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EXHIBIT X
SUSPECT # UNO
SUSPECT'S SUSPICION: "HE did it, mommy!" Pointing paw at -->
Florida is officially the Icecube State. Even Bad Puppy is feeling the nip. He never ever liked being under blankets before. Ha. Not tonight. Went hiding when I was calling him to go outside to do his bithnez.
REMINDER: Still answering your VHERS questions in the post titled "So Many Chores" below.
I'll be on the road today. Furbabies will be under the gentle care of Alpha males and elves, Lord help them.
If I can, I'll update with some tweets (above the blog) and on Facebook with some pics of the road adventure. Alpha Males are already betting on how many times I'm going to get lost (have they no idea that I, a woman, ask for directions? And I, a savvy woman, has my puter with me?).
Below, my Furry Bad Boy is trying to convince me to fit him into the luggage. He isn't happy with me right now.
"Look, I promise I won't pee on your things. Let me go, pleeeassse, mommy!"
"Hee, hee, hee, you can't go if I don't move."
Sigh. I wish I could take him with me. But the hotel (and my roommates) will never survive him.
Here comes trouble. That was the first thought that crossed Jaymee's mind when she saw him walking around.
Nick's eyes narrowed a fraction. She was going to be trouble. Her ass, for one thing, roused his interest. Very much. Jaymee blinked. Oh no, she had seen that look before. It was the Big Bad Wolf! He was neither nice nor safe. Oh-oh, mutant pombabies might be on the way in 60 days.... Sigh. Big Bad Puppy sez: "Hee hee hee." 
"I'm looking for work," he said. "Do you have any job openings?"
Jaymee's eyes traveled down the length of him.... If he could roof, she thought, then she could build a rocket ship.
She arched a brow at him. "You need tools," she said.
"I'm good with guns," he told her.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX-RATED
Turn down the volume a little ;-P. Thing blasted my ears off.
And now I have to reroof with a fresh wound. In my palm. Grrr.
Bad Puppy. Don't let that guilty look fool you. He was playing Alpha Meanie this morning. No treats for him. I'm going to have to give him to Nora for boiling.
You can tell I'm not working, can't you, since I'm stalking the Bad Puppy around the house, seeing what he's up to....
He climbed up on a chair, jumped over "fence," so he can have a better look at the baby unicorn. Uh-huh.
And yes, yes, I'm hearing you...my books are everywhere. I'm a mess.
GOT HIM!
Almost lost another book!
Now, after reading THIS BIG AUTHOR's rant about Nora Roberts which was deleted, I'm tempted to edit my play from last Sunday and add her for the More Cowbell scene. But really, you should just read this from Google cache:
When The Most Successful Author in Romance Judges Others
9:06 AM PST, January 11, 2008, updated at 10:03 AM PST, January 11, 2008
Hi, y'all. I debated whether to post publicly about this tempest in a teapot in the romance world, because the last thing I want is to be eviscerated by Nora Roberts' avid fangirls. But there's a quiet little stream of conversation in the world of romance writers as to why Roberts, unquestionably the richest, most award-winning, most successful romance novelist in the world -- in fact, one of the most successful novelists in the world, period -- hangs out at a blog site called "Smart Bitches," where the topics include open attacks on authors so far down the food chain that one wonders how Nora has time in her busy career to even notice they exist.
Now Roberts has weighed in (via an interview with the national press) on a controversy surrounding old-school historical author Cassie Edwards. I don't know Cassie Edwards; I've never read one of her many (nearly 100) historicals. But so far as I can tell she's a hardworking, 71-year-old author who's never slammed any other author in public. To the best of my knowledge Ms. Edwards is considered a rollicking good storyteller who likes to write westerns and pirate novels. She does not appear to have any pretensions, and her fans clearly love her books.
But -- according to reports launched by the Smart Bitches bloggers, who admitted beforehand that they don't like Ms. Edwards' old-style books, and have spent considerable time making jokes about them -- the author "plagiarized" bits and pieces of research material. The horrendous offense? Some passages about (I'm not kidding) buffaloes and ferrets. Looking at the passages myself, all I see is a writer who maybe should have paraphrased some research info a little better. I don't see malicious or greedy intent; I don't see "plagiarism" in any serious legal interpretation of the charge. If there's more to the issue than that, I haven't seen the evidence.
But I kinda doubt that Ms. Edwards' success is built on her nature writing. I kinda doubt she sat at her computer thinking, "If I use this other author's description of a buffalo, I'll sell ten times more books."
But now this grandmother (and accomplished violinist) is fielding national wire service inquiries about her alleged misdeeds. And Nora Roberts -- unsolicited, unharmed, with no personal beef with Ms. Edwards in any way, as far as I know -- has stood up atop her unassailable pile of money and awards to say -- in the national media --that Ms. Edwards appears to have committed plagerism.
Why does Roberts feel compelled to play lawyer, judge and jury regarding a fellow author? Roberts has achieved a level of good fortune 99.9 percent of authors can only dream about. But does that make her not only the spokeswoman for the romance genre, but also its enforcer of public condemnation for unproven offenses?
Not for me, and not for thousands of other hardworking authors trying to earn a living down here in the trenches, that's for sure.
Wow, huh. I'm speechless. BTW, the comments after this "new" post on Amazon were obviously addressing the original post above. They'll probably be deleted next ;-).
My deleted scene would definitely have:
La Nora standing "atop her unassailable pile of money and awards" saying something smartass ;-).
The big topic around the Internetz this weekend was about fangrrls. What is a fan/fanatic/fangrrl? It's a negative term these days because of the swarms that can attack your blog if you so much as say a bad thing about their favorite author's books. I repeat, in case it's not loud enough: BOOKS. B-O-O-K-S! Now, it's also a term tossed at readers who agree with an author's opinion. Opinion. O-P-I-N-I-O-N!
I'm so confused. So are we all a bunch of fangirls fighting, unable to think for ourselves? Am I crazy, but is it okay for some people to say something is wrong, but not others? I really don't get that. Sometimes, dealing with crapenters seems like a cakewalk.
Talking about fangirls, Bad Puppy (also now known as Horny Bad Puppy(TM))'s new year resolution is not to destroy any more of mommie's romance books:
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There was once a puppy who knew how to manipulate his mommy's heart with Christmas kisses.
See how he tried to divert her attention? See how INNOCENT he looked?
But the puppy was evil and loved to eat his mommy's books that took her attention away from him. Behind her back, using special dog-fu, he climbed up some chairs, took one book in his mouth, jumped off and trotted BACK to his nest to fight it to the death. After beating up and chewing his competition to bits, he climbed up the chair AGAIN and took on another of them! Bad evil naughty puppy did this to THREE romance heroes.
What amazed his mommy was the fact that his nest was in another room. This bad puppy took the time to take each book to his territory to rip apart.
Mommy was very upset. No more kisses for Bad Puppy all Christmas night.
The Alpha Male stole my truck (automatic) and disappeared. Where, oh, where is he? Rather, where IS MY TRUCK? I want my damn truck back.
When I got home, I saw this:
I wish wallpapering in life is as interesting and easy as puter wallpapering ;-). My favorite twins look so good in this pic, don't they?
I was looking at the New York Times 100 Most Notable Books in 2007 (can't link--you have to be a member). One hundred titles later, and there's only one that I might read: Harry Potter #7. That makes me...so unkewl ;-). Are any of you members of the NYT online (free)? If you are, let me know whether you've read anything else on that list.
Bad Puppy has decided that the tall laundry basket is his new "nest." He loves to jump in and play in there...until he's bored. Then he finds out he's trapped because it's not the same jumping out as jumping in.... Hahaha, found a new puppy prison. The whines are pathetic.
Book recommendation: You have to read C. L. Wilson's Lord of The Fading Lands. Now. So damn good.
Heya, back home safely ;-). I'm tired, tired, tired, because I had to work today after running home from the airport! Been up since 3am and Grey's is on right now, so I have to watch, of course. Can you say--McDreamy Fangrrrrl?
It has been a stunningly whirlwind week, don't you agree? Five days ago, I jumped out of an airplane. Then I flew in one to New York City. Then I rushed back after three days and jumped on a roof to get it finished so I could get a paycheck on Friday (and pay for the three Victoria's Secret bras, ahem). And how has your week been? ;-)
I have a Ranger Buddy Ballroom Dancing update. The guys at the jobsite are complaining that since I wasn't around for him to show off his partnering skills, he's been forcing them to play his partner as he shows them how a man is ALWAYS in control of his woman. Bwahahahaha. I need to watch him do this.
Bad puppy was deliriously happy to see me...until he realized that I was giving him Da Look. Yes, that Mama Is Mad Look. Why is mama mad? She's not happy because bad puppy has decided to show how much he missed mommy by peeing on the other man's pillow again. After all, it must be the other guy's fault that mummy is gone, right? Sigh.
And oh, tomorrow is payday. Got to go chase after some bills.
Double sigh. I came home from New York to play mommy to bad men and bad puppy.
EDITED TO ADD:
I haven't forgotten about the message board for the blog. Still looking. I can't wait to have one, actually, so I can put up the list of Non-Politically Correct Romances we've compiled and then we can just add to it as we come up with more titles.
Heading to Charleston for the Low Country Workshop this Friday, folks! I'll be driving and without my usual roadtrip buddy, sniff*. I'm also going to so miss my little Jiggle Low. He's been a shadow and actually likes to climb on top of me to sleep ;-P. So much so, that he's become an argument between me and the S.O. because well, the bad puppy thinks I'm his and no males are allowed to sleep close by. It amuses me no end.
So poor Jiggle Low is going to be without his momsie for the weekend. Sigh. Only I can get so darn connected to a furbaby.
His Jedness, in one scene, had to be in one country while Hell was working in another. This is the first time he'd ever kept wondering (I call it worrying, but he keeps saying it's wondering) about another operative's safety. It's all about his actions, that Jed, because he uses those big words from that dictionary of his to obsfucate the truth. ;-) He would disagree, of course.
I received an email yesterday which complained that Jed isn't a loving kind of character. I'm not sure how to respond to that. Going to have to sit on this and brood about it. There are many words I'd use to describe His Jedness but "loving" wouldn't be one of them.
The email went on to say that that since the hero is so "unlovingable," (is this word in Jed's dictionary?), then the romance between my heroine and him is also unacceptable. I wanted to pound out a quick reply to say, "Whoa...I haven't even gotten to the romance yet, dear reader!" But I stopped myself.
Part of my dilemma is a pseudo-rule I set for myself about fan/reader mail. Without a specific question, I will not write an explanation or defense of my story or my characters. A reader has the right to his/her opinion, and even the worst criticism is part of the writing for the public process.
For example, remember that hate-mail from that librarian dude who wrote that my book was trash? I know I gave a tongue-in-cheek reply saying that he must have wandered into the wrong aisle, but I also tacked on the suggestion that he returned the book, since he hated it so much. It was only when he replied several times after that to add that I should be ashamed of myself for writing his equivalent of excrement and that in future, I shouldn't write books like VHis anymore, and that if I don't follow his advice, my writing career will be a nothing, that I took offense. Yeah, hate the book, fine, but don't tell me what I can or cannot write.
So this reader feels VHis is a failed romance because Jed is "unlovingable" and doesn't "communicate his love." Then she tacked on, "The hero sucks so better luck next time." Argghhhhhhhhh.
Jiggle Low tells me what he thinks by his actions. The bad boy still lifts his legs and pees to mark his dominance. Unacceptable. Especially when he does it to the pillow on which someone else has slept. Totally unromantic. But he's communicating his feelings to me. There are different ways to communicate love. Just saying.
I need some sexy veges. They always put me in my Zen place.
MAY 07
