M.J. Scott's Blog, page 4

Sunday snippet

Just two more sleep! Are you ready for Playing Fast?

Still time to pre-order: links are here. And if you want a chance at some giveaways and sneak peeks…sign up for my Melanie newsletter!

The post Sunday snippet appeared first on Crossed Wires.

Sunday snippet

We’re getting very close to Playing Fast now, so have another snippet!

Pre-order links are here. And if you want a chance at some giveaways and sneak peeks…sign up for my Melanie newsletter!

The post Sunday snippet appeared first on Crossed Wires.

Sunday snippet

It’s Playing Fast snippet time again.

Pre-order links are here. And if you want a chance at some giveaways and sneak peeks…sign up for my Melanie newsletter!

The post Sunday snippet appeared first on Crossed Wires.

Sunday snippet

Time for another taste of Finn and Eva from Playing Fast, only a few more weeks to go now!

Pre-order links are here. And if you want a chance at some giveaways and sneak peeks…sign up for my Melanie newsletter!

The post Sunday snippet appeared first on Crossed Wires.

Sunday snippet

Having emerged from deadlines and travel and such things, am attempting to get back on the blogging wagon. Let’s start with a Sunday snippet. This one is from Playing Fast, which comes out in one month! Who’s ready for some Finn?

Pre-order links are here. And if you want a chance at some giveaways and sneak peeks over the next month…sign up for my Melanie newsletter!

The post Sunday snippet appeared first on Crossed Wires.

Dropping in

To say, yes, I’m still alive. I know there has been blog silence for a month or so but I didn’t think anyone wanted to read a month of “I’m sad my cat died” posts. I am still sad my cat died but in a less immediately too much crying at the drop of a hat at all hours of the day way and more a ‘pets leave holes behind’ kind of way. I am however staring down the barrel of a too rapidly approaching deadline so not sure I’ll be back up to three posts a week until the book is done but will aim for something…

While we weren’t paying attention it has turned into autumn (though so far in Melbourne a weirdly warm autumn). Still, the leaves are pretty. As exhibit 1, above, demonstrates.

To distract you while I’m not here so much, may I recommend Vivian Swift’s blog (writer/watercolourist/cat lady). I have recently discovered Vivian’s beautiful and charming books.

Or may I suggest you go watch The Night Manager (Tom Hiddleston being brilliantly britishly handsome and Hugh Laurie being brilliantly evil).

Or you could make some of these cookies. Because they’re yummy.

I’ll be over here writing. And pouting that I can’t go see Civil War until I hit a certain word count (I am mean to me). The Torti, for those following along is coping okay with solo kitty hood though I think she’s a bit lonely during the day. But she’s happy enough which means I will probably wait until I’ve finished my big trips for the year before thinking about new kitties….probably.

 

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State of the Mel #10

Every so often I do one of these posts, mostly for new followers at various places to catch folks up on who I am, what I do and an update for everyone on what I’m working on. The last few weeks have been a bit of a rollercoaster here at Chez Mel. On Good Friday I found out that The Shattered Court had finalled in the Paranormal Romance category of the Romance Writers of America’s RITA® awards which was very exciting. This weekend, very unexpectedly, I had to put one of my cats to sleep (the Fuzzy Girl has left us for those who are regular readers so vale to my gorgeous little girl who was only five and a half, which is just not old enough). So that sucked. And I may be a bit quieter than usual online for a bit. But otherwise, for all about me, read on…

Who am I?

I’m Melanie Scott (most commonly answering to Mel). I write books. Specifically I write fantasy (dark and urban) as M.J. Scott and contemporary romance as Melanie Scott.

Selfies are good. Have a selfie.

 

 

M.J writes dark fantasy (the Half-Light City series which is now finished and The Four Arts series which began with THE SHATTERED COURT) and urban fantasy (The Wild Side series). Currently sorting out the schedule for the next few M.J. books so hopefully news on that soon.

Melanie writes the New York Saints series. Book 1 in that series THE DEVIL IN DENIM came out in August 2014. Publisher’s Weekly picked it as one of their Top 10 Fall 2014 romances, so that was pretty cool. Book 2 ANGEL IN ARMANI came out December 2014. Book 3, LAWLESS IN LEATHER came out in May 2015. Book 4, PLAYING HARD came out 2 Feb and then Book 5, PLAYING FAST, comes out August 30. The first three books are out in Germany in late April/May. Read more here.

My agent is Miriam Kriss at the Irene Goodman Literary Agency. She’s the gal to speak to if you have queries about rights to any of my stuff.

More specifically I’m of the female persuasion, I have a day job that I don’t tend to talk about much online and so far have survived four decades living in Australia home of many things that the rest of the world believes will cause instant death (to be fair, some of them do but they don’t tend to hang around cities so I’m cool with them). I live in Melbourne which is down south where coffee is weirdly popular (I do not drink the stuff), so is Australian rules football (I do not really do football) and the weather is temperamental (we like four seasons in one day and always having to pack an umbrella). It is now Summer here. Unlike last summer, which was oddly cool, this summer has had some hot days (good for tomatoes, less good for this pale gal. I am Team Moderate Temperatures, so I like spring and autumn). Not Team Winter or Team Summer (too pale skinned to love sunbaking though I do love swimming and the ocean so Team Vampire Strength Sunscreen). If I’m ever really rich, maybe I’ll just follow Spring around the world. Luckily summer so far has mostly not had long stretches of hot days and nights which is about the only time I wish I lived somewhere else. My caffeine of choice is Coke Zero. Coffee makes me sick (hence I do not drink it) and tea just doesn’t caffeine me well enough. Besides writing, I like geeky things, movies, TV, ballet, knitting, embroidery, various other crafty things, food, photography, watercolours, stationery, music, baking, project life, naps, travel and books. I also have my girly moments (nails/make up/perfume/sparkly things/bags/shoes). I like to talk about all these things here on my blog.

I am an experienced, if currently sad, cat butler. My current feline employer is the Torti (a relatively sane for a calico/tortoiseshell girl who like rattly mice and glaring out windows at birds and other cats who have the temerity to wander into her line of vision) . The previous employers (if you go delving into the archives) were the Fuzzy Girl (a slightly less sane, built like a teeny Garfield (low slung but not chubby), tad un-coordinated, very chatty fluffy grey and white girl who liked naps, tummy rubs, telling everybody everything that has happened every second of the day and falling off the sofa in her sleep), the Orange Cat (a very sweet but neurotic red burmese boy who also liked telling you what was happening only at a far louder volume than the Fuzzy Girl) and the Grey Cat (possibly the most sane of my cats, a fluffy smoke tabby moggy girl who chirped rather than meowed but was otherwise a well behaved glamour puss). I will fill the recent vacancy in the number of employers eventually but not until it feels not quite so recent as long as the Torti is okay being solo kitty for awhile. I hang out with friends of the writer and non writer variety and I am slightly prone to klutziness. Like break-ankle-getting-up-from-couch klutziness. Maybe this is why I knew the Fuzzy Girl was meant to be my cat.

My teeny tiny garden is often neglected even though I like growing things.  I have had a good crop of tomatoes this year (last year’s cool summer meant tomato plants died) some herbs, a few jalapenos and I have managed to keep  a new crop of various house plants of the ‘surely I can’t kill one of these variety’ mostly alive for the last six months (well, I seem to have lost a couple of succulents but everything else is, touch wood, okay). I am team Iron Man and Team Captain America (which will make watching Civil War interesting), team Buffy, team Thor, team Ollicity, team Baymax, team genre, team animation, team Outlander, team Winchester, team X-Files, team BB-8, team Rey, team Jennifer Jones, team Austen, team Minions, team fantasy, team happy endings are the best, team chocolate (preferably dark), team margarita, team ginger beer, team science, team musical, team music in general, team my heart belongs to Number 10, team reading is sexy, team thinking, team virgo, team colour and pictures make me happy, team baking, team movement is good even when you don’t want to, team glow, team don’t be a douche and team life is better with folks who make you laugh.

More about the books, please?

The Half-Light City series is an alt-world dark fantasy quadrology. It has fae and vampires and werewolves and magic and follows a bunch of characters through a particularly troublesome time in the Half-Light City which houses many races and many problems. All four books SHADOW KIN, BLOOD KIN, IRON KIN and FIRE KIN are available at all the usual places.

The Four Arts series is also an alt-world dark fantasy series (at this stage I think it’s a trilogy but heck, I thought that about the Half-Light series initially). It has witches and demons and religious differences and a heroine trying not to get her life ruined by all of the above. It began with THE SHATTERED COURT in April (also available as an audiobook). I’m currently working on the second book which is tentatively titled THE FORBIDDEN HEIR.

The Wild Side series is an urban fantasy trilogy which follows the adventures of Ashley Keenan who is trying very hard to be a normal boring human accountant but all the pesky werewolves and vampires in her world make that difficult. The first two books THE WOLF WITHIN and THE DARK SIDE are available at all good ebook retailers. Likewise, THE DAY YOU WENT AWAY is a free short story prequel that you can find at all the usual ebook sellers plus on Wattpad.  I am hoping to write the final book, BRING ON THE NIGHT, this year in between my contracted books.

The New York Saints series is a contemporary romance series about three guys who buy the New York Saints (the worst team in MLB) and the women who complicate the process. As mentioned above, THE DEVIL IN DENIM and ANGEL IN ARMANI, and LAWLESS IN LEATHER, are all out and I have not long finished writing PLAYING FAST (which is the fifth book after PLAYING HARD which just came out last week).  Playing Fast will be out on August 30. The Devil in Denim, Angel in Armani and Lawless in Leather are also available in audiobook at Audible for US folks. The first three books will also be coming out in Germany starting sometime in April as far as I know.

What are you working on?

The last two year’s writing schedules were  a bit nutty. Which meant, naturally, that life decided to sideswipe me with other stuff.  Including a four month or so bout of benign paroxysmal positional vertigo which was very unpleasant. But I caught up eventually and continue to WRITE ALL THE THINGS and DO ALL THE OTHER STUFF I LIKE.

I’m currently writing THE FORBIDDEN HEIR and have just finished writing PLAYING FAST. Everything else under consideration currently falls under the heading of sekrit squirrel business which can’t be discussed publicly. But I still haven’t received either my clone army or my allocation of minions so while there are plenty of books in the pipeline, the order of said books will depend on time and brain space. If you want to be updated about things as they happen, sign up for my newsletters. M.J here and Melanie here.

Tell me more…

Places I hang out include here on the blog (but hey, you knew that already). I love me some twitter and @melscott will find me there. I tend to be most active on twitter but you know, internet procrastination for the win, so I hang out elsewhere.

M.J’s facebook page is www.facebook.com/AuthorMJScott and Melanie’s is www.facebook.com/WriterMelanieScott. If you’re into Google+ I’m here (on and off, as Google doesn’t make it easier to post there quickly). I get my fix of pretty things, recipes, geekiness and ideas for stuff on Pinterest where I’m mel_writes. If you want to keep up with the blog you can subscribe in a blog reader with the RSS feed via the button on the top of the page (or directly in Bloglovin if you’re a Bloglovin user using the button in the sidebar).

I like to take pictures, so if you like looking at pictures, my Instagram handle is melwrites. I also post various pics on Facebook and Twitter. I take most of my pictures with an iPhone 6 (previously a 5) and also break out my Canon DSLR. I also dabble a bit with art (mostly watercolour) and various crafts and pictures of what I’m dabbling with get posted in the same places.

And that about wraps it up for me. Until next time…if you have any questions, find me at one of the places above or drop me an email via either of my websites.

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Sunday snippet

Another taste of Guy and Holly from Blood Kin, Book 2 of the Half-Light City series.

The post Sunday snippet appeared first on Crossed Wires.

Watercolour love

I’ve been doing an online course with Jane Blundell for the last few months. Jane is a brilliant watercolour artist as well as a font of all knowledge when it comes to watercolour paints and colour mixing.  Because the course is online, I do my homework and photograph it and send it to her, which means I’ve been taking lots of pretty pics of watercolour mixes and pigments and paintings, so here are a few bits of pretty to stare at. I love looking at watercolour on the page, the way the pigment moves and mixes is fascinating.

Colour mixes.

Dried palette pools are always pretty.

 

Tones and mountains.

Earth triads colour wheels look like planets. Also, I sometime cannot paint inside the lines of a circle :D.

It’s not easy being green but it’s purty…

  Washes that look like the Outback.

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Bad cook

Confession time. Sometimes I’m a bad cook. Or maybe a lazy cook. I like cooking generally but sometimes I lose the mojo.The last month or so I’ve had lots of day job day swapping, a few weekends not at home, another few weeks and weekends with extra events and a bout of cortisone-jab-to-the-cranky-knee insomnia. Which has all equated to my routine being out the window, a lot of ‘what is in the freezer’, ‘where’s that take away menu’ and ‘cereal for dinner is just fine’ type situations in the kitchen.

Basically right now I’d rather eat this than cook.

I’m in a slump. Putting some smoked chicken in my salad instead of tuna is as about as exciting as it’s gotten around here cooking-wise. And cooking slumps are not good for my budget, my health or my productivity. So I’m looking for ways to un-slump myself. April is not looking to be any calmer than March and I have a book deadline rapidly approaching (yikes). So I think I need to sit down and do some good old fashioned menu planning and meal prepping. So if anyone has any tips or fave approaches to doing this (especially for the smaller household) let me know! Otherwise, I’ll be over on Pinterest browsing and seeing if inspiration strikes. Or else seeing if I can bribe Shutterbean to move to Melbourne and then come to my house and meal prep every week

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