I walked into the pages of one of my books last week.

With two baseball books to my name- this month’s Double Play and last year’s Sliding into Home- I’ve been thinking about the Major Leagues quite a bit lately. So when I took a road trip with my family to see the Cincinnati Reds take on the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park in Pittsburgh, it was sort of like seeing one of my books made into a movie. Minus the love scenes!

There was no lack of cute guys. My husband thoughtfully provided us with seats just above the Reds’ dugout so I was able to observe things up close and personal. And what I love about these guys- beyond the general attractiveness of being athletes in their prime – is how much passion they pour into the game. The helmet toss when they strike out or the telling irritated jab of the bat into the ground on their way back to the dugout. I could almost visualize the medieval knight jamming his sword in the dusty ground. You know those batters aren’t just playing for the money. They wanted to get on base. And they didn’t want to just get on base for selfish reasons—it wasn’t about personal glory. I could tell because those same competitors were just as likely to clap and whistle for their teammates when they got a line drive up the middle. I like that investment in the game—the drive to win and the willingness to cheer on the guys whose bats are hot to get the job done.

It was just like I imagined it! Of course, I’ve been to plenty of Major League baseball games in my day. The time my husband insisted on taking in a Rockies game as long as we were in Denver. Never mind the fact that we were in the middle of a cross-country move from Kentucky to Utah. When in Rome… see Mile High Stadium. Then there was the trip to California in which the highlight was a day game in Oakland and a night game at the now defunct Candlestick Park. Or was it the other way around? There was so much baseball that day, I could hardly keep track. And during the Kentucky years, I rooted on any number of Reds’ players through some lean years.

But this year, the Reds are at the top of the NL Central, winning games and making for one heck of a show for this baseball fan. Actually, I guess I’m a sports fan in general since I’m just as quick to fall for a hockey player or a football star. I don’t discriminate when it comes to fierce competitors.

Heck, I even have a soft spot for the coaches. Witness my fascination with Mike Tomlin, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ coach who I got to see in action in Latrobe, PA when we dropped by this NFL team’s training camp last week. (Remember, when in Rome… take in the Steelers’ workout as long as you’re in the same town where the Pirates play). But for the purposes of my August book, Double Play, I happened to fall for a baseball manager – sexy Heath Donovan who heads up the Boston baseball team in my version of the majors. Heath might be past his playing days, but that doesn’t detract from his hotness factor in the least. In fact, he’s more determined than ever to stay in the game, and no one but a quirky book reviewer would ever dream of distracting him from that goal…

I hope you’ll check out Double Play this month and see what I see when I step into the baseball world. Love scenes included.

***You can see What I Did on My Summer Vacation here. What about you? If you had to write that famous annual essay theme this year, what highlight from your summer would you mention? A family picnic or day at the beach? A shopping trip in the next town over? Chat with me on the boards today and I’ll give one random poster a signed copy of Double Play.

I had one of those days recently where everything went wrong. You know the kind I mean. Copier breaks when you have a big project to send out. Fax machine is out of paper. You’ve lost your scanner software and the computer keeps asking you to reinstall. The phone doesn’t stop ringing. You spin your wheels all day and by the end your frustrated, exhausted and ask yourself “Why am I doing this?” Sometimes, on days like this, we tack on another question, like “What would my life be like if I had been a ___ [fill in the blank].” In other words, what would life be like if you’d chosen the road not taken?

I don’t do this too often, preferring to take a “no regrets” approach to life for the most part. But sometimes the need to look back and wonder “what if” is too great. What if I hadn’t quit that job? What if I’d gone to school for what I’d wanted to in the first place instead of being talked into something else? What if I’d taken the trip to Paris?

I have to confess I can ruminate over all those questions from time to time. I thought about getting my Ph.D. and opted to put it off, never getting back to it. I turned down a couple of fun job offers to do other things and – as much as I love writing – I wonder what life would have been like if I’d taken them.

Honestly, I think we play this game to reassure ourselves we’re doing the right thing. It’s our brain’s way of getting us to re-evaluate our choices and see that we’re right where we belong, even if at that moment our path feels challenging. And if you’re playing the “What if I’d…” game too often, maybe it’s a sign you’re ready to make a change. Take that big gamble and do something different with your life.

For me though, for today, I know I just had a bump in the road. If I could do it all over again, I’d opt to be a writer. It’s a job full of rejection and uncertainty, sure to make you doubt yourself on a regular basis. There’s no fun gossip at the water cooler since it’s you against the world day in and day out. And the benefits are the more esoteric kind that don’t include dental insurance.

But when the copier’s not broken and the scanner is humming happily, I sometimes receive a fan letter that starts out, “I couldn’t put your book down!” It’s a rocking awesome feeling and it sends a whole world of other worries packing. That’s when I know I’m right where I should be.

***Have any “other roads” you look back on sometimes? Another career you considered? A field of study that interested you that you never got a chance to explore? Share with me today and I’ll give away a coupon for a free download of The Virgin’s Pursuit at eHarlequin, good through the month of July. ***

As a rule, I try to ignore the role of luck in my life. I can’t control it, after all, so I sure as heck don’t wait around for it. A lot of days, I prefer to think luck—good or bad—is superstitious hype. I work hard and it either pays off or doesn’t pay off. I can only control my effort and my training for any given situation, right? So there’s no sense worrying about the things I can’t control.

But last week reminded me in no uncertain terms that luck is alive and well and remains a fickle beast. First, I locked my keys in my car while my husband was out of town and couldn’t help. In my search under the van for a spare key I was sure we must have tucked away at some point, I scraped both knees, got grease on a new blouse and toasted my fingers on the muffler. I finally found the key, but only after I bothered my mother-in-law for a rescue mission. That incident felt a little unlucky to me since I haven’t locked keys in a vehicle in a decade, but after bandaging all my assorted scrapes, I moved onto the discount store for a few necessary items for a picnic. Only to find out my husband had my membership card. Did I mention he was out of town? I had to close the account, talk to three store reps including two via phone and open a new account before I could buy hot dogs.

Still, things had to improve.

I went home to clean up the house for the picnic and cracked my head on the wrought iron patio table while vacuuming underneath it. I ran over a toe with the shop vac and cut that, too. Normally, I’m not a clutzy person. If anything, I lean to the slow, cautious side. By the time I finished on the patio—spilling some paint on the way—I decided to take to my bed and not bother with supper. Who would trust me near a gas flame on a day like that?

So I’m convinced bad luck hovered like a dark cloud over me all day. I think I could have started the morning wrapped in gauze and I still would have ended up bloodied and bruised!

But the little bout of bad luck doesn’t discourage me in the least. If anything, the reminder that the universe can dole out anything helped me recall that I’m really lucky most days.

I have three great kids who are healthy, happy and fairly well-adjusted. I know that all the brilliant parenting in the world can’t always result in that combination of blessings, so luck played a role. Also, ten years ago I had the good fortune to have my manuscript picked out of a pile of wanna-be published books and an editor loved it. I still say that was darn lucky. Sure I had to write a good story. But I know there are lots of other good stories that don’t find their place in the sun for other readers to enjoy, so I remain very thankful an editor’s eye came to rest on my project at just the right time. With that in mind, I guess I don’t mind a little bad luck on the small things if I can keep up my happy streak on the big things.

**Ever have a Murphy’s Law kind of day? Ever locked your keys in the car? Share one of your trying moments with me and I’ll send out a copy of one of my backlist books to a random poster.

I recently fell off the wagon of writerly self-discipline. I turned in my December book (Under Wraps, a holiday Blaze) and promptly shoved my computer aside to indulge the sometime-enemy of my writing—reading.

You see, I can’t write when I’m on a full-fledged reading binge. I save up books for times like these—books I don’t want to have to put down for anything, let alone work. And when I find pockets of time in between my work, I read like a fiend.

I can’t tell you much I enjoy this. I’ve got romance, non-fiction, literary fiction, history books, historical fiction and a couple of cookbooks spread out all over the house. The history and the cookbooks are the only books I don’t devour whole. Everything else I prefer to consume in giant gulps.

And while reading is very necessary to the writer’s soul, I call it the sometime-enemy of my work because it’s such a profound joy to just read that I find it very hard to get back to work after bingeing. It’s like getting back to dieting. Or exercising. Sure, I know I’ll feel better in a lot of ways once I start working again. But geesh… who doesn’t love lingering over the proverbial bag of potato chips?

So this time, I’ve decided to give myself a transition stage to phase back into writing. Recently, I purchased a bunch of books on writing. With titles like What If? Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers (Bernays and Painter), and Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within (Goldberg), how can I not get excited about writing again? I will read my way back to working.

It’s the perfect plan—the writerly equivalent of healthy potato chips. Wish me luck!

***Do you play mind games with yourself to keep yourself on track? Develop elaborate schemes to ensure you don’t snack at night or only spend so many minutes a day on Facebook, or don’t bring home work on the weekends? Tell me about the deals you make with yourself and I’ll give a signed copy of any backlist book (assuming I have it!) to one random poster.

As a writer, I’ve taken a special interest in seeing what effect digital media has on language, writing and communication in general. When email first became a popular way to communicate, I watched with interest as the speedy medium wreaked havoc with our ability to restrain ourselves. No longer did we have the luxury of rethinking an angry letter penned at three a.m. since once you hit send, you were committed. Unlike the real life mailbox, there was no retrieving the thing.

Lately, I’ve watched Twitter cull our thoughts into soundbites, with posts condensed as ruthlessly as classified ads to make every word count. Likewise, I’m intrigued by the Facebook status, something near and dear to my heart since I’m a bit of an FB fan. I believe there’s an art to a good status post in the same way there’s an art to a good pen pal letter or an engaging email. And while Facebook gives you more characters to play with than a tweet, I still say you need to use them wisely because who’s going to read your status if it’s a mile long? On the other hand, if all your posting is hi, goodbye and the like, you’re not attracting any attention.

And I’m moving forward on that assumption—that we want attention for our Facebook status. Your status is the snippet of you that goes out into the world on your friends’ home pages, the quickest window into your world. If you want those friends to stop and chat with you, you obviously need a good conversational ice-breaker.

I’ve noticed a few things that attract attention. The birth of babies. Promotions. Good news in general. Everyone will take time to share a “good on you” post when you’re flying high or when it’s your birthday. But sometimes those posts generate a tame collection of hurrahs and don’t really invite chat and commentary.

What does? Intriguing observation. A moment to let visitors see the world through your unique lens. Quirky moments. The funniest or most offbeat thing that happened to you in a day, whether it was locking yourself out of the house in your bathrobe or using regular dish detergent in an automatic dishwasher.

At least, these are my favorite status posts. I love to hear my friends’ voices and nothing brings them to life more quickly than a glance at their day, through their eyes. I hear one friend’s dry wit, another’s raucous sense of humor, and yet another’s relentless optimism.

It’s fast, it’s fun, and it lets me feel like my friends are close at hand. On the best days, it allows me to invite those friends into my home to hangout for a little while. Even the die-hard letter writers of the world like me can appreciate that.

*Are you on Facebook? Do you troll your friends’ status updates every day like me, commenting on the things that attract your attention? Or do you use it more for one-way communication to alert the world at large to what’s going on with you? Talk to me about how you use your FB page or that all-important status box, and I’ll give one random poster a signed advance copy of my April Blaze Historical, THE CAPTIVE, which just rec’d a Top Pick from Romantic Times.

Maybe you’ll think this sounds crazy coming from a romance author. But I’m not sure how I feel about Valentine’s Day.

I like the candy hearts, and I’m always hopeful there’s a dinner out in the works. But overall, Valentine’s Day feels a smidge manufactured to me. (Oddly, I posted elsewhere about how Christmas was all in how you look at it, and came away feeling like it was not over-commercialized because I didn’t let it be.) In researching this- my reasons for feeling shoved into romance on February 14th– I went to the History Channel’s website. I was reminded that Valentine’s Day is named for a martyred saint with no connection to romance. (Not to take away from his sainthood… I’m sure he – or any of the martyred saints named Valentine, of which there seem to be two or three—was a great guy.) But who made the jump between the martyr and the romantic holiday? The ties between love and sacrifice feel a little suffocating.

I think Valentine’s Day is another victim of our culture cross-wiring Romance and romance. I’ve made the case elsewhere the Romantic poets weren’t talking about undying love so much as deep, passionate feeling. In this way, there is an element of Romance in Romeo and Juliet. It’s all about big, sweeping emotion. But I don’t look to Juliet for model heroine in my happily-ever-after vision of romance, that’s for sure. Anyway, I wonder if somewhere along the line St. Valentine and his sacrifice/passionate commitment to his faith was called Romantic in the old-school sense of that word?

Whatever happened in the cross-wiring of meaning to give us a Valentine’s Day that equates with romantic love, let’s set that aside for now and look at what we have for a Valentine Day icon. The winged Cupid is usually a child and—again with the violence theme—he comes bearing weaponry. If we’re going to have a half-naked icon to inspire romance, why not Hugh Jackman or the yummy Gilles Marini of Brothers and Sisters fame?

Seriously, I think Valentine’s Day is an awfully concocted holiday. We’ve turned it into something we wanted to have as a culture—a day to celebrate love. And that’s cool. But as long as the generations before us pinned meaning on the holiday that wasn’t there to start with, why don’t we do the same?

Let’s say we’re going to come up with a new Valentine’s Day icon. We could come up with a flower more original than the over-taxed rose. Georgia O’Keefe, for example, knew about sexiness in a flower. I vote we use something more like this. Or, if we’re looking for something wildly romantic, how about a couple?

What do you think? If we had it to do over again, what images do you think would be right for Valentine’s Day—what says “romance” in the sense that has to do with falling in love—as far as you’re concerned? I’ll give away a copy of any book from my backlist to a random poster… your choice!

I’m hibernating like I’ve never hibernated before. I don’t know that it’s such a particularly cold winter for my neck of the woods, but I’m definitely crankier about the weather than normal. My feet haven’t been warm since November.

I’ve never invested in a full-spectrum lamp that is supposed to imitate natural sunlight, but I’m debating it. I might be suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder and not even know it! I sleep too much and awake cold and cranky, feeling like I should be hibernating more than my life can afford.

Part of the problem is that I can’t just stay indoors the way I could when the kids were younger. Now, they need rides someplace every two hours, so I’m forever getting into a cold car to take short trips to school, gyms or friends’ houses. Who guessed I’d ever miss the days when I was tied to the house 24-7 with babies?

But since complaining goes against my preferred nature (would you ever guess it from my post?) I’ve decided to surround myself with every tool possible to make this an easier winter for myself. Starting with
 wool socks
 full-spectrum lighting (I’m ordering this week!)
 more plants (possibly more things to kill, but they say it helps to surround yourself with a bit of the outdoors)
 a vacation

Notice the last line item? I really think it’s necessary to surviving a winter up north. While I lived in the south, I did not crave vacation time in the winter the way I do when I live in the frozen tundra. Maybe I’ll cheer up when my husband books us a flight somewhere warm (should I add “prayers for cheap airline fares” to my list?).

In addition to the above action list, part two of my coping strategy is to give thanks for what I can about the winter. That list does not include running my dryer non-stop for the mountains of wet hats, gloves and ski pants that end up on the laundry room floor. But it probably would include:
 my kids’ rosy cheeks when they come in from outdoors
 the sound of sharp skates on fresh ice
 the snow days when we everything around us is cancelled and no one goes anywhere
 a warm oven with homemade cookies
 long wool coats that hide the winter five pounds I gain by eating aforementioned cookies
 fireplaces

Surprisingly, I realize I could have listed more. The best part of weathering a hard winter though, is arriving at spring. Southern springs might come faster and with more flowers, but a northern spring remains sweeter to me for how hard we had to work for it. Absence makes the heart grow fonder I guess.

Stay warm, my friends!

***
While I shiver, I would like to hear what you like about the cold weather months. Dig deep! There must be some perks we can think about. I’m going to share a copy of MANHUNTING, my February Valentine anthology, with one random poster.