…I caught the stomach flu.

Time travel romance. I’ve been told there are two ways to write one. One way has a character going forward or backward in time as themselves. The other way has a character going forward or backward and occupying another body. I recently read one of the latter premised romances and hated it. Honestly. I really, really did not like the idea at all.

In the book I read, a tall thin woman magically finds herself transported in time and comes to consciousness in the voluptuous body of a beautiful woman. The upstaged woman is married to a hunky guy who happens to be in love with his wife. She doesn’t love him. However, the heroine, in the other woman’s body, happens to think he’s yummy.

I have no idea what I expected when I picked up the book. As a writer, I have an active imagination, but for some reason it never once occurred to me to have a love story where one of the characters is in another person’s body. Not only that, but to have that other body be loved already by the hero. Once I realized the premise, I knew there was a problem.

Frankly, I didn’t find anything romantic about the story at all. To me, the premise comes straight out of the Stepford Wives. Gorgeous guy has a wife he’s not happy with and then one day she magically transforms into a sex maniac who thinks he’s God’s gift. I can see how this might appeal to a male reader (after all, don’t we make our heroes a little too perfect?), but how this appeals to a female reader eludes me.

The sex scenes were gross IMHO. The heroine was tall and slender in her own body. Every time the hero waxed poetic about how hot and horny the voluptuous figure of his wife made him and the heroine got turned on, I was like, HELLO? He’s not talking about you! When the hero wrapped his wife’s long hair around his fist and praised its silky texture and soft smell, and the heroine swooned, again I was like, What are you thinking? You have short blond hair. He’s NOT talking about YOU. And the “oh you feel so good” sex statements by the hero made me wince. I felt like shouting, HE’S NOT FEELING YOU!!

Yuck. Yuck. Yuck. *shudder*

I guess there are readers who like this type of story or else they wouldn’t be published, but I can say unequivocally that this premise is not for me. I’m not physically perfect by any means, but I still expect the guy who loves me to love ME. Let me tell you, if my husband praised my blonde hair (I’m a brunette) I wouldn’t get turned on, I’d get pissed.

Anyway, to finish the story, the transported woman ends up staying in the past in the other woman’s body. She has kids with the hero (which in my mind is like being a surrogate. Nothing wrong with surrogates, mind you. I’m just saying that you have to picture the child as the product of another woman and your man. Or actually another woman and her man.) and they live HEA.

The HEA for me was that the story was done.

Maybe I’m weird, but I don’t see the appeal. If this type of story is one you like, can you tell me why? Because truly, I can’t think of one thing to like about this premise. Or maybe you have another premise that’s like nails on the chalkboard for you. What is it?

I spent most of this morning and afternoon getting ready to run to the post office. Today I mailed the Passionate Ink chapter application to RWA. :dance: We have almost 200 RWA members and 50 non-RWA members who intend to join if the chapter is approved. It was a pretty impressive packet we sent in and our Membership Chair and Secretary worked really hard to compile the paperwork for me to send in. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes, but it looks good.

I also mailed off more contracts today so you’ll be seeing more work from me. I’m eager to release my vamp series. They’re fun and fast and a joy to work on. I’m looking forward to writing a bunch of them. *g* I’ll keep you posted on those too.

Oh man… yesterday, while struggling through edits, a wonderful e-mail popped up by the fabulous, amazingly talented Shelby Reed. I can’t rave enough about her writing. It’s wonderful, fabulous, awesome. I think as writers we all have a talent we aspire to. I aspire to Shelby’s. She writes emotion like no one else I’ve ever read. When I finish her books I’m so very sad the story is over. Very sad. And certain my own writing will never reach that level. She’s just got it. Pure talent. If you haven’t read a story by Shelby I urge you to do so. You won’t be sorry. You can find her backlist here.

I’ve been waiting months for her next release and it’s scheduled to come out the 22nd of this month. :dance: (which leads me to remind all aspiring EC authors that EC sometimes takes as long as New York to publish a book. Be prepared. If you hear stories about other e-publishers coming back with a reply within hours or days and expect something similar, don’t. Not to say it can’t happen, just don’t expect it to.) Shelby’s new story is titled Seraphim. I’ll posting more about it shortly…

In other news, the edits I’m doing are moving along with torturous slowness. I just can’t stay focused on it for more than a paragraph or two at time. I don’t know why, or how to fix it. I love the story, I love the characters, I love the way I’m tweaking it. But I just can’t give it the attention it deserves. It’s a struggle. These characters are complicated people, not always likeable, though they remain sympathetic. They’ve got a messed up past with each other and unlike stories where the rakish hero has some issues, in this story it’s my heroine who can’t get it together. So I’m adding a sexual scene right now and it’s like picking my way through a minefield. These two don’t leave their troubles at the bedroom door. No for them, sex exacerbates their struggles. Which leaves me struggling to write it.

And lately my typing and spelling have sucked @ss. I’m so mad about that. Everything I write or send out has typos and misspellings. It started with the 700+ emails a day on the Passionate Ink loop and still hasn’t worked itself out. It’s driving me batty. The worst part is switching words, like “there”, “they’re” and “their”. I was writing my RTB column today and noted that I wrote “alludes” instead of “eludes”. :doh:

Thanks again to those of you who purchased Catching Caroline, found you enjoyed it and spread the word. I really appreciate it. ((hugs))

Regular readers know that I’ve been struggling with the purpose of my blog. What’s it for? (Besides being a prime place to stick my foot in my mouth? :doh: ) Only a tiny percentage of the people who come through here daily comment, which is not a bad thing, just an observation. I’m continually surprised by the people who pop up and say, “I love your blog.” The most surprising thing to me, however, is the number of requests I receive from publicists and authors to review books on my blog. :scratch:

I guess this catches me off guard because most would say that my blog is a writer’s blog. I don’t talk much about books by other people, aside from mentioning my latest book purchases, and unless I’m missing something, I don’t find my blog linked to all that often. Many of the blogs I visit don’t have me on their sidebar. So where do the potential reviewees find me? And why do they think anyone cares about my opinion?

That’s not to say I’m not flattered. Of course I’m flattered. Very much so. The requests suggest I have some influence, which is a nice illusion to have as a just-starting-out author. But I don’t know how to respond. So far, I just haven’t. (Mean of me, I know.) It’s not as simple as accepting a free book and reading it at my leisure. They want me to read it and post a review on my blog. Perhaps I’m paranoid, but what if I hate it? What if it sucks? I cannot tell a lie. *g* Okay that’s crap. As y’all have seen here, I’m pretty good at saying the first thing that comes to mind and then drowning in the ramifications long after. I wouldn’t want to have to say I liked a book if I didn’t and I wouldn’t want to say a book sucked when obviously the publicist/writer had hoped that I would help them sell the book in question, not disparage it.

I’m also wondering if this works for people. Does getting reviews on blogs increase sales? If so, why don’t we plug books more, help our friends? Too annoying perhaps? My future plan is to mention more books I’ve read recently that I enjoyed. I’ll start tomorrow. Probably.

I really don’t know. I’m over-extended with my commitments as it is, I’m not writing near as much as I want to be, and I keep taking on more stuff to do. :doh: Am I mad? I think so. Thing is I want to do all the things people ask me to do. I want to volunteer to participate in great ideas. I just hope there’s enough time in the day to do all the things I want.

I’m torn right now because I’m editing my deadlined story while in the back of my mind my EC vamp series is begging me to finish the next installment. I wish I could do both, but I can’t. I need to come up with a schedule so that I can productively write, and hopefully sell, all the stories I want.

Paperwork for the new RWA erotic romance chapter, Passionate Ink, came in over the weekend. The board and I spent much of today discussing it and getting the paperwork ready for me to mail. We expect to be approved before Nationals next month and look forward to having our official website up. :dance: We’re planning great things for our members. Super things. Stupendous things. I’m very excited about it.

In other news, (come on, you knew that was coming) I got feedback about Catching Caroline today. It seems to be going over well. It’s hard to tell when you only hear from the people who liked it. (Do people write authors and say they didn’t like a book? I suppose they do if a series they’ve invested in is disappointing. Probably not for a new-to-you author.) Anyway, I’m very happy about that. I was also very happy to hear a reader got surprised in all the right places. I prefer to keep readers guessing. Not that I do it on purpose. I’m a pantser so usually I’m surprised too.

Thank you to everyone who bought the book in the last two days. ((hugs)) It means a lot to me.

Catching Caroline is on sale now!! :dance: A day early. :bounce: