I was very excited to find all three of the MARKED books available for pre-order already… in Canada. *g* It’s very early, but I don’t mind. In fact, I’m thrilled!

I wish I had something fun and interesting to share, but alas, I don’t.

I’m writing and doing work stuff, hustling my kids to and fro, and thinking about the rapidly approaching holidays.

For those of you who have a veteran or active duty military person in your household, you might be interested in Knott’s Berry Farm’s annual salute to veterans. My family goes every year and we have a blast. Plus, they always have the holiday craft fair up and running, which is a great way to get some Christmas shopping done at the same time!

Can you believe it’s the second week in October already? Jeez. Time flies faster every year, I swear.

HEAT OF THE NIGHT galleys go back today and then I’m done with the book. The next time I see it will be when it hits the shelves on January 2. Yay!

I started writing new material in MARKED 1 this weekend, even though I said I wouldn’t. Thing is, instead of forcing myself to work through the weekend, this time the problem was that I couldn’t force myself not to. I’m just too excited about it.

Since it’s been so long since I originally conceived the concept, I’ve spent the last year thinking, planning, plotting, etc. I had all these ideas of what it should/would be. (Plus, I had a couple ‘friends’ who said things that made me doubt myself and my direction.) But… awesome thing is, when I sat down with it again and started writing, the story took on a life of its own again. It will be what it will be, and I’m having so much fun with it! It’s the most difficult thing I’ve written, but also the easiest. I guess because I love Evangeline and her story, and at the end of the day, that’s the most important thing — that I wrote a story I loved and then shared it with readers.

I spent a lot of the weekend doing technical stuff with my sites, which I love doing. This week it’s all about tearing myself away from writing to clean my house. Writing is way more fun than cleaning, I must say.

Happy Monday!

I’m starting to feel a little better, but not by much I’m afraid. I’m still living on soup, water, and bread.

Some good news: I spent the last couple of days editing the first part of MARKED 1, since I didn’t feel up to writing new material. Even though it’s been over a year since I wrote the partial, I still love it. Such a good feeling!

This weekend I’m sticking to my plan of not writing, even though my brain is full of ideas. *g* I’ve got HEAT OF THE NIGHT galleys here, so I’ll work on those instead. And rest. Hopefully by Monday I’ll be ready to write.

I have the stomach flu. Starting feeling yucky yesterday afternoon and by 3 AM, I was sick as a dog. Mercifully, my mom was here visiting and she made a run to Rite-Aid. Can I just say that my mom ROCKS? I seriously thought I was going to DIE and she saved my life. (Hubby slept right through my torment, but mom heard me pacing and came to my rescue.) I’m still feeling absolutely awful, but *fingers crossed* I get over it soon.

I came home sick from Kentucky, the result of too many days of only a few hours sleep a night. I was getting up at 5-6AM every morning (which was 3 hours earlier for me on PST) to write with my dear friend Shelley Bradley, and by the end of the trip I had a sore throat and sinus trouble.

My kids have half days at school most of this week, so I haven’t been able to catch up on my rest. I’m looking forward to the weekend and hopefully sleeping a lot. If you’ve emailed me recently, forgive the delay in my replies.

In the meantime, here’s a fun pic from RAW (I do promise to tell you all about it soon!!). I’m not so keen on how the pic makes me look HUGE. *g* Do note the lovely necklace I’m wearing. It was handmade for me by a fan, Diane Smith. She says it was inspired by my books. I can’t tell you how touched I am that something I wrote could inspire such a beautiful piece of jewelry. It’s a three-strand necklace featuring stones of various shades of purple (my favorite color) and pearls.

(from l to r: Naughty Nikki, J.R. Ward, me, and Shelley Bradley) Click on image to see larger size.