Birthday Summary

You know that you're a writer when your husband buys you a coffeemaker that brews iced coffee for your birthday and you couldn't be more thrilled. Now I've got story fuel for the hot, summer months.

Thanks for the well wishes, everyone. You may be wondering: How did that day of choosing what I do work out? Well, a whole day is a little unrealistic. :-) You all probably knew that. But I watched some television and actually focused on the show, ate pizza, played pool and spent time with family. Plus, I stared at my fancy new coffeemaker for longer than necessary. Pretty perfect if you ask me.

Now, back to work.

Enjoy the rest of your holiday weekend.

-Kinley

The Real Meaning of Birthdays

Birthdays aren’t about presents. (Although I like presents.) Birthdays aren’t about cake. (Although I like cake. Especially cheesecake made by my mother-in-law.) Birthdays are about celebrating your life. You’re another year older, another year wiser, and you’ve gone through another year’s worth of development.

I think of life as a development process. My job description is to grow, learn and evolve. I need to go out of my way to find viewpoints that I never considered. And I need to be self-aware enough to know that I am different from every other person on the planet (and the aliens in space, the monsters in the closets and the creatures in other realms). My view is warped from what other people are thinking.

Birthdays should celebrate your warped-ness. What do you want to do in this moment? What makes you happy? On your birthday, I believe you should do whatever your answer was to those two questions. Because we all do a lot of what we don’t want to do. I live my life trying to alleviate the tensions that aren’t necessary. But I still get caught up in the stress. I still get distracted by my goals.

Birthdays are not a day for goals you’re reaching for. Birthdays are a celebration of the goals you’ve already achieved. Who matters most to you? See them on your birthday. Do you like to be alone? Be alone on your birthday. What sparks your heart to life? Your birthday is the perfect time to remember this stimulus because birthdays are dependable, happen yearly, and Facebook reminds you when yours is approaching.

All of us are self-motivated to some degree. Sometimes the degree is high and sometimes the degree is low. No matter the scale, other people get involved in our lives, creating complications that cause a wide range of emotions from happiness to sorrow.

Some people may believe that celebrating yourself is egotistical. To those people, I say: Dude. It is one day out of three-hundred-and-sixty-five days. I have statistical evidence that says it’s okay. Are you really going to label someone narcissistic if they celebrate themselves 0.2% of the year? People get so busy existing, they forget to live.

A birthday exists because it’s a celebration of life! Whoohoo! You’re alive and you survived another year. Congratulations.

And yes, tomorrow is my birthday. I’ll be spending time with my family and eating delicious food, while attempting to forget about the things I need to do later and concentrate on what I’m doing now. Because I struggle to focus on what’s really important every day. For me it’s loving family, writing entertaining and compelling stories, and being thankful for each moment I have here.

What’s the most important thing in your life?

Think of your next best birthday. How would/will you spend the day?

Crescent Moon Press Blog Tour Stop #7

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WINNER OF SCRAPBOOKING 

BASKET ANNOUNCED!

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I'm choosing the contest winner of the Scrapbooking Basket a little early. Congratulations to: 

Tanya Reimer. 

Please contact me by e-mail.

The grand prize will be announced on the Crescent Moon Press Blog on June 4th. Good luck everyone!

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Welcome to the home of the Shadow Shifters, powerful beings born in darkness, formed by gods and ruled by a king. I love the romance genre almost as much as I love fantasy and the idea: If the dictionary was truly accurate, it would have no definition for impossible. 

I can boil down my devotion to writing by a mantra I crafted for this blog. I’m totally keeping this code indefinitely.

Fantasy Romance Author Code of Honor:

1.) Believing in fantasy opens portals and hearts.


2.) Laughing makes the realm a better place.


3.) Romance rules supreme, even over the gods.

If I can make you giggle, smile or tingle while reading, I’m doing my job. I aim to write stories about sexy men and interesting women. I enjoy writing scenes that still make me laugh after a year of editing and the ones that bring a tear to my eye. If you ever experience either, please let me know. I’m trying to convince my husband I’m actually funny, or at the very least clever. You don’t have to laugh out loud (overall feeling of amusement or even a twinge will suffice).

Thank you for visiting me today. Please enjoy RUINED. The novel will release soon from Crescent Moon Press. Scroll down for the contest details!

Give scandal a crown

& call the adventure

wickedly entertaining.

Blurb for RUINED

Jessa is one healing away from death. Under the thrall of her gift, the Court’s Senior Healer risks giving her life in exchange for her patient’s.

Vale is a rebel ruler. When his brother is killed, he’s given the throne and the decree from the Court to produce an heir or lose his family’s hold on the land——and his deceiving advisors aren’t afraid to use murder as a weapon if their directive to stay away from the Senior Healer goes unheeded.

But Vale burns to possess Jessa. The heat between them leaves a wake of smoke, and even the powerful forces above want to bind them forever. Vale taking another would be a betrayal neither could survive.

Their enemies fear a child born of such a powerful Healer and Warrior, but little do they know, the true threat lies in the bond forged in shadows and fused in fire.

STOP #7 PRIZE

Romantic Fantasy Scrapbooking Basket!

Including:

-12” X 12” Hello Beautiful Scrapbook Kit -3” X 3” Mat Stack -Fresh Cuts Paper Embellishments -Letter Stencil -20 Colorful Gel Ink Pens -Once Upon A Time Stack 12” X 12” (48 Sheets) -8 ½” X 11” – 10 Colors (100 Sheets Cardstock)

-Martha Stewart Tinsel Glitter -Assorted Stickers -CD of Creative Lettering for Windows/MAC -Two Chalk Ink Pads (Blue & Green) -4 ft. of Premium Ribbon -Assorted Party Scrapbooking Papers (12 Sheets) 12” X 12” -Black Magic 12” X 12” 20 Sheets/20 Colors

To participate in the contest, please follow my blog, and e-mail me the answer to following question:

The Shadow Shifters have four spiritual gifts, blessed from their Ancestors, which travel through their bloodlines: Warrior, Healer, Seer, and Sensitive. What are Vale and Jessa’s perspective gifts? HINT: The answer is revealed in RUINED’s blurb.

Please e-mail me the answer at kinleybaker@gmail.com. Follow my blog to qualify for the prize I’m giving away and the grand prize and include the name you're following under in your e-mail.

Crescent Moon Press Blog Tour:

***GRAND PRIZE***

KINDLE or NOOK and a dozen EBOOKS.

NEXT STEP

Travel to Lynn Rush’s awesome website at www.lynnrush.com to continue the blog tour for the chance to win the ***GRAND PRIZE***. She has a great, engaging blog and I’ve heard amazing things about her New Adult novel, WASTELAND. I can’t wait for its release! For full contest details, head over to Crescent Moon Press. 

A question for fun in the comments. Have you ever fallen in love with a forbidden man or woman?

If you're interested in staying up to date on my newest releases, please visit here and join my newsletter. 

Crescent Moon Press Blog Tour!

I'm blogging for the big Crescent Moon Press Blog Tour tomorrow and I'm pretty excited about my Fantasy & Romance Scrapbooking Basket! :-) RUINED isn't out yet, but I've never participated in a blog tour so I'm along for the ride! Grand Prize is a Kindle or Nook & 12 free ebooks :-)

16 authors, 16 stops, 16 prizes and 16 times the fun!

Visit Crescent Moon Press (www.crescentmoonpress.com) for more information. Contest starts TODAY!

Thank you for visiting.

Kinley

Hey Strangers

Happy Wednesday! It occurred to me I should provide my social media info. If you get a chance, please head over to my Facebook and Twitter:

www.Facebook.com/kinleybaker
www.Twitter.com/kinleybaker

I'm also posting today about a writing problem at Castles & Guns:

http://www.castlesandguns.com/2011/05/premature-sending-writer-affliction.html

Other than that, I sent in my second round of edits for RUINED and I'm revising a new series! Yeah :-D

Hope to see you all for the big Crescent Moon Press blog tour next week! Authors will be posting May 24th-26th. Come by for a chance to win individual author prizes and the grandprize! A nook or kindle. Your choice! Visit www.crescentmoonpress.com for more information.

Kinley :-)

Note To Self

Stop blogging. Finish your second round of edits for RUINED!

Okay, okay. I'm doing it :-)

Guest Author Mimi Barbour

Hello everyone! I have a special guest on the blog today :-) Please help me welcome, Mimi Barbour! 

Mimi's Blog:

While I wrote my latest release “Together Again”, one of the areas in the story that I worked on the most was the conflict going on not only between the hero and heroine, but also the secondary characters. I wanted each scene to be so riveting that the reader would have a hard time putting the book down.

I’m sure every author has their own way of creating conflict, and I must say, it’s not something I have a set of rules for, or that I follow methodical steps. It’s more like a knowing I get when I’m writing each scene.

For me, I envision circumstances that will make my characters really happy. Ways to make their lives more comfortable, to bring them to a happy ending. Then I totally destroy those images by shifting everything so either the opposite happens, or something unexpected occurs to wipe the smiles off their faces. (Me bad!)

Back when I first began my writing career, I tried to rely on unbelievable situations cropping up like an unexpected earthquake (sigh!!) or an ‘out of the blue’ car accident. These things really do happen in real life, that’s true, but unless you’ve set the scene so it’s feasible for these types of conflicts to part your lovers, then it’s not convincing, and most editors can spot these weak, pitiful concepts and they don’t like them. And neither would the readers. They expect more from us, and that’s what they deserve. A well-designed set of circumstances that makes life difficult for our heroes and heroines, where they have to strive for their love to win the day, adds a lot more excitement to the story. Then the reader feels as if they’ve really gotten their money’s worth of entertainment. Once that story is finished, they go looking for whatever else they can find by that same author. (Me, me!!)

One way that helped me see more clearly how to manage discord and strife among the pages was to pay close attention to how the writers manage it for TV scripts. They don’t have the advantage we do of more pages. Everything has to be pared down so it can fit into a specific time slot. It’s true that they have the ability of using facial expressions along with dialogue, whereas we have to simple settle for descriptive words. But if their actors aren’t great, the scene can lose emphasis. Whereas we can go right into the thoughts of each person and explain their emotions. It’s a power thing – a control we have – and we need to use it well. 

Apart from physical strife, which is most effective when writing a romance novel, passion is compulsory.  Interrupted, thwarted, misplaced sentiment puts our players at odds and creates the exact atmosphere so necessary to give the scenes the ultimate conflict.

I’d love to hear your views on the subject so please visit with me at my website

see e-mail address on my contact page - or on Facebook

If you sign up for my newsletter, which I only send out when there’s actual news, there is a drawing most months for a winner to get a copy of my latest book.

It’s been lovely visiting with you and your friends, Kinley. Thank you for having me as a guest.

Mimi