Happy Holidays and Happy New Year too!

So much happiness! I hope you get your piece :) And your peace.

Having the child home during the vacation break has been trying but I love her so no real sweat off my nose. Plus, she pretty much occupies herself. Can't beat that.

Had my birthday this week and it was fun. The child put together a whole party for me which included pin the tail on the donkey, guess who drew this picture, and tell me what the letters of HAPPY BIRTHDAY stand for. Let's just say that the letters stood for nothing I would have thought of and the game involved the child's sleeping mask even though we all knew what letters were being used. :) It was a blast though and I really appreciated how she worked on it all day so I would have a "real" birthday party. She's the best :)

Best Christmas present this year - very cool fairy headphones for the iPod.

The year is winding down and I'm winding down with it for right now. Happy New Year to all in a little over an hour. May 2009 bring you everything you wish for. I'm simply hoping for a better year than the last :)

Misty

Thanksgiving a day early!

I wanted to post this today because tomorrow will probably be insane and I don't want to forget it :)

Happy Thanksgiving! Thank you to all the readers, reviewers, writing buddies, critique partners and friends I have made through this business.

And in the writing vein I will add this additional thanks...I finished IVY!!! I typed THE END last night after four intense days where I accumulated 16,000 words to type the end. I have edits to do (boy howdy!) but it is at least all there!

So those are a few of my thanksgiving moments. Have any you want to share?

Enjoy your turkey day tomorrow :)

Misty

Great Review and good progress

Hi again!

Just wanted to take a moment to say YAY! because I got a fantastic 5 heart review from the Romance Studio for my newest book A Mother's Heart. Yeehaw!!! You can read the review here:
http://theromancestudio.com/reviews/reviews/mothersheartsimon.htm
Thank you so much, Brenda Talley!

This was one of the very first books I ever wrote and it morphed so many times I couldn't even tell you what the original story was :) But I really wanted to tell a story of a woman who thought that the motherly instinct was genetic and that if her mother hadn't had it then surely she couldn't be trusted with kids. It's available in e-book right now from The Wild Rose Press and I'm ordering copies next week of the print book which is available publicly on Dec 6.

In other news I have made strides on the latest Ivy and have approximately 15K words left to write before I can start revisions/rewriting. YES! Seriously never thought I would get to this point some days.

I have to credit a great book for giving me the kick in the rear I really needed. This book is one I highly recommend no matter what stage of your writing career you are in. It's called No Plot? No Problem by Chris Baty, the man who started NaNoWriMo. For some reason I forget sometimes that the first draft is not the one that should be ready to send out as soon as you type THE END. I worry so much about making the first draft good that I don't let myself make mistakes. This book begs you to make them and it is an awesome tool to have around when you are feeling the slump.

I don't do NaNoWriMo simply because I'm almost always in the middle of a book come Nov and you have to start absolutely fresh. But next year I might just try to schedule myself so I can compete. What a rush!

Talk to you later,
Misty

Here I am again

Wow, look at that, twice in one week. That might be a record of some sort :)

So, today I'm working on the rest of the last Ivy book. This is the fifth and final book because I don't want her and her escapades to get boring because I have too many books in the series. Have you ever read a series faithfully but at one point you wondered why you were still reading? Wondered when the books started being a little bit boring? Or too far out there?

I don't want to be that author. I don't want people to stop reading because I don't have any other way for the character to grow. But I do want people to still be excited when a new Ivy comes out and I'd like to go out high on that wave.

So I'm writing, struggling with it and hating it some days, but I'm writing it and I hope to be finished by the end of the month. Keep me honest :)

Misty

Return from the Dead

LOL! I wasn't really dead, obviously. But it felt like it for a while. Honestly, I've just been struggling with quite a few things and haven't made time to get over here. I've had the time, I just haven't used it to blog. So no excuses. I will try to be more consistent and come up with some topics that aren't going to bore the snot out of anyone who is still reading :)

Misty

The books are in the building!

And may I just say how totally thrilled I am!!!! I love the smell of them, the look of them, the air that brushes by my face when I fan the pages! Woo-hoooooo!!!! I hope I always feel this way about my new books. Then again this is book eight that I've received and the enthusiasm hasn't waned at all so I think it's a pretty safe bet that it's not going anywhere!

If you are interested in having a book signed, let me know :)

Misty

Super Cool Release Day!!!!

Woo-hoo!!! Frame and Fortune, the next installment in the Ivy Morris Mysteries, is out today!!!! Run, don't walk to find out exactly what Ivy is up to these days. I can promise a lot of fun and mystery :)

Here's the blurb!

There's something in the freezer...and it's not Chunky Monkey ice cream.

Actually, the something is a someone. Ivy Morris' best friend, Bella Landry, is in serious trouble because of the surprise she finds in the unused walk-in freezer at her hair dressing shop. Calling amateur sleuth Ivy is a no-brainer for Bella, especially because it's Ivy or no one since she can't trust her policeman boyfriend (he's the one who cuffed her and booked her--and not in a sexy kinda way).

But Ivy might finally be in over her head this time, with Bella's ex, the Bastard, showing up in town wanting to help and only making things worse in the process. Who is he secretly calling? And does it have anything to do with the person who's running around town stealing picture frames but leaving the pictures?

Ivy's got a convoluted mess on her hands involving secret lives, secret agendas, and a lot of money she can't explain. To top it all off, the decidedly delicious Ben Fallon has turned gourmet cook and chief bottle washer in her house...all while slowly taking over a few of Ivy's drawers.

What's a girl to do? Well, when you're Ivy Morris, you wade on in and hope you stay alive long enough to taste that Chicken Parmesan Ben has cooking in the kitchen.

ENJOY!!! I'm having the time of my life!

Misty :)

I'm not even going to go there

So here I am, yet again. I thought I'd pop on and tell a little bit about what has been going on lately. I went on retreat and finally finished my latest book named Looting the Librarian. I am in edits ode right now and this will be the most extensive set of editing without actually rewriting the thing that I have ever done. Wish me luck!

I went to see Eddie Izzard in Pittsburgh! Woo-hoo!!!! I adore him so very very much! I have a keychain with his beautimuss mug on it and am in love :) Don't tell my husband. LOL.

I've been busy getting together the info for my next release - A NEW IVY!!!! She will be out soon and this one is called FRAME AND FORTUNE. I will share cover art as soon as I get it since I absolutely adore the covers I get for these stories :)

And that's about it for right now other than the fact that school is almost out and I can't believe where the year has gone already. Whew!

Talk to you later!
Misty

Part 4: The Brotherhood of the Tear Away Pants

Why am I always last?!?!?! It's because I procrastinate...I know this well. So, here we are days after the event but I still get a little high when I think about the night Megan, Natalie, Vicki and I went to an all make review with Megan's sister Whitney who was ultra awesome to have gotten us tickets! Weeeee!

I think the other ladies (okay ladies!) have done the ranting I would have done and have done, so I'm just going to talk about the silly. Can we say cheesy? Now I know that the ladies go there to have some fun and I had a blast but some of the stuff they did was more funny than sexy. And if I had to hear one more time about buying a t-shirt...Well, it wouldn't have been pretty. I kept yelling "PANTS OFF!" and yet they never really did take their pants off. Hmmm. Although, the cowboy dance was absolutely to die for. And the part where I got slid across the chests of several men to stand at the correct place in our group picture will forever stay with me. The bar guy Nat was talking about thought I wanted to squeeze his butt though really I was just freaking him behind his back. LOL :)

So that was my night out with the ladies (okay ladies!) and I got a squishy hug which you can see on my new slide show at myspace. Enjoy. I did.

Misty

Looking at my Reviews

So this might sound egotistical or even just strange, but that is nothing new here :) I've had a lot of stuff going on personally and am finding that writing recently is like pulling teeth - love that phrase! I have the will, I have the story, but actually sitting down and writing it is just not happening. That's not the strange part. What I do about it might be considered odd. I go back over my positive reviews from previous books and boost myself. I know, I know, there's nothing wrong with that. But sometimes I feel like I'm being too sefl-indulgent. The thing is, though, it has helped. There are people out there who have read my work and not vomited!!! LOL!

***Pity party officially over***

The point of this is that it is not easy to write. Some days it flows right out of your head and onto the page like divine inspiration. Those are the awesome days. But I think the true strength of a writer is shown when it is like pulling teeth but you still get in there with your pliers and go to work.

Have a good day! I'm planning on it :)

Misty

Sufficiently Candied

OY VEY!!!! I love me some peanut butter eggs but I am sugared and chocolated out! I didn't know it was possible but this year there was just too much candy!!!

In my news: I am almost done with my new book with The Wild Rose Press. I'm having a blast on Romance Book Junction (which I think I might have mixed up the words in a previous post. If you couldn't get there, try, try again). I'm also in the process of writing my next book-a funny paranormal. I'm about a third of the way through so I have to get back into gear.

Had a great easter and I hope everyone else did, too. For those who celebrate Passover or another holiday at this time that I'm not aware of, I hope you enjoyed that too. I'm so happy it is SPRING!!!!

Misty

Party all the time!

That song used to abslutely kill me...My girl wants to party all the time, party all the time, party all the tii-iime. LOL. I won't sing anymore just in case I make that song loop in your mind all day :)

So today I will be partying most of the day. Lots of relatives are either already here or on their way. Oy, family! I don't plan on writing today but am firmly entrenched in the ms so shouldn't have any trouble getting back into it come Monday. I'm having a blast with this story and hope it is as amusing as *I* think it is ;)

I just joined a new site called Romance Junction Books through invitation from my friend Alayne Adams. It's a great social site for romance readers and writers. I recommend going over and checking it out at www.romancebookjunction.ning.com Some great authors over there and it looks like the creator Victoria Purling has many exciting things in store coming up. So hop on over, check out yours truly and see what's the haps. I don't think yuo'll be disappointed. :)

We'll chat more tomorrow!

Misty

Catch-up

Lots of good things going on. My youngest brother just moved into the area and we've been having a good time hanging out. My daughter's birthday is coming up, so I'm getting ready for that. And this weekend is a huge family weekend. Whee!

I turned in the next Ivy book to Draumr and hear that I will have the same cover artist ehich is AWESOME!!! I love Patricia Storms. If you haven't seen her work other than my covers, you really should go check her out.

I'm working on my next manuscript. Did over 3000 words yesterday and think I have the flow going again - total relief. I hope to have it done about mid-April, then editing, then who knows? But I will be going on a writing retreat in May and want to write something new there, so that's my goal. Yippee!

Also, I JUST CONTRACTED ANOTHER BOOK!!! Woo-Hooo!!! It's called A Mother's Heart and you can see the art for it on the side bar. I think the artist did a fantastic job with the concept. Love the dog! I have to label it as Coming Soon because I don't know the exact release date yet, but I'll post when I do. It will be an ebook first so you can have the convenience of buying it at 3 in the morning if that's when your credit card calls to you :) Or your reading necessities. I'll post blurb and stuff later, but if you want to see more on it, you can go to The Wild Rose Press site at www.thewildrosepress.com

Have fun and we'll talk more later!

Misty

CHAT TONIGHT!!!!!

I could have sworn I had posted this when it originally came up but now I can't find the post. I'm having some technical issues over here so I'm not sure what happened. I may have written it and not posted it but that would be weird!

Anyway! The authors of The Shape of Love - Victoria, Vicky and me (the Un-Vicky!) are having a chat tonight over at our publishers website forum area. Stop on by and be prepared for a fun time! You can find us at http://www.draumrpublishing.com/forums/index.php?&act=Reg&CODE=00 to register then head on into the forums! We'll be there from 8 to 10 EST so come over for some fun!

Misty

So Many Cool Things!

Hello out there! I had to take a break for a family crisis and I apologize for that. Unfortunately this crisis will be somewhat of a longterm thing so I figured I'd better get back on the ball with my life in the meantime. So here I am. Happy to see you!

I had two book signings recently. Both went fantastical! The first was at The Paperback Exchange. I sold a ton of books and got to hang with two local authors Susan Kelley and Alayne Adams. Great time! Then I got my new anthology in the mail and spent some time with the two V's to sign before we had another book signing at a great store called One Good Woman. Phenomenal! Great coffee, great gifts, great atmosphere. Sold even more books and got to hang with Vicky, Victoria and Alayne again! YAY!!!! I'm going to put the cover up here as soon as I remember how the heck to do it :)

Then today was day two of no school because of weather but I did manage to get back into editing Ivy and it's flowing right along. So good times, good times! What have you all been up to?

Misty

Here I am!!!

Did you think I forgot about you? No way!!! One of my goals this year is to be consistent with the whole blogging thing. So here I am. I had a good time in VA. I love hanging with my girls. We went to dinner and sang in the car and so many other fun things. I think I'm going to carve out time this summer to spend a week down there. My aunt lives in a house surrounded by a creek, a bay and a river. It is so peaceful and I even wrote down there! YAY!

And speaking of writing, here are some numbers for you if you are interested. :) Saturday - took the day off, first one since Jan 3rd. Sunday - 2007. Monday - 4075. Tuesday - 4112. And today - 2091! So yay! again because I have consistently (love it!) hit my goal every day. Woot!!!!

New news!!! I just got a peek at the cover for THE SHAPE OF LOVE and I cannot wait for it to come out. It is gorgeous and I will share as soon as I have permission!!!

Misty - should be smacked for excessive !!!!!!!! use ;)

Cya soon!

I'm going to VA tomorrow morning and I won't be on the internet at all until Sunday night again. So farewell until then :) Have a good weekend and behave yourselves.

Before I go I want to just check in with the word count challenge. I hit 2007 words today so I have kept at a minimum of 2000 words a day since the 3rd. And I'm pretty excited about the story now. I'm taking my laptop with me this weekend so we'll see if I manage to get anything done.

Wish me luck!

Misty

On track

YAY!!! I hit 3000 words today and the strange thing is that it was 3000 words exactly and I hadn't checked word count since 2273. How bizarre is that? But I have met or exceeded my goal for eight days now and am feeling good. I am over halfway done with the book and feeling good about that too. I love getting halfway at least because it feels more like downhill from there. I still have many plot twisties and nasties but I also have a firm idea of how it will all work out and come together nicely. YAY, again!!!

Tomorrow I will hit at least 2000. I have a social engagement during the day (I love the way that sounds LOL) and then I will write in the evening. Then Saturday I am going to be in Virginia, right where I set the fictional town on Martha's Point so I will do a little research and rejuvenate myself in the writing by taking in the scenery and putting it on the page. I plan on writing while I'm down there but we will see. I have two days of writing vacation coming to me, but I'd prefer not to use them.

Ta-ta for now!

Misty

Feeling Good

So I'm keeping up with this goal of mine for the month of January. Every day since the third (which I know is not that long, but I'm still proud) I have hit at least 2000 words. I'm sticking to it and feeling happy. I think I explained before that it is possible to take 2 days off a week without penalties but I really don't plan on taking advantage of that. In fact tomorrow I plan on boosting myself to at least 3000 words for the day. We shall see!

Tonight is going to be a short one but at least I was here trying to stick to my consistent word :)

Have a good night!
Misty

Sunday, Sunday

Had a quiet day with the dh and daughter. Went out to lunch and cleaned the house. Still deciding if I'm going to do any writing today. I'm allowed to take off two days a week during this month of writing and today might just be one of them :) We'll see.

So while the laundry is running and the other peeps in my house are playing video games, I'm doing contest judging. I'm pretty happy with this batch of entries. I've been judging contests for approximately six years now and let me tell you that some of them have been horrendous. I can take misspellings and a lack of commas, but I've had entries where the sentences make absolutely no sense at all and the thoughts are all jumbled. Or the POV switches every other sentence, sometimes in the middle of the sentence. I understand that for some people this is the first writing they've ever done and I try to judge accordingly, but it can be hard to slog through. But as I said, this batch is very pleasant and I am giving some really high marks. Good luck to the entrants :) THe last thing I will say on this right now is READ YOUR MANUSCRIPT OUT LOUD TO YOURSELF. Your brain will supply the words that you THINK should be there. You have less of a chance of making a rudimentary mistake if you read it out loud. If your tongue is tripping over the sentence perhaps you should rewrite it.

Misty

Meeting Day!

I know I've said it before but I'll say it again - I love my local writer's group through RWA. We have such a blast when we are together and I love the energy. Today we had to sit in a very very very small room for all our members, but it was still fun :)

And then I came home and met my goal while my parents to my kid to the local Farm show. She loves to watch the baby ducks slide and apparently there were some huge bunnies there!

So I'm two for two days on over 2K a day and I have about 36K words to go, maybe more. Wish me luck!

Misty

YAY!!!

I'm back up and running!!! My wonderful, wonderful, fantabulous husband fixed my laptop and I am back into the land of writing! I started with my goal today at my friend Alfie CWABy book in a month. The goal for me is 2K a day. You only have to hit the goal five days a week but I plan on doing all 7 to get the next Ivy done. I hit my goal at about 4 this afternoon then pulled together all the stuff I need for my writer's meeting tomorrow. I still have time though tonight and I might write again. We shall see :)

I'm really looking forward to getting this project done and moving on to the next thing. I adore writing Ivys but it can be nice to be done for the year before the next one ;) I have no idea what my next project will be. It will depend heavily on what's going on with my writing. But let's take it one step at a time LOL. I'm getting ahead of myself already!

On the new book front too, I heard from the publisher Rida today and hopefully we will have the book sometime after the beginning of Feb so keep your eyes peeled for future updates.

Have a great evening!

Misty

Squat

As in I have done squat today :( My laptop is on the blink. I can type for a while but then if I close it to go do something like take a break, when I get back the whole screen is white. It whites out too while I'm typing and then I lose everything I've written. So now I'm scared to write any more words for fear I will lose it all. VERY FRUSTRATING!!! So I may end up doing my story on the Alpha Smart or my desktop though I am loathe to use either one. Sigh.

In better news I got my haircut and I really like it. I also signed up for a class with Lori Wilde whom I love. She's teaching high concept writing. I took her Romance Writing class through ed2go and ended up buying her high concept book and working through it myself. But now she is teaching a class to go through the book and I'd like to see if I got the lessons right.

I might also be participating in a write a book in a month challenge again this month. So lots going on and hopefully good news will follow behind all my hard work :)

Misty

Updated Website

This year is all about goals. My first goal has been accomplished and I'm pleased as punch :) I updated my website at www.mistysimon.com. It still has a few bugs with a template issue, but I'm pleased. I realized when I was in there that I hadn't updated since July of 2006. Oops! That is way too long to go without any updates. I didn't even have info on Something Old, Something Dead on there or Reignited. Bad Misty!!! No biscuits again for me! LOL.

Today, I'm getting my hair cut and starting on rereading the Harry Potter books from 1 through 7. I've never done that before, read straight through so I'll be interested to see if I catch everything this time around.

And I'll be writing this afternoon. I started out with a good 1,000 words yesterday and am aiming for 3K a day going forward. Hopefully I can get back up to speed since it's been a while.

Wish me luck!

Misty

New Beginnings

So my on the word train thing didn't pan out the way I thought it would. I got off the word train pretty quickly and honestly just took a break. My poor brain had turned to mush, no kidding. I wrote approximately 320,000 words from Jan to Dec 2007 and it rebelled on me when I asked it to write any more. But that's okay. I got a lot of good stuff done last year and am now rested and looking forward to what I plan on doing this year. First up is finishing Frame and Fortune. I have roughly 20K on it at this point, maybe a little under that. If you read my last post you'll see that Ivy's are normally about 60K so I have about 40K to do this month. I want to have it out the door to the publisher no later than the end of January. Sooner if possible. We'll see :)

In other news, my anthology with the lovely Vicki and Vicky should be coming out here soon and I will update as I get more info. You're not going to want to miss this one since it is shape shifting domestic animals :) YAY!!!!

And finally, this year I have chosen three words that will describe my year. They are Persistent, Consistent and Focused. What are your goals or words? Let's see if we can stick with them.

HAPPY, HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL!!!!!!!!!!!

Misty