Kristen Painter, co-founder of Romance Divas, has put a call out for writers to sign a petition for RWA to change their Rita and GH rules that exclude epubbed and small press authors. As someone who started out and remains an epubbed author, this is an issue near and dear to me, so I decided to post about the petition and give anyone who agrees the option to sign it.

A change needs to happen, so I’m helping DO something about it.

Here’s the link: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/ChangeRWA/index.html

After you sign, you may be taken to a page asking for a donation…just ignore that. Your signature is recorded regardless.

Yes, this is my new address. 1 Deadline Hell Avenue.

Here I sit with my little whine, and I can’t even have any cheese with it because I’m on Weight Watchers and I’d rather save my points for something else.

The moments between me and the deadline are sliding by far too quickly, and the library day job is at a peak in insanity, so if I implode and don’t blog for a few days some time in the next few weeks, you know why.

Pray for me.

I’m over at the Samhain Blog today talking about writing through flood, famine, and other natural disasters as well as chatting up my upcoming release, Big Girls Don’t Die.

Click here to come say hi!

Angela James, editor extraordinaire, is coming to Romance Divas for a 3 day class on Epublishing! Come join us Jan 13-15 and ask her anything.

Everything You Ever Needed to Know About Epublishing (and some things you didn’t know you should know)

Why doesn’t epublishing offer advances? What are some of the pros and cons of publishing my manuscript via epublishing? How do I research publishers? Can I really make money in epublishing? What exactly is POD? Can you give me a snappy comeback for people who say that epublishing isn’t real publishing?

Epublishing has evolved and grown, especially in the last 5 years, but with growth comes pitfalls and problems, and trusting an epublisher with your baby might seem like a risky proposition. We’ll cover the basics of epublishing, from choosing an epublisher and contract details to methods of ebook and print distribution to reasons why you might not want to epublish your manuscript.

Bio:

In 2005, Angela James joined Samhain Publishing, Ltd, a small press company focusing on digital publishing, as its executive editor, where she has played an instrumental role in building the company from the ground up. In her executive position at Samhain, Angela is responsible for managing the publisher’s editorial services division. Her responsibilities include the management of editorial staff, quality oversight, networking and marketing efforts at regional, national and international writing conferences to promote the electronic publishing industry as well as Samhain.

In addition to her administrative duties, Angela continues to edit more than 50 authors including national bestselling authors Lucy Monroe, Lilith Saintcrow and Deidre Knight.

I’m over at The Novelty Girls doing my usual thang. Come exercise your visitation rights!

Loribelle Hunt will be doing a workshop about writing werewolf heroes for WIM tomorrow. There will be lots of other cool stuff going on too!

Here’s the official details:

Cobblestone Press is hosting the 2009 annual Words in Motion Conference Jan 9-11 (Fri, Sat, and Sun) at in the Community Forums at http://www.cobblestone-mainstreet.com

Attendance and participation is free.

Theme: Sci-Fi, fantasy, and urban fantasy romance

Presentation Schedule includes:

January 9th, Friday

· Character Development for Urban Fantasy by Yolanda Sfetsos

· Creating 3 Dimensional Characters for Paranormal Worlds by Patti O’Shea

· Developing Believable Wolf-Shifting Heroes by Loribelle Hunt

Saturday, January 10th

· World Building for Paranormal Romance by L. Shannon

· Writing Science Fiction Romance by Kayelle Alan

· Your Underwear is Showing: How to Prepare for Online Events By Alice Anderson

Sunday, January 11th

· Creating Super Hot Super Heroes by P. Andrews

· Top Mistakes that Authors Make When Writing Paranormal Romance by Cobblestone Press Managing Editor, Brandi Loyd

· Designing Covers for The Darker Side of Romance

Other Events during the 3 day conference is an Author Parade that runs Friday-Sunday – Authors post their contests for readers to enter.

Also Publishers will have a Publisher Panel for Q&A throughout the conference.

To attend, you only need to register at the Mainstreet Forums and you will be allowed access. (Registration is required to reduce the amount of spammers to the site)

We hope you will start off the New Year at Words In Motion Conference!

Last night, I found out I’m a CAPA Award nominee from The Romance Studio for my naughty pirate time travel, Treasured, in their erotic fantasy romance category.

YAAAAAAAY! I’ve never been nominated for anything before. This is so exciting. I’m so flattered! TOTALLY made my day!

In even more awesome news, a bunch of my best writer friends have also been nominated!

In the contemporary erotic romance category, Forbidden Fruit by Eden Bradley got a nod. And in the erotic paranormal category, Loribelle Hunt’s Captured Moon was nominated, and my girl R.G. Alexander got two nominations in that category–one for Regina in the Sun and the other for Lifting the Veil.

Sweet! Go us! (Check out the rest of the nominees here)

Okay, so I’m fat. There I said it. I’m out of the closet.

But I’m going to get healthy.

What brought this on? I turned 28 a few weeks ago and I know it’s only going to get harder as I get older. I’ve seen how my family struggles. My parents, my grandparents. I don’t want to do that. So, I’ve decided I’m going to get healthy by the time I’m 30 and stay healthy. A lifelong change. It’s time, I’m ready.

Gemma Halliday, a truly awesome sauce author, let me know about this program going on through the show The Biggest Loser, where losing weight means they’ll help feed the homeless.

So, if you’re hopping on the healthy bandwagon this year, join me and make a pledge. It’s free…except the sweat equity of getting fit.

Here’s the info:

“For every pound you lose, we will donate 10¢ to Feeding America™ – enough to provide one pound of groceries to a local food bank. Report your final results between 4/1/09 and 5/5/09.”

See program details.