl moment. She said I could write! Y'all, I was definitely beaming like a kid in a candy store (speaking of which, definitely need to read Clover again! I also met another writer, Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond who encouraged me to keep my chin up and don't give up on traditional publishing. I took a picture with Victoria Rowell (that didn't save to my phone! *cries*), who is as gorgeous and talented in real life as she is on screen and I watched her panel with AlTonya Washington. I started talking to a young student who was also presenting because she was part of Kwame Alexander's Book-in-a-Day Program, and that was one of the most worthwhile conversations I'd ever had. I have every confidence this young lady will go far! The final panel was with Ms. Tananarive Due and Tina McElroy Ansa, who were fantastic and spoke some serious truth about what it means to be a writer and a community of writers. It was the perfect way to begin NaNo and a recharge of why I wake up at five or earlier every morning and start writing.

- Please go support my girl BJ Thornton. She's awesome and I want to write like her when I grow up. And Karen Lord. She was reviewed in The New York Times. Holla!


The low point:

I lost a very dear friend to me, Ruthy Charlot, in mid-October, which just really threw me for a loop because it was so unexpected. But every writer has their go-to cheerleaders, and Lord knows she'd become one of mine. She challenged me to be better, not in terms of skill, but in terms of having the courage to tell the story I truly want to tell...or the story that truly needed to be told. She made me more discerning about what I say, how I say it, and to whom I listen. She was even editing a story for me that was to be published back in November (That's on indefinite hold right now, but it will be released at some point.). She was brilliant, encouraging, and one of the most beautiful people I knew. She's missed. Dearly.


So, in these last four weeks of 2010, I hope I continue being productive and that 2011 sees more of me on your bookshelves and this blog, quite frankly!

Available Now!: The Beauty Within

When full-figured barber Tyler Carver enters GD Fitness for a personal training session, she immediately butts heads with her trainer Gunnar Daniels. Refusing to allow Mr. Just-Walked-off-an-Abercrombie-&-Fitch-Billboard’s rudeness, she gives him a piece of her mind and storms off. Too bad she can’t stop thinking about the gorgeous gray-eyed grump.

Former fashion model-turned-gym-owner Gunnar Daniels, having a day sent express from hell, thinks it can’t get any worse until Tyler Carver, in all her curvy, chocolate glory, takes his breath away the moment he locks eyes with her. Knowing he acted out of character during their session, he apologizes to her. Yet, he wants so much more.

Can Tyler and Gunnar help each other discover that beauty is more than skin deep…that the beauty within is what truly decides the beauty without?

Browse Before You Buy

Buy The Beauty Within: Lulu

I've also done two interviews just in time for the release: One at Dyanne Davis's Web site and the other at the SORMAG Blog. Check me out!

Thanks so much for your support! I appreciate it from the bottom of my heart!

Romance in Color Rising Star

I have been deemed a Rising Star at Romance in Color for the month of June. Holla! Check out my interview here and the review of Being Plumville here.

AJ's Serendipity 6

Hi everyone, the radio interview went well, and Ms. Robinson was very nice! It was a good experience :).

And, in the spirit of such a good interview (and because it's Sunday) there is an update of AJ's Serendipity. We are on part 6 now, so I hope you enjoy. You can either follow the link or go to the google group to read. Below is an excerpt :).

~~~~~~~~~

“You want to see the painting?”

Her eyes went wide and she nodded, scrambling to her feet. AJ led them into his bedroom where he tore off the brown paper that covered the art. When the framed painting was revealed, both let out a gasp of awe.

“Oh, my,” Samara breathed. “Oh, wow . . .”

Even though he had seen it before, he was just as breathless as Samara. The painter had a hell of a lot more talent than one should have when painting for pennies and tourists. Or maybe it was just he and Samara who had inspired the masterpiece before them. It was as if the artist had captured the love they felt between them, had seen it before they did themselves. AJ thought back to what the artist had said, about him and Samara being in love. Can two people fall in love in an hour? Enough for strangers to see? How could this artist see and Samara . . .

There were tears falling down her cheeks as she gazed at the art. Concerned, AJ lifted her face to his and used a gentle thumb to wipe away her tears.

“Samara?”

“You . . .” she began, then shook her head and looked back at the painting. “I never . . .”

“You never what, darling?”

“That look . . . you only see that look in movies.”

“The look?” AJ repeated, staring at the painting in confusion.

Samara licked her lips and glanced at him helplessly. “It’s only been three days . . . that painting . . .”

AJ caught on, and he grinned despite the hammering the heart was doing inside his chest. “He gave us the painting for free because of that look, Samara. What he captured in that painting . . . it’s as rare as it is pure. And it’s true. Dear God, Samara . . . it’s so true.”

Radio Interview

So as a change of pace, I decided to announce the fact I'm going to be on the radio BEFORE I actually am instead of AFTER. It's a new concept I'm trying out lol. Anyway, this Sunday from 2-3PM I will be on WILD 1090 AM in Boston for Studio V with Victoria Howard Robinson. I don't know if there is a way to listen online, but hopefully I'll get a tape someway so I can listen to myself (even though I really don't like the sound of my own voice, but eh, what can you do.) If you're in the New England area, I hope you can listen! I'll be talking about Being Plumville at the very least, so yeah. That's the announcement :).

Home (cue Stephanie Mills)

So yesterday I had interviews. I was home yesterday for a total of twenty minutes--two ten minute breaks before going out and handling business. It was really surreal. I had a paper interview Country Chronicle for an article. Then I had a radio interview on 620 AM (Columbia). Urban Scene with Don Frierson (possible relation, my father was born in Columbia). And turns out he went to school with my mother, and he knows her and he started waxing poetic (which, actually, isn't a surprising thing, because apparently my mother was, as they say "all that and a bag of chips") AND he was the host of my elementary school's 54th Anniversary Reunion. I had a brief lunch with my friend who I might not see for the rest of my time here, and I think the waiter was flirting with me, but I couldn't be sure because I'm really rather awful at flirting! lol But I was looking cute, and he wasn't bad looking either, so we'll say he was ;). Before the reunion I went back to the radio station and gave a little blurb on my friend's radio show (dressed for said reunion), and we chatted a bit outside before I went to the convention center where the reunion was held. Saw all my old teachers from my second grade to fifth grade teachers, my old PE coach. It was very nice to see them all; the people who planted seeds and shaped my early education.

Home. Roots. They can be wonderful things.

So today I'll do some more things to get ready for the book signing tomorrow. I hope you can make it! 2-5 Columbia Museum of Art.

:)