Tis the time of year for radio stations to start playing Christmas carols. With snow on the ground, I’ve found myself finally in the Christmas spirit. I’ve started turning to the radio stations that play Christmas songs 24/7.

I thought it might be interesting for us to share what songs we hope to hear when we tune in those stations. I have to admit that the two songs I’m about to give you are as different as night and day. The first is Mary, Did You Know? I love the melody and the lyrics and I haven’t heard it at all this year.

The other song I’ve heard twice so far this season.
The lyrics and melody are catchy and the song always bring a smile to my lips.

Okay, your turn….what are YOUR favorite Christmas songs?

This morning I got caught with my pants down and didn’t get the JQ blog up in time. Normally, I have my blogs done early because they’re on my calendar. I suppose it’s the time of year. I’ve spent the past three days driving all over town, shopping, snatching toys out of the hands of other desperate mothers and dashing for the check out line. (Okay, it hasn’t been quite that bad.)

The point is, I’ve barely been near my computer, let alone checking my calendar. So it was this morning before I realized I needed to blog.

Why, you may wonder, in this age of digital wonder was I driving all over town instead of ordering on line like a civilized person? Last year, I got burned ordering on line. A gift I ordered on December 2nd didn’t arrive until mid-February. It was something for my mother and I’d talked my sister and my dad into going in on it. So on December 23rd, I was driving around town (okay, to the jewelry store three miles from my house) desperately looking for a replacement gift. It worked out. She loved the replacement.

But this year, I wasn’t willing to risk it. I decided I’d rather have the stress of facing the crowds than the stress of waiting all month for packages to arrive. But of course, there was one crucial item I couldn’t find locally, so it’ll be arriving in the next three to five business days. I hope.

What about you? Are you an on-line shopper or a local shopper? Which is more stressful or more fun? Do you have any shopping horror stories? That wasn’t you I swiped the toddler safari truck from, was it?

Yesterday, Robyn shared her news about her RT nod (her third if I’m not mistaken), so I figure I should share my news too.

This year, RT nominated me for a Career Achievement award for Series Romance!

I’m so excited I can hardly stand it. And completely surprised too! The other women nominated in my category are Jessica Hart, Leslie Kelly, Tanya Michaels, and Karen Whiddon. I’m not familiar with Jessica Hart’s work, but I adore all the other writers. It’s such a great group of ladies be included in. I just couldn’t be more excited!

Okay, now back to our regularly scheduled programing … please read Nancy’s wonderful post below about how to sloooow down for the holidays.

Is it just me, or does it seem like the holidays have arrived early this year? It feels like it shouldn’t even be Halloween yet. Probably because Halloween came and went without even a carved jack-o-lantern or toasted pumpkin seed in our household (Awww, man, and I love toasted pumpkin seeds…).  Halloween was preempted by deadlines and obligation. There was just no time. Missing that, we held on tight and careened into November, which is birthday season in our family; then the birthdays gave way to Thanksgiving.  Now, here we are sprinting toward the end of 2009.

I realized the other day, I need to slow down and smell the Christmas cookies. Actually, I need to make time to bake some. I need to make time to enjoy my family and the meaning of the season before it’s over and we’re halfway through another new year.

It’s time to take a deep breath and live in the moment.

I’m reading a great book called Ten Zen Seconds by Eric Maisel. Chapter nine, Embracing The Moment, really spoke to me. It’s about the difference between “passing the time” (or in my case, racing through it) and “being present.” Living in the moment.   It’s really given me pause and made me think.      

How is it that we get so busy that we don’t have time to enjoy life? We get so caught up in planning and scheduling and racing from one thing to the next that we neglect to live. Events that are supposed to be fun and memorable become burdens or worse yet, they slip by because we don’t have time or we we’re present in body, but not in spirit as our mind wanders, planning what’s next .

The commitments and obligations won’t evaporate – and the truth is, we probably don’t want most of them to go away.  I’m very blessed to be a wife and mother (my family is my top priority); I’m on deadline (thank goodness for book contracts!); I’m way over committed in the volunteer arena (I can’t imagine giving any of it up); I’ve barely made a dent in my Christmas list (probably good for the budget – but gifts will find their way under the tree); my parents are arriving for the holidays in less than a week (one of the events I’m anticipating most– who knows how many more Christmases we’ll share.  I don’t want to take for granted a single moment with them). Oh, and remember that gingerbread house I blogged about on December 1? Yeah, that one. Well, December’s not over yet…

So, here’s the question: What’s your best tip for living in the spirit of the season? How do you keep up with family, friends, work, housework, decorating and all those holiday concerts, pageants, and parties and keep your sanity?

 ”An Angel in Provence”  by Nancy Robards Thompson

www.NancyRobardsThompson.com

I recently got the cover for my next Legend Hunters book, Desire Me, which will hit stores in early summer 2010. And it’s totally stunning so I must share it with you. Isn’t it so beautiful? I was super excited when I first saw it because in my mind this book felt like a blue book. I’m sure at doesn’t actually make much sense, but sometimes I get a color vibe.

In any case it got me thinking about how some covers can really create a feeling for a book and can enhance the story or sometimes make a book not quite work. You know I love great covers and I will often pick up a book I’m drawn to because of the cover. It’s actually how I found Teresa Medeiros many years ago. I was in a bookstore looking around and the cover for her book Heather & Velvet caught my attention (gotta love those old Fabio covers!) and I was instantly hooked and now she’s one of my favorite authors.

What are some of your favorite covers? What do you usually look for in a cover? Have you ever bought a book simply because of the cover? I’ll draw a winner from one lucky commenter today to win an autographed copy of Seduce Me.

In other news I must brag about the fact that yesterday I found out that Seduce Me is a Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice Award Nominee for Best Historical Romantic Adventure! Go Fielding and Esme!

Remember the days when our parents or grandparents stayed in the same job or occupation for most of their lives? My grandfather worked for the same big metropolitan newspaper for 45 years! I read somewhere that the typical American will change jobs an average of seven times in his or her lifetime. That seems like a lot to me, especially since I’ve only done it once. Sort of – I started out as a staff nurse, became a nursing instructor for awhile, and spent most of my career in Intensive Care. (That is not me at the left, by the way). So I stayed within the field, but worked in several different specialties. My husband’s career has been that way, too. He’s a research scientist, but he has more than one specialty. He started doing medical research, then went to industrial chemistry, then into pharmaseuticals, and now he’s back to medical research. (That’s not him on the right, either, although we do tease him about being a mad scientist! )

For the past ten years, I’ve practiced a totally different career – writing books. Full-length novels. And my writing career was the first time I’d truly started over – started from scratch, as it were. As in any new profession, there was lots to learn, and I don’t think that will ever end. I’ve written 17 novels, and now I can brag about another new venture within the field. Short stories.

If you’ll look under the ‘new release’ banner at the right, you’ll see a book cover for The Mammoth Book of Time Travel Romance, which is being released today. The headliners in this volume are Linda Howard and Jude Devereaux and there are lots of other terrific authors who contributed. I was also asked to write a story to this volume, which was a first for me. I’d never written a short story before (well, not since about 6th grade), nor have I ever been given license to do whatever I wanted with it. My only guideline was to make it some kind of a time travel story.

The obvious thing would have been for me to write something historical – I could have had a character from the Regency period show up in the present time. Or the reverse. Instead, I decided to go with a man from the future and bring him back to the present to deal with an issue that will have an impact on his time.  So it’s quite a change for me – and it was a lot of fun. It was so much fun that I agreed to write a second one for The Mammoth Book of Irish Romance which comes out next month, and a third for The Mammoth Book of Regency Romance – out in June. If you’re looking for something with short, fun stories, give The Mammoth Book a try!

In the meantime, I’d be interested in hearing about your new starts. Tell us about a big change you’ve made, and I’ll pick one poster to receive a copy of Taken by the Laird, my October release from Avon.

I read all sorts of romance novels…suspense, historical, paranormal, contemporary. In addition to the happy ending I know I’ll get from a romance, there are a few other things I want out of a story. Good structure, of course. Great dialogue. Multi-dimensional characters. But aside from those obvious choices, here’s a list of things I just can’t do without.

Laughs. Even if the book is a romantic suspense, even if Scarlett is not going to end up with Rhett, even if I’m going to dampen the pages with my tears later on, I want a couple laughs. If I’m reading a book that doesn’t make me at least chuckle once in a while, it’s fair to say I’m snowbound in a mountain cabin. Make me smile, on the other hand, and I’m yours.

Animals. Yes, yes, you all know I’m a dog lover. But how a person views animals is so revealing. Sherry Thomas’s Private Arrangements is about an estranged couple who hasn’t seen each other for ten years. Way back when they were still in love, he gave her a puppy. That dog is very old now. I can’t tell you how poignant it was when the hero sees that dog again after their long separation. Blerk!

Someone being told off. That’s always so much fun! Finally, the nasty frenemy gets blown out of the water, or the evil mother hears just how much damage she’s done. It shows wonderful character growth, doesn’t it? Because being told off implies that person had it coming for some time, and our hero or heroine has finally grown up enough to say what needs to be said.

Food. In a perfect world, I’d have a butler to procure me whatever the heroine was so enjoying (and I’m working on it, believe me). If you’re a writer who can make a reader hungry — even a well fed reader like myself — you’re a really good writer.

A scene where the hero and heroine look fabulous. Call it the Cinderella Syndrome, but we all love seeing our couple looking great. We may not ever go to a ball, but we can pretend, right? The dress fits, the shoes don’t hurt, and the hero is staring at you with hot and hungry eyes. Mm-mm!

A scene where the hero and heroine look like idiots. Even better. Let them screw up, let them be less than perfect, let them babble, let them ruin an important event. Let them be imperfect. Bridget Jones making that speech at the Darcys’ anniversary party… “No! No! NO! It’s just that…it’s such a terrible pity. For Britain. To lose such top people…top person, really.” Nothing is less interesting than two perfect people who are perfectly happy in their perfect world. Just typing that sentence makes me sleepy.

Him defending her. “Can’t you see that, how wonderful, how special she is?” That’s from one of the most unapologetically romantic movies I’ve ever seen…A Walk in the Clouds starring Keanu Reeves. He’s telling her disapproving father that the heroine deserves better treatment from her family. I believe he gets kicked off the vineyard for that speech. Sigh!

Her defending him. Our own Jaunty Quill Kate Smith did this quite nicely in When Seducing a Duke. The hero is a man everyone loves to hate, and the heroine finally has had enough. You go, sister! I did it myself, a bit more, er, physically, when Chastity punches a guy who insults Trevor. That was really fun to write. 

A person you love to hate. The nasty coworker. The sneaky pseudo-friend. The guy who keeps getting in the way of Our Hero. The ex who breaks a true and loving heart and doesn’t even care. What I love too is when these characters get at least a glimmer of redemption.

A job I’d like to have. I read to escape, as do we all. Chef. Airline pilot. Navy Seal. Horse trainer. Vampire slayer. I’m never going to have those jobs, but how cool to get a little look into what that would be like! Personal shopper. Jewelry designer. Wizard. Surgeon. Yep. I need to have a few more lives. In the meantime, I really like reading about a person with a cool profession.

Are there elements in a book you really love? What are some you could do without? If you’re a writer, what’s your favorite thing to write about in your books?

As I was finishing up my current book (Marrying John Doe June 2010) I realized I’d named the hero Nick…again. There are just certain names–especially male names–that I seem to choose (and like) more than others.

As I was thinking of this, I thought it might be fun to tally up the names I’ve used so far in the books that I’ve written.

Okay, so here goes:

Names in more than one book
Nick- 3 books
Dan- 2 books
David-2 books
Jake- 2 books

Just one book-
Alex; Carson; Clay; Drew; Jack; Jay; Josh; Matt; Mitch; Robert; Sal; Sam; Seth: Tony

I will soon be starting another book. The hero’s name in that book is currently set to be…Derek. But another book that I’m also currently plotting has a hero named Dan (which would make Dan tie with Nick with three books)

I’d be curious to know what is your favorite hero name. And I’d also like to know what names can you really not stand?

My mom and grandmother did huge amounts of baking and candy making during the holidays.  One of my fondest memories is coming home from school and stepping into a warm kitchen that held the scents of vanilla, chocolate, mint, and cinnamon.

Well, what I really loved was seeing all those cookies cooling on racks.  Very few were the frosted and decorated type, though she made delicious butter cookies shaped like candy canes.  All of her cookies were so scrumptuous. 

Mom would start baking cookies right after Thanksgiving.  She’d store many of them in the freezer to be doled out as gifts, but there was always plenty on hand for the family too.   Oh, and she made brownies from scratch.  Thick, rich and chocolaty.  They never lasted long!  Same with her fudge which was the creamy type that she cooked on the stove. 

Grandmother prided herself on the divinity she made each year, swearing that she had to wait until the weather was just right to make it.  They were just perfectly beautiful little clouds, sometimes tinted in pastels.  In all honesty I was never a fan of it though.

I did like her peanut brittle.  That’s one thing I’ve never tried making, because I also remember her saying how much trouble it was.  Uh, thank you, I have enough trouble without looking for more!                  

She was always experimenting with different types of fudge.  Some were fabulous.  Some were interesting in a who’d have thought way.  Some not so much.  It was the same with the little fruit and vegetable cakes she’d make: pumpkin, zucchini, pear, and some that were unidentifiable other than a strong taste of allspice.   

Those are some of the memories I associate with the holidays.  I don’t do much dessert and candy making at all, but when I do I’m thrust right back to those simpler happy times.

That’s what is was like for the heroine in my latest book, A Cowboy Christmas.  Ellie is a stranger to the kitchen, but she had fond memories of her mother’s baking.  She’s also a total believer of all things Christmas and tries to recreate those traditions that she holds dear just once.

 Do you keep any holiday baking traditions that have special meaning for you, or bring back fond memories?  Are there certain candies, cakes or cookies that you buy for the holidays that have become a family tradition?

With Thanksgiving just days ago, and Christmas on the way, I often reflect this time of year on all the things for which I am thankful.  One of them is my husband, whom I will affectionately call “The Brit,” since he was born and raised in England, still has a sexy British accent despite living and working in the States for eighteen years, and insists English beer is the best on the planet.  He even has a pair of socks decorated with the Union Jack.  He once owned a red, white, and blue pair of Speedo’s (what used to be the preferred swim attire of male Brits), but thankfully, that tight little number is long gone! 

We married more than seventeen years ago and in our journey together, I’ve come to appreciate many things about The Brit whom I characterize as an endearing blend of Mr. Bean’s Rowan Atkinson (for his quirky sense of humor) and Dr. Who’s David Tennant (for his genius smarts):

The Brit introduced me to new, interesting cuisines

Before I married The Brit, I hadn’t eaten Indian cuisine.  Maybe a mild dish with a few teaspoons of curry powder thrown in, but nothing like the delicately spiced, creamy Chicken Korma that’s the Brit’s favorite, Chicken Tikka Masala, crispy thin papadums, or naan (flat) breads.  Early on in my culinary education, the Brit, in his patient and encouraging ways, picked out restaurant dishes for me that would whet my palate.  I’ve grown to enjoy Indian cuisine so much that Friday night is usually curry night in our household.

He buys me English Chocolate

Just the thought makes my mouth water.  Smooth, creamy British chocolate (Cadbury especially) is divine and tastes better than what’s sold in grocery stores here in Florida.  Some people bring back souvenirs from England; we bring back suitcases full of chocolate and biscuits (the British word for cookies), including Club Bars and Penguins that are coated in dee-lish chocolate.

Speaking of dee-lish things, we often bring back Christmas puddings, too, a traditional dessert made of suet, dried fruits, nuts, and sometimes brandy that’s steamed and served on Christmas day.  In our household, it’s usually drowned in a homemade Brandy sauce.  Yum!

He got me hooked on British comedies

I think I’ve laughed more in my married years than ever before in my whole life.  Thanks to The Brit, I’ve seen every episode of Black Adder (hysterical, semi-crude historical-set comedy featuring Rowan Atkinson), Only Fools and Horses (about two wheeling and dealing brothers), ’Allo ’Allo (one of my favorites, about a French café owner in World War II), and Are you Being Served? (an older series but a good one, set in a British department store).  There are more, of course, but these are the first to come to mind.

He appreciates old things

No, I don’t mean me.  I mean centuries-old castles, museum collections, and historic sites.  Not far from the house in Hertfordshire where he grew up are Roman baths, discovered by construction workers when digging to expand the local motorway.  It’s exciting to step into the preserved, underground area and see what was used by people long ago.

Since I write medieval romances, The Brit understands my interest in visiting castle sites, and has taken me to both wind-scarred ruins where only the most basic outlines of the castle remain, and to better preserved sites such as Warwick Castle.  My creative brain cells go into overdrive when I am in these ancient places, and it’s exciting to be able to share my love of history with him in this way.

He is a great dad

Our daughter adores him.  I love him for the way he adores our daughter, from helping her with her Geometry homework to assisting with Science Fair projects.  His goofy sense of humor has brought her around from tears of frustration over her homework many times.  And when it comes to reading stories aloud and making all the characters’ different voices and accents, there’s no one better than The Brit.  And no, I’m not just saying that so he’ll buy me some more British chocolate.