Naming My Baby #CharacterNames #BabyNames #Farscape

I found another blog challenge! This one looks fun, too! Especially this week's topic...

Characters I'd Name a Baby After

Well, this one is easy because I've already done it!

My 4 children all have unique and meaningful names. Two of my kids are named after hockey players. My husband and I were big hockey fans although I'm feel bad for my oldest son because I didn't foresee that he'll have to forever be telling people how to pronounce his name. I didn't see that until our first doctor's visit.

The boy's names were easy.

But choosing a girl's name proved much more difficult. There were too many options. Way too many. And my husband was difficult to negotiate with. And after having two boys, I was super excited to have a girl so I wanted her name to be special and I admit...girly.

After months and months of consideration and negotiating, my daughter, Aeryn, was born.

Let me explain.

I'm a big fan of the Sci-Fi TV Show, Farscape. I was seriously addicted to the characters and the amazing story lines, not to mention the artwork, special effects and alien creations (Jim Henson...enough said).

The love story between astronaut John Crichton and the Sebacean Peacekeeper pilot, Aeryn Sun, is what kept me glued to that show week after week.

For those not familiar with the epic show, astronaut and scientist John Crichton (played by Ben Browder) was a test pilot for a new space shuttle. His first flight took an unexpected turn when he inadvertently created a wormhole and was hurled through space to arrive in a distant part of the galaxy where he eventually found himself onboard a living spaceship with a bunch of escaped alien convicts.

He joined them in running from the Peacekeepers, a strictly disciplined military organization that policed that part of the galaxy.

Aeryn Sun (played by Claudia Black), was a Sebacean Peacekeeper pilot that was captured by the escaped convicts and taken onboard their ship, Moya. Once she was considered by her commander, Crais, to be irreversibly contaminated from her contact with the crew, she had no choice but to reluctantly join them.

All Crichton and the crew wanted was to find their way home.

I love Aeryn's name. It's beautiful and strong, independent and unique. And I love the spelling of it. Though it sounds like "Erin," the spelling gives it that feminine quality that I wanted for my little girl.

Check out the other Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge posts!

Childhood Memories: A Walk Back in Time #MFRWAuthor

Blogging is an opportunity for authors to connect with readers. Despite being writers, blogging is an entirely different style of writing and often stumps us. To help our authors blog consistently, thoughtfully and with purpose, Marketing for Romance Writers is announcing the 2019 Blog Challenge. Each week, authors use our writing prompt to create a meaningful blog post. We'll be posting every Friday... join us as often as possible.

Week 2: "Childhood Memories: A Walk Back in Time"

Before my mother died, I had a fantastic childhood. Being two years younger, my little brother was my best friend/worst enemy. When we weren't fighting, we were creating all sorts of imaginative things to do. Although I was born in the '70s, I was an '80s child. We enjoyed playing with toys before the internet, before cellphones, before tablets and limitless television watching.

My dad worked second shift in a factory and my mom spent her days attending college classes and her nights either reading, doing homework or talking to her mom on the phone or at her house. This left my brother and I with a lot of time with just each other to keep us occupied.

We only had 13 channels on TV to choose from so if it wasn't Saturday morning cartoons, then my brother and I were playing game boards, toys, bike riding or creating our own fun. We played tag and hide-and-seek. We rode bikes at our grandmother's house. We chased each other around with squirt guns.

A lot of time we played pretend. We pretended we were Radio DJ's, we were soldiers, we were sword-fighters, we were theater actors, we were newspaper reporters, we were adventurers searching for gold, we were fishermen being attacked by sharks (the shark was often played by my dog, Reva), we were also astronauts exploring new worlds. We tore my mother's sofa apart and used the cushions and blankets to make tents/cabins where we were attacked by Big Foot, werewolves, aliens or whatever monster seemed the most ferocious.

Our imaginations took us everywhere in the world and beyond, all from the comfort of our little 3 bedroom house in Southern Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. 

Be sure to visit the posts for the MFRW's Blog Challenge!

I write sensual paranormal and historical romances. Interested in learning more about my stories? Sign-up for my newsletter where you'll learn about my new book releases, updates on my works-in-progress, writing tips, book reviews, contests, and other fun book-related info!

You can Follow me on ...

BookBub | Amazon | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads | Pinterest 

Happy Writing!

~Tricia

Writing for fun, profit or other? #MFRWAuthor #writerslife

Blogging is an opportunity for authors to connect with readers. Despite being writers, blogging is an entirely different style of writing and often stumps us. To help our authors blog consistently, thoughtfully and with purpose, Marketing for Romance Writers is announcing the 2019 Blog Challenge. Each week, authors use our writing prompt to create a meaningful blog post. We'll be posting every Friday... join us as often as possible.

Week 1: "Writing - Doing it for fun, profit or other?"

I started a little late this year, but I plan to get caught up with the Marketing For Romance Author's 2019 Blog Challenge. Here goes...

I started writing for fun. Writing was another form of imaginative play when I was a child. My first series was about my brother's pet turtle, Gonzo, who was a detective, solving mysteries in our grandmother's backyard.

Eventually, my stories developed along with my own growth as a child into a teenager into an adult. After my mother died when I was 11, I found myself writing stories about a young girl with a troubling home life, usually with no mother. Writing became therapy for me. It helped me work through the struggles that I was facing. As a matter of fact, that hasn't really changed at all. I still consider my writing to be very therapeutic.

I didn't consider writing for profit until my senior year in high school when my creative writing teacher, Mr. McCormick, took me aside after class the one day. He told me that the short story that I had handed in had great potential to become a novel and I should consider publication one day. Up to that point in my life, I'd never considered writing as a career choice. Until then, writing was just for fun.

After that fateful day, I began reading books on the writing craft, I took writing courses and workshops, and I attended writing conferences. I began crafting my novels and submitting them to the big New York publishers. Although I received rejections, all of my submissions were returned with helpful insight and constructive criticism on how to strengthen my writing and requests to keep trying and resubmit.

I never gave up. It took a while before my confidence in my writing strengthened, but I continue to grow as a writer every day. I think we all do with each story we write. We learn distinct lessons from each manuscript we write.

Each year, my writing income grows. I consider myself blessed to be able to make money doing something that I love. Not everyone has that kind of opportunity.

So, in answer to the question... Yes. I write for fun, profit and therapy. All three.

Be sure to visit the posts for the MFRW's Blog Challenge!

I write sensual paranormal and historical romances. Interested in learning more about my stories? Sign-up for my newsletter where you'll learn about my new book releases, updates on my works-in-progress, writing tips, book reviews, contests, and other fun book-related info!

You can Follow me on ...

BookBub | Amazon | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads | Pinterest 

Happy Writing!

~Tricia

#BookReview: Top Secret Twenty-One by Janet Evanovich #mystery

Top Secret Twenty-One by Janet Evanovich

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Catch a professional assassin: top priority. Find a failure-to-appear and collect big bucks: top score. How she'll pull it all off: top secret. 

Trenton, New Jersey's favorite used-car dealer, Jimmy Poletti, was caught selling a lot more than used cars out of his dealerships. Now he's out on bail and has missed his date in court, and bounty hunter Stephanie Plum is looking to bring him in. Leads are quickly turning into dead ends, and all too frequently into dead bodies. Even Joe Morelli, the city's hottest cop, is struggling to find a clue to the suspected killer's whereabouts. These are desperate times, and they call for desperate measures. So Stephanie is going to have to do something she really doesn't want to do: protect former hospital security guard and general pain in her behind Randy Briggs. Briggs was picking up quick cash as Poletti's bookkeeper and knows all his boss's dirty secrets. Now Briggs is next on Poletti's list of people to put six feet under. 

To top things off, Ranger--resident security expert and Stephanie's greatest temptation--has been the target of an assassination plot. He's dodged the bullet this time, but if Ranger wants to survive the next attempt on his life, he'll have to enlist Stephanie's help and reveal a bit more of his mysterious past.

Death threats, highly trained assassins, highly untrained assassins, and Stark Street being overrun by a pack of feral Chihuahuas are all in a day's work for Stephanie Plum. The real challenge is dealing with her Grandma Mazur's wild bucket list. A boob job and getting revenge on Joe Morelli's Grandma Bella can barely hold a candle to what's number one on the list--but that's top secret.

My Review:
I can always rely on Janet Evanovich to brighten my day and provide a book with laugh-out-loud antics. The combination of bounty hunter, Stephanie Plum, her side-kick, Lula, and the annoying Randy Briggs is guaranteed to wreak havoc and chaos in Trenton, New Jersey.

Stephanie's on the hunt for another skip, Jimmy Poletti, who proves elusive, but extremely active since Randy Briggs is convinced Poletti's out to kill him. And because Briggs being, well, Briggs, no one will help him but Stephanie. She figures if Poletti's out to get Briggs, she'll have a better chance at capturing him by keeping Briggs close.

This story is filled with mystery, mayhem, Chihuahua minions, dead bodies, a scary Russian assassin with one eye, rocket launchers and car bombs. It also has Bob, the dog. And smokin' hot Ranger and sexy Morelli, so I'd say this book is definitely worth the read.

View all my reviews

New Year, New Goals 2019 #AuthorUpdate #NewYearResolutions

Usually I blog about my New Year's Resolutions within the first week of the New Year, but I needed to take some time to evaluate my goals. I looked over my many accomplishments for 2017. You can see that post here. This year I have a lot more planned. I'm more ambitious than ever and I hope to make 2019 a successful year!

I haven't announced this yet, but I've recently signed a contract for two new romance novels to be released in a boxed set collection. I've had stories published in anthologies, but these will be my first boxed sets, so I'm eager to see how different these projects are from each other. I'm very excited to be a part of this! 

I've mentioned before that I want to dip my toes into self-publishing. Well, this is the year I'm taking the plunge. I've been writing like crazy this last year and I've collected several stories that I want start releasing. I'm gathering a list of beta readers. If you're interested in reading unpolished stories with a critical eye, you can shoot me an e-mail to request being part of my list. All of my stories are romance, but I write in several subgenres. To date, the stories are paranormal, historical, gothic, sci-fi, contemporary, fantasy and apocalyptic. If you're interested in a specific subgenre, also mention that in your email. 

Okay, so moving on to my goals.

This year, I plan to...

• Publish these nearly finished books 
• Regency Paranormal Romance about a werewolf - included in the Boxed Set
• Paranormal Romance - TBA - included in the Boxed Set
• Paranormal Romance with Witches and Zombies
• Paranormal Romance with Cougar Shapeshifters
• Victorian Paranormal Romance with a Ghost
• Fantasy Romance set in Middle Ages
• Contemporary Holiday Romance
• Historical Romance with Pirates (possibly - this one needs more work than the others)
• Write 2 - 3 new novels
• Sci-fi Romance with an Alien
• Paranormal Romance with Witches and Zombies (Book 2)
• TBA - I want to leave this open for that moment when inspiration hits
• Blog more regularly
• Last year I participated in the Insecure Writer's Support Group (#IWSG) and Marketing For Romance Writers (#MFRWAuthors). While these two groups and their monthly/weekly posts kept me somewhat consistent with blogging, I want to add more content for my readers. This year I want to continue those posts and re-introduce guest bloggers and author/book spotlights. These posts were always popular in the past. I also plan to write more content about my books, writing, research and personal life/interests. Also, more #BookReviews. Readers love those posts and I love reading more books!
• Learn more about Marketing
• Read more Marketing books
• Attend Workshops and Conferences
• Research Marketing websites
• Network with Authors and Readers
• Guest Blogging/Author Spotlights/Book Spotlights
• Join Blog Hops and other events
• More Giveaways! Readers are important to me and I want them to know it!
• And most importantly...

This seems like an ambitious list and I hope I can achieve all or most of it. I'm pretty flexible, so I'm constantly rearranging my plans and schedules. That's mostly because I have 4 kids who keep me busy. 

What are your goals for 2019? I'd love to hear about them! 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

~Tricia S.