Jessica Scott's Blog, page 36

The Burden of Proof

Today has been a ranty mcrantypants day for me. Here's just one thing that got my blood pressure up.

My lieutenants used to laugh at me when I would say it's not what you know, it's what you can prove. Except that, sadly, the burden of proof is the single most frustratingly true thing about being a commander and the most important constraint around.

Folks there is no job in the world that carries with it as much power, authority and responsibility as being a commander in the army. Literally everything falls under the purview of the commander from the big stuff like training requirements to ammo detail to whether your soldiers' spouse is making their appointments (am so not kidding in this one).

So when I see articles in the media about how "the Army" knew about xx crime of the week and yet chose to do nothing, I get frustrated. Now mind you, I'm aware that we don't always get the full story from the media and there are far too many cases where commanders knew and had proof but chose not to take action but I wonder how much "proof" the commander actually had in their hands.

Case in point: let's say you're a commander and you "know" a soldier has committed a crime. How do you know? Because their spouse is telling you this in the same breath as she loves him and wants him back. But what can you prove if the spouse is unwilling to either make a sworn statement or go to the police? Do you have the basis to conduct a commanders inquiry? Depends on what your lawyer says. And when the lawyer, you know, the folks who have gone to actual law school, say you've got nothing, well, you've got nothing. Except suspicions that someone in your formation has done something really bad and there's nothing you can do about it.

I also cringe when the media says "the Army" did x, y, or z or failed to do the same. Folks "the Army" doesn't exists, not in this manner. When something is done or fails to get done, that's on the local chain of command from the squad leader/team chief to the company, battalion and or brigade commander. The monolithic "Army" making decisions that impact individual soldiers lives happens in the form of policy. There's a person implementing that policy and applying thought and a little thing called commander's discretion.

People are complaining that the promotion rates for captain and major are going down. Folks this is not a bad thing. The days of no lieutenant left behind are over, as they should be. Not everyone should command. Not everyone should be a field grade officer. Because the problem is that when you have no officer left behind, you end up with a lot of dead weight, of people who are in leadership positions who are supposed to, hell, are required to make decisions who lack either the aptitude or the willingness to make decisions.

And not just decisions but sound decisions. That's how things get royally screwed up: when you have people in charge who either lack the aptitude or the intestinal fortitude to make the hard decisions or hell, any decision. Fall backs to policy are a surefire way to ensure that someone gets screwed.

Maybe it's a bridge too far to hope that we'll get back to a day when people actually think instead of regurgitate what "they said". I certainly hope not.

So West Point Called…

And well, I guess they're looking for a sociology instructor in the Behavioral Sciences and Leadership Department.

Yeah, um, I was not that cool and composed when I got the call today.

Holy. Crap.

He asked me if I wanted time to think about it. Said I was one of the top selectees (not sure how that happened).

I'M GOING TO TEACH AT WEST POINT!!!!!!

Weekly Winner of BECAUSE OF YOU

The winner for last week's entrants into the Blog Hop is

mary_reiss@hotmail.com!

Please email me so I can shoot the copy of Because of You your way in your preferred digital format.

Don't forget to leave a comment for next week's drawing and to be entered into the grand prize at the end of the month! No need to leave a new comment for next week's drawing! And remember to check out the other blogs in the Romance At Random Reader Rally, going on now until the end of the month!!

Thoughts on a New Unit & Authors Behaving Badly

Army Life

I reported to my new unit this week. It wasn't a major move or anything, I just walked upstairs to the new battalion. But it's interesting because my mental shift hasn't occurred yet and it really needs to. Us is not my new unit. Them is my old unit, not the other way around. We had a change of command and it turns out the new battalion commander and I served in First Cav back in 03-04. Not sure if him remembering me is a good thing or not because, well, instead of being a mouthy captain, I was a mouthy staff sergeant. But he seemed nice enough about it so we shall see.

As I move into my new unit and prep to take command again, it's dawned on me that I really miss being a commander. Not just that, but I miss my folks from my old company. They weren't just my subordinates. They were my team and they really were a hell of a good team. My first sergeant put up with so so much from me, my XO knew how to figure out what he could stall on because I'd forget and how to keep up with what was going to piss me off versus what he could tell me later. My ops sergeant, hell, she was a young sergeant going on First Sergeant. She was pure awesomeness in so may ways, but the most important was her honesty. I could count on her to give me a no bullshit assessment and when you're a commander, you sometimes wonder if people are just blowing smoke up your ass because, well, you're their boss.

I miss my old team too because I knew who I could trust, who I had to watch and who I could count on. It was familiar. Now, moving upstairs, I have a new team I'm moving into. The biggest thing I have to do is not compare them to my first team. They will be a different team. There will be different things that are good and different things that will frustrate me but it will still be my team. I told the other commanders in my new unit that I'm looking forward to being a commander again. One of them looked at me like I was crazy and asked why?


Why do I enjoy command? Because I get to make a difference. I get to say I can help you with that. Or I get to say you don't get to be a Soldier any more. The minute I start believing I can't make a difference, it's time to hang it up. So on that note, I am looking forward to this again.

Authors Behaving Badly



In the writing world, it seems that 2012 really is the year of the apocalypse. There have been several major dustups about reviews, googling one's self, authors gaming the review system, reviewers attacking authors.

I've joked with several authors that I can't wait to be an episode of authors behaving badly because hey, there's no such thing as bad press, right? Well, not exactly. I do think there's bad press in these cases and here's why: depending on what's been said and no, I do not lump all episodes of authors coming out and talking about reviewers or whatever into the same boat, it leaves a thought in the back of my mind about the author. Most of the reviewers, I won't remember. I may remember the specific review but I won't remember in 6 months (probably either one but that's a whole nother issue).

So there's a couple of things that come to mind about the whole thing. First, remember what Nora Roberts said at RWA 10 during the keynote luncheon and I'm paraphrasing badly here: "Get over it. Reader A is going to love your book for the same reason Reader B is going to want to burn it". And second, Laura Kinsale wrote a great post about reader reaction getting into an author's head. The point she made was that writing is first and foremost, the author putting a story on paper. Yes, each reader will take something different from the book but at the end of the day, the author must write what she feels the story needs.

I can relate to this. For the last few months since Because of You came out, I haven't been able to get reader comments out of my head. So I've made a conscious effort to stay off Goodreads, Amazon and BN review sections. If you've liked my book, thank you so so much for reading it and for telling people that you liked it. And if you didn't like it, I'm so sorry it missed the mark for you but thank you for reading it and giving it a shot and for telling people that, too. Honestly, I'm grateful that people are even reading it. I'm grateful for having had a book that people read. That doesn't mean that a couple of negative reviews haven't stuck in my head, but not for the reason people might think. One review said holy crap this author repeats herself enough. We get it.

Why would that one stick in my head? Well, because I *do* have a problem with repetition. So I've got to work on that as a writer. I can't fix anything about Because of You now. All I can do I keep this in my head as I get ready to revise my next book.

Authors, ask yourself, why are you googling reviews and reading them? What do you get from that? If it ends up pissing you off and causing you to obsess about why the review was wrong, unfair, unjust, lies, whatever, maybe there's a better use of your energy? Are you looking for ways to improve your writing? Maybe there's something to that then but you're going to get such a vast overload of information, you might be better off finding a good critique partner.

That's the wrap up for this week. Don't forget that you can still enter to win a copy of a hard copy ARC of Because of You at Goodreads.

You can also enter the Romance at Random Reader Rally and leave comments all over the place to win lots of free books!

And Back To You is up for preorder!

Welcome to the Romance at Random Reader Rally

So I'm taking part in the Romance at Random Reader Rally. Between now and January 31, I'll be giving away ecopies of Because of You, one copy each week. Leave a comment to win and make sure you check out the main page over at Romance at Random to see other participating blogs as well as a chance to enter the Grand Prize Drawing!

As an added bonus, at the end of the month, I'll give a $25 gift card to either Barnes and Noble or Amazon to one lucky commenter!

Click on the link below to be part of Romance At Random's random 5 book giveaway drawing – then, comment in our post to be eligible for the Grand Prize drawing! Winner of the Grand Prize drawing will be randomly chosen from the comments in this post (ebook for International readers thru Net Galley, all Net Galley terms & restrictions apply; ebook (Net Galley) or print for US readers)

Enter below for a chance at the Grand Prize!

Sex on Bikes! + Giveaway

Fellow Loveswept Author Ruthie Knox joins us today to talk about her debut novel Ride With Me, coming next month from Random House digital!

When I first had the idea to write a sexy romance novel set on the TransAmerica Trail—a forty-two-hundred mile paved bike route that crosses the United States from Virginia to Oregon—I was so overcome with giddiness at the idea of getting to put bikes in a book, I didn't think it all the way through. I neglected to consider that I'd just given myself a rather intimidating mandate: I was going to have to make bikes sexy.

I mean, it's all very well if you're Jessica Scott, and you write about men who wear boots and carry guns and blow shit up. Women are conditioned from birth to find guys like that hot. Cyclists, on the other hand? Not so much. And it's all the these fellows …

I know. I know.

But I was undaunted. I would bring the sexy back to cycling. I had the power! And anytime I felt faint of heart, I just reminded myself that the Venn diagram of "cycling" and "sex" does have overlap.

See? His name is Lance Armstrong.

Or, wait, no. Diagrams are too brainy. I'm supposed to use more pictures. How about this? Does this do it for you?

Eddy Mercx was also quite the hottie back in the day, what with his sideburns and that sweetie-pie-Elvis face. Plus, his name has an "x" in it, which makes him automatically sexy.

Point being, yes, okay, cycling isn't our manliest sport. It's got the grunting and the sweating, but it's also got the spandex shorts, the helmets, and products with names like "Butt Butter."

For me to make this bicycling romance novel thing work, I needed guidelines. So I made myself a little index card, and I propped it up on my monitor.

Here are Ruthie's Rules of the Road:

(1) The hero may not wear spandex or engage in any kind of gearhead weenery.

(2) The hero may putter around bare-chested in the sun, getting grease on his hands as he tunes the heroine's derailleur.*

*Bow-chicka-bow-bow.

(3) The hero may not drink any liquids from a tube or be seen fretting about hydration levels or eating power bars.

(4) The hero may drink beer and eat burritos. (See? Manly!)

(5) The hero must wear both helmets—because safe sex is important, but so is making sure you don't leak gray matter all over the pavement after you get hit by a logging truck.**

**Corollary to Rule 5: The writer need not mention either sort of helmet more than once or twice, so as to make it easy on the reader to conveniently forget all about them.

(6) The hero may not make use of any products designed to "prevent chafing." No butt lubricants were employed in the writing of this book.**

**NB: The writer is still laughing five minutes after having typed that sentence.

(7) The hero may pound his tent stakes into the ground with a giant rock, all caveman-like.

And, finally, the rule that trumps them all—

(8) The hero may make up for any perceived deficiencies by being astonishingly good at tent sex. Like, seriously gifted, people. He'll prove it to you. Repeatedly.

BOOK DESCRIPTION

Ride with Me, available from Loveswept on February 13, 2012!

In this fun, scorching-hot eBook original romance by Ruthie Knox, a cross-country bike adventure takes a detour into unexplored passion. As readers will discover, Ride with Me is not about the bike!

When Lexie Marshall places an ad for a cycling companion, she hopes to find someone friendly and fun to cross the TransAmerica Trail with. Instead, she gets Tom Geiger — a lean, sexy loner whose bad attitude threatens to spoil the adventure she's spent years planning.

Roped into the cycling equivalent of a blind date by his sister, Tom doesn't want to ride with a chatty, go-by-the-map kind of woman, and he certainly doesn't want to want her. Too bad the sight of Lexie with a bike between her thighs really turns his crank.

Even Tom's stubborn determination to keep Lexie at a distance can't stop a kiss from leading to endless nights of hotter-than-hot sex. But when the wild ride ends, where will they go next?



BIO

Ruthie Knox figured out how to walk and read at the same time in the second grade, and she hasn't looked up since. She spent her formative years hiding romance novels in her bedroom closet to avoid the merciless teasing of her brothers and imagining scenarios in which someone who looked remarkably like Daniel Day Lewis recognized her well-hidden sex appeal and rescued her from middle-class Midwestern obscurity. After graduating from Grinnell College with an English and history double major, she earned a Ph.D. in modern British history that she's put to remarkably little use.

These days, she writes contemporary romance in which witty, down-to- earth characters find each other irresistible in their pajamas, though she freely admits this has yet to happen to her. Perhaps she needs more exciting pajamas. Ruthie abhors an epilogue and insists a decent romance requires at least three good sex scenes.

GIVEAWAY

One lucky commenter will be randomly chosen to win a digital copy of Ride with Me. Winners will pick up their copy through Net Galley. Good luck to all!

New York Times At War Blog

I wrote a piece for the New York Times At War blog through Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. I hope you'll swing over and check it out.

 

http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/author...

 

 

New York Times At War Blog

I wrote a piece for the New York Times At War Blog about the end of the war.

http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/0...

Win a Hard Copy ARC of BECAUSE OF YOU

Okay so I totally sent out teaser pictures a few weeks ago and have been working through the details of a giveaway for a few of the hard copies of Because of You.

Well, that day is here. I've got a Goodreads giveaway up and running for 5 ARCs of Because of You. I hope you'll spread the word and enter to win. Oh and these are not the only 5 copies out there. There will be more chances to win in the coming weeks so stay tuned!!

Click here for the Goodreads link to enter to win!

And the Winner is…

So I'm a little bit behind in posting the winner of the 25$ gift card to either Barnes and Noble or Amazon is StacieD! Please email me your info and what you'd prefer so I can get it out to you!!