Saturday, December 26, 2009

New Additional January Contest

I know everyone loves contests and even more when they are the winner! I'm starting another contest in addition to my regular contest and this one will be drawn on Jan 30th AFTER my day with Author Roast and Toast as I'll also have contests that whole day that I spend with those wonderful ladies over there, oh, and we can't leave out Oliver! He is the handsome butler who keeps them all happy.


So be sure to join me at Author Roast and Toast on Friday, January 29th!


Now, back to my new contest. I've titled it 'Word of the Week' because once a week on Sunday, I will post a word, then during the last week, after you've gotten the last word, be sure to send me an email with 'Word of the Week' in the SUBJECT line. Set yourself up a reminder to return to my site to get your WORD! You won't want to miss getting into the contest for a chance to win one of my books. It'll be your choice and they are both listed on my site as well as on my contest page. The contest link on the main page will get you to the contest zone. Good luck and thank you for being a part of this! Tell your friends so they can join in the fun too!


thank you!


Deanna

Sunday, December 20, 2009

No Turning Back - soon to be released!


Hi everyone!

I hope your holiday season is off to a great start and your plans are set to spend time with friends and family. Is all your shopping done, presents wrapped and the stress gone because your plans are set? Well, I thought you needed a laugh today!

I'm working hard on my edits for No Turning Back, still, and am hoping to see it released in early January. The tentative cover is posted here, I hope you like it. I've also posted a picture of what I think the hero, Nathan, would look like. Let me know your thoughts, does he work for you? LOL mmmmm...mmmm...mmmm. I'm also working on the book trailer so that can be out there for you to
view also. I'll have them on my website.


Never Surrender is holding its own but sales could always be better. I'm getting many responses from those who are eagerly waiting for the sequel so I will have to get started on that story too.

Please sure to enter my December contest! Send me an email with 'contest' in the subject line to be entered, its that easy! The drawing is Jan 2 and the winner will have their choice of which book they'd like.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I hope 2010 brings you all you wish for. I'd love to hear from you or just post a reply to this blog. Again, thank you so much for stopping by to review my blog and we'll chat again soon!

Deanna

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Re-release of Never Surrender!

Hi Again!

Glad you stopped in to see what is happening with me. Maybe you're new and that's great; I love new people to help spread the word about my novels. You will tell your friends, right? Whew, good!

In case you weren't aware, in July I lost my publisher, Mystic Moon Press. They closed down their site and didn't contact any of the authors nor pay them. Luckily, because I was new to them, I didn't have much money that they kept.

Any way, long story short, I am now self-publishing and will have a bit more control so I've got my fingers crossed that I've made a good move. My books will now be printed by BookLocker.com and they list books on B & N, BookLocker.com, Amazon AND with Ingram Distributors, who sell books to book stores nationwide and I will be listed in the back of their monthly mailings under the Print On Demand books. Any book store will be able to order my book for their stores, so wish me luck there, too!

I now have a new ISBN # and Never Surrender should be available again on the websites in a few short weeks, so keep an eye out for Never Surrender online! I'm pretty excited about this.

My first book signing went well at the end of August. That was held in Lewiston at And Books, Too! and the staff was wonderful! Many people stopped by to say hi and some bought the book. Thank you to all of you!

I'm working hard on my next manuscript so that it can be out by Thanksgiving. The writing is done but the edits are not. Those will get done, along with a book mark to go with the book and a book trailer. Guess you need to know the name of the novel, eh? It's called NO TURNING BACK and is an historical romance set in England, 1775, about finding love a second time when you thought there was no chance of it. Is it possible to love again when you lose the love of your life? Stay tuned to find out more. Want a sneak peek? You can check out a few chapters at www.writing.com/authors/butterfly55_55 The chapters will be found as Fire On The Water. I've since changed the title of that manuscript to No Turning Back but the title is all that got changed, so go peek and leave me a message here or on my website to tell me what you thought.


Thank you for taking the time to read me. Follow me here, on MySpace, Twitter, my reader group, and Facebook. Till later, happy reading! Forward me to your friends!

Deanna

Saturday, August 8, 2009

I've added a chat room to my site! Go see!

Hi everyone!

Thanks for popping in to see what this is all about! I'm excited to let you know that I've added my own chat room to my website at www.deannajewel.com so hop on over and check it out. My chat times to begin with will be on Tuesdays at 7:00 PM PDT, that's 10 PM on the east coast. These times may be revised if I hear that people aren't happy with the late time frame back east. The room is open anytime but I'll be there on Tuesday nights. Although, I may just pop in if I see anyone there so I can chat with you. That would be great.

Pass my site on to your friends. I'd love to see reader/writer chats there and the room filled with those who enjoy our books. I'd also love to hear from you by email or as a comment below about what you think of my addition. I've named it Deanna's Chat Cabana, complete with cabana boys to wait on us while we chat with never ending champagne! I think they may even be willing to put your lotion on your shoulders for you! LOL Please, enjoy the room and I hope its fun!

Sunday, June 21, 2009

Ads on new sites!

Hi Everyone!

I wanted to share with you that I've increased some advertising in hopes the word gets out about my new novel! I've signed on with Eye On Romance and Manic Readers and my ads are going out with their newsletters so I'm hoping for more traffic to my sites and sales.

One can only hope, but it's the readers who make the author reach the top. I have confidence in my readers and in those who try me for the first time. Please share my site and my novel with your friends, so they tell their friends. An author needs to be able to hold the reader's attention and keep them turning pages. I hope, again, that I've done this for you.

Think of the books you've read. Are there some characters who refuse to leave your mind AFTER you're done reading? Do they linger, making you relive the novel so they stay alive in your mind? LOL I hope I've been able to create that with my characters. Let me know if that's happened. I'd love to hear about it.

Enjoy your summer, it's only getting started. Happy reading!

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Never Surrender paperback IS coming!!

I know I haven't posted as often as I should for those who keep in touch. I'll do better!

I'm so excited and want to share with you the fact that Never Surrender has been uploaded to the printer and the cover is waiting their approval. As soon as the cover is approved, in the next few days, the book will be released for paperback! What an exciting day that'll be for me. I've waited years for this to happen and owe it to Mystic Moon Press for taking a chance on me. I'd like to show them that it WILL sell and their chance on me will pay off. For that to happen, I need your help and that of your friends who love to read. The paperback can be order from the bookstore at www.mysticmoonpress.com or go to my website www.deannajewel.com and click on 'buy now' next to the cover of Never Surrender. Of course, you can still get it from Amazon, Fictionwise, and other sites out there.

The next manuscript to be sent to Mystic Moon Press will be an historical romance set in England with ships, dukes and pirates and of course, a strong heroine! You can also read more about this and my other manuscripts in progress on my website. Stop by, roam along the beach there or sit back in one of my chairs and enjoy my site for a few minutes. Please send it to your friends, join my reader club, subscribe to this blog so it arrives in your email each time I post. Check out my upcoming events. I'll be doing an author chat on June 20th and the 30th, each at different sites so check them out.

I so appreciate my readers. None of this would be possible if the readers didn't visit my sites. Thank you so much. Please enter my contest for a goodie bag filled with bookmarks, a Deanna Jewel t-shirt, other items from me and a copy of Never Surrender either in e-book or paperback.

I look forward to hearing from you, reading your posts here, in my guestbook on the website or in my email. Again, THANK YOU for reading!

Deanna

Saturday, May 2, 2009

Never Surrender - Hero: Taima, Shoshone Warrior

I'm glad you stopped in. I hope I can peak your interest in my hero enough to want to read the book and share it with your friends. I would truly appreciate that. The paperback will be available soon! Visit my sites often for the release date of the paperback.

Let's start where Taima begins....within the dreams that Kate has. He beckons to her yet never gets close enough in the dream for her to actually see who he is. She can see how handsome he is, how sculpted his body is and his magnetism pulls at her, making him irresistable. When she awakens from the dream, all she thinks about is how much she needs to find out who he is, but where does she start? How will she know when she meets him? Most of all, WHY is he haunting her and what does he want?

Taima is a warrior and leader of his people of the Shoshone Nation. His chisled jaw-line and his scultped body only add to the intensity of his blue eyes when he looks at a woman. He's respected and sought after by the women of his tribe, though they know they don't stand a chance with him. They also knew his wife and mother who were killed only a few years ago by white trappers. Taima vows to be true to his woman and refuses to realize he needs another woman in his life to love and hold.

Can spirits reunite more than one hundred years later? What kind of love is it that moves through time, keeping spirits and souls together? Only by reading Never Surrender will you find the answers to a love that bind these two lovers together forever...even through time!

Never Surrender can be purchased from my website. If you think your friends will enjoy reading my time travel novel, I invite you to share my links with them and thank you for doing so. I hope you truly enjoy reading Never Surrender! There are many surprises within the story and I also hope my characters remain alive in your mind for months after you read them.

Again...I thank you!

Saturday, April 25, 2009

Do YOU have the Power? Think Positive!

Hi Everyone,

I know it's been a while since I've posted, but I'm back and will post more often now. I just have to share some insights into what I'm currently reading but really already knew. It only reinforces that knowledge. We attract what we think. If your life isn't going the way you want it to, who really is to blame? One would like to blame everybody around us but that isn't where the blame needs to go.

Ever heard the saying "It's all in your head"? Well....it IS! We attract what we think! Think about it for a bit. When you're depressed, what happens in your life? Things seem to get worse and we can't figure out why. Our friends seems to dwindle and not come around, work doesn't go right, our health deteriorates, our thoughts get worse. We certainly don't want to blame ourselves, yet, that's where the blame needs to go. Check out those boxes in the back of your mind, way back there in the dark corners where you've pushed things you don't want to deal with. Dust the cobwebs off one box to start with. Now carefully open it and one at a time, deal with what you pull out of there. Is it really something you need to hold onto? That could be what is holding you back. Toss it over your shoulder and be done with it. If it was about a person who wronged you, forgive them, forget about it, and move on. Being angry with that person isn't hurting anyone but you. Toss it! NOW!

Move on...you WILL feel better. Empty one box a week to start. Take notice in a few days of how you feel. Things will seem lighter, your mood will change because you aren't carrying around so much anger. Think positive, happy thoughts and QUIT the negative SELF talk!! That has to stop before you can move forward. No one can love or care about you until you care about yourself. You're not a bad person so why the bad self talk? Only you can fix that so start today. Let me repeat that: No one can love or care about you until you care about yourself.

I'll be writing more on this later so please stop back next week. Improve yourself and watch things around you begin to improve!

Deanna

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Never Surrender - read Chapter One here

Hi everyone!

I'm inviting all of you to pop over to Fictionwise to read Chapter One of my new novel. Go to: http://www.fictionwise.com/ebooks/eBook78308.htm

I'd love it if you bought the book and if so, please go back and rate the novel for me. I'd also love to end up on their best selling e-book list but I need your help for that. Please share my site with your friends who enjoy historical romance and time travel novels.

Authors don't make it without loyal readers; we love you!

Deanna

Saturday, March 28, 2009

Why we read....

When I read, I want a mini vacation. I want to be taken away from my everyday world and whatever problems I might have on a given day. Maybe to experience something in another country. To see the people from another's point of view.

I read so that I can visit the world of the author and see where they can take me. Some authors write so smooth you don't realize you're even turning the pages and before you know it, you're deep in their created world, enjoying the characters and feeling what they feel, smelling what they smell, whether it's the smoke from a crackling bon fire at night or the scent of sagebrush that's been rubbed between your fingers. It could be the damp earth one smells while walking through the woods on a tropical island, colorful birds cawing overhead and the screech of monkeys jumping from branch to branch. Maybe the characters are walking on a warm sandy beach in the afternoon, enjoying each wave as it washes over their feet with the refreshing coolness of the ocean as the sand filters between their toes.

Whatever the world, it's different from my own and takes me there if the writer has done their job. I strive very hard to pull my readers into my world and become the character, to enjoy the thrill of falling in love again, or seeing old friends you've missed, or discovering something mysterious and figuring out what happens. I want you to want to keep reading. I hope you can't put down my books and will one day reread the story.

Next time you pick up a book, I hope it takes you to another world that you can get lost in and enjoy! It should tug at your memory weeks after you've finished it. That's the joy of reading and that's what I want my readers to feel.

Thank you for stopping by. I'd love to hear from you. Until next time, happy reading!

Deanna

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Reader/Surfer Appreciation....

I consider myself a reader and a surfer of the internet though I should be writing, but we all need a small break once in a while, right? I love clicking from site to site, checking what's out there and how big things actually are on this highway. One could easily get lost or dig so deep into some websites we're not sure where we began or how we got there.

What DOES draw us into one site more than another? Is it the color that pops off the page or more the words that draw us in, promising more if we delve deeper? How long do we spend on a website? Or is it how long do we spend 'inside' a website, tunneling further inside with every click? When you enter, is it like visiting a place that you can actually envision, lined with pictures and soft carpet and smells of brewing coffee or do you imagine yourself enjoying a latte in an overstuffed chair while watching a good movie or reading a good book.

Do you surf and click because you're bored, need to find information, looking to learn something new? We all have different reasons we click and read. Some sites allow us to network with other readers, be a part of a community and actually belong. Those of us who may spend hours alone working look forward to saying hi to those in our network and it makes us feel good or perhaps YOU make someone smile who's having a bad day as they surf around. Those are the good things we look for while we're out here. But I'm glad you stopped in to enjoy a comfy chair and smell the coffee here for a while; I DO appreciate that you took the time. Please know you're welcome to stop in anytime and when you're ready, click on my other sites and venture into the hallways there. Leave me a comment or sign the guestbook, say hi and let me know you stopped in. Don't be a silent visitor, I would enjoy reading that you were here...or there.

Until later, safe surfing and I'll see you soon on the highway! *W*

Deanna

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Book trailers

I've been considering this for a while now. I've watched several that are out there posted by other authors and they really are amazing. Some authors have gone to so much detail and precision timing so the pictures change with the beat of the music. I can only hope mine will turn out as good. I'm not sure when I'm going to get the time to produce mine but I will. I'll post a note on my website along with the trailer there and also post it anywhere that I'm allowed to do so! LOL

Pictures are being collected for the trailer for my current book, Never Surrender, and also for my next novel which is about falling in love the second time after losing the first love. The second one takes place in England, 1778 and involves ships, pirates, handsome dukes and a beautiful heroine of course! Collecting trailer pictures is fun but so time consuming I get lost out there. Hubby thinks I forgot about him! That's isn't possible though! He's too important to me!

Then there is deciding what type of music to use but that is fun to listen to also. So many pieces out there too. I hope you stick with me so you can see the end result of the final trailers. I should have more time once May and June roll around so stay bookmarked to my sites and check back often. Have to run for now but I'm out there. Leave me a post on one my sites or stay connected in the background, so long as you stay connected!

Until next time.....happy reading and surfing!

Deanna

Sunday, March 8, 2009

Find me, I'm out there! Time travel novels...

Promotion....I love surfing the net for new places to link up with, even though it seems a time-waster, it's not because it eventually will get me to so many places. More readers will be able to connect with me and that's my long term goal. If you like, I'd be honored if you would forward my links to your friends who you think might enjoy time travel and historical romance novels.

A friend sent me to a new site the other day and when it's up to full power, will be a great site for readers and authors alike. Though when I put in the name of the site, a different site came and I'm now aware there are two sites with the same name although getting to them is different. The site is called The Bookhouse: http://www.freewebs.com/thebookhouse/paranormal.htm Now the other site has the same name but what comes up is: The Book House. I'm listed in the site at freewebs.com so please take a few minutes and check out the site. Ernie has done a great job there.

My yahoo reader group is also out there. Check out yahoo for Deanna_Jewel_Readers and join me! You can also enter my contests at my sites by going to the link on the left which will also show you my others sites if you care to join me there.

I thank you for taking the time to read me and pass on my links. You will help me get the word out about another great novel! Thanks again and until later.....happy reading and surfing!

Deanna

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Spring in the air?

I have a bad habit of rushing spring when I hear the birds in our courtyard and the first warmer day brings sunshine and the smell of spring! It puts a smile on my face. I had to go out to my garden and brush the old leaves away from the new hyacinths coming up and the crocus sprouting through the dirt. Their little green heads emerge and beg for sun. Soon their colors will brighten the gardens out there.

Then I look around at all the work I need to do before spring actually takes hold. It'll give me something to do while I contemplate my muse and where my story lines will take me next. Working in the yard also allows me time to listen to what my characters want in their story, the different paths they could take and the what-ifs.

I hope you have something to keep you busy until spring brings us warmer weather and we can get outside to enjoy the spring flowers and watch the birds flutter around their houses. We're lucky to have so many birdhouses in our yard and it again makes me smile to watch them as I sip my morning coffee with hubby. The robins are cleaning up the last of the crabapples on the trees and the smaller birds fight for the house they want as they stuff in long grasses and bits of old yarn. Soon the chirping of baby birds will be music out there.

But my characters are calling so I must add a few more pages. Please drop a comment here or visit my other sites. Thank you for stopping by. Enjoy everyday and look for the sunshine around you.

Deanna

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Welcome to my blog. We all have to start somewhere and jump right in to get our feet wet to experience new things. I invite you to respond as you feel necessary so we can all have fun here and share thoughts and opinions.

I write time travel and historical romance and would love to hear from others who enjoy reading or writing time travel novels. Do you have favorite locations, time periods, character type? Post your comments and let's share what we like and don't like.

I look forward to hearing from you. Please visit my other sites and be sure to enter my contest!