Okay, the “baby” baby is going to turn 2 next month, but the first-born is 4. Hard to believe she’s so grown up already. And doing things like building herself a website. (Her dad helped.) She built a “snowman” a few weeks ago with tupperware, and then informed me that it was an abominable snowman. Who says “Namaste”.

Her teachers are not going to know what to do with her. Half the time we don’t know what to do with her, but we’re trying to give her the tools to let her develop her imagination and give her room to grow.

Go see what the Ja(y)nes, Sybil, and all committed romance bloggers have done! Romantic Advances. Building the TBR mountain one book at a time. Explanation at Dear Author.

Earth Girls Aren’t Easy will release Aug. 29! Ebook ISBN 9781419912313. Every summer reader needs a little campy space opera with hot sex! Now I can look forward to doing the new cover art happy dance.

Happy Memorial day. Remember your vets, those still with us and those with us only in the lasting impact of their actions.

We saw a golden eagle in addition to the family of bald eagles on our morning walk, impressive symbols of freedom all. (Since we live by a river very rich in salmon, our fishing avian friends are easy to spot perching above the water.) Hoping Mr. Golden is also nesting nearby so we can look forward to more sightings.

Brenda Novak’s Juvenile Diabetes auction is still underway. You can still bid on signed print copies of The Gripping Beast and the Beginnings Anthology from yours truly, plus many more items for readers and writers alike.

Nikki Duncan enjoyed Damon so much that she created desktop wallpaper for Only Human! Thank you, Nikki. If you’d like Damon to come and inspire you, click to download.

I have to say, this is my favorite EC cover to date. Syneca did a fabulous job on the artwork!

I’ve been missing a big piece of the puzzle from FALLEN, and it was really stumping me. But I got it on Friday! Love when those breakthrough moments happen. I love when it all comes together, it’s alive, you can see the whole picture, and the story is just…THERE. What a rush! And then it just flies. I can hardly type fast enough to keep up (and I can type 120 wpm). I’ll never be a handwriter for that reason alone, I can’t handwrite with anywhere near the speed I can type. (The other reason I’ll never be a handwriter is because it takes about one page for the repetitive motion strain to cause pain. Typing is much easier on my hands, and doesn’t put me out of work the following day while I recover.)

I also have followup material from FALLEN. This wasn’t planned, but I have a subplot that’s not going to tie up in the novel, and will either spawn a novel or a novella. I’ll pitch it and see what flies. It’d be nice if a follow-up novel became St. Martin’s book #4 and I could just write them back to back without having to leave this world when I have the whole thing in my head. At the very least I’ll go from FALLEN into the proposal/pitch for the follow-up.

Which brings up the reader question, what happens if I’m told no? What about that dangling subplot? Well, I handled dangling subplot with Night Music by writing Night Rhythm and putting it up on my site as a free read. I always have that option if nothing else. (Night Rhythm is a bit too short to publish with Samhain standalone, although I suppose I can always propose that it be included with Miss Lonely Hearts as bonus material to make it more widely available.)

Anyway, sequels can get into tricky territory with contracts and so on. But as an author, we do always have the option of finishing out the story and doing something creative with it. But just because I want to write a sequel to FALLEN, and I intend to do my utmost to convince my St. Martin’s editor that it’d be a terrific idea to buy the sequel, doesn’t mean I will get a yes. Hence my thinking ahead for other options to tie off those loose threads.

I’ve written a lot of articles and essays over the years for RWA newsletters, for my RTB columns, etc. And I was thinking that I could make good use of them by republishing them here on my website one day a week, adding new material as it comes up, and then maybe compiling them into a downloadable PDF for writers. Any preference for article day? I’m leaning towards Monday since it’s the start of the business week.