dahlia dewinters

Support for MC/IR Writers, Information for their Readers

With the recent announcement of the Romance Writers of America sanctioning a chapter that deals with Multicultural and Interracial Authors of romances, I decided to take figurative pen in hand and make some comments. MC= Multicultural and IR= Interracial. Note that all IR is multicultural, but not all MC is IR. J

Writers need support. We need support through those times where we’ve done a manuscript and thought it was the worst thing we’ve ever written. We need support with the promotion that we are doing with our books. We need support when mapping out our next great idea.

Our readers want to know what’s new, what’s happening, what’s going on. They want to be there when our book releases, so they can be ahead of the wave.

I am pleased that the Romance Writers of America have finally acknowledged that yes, there are writers and readers of multicultural and interracial romance, but I also think that they are late to the party.

Ever since I picked up Sandra Kitt’s Color of Love, I have enjoyed reading romances that featured a black heroine. Mind you, it’s also fun to read the other types of romances too, but it got a little annoying to read about the heroine’s “creamy white skin” and “golden flaxen strands”. I wanted a heroine who had to set her hair at night and maybe touch it up in the morning before work. I wanted a heroine whose hero appreciated her thick curly hair, her creamy brown, bronze, earth-colored, carob-colored skin. Thus, I began writing romances of my own and reading romances that featured multicultural characters.

I also see the need to support authors of this romance genre, who can too soon get lost in the shuffle. My Facebook groups: IR/MC Romance Readers and Writers, as well as Multicultural Romance Authors. These groups are specifically for authors and readers of romance (not women’s fiction) that feature multicultural characters. These groups are new and finding their way, but we’d love it if you’d stop by, join and add your voice to the conversation!

Dahlia

Sultry Saturday – I'm Ready for some Football

Aren’t you? The Giants won the Super Bowl, Peyton Manning was fired from the Colts and Tim Tebow is a Jet. Drew Brees had a slight contract dispute and Wes Welker didn’t get the long-term contract he was looking for (but who’s surprised about that, really). Lots of changes taking place in the world of American football.

But this Sunday’s Hall of Fame Game with the Saints versus the Cardinals (no fair telling who’s going to win that one) kicks off a new season of any given Sundays. Will Peyton Manning get crushed in Denver or will he be able to pull out a ring? I mean, Tebow got the Broncos to the playoffs last year, so it’s not like they’re not a good team.

Enough with the football chat, I could go on forever, tell you about my fantasy league and why I think Matt Stafford is fantasy gold this season. But you don’t want to hear that. What you want to see is some American football hotness.

This is not my personal list, although I do have some favorites! See if you can guess who!

Brian Urlacher may be getting a little old for football, but the 6’4″, 258-lb linebacker certainly doesn’t show it on the field. He takes them down to the turf, even returning a fumble off of Michael Vick for a 90 yard touchdown. Elected to the Pro-Bowl eight times, Urlacher has proven he’s not just another hard body, although we appreciate him just so.

Peyton Hillis, a Razorback running back from University of Arkansas, has had quite a career in the NFL. First, a member of the Denver Broncos (where he had a stellar season), where the other Peyton is currently residing, he went to the Cleveland Browns, was voted to the cover of Madden and promptly had the worse season. Switched agents, pulled hamstrings and, gasp, got married. He is now with the Kansas City Chiefs and I have my fingers crossed that his 6’2″ 250-lb power running back will post the numbers he had his season with the Broncos. You’re awesomely cute, Peyton, but don’t mess up my Fantasy team, please?

Adrian Peterson, running back for the Minnesota Vikings is all that he’s cracked up to be. A former ProBowl MVP, this 6’1″ 217 lb specimen set an NFL record for the most rushing yards in a single game, in his first season as a Viking. But you don’t really need to know that, right? Just take a look at the picture and enjoy.

The Terrible Towel town, Pittsburgh, is the football home of this next lovely fellow. A safety with the Steelers, Troy Polamalu was a first round draft pick in 2003 due to his stellar college career at the University of Southern California. Making interceptions, tackling and rushing, this guy does everything but kick and pass. Gorgeous hair too, his Head and Shoulders commercials are legend..

For you poor, poor Jets fans, don’t fear. You have a cute quarterback. Not a very good one, but a cute one and that counts for something. Mark Sanchez. He, like Polamalu, also attended the University of Southern California and was the second quarterback drafted in the 2009 draft. At 6’2″, 225, he’s rather short for a quarterback, with his Giants’ counterpart being 6’4″, the average height for quarterbacks, he still manages to make quite a few good games, to the extent of beating Peyton Manning and the Colts in the 2011 AFC Championship game. Good quarterback, needs a better O-line. But, he can always fall back on his looks!

There you have it folks, some of the NFL hotties that are on the field today. Granted there are tons more, but I just wanted to give you a sprinkling. If you have one, list your fave NFL hunk in the comments.

Dahlia

Coming Soon – The Wisest Maiden

Writing is easy compared to the editing process. It’s difficult to take words that you’ve already written, that you’ve already determined that they say what you want them to say, then tweak them to make them more evocative. But I tell you, the hardest part of the process of getting a book into e-print is the blurb. So, here is the “work of art” that made me pull my hair out in the space of fifteen minutes:

After she is forced into marriage with a powerful ruler who deflowers and kills his brides, Issalia is compelled to use her wits to avoid the executioner’s axe. But can she avoid having her heart captured by the deeply wounded king?

You have no idea (or perhaps you do) how difficult that was to write!

Without further ado, here is the cover reveal and longer blur for The Wisest Maiden:

The Wisest Virgin – Liquid Silver Books – August 13th

Blurb:

Betrayed by his first wife, King Toridesh gives his new brides no
chance to deceive him. After he marries a virgin of his choosing and
consummates the marriage, he has them killed.

As an only child, Issalia has been sheltered by her parents in an
attempt to shield her from their king’s murderous intent. When her
mother falls ill, Issalia refuses to allow their market-stall be
closed for the day, knowing that this one day of income stands between them
and poverty.

While in disguise, the King spies the lovely Issalia in the
marketplace and takes her as his next bride. Will Issalia
succumb to the fate of the virgin brides before her or will she be
able to break the King’s curse?

See the Pinterest board.

Missing New Orleans

It’s barely ten a.m. and the temperature outside as I type this is already 82 degrees. Yep. It’s totally summer. I’m glad. The hot weather gives me an excuse to stay in and write. Strike that last. I’ll use any excuse to stay in and write, who am I fooling?

Weather like this always reminds me of the time I spent in New Orleans, back in the early nineties, way before Hurricane Katrina and the casinos. When it was hot like this, and that was all the time during the summer, you could go out to the daiquiri drive thru and get a strawberry daquiri. That’s right. In New Orleans, there were shops in strip malls that sold at least 10 different flavors of ALCOHOLIC daiquiris.

<—–Yes. Alcoholic slurpees. You’d go in (or drive up) and order the one you wanted. Then you would drive off home sipping at your daiquiri WHILE YOU DROVE. Yes. Awesome, right? Oh, for you teetoalers out there, there was always the Bahama Mama down at the faaaaar end of the row and the server would always sigh heavily and cut their eyes when they had to serve up one of those.

That large jar? That’s for tips. Yeah, not gonna happen. I just cleaned out the change holder in my Toyota to buy this daiquiri, boss. There’s nothing left for you, sorry. By the way, um, you’re NOT a waitress. You’re getting paid at least minimum wage.

Also, I think there was a ton of a lot more going on in those shops than I was aware of back then. People (guys) were always hanging around. And not the cool kind either. The kind that would ask you for a “ride”. Uh-huh. That’s another blog post.

Now I have to settle for a strawberry banana smoothie from Burger King. No alcohol. Le sigh.

When the heck is New Jersey going to get a daiquiri shop. I’d even give up the drive thru.

Reflections

Time for me to take a deep breath. I’ve got two (count ’em) two stories out on submission that I’m waiting to hear yay or nay and I’ve gotten ideas for two more stories. A writer FB friend of mine, Kassanna lit a fire under my writer bootie when that very day I’d been at sixes and sevens about what to do next. So now, I’m happily working on a sort of a sequel to Kitty Wishes, which was my first little book released last October. Does time fly or what?

Speaking of Kitty Wishes, I’d like to send out a big thank you to those of you who read Kitty Wishes. It is really quite flattering to see that people appreciate the stories that I make up in my head. I hope that it was entertaining to you and that you look forward to my upcoming releases. Right now, I am about 25K into my zombie story, spawned by my watching of The Walking Dead and kinda not really feeling the storyline. For those of you who watch, when they got stuck on that farm for about sixteen years, I had had it. I will say the comic was much better.

So there you go. I leave you with two things: Thank you to my readers, whoever you may be. And, if you haven’t purchased Kitty Wishes and are into paranormal lite…well what are you waiting for?

Much love!

TSS