It’s odd that the whole time I was away (nine freaking-awesome days) I kept to my usual schedule despite the time zone change. Which was pretty cool. I rose at 5-ish and had the lake house to myself until the others began to stir.

Yet, when I returned home, my body clock went haywire. Every night since I’ve been back, I’m up past three in the morning, sleeping far too late to get the kind of start this morning girl enjoys. So ever since Wednesday, I’m fighting fatigue. Translation=terrible productivity.

However, since this is my first report card since I returned, I’m going to claim the work I accomplished on the trip! This is my blog, hear me roar.

Gah! How much coffee did I put into this pot? No amount of creamer will turn it the right shade of mud.

Anyway…the day before I left for Seattle, my new editor at Samhain accepted two new cowboy stories—Unbridled and Unforgiven. I completed the contracts and cover art sheets while I was on the lake. The first will be out in November, the second in January.

On the 5th I wrapped up MIK-7, retitled Knight of My Dreams. Ellora’s Cave has already accepted it. Now, I just have to wait for the editor to edit and to get a date for publication that I can share. Readers will be happy to know that Quentin and Darcy are back together, but of course, they have a new set of problems to contend with. I know, I’m mean that way.

I did some brainstorming with the amazing brain trust at the cottage on a story that has been giving me fits for months. It’s a Medieval fantasy and I have about thirty pages written on it, but I couldn’t get to the center of the story. Now I have a new direction and should be able to pull it out of the toilet.

I started another short story at the cottage and am about halfway through it. I added pages to a historical I’m determined to finish this year. It’s a Medieval and has Normans and Saxons and Vikings, a siege and a battle, and assorted swiving. Gots to have sex, ya know.

So lots accomplished; lots planned. I did some sightseeing with Sasha, my cousin and his partner. So plenty of fodder for new books.

In the next few days, I’m going to dive into research since I’m a little burned on writing. I ordered three books from Amazon on castles and castle-building. Was in Books-A-Million yesterday and bought a huge illustrated volume on mythology and can’t wait to dig into those stories.

Until next week… Sure hope I have progress to report!

You’ve suffered long enough. Following are the names of the winners (selected by a random number generator) of my “Flashback” novels. The winner of All Knight Long…is Jeanette Juan! The winner of Sanctuary is…Brandy!

I’m not the greatest photographer, and some of my subjects are reluctant, but here are a few pics from my time at the lake house. If you are viewing this blog from Facebook, then you will probably have to come to the blog to see the pics: My Blog

This was taken my first night there. I couldnt’ wait to get out on the balcony and see something. I saw more than I hoped and snapped this pic. Isn’t it romantic? What a shame that view was shared with five other travel-tired writers. 😉

The next morning, I took a cup of coffee outside and was blown away with this view. That’s Mount Rainier in the distance.
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It’s past noon here. I stayed up until after three last night, couldn’t sleep, kept going through my gazillion emails to see what all I’d missed and owed. Woke up around 10:30 AM, and about had a heart attack, because I was supposed to go to the 5-year-old’s school to eat lunch with her today. That started at 10:50, and I live a good 45 minutes from her.

So, did I blow it off? Could you? I dressed, washed my face, teeth, brushed my hair and was out the door in three minutes. Then I flew like a bat out of hell. Got there ten minutes late, and broke a dozen laws to do it, but it was all worth it.

Now I’m back home and going through my pictures. Wanted to post something quick just to get it up and thought I’d share this.

As always, there’s a story that goes along with this. This was our first day at the lake house. Only Sasha and I were excited about the water. The rest thought it was too cold, but Sasha’s from Canada, and I’m just a plain ole crazy water baby. We took out the paddle boat, although neither of us had ever been in one. We laughed our asses off just dragging it into the water and trying to board. But we made it in and started pedalling.

What we didn’t know, that the girls hanging off the balcony knew, was that there were two fishermen in a motor boat watching us. We started pedalling, but couldn’t figure out how to steer, so we were going in circles and laughing like crazy. One guy elbowed the other and pointed at us, and they started laughing. When I finally figured out there was this little lever I could push forward and back to steer with, we didn’t care so much that I couldn’t seem to steer in a straight line, so we kept making circles until our stomachs hurt.

After that day, the ladies always headed to the balcony whenever we started walking toward the beach.

I promise I have some very nice pictures of the lake and the ladies to share, but I haven’t downloaded them yet to my PC, so I’m sharing something Sasha sent me from our first night there. If you don’t recognize it, that’s the moon, looking very like a space ship. And if you look down and to the right, you’ll see a little green orb. Now, if you remember my blog from a really long time ago when I went on a ghost-hunting expedition, that’s a ghost “orb”—only swear to god, I’ve only seen them white. I’m thinking…moon-ship…that has to be an alien’s ghost!

I’ll be back tomorrow, and I promise I’ll have those winners announcements and more pics!

I’ll be in catchup mode for a couple of days. I arrived home around 9 PM CST last night. Only took me an hour to get from the airport (it’s easily an hour and a half drive)—didn’t know I’d flown. Guess I was eager.

I have tons of email and laundry to do. I want to be able to get back to work quickly because I still have Lora Leigh’s RAW to get ready for at the end of this month. September cannot be all about fun.

I’ll do a recap of everything I accomplished, saw, learned in the coming days. For now, I’m unwinding.

Oh! And tomorrow I’ll announce the winners for the Flashback books. Thanks to everyone who checked in here while I was gone. I did get access to read the comments and appreciated it very much.

To my retreat buddies—beware! Pictures are coming! 😈

Anything else? Yeah, the pool is calling me. We missed each other very much. Until tomorrow!

While The Cat’s Away Countdown – Last Day…

Okay, now the song’s in your head. Bwahaha! 😈

Sometime later today, I’ll be back online and pouring through a gazillion emails. If I was lucky while I was away, I got a chance to check in a time or two. Otherwise, it will take a couple of days for me to climb out from under the mountain of messages and laundry.

As soon as I can I’ll announce the winners of the books I offered. I’ll post pictures of my cottage-mates and talk about our wild old time—or at least as much as they will let me without having to plead the 5th. Can’t wait to hear who you’ve been doing, too! Later! ~DD

While The Cat’s Away Countdown – Day 6…

September’s Moon is the Harvest Moon. According to The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Wicca and Witchcraft, it’s “a time of protection, prosperity and abundance.”

There’s energy in this month. It’s time to harvest grain—which translated means September’s a time of prosperity. Winter’s beckoning, but for now you can celebrate.

I’ll be thinking of you. And missing my daily blog. Maybe. Depends on how well the ladies and I get along. Six days of togetherness? Don’t they say that three days is the rule—after which company and socks begin to stink? I know I mucked that one up, but you get my drift. Can’t wait to share pictures!

While The Cat’s Away Countdown – Day 8…

If you’ve been following my blog, you know that I’m presently sitting in a cottage somewhere near Seattle with five other multi-pubbed authors, hard at work. Since we were told the lakehouse doesn’t have Internet connection, I preposted blog entries to keep you all entertained while I’m gone. And to keep you coming back, I’m offering chances to win some of the books I’ll be featuring here. So, be sure to stop and read, then don’t forget to post a comment to enter!

Tomorrow’s posting will include a chance to win All Knight Long, which originally released in March 2004. What you may not know is that I used to keep a page on my old website for every book, called “The Story Behind the Book”.

Here’s what I wrote back in November 2004 when Joe and Lily’s story first came out!

I love old B-horror movies.

Honestly, the cheesier the better! And I’m not talking about slasher movies. Give me a vampire lurking behind the curtains, or an alien pod-person chasing a woman with his stiff-legged gait. I’ll never ask why she can’t outrun him—because I know she subconsciously wants to be captured!

Growing up, I rushed home from school each day to see the latest episode of the horror-soap Dark Shadows because Barnabas Collins gave me the shivers. “The Blob” was my favorite movie—I watched it so many times I could quote the dialogue. If Peter Cushing or Vincent Price were in the cast, I was glued to the tube. Those were seriously creepy dudes!

I considered myself a vampire and werewolf expert. By the time I was eight, I could tell you every way you could kill a vamp or become one. Before I ever understood what sensuality and desire were, I thought vampires were the perfect boyfriends—attentive, snappy dressers, and they could disappear from your bedroom in a whirl of mist if your mom poked her head inside your room at night.

I also had a favorite fantasy. I knew I wanted to meet a dark, dangerous vampire, be tied between two stakes, and forced by him to become his girlfriend. My fantasy always ended with his teeth piercing my neck because my little imagination thought the excitement ended there!

Of course, my fantasies changed as I grew older—the details about what happened after the bite grew more important. I worried about rug burns on werewolves’ haunches, how a teenage vampire might shower off the blood and be in bed before his parents discovered him missing for the night.

I also watched King Kong again and again. There was something intensely thrilling about that large, hairy male ape and his one-track obsession with Fay Ray. When she was draped over his large, dark palm in her negligee, she didn’t look like terror was the only emotion she was feeling.

Now I’m an adult—perhaps a little arrested in the maturity department—and a writer. Since I never outgrew daydreaming about monsters who stalked unawakened virgins through dark, deserted forests—I’m free now to revel in my imagination. Daydreaming is now a profitable activity!

When I sit at the dinner table, I may wear a little smile because Joe Garcia’s search for his humanity led him some interesting places. I let the poor guy indulge in all his manly-monstery impulses. And the best part is, I can keep “living” in my alternate reality as long as I don’t end the series!