Contest Time! I need your help!

This is part of an email I'll be sending out to my friends. Since we're all friends here, please consider yourself invited to spread the word and win prizes! Send a message to five friends, or post something on your blog, and I'll enter you to win a $25 Amazon gift card. Just copy me or send the link to: contest @ suzannevreese.com. Even bigger prizes are available if you actually read the book and recommend it! Finally, one last favor to take note of: if you've decided to buy the book (just cause you love me or whatever) please do it ON DECEMBER 11 FROM AMAZON!

See my website for a preview or more info!

It's All About ME! ME! ME!

I received a rejection letter yesterday from a blog referral site. They said I hadn't been here enough for them to put my link on their site. There are no hard feelings. I know it's true. Only twice last month and once so far this month. Bad me. Bad, bad me.

Part of that is because I've been crazy-busy getting ready to be an author-type person.

The other, I have to admit, is really lame. But here it goes, true confessions. I read a comic strip a while back that referred to bloggers as narcissists. Now, I'm not usually one to care what others think of me. Obviously. I'd probably do my hair and makeup every day if did. Maybe even buy new clothes every once in a while instead of wearing my daughter's rejects. I'd definitely work on reducing my embarrassing moments quotient. But the word narcissist struck a chord with me - a sour one. I won't go into detail about why, but I have good reason.

So every time I've started to blog since then, I've decided that whatever I have to say about ME! ME! ME! just isn't all that important. Because, hey, I AM NO NARCISSIST!

So I'll try to get over this phobia and be better about keeping the blog up-to-date. If there's anything worse than being called a narcissist, it would have to be getting rejected. Because that means somebody doesn't love me! And they have to love me! Please, please, please love me!

See? I am sooo not a narcissist.

Edit-itis

I'm wondering if I'm the only one who suffers from this particular malady? I have a stack of books next to my bed, another in a basket by the couch, and yet another in the bathroom. All of them are perfectly reasonable books, some better than others, but none horrendously written. Yet they all have one thing in common - I've only gotten through a few chapters before giving up.

I usually love reading. But because I'm in the editing stages of two novels, I can't seem to shake this rather serious case of edit-itis. I'll jump into a new novel, excited about the upcoming adventure, but then instead of thinking about the story I'm thinking: "Author intrusion!" "Two pages of narrative summary? Come on! Cut...cut...cut!" "Telling, telling, telling. Show me something!"

It's not that these authors are bad...it's just that my brain can't stop looking for the defects in their writing. And the pleasure has been sucked out of the reading. In fact, I'm getting pretty good at Sudoku, since that's where I usually end up in my brief moments of downtime. J.K. Rowling is the only author I've found so far that I've been able to get through without the disease kicking in.

So I'm curious. Does anyone else suffer from this rather serious malady? Is there any hope? Any suggestions? Any other authors whose writing is immune? Help!

My Ninja

I do realize I have five children. Maybe six. I'm never sure if I should count my son-in-law in that number - on the one hand he's a fine young man that I'm pleased to have as part of the family, and I wouldn't want him feeling slighted by being left out; but on the other hand, saying I have six feels like I'm trying to take credit for raising a child I didn't raise. Some day maybe I'll ask him, if I'm thinking about it when it's not five o'clock in the morning. But I digress...whether I have five or six, I only have one who currently jumps in front of a camera lens or microphone at every opportunity. So if it looks like I'm playing favorites - well, the blame lies with them. And so here he is...my ninja.

I'm kicking myself, however, for not getting pictures of my 18-year-old this Halloween. There are pictures out there somewhere, just not on my camera. She and three of her friends spent most of the day working out costumes - that was after weeks of planning. They floated up to the house at close to ten o'clock: four decked out prom dresses that represented the four seasons - not the music group. One had a white dress with hair painted white and sticking straight out, another was in a yellow-sequined dress with sunflowers, another a brown gown wrapped in leaves, and my Whit was decked out in a flowing light blue with tulips. They were all coated in glitter. They did go to a couple of houses and ask for candy, just to say they did, but mostly they just did it for the fun of it.

Considering they could have just as easily been part of the group that left splattered pumpkin carcasses all over the road - once again I'm thinking what a lucky mom I am.