Kate McNeil's Blog, page 11

Your Writing Soundtrack

I mentioned in a previous post that I recently got a Fitbit Flex, and although thinking about the purchase itself is usually enough to get my butt out the door, there are days when exercise is the last thing I want to do after work. So I made a deal with myself…any day that I’m desperately trying to come up with excuses NOT to get moving, I can download one new song from iTunes and add it to my workout playlist. Problem solved!

Well, except for today, when I got so immersed in downloading new...

Agents of Romance Review!

How much do we love the Agents of Romance blog? How much? Just ask us! The answer is A LOT!

What’s not to love about a book review blog that features kick-ass reviews of books that you’re probably reading too? Even the color scheme is fierce, and any blog with a button that looks like this…

…yeah, we’re fans. (Parker and Vivian give that button an enthusiastic thumbs-up too!)

We were honored to have Autumn read and review Pistils, head over and check it out, stick around to peruse some of the ot...

You OWE US That Book NOW! (and more news)

No, believe it or not, I’m not referring to myself in that title…the novella is still in very good shape and I’m feeling more and more excited the closer I get to the end! (In a good way. Not in a Oh thank God it’s almost done way.)

In my last post, I mentioned that the Vivian novella was going to be pushed back a little bit due to real life, etc., and that my next post had something to do with that topic.

I read a LOT of blogs, especially by writers I enjoy, and something I saw recently (alth...

Just Breathe!

I know that breathing is something we do automatically, even asleep or unconscious, but there are times when I feel like I have to remind myself or I genuinely will forget!

Britt and I have dropped off the radar for the past few weeks thanks to a perfect mixed bag of life, family, summer, vacations, and…a brand-spankin’ new full-time job for me! I love it already, even after the past week of all-day corporate training, but sadly the exhaustion of it all meant I stumbled home and stared at the...

Reviews…Deeeeep Thoughts, Part II

A couple of weeks back I posted about Goodreads’ policy allowing authors to rate/comment on their own books. Today let’s address one facet of Amazon’s quirky review policy: not allowing friends and family to review your book. From their About Customer Reviews: If you have a direct or indirect financial interest in a product, or perceived to have a close personal relationship with its author or artist, we’ll likely remove your review.

First off, “allowing” is a broad term, since first Amazon ha...

How Much Do Your Readers Know About YOU?!?

A couple of posts back, we did jumpy claps over our interview on Rachel Carrera’s blog. We found out that one of readers’ favorite answers (and one of ours too!) was the infamous #15! For a refresher:

15. What inspired the current or most recent story you’ve completed?

We were chatting one day and the topic of how ridiculously easy it is to find out information on people these days came up. One thing led to another and we gave ourselves a challenge…we picked a random person that we followed on...

Blog Wranglin’…Twice the Work of Riding the Bull, but Twice the Satisfaction!

For those of you who use WordPress’s Reader to keep up with your blog reading, God bless you. I gave up. It was just a hot mess that didn’t seem even remotely organized. I really like to try following every blog that follows us (for at least a few posts) to give them a try…I’ve found some amazing people and blogs that way. Unfortunately as the number of blogs I followed grew and grew…I started procrastinating on my blog reading, because the Reader was such a mess.

In desperation, I went back t...

Author Interviews…This Time It’s US!!!

We’ve mentioned before the series of Author Interviews that our friend Rachel Carrera has, with a new one each Friday, and today our interview is up!!!!!! We are over here turning cartwheels and doing jumpy claps at the opportunity to share how we do the voodoo that we do!!!! Head on over to check it out, and leave Rachel some love while you’re at it!!!!

Happy Friday all!!!!!!!!

What Is This You Say? A NEW BOOK????

Here it is…………

My name, Vivian, means alive…

I lived, yes…I lived, I learned, I remembered. I won’t lie and say my life was horrible, because it could have been a million times worse. But it taught me too young how to distrust those you should love, and then how to guard yourself against people who would never drop those smiles, even as they stab you in the back.

At one time, I was Vivian Carmichael, Case Officer for the Central Intelligence Agency. Overnight I became persona non grata, burned b...

Reviews, Deeeeep Thoughts…Part I

So we’ve already covered what makes a good review (in our humble opinion), but let’s get a little more specific about a fairly controversial topic on Goodreads…the ability of authors to rate/review their own books.

I’ve seen authors vehemently defending both sides of the equation…on one side, authors are active members of Goodreads and should be allowed to rate all books accordingly, especially if they clearly disclose that it’s their book and they’re explaining why it deserves the rating they...