Debra St. John Offers a Challenge About Her Holiday Book - New Year's Eve at The Corral

Please welcome my good friend and guest, Debra St. John, who happens to have just released a great holiday book called New Year's Eve at The Corral

First, here's what Debra has to say about her new book:

Tina Perkins thinks falling in love with your best friend is a tired cliché. She's had a flirty friendship with Nick Jameson forever, and she likes it that way. Until she's dared to sleep with him and suddenly can't stop thinking about what it would be like to cross that friends to lovers line. 
 
Nick wants Tina. Badly. New Year's Eve is the perfect time to make a resolution to get her into his bed. He doesn't want to ruin the friendship they share, but adding 'with benefits' to the label would make things perfect. 
 
As the clock ticks closer to midnight, there's a lot at stake. Will a night of passion ruin everything or lead to a lifetime of love?

AND NOW HERE'S DEBRA'S CHALLENGE:

When I submitted this story, my editor told me books of this length don't sell well. My immediate thought was how fun it would be to prove her wrong. (In the best way possible!)

Almost immediately an idea began to form. As crazy as it sounds, I decided to challenge myself to sell a thousand copies of this book.  Why a thousand, you ask? Simply because a hundred didn't seem like enough (LOL).

For less than the cost of a cup of coffee (and I'm not even talking about one of those fancy frou frou ones) you can help me win this personal challenge. All you have to do is buy a copy of the book.  (Passing word of the challenge along to your reader friends would be appreciated, too.)

You might be thinking: What's in this for me? Well, I'll tell you...First, you get to read a great story! You also have the chance to win  some prizes. (And who doesn't love prizes?) If you buy a copy of the book, if you tell a friend (or two or three or ten....you know, like those old commercials: And she told two friends and she told two friends and so on and so on...), if you Tweet about the challenge or post about it on Facebook, or if you leave a comment here, you can earn Rafflecopter entry points. The winner of the Rafflecopter drawing will get a paperback set (autographed of course!) of the original Corral series: This Time for Always, This Can't Be Love, and This Feels Like Home (If you're outside the continental U S of A the set will be digital.) AND digital copies (in the format of your choice) of the first four books in the Holidays at The Corral series (Christmas, Valentine's Day, Fourth of July, and Halloween).

So, what are you waiting for? Go grab a copy of New Year's Eve at The Corral !

TWRP: http://catalog.thewildrosepress.com/all-titles/4728-new-year-s-eve-at-the-corral.html             

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MEEI0NN?tag=thewildrosepr-20

B & N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/new-years-eve-at-the-corral-debra-st-john/1124933779?ean=2940156932573

Happy Reading and many, many thanks for participating in my challenge!

Rafflecopter Links:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/017cafc21/?

Twitter hashtag: #sellathousand

P.S. If you can't wait to find out if you've won copies of the holiday books, they are on sale for half price for  most of the month of January 2017.

My Guest, Romance Author Debra St. John, Tells Us About Her Next Big Thing for Thanksgiving

My guest today is a very good friend of mine and a great romance author, by the name of Debra St. John. Debra is answering questions to share her Next Big Thing for Thanksgiving with us.

What is the title of your book?

An Unexpected Blessing

Where did the idea come from for the book?

I wanted to write a Thanksgiving story, so I had a lot of the background details in my head. I knew it would include all the best things about the holiday: food, things to be thankful for, and time with family. I also knew I wanted the setting to be a small town. The actual plot for the storyline just came to me one day.

What genre does your book fall under?

Contemporary romance. I’d call it cozy with some spice!

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

Well, he’s not really an actor, but country singer Justin Moore has the right look and the right smile to play Joe. I think Natalie Portman would make a good Katy.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

When an ex-con and the girl he’s had a secret crush on for years reunite, the sparks fly and attraction blooms, but their love is put to the test by small town gossip that can’t get over his past.

Is your book self-published or represented by an agency?

It’s available from The Wild Rose Press.

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

About two months.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday, but it so often gets pushed aside and forgotten in the rush to get to Christmas. I wanted a book to celebrate all of the wonderful things about Thanksgiving.

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?

My heroine, Katy, shares my views about Christmas needing to wait its turn in order to give Thanksgiving its rightful due!

Links:

www.debrastjohnromance.com

http://acmeauthorslink.blogspot.com

http://heroineswithhearts.blogspot.com

www.authorsbymoonlight.com

Excerpt:

 “Are you going to dance with me or not?”

     “Yes, ma’am, I am.” He stood and offered his hand.

     She slid hers into his warm grasp. As always, his touch caused a little shock in her heart. The weight of a hundred pairs of eyes followed them out onto the floor. The dirt was packed smooth, and a ring of hay bales marked the area. Her tummy quivered with a combination of nerves and anticipation.

     He found an open spot, which wasn’t difficult with the other couples affording them a wide berth, and then curved his arm around her waist to draw her close. Her body fit perfectly against him. A shiver tingled through her. She rested her free hand on his shoulder.

     His thigh brushed hers as he rhythmically shuffled his feet to the music. His gaze captured and held hers. The rest of the room faded as she stared into the warm, melted chocolate brown of his eyes.

     She didn’t care that people whispered. Snuck glances. Or outright gaped. All she cared about was swaying to a soft, slow beat. The quicker thud of her heart. Strong arms wrapped around her. And the desire to stay right where she was. Maybe forever.

Please welcome Debra St. John by leaving a comment. 

To see my review of Unexpected Blessing, go to:

http://www.amazon.com/An-Unexpected-Blessing-ebook/dp/B00A53KMSC

Please Welcome My Guest and Good Friend, Debra St. John - Romance Writer

I'm very happy to host my good buddy, Debra St. John, here today at Double M, as she tours the cyber world promoting her sweet and spicy romance, "Wild Wedding Weekend."

And now, here's Debra -

Morgan, thanks so much for having me back at Double M! I’ve been ‘touring’ the web promoting my latest release “Wild Wedding Weekend”, and it’s a privilege to be here for one of the stops. Today’s visit is special because Morgan is not only a fellow author, but a dear friend as well.

Over the past few months I’ve had several projects going on: promotion for WWW, edits on my upcoming release “This Can’t Be Love”, and trying to make progress on a new manuscript. With all of that going on, I’ve had to make sure I stay on track and on top of everything, so along the way I’ve set some goals as to what I’d like to accomplish.

As a writer, setting goals is an important part of the process. Without them, at least for me, not a lot happens. I tend to use two different types of goals. What I like to call informal and formal. An informal goal is one I have in the back of my mind that ‘someday’ I’d like to get around to. Someday could be today, tomorrow, or next year. These are nice because they give me a direction to head in, but being fairly open-ended, don’t really provide an impetus to get going.

What works better for me are those formal goals: ones I’ve written down. Somehow putting them in writing makes me more accountable. Plus it’s fun to check off or cross each goal out after I’ve accomplished it! For my formal goals I like to follow an acronym I picked up: S.M.A.R.T. I’ve seen several variations of this acronym used, but these are the phrases that work best for me.

SMART goals are:

Specific – Not I’ll write some pages today, but I’ll write at least ten pages today.

Measurable – Checking the page count at the bottom of my word processing screen will let me know if I’ve reached my goal.

Action-Oriented – Getting those pages done means I’ve actively put my fingers to the keyboard and put some words on the screen.

Realistic – I didn’t say I was going to write 100 pages today. Ten is much more manageable for me. And, I said ‘at least’, so I can go further if I’m inspired.

Timed – I want to get those pages done today, not whenever.

So, in a nutshell, my SMART goal for today is to write at least five pages. (Since it’s a work day and time is a bit scarce, I’ve adjusted my example of ten pages to make it a bit more realistic.) I’ll check back in at the end of the day and let you know how I did!

Now, how about you? What’s your SMART goal for the day?




Here's an Amazon link, in case you feel the urge to buy Debra's book.

And here's here website: http://www.debrastjohnromance.com/

Please leave a comment below to welcome Debra here to Double M.

MEET ROMANCE AUTHOR, DEBRA ST. JOHN

Today, I'm very happy to introduce to you a wonderful friend and and great romance author, Debra St. John. To celebrate the release of her debut Western-style romance, This Time For Always, I'm holding a contest in which you might win an autographed copy of her book for yourself. But first, check out Debra's blog. After that, I'll tell you how you can enter.

For more about Debra, hop over to her website at www.debrastjohnromance.com

My Music Muse

A huge thanks to Morgan for having me here today. In fact, if it weren’t for Morgan, I wouldn’t be where I am career-wise at all. So I owe her thanks in many areas.

But I’m getting ahead of myself…

I have always loved music. All kinds of music. I don’t do much without music in the background: write, garden, scrapbook, exercise, etc. When I was little, my sister and I would crank up our Tony Orlando and Dawn LP and dance in our living room until Mom yelled that we were shaking the whole house. Later we moved on to more hip things. Believe me, in our house, Grease WAS the word.

In high school I went the pom girl route instead of the cheerleader route. I was a huge Rick Springfield fan. In fact, one of my earliest works features a rock star hero that is suspiciously like the dark-haired Aussie. (Too bad I wrote it before I knew what writing was really all about. One of these days I’m going to have to bring that one out of the closet and see what I can do with it.)

After that I moved on to the hair-bands of the eighties. Bon Jovi, Skid Row, Poison, and Motley Crue were among my favorites. I even had a life sized poster of Jon Bon Jovi on my closet door in college. (My roommate was NOT amused.)

On a post-college trip to Texas to visit an old high school friend, I fell in love with country music. It was really this music that started my journey toward publication. After returning home, I found a local bar where I could enjoy my country music and line dance to boot, or boot scoot as it were. Basically from there everything fell into place and brought me to where I am now. There I met the guy who would eventually become my husband. I also met a ton of other great friends. These friends inspired me to write a story set at the bar. That story eventually became “This Time for Always”.

In the course of conversation one day, a friend from the bar mentioned that she belonged to a local writers’ group. When I mentioned that I had always wanted to be a romance writer, she invited me to come along to a meeting. After one meeting, I decided this was the group for me, and I joined the Chicago-North chapter of The Romance Writers of America. Morgan joined the group not long after I did and we became friends.

I dabbled with my writing for years, submitting a couple times to Harlequin and getting rejections. It was a little over a year ago, that I e-mailed Morgan and said that I had decided it was time to get serious about my writing. She suggested submitting to The Wild Rose Press, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Now, here I am today with my first romance out in print, another under consideration, and a free read coming out in December. I’m also working on the next book in the series that features the bar where it all started. (And these days I count Toby, Kenny, Carrie, and Brad among my favorites.)

The music still brings me inspiration. There’s a story in every song.

So, yes, my music muse has been good to me. In more ways than one. Feel free to visit me at http://www.debrastjohnromance.com/ to find out more about where my muse has taken me.

How to enter the contest: Leave a comment at the end of this post, then send an email to blogcontests@morganmandel.com , leaving your name and saying you commented. One winner will be drawn from the entries and an e-mail will be sent to you requesting your snail mail address. Good luck!

Hot Mamas

Okay, after seeing Trace Adkins Friday night at Sears Centre Arena, his performance was so great, some of his songs just happened to stick in my mind. Actually, that probably would have happened even if I hadn’t gone to the show. Like everyone in the world probably knows, I do love country music.

Anyway, his song, Hot Mama, sprang to mind when I read an article in the Daily Herald in the Health & Fitness Section on Monday. It was about Moms participating in an unusual health program called StrollerFit, with all kinds of fun exercises like Peek-A-Boo Lunges and Ring-Around-the-Rosie Squats.

Apparently this craze is sweeping the NorthWest Suburbs of Chicago and classes are being held at many park districts. More on this program is at www.strollerfit.com.

Gone is the idea that once a woman has a child she can no longer be attractive. Instead, women are encouraged to get back into shape and not suffer in the process. Many books feature women who have children. Miraculously, somehow they manage to make it through birthing without losing their svelte beauty.

Some themes centering around women who give birth are the Single Mother Going It Alone, Man Falls for Woman with Instant Family, and the Secret Baby novel. Secret Baby is about how a woman keeps the birth of a baby from the biological father. At some spot in the novel he learns about his child and mayhem results. Although it’s been done often, if it’s done well, the suspense and discovery can be riveting. If you’d like to read one, I recommend This Time for Always by Debra St. John. You’ll hear more about her novel in a later post.

In the meantime, I thought I’d put up the link for Trace’s video, Hot Mama, for you to enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjdpSQD2bns