I’m taking poll on how people feel about birthdays. The topic has come to my mind because this week (July 28–to be exact) I’m celebrating one of those milestone ones –the kind with a 0 or a 5 involved. They hit me a bit harder lately and make me think a bit more. They also make me very happy that I’ve lived to reach another one.

As I look back on all of my birthdays, I’ve started to think about the different ways I’ve celebrated them. When I was a kid (except when we were traveling to or from a cottage my family used to rent in Northern Michigan), I got to choose my favorite dinner. And I always chose the same thing–turkey salad from Sanders, a famous restaurant and ice cream parlor in Detroit, Michigan. My mom always had the turkey salad delivered to the house, packed in dry ice, along with Sanders’ famous ice cream and birthday cake. Heavenly! As long as my three sons were all living at home and unmarried, I used to let them choose their birthday dinners, too.

I also vividly remember my fifth birthday because my Mom threw a huge party for me. I can picture myself playing in the back yard with friends and each of us received a special paper doll with a complete wardrobe that could be attached with magnets. Funny that I remember the magnetic paper doll more than any of the presents I received that day. And I still have images in my mind of running on the lawn in my party dress. It’s been a long time since I’ve worn a party dress on my brithday! I think I’m going to revive the tradition this time.

Another memorable birthday was also one of those milestone ones. This time my editor Brenda Chin (who is the best editor in the world) invited her authors to go white water kayaking. What fun! We were all in individual kayaks and I eventually flipped out of mine and had to cling to a big rock until I was rescued by our guide. And he was the epitome of a Blaze hero! High quality eye candy. I eventually put him in one of my books.

Another birthday that stands out in my mind was the one when my oldest son took me to my favorite local restaurant, Rosalie’s, in Skaneateles, NY. I was going through a divorce at the time, and I was so moved by his thoughtfulness. He didn’t want me to be alone. But he didn’t just take me to any restaurant. He took me to my favorite even though it was an hour’s drive away. Kevin has also inspired many of my heroes. He has a lot more than eye candy going on.

I could go on and on. Believe me, I have quite a few birthdays to remember here. Recently, I’ve been celebrating a lot of them during RWA’s National Conferences. And that’s what I’ll be doing this year. On July 28, I’ll be signing books at the Literacy Signing in the Dolphin Hotel in Orlando, and then my roommate is treating me to dinner. I’ll be wearing my party dress to both events.

And I’m going to do something different this year. Instead of confining my celebration to just one day, I’m going to continue to celebrate all year. Another author and I are already planning a trip to Spain next March, and I have a list of new things that I’m going to try. Not a bucket list. I’m not quite ready for that yet. But birthdays are too marvelous to celebrate them on only one day.

How do you feel about birthdays and what special ones do you remember? Please share. And I’ll send either my new August release, “Twice the Temptation,” or any book from my backlist to the top five stories.

Happy Birthday to all of you!

I’m in Orlando, partying conference style all week – so I’m posting ahead of time and although I’ll try to get internet to check in today, it might be sketchy.

So I thought I’d use the day to play a little game

Answer as many of these questions as you’d like -for each answer, I’ll toss your name in the hat to win goodies from the conference (free books, doodahs from the goodie room, whatever I bring home).

*Name three books on your nightstand right now (if you don’t have books -first off, why not?- and secondly, go ahead and name three things instead)

*If you could ask any character you’ve ever read for advice, who would you ask and on what topic?

*What one character would you trade places with for 24 hours?

*Pick up the book you’re currently reading, turn to page 172 and share the third line on the page.

*What book in your TBR pile are you most looking forward to reading?

Hope you have a GREAT day. And if you’re in the Orlando area, stop by the RWA Literacy Signing this evening from 5:30-7:30 p.m. at the Walt Disney World® Dolphin Resort, Pacific Exhibit Hall

It’s the cover for my second Blaze, SEDUCE AND RESCUE!
This book is a sequel to my first Blaze, LET IT RIDE that was released last May ‘09. Seduce and Rescue also takes place in Vegas and at Nellis Air Force Base, and all the buddies from the first book are back in this one–including Captains McCabe and Hughes, who are up to their usual pranks. There’s only one person who hasn’t paid up from the bet the guys made in the first book, and that’s this book’s hero, Lt Col. Ethan Grady.
I’m so excited about this story, because it was such fun to write. My heroine, Lily, was impulsive and wild, and likely to do anything that popped into her head, which made for some really fun scenes. Here’s the blurb from the back of the cover:
Out of the fire…and
into his bed!
Lieutenant Colonel Ethan Grady is having his very first massage with a rather eccentric but smokin’-hot redhead, Lily Langford. But her touch isn’t so much calming as it is very distracting. When he accidentally sets Lily’s business and home ablaze, Ethan can’t tell if the smoldering is from the fire…or their attraction to each other! But now Ethan’s condo is invaded by the free-spirited Lily, who’s convinced that he’s the one who really needs to be rescued. And Lily’s methods? Well, they’re not so traditional. Still, Ethan can’t remember having his chakras aligned so…er, intensely. But will this be rescue—or retreat?

Isn’t the cover gorgeous? Even though Lily is technically a redhead, this picture just perfectly encapsulates my idea of Lily and Ethan.
SEDUCE AND RESCUE will be on shelves October 1st!
And i just learned my next Blaze will keep my working title PRIMAL CALLING, and will be released in March 2011. PRIMAL CALLING is about a reclusive Alaskan bush pilot and the Travel Channel celebrity who sneaks aboard his plane. Things heat up fast when they get stranded on the frozen tundra!
So, I guess I don’t have a question except…don’t you think the Harlequin Art Department has been doing a fantastic job with the Blaze covers?

HERE’S HIS STORY:

I would have preferred to tell this story in person, but it is simply too ridiculous not to share as quickly as possible…

So I’m taking a shower, which is normal for a Saturday morning. And my parents and brothers go to karate practice, which is also normal for a Saturday morning. I get out of the shower — still normal — and try to open the door — still normal — at which point the doorknob in my 90-year-old house falls off — not normal.

I am now alone in the house, trapped in the bathroom.

My family will not return for two hours. I am straight-up, R Kelly-style trapped in the bathroom. I have no phone. I also, for the record, have no Beretta. And there was no singing, although in retrospect there should have been.

The first option is to wait it out. I could take an extra-long shower, Clorox-wipe the entire bathroom, or do the Unspeakable (which honestly couldn’t occupy me for two hours). The second option is to exit through the window. But I wouldn’t be able to get back into the house. So I would be marooned in my hot backyard, wearing my dirty boxers and a towel, waiting for my family to come home. The third option is to escape. I go from R Kelly to MacGyver, amass a collection of potentially useful bathroom items — electric razor, seven toothbrushes, plunger (not sure how exactly that would have helped), hand soap, Q-tips, depleted toothpaste tube — and get to work.

My first plan of attack is to reattach the doorknob, which of course fails. Then, after about fifteen minutes of poking, hitting, jiggling, and otherwise harassing the door with various implements, I discover the fatal flaw of my prison: The door opens inward, but when I push it out, the Little Thing that the doorknob operates that goes into the Little Notch in the door (I don’t know much about door anatomy.) gets pushed back into the door. So all I need to do is block the Little Thing from going into the Little Notch while I yank the door back towards me.

I survey my toothbrush army, and ultimately select two soldiers for the mission: The smallest (one of my brothers’) and the largest (a surprisingly robust free handout from our swanky downtown dentist). I lodge the small toothbrush in the Little Notch, hoping that the Little Thing will slide over it when I pull the door. But without a doorknob, it is very difficult to exert inward force on a door, so I use the large toothbrush to pry into the stump where the doorknob once was and start yanking.

With each toothbrush dangerously close to its breaking point, the door lurches open. A refreshing burst of not hot-sticky-just-took-a-shower air comes over me. Free at last! And it was so freaking fun.

If you really want an adrenaline rush, I encourage you to succeed in escaping from an inconvenient but not dangerous situation using only immediately available household items.

Hoping there will be no Volume 2.

Well, it’s actually conference time for a couple thousand Romance Authors as they all congregate for the Romance Writers of America national conference, held this year in Orlando Florida! There are workshops. There are awards ceremonies. There are keynote speeches and spotlights and book signings. There are parties and get-togethers and luncheons. There really is something for everyone.

This is one of the most fun, and most exhausting, events of the year for many writers. And having never attended any other type of conference, I’m not sure if that’s the norm for conference fun or not.

What it does mean, though, is that the blog will be a little on the quiet side for the next week. With most of the authors computer-less and the editors busy with appointments and giving workshops, it’s likely to be a little quiet around here. But don’t worry – we’ll be back in full blogging mode by the beginning of August and everyone will have fun stories and tales to share.

In the meantime – what’s your conference experience? If you’re a writer, do you attend the RWA conference? Readers, would you come to the literacy signing if it was nearby? And have you ever attended a conference? What’d you think?

As I’m sure most of you know, the RWA Annual Conference is coming up at the end of the month. This is a time of much excitement for romance writers and editors alike, and this year will be my first RWA conference!

For the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to plan my time at RWA. My appointments are scheduled and I know when the main events are. It was strange and wonderful to have someone book a hotel and flight for me. Usually I’m the one booking things for others.

Thursday night is packed! I’ll be going to the American Romance authors’ dinner, the National Readers’ Choice Awards, the PASIC reception and the eHarlequin pajama party. Friday morning I do my first appointments ever—nervous, who me? Friday afternoon I will of course be attending the Spotlight on Harlequin—I hope to see you all there. Friday night is the Harlequin party, which I’m told is a total blast. I can’t wait to party with the Blaze babes! Saturday I’ll be going to our Blaze authors’ lunch, PAN, and the RITA Awards ceremony. Plus, I’ll get to spend time with three of my authors: new American Romance author Leigh Duncan, fabulous Blaze author Kira Sinclair, and brand new Blaze author Meg Maguire. Trust me, you’re going to love her first book!

Do you have any advice for me on my first RWA conference? What are your favorite events? What workshops look good to you?

I’m very much looking forward to seeing those of you I’ve been emailing and talking to on the phone over the past four years. I hope you’re all as excited as I am about Florida.

Can’t wait to see you there!
Laura

I know many Blaze Babes have talked about research, but when a person is neck deep in it, as I am, it’s hard to think of much else. So- another blog about research!

Next year is the 10th anniversary of Blaze, if you can believe that. I’m writing a Uniformly Hot Blaze to celebrate, and in this book both the hero and the heroine are in the U.S. Air Force.

I know as much about Air Force life as I do about quantum mechanics. Not a good place to begin, but I love the story and the characters, and I’m determined to do them justice.

The problem is, there is a humongous, gigantic, epic amount of information about the Air Force. A lot of the data is available online. Too much data. Trying to get the specifics, the telling details, is turning out to be a huge task. For example, when to Captains greet each other in every day work situations, do they just act like regular folks on the job (only in uniforms) or is there a protocol that’s understood and observed?

Then there’s the issue of jargon specific to not only AF personnel in general, but how that differs from the jargon of fighter pilots.

I probably could skim some things, but I don’t want to. One of the things I’m loving about working on this book is that I’m a total sentimental sap when it comes to folks serving their country. Seriously, I tear up at the National Anthem, I’m a sucker for men and women risking their lives for a greater cause. Honor and courage move me deeply.

So I’ve got close to 80 bookmarks on my computer, everything from details on uniforms to job descriptions to the course syllabus of Fighter Pilot Training School. I also have a 3 DVD set that was produced by Tony Scott shortly after 9/11, that follows three hopefuls in their quest to fly F-15s.

It’s still not enough, and I’ve got a ton of xx’s where I can’t find the specific word or phrase or even the correct training progression. It would have helped a great deal to have been in the Air Force myself, but it’s a bit too late for that.

What I have found is that there are live online chats with recruiters that I can go to, although I feel guilty taking up much of their time. I’m going to try to drive to Vegas and go visit the PR person at Nellis AF Base, if at all possible.

If I’m lucky, I’ll hook up with someone who knows the universe of this particular branch of the military, and maybe, maybe, they’ll take a look at the manuscript and help point out corrections that need to be made.

I know the books aren’t on the shelves for long, and that so many people regard them as little books (and that’s on the kind end of the spectrum), but I cannot, will not, give this subject a light brushstroke. Of course, the central theme is the love story, and it does take center stage, but the world my characters inhabit deserves to feel real, be as close to the truth as I can make it.

I wish I had months and months to research, but I’ve got to work fast, so that means working smart. And being disciplined, because all I want do is dive into the research and not come up for air.

I have always loved reading books that took me new places, that gave me the experience of entering a fully formed world I’ve not been exposed to. I’ve also read too many books where the research has been painfully neglected. The may be small books, but I know Blaze readers are smart and deserve the kind of reading experience that lets them escape into a world they can inhabit, that feels utterly real.

So, um, if anyone knows an Air Force kinda person who wouldn’t mind talking to a writer – let me know.

Also, just because I love it beyond belief when I can lose myself in another world, any contemporary examples out there? Favorite books that swept you away to a new, unique view of life? I’d love to hear about them.

Greetings Blaze Babes.

I won’t be around to chat on the 15th for the next couple of blogs. This month I’ll be on a cruise ship in Alaska, being served, seeing whales, being served, hiking glaciers, being served . . . do we detect a theme? Single Mom is ready for a break. Next month we’ll be on our annual trip to the wilds of Maine.

I just turned in a Blaze, the second book in an online-dating trilogy to be released next year in February, April and June. I played around with another different type of hero, and ended up just as in love with him as I was with my nerd hero, Edgar, from Surprise Me . . . I don’t know, maybe my subconscious is telling me to get over Gerard Butler already, whadya think?

This month we are progressing to the next course in our outdoor summer meal. This savory tart is fabulous on a buffet or as a vegetarian main course (both my sons went vegetarian this month, and after reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma, I don’t blame them). It’s beautiful with the pattern of yellow and red tomatoes scattered with black olives, very tasty and can be made a little ahead.

Anyone scared of making pie crust, I’ve come up with a great method, adapted from Cook’s Illustrated and Shirley Corriher, the fabulous chemist/cook whose books, Bakewise and Cookwise analyze the scientific way ingredients act on each other.

Here is what I learned: Fat coating flour keeps the pie crust (or any baked good) tender, because the flour can’t form gluten bonds, which are good for nice, chewy bread, but not for pie crust. Alcohol helps similarly. Bigger fat pieces make the crust flaky, because they melt in the heat and leave holes. Tender and flaky are things we definitely want for pie crust.

Here’s what I do: In a food processor, add roughly 1/5 to 1/4 of the total fat (butter, lard, Crisco) in your recipe to the flour and whatever other ingredients (usually salt and/or sugar), turn on the machine and let it run, so the fat is completely mixed into the flour, no visible pieces left. This will make it tender. Then add the rest of the fat in pieces as you usually would, and pulse until they’re pea-sized or slightly smaller. Replace about 1/4 of the ice water in your recipe with vodka, sprinkle that over the fat/flour, and pulse until the dough forms clumps. Chill first or roll out immediately and chill after. I use a floured silicone baking sheet to roll out the dough and usually put the crust (in the pie plate) in the freezer while I’m making the filling.

Here’s the recipe! Bon Appetit!

Tomato and Onion Tart

Have a terrific summer!

Cheers,

Isabel
www.IsabelSharpe.com

What are your favorite things to do in the summer?

Lately, my favorite things are reading, traveling, and (I hate to admit it) catching the new summer series on cable TV. I think at some time in my (not too distant past) sitting by a pool or on the sand at a beach would have been right up there. And swimming would have hit the top of my favorite-things-to-do list. (But a visit to a pool or the beach always involved a book. Or two or three.) Lately, my old favorites like riding my bike, roller skating and running aren’t even making the top ten anymore.

Just in case any of you are favoring more sedentary activities (as I seem to be doing), I’m going to recommend a great book, a new TV show, and a travel destination.

The book I highly recommend is one that I picked up in the Borders at the Jet Blue JFK terminal because I had a four hour layover. It was Elizabeth George’s latest Thomas Lynley mystery, and I loved it. (I have to admit that I love to read mysteries probably even more than I love to read romances. Give me romantic suspense and I’m in heaven!) I used to be an avid fan of Elizabeth George’s, but I haven’t read her in a while. This story and the English setting fascinated me, and since she’s never a quick read, it distracted me from things I had to get done. For me, that’s always a sign of a really good book. (”Silence of the Lambs” once cost me a whole day in Hawaii! Stephen King’s “Salem’s Lot” made me miss most of a Labor Day Weekend at a good friend’s house.)

Now for the TV series. So far my favorite new series of the summer is “Memphis Beat” on TNT. “Covert Affairs” on USA is premiering tonight, but it will take a lot to edge out “Memphis Beat” as one of my new favorite summer shows. Of course my “old” favorite summer TV series include “White Collar,” “Burn Notice,” “The Closer,” and “In Plain Sight.” But the thing I really like about “Memphis Beat” (aside from the fact that it’s a cop show) are the characters and the setting. I’ve watched three episodes and I want to visit Memphis.

The travel destination I’m going to recommend is Queechie, VT. I’d never heard of it. My sister dragged me there on our way back from Nargansett, RI to Syracuse, NY. We did visit a beach first, and the route makes a nice triangle on the map. We stayed in Woodstock, but the place that drew my sister there was the glass blowing factory that Simon Pearce established in Queechie. Simon relocated his family there from Ireland and bought an old mill to design and manufacture his glass. His wife is a potter. In addition to a waterfall and glass and pottery demonstrations, there’s a fabulous store and a gourmet restaurant. Shopping, great food and wine–that seems to define what I like in a travel destination–even more than a beach. Queechie is a bit out of the way, but if you’re visiting New England, I highly recommend it.

One more thing–as long as I’m listing favorite things and recommending… It’s the fiftieth anniversary of the novel, “To Kill a Mockingbird.” If you haven’t read it, I recommend it. If you have read it, I recommend reading it again. I had the great pleasure of teaching that book for fourteen years to ninth graders, and I never grew tired of it. I intend to read it again myself before the summer ends.

Have you got a list of favorite things you like to do in the summer? Do you have a book or a travel spot or TV show that you’re crazy about? Or do you have a memory of reading “To Kill a Mockingbird?” or seeing the movie?

Please share.