Romancing the Blog | Romance Authors and Readers Who Blog

by Special Guest Donna Lea Simpson

I am, I suppose, a bit of a loner among writers. I belong to no critique groups, I write alone, and haven’t joined RWA, so I don’t know how other writers feel about the secret lives of their fictional characters. I’ve read lots of articles on creating ‘backstory’ for characters, but that’s such a cold and technical term for how characters are born and live and begin to breathe.

When I ‘create’ a fictional character, I assume they have the kind of rich depth in their past, their thoughts, their innermost needs, that every human being has, no matter how shallow they seem. I may not know about it yet, but they have a past that explains who they are and why they’re like that. While I like to believe I create these for my characters, they do sometimes surprise me.

They keep secrets, you see. They’ve done things they’re ashamed of, and they don’t want to tell me. Like any other person, I have to get to know them first, and they have to trust me before they’ll tell me anything. You would think I would have some access to this privileged information, but no, I must tease and coax the truth out of them.

This has never been more evident to me than while writing the three books of the Lady Anne series, beginning with Lady Anne and the Howl in the Dark (Sourcebooks Casablanca – April 2009). Anne is, in some ways, the simplest of all the characters. She’s open and honest and forthright. And yet… even she has secrets. One is that she is wildly passionate and a little ashamed of that fact. Her sensual side does not seem quite ladylike to her, for it was drilled into her early that ladies do not feel the too ‘earthy’ sensation of physical desire. When she meets Lord Anthony Darkefell and falls madly in lust with him almost immediately, it appalls her, and yet… she’s intrigued. In her youth she had very unsuitable yearnings for the handsome stable lad and a hunky footman or two. She hasn’t told me all, yet, but I do believe she let one or two of them kiss her behind the barn door. But what she feels for Darkefell is wilder, deeper, lustier and more frightening because she knows if she marries him, she’ll be able to indulge every dirty little bit of her sensual side. She’s terrified to let go, afraid of being swallowed whole by passionate love.

But the other characters… oh my, the secrets they have! Lady Darkefell, the marquess’s mother, is probably the most complicated and tortured. I’m dreadfully afraid she’s done some things of which she is deeply and properly ashamed. Those secrets will have repercussions for her sons and others in their lives. I know some of her hidden past, and I’m more than a little appalled at her past indiscretions and errors in judgment, but I feel sorry for her too. Oddly enough, much of what I know about Lady Sophie Darkefell’s secret life has not made its way into the novels.

And Tony, the virile and passionate Lord Darkefell? He is actually the most secretive, I think, of any of the characters in the Lady Anne books. I know he’s still keeping things from me, and I’m almost afraid to learn what he’s hiding, because I really like Lady Anne. I’m worried some of his secrets may hurt her, if she finds them out. It’s a friendship, after all, that I have with these people. I’m writing their stories, yes, but often they tell me what to say. I never believed that before, but then I’ve never had the feeling that there is so much going on beneath the surfaces of these characters’ lives that even I don’t know about.

How am I going to find out what they’re all hiding? I guess I just have to keep writing. They’ll tell me in their own good time. I hope. Check in with me sometime and I’ll let you know how that’s going!

This question is for readers; do you go into a novel knowing there are things about the character that are hidden and may not be revealed even by the end of the book? Do you ever imagine you know more about them than the writer?

And for all of you writers… I know we’re supposed to be in control, but beyond your characters coming to life and following their own paths—something many writers experience—do you ever get the feeling your characters are actively hiding something from you? Do your characters have secret lives?

The publishing industry is in turmoil. Good book-loving people are getting fired. Books aren’t being distributed. Bottom lines have picked up shovels and started digging. Authors are having their print runs, advances, and contracts slashed or they’re being dropped like yesterday’s spam. It’s raining puppies and kittens. Godzilla has just risen out of the Hudson River and is stomping Manhattan into rubble.

In other words: It’s bad.

I’ve noticed that when times get tough my reading habits seem to shift. Over the last few months I’ve gone from reading paranormal romances to urban fantasy to historical romances. I suppose it’s only natural to return to the genre you started reading and writing in for comfort. I tend to relax when I read a historical romance. I suppose there is something soothing about reading about a ‘simpler time’. Yes, I know they’re 99% fantasy, but that doesn’t quell my enjoyment. In fact, it adds to it. For me, reading historical romance novels is an exercise in pure escapism. There is no other adult book genre that hits the spot quite like a historical.

I feel the same about cooking. I took a three month cooking class last year that covered everything from baking to international foods. Up until that point, I’d always thought cooking was difficult. I mean I could read a recipe and follow it, but I was never relaxed while doing so. In fact, most of the time it was quite the opposite. Think full-contact sport. (Picture heart palpitations, sweaty palms, lots of cursing and bleeding.) Now, I’m not exactly Emeril, but I get the job done.

One of my favorite things to do is bake. I don’t know how to make a lot of bake goods (a few breads, scones, biscuits, cookies, cakes, etc.), but I do enjoy the few that I can make. This is why I was so excited to find Suzanne McMinn’s Chickens in the Road website. Not only does she write for Harlequin, but she also LOVES to cook. And lucky for me, she breaks the recipes down, using food porn pictures to go along with her instructions. Considering the calorific creations she comes up with, this is probably a site I should be avoiding—but I can’t. I’m weak. *g* Like reading historical romances, I find comfort in her posts. They remind me of my childhood growing on the farm.

I guess what I’m saying is that there are many ways to find comfort during these trying times. If reading the types of books you’ve always enjoyed isn’t doing it for you anymore, then try another genre. There are a lot of wonderful books and authors out there waiting to be ‘discovered’.

What do you do when you need comforting? Do you have a favorite recipe you cook? Do you have a favorite author or genre that you read? I’d like to hear your ideas.

So how ’bout that publishing business, huh? If you follow the news — and I do, closely — you’d believe the industry was headed for a cliff. If you pay attention to the people — and I do, closely — you’d know there is great optimism, innovation, and enthusiasm. I’m putting my money on the people.

First, some tough love: due to the, ahem, global economic crisis, long overdue changes are going to hit the industry. Acquisitions will decrease, advances will be lower, royalties will be squeezed, print runs smaller (not necessarily a bad thing), editors will be overworked as will all others at publishing houses, and there will be a emphasis on playing it safe. Oh, and you’re going to see lots of crazy deals, like huge money given to the rich and famous, that make you grind your teeth and grumble.

But enough of that! In the foreseeable future, you will be forced, as authors, to make choices about your careers, and I’m guessing more than a few of you will look at the current publishing climate and think, “Today, I’m going to take a chance on something completely different.” You might win, you might lose, but you’ll also know that you were bold, beautiful, and breaking through.

Flash back to February and the Tools of Change Conference in New York — another group of geeks, but they were publishing geeks. Again with the optimism, the enthusiasm, the belief that change, while inevitable, doesn’t mean the end of the world as we know it. The energy that comes from spending a few days talking to people who know, absolutely know, that we are at the dawn of an age where more people are reading and writing than ever before is inspiring.

These weren’t people talking the talk, these were people walking the walk. Building things, growing things, changing things. Experimenting, taking risks, turning experience into magic. Once you abandon the word “no”, decide to try something new, follow a dream, already you’re winning.

A few weeks ago, as I do every year, I attended the South by Southwest Interactive Festival. It’s grown from a sleepy-but-innovative few days of geekiness to a full-blown 10,000-person strong-but-innovative few days of geekiness. In this current climate, you’d expect attendance to be down and optimism to flag. Au contraire! In every corner of the massive Austin Convention Center — plus the overflow conference room in the Hilton Hotel across the street — creative DIY attitudes reigned supreme.

As people around me took active control of their own destinies, I realized it was time for me to do the same. Even as my current project draws to a close (meaning someone is going to have to curb her shoe and purse addiction!), I’m facing the future with a sense of relief. Now that the project is over, I can concentrate on what I truly love while building my business the way I’ve wanted to these past few years. I am moving forward, scared but incredibly optimistic.

I am drawing inspiration from the people I’ve encountered these past months. On Wednesday, I had a special treat in my inbox. One of those projects I’d heard about in New York had launched in beta: Filedby author is now up and running (full disclosure: Mike Shatzkin, who is involved in the project, is a friend and I’m trying to get him to adopt me as a mentee!). The time I’d given myself to write this post was actually spent setting up my profile on the site, finding authors, finding books, and exploring.

(And by exploring, I mean finding favorite books and authors and wondering how it was that the site had been in public beta for nearly a whole day and I was the first person to write a mini-review for House of Mirth.)

The shorthand description is that Filedby is like Facebook for bookish people. Sorta, kinda, but without the messy awkwardness of asking people to be your friends (I mean, seriously, do you think I have the guts to go up to, oh, Jill Monroe and ask her to be my BFF?). Instead, you leap straight into a conversation about books and authors…adding a social level to that most awesome activity of all: reading.

With a mix of technology. Author pages and book titles are drawn from an existing database. Authors can claim their pages and interact with fans (and, ahem, help clean up some of the messy information contained in various publishing databases). Readers can build their profiles around books and authors they love. I strongly suggest that all of you check it out — I’m sure, like me, you’ll see the potential, the magic, and even, yes, draw some of the inspiration you need to try something new in this era of possibility.

Here’s what the Filedby people have to say, :

The site is the first large-scale author-centric promotional platform to provide every author that has been published in the U.S. or Canada a free, hosted, ecommerce enabled web page ready to be claimed and enhanced. With more than 1.8 million pre-assembled author web pages and over 7 million book titles, filedbyauthor is the most complete site for finding and engaging with authors and their work.

So come join me as I build my favorites list. Better yet, claim your author page and fill in some of the blanks. Think of it this way: you’re helping me goof off. It’s altruism!

(Since writing this draft, another friend has launched a new project, drawing on her incredible skills. Now I’m feeling like a slacker…off to work!)

In my last post, I talked about how I wanted to catch up on all the series that I read this year. One series I really enjoy but have fallen behind on has been the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. But I did finish “Dead Beat,” the seventh novel in the series, a few weeks ago.

It was a good read, but something really struck me about it – how much action there was. During the course of the book, wizard Harry Dresden (the main character) gets beaten up, threatened, injured, and more too many times to count – all in the space of a few days.

And it’s not just poor Harry. Several books I’ve read recently by authors like Cindy Gerard, Kresley Cole, Roxanne St. Claire, Kristin Cashore, and Jim C. Hines have featured lots of action. I’m wondering if this is something authors are doing more of these days – adding in more and more action in their books.

Maybe authors are trying to give readers more of a movie- or television-type experience. Maybe readers just expect more of these scenes. Maybe authors and readers both just like it when stuff blows up a lá Jerry Bruckheimer movies. I certainly do.

But one thing I do know is that action is good for a number of reasons. As a reader, it keeps me hooked and flipping pages. How is the heroine going to fend off the five ninjas that she’s going up against? Especially when she doesn’t have any weapons? If I want to know, I have to keep reading.

As an author, I love writing action scenes. These sorts of scenes really get my creative juices flowing, and I always think about how I can write something that’s real and cool and gritty and still makes my readers worry about the fate of my heroine. Action scenes always challenge me to try to come up with something new and fresh.

If more action is a trend, then I’m totally on the bandwagon as a reader and an author. (What can I say? It’s hard to write an urban fantasy series about an assassin without a lot of fight scenes).

So sorry, Harry. Looks like you’re going to have to take a few more hits on the chin for the team.

What about you? What do you like as a reader? What do you like writing as an author? All action? Or some breathers between fight scenes?

Authors. As with everything there are good ones and bad ones. Ones that write books we (personally) love and ones we throw on the floor and stomp on. But this post isn’t about the later. This post is about the authors we do love and what we want from them to keep us buying books from them.

Now a disclaimer: I’m going to admit right upfront that I am going to ask for things that I as an author do not do. I know there is a certain level of hypocrisy here, but hey, maybe it will show how somethings we as readers want may not be what is best for the author in some way or another.

Let’s get on with the list!

• A web site, and not any web site. I want a web site that is easy to navigate and isn’t hard on the eyes. Please, figure out some way in whatever budget you have to make it look professional–honestly it isn’t that hard or expensive to get a professional web site these days. If I open a web site and it looks like it was your fourth grader’s summer project, well guess what? It changes how I think of you. Unfair? Probably. Real? Yes.

  And as long as I’m being difficult, here are a few things I really want to find on this easy-to-navigate, professional-appearing site.:

  • Your releases. Yes, seriously! I want to know what you’ve had published before. I want to know what you have out now. And I want to know what is coming up soon. Really I do.
  • A way to get a reminder when your next book comes out. I don’t need a big old fancy newsletter; a simple note will do. But give me something. If I love your books, I WANT a nudge that says “Hey, my book is in the store NOW.” I know you may not realize this but I don’t have time to check your site every month just to see what is happening. It would be nice, if you could contact me. (But as an aside, ONLY if I ask for this contact. Sending me a newsletter I didn’t sign up for or that doesn’t have an easy “opt out” link is the SUREST way to make me not buy your book.)
  • A picture. Weird I know. But I like to see you.
  • Buy links. You want me to order your book? Give me a link. This also provides me with strange little bits of information I, for whatever reason, like to know–like who the publisher is and when the book was or will be published.

  And that’s about all I need. I know some authors write blogs or provide forums and free reads. I personally don’t need any of that. Just give me the straight dope on the books and a look at you–and we are good.

• Write the same book, but different. I KNOW this is a horrible thing to ask, but I’m being honest here and it is what I want. (Not what as an author I want to do–so this is one of those hypocritical moments I warned you about.) Say I fell in love with your dark sexy shifters and read on some blog, “Good News! Dark sexy shifter Author A has sold a new series!! It’s a romantic adventure, no paranormal at all.” My first reaction? Anger, annoyance, petty pouting. Just when are you planning on writing these books? And if you have all this extra writing time, WHY aren’t you writing more dark sexy shifters? HUH??? Seriously, get your priorities straight if you expect me to stick with you.

  Then there is the different part. If I love the dark and sexy, I expect that always. If it is a tortured hero that drew me to you, I want another one, and another one after that. But I don’t want the same book–so you better think of some way to twist around that plot and characters while still giving me the core book I desire. I know this isn’t easy–all the more reason you better not be wasting time writing those darn romantic adventures that I never asked for in the first place.

• Reply to my fan mail (email anyway) and make me feel loved. You don’t have to slobber all over me, or offer to send me cool free stuff (although I do love cool free stuff), but if I write you a note saying I loved your book, give me more than, “Thanks, Author A.” Even a smiley face goes a long way to make me feel a little love.

• Don’t miss your deadlines and then be playing on the Internet or bopping around conferences. In fact, don’t miss your deadlines. Unforgiving little reader, aren’t I? But seriously, if you’ve posted that you are under contract and the next book should be out such and such date, then it isn’t…and instead I see all kinds of fun pictures of you at 4,000 conferences or 20 million Twitter tweets…well, let’s just say, I’m really not that understanding. Sorry, I’m not.

So, there you have it my sometimes irrational always demanding expectations of the authors I love. How about you? What do you expect from authors?

I’m a cookbook addict. I own more than any human being probably should, and have a hard time stopping myself from buying a new one. I’ve bought cookbooks for years, from the original Betty Crocker to the Joy of Cooking, to Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa cookbook series and even the Food Network stars’ favorites’ collection.

I’ve noticed an evolution in my cookbooks over the years. They’re almost…novels. They’re not just about the recipes, and in fact, many, like Ina Garten’s, have very few recipes. They’re more about the story. The “life” behind the food. Ina’s book, for instance, includes advice for setting up your home. Designing a kitchen. Picking herbs, hosting a dinner party. Finding your inner bliss, etc.

The one featuring the Food Network stars has little interviews with each of them, that ask those quirky questions like what their favorite foods are or where they most like to vacation. There are photos of the chefs at home, photos of them cooking, and big smiling close-ups, like a regular Sports Illustrated for food.

None of this really helps me cook any better, of course. Knowing what Alton Brown makes for his kids for dinner doesn’t make my steaks come out any more tender, or lend a new flavor to my broccoli. But for the author in me, it gives the books that added dimension of story, that fun little window into people’s souls. I know it’s all been written and polished by marketing people and publicists, but still, it’s nice to have that extra human touch.

I do make the recipes, of course. I’m not just a cookbook addict, I’m also a food addict, LOL. I spend an inordinate amount of time in my kitchen, replicating the recipes I find on those pages, hoping to have them not just taste like the originals, but look like them too.

Why?

Food, I find, is fun. It’s a creative outlet much like writing. I don’t get so fancy as to make separate sauces just to decorate the plate, or buy herbs that will just sit on the plate and get tossed at the end of the meal, but I do try to make a good presentation–even if it’s not perfect, and not exactly the same as what Ina or Emeril would do (and even if I have to improvise because I burned something or forgot an ingredient). My kids are unimpressed. All they want to know is whether the meat under that parmesan crust is chicken or fish. My husband is the kind who puts barbecue sauce on everything. My efforts are pretty much unappreciated by everyone except me.

But…I still read the cookbooks, create the meals, expand my family’s palatte, and create a story with most dinners. I’m hoping that when my kids grow up, they’ll remember dinners at our table, and maybe have a few stories of their own to tell, or some memories to share with me. They won’t be as canned and perfected as the ones in the cookbooks I’m reading, but that’s okay.

The stories I’m really interested in are the ones in the Jump family cookbook, anyway. They’re the ones that make me laugh, and bring true joy to my heart, because they have all the ingredients of a messy, imperfect family, barbecue sauce and all.

Shirley

I read a recent romance by one of my favorite authors, now a NYT and USA Today bestselling author, Ms. Francis Ray. (Congratulations, Ms. Ray!) She’s probably my all-time favorite and, as I neared the end of her latest release, I knew why.

In addition to a great plot, characters you’d love to hang out with, and tons of tension of every variety, Ms. Rays always takes the storytelling high road.

In this day and age, that says a lot.

You see, her most recent book, Nobody But You, is about NASCAR race car driver, Cameron McBride, who reconnects with the woman who previously left him standing at the altar. I won’t give out any spoilers, which may make it hard for you to fully see my point, but I will say that the book involves a child he had no knowledge of fathering. Not so secret since both the reader, and Cameron, learn about the child in the very first chapter. (See, no spoilers.)

Anyway, my point is, as the story unfolded, I realized how easy it would have been to base the heroine’s motivations for running away and hiding her pregnancy, and her subsequent actions, in negativity. As Caitlin and Cameron muddle through their continued conflict and new issues, I had a deep and abiding sense that this story could have gone another way and been a whole lot less positive in its delivery before reaching the happily-ever-after. Of course, in a romance, the HEA is guaranteed, but the route to get there can take many directions.

Had Ms. Ray made different choices, the story would have been no less engaging, to be sure, but I probably wouldn’t have sighed upon reaching the last page, reveled in the warm fuzzies, and been inspired to achieve a similar high road with my own stories. Again, no spoilers but, for example, Caitlin never denies the paternity of her son. She also tries hard not to hinder any relationship once Cameron learns of his son. Of course, not telling him initially is certainly a hindrance but she had her reasons. (You’ll have to read the book to find out.) Even so, the characters seemed so positive, so uplifting as opposed to wallowing in the mud.

Have you ever read a romance and wondered whether it was necessary for the characters to say that line of dialogue, act in that way, think along those lines? That perhaps, had the character been given a different option, one no less realistic and no less interesting, the story would have been more satisfying overall?

I write inspirational fiction, but consider that I’m not talking about turning all the heroines into Pollyannas or the men into similarly perfect characters. I’m just saying, there’s so much negativity in the world, can’t we look for intriguing, engaging plot lines and character motivations that don’t sink us all the way to the bottom of the crab barrel before we climb out?

Conflict and negativity are not synonymous. I love a romance full of conflict, even very sensual ones like the stories crafted by Ms. Ray. I find myself less and less attracted to those, however, that do so through negative drama.

In no way do I believe it’s easy to write in this proposed manner. The low road is broader and easier to find.

If you understand what I’ve tried to say, I’d love to hear from you. Anyone else have examples of romances where the author wrote a story full of page-turning conflict while managing to remain above the fray too often found in our society?

I’ve noticed an interesting pattern lately in my romance reading (so to qualify, this is definitely a limited statistical sample). But I haven’t been able to figure it out, so I figured I’d seek out some help, and word on the street is that you are the ones to ask.

It didn’t matter whether the book was a historical, paranormal, romantic suspense, or science fiction romance (the main kinds I read). Traditional romance publishers as well as other kinds released the books. The publication date varied wildly—decades between books, in some instances. It didn’t matter if the sex was hot, not hot, or somewhere between.

The pattern I’ve noticed is this: the sexual consummation, if it happened onstage, occurred around page 200. Basically, the deed is accomplished somewhere in the range of pages 175-225, adjusting as needed given the total page count.

On the surface, this may seem like a trivial observation—or maybe not. Maybe it’s unique to this last batch of books I’ve read—or again, maybe not. However, it has happened enough that I started to wonder if there was a bigger picture to grasp here.

One possibility might relate to the fact that I love being tortured by escalating sexual tension. So when the tension is over because the hero and heroine have engaged in the ultimate joining, I feel as though I’ve lost the momentum of the romance arc. One book had tension so delicious I found myself cheering it on (uh…inside my head, of course). But the consummation, while also delectable, came far before the external plot resolution, instead of both coinciding toward the end, as I had come to hope.

Another possibility lies in that editors are guiding authors to place such plot occurrences here, here, and…here. It happens in film scripts. If you don’t have the first complication by page 28, forget it.

Now normally, I don’t try to second guess where a plot or the romance twists and turns are heading. But now that I’ve encountered this pattern across different books, I’ve occasionally become distracted by this “page 200” phenomenon, anticipating its occurrence like it’s a game of Whack-A-Mole.

In all seriousness, I now ask you: Have any of you noticed anything similar? If so, is this pattern some kind of rule, spoken or unspoken? Does it represent any kind of historical shift in how authors write romances, and what readers want? Or is it just a mildly interesting coincidence?

Television needs to talk to romance writers, I’m telling you. We could fix all kinds of things.

The past two weeks, I’ve been watching Chopping Block, the NBC attempt to replicated the success of Top Chef, one of Bravo’s star shows. I am absolutely their target audience: I’ve never missed an episode of Top Chef, and I trail Anthony Bourdain around the world, watching him eat pig and innards of various creatures, even though I would not—not even if you paid me and gave me my own TV platform—eat innards of any kind. I read foodie blogs and chef biographies and could probably come up with the names of at least a handful of the most influential chefs around the country. And, like half the rest of the world, I secretly believe that I could be a chef if given the right opportunities.

Here I am, prime audience material. Reality TV junkie. Foodie. Top Chef addict.

Chopping Block is not working for me.

Because I am a writer, I know exactly why it’s not working. It’s slick and clever and appears to have all the right elements: high stakes, New York City setting, great production values. But they forgot that it’s not ever really about food or the restaurant business. It’s about the people, food philosophies, the narrative line, the utterly individual, eccentric, singular stories.

We always want a story. A hippie girl who wandered to France and fell in love with fresh produce and came back to San Francisco and started a restaurant with her hippie values and started the local and fresh food movement (Alice Waters) with her famous Chez Panisse. It’s a story about a tough-talking ex-druggie New Yorker who smokes and drinks and tenderly falls in love with culture after culture on his travel show (Anthony Bourdain).

It’s also the story of the food philosophy, which is the story of the food itself. The still damp tomatoes landing on a butcher block counter in Waters’ kitchen; the roast suckling pig in a Vietnamese restaurant that will make Bourdain’s eyes moist. It’s Marcel’s molecular gastronomy and weird hair one season on Top Chef, and Jeff’s ten dozen layers of everything this year.

Marco Pierre White is a great character in his way—that wild hair and English accent and knowledge of food, but we only see him sitting in a chair pontificating or sneering at the poor chefs who would do anything to please him. Top Chef’s Colicchio has a geniality that makes us think he really wants every single chef in those kitchens to succeed beyond their wildest dreams. He can be very critical and harsh, but we expect that. We know that he knows great food and we can trust him to tell us what it is.

In comparison, Chopping Block seems mean-spirited. In one brief segment, White stirs together fresh simple ingredients to make a stunning meal, and the show shimmered with a little bit of life. We saw his passion for food, his philosophy, and we saw the ease of a great chef handling food. We’re not seeing much of that. Most of us don’t care about the front of the house, the decoration or the service angle. We want food, baby. The history, the flavors, the story of it. We aren’t seeing enough of the cooks to understand what their stories are and why we would root for them. We’re not seeing their particular food philosophies. The show is all slick production values and high stakes, but in the end, they don’t get the story angle.

This same power of story and character is what creates and kills entire subgenres in romance. How many people picked up Scottish historicals because they first read OUTLANDER? How many vampire slayers were born of Buffy? How many vampire YA novels are earnestly attempting to tap into TWILIGHT passion? Imitation is the sincerest from of flattery, but we all know a bloodless franchise when we see one. This one doesn’t work. I’m sure you can think of others.

How do you feel when an imitation falls so far short? Can you think of other examples? Are you a foodie television person? Do you agree with me that it’s all about the story?

All of us who are writers (and of course other professions as well) have to juggle all the balls of our life in the air while walking on the tightrope of . .. gee, I was going to say sanity. That seems a little intense, but you know what I’m talking about.

It really hit home for me this week when I took two days off of reading email to finish a book that was due this week. (Well, let’s be honest it was due a long time ago, but I had promised it “no later than”, you know.) For the first half of my writing career, I was never late with a deadline. I balanced the writing, with parenting of small children, exercising, dealing with a husband, and keeping the house and staying in touch with friends and family.

Now, my children are grown, I’m single, I have fewer deadlines, both of my parents who suffered with horrible long-term illnesses are gone, but the rush is even more stressful. I still do housework (even with the every other week cleaning lady), I have public appearances, I write much larger and more complicated stories, I do a lot of promotion and I have an active social life. And truth to tell, my mother recently passed away, so her care was a part of my excuse for the lateness of my last book. But the point is, I should have less to do other than write, and I am still late.

I think that will change. I should be done with the next book ahead of schedule, but I’ve thought so before. And I do think that a book is a lot more than putting words on paper; there are times when it’s absolutely essential to slow down, walk, drive or talk to a friend, even watch some television or (my favorite) take a shower, and the knot in the book will unwind, but still I shouldn’t be late.

So, here’s a question–how about email? I have so much email I have trouble wading through it. And it seems I’m constantly on the Internet; if not for correspondence then for research (Is it GREAT or what?) and/or social networking. It takes up a huge chunk of my time.

Anyway, the point is, that I thought by now, I’d know how to balance my life so that I wouldn’t stress out, but I have a sneaking suspicion that stress is what propels my muse… is that sick or what?