More Writers Tools

I hadn’t really decided what I was going to write about today when I began preparations for Tuesday’s critique evening. I had been really slow this week in getting it together to write anything coherent on my current work in progress when I realized I needed to do a little research. Along the way to finding the ultimate restaurant in the Edinburgh, Scotland area, I stumbled across a couple of great websites I thought all of you should know about.

First up is the blog for Harlequin Blaze located at http://blazeauthors.com/blog/. Here you will find items from authors, special story themes and items from the editors themselves. There are also humorous stories from the authors which had me entertained for a while. So, if you are looking to write for Blaze this is the place to be. Occasionally, they give away critiques and hold contests for a chance with an editor.

Next up is an amazing set of podcasts located at http://www.podfeed.net/podcast/Harlequin+Meet+the+Editors/13708# . I didn’t know that all the editors at Harlequin did these in order to better clarify their positions on submitting to them and acceptance by them. They are done very well and with eighteen podcasts, there is sure to be something right up your alley.

Another great site is one called Romance University at http://romanceuniversity.org/and what caught my eye here was the column about men done by a male psychologist. The first one I read was about how guys really interact with each other and women as well as how men open up to each other. After reading that column, I better understood why my DH had said to me on numerous occasions when we talked books, ‘Honey, guys really don’t act that way.’ Now I understand why. There is tons of good information on this site gals!

Next came Maggie Lawson’s website at http://www.margielawson.com/ and again, I was surprised at exactly what she had there. This woman is a NYC bestselling author yet she finds time to hold classes, puts those class notes and exercises in notes so those who can’t afford actually attending one of her workshops in person can take it like a self study type of workshop. Now some of the classes may not help me, but there is still lots of good information.

These were the best in my opinion but here’s a list of even more good websites with very brief explanations on what they are:

http://paranormalromanceblog.com/ - This is Harlequin’s Paranormal blog. Lots of interesting articles, author interviews and author ramblings.

http://www.romance-ffp.com/ - This is the official website of RWA Futuristic, Fantasy and Paranormal chapter commonly known as FF&P. Great information so join when you can.

http://translation2.paralink.com/ - This is a free translation website. Good for if you are trying to translate something. We used it for Russian to English and were pleasantly surprised.

http://www.etymonline.com/ - This is a free etymology dictionary and was given to me by another author friend. You can look up anything here. And I mean anything.

http://paranormalityuniverse.blogspot.com/ - Paranormalty is an interesting mix of authors and industry professionals again in the paranormal field but isn’t bound by one publisher.

http://fierceromance.blogspot.com/ - Fierce Romance talks about the kinky side of romance including BDSM so if you don’t know much about it, this is where you can find out.

http://www.scifiguy.ca is a very interesting review site which talks about the industry of sci-fi and sci-fi romance as well as the books themselves. You can win all sorts of freebies here.

Now, I know there are tons of good places out there to learn things but very few have been as thoroughly checked out as these have been. Goes to show you just what can happen when one is bored...LOL!

Now for the fun stuff!

Celebrate my new novel, More Than Robotics and get me on the best seller list for September by purchasing it TODAY.

From now until mid-October I am also giving away one copy of a previously released elf book, newest to oldest, in anticipation of this year's Christmas release, An Elf's Love. The giveaway book this coming week is The Thing About Elves!!! Also, I will be giving a copy of the first book in my Orchid series, Fluke, to the first person who comments today only! And don't forget to leave me your email addy in today's comment so I can get you your book! It's another double-whammy week as you have the chance to win TWO FREE eBooks!!! One now...one later!

I know you’ll love both these series as much as I love writing it! Enjoy getting ready for Christmas AND a space ride during the month of September!

All you need to do to be entered is to just comment on my blog, The Many Shades at www.themanyshades.blogspot.com to get into the weekly drawing. Every Wednesday is my day to post here and the contest runs from then till midnight Tuesday for the weekly portion. So come see about all the wonderful promotion opportunities I'm offer fellow authors AND the planned giveaways for all readers out there.

Hope to see you there!

Just to get you even more excited about these FREE giveaways, here's list of the previous winners! See...people really do win...and are enjoying their books right now. This could be YOU!

August Giveaway SiNn
9/2/2009 Annalisa
9/9/2009 quilting reader
9/16/2009 Susan [garysue@dejazzd.com]
9/23/2009 Laura Beck
9/29/2009 Gwynlyn MacKenzie

Thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you all next week!

Lynn