Fatin has been an integral part of the romance community for years – she owns and runs the RR@H Novel Thoughts and Book Talk blog, is an administrator of the WriteMinded loop, an author assistant and a tireless advocate for romance novels. She is also a friend to many in this community. On Tuesday, March 8th, she lost her husband in a senseless act of violence, leaving her alone with four children. You can read more about the tragedy here.

The romance community would like to rally around her. Therefore, we will be holding auctions on ebay the last week of March. More information on exact days and donations will follow, as well as a link to a hubpage where you can peruse the items that will be up for auction.

If you are an editor / agent / author and would like to donate something for the auction – such as a critique, mentoring, lunches at RT or RWA, swag, signed books, etc., please contact me via my contact page with your donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!

Also, Larissa Ione asked readers recently what type of items they’d most like to bid on, so you might find this list helpful.

Thanks in advance for your support!

A pretty good excuse, right?

It’s launch week for Carina Press, and that means it’s time for Shannon Stacey‘s contemporary romance, EXCLUSIVELY YOURS!

When Keri Daniels’ editor finds out she has previous carnal knowledge of reclusive bestselling author Joe Kowalski, she gives Keri a choice: get an interview or get a new job.  

Joe’s never forgotten the first girl to break his heart, so he’s intrigued to hear Keri’s back in town—and looking for him. Despite his intense need for privacy, he’ll grant Keri an interview if it means a chance to finish what they started in high school.

He proposes an outrageous plan—for every day she survives with his family on their annual camping and four-wheeling trip, Keri can ask one question. Keri agrees; she’s worked too hard to walk away from her career.

But the chemistry between them is still as potent as the bug spray, Joe’s sister is out to avenge his broken heart and Keri hasn’t ridden an ATV since she was ten. Who knew a little blackmail, a whole lot of family and some sizzling romantic interludes could make Keri reconsider the old dream of Keri & Joe 2gether 4ever.

I’ve got my Kindle copy, thanks to the magic of preorder – so go forth and buy!  Because Shannon’s awesome and her books are awesome (love the Devlin books especially!)  I’m diving right in after today’s writing session…

Yeah, okay, so Zoo’s away (I think I just rhymed and I didn’t mean to, but it’s 5AM and I’m not really seeing straight anyway) and it’s been fine with the kid and the dog and stuff for the past few nights.  And last night, the kid decided that she only needed to sleep for an hour and wake up and so I put Elmo on and settled in with an old Linda Howard for comfort because I hadn’t written all day and Linda Howard never fails to inspire me.

And Gus is all kind of running around and knocking his bed across the room for no reason and I finally get him settled on my bed where he procedes to squash my legs.  The kid was already squashing me because we’re all together because Zoo’s away and I realize now that this is crazy on my end but it’s too late to change.

So then something catches my eye and I look up at the ceiling and there is a spider up there.

I’ll let that settle in for a moment.  Because those of you who’ve been reading this blog for a while (or Writeminded) know that I cannot handle spiders or crickets.  (Or butterflies, but that’s more of a gross me out thing and I could deal with a butterfly in the house, because even though it’s a worm with wings, I know it won’t kill me. ) But the crickets at least stay in the basement, while the spiders seem to feel they can have run of the house.  I’m guessing the warm weather brought them all out of the woodwork.

So, it’s kind of right to the side of the bed – I can’t reach it.  I can throw a shoe at it until it falls but it could fall on the bed and that wouldn’t be good.

And it’s staring at me.  Black and white and tarantuala-sized.

Okay, maybe not that big.  Maybe.

And I’m like, okay, I can do this…it will move away and I can live and let live and it won’t eat me while I sleep.

And THEN I look at the big light that hangs over the bed and there is ANOTHER spider, crawling around.  It’s like a spider family reunion and Arachnophobia (which is a surprisingly funny movie) all at once.

I now realize I could die.

Gus, of course, is no help, as he has not even bothered to wake up and realize that we are in imminent danger.  I think about texting Zoo and telling him to come home immediately, but figured by the time he got home from Florida it wouldn’t work in my favor.  Of course, I did text him with a scream about spiders.

Anyway, so in a moment of brilliance (these do not come often, trust me) I race downstairs for the vacuum.  I hate our vacuum – it’s a canister and a pain in the ass but I haul it up the stairs and turn it on and get close to ceiling spider.  It knows it’s going to die and doesn’t try to fight the suction.  The other one on the light is still running and romping and playing until it sees me with the hose – then it goes still and gets sucked into the void.

Of course, then I worry that they will escape at night and bring the rest of the spider family to my ceiling to kill me.  I know they’re sitting in the vacuum bag, plotting.  I’m totally going to need a new vacuum.  And Zoo can’t ever leave the house again, unless he leaves behind someone to kill the spiders.

and time makes lovers feel, like they’ve got something real, but you and me we know we’ve got nothin’ but time…oh, sorry, having a Boy George 80′s moment.  I still love that song.

Anyway, here’s the deal – I want my cube clock back.

Seriously, I’m pretty good with new technology.  I switched from a PC to a Mac without much issue, I’ve installed software and moved from a Blackberry to a PalmPre with few difficulties.  I can work a remote, set my DVR.

I haven’t been able to work an alarm clock since my Sony cube.  I’ve had that cube since before college.  Which, was a while ago.  Quite a while ago, and I can’t believe it’s still working.

See, it was on my side of the bed until Zoo and I had to switch sides for the kid.  And then since I was staying home and he was the only one going out to work, the clock stayed on his side.  And then I bought a new clock.  A big, shiny new clock that I didn’t know how to set.

Zoo set it for me and it took me the better part of six months to realize he’d set it to a Spanish radio station.  I couldn’t understand any of the songs when I woke up but I’m not a morning person and just assumed that I was really tired.

I have four new clocks – four perfectly good clocks and I can’t work any of them.  So, last week, I bought a new Sony cube.  I figured – it’s the cube!  Probably as easy as my old cube…a perfect solution.

I still can’t work it.

I know you’re saying to yourself, why doesn’t she just give him the new clock and take back the old clock? And I have no answer for you.  It’s not like the clock is being held hostage or anything.

As long as I’m confessing, I might as well admit that most of the time I end up watching the commercials on the shows I’ve DVR’d because I forget they’re recorded shows.  Just me?  Yes?

In my city, they’re starting to pass out dry ice, which I’m taking as not a very good sign for those people who’ve lost power.  (We’re okay, so fingers crossed we stay that way.) It’s a mess around here.  Early Saturday, part of our neighbor’s tree fell across his driveway into our yard.  As Zoo said, it hasn’t been a really good year for the foliage in our yard.  Add 2 bushes and 2 more trees down, as well as parts of our fence, but it’s nothing in comparison to what’s happened around us.

I will, of course, still bitch about it.  Just not a lot.  But you all understand.

When we lost all our trees a few weeks ago, I put in for a homeowner’s claim – I really didn’t think they’d be covered but we’ve (luckily) never had to put in a claim and I figured I’d try.  It was denied, and I asked, since we’re getting new trees, why / how they’d be covered.

The woman said, “Well, they’d have to be destroyed by an explosion, fire, an aircraft crashing into them, or they’d have to be run down by a vehicle not registered to you.”

And I’m thinking, dude, if any of those things are happening, I’m worried about a lot more than my trees. But hey, I guess that kind of puts it all in perspective.

When I told Zoo, he said, Maybe we can borrow some parts from a local airport and scatter them throughout the trees.

I just looked at my watch, which claims it’s the 31st.  So really, I’m still back in February somewhere.  Mainly because I’m on revision deadline and I need those lost February days, especially the ones I lost when I was sick with the flu along with my kid and Zoo. So don’t ruin my illusion, okay?

But I think I’m on track with the book  - these revisions are for PROMISES IN THE DARK (aka Zane’s book, out 11/23) which just went up for pre-order on Amazon!  I’ve got book blurbs for both Promises and LIE WITH ME (out 10/26), and I think my book pages will be updated with them over the next couple of weeks, so I’ll point you in that direction when they’re up.  No covers as of yet, but hopefully soon!

Since most of my books are connected, I find that sometimes I have to write ahead on the characters (like, into the next book) in order to see the bigger picture.  That’s the way they reveal their world to me, and then when I know what’s happening with them in the future, it helps me to paint a better picture of them in the current book.

As I say to Larissa all the time, this totally makes sense in my head.

Anyway, this week marks the return of Real Housewives of New York.  I’m sadly addicted to the entire Housewives franchise, but New York is my favorite.  I’m finding Celebrity Rehab to be horribly depressing and American Idol isn’t thrilling me because the judges don’t interact with one another anymore, although thanks to one of last night’s performances, I found a new song for Mace’s soundtrack – Lips of an Angel by Hinder.  Not a new song, but it’s pretty perfect for my purposes.

So, what’s up with you guys?  Recovering from snow?  Is everyone healthy?

I had to call the dry cleaners because there was some small mix up with Zoo’s shirts…so I call and I’m like, Hi, it’s Zoo’s wife (because he’s the one who always goes there since it’s on the way to the train – I’ve been like, once.)

The woman who answered was like, Oh, Zoo’s wife!!!  And then people in the background were like chiming in, saying Zoo, etc. Like he was some kind of dry cleaning celebrity.

I IM’d Zoo and asked him what he does when he goes to the cleaners to elicit such a response at the mention of his name.

Then again, maybe I don’t really want to know.

1. Snow will not ruin my weekend plans because those include sitting in bed writing, reading and eating cake.  And catching up on TV shows I missed.

2. I missed Burn Notice again last night…and Celebrity Rehab.  And the Real Housewives of Orange County.  And Grey’s.  Falling asleep will do that.

3. Jaci Burton has a new book out this week.

4.  If Jaci Burton lived closer, I would give her this cake.

5.  This cake was made by a good friend of mine.  I get to eat the samples – they are good.

6.  Cake totally helps with revisions.  This is a proven fact.

I was battling a migraine and trying to get things done, like some guest blogs I owe, plus adding to a scene for my newest proposal that agent suggested, plus working on one of those, just for me projects.  The day went surprisingly well, because I just took it all slowly.

I decided to put the last of my copy editing off until tomorrow, when I was sharper.  I can’t do those when I’m foggy.  I can write while foggy – written some of my best scenes that way.

I was also playing around on Facebook, asking people to suggest some of their favorite music and I got some great suggestions.  The first thing I do when I get a lead on a new song is play the sample on iTunes while I look up the lyrics.  Several of the songs suggested to me today are actually really perfect for the proposal book (It’s Mace’s book – I’m calling it In the Air Tonight, but I doubt that title will stick. Working titles rarely do.)

I also have RITA books to read – it’s my first year judging. Oh, for those of you not familiar with the RITA, it’s the RWA’s (Romance Writers of America) awards, announced yearly at their conference – there are different categories, like Romantic Suspense, Paranormal, Best series romance, etc.  There’s also a Golden Heart contest for unpublished manuscripts too, and I know lots of the Golden Heart winners went on to have their manuscripts published, so it’s a cool contest.

So yeah, that was my day?  Yours?

By the way, there was entirely too much football on today.  Seriously.