I Read Romance - do you?

Ever wonder how I transitioned from working in the psychiatric field to writing about vampires, werewolves, and demons? Why I write from the male point of view? Or what 5 books I'd take with me if I were stranded for 3 months? Check out my interview today on I Read Romance! http://www [dot] ireadromance.com/wordpress/?p=672 I've been working hard on writing and reading less for the past few weeks. But I'll be leaving for RT in less than 3 weeks and need a few new eBooks for my iPhone for the plane trip. Recommendations are welcome - non-DRM though.  Sam

Why adults on Benadryl should not play with matches.

My poor husband has been sick for over a week. He finally is holding up the white flag and is at the doctors. Hubby rarely gets sick. He normally has a pretty sunny disposition. For days now he's just been miserable-- not sleeping, coughing, sputtering, sore throat, fever, AND he's actually had to call in sick at work. Hubby never calls in sick to work.  So while hubby has been sick, my son has been busy working on a huge physics project. A Rube Goldberg machine that will blow out a candle. For those of you not familiar, Rube is a cartoonest (and inventor) who was famous for depicting complex devices that perform simple tasks in really convoluted ways. So my son's machine - AY YI YI - A marble travels down a tube then hits a cassette tape initiating a domino effect of multiple cassette tapes. The last one knocks a ball off of a platform. The ball is attached to the lid of a music box which then flips open. The music box starts to play. As it does, a string is wound around the music box key. The other end of the string is connected to a roll of quarters. The quarters are positioned on one end of a board. On the other end of the board, which hangs over the edge of the platform, is a heavy ball. As the string winds, the quarters are pulled off of the board, then the ball falls. Of course the ball is hooked to something. Right? It's connected to a cork which is stuffed into the bottom of a funnel. When the cork pulls out, sand starts to pour out of the funnel down a trough and into a coffee filter that is suspended by wire and tied to a lever by a rope. As the filter fills with sand, the lever tilts. On the other side of the lever is a homemade track with a matchbox car on it. The filter with sand goes down, lifting the track. Once it reaches a certain height, the car zooms down the track and hits a mousetrap, setting it off. The mousetrap is hooked up to a string which is wrapped around a fan. The trap goes off, pulling the string and turning the fan blades. In front of the fan is a trough of water with a homemade sailboat in it. On the sailboat is a lighted candle. The fan blows into the sail, moving the boat with the tealight directly under the filter with the sand. The flame burns through the filter, then the sand spills out, extinguishing the candle. Whew! You can imagine how many hours it took for my 15 year old to put all of this together. HOURS and HOURS and HOURS. Yesterday he was working on trying to shave off a little time. Hubby suggested using an accelerant to speed up the burning process. "We can add a little lamp oil."  OMG! The entire thing went up in flames. The flames were so high that they jumped above the wire that suspended the filter and caught on the rope. From there the cardboard trough caught, then the funnel. I ran out of the garage to grab a nearby hose. By the time I came back and put the fire out, 2/3'rds of the machine was gone.  We stood back, looked at the mess, and started laughing. It was definitely one of those times that if we hadn't laughed, we would have cried. My son worked until late yesterday putting everything back together. This time using more non-flammable material and NO accelerant.  The good news is that he's learned a lot in building this thing. He's learned quite a bit about physics - energy transfers, chemical reactions. He's also learned why you shouldn't let adults on Benadryl play with matches. Sam

Forbidden: The Temptation is available for Pre-Order!

I woke up this morning to an eMail in my inbox telling me that Forbidden: The Temptation is available for pre-order from Amazon. And it's 20% off! *jumps up and down clapping* Best of all, is ALREADY has a ranking which means that someone ordered it already. It wasn't my mom, because I have told her yet. LOL! If you do happen to buy and read it, please let me know what you think. Amazon reviews are verrrry nice too.  My plans for today are to clear all my emails and do my blogging, drop my son off at school, stop at the gym, then the grocery store, then home to shower, then write until 2:30, then pick up my son, and write until 5:00. That should give me a full day of writing and my goal is to finish draft 1 of The Sacrifice today. That gives me some time to polish. I chatted with my editor yesterday and have a 1-2 week extension. I want to spend that time fine tuning. Now...on to the work! Sam

Using my blog for something important.

I normally don't use my blog to discuss anything political, but liberal or conservative, republican or democrat, we can all agree on the need to educate our children. I know that the economy is a train wreck right now, but the budget cuts that we're faced with to our schools here in San Diego have me greatly concerned. If you live in California, especially in San Diego, please don't sit back and remain silent. Lend you voice. Sending an email will only take a few minutes and it could make a HUGE difference.  Then after you are done, ask someone else that you know to do the same. Let's use the power of social networking to send a powerful message. On March 10th, the Board of Education identified approximately $100 million in budget reductions for the 2009-10 school year. They did so because by State Law they are required to adopt a balanced budget each year based on the available revenues they are given by the State of California. In two short months, they will receive the final funding allocation and the budget will need to be solidified. That gives us two months to push for more school funding from the State of California. The Obama Administration is sending stimulus money to California for education. It will not fill the $150 million budget deficit hole for the 2009-10 school year, but it may help mitigate some of the cuts. We are already looking at increased class sizes with fewer teachers and principals and less funds for transportation. In the worst case we could be looking at cuts to the arts, athletics and many other programs that we and our cherish. Here's the problem: The State may try to hold up sending out the stimulus funds to local school districts because they are worried about the need to make more cuts to the state budget. San Diego Unified and other urban districts took a disproportionate hit in the last budget cuts and we need to make sure that we get our fair share of the federal stimulus money. What can you do? E-mail every legislator from the San Diego area and the Governor.  We need a united San Diego delegation to pressure the Governor to release the money. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger http://gov.ca.gov/interact Senator Christine Kehoe senator.kehoe@sen.ca.gov Senator Denise Ducheny senator.ducheny@sen.ca.gov Senator Dennis Hollingsworth senator.hollingsworth@sen.ca.gov Assemblymember Marty Block assemblymember.block@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember Lori Saldana assemblymember.saldana@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember Mary Salas assemblymember.salas@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember Nathan Fletcher assemblymember.fletcher@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember Joel Anderson assemblymember.anderson@assembly.ca.gov Sign a petition to support Stimulus Dollars for our schools. You do NOT need to donate anything to the website. Just close the window after signing. Visit http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/School_funds/ to add your name. What to tell Sacramento: Don't hold up the stimulus money. Our schools need the stimulus money now. San Diego Unified got hit harder in the recent cuts than the average California school district. We want our fair share of the stimulus money. The winning formula is for the state to allocate the stimulus dollars to schools with "50% to categoricals and 50% to revenue limits." Thanks for listening! Sam

You can now download books from All Romance eBooks to your Kindle!

Bree - the Bree half of the Moira Rogers writing team was one of the first to blog this terrific news this morning. It seems to be all the buzz. Or so my Kindle-using friends are telling me. So, if you have a Kindle - go check out Bree's post!

moirarogers [dot] com/blog/?p=749

I do the vast majority of my eBook reading on my iPhone these days. My only regret about the Stanza application is that it doesn't support DRM...yet. Last month they announced that they've licensed Adobe DRM - so I think it's just a matter of time before I can read virtually any book I want to on my iPhone.

Do any of you read eBooks and if so, what do you use to read eBooks?

Sam

Who's my favorite hero?

Thanks to Ann Lory for letting me come and visit her blog today. There's a little contest, an interview, and an excerpt from my newest release, "The Temptation", featuring my favorite dirty-talking cowboy. Pop on over and say hello!

While your there, note that Ann's latest book "Bait and Switch" was just released. It's the first in her brand new Frisky Business series. LOL! LOVE that title. 

annlory [dot] blogspot [dot] com

Sam

Give-a-way - Mini promo packs!

Today I'm going to chatting over on the SamhainCafe Yahoo Loop with some of my fellow Linden Bay Paranormal/Urban Fantasy authors. The chat will start at 11:00 am pst and go for 3 hours. I'll be posting about my Forbidden series and I'll be there to answer questions. If you can, please hop on. I think it will be fun. With the print release of Forbidden: The Temptation just a week away (it's already available in eBook), the timing is excellent. 

In honor of the print release, I have some really nifty signed bookplates. Anyone that would like one should contact me this week. I'll also include a Forbidden bookmark and button in the envelop. Send me your snail mail via the contact form on my website with the comment "Mini promo pack request" and I'll mail them out throughout the week (as long as my supply lasts). If you want to know what they look like - you can find images of them in the "Fun Stuff" page on the website. 

Website: samanthasommersby [dot] com
Address for today's chat: groups [dot] yahoo [dot] com/group/samhaincafe/ 

Hope to see some of you there!

Sam

Why enter the Spring Into Romance Contest?

My local RWA chapter is sponsoring the following contest. Check it out!

Sam

__________________________________________

The Spring Into Romance Contest is known for its meaningful feedback. 

New score sheets this year include category-specific sections. 

The SIRC is one of the best contest values around, at $20 for RWASD members, $25 for non-members, ($35 foreign).

No synopsis required.

Discrepancy judging will be used, as needed. 

As many as five finalists per category will be judged by these relevant final judges:

Contemporary Series/Category Romance: Keyren Gerlach, Harlequin 
Contemporary Single Title Romance: Frances Jalet-Miller, Grand Central Publishing (formerly Warner Books) 
Suspense/Adventure Romance: Diana Ventimiglia, Silhouette 
Novel w/Strong Romantic Elements/Mainstream: Adam Wilson, MIRA-Harlequin 
Historical Romance: Linda Fildew, Harlequin - Mills & Boon Londonƒn
Paranormal Romance: LaToya Smith, Grand Central Publishing (formerly Warner Books) 
Young Adult Romance: Laura Bradford, Bradford Literary Agency 

Send the first 25 pages of your manuscript. 

Postmark Deadline, April 4th, 2009

See www [dot] rwasd [dot] com for full rules and entry information.

Sam

Talk about something totally amazing!

My husband and I went to an art show the other night. We both fell in love with an incredible pair of paintings created by Mollie Kellogg, featuring Hades and Persephone. The paintings were inspired, of course, by the infamous Greek Gods and their story. But the artists interpretation was also inspired by the following poem "For Persephone" which was written by T. Collins Logan. 

I thought I'd share a small thumbnail of the images (which doesn't come close to doing them justice) and the poem. They are being delivered Sunday and we're going to have to make some lighting adjustments before we hang them, but I'm excited none-the-less. 

Some weird and wonderful coincidences (which you know I love):
* The artist did a series that inspired by vision for Luna, the succubus in the Forbidden series. 
* My son just spent the last month studying the Greek Gods in his English class.
* We found out after purchasing the paintings about the poem by T. Collins Logan and it's significance. I know Mr. Logan. Although I knew of his love of mysticism, I didn't know he wrote poetry. He's also our handyman and I count both he and Mollie as friends.
* The shades of red and gold in the painting exactly matches the pallet of colors in the room we plan to hang them in. 



For Persephone
By T. Collins Logan

You might think
that having walked across the eons
without your hand in mine
I could wait just one more day
to see you
and that the promise of tomorrow
and tomorrow, and tomorrow
is enough
and that in this deep winter of my heart
in these still hours
where my soul stays warm
by fickering light of memory
I know you are there
just beyond the borders of my realm
thinking of me
yearning for me
even as you tend your verdant, crowded garden
and I would not add my sorrow
to your own
but this alone I feel
has a different heft than solitude
and as this page is my companion
and these syllables my counselors and friends
I grieve the distance
between your breath and mine
in streaming words
like a slow, persistent warmth of tears
against my cheek
where the cherished promise of winter's end
becomes a trick of jealous gods
who live forever without knowing pain
and however great my power
to shape the comforts of my world
it is your voice, your scent, your smile
your nearness
which ignites from this grim dust
a flame so fierce it dims the sky
lifts up a sacred offering
that love and hope and joy will grow
with soaring possibility
and yet, I know,
that others thrive in the season of my loss
and long untended fields are carefully sown
and fences for a horde of untamed beasts
are mended
and children laugh and play
without a thought
for the weight of shadows
on our parted time
so I will rest in a truth made clear:
it is you, it is you, it is you
that wherever you are
there is life
and love
and light
and I shall steel myself to wait
for night to pass
for the moon to boldly trace her path
and for the slow turning of the seasons
to bring you close to me
once more.

I just love it when things come together...like magic!

*hugs*

Sam

In the mood for some Sinful Chocolate Cake?

The new issue of the Samhellion Newsletter is out and in it I posted my recipe for Sinful Chocolate Cake. Yum Yum!

You can read the entire issue at: thesamhellion [dot] com/2009/march/index [dot] htm 

Here's the recipe:

Sinful Chocolate Cake
(serves eight)

1 box of Devil's Food cake mix
1 box of instant chocolate pudding
1 cup of semi-sweet chocolate morsels
1/4 cup Godiva Chocolate Liquor

Pour the cake mix and pudding mix into a large mixing bowl. Follow the directions on the cake mix box substituting 1/4 cup of Godiva Chocolate Liquor for 1/4 cup of the water called for. Substitute coffee for the remainder of the water called for on the box mix. Add the chocolate chips. Cook in a bunt pan according to the instructions on the box.

And, in other fun news - I just got a new review for Forbidden: The Claim from the Bookwenches. First I have to say that I LOVE that name ... Wish I'd thought of it. 

Here's a little excerpt from the full review, which can be found here: bookwenches [dot] com/reviews [dot] htm

"The conflict that arises is written with a flair for the unusual, while keeping the reader enmeshed in the drama that unfolds. I found myself reading as quickly as I could to see what the outcome would be. If you are looking for a wickedly enthralling read, this book is for you. I can't wait to read more by this talented author." --Teagan

Sam

Available March 1, 2009 - Forbidden: The Temptation