I love Valentine’s Day! There was a bit of a twist this year. I spent the day presenting a program to approximately 100 members of Tampa Area Romance Writers! The morning began at 9a.m. and my topic was “How Good Does Your Book Have To Be in this Market? Ten Things You Should Check Before You Send In Your Manuscript.” Some of those in the group had submitted the opening page of a manuscript which I read aloud. There was much discussion between myself and the audience whether a page met the requirements I’d outlined in my speech. Authors Julie Leto and Roxanne St. Claire were several of the authors in attendance who added to the discussion. After lunch, my topic was “The Power of No.”

I enjoyed the enthusiastic response of the large group (every seat occupied!) as well as seeing friends, many published authors themselves. By mid-afternoon, I participated in a group booksigning at Barnes and Noble. I shared a table with author Karen Rose, who has a new hardcover, Kill For Me, in stores and currently number 20 on the New York Times list. See photo below of Karen personally autographing a copy of her book to me. What a fun day!

My daughter had invited me to dinner with her family that evening so it was a busy but very satisfying Valentine’s Day for me filled with friends and family.

So far I’ve had a busy–but hectic–year. I’ve just mailed the finished copy of a new book–and the first in a new series for MIRA Books–titled OUTCAST. It’s due in stores June 30, 2009 so check back here for further details, including an excerpt. A STRANGER’S GAME will be released in a mass market paperback in August and in stores 7/28/09. In the meantime, this month two of my favorite books are being re-issued and even specially priced for readers.

AFTER THE KISS (Dell) is a historical novel and, although a stand-alone book, is one of those in my Captive Hearts series. Too tall and entirely too outspoken, Miss Eliza Sheringham grew up thumbing her nose at polite English society. So when Captain Lord Marcus Wharton, called The Beau for his stunning good looks, set his rakish sights on her, Eliza thought nothing of rejecting his advances. Until a stolen kiss swept her into the arms of a man too dangerous to love

The INHERITANCE (Dell) is another reader favorite. It’s about the ravishing Duchess Daisy who vowed to save Severn Manor by marrying Nicholas Calloway, a Texas bounty hunter come to claim his family’s ancestral lands. But the moment they met, the slate-eyed barbarian took Daisy’s breath away. She proposed a marriage of convenience. But she hadn’t reckoned on flash-fire passion with the savage new duke.

Both sound romantic and delicious, don’t they?

Happy Reading!

There’s something about actually being “at the game” that makes it more exciting. The swell of sound in the crowd, stomping on metal tiers that reverberate under your feet, rising to your feet with a yell in your throat as your team scores a touchdown. And those greasy, absolutely delicious Bronco Brats (bratwurst on a bun with mustard and catsup) that you eat only at the game. And, of course, you’re wearing the same colors as everyone else in a crowd of around 70,000 people, most of you rooting for the same team.

When I taught theatre at Southwest Texas Junior College in Uvalde, Texas, way back in 1973, I was first exposed to the “Friday Night Lights” phenomenon. Everyone went to Uvalde High School Coyotes football games on Friday nights because there wasn’t much else to do in a small, Southwest Texas town. I didn’t understand the game, but I soon learned.

I commuted to the University of Texas at Austin School of law each week for the first year and did it with a five-hour-long Greyhound bus ride. Texas has two great professional football teams, the Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans (formerly Houston Oilers) always scheduled sequentially on Sunday, so I could listen to the first game and half of the second on a transistor radio. I’d end up at Mr. Gatti’s Pizza in Austin, which had a large screen TV, and watch the end of the game, while I ate pepperoni pizza and read torts or constitutional law for my classes on Monday.

I was frustrated when I took a job out of law school in Richmond, Virginia, and everyone was a fan of the Washington Redskins–mortal enemies of the Dallas Cowboys. For two-and-a-half years I gritted my teeth. Then I transferred to a firm in Miami, Florida, and my love affair with the Miami Dolphins began.

The first Dolphin games I saw were played in the Orange Bowl. Then Joe Robbie built a new stadium close to where I lived in Pembroke Pines, Florida, and I became a season ticket holder for the first time. I watched every game Dan Marino played through the end of his football career.

When I moved to Denver, it was just after John Elway retired. It’s fun to be a Broncos fan, because their symbol is a white horse. They’re the “good guys.” It was tough attending the Monday night game where the Dolphins played the Broncos. I was still new to Denver, so I rooted for the Dolphins, who won.

One of the interesting things about football is that people rarely change their affiliation from one team to another. If you’re a Dolphins fan, you’re a fan for the rest of your life. It took a couple of years, but I managed to become a Broncos fan.

And now I’m in Florida, in the home territory of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. This time, I haven’t been able to make the switch from being a Broncos/Dolphins fan. And I’ve tried. I’ve attended games all season, but in the end, I’d rather be in a sports bar somewhere watching “my” teams play.

If you like football, you understand what I’m feeling. And if you don’t, maybe this will help you understand what inspires your brother or sister or husband or father to be such a fan of the game.

Yesterday dawned cloudy and rainy, which seemed like perfect weather for museums. I headed for the Victoria & Albert Museum, which you can get to through tunnels in the underground. Raphael’s “cartoons” (drawings of intended paintings) are there, along with the bed with the tallest canopy I’ve ever seen dating back to the 1500s. There’s a room of fashions through the ages, and I’m glad I don’t have to pay for embroidered silk dresses, but there’s something “insignificant” about what we wear these days. In the old days your clothes spoke to your wealth. Today you can be wearing a very expensive dress that is barely there.

I intended to go to the British Museum, where I could have seen the Rosetta Stone and the Elgin Marbles. But while I was in the Underground I came to the Hyde Park Corner stop and decided to get off. Amazingly, the sun came out and shone for an hour, during which time I took a walk in Hyde Park along the Princess Diana Memorial Walk. Within the hour, the sun was gone.

Then it was back on the Underground to meet my new friend Joanie Humphrey in Chinatown for lunch at the Golden Dragon. As I mentioned, Joanie speaks Cantonese, so when she greeted the hostess, we were immediatley ushered “upstairs” where the native speakers go and the menus are in Chinese. Joanie ordered green tea and a selection of delicious dim sum. She ordered her favorite dessert for us, Sweet Lotus Seed Cakes–which are crushed lotus seeds (tasted a lot like almond paste) covered in an egg white case that is deep-fried. Delicious!

We planned to see THE DUCHESS in one of the theatres on Liecester Square (the center of the theatre district, which is around the corner from London’s Chinatown), and went to the Odeon–where the tiny screen was a bare 24 feet across. Still a wonderful movie, which I will see again on a bigger screen when I get home.

Then it was off to Victoria Station on the Underground to see the musical BILLY ELLIOTT. This has the most imaginative “blocking” (movement of actors onstage) that I’ve seen in a long time. The musical is set in a Welsh coal mining town and it was sometimes hard to understand what the actors were saying, and the language was explicit (and profane), but the dancing was superb and it was an altogether entertaining show.

This morning I packed for the flight back to Rome, from where I will catch my flight back home to America. Hope to get to the Trevi Fountain one more time!

jj

Those of you who know me well know I love to go to the movies. At home, I always go to the movies on Friday afternoon to “prove I don’t have a real job.” Of course, no one sees me working till late at night at the computer to make up for the time I spend at the theatre! Luckily for me, there are dozens of movie theatres in London–to give the crowds of tourists a place to go on rainy Sunday afternoons (like today) when the theatres are dark (No theatre on Sunday. They have shows on Monday instead). Yesterday afternoon I found my way to a theatre in Leicester Square to see APPALOOSA, a western written and directed and starring Ed Harris and also starring Viggo Mortenson and Renee Zellweger. It’s an odd western and therefore very interesting and really well done and I’d recommend you see it.

Yesterday evening I was invited as a guest of BBC correspondent and author (THE HISTORY BOOK) Humphrey Hawksley (his wife Joanie is in management and speaks Mandarin and Cantonese) to a dinner party hosted by his good friend Liz Jensen (another British author) and her other half, Carsten Jensen (a well-known, prize-winning Danish author). Also in attendence were two Swedish authors and their spouses. Marika Cobbold (writing literary fiction) and her husband Michael (an attorney), and Kitty Sewell (writing thrillers) and her husband John (an anesthetist).

This is the kind of literary dinner party you might dream of attending. Every writer there was someone who could contribute another piece to the struggle and journey of being a writer, from difficulties with writing schedules and discipline, to negotiating contracts with publishers, to figuring out where and how to find the inspiration to get the story down on paper. But the conversation didn’t stay on writing. It was also about travel (Kitty and John are heading to India today for research), and the Francis Bacon exhibit currently here in London (I was trying remember who Francis Bacon was from my college humanities class) and whether his paintings were too dark and how intelligent they were (!), and on the delicious food that came in courses.

Carson cooked the first entre–risotto with various kinds of mushrooms, which was followed by Liz’s contribution, cod and sweet potato and coconut stew with crunched brazil nuts and cilantro sprinkled on top (I got the recipe and will be cooking it for my family) and a dessert of honey cake with apricots and clotted cream. Of course there were appetizers earlier (9 p.m.) in the evening with champagne and white wine with dinner. We broke up around 12:30 a.m. and Humphrey and Joanie gave me a ride back to my hotel.

Joanie offered to take me to London’s Chinatown for lunch on Monday, and we’re going to see THE DUCHESS afterward. Can’t wait!

Today it’s raining pretty hard, so I’m headed to the museum and the movies. Will check back with you at the end of the day.

jj