JUNE! Already! IWSG Posting

 

IWSG WEBSITE

I am happy! Amidst preparing for travel, amidst life and it's good and bad challenges, I have made time to write! I'm coming back into it gently, trying not to judge and enjoy the feeling of what I have inside me and on "paper". Whew, I am thankful for finding again a love of the story. Writing is not an easy trek and can be so incredibly frustrating. Yet the high when the writing comes is like nectar, making the drinker want to taste more. So this post will be short because I want to go write other things. I just wanted to share this with those who understand. Sometimes something happens and something clicks and a burden is lifted. This happened to me. Thank you H.C. for being that something.

Courtesy of BBC

The awesome co-hosts for the June 5 posting of the IWSG are 

Liza at Middle Passages, Shannon Lawrence, Melissa Maygrove, and Olga Godim!

PLEASE GO VISIT AND THANK THEM FOR CO-HOSTING THIS MONTH!

April Showering Me With Kindness & ISWG

 

IWSG

Our "X" Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG

Please visit our co-hosts this lovely month of April: 

Janet Alcorn, T. Powell Coltrin, Natalie Aguirre, AND  Pat Garcia!

I'm starting out my post this month with the IWSG information because I love how important it is for me to be a part of this blogging community. I don't post as much as I should, but I love being here and how it keeps me humble, and keeps me tuned in to the "writing internet crowd." And even though I've been sent to the back of the line twice (!), I'm still hanging in here. My answer to this month's question is...

How long have I been blogging (Or Twitter, Instagram or Facebook)? What do I like about it and what has changed? 

I've been blogging since at least 2011. SOOOOO much has changed since I started and I find it a mixed bag. I gave up on Wordpress, because it wasn't the right fit for my brain. If I had someone else blogging for me I'd us it, but it was too much of a pain back then and I haven't tried it again in a very long time. I'm no longer on X/Twitter at all. I just can't do it. Instagram and FB are where I usually spend my time when doing social media. Even they are getting on my nerves. Not so much FB because I really keep up there with the special people in my life that I can't see every day. I pay no attention to anything else. Instagram never lets me just see the people I follow. If it did that, however, I'd be on it toooo much so maybe that's a good thing! Once I get back into marketing my novels I'll do a lot more on those platforms, and possibly TicToc but for now, I'm happy doing what I'm doing. How about you?

We recently got our little furbaby groomed for the first time. Not just bathed, but a whole new haircut and he looks like a new dog! Never seen him this way before and I like it. I liked the way he was with his long hair as well, but it was getting to be a real mess to deal with. What do you think? Like the new cut? The old? I like them both!

I have decided to enter one of my unpublished (but edited professionally) novels in a contest. Wish me luck? I'm very nervous about this because it's the first in a trilogy and if it doesn't go well...? I'm terrified!

Before...

After! We didn't want his face changed much, so I think she did a good job.

Autumn in October Begins The Nestling In... IWSG

 

IWSG

I started this post and never finished it, till today that is, so I'm technically not late! Yay me. I'm finally home for what looks to be many months in a row! So, what is my excuse for not writing? I don't have one, not even a little one. So, I'm thinking of taking on NaNo this year. I've done it before and done wonders with it so I think that is a challenge I will take on, which will, at the same time, take on the challenge of procrastination. I'm ready to take on both. Ready to get this WIP in line, finish it and congratulate myself. Okay, all big talk, but seriously, haven't you been here before? Knowing you can DO this and just...not?

I'm tired of not liking myself for not doing what I know I can do. I'm starting this month to get ready for next. Writing two things I've committed to; a story for a friend and a recounting of a trip to Maine I took this year with another dear friend. My schedule is full and now all I have to do is DO IT. Wish me luck?

Please go and visit our delicious IWSG co-hosts this month 

and thank them for all they do for us!

Natalie Aguirre, Kim Lajevardi, Debs Carey, Gwen Gardner, Patricia Josephine, Rebecca Douglass!

Taken while walking the hills of Western North Carolina

So...September Already? IWSG

IWSG

How is it possible for time to flow so swiftly? I can't believe it's already September, though, I'm very happy with the weather we've had. Not like some areas of our world where the heat is so extreme and lives are threatened every day.

The question for this month I answered last month, so will say instead that I'm so very proud to be a part of this group. I really appreciate all of the writers/artists here on IWSG, and love how diverse we all are. 

I've started reading again. I don't know why, but during Covid, I couldn't read. I stopped reading and wondered if it was just part of growing older. But, I'm not THAT old, and I'm back reading again, so perhaps it was a coping mechanism? I did so many other things, including crocheting and learning to knit. I practically lived in my garden...

I know lately I'm not the best at visiting or answering, and I'm sorry. I am slowly getting my butt back on the ball (literally! On an exercise ball) to spend more time here. To spend more time developing the stories I have lined up, waiting impatiently to be put on "paper." Husband is going in for second knee surgery so will have much time staying at home this fall. 

Thank you all for being a part of this community, for your support over the years, and for being who you are, wherever you are.

Please visit our wonderful co-hosts this month:

Sonia Dogra, J Lenni Dorner, Pat Garcia, Sarah - The Faux Fountain Pen, and  Meka James!

Ready to go see Barbie, pink as we can be! Saw Oppenheimer as well, both worth seeing IMO...

June! OMG it's June IWSG Already!

I'm so glad to realize that I've only missed IWSG by one day. Last year, I missed so many that I got relegated to the end of the line on the sign up, after at least 6 year or so of not missing any. Be that as it may, I'm not at all upset to be able to say I actually have been writing after a hiatus of over a year not writing. It finally feels good to be writing, to be reading, to be ready to take on the monster of my fear and disinterest. Have you gone through this? I know there are words for writer's block, but that is different I think from what I've gone through the last year and a half. In all my adult life, ever since I was an adolescent I've read. I've never, in my memory not read. But during Covid, and since I realized I was trying to write for money, I've stopped readying novels. I decided to try again and started with a novel called "The Rose Code," by Kate Quinn. What a great way to get back into reading! What a wonderful novel to find and discover my love of reading with. I highly recommend it, especially if you're a history buff. I've been interested in the "Ultra" story of WWII for a long time, Bletchley Park and all that. This story makes it so much more real and interesting to me. 

Then I read "Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret" by Craig Brown. I don't recommend it. Because, perhaps it's my being female, but I found it "sensational" and not at all complimentary to the Princess. It's hard to understand her point of view, especially when written about like this, but I came away feeling that she was very misunderstood and maligned and generally not looked upon with any sympathetic eye. I felt sorry for her. I felt that there was no way, in that time, for her to have won at all. Talk about the "Spare Heir". I think she and Prince Harry would have had great conversations.

Then I went on to read "All The Missing Girls" by Megan Miranda. So, after a drought of reading, I'm on a roll! This also, is another book I would hesitate to recommend. I felt disturbed when I finished. Mainly, I believe, because it perhaps hits too close to home in that we are all human and who are we to judge others when we haven't lived their lives? When we don't "know" anyone's full story? 

Anyway, now I'm on to another, and I'm on chapter 4 of my WIP. I feel that the judging I'm doing for the contest I've agreed to judge for is really helping me get my "writing" grove back on. I feel so blessed to have these opportunities, to judge, to read, to write. For now, though I feel insecure about being "good enough", I do feel blessed to be where I am. Perhaps this is a new beginning for me? Who knows? I'm just very glad to be where I am right now.

Sorry to have rambled so long! Enjoy June and the beginning of summer! 

Please visit our amazing co-hosts for this month, 

Patrcia Josephine, Diedre Knight, Olga Godim, J. Lenni Dorner, and Cathrina Constantine!

Some love from my garden...

The Heat Did Not Wait For August

 

 IWSG

So, today's post is a bit different, and yet pertains to all artists of any medium and their struggles. I recently read the actress Viola Davis' memoir "Finding Me." She dives right in and gives raw, passionate, desperate descriptions of the life she has led. I felt uncomfortable in the first few chapters, but each time I thought to put the book down, I picked it back up and did what she wanted me to do. I dived in and swam right along with her. Her story is of course courageous, loving, and again, raw. Her life is not sugar coated and her story all the more touching for her honesty. What amazed and inspired me was this painful honesty and her true, deep modesty. She inspires the true meaning of freedom and the responsibility for that freedom, hard-earned and well deserved. She was born into the same country I was, but her story is vastly different from mine. She took responsibility at an early age to be the best that she could be in a world that stood against her. She also presents a lesson to me as a writer that goes very well with the question of the month in August. "...do you try to be original, or do you write what readers want to read?" Viola Davis' story is this question: Do you be original or give what you think your audience wants? "Finding Me," her answer to that question, is a compassionate, sharp, no nonsense read.

  

August 3 question: When you set out to write a story, do you try to be original or do you try to give readers what (you think) they want?

I start out writing what I want to write. Once I get the first draft down and am revising, I often change things that little voices in my head (and not the ones I should be listening to, as in, my characters) tell me will make readers like it better. Then I have to go back and weed some of those nasties out and go for what my characters tell me they want/need to do as best I can. This little balancing game drives me mad. Reading Viola's story has made me re-think what I'm going to do next...

Please visit our IWSG co-hosts this month and thank them for helping out!

Loni Townsend, https://www.lonitownsend.com/

Lee Lowery, http://leelowery.com

Tara Tyler, http://taratylertalks.blogspot.com/

And Me!

Hello December 2021! Hello IWSG!

 

Good morning Everyone! The beginning of the end of this year is today and what a way for this year to go out. At least we had (well, my family did) a more or less "normal" Thanksgiving, especially compared to last year. A new variant on the horizon is putting to bed the idea we can look forward to a new year without Covid, but, oh well. If this doesn't prove how "global" our world/economy/society is, I don't know what else can!

I am going into December with the mindset that I can finish this year with the love that I went into it with. For my family. For my friends. For my little lovey dog, and those in this world who make it such a bright place to be, even in the midst of chaos. I wish for all of you to have this brightness in your lives and outlooks on our world as well. May kindness, generosity, love and peaceful happiness be yours in these last days of 2021. May they overflow into the new year coming and continue on as long as possible.

I am grateful also to this community of writers who keep coming back, and keep supporting each other. I love being a part of IWSG even if I don't blog as much as I want. I am looking at next year as one of change and my writing will be a part of that change. More on that next year! I just wanted to acknowledge Alex, and all the wonderful folks/writers who make this blog hop possible for us to participate in. You all rock the writing world! 

Please visit our co-hosts this month and thank them for being such a wonderful part of our community:

PJ Colando, Diane Burton, Louise – Fundy Blue, Natalie Aguirre, and Jacqui Murray!

Question of the month is: What about writing stresses you, and what delights?

Thinking I have to make money with my writing stresses me. 

Not being able to put into words on paper what is in my head stresses me. 

Not being "good enough" stresses me.

Finding the mind link with the protagonist (s) in the story delights me! 

Writing a sentence and it comes out exactly as I hoped it would delights me! 

Finishing a novel delights me! 

Working with my graphic artist, formatter and editor delights me! 

So in the end, it's all good!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO EACH AND ALL OF YOU

April Pulling Back The Curtain On Winter IWSG

IWSG

What more can we ask of April than the beauty we are beginning to see? We have pink trees, white trees, yellow daffodils, purple/white/yellow crocus's, and new green is shading everything. Lovely. Now children can play outside with gleeful abandon and teachers can get a much needed boost from watching and listening to their laughter, well at least most of the time. Another year is beginning with Covid, yet, if everyone will behave, we might actually have more of a "normal" life either by summer or (please) at least by fall. I feel hope again. Since I had my second vaccine (Pfizer) a mantel of fear has lifted from my burdened shoulders. Seriously. I don't really care if someone doesn't "believe" in Covid or the necessity of the vaccine or masks. What I care about is the burden on me is gone. I cried when my parents were vaccinated and I realized I had been SO worried about them dying from Covid. Yes, I know their time will come, as will mine, but at least not yet, not from this. I don't have much to convey on the writing front at the moment. Next month I will!

Please visit our wonderful co-hosts this month and thank them!

PK Hrezo, Pat Garcia, SE White, Lisa Buie Collard, Diane Burton!

IWSG optional monthly question is: 

Are you a risk taker when writing? Do you try something radical, different in style/POV/etc. or add controversial topics to your work?

I see this as two questions and both I would answer yes. I feel I risk whenever I put something in a book someone might read and ask themselves, "Did that happen to this author? Is this a "memoir moment?" and so feel I am a risk taker. I imagine Oprah (yes, dream big, right?!), posing the question, "What made you write about this? Has it happened to you personally?"

The second part of the question is risking to a point but perhaps not as much as someone else might. I have a novel in mind that I have not written yet because for me it would be huge to put it out for other people to read. So I will wait and see what happens. In my novels I've written about abuse, murder, greed, love, killing sadness, lies that break families apart, all things that can be considered risky depending on how you deal with them.

Happy Easter! Happy spring! Enjoy today, it's the only one you have right NOW!

IWSG March In With Sunshine!

 

Though we have had some wind, March has not come in with a "roar" as it does sometimes. We are so lucky right now that we have SUN for the next 7 or 8 days! After so many cloudy/snowy/rainy days, the relief is as deep as my need for Vit D (which I do take in supplement form but sun is so much more fun).

IWSG is what keeps me writing on the internet these days, as I am in revision mode on a WIP. 

Our Twitter Handle is @theIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG

Please go visit our wonderful co-hosts this month and thank them for helping out.

                                    Sarah - The Faux Fountain Pen, Jacqui Murray, Chemist Ken, 

Victoria Marie Lees, Natalie Aguirre, JQ Rose!

I wanted to share a recent epiphany with you. For years I have fought with myself, blamed myself, felt guilty, and generally negative about a certain aspect of writing. This aspect, I felt, meant I wasn't a "real" writer. So, I have kept it to myself and struggled with it. I realized this past Sunday, in a "family meeting" my son asked to have to talk about things together, that I finally had a safe place to discuss this aspect of writing that I have so struggled with. I said the words out loud, over and over and acknowledged them, and gave voice to them, and owned them, and wow, the feeling was overwhelming and positive, like I no longer drowned in the negative, but had found a way to burst the surface and breath clean, life-giving air. Here are the words:

I hate to go and write. I hate to make myself go and write. I hate the thought of having to go and write. I literally HATE that part of writing. 

Once I breathed this into the air a strange uplifting feeling came and I smiled, I laughed (at myself) and realized I had found a small freedom that now allows me to go ahead and hate making myself write, which in turn allows me to do just that. Make myself write, without guilt, without shame or blame.  You see, once I'm here in front of my screen and reading and writing and putting the pieces of the puzzle that is my wip in place, I LOVE writing. I love being here. I love the storytelling.

I am not a "wordsmith." I am not someone who loves everything having to do with writing. And I don't have to be. I just have to be the writer I am. I am a storyteller and that is the kind of writer I love to be. Do you love every aspect of writing, if you write?

Happy Spring Everyone. 

February Comes With A Heart And A Recipe In Honor Of Josephine Wake

February has come in cold and white, which doesn't bother me since I don't have to go out in it too much (picture me saying: COVID). Yesterday I did a snow angel for the first time in years, and today it's disappeared under a new layer of snow.

Like my current work in progress I feel I'm finding layers that were hidden from me before. I wrote the original first version of this wip YEARS ago, and lost it (computer got wiped and I cried like a baby).

So I am going from a previous copy leading up to the original first version and already in the first three chapters my heroine has decided what I wrote before is not correct. She is much more tomboy in this one. I love meeting her this way. This is historical fiction, so I have room to work but also a structure I must follow. I like the challenge. I like my heroine. I like progress is happening.

I feel this novel will be all the better for me having waited to really meet this woman. Have you had that happen? Your character tells you what to do, or tries to work with you instead of making you go it alone?

Yeah, it's great, isn't it? Have a wonderful February.

In honor of our dear friend Jo, 

here is a recipe for quick and easy 

Pimento Cheese 

 my mother Sue Miller gave me.

Ingredients: 2 bags shredded sharp cheddar cheese, 1/2 a block of cream cheese, warm/room temperature, 1 jar (12 oz) pimentos (roasted red peppers), mayo to taste (I like about 1 tablespoon. If you like yours a bit spicy, add your favorite hot sauce or some diced chili peppers.

What to do: Cut up pimentos into small pieces. Mix everything together. You'll see why you want everything room temperature when you do. You can eat right away or let sit over night to marry the flavors.

February 3 question for IWSG - Blogging is often more than just sharing stories. It’s often the start of special friendships and relationships. Have you made any friends through the blogosphere?

Yes I have and I am so very grateful. I have been a part of a group for almost seven years now that I found from the IWSG/ABC Blogging Challenge (in April) and through all our ups and downs, we are still going. We've lost a few along the way, Jo is one of them, but we still hold them in our hearts. 

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG

The awesome co-hosts for the February 3 posting of the IWSG are 

Louise - Fundy Blue , Jennifer Lane, Mary Aalgaard, Patsy Collins at Womagwriter,

and Nancy Gideon! Please go visit them and thank them for co-hosting today!

PS

I hate the changes blogger has made to posting here. I can't figure anything out that before was so easy to do. So pardon my unprofessional looking blog posts for now. I am still working out the roaches. Yes, these aren't just bugs to me, but roaches. Yuck.

baby image from: https://babygooroo.com/articles/decoding-your-babys-cry

January 2021, Jo Wake, IWSG, Rain, Whew!

 

 

On February 6 (the next IWSG posting), we would like all who want to participate to share a recipe that brings warm memories of friendship and love in honor of our blogger friend Josephine “Jo” Wake who passed away December 16, 2020. She was a dear friend, full of spunk and she wrote a blog:

JO WAKE about FOOD, Life and a Scent of Chocolate. 

I had the honor of meeting her and her husband Matt in 2019 and it was a great joy.  We spent three days with them in Canada. I miss her already.

The link to the Linky link is here...              HONORING JO WAKE RECIPE LIST

The awesome co-hosts for the January 6th posting of the IWSG are

 Ronel Janse van Vuuren , J Lenni Dorner, Gwen Gardner Sandra Cox, 

and Louise - Fundy Blue! 

Please go and visit their blogs and thank them for all their hard work! Also, visit the IWSG website and sign up, if you'd like. We are a great bunch of folks who do our best to help support others like us... meaning Insecure and yet Happy to write, even when we're not! There is a question every month to answer if you'd like. This month I'm not as I already have sooo much to write about.

So, in this "new" version of blogger, I can't seem to fix when this posted, so it's two days early. But oh well. That much longer to read it I guess. I also wanted to post about my newest work that is no longer in progress, but done, finished, out, and not just in ebook form. The new soft cover is ready for your buying/reading pleasure. I do hope you enjoy it/get something from it. For me the road has been long slogging my way through doubts, physically making myself write especially when I felt I was over being a writer, and some long talks with myself. These characters, these folks in this novel wouldn't leave me alone. Nor would my family, especially my husband and my mother. So I thank them, and all those who supported me, pushed me gently, and read it for me and gave me feedback. This book has finally blossomed into the life it was meant to live. 

                                     AVAILABLE ON AMAZON NOW IN SOFT COVER

The past is not an easy force to be reckoned with. 

 

For Annalyn and Jack heartache is unexpected. After a whirlwind romance and marriage, a shattering secret tears them apart. Desperate to escape, each embark upon separate journeys to try and heal, to rebuild faith in life with new loves. But moving forward, they discover that rebuilding their futures depends upon coming to terms with their past. Will facing the truth allow them to find, and accept, the love and healing they each so desperately need, or will the secret continue to break lives—and hearts—apart?

AVAILABLE ON AMAZON NOW IN SOFT COVER

December 2020 Finally! & IWSG

 

IWSG WEBSITE

I am so darn happy December is here! (and not only for the snow!) I'm sorry I missed last month's post, and almost missed this one, but in November I was depressed, and, today is my son's birthday!

I feel a lot better this month. Last month I think because of Thanksgiving, I felt the absence of my family too keenly and couldn't write about it. We all made it through and for that I am more than grateful. I still miss the you-know-what out of my parents though. This is a looooong time to go without hugging/touching/seeing them. But I won't jeopardize them just because I miss them.

My son has been living with us all year because of a medical issue. He can't work and is not only in constant pain, but also depressed because of it. Finally, we are seeing light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak. It will take more time and more physical therapy for him to get back to his former self, but it IS working! I/we have much to be grateful for. So, December has not come too soon for me. 

The young lad with his snowman "Churchill!"

The other wonderful piece of news is that my book cover should be finished soon. The edits are finished. The formatting is happening as I write, and hopefully my next novel, "Rain" will be out before Christmas! (Hint, it would make a great present!) Shameless I am. But not about being happy! For the first time in a while, I do genuinely feel happy and hopeful for not only my future, but for our nation's future as well. The Covid vaccine should (hopefully) go a long way toward helping us all heal.

So I am not feeling too insecure today, even if I'm late to post. I feel optimistic and full of love for the world, and especially my son. He is a light in my life and has been since the day he was born 34 years ago. Though I'm sorry for the reason he is with us, I am not sorry he's here! I wish you all the best of the holidays, a Merry Christmas, whatever it is that you celebrate. I also wish us all the best in the new year to come. May we all be able to move on to a life that even though Covid will still be here, hopefully the new year will give us a chance to learn to live with it without fear. Blessings to you.

And before you stop reading, please stop by our wonderful co-hosts this month and thank them for being there for us! 

Pat Garcia, Sylvia Ney,Liesbet @ Roaming About Cathrina Constantine, and Natalie Aguirre!

October and The Air is Sweet IWSG

 

Click on image for IWSG Site

Have you heard of the singer Jackson Browne? 

He sang a song when I was younger called "Running On Empty". 

That is how I feel today, as I send my thoughts out into this crazy sad changing world. I mean, I know the world is always in a state of flux. The world is not stagnate and that is a good thing. The changes happening right now however, feel more threatening than changes I've lived through before. I am concerned for my children, for whether they will even have their own children and that if they do, what will their lives be like? Not like mine, that is for sure. I understand people reminiscing for the "good ole days" now. For me, that is BC... Before Covid. I've been doing well I thought until now. I've been very busy finishing a novel, moving, creating a new garden/yard, building shelves, building a gardening shed, taking care of our son. Busy. And happy to feel blessed to be able to do all these things. Now I see autumn and the colors starting to appear outside and I know this part of my life is done. I put my lawn "to bed" yesterday, mowed and weeded for the last time till spring, and I felt like a chapter closed in the book of my life. What will winter bring with people having to stay indoors more than they had to during the summer? Will our country smarten up and make more of an effort to end this devastating virus in a united front? Will the ones who refuse to wear masks for others finally realize that we need to stick together on this? That we can beat it, or at least slow it down if we just do basic steps to help? I feel the only blessing is that the majority of the time when the virus hits, it does it gently, that the majority of people do not die or have horrible consequences. That is indeed a blessing I am thankful for. Still doesn't mean I want to get it!

Anyway, I'll stop now and think about the breeze carrying autumn that blew over my face yesterday while I worked outside. I'll think about the love of my family, and my friends. I will listen to a favorite song that seems to speak to my soul no matter where I am every time the seasons move from winter to spring or summer to fall, "The Southland In The Springtime". I wish you all peace, health and happiness...

The wonderful co-hosts of the IWSG this month of October are....

Jemima Pett, Beth Camp,Beverly Stowe McClure, and Gwen Gardner!

Please go visit their websites and thank them for being here for us all!

March Is Marching In IWSG

IWSG WEBSITE

Today I wanted to share a friend's newest release with you, so will do so after my IWSG post, which is short this month! I know you're happy to hear that.
Writing is making a slow come back for me, but it IS happening. The journey with these characters is coming to fruition, and whew, I am glad. Makes me almost get excited about covers and formatting and such, the next steps...

On to March's question of the month:
Other than the obvious holiday traditions, have you every included any personal or family traditions/customs in your stories?
Yes, yes I have. Growing up we never had only one type of cereal in the house because, and I don't know how it started, but we always mixed our cereals. One was just so boring! So I used this in one of my novels, that hasn't come out yet, but I did use it!

Sneek peek...!

Our amazing IWSG co-hosts this month, besides me, are:

Shannon Lawrence  http://thewarriormuse.blogspot.com/

Sarah Foster http://thefauxfountainpen.blogspot.com/

Natalie Aquirre http://www.literaryrambles.com/

Jacqui Murray https://worddreams.wordpress.com/

Please go by their blogs and thank them for co-hosting this month!!!

Facebook/ Blog/ Website

On to the most exciting news! Elizabeth is a multi-published author of books for people who are believers in happily-ever- after, true love, and stories with a bit of fun and twists with their plots. The mother of four young men, she tackles laundry daily and is the keeper of the kitchen. She lives along the shores of the Ohio River in West Virginia, but dreams daily of the beach. Here is her latest achievement and newest release...

It's about...

Hayden Matthews isn’t looking for love—she’s trying to get as far from it as possible. She's already wasted eight years in a failed marriage and is ready for a good life. A peaceful life. One where she can raise her daughter to be strong, independent, and happy. But to make that happen, she must fix her own life first.

Cam Vorelli has loved Hayden since he was in grade school. Always in the friend-zone, he stood on the sidelines, his heart breaking, as she said I do to the wrong man. A man he knew didn’t deserve her, who could never love her as he did. But what could he say? She was marrying into his family. Cam would never break a holy vow much less be disloyal to his kin.

Until he sees the bruises on Hayden. Abuse is a game changer.

Leaving a husband like Tag, who has a hot temper, a badge, and a gun is tricky. When Hayden calls Cam for help, she isn’t trying to lure him into any romantic webs. She needs someone she can trust and knowing her soon-to-be ex fears his former NFL cousin is a bonus.

When Cam comes to her rescue, he isn’t doing it to win her love. He does it because it’s the right thing to do. But if she starts to feel the same for him…couldn’t it be fate?

Kobo: FREE

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/about-us-a-second-chance-novel

Smashwords FREE

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1004700

Amazon: FREE 

https://tinyurl.com/u6xcrob

This is a "heart" novel, one of hope; one that speaks to all of us and shows the worst as well as the best of who we can be.

IWSG December - Baby It's Cold Outside!

IWSG

This Christmas we are staying in Ohio. It will be a "small" Christmas, one without the large, loving, boisterous family we usually spend it with. I am sad about that, but also happy to think of having a "small" Christmas. One with my husband and I, and perhaps our daughter (who lives close by, but might be busy); one where we share time with each other and maybe dream about the time to come next year when our life will change again. School for my husband will be over, and we will move on to wherever it is we are to be next. We have options! This is good! So this Christmas will be a quiet reflective and cosy gentle time before the big push through the last semester. I hope and wish all of you whatever you wish for this season and that next year will bring good things to you. Merry Everything!

December 4th (optional) question is:
Let's play a game. Imagine. Role-play. How would you describe your future writer self, your life and what it looks and feels like if you were living the dream? Or if you are already there, what does it look and feel like? Tell the rest of us. What would you change or improve?

Okay, first, I would add to the question by asking: Is living the dream what you thought it would be?

Now, imagining if I were living the dream...
My life is moving faster than I thought possible, and I am providing not only so my husband doesn't HAVE to work, but I've paid my children's student debt off and they are free! My daughter now works for me marketing me full time and is happy to schedule her life as she needs to. My husband teaches because he loves it, which is a bonus for us. My son is moving up the ladder in his chosen field and writing/singing when he wants, selling his songs and making his living doing what he loves. Enabling all this, I am busy writing, giving my stories wings and loving having a full life.  

Our wonderful co-hosts for December 4th are:

   Tonja Drecker,

Beverly Stowe McClure,

 Nicki Elson,
Fundy Blue,
Tyrean Martinson! 

Please go by their blogs and thank them!

Please visit these websites below for more information on helping our planet, and therefore helping ourselves to not self destruct..

Images from:

https://evoke.ie/2019/01/01/life-style/these-are-the-5-most-significant-ways-you-can-save-the-planet-in-2019

https://www.kafetero.com/post/fun-ways-to-save-the-planet

https://pngtree.com/freepng/save-the-world-globe-and-hands-doodle-earth-icon-hand-drawn-on-white-background_5009285.html