Edie Ramer's Blog, page 17

Looking for ghost stories!

GOT A GHOST STORY?
Have dead people visited you?

If you've had a ghostly encounter, I want to hear about it.

Send your story to edieramerbooks@gmail.com, I'll post it on my blog and give you a free copy of Dead People (Haunted Hearts book #1).

My updated life

I've been so busy lately, I haven't posted on my blog. ENTANGLED, A PARANORMAL ANTHOLOGY is getting fabulous reviews. A generous donor is matching all royalties on sales through October 20th to give to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. Bestselling author Phil Hawley will also "give a copy of STIGMA to anyone who purchases the anthology during this period." You can read more about both offers here. I'm awed by all the support we've been getting.

In addition to ENTANGLED, I have a short story and an essay in two other anthologies with proceeds going to charities: ANY WITCH WAY BUT WICKED and AUTHOR MOMENTS. I belatedly updated my website. Just click on the links and find out more. I have excerpts!

I finished the first draft of a GALAXY GIRLS novella. After that I plan to write a DEAD PEOPLE short story. I'll give the short story to my newsletter subscribers for free. About six years ago, Karin Tabke and I co-wrote a fun mystery. We still love it and plan on self-publishing it in November.

I have something extra planned that should be fun, but I'm not ready to talk about it yet. On the TV front, I'm hooked on the new show Revenge, and I'm disappointed in this seasons Project Runway contestants. But I still love Tim Gunn and Heidi. For the most part I limit myself to one show a night. Sometimes no shows. What have you been doing?

A double interview and more giveaways!

Lori Brighton and I are at Book Girl of Mur-y-Castell talking about our stories in entangled and future books. We're giving away 4 books: 2 of Entangled, a Paranormal Anthology; 1 Galaxy Girls; 1 To Seduce an Earl. Comment and get a chance to win!

If you have time, check out this double review of Entangled. It's fun to see how subjective this is. They don't always have the same opinion. They both liked my story, though. Lis said, "It's an awesome story with a surprising ending." Blodeuedd said, "What a cute story about Tory and her adopted cat Samson." I love "awesome," but I'll take "cute."

I got a fantastic review for Galaxy Girls yesterday, at Lilac Wolf and Stuff. "I have to add Edie Ramer to my growing list of fabulous authors that are writing stories better than you find on the New York Best Seller List." It was a fabulous way to start the day!

You also have a chance to win Galaxy Girls and books by other writers at Small Blogs, Big Giveaways. It's open through the 23rd. So, go forth and win!

Small Blogs, Big Giveaways!

Reading Romances is hosting a fun giveaway event, with many prizes including gift cards! Laurie from Laurie's Interviews let me be in on it. I'm giving away two e-copies of my books. One of Entangled, a Paranormal Anthology, with all proceeds going to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. And one of my sci fi/paranormal romance Galaxy Girls.

Here's the short blurb for Entangled, a Paranormal Anthology:

Ghosts, vampires, demons, and more! Entangled includes ten suspense-filled paranormal short stories from authors Cynthia Eden, Jennifer Estep, Edie Ramer, Lori Brighton, Michelle Diener, Misty Evans, Nancy Haddock, Liz Kreger, Dale Mayer, and Michelle Miles, plus a Seven Deadly Sins novella by Allison Brennan.

Stacia Kane contributed the foreword. Formatting and cover art were also donated to the project by Lori Devoti and Laura Morrigan.

I'm also giving away my sci fi/paranormal romance Galaxy Girls. It's a mix of fun with serious stuff that matters. I call it my homage to the Gilmore Girls – if they came from another planet and used pheromones as weapons. (Wouldn't that be cool to do?)

Genetically created to be broodmares, Phyrne Galaxy and her mother, aunt and cousin don't need men, they need freedom. They escaped from the warring planet of Kergeron to Earth, where Phyrne's aunt's vision of winning money in a New Jersey casino comes true. Too bad her aunt's precog didn't show the hoods waiting outside with guns. But Phyrne has her own weapon, more powerful than bullets. She's ovulating.

Phyrne turns up the heat, taking out more than the crooks in her wave of sexual torture. FBI Special Agent Hawk Higgens, running to protect the women, is brought to his knees, too. Caught in her procreative spell, Phyrne ravishes Hawk.

Being seduced by an alien and left half naked and unconscious in the back of a surveillance van changes Hawk's life. He joins the Foundation, a privately funded agency that hunts aliens. Six years later, the reason for his career change pops back on the radar in a tea shop in Kentucky. The woman whose face still haunts his dreams has an addition to her family – a five-year-four-month-old daughter.

At the same time, two Kergeron warriors are sent to Earth to bring the women back to their home planet. With an ex-FBI agent and two alien warriors on her trail, Phyrne's calm life running the Tea & Comfort shop is about to get shaken, stirred and screwed.

Both books have gotten awesome reviews. I'm proud of both of them.

To enter the contest, go here or to Laurie's place. Scroll down to see the easy-to-fill-out entry form.

Thanks for stopping by! Go enter and win!

Awesome day! Giveaways still available!

I had an awesome day yesterday! Entangled, a Paranormal Romance was mentioned all over the internet. The Season, RT Book Reviews, and Barbara Vey's Beyond Her Book Publishers Weekly blog are a few places.

Cynthia Eden had a HUGE DOUBLE RELEASE PARTY for Entangled and for her new e-novella Bound in Darkness. She has tons of giveaways, with many guest authors. I'm giving away Cattitude and Galaxy Girls. I asked the age-old question "If you could be an animal, which one would you like to be?" Someone said a unicorn, which I loved. Big cats seem to be the favorite. The contest is still good until noon today (the 13th). So, go and comment on my post and any others.

I'm giving away an e-copy of Entangled at Magical Musings, too. I'm announcing the winner tomorrow, so you have until then to comment and have a chance to win.

Entangled is on two bestselling lists already. I am so frickin' excited!

New indie author Trish McCallan is on fire!

I have so many friends who have new books out, all great writers, and I need to put up a post about ALL of them. But today I want to talk about Trish McCallan. Trish is a former critique partner and blog partner. I've been reading excerpts of her book as she wrote it, and her writing is strong and gritty and compelling. So are her characters. The title of her debut book, FORGED IN FIRE, is a good way to describe Trish and most every writer I know. Especially the ones who have been honing their craft for a few years. Learning and writing and rewriting.

It's paying off for Trish. FORGED IN FIRE has been available for only two days, and right now on Amazon it's "12,367 Paid in Kindle Store." This out of hundreds of thousands of books! So, here's the cover (created by the amazing and gorgeous Laura Morrigan), the description, and below that an excerpt. You can see for yourself what I'm talking about.

Canvassing the rides took next to no time. Still, when they arrived at the shooting gallery, a crowd had gathered.

"Man, he hasn't missed once," a weedy teenager said.

"Neither did the other one," someone to the teenager's right responded.

They slipped between a balding man who reeked of cheap cologne and a brassy-haired woman who reeked of cigarettes. Beth gagged and held her breath.

"You wanna bet they're cops?" a stooped man with graying hair said to his stooped and graying wife.

"I doubt it, dear. Those muscles didn't come from donuts."

They weaved their way through a flock of teenage girls wearing shorts that skirted the edge of decency, and discovered that the front of the crowd consisted of children.

They broke into the open as Rawls leaned down and handed a plastic doll to a tiny Asian child in a frilly sundress.

"Here yah go, darlin'," he said, his blond head gleaming like platinum in the sunlight.  "I'd have got pink to match that purty dress—but pink's Cosky's favorite color."

"I'm not the one asking for dolls," Cosky said with a pointed glance at the half dozen Barbie knockoffs clutched in tiny hands.

Beth glanced over the front row of children; they all held an array of cheap toys.  Her gaze lingered on a red-headed little boy and the purple dinosaur he cradled to his fragile chest. Her heart started aching. Something about him reminded her of Kyle. Maybe it was the shyness in the dip of his chin, or the way he avoided everyone's eyes, or that bright red hair.

"What?" Zane's gaze was locked on Rawl's grinning face. "You decide to break the vendor by winning all his toys?"

Rawls looked up and shrugged. "The guy we came for is off-site on lunch break. Since he's not answering his phone, we figured we'd try our luck while we waited. Might as well give the rugrats some mementoes."

"We'd have upgraded these cheesy toys by now if Rawls would spend more time shooting and less flirting with the ladies." Cosky winked at the cluster of grade schoolers.

"Cosky's just jealous," Rawls shot his buddy a smirk. "Poor bastard couldn't hit the hull of a sub from the dock."

"Pay attention, prettyboy—" Cosky slapped a five dollar bill down on the waist-high counter and waited for the scowling attendant to scoop it up and move out of the way. "—while  I show you what real shooting looks like."

He raised the BB gun to his shoulder. A steady phuffitt, phuffitt, ping, ping filled the air, and the metal ducks toppled over in a massacre of sunny yellow.

Beth stared at the rifle. According to Chastain, his son had used one of those guns. Touched one of those guns….

She'd read various books through the years that had featured psychic heroes or heroines, and then there were all the televisions shows. In the movies and books, just touching an object could spark a vision. It was hard to believe she was actually considering the idea—Lord knows she'd never put much stock in psychic phenomenon. But it was little hard to dismiss the possibility considering everything that had happened since that damn dream.

She turned to Zane, and lowered her voice. "Can you pick something up off the rifle? Agent Chastain's son must have touched one of them."

He glanced at her, surprise flaring in his eyes. "It doesn't work like that, at least not for me. I've never gotten anything from an object."

"Oh," Beth murmured, surprised by the quick rise of disappointment.

Zane studied her face for a moment, and then turned back to the counter.

It wasn't until the last target fell and the puffing pinging sounds dissipated that Beth heard the excited whispers rising from behind. She turned to find half a dozen teenage girls admiring Cosky, Rawls and Zane's long, lean frames. Several of the girls adjusted their blouses to display maximum cleavage.

"Hell," Mac said from the sidelines where he stood with his arms crossed and his feet spread. "You call that shooting? Took fifteen seconds to take them down. If they'd been snipers we'd be dead by now."

Snipers?

Beth stared at the smiling yellow ducks and rolled her eyes.

Dropping his arms, Mac stepped forward and snatched the BB gun from Cosky's shoulder. Beth snorted beneath her breath. Good Lord, they'd regressed to kindergarten.  Her gaze shifted to Zane. Well, at least three of the four had. Zane appeared to be the only one—

She dumped that comparison when Zane stepped forward and made a grab for Rawls' gun. As Mac started shooting, and that oddly rhythmic phuffitt of escaping air and ping, ping of metal hitting metal once again filled the booth, Zane dug into his pocket and pulled out a money clip.

Beth glanced at the prices affixed to the post in the middle of the booth and did some quick mental gymnastics. A snicker escaped. If her calculations were correct, it cost two bucks to win a prize that cost about fifty cents at the dollar store.

"If you want to impress Beth with some fancy shooting," Rawls drawled, "you better let me keep the gun."

"Not another one!" The waif-thin teenager manning the booth groaned as Zane dropped a wad of bills on the counter. The attendant stalked over to the rope that stretched the length of the booth and plucked down the peach-colored pony Mac pointed to. He fired the stuffed animal to the commander and threw up his hands. "Why don't you just give me your wallets and I'll hand over the prizes. It'll save time."

Mac caught the pony and handed it off to a dark-haired sprite in a yellow dress. "We want to upgrade these shitty toys."

As Zane brought the BB gun up to his shoulder, another man pushed his way through the crowd.

"What the fuck?" Freckled, skeletal hands plunked down on bony hips. He glared at the multitude of toys in the first row and then transferred his ire to the booth attendant. "You giving them away?"

Mac glanced over and froze, then lowered his BB gun to the counter. Beth turned toward the new arrival. From the commander's reaction, he had to be the man they'd come to see. Zane set his gun down as well and just like that all four men morphed from competitive schoolboys, to steely-eyed men on a mission.

It's available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords. I think she has a winning book here, and I'm sure I'll see her much higher up on Kindle's bestseller list.

What writers do you know who are on fire?

Interview and giveaway

I'm at the lovely Joan Swan's today (Monday) with a giveaway of GALAXY GIRLS. Joan made a very cool bookmark for Galaxy Girls and is giving away 5 of them. I reveal some writing secrets you might not know about me. I hope you'll stop by.

I also have an excerpt of Galaxy Girls at Only Romance, which is also cool.

I need a clone

I'm at three places today. Four if you count typing in my office with my beagle softly snoring behind me. If you're a writer, you might be interested in my How To Write Shop article about promoting your ebooks on Amazon and Yahoo forums. I got the information from Trish McCallan, who's using the forums brilliantly. More power to her!

I'm also on Indie Snippets with a snippet from Galaxy Girls. It's a fun place. I really like it and thanks to Bryan Dennis for doing this.

Last, I'm at Magical Musings, talking about The Important Things.

All four of me hope to see you online somewhere.

 

 

Exciting news!

Yesterday was proof that bad things come in 3s. They were irritating bad things – starting with my internet connection not connecting – and not tragedies. (After two hours, I did get online.) Good things happened, too, and I'm all about good things. DRAGON BLUES is featured in the September issue of RT Book Reviews! It's on page 23, and it looks gorgeous! It's under What's HOT This Month in Self-Publishing. They mention DEAD PEOPLE, too, which finalled in the RT-sponsored American Title V contest.

Even more exciting things are on their way, as you can see by this fantastic cover by Laura Morrigan.

Cynthia Eden talks about it on her blog, and has an excerpt from her story. Later, I'll blog about it and put up an excerpt from my story, The Fat Cat.

So, that's two exciting things. I'm waiting for the third.

Anything exciting in your life lately?

Unusual interview

I'm at Laurie's Thoughts and Reviews with one of my Galaxy Girls characters interviewing another. It was my suggestion, but as soon as she said "great idea" (or something similar), I inwardly groaned and wondered if I could pull it off. So I'm pleased at how fun it turned out. It catches the fun tone of the story (though GG has some dark spots, too.)

Laurie also wrote an insightful review that gave me something to think about. That's what a good reviewer does. I almost forgot, but I'm doing a giveaway there, too.

Michelle Diener, whose debut book, In A Treacherous Court, is officially out now, is at Magical Musings, talking about all that she's learned on her journey to publication. A lot!

I should be writing but I'm monitoring a great class on formatting and converting Word files into epub and prc files. Yesterday I formatted 2 books. Today I'll format 3 much quicker than I did yesterday. (I hope) Then I'll try the conversion. Lori makes it look easy. Wish me luck.