Lisa Fox's Blog, page 33
June 7, 2016
Scribbler’s Women’s Weekend Writing Retreat August 12-14!
Scribbler’s Women’s Weekend Writing Retreat August 12-14!
Why retreat?
Time to write
Work on craft
Re-introduce yourself to your muse
Commune with other writers
Recharge creative flow
I like so many other writers’ have a day job and I’m always stealing time to write. Fifteen minutes here, thirty minutes there, but rarely do I get a large, uninterrupted (by children, husbands, pets) time to write.
Which is why at least once a year, I put myself first and disappear from real life and take off to a pretty setting, one preferably with a beach, a large porch with comfortable chairs, good food (chocolate is a necessity) and time…time to write, time to think about writing, talk about writing with other writers and yes, dream about writing versus what to make for dinner, the bathroom needs to be cleaned, the dog needs to be walked etc…
So if you are of a like mind, come join us Scribblers for three magnificent days of writing and inspiration at our Women’s Writing Retreat in scenic Duxbury, MA.
Whether you writing muse finds inspiration walking along the large, private sandy beach, a sunrise/sunset yoga and meditation class on the beautiful grounds, or walking the reflection labyrinth, we know you will find this space and place to be one to help you put pen to paper.
The large, sunny meeting rooms will foster your creativity amid the energy of other writers. Like Scribbler’s Ink Workshops, this retreat offers a positive, welcoming environment for writers of all skills and genres.
This full weekend includes writing workshops, breakout sessions, speakers, individual sessions with a developmental editor, beta reading, and best of all, the opportunity to enjoy the camaraderie with other writers.
Cost includes shared lodging and meals (Saturday dinner is not included. Feel free to take this time to explore beautiful Duxbury)
For more details and to register, go to: http://scribblersink.com/#/writing-retreats/
Filed under: Guest Blogger Tagged: Craft, Inspiration, Scribbler's Women's Weekend Writing Retreat, Writing
June 5, 2016
June 4, 2016
June 3, 2016
June 2, 2016
The Athletic Aesthetic Collection!
He studied her again, another slow, detailed appraisal, then leaned forward and steepled his fingers under his chin. “Why did you come here?” — Kyle Weston, Rigorous Training, Story 1 of Athletic Aesthetic from Sweetmeats Press.
The Athletic Aesthetic – Five Erotic Tales of Sporting Prowess
An unorthodox coach believes that a determined gymnast lacks the necessary discipline to make it to the top. He’s a hard task master but, if she can convince him to give her a chance, the results could be spectacular!
BUY LINKS:
Amazon: http://goo.gl/GPnLaq
Amazon UK: http://goo.gl/TyiRzU
B&N: http://goo.gl/HR5meU
Kobo: https://goo.gl/4Yut5F
iTunes: https://goo.gl/IlEVmJ
Filed under: Writing Tagged: Erotica, Lisa Fox, Sex and Sports, Sports Erotica, The Athletic Aesthetic
June 1, 2016
OUT NOW: Four Letter Words by Charlotte Howard
Four Letter Words by Charlotte Howard
Paige Holmes has made her choice. But as she begins to get her life back on track, she also starts to question her decision.
Then, the letters arrive. When Paige finds herself in trouble once again, she must decide who she can trust.
Will she go back to the one she denied, or will she stand by her choice?
Love and lust are, after all, both Four Letter Words .
BUY LINK: http://www.tirgearrpublishing.com/authors/Howard_Charlotte/four-letter-words.htm
Excerpt from Chapter One
Laying my head back against the black leather seats of the Jag and gazing ahead, I lifted a finger and touched my lips that were swollen from his kiss. The weariness of the past few weeks was beginning to take over, weighing on my eyelids as they began to droop. I should have been reassured by the man sitting next to me.
I shifted in my seat so I could watch him as he drove on. He was a force that even nature had no hold over. There was an urge to reach out and cling to his broad bicep, a need to feel the security of his physical strength, aching somewhere deep inside of me.
We didn’t speak as he pressed all his weight onto the accelerator, urging the car until it was over the speed limit. I half expected the shine of blue lights to fill the inside of the car, with sirens blaring around us. But they didn’t. Of course they didn’t. Even if a marked car was to pass, I doubted Vance Ellery would slow down, and I had even less that the police would attempt to pull him over. I suspected that the personal phone number of every single high-ranking officer in the country, was tucked away in a neat Rolodex on Vance’s desk or even stored in the memory bank of his mobile phone for easy access.
The silence should have been soothing. I should have been able to let my lashes flutter against my cheeks, and slip into a relaxing slumber. Instead the lack of conversation added to the tension that built behind my eyes. I closed them, hoping that soon I would drift off into a deep sleep, where I would be surrounded by falling flowers, rainbows, and sunlight. Ha! If only I was deserving of such luck. There were no pleasant dreams awaiting me after the sandman visited. Only nightmares wanted to be part of my night. They tormented me, bringing memories that I’d tried to bury and forget. They hounded the darkness, giving me nothing but misery and pain and suffering. It was as though all my sins from a previous life had been rolled over into this one.
If the visions of his face, the sound of his voice had been the only elements of my slumber, then I might have been willing to slip away and let the desperation of rest take me to the shadowed places I dreaded. My soul was destined for torture though. I was to be punished for his crime.
The mere suggestion of sleep forced my blood to pulsate until it was the only thing I could hear, throbbing in my temples. The searing pain of anxiety and panic stabbed at my chest, pins pricking my skin, as I let my eyelids fall. A shudder fell down my spine, waking me from the light doze I’d stumbled into.
Breathe in, breathe out. In with the good, out with the bad. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Breathe in, breathe out. A mantra, taught to me by a yoga instructor years before hell had entered my life, repeated over and over in my mind. I inhaled the cool air through my nasal passages, allowing it to slip down into my pain-filled lungs, exhaling all the bad out of my mouth in a gigantic whoosh.
Ahead, the roads were empty, weaving out of the village and headed towards Richart Courts, the hotel that was to be my sanctuary for the next couple of days before I had to face the next challenge. New York City.
How anyone could expect me to go back there was beyond belief. The only logical explanation for their plans for my future was that facing New York was the lesser of the two evils that haunted me, threatening to rip away the seams that had begun to fray around my already tattered edges.
Four Letter Words is the second, and final, part to Paige’s story. To celebrate its re-release, the first part of the Words Duet has been reduced to 99p / 99c!
****
Author bio:
British author, Charlotte Howard, was born in Oman and spent much of the first part of her life flitting between Oman, Scotland, and England. Now settled in Somerset, Charlotte lives with her husband, two children, and growing menagerie of pets.
Her career as a writer began at an early age, with a poem being featured in an anthology for the East Midlands. Since then Charlotte has written many short stories and poems, and finally wrote her first full-length piece of fiction in 2010.
During what little spare time she has, Charlotte enjoys reading and writing (of course), spending time with her family, and watching action movies whilst eating curry and drinking tea.
Charlotte is an active member of Yeovil Creative Writers Group.
Social Media links:
Filed under: Guest Blogger Tagged: Charlotte Howard, Four Letter Words, Romance
May 29, 2016
May 28, 2016
Saturday Video – The Origin of Memorial Day
An interesting look at the history of the holiday.
Filed under: Saturday Video Tagged: History, Memorial Day, The Origin of Memorial Day
May 27, 2016
May 26, 2016
Sale! One Kiss Is $0.99!!!
ONE KISS, is still on sale for JUST $0.99! Check out the first book in my Midnight Kiss series while the sale lasts!
Get it everywhere!
Amazon – http://goo.gl/kUhg13
B&N – http://goo.gl/ywuET7
Kobo – https://goo.gl/dlC1ly
iTunes – https://goo.gl/YIv9gi
One Kiss by Lisa Fox
Blurb:
Sometimes one kiss can change everything.
New Year’s Eve is supposed to be a night for celebration and new beginnings. For best friends Kat and Dean, it is a nightmare filled with disastrous dates and enraged ex-girlfriends!
Lucky for them, they’ve got each other to help laugh off the embarrassing, and downright inappropriate, moments. But then midnight rolls around and neither of them have anyone to kiss…
There’s no doubt this is a night they will always remember.
The real question is whether it will be a night they want to forget…
An Excerpt From: ONE KISS
Copyright © LISA FOX
All Rights Reserved, Harper Impulse, a Division of HarperCollins Publishers
CHAPTER ONE
Kat spun around when her cell phone rang, and the stiletto heel on her brand new shoes snapped, knocking her off-balance. She crashed down on the living room carpet with a loud thump, grunting out a string of vile curses. Her short, sparkly dress twisted around her hips as she scrambled to get up, and a few sequins fell off when she collided with the coffee table. The phone slid off the glass top, bounced twice, and hit the floor. She snatched it off the ground as the last bars of “Tank!” played, brought it to her ear, and winced as the missed call beep blasted her eardrum.
“Son of a bitch,” she muttered, and checked the caller ID to see who had caused her all this grief. Dean. It figured. Her eyebrows furrowed. She hadn’t expected to hear from him for another few days. He was supposed to be out somewhere swank tonight, spending a very expensive, very exclusive New Year’s Eve with his girlfriend, Marine. The more expensive, the better. Marine wouldn’t settle for anything less. And she would not be happy if she knew he was calling Kat in the middle of their date. There had to be something wrong.
She slipped off her broken shoes as she called him back, grimacing when she tossed them into the trash can. It was a damn tragedy to have to throw out a cute pair of shoes. This was not a positive omen for the evening.
“Hey, Kat,” he answered on the second ring, and the familiar sound of his deep voice made her smile. Dean had a way of always making her smile. He also had a way of getting under her skin and driving her crazy too, but right now it was good to hear his voice. She’d missed him a lot during the Christmas break.
“Hey, yourself.” She switched the phone to her other ear and pushed open her bedroom door. Going out tonight was probably a bad idea. She was beginning to regret letting Ron talk her into this ridiculous blind date. If there was any time left to back out, she would have. Well, maybe that wasn’t entirely true. She was kind of excited. Curious anyway. She’d been so stagnate lately. It was time to shake things up. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing. I just got back and I wanted to say hi.”
“Huh-huh,” she said, allowing him to hear the skepticism in her voice. This was not a “just say hi” call. Something was up. She could feel it. “I thought you’d be out with Marine by now.” She knelt down in front of her closet and pushed her half-unpacked suitcases aside. Her shoulders sagged as she peered into the dark, chaotic recesses. She was never going to find anything in there. Why had she never organized? Maybe that ought to be her New Year’s resolution. She dug around and pulled out a pair of red, patent leather Mary Jane’s, which she examined and promptly tossed aside. Definitely not right. “What are you guys doing tonight?”
He took a deep breath and exhaled. “Mari and I broke up.”
Kat sat back on her heels. That was news—and not the bad kind. The last time she’d seen them together, Marine had been clinging to Dean’s arm as hard as usual. Found someone with a bigger wallet, did she? formed on her lips, but she bit the words back. He knew exactly how she felt about Marine. He didn’t need to hear it right now. “What happened?”
She heard the phone shift and knew that he was raking his fingers through his thick, curly hair. It was what he did whenever he was upset. “It started out like it always does, you know? She bitched about my job, cried over all the money I was ‘losing’ by not going somewhere else, and then she got all twisted, went on this rampage about how we can’t get married if—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” She shook her head so violently, her hair got caught on a button of the only business suit she owned. She winced as she pulled herself free, ripping out a fair amount of hair in the process. “Please don’t tell me you proposed to her?”
“What? No. But it’s what she wants.”
I’ll bet. Marine was no fool. She was entering her late twenties and while she was a working model, she wasn’t one of the elite. One day very soon she was going to be nothing more than an old face in a sea of younger, fresher faces. For women like Marine, marrying well became the next logical step. Dean was an excellent candidate. He was young, ambitious, an award-winning designer on the ground floor of a successful boutique web design and marketing firm. He’d already been headhunted a number of times by the corporate giants. If he ever decided to make a move, he’d be able to name his price. And, as an added bonus, he looked great in a suit. “I don’t understand. You broke up over that? You guys have had that fight a million times before.”
“Well, this time when she left, I didn’t stop her.” He paused. “I haven’t heard from her since.”
Good riddance, she almost said aloud. He deserved so much better. “When was this?”
“Tuesday.” She heard him sit down on his couch, the familiar creak of the springs in the background. “Right after the holiday dinner.”
Kat’s mouth dropped open. “Before Christmas? Dean, that was over a week ago! You’re just telling me now?”
She could feel him shrug, see his sheepish grin. “You were in California, and I only got back from Colorado last night. There was nothing you could do.”
She huffed in reply and dove back into the closet. There was probably something she should be saying, some comfort she should be offering, but he didn’t really sound all that upset, and a deep, mean, little part of her was glad Marine was gone. A deep, selfish little part of her actually rejoiced. “So, what happens now?”
He didn’t get a chance to answer because Kat yelped as a pile of boxes fell down around her head.
“Kat,” he called, his voice sharp with alarm. “Are you all right?”
She couldn’t help but smile. She knew without any doubt that he was on his feet, that he’d leapt up the moment she screamed, and was ready to jet over to her place to save her immediately. Sir Galahad had nothing on Dean. Sickening as it was, it never failed to strum a cord way back in the depths of her black, little heart. She wasn’t used to people wanting to care for her and every time he did, it left her feeling a bit unbalanced, yet oddly touched. But, no matter how sweet, it was the reason behind most of his problems. He was a sucker for a female in distress—or at least the ones who were convincingly in distress.
“I’m fine,” she said, pressing her palm against the side of her head where the corner of a box had struck. She supposed she should have been grateful there was no blood. A great, big river of blood gushing out of her head would only have made the night that much more awesome. “I’m trying to get ready for Ron and Alan’s party.”
“I didn’t think you were going.”
“I wasn’t.” She had intended to stay home and work, maybe have a glass of champagne alone at midnight, but then Ron approached her the day after the holiday dinner with his idea, and she had randomly said yes, surprising both him and herself. A sigh escaped her lips as her gaze touched the disarray spanning out into the center of her bedroom. She should have stuck with her original plan.
Filed under: News Tagged: Friends to Lovers, Kindle Sale, Lisa Fox, Midnight Kiss, New York City, One Kiss, Romance
