Square One

On Tuesday, I got my assignment from The Most Amazing Editor In the World, Kerri. Send her In the Zone book 5 by mid-May. The next day, I begin to plot. I know I want it to be Booth MacDonald's story. I decide Elliot Fleming is going to buy the team a plane, so I think, why not have Booth fall in love with one of the flight crew? It'll be a "forbidden love" story. Here are the initial notes I made.

Then, I started with the Post-its. I write scene descriptions down and move them around as needed. I got about half the book plotted, but hit a bit of a wall, so I decided to just start writing.

I wrote about 700 words. It was fun. Then around nine o'clock, I thought, "This story sucks." I also thought, "Kate, this is the end of your hockey series. You have no more ideas." I rarely get these self-doubt attacks, but there it was.

Enter Jennifer Lazaris, a fellow hockey romance writer and friend. With her help, I find some tropes that sound interesting and all apply to the heroine.

• She's the sister of one of Booth's teammates.
• She's a virgin.
• She's a big, beautiful woman, but with shaky self-confidence.

Together, we start brainstorming what Booth's heroine is like. Why is she a virgin? Who's sister is she? When we finally said good night (or when Jen finally said, "I must go make pancakes now"), I was excited about the new heroine. I had also killed off Phoebe Sugarman and her daughter Sam. Booth's physically handicapped dad might also have gotten cut. That remains to be seen.

Today, I am revitalized. I jotted down two pages of notes about the new heroine.She doesn't have a name yet, but she will soon because I can't write unless there are names. I got a bit more nailed down about who Booth is and what happened to him before he became a Barracuda.

This book is taking off and I'm really excited.

The Big Day for Across the Line

It's Release Day for Across the Line, book two of my In the Zone hockey romance series! It's been so encouraging to see the book being pre-ordered. It makes me grateful for that anonymous back cover copy writer at Carina and the artist who gave me this sexier than sin cover. I am so excited.

Here are snippets from some early reviews:

"Willoughby's second In the Zone contemporary sports romance (after On the Surface) is a real charmer."

-Publishers Weekly

"With this second book in the series, this author just made my "auto-buy author" list!!" 

5 stars, Christi of Smitten With Reading

"As long as Kate Willoughby keeps writing, I will keep reading her wonderful books."

- 4.5 stars, Steffi from Swept Away by Romance.

"Kate Willoughby's writing is fantastic, her story is fast paced, fun and throws in a few laughs. I find myself not wanting the story to end..."

-4 stars, Jac of For Love and Books

"I enjoyed the book so much that I have gone back and purchased the first book in the series..."

-5 stars, Christine Mize

All you readers who pre-ordered, you should have already received the book. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for trusting I would tell you a good story. (Is the bird thing a stretch? Sorry. LOL)

Today, Tim Hollander will no longer be the only Barracuda swimming in the literary seas. (Sorry for the horrible metaphor. I'm a little tired from trying to make my deadline for book three.) He has a brother standing beside him. My plan is to keep writing hockey romances as long as it's fun and I have new stories to tell. (Here are four guys from the LA Kings who are/were like brothers: Mike Richards, Drew Doughty, Dustin Penner who sadly is no longer a King, and Jeff Carter, recently married.)

In the pipeline is Alex Sullivan's story, OUT OF THE GAME, book 3 of my In the Zone series. After that, I have ideas jotted down about Jason Locke's story, and a few thousand words written about Dustin DeVries.

In the meantime, check out Calder Griffin and see how he makes it work (any Tim Gunn fans out there?) with Becca Chen. She's an Asian restauranteur. He's an NHL player returning to the ice after being injured. Committed to their jobs and with thousands of miles between them, they don't stand a chance.

Photo credit: Tatiana Gerus and Prayitno via Wikimedia Commons

Harlequin Junkie Review - FIVE STARS and a TOP PICK!!!

I cannot express how excited I am that Heather at Harlequin Junkie gave On the Surface five stars! Not only that, they chose it as an HJ Top Pick. Thank you, Heather. I'm so glad you're a Barracuda fan!

Here's the last line of the review:

"If you are a sport romance fan then I highly recommend this series. I’ll be on the Barracuda bench – cheering them on."

And check out the cool little banner she pasted on my book cover! I love it.

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

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!

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Goodreads
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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…

Forfeiting to Harlequin Superromance

I got word today that there's a Harlequin Superromance book coming out with the title IN HER CORNER. Harlequin tries to avoid publishing two books with the same title.

Sigh.

So, since that book comes out first, I have to change my title to...

ACROSS THE LINE

I think ACROSS THE LINE is actually just as nice a title. It fits the story, because both the main characters cross a line with each other, and there are lots of lines in hockey, like the blue line, pictured here with the handsome Jarret Stoll of the LA Kings. And oddly, enough it was on my original list of suggested titles, so I thought of it. LOL

Let's hope that title sticks!

At last!

I finished the first draft of the second book in the IN THE ZONE series.

Hallelujah.

Title Finalized

The Powers that Be at Carina Press have decided that the title of my hockey romance will remain ON THE SURFACE. They were afraid that with the word "sniper" in the title, the book might be mistaken for a military romance.

I sort of laughed about that because I assume there will be some sort of imagery on the cover that will indicate to readers that there's hockey lovin' inside. I actually pray that there will be hockey imagery on the cover.

There are women who love hockey out there. I want them to find my book.

You Can Play

I'm deep into writing hockey romance #2 for Carina Press. Part of the plot of this book came about from a video I watched months ago. It features two of the Los Angeles Kings, Alec Martinez and the captain, Dustin Brown. They wanted to record a message that showed they support people who want to play the sport of hockey, regardless of their sexual orientation. I really liked and respected that they alone out of the entire Kings organization took the time to make a short (albeit stiff) video. It stuck with me until the time came to plot my second hockey book. 

The You Can Play project strives to "promote respect for all athletes," a worthy goal, and one I hope will resonate in the book.

Save the Date!

I have received the release date for the Untitled Hockey Romance! 

April 21, 2015

I'm so thrilled and excited. This is to coincide with Carina Sports Week. It's also just in time for the NHL playoffs. (Go, Kings, go!)

I am still waiting to hear on what the editorial team at Carina has chosen for a title. I submitted a long list of possibilities for both the first hockey romance and the rest of the series. 

Out of that list, my personal favorites for this first hockey book are:

A KISS FOR LUCK
THE TROUBLE WITH FANS
WHEN ERIN MET TIM

I can't wait to hear what they pick. 

Knowing the Score

As a new Carina Press author, I felt compelled to read one of their titles and recently a sports romance book came out, so of course, I got that one. Knowing the Score, by Kat Latham, is about a rugby player. I've never watched rugby before and know very little about it, but I thought reading it might be a wonderful exercise for me. I'm assuming that some of the people who buy my hockey book (still untitled!) won't know much about hockey either, so reading Knowing the Score would put me in their shoes.

I thought it was a fun read and very well written. I liked the foreign setting (London.) It was a sexy book. The hero, Spencer, was fantastically masculine while still being soft with his woman. The secondary characters were well-fleshed out. I thought the rugby parts seemed realistic, a big plus in my book and something I hope to achieve with my own book.

On the Dotted Line

I finally received my contract from Carina Press, the electronic arm of Harlequin. It's long. I have some reading to do this afternoon, but I'm excited and eager to get it done, because once the contract's signed, my editor, Melissa Johnson, and I can get started polishing the book for publication. I can hardly wait.

In the meantime, I thought I put down in writing a goal of mine and how I plan to achieve it. After reading the steps, I'm sure you'll detect a pattern. Such is the life of an author. But I'm actually not just waiting, I'm busily writing the next book in the series. It's a rare day when I don't write.

Twelve Step Program for Becoming a 

USA Today Bestselling Author

1. Sell to Carina Press
2. Wait
3. Sign contract
4. Complete developmental edits
5. Wait
6. Complete line edits
7. Wait
8. Approve the book cover
9. Wait
10. Announce release of the book
11. Wait
12. Pray

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!

I have loved hockey romance since reading Rachel Gibson's See Jane Score in 2003. I have loved almost all her Chinook series books. I loved feeling like I was seeing behind-the-scenes of the sport, a sport about which at the time I knew absolutely nothing. It didn't matter. I still loved and enjoyed those books.

And now I'm about to be on the author side of hockey romance because Carina Press wants to publish HARD TO RESIST! No. Scratch that. They want my hockey book PLUS the second hockey book I haven't even written yet!

Fist pump.

They want to develop a marketing plan for my hockey romance series. Yeah, baby. That's what I'm talking about. I have begun to daydream about Julia Quinn Bridgerton Series type success.

Photo by ME. This was taken when I went to a Kings practice at the Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo. I had an absolute blast. At the time I had a hard time identifying the players because I didn't know them by number. If I went today, it would be a completely different story. I know my boys.

And by the way, they're still in the running for the Stanley Cup. Sunday is Game 6 against the San Jose Sharks. I can't wait.

Living in Limbo

On April 7, I participated in #CarinaPitch. This was a one-day Twitter event that allowed authors to pitch their books to Carina Press editors using a maximum of 2 tweets. It was a blast. I pitched my hockey romance, HARD TO RESIST, the first in a series about the fictional NHL team, the San Diego Barracudas.

My 2 tweet pitch read:

#CarinaPitch NHL News: Nurse accosted by irate fan while in line for an autograph. San Diego Barracuda Tim Stockdale defends her. 

Stockdale after the fight, "You don't treat women that way. Ever." #CarinaPitch #HockeyRomance 

To my delight, three editors requested to see the manuscript, Mallory Braus, Melissa Johnson, and Angela James. After a crazy weekend spent polishing the book, I submitted it.

Now, only ten more days remain until the purported deadline to hear from Carina about my hockey book, HARD TO RESIST. I really have no idea if this is a valid deadline. It's more like I heard a rumor about a rumor that the editors will get back to us by the end of May.

I have been hard at work on a second hockey book, tentatively titled HARD BODY. It was going to be a short novella, but now it looks as if it may actually be Book 2 in the Barracuda series. The characters had more to say than I had anticipated.

Photo by Prilfish (cc)

For Shame

It's been a month since I last posted? How sad. So much has happened.

I have submitted "the hockey book," now tentatively titled Hard to Resist, to Carina Press. I participated in a one day Twitter pitch session and three editors at Carina--Mallory Braus, Melissa Johnson, Angela James--asked to read the manuscript.

I am now waiting to hear if any of them would like to obtain it.

The Los Angeles Kings, the hockey boys I adore, are in fourth place in their division. I hope they stay there so they can go on to the semifinals for the Stanley Cup. That's me in my Kings cap.

I have begun work on another Barracuda hockey team book, but I'm trying to keep this one shorter. It's been going well so far. I'm really excited.