Shiloh Walker's Blog, page 93

Guest blog from Lynn Viehl… also known as …the day Shiloh curled into a ball and cried

Why? Because I CAN’T WIN THINGS ON MY OWN BLOG! Damn it! Kicks rocks.

Okay.

Carrying on… ahem.

Here we go!  Everybody say hi to Lynn!

Everybody!  Read her awesome post and enter to win her awesome prize…and ignore me. I’m over here kicking rocks.

The Rule of Three

Lynn Viehl

Lately my life has become a ménage à trois .  Not in the classic sense, of course; that would be a little difficult to explain to my mother:  Hi Mom, meet my guy, and my other guy.  I know it’s a little unconventional but . . . Mom, put down the baseball bat.  Instead, sets of threes have taken over my life:  I live with three wonderful people (my guy and our two kids) and three pets (two dogs and a cat.) Every day I work three jobs (author, housewife and teacher) and devote my spare time to three hobbies (quilting, painting and journaling.)  Last week I even grew two extra heads.  No, honestly, I didn’t, but I bet you’re paying attention now, right?

Despite all the naturally-occurring, non-gruesome, G-rated threesomes in my life I’m still learning how the rule of three works.  Did you know there is an actual rule involved?  As it happens using threes is a sure-fire way to make things like storytelling, humor and ideas more effective, as three is the smallest number of things that make up a pattern.  Because it’s the smallest, it’s also the easiest for us to follow, understand and remember.  For example, we can name the Three Stooges (Larry, Curly and Mo) much faster than Snow White’s Seven Dwarves (Sleepy, Dopey, Angry, Smiley, Shorty . . . and those other two little guys.)

Writers rely on the rule of three when we structure classic story arcs (aka the introduction, the complication, and the resolution) and comedians tell jokes with the comic triple (the set-up, the expectation, and the punch line.)  Back in 1971 our teachers even used the rule of three while making us memorize a new street safety code — Stop, Look and Listen — that reduced road casualties across the nation 11% that year and has been saving young lives ever since.

It’s also natural for most storytellers to unconsciously rely on the rule of three when writing a story (according to Philip Larkin, a beginning, a muddle and an end.)  I’ve always liked writing trilogies, and the very first romances I published were a threesome, at least until my editor said, “Where’s book four?”

From there I wrote what would become an eight-novel romantic suspense series, a ten-novel SF series, and then a twelve-novel dark fantasy series, all of which I enjoyed but over time seemed to be stretching out into never-ending stories.  As a reader I enjoy long series, but these days there are so many being published that it’s tough to keep track of which book is what without a cheat sheet.  That’s why I decided to take a break from writing long series and go back to my story-writing roots with the Lords of the Darkyn trilogy.

Writing a three-book series is not easier than a lengthier project; in some ways it’s more demanding.  Having ten or more books to spend in one universe doesn’t impose a lot of limits, but a trilogy demands you get everything done no later than book three.  For me this meant I had to stop falling in love with my secondary characters, most of whom always want their own books. Keeping control of my subplots and connecting threads between the books was also imperative.  It’s a bit like taking a three-day weekend holiday versus spending a month or two on vacation; you can’t bring a lot of baggage, you don’t put off anything important and dawdling by the pool for days to flirt with the cabana boy is simply not an option.

Along with the challenges writing a trilogy offers some decent benefits.  Keeping track of your characters and their storylines doesn’t require updating a complicated, gigantic series encyclopedia; you can usually fit all your story stuff in a few binders.  Readers don’t have to wait years for you to finish a series story, while you don’t have to worry as much about a publisher ending your series before you’ve written the final book.  Trilogies tend to attract more new readers, too, because they don’t have to read five or ten books to catch up if they discover the author in mid-series, because book two is mid-series.

To celebrate the holidays and the release of Nightbred, which is the mid-series novel in my Lords of the Darkyn trilogy, I have for one winner signed copies of all three novels (Nightborn and Nightbred in paperback plus a manuscript copy of Nightbound, which will make the winner the very first person besides me and my editor to read it), all packed in my hand quilted and beaded Emerald Dreams tote. If you’d like a chance to win, in comments name a trilogy or short novel series you’ve enjoyed reading by 12/7/2012… (ETA by Shiloh…I’ll draw a winner and post it here by 12/14…you must check back to see if you won, folks...)  This giveaway is international, too, so everyone on the planet is welcome to join in.

Saturday Snippets…CELEBRATION! Also…NEW COVER!!!

They had just left a party… that’s a celebration, right?

From BEAUTIFUL SCARS, erotic contemporary romance due out in ebook in January.

And… LOOK IT!

 

She all but groaned as he launched into the one part that got to her, every damn time, right near the end.

His voice dropped, lower, rougher.

A shudder went through her and she grabbed the glass of wine, drank it down. They’d emptied the bottle and she wished she could blame the heat burning inside her on the wine, but it wasn’t that. It was him. Always him—

“What is it about you and that song?”

As the music faded, she jerked her head up, saw him staring at her.

She tried to shrug. It wasn’t the song, it was him. Something about the way he sang it, hell, the way he sang anything… She licked her lips and stared off into the distance, trying to figure out the right way to say something that wasn’t a lie, but didn’t leave her stripped bare.

A harsh groan reached her ears.

Startled, she looked at him, realized he was staring at her mouth.

Two seconds later, he was reaching for her.

Stunned, she couldn’t think. As his lips covered hers, she just couldn’t think.

Marc was kissing her.

Damn it.

Marc was kissing her—

Had she drank more wine than she’d thought?

“Open your mouth,” he snarled against her lips, a harsh, urgent command in his voice. “Give me your mouth.”

Dazed, she did just that, opened for him.

His arms came around her as his tongue stroked across the bottom of her lip, slowly, seductively…teasingly. Oh, hell. She was in trouble. Big, big trouble…

And she didn’t plan on doing anything to stop it, either. Not when he broke his mouth away to brush a line of stinging, hot kisses down her neck to her shoulder. Not when he stroked a hand up her thigh, the other cupping the back of her head.

Lissa Matthews

Rhian Cahill

Leah Braemel

Myla Jackson

Caris Roane

Jody Wallace

McKenna Jeffries

Taige Crenshaw

HelenKay Dimon

TJ Michaels

Delilah Devlin

Eliza Gayle

Lauren Dane

Flashback Friday

And look!  This has pretty new cover…

He looked awfully young to be a Santa, Vikky mused as she lowered her butt onto his thigh. The length of leg under her bottom felt damned hard and the skin above his beard, around his eyes, was too smooth for him to be as old as the Santas usually were.

The gray-green eyes gleaming at her over his gold-rimmed, crescent shaped spectacles looked kind of familiar but nobody she knew would take time to work as a Santa in a mall. Even though this was one of the classiest Santa jobs known to man, with the real red velvet suit, the richly painted chair. Hell, most of the stodgy old men she knew from the bank were so damned uptight, they could eat coal and pop out diamonds.

His voice seemed a little strained as he said, “So what kind of Christmas wish do you have, young lady?”

Flicking Cindy a glance, she saw the dare in her eyes, watched as she shook her head. She didn’t think she’d do it. After the weekend she’d just had, she sure as hell would. If for no other reason than to blow off some steam.

And at least he looked young enough for his heart to take it. Inching forward, she curled an arm around his shoulders, waggled her fingers at the camera and smiled before turning to look at Santa.

Lowering her head, she whispered…

Read more…

So… this was this morning

I’m not exactly sure what to think.  You? (It’s a slideshow…give a minute.)

A rambly sort of hodge-podge…soldiers, contests, more…

I’ve got my Naughty and Nice signing coming up this weekend in St. Louis with Sylvia Day, Jaci Burton, Shayla Black and more… it’s a ticketed event and it is sold out. If you plan to come, I can’t wait to see you.

There is a new contest!  I unexpectedly got some ARCs of THE REUNITED…want an easy chance to win?  Just hop over to this page and find out how.  Click on the button…

There is also a special contest for street team members only. Please note, it’s restricted to current members only…a thank you for the work they put into spreading the word about my books. I do random contests and giveaways for the group and this is the latest. Anybody is welcome to join, but only members who were part of the group prior to 11.26 can enter this contest. The page is also password protected, so if anybody notices a locked page, that is why.

Soldiers! It’s Giving Tuesday…we have Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday…and Giving Tuesday. I have to admit, I’m fond of the ‘give back’ things. I honestly to believe that when you bless others, help others, you’re blessed in return, and I know there has been a time in pretty much everybody’s life when we’ve needed a pick me up…whether it’s just a friendly smile, money to get you through the lean times, or even a card during the holidays when you’re away from home…it all counts, and it all matters. Every act of kindness makes the world better, for you, for somebody else.

So…ways to give!

A few more soldiers who can use cards during the holidays!

SSG BAEZA, JORGE

B CO 2-7 CAV 4 BCT 1 CD

NAGHLU HIGH

APO AE 09354

SSgt WJ Ryder

CLR-15 CLC 153 Maint Plt

unit 42181

FPO,AP 96427-2181

Jeremiah Hochstedler

Jennifer Anderson

4-2 SBCT S-6

FOB Masum Ghar

APO,AE 09355

SSG Jorge Baeza

B-CO 2-7 CAV 4 BCT ICD

NAGHLU High

APO,AE 09354

And if you’d like to do more on Giving Tuesday…you can try doing a Kiva Loan and see how $25 can change a person’s life. I joined the Happy Ever Team, a group of romance readers and writers who use Kiva…

Or maybe you can send a toy or a cash deductible donation to the kids of Pine Ridge so they can all have a Merry Christmas this year.

**Please do not post the soldiers names to FB. Also, if you’ve never written soldiers before or are unfamiliar with my helping posts, please visit this page first. Important info there.

Image via Dreamstime Free

A pinterest post…Cosmo version

 

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Source: cosmopolitan.com via shiloh on Pinterest

 

Look inside!

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Source: shilohwalker.com via shiloh on Pinterest

 

 

Saturday Snippets… HOLIDAY!

A twist on A Christmas Carol… I so love twisting things up…

Eben Marley walked out of the main offices of Venture Advertising, his briefcase held loosely in one hand, his eyes flicking to his watch. The merry calls all around him went unheeded.

Merry Christmas!

Happy New Year!

Somebody brushed a hand down his arm, and a scent he had never forgotten surrounded him.

Slowly, he turned his head, already knowing who he’d see—Cara.

The pretty administrative assistant smiled at him, her eyes not reflecting the smile. A charming dimple winked in her cheek as she brushed her hair back out of her face.

The soft scent of her body drifted to his nostrils and he breathed it in deep, feeling it like a punch in his belly.

Three years… He could recall just how long it had been, and his body flared to sudden rampant life.

“Cara,” he said, inclining his head at her, lifting a brow as he waited.

Maybe…just maybe… The thought never had time to complete itself. “I hope you have a Merry Christmas, Mr. Marley,” she said before cutting sharply to the right to catch up with some friends.

Mr. Marley.

As she walked away, those words mocked him. A three-year-old memory loomed large in his mind. Just one night—one that had haunted every waking thought for months, until finally, he’d forced her out of his thoughts, suppressing the memory of that night. Except for his dreams.

She still haunted his dreams.

One night…that pretty admin, in the elevator at the Grand as he whisked her up to a room where he had fucked her throughout the night, starting with a quickie in the elevator after he’d pushed the stop button. It had ended with him leaving her the next morning with orders for his driver to take her home while he attended to business.

As she walked away, her head bent low against the wind, a memory of that sleek little body wrapped around his, grabbed him by the throat—err, maybe the throat wasn’t a good term—he mused as his cock started to throb within the constraints of his underwear and trousers.

Now destined to spend the night hungering for another taste of her, he rolled his eyes and muttered, “Yeah…merry Christmas.”

His idea of “merry” was knowing how much money people sank into advertising for Christmas. His company’s profits were above last year’s, and his own personal bank account was all but groaning.

That was the only thing that interested him about Christmas. Sooner or later, he might slow down enough to have some fun. A rich, husky laugh reached his ears, drifting to him on the wind, as he arrived at the black car waiting at the curb. He stopped, turned his head—the admin assistant, laughing in delight as she accepted a gift from somebody Eben placed as being in accounting.

A night with her definitely would be an improvement over the paperwork he planned to go over. She was grinning with delight as she tore into the present, and he groaned as another image, one he hadn’t thought of in years, rushed to the front of his mind…that girl…Cara…sliding him that wide, wicked grin just before she’d closed her lips over his cock.

Tearing his eyes away from her lovely face, he ducked through the car door, telling Jacob, “I want to stop by the bank on the way home.”

“Sir, the banks closed at noon today—about thirty minutes ago,” Jacob said, his face stiff, eyes blank.

“Closed? Why— Damn it. Never mind, Christmas,” he muttered, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Take me on home then. Hell, I should have stayed and gotten more work done.”

“Work late? On Christmas Eve?” Jacob said gently. “C’mon, boss. Have a little fun.”

Have a little fun… Unwillingly, his eyes drifted back to Cara…

Read More…

Rhian Cahill

Leah Braemel

Mari Carr

McKenna Jeffries

Taige Crenshaw

HelenKay Dimon

Lauren Dane

TJ Michaels

Jody Wallace

Flashback Friday…Voyeur

FYI**… This is one a bit of a tear-jerker, and it’s racy as hell.  Hard to post much of an excerpt that’s not too…um.  Well.  Anyway.  :)

When he stepped from the shower, Ashlyn was waiting for him, Kye standing behind her, watching her with hot eyes as she dropped to her knees in front of Connor.

“How can you share her like this? She’s your wife. Does it not bother you, to see her doing this to another man?”

Kye met his eyes as Ashlyn took his cock into her very talented mouth.

Slowly, his mouth curled up in a smile and he shrugged, saying, “I’m giving her a fantasy, something she’s dreamed of but would never ask for on her own.”

Read More…

Happy Thanksgiving

Taking some time today to thank God for all the wonderful blessings He’s given me…including all of you, who make it possible for me to do this.

May all of you have a wonderful and blessed Thanksgiving.  And if you’re not in the States, have an absolutely wonderful day and think of all the turkey and yummy desserts we’ll be eating…

About the Hunters

I’m still getting a lot of emails asking about continuing the series, why I’m not pursuing self-publishing, why I’m not trying to continue with it…etc…

Sooooo…there are a number of reasons.  Time, money, the drop in sales, etc.

The drop in sales… While writing is definitely what you can call a labor of love, just laboring on something isn’t going to help me meet my obligations as a person…as a mom with kids, as a wife, a partner in a marriage, etc.  We’ve got bills.  Loving to write and putting out words doesn’t meet those obligations.  Spending time on a series that isn’t paying out very well is taking away time from the books that are helping me to meet my obligations.  I realize boiling it down to the numbers isn’t anything readers want to hear, but it is something I have to consider. Something that really sucks is how many thousands of pirated copies of the Hunters books I’ve had to fight to get off the net…maybe if even 10% more of those who had pirated had just bought the damn books instead, I might consider investing the time in trying to pursue it, but I’ve seen the numbers on my end and I just don’t know it’s the wisest biz decision.
Money…  Yes, that word again, but not for the same reasons.  Self-publishing is expensive. Contrary to what some people make it out to be, you don’t just slap a book together and throw it up on Kindle/Nook.  I invested close to $1000 upfront for formatting, editing, covers, distribution and promo on  Blade Song and the sequel cost more, because the editorial work on  Blade Song  (typos, etc) wasn’t as good as it could have been, so I invested in a better line editor for book 2.  This series is going very well, though, and it’s worth it, on my end, because I’ve seen that investment pay off.  I will be honest…if I hadn’t seen a return on that investment, and a profit, I wouldn’t have gone forward with book two.  I can’t spend money and time on something that isn’t going to work out, business wise.  And it all comes back to that, in the end. I love writing .  I want to do this for the rest of my life.  Which means, I have to make wise business decisions…if I’m spending time and money on things that aren’t working out for me, (that means…making a profit)…then I can’t keep writing, I have to go back to nursing and there are no more books. Considering the drop in sales with the  Hunter  series, I question whether it would be a wise decision to pursue self-publishing it, especially with the upfront cost.  Plus…I can’t afford it at this point.
Time…  This is a doozy.  There are 24 hours in a day and nothing we do or say will change that fact.  I can only write for so many hours in a day and a certain amount of that time has to be focused on contracted projects.  Those projects come with deadlines and I have to keep my deadlines.  I love my editors and I want them to be happy with me and I also have readers who kind of want those other projects done, too.  Basically, I do have other commitments and I can only do so much.  At some point, something has to give. I can’t chase after every option that might be out there to try and keep that series alive, especially when it’s been in a slump.  It just never caught the interest it needed to stay alive for the long haul.

At some point, everything has to end.  Hunter’s Rise was a solid book and Toronto was one character I definitely wanted to get to.  I had that chance.

Does this mean I’ll absolutely never write another Hunter book? I don’t believe in saying never.  But it would take a pretty impressive thing to get me to consider it, and I’d have to have more time on the table first. Who knows…maybe paranormal will swing back around again and the sales will spike.  If there’s enough reader interest in it, I can look at it later down the road, but at this point?  I just can’t.