Today’s Smile (Maggie)

Was going to post my latest doggie video here, as a reason to smile today, but Wordpress says the file is too big. Darn it! It’s Niblet, my bulldog, rocking out to a Beastie Boys tune. Fortunately, it posted just fine on my solo blog Shayne’s Shenanigans.

Also, my editor, Leslie Wainger, wrote the sweetest, most touching blog post about my summer series at Eharlequin.com Her blog brought tears to my eyes, so go check it out and leave a comment if you have time.

So you can visit those two places to catch up.  Three if you count my home page, MaggieShayne.com, which was just updated today with links to all my doggy videos (3 so far) and lots more info.

I actually tried to post this mini-blog/update this morning and had all sorts of mishaps.  It said it didn’t post at all, but did, all mixed up.  So this is the improved and cleaned up version.  Sorry for the confusion.

Are we too dependent on technology yet?  Maybe!

And of course, the really big news is that my latest book, KISS ME, KILL ME, is on sale now, hot off the presses, which means I’m a nervous wreck and can’t focus on work. What else is new?

Go buy it so I can relax, okay? =)

I’ve been procrastinating this week, and it’s not a good time for that. So I really do need to get to work today. Therefore, this blog may be on the short side, but there’s really not all that much going on to blog about.

Big hugs and enjoy my bulldog, until next time.

Niblet (standing) & her bro, Buster

Family Matters (Suzanne Forster)

I almost missed my blogging day!  I have family here and then some. 

Oh, dear, something is wrong with the blogging window.   My words are disappearing into the margins and I can only see half of what I’m typing.   What’s with that?

Okay, guess I really wasn’t destined to post today.  Back to the siblings, nephews, nieces, their friends and their pets.  It’s quite the zoo around here, lol.  Last I heard everyone was leaving tomorrow.  I love em.  I’ll miss em, but I can hardly wait!

Suz

Heroes and Heroines (Anne Stuart)

First, news flash!  RECKLESS is on the shelves, and it’s getting wonderful reviews, thank God.   And while trying to survive the nervousness that having not just one, but three new books out, I’ve been thinking.

Deep Thoughts Department:

I answered an email questionnaire from an Italian website, and it got me to thinking.  In the beginning I didn’t quite understand what she was asking (lost in translation) and I thought she wanted to know what kind of actors I’d want for my characters.  This was my answer:

Clive Owen, Alan Rickman, or half the actors from Australia and New Zealand (Simon Baker, Alex O’Laughlin, Russell Crowe <don’t laugh>, Guy Pearce, etc.).  For actresses, mainly American ones.  Maggie Gyllenhaal, Laura Linney, and Ellen Page.

In general I tend to like clever, elegant hero types, and shy away from brawn.  Russell Crowe is the exception.  He can play character types who are earthy.  Most of my heroes belong in a drawing room or a penthouse. But a few belong in the countryside, and are uninterested in the games my heroes tend to play.  Those are the Russell characters.

I quite often hear Alan Rickman’s voice in my head when I have a decadent aristocrat.  In the past I’ve used Brad Pitt both as a buffoon supporting character and a charismatic leading man.  And Daniel Day-Lewis around the time of Last of the Mohicans inspired any number of early historicals.

Mostly, though, I start with a physical stand-in and go from there.  For some reason George Clooney, Leonardo de Caprio, Matt Damon and others, while I enjoy their movies, have failed to get my creative mojo going, and yet Japanese actors like Etsushi Toyokawa, or J-rock stars like Gackt and Yoshiki for some reason managed to give me a huge spurt of energy (yes, I know, naughty way to put it).

However, it turns out that wasn’t the question.  The question was, what are the characteristics that define your characters?  And it got me to thinking.

For heroes:

Self-honesty.

No illusions about who and what he is.  I want a hero who’s willing to look into the deepest, darkest part of his soul and not make excuses.  He might think he’s worse than he really is, but he doesn’t need the illusion that what he’s doing is necessarily right and good in order for him to do it.  This works with modern heroes – spies and the like, who will kill when ordered to, use a woman sexually in order to find out her secrets, contemplate killing her even if she’s an innocent.  He’s someone at the very edge of being a sociopath, but he falls short, because he knows what he does is wrong.  Hates himself for doing it.  But does it anyway.

My historical heroes are usually aristocrats (though one of my favorites, Simon of Navarre, was a medieval wizard).  They have the money and position to do exactly as they please, and society was less stringent in the Georgian period.  They will seduce a woman simply because they want her, with no concern as to how it might affect her in the long run, ruined and possibly pregnant.

A willingness to do whatever needs to be done if it’s something he believes in or wants.

If he works for an intelligence organization then he will follow orders unless he believes they’re wrong.  Then he’s willing to fight against the entire establishment.  If he’s a jaded aristocrat who wants revenge and finds the heroine to be the perfect vessel, he’ll do it. 

A total unconcern for society’s rules.

My hero tends to live outside of society, and he doesn’t care in the slightest if he’s ostracized.  Quite often society, in the form of his family or the so-called establishment has betrayed him in the past, leaving him angry and wounded.  He wouldn’t care what other people think.

A black sense of humor.

While my hero tends to be grim and relentless, he also can find humor in unexpected things.  In a heroine’s determined resistance.  In his own contradictory behavior.  My hero is always capable of laughing at himself.

His own particular sense of honor, which can be different from anyone else’s.

Jo Beverley and I go back and forth on this.  I find some of the worst behavior acceptable in a hero if it’s true to who and what he is.  Some heroes will kill in cold blood, particularly someone who has hurt their heroine.  They will conceivably run off with the stolen money if they want it and they decide that people who were robbed either don’t need it or don’t deserve it.  It goes back to the unconcern for society’s rules.  They don’t care much for society’s laws either.

A tendency to be solitary.

My hero tends to start out solitary and to stay fairly isolated by the end.  He will allow, no, welcome, the heroine into his narrow existence, and he will slowly start to allow others.  The heroine’s friends and family may be admitted, as well as people he’s known for years and is finally ready to accept as a friend.  But my heroes will never live in the suburbs or give speeches in the House of Lords, and any Regency houseparties they throw will either be grudging or have an ulterior motive.

In other words, my heroes tend to be fairly uncivilized.

As for the heroine:

She needs to be smart.

In fact, the hero, heroine, mentor and villain need to be highly intelligent.  My stories are about complex games people play, and the smarter the players, the better.

Forgiving.  Obviously.  Anyone attached to my kind of hero needs to be able to overlook and forgive all sorts of bad behavior.  She can and should call the hero to task over things, but holding grudges, no matter how tempting, would destroy the relationship.  If you fall in love with a Very Bad Man then you have no choice but to forgive him for the Very Bad Things he does.  Even as you do your best to stop him from doing Very Bad Things.

Someone who adheres more to society’s rules and understands why they’re necessary.

My heroine tends to start out on the more conventional side of the story.  Women in historicals are more vulnerable – very few can ignore the rules and get away with it.  Once she’s paired with her hero she can slowly begin to bring him back, at least to the edges of society, so that he can survive in normal situations as well as dire ones.

The same holds true for contemporaries.  I think women tend to care more about community, recognize the value of good friends and family, and want to share that appreciation with the hero without forcing anything on him.

Strong-minded but vulnerable.

I know, my heroines tend to be too vulnerable.  I can’t help it, it’s my particular fantasy.  I’m a powerhouse who secretly can feel very fragile, and it’s what I respond to in my heroines.  Strength and vulnerability.

Adapability.

Probably the most important thing my heroines need.  The ability to adapt to extreme situations, solitude, guns blazing, orgies, kidnapping.  And after she’s happily bonded with her hero things don’t necessarily get much better.  She needs to be able to face things without falling apart, turn on a dime if the situation calls for it (what the hell does turn on a dime mean?), let go when she needs to, hold on when necessary.

Some see my heroines as weak.  I see them as Superwomen, able to deal with the mad, bad, dangerous heroes I write.

So what characteristics make up my characters?  Apart from exceptional good looks, astonishing sexual prowess, charisma, intelligence, and strength, and all of the above?  The ability to love, of course.  But the true redemption, for both broken hero and heroine, is the ability to accept love.  Then, no matter how bad the Very Bad Man is, or how vulnerable the heroine is, they can find a real Happy Ever After that nothing can take away.

Ah, Today’s Wonderful Customer Relations (Pat)

Sorry to be so late this week. All three dogs have stomach infections and resultant diarrhea since Thursday night. Between vet visits and carpet cleaning, I was distracted. They are better now, but I’m keeping a close eye and sprinting them outside if they even look as if they might have an episode.    Ah, the joys of  sharing a house with animals.

But here I am with another complaint. I’m with Suz and Lynn about today’s customer service. I had a rather large fight with Macy’s last week, and I’m ready to start a war on companies that use off-shore collection people.

It all started last Wednesday. I was minding my own business, working on some publicity for the new book when I received a call from a distinctively Indian voice saying I was late on a payment on my Macy’s account. I was astounded at first, because I knew I wasn’t late. I had just paid the last of my Macy’s bill (I WAS a very good customer).

I went around and around with this person, explaining there was no way I owed fifty dollars, much less was late in paying it.  And he just continued to repeat the same words over and over again, that I was late, etc., etc.  I kept demanding details. He had none. Then I discovered he was talking about an account that had been dormant for nearly two years. It had been paid off, and I thought I had closed it. There had not been a charge in two years. I no longer had the card.

He finally talked to his supervisor, who apparently was also Indian. Neither could explain the origin of this charge, but we agreed to call it a disputed bill, take it off collection, and they would send me an explanation.

Okay, I can deal with that. It wasted a hour of my day, but, hey, worse things have happened. But then a few hours later, the calls started. Every hour I would get a call from the Indian collection branch.   There was always dead time after you answered, about thirty seconds of nothing, not even a “please wait.”    Then often  there was a mechanical voice would say all circuits were busy.    The blank time was obvious the delay in making the overseas connection.   You couldn’t call back; the number was busy.   And the calls continued.     

I finally got another resident of India the next afternoon after trying to answer several hours. I explained – very patiently (or maybe not) - everything that had happened the previous day, that it was a disputed bill. He just kept insisting I had a late bill. I finally blew up and said I wanted no more calls.  He promised no more calls.

Three hours later, the calls started again. By then I was purple with outrage. I tried to call THEM and talk to someone in charge. No luck. Couldn’t do it.

Tried to call the American office. No, the phone kept going back to India. Finally I emailed. A very angry email, I might add.

The calls stopped and four days later I received an email with an explanation.

I once had two accounts with Macy’s, a store account and a Macy’s Visa. The fifty dollars was on the Macy’s store account long in disuse. According to the email, one of my payments to the Visa account was $200.00. I paid at the store, and the clerk made a mistake and put down $250.00 and my account was credited for $250 rather than $200. Their mistake, not mine. Then they compounded the mistake by placing a $50.00 charge on the wrong account with no explanation. 

All of it THEIR mistakes. Nearly four days of hourly phone calls from India, four rather confusing calls with Indians from India who had no idea of where the charge came from, and one very frustrated customer.

I kept thinking through all this how I would feel if I were an American late on a payment because I’d lost my job. How would I feel being harassed by non-Americans who were entirely clueless and without authority to solve a problem. I won’t even talk about the total lack of efficiency I found in this whole process.

They have lost a very good customer (the store is half a mile away).    At this point, I never want to see it again, much less patronize the store..     I’m comforted by the fact that it’s more their loss than mine.

Olympia’s 81st Annual Pet Parade – the agony & ecstasy!

I finally made it to a parade—and who would have thought it would be a parade that I’d marched in as a kid.  I completely forgot about Olympia’s annual Pet Parade until I saw a banner on Capital Way last week.  I knew instantly that this was destiny.  I’m a parade nut.  I would have gone anyway, but the opportunity to relive one of the highlights of my youth was irresistible. 

Decades ago I was regular in the Pet Parade with my childhood pal and protector, Duchess, a majestic German Shepherd with dark markings and the watchful gaze of a wolf.  I was a skinny, geeky kid with glasses, but no one messed with little Suzi when Duchess was by her side.  That dog made me feel ten feet tall.  She and I even won some prizes together.  Quite a pair, the four-eyed munchkin and her monster “pet.”    

Now that I think about, maybe this is why I’m so fond of parades.  I associate them with the best parts of my past. 

Mystery solved!

I was really wondering what to expect from the parade after so many years.  Had it grown exponentially and become commercialized?  Would there be media?  Dignitaries?  A grand marshal?  A Pet Parade Princess?  Would the kids and their pets still be the heart of the parade or would they be relegated to the sidelines, watching?

I tried to prepare myself for the changes.  This couldn’t be the parade of my youth.  Too many years had passed.  And according to the newspaper, the parade route had been relocated and was much longer than I remembered.  A bad sign.

When I got there, I found myself waiting breathlessly with hundreds of kids and their families.  Another bad sign.  Why weren’t all these kids in the parade?  Was this going to be the Westminster Dog Show on wheels or a parade?

But I needn’t have worried.  Following right behind the police car with all lights flashing that led the way was a straggly line of kids and their pets, colorfully costumed and proudly marching.  The parade’s theme was “Once upon a time” and the kids did it proud.  I saw Dorothy and Toto, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion, along with the Wicked Witch and her green-eyed black cat.  I also saw ballerinas, super heroes, Alice in Wonderland, the Cheshire Cat and every other story book character you can imagine.

Of course, there were floats, all home-made and in some cases quite precarious.  There were breakdowns en route.  Wheels came off wagons and animal cages broke open.  A hamster escaped and could so easily have been breakfast for the Great Dane who sniffed it and stopped its mad flight with a gentle touch of its giant paw.  Ah, yes, it was a pet parade from beginning to end.  The one I remembered.  The one I proudly marched in with Duchess by my side. 

The highlight of my youth is now definitely one of the highlights of this trip home. 

Of course, it ended too soon.  I wasn’t ready to go home, so instead I went to a Genealogy Café meeting at the local library, where I met some genuinely helpful genealogy buffs and took copious notes.  Afterward, I discovered a fabulous downtown restaurant, a charming one-of-a-kind place where everything on the menu is prepared with love, care and creativity.  The food was amazing and the prices surprisingly reasonable.  One fun thing I’ve discovered—these Pacific Northwesterners are foodies!    

The agony of the blog title is that I don’t have pictures!  I took tons of them.  I even went to the park afterward where the kids gathered for ice cream and prizes.  I worked up the courage to ask some of the little story book heroes and heroines to pose for me with their pets and I took pictures galore, thrilled at the shots I was getting.  But when I checked my camera later, I could only find three of the shots I’d taken—and they weren’t the good ones! 

So, some great nostalgic fun–and alas, a sigh of disappointment at unpredictability of today’s modern technology.  But, I will carry these memories in my heart, which never forgets, they say.

I’m hoping the parade website will have pictures and if they do, I’ll see if I can snitch some to share when I get home.  I hope someone got a shot of the runaway hamster! 

Suz

INSOMNIA (Anne Stuart)

Yawn.  I can’t sleep.  I guess part of the problem is I went to bed at 9 pm in order to listen to an audio book (Lisa Kleypas’s IT HAPPENED ONE AUTUMN).  I kept drifting off and jerking awake again.  Too tired to pay attention, not tired enough to actually go to sleep.  (I always go to sleep listening to books on my iPod, then just go back to wherever I remember being before I fell asleep.

But not this time.  I took the earphones off and tried it without.  Kept falling asleep and jerking awake again.  Tried Lisa again — go go.  Switched to the second half of COLD AS ICE (I figure if I know the story so well it won’t distract me) but it was so good I kept getting caught up in it.  (Don’t come here if you’re looking for false humility, guys.  I’m stuck on myself).  So I listened to the love scene, jumped ahead to the closing scene (awwww) and then lay there trying to sleep.

I tried to brainstorm for my gaslight romance.  Coming up blank, since so far I have a heroine who has no reason to be particularly interesting.  OK, I can brainstorm on the next paranormal.  Need a heroine there, but nothing was working.  Started writing my mother’s obituary, just to be gloomy (hey, it’s the middle of the night and it’s raining cats and dogs — you don’t tend to think cheerful thoughts under such circumstances).  That didn’t work either.

So I dragged my butt out of bed, came downstairs and had a couple of unbuttered slices of the bread I baked today (corn meal and whole wheat and honey — yum!), and now I’m thinking of going back to bed with Lisa and seeing if I can concentrate.

Update.  I was able to sleep.  Got in a decent chapter of the book, brought my very wet cat, Phantom, with me, let him curl up on my tummy and managed all this without waking Richie up.

What do you guys do when you get insomnia?  From early childhood I’d tell myself stories to put myself to sleep, and that eventually morphed into writing them down, and then … well, you don’t need my history.  Or if you do, I’ll give it to you some other time.

But anyway, the problem now is my usual sleep ritual becomes a new stress-factor.  So I listen to other people’s stories via the iPod and fall asleep that way, and usually it works.

Anybody got other ideas?