Blogging Q & A

Having a blog is changing things…changing me.  So many of you write to me after you read my blog and I’m amazed.   For years I’ve felt like  a scrapper, one of those street urchins that learns to talk tough and walk tall, calling myself a lone wolf kind of woman and now I realize I’m wrong about so many things.

For starters, I *am* a scrapper, but I’m far from alone. It’s taken me a divorce and twenty some months to discover that I might think I’m a lone wolf, but it turns out I’ve got a whole big wolf pack padding along right behind me. And much to my chagrin, I’ve realized the reason I can talk tough and walk tall is that there are a couple really big bad wolfs leading the pack that’s padding behind me. Alone? On my own? Hardly.

So yes, I’m a scrapper–a runty, runny-nosed, bespectacled scrapper–with a lot of power right behind me, just in case I need help.

And I need the help.

We all do.

That’s what I’ve learned through my blog, too, and what I hear from those who’ve read my blog and written to me afterwards.

I think we all have people who would be there for us if we just let them. I think we have more love and support then we know, or wish to acknowledge.

In the last couple weeks I’ve had readers email me to let me know how much they love my books, and enjoy my blog. Others write to tell me how sorry they are that I’ve family who are sick, or share how glad they are that I’m putting my kids first, or pleased that I’m taking time to do things again that I once enjoyed. Others just want to know details about this guy I’m crazy about that lives 2,600 miles away.

To show that I actually do read my email, and do care about your thoughts and questions, I’ve decided to try to answer some of the recent questions in one blog blurt.

Question: When will your last book for Harlequin Presents be published?

Answer: I’m still a Harlequin Presents author and under contract to write lots more books. I plan on writing for Harlequin for years to come.

Q: Why didn’t Frog Prince have more of a romance in it?

A: It wasn’t supposed to be a romance. It’s a novel about a woman discovering who she is, and what she wants, and the relationship in this book is really of developing a relationship with herself.

Q. Will your next Warner book have romance in it?

A. Yes. 🙂 It definitely has a romance in it.

Q. Is it true your books are autobiographical?

A. Actually, no. I’ve never dated a sheikh, or a sultan, or slept with an Italian Prince or an Argentinean count. I haven’t even met a Greek tycoon but I do know that Paris Hilton has.

Q. But your chick-lit is autobiographical, right?

A. Parts of each book have lots of me in it, but the books are fiction and have characters and plots and conflict that have been created to drive the story to a satisfying conclusion. In real life, we might have a particular event happen, or feel an emotion, but we don’t always get the resolution we want or need. In fiction, I get to take messy events and intense emotional conflict and tie it up. I love that.

Q. So just how many Harlequins are you writing a year now that you also write for Warner?

A. Fewer than I used to. Somewhere between two and three. This year it might only be two.

Q. Is your long distance boyfriend related to your trips to Hawaii?

A. Ah, a personal question. If I were a press weary celeb, I’d say ‘no comment,’ but hey, I need all the press I can get. Yes, long distance boyfriend lives in Hawaii.

Q. I read on your website that the heroine in your next book, Flirting with Forty, dates a much younger man in Hawaii. Is your boyfriend younger than you?

A. No comment.

Q. You said in an earlier blog that you and your boys are learning to surf and then your next Warner book features a forty-year-old-heroine that dates a surf instructor.

A: I’m afraid I don’t see a question. Next question?

Q: Are you dating your surf instructor?

A: I think that just about wraps up our questions for today. Thank you everyone for your emails and feedback.

In the meantime, I’m in St. Louis today for a Waldenbooks regional bookseller meeting and will post in the next few days about the authors attending, and who invited me and what I’m doing here…

Yours always—

Jane

By posting a comment, you consent to have your personally identifiable information collected and used in accordance with our privacy policy.