Sarah Gerdes's Blog, page 4

The emotional lifeline of Hope

From the start of Monday, the week has been frought with bad news. All sorts. Job loss. Friends losing homes. A divorce. It’s not a surprise to hear the words of despair, the temporary absence of optimism, of hope that the situation will improve.

Hope is an emotional lifeline. When I told Rog I intended to write about it, he says “No, what right do you have to pontificate to others?”

“Who better to write on hope that me?” It was then I reminded him it was I who’d experienced divorce, single parenting, bankruptcy, foreclosure, the freezing of my assets and an expanding arse to boot. He krinkled his face when I recalled it was my hope we’d have children someday, which was a mantra I chanted for seven years as he maintained he’d rather get divorced than bring a child into a dark, hate-filled world. Until one day, he woke up and essentially said ‘we might bring a child that will make the world a better place.’

Nobody who hasn’t been a part of my life has any clue that it was the hope in dark times that allowed me to endure to reach the point I am at today, which to the outside, is perfect. For years, it wasn’t perfect. It was hard. Lonely. Loveless and it was my foundation.

“Ok,” he mumbled as he walked in to the office. “Write it. Just don’t be sappy.”

I make no such promise.

Hope is found when a stranger smiles at you on the walk home.

Hope is given to a foster child turns 18, and a business owner takes a chance and gives a job.

Hope is what remains inside a woman, long after her man has walked out the door.

Hope is rewarded when a new man appears, one far better and more deserving then the one who left.

Hope is felt when a mother tells her daughter her son will one day return.

Hope is rewarded when the daughter broke it off, right before saying “I do.”

Hope is renewed when the son goes to college on his own accord.

Hope is a person wronged will forgive, and a friendship will be regained.

Hope is the crowd will cheer, not boo.

Hope is going on again the next night, no matter what happened the evening before.

Hope is the light in a newborns eye.

Hope is the enemy of despair.

Hope sees me through the tears and heartaches.

Hope is within, ever present.

Hope is life.

Asian Style Crab Crepes

If you want an incredible tasting appetizer that is also beautiful, holds until the next day AND is fun to cook, this is it. For the carnivores at my gourmet cooking class a few weeks ago, this won top awards. (The vegetarians loved the artichoke bruschetta that best). When I say ‘hold until the next day’…to be clear, the batter must be separate from the filling.

Ingredients
½-3/4 cooked white crabmeat, shredded
7 scallions, both white and green parts, chopped
3 fresh hot green chilis
2 ½ cups chopped cilantro
¼ cp canola or sunflower oil
1.5 tbsp dark sesame oil
1/3 cup lime juice
1 ½ tsp soy sauce
1 1/2 tsp chopped or grated fresh ginger
1 large garlic clove, finely chopped or crushed salt

For garnish, peeled shrimp, orange, lemon and lime wedges, dill sprigs and basil leaves.

Preparation


1.     Toss together the crabmeat, scallions, chilis and cilantro (and yes, you will use ALL the cilantro)
2.     Stir together the canola or sunflower and sesame oils with the lime juice, soy sauce, ginger and garlic. Toss with the crabmeat mixture. Add salt to taste.
3.     Cut the crepes in half. Warm them in a pan or in the oven at 350 degrees.
4.     Fill and fold the crepes, arrange on the platter and serve immediately.



1 1/2 cup milk
3 tbsp salted butter (melted)
½ tsp salt
¾ cup plus 2 tbsp butter all-purpose flower

Preparation


1.     Sift dry ingredients together
2.     Combine milk and melted butter
3.     Add wet to dry, blend with old-fashioned egg beater or electric mix.
4.  For a thin crepe, use 1/4 cup batter. For a thicker crepe, a bit more-like 1/3.
5.     Pour in crepe pan


To make the crepes look extra exotic, add chopped fresh herbs, such as chives, parsely, tarragon or chervil to the batter just before making the crepes. When serving…cut the round crepes in half. Spread the filling in the center–a little goes a long long way. Start at the corner, fold in, and make a nice folded crepe. If necessary, use a toothpick to hold the crepe together for a finger food. Looks great!!

At the class, I used a full-size crepe pan. It’s about 9″ round. This was perfect for cutting the crepes in half, as noted above. The size was fine for a dinner, but for a party, the crepes and serving sizes needed to be smaller. For a baby shower I gave, I used my small omelet pan, (any non-stick pan works fine) and made crepes about 3-4″ in diameter.

One last note. With or without a non-stick pan, melted butter is a far superior substance than  even the most expensive non-stick products. Better taste aside, the butter simply works the best. My trick is to melt one stick of butter in a small bowl, place on a plate my the stove along with a tablespoon and a paper towel. After putting a TBS of butter on the surface of the pan, I spread with a paperto wel, thoroughly coating the bottom and all sides of the pan. THEN pour in the batter, swirl around the bottom and sides of the pan.

Unlike breakfast crepes, you don’t want the edges to turn brown before turning. Keep an eye on the crepe. It takes only a minute or two so on med-to-low heat on each side. The goal is to have the crepe cooked, but not brown.

When you are done, slide the crepe on to a dinner plate to cool. It will burn your fingers if you attempt to put the cold filling directly in the hot crepe. It will also change the flavors slightly. Of course, you can eat this app warm or cold, and it’s divine either way. Enjoy!

The 3 D’s of Success

There I am, lying on my back, the ceiling spinning, sweat dripping from every pore and I’m having an out of body experience, willing my soul far from the oppressively hot room. The hot hatha yoga class is nearly over, the final Shivasna meditation pose supposed to one of relaxation, where the body absorbs all the pain and punishment it has endured in a room of 110 degrees and 60 percent humidity. It’s the hardest part for me, because all I can think about is getting out of the room, into the cool air and slurping down ice cold water–which of course, is  the worst thing I can do.

“The 5:30 a.m.
class is my favorite,” says the teacher, her voice calm and sincere. “It’s because
the students here embody the three D’s: decision, discipline and determination.”
I snap back to the present, the mantra reminding me of a keynote speech on
success and entrepreneurialism more than yoga.

I sucked my soul
back from its hovering position above me and refocused on her words.

“The people in this
room made the decision to be here. Then you had the discipline to
get up at four or thereabouts, eat and come here. Once in the room, you had the
determination to put your entire effort into every one of the twenty-six
poses.”

She’s absolutely right,
I thought, breathing shallow, telling myself I can last another few minutes. Her
Three D’s can be applied to pretty much anyone who’s achieved success by any
measure. “We” make the Decision to go to college/run a marathon/write a
book etc. Then we have the Discipline to study/train for a year/fail for
a few novels and through Determination do we get persevere through the
downs and ups, blisters and callouses and rejections on the long, hard and oftentimes
bumpy road to our goal—the decision we made in the first place.

As Mimi, the
morning instructor talks through the last five minutes of meditation, I continue
ruminating on the notion, considering the application of the three D’s, reflecting
how I’ve defined much of my adult life by determination, but neither decision
or discipline. In fact, my oft-repeated joke has always been that God didn’t
give me any natural skills or talents except one: Determination. My husband lovingly
calls me his goat, but not in the Michael
Jordan-type greatest-of-all-time. Rog means it literally. He often says I
will “chew my way through a wall to get what I want.”

I take that as a compliment
by the way. I just simply say: that’s what I want and keep going until I get
it. Of course I’m realistic, no WNBA or President of the United States for me.
But I do tend to focus, ignoring every bit of distracting, external noise in my
path. As my yoga instructor implied, it’s a personal decision, a
personal level of discipline and personal determination that got each
and every one of us to yoga in the first place. No one else got us up, dressed
us, stood for us or wiped the sweat off our faces when it was all over.

The after effects
of that wonderful morning yoga session was I have added the other two D’s to
the one I’d always considered the absolute. Perhaps that’s also given a conference
seeker another topic.

Gift card scamming

The server scam

Gift cards are
wonderful things. Easy, convenient, and during these strange times, helpful
when things can be delivered directly to your doorstep, including food. Yet I
realized many of you might be unaware of the latest in gift card scamming that
I’ve actually experienced firsthand.

It goes like this. You give or receive a gift card for $200, the amount I provided my parents last year for their anniversary. This happened to be for the Cheesecake Factory. Upon presentation of the bill, and their providing the gift card, the server returned stating that the gift card was only for $50. Well, that wasn’t the case, but my parents, without the receipt showing the authorization, were unable to argue otherwise. The bill was over $100, and their card—as told by the server—was only for $50.

My parents—bless their hearts—didn’t tell me this for over a month, because they assumed I was the one who actually misspoke (or being totally cheap). I was incensed. I dug through my receipts, found the activation code, called the gift card number and verified that yes, it was activated for $200. Armed with this info, I then called up the General Manager in the Reno location of said restaurant. To spare you the minutiae, what he ultimately found was that the server had taken the bill, uses the entire amount of the gift card, applying only a portion of the gift card, thereby pocketing the rest. It’s quite ingenious and might appear in one of my books at some point.

Problem solved and lesson learned, I thought. Although it’s classless, I began including the activation receipt along with the gift card. In my line of work (author/advisor) I get a ton of gift cards myself, and happily use them. As it happens, I received one for PF Chang, a wonderful chain serving fantastic food. The card is for $150, but I was not given the activation receipt. However, I’ve learned a lesson. Prior to going in, I went on line, used the website on the back to confirm activation and amount. Sure enough, $150. Imagine my surprise when the server told me that only $75 was on the card. I disputed the facts with the server, identifying the activation and amount, even the General Manager came over, but to no avail. I didn’t have the hard copy, activation receipt. In short, I was out the $25.00.

The last example—because third times a charm, right? This time it involves Red Robin. In this instance, a relative had given me the gift card, again, no receipt. Once again, I verified the card amount on line as being $50. What I did different was upon arrival, I requested the hostess to do a quick check of the amount on the gift card. In less than 15 seconds, she assured me it was in fact, $50.

Now I had a witness.

When the bill for
$42 including a tip was presented, the server told me that $15 had already been
used on the card. Hmm. I rather pleasantly called over the host. She was
unaware of the what had transpired, and affirmed the amount on the card. I politely
told the server she must be mistaken, as did the hostess. She stumbled and
fumbled, but I received a revised bill and statement. Whatever she did in the background
to rectify the situation was never revealed.

Three restaurants,
three versions of the same scam. No need to make a big scene, because I get it;
people are well…people. Not everyone is going to operate the same way, and as a
well-known Hollywood producer once told me, “Everyone is broken in one way or
another. If we (producers) don’t work around their issues, nothing in Hollywood
would ever get done.”

So the work
around is have the receipt if possible, and if not, check the balance on line
(look on the back of the card). When you arrive at the establishment, ask the
hostess or manager to double check the amount so you don’t run into issues.
Lastly, at the beginning of the meal, prior to ordering, tell your server that
you have a card and the amount has just been verified by the manager/host. That
removes any possibility for fraud to occur.

After that, enjoy
a great meal!

Getting to the CEO

Breaking through the email barrier

There has never been a better time for email outreach, the stay-at-home economy requiring workers to be tethered to their devices more than ever. A few weeks back, the told NPR this was the first time he’s been home in 30 years, his email, video conferencing and phone becoming the life-blood of business. That means you, the business development, sales or PR person, are presented with the best opportunity to get in front of the right person for your pitch.

Yet you it’s not always as easy as connecting through Linked In, especially when you want to reach executive staff. Emails are switched up and around, purposefully confusing the outsider. Because I’ve spent several decades breaking through the email barrier, “cold-emailing” and getting responses from the executive levels at the largest retail, technology, banking and manufacturing companies in the world, I’m going to share a few tried and proven tricks.

Conventions

A convention is
technology-industry-speak for a format used by the company. These are pretty
simple and vary depending on the size of the company. When it was small, it was
bill@microsoft.com – which of course,
was for Bill Gates. It remained so until he formally left his position. All
other bills had a convention using numbers. As the company grew, it modified
the names in a combination of first and last names, letters and so on.

Conventions aren’t limited to just the first and last names. It also applies to the company name. For instance, for Benjamin News Group, a Washington-based firm that’s presently being acquired by another entity, it’s bngspkn.com. It was the first three letters of the name, then the city where the firm is headquartered. Now, this is different than the URL designation on the main website, so how did I attain that email and correct ending? I “cold-emailed” the general manager of an Idaho-based retail partner first, pitched him and ultimately created a partnership. After that, I was given the name of BNG, but not the email. That was up to me. Playing around with the conventions I mentioned above, it worked.

Most commonly used conventions



First
name, last initial: sarahg@First
name only: sarah@First
initial, last name: sgerdes@First
and last: sarahgerdes@

If the company is
a mid-size (250 or above), you will have the same names. In this context, they
usually modify the first or last only slightly, but adding the second, then
third letter, or also adding a number.

First
name, last initial: sarahge@First
name only: sarah1@ or sarah01@First
initial, last name: sagerdes@First
and last: sarahgerdes01

It’s rather amazing how uncreative those assigning names are, and how easy it is to penetrate a firm using a combination of the above.

Getting creative

These aren’t always going to work, so you need to dig deeper. Looking up the CEOs name for the largest property holder in the country was done through a search on legal filings! It turns out that families get in spats, and when emails are filed with the court of law as a part of the proceedings, these documents are made public. Along with the full content, so are the emails. Can you believe that people don’t go back and change their emails? I’ve contacts who haven’t changed their emails for two decades, and in fact, I’ve not changed my BMG email in that long. That said, I have disabled it because I’m not taking on new clients at the moment, and if a person wants to get a hold of me, they can get creative themselves.

Another creative way…. social media

This isn’t perfect for a long pitch, but I’ve had executives, fans and parents track me down on Instagram and Facebook (see above comment on creativity). Several of these have been busines oriented, but most have been of a personal nature, seeking additional clarity on a topic I’ve written about. Because I don’t have a service or personal assistant, I eventually get to these items myself. It might take me a while, and I sometimes skip over or neglect my accounts for a while, but I do eventually get there.

Forwarding emails

This is another
little trick that I’ve used myself. I’ve always wanted to make sure that
variations of my name are taken, whether or not I use the various
instantiations. To have one dashboard (or view) of all my accounts, I have them
forwarded to my central account.

Executives do the same, using not just one, but multiple accounts, all being aggregated into a single view. My only caution to you, the sales/biz dev/executive, is to beware of hitting multiple accounts without waiting a reasonable period of time for a response (a week). Don’t hit all of them at once, as much as you want to get after it—the recipient will only become annoyed. It might take a month or so, but be patient.

The list of DON’Ts

On one hand, it’s
wonderful to know that it is possible to reach the CEOs of the largest firms in
the world. By the same token, your email MUST be free of a few things that will
catch it up in spam.

No links. This is the first spam filter applied to
any email. Don’t link to your website, home page, or product listing. You will
never recover.

No links in
your signature. My email
signature (at the bottom, name/title/phone etc.) included the link from my name
to my author page. This was causing my emails to go into junk. It was surprising
for me to learn that even recipients who’d authorized me (my attorney in this
case) had the filters set so high that all my correspondence was going in to
junk. I had to remove the link from my signature in order for him to receive it,
even though I was specifically authorized by him.

No attachments. This also gets caught in the first line of
defense. When writing the first pitch email, it should be so inspiring it gets
a response. Attachments can be sent thereafter.

Don’t copy
another person. If you
have the CEO and a VP, you need to make a choice. The rates of a non-response skyrocket
when you have two or more copied. Why? First, no one is required to respond—the
buck gets passed or the dropped entirely. Common thought is that the person on
the To line will respond, and those CC’d will just observe.

That’s the wrong way to go about it. If you are confident in your pitch (and your product/service warrants it), make it to the CEO, who will in turn, provide it to the executive in charge of that area. Otherwise send it to the VP in the appropriate area. This strategy also provides you options in case you don’t receive a response (ergo, send to the CEO when the vp doesn’t respond or vice versa).

Bouncing or received?

How do you know if
an email is incorrect? The email will immediately bounce as undeliverable. You know
it’s working when the email doesn’t bounce, but you don’t receive a response.
This indicates it’s likely gone into a “holding folder” where an assistant is
assigned to look at it.

One such case was when I sent my first email to Steve Ballmer when he was at Microsoft. In that instance, I new I had the right email as I was a vendor. After three days, I received a response providing direction on the opportunity at hand, and when I inquired, learned that he had three assistants monitoring his email. He’d respond personally after a first review of the incoming mails were culled.

When to send

There’s an adage I
heard a million years ago when I was starting out. My vice president of marketing
told me “the higher the title, the earlier they will be up.” I’d been sending
emails between the standard workday, thinking if I sent at 8 am (their time,
not mine) I’d be the at the top of the in-box. Sure, I might have been, but by
that time, the day was off and running, and the email wouldn’t even be opened
until the afternoon. Conversely, if I sent the email in the afternoon (thinking
people were winding down the day) I’d get more mindshare. Negative on that.
Tired, grumpy and overwhelmed tended to be the emotions I’d experience when I
placed a follow up call.

Sending early,
as in 6 a.m. Yep, I wrote
that. A CEO has thinking about the business 24×7, rising early to get a jump on
the day. Delegation is one key to success, so the email is read and forwarded
to the right person. If that means you are on the west coast, you get up at
3:30 a.m. and send that baby off (unless your system can schedule it for you),
but beware. If you receive an immediate response and don’t answer, it’s clear
that it’s a bot on your end.  

In a recent
example, I sent an email to the CEO of a 26B firm last week. He responded in 1
hr 22 seconds, his email forwarded along to two vice presidents, one being the
primary contact.

Sending Sunday
night. Until recently, this
has been my favorite time to send an email, because I constantly found that
CEOs weren’t/aren’t waiting until Monday morning. Many get online Sunday night
to plan for the week ahead. Last month I sent off a pitch to a Canadian investor
(who is Asian) who told me he likes to receive items on the weekend to review—and
his best time is Sunday night! Within an hour I had my response to the proposal
and next steps.

I say “until
recently” because I’m personally trying to not work on Sunday for any reason,
not even cracking my computer open to write or work. As I’ve aged, I’ve gotten
more focused on family than business, especially on Sunday. If you don’t share
this perspective, then by all means use this as a tool—and sometimes, others
will require it.

Now go forth, write and send—oh wait, it’s Thursday afternoon. Not yet!

Resilience & rubber bands

“During these Covid times,” being flexible and strong, never breaking and always protecting like those elastic gems is a must

March 17 was the invention date of the rubber band, a wonderful, magical tool that I couldn’t live without. Had British inventor and businessman Stephen Perry not been fooling around with vulcanized rubber, papers, products and hair and other mishmash items would scatter around willy-nilly.

Stephen Perry

“During these Covid
times” as my ten-year old has been saying for two months now (the precursor to
suggesting or doing something that’s normally not acceptable) I’ve been
thinking about the rubber bands of life.

Bodies expand and
contract like those wonderful elastic vulcanized rubber thingy-ma-jigs. Financial
lives have been stretched to the breaking point, pulling and hurting in equal
amounts, momentarily contracting then pulled again. Our emotional and mental states
have also expanded beyond points we were prepared to endure. For a few, the
rubber band has snapped. A front-line doctor took
her life, horrific
crimes have been committed against fellow human beings.

Yet this time hasn’t been entirely bad.  Bike sales have spiked during Covid, the joys of family together melded with the very real need to get out of the house. And prior to that, games, puzzles and ebook/traditional sales dramatically increased. I’ve not experienced or seen bad temperaments of in-store fighting or wars of words. On the contrary, here in Idaho, it’s been politeness and sharing, the six-foot distance doing no more than stretching our boundaries, the visual rubber band at work. The elasticity of the human spirit has been wonderfully at work.

The rubber band family

Those of us Idaho-imports
moved here had no idea that stocking up for potential snow storms would help
against a completely unexpected virus. And when you do live in rural area, you make
must have a level of self-reliance stock up because you have to. Town is thirty
minutes away, the nearest gas station fifteen, so if the unexpected happens,
the bread (and toilet paper) will be long gone before you can get to town.

For yourself or
your family, coming out of the “these Covid times,” doesn’t mean spending
wildly on fun stuff, although it would be nice if you can. It means preparing
for the next unexpected wave. Doing so gives me safety of mind, which is akin
to ensuring my personal rubber band around my family is in good shape,
protecting it and holding it together.

What about the fires
in Florida which happened this month along with the flooding
in the Carolinas? If Covid weren’t enough, you have strife-inducing events caused
by nature. Out here in Idaho, most goods come in (via truck) from the coast. One
year, a strange snow melt covered the singular pass between Seattle and this
region, shutting down the artery for two weeks. We had tires on a semi which was
stuck, along with lettuce, clothing and every other item it takes to live. So
while it wasn’t a fire, flood or pandemic, it was a simple snow melt that
brought this region to its knees.

This all gets me to wondering, how can we be more like that beautifully simple product created and patented by Stephen Perry, expanding and contracting when the challenging times come again? It’s simple, just like the rubber band. Stock up on essentials well before it’s necessary; be it clothing for the kids (buy one of present size, then one size larger) that extra can of food, the additional box of detergent and of course, toilet paper and water. It’s not sexy and won’t gain you followers like that photo of being in Greece, but it will keep you alive and help you sleep at night, and that comfort is priceless.

Start today, sleep tomorrow

Money: always have $500 in small bills if
possible. Start today with a ten here, a twenty there. Save it/don’t touch
it.

Food: Buy an extra can of anything you pick
up. Buy-one/save one is a good motto to follow. You’ll have two weeks of
short/long term food storage and paper products in no time.

Clothing: buy an extra size when it’s on sale, for
yourself or kids. My weight went up twenty and nothing fit. While some wore
pajamas and sweats for comfort, I wore them out of necessity. NO BUENO!

Gas or other
essentials. We were down
to a few gas tanks, but seeing how the coasts were hit, we had a month lead
time until restrictions hit us. We were lucky that way, because we had time to
purchase and save. Now that the shelves are being restocked, do so now.

These are at home
items, but the Go Bag, which I’ve often referred to, and have for each of our
cars, has essentials that can all fit in a waterproof backpack. I go through it
about every 4-6 months just to be on the safe side. Fires are the big thing
around here, and I’m telling you what: if you can’t get it and go in under thirty,
life is not good. The Go Bag is my mobile rubber band that keeps my family together
at a basic level.

Fires are the big thing around here, and I’m telling you what: if you can’t get it and go in under thirty, life is not good. The Go Bag is my mobile rubber band that keeps my family together at a basic level. We have for each of our cars, has essentials that can all fit in a waterproof backpack. I go through it about every 4-6 months just to be on the safe side.

Staying Above Ground

romantic suspense title coming June 2020

A week ago, I learned my amazing designer had six months worth of projects cancelled due to Covid. He had created massive trade show pieces, web design, software application front ends–all shut down mid-stream. Most of the clients were unable to pay for the work he’d done, let alone pay for the aspects remaining. Now, I love this guy in a purely platonic, he’s an-incredibly-talented type of way. He’s created the covers for my last 15 books and a myriad of social media, in-store retail and odds-and-ends I’ve required. His question: Do you have any upcoming books that I can work on now. My answer: YES!!

The backstory is my stuff usually gets slotted in months in advance and let’s face it: author covers/design are pretty much at the bottom of the priority list due to the time it takes and the money. It’s simple math, and I’ve never had a problem with it. That said, the unfortunate circumstances have allowed me to skip to the front of the big-boy line.

Passing on the love



Download a free ebook and enter to win a free, signed copy of Above Ground

This novel is similar in genre to Global Deadline. A suspense genre set in Las Vegas. It goes to the editor in three weeks, which means it will be out June if I’m lucky. And since I’m thrilled to keep my designer at work on my projects, I gave him the green light to work on Chambers 3.

Want to be an advance reader? Let me know on my Facebook page, Instagram or direct. Also, you can download a free book and enter to win a signed copy as well as get alerts for new promotions when I have a title that’s included in group-author promos.

Back of Book

Far beneath the bright lights of the Vegas strip lies a thriving subtropolis, nearly 300 miles of it. It’s dark. It’s real. And it awaits those who can’t make it in one of the most competitive cities in the world.
—
Born to a single mother and former showgirl, Shay Wilson was determined to succeed in her hometown of Las Vegas, not on stage but in the courtroom. After paying her way through school as a bartender, Shay is hired by one of the most prestigious law firms in town, yet quickly realizes she’ll never make partner unless she finds clients of her own. With that goal in mind, she returns to her former night job to serve drinks and pitch potential clients. But with these new clients comes trouble. Shay expected to fight crime in the courtroom, not on the streets.

Discovering her new clients are linked to a national fencing ring of stolen goods puts both her personal and professional lives in jeopardy. And the two men Shay turns to for help add to the danger. One is an undercover cop tasked with exposing the organized crime, and the other is an executive intent on discovering who in his organization has betrayed him.
To survive, Shay takes refuge in the dark underworld below the city, a shelter to criminals and innocents alike. Uncertain of how to navigate this new landscape, Shay must figure out who to trust, who to fear and how she will make it out alive…

Chambers 3: The Sphinx Princess

Not quite ready to share the back of book on this one, but here’s the cover. I love it, and hope you do too.

As with all the historical-fiction/time travel Chambers series books, this third installment is based in and around the facts of a particular time in Egypt. The pharaohs built tunnels connected the pyramids to the Nile in order to escape or simply relax. Mia, pictured above, is believed to be a reincarnated Princess, who in real life died in her early 20’s. Won’t say anymore for now… looked for specials on my authorpage or other social media. Books 1 and 2 are up and available if you want to catch up now.

Want to be an advance reader for either? Let me know on my Facebook page, Instagram or direct. Remember to download a free book and enter to win a signed copy.

Staying….Above Ground

romantic suspense title coming June 2020

A week ago, I learned my amazing designer had six months worth of projects cancelled due to Covid. He had created massive trade show pieces, web design, software application front ends–all shut down mid-stream. Most of the clients were unable to pay for the work he’d done, let alone pay for the aspects remaining. Now, I love this guy in a purely platonic, he’s an-incredibly-talented type of way. He’s created the covers for my last 15 books and a myriad of social media, in-store retail and odds-and-ends I’ve required. His question: Do you have any upcoming books that I can work on now. My answer: YES!!

The backstory is my stuff usually gets slotted in months in advance and let’s face it: author covers/design are pretty much at the bottom of the priority list due to the time it takes and the money. It’s simple math, and I’ve never had a problem with it. That said, the unfortunate circumstances have allowed me to skip to the front of the big-boy line.

Passing on the love



Download a free ebook and enter to win a free, signed copy of Above Ground

This novel is similar in genre to Global Deadline. A suspense genre set in Las Vegas. It goes to the editor in three weeks, which means it will be out June if I’m lucky. And since I’m thrilled to keep my designer at work on my projects, I gave him the green light to work on Chambers 3.

Want to be an advance reader? Let me know on my Facebook page, Instagram or direct. Also, you can download a free book and enter to win a signed copy as well as get alerts for new promotions when I have a title that’s included in group-author promos.

Back of Book

Far beneath the bright lights of the Vegas strip lies a thriving subtropolis, nearly 300 miles of it. It’s dark. It’s real. And it awaits those who can’t make it in one of the most competitive cities in the world.
—
Born to a single mother and former showgirl, Shay Wilson was determined to succeed in her hometown of Las Vegas, not on stage but in the courtroom. After paying her way through school as a bartender, Shay is hired by one of the most prestigious law firms in town, yet quickly realizes she’ll never make partner unless she finds clients of her own. With that goal in mind, she returns to her former night job to serve drinks and pitch potential clients. But with these new clients comes trouble. Shay expected to fight crime in the courtroom, not on the streets.

Discovering her new clients are linked to a national fencing ring of stolen goods puts both her personal and professional lives in jeopardy. And the two men Shay turns to for help add to the danger. One is an undercover cop tasked with exposing the organized crime, and the other is an executive intent on discovering who in his organization has betrayed him.
To survive, Shay takes refuge in the dark underworld below the city, a shelter to criminals and innocents alike. Uncertain of how to navigate this new landscape, Shay must figure out who to trust, who to fear and how she will make it out alive…

Chambers 3: The Sphinx Princess

Not quite ready to share the back of book on this one, but here’s the cover. I love it, and hope you do too.

As with all the historical-fiction/time travel Chambers series books, this third installment is based in and around the facts of a particular time in Egypt. The pharaohs built tunnels connected the pyramids to the Nile in order to escape or simply relax. Mia, pictured above, is believed to be a reincarnated Princess, who in real life died in her early 20’s. Won’t say anymore for now… looked for specials on my authorpage or other social media. Books 1 and 2 are up and available if you want to catch up now.

Want to be an advance reader for either? Let me know on my Facebook page, Instagram or direct. Remember to download a free book and enter to win a signed copy.

Suspenseful and tense…a page turner

The Cube Master…. “Gerdes has created another winner. YA as well as mature readers of techno thrillers will be rewarded.”

Always a joy (and relief) to get a good review. In case you missed it in the wave of news, bookmark this for your reading list. A tip: signing up for my newsletter at BookCave. allows you to download your book of choice. Scroll along the top and you can find authors, books, deals and offers. Incarnation is presently running under a promo which allows you to read book 1 of the series for free, and a few others. It ends at the last day of April. In the meantime, here’s the taste for book 2 in the series which is available at all the major print and the major ebook outlets, plus Amazon .

Me and Bonnie, long lost relatives

A wonderful, weird outcome of this stay-at-home period has been the ancestry efforts conducted on Family Search, Family Tree and whatnot, lines and lineage all strung together like the vines on netting, where one branch ends, another begins.

My own discovery has been a bit odd, starting with a round, chunk of grey which, like Star Trek, no grey had gone before. Visualize your face as a clock, then find 11, approximately the upper left diagonal of your eye. Trace the line with your fingertip, starting at the brow, ending at the hairline. Then, because you have nothing better to do at home, make a circle about the size of a quarter. Just for fun, extend that to a silver dollar.

Bonnie as a teenager

Now imagine that circumference all grey, as in, you took a white marker and painted it grey. That’s how I came to find my heritage with Bonnie Raitt, for she too, has a grey circle at the top left of her hair. Who knew that all it would take is Covid-19 to connect my grey circle with hers?

Why now? Why this time?

As so famously said by the illustrious law student Elle Woods whilst attending Harvard law, when asking the question of a man discarding previous sperm “donor” attempts, but not “this time?” In my case, I’m asking myself, why now? Why this time?

middle-age Bonnie

Easy. No hair coloring available, and having learned from past attempts at being my own stylist, coloring is not a skill set in my bullseye. It’s better to go grey than go green (sorry, no images but it’s alive in my memory). The last time my hair was natural was eleven years ago, and before than, fourteen years, both aligning with pregnancies and breast feeding when I went au natural across the board, from eating to dying to fixing, pricking and plumping. The good news for me was I was younger then and I didn’t have grey. The bad news was I couldn’t even recall my natural hair color, but I certainly do now.

Poor Bonnie however. You can see she had “the spot” as I now refer to it when in high school! Youza. I think it’s like a birthmark–one needs to embrace it, just like Cindy Crawford and “the mole,” which somehow got morphed into a beauty mark. If that was on me, my brothers would haven’t called it for what it was: a curse. But in our new-age day and way, what do we do? Love it. Hug it. Embrace it. Let it shine. Don’t cover it up, slice it off or otherwise diminish it’s greatness. Bring it to life! I say.

Rog says not

My dearest husband is not about embracing, loving or cultivating “my spot,” like a fertile plot of soil. He is about shading it with an eye pencil, and when that doesn’t work, he’s not above recommending a permanent marker. When I balk, he offered up one of the girls non-soluable paints from IKEA. I tried to compare myself to Cindy and the mole, which didn’t go far. She had the body to match. Not I.

Present day Bonnie- still the boss

The real problem with my body’s attempt to become like Bonnie is that it’s on my part line–just like hers! Couldn’t my body have chosen to be original? Or self-identify as a back-of-head spot of above-the-ear-spot? Why on my part line?

Further, could it not have been born a part of me, like Cindy and her “beauty mark?” It was a part of her being from the get-go and her parents were probably too cheap to spend the money on a six-year-old. They had no choice but to call it pretty. By the time she was a teenager and making more money than her parents, she too, was convinced it was pretty. Compare that to my ugly mark, because let’s be honest. When you get a sun spot, it’s from age, not from God. My grey blob at 11 o’clock is a curse of aging, not a beauty gift from the almighty, like a snake in waiting, hoping for the sun of Covid to shine on us all, thereby revealing our true nature.

As I’ve become more reconciled to my relationship with Bonnie, I’m pointing out our similarities: we both have blue-ish glasses. we both insist on having long hair and wearing long earrings, but tragically, the comparisons end there, but I’m certainly not slingling the guitar like a boss as Bonnie.