Progress for Texas Men

After dealing with ten days of house guests, life’s starting to settle down around the old homestead, which means I have time to attack the huge stack of work that’s been growing babies in my inbasket.

I have over 4000 emails in my inbox to contend with—so if you’ve written me recently, I’m getting to you, I promise! I have a work in progress that’s getting whittled down, page by page, but now I really need to dive headfirst and “get ‘er done” (don’t you just hate that phrase!).

Like I needed to take time away from the keyboard, but today I went to a local writer’s meeting. Okay, I live in a small town, so I wasn’t expecting writers who are balls of fire, but I knew I was in trouble when every one of them were poets. I don’t write the stuff. I appreciate some classics (Shakespeare’s sonnets, Tennyson, Wordsworth, Browning), but I haven’t a lot of patience with the form because frankly, I want to tell a bigger story.

But I wanted to connect with local writers. So I went. I didn’t know I’d be expected to vomit a poem. The challenge was to write a poem with 2 syllables in the first line, 4 in the next, 6, then 8. Here it is, and now you’ll know why I never aspired to be a bloody goddamn poet.

You’d think that would have been more torture than a body could stand, but I promised to come back next month. I even accepted an assignment to come up with another poem. Now, poems are flying through my mind, but nothing I can bring to that group because they’re all kinky as hell.

I complain, but I really enjoyed visiting with the little group, although I should have known I wouldn’t find any other erotica writers when I realized we were meeting in a rest home. :ohh:

I’m talking about cowboys on the Aphrodisia blog today, so come and keep me company!

Also, I loved the comments you left regarding my latest little poll (see entry below). Didn’t think about adding Kyle Schmidt to the list because I was looking for blond men, but add a few highlights to his hair, and I think he’d be great!

I have a winner from my latest little contest. I think I’ll bundle up some more gifts from my RT stash and send them to…Jolene! So girlfriend, send me an email so we can settle on your choice of books. Email Delilah

I’ll be playing “list mom” at EC’s chat loop all day today. If you’d like to come hang out, my fellow moms (Myla Jackson and Shayla Kersten) and I will be posting sexy excerpts from your favorite EC authors, running scavenger hunts for prizes and hosting one live chat!

If all you can manage is the live chat, plan to be at your PC around 11 AM CST. I think I’ll be sneaking in to steal the Fallen Angel’s chat room, but if I have to change locations, send me a message for the URL.

In the meantime, place your vote for your favorite actor to play Quentin, the handsome blond vamp from the My Immortal Knight series. Enter a vote, post a comment, and you’re entered to win a PRIZE. I haven’t decided what to give away yet, but you can tell me what you want in your post!

19 votes total

Brad Pitt (37%, 7 Votes)
Daniel Craig (26%, 5 Votes)
Leo DiCaprio (21%, 4 Votes)
Cillian Murphy (11%, 2 Votes)
James Spader (5%, 1 Votes)

Not the sexy post you expected from the title, huh? (I have dibs on that title BTW!!)

And it took me two days to post the pics, so sue me! I’m entitled to be grumpy today—it’s my birthday, and don’t bother asking how many candles will be on my cake (let’s just divide a century into two parts and assume the first half has some meaning to me!!!).

On a happier note, I have pictures I took of a recent excursion on Lake Hamilton with some writer friends of mine. Here’s Captain Cyndi, who invited us to stay at her house which sits at the edge of the lake.

Can you tell if Shayla’s having fun yet? She’s as grumpy as I am about having my picture taken.

“The Shade” was dutifully taking notes as we careened around the lake.

Lake Hamilton is in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Probably the greatest concentration of wealth in our poor state lies at its edges. The houses are amazing. This is the one I want to buy when one of my books gets picked up by Playgirl and is made into a series of naughty movies, all artfully done, that cross over to mainstream DVD buyers as the “smut you must have!”

Since I was the one carrying the camera, I have the power of THE CROP! Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me…

The first story in my new Shadowlands series is out!

“Highly recommended” from RRTErotic: “…A turbulent relationship and sexy, spooky thrills await readers in SIN’S GIFT…This is a well written and engrossing tale with complex characters who have hidden depths. Enter into other realms with the highly recommended SIN’S GIFT.”

5 Hearts from The Romance Studio: “…Wow, I loved this novella. It’s fabulously exciting and a fast, exhilarating read…I love Delilah Devlin’s books and this is one of her best yet.”

Current progress for Texas Men

As you can see from my progress bar, it’s been slow-going since I started. I think I have that licked. The first chapter gave me fits because it had to be pacey, had to be funny and descriptive, and I had to cut some stuff I wanted to add because I thought it was so cool, but it didn’t really help. Stop. Start. Stop. Back at it now!

Starting this weekend, I’ll be participating in a Book-in-a-Week challenge that will hopefully kick my ass into high gear. Then I’m housesitting for someone later in July. I’ll be away from my telephone so no one will be able to reach me. AND I don’t plan to use her Internet connection more than once a day. I may take my AlphaSmart and type like my hair’s on fire. I have to finish this book and a novella by the end of August, so I can’t dick around!

Tomorrow I’ll post pictures of me and some of my writer buddies flying around Lake Hamilton on a pontoon boat. It’s nice hanging with writers, dreaming up new things to write about.

Hope you’ve had a chance to get your copy of Sin’s Gift. If you buy it, let me know if you’d like me to write more in that series. I’m inclined to do so, but would like to hear your desires!

It seems like it’s been forever, but Sin’s Gift, the first in my new Shadowlands series, is finally releasing today!

Here’s a sexy excerpt to whet your appetites! Please remember this is unedited!

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Note for Readers: You must be of legal age in your country of origin to read this excerpt.