Jenna Petersen | In Search of A Topic!

When the fabulous ladies of Fresh Fiction contacted me and asked if I would guest blog today, my first reaction was to be excited. We’ve all met a few times and they are, of course, lovely and fabulous and always fun to hang out with. So now I’m hanging out with them in a virtual world.

My second reaction was to freak out because I realized I had no topic. I tried to sneakily ask for a topic, but was told that I could blog about ‘anything’! Oh boy! Anything. Which means I can blog about ANYTHING and that doesn’t narrow it down at all.

So I went out in search of a topic. I went blog hopping. Yes, this was a travesty. To have to hop from interesting blog to interesting blog, reading fabulous authors’ words about a variety of topics. Yeah. Poor me, right? But as great as it was, it didn’t help me at all. A lot of authors were talking about writing, which I’m always happy to talk about (after all, I run The Passionate Pen , but Fresh Fiction is more about readers and authors coming together and I didn’t think that writing about plotting or the industry of romance would fit very well. If I’m wrong, let me know, since Jess Michaels will be blogging here later this month. And I have some ‘influence’ over her. :)

But that still leaves me in a bit of a quandary. So I thought I’d tell you a bit about my summer. It’s August already, which just blows me away. This summer has flown by the same way it used to when I was a kid between school. You remember those summers, don’t you? When you felt like before the summer was started, it was already over and you were back to school?

That’s been this summer for me. And I blame it all on Fall. You see, I have two books out this Fall. In October, I’ll have Seduction Is Forever out as Jenna Petersen. This is the final book in the Lady Spies series, so I’m extra excited and nervous about it. I have enjoyed every moment of writing this series. I started out to write something fun and exciting and I ended up falling in love with my heroines. And lusting, just a little bit, over my heroes. When that happens, it’s just one of the best things for an author. So I hope you all will enjoy the end of the series.

And if that wasn’t enough to make the next few months fly by, then in November my alter-ego, Jess Michaels, will have her very first full-length erotic historical romance, Everything Forbidden. After writing a variety of novellas since my debut “Ancient Pleasures” in Secrets, Volume 11 in 2004, this is another thing that has me jumping out of my skin with excitement and pure nerves.

Add to that travel, my birthday (which was yesterday) and getting Lasik (on Wednesday of this week) and I am plain tuckered out and wondering what I’ll do with the last fleeting days of lazy warmth and fun in the sun.

Any suggestions? And what are YOU doing for YOUR summer?

I’m giving away an advanced copy of Everything Forbidden to one lucky person who comments on the blog or asks a question today!

Jenna Petersen

Debby Giusti | Pinch me, I must be dreaming!

My second Love Inspired Suspense from Steeple Hill came out this week! Seeing SCARED TO DEATH on the shelf in my favorite bookstore is the continuation of a dream come true that started in April when my debut novel, NOWHERE TO HIDE, was first released.

If you’ve ever worked to accomplish a goal that at times seemed almost unobtainable, I bet you can relate to the elation I feel having two books in print. The path to publication can be long and winding, filled with dead ends and detours. Constructive feedback is hard to come by, yet rejection abounds. Taking an idea and developing it into a full-length manuscript demands intense effort and self-discipline.

Unfortunately, many would-be authors don’t persevere long enough to see their books in print. Because perseverance and determination are the key. Everything else can be learned.

I made it because I kept trying.

So can you. No matter what you’re hoping to achieve.

Most dreams start with a tiny spark of an idea. For a writer, the process usually begins with a “what if!”

What if a woman’s husband was murdered and the people who killed him are now after her son? If you read NOWHERE TO HIDE, you’ll recognize that storyline.

And the “what if” for SCARED TO DEATH? What if a woman answers an estranged friend’s call for help and ends up in the middle of a sinister medical scheme that’s killing people in small town Georgia?

My third book, MIA: MISSING IN ATLANTA, comes out in March. What if a returning war hero’s search for a missing girlfriend leads him into a web of corruption and exploitation that almost costs him his life?

I’m working on book four now, with book five and six in the lineup. Guess that means I’m hooked on writing stories and seeing them in print.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Right now, I need to know what you think of SCARED TO DEATH. Visit my Web site, http://www.debbygiusti.com/, or post a comment on my blog, http://www.ladiesofsuspense.blogspot.com/

I’m waiting to hear from you.

Wishing you abundant blessings and may all your dreams come true!

Debby Giusti

Back to My Roots - Carly Phillips

I started writing family stories. Seriously. I thought I would sell to Silhouette Special Edition and I tried. Boy did I try … but it wasn’t meant to be. Seven years, ten manuscripts, I caught on. Shorter contemporary seemed to be my style. In 1998 I sold to Harlequin Temptation/Heat and in 1999 BRAZEN was published. I wrote category for two years before segueing into single title contemporary with THE BACHELOR, THE PLAYBOY and THE HEARTBREAKER. Since then, all my trilogy or linked books have been light and fun – until CROSS MY HEART and SEALED WITH A KISS. In those books, I took a turn back to family mixed with drama and less lightness … it’s been a good break. A fun break. It seemed right when CROSS MY HEART was in hardcover to try something different. But I listen to my readers and I know they want more of my lighter books, more often.

SO A NEW YEAR IS COMING – and in 2008, I’ve decided to return to the light books that my readers love, all in PAPERBACK. I know that for everyone’s wallet, this is a good thing. I know that as a reader, as much as I enjoy the variety of books on the shelves, I love fun contemporary which is why writing it again is bringing me a lot of pleasure and enjoyment. I’ve just finished HOT PROPERTY which is the last in The Hot Zone series which will be out in July 2008 and an as of now unnamed new book and the beginning of a three book series in September 2008 – hero based. Light. Fun.

How about you? What do you enjoy reading? Paranormal? Light contemporary? Dark romantic suspense? What floats your boat and what can’t you get enough of for your reading pleasure?


NY Times Bestseller, CARLY PHILLIPS

www.carlyphillips.com (see the video!)

www.plotmonkeys.com (blog)

Colette Gale | It's probably no surprise that I'm a great fan of The Phantom of the Opera (since my first book is an erotic version of that story).

So, when I went to Paris for research last year, part of our itinerary was, of course, a trip to the Opera Garnier, which is the opera theater that figures in the original Phantom of the Opera. I learned a lot about the famous building, as well as some of the legends and facts that surround it and were used (or tweaked) in Leroux's and Webber's versions of the story of the Opera Ghost.


That's me, standing in front of the Opera House on a very cold, dreary, yucky day!

First of all, the tour was great--it was fabulous to be inside the opera house!

And, yes, there is a lake under the building--nothing like the one we see in the movie, but there is a lake there. I guess Gaston Leroux took very appropriate artistic license when he described the Phantom's underground lair and its lake. It's really no more than a very large tank--not that I got to see it.

That was the disappointment of my tour. We got to see pretty much where the patrons would sit or congregate, but nothing backstage or beneath the stage! In that sense, it was very disappointing.

However, the building itself is magnificent! The grand staircase alone (where the Masquerade scene is in the movie/musical) is made of six different kinds of marble--all different colors, from different geographic locations, and it's just stunning. This is a very dim pic of me standing on the grand staircase--my husband used a flash, but I still had to lighten it up in Photoshop, and this is the best I could do. But you get a sense of the grandeur of the staircase.)

These other pics I had to get from elsewhere--but this is what the interior of the Opera House looked like for real. (And notice that the exact same interior is depicted on the cover of my book!)

One of the things we learned during our tour was that this was the first theater constructed out of steel, so that it couldn't burn to the ground as so many opera houses and theaters did. So even when the Phantom drops the chandelier in that ending scene of the Webber/Shumacher movie, the Opera House wouldn't have been completely destroyed. Just a little!

This second, well-lit picture is actually of the boxes. Not the infamous Box Five (which shall be kept empty for the O.G.), because these are the boxes on the right side of the stage--where the women would have sat.

The first box actually was made for the Emperor Napoleon III's wife, Eugenie. Her husband would have sat in his box across the stage from her on his own side...the better to flirt with and take notice of the dancers, of course. However, neither of them ever attended a performance at the Opera Garnier, for they were overthrown before it was finished!

This picture shows the chandelier made famous by Webber and his version of the Phantom of the Opera. Yes, the chandelier does fall in the original book, but it's not as magnificent of a disaster, in my opinion, as the way it's portrayed in both the musical and movie done by Webber & Co. It would have been pretty impossible for the massive light to fall the way it's been described in literature and film because it's held in place by counterweights and a very stable structure.

But, in fact, the whole idea of the chandelier falling was based on a real event in which one of the counterweights fell from its moorings and landed on a woman, killing her. There was a fire in the attic of the Opera House, and it melted the steel mooring, thus weakening the cable enough to let the counterweight fall.

So there you have it: some of the myths from The Phantom of the Opera explained!

And if you'd like to know what I think happened during the Music of the Night scene, and when Christine was down in the Phantom's lair...and why, why, why she left him for Raoul, check out my latest release: UNMASQUED: An Erotic Novel of the Phantom of the Opera, available now in bookstores everywhere.

Colette Gale
~seducing the classics~
UNMASQUED: An Erotic Novel of the Phantom of the Opera (August 2007)
ColetteGale.com

New Look and a Field Trip to Austin for Jasper Fforde

Fresh Fiction always seems to be changing and our blog is going in a new direction. We've asked several authors and readers to contribute over then next few months. So, please stop by and check us out.

If you're interested in being a guest, please contact us at info @ freshfiction.com

Jasper Fforde
Originally uploaded by freshfiction

At last, we have our THURSDAY NEXT signed!
Now, to our field trip...

Austin -- north west -- confusing directions (Google Maps does its best, but it would really help if the streets actually had their names up!) WHERE is MOPAC? but we found the Barnes & Noble eventually and arrived only five minutes late for Jasper Fforde on Friday night. It was hot and steamy, outside and in the store, especially up in the alcove where Jasper was talking about THURSDAY NEXT First Among Sequels to a crowd of about 150. I know, I counted to 150 then got bored. It wasn't as if I could actually see him being stuck in the walled off video/music section with the usual assortment of "small children" wandering through complete with skateboards obstructing the view. (What WERE they looking for?) The center section of the alcove, surrounded by a "up" escalator and a "down" escalator, was PACKED with fans. You could tell by the STACKS of Fforde books they were clutching. I actually felt bad because I only brought one copy of the current book and being a polite rabid fan, did NOT bring my complete collection of the Jasper Fforde books. Silly me! The fans were double occupying chairs, leaning on posts and oddly placed book tables. A few managed to find a place to perch on the railings or on the floor. Did I mention it was CROWDED? and HOT?

But from what I could hear in the next 45 minutes, Fforde was entertaining. He told us about Swindon where they've honored him with streets name after his characters (not him to his dismay) and hold an annual Fforde Ffest each year. He also told us about his writing secrets which he's been accumulating since he was told there was only four secrets to writing. His are a bit shall we say, special just for Fforde writings. We also participated in a Welsh pronunciation quiz. Always fun to try to decipher places in Wales. And people wonder why lorry drivers get lost! If you've read any of the Thursday Next books you'd recognize that Fforde's talking style was very much like his writing style -- stream of consciousness and fast jumps and wandering among subjects. Very charming but I especially enjoyed his love of "bad" jokes and how he actually created characters so he could tell a horrid joke or pun -- forcing them into the plot at times! Suddenly it all came clearer! And let's not forget his pride of mangling physics. Although that was one science section in college I actually got A's in without trying too hard. Hmm....

All in all, the drive of 250 plus miles and the wait for his signature and stamp in our book (add another two hours) was worth it!