by Laura K. Curtis | Jul 14, 2014 | Books, Freebies & Giveaways, Romance, Stuff! |
In Toying With His Affections, the heroine, Evie, sells sex toys for a living. She works for a fictional company called Goody’s Goodies that has both retail outlets and a home party arm. Now, before I started writing this book, I knew very little about sex toys. I knew the basics, but not how wide a variety there were, nor that home parties for such a thing even existed.
So, naturally, once I’d decided to write a sex toy story, I had to do research. Which meant hosting a party of my own and conning my friends into inviting my friends to attend. We had a great time. I highly recommend the Passion Parties folks to give you a bunch of good laughs, even if you think sex toys aren’t your thing.
Anyway, I bought several things at the party, some just for me and some to give away as promotional items. Today, I am giving away “31 Sexual Favors for Him.” It’s a set of cards that you can give to someone (or several someones, if that’s what you are into) like little coupons to brighten his day.
As usual with Rafflecopter raffles, don’t forget to CLICK THE BUTTON showing that you’re a member of the mailing list or that you’ve left a comment, or the entry won’t count!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
by Laura K. Curtis | Jul 11, 2014 | Dogs, Stuff! |
Many of you already know this, but some of you may not. (You may also not care—feel free to move right along if you’re here for the freebies; there’ll be another of those tomorrow.) The past month or so has been exceedingly tough, but things are looking up and I have time and energy again to let you know what’s going on.
First and most importantly, my crazy younger dog, Philomena, was diagnosed with kidney disease. She stopped eating and dropped from 32 pounds to 23. I was an utter wreck. We thought for a little bit that she might not live. We were force-feeding her day and night, shoving pills down her throat coated in yogurt to keep her from choking them back up, running her back and forth from the vet constantly. After her first five day stay in the hospital, she came home, and then went back in for another two days. We were scrambling to re-arrange schedules, etc. so that we could maintain some control. But then, after the second stay, they found a new medication for nausea and she popped back up, started eating again, and yesterday’s blood results were excellent. She’ll likely be on drugs and a special kidney-friendly, low-protein diet for the rest of her life, but she’s back to getting into trouble and generally making a pain of herself.
In fact, just today, Mike said to her “you’re so cute, I just want to strangle you.” Which is a good sign that everything is getting back to normal.
My own issues have been brewing since at least last July, though actually longer. The first time I remember losing my grip (literally) and sensation in my right pinkie finger was probably 20 years ago. But it went away. It’s come and gone over the years without me paying it a whole lot of mind, but when I ruptured the C6-C7 disc last July and my whole arm went numb and useless, it was time to start paying attention.
At RWA last year, I was on a lot of painkillers. I’ve been on and off them ever since and once I got my insurance straightened out, I set up surgery. They went in, pulled out two discs (a second had gone bad because of the instability caused by the first one) and then found bone spurs pressing on the nerve that they had to shave off. They put in two small plastic “spacers” instead of discs, that were then screwed in. After a while, the bone should grow around them, “fusing” the vertebrae. Both of my doctors were excellent and when I woke up, the pain in my mid-back that beat like demon wings beneath my shoulder blades had already begun to dissipate.
But neck surgery is…not easy. I am wearing a neck brace which is uncomfortable, especially in the heat. The surgery was July 3, and today is the first day I managed to sit up in bed without lifting my head in my hands as if it were a bowling ball, not something physically attached to me. Yesterday was the first day I managed to eat anything more solid than soup and eggs. (And yesterday it was rice and toast—my stomach is completely destroyed from the number of painkillers I’ve taken since the surgery.)
So, that’s where we are. Yes, I am still planning on going to RWA. Today I feel much better about that choice. Even 48 hours ago, I was thinking I must have been out of my mind. But I’ve only taken one pain pill today and I did the dishes and walked around and, as I said, didn’t have to lift my head as a separate object. So things are looking up. On Monday I go see one of my docs, and on Wednesday I see the other. I suspect I will be required to wear the neck brace at RWA, and I will probably spend most of the con in the bar hanging out instead of walking from place to place.
by Laura K. Curtis | Jun 20, 2014 | Freebies & Giveaways, Stuff! |
Conference season is upon us and when I was at RT recently, I spent a great deal of time talking about manicures with people. I have never had a manicure except when one of my friends insisted that everyone in her wedding party have one. I hated it. I bit my nails right into my twenties, so I never got the hang of the whole thing. And even now I keep them short and very rounded because if there’s a corner anywhere, I’ll pick at it. Also, if I get nervous, my nails break right at the fingertip. (As a side note, my mother’s manicurist says this is because you have a lot of nerves in your fingertips, and when you’re stressed, they throb. True? Not true? I have no idea.)
Anyway, I thought it might be fun—since the in my forthcoming book, Toying With His Affections, the heroine is a bit more of a girly-girl than I am—to do some fun girly giveaways in celebration of the new book. And, naturally, given the multiple manicure conversations at RT, I figured I would start with nails.
This giveaway is for a set of Formula X “Press Pods.” Each of these tiny bottles works sort of like those pens that you shake and then squeeze. You break the cap off, then squeeze a drop of polish out onto the brush (which is revealed when the cap breaks off), then do up a manicure. Each color is good for only one manicure since they cannot be closed again after they’ve been opened, but it comes with 24 different “pods.”
As usual with Rafflecopter raffles, don’t forget to CLICK THE BUTTON showing that you’re a member of the mailing list or that you’ve left a comment, or the entry won’t count!
This entry is U.S. only due to the contents of the package, but keep an eye out for more that will be overseas-friendly!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
by Laura K. Curtis | May 31, 2014 | Stuff!, Writing |
Are you an author? If so, and if you’re planning on going to Bouchercon, you should sign up today! Why? Because if you don’t sign up by June 1, you won’t be on a panel! So run over to Bouchercon 2014 — Murder at the Beach right now and then come on back and read the rest of this post. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.
OK, you’re back? WHAT? You haven’t left yet? Well, let me tell you why you should.
Bouchercon, for those of you who don’t know, is a reader and writer conference. No, you don’t have to be an author. Yes, your favorite mystery and thriller authors will be there. And this year, it’s in Long Beach. Say it with me…Long Beach. Nice weather when so much of the country will be miserable.
But even without the weather, even without the beach, B’con is so worthwhile. B’con 2012 was the place I first got the chance to meet my literary idol, John Connolly. (You can read about that encounter here.) Over the past few years, I’ve both moderated and sat on panels, and in both cases I really enjoyed myself. Because B’con is a fan conference, there’s a lot more interaction between readers and writers. Yes, it’s nice to socialize with writer friends the way one does at RWA or Sleuthfest, but at B’con you also get to meet people who have actually paid money for your books. Do you know what that’s like? Because it’s pretty darned fabulous. These are people who are literally invested in you.
And, as a fan (because, yeah, if you didn’t get it from my pathetic reaction to John Connolly, I am a fan), it’s great to be able to meet the folks whose books you’ve invested in. The people whose characters you know and love. You can hang with them in the bar and find out their deepest secrets. You can go to panels and get the scuttlebutt on what’s coming next. Who has a movie deal? Who’s starting a new series? Get books that aren’t yet available to the general public. Get books signed. Oh, the books, the books!
There’s also a fair amount of general silliness at Bouchercon, like the 2012 cocktail party sponsored by criminalelement.com, where attendees were provided with a mugshot backdrop and various props…and went all out! (You can see the pictures on Pinterest.) Fans and authors alike were getting goofy, and it was all-around fun.
You just never know what’s going to happen at Bouchercon. (Last year, Clare Toohey and I got kicked out of a bar before the conference even began, which I admit is something of a record.) That’s part of its charm.
And if you’re shy, or uncertain about going to a conference, this is a great one to start with. Seriously. Everyone is super-friendly and very helpful. And did I mention it’s in Long Beach?
by Laura K. Curtis | May 23, 2014 | Books, Stuff! |
The latest shots have been fired in Amazon’s bid to take over the world, or at least to become the Wal-Mart of the digital set. If you’re not familiar with their latest move, the NYT has covered it quite thoroughly in multiple articles.
This particular tactic doesn’t come as a surprise to me. I was already at Macmillan in 2010 when Amazon pulled buy buttons off all Macmillan’s books. And then there were a series of bad decisions—publishers should have chosen a different method than agency pricing, they should have told Apple that it wasn’t their business to fight Apple’s battles, and the Justice Department should have recognized that the publishers in no way, shape, or form were acting against the best interests of consumers. So, yeah, everyone screwed up. But anyone who didn’t see this coming has been living in a fantasy world.
Seriously.
As a reader, I appreciate my Kindle. But when there was a Borders in my town, I shopped there. Now, the closest bookstore is an hour away. I stop at Posman books in Grand Central when I pass it on a commute, but I really like electronic books. I don’t want Amazon’s handouts to those booksellers. I want individual bookstores to be able to sell me ebooks that are DRM-free that I can use a variety of devices and apps to open. I want to be able to pick my outlet, be it Amazon, an indie, B&N, or from the publisher itself. And wherever I buy a book, it should work for me, without my having to break through the technology with special tools. I was a huge fan of TotalBoox, which I talked about here when they first hit the scene. I still prefer their method of delivery to Amazon’s, but their UI sucks for genre readers and they don’t seem to be interested in changing it. This is the moment where they could REALLY make a difference, but without someone on staff to handle genre categorization, it’s not going to happen. But seriously, if someone wanted to take that job on, I’d be ALL OVER this service. They offer so much that Amazon simply cannot.
But that’s another post. This one is about my own discomfort not only with Amazon’s guerrilla tactics (see what I did there?) but also with people’s seeming surprise. We live in a capitalist society and for years we’ve been ignoring the increasing deregulation of businesses…which has almost always led to problems. Capitalism may be the best thing we’ve come up with, but it isn’t pretty and it isn’t fair. What on earth led people to think it was?
You may or may not believe that people are inherently greedy. That it’s a dog-eat-dog world. But however you feel you feel about people, you need to understand that companies, be they HMOs or Amazon, want only one thing: money. As much and as fast as they can get it. Bezos makes a lot of noise about how much better Amazon is for authors. Really? Macmillan authors didn’t feel that way in 2010. Hachette authors don’t feel that way now. Amazon is designed to benefit AMAZON. If, along the way, it accidentally benefits some other people too, well, that’s fine. But it’s not designed for that purpose. If every other book sales outlet failed tomorrow, and Amazon were the only place where you could sell your self-published work, do you believe you’d still get the same kind of terms from them? Because I don’t. Not for a second.
Think about it. Especially before you make your next purchase…of anything.
by Laura K. Curtis | May 2, 2014 | Books, Stuff!, Writing |
Anyone who thinks the life of a writer is glamorous has been watching too many movies or too much Castle. In fact, most of the writers I know who don’t have to leave their house for day jobs or to take their kids to school spend a fair amount of time in sweats or pajamas. Their clothes have coffee stains and wrinkles. Their footgear is more often slippers or socks than heels.
But once a year, for the Edgar Awards, the ugliest award on the planet brings out the beautiful side of the mystery-writing community. Even I stuff myself into fancy clothes and head out for the evening. So without further ado, here are some of the fashions on display at the Edgars 2014:
In Toying With His Affections, the heroine, Evie, sells sex toys for a living. She works for a fictional company called Goody’s Goodies that has both retail outlets and a home party arm. Now, before I started writing this book, I knew very little about sex toys. I knew the basics, but not how wide a variety there were, nor that home parties for such a thing even existed.
