Sourcebooks Casablanca Romance Authors

I was finally able to have a movie fest over the holidays in order to play catch up on some titles that I missed along the way. The Holiday (2006) with Kate Winslet, Cameron Diaz, Jude Law and Jack Black was the cutest movie that I've seen in a while. I absolutely fell in love with the concept. For those of you who haven't seen the movie, two women with relationship and career issues swap houses in each other's countries (USA and England.) The ladies meet local guys and fall in love. Hey, I'm a romance writer so being fond of the love stories was a given. But what I found fascinating was the swap. There are times when life gets overwhelming, whether it's from the holidays, job, family or finances. Wouldn't it be nice to just say you've had enough and take off somewhere to recharge your battery? For me, two weeks in a cottage in the Scottish Highlands would be ideal. That's where I would want to regroup. According to mindbodygreen.com, here are 27...

My dentist's receptionist called me at the end of September, and the conversation was kind of surreal. Receptionist: Ms. Browning-Erwin, you have an appointment for September 29. This is your reminder. Me: Oh. Sorry. I have to reschedule. I'll be in London. Receptionist: That's okay. We have a week later. Me: Um, nope. I'll be in Paris. Oops. Receptionist: How about a Tuesday, two weeks after that? Me: Sure... oh. Hmm. No. I'll be in Napa. Let's just make it for sometime in November. I think I'm free then. True story. I'm pretty sure she thought I was just showing off by the end of the conversation. My husband took me to London and Paris for our 25th Anniversary, and it was magical. Then last week, I was in Napa to celebrate the very special milestone birthday of a friend. I'm sure there are stories to be told, but I just got back. I actually wrote this before leaving. Check my Facebook for updates! In between, I attended a...

Bottoms Up! Otter Explores Bucket in Georgia Aquarium I’ve always had a fondness for aquariums, especially in the summer. Zoos can be hot, overly bright, noisy, and, unsurprisingly, redolent of their various inhabitants. By contrast, aquariums tend to be temperature-controlled, softly lit, reasonably quiet—give or take the occasional dolphin-click, whale song, waterfowl squawk, or seal bark—and less odoriferous, provided you don’t mind the smells of brine and sea wrack.   And there’s something soothing, even hypnotic, about watching multicolored fish or sea mammals glide silently through the waters of their tanks, while kelp forests sway in the current. I’ve been to several fine aquariums over the years: Monterey Bay, with its charming sea otter exhibit; Stanley Park, Vancouver, where I first saw beluga whales; and Georgia, which boasts an amazing collection of aquatic life that includes whales, dolphins, otters, penguins, and an albino alligator (the latter looked like ...

This year, for the first time, I'm attending the national Romance Writers of America conference. But I'm not going to talk today about how excited I am to meet my editors and agent in person (for the first time ever!). Or how many authors I'll be fangirling over. Or the workshops, or the chance to talk with author friends, or the books galore. Nope, today I'm just going to talk about getting there. I live in the Midwest, but not near any travel hubs. So flying can take quite a while, especially since I can make flights get canceled with my mere presence. (It's a gift.) But with relatives at each coast and to the far north and south, travel is a necessity. I just prefer to go by car when I can. So I'm road-tripping to RWA--today, actually. I've scheduled this post ahead of time, because when you read it, I'll be cutting my way southward to San Antonio. I'm bringing music, snacks, and--courtesy of my library--a few audiobooks. My hope is that ...

from Mia Marlowe... Break out the bubbly! Toot the noisemakers! One Night with a Rake has landed in a bookstore near you. I'm excited about this story for so many reasons, but mostly because I love the characters. My hero Nate is as conflicted and tortured as any romance reader could wish. The heroine Georgette is full of good intentions that constantly get her into trouble. And they're surrounded by fun secondary characters, like Reuben Darling, the handsome, but not terribly "book smart" footman who's suffering from an unrequited love for Mercy, Georgette's lady's maid. (Mercy is a reformed whore who thinks being a respectable woman is ever so much more trouble than being a light-skirt!) While I love One Night with a Rake now, it's true that we writers never love our stories quite so much as when they are finished. It's easy to love a gorgeous cover and ringing prose that took a number of sharp eyes to shine up. It's the birthing ...

For the past three weeks I’ve been travelling with my husband and two kids. It’s the first big holiday we’ve ever had, and it’s been amazing. Disneyland Hong Kong We started in Hong Kong Disneyland for the kids, but since neither hubby nor me had ever been to Disney it was fun for all of us. The youngest loved the teacups, again and again and again, while the eldest discovered the thrill of rollercoasters. yellow flowers in Death Valley After that we went to LA and began our tour of the west coast that included San Diego Seaworld, the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Death Valley and San Francisco. The flight over the Grand Canyon was spectacular (my credit card bill will be waiting when I get home). And we were lucky enough to see flowers in Death Valley which I’m told is pretty rare. This week I’m in Chicago for the RT Convention before heading off to NY and then Niagara and home via Dubai. Grand Canyon from the helicopter All those different climates, and di...

from Mia Marlowe... I'm a lucky girl and I know it. My DH has been a travel industry IT professional for most of his working life. Because of that, we've been able to take lots of trips that wouldn't have been possible for us otherwise. I've tagged along on his business trips to England, Ireland, Brussels, Germany and the Netherlands. He works, bless the man, and I get to overdose on museums and cultural treasures. Yeah, it's not fair, but he doesn't complain.   Yesterday I had a 48 hour day. We were returning from a week in Tokyo ( The pic above was taken from the window of the office building where my DH was working. That bit of white in the distance is Mt. Fuji--150 miles away!) It was a little like time travel because we left Narita airport at 3 PM on March 3rd and arrived at JFK in New York at 1 PM also on March 3rd! Tokyo, a city of 12 million souls, is a fascinating place. It's a study in contrasts, dense high rises, covered "gerbi...

by Amanda Forester Here I am at the Dolphin Hotel, Orlando Florida… finally. If you follow this blog you may be aware that I do not care to fly (translation – it terrifies me). So when the annual conference for the Romance Writers of America (RWA) announced it was going to be in Nashville, I looked up the train schedule and decided to give it a try. When the conference location was changed to Orlando, Florida, I took a big breath, made more train reservations and went for it. Since I live in Washington State, that meant a huge cross country trip with my family, including my two young children (no possible way when they found out I was going to Disney World that they were going to be left behind!). First, let me say that traveling in small confined spaces with two young kids is about what you may expect, only more so. Overall, though, we are having a fabulous time. We began our journey in Seattle and boarded the Empire Builder train. The views along the coast and through the Cascade Mou...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy Ever wish you could just run away and have a brand new start on life? I'll admit, the thought has crossed my mind, or at least figured in my day dreams. Back in the days of my DDJ (dreaded day job) my best friend and I liked to joke about running away to some tropical island where we'd lie about on the beach with native boys bringing us fruity drinks with little umbrellas. Matter of fact, those shared day dreams eventually led us to make our very first trip to Hawaii back in 1992 (yes, I still have the T-shirt, old and faded in the rag pile) ! However we were so busy sight seeing on that brief vacation (I think we were only gone 5 days because we both had kids at home) we only managed one brief afternoon on the beach. That was at Hanauma Bay, and alas there were no native boys. Also, our drink of choice was diet Pepsi. Still, that little jaunt whetted my appetite for lovely far off islands, and my BFF and I still joke about those na...

by Deb Werksman Since this month's theme is travel, and since I travel a lot, I thought I'd share my process for choosing which reading material to take with me. It's really not as easy a formula as that for shoes (one pair for every day of the trip plus one extra--my motto is "there's always room for one more chair at the table and one more pair of shoes in the suitcase"). Business trips are a great opportunity to catch up on my reading, and unexpected delays have to be planned for. There are 4 pools from which I take my reading materials: *manuscripts I'm editing : these are organized in my office according to the date they're due to the copyeditor, with lead time factored in for editorial notes and prepping. Any time I'll be away more than one night, I always travel with a minimum of 2 manuscripts to edit. This is because: a) I might get only partially into the manuscript and require a revision before I can go further b) I ...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy Our month of posts about travel is almost over and we've certainly been to an exciting array of interesting places. However, having returned just a few days ago from my latest cruise adventure, I can strongly identify with Dorothy Gale in The Wizard of Oz . There really is NO PLACE LIKE HOME! As much as I love to travel (and you all know I love it A LOT ) , I'm usually home sick after a couple of weeks and ready to hop on the nearest plane, train, automobile, or available transport device and head back to my humble abode. So with a nod to David Letterman's Late Show , here then are my Top Ten Things About Returning Home: I miss my dogs! Sometimes I take them along, but usually I can't, and I always worry about them when they aren't with me. Plus, it doesn't matter if I've been gone five minutes or five weeks, they are always thrilled to see me when I walk in the door. I like sleeping in my own bed. For over twenty ye...

by Amanda Forester Grab your knapsack; it’s time to ride the rails! There is something nostalgically romantic about boarding a train and experiencing that rush of excitement as it lurches from the station and chugs down the tracks (ok they don’t exactly chug any more, but you get my drift). I have been fortunate to be able to take several long train trips. Of course, those who read my previous blog will know this is due more to my deep and abiding fear of planes than to an innate love of train travel, but in taking train trips I have found many things I enjoy. The one thing I realized as I started to travel by ground is just how BIG the country is. When you get on a plane and disembark at your destination several hours later you miss the true feeling of how big this place is (though I grant you an aerial view can be illuminating). There is also something very grounding (forgive the pun) to experiencing travel from a slower perspective. It forces me to acknowledge the spaces between ci...

We are closing out our month long discussion of traveling and that is rather sad. I have SO enjoyed hearing of the wonderful places both domestic and foreign that the CasaBabes have visited over the years. I have, I confess, been a wee bit jealous upon occasion as I have only ventured outside of US borders twice in my lifetime, and that was only to Mexico! Fun, believe me, and somewhat exotic, but give me Greece any day! Or even Brazil, right Cheryl? LOL! Cheryl’s tongue-in-cheek blog 2 days ago (scroll down) had us virtually traveling to some stunningly gorgeous locales without concern for packing the sunscreen or appropriate clothing. I mean, I have traveled through parts of the American West, heck I live in the American West, and my Native American experiences have never been THAT good! So, super stud hunk muffins aside, if I could go anywhere with money not an object – we are still in dreaming mode apparently – Where would I go? 1. England. “Naturally,” you say in a sarcastic ton...