Let's Kick off Summer!

Welcome to Summer!

CAPE CURSED FREE JUNE 9, 10 & 11

I don't know about you, but this is my favorite time of the year.  I love waking up to birds singing and it remaining light outside until nearly bedtime.  Another thing I love about summer is reading.  I've found some great books over the years during this time of year.  Outlander, one the books I read during the summer years ago, will soon be a mini-series.

There's nothing better than sitting under a shady tree or sitting in a beach chair with the rhythm of the surf to keep you company while you enjoy a great book.  

In celebration of summer, my novel Cape Cursed is FREE from June 9-11 in the Kindle store.  It is set at the beach and is filled with hot romance and chilling suspense.

Download it now before it is no longer free, then sit back, relax, and be transported to the beach as you read Cape Cursed.  Click here to begin your download.

Cape Cursed Makes Landfall-The Name Game

Welcome back on this last day of the Cape Cursed book launch!

Bliss Sherman is the female lead of Cape Cursed and Parker Swain is her male counterpart.  When I write a book, I take great care and have a lot of fun naming my characters.  One of my other novels, A Shepherd’s Song, is an allegory and all the main characters’ names have a tie-in.  I’m offering a $10 gift certificate to the OBX store to the first person who comments on this blog and can correctly tell me the significance of the characters’ names in that novel.

I came up with the name Bliss Sherman for the female protagonist in Cape Cursed because I wanted a first name that would imply beauty and happiness, and for the last name, I gave her Sherman.  I’m not from the South, but I know that the name Sherman still riles the blood there.  I wanted Sherman to denote how Bliss was coming to this beach and turning everyone’s life upside down much like the Civil War’s General Sherman did. 

I love how Southerners like to use surnames for first names.  I thought the name Parker for the male protagonist would imply something being stationery and reflect Parker’s view that the lighthouse should not be relocated.  It also reflects how Parker and his family have been fixtures on the cape for decades.  Swain is an old-fashioned word for a male suitor.  I thought would make a great last name for a romantic lead.

If you had to come up with the name for a character in a romance novel, what would it be?  I will send a bookmark to all who leave a response. 

Don’t forget to enter the raffle and tell your friends too.

Thanks for dropping by.

Janice

It's Finally Here! Cape Cursed Makes Landfall Today!

The watches have come down and the warnings have gone out!  Red flags snap in the wind as the black storm clouds gather and roll ashore.  The roaring surf pounds the beach, as the rain, like silver darts, pelts your face.  The blowing sand stings your legs while the wind shrieks in your ears so loudly no one could hear you if you screamed. 

Prepare yourself now because Cape Cursed is making landfall, and you have no means for escaping this Category 5 of a romantic suspense novel.   Cape Cursed, my new novel, barrels in packing a surge of suspense that knocks you off your feet and a blistering romance that sweeps you up and carries you away.  Cape Cursed is now available in paperback from Amazon and digitally in the Kindle and Nook Stores and at Smashwords.

Here’s a bit about the novel:

Inspired by the actual relocation of the Cape Hatteras lighthouse in 1999, Cape Cursed is set on the fictitious Outer Banks location of Cape Destiny, North Carolina.  Bliss Sherman comes to the cape determined to make a name for herself and her new firm by accomplishing an incredible engineering feat—moving the Cape Destiny Lighthouse inland before it's swallowed by the Atlantic Ocean. 

Cape Hatteras relocation from the National Park Service.

Bliss, who has struggled with dyslexia, discrimination, and betrayal by her ex-husband and former business partner, Jonathan, faces her greatest challenge when she falls in love with the handsome, mysterious descendant of the lighthouse keepers, Parker Swain, who vehemently opposes moving the lighthouse.

When Bliss is viciously attacked, she begins to wonder if the curse that is rumored to be attached to the lighthouse may be true.  Who is sabotaging the move?  Who is trying to ruin her?  Who wants to kill her?  When all clues point to Parker, she dismisses her suspicions, deciding to trust him and her heart, but as the evidence mounts against Parker, she begins to doubt not only herself and her heart, but Parker. 

Can she trust her judgment?  Can she trust Parker?  Most importantly, when she is trapped inside the lighthouse with him during a hurricane, can she trust Parker with her life? 

I chose September 1 to release the books because that date is the peak of hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean, and I hope Cape Cursed will be the peak of your reading season. 

This book, for those of you who have read my other novels, (by the way, thank you!)—St. Anne’s Day and A Shepherd’s Song—is a bit different.  Unlike St. Anne’s Day, which was a romantic comedy, and A Shepherd’s Song, which was a heartwarming Christmas story, Cape Cursed is a romantic suspense in the style of Mary Higgins Clark. 

Since Cape Cursed is set on the Outer Banks of North Carolina and I’m so fond of that stretch of beach, I’m raffling a $25 gift certificate to the OBX store to celebrate the book’s release.  This online store has everything from jewelry and T-shirts to stunning beach photographs and books.  The raffle concludes at midnight on September 3.  So don’t forget to enter.

Outer Banks-Photo by S. C. Miller 

As usual, if you’ve read Cape Cursed or any of my books, please post a review wherever you purchased the book and on Goodreads if you are a member.  The more reviews, the more these sites suggest the book to people browsing for a new read. 

Also, if you like my books, please spread the word to your reading friends and family.  I truly appreciate it.  I love hearing your reactions to the stories, and I also love meeting you.  I have a few events scheduled for the fall.  If you are interested in having me come to your book club, library, ladies group, etc., please email me.  There is no fee and we always have a good time!

Enjoy your Labor Day weekend & Enjoy Cape Cursed! 

Tag--I'm It!

Thanks, Lily Silver, for tagging me for The Next Big Thing Blog Hop.  Lily has a new book The Rock Star Next Door .  It is a modern fairy tale, and who doesn't need a good fairy tale?

The Next Big Thing originated on the She Writes site, as far as we could work out, and is designed to raise awareness of our work, or work in progress. We do that by answering ten questions about it. We graciously thank the person who nominated us, and tag five other authors whose work could well be that NEXT BIG THING.

Lily's book was featured in the Thanks for Great Book Blog Hop & Fall Book Release event that just concluded.  Click here to read more about it.

Now, it's my turn to answer the questions and tag five more writers.  So far, I've struck out on tagging anyone.  If you are interested, please contact me.  It's really not hard and a great way to spread the word about your NEXT BIG THING.

My latest novel, A Shepherd's Song, also debuted during the Thanks for Great Book Blog Hop, but since we are talking about the NEXT BIG THING, I'm going to preview the next book that will come out.

What is the title of your next book?

The title of my next book, which will come out in late spring, is CAPE CURSED. 

I just love the cover my designer created.  

Where did the idea come from for the book?

For more than 20 years, my family has vacationed on the Outer Banks of North Carolina.  Some years ago, the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse was moved inland--a major engineering feat--to save it from the encroaching Atlantic Ocean.  I wondered what would happen if a  Yankee girl's company came to the Outer Banks to move a beloved lighthouse?  Thus CAPE CURSED was born.

What genre does your book fall under?

CAPE CURSED is a romantic suspense.  

 Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Bliss Sherman is the heroine and she is half Korean.  No Asian/American actresses came to mind so I googled some.  Sonia Couling best exemplifies the beautiful woman I see in my mind when I think of Bliss.  

Parker Swain is the handsome descendant of the lighthouse keepers.  He's blond, soft-spoken and a Southern gentleman.  Tim McGraw would be a good one or Matthew MConaughey.  

Nancy Klempner is Bliss's faithful assistant.  She's an athletic, blonde, older woman.  If we could frump up Nicollette Sheridan, she'd be perfect.


What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

When beautiful Bliss Sherman arrives at Cape Destiny to move the cape's beloved lighthouse, she faces an even greater challenge when she falls in love with the handsome, mysterious descendant of the lighthouse keepers, Parker Swain, who is vehemently opposed to her moving the lighthouse and who may be trying to kill her.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? 

I'm a control freak.  I like self-publishing.

 How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

In all honesty, I' don't know. I've lost track.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? 

I'd say it compares to the seaside moodiness of du Maurier's classic Rebecca.  

 Who or What inspired you to write this book?

Strangely, one of the former secretaries where my husband's worked inspired me.  She was  very possessive of the company, even though she had no vested stake in the organization, other than being a regular employee.  Nancy is Bliss's assistant and is devoted to the company much as my husband's co-worker was.  

What else about your book might pique the reader interest?

The Outer Banks is a very romantic as well as treacherous place.  It is called the Graveyard of the Atlantic.  I wanted to capture the romance and danger of that stretch of coastline. 

Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to contact me if you'd like to be THE NEXT BIG THING.    

The Worst of Times

No vacation goes unpunished. ~Karl Hakkarainen

It’s vacation season, a time most of us look toward with longing.  As much as I like vacation, I must admit that at times they can be like a Dickens’ novel:  the best of times, the worst of times.  

Greetings from the Griswolds!

I’ve had my share of bad vacation experiences.  The earliest dud I remember occurred when I was about nine.  We were camping at Shawnee State Park near Bedford, when I sat up suddenly in the middle of the night in the tent and promptly vomited on my seven-year-old brother.  Not surprisingly, he began to cry.  While my mother fumbled in the dark with a lantern to clean up the messy sleeping bags and find him clean clothes, he got sick too.  All that I remember is lying on a picnic table the next morning with my brother.  He was clad in my mother’s stretch pants that came up to his arm pits because he had no unsoiled clothes left while my dad and mom took down the tent.  On the ride home, we had to take turns lying down in the station wagon and vomiting into a bucket—that’s a Kodak moment I’d like to forget. 

The summer I was first married, we went to the Outer Banks with my family.  I was having a great time until Tuesday when I began to feel a bit creepy.  When I spiked a high fever later that evening, we headed for the doctor's.  We had to drive to secluded Collington Island—think setting for the Swamp People show.  After navigating through abandoned cars and Spanish moss, we found the doctor who diagnosed strep throat. I spent the rest of the week on the couch while everyone enjoyed the glorious beach weather. My only source of entertainment was the Democratic National Convention, which was on all three of the channels we received on the portable TV in the cottage.  Fun times, that was. 

Swamp People

The following April my husband and I thought it would be fun to take Amtrak to Washington, D.C., for the Cherry Blossom Festival.  Traveling by train conjured up romantic images of The Orient Express, but that was quickly dispelled  A trip that takes five hours by car took nine by train.  But the scenery must have been gorgeous, one would think.  Unfortunately, no.  Train tracks do not run in the most scenic areas of towns.  We got a nine-hour tour of every slum and depressed town between Pittsburgh and D.C. 

Amtrak???

 It rained the whole time we were there, knocking off all the cherry blossoms.  I had purchased new jeans for the trip, and because we were so wet, the dye bled and stained my legs. To top off my tour of the nation’s capitol as a Smurf, I came down with the flu on the way home.  Nothing like sitting for nine hours on a train with fever and chills and returning to a lovely Pittsburgh greeting of a late-April snow storm. Of course, we had no coats.  

I was a surly Smurf!

Vacation accommodations are always a gamble.  The year my mom booked a cottage for us right on the lake in Sandusky, Ohio, when we went to Cedar Point sounded ideal on paper.  Yes, we were right on the lake--next to a drawbridge that went up and down all night with clanging and boats tooting horns.  It reminded me of that scene in Annie Hall where Woody Allen’s character as a child lived under the Coney Island roller coaster. 

Alvy Singer as a child in Annie Hall.

Through the years, we’ve had bats in our cottage, skunks under our camper, and have been evacuated twice for impending hurricanes headed for the Outer Banks. 

While those vacation disasters were unpleasant, it’s not every holiday mishap that induces nightmares for years to come.  The pièce de résistance of vacation catastrophes that holds a special place in my family lore, even today, is our fateful trip to Skyline Drive, in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia.  I was probably 10 and, once again, we were in our tent, and to make things really pleasant, it was, you guessed it, raining.  In fact, the days we were there, the area set records for rainfall. 

Raining again!

 During one brief respite from the deluge, we--my parents and my three siblings and I--emerged from our tent to take a walk.  My little sister’s shoes got wet, so as my mom headed back to the tent to get her a different pair, we saw people pointing.  We were heading right toward a black bear.   

My nemesis

Our legs turned into wheels like those of the Road Runner, and you never saw six people run and cram into a station wagon so fast.  Terrified, we kids refused to leave the car.  My dad thought we were nuts, but we wouldn’t let him sleep that night in the tent either.  After an uncomfortable night of six people sleeping in the back of a Ford LTD, we packed up and headed to a safer Pennsylvania campground.  

Feet don't fail me now!

The saying goes A Bad Day of Vacation is Better than a Good Day at Work—I don’t know about that--I’ve never had nightmares from work.   

This originally appeared in the July Issue of Northern Connection magazine.

Take It Easy

Several years ago while on vacation at the Outer Banks of North Carolina, my husband, sons, brother and I decided we would like to try our hands at kayaking. We booked a tour, and on the day of it met our guide, Jimmy, a handsome young man with shoulder-length, wavy brown hair in the parking lot of The Pig Man’s Barbecue. Jimmy emerged from his truck wearing a great big smile, but no shoes. His slow, Southern drawl and genteel demeanor made us all downshift our accelerated pace a bit.

When we booked the tour, I had assumed that we would be plying the placid waters of the marshy Albemarle Sound, but Jimmy informed us that we would be heading about 45 minutes inland to a place called Buffalo City, North Carolina. As we drove, it seemed as if with every passing mile we were heading back further into time as civilization rapidly disappeared. When I saw the “Beware of Bears” sign, I realized this was not going to be simply a new form of canoeing.

Outside of the Wyoming Prairie, I have never been to a more remote place than Buffalo City. Situated in the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge, Buffalo City was once the largest town in Dare County, with 3,000 residents. It existed from the 1870s to the 1950s. From after the Civil War until 1920, it was a logging community, and after that, it became one of the chief producers of moonshine during Prohibition, exporting its contraband to Speakeasies all over the East Coast. After Prohibition ended, the population dwindled and the town was eventually abandoned. Today, you would be hard pressed to find any evidence that the place had ever been inhabited. The only visible sign of life outside of the few kayakers there were the insects that were the size of predator drones and just as fierce.

We doused ourselves in bug spray and listened to Jimmy’s instructions on how to get into the kayak, how to hold the paddle and how to stroke the water. He stressed that you just put the oar in the water and draw it back toward yourself. Simple enough. Before we embarked, Jimmy also dropped this little tidbit: “Oh, by the way, it’s called the Alligator River because there are alligators in the water.”

How comforting to know.

I probably would have been fine had we been on a large body of water, but we were to head down a series of narrow, bayou-type canals, about 12-feet wide, to a lake. I paddled furiously, but I kept going perpendicular and running into the shore. My husband circled back to see if he could help, but I told him I was OK. Finally, when I was so far behind the group, my brother came back and in true brotherly concern said, “Come on doofus, I’ll tow you.”

When we finally got to the lake, Jimmy taught us how to howl and call the red wolves that inhabit the reserve and how to catch dragonflies and put them on the front of your kayak to ward off mosquitoes. Jimmy also taught me something else out on the lake: I was going at kayaking too hard. Instead of gently, lightly stroking the water, I was paddling like I was a galley slave in Spartacus. He told me to take it easy, and when I did, I began to glide across the water with little effort. And in the right direction!

 I’ve discovered that I often do that—I go at things too hard when easy-does-it would work better. Maybe you do that too. Recently, I got a contact lens to help my vision when reading. I had so much trouble removing the lens, I irritated my eye and made it bloodshot for a whole day. Since then, I’ve discovered that I was going at it to hard and a gentle touch is all it takes to remove it. Many of us want to get in shape and start out on restrictive diets, exercising for considerable lengths of time. Fitness experts are always advocating that little changes can yield great results, but that seems too simple to be true.

Saving more money is also a worthy goal that many of us aspire to, but we often attempt to do it by being too Draconian and taking a hatchet to our budget only to fail. I like to track my spending online through my bank. The program it employs lumps all expenses into categories for me. Often when I look at the totals for expenditures like dining out, entertainment or groceries, a little box appears that says something like: Cut 10 percent and save $1,200 a year. Cutting back that small amount seems doable and would bring great rewards.

Many of us have been conditioned to believe that the only way to do something is with a “go-big-or-go-home” attitude, but I’ve learned that Jimmy’s easy-does-it approach is often all that it takes to achieve the best results.

Published in the March 2012 Issue of Northern Connection magazine