UPDATE: The winner is…Dana Zamora!
*~*~*

Y’all said you wanted more puzzles, so…

I’ll be out of pocket today. I have a doctor’s appointment in Little Rock and will be away from my desk. I posted this early, so you’d have something to play with while I’m gone. Hope you enjoy it!

For a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card, solve the puzzle, then tell me what he’s hunting. I always enjoy what you come up with!  

UPDATE: The winner is…ButtonsMom!
*~*~*

No excitement around here. We’re awaiting a part for the pool to see if it will fix our filter problem. Then we have to go back into wait mode while the pool clears to a sparkling blue. The summer will be half over before I get to do my daily swims! In the meantime, the only excitement we’ve had is the news that a dollar store is going out of business. With 75% off sales, my daughter is going into hoarding mode, buying up enough shampoo, deodorant, and pet food and treats, to keep us going for a year or two—no exaggeration. She heard rumors of a 90% off sale coming next Monday, so you know she’ll be scraping what’s left off the shelves to bring home. She’s also said she plans to be parked in front of the store when the doors open. They have AC. Good for her! She does love a good sale, and the 10-year-old has the fever, too. She came away with an astonishing amount of Squishmallows  and hair products.

But back to the contest…

As a way to solve my book-hoarding problem and make room in my bookshelves, I’m continuing my Clear My Bookshelf Giveaway! I have a ton of my books, collected over my 20 years of publishing. So, rather than consign them to the burn barrel I thought maybe a bunch of giveaways would be fun. As the first couple of giveaways seemed to garner a lot of interest, I’m happy to offer more opportunities for readers to win a signed copy of one of my old books! Check to see who the last winner was! It may have been you!

So, for a chance to win a randomly chosen by me (I might say, do you want a western, an erotic novel, or a paranormal?) book, which I will of course sign and fill with a bookmark and a postcard, painted by me, tell me whether you love to shop a good sale!

The last story in the Delta Heat series is out—Mondo’s story! And it’s FREE in Kindle Unlimited! Follow the link to read the opening of the book. Be warned! This story has erotic content! Very erotic content. A sex-fest, truthfully! Enjoy!

Order your copy now! | Read an excerpt!

Mondo Acevedo is a legendary Dom and Master at the La Forge club. He’s helped his Memphis PD friends navigate the BDSM world and find the women of their dreams. Now, the vice cop and Dom is the last single man standing. But Mondo’s waiting for the right woman, one strong enough to match his dark passions, and he’s sure a timid grade school teacher definitely won’t make the shortlist.

Sunny Boudreau is content with her somewhat vanilla life, But when a trio of lovers moves in next door, she’s drawn to them and their group of friends, especially a certain tall, dark, and dangerous Dom.

Mondo tries to warn Sonny off, but her first taste of the club only whets her appetite and ignites her desire to prove she’s exactly the woman Mondo needs.

Product Warnings: Contains scenes with m/f/m f/f/m, and an orgy of pleasure among friends.

Note: This book was previously published.

UPDATE: The winner is…Pansy Petal!
*~*~*

Cue “End of the Road” by Boyz II Men to play in the background.

Besides writing romance, I am an avid reader. I try to read a book every two days.

Now, before you credit me with being a speed reader, I will admit that my husband and our bossy mastiff fall asleep early, so I have about three hours to read. I usually pick out a book and start after dinner with interruptions, and after the males are quiet, I can get my reading groove on.

Eighteen months ago, I decided to clean out my Kindle. I had books from 2012 that I had never read. So, I made a deal with myself:  read one old and then two new (published in 2023 or later) to make a dent in the TBR list.

For years, I finished the book no matter what. After I started publishing, I felt like I had to hang in and finish a book as a sign of commitment to the writing community.

However, life is too short for bad books.

I felt guilty for not finishing. I’d message my friends and defend my decision not to finish as if the “Kindle Police” were going to report me for having DNFs (Do Not Finish).

Then, I started to notice more people talking about not finishing books. What once had been a somewhat taboo topic was discussed openly.

I have reasons for not finishing. The first is if I find five proofreading/editing mistakes within the first three chapters. Authors are taught that the first three should grab the reader’s attention. So, misspellings, incorrect word usage, or poor grammar causes me to stop.

Recently, I’ve come across three published books where I believe the authors forgot to tap “Accept Changes” before uploading the manuscript and pressing “Publish.” These were not intentional cross-outs—no, they were unnecessary extra words. Again—DNF.

This is a hard rule for me—if the pet dies. I won’t finish and most likely won’t read anything else by the author. True story:  I almost dumped a friendship because she sent me a book where at the end, the dog died. I still feel upset about the poisoned pet, and I never read another book by that author.

Excluding Dark Romance, another stopper for me is when a main character is written to be so ugly and hateful that I can’t believe that they are worthy of love. There are times that I think that authors intend to create a strong, outspoken character and instead, they read as a total jerk. I try to keep toxic people out of my life, so I’m not letting them in my reading.

Filler. I accept that some stories are shorter than others. What makes me quit a book is when the author stretches out the tale with multiple-page passages in another language, recounts a prior scene two or three times, and repeats the same reasons for why the couple won’t work. I have a running joke with a friend about a series that we both love. In each book, the couple has officially committed and marching to their HEA. The author adds a final kidnapping, an explosion, or a car chase. Those events don’t add anything else to the story except an action scene and another deep kiss. If I discovered the series today, I might be annoyed by the “one more” to consider DNF-ing.

That brings me to the most difficult to explain—I didn’t connect with it. There are times that I just don’t like the book. It could be that I had figured out who committed the crime too early. A character is too stupid to survive in the real world. I will admit that as my years increase, I find myself getting irritated by characters in their early twenties who run crime syndicates, are running billion-dollar, large corporations, or find the answer to a problem that people have been working on for years.

The great thing about reading is that there is always another book to read. With the explosion of Monster Romance and Alien Romance shorts, I can devour two a night, and that makes me feel accomplished.

Now, I’m curious- What causes you to DNF? A Winner will be chosen at random to win a $10 Amazon Gift Card.

About the Author

Melanie/M. Jayne is the teller of tales of the Novus Pack and an Amazon Bestselling Author. See Me was a finalist for the Holt Medallion. In 2022, the Duchenne Vampire Series enriched her portfolio. She loves reading, luxury handbags, watching sports, and the Bravo Housewives. Learn more at www.readmelaniejayne.com.

Last week…

• I worked on two editing jobs for other authors; I finished one.
• I finished revising, formatting, and uploading Once is Never Enough (the last story in the Delta Heat series),which releases Tuesday, June 11th.
• I uploaded the stories in the follow-on series, Delta Fire, including finding art and uploading the pre-order for the last book in the series, which has not previously been published, Ignition. Amazon’s KDP has been a PITA so far as loading books 2 & 3 of the series. I’m getting worried they won’t get their act together in time for the planned releases in July-September. We’ll see.
• I didn’t write a word of the next MBH release, Cyrus, which is scheduled to release June 25th. I have so much on my plate to do with my side gig (editing), the revisions of the Delta Fire stories, and the editing of the stories for the Secret Identities anthology, that I need to push out that publication date. I really don’t want the added stress right now. Yes, I do have limits!
• I created the Secret Identities webpage on the Collections site! Go take a look!
• The biggest bummer of the week is that our pool isn’t “swimmable” for now. We were having fits, dumping tons of chemicals and never getting the water perfectly crystal clear, so we decided to replace the sand. When my SIL replaced it and put the filter back together, it leaked. We’re waiting on seals and a collar for the filter, which won’t arrive until Wednesday. I’m crossing my fingers that’s the problem. Otherwise, I’ll be paying a ton of money to have a pool place come out to the boonies to repair the thing. Ugh! All I want to do is swim!

This next week…

• I’ll celebrate the release of the last of the refurbed/recovered Delta Heat series!
• I will work on three editing projects for other authors, finishing two, I hope!
• I’ll be editing stories in the Secret Identities anthology. Plus, I’ll work with the authors to organize a promo schedule.
• I’ll put out a call to authors who might want to blog on this website, July through September.
• I’ll continue wrangling with KDP to get my pre-orders up for the Delta Fire series.
• I’m going to have to re-order my publication schedule, moving the release date of Cyrus because I have to find time to finish the book in my stacked schedule.
• I have a doctor’s appointment at the VA in Little Rock. I’ll be taking the family with me for a chance to catch a meal and do some shopping in the “big city.”
• I will resume creating small art daily for #The100DayProject. I fell behind finishing up the last pieces, but I will get to 100!
• The pool situation will be settled this week!!!!!

That sounds like enough, right? Does it seem like my little report card lists are getting longer and longer? 

Open Contests

1. Clear My Bookshelf Giveaway (Contest) — This ends on Tuesday! Win a FREE signed book (with hand painted—by me—bookmark and postcard!)!
2. May into June (Contest) — Last day to enter! Win an Amazon gift card!
3. Saturday Puzzle-Contest: An Imaginary Friend — Last day to enter! Win an Amazon gift card!
4. Cover Reveal & Contest! — Last day to enter! Win an Amazon gift card!
5. Word Search: Inside SECRET IDENTITIES (Contest) — Win an Amazon gift card!
6. Gabbi Grey: Are we allowed to have favorites? (Contest) — Win an Amazon gift card!
7. Story Cubes — Tell me a story (Contest) — Win an Amazon gift card!
8. Saturday Puzzle Contest: On this day…Ghostbusters released! — Win an Amazon gift card!

UPDATE: The winner is…Anne Marie Flamini!
*~*~*

Okay, so you’re probably thinking my topic is kind of weird, but hear me out.

Coming up with topics on a daily basis isn’t always easy. Yes, I can talk about books, but doing that every day…? Boring. I have guests, so that changes things up. When I’m reaching for a topic, I love to check the calendar for weird holidays because I love an excuse to celebrate. Today’s holiday was VCR Day, and I thought about it, but got nothin’. So, I moved on. Then I thought about the History Channel’s website. Every day, they have a “This Day in History” post, so I headed on over to steal some ideas.

Some of today’s offerings were…

• Muhammed died (632)
• Robert F. Kennedy was buried (1968)
• Apache chief Cochise died (1874)

Those are sacred dates, so I know better than to have fun with them. Then another one popped up.

• Ghostbusters released (1984)

I remember when the movie came out. I think I was pregnant/giving birth at the time, so I didn’t see it in the theaters, but back in the day, we had HBO and a new-fangled way of watching movies we wanted, whenever we wanted, called a VCR (see how I worked that holiday into here?!). Ghostbusters was one of the recordings we made so we could enjoy it whenever we wanted. When my family went with me to Germany for my second tour there, all those taped movies we’d made were sooooo important! Remember, that was before streaming, and sometimes, we only had one channel, AFN (Armed Forces Network) to watch. The library on post had a ton of classic movies (most in B&W) to check out, and I attribute my love of classic movies to that period. However, it was our library of movies recorded off of HBO that saved our sanity. There were many, many kids’ movies among them…

Anyway, Ghostbusters it is, and I did manage to find an image I could use without getting into trouble with a copyright, so enjoy the puzzle!

For a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card, solve the puzzle, then tell me what classic movies you might have seeing made into a puzzle.

UDPATE: The winner is…Debra Guyette!
*~*~*

Oh! We haven’t played this game since February!

I bought this little brainstorming tool years ago at some writers’ conference. “Story Cubes” is a brainstorming game. You roll the dice, and whatever pictures appear face-up are the ones you use to riff off a story. You can try to include all the cubes in your “story” or choose a few.

To make this fun, I’ll offer a prize—a $5 Amazon gift card—good for purchasing one or two stories…
Have fun with this! Don’t overthink! Here’s the roll…