We finalled!

Hey, Christo here!

Did you hear about the RITA nomination Nat and Anne and I got? Cool, yes?

I didn't know anything about the RITA contest, and Anne didn't bother to mention it before she went off to New York. So when a very nice woman began leaving messages on the answering machine, I listened to them, but I didn't know what she was talking about.

It wasn't until Anne called home later that night that she told The Prof and he told me. Nat was in NYC with Anne and Nancy the Cat Slayer doing weddings and chocolate tours and whatnot. Girl stuff.

But what I want to know is, how could Anne just go off and not tell me something might happen? How could she FORGET?

Boggles the mind.

She and Nat are home now. Nat brought chocolate and tales of amazing places we need to go next time we're in New York City. We can do that, but we're also going to a baseball game or two or maybe a hockey game, depending on the season.

Anne, who is out running errands today, said to tell you that she's got the blog on the Pink Heart Society for April 1, so if you want to find out what she did in NYC, you should check it out.

She is giving away her favorite chocolate confection there, too. She and Nat brought a bunch home because they think they are the neatest funniest seasonal chocolates ever.

Check 'em out. Leave a comment. You might win your very own Chirp N Dale!

Christo is a RITA finalist!

Hi from New York!

We've been having a fabulous time, and it isn't even wedding day yet. That's Saturday.

In the meantime, though, we've been wandering the city, getting reacquainted with old haunts, seeking out a few new ones, and generally enjoying ourselves.

Nancy the Cat Slayer (not!) has joined me for this trip as The Prof is proffing and can't possibly leave his classes (he did retire, but no one told him that!). NTCS is a good traveling companion and we manage to find fun things to do regularly.

Yesterday we went to the Brooklyn Museum which was wonderful. I'll tell you about it later, but I have more exciting news to share that I got when we returned.

I had an email from Anne Gracie congratulating Christo on his RITA nomination!

Turns out the RITA finalists we announced yesterday and ONE-NIGHT MISTRESS. . . CONVENIENT WIFE is one of them.

Christo is pleased. Natalie is pleased. I'm thrilled and delighted and honored. Not to mention amazed.

This year there are FOUR (count 'em) Presents and Presents Extra nominees. Besides Christo's book, Jane Porter, Jennie Lucas and Kelly Hunter all have finalists in the contemporary series category! It was a huge category -- over 250 entries, I've heard. So the competition was fierce. And to have so many books from the line is great news.

I'm going to celebrate with Christo today by taking him to the Pierpont Morgan Libary and checking it out. Never been there. I've heard it's wonderful. Natalie is up for the chocolate tour. But it's drizzling and promising worse, so I'm not sure we'll make that.

Back home on Wednesday!

RITA winners

Well, sadly for PJ and Ally, Antonides' Forbidden Wife, didn't win the RITA.

But other terrific books were winners of tonight's RITA awards at the RWA National Convention.

In PJ's category, contemporary series romance, A Mother's Wish, by Karen Templeton won the RITA. I haven't read her book, but I have no doubt it was deserving of the honor. Congratulations, Karen. And congrats as well to all the rest of the finalists. It was an honor to have PJ and Ally's book up there among them.

A couple of RITA winners I'm particularly happy about were Joanna Bourne's My Lord and Spymaster, which I thought was a terrific, fast-paced, compelling read, and Cindy Gerard's Take No Prisoners. I haven't read it yet, but I'm thrilled anyway because Cindy is an old friend.

You can read a list of all the winners on RWA's twitter site. So check it out and make sure you note down the names of the books and authors.

It's a tough competition, and any book that wins is worth reading.

Following the characters

Over on Kate Walker's blog I think I have a post on Thursday. Kate is celebrating Presents this month and has asked a few of us to write about some aspect of Presents for her while she's living it up in Washington DC at RWA.

This is very Tom Sawyerish of her. But even so I was happy to oblige.

There's a lot to enjoy in writing for Presents. Our books go all over the world. We get to research amazing places -- and we get to imagine whole worlds of fascinating people. As a day job, it's hard to beat.

I would happily have written all my books for Presents but that's not the way my mind works. I follow the characters wherever they go. They dictate the story -- and sadly, marketing and editorial don't think in broad enough terms for them all to be Presents.

That's okay. I probably couldn't write at all if I tried to specifically aim my books for external guidelines. I'm just glad 28 of them have fit there so far.

This is the weekend that PJ and Ally's book, Antonides' Forbidden Wife, is up for the RITA award in the short contemporary category. If ever a book didn't seem to 'fit' the notion of a Presents, their book might be it.

PJ hadn't even been on my radar as a Presents hero. I'd always known him as a surfer. Of course I also knew he was more than that. But surfing really formed a lot of who PJ was as a young man, and it is still a core element in the man he became.

He was a free spirit, a lone wolf, a man who didn't march to his family's drummer. As such he was very much a role model for the young Ally. At least he was a great support for her in those days. He gave her the means to do what she wanted to do with her life simply by marrying her.

When I followed them into and out of their back story I was fascinated by the people they were and the adults they became. I had no idea that they even had a story when Karin Stoecker, the editorial director at Harlequin Mills & Boon said she'd like to read Peter's story after he'd been in his brother, Elias's book.

"What about Peter?" she said expectantly.

I didn't know anything about Peter when she asked. The first thing he told me was that as soon as he left New York, he began to go by his initials, PJ. He re-invented himself. He was very happy to tell me all about his life up til then.

But in order to write Antonides' Forbidden Wife, I had to follow him and Ally for several months. I had to learn about them as they seemed to learn about themselves. I'm very happy they ended up being in Presents.

I wish them the best of luck on Saturday night. I'm going to be packing to head out for the grandchildren's the next day.

But no matter what they do or don't do on RITA night, I'll always love having spent time with them, following them around, and helping them get to their happily ever after.

It's a Presents with an M&B cover in the RITA version. The only version I had at the time of the contest.

Conferences Galore

This week is 'conference week' for romance writers.

The Romance Novelists Association, based in Great Britain, is holding their annual conference at the University of Cumbria in Penrith beginning today and ending Sunday.

I had the pleasure of attending in 2003 when the RNA conference was held in Guildford, and got to be "the expert from afar" which was an interesting and novel experience. I spoke on the differences in the British and American romance markets, which in my estimation depended largely on the romantic fantasies held by each nation's readers.

Preparing that talk really made me stop and think about why certain wonderful, well-written books that are hugely popular on one side of the pond elicit barely more than a ho-hum on the other.

Besides doing that, I got to listen to lectures and panel discussions by many of the UK's most interesting romance novelists and editors, learning from them in a relatively small group (compared to RWA), university setting. It was wonderful.

I know my editor is there this weekend because she said she hadn't had time yet to read Demetrios because of preparing for her RNA commitments.

I hope she's not so exhausted from the conference that when she finally gets to him he doesn't put her to sleep!

If RNA isn't enough, later this coming week the Romance Writers of America are holding their annual conference in Washington, DC. The RWA conference, unlike the RNA conference, is generally a mad house with, literally, thousands of attendees. It's a great place to network, to meet old friends, make new ones, and learn from some of the brightest and best speakers in our business. It's also exhausting.

I love going to RWA, and I would be there this year -- even wearing pantyhose -- because I love it and because PJ and Ally's book, Antonides' Forbidden Wife, is a finalist for the RITA. But The Prof and I had already made plans to go see the new grandsons before PJ did his 'finalist' thing. And I'm sure he will carry on perfectly well without me.

RITA nominees do that. You can't control anything about them. They are a blessing when you receive them. Whoever wins is indeed fortunate. And to me it's always been totally unpredictable.

In 2000 I had two nominees for the RITA in the same category, The Stardust Cowboy and Gibson's Girl. I figured they would cancel each other out.

I was wrong. The Stardust Cowboy won the RITA -- and it was the second best thing that happened to me that day, because an hour later my daughter gave birth to our first granddaughter!

I thought it was positively spooky to have a book up for the honor this year and have another grandchild due at the same time.

Fortunately Sol took things into his own hands and made sure he was already on the scene.

I am thinking of all my writer and editor friends at the conferences this week and hoping they're having a great time. I'm sorry I'm going to miss seeing them. I'm sorry I'll miss the buzz of excitement that comes when so many of us get together. I might even miss the exhaustion afterwards.

But I'll have the grandkids to dote on -- and some DVDs of a physics course that I've been watching so I can get to grips with George.

Do you go to RWA or RNA or local writing conferences? Do you write books? Or read them? If you read a lot of romance, have you ever been to one of the RT conferences? I haven't. Tell me about it.

RITA nominees

Today was the day RWA announced the finalists for the RITA awards which will be presented at the national Romance Writers of America conference in Washington, DC this July. There is a full list posted at the RWA site, but I can't get the link to work so you can get there easily from here.

So I can't show them all to you, but I'm happy, thrilled, delighted, over-the-moon, gobsmacked and a variety of other adjectives to tell you that PJ and Ally's book, Antonides' Forbidden Wife, is one of the finalists!

Ally has been walking around with a smile on her face ever since we got the phone call this morning. PJ looks somewhere between amused and smug -- like he's caught the wave of the day, and nobody -- but nobody -- has had a better one.

I've told him that that remains to be seen, that there are other finalists. He wishes them well. And then he just grins at me. He's happy. He's vindicated.

I'm grinning, too, of course, because PJ was not expected to be a hero.

He was a surfer, for heaven's sake. When I wrote about him in his brother Elias's book, The Antonides Marriage Deal, PJ was a thorn in his brother's side.

He was the theoretically 'irresponsible' brother, Peter, who had taken off for Hawaii at age 18 and never really bothered to come back. Not until halfway through Elias's book at least -- and only then, as far as Elias was concerned, to annoy him.

Of course it didn't turn out that way. Unbeknownst to his family, Peter Antonides had reinvented himself in Hawaii. Or maybe he discovered who he really was beyond just one of those Antonides kids. He'd grown up, found a life, a purpose, even a new variation on his name. He found himself.

And incidentally, he found Ally.

He didn't tell me that then. He was a fun supporting character. I liked him as soon as he appeared. But I didn't know a lot about him because Elias's book, as PJ continually reminded me, was Elias's book. And Tallie's. It was their story, and Elias didn't want him horning in on it.

PJ didn't mind. He was a patient man. Easy going. Laid back. A mañana sort of guy.

A Presents hero?

Perhaps not your usual suspect. Still, he was my idea of a Presents hero. He was strong and determined. Patient. Honorable. Competent. Patient. Pretty darned gorgeous. And did I mention, patient?

It's true. PJ bided his time. He waited for his book the way he waited for Ally. Though he did tell me he was glad the book at least hadn't taken ten years.

Still, he waited through Theo and Martha's book, through Flynn and Sara's book, through Spence and Sadie's book. He was even prepared to take a back seat to Sebastian and Neely's book.

But then, all of a sudden, Sebastian had issues. I had a deadline. And, guess what? I needed a book. I needed a hero. I needed PJ.

Just like Elias and Tallie had. Just like Ally did.

And there he was, my hero. PJ Antonides stepped in and took over. He eased Sebastian out for the time being and began telling me his story, introducing me to Ally, doing for me what he'd done for everyone else -- saving the day.

Is it any wonder I fell in love with him?

So I am incredibly happy that he and Ally have made the RITA finals. And I really wish I could take them to Washington for the conference and the awards ceremony.

But I'm going to be celebrating it from afar this year. I'm going to have grandkids here in summer camp that week and, I hope, a brand-new one to go see in Seattle right after.

PJ says he understands. He says he doesn't mind. He says he knows we'll be there in spirit, anyway, and he's just basking in the joy of his nomination. It's true, of course.

But lest you think that besides being patient, competent, strong, determined and drop-dead gorgeous, he is also terribly terribly noble, let me tell you the whole truth.

PJ is thrilled that Antonides' Forbidden Wife is a RITA finalist and we're not going to Washington, because he still gets all this glory -- and he doesn't have to wear a tie.

Reading RITA books

The silence you've heard from this quarter is due to my having been stuck into galleys on Christo (not my favorite pastime) and reading the RITA entries whose scores are due on Monday.

It's always interesting to read RITA books because they are almost always by authors I am not familiar with. There is a sort of grab bag experience about it. When I open a book I never know what I'm going to get -- and none of the regular reasons I pick up a book (I like the author, I like the back cover copy, I like the cover art, it's in my line, I like the way it begins -- or ends) apply.

They are just here -- and I read them.

So for the past week I've been reading. I have found a couple of authors whose back-lists I'm now going to be looking for. I was delighted to find an author whose books I'd more or less lost track of is doing a bang-up job still. I was bored a couple of times. I tossed one across the room.

But I came away feeling that the genre is healthy, that there are more good books out there than bad ones, that new authors are coming along that I want to keep an eye on, and that "old" authors still have their finger on the pulse of what makes a good romance.

I've sent in my scores. I've almost finished the galleys.

And I have about half of Demetrios's story roughed out (not written, but rough drafted. Very rough drafted!). I'm going to have to figure out where they go from here, though. Here being out in the middle of the Mediterranean!