A Wonderful Year

Wow, I can't believe the end of the year is fast approaching :( It must be true that the older you get the faster time flies...which is a a very bad thing considering how much I need to get done! It's been a fabulous year with many surprises and a great deal of happiness. As Christmas and the New Year approach I like to take time to count my blessings. And at the very top of my list are my lovely readers who have made my dreams come true! Thanks to all of you and my wish for a wonderful holiday season and a New Year filled with peace, happiness and security...oh, and a ton of fabulous books!!

Best,
Alex

Weresnakes are Sssexy! Help us prove it!

Hey All!

Well with January on the horizon, Audra and I are gearing up for our new release, Entwined by Fate, the first in our American Ophidians series. And what are we doing? TONS of fun stuff, and if you feel so inclined, you can help!

First, we have made some awesome sprouts for the book release. One is a countdown sprout, the other, a button sprout. Both are snatchable, and we are hoping you will take them and put them on your blogs and FB to show your support.





Second, how would you like to get promo goodies for the books in the mail? Well I'm starting our snail mailings this coming week! If your interested in getting goodies, send me your address to stella@stellaandaudra.com and I'll get some goodies out to you!

Third, and this is the most important, Buy the book January 19th! Don't worry, I will remind you guys, but this is paramount. See, we were told this book was a marketing risk, mostly because the reading public isn't ready for this kinda work, apparently they would, in the eyes of publishers, rather read the unending chain of werewolves and cats, and wouldn't wanna try something new, fresh or imaginative. So we would LOVE to prove them wrong, and you can help. On January 19th, please consider buying the book in print from Amazon.com (if we had the distro, it would be available in your bookstore, which is what we are trying for next book) and post to your friends and family about this book. This is NOT a self published book... but being with small press makes it REALLY hard to get the print out there. So please, help us change things, and get this book out there.

Until January, talk about the book, Make comments on the blogs that have done reviews, write about the different kinda romance out there on your own blogs, and talk about it in chats. Every word written and uttered about this book will help us reach our goal.

So guess what? We are running a HUGE contest giveaway as well! To help celebrate this awesome release, we are giving away tshirts, mugs, totebags, notebooks and print books of our other books to readers that havent ever heard of us or read us. How to win? For starters, post the sprouts anywhere and leave a link in the comments here.. For ever link, you get an entry.

If you blog about this book in anyway, post about it in the comments here as well. For every comment for that, its one entry.

When you buy the book, on the January blog post, post a comment, and you will get 2 entries for buying the book! We have over 50 goodies to give away, and 15 print books so there will be a LOT of winners!

Help us spread the word and win! Thanks to everyone!

Another fantastic review for our weresnakes!

So we got another review for the new snake novel and this time from Smoking Hot Books Blog. I'm happy to say I woke up to this awesome review, that has a CONVERSATION going on about it, and it tickles my insides.

See, I know that everyone isn't going to like this book, and I know that people have an unholy fear of snakes. I can fault them, I'm scared of the gingerbread man *shrug*. But the fact that so many reviewers agreed to review it and while they are trickling in, they all have one thing in common so far: THEY LOVE THE BOOK.

This is awesome to us, because we were told by several publishers that this book is not marketable. to that I say BULLPUCKY. I'm a firm believer that if the author works at it, pretty much anything can be sold, but I digress. This book is marketable, and will have readers. It does now, and they like it.

Anyway, Heres a little snippet of the review we got this morning:

I found myself captivated by their world and watching reruns of the MTV music awards when Brittany came out on stage with a boa constrictor. Lucky girl. I want my own snakie to rub my fantasy scales with! Move over werewolf’s there’s a new game in town.

Seriously? That's one hell of a review. Thank you tons K.C. for giving the book a chance and seeing that it is readable, and people would want to read it. You can read her entire review HERE and get in on the conversation as well. I would love for you to weigh in as well.

Who is ready for AAD 2010?

The registration for AAD is now open!

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

And yes, we will have a promotional junket started in December to get more attendees (a video, a sprout and a blog post to post about)

We have some fantastic authors joining us this year including Susan Sizemore, Caridad Pineiro, S.J. Day, Elizabeth Amber and Emily Bryan! More authors will be signing on every day to keep watch to the website!

Great News

For those of you who didn't hear my shrieking (I can't imagine there's anyone in the northern hemisphere who missed it :) Darkness Unleashed debuted #24 on the New York Times Bestseller list and #120 on the USA Today Bestseller list.

I have to admit I'm still buzzing with excitement since I never truly dreamed this would happen. My writing career has been far more the lesson of the tortoise than the hare. It took almost ten years of submitting to to publishers before I sold my first book. It took another five years to move from the short, sweet regencies into the more mainstream historicals. Then came the paranormals and five books to reach the bestseller lists.

I hope that those who dream of one day seeing their writing published will take heart from my story and realize that for every writer who is an overnight sensation there are far more of us who have stood in the trenches, writing and perfecting our craft for years before ever being given an opportunity. And most of all, I hope I can inspire others to put aside their fear of failure and go for their goals, whatever they may be. I have stacks and stacks and stacks of rejection letters, some of them assuring me that I am a talentless hack that should keep my day job, but I never let them take my dream.

Don't let them take yours either. Just go for it :)

Happy Thanksgiving to All!
Alex

AAD blog hunt winners!

Ok.. we had some great entries, and we have 2 winners!

Jennifer Mathis

Afshan

So congrats!

But guess what? We have another wild card winner. they wont get as much stuff, but they do win some goodies!

Mortal Sinn

So congrats and email me at blueflamesabove@yahoo.com with your address and I shall be sending you goodies in a week or two.

Mixing Things Up...

Dragons are perhaps my favorite characters to write. Why? They're playful, smart, strong and sort of mysterious. At least my dragons are. Then there are the dragon shapeshifters. My dragon princes are half human/half dragon. They've got all the cunning and power of the dragon and Alpha maleness to the Nth degree. Hubba hubba. ;-)

As it happens, I have a new dragon book coming out in ebook formats on the 17th. It's called DRAGON STORM and it's not only a fantastical visit to my dragon world, but it's also a dimension-travel tale that brings twin dragon princes to our modern world where they meet their destined mate (yes, it's a very naughty menage!) and bring her back to their medieval-ish world. Yes, I'm really mixing it up in this book! It will be in print from Samhain Publishing sometime next year.

But I've got something even more daring coming at the end of next month. Zombies. Yep, I said zombies! Not a word you'd normally associate with romance, but like I said, I really like to mix things up. ;-) I'll post more about it next time, but keep an eye out for a duology called HALF PAST DEAD from Kensington Brava. It's my first-ever release from a big "NY" publisher and it contains the novella that will launch a series of military paranormal romances I'm calling Guardians of the Dark.

The first novel in the series will release in March, titled ONCE BITTEN, TWICE DEAD. The heroes in the series are all special ops military dudes and their task is to fight the zombies alongside some cool women who come into their lives. The heroine of the first novella is a Navy doctor. The heroine of the first novel is a county cop. There will be at least three more of these stories - one more novella that will release later in 2010 and two more novels.

Zombies may not sound sexy, but believe me, the men who fight them are super hot. *fanning self* When I was asked to write about zombies, my first thought was "Huh?" But then I thought about it a bit and I realized it was the next logical step for the paranormal genre. It pushes the boundaries, which is something I'm used to doing and it was definitely a challenge. Hopefully you'll like the mix of menacing zombies and heroic protagonists who are tasked with saving us all. I wouldn't call these books "horror" but they definitely have some suspenseful moments here and there, in between a whole lotta romance.

I can't wait to hear what you all think of not only the zombies, but my latest dragon adventure. Have I gone too far mixing things up yet? LOL.