KELLIE KAMRYN TALKS ABOUT PLEASURE ISLAND

Today author Kellie Kamryn is a guest.

Kellie Kamryn, Author

Caroline: Readers love to get to know authors. Share anything that lets readers get to know the real you.


Kellie: I grew up in rural Manitoba, Canada. A small town but I spent most of my childhood in a gymnastic gym in the city of Winnipeg, training as a competitive gymnast. I have 5 siblings – 3 sisters and a brother, and I’m the oldest. I’m in the process of divorce and I have four children from my marriage – 2 boys and 2 girls.

Caroline: Four children must keep you busy. Who are your favorite authors and favorite genres?

Kellie: Eloisa James is one of my all-time favorite authors. I love to read historicals, but I also enjoy all other types of romances. I also read a lot of spiritual books and my favorite author is John Shelby Spong. His work just really speaks to me.

Caroline: How many books do you read a month? What are you reading now?

Kellie: I used to read a book every week, but now with my writing contracts it takes me forever to get through a book! LOL I just finished a great YA on my kindle, LEGEND OF THE HERMIT MASTER. I have a huge TBR pile on my Kindle and on my book shelf. I’m not sure what I’ll get to next.
 Caroline: I know what you mean. My Kindle list keeps growing faster than I read. Lovely to have all the books in one light-weight unit, isn’t it? When you’re not writing, what’s your favorite way to relax and recharge?



Kellie: I love to sit out on my deck and look up at the stars after the kids have gone to bed. There’s something peaceful about reminding yourself that you’re a small but important piece of the universe. When you put yourself in that perspective, I find that some of my stress melts away because in the grand scheme of things, none of that matters. At the end of the day, if you’ve tried your best and you’re doing what you love, that’s all that counts.


I love to read, hot baths are relaxing and other than that, I like to spend quiet time (now that’s a relative term with four) with my kids where we just watch a movie together or sit and read together. Bedtime is my favorite part of the day! We sit and read together, it’s quiet and then they go to sleep. Our lives are very busy, so I cherish quiet time with them.

Caroline: Sounds like you’re a good mom. I miss those days when our kids were young and we read together and then tucked them in at night. Describe yourself in three or four words.



Kellie: Sweet, big-hearted, sassy (a lot, lol) and introspective

Caroline: Would you like to share any guilty pleasures that feed your muse?


Kellie: Well, a guilty pleasure that doesn’t have anything to do with my muse is Lindt Chocolate Peanut Butter Balls. The best thing. Ever. That feeds me so I suppose in a way it keeps the muse happy.



Caroline: Mmm, the caramel chocolate are my downfall. How long have you been writing?

Kellie: I’ve kept journals and wrote poetry all of my life. I had a goal to write a romance novel so I did. That first one was awful! LOL I’ve been writing seriously for about 4-5 years now to be published. I figured if I didn’t go for my dream, no one else would.


Caroline: Where do you prefer to write? Do you need quiet, music, solitude? PC or laptop?

Kellie: I’d prefer to write out in a cabin in the woods. Alone. But I have a PC in the living room across the room from the kids computer. As a single mom, I need to know what my kids are up to, so I prefer to be right in the thick of things, so writing alone isn’t an option. If they’re at school, I use either the PC or laptop depending on how I’m feeling.

Sometimes I need music to get me in a good mood. Music can affect our mood so much! If I need to get in the mood for a sizzling sex scene, I admit that I listen to raunchy rock music or sexy dance music, LOL. If I need quiet, I listen to soothing instrumental or something. I have a varied taste in music. Then there are other times I need quiet, but since quiet is a relative thing in my house, I take what I can get!

Caroline: I agree music can create a mood. Are you a plotter or a panzer?

Kellie: All my stories start off as a “what if” question. Then the characters come to me and I sort of plot out who they are, but as far as the story goes, I begin writing and then let the characters take me on an adventure!

Caroline: Do you use real events or persons in your stories or as an inspiration for stories?

Kellie: Sometimes I take a funny situation, embellish on it and create a story. My stories are mostly wishes. PLEASURE ISLAND for example was creating a happy ending for a woman who had gone through divorce. I’m an eternal optimist. I think that we have the ability to create our own happy ending. I’m working on mine.


Caroline: Tell us about your writing schedule. Do you set goals? Do you write daily?


Kellie: Lately, I haven’t written anything new! LOL Before I had promotion to do and I was in the strictly selling stage, my goal was to write 1000 words a day. Not difficult because I’ve managed 5000 in one day before. (A+ in high school typing class) If the story is flowing and I have no interruptions, then I can create a lot. Now I set different goals for myself – getting edits done by a certain time, submitting a piece by a certain date, beginning a new piece etc.



Caroline: Be a fast typist is a definite plus, isn’t it? What do you hope your writing brings to readers?


Kellie: Love. Hope. Romance. Hot sex. All the things I wish for myself, I want for them.

Caroline: What long-term plans do you have for your career?


Kellie: At this point, to keep writing, creating and selling books. Sure, who doesn’t want to make the NYT Bestseller list? Right now I want to do what I love and see where it takes me. So far it’s been an exciting ride?



Caroline: Would you like to tell us what you’re working on now?

Out January 2012

Kellie: Right now I’m promoting PLEASURE ISLAND and two more I have with two different publishers. I have two novels coming out next year, so edits will begin for those and I want to get book 3 in that series ready to go as well. I also have another novella in the WIP stage, so I’ve got lots to work on.



Caroline: Isn’t it amazing how much time we spend on promotion? What advice would you give to unpublished authors?

Now from Sweet Cravings

 Kellie: Don’t give up. If you want something bad enough, find a way to do it. And to go along with that – expand your network. Do your research on publishers, agents, etc. Talk to other writers, find out who their publishers are. It’s how I figured who I wanted to submit to and where my work would fit the best. It saves you a lot of rejection letters. But don’t be discouraged by rejection either – it means you’re trying and getting somewhere!

Caroline: So true. You have to submit in order to sell. Tell us about your latest release.

From The Wild Rose Press'
Wilder Roses

Kellie: Here’s the blurb for PLEASURE ISLAND:


Chelsea Hunter didn't come to the resort looking for sex. Jake Davis intends to change her mind. Will they be able to turn up the heat, or will their visit to Pleasure Island leave them cold?


After finalizing her divorce, Chelsea Hunter came to the resort island of Paradise for some peace and quiet so she could figure out what her next step would be. She hadn’t expected to find herself at an exotic hotel dedicated to pleasures of the flesh. Too bad she doesn’t want sex.

Jake Davis is back in Paradise after visiting a year ago when his own marriage fell apart. This time his fantasy is to guide a woman through her sexual journey. He hadn’t counted on being paired with the only woman in Paradise who prefers privacy over pleasure!

Will Jake be able to discover what Chelsea truly needs, or will their journey to Paradise remain unfulfilled?


Caroline: Intriguing. How about an excerpt?


Kellie: Here it is:

“This is a what?”


Chelsea Hunter couldn’t believe her ears. An island resort dedicated to entertaining people’s sexual pleasures? This wasn’t what she’d signed up for when reserving her room at the beautiful Caribbean locale. What the hell would people think if they found out she’d come here?


“I assure you that you’re in the right place, Ms. Hunter,” the blonde behind the reception desk told her.


Chelsea struggled to look anywhere but at the receptionist’s chest, whose gigantic breasts spilled out of her red string bikini. “There must be a mistake. I reserved a room at Paradise Resort.”


“This is Paradise, baby,” drawled a smooth voice from Chelsea’s left.


Chelsea turned, only to struggle again with where to look. There stood one of the most gorgeous men she’d ever laid eyes on. She’d guess him a few inches shy of six feet, but his perfectly sculpted body totally made up for it. He may not have been tall, but the handsome factor was off the charts. Close cropped dark hair, midnight eyes, broad shoulders and chest without an ounce of body hair, tapered waist, and—Whoa. A zap of lust zinged straight to her core, and she dropped her gaze to his muscled thighs. That couldn’t be real. Maybe his Speedo made it appear larger. She flicked another quick look. Damn…Wet heat rushed between her thighs.


Bringing her gaze back up to his face, she flushed at the amused sparkle in his eyes. She braced her hands on the reception desk, her wedding ring twinkling a bittersweet reminder as she leaned forward.


“There has to be some mistake,” Chelsea pleaded. “I’m at the wrong place.”



Caroline: LOL That reminds me of a similar scene in Sandra Crowley’s CAUGHT BY A CLOWN, a romantic suspense where the heroine is briefly trapped in a nudist colony. Where can readers find your books?



Kellie: My buy link for PLEASURE ISLAND is http://www.wilderroses.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=86&products_id=848o

For MONKEYS, SEX, AND OTHER BIRTHDAY SURPRISES, the link is:
http://store.secretcravingspublishing.com/index.php?main_page=book_info&products_id=137&zenid=70e41e3aa9c9c9803b4602185b4e76af

Caroline: Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?


Kellie: I love to have fun! Life should be a series of adventures. If you’re not having fun, ask yourself why.



Caroline: How can readers learn more about you?



Kellie: My website is www.kelliekamryn.com,


Blog: http://www.kelliekamryn.blogspot.com,
Facebook Kellie Kamryn
Twitter @KellieKamryn

Caroline: Kellie, thanks very much for sharing with us today. Please return on Friday for Diana Cosby’s information on her annual drive to provide food for those in need.



Thanks for stopping by!

My Favorite Blogs and Bloggers!

Wow, Blogger has been having a meltdown, but I'm finally able to post my tribute to some of my fellow bloggers. I try to read the blogs of all my friends but, let's face it, it would take all day to visit each blog. So, I rotate visits to my faves. Here are some of my top picks.

Beth Trissel has one of the most beautiful blogs around. She generously uses photos taken by her and her family to illustrate her posts. She lives in picturesque Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, and I always love the information she shares. See "One Writer's Way" at http://bethtrissel.wordpress.com If you haven't read her books, do yourself a favor and read one today. Here's an excerpt from her blog:

Goldfinch from the garden of
Beth Trissel's mom

“A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.” Lou Holtz


Some of the cheeriest, downright euphoric, birds in this world are gold finches. And I don’t know how they’ve managed it, or if they’re responsible, but sunflowers have taken over my entire garden except for the plot where I’ve pulled them out and planted vegetables. This gradually expanding patch is absolutely hedged in by sunflowers. I don’t know if the birds flung extra seeds all over the ground, or how all these sunflowers came to be, but I’ve never known a garden to be overrun like this. (*Mom took this pic of a gold finch at her house.)

Kristen Lamb's social media blog is tops for learning your way around promotion and building an online presence via her "Warrior Writers" blog, http://warriorwriters.wordpress.com/ She also gives great writing tips and is a dynamo of energy. She also has written WE ARE NOT ALONE to guide non-technical writers like me. Here's an excerpt:

Almost any of us who decided one day to get serious about our writing, read Stephen King’s On Writing. Great book, if you haven’t read it. But one thing King tells us we writers must be willing to do, is that we must be willing to, “Kill the little darlings.” Now, King was not the first to give this advice. He actually got the idea from Faulkner, but I guess we just took it more seriously when King said it…because now the darlings would die by a hatchet, be buried in a cursed Indian filing cabinet where they would come back as really bad novels. …oops, I digress.


Little darlings are those favorite bits of prose, description, dialogue or even characters that really add nothing to the forward momentum or development of the plot. To be great writers, we must learn to look honestly at all little darlings. Why? Because they are usually masking critical flaws in the overall plot.


Today we will address two especially nefarious writing hazards that like to lurk below the wittiest dialogue and most breathtaking description:

Sandra Crowley has her "Driven2Danger" blog at http://Driven2Danger.blogspot.com and I'm the featured guest today. See how cool she is? Seriously, she has some unusual and interesting guests on her blog and I've been impressed at her diversity and ingenuity as well as her writing ability.

Going Fast!



This week I'm thrilled to introduce D2D's readers to my friend and long-time critique partner, Caroline Clemmons. This multi-published, award winning author and fun loving woman is a delight to know as you'll soon discover for yourselves. Have a great time talking with Caroline...

"Sweethearts of the West" is a team blog (of which Sandra and I are members) of writers whose contemporary and historical books are set west of the Mississippi. Some of the blogs just amaze me! The authors are so resourceful and generous in sharing their research. Stop by http://sweetheartsofthewest.blogspot.com/ and see for yourself.

Of course I love this blog and devour each post. I've learned some fascinating things. Do you like ghost towns? Here's an excerpt from Sweethearts of the West blog co-owner Celia Yeary's post on the coal mining ghost town of Thurber TX, which is about an hour west of Fort Worth:

Thurber miners

When my husband and I travel from Central Texas to North Texas on Highway 281, we pass under Interstate 20, which runs East-West. At that point there is a sign pointing west: Thurber-11 miles. After seeing this sign for several years, I wondered about Thurber, Texas, a small town I'd never heard of even though my place of birth was nearby. By researching Thurber, I found an amazing story of a thriving coal-mining town in the Nineteenth Century, now a ghost town with little remaining of the once-thriving populated area. Almost all signs of life are gone, including all the buildings.

"5 Texas Writers" are friends from my local RWA chapter. I've known four of them for many years and am I'm delighted to have recently met the fifth. Catch them at http://5texaswriters.blogspot.com/ If you check them out, please follow them. Their blog is new and needs more readers an followers. Here's an excerpt of nurse practitioner and YA author Avery Michael's latest post:

Avery's avatar

Nourishing the Soul



I've heard this phrase often, but never knew exactly what it meant. We feed our bodies with all types of substances but what does a soul need?


A special kind of Chocolate? Italian? Mexican? Sushi? Cheesecake?

I don't mean to make light of the spiritual aspect of our bodies, but how does one go about feeding a system that is vitally important yet not actually a tangible thing.


After going through an illness lately, I came across the phrase again and there's nothing like your body showing you in a huge, big time way no one is immortal. So I decided to do a little research and lots of thinking. And I think I came up with what I believe is necessary to sustain a soul.


1. Know who you are. I don't mean as a wife, a mother, or whatever your day job is, or how others perceive you, but who you really are deep inside. How do you do this? Start by being still. Very, very still. Let all those labels fade away like a summer storm. In the calm aftermath, think about how you are feeling, think about what you know to be true about yourself. Embrace the bad as well as the good. Work on the bad and enhance the good.

That's probably enough for today. On the sidebar, you can see these and several other favorites listed. Of course, it's impossible to list all those I like. There are too many.
Allow me to remind you my backlist of books is available now at Smashwords and Amazon. Those books are the contemporary BE MY GUEST and SNOWFIRES, and the historical Kincaid duo, THE MOST UNSUITABLE WIFE (Book one) and THE MOST UNSUITABLE HUSBAND  (Book two).

Smashwords buy link: http://www.smashwords.com/books/search?query=Caroline+Clemmons

Amazon buy link: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Caroline+Clemmons+Kindle&x=9&y=17

 Thanks for stopping by today!

 

PLANNING YOUR BOOK: PLOTTING VS. SEAT OF THE PANTS

Plotting Yields
A Good Map

Plotting versus Pantzer (writing by the seat of your pants) is an ongoing controversy. I believe I’m a combination, a Plotzer. A firm plot outline is like a road map: it’s a great guide that speeds you on your way with no misdirection. Like any road trip, however, the author can choose to take an occasional sidetrip, hence the Plotzer designation.
 Before I learned about plotting, I had trouble with my work having a sagging middle or the final work turning out too short. Fortunately, I was able to attend an all-day “Story Magic” workshop by Laura Baker and Robin Perini. If you ever have this opportunity, please do yourself a BIG favor and attend. I’m sure the people around me that day saw a light bulb switch on.

What a great concept--at least for me. A few in the workshop were not as impressed as I was, much to my surprise. My friend and plotting partner, Sandra Crowley, was one of those like me who thought “Story Magic” a terrific concept. Believe me, this does not stifle creativity; instead, plotting stimulates your brain.

The “Story Magic” process is copyrighted by Laura and Robin so I can’t divulge their secrets. I can share with you that the plotting board is greater, in my opinion, than sliced bread! One of the great things about it is that when you’re finished plotting, you have a detailed outline from which to write and fashion your synopsis. For me, this outline speeds up the writing process and allows me to finish more books in a given time, plus it helps me write a better book. Not a bad deal all around, right? 

Divided Plotting Board

To create your plotting board, trek to your office supply and buy a folding “science board” that costs around ten dollars. Or, you can use a sheet of poster board that is less than half a dollar. For a novel that will be 85,000 to 100,000 words long, divide the board into four rows and then divide each row into five sections. I’m not that great at math, but this should produce twenty spaces. Let’s say that each of the spaces represents a twenty-page chapter. In the first space, write “Inciting incident.” At the end of the first row, mark in “First turning point,” and at the end of the second row, “Second turning point,” and at the end of the third row, “Third Turning Point.” At the end of the bottom row, write “Resolution.” Back up to the third from last space and write “Black Moment.” These turning points and the black moment are general guides and you may need to shift them a chapter or so. If you want a short novel, say a category romance, simply leave off one row. Now, drag out all your colored sticky notes. Come on, you know you use them. I choose pink for the heroine, blue for the hero, yellow for secondary characters, and other colors for plot points, and romance points.



Sandra Crowley

 Having at least one more person to brainstorm with you while you do this is helpful. When Sandy isn’t in the area, I can email her or talk to her on the phone. Face-to-face is best, but Sandy has moved to Colorado and is only back in Texas once or twice a year. We make good use of the time she is able to visit me, though. This year we plotted several books for me to work on during 2011. At times, other author friends like Ashley Kath-Bilsky, Bobbye Terry, Geri Foster, and Jeanmarie Hamilton help me with plot questions, and so do my sweet Hero Husband and my Darling Daughters.

Start with the inciting incident. This is the second that life changes for the hero and/or heroine and launches the book’s quest. You can jot down bits of dialogue on the sticky note, stage directions, scene's purpose, turning points, and anything you choose to help you remember an idea. Using a different color sticky for each person is important. Here’s why: When you are finished, you can look at the plotting board and see if there are holes in your plot. For instance, what if there are no blue sticky notes for several squares? What if there’s a plot turning point, but not a romantic turning point? One glance at the board lets you know if the plot has problems. Once you spot a problem, you can fix it and not have to spend time writing only to delete a scene or two.

Plotting Board Almost Completed

When you are finally satisfied with the sticky notes on the plotting board, simply gather them IN ORDER. Secure them together and you have your entire book’s plot in your fingertips. Easy, peasy, right? Don't panic, it takes practice. If you have a question, email me and I’ll do my best to answer your question.


Please return on Friday for my Friday Friends blog with historical and paranormal author and editor, Paty Jager.

It's almost time for another issue of my Mostly Monthly Newsletter. If you haven't signed up yet, please go to the sidebar and do so. Each issue contains an exclusive short story, a recipe, news, and miscellaneous stuff.  This month's recipe is for Fandango Chili, perfect for a winter meal and a favorite of my husband's and mine.