Rebecca Crowley's Blog, page 7

jozi: one month on

Today marks four weeks since I left the UK and the time has absolutely flown. I still feel as green as a new shoot as I navigate my new country of residence, but I’m slowly getting to grips with the commute, the vocabulary, and the way of life down here at the bottom of a continent.

Every day it seems I make a mental note to pass on one or other funny expat observation and then utterly fail to do so, so I’ll try to encapsulate a few of my favorites.

-       This may be a side effect of living without a television for six years in the UK, but our new house came with a satellite subscription and 200+ channels of pure awesome. We get TLC from the US, BBC from the UK, and selectively-bought series from HBO and Showtime like True Blood and Ray Donovan. The airing schedule is a couple of weeks behind the US, but who cares? I can finally watch Eric Northman in flat-screen HD glory rather than a fuzzy download from a Chinese website!

-       Joburg natives are some of the nicest people you could hope to meet… until they get in their cars. I’m losing track of how many social events we’ve been invited to by people we barely know (including the woman who completed the insurance survey and suggested we go out with her friends about five minutes after we opened the front door). In the shops and on the streets people smile and joke and look you in the eye and apologize if they bump into you. But if you need someone to let you into a lane during rush hour? Forget it! Even though very little seems to start on time here, every driver seems to be in an urgent hurry and is unafraid of using the horn to let you know. I still find it hard not to get stressed by the impatience of other drivers, but I’m gradually learning to attribute it to ubiquitous haste and not a reflection on my driving abilities. Check back in three months when I’m bitching about slow drivers hogging the fast lane!

-       Living in an upscale neighborhood, going to nice restaurants and a brand-new gym, and mingling almost exclusively with fellow high-achieving professionals in what is arguably Africa’s most developed city makes it easy to forget that South Africa is the most unequal country in the world. I’ve never been comfortable with the humiliating spectacle X-Factor and American Idol make of poorly auditioning contestants (to quote Extras, “we wheel out the bewildered to be sniggered at by multi-millionaires”), but Idols SA – the local incarnation of the franchise – brings a new severity. In the US we laugh at fat contestants with no self-awareness, in the UK we laugh at immigrant contestants singing in broken English, and in Idols SA we laugh even when the contestant’s hometown displayed on the bottom of the screen reveals they’re from an incredibly deprived, crime-ridden, opportunity-barren township. Yeah, maybe they suck at singing, but there’s something pretty sinister about people tucked cozily in front of their TVs ridiculing someone who may very well be headed home to sleep on a packed-dirt floor.

-       Yesterday I saw a city bus that pretty much summed up my experience thus far. The digital readout on the front of the bus, meant to display the destination, instead repeated in scrolling neon: “??????????????” And after four weeks in Joburg, that’s how I feel most of the time – not really sure where I’m going, but happily strapping in for a wild ride.

In non-expat news, it’s less than two weeks until The Striker’s Chance releases from Carina Press! It’s already gotten its first review and I couldn’t be more chuffed. I’ve added pre-order links for ARe and Barnes & Noble so feel free to buy multiple copies for multiple devices. I’ve got a lot of guest posts all around the blogosphere in the pipeline, so keep your eyes peeled!

excerpt excitement

I’m sharing the first-ever excerpt from The Striker’s Chance over on The London Diaries – have a look!

http://stephinlondon.com/2013/08/07/the-strikers-chance/

guest post – Zee Monodee

Since I’m caught up in the endless admin that surrounds an intercontinental move, I’m excited to welcome Zee Monodee to the blog with a stunning excerpt from her latest release, The Other Side!

Set in Mauritius, The Other Side is the first book in the Island Girls Trilogy and follows Lara Reddy on a rocky journey back to her parents’ culture-driven homeland after divorce brings her life in London to a screeching halt.

Once she’s back in the place she fled a decade earlier, Lara has no escape. Not from the gossip, the contempt, the harassing matchmaking…and certainly not from the man she hoped never to meet again. The boy she’d loved and lost—white Mauritian native, Eric Marivaux.

Lara now stands on the other side of Mauritian society. Will this be the impetus she needs to take a chance on Eric and love again? The Other Side is a sultry, sensual romance available now from Decadent Publishing and Amazon, and as one of Africa’s most recent transplants I’m delighted to be able to share this excerpt:

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Eric Marivaux stood in the office of his private practice, staring out of the window at nothing in particular. The Grand Baie summer sun beat down on the pane and licked at his skin, burning him with the rays that passed through the glass, but he paid the physical sensations no heed. All his focus lay on his memories, especially of the encounter he’d had with Lara earlier.

Lara, whom he’d loved and lost so many years ago.

How did meeting her again make him feel? He didn’t have a clue, and this uncertainty rattled him beyond the pale. A part of him didn’t dare browse his feelings for the full effect this meeting with her had had on him. But he couldn’t hide, and the sooner he faced the truth, the easier it should be for him to keep on moving forward. At least, he hoped.

He didn’t want her back. Not in his proximity, not in the same place, not on the same soil. The more distance between them, the better. He’d had to work so hard toward finally accepting such a reality, so why had fate chosen that precise moment to put her back onto his path?

He ran a hand in his hair, letting his fingers work at untangling the knots. He should cut the long locks, but damn if he found the time.

Why now? He’d recently reconciled to the idea none of his relationships would work out, because she was the only woman he’d ever love. Peace with that notion had come hard. If he hoped to settle down someday, he’d do so for convenience and companionship, but never for love. It took one face-to-face meeting with her to send his certitude spinning like a crazy top.

No, she shouldn’t be here. He had no desire to see her and be reminded of what he’d let go. He’d wanted to run when upon recognizing her earlier. Run as fast as his legs could carry him. Run away from the hurt and the anger that inevitably crept into his whole being and consumed him completely whenever he even thought of her.

Yet, he hadn’t been able to resist. One glance at her, and he’d been a goner. Again. So he’d given in, and revelled in those short but sweet moments they’d shared. She’d felt so good in his arms—

He sighed and ran his hand over his face again in a gesture fraught with weariness and frustration. Lara. He’d stumbled aback when he recognized her. She’d changed in the past twelve years, since the last time he’d seen her.

She was a woman and not a skinny seventeen-year-old anymore. The long hair had also tricked him. The straight black locks framed the sides of her face, whereas in the past, she used to draw it into a high ponytail that bounced with her every step. He loved to tug on her long hair, which would annoy her so much, and when she frowned and narrowed her gaze at him, he would swoop in and steal a kiss. After which she would smile. Reluctantly, but she’d smile nevertheless.

Why was she back? He had returned to Mauritius because she wouldn’t be there. Her life was in London. What was she doing here? He prayed she was on vacation.

He closed his eyes and let his head touch the surface of the window. The glass felt hot against his skin. As drained as he felt, he couldn’t bother with a possible burn to his sun-sensitive skin. Meeting her again had shaken him up. More so, because he couldn’t bear to see her and know she belonged to another man now. To that darkly handsome husband of hers, who, he’d been loath to admit, resembled Tom Cruise, Lara’s teenage crush. The guy also had brains, since he was some hotshot actuary or something, working in investment. And Lara had seemed happy with him. He remembered the joyous expression on her face when he’d seen them once on Piccadilly Circus in London.

That day, he’d known for good she was lost to him, stupid fool he was. He’d been an idiot to leave so abruptly for France all those years ago, his relationship with her hanging as unfinished business.

But it had all been a long time ago. A different lifetime, even. He forced his eyes open, and rubbed the nape of his neck as he peeled himself from the window and stepped closer to his desk. No use pondering the past, especially one that had not gone as planned.

Would they have worked out, the two of them? He’d never know. Better this way.

the end

In about five and a half hours I’ll be on my way to Heathrow to bid a fond farewell to six years in London, but also to excitedly restart the clock on my new life in Johannesburg. In the meantime I’m over at the Contemporary Romance Cafe today talking about endings – what are your favorites?

http://contemporaryromancecafe.com/the-end/

back to camp

July is upon us, and amidst all the crazy final-stage admin involved in wrapping up my life in the UK and starting a new one in South Africa – oh, and, y’know, planning the wedding that’s now less than three months away – I thought it was probably a great idea to commit to another NaNo event.

Admittedly I’ve only set myself a 30,000-word goal for July’s Camp NaNoWriMo (an extension of the annual November project), however I’m proud to say that at this point I’m pretty much beasting it.

See for yourself! And be sure to check back for delicious schadenfreude when I inevitably crash and burn.

http://campnanowrimo.org/campers/rebecca-crowley/

introducing…

I’ll always remember that day last November when I came back from a (slightly boozy!) work lunch to find an e-mail from Angela James, Executive Editor of Carina Press, saying the team loved my contemporary sports romance and wanted to offer me my first-ever contract! My reply e-mail was embarrassingly gushy, and that evening my fiance and I downed far too many Sol beers in celebration.

The intervening eight months have been long, eventful, and full of firsts. First contract signed and executed, first art fact sheet, and first – and hugely informative – editing process. There have also been some seconds – second contract with Carina Press for my holiday novella, and second contract for a full-length novel, this time with Samhain Publishing. But as the clock steadily ticks down to the release date for my debut, The Striker’s Chance, I’m delighted to share what is possibly the most exciting first of all: the cover reveal!

Now, without further adieu, I’m delighted to reveal the cover for The Striker’s Chance!

Landing the PR contract for North Carolina’s new soccer team could take Holly Taylor’s career to the next level. Her task? Make Kepler “Killer” de Klerk, an athlete with a party-hard reputation, a star. But revamping the sexy footballer’s image while battling her unwanted attraction to him is easier said than done.

The car accident that derailed Kepler’s European career also gave him some much-needed perspective. He’s ready to give up on fame and focus on the game he loves. The last thing he needs is a headstrong brunette pushing him back into the spotlight, even if butting heads with her is the most fun he’s had in ages.

The more time Holly spends with Kepler, the more she sees how different he is from his tabloid persona. But when she’s offered her dream job for a price, she finds herself torn between the career she’s spent years building and the man she doesn’t want to give up.

Phew, that is one sizzling dude. These cover designers sure have a hard job, don’t they? Flicking through photo after photo of sexy, shirtless guy – but I guess someone’s gotta do it, right?

There’s still a little over two months to go until The Striker’s Chance releases, but you can pre-order it at Amazon and Amazon UK, and at least there’s a little cover eye candy to ogle in the meantime!

save a horse

I’m back at the Contemporary Romance Cafe today, with a gratuitous cowboy butt shot: http://contemporaryromancecafe.com/cowboy-take-me-away/

There’s lots of other exciting stuff coming soon – my first-ever cover reveal, a new title reveal for my holiday novella, and the madness of attempting Camp NaNoWriMo in the same month I’m moving continents. Stay tuned y’all!

if at first you don’t succeed

Last spring, freshly returned from two weeks in Cape Town and the Western Cape, I stumbled upon an old documentary about the Special Task Force, the South African Police Service’s answer to the SAS. The guys featured in the documentary were like human tanks. They went through an insane, multi-day application process that involved severe sleep deprivation and dodging live rounds. Then they became experts in sharpshooting, explosives, urban combat, and hostage rescue, complete with breaking down doors and high-speed chases. And just in case they weren’t yet sufficiently bad-ass? They all have to be proficient in skydiving, so they can be parachuted in wherever they’re needed.

In short, these dudes were amazing. And I got to thinking.

I had a few days off over Easter and thought it was the perfect time to kick off a manuscript. Thus was born Secure Target, the first installment of the three-part Elite Operators series. It was a romantic suspense in which super-sexy STF officer Bronnik Mason is assigned to protect girl-next-door Lacey Cross from a serial killer who has named her as his next victim. I loved the way Bronnik’s big, blond, rugged strength was softened by his over-developed sense of honor, and I loved the way Lacey tapped into a fearlessness and strength she’d never had reason to access, and certainly didn’t realize she possessed. After a few revisions I decided the manuscript was ready for submission, and began shopping it around in July 2012.

This was my first completed work – and subsequent submission – in five years. The story of my previous attempt is too long to include here, but needless to say the industry had changed a lot in that time and I was now targeting digital publishers rather than narrowly defined Harlequin lines. I knew these things took time, so as soon as the submission e-mails went out I put them to the back of my mind and set to work on the next project.

The next project, as it turns out, was The Striker’s Chance, the novel that began as August’s Camp NaNoWriMo effort and ended with an offer of publication from Carina Press in November. I was already halfway through my November NaNo project at that point, and that story has ended up as Love at Last Sight, one-half of a forthcoming military holiday duology from Carina Press. So to say I had a lot of writerly things to think about is an understatement, and sure enough, Bronnik and Lacey fell even further down my list of priorities.

Cue January. My military holiday story is done and submitted. I haven’t yet received edits on The Striker’s Chance, but I know they’re coming. Do I start something new? Do I save capacity for edits? Probably a good time to update my query tracker spreadsheet… And oh, I realize it’s been six months since I sub’d Secure Target and I haven’t heard a thing.

I sent a polite nudge to Samhain Publishing, the place where I thought the novel would have the best fit. I received a very quick response, and by mid-January the verdict was in: the manuscript had gotten waylaid between its first and second readers, and while the editor felt it had potential, she wanted revisions.

Okay – a revise and resubmit request. I’d heard of these, and I thought they sounded a hell of a lot better than a rejection. As fate would have it my Striker’s Chance edits came through around that time, so when I turned back to Secure Target a few weeks later I not only had fresh eyes, I had a HUGE arsenal of new skills from my first professional editing process. I turned the manuscript around in early March – about six weeks after receiving the R&R request – and crossed my fingers this story would finally find its home.

On April 23rd – more than nine months after it was originally submitted – I got the e-mail. The editor loved the revised version and offered a contract! And so, now that the ink is finally dry, I’m delighted to announce that Secure Target, the first book in the three-part Elite Operators romantic suspense series, will be released by Samhain Publishing on March 11, 2014!

I’ll leave you with the preliminary blurb, and the earnest encouragement for anyone losing patience with the submission and revision process that sometimes, it really is worth the wait!

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Experienced hostage rescue operative Bronnik Mason has been chasing a serial killer around the globe for over a year. He’s taken the case after four women have already died, and he’s sworn to do everything in his power to ensure there won’t be a fifth. But when it comes to safeguarding Lacey Cross, a beautiful and fearless small-town receptionist, Bronnik realizes this case will put his professional boundaries to the test.

Having grown up in the shadows of brothers who were always on the wrong side of the law, Lacey is dutiful, hard-working and uncomplaining – and bored. When the sexy South African police officer bursts into her office, she’s yanked out of her sleepwalking existence and into a world of terror and jeopardy. She’s never been more afraid – or had more fun.

Can Bronnik protect Lacey from the most ruthless criminal he’s ever faced – or will her death be as anonymous as her life until now? Secure Target follows Bronnik and Lacey on a high-stakes, international journey fueled by action, danger, and a hefty dose of sexual tension.

guest post – Romy Sommer

Whilst preparing for my ever-nearing move to South Africa, I stumbled upon ROSA, a local community of romance authors. The warm welcome and unfailing support I’ve gotten from this bunch has already been staggering, and one of the best introductions to my new home I could’ve hoped for. Today I’m delighted to welcome Romy Sommer, a ROSA member and one of the newest names at Harper Impulse, to the blog!

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On the Yahoo loop for South African romance writers, we recently had a discussion about choosing settings for books – do we set our books in places we know, or do we set them in exotic locales we’ve only researched?

I’m definitely in the latter group, because (for me, at least) where I live isn’t that exciting.

Part of the fun of writing is getting to research these exotic locations, and I think I’d feel cheated if I didn’t get to spend hours of internet time surfing for pictures of Caribbean islands, visiting tourism blogs, or scrolling through maps of places I’ve never been.

Waking up in Vegas starts in Vegas (where I’ve never been) and ends up in a fictional European nation that I’ve certainly never been to (because it doesn’t exist).

My 1920s novellas, published under the name Rae Summers, also require large amounts of research and even larger leaps of imagination, even though two have been set in places I’ve actually visited. Because let’s face it, things were different back then!

For me, the trick to writing about a place you’ve never been is to research, research, research. And not just the usual touristy spots and websites that only show one side of the place, but read blogs of people who live in those places and talk to people who’ve been there.

With Vegas I got lucky – one of my CPs got married there, and one of my work colleagues spent a raucous boys’ week there (guess who was the most help with finding outrageous stuff to do, and who could tell me what the inside of a Vegas hotel room looked like!) And another writing friend had an engineer hubby who’d worked on constructing Vegas hotels and could tell me exactly how far the windows could open!

But it was in writing the second half of Waking up in Vegas that I had the most fun.

In creating my own fictional nation of Westerwald, getting the details right mattered much less, and the setting could serve the story rather than the other way around. Since the place exists entirely in my own head, I didn’t have to worry about practicalities like building safety regulations and how far the windows could open!

My preparation for writing this book included creating a rough map of Westerwald, putting together photo albums, and even wrote a history for the little nation. While almost none of that made it into the final novel, it gave me a much clearer picture of the setting and I hope provides the story with a much richer backdrop.

Please read the novel and let me know if I succeeded! Do the settings in Waking up in Vegas work for you? Or have you been to Vegas, and did I get it abysmally wrong?

And if you’ve read the book and wish you could visit Westerwald … you can! My fictional nation is based on the Rhine River area in Germany.

I love hearing from readers, and if you’re a writer please tell me: do you set your stories in places you know – or in places you wish you knew?

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What happens in Vegas…

Waking up to the bright lights of Vegas in an unfamiliar penthouse suite, cocktail waitress Phoenix Montgomery finds she’s covered from head to foot in gold glitter and not alone – aside from the empty bottle of champagne, there’s a mystery man in the shower and a huge sparkly ring on her finger!

Stays in Vegas?

There’s no denying Max Waldburg’s demi-god sex appeal but commitment-phobic Phoenix doesn’t do relationships. Only it seems her new husband (agh!) has other ideas…he’s trying to keep that ring on her finger and his wife firmly back in his bed. The only question on her lips is – why? Or maybe, why not?

Waking up in Vegas is published by Harper Impulse, a division of Harper Collins, and is available from the following online retailers:

Amazon * Amazon UK * Barnes & Noble * Kobo * iTunes

You can follow Romy on Twitter, Facebook or on her blog.

the cafe

Once a month I’ll be posting at Contemporary Romance Cafe, a fabulous blog of Carina Press authors that’s chock-full of contemporary romance goodness. Check out my first post, on finding inspiration in the littlest places:

http://contemporaryromancecafe.com/everyday-inspiration/