My Two Blessings

I positively adore Julie Lessman and her O'Connor saga which began in the Daughters of Boston series and ended in the Winds of Change series.  So I was delighted when she announced she is self publishing her  latest story  A Light in the Window which is the prequel love story of Marceline and Patrick.  It will be released in Ebook format and available November 9th.  It is currently available for pre-order on Amazon.com. Synopsis:  One Woman. Two Men. One stirs her pulse and the other her faith. But who will win her heart? Marceline Murphy is a gentle beauty with a well-founded aversion to rogues. But when two of Boston's most notorious pursue her, she encounters a tug-of-war of the heart she isn’t expecting. Sam O’Rourke is the childhood hero she’s pined for, the brother of her best friend and a member of the large, boisterous family to which she longs to be a part. So when his best friend Patrick O’Connor joins in pursuit of her affectio...

“Hey Hunter, time to do the meet and greet thing.” “Okay, come on down into the galley. Watch the hatch lid. Don’t want to hit your head again.” “Yes sir. Something smells delicious and looks like you’ve made enough for an army. I didn’t know you even cooked.” “Learned at the feet of Uncle Grey. Frittatta’s. Want any?” “Yes, please. Who is Uncle Grey?” “Grey Lee, owner of the Blue Steel. He’s not my real uncle. My grandmother lived in the neighborhood and took me in after my parents died. I was eight. His kids, Connor and Danny, we all hung together. He called us the 3 musketeers. Whenever we went into the grill, he’d put us to work. Cleaning, food prep, busing tables. If you wanted to eat, you had to work for it. He sort of adopted me or maybe I adopted them. We served together, Connor, Danny and I.” “What branch of the military?” “Marines. Special forces reconnaissance. I moved on to the FBI, Connor became a doctor and Danny just retired. He’s c...

Ah life!  You would have thought with hubby out of town for three days doing the Audio Engineering Society  convention thing, I would have a lot of times on my hands and get a lot of things done.  Especially for Nanowrimo .  Don't know what happened to the time. Friday after lessons,  James and I went to the fabric store to pick up material for his Dr. Eggman costume, then we went to the shop to do payroll.  Saturday we went to Target for more things for his costume, then on to the grocery store.  Today I spent several hours working on his costume and I'm converting this (the jacket) To this: I'm 75% done with a whole lot of encouragement from my son to "keep going mom."  I'm done for the day, lessons have been planned for the week, dinner and cleanup is done and I'm ready to fade for the day.   Now ask me if I got any planning done for my nanowrimo story.   Kind of, sort of, not really.   I'm feeling ill ...

Light bulb moments!  You spend hours doing something then realize it's not what you wanted in the first place.  Wasted time this week fooling around with changing the blog domain over to my name, designing the blog and never being completely satisfied.  Then realized I was totally happy with my My Two Blessings and will hold the other domain in reserve for when ready for my actual author site.     Also spent 2 to 3 hours going through model sites trying to find a picture of Hunter's mystery woman. (The one I found originally and mentioned in an earlier post - wasn't the right one)  Then it hit me.... Hunter doesn't know for sure what she looks like and because of that I don't know for sure and her full identify will be revealed through the story.  Sometimes procrastination leads you through a lot of worm holes.   In the midst of planning Green Cross, my F2K class this week is all about creating conflict between your antagonist ...

Happy 59th Anniversary  Mom and Dad I've been very blessed to have you as my parents and you have set the bar and showed us  through example what commitment and love mean.  Thank you.  Blessed Union   Very rarely, God chooses two extraordinary people, bonding them in marriage, a unique, blessed union, a golden couple who shine like a beacon of hope for the rest of us— hope that we can learn to glow as they do, with intelligence, good character, strength and love. We feel privileged to know you. Happy Anniversary For us, you are truly heaven sent.   By Joanna Fuchs

Brainstorming away here for Green Cross and in midst of it, getting insight into scenes to edit for Blue Steel .  Changed the name since I have a theme going here with Red Thief and Blue Steel . Green Cross sounds more interesting, than Ice, since it isn't going to be about diamonds but nanotechnology and deceit.  Don't you think?    My goals this week will be to interview Hunter, write his backstory and get to know him better.  Plus get a grip on other characters - my main female lead, her sister and my villains.  Also completed a bit of research on settings since story will take place in a few places.    Although reading and working through Writing Begins with the Breath , received Chris Baty's Writer's Workbook - Ready, Set, Novel ! and  will use it for brainstorming, plotting and planning.    My creative writing class is going strong and this week's task was to write the same scene from two different points of view...

I'm really enjoying the F2K creative writing course through Writer's University.  The lesson this past week was all about senses   Besides the normal  - hear, see, taste, feel and smell - Bob came up with 3 more:  Sense of Time  (a song, a place, a specific time period), Space (open room, close cove, busy street), and Unknown  (danger).  We have to come up with 8 sentences which implied and didn't include the specific sense words.   Plus one paragraph that included all the sense without saying what the sense is.   Then let your fellow classmates identify which senses you used.   Here's mine:  Exercise One She danced in the chair, her head bobbing to the beat, her fingernails tapping the scarred table top in an out of sync rhythm that struck him as discordant until he recognized the sequence. Sage’s belly tightened as her leg muscles turned to rubber when she saw who stood outside her door. The pearl whi...

Distractions and will power.  Two things I've been working on, in myself and my two guys.  Technology poses a bit distraction for all us and I'm toying with the idea of a technology free week. I need to wean myself away from the internet and  reset my brain.   Have gotten in the habit of checking emails on my iphone first thing in the morning, which of course, leads to facebook, then let's see who posted what on Well Trained Mind and then it progresses throughout the day. A few minutes here, while waiting for James to finish his math, a few minutes there while he writes his paragraph, and so on.  Which makes me feel like I'm not getting anything accomplished work wise on the web because by the evening, my brain's gone in to passive mode.  My I-phone sort of became a quick work around  the no technology until 4:00 rule.....because it's only for a minute or two (snort). I just finished reading Overcoming Writer's Block without Willpower...

Nano Nano.  Why is it every time I think of Nanowrimo I'm reminded of Mork and Mindy. *grin*  The 2012 site has been relaunched.  Be sure to check out the new forums.  I'm in the curiosity stage where anything and everything is possible.   Also just finished reading the 'curiosity' chapter in Writing Begins with the Breath and one of the touchstone exercises asked: What are you curious about? What have you learned through experience and what have your learned from books?  Notice the difference between heart/body learning and head/mind learning.  That triggered quite a few brain cells to start shooting here, there and everywhere.   My late grandmother was a great believer in brainstorming and creative thinking.  When you brainstorm, all things are possible and don't discount anything. Throw it out there on the table and see what happens.  I'm trying to keep that in mind as ideas pop up for my latest story. Herring says: ...

Today begins the fourth round of A Round of Words in 80 days .  Round 3 was a complete and utter failure for me.  The editing didn't go so well.  I got side tracked by an online critique class which ended up going nowhere when the instructor simply disappeared the last three weeks of the class and never returned.  The powers that be are still trying to figure out what to do.  And I just quit writing.  I was completely blocked and my muse took a vacation. Happy to say my muse has returned and I'm feeling more creative.  Started reading and working through Writing Begins with the Breath by Laraine Herring.  I like her perspective on being blocked. "The writing is not blocking you.  You are blocking the writing... The first step when you find yourself stuck is to become aware of what is being blocked...Can you identify some piece of the next step that contains something you might not be reading or willing to address yet?  Writing...