Book Releases

Holding On (Colorado High Country #6) —
The Colorado High Country series returns with Conrad and Kenzie's story.

A hero barely holding on…

Harrison Conrad returned to Scarlet Springs from Nepal, the sole survivor of a freak accident on Mt. Everest. Shattered and grieving for his friends, he vows never to climb again and retreats into a bottle of whiskey—until Kenzie Morgan shows up at his door with a tiny puppy asking for his help. He’s the last person in the world she should ask to foster this little furball. He’s barely capable of managing his own life right now, let alone caring for a helpless, adorable, fluffy puppy. But Conrad has always had a thing for Kenzie with her bright smile and sweet curves. One look into her pleading blue eyes, and he can’t say no.

The woman who won’t let him fall…

Kenzie Morgan’s life went to the dogs years ago. A successful search dog trainer and kennel owner, she gets her fill of adventure volunteering for the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team. The only thing missing from her busy life is love. It’s not easy finding Mr. Right in a small mountain town, especially when she’s unwilling to date climbers. She long ago swore never again to fall for a guy who might one day leave her for a rock. When Conrad returns from a climbing trip haunted by the catastrophe that killed his best friend, Kenzie can see he’s hurting and wants to help. She just might have the perfect way to bring him back to the world of the living. But friendship quickly turns into something more—and now she’s risking her heart to heal his.

In ebook and soon in print!


About Me

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I grew up in Colorado at the foot of the Rocky Mountains, then lived in Denmark and traveled throughout Europe before coming back to Colorado. I have two adult sons, whom I cherish. I started my writing career as a columnist and investigative reporter and eventually became the first woman editor of two different papers. Along the way, my team and I won numerous state and several national awards, including the National Journalism Award for Public Service. In 2011, I was awarded the Keeper of the Flame Lifetime Achievement Award for Journalism. Now I write historical romance and contemporary romantic suspense.

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Seductive Musings

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Contests, news and a Project: Happiness update







Let me just say that pneumonia sucks. I totally understand now how this illness can kill people. There were a few nights when I wondered whether the combination of asthma and pneumonia would make me either faint or just stop breathing. That’s how hard I was coughing. The world would just start to go gray. My doc was giving me about 24 hours to get better, or I was going to land in the hospital.

Fortunately, I have come back to the world of the breathing — mostly. Inhalation is a sweet thing. Thanks to all of you for your emails, tweets and Facebook posts. Your encouragement meant a lot to me.

Before I launch on a Project: Happiness update, I wanted to let you know about some upcoming events and contests.


The 12-12-12 Leap Day Giveaway



I am a proud Leap Day baby. And this year — 2012 — I am celebrating my 12th real birthday. In honor of that, I am giving away 12 books through Goodreads — six copies of Surrender and six copies of Untamed. You need to be a member of Goodreads to participate, but signing up is easy. A lot of you probably already are Goodreads members.

To sign up for the Surrender giveaway, click here and scroll down the page to where you see “Win A Copy of This Book.” To sign up for the Untamed giveaway, click here, and do the same.

(Side note: If anyone has librarian privileges at Goodreads, please email me and let me know or message me through Goodreads. There are some things on my books that need to be updated, such as the new covers for Surrender and Untamed, and I don’t know how to make that happen.)

Unfortunately, I’ve had to limit participation in this giveaway to addresses in the U.S. and Canada. Now that I’m not working at the paper, I just can’t afford overseas postage. I feel terrible about that. I’ve never limited participation before, but you gotta do what you gotta do.


A MacKinnon’s Rangers special



Yes, Valentine’s Day is behind us, but on February 27, Under the Covers Book Blog is having me on as a guest. I’ll be bringing you a MacKinnon’s Rangers extra — a chapter-length look at Iain and Morgan offering Annie and Amalie some Valentine’s day affection. The mini-story takes place on Feb. 13-14, 1760, at the MacKinnon farm on the colonial New York frontier.

I didn’t want to give away any spoiler for Defiant, so I set the story just before Defiant opens. This means the action is taking place between the ending of Untamed and the epilogue of Untamed. Annie has just had her baby girl, and Amalie is eight months pregnant — and fearful of what is to come as women were back in the day when childbirth so often meant death. I find it very romantic when men find a way to nurture their women at times like these when what we think of as romance — hot sex, seduction — aren’t necessarily possible. Marriage isn’t a constant stream of hot sex dates so much as a commitment to live each day together and love each other fully. I try to give you some romance in daily life in this story, showing Iain and Morgan’s tender sides.

Those of you who want a taste of the MacKinnon brothers to tide you over to Defiant’s July 3 release date are in luck.

I’m uncertain of the details, but I plan to give a book or two away that day. Watch Facebook and Twitter (@Pamela_Clare) to get the live links.

Project: Happiness update
Body-Mind-Spirit



I wouldn’t say that Project: Happiness was derailed by pneumonia, but my focus was entirely on getting well. And that’s fitting, as a huge part of Project: Happiness for me is learning how to take care of my physical self.

I’m a history geek, as you know, and in my study of the ancient world — 10 years of Latin, people — I was always very touched by the old Latin adage, “Mens sana in corpore sano.” This translates to, “A healthy mind in a healthy body.”

It was an ideal to which philosophers at least adhered and which grew out of the almost identical Greek concept: “Νοῦς ὑγιὴς ἐν σώματι ὑγιεῖ.”

It’s amazing to me how ancient people’s saw the world so clearly and understood human life so well. We hire personal trainers and nutritionists and spiritual gurus to impress this concept on us today. So many people think starving themselves or pushing themselves to exercise and be thin or muscular or physically perfect is the key to happiness. Others spend years educating themselves or pursing worthwhile intellectual work — only to sit at a desk 24/7 and find that, while their minds are strong, their bodies resemble nothing so much as a pile of mashed potatoes.

How many people truly find balance? Probably not many.

I would like to be so bold as to propose an update to the Greco-Roman ideal and offer this: “A healthy spirit and a healthy mind in a health body.”

I see people as a blending of the three — body, mind and spirit. Each plays its role in leading us toward growth in this life and toward meaningful happiness. Neglect any one of the three, and the potential of our lives diminishes. Oftentimes, people neglect spirit until age or illness deprives them of their bodies. Each is an equally important part of our human existence. Although I’m not religious in the traditional sense, I think of them as a kind of personal trinity — the Three in One that is reflective of something higher.

I’ve had some time to think about how I want to undertake Project: Happiness. And, yes, I mean to create a road map, a way to quantify making qualitative progress in my life. After 47 years, I’ve concluded that we make progress in our lives when we devote true energy toward our desired goals. If you have no plan, if you have no road map, you have no way to measure your efforts or their results. In other words, shit doesn’t happen unless you make it happen.

As my grandmother used to say, “Wish in one hand, and piss in the other, and see which one fills up first.”

This is no longer about wishing. It’s about achieving. I don’t have decades left to goof around. What I want to be, I must become. What I am tomorrow is what I’ve built today. If I have a goal, I need to draw it out of my heart and make it real. As strange as it may be to say that happiness is something one can set out to achieve, I believe it truly is, not by chasing it or going to parties or escaping into other distractions, but by doing the hard work of becoming the person I was meant to be in all areas of my life.

In upcoming blogs, I’ll focus on each of these areas — body, mind and spirit — and the steps I plan to take and the challenges I know I will face.

To start with, I am thinking each day of what I am doing for each of these three areas of my life. What did I do for my body today? What did I do for my mind? What did I do for my spirit? A day that involves adequate rest, exercise and nutrition, together with satisfying work and prayer or meditation could be considered a successful, balanced day, for example. By consciously planning to achieve something for each part of myself, I hope to bring balance to my life — and to expose the areas where I need to work harder.

So stay tuned for the first exploration: Body.


And, yes, and more MacKinnon’s Rangers, too!

Plus, watch for I-Team news! 


11 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Pamela,

I'm sorry to hear that you're under the weather but happy to know you're recovering.

I really like what you wrote about Project: Happiness and I thought you might want to check out this website that you can relate to with your project: http://happyscience-usa.org/

Take good care of yourself,
Mei-Ling

Tricia29 said...

Hi Pamela,

I'm really glad to hear your on the mend.

I'm not sure if I mentioned this to you in a previous blog/email but when I get pneumonia, I make homemade chicken stock and put 50 peppercorns in it and let it simmer the entire day before taking a bowl full. It'll make you sweat the bug out and really clears up the passaways. As my dad says, "It warms the cockles of your heart", Chai Green Tea also is a wonderful remedy. Both are antioxidents that help in healing and both are homeopathic ways of healing instead of relying on medication.

I've been on your band wagon with Project: Happiness since you initiated it. One huge thing is that two things have to be constant: Belief and Faith. Spirituality relies on us having the capacity to believe in ourselves and to have faith that everything happens for a reason and that everything will turn out fine. We're in the drivers seat, moreso, we have control over how we feel or how we want to feel.

Ellie C said...

Pamela,

I am so glad that you are on the mend...and appreciate your patience with my long distance nagging!

Project Happiness is, to me, finding balance in my life. Balance between needs, wants, dreams, hopes. It also is identifying the difference between needs and wants as well as the similarities of dreams and hopes.

Best to you, life is both the journey and destination.

e

landin said...

I'm so glad you're feeling better now Pamela! I hate the feeling of not being able to breathe so I can only imagine how awful it was for you.

I love what you have to say on your project happiness and find it inspiring, I can't wait to hear more of your journey!

Dalila G. said...

How wonderful to have you back, just take it easy and remember to stop and rest now and again.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! Love that picture of that leap year cake! Too cute and yummy!

Can't wait to hear more news of the MacKinnon’s. Looking forward to your visit on Under the Covers Book Blog.

Have a great day!

Anonymous said...

I love your posts everytime. It's never too late to make serious changes inyour life, whatever people may say about that. Live, love and laugh Pamela!

Glad your feeling better :)

I so know what you are going through with the pneumonia. I've been going through the same thing since December.

I can't wait for the Under the Covers Valentine's story!!!!

And I love the questions "What did I do for my body today? What did I do for my mind? What did I do for my spirit?" I agree that just being aware of that makes a BIG difference in how you approach your life.

oh, and one quick question. I noticed in Carnal Gift (the ebook version) that you said it was substantially expanded from the book version. And at the end of Carnal Gift you said that Ride the Fire was also going to be re-released but by Berkley Sensation. Will that one also be edited differently with new content from the previously published version?

@Booklover1335 Check out Pamela's February 6 blog post for your answer. (Fresh edit, new epilogue & new cover.) :)

Hi, Mei—Ling — Thanks for the link to the website. I'm going to check that out!

I'm taking things pretty easy, just trying to get lots of rest. I seem to be very tired all the time. Thanks for the good wishes!

Hi, Tricia — Thanks! That chicken soup recipe sounds really appealing. I'll keep it in mind. I made a couple batches of chicken soup myself. I found myself craving it — just protein in general. Strange.

As for spirituality, I think you're right that it plays a fundamental role in deeper (i.e., true) happiness.

Hi, Ellie — I found your long-distance "nagging" to be sweet. Thanks!

We delude ourselves about what we want and what we need. Figuring out those two things and knowing the difference saves years of frustration and lost time.


Hi, Landin — Thanks so very much! Yes, breathing is really important. Just getting a good night's sleep seems like such a luxury now. I've been on prednisone for most of two weeks and you just can't sleep when you're on that, whether you can breathe or not. Tonight will be my first night off the stuff, and I hope I sleep like a baby.

And thanks! If what I write here inspires anyone, that's wonderful.

Hi, Dalila — Thank you! I really have no choice but to take it easy. I just don't have energy for anything. It will get better, I know.

I wish I were having that birthday cake! Pretty fancy, isn't it? A reporter is coming by my parents' house tonight to photograph my 12th birthday party. The local paper (not the one I used to write for) is doing a story about Leap Day babies, and I guess there just aren't that many of us. Tonight we're doing the family thing, then my boys have something planned for the actual day of February 29. I'm going out with friends on March 2.

I'm excited to share the Under the Covers Book Blog piece with all of you!


Hi, Anonymous — Thank you! And thanks for the encouragement. Every single moment is a new moment, and that means every single moment holds the potential for change. I think it's hard for human beings to remember that in the bustle of daily life. Slowing down and trying to focus on that fact by itself is, I think, very helpful.

Hi, Booklover — I am so sorry to hear you've had this since December. That must feel like an eternity. I was telling my mom yesterday that I feel like two weeks just got sucked out of my life, but you've been dealing with it for three months. Have you been back to the doctor?

CARNAL GIFT had the 100 manuscript pages the original publisher cut restored, plus it was re-edited. RIDE THE FIRE will get a fresh edit, a new cover, plus it will get the as-yet-unwritten epilogue. I'm not sure why they're waiting till Feb. 2013 to get the book out again. I wish it were coming out sooner!

Hi, MsBookJunkie — I see you answered the question for me! :-)



Thanks, everyone, for your supportive comments and for sharing your own thoughts.

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"I am an artist. I am here to live out loud."
—Emile Zola

"I am tomorrow, or some future day, what I establish today. I am today what I established yesterday or some previous day."
—James Joyce

"Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery."
—Jane Austen

"Writers are those for whom writing is more difficult that it is for others."
—Ernest Hemingway

"When I write, I feel like an armless, legless man with a crayon in his mouth."
—Kurt Vonnegut

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—Toni Morrison

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—the character of Chaucer in
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