Happy New Year!

Yes, I know I'm slightly early, but this is my last Killer Hobbies blog post of 2015!   

Life's fun right now but really different from my norm.  Oh, yes, I've started writing my third Barkery & Biscuits Mystery, and I'll be reading my manuscript for COVERT ALLIANCE, my next Harlequin Romantic Suspense, this weekend before emailing it to my editor.  I'm doing some additional plotting, too.  That part's all usual for me. 

But meantime I'm still working around all kind of holiday and family stuff.   

Last week we went to see Frozen, Disney on Ice.  Wow!  Those skaters were amazing!  We also went to see the new Star Wars movie at the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood, where they presented a sci-fi light show first.  Another fun outing. 

We've family staying with us and visiting us, and more to come.  We've yet to take a drive around the major Christmas light shows this year and are probably out of time.  Yesterday we had our carpets cleaned, partly in anticipation of the arrival of our young grandsons next week.  The dogs had to stay in my office with me with all the excitement going on, but they wanted to go help and kept barking. 

This afternoon we'll head to Pasadena to watch people put the last touches on the parade floats--including our younger son!  Then there's New Year's Eve, New Year's Day, and more that's not conducive to spending my usual amount of time writing.  But oh well.  The celebrations and seeing family don't happen often, so I plan to enjoy them now, and write whenever I can find a few spare minutes. 

So... Happy New Year, everyone!  I hope you all have a wonderful and prosperous 2016.

Happy Thanksgiving

Yep, it's that time again.  Tomorrow is the big day. 

I mentioned last year that my Thanksgiving then would be a small event.  This year it's even smaller.  The neighbor who'd joined us last year has moved away, so this year it will just be my husband, younger son and I together on Thanksgiving.  Well, the dogs, too, but they don't sit at the table with us.  They stay on the floor and beg.  No human food for them, though, since both have health issues that mostly relegate them to doggy food and treats. 

But this Thanksgiving is a harbinger of things to come.  Lots of relatives will be with us soon, starting right around Christmas and continuing into January.  They include in-laws and our older son and his family--our d-i-l and two grandkids.  Plus, our d-i-l's delightful parents will be visiting for a short while, too!  It helps that we live in California while they all live in the Midwest.  No big El Nino presence here yet, but even if it arrives it's hopefully easier to live with than lots of cold and snow. 

So, there are lots of things to be thankful for tomorrow and beyond.  Meantime, I'm also thankful for a fun and fruitful writing year--three books published plus one e-published so far in 2015:  BITE THE BISCUIT, my first Barkery & Biscuits Mystery, CANADIAN WOLF, my seventh Alpha Force paranormal romance for Harlequin Nocturne, and KNOCK ON WOOD, my second Superstition Mystery, plus the Kindle version of ONCE A CAVALIER, a time travel romance. 

I'm working on my next book under deadline, a Harlequin Romantic Suspense, and will then head into the next Barkery book.  Next year is likely to be busy, too--another year to be thankful for. 

And you?  What are you up to this Thanksgiving?

More Book Promo and Loving It!

I've been writing here a lot lately about blogging and otherwise promoting my work, especially since I've had two new books published during the last two months. 

The most recent is KNOCK ON WOOD, my second Superstition Mystery.  It's a cozy mystery published by Midnight Ink, and it's starting to appear in bookstores.  In September it was CANADIAN WOLF, a Harlequin Nocturne, which sometimes appears in bookstores in a two-in-one version with another author's paranormal romance included, but I've yet to see any of them on shelves in Southern California, where I live. 

Last weekend, I took a trip with my husband to visit some dear friends who are currently living in La Jolla in an apartment on cliffs overlooking the water, a wonderful place with a great view, including kayakers and water boarders, cormorants, sea gulls, and an osprey they've named Ozzie who lives on a tree just beyond their balcony.  It was a totally delightful visit--and I used it partly for promotion, too!  Yes, I missed our dogs but our younger son stayed with them, and they love him so all was well. 

On our way to La Jolla, while we were there, and on our way home we managed to stop in nine bookstores, mostly Barnes & Nobles and related Bookstars, but also an independent mystery bookstore, the wonderful Mysterious Galaxy.  Not many had KNOCK ON WOOD yet but some had books from my backlist of mysteries.  I left bookmarks and promised to stop by again next time I was in the area--which, since my friends may be in that area for a while, might even be soon! 

This weekend, on Saturday, I'm participating in the Burbank Library Author's Showcase, where I'll bring books and swag to introduce myself to local booklovers whom I may not yet have met.  And on Friday I'll be interviewed for an online radio broadcast.

And, yes, I'm still in the middle of my blog tour.  It's always fun to see the posts appear--mine as well as the hosts' reviews of KNOCK ON WOOD.  Plus, I'm working on some related online magazine articles. 

Will this slow down?  Probably.  I don't have another book scheduled for publication until May 2016, when my second Barkery & Biscuits Mystery, TO CATCH A TREAT, will be released.   

On the other hand, if I can keep up even a portion of this pace, I'll do it--as long as I can soon dive in more deeply to my actual writing.  After all, I still have deadlines!

Dog Sense

No one who knows me or reads nearly any of my writing isn't surprised to know I'm an animal lover, especially dogs.  And most particularly my own dogs, Lexie and Mystie, who are Cavalier King Charles Spaniels.

Yesterday, Lexie surprised me by her level of knowledge of what I was doing.   

 

I include recipes in my Barkery and Biscuits Mysteries, even though I'm not much of a cook or baker myself.  The dog treat recipe in the first in the series, Bite the Biscuit, was provided by a friend, whom I was with when a sample batch was baked.  The ones I'm including in the next book in the series, which will probably be called Treachery and Treats, were provided by a couple of Facebook friends on my street team, and I wanted to try them out before putting them in the book.  I got the ingredients and started baking one of them yesterday. 

As soon as I started, Lexie was there, begging and acting as if she knew exactly what I was doing--baking treats for her.  Sure, she must have smelled the ingredients.  But when I cook people items for dinner she doesn't act a fraction that excited.  This time she even went into my husband's home office and started talking to him, as if telling him what was going on and encouraging him to visit me and tell me to give her a treat--even as they were just starting to cook.  There was no meat involved, just good, wholesome baking ingredients.  How did she know I was doing something different from my norm: cooking something not particularly for humans but for her?   

When the cookies were complete Lexie did indeed get a sample.  Several samples.  Even Mystie got a little, although she has a chronic tummy issue which prevents me from giving her much of anything outside her prescribed food.   

Both dogs surprise me, though.  Mystie's favorite toys are rubber chickens that squeak.  The other day we were out shopping and found a variation on them--a squeaky rubber chicken decorated as a pirate.  We bought one, of course, and didn't intend to give it to her immediately, but she smelled the toy and insisted... and so we obeyed. 

I always knew doggy noses were amazing.  I can sort of understand why Mystie knew the toy was hers, assuming its scent was similar enough to her existing ones. 

But how did Lexie know I was about to bake dog treats?

My Next Project

I did it!

If you happen to have read my Monday post at InkSpot, the blog for Midnight Ink writers, you'll know that I met my June 1 deadline for the manuscript for my second Barkery & Biscuits Mystery.  I still have some odds and ends to accomplish with it, including providing an acknowledgment, dedication, and recipes.  I've already received some great-sounding recipes for dog treats from some online friends, but I want to give them a try before sending them along for publication.  In any event, with all I had going on last month I'm really pleased that I was able to meet that deadline.

Right now, I have a looming deadline for the edits for the second Superstition Mystery, KNOCK ON WOOD, but don't anticipate any problems with it.

And my next writing deadline after that?  It's for my third Superstition Mystery.  I started thinking about that one evening as I was finishing the Barkery manuscript and my subconscious mind, as usual, started its routine as I took a bath.  I came up with a plot idea I really liked and wrote it down on a notecard before I went to bed.

But the next morning I checked my computer files and I already had jotted down an idea for book number three.  I still loved my idea from the night before, but thought that the one I'd previously come up with would work better for this particular slot. 

So, I now have to flesh it out... then write the story. 

And that other new idea?  As I said, the next one I need to write is number three in the Superstition Mystery series and it's the last there's a current commitment for.  But with that fourth idea, now I've got yet another reason to cross my fingers that the series continues!

What are your fingers crossed about this week?