Coming soon: CRAZY

I’m putting the final touches on my new novel, Crazy. It’s been a long time coming but I think you’ll find it was worth the wait. Once it’s up on Kindle, I’ll be doing a ONE DAY GIVEAWAY, so watch for it! Here’s a little bit about the book.

Someone is stalking star chef Emily Simonson. That someone wants her dead, but first, that someone wants her terrified. And that someone has figured out the perfect way to do it.

Aspiring actresses who bear a resemblance to Emily are being murdered and before each murder, a warning is sent. But those warnings don’t tell who, where or when. Who is next? And when will it be Emily’s turn to die?

CRAZY takes you into the mind of a fiendish killer who, fueled by Satanic fantasies and a mysterious Guardian, wreaks havoc in Hollywood. There’s a lunatic on the loose. Who will be the final victim?

Read two chapters here: CRAZY

What's All This Fuss About Sex?

What is it about the subject of sex that makes people in this country so uncomfortable? I’ll admit I really didn’t have the faintest idea of how people would react when my daughter, Kimberley Johnson, and I started work on The Virgin Diaries. She had the idea, I thought it was great and the book was born.

Our aim was to create a book for virgins of all ages and, since virgins are generally young people living at home, for their parents to use as a tool for opening a dialogue with their teen about first time sex and the emotions associated with the experience. We had no agenda when putting together the accounts we gathered. There was no judgment or advice given regarding what a person should or shouldn’t do. It is a book that is simply meant to inform and allow the reader to come to his or her own conclusions and apply those conclusions to their lives.

Once we got the book finished and out on the market, we did what any author would do. We went looking for reviews. And that’s when we found out that people were actually “apprehensive” and “afraid” of what was between the covers. I don’t know what they expected to find. It’s not explicit. It’s not “dirty.” It’s not erotica, which to my mind is just another term for female porn (thank you to Joey on the TV show Friends for that observation, which I have just co-opted). It’s 72 stories from real people telling what it was like both emotionally and physically.

One woman said she thought it was a good idea but she didn’t think it was appropriate for teens under 18. To that I have only this to say: in most instances, the horse is out of the barn by then and Elvis has left the building! There were so many stories where the first time took place at an achingly young age: 12 and 13. The average age? Around 16. Why on earth would a parent want their teen to be uninformed or misinformed about something so important? In then end, our adult reviewers gave us rave reviews.

Teens shied away because we’re older – I could be Grandma and my daughter could be Mom, so who wanted to listen to us? So my daughter went out and sought teen book bloggers. Again, we were greeted with that apprehension. Surmounting it was pretty easy. Kimberley told them to just read it and if it makes you uncomfortable, put it down and forget about it. None of them put it down and all of them gave it a great review.

Studies show that in states where abstinence is the only thing taught, the teen pregnancy rate is higher than in states with a comprehensive sex education program. Even then, sex education deals more with the biology than with the emotional aspect. Again, my question is why do parents wish to stick their heads in the sand and deny the physical urges associated with puberty, the peer pressure and the pervasive sexual messages in advertising, movies and music throughout our society and the effect those factors exert on their children? Particularly when there is so much at stake? Knowledge is power and it is the duty of every parent to arm their children with every resource necessary to meet the challenges of modern society and sex is one of the biggest challenges faced during the teen years.

If this book had been around when I was a teen, I would have devoured it. The same goes for Kimberley. So many people who contributed their stories had the same thing to say. Our teen reviewers DID devour it and saw the value of the information and never once considered it to be titillating or embarrassing. They were grateful for the real input from real people. The Virgin Diaries is timeless and yet a book for our times.

Visit The Virgin Diaries Blog and join the conversation.

Why I Write What I Write

I love reading. Always have. The day I got my first book, a primer about David and Ann and their dog Spot, I was hooked. My heroes have always been the people, who like Calgon Bath Oil, could "take me away." There is something so amazing about the written word and its ability to transport a person to far off places, put them in situations they would otherwise never experience and give them sometimes visceral experiences. I recall an occasion when I was coming down with the flu and knew it. So on the way home from work, I stopped and picked up some paperbacks to read for the duration of my illness. One of them was The Exorcist. I was feeling pretty poorly and thought I’d get in a few pages before I fell into bed. At the time I was living in a one-bedroom apartment and had given the bedroom to my five-year-old daughter. I slept on a sofabed in the living room. I hadn’t yet pulled out the bed and was reading furiously when my little girl awakened and wandered into the living room to ask for a glass of water. I was so into the book that upon hearing her tiny voice calling “Mommy” my heart leapt into my throat, the book flew across the room and I landed with a thud on the floor. Now THAT was a visceral experience!

I like to read all kinds of things but I love writing thrillers and weird stuff. Like the song says: I don’t know why. I just do. I like going to odd and disturbing places in my head and finding out what sorts of things lurk there. Sometimes I’m surprised. Mostly it makes me laugh because the things I write are so unlike who I am. Well, the boring characters are sort of like me, but the villains, who are so much fun for me to write, are the polar opposite of me. I guess that’s why I like to write them. They let me bust out of my shell, so to speak.

The thing that’s so cool about writing, as opposed to acting, which was something I thought would feed that inner rebel, is that I get to be ALL the characters and I have ALL the control. So you now you know. I have control issues. So much of life is out of our control and I’m lucky to be able to have that one little corner where I can do and be anything and everything I can possibly imagine. It’s a powerful thing, even if it’s just an illusion.

Mostly I write what I write because it’s fun, pure and simple. It’s hard work but it’s enjoyable hard work and I love doing it. The MOST fun is when people like what I write. Then I feel like I really did something special. I got to take them away, transport them to a world created in my imagination and engaged them. What a feeling! And who knows, maybe someone will be inspired to write because of one of my books, just like I have been inspired by the authors who have engaged me.

Paper vs. Digital

I was one of those people who always said, "I want to hold a book in my hands!" I really believed it. And I will admit I do like having books around me. They're like old friends or a comfortable pair of jeans. But I'm also a modern woman and an author who has several books out, both in print and in digital formats. So for Christmas the only thing I wanted was a Kindle. I wanted it so I could download my own books and make sure the formatting looked right. And I thought I'd also download a book every once in a while.

I am now officially addicted to Kindle. I love that I have tons of books at my disposal ALL THE TIME! It's great not to have to worry about losing my place if I get up and forget to bookmark my page. And because I really don't want to pay the high prices that traditional publishers insist on charging for eBooks, I'm getting acquainted with a lot of Indie authors and finding that some of my favorite mainstream authors like F. Paul Wilson and Dean Koontz have plenty out there for $2.99 and less. I did step up to the plate and pay $7.99 for the new Sue Grafton. It was worth it.

I will probably buy a conventional book every once in a while. But only if it's one I absolutely, positively have to have and only if the price between the conventional book and the eBook is just a few dollars apart. But then again, maybe not. I've always had a thing for gadgets and my Kindle Touch is a gadget that I love. It's lightweight, small enough to bring anywhere, GREAT for going on trips ( I used to have to lug a bunch of reading materials with me whenever I went on vacation or a business trip) and not only can I download books, I can download games.

The only drawback, as far as I can see, is that you must remember to recharge your eReader. The charge lasts for a long time but it's still a necessity and I can imagine getting all in a dither if I forgot to do it. Then I'd have to sit there, tethered to my computer in order to read and get charged simultaneously. But I'm a pretty savvy gal and I think I can remember to plug in that puppy before I got to bed so all of my goodies will be waiting for me when I arise and once again greet the day.

So there you have it. I am a traitor to paper. I have been seduced by the digital age. And I'm unrepentant.

The Minds of Men

If you ask most women how a man reacts to losing love, you'll get an answer along the lines of "Oh, they don't feel the same way we do. Men have a much easier time of it than women. They just go out and find another woman."  I suppose in some instances that's true. But for the most part, I think men experience the same hurt, the same sorrow, the same feelings of helplessness. They just don't show it. It isn't "manly".  But that doesn't mean the feelings aren't there.

Aint' No Sunshine: Men Reveal the Pain of Heartbreak was a revelation to my daughter and me. We really didn't know what to expect when we began collecting the stories but what we got exceeded any expectations that may have been lurking in the backs of our minds. Some of the stories brought us to tears. Others made us laugh and only one painted the picture of a man whose first and seemingly only concern was for himself and yet, we still applaud that man because he sent us an honest story. We are finding those who've read it agree with us.

We expected that only women would be interested in this book. We were wrong. We've heard from  several gentlemen who told us the book was helpful to them because now they knew they weren't alone. Wow! That's the icing on the cake.

The 42 year Old Virgin

It isn’t often one finds a totally honest person when it comes to the subject of virginity. It’s the reason my daughter Kimberley and I decided that anonymity was the way to go when we began collecting stories for our book The Virgin Diaries. It’s a personal subject and most people don’t want to go on record talking about what in so many instances was an awkward and sometimes embarrassing event in their lives. In my instance, I really didn’t care but needed to be mindful of the person who was my first. After all, I may not care but it’s possible that he wouldn’t want the whole world to know about his deflowering of me.

Recently my daughter started corresponding with a gentleman who found our book online and was overjoyed to find something of this nature. Why? Because he’s a 42 year old virgin. Hard to believe but true. He’s written a book about it and wanted to participate in our blogs and so Kimberley, that Mistress of the Questionnaire, came up with some questions and he answered. His entry is thoughtful, well written and honest. I am impressed!

In the course of going through and editing his piece (I did very little—didn’t have to because it was so well written) I couldn’t help but feel compassion for this man who is now experiencing regrets for having waited so long. I’m certain that fear is also a part of the equation because after having waited for all these years, there must be feelings of inadequacy. I just want to tell him not to fear. Don’t be afraid that women might think you’re weird. Well, perhaps they might but then again, you may find a woman who will be happy to show you the ropes. For you, Anthony, are that rarest of creatures: an adult male who has never engaged in sex and therefore, carries absolutely no threat of transmitting a venereal disease. In this day and age that is SUCH a plus!

Although Anthony is an arch conservative and I am a proud liberal, there some things that transcend politics and this is one of them. I commend him for his honesty and sincerely hope he finds that Sarah Palin loving, pro-life Tea Party woman who will rock his world.

Read his story here: Interview with Anthony Tarquino: The Real 42 Year Old Virgin

The Serial Killer In My Head

I am currently rewriting a novel I completed about a decade ago. It's about a woman who has begun to achieve success only to be stalked by a nefarious character who remains unnamed and mysterious for a good part of the story. The killer decides that not only should the object of hatred be killed but tortured in a most unusual way, that being to kill people who look like her as a prelude to the main event. The character is loosely based on a person I've known in the past but who is not, at least to my knowledge, a serial killer.

When I first wrote the story, it was titled The Happy Face Killer and it was fun in a bizarre way to have the killer leave a bright yellow Happy Face with the inscription "Have a nice day!" at the scene of each murder. You can imagine my dismay that after spending a year writing and polishing and paying for a professional edit, I found out there was a real Happy Face Killer and someone had written a book about him titled The Happy Face Killer. I bought the book and read it, recalling that I'd actually heard reports about the guy on the news. He was a long distance trucker who picked up women who hung out at truck stops, raped and murdered them, then left little scrawled happy faces in restrooms along the interstate system.  Not a very imaginative fellow, nor was he very smart because they caught him and he's in prison now, but wow! Was I ever bummed. So I put the story aside and thought perhaps I'd drag it out again after a few years had gone by.

So they've gone by and I'm doing the rewrite and it won't be titled The Happy Face Killer any longer because I don't want my novel to be confused with the true crime story. In doing research, I've had to read about real killers but I do things ass backwards sometimes, so I did the research after I'd finished the story - just to check if my killer is believable. I found that my fictional killer was just as much of an egomaniac as real killers are. My killer sends missives to the news media. So do real killers. The Happy Face Killer did and so did the Zodiac Killer. Zodiac was smarter than Happy Face because they never found him, although I recently read they think they know who he was but now that person is dead, so the authorities will never know for certain.

I gotta tell you, it's a pretty weird thing to find out that the serial killer living inside your head mirrors the real ones out in the world. In one way it's a great feeling because you know the character stands up to the test of reality and is, therefore, believable, or at least as believable as a crazed manic can be in an ordered world. But on the other hand, it's scary to know that a character like that is back there, lurking somewhere in  the nether regions of your brain, just waiting to get out.

It makes me grateful that writing about it is all the thrill I need rather than the screwed up soul who has to act on those thoughts.

So I'll get back to work and try to get this done by the end of the year and then all you people who like to read mystery-thrillers can pick up a copy of Crazy and get a glimpse into the mind of my serial killer. More than a glimpse, actually but I'll leave that for later. Don't want to put too much on the table right now!