February 28, 2014

Luc Robitaille! Holy Crap!


I'm minding my own business watching the Kings play shut down the Calgary Flames on TV, when Jim Fox or Patrick O'Neal--I can't remember which one--announces a two-day event the Kings are holding--a chance to "learn and discuss the business of hockey with LA Kings, AEG, and other top sports executives."

It's supposed to be for people looking to break into the sports industry, but this sounds perfect for a hockey romance author too. I worried that they would be requiring applications or something and I'd get beat out by kids majoring in contract law, or statistics, or broadcasting. But no. All I had to do is fork out some money. Done, baby!

For a mere $160, I will get to listen to four panels:

--The Business of Hockey: Industry Customs, Current Trends, and the Future of the Industry
--Make Me an Offer: Negotiations and Talent Representation
--The Role and Impact of Media
--Getting in and Staying In: Tips on Breaking Into and Succeeding in the Sports Industry

I will get to see two Kings games, one from a VIP box, the other from a 200 level seat.

I will get an LA Kings Professional Pad Folio. (I may even get two, since I signed up for both days.)

I will get to be in the same room with Luc Robitaille. I will be able to ask him questions and he'll answer them. (Pardon me while I faint.)

I will also get a raffle ticket for a signed LA Kings jersey. (Again, maybe two tickets.)

A more prime research opportunity could not be had. Just the tickets to the games would cost that much, let alone the panel discussions and swag. My tummy is all aflutter just thinking about it.

God bless the LA Kings.

Photo credit: JamesTeterenko via Wikimedia Commons

February 25, 2014

Cover Reveal for On the Surface

It's here! The cover! I love it so much. It's so clean and bright. It's got a very cool ice font!

The arrival of the cover means that the release day is fast approaching. Well, maybe not fast, because time has been dragging for me. It's going to be like Christmas when it the big day finally arrives.

Have you pre-ordered yet?

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Goodreads
iTunes


February 24, 2014

Back Cover Copy for On the Surface

Yours truly wearing her favorite piece of clothing
I'm so excited to share with you the back cover copy for my first hockey romance, On the Surface, Book 1 from the In the Zone series which chronicles the lives and loves of the fictional San Diego Barracudas. I hope it sounds interesting to you. If so, feel free to pre-order it!

Amazon
Goodreads
Barnes & Noble
iTunes

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Book one of In the Zone



NHL player Tim Hollander lost his temper one time and threw a water bottle at an abusive fan. After “Bottlegate,” he’s traded to the San Diego Barracudas, where he’ll need to keep the bad publicity to a minimum while proving he can still compete with the younger guys on the ice.



Erin Collier is a pediatric nurse who’s never seen a hockey game, but gets in line for Tim’s autograph at a PR event in hopes of impressing the doctor she has a crush on. When an obnoxious fan gets pushy toward Erin, Tim rushes to defend the pretty stranger, throwing a punch in the process.



Grateful for the rescue, Erin agrees to stand by Tim during the resulting press conference and host him at a hospital charity event. Their chemistry is palpable, and soon their lives are intertwined. But Erin doubts a hockey player is capable of anything resembling a real relationship. And if Tim can’t get her to see beyond what’s on the surface, they’ll never last longer than a single season…

February 19, 2014

The Other Guys - P.A. Parenteau of the Colorado Avalanche

The Olympics have been killing me. I really detest the NBC coverage of the games. The men's hockey games air at ridiculous times. Thank God for DVRs. I can't wait until regular hockey is back. I heard from Jon Rosen, the LA Kings Insider, that the Kings who aren't in the Olympics--which is everyone except Kopitar, Brown, Carter, Doughty, Quick, and Voynov--will be practicing today at the Toyota Sports Center. Finally! Their next game is against the Avalanche on February 26.

In anticipation of that game, I thought I'd do one of the Other Guys posts. I haven't done one of those in a while.

Pierre-Alexander Parenteau was born in Quebec. He plays right wing. Here is his roster picture. I find that roster pictures generally suck, sort of like school pictures. This guy would be so amazing looking if he just got a haircut. I swear, the NHL would get a lot more female fans if they just hired someone to do makeovers.



Man with baby in his arms = insta-cute.


Lastly, there is this fan wallpaper by DenverSportsWalls you can get from DeviantART. I think it looks pretty cool. If you want to follow him, he's @PAParenteau on Twitter.

February 16, 2014

First Line this Morning

I'm (trying to) start Book 3 of the In the Zone series. This is probably my third try. This is typical for me, however. Trial and error is the name of the game for me.

Here is the new beginning for the book. I hope this one sticks.

Alex Sullivan believed in love at first sight, but he seldom mentioned it to anyone. His San Diego Barracuda teammates would have laughed at him. Give a hockey player a gem like that and he’ll jump on it with a vengeance: Photoshopped pictures of his face on a naked baby Cupid on Twitter, fake voice mails in falsetto, “Alex, I just love you so much, from the first moment I saw you, I knew you were The One…” Shit like that. At least, that’s what Alex would do. Any excuse for a good laugh at a teammate’s expense.

If there was one guy on his team he might trust with this information, it was Tim Hollander. Holly had it bad for this nurse he’d been seeing a lot of lately. If anyone could understand Alex’s romantic side, it would be Holly. And yet, Alex still kept quiet, especially because if Tim found out who Alex was mooning over, he would kick his ass.

Photo credit: leoncillo sabino via Creative Commons

February 14, 2014

Are You on Drugs?

I am in the middle of copy edits for Across the Line, Book 2 from the In The Zone series. This is when my editor--the fabulous Melissa Johnson--points out the small stuff that I may have missed, including any typos I may have made.

I come across a comment from her in the sidebar that says "LOL."

I look at the manuscript to see what was so funny. I love to see what makes her laugh. I want to know if it's something that made me laugh too.

Unfortunately, I didn't see an intentional joke. The hero, Calder, is talking to his girlfriend, Becca, about how much better he played that night. Calder thinks it may have been that the coach put him on the starting line-up.

I look more carefully at the sidebar. I see that Melissa has deleted two letters. TH.

Hm.

Then it comes to me. What I really typed. I crack up.

"Okay, but the difference between the first game and this one was like night and day. What happened?

"I don't know. I think maybe it was because Coach started meth tonight."


February 11, 2014

Meeting the Kings

The other day I got to meet Willie Mitchell and Slava Voynov, both defensemen for the Los Angeles Kings. It was a blast. They were signing autographs at the Staples store in Burbank, about a 20 minute drive for me. (For those of you who don't know, the Kings play in the Staples Center. The Kings aren't just choosing an office supply store as the ideal place to sign autographs.)

The balloons indicate the signing area
I can imagine how strange we all looked to the regular shoppers.

It was fun to meet other fans and wallow in our geekiness. It's almost like having a secret identity and being allowed to shed the disguise for a couple of hours. In "private", I am a rabid LA Kings fan who owns a card containing a swatch from a Justin William's game-worn jersey. It is encased in plastic. It is a source of both pride and embarrassment. But at a fan event like the autograph session, I am among my peers. It is refreshing and exciting.


The rules of this signing: we could have one signature per player, we could take a photograph but would have to stay in front of the table.

Bummer. My son, who accompanied me, put his longboard and hat back in the car so that I could get my jersey signed by Slava and Willie. I love that boy so much. He knew how important it was to me to have the advent calendar I'd made signed by players.

I got really nervous as the line moved forward after an hour of waiting. The Ice Crew girls liked my  calendar. Slava signed first. I said hi. He said hi. That was the extent of our conversation. Maybe I should have learned a Russian greeting for the occasion. Good idea for next time.


Willie signed the back of the calendar and then asked to see it flipped around, because he didn't get a good look at it. I told him what it was and he really liked it. Bailey, the Kings mascot, gave it a thumbs-up. (I had him sign it too. Bailey is terrific.) By then the woman in charge was giving us the evil eye even though it was Willie who had chosen to hold up the line. (Back off, bitch! LOL) 


Here's what my jersey looks like now. (King, Nolan, Muzzin, Voynov, Mitchell)


And here's the front of the advent calendar.



February 8, 2014

On the Surface News!

I was on Amazon looking for pictures of my book covers for my web designer and look what I found!


My first hockey romance is available for pre-order!

What are you waiting for???

February 5, 2014

Winner!

The winner of the ARC for On The Surface is Kim P.!!!! Congratulations. I will email you as soon as the ARCs become available.

Thanks to everyone else for participating in the Sports Romance Blog Hop.

February 3, 2014

Blog Hopping, Shoes and Water Bottles

I'm so excited to be part of Cassandra Carr's Sports Romance Blog Hop. On The Surface, my first sports romance novel isn't coming out until April 14, but I wasn't about to let that stop me!

For this blog hop, I thought I would touch on an event in hockey history that ignited my imagination when I was just starting to write On The Surface. I had in my mind that I wanted my hero to have been recently traded from his old team amid a flurry of bad press. I turned to the internet for help.

Lo and behold, I found Mike Milbury's shoe incident. There was a fight. A fan started whacking the players with a hockey stick and Mike Milbury ended up going up into the stands and hitting a fan on the leg with his own shoe.

Here's a video if you're interested in seeing what actually transpired.

Inspired by this true event, I changed the item from a shoe to a water bottle and gave my hero, Tim Hollander, a strong reason to act the way he did. Here's an excerpt in which the incident is first mentioned in Chapter Two. Tim was traded to the San Diego Barracudas a couple of weeks earlier and is on his way to the car dealership to pick up his new Escalade. In the taxi, he has a conversation with the driver.


“What’s your name, man? People sometimes ask what famous people I’ve driven and I’d like to add your name to the list.”
“Tim Hollander. I play right wing. I’m a forward.”
“That’s offense, right?”
Tim laughed. So did Garcia.
“Hell, I told you baseball’s my game.”
“Yeah, forwards are offense.”
They continued on the 163 through a large interchange. The signs said they were in Mission Valley now. Tim relaxed, knowing this guy wasn’t going to hassle him about his performance last season or ask about Bottlegate. They talked some more. Garcia was easy to talk to. Part of the job, Tim figured. Cabbies were probably a lot like bartenders, but with wheels. Oddly, the more they talked, the more Tim felt like unloading and he ended up telling Garcia about Bottlegate anyway.
“Wait a second,” Garcia said. “Let me get this straight. The guy actually said that your daughter was better off dead than having a father like you?”
“Yes,” Tim said. The Philly fan had actually said much more than that while Tim had sat in the penalty box. He hadn’t shut up for a full minute, criticizing Tim’s play, or lack thereof, and eventually getting personal.
“What an asshole.”
“Thing is, my daughter had died only a few weeks before that.”
Silence.
“She died?
“Yeah. Leukemia.”
“Shit, man.” Garcia met Tim’s gaze briefly in the rearview mirror. “I’m sorry to hear that. Really sorry. That’s fucked.”
“Thanks.” Tim gave him the tight-lipped smile he always did when people offered their sympathy.
           A few moments passed. “You know what, man? I admire your restraint. I probably would have done a lot more than hit him with a water bottle. I’d probably have killed the guy.”

So, I owe a debt of gratitude to Mike Milbury for inspiring Tim's tragic backstory, even if I don't care for his hockey commentary on NBCSN.

Like I said, On The Surface doesn't come out until April 14, but I want to give away an Advanced Reader Copy to one lucky person. There are many ways to enter. Make sure you leave your email address in the comment section so I can notify you if you win.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here are links to the rest of the authors participating in the blog hop. Please visit them to win more fun stuff!


3. N Kuhn