Chicki Brown's Blog, page 35

Juneteenth Sale! Coming At You Live!If you haven't guesse...

Juneteenth Sale! Coming At You Live!

If you haven't guessed it, yes, it's time to break open your Kindles or Nooks and get to buying. From June 13th to June 19th you can pick up these titles on discount from new to you or your favorite IR/MC authors:
$1.79 to $0.99Bad Boy Next Door by Melissa Blue
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

$2.99 to $0.99Fifty Shades of Jungle Fever by LV Lewis
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

 $3.99 to $1.99A Kiss of a Different Color by Bettye Griffin
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

$2.99 to $1.49Framing Felipe Holley Trent
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

$2.99 to $0.99Donor by Ambrielle KirkAmazonBarnes and Noble
$3.99 to $0.99Jaded Hearts by Olivia LindenAmazonBarnes and Noble
$3.90 to $2.50Abandoned But Not Alone by Theresa Henry
Amazon

 $3.99 to $2.99Ain't Nothing Like The Real Thing by Chicki Brown
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

$2.99 to 1.99
D.N.A. -Nothing Would Ever be the Same Again by Ey Wade
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

Juneteenth Sale!

It's June and you know what that means? It's hotter than hades outside. It  also means Juneteenth is right around a corner. And THAT means it's almost time for the Juneteenth sale I'm a part of it.

Why Juneteenth?
The simple fact is there was a time in America's history where folks would get fined, punished or thrown in jail for teaching people of color to read. More specifically, teaching slaves to read. The general fear was if you taught slaves how to write they might, you know, think about their lot in life. They may not be happy about it. They just might educate themselves. And then the nightmare would begin: they might educate others.

What I do every day as a passion, for a living was illegal in the United States. Took some time for the word to get out that slavery had been abolished and that was just one step closer to where I'm sitting now. I don't know about you, but I think that's cause for a celebration. It's worthy of taking a moment.
 From June 13th to June 19th you can pick up these titles on discount from new to you or your favorite IR/MC authors:
 

$1.79 to $0.99
Bad Boy Next Door by Melissa Blue
Website


$2.99 to $0.99 Fifty Shades of Jungle Fever by LV Lewis
Website

$3.99 to $1.99 A Kiss of a Different Color by Bettye Griffin
Website


$2.99 to $1.49 Framing Felipe by Holley Trent
Website

$2.99 to $0.99 Donor by Ambrielle Kirk
Website

$3.99 to $0.99 Jaded Hearts by Olivia Linden
Website

$3.90 to $2.50 Abandoned But Not Alone by Theresa Henry
Facebook Page

$3.99 to $2.99 Ain't Nothing Like The Real Thing by Chicki Brown
Website

 $2.99 to 1.99
D.N.A. - Nothing Would Ever be the Same Again by Ey Wade


Stay tuned for more information...

Facebook overload!

Happy Monday! Hope everyone had a fantastic weekend.

I had to turn off the notifications on all of my groups. Yesterday I was away from the computer from 9 AM-4 PM, and when I got home, I had 1,100+ messages! I can't handle that kind of volume, so from now on I'll just visit each page to look at the posts and say hello...

 Authors, how do you handle being a member of multiple reading/writing groups?  

Are you done?

I read this quote below this morning, and it really impressed me. No matter what your age, are you still learning? Think about it...  

”For every man, education should be a process which continues all his life. We have to abandon, as swiftly as possible, the idea that schooling is something restricted to youth. How can it be, in a world where half the things a man knows at 20 are no longer true at 40—and half the things he knows at 40 hadn’t been discovered when he was 20?” - author and inventor, Arthur C. Clarke

A tribute to the pioneers

A great article from Michelle Monkou in USA Today. It's a wonderful reminder for those of us who already know, and a fine lesson for those who don't.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/happyeverafter/2013/06/03/michelle-monkou-african-american-romance-pioneers/2383373/
If you love romance, please check it out, and also check out here latest release:

Fun Friday Special Announcement!

Just wanted to let you know about some real fun that starts tomorrow. I am participating in The Romance Reviews gigantic June giveaway.        More than 400 participating authors and publishers!!!
        More than 400 prizes to be won!!!   Click here to go directly to the site: http://www.theromancereviews.com/event.php   

Paradigm shift

Ever since I wrote last Thursday's post, I been doing a lot of thinking about my writing career. There's nothing I love more than creating stories from my imagination. It gives me more joy than anything else at this point in my life.

The key phrase in that last sentence is "at this point in my life." As a result of all this recent musing, along with the comments of my authors friends and associates, I've come to the conclusion that I have been putting too much pressure on myself - pressure to be prolific (at least two novels and one short a year). Pressure to make my books available with every profitable retailer. Pressure to promote my books on as many sites as possible. Pressure to do interviews and book features around the Internet. Pressure to post regularly to my blog. Pressure to stay connected with readers on thirty plus Facebook groups. Pressure to retweet for an endless number of Twitter followers. Pressure, pressure, pressure...


At my age, I realize that I can't look at my writing career, or what's left of it, in the same way my colleagues who are in their twenties, thirties and forties do. Neither should I pattern my writing and promotion plans after theirs no matter how successful they are.

I have released and promoted seven books in less than three years, and each one has made a Kindle bestseller list. Next month will be my third anniversary of being an indie author.

All I want to do is write books that my readers love, whether or not they make the Kindle bestseller lists. Since I don't have an author assistant, and still can't financially justify paying one, it looks like I either need to scale back and let things happen as God sees fit or continue trying to do everything myself and face the consequences to my health and sanity. Lately my blood pressure has been out of control. So far, everything the doctor has prescribed has given me some kind of ugly side effect or failed to control the numbers. I also need to lose 50-60 pounds, which is nearly impossible when you sit on your butt 10-12 hours a day and have two bad knees.

I guess all of this boils down to one thing -- I need to be me and stop being concerned about making a certain number of sales every month. Thank God I have a working husband....

Fun Friday

This is movie weekend for me! I'm going to get my Diesel/Rock fix.   Those of us in the U.S. will be enjoying the Memorial Day holiday, so if you happen to be going to the lake, take heed to this story: NEVER ARGUE WITH A WOMAN One morning the husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap. Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the boat out. She motors out a short distance, anchors, and reads her book. Along comes a Game Warden in his boat. He pulls up alongside the woman and says, "Good morning, Ma'am. What are you doing?? "Reading a book," she replies, (thinking, "Isn't that obvious?")  "You're in a Restricted Fishing Area," he informs her. "I'm sorry, officer, but I'm not fishing. I'm reading." "Yes, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start any moment. I'll have to take you in and write you up.""If you do that, I'll have to charge you with sexual assault," says the woman. "But I haven't even touched you," said the game warden. "That's true, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment." "Have a nice day ma'am." He left.  MORAL: Never argue with a woman who reads. It's likely she can also think.
   

Author instability

I made the decision to limit my blogging until A Woman’s Worth is completed, but today I felt the need to post.

For the past few days, I’ve been frustrated, discouraged and slightly depressed. Everything is getting on my nerves. I feel unproductive, unsuccessful, unmotivated, isolated and lonely. Yesterday, I even experienced an ugly moment of writer jealousy for which I am not proud.

My sales are in the toilet this month, because I stepped back from doing promotion in order to write - one of the miserable things about being an indie author without an assistant to do the grunt work for you.

Thought I'd hooked up with a new critique partner, but that didn't work out. I need someone to interact with on a regular basis, and after she agreed, she realized she didn't have the time.Still haven't written the big initial love scene, because I seem to have a mental block against it.


After I read my devotionals this morning, God gently reminded me that I go through this syndrome with every book. He said if I didn’t believe Him, I needed go back through my blogs (this one and the old one) and see proof.
Sure enough, when I did I found entries entitled, “Frustrated,” “Overwhelmed,” "Distractions," and “Obsession.”
This valley experience seems to just be part of my process, but I hate it and would love to find a way to avoid it completely. I just want to get back to being the happy writer…


 
  

Fun Friday: Music for the Muse

Doing something a bit different today. My writing sister, MJ Kane, has a great blog post today about writing and music, so I decided to steal her idea. You can read her post here:  https://authormjkanebooks.wordpress.com/2013/05/17/music-to-fuel-the-muse/comment-page-1/#comment-2023

I'm getting ready to write the first major love scene in A WOMAN'S WORTH, and I need the right mood music in order to do it. Myproblem is that very few new songs appeal to my "old school" nature. They're too graphic and not the least bit romance. I want romance not just sex. There are a couple out there now that do the trick though.

This song by Alicia Keys and Maxwell is the perfect background music for this scene. It's one of the sexiest songs out there right now that's not raunchy. Every time I hear it, I think of Marc and Gianna. Sigh...

 John Legend gets very close to erotic in Tonight, but I like it. 

Writing love scenes is always hard for me, because it's difficult to find the line between sexy and pornographic. :D  When I try too hard to keep from being vulgar, I often go to the other extreme and end up with a watered down unsexy bedroom scene.

Here are two of my favorites from back in the day:

  
It will probably take me all weekend to write this scene...