I love Jane Austen. I really do.  Heck, I co-own an entire site dedicated to indie published Austenesque books.  So love might be slightly understating it.   There is one book of hers, however, that I just cannot love - Mansfield Park.  I admit that I have problems with Sense and Sensibility too.  It's not my favorite, but I do not HATE it like I HATE Mansfield Park.   Truthfully, the biggest problem with Mansfield Park...

I'm not the biggest Maroon 5 fan but I've liked a few of their songs (not Moves Like Jagger - what? No, Adam, you do not have moves like Jagger. But I do Zumba to it, my darlings, I do indeed).  Their newest song, Payphone, is ridiculously catchy and gets stuck in my sad little brain.  I hate it, but I love it, but I hate it...   And what is all this about being at a pay phone?  Is it a song about time travel?  Where exactly IS...

I don't often get all "state of the publishing industry" ranty on this blog, but I've been fuming over this issue for awhile... so here it goes.  I'll keep it short-ish.  I always promise this and then two pages of single-spaced ranty-ness later, I'm thinking "oops, yeah."   Ebooks.  Here's the deal.  They don't cost a lot to produce.  Yes, there is obviously the work of creation, the blood, sweet, tears, and sacrifices that go...

Writing, like anything else, is a lot of behind the scenes work for a few hours (or however long it takes you to read the book) of "glory."  You have to put in the hard hours, days, weeks, or years of work to make the team, or hit the home run, or sometimes even to just get out on the field.  But when it all comes together it can be magic.  Which brings me to a complete switch in my sports analogy from baseball to figure skating (this is just...

A few random facts:   I love the movie Newsies.  Really, what is not to love?  A young Christian Bale singing and dancing?  Sign me up, please!  This movie happened to come out when I was 12, so I was the perfect age to become mildly obsessed.  I have passed on my obsession to my younger friends...I've been known to host a Newsies movie watching sleepover or...