The castle is actually a picture that I had taken, along with the castle gardens in another picture and the clouds were another shot. In Scotland, I would often get white sky backgrounds so I needed to add clouds. I also added texture for fun. And the dragon, of course.
Ugh, Daylight Savings Time. I need to remember to reset my car clock.
I soared with the dragons yesterday! I ended up writing 7,000 words on Wolf Pack. It’s a novella, so now I have 9,000 words done. Yay!! I shoot for 23K on a novella, but sometimes they end up around 33K. It just depends on the story, but I’m having a blast writing it. It’s a medieval Highland wolf story, first that I’ve done.
I’ve got to run errands, not wanting to, but we’re celebrating Saint Patrick’s Day and I am out of food again.
I write about werewolves, why not gargoyles? In my fantasy novels, I could. I wrote about unicorns and trolls and the fae. In my urban fantasy, it has to be more realistic. Unless I write like some authors who have done, who created a gargoyle as a romantic hero in modern times. Don’t think it can be done? lol
I was a skeptic, but they were fun to read.
So I was reading that keeping your mind active with creating new things can help keep your brain functioning better. Yay!!!
Maybe working on the oil painting class is helping my brain out. I sure hope so. Of course, creating stories should too.
Okay, enough fantasy and reality–I am avoiding the news today so it doesn’t hurt my mojo to write–I’m off to get at it again. Seven-thousand words to go! And to think I hadn’t even written a word of the novel only a short while ago!
Oh, and Joy to the Wolves will be in audiobook too. I’m so excited about that!
This is an image I shot of a viaduct in Glenfinnan and I did catch some shots of rainbows and fogbows while I was there. But in this shot, we finally had a little bit of a clearing in the skies. We were rained on while waiting for the Harry Potter train to come!
Okay, I’m off to the grocery store. It’s been about 2 weeks. Hope you all have a great day.
I love Highland cows! I also love longhorn steer, but I haven’t found them to take pictures of and I live in Texas, I know. I took these pictures in Scotland.
Okay, got a little written yesterday on Red Wolf–after little one went home. Wild storms this morning at 3. It’s still raining. I believe them now when they said we would be under flash flood watch. My dogs haven’t even asked to be taken out when they’re usually ready as soon as I get up. It’s still thundering like crazy.
I’m back to the story, so have a fun day and I’ll catch you later!!!
Modern day werewolf laird Ian MacNeill reluctantly allows a film production company to use his castle, but he knows his secretive clan has a big problem when a beautiful red werewolf female who insists she’s working on the film keeps showing up in the wrong places…and a matter of pleasure.
Julia Wildthorn is not who she says she is—she’s sneaking into Argent Castle to steal an ancient relic for her grandfather and to do research for her next werewolf romance novel. When she catches a glimpse of Ian, she realizes he’s the perfect hero.
Highland Wolf Series: Heart of the Highland Wolf (Book 1) A Howl for a Highlander (Book 2) A Highland Werewolf Wedding (Book 3) Hero of a Highland Wolf (Book 4)
A Howl for a Highlander: A Highlander is never out of his element…
“Highlanders and werewolves. Be still my heart!”—The Good, the Bad, and the Unread
A Highland Wolf on a Mission…
Duncan MacNeill is hell-bent on catching the thief who’s stolen the clan’s fortune and run off to Grand Cayman Island. Duncan has rarely left his homeland and he couldn’t care less about an island paradise. He never expected to find a beautiful distraction who will show him just how appealing paradise can be…
Meets a Dangerous Distraction…
Lone wolf and botanist Shelley Campbell headed to the island to study the old growth forests. She didn’t count on meeting a handsome Highlander who can’t keep his paws off her.
A Highland Werewolf Wedding: He never thought any woman could get him to the altar…
On The Run…
After werewolves Elaine Hawthorn and Cearnach MacNeill almost have a head-on collision on a foggy Highland road, they’re pretty well stuck with each other. It’ll be hours before anyone can get there to pull his car out of the ditch and they both have better places to be.
And Nowhere to Hide From Each Other…
The sexy little American brings out all of Cearnach’s big bag protective instincts. If she thought she was in trouble before, Elaine has no idea what kind of complications a hot Scot can cause…
Delightful, steamy, and devilishly funny, join the hundreds of thousands of readers who already discovered that USA Today bestseller Terry Spear delivers a sizzle worth howling about.
A Hero of a Highland Wolf : How difficult can one Highlander be?
“Spear combines captivating characters, gripping mysteries, and all-consuming love stories.” —Fresh Fiction
She’s ready for change… Colleen Playfair has never been to Scotland, but when she discovers she must spend a year and a day overseas learning to manage her newly inherited estate, she’s ready for the challenge. She even has some ideas for improvements—if she can get past the sexy werewolf who seems convinced he’s the one in charge.
But he’s digging in his claws… Grant MacQuarrie and his clan have been managing Farraige Castle for three centuries. The last thing he wants is a meddling American heiress trying to change the way things have always been done. He’s more than willing to fight the she-wolf every step of the way, using every tool at his disposal. And if that means taking the lass to bed, well…all the better.
Locked in a battle of wills, caught in an attraction they can’t escape, Colleen and Grant must find a way to work together…or face losing it all.
***
I’m off to write on Red Wolf again, still need to do promo blogs for Night of the Billionaire Wolf, but with Winning the Highlander’s Heart on sale, and just learned of the Highland boxset on sale, I’ve been busy with doing some promo for them. Also applied for 2 Kobo ads. I never get them, so I won’t hold my breath on that. I’m still watching to see if I broke even on the Bookbub ad! But I’m happy to give some deals to fans when we need the escapism the most!
Lady Anice vows to flee the amorous advances of King Henry I, and return to her home in the Highlands, where she hopes to find a laird to wed, when she learns her staff has vanished. Premonitions of imminent danger warn her of foul play and she is certain she is cursed when it comes to marriage.
The king orders the Highlander Laird Malcolm MacNeill, seeking an English bride, to provide the lass safe escort and learn what has become of her staff. Escorting her home safely proves a dangerous trial in and of itself and keeping his heart out of the matter, when the king wishes her wed to one of his loyal barons instead, complicates issues further. Losing his heart to the lass means Malcolm could very well lose his head.
Some of my mother’s ancestors were from Scotland and the family that inspired me were the MacNeills–Malcolm who ran off with the duke’s daughter, Elizabeth Campbell. Now, trying to find the true information about this is nigh to impossible because the records just don’t exist. But the family’s tale has spread across families none of us have ever met, some of whom still live in Prince Edward Island where Malcolm and Elizabeth ended up.
But their love story inspired me to write the Highland series.
Winning the Highlander’s Heart is regularly $4.99 but for 2 weeks, it’s 99 cents. Get yours while the sale lasts!
The MacNeill Clan even evolved into a Highland Wolf series! Working on edits on the next one now!
Pillars and background from a picture I took in Scotland.
Can you imagine telling a dragon what to do? Just pretend it’s a very big lapdog. Feed it well. Pet it nicely. Speak soothingly. And always remind him that you are the boss.
Now that you’ve had your lesson 101 in being in charge, I’m back to writing and trying to take charge of my characters. It’s not working. They often take over. And then there are the dogs. The granddaughter–toddler, you know. But in the end, it all works out.
I wanted to do more with this, but I have too many deadlines, so maybe later. I took the picture in a small town in Scotland that had a pretty pond and tons of birds. Really pretty. Love the bridge in the background. And I added the boat and woman.
Maybe not, but I’m moving in a direction that I might need to change. Still, I have a story rolling, rolling, rolling, and I’m excited! I love it when I get an idea and can start moving to the end. I can change it. Sure I can. But I have to have something down on “paper” before I can change it.
I thought I was going to be behind yesterday on Wolff Bros story because I wrote all day on SEAL Wolf Team to the Rescue. But I must have been WAY ahead on word count, 3500 instead of 1500 because I was right where I was supposed to be. Which is good because today, I’m going to be behind. I’m concentrating on the novella because it has to be turned in sooner. I wrote 6000 words yesterday!! I hope to get 4,000 today and I’ll be close to halfway done. That’s the miracle of novellas. They don’t take as long to write.
Okay, I’m off to get going because it’s almost 8 am and I don’t even know how that happened. Do you?
In the one picture I took in Scotland, I was on the bus in Edinburgh, and we saw a beautiful rainbow. But the setting wasn’t beautiful, cluttered with buildings and stuff. So I created a fictional world–from a photo I’d taken from a castle on the Isle of Skye. The scenes were both fantastical, as if being dropped into a fairy world, yet both are real. I’m sure the passengers thought my friend and I were nuts as we took as many pictures of the rainbow as we could capture while the bus kept moving along.
In the one I took of the cardinal, he was looking into the water as if peering at his reflection. But, what if–and that’s the start of a story. What if he sees himself as a hawk. Or he wishes he were a bird of prey. Or what if he realizes the hawk is above, his reflection in the water? That’s what makes creating stories from reality into fiction, or fantasy, fun. The cardinal was really at a birding stand at the cabins where we did our writer’s retreat, staring into the water. I edited the book I had to edit while there, but I also took advantage of photographing as much as could. 🙂 <3
The cooper hawk was sitting on my fence. I included an awful picture of a blurred version of the cooper hawk when he was on a different fence section and was getting ready to take off. I wouldn’t have shown it on here, but I posted it on FB to show the wing span, and one of my readers said it was a shifting hawk! There you have it! My shapeshifters shift so fast, they are a blur of forms. I love my readers. 🙂 She turned my poor photo into fantasy, and now, you know what that means? Anyone who sees a creature shifting is in trouble.
I really, really need to run errands today. I hate running them because it messes up my writing routine, then I’m struggling to get it done. If I don’t go early, though, I’ve begun to write, and then…yep, no errands. My car registration came in and I have to get a safety inspection before I can register it, so….no putting it off. That’s the mundane of life. I’d rather be photographing, creating bears, creating composites, gardening, and writing. Oh, and I did get about 60 gals of branches cut and weeds pulled yesterday. Then I moved a rock, it was starting to get too dark to work, and found a snake. Yes, it was a garden snake, but that decided it. No more gardening for the night!
