DeAnna Cameron's Blog, page 8

#SneakPeek of DANCE WITH ME #excerpt 1

DANCE WITH ME releases next week, and I’m getting pretty excited. In fact, I can’t wait a whole week to share it with you. Let’s take a little peek now, shall we?

 

CHAPTER ONE:
The man in a vintage tuxedo gazed down at the belly dancer with bedroom eyes and crooned as she pressed her shimmies against him. A warm flush came over Melanie, as though she were intruding on a private moment, not one played out for a movie camera more than sixty years ago.
“Aren’t those black-and-white films great?”
Melanie spun away from the television at the sound of her friend’s voice and nearly knocked a box of hip scarves off the glass display case. She adjusted it back in place and composed herself.
“Sorry.” Abby snickered. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“You didn’t,” Melanie grumbled, returning to her task of folding the scarves into tidy squares and stacking them beside the cash register. “I thought you were in the dance room, helping Janaya with the class.”
“She wants to try teaching on her own.” Abby grabbed a bag of chandelier earrings that needed to be organized.
Melanie’s eyes widened. “It’s only her second week. Is she ready?”
Abby shrugged and continued hanging the dangling earrings on the revolving floor stand. “We won’t know till she tries. Honestly, I’m happy for the break. I feel guilty leaving you up here to work on the boutique by yourself. You should at least let me pay you.”
“No way. After all the free studio time you’ve given me, it’s the least I can do. Besides, the less time I have to spend at my mom’s place, the better.”
“So what’s that like, living with your mom again?”
“Hell.” Behind her the musical number on the screen came to an end, leaving a silence in the shop that made her uneasy. She turned and clicked off the television, happy to do anything but meet the questions she knew she’d find in her friend’s expression, if she dared to look.
“What happened between you and Chet anyway?”
There it was, the question she’d been avoiding all week.
“You know, the usual,” she mumbled and grabbed another wad of chiffon and jingly beads from the box. As she folded the chiffon with laser-sharp focus, her arms prickled from Abby’s glare. She peeked upward.
Abby was not only staring, but her lips were tucked in that stubborn expression that said she was not going to let the topic go.

 

Check back tomorrow for another peek
And there’s still time to get the special pre-order price: Just 99 cents!
Get it here:

 

 

Adventures–and Misadventures–in #BookMarketing

Part of the fun of being an indie author is having so many book marketing opportunities. That doesn’t mean they all work out, though. Like everything else in this business, you have to learn from your mistakes and move forward.
I share some of what I’ve learned recently about book marketing in this month’s Confessions of an Indie Pub Girl column.
You can check it out HERE .

#Preorder DANCE WITH ME for just #99c #Kindledeal

 

 

DANCE WITH ME (California Belly Dance Romance series, Book 2) goes on sale for $3.99 on July 13, but you can get it for just 99 cents during the limited-time, pre-order special!


To ambitious belly dancer Melanie Drake, celebrity drummer Taz Roman is a self-absorbed playboy she prefers to avoid… until he makes her a tantalizing offer.
He needs someone to pose as his live-in girlfriend to get his meddling sister off his back. In exchange, he’ll coach her through the upcoming Belly Dance Divas’ audition. 
But when Melanie’s fake feelings turn real and their secret backfires, she discovers Taz isn’t the man she thought he was. Will the deception destroy them both, or can she find the courage to fight for what she truly wants?

SHIMMY FOR ME Today at Sizzling Summer Reads

 

 

I’m thrilled to be featured, along with SHIMMY FOR ME, at The Romance Reviews’ Sizzling Summer Reads party today. Look for Question #7 here:
http://www.theromancereviews.com/event.php
And don’t forget to enter to win lots of great prizes while you’re there!

 

New Release: SHIMMY FOR ME #audiobook

I’m thrilled to announce the audible version of SHIMMY FOR ME is now available! It’s voiced and produced by the lovely and talented Sarah Beth Goer (you can read my interview with her HERE).
Want to see it at Amazon? Click HERE.

Is It Feeling Crowded to You?

This might not interest most of you, but it might interest Amazon watchers:

In January, Shimmy for Me slid into the #99 slot on the Women’s Fiction>Humor best-seller list when it hit #11,000+ in the paid Kindle Store. Today, it just did it again, but it had to reach 6,544 in the paid Kindle Store to do it.

If there was any doubt that the romance genre is becoming more competitive, I’d say this is proof that it is … in spades.

 

Anyone Speak Serbian?

 

 

Look what was in the mail today: the Serbian translations of THE BELLY DANCER and DANCING AT THE CHANCE. Can you tell which is which?
Personally, I find it fascinating that the publisher changed the spelling of my name. Maybe my spelling has some funky sounds in the Serbian language? Dunno.

(Did you guess correctly? NA VRHOVIMA PRSTIJU is THE BELLY DANCER, and PRILIKA ZA PLES is DANCING AT THE CHANCE.)

 

Book Formatting: It’s Tedious Work, But…

The editing of DANCE WITH ME is done (finally!), and that means today is the day to format the print version. It’s tedious work, and not a lot of fun, but you know what? At the end of the day, it’s going to look like a book. And that makes me happy 

 

Photo credit: Gualberto107 via FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

Curious About Book Marketing?

USA Today best-selling author Brenna Aubrey stopped by the O.C. Writers book marketing workshop a few days ago to share her book marketing wisdom — because, yeah, she’s awesome like that.
I wrote up some of my notes and shared them in this month’s installment of “Confessions of an Indie Pub Girl.” If you’re interested, you can check it out here:
http://litcentraloc.com/7-book-marketing-tips-from-a-pro/

When Inspiration Strikes, the Inspired Go to Pinterest

Yes, I know I should be finishing the edits of DANCE WITH ME, but I just can’t shake all the story ideas I have for JINGLY ALL THE WAY (that’s what I’m calling the holiday-themed story for the California Belly Dance Romance series for now, but it could change…don’t get attached).
So, I took a few minutes to capture some of those ideas on a new Pinterest board. Wanna see?

Follow DeAnna’s board JINGLY ALL THE WAY Inspirations on Pinterest.