I’ve finally got a title, a cover, and a blurb! Without further ado, here is the promo for Into the Whirlwind :

Mollie Knox makes the most beautiful timepieces in the world, until the night Chicago was destroyed in a legendary fire. With her world crumbling around her, she must save her company before time runs out on her business.

Zack Kazmarek is a powerful attorney with ties into the political, mercantile, and ethnic roots of the city where he reigns supreme. His only weakness is Mollie Knox, a woman who has always been just beyond his reach. After the fire that destroys Chicago, all rules are off, and Mollie is now fair game. As Zack finally begins to pursue the woman he loves, a hero from her past emerges to help her rise from the ashes.

While Mollie struggles to rebuild, two men battle for her heart. One has always loved her, but the other has the power to save her. In the race to rebuild the city, will she make the right decision?

Scheduled for release August 2013 (sorry for the long delay! I normally would not start teasing folks with these previews, but Amazon has already let the cat out of the bag, so I figured I would let my readers know about it!)

I hear rumor that a prequel is in the works for Downton Abbey! It will feature the courtship of Cora and Martin, and is being written by the original screenwriter for the series, the masterful Julian Fellows.

I’m not normally a fan of prequels, as the viewer already knows where the story is headed, but I CAN’T WAIT for this one! We already know from the mini-series that Martin married Cora for her fortune, but that she was desperately in love when she married him. This has all the makings for a terrific story. I am especially excited about the costuming. I write most of my novels set in the 1880’s and 90’s for the shallow reason that this was the best era for fashion!

A pair of younger actors will be cast in the leading role, but the filming will once again take place at the magnificent house (Highclere Abbey in real life). The series will not air until the current Downton Abbey runs its course. Let the countdown begin!

I am probably the last person on the planet to hop on board Pinterest. I have just barely dipped my toe into the water over at Facebook, and please don’t get me started on Twitter. I don’t understand Twitter’s purpose…..but after poking around Pinterest, a lightbulb went off. “Ahhh….. I understand how I can use this!”

Sometimes it is hard for a writer to describe the kind of writing they do to a new reader. The book cover can indicate tone, genre, and overall mood…..but the cover of a book is out of our control. Pinterest is not! So I have the opportunity to hunt for images that capture the mood, settings, even some scenes that occur in the book.

I’ve put together a few basic pages over at Pinterest that can give a little more insight into my books. For example, much of Against the Tide has a gothic vibe. It is darkly romantic and filled with suspense. The spooky house above looks very much like a where one of the major characters lives and where a lot of important scenes occur. If you’ve got a moment, hop on over to Pinterest and check out the board for Against the Tide!

As the Olympics get underway, the coffee coolers in workplaces all over the world are dominated by people discussing The Games.  My workplace is no different….except that on a college campus, the general tone of the conversation tends to be somewhat condescending towards the sporting world.

The general opinion among a huge swath of college professors is that sports glorify hyper-masculinity, divert students from worthwhile endeavors in the classroom, and serve little or no value for society.

I could not disagree more.  I firmly believe that sports help keep the body physically fit, develop camaraderie among team players, and are a healthy activity in a world full of overly-seductive drugs, trashy movies, and promiscuity.

My husband has some interesting observation on the value of sports to our society.  He teaches in one of the roughest high schools in the state of Florida.  His students are mostly from broken homes, many are in gangs, and the dropout, pregnancy, and incarceration rate would break your heart.  My husband reports that his best students are the ones playing in team sports.  By “best students,” he means the ones who come to class, stay out of trouble, and turn in their homework….not necessarily the most academically brilliant.

Bill believes the structure and discipline from playing sports teaches these kids important life skills.  You can’t show up the day before the season’s first football game and “cram” to learn football.  It takes months of drill, conditioning, practice, and self-discipline before the kids get to that first game.  There is a healthy dose of delayed gratification, teamwork, and time management that is necessary to be successful in a sport.  Those are transferable skills!

I suppose there a plenty of activities that might serve a similar purpose: the chess club, boy scouts, canoeing…. more power to the kids who pursue those activities, but they don’t really appeal to a broad audience.  Sports do.  I know the kids in Bill’s high school are all dreaming of being the next Donovan McNabb or Payton Manning.  This is an impossible dream for 99% of them, but that does not mean their sports training is in vain.  They will learn time management, self-discipline, and delayed gratification, and these skills are going to give them a chance in this world.

An interesting factoid:  If you remove colleges with televised sports (USC, Ohio State, etc.)  college athletes generally have slightly higher GPAs than the overall student population.  Food for thought!

You know you are hopelessly gone if you submit yourself to take a quiz to find out which Downtown Abbey character you are.  I’m Anna, the Housemaid.

Anna may be the most sympathetic chracter in the entire Downton Abbey cast……but I have class-envy.  Couldn’t I have been one of those ladies with the pearls, the silks, the rides in the countryside?  Please, oh please? 

You can take the quiz here.