Do you NaNo?

Stay tuned.

I'm gearing up for November's big challenge, National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo. If you've never tried it, maybe this is the year to give it a go? Nothing else like it. This big challenge is a push beyond all pushes. Time to pull on the big girl panties (or in some cases big boy boxers) and see if you're made of the stuff or not.

Sound grim? Well it isn't. Even if you don't make the 50,000 word standard goal, or even if you don't make your own personal goal... if you write more in November than you usually do any other month then it is a great success!

My big goal will be to complete Dead Men's Nails: Kindred Spirit, but if I have time I want to push on to see if I can complete even more than just one story. KS needs 40-50k to finish. I've added my goal meter to the blog and will be posting regular updates throughout the month.

Wish me luck, or better yet, join me in November and sign up for your own goal over at the official website, http://www.nanowrimo.org/ Feel free to friend me there. I'm user: L.Shannon and always glad to share in success or commiserate with the bumps in the road.

Shannon
www.lshannon.net

It's BIAWE time!

Yep, starting tomorrow it's time to write! Not sure of the exact start time yet. That will depend on who ends up joining in, but if you'd got words that need to be written (like I do) then join in. We'll write like mad until we all collapse on Sunday night.

Soo... stock up on what you need, sharpen your virtual pencils or even your real ones and chime in here or IM me if you're joining us for the AUGUST BIAWE!

Shannon

New Release: The Vixen Files!

The Vixen Files
ISBN-13: 978-1-60272-556-0
AUGUST 09, 2009!
Cover: Trace Edward Zaber
(isn't that cover great?!)

James Smith is a notorious spy, selling his skill to any power willing to pay his steep prices. Smith’s lack of loyalty is the only consistent intelligence Agent Mae Vixandra can gather on this mysterious man. Now it’s fallen to her to capture him once and for all, and if possible, convince him to finally use those impressive skills for something more worthy than a quick buck.

If flipping a rogue spy were the only purpose, Mae would have the job tucked to bed without a second concern. She’s spent a couple centuries protecting her adopted America. Now she does so with the backing of a secret agency and a team staffed by her own six werewolf daughters. Together or apart they can handle about any job sent their way. But capturing James Smith offers Mae a very personal agenda. If her premonition is right, he’s her mate, and she’s been a widow long enough that even a traitorous spy is a risk worth taking...

If you love fanged or furry heroes and tough girls in ass-kicking high heels, don't miss out on this exciting new story! Go here http://www.amberquill.com/AmberHeat/VixenFiles.html and buy The Vixen Files today!

L. Shannon
www.lshannon.net

Get Hooked on a Series Contest

Check out this fantastic contest over at the Moira Rogers website! http://moirarogers.com/?q=node/347 Seriously those girls are crazy over there and why shouldn't we all benefit from the insanity? Get this... 50 books from 50 series with 50 WINNERS??? Don't miss out on this great contest. Run, don't walk, click your way over there right now! http://moirarogers.com/?q=node/347 Contest ends June 1st.

My books that you could win include:
Anom'tan 1: Walking with Synn - "Hot and steamy" RRTErotic
Acacia 1: Abducting Aeron - "L. Shannon has an awesome new series on her hands" FAR
Division 8, book 1: Zeven Ways to Kill Your Lover (YES, You could win my brand new book!)

So what are you waiting for? Go already! http://moirarogers.com/?q=node/347
Shannon
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
L.Shannon ~ http://lshannon.net ~ Dark Paranormal Romance
Eagle Clan: Father of the Wolf - AVAILABLE IN PRINT NOW
Nothing but Ash - 4/20/09 - Liquid Silver Books
Zeven Ways to Kill Your Lover - 5/17/09 - Amber Quill Press
FREE BOOK (Welcome Home) at http://www.lshannon.net/SCV.html

Zeven Ways to Kill Your Lover

Zeven Ways to Kill Your Lover
A Division 8 novella by L. Shannon
Finalist in the Brava Novella Contest!
Release: May 17, 2009 - Amber Quill Press
http://amberquill.com/AmberHeat/ZevenWays.html

BLURB
Zeven had a simple plan. Get the contract, kill the mark and protect werewolves from being exposed to the humans and hunted to extinction. But when the mark turns out to be the woman who stole and then broke his heart, everything changes. With Harley back in his sights, Zeven has a whole new plan—keep her from running, keep her alive and convince her to accept werewolves and be his mate.

To Harley, nothing about Zeven or his life is simple. And the possibility of a future for them together seems impossible, especially since the local clan of werewolves wants her dead and Zeven is all that stands between her and her escape from the Las Vegas territory. The stubborn homicidal shifter is determined to be heard out even if it costs them both everything.

But if there is a chance for them, Zeven and Harley will have to take on the whole rabid clan and settle a lot of history between them. But will he be able to forgive her for abandoning him ten years before? Or will she run again, unable to face the killer he’s become?

EXCERPT

Harley Lex knew she was in shock and was completely helpless against the biological response. Her breath came too fast, too shallow. Her heart raced. Her vision tunneled down to just the gruesome picture in her shaking hand. For a long second, she stared, gradually making sense of the image. It showed the brutalized remains of the two people she'd left behind to be killed the night before. Two friends from the hospital who'd been murdered in cold blood.

On the back were two words.

You're next.

Dizziness dragged her down. She fought back the panic attack. Later. I'll break down properly later. But at the moment that kind of weakness would just get her killed. One deep breath, then another. After a long sleepless night, debating if she should report the attack or not, then she'd found the picture and she'd ditched work, bolted out the door. She needed focus and motion, to pack and run.

At least this time she'd pack.

She grabbed her UCLA duffel bag and stuffed in jeans and T-shirts. What do I need? Where will I go? She had an aunt living in Michigan, but she couldn't risk endangering her. Where she ran to wasn't important. All that really mattered was getting her ass away from Vegas.

At the bottom of her closet she saw the black bag and grimaced. Damn thing would finally come in handy after sitting ignored for more than five years. She jerked it free. How many times had she settled somewhere new and carefully repacked her escape bag, just to feel safe? Now she felt damn lucky for the paranoia.

The two thousand in the bag would get her out of town and she'd worry about the rest later. All that mattered now was staying alive. She headed for the door, gripping both bags in one hand and opening the door with the other--

--and was slammed back into the wall with a crash.

Sunshine outlined a huge man, combining dark shadow and blinding light. Her heart thundered once before she was heaved off her feet, pinned to the wall and confronted by black wraparound sunglasses that reflected her own terrified face.

She clawed at the thick arms and kicked against the huge body. But the man's weight crushed her to the wall.

The pressure changed, loosened. The man's honey brown skin came back into focus.

"Oh, fuck." The voice was familiar, from a past she'd left behind. He slammed the door and threw the wraparounds across the room with a vicious snarl of fury.

She met the man's cold, pale gaze. Dear God, how did he find me? "Zeven?"

Her former lover fell on her once more, claiming her mouth, demanding the response that was too damn easy to give. She kissed him back, matching his passion, pouring her stress and emotion into the wild contact that she'd craved for so long.

Then Zeven ripped away from her lips. "What the fuck did you see?"

That brought Harley back to the moment, back to the stupidity which giving in to animal attraction would be. "Shit. I need to get out of here." She struggled, jerking in his grasp. Zeven showing up took her terrifying day straight into FUBAR range. Now it wasn't just the ones behind the threatening note. She had to escape Zeven and his homicidal family, too.

His hands tightened on her arms, holding her in place, when she should be running. The ravaged look in his eyes tore open a wound she'd thought was healed or at least scabbed over. Why was he here? Why now, after ten years?

For one second she imagined saying, Zeven, come with me. Then her survival instincts kicked in, and thumped her ass awake. "I've got to get out of here."

But Zeven, her long-lost lover, wasn't moving.

Almost visible memories passed between them. Memories she'd love to linger in, try to reclaim if only she had more time. If only being with him wasn't such a deadly mistake.

"They sent me to kill you." The growled words shattered the chemistry and memories.

The irony forced a choking sound from her suddenly dry throat. "No, it's not possible. It can't be your pack." It couldn't be the same werewolves... But same or different didn't make much difference. It must be her fate to be killed by werewolves. Zeven's pack hunted her for being human, knowing their secret, and loving Zeven. After five quiet years, she'd witnessed a werewolf bar fight and was back on the most wanted list. But why did it have to be Zeven?

The emotion drained from Zeven's expression, leaving him still and cold, a killer. Completely different from the man she'd known.

Oh shit. "Are you going to kill me?" Getting killed by werewolves would not be a surprise, but dying at Zeven's hands would be hell...for them both.

END EXCERPT

Zeven Ways to Kill Your LoverAvailable now at Amber Quill Press!
http://amberquill.com/AmberHeat/ZevenWays.html



Shannon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

L.Shannon ~ http://lshannon.net/ ~ Dark Paranormal Romance

Eagle Clan: Father of the Wolf - AVAILABLE IN PRINT NOW

Nothing but Ash - 4/20/09 - Liquid Silver Books

Zeven Ways to Kill Your Lover - 5/17/09 - Amber Quill Press

FREE BOOK (Welcome Home) at http://www.lshannon.net/SCV.html

Nothing but Ash

Nothing but Ash

A Midnight Ridge novella

by L. Shannon

Release: 4/20/09

Liquid Silver Books

ISBN 978-1-59578-538-1

Owen’s life is in shambles. His wife is missing and presumed dead. His daughter is running wild and considered the worst criminal in Midnight Ridge. The sheriff, his former girlfriend, expects him to get his act together and “find his balls”. It couldn’t get any worse. Until his wife’s ghost shows up, determined to lead them to her killer, a wolf hiding among the sheep, picking them off one bad seed at a time...

EXCERPT

Chapter One

“Your daughter is locked up in my jail again.” Sheriff Erin Walker hated these calls with a passion. In a town of under two hundred with the people scattered spaciously around the forested base of Midnight Ridge, crime was rare. This was the third time this week she’d hauled Sienna Sinclair in and put her teenaged ass behind bars.

“Again? What has she done this time?” Owen Sinclair sounded tired, beaten down by the reality of raising a troubled kid alone.

She sighed. The answer didn’t really matter. The girl was just as messed up as her father. The difference was, Sienna was striking out at a community that had failed to save her mother. She couldn’t blame Sienna, not one bit. Every second of the two years since Cindy Sinclair had gone missing and then been presumed dead had been hell for them all.

“We have to do something about her, Owen. This can’t go on.”

“I know, Erin. I know.”

She’d grown up with Cindy and Owen. She wasn’t just the local sheriff. She was also one of Owen’s closest friends, Sienna’s godmother, and worried sick about both of them. Hearing the defeat in Owen’s voice broke her heart. “Come on down to the station. We’ll talk.”

“I’ll be there in twenty or so. I need to get Henry to watch the store.”

“We’ll be here.”

He answered with a grunt that might have been, “Okay,” before the phone clicked dead.
Erin dropped the department phone back into its cradle. It tore at her how little she could do to help them. But this time she was going to be blunt and lay it out. If she and Owen couldn’t get through to Sienna, then... well, they’d have to get serious.

The teenager had flattened James Marshal’s tractor tires, burned a few corn stalk pyres, stolen from her own father’s store, taken joyrides in Miss Carolyn’s old Caddy and tried to hotwire Erin’s Jeep... but this time was worse. What the girl’d done this time wasn’t just a prank. It was... disturbing.

Smoothing back her wind-tangled hair, she retied it into her usual ponytail. She reached halfway to her desk drawer for the lipstick she kept there but halted. No, she wasn’t going to spruce up. No need. It was just Owen and he didn’t even know women existed. His whole heart had died when Cindy disappeared. Shame too. He’d always had Erin’s heart firmly in his pocket if he ever cared to look.

Never mind that.

She left her tiny office to check the front desk. “Everything good here, Irma?”

“Yes, ma’am. It’s all good, all quiet.” A sweet little mouse of a secretary, Irma Parson pushed her glasses up and fussed with a vague attempt to hide her fresh pink nail polish. Not that the girl would get in trouble for it. No, it was more likely Irma was just being shy about the new, more feminine color on her normally bare nails.

Did Irma have a date? If so, it was about time. “Go ahead home, Irma. I can handle Sienna myself.”

With a single nervous glance at the clock, Irma snatched her purse and nearly darted for the door. “Thanks, Sheriff Walker.”

The door slammed shut and left the quiet moving through the room like a dangerous shadow holding the unknown. It was silent enough to raise the hair on the back of her neck.

Had Sienna ever been that quiet in her whole life? Not that Erin had ever seen. Rushing back to the lock up, she turned the corner and found the girl standing in the center of her cell. One hand rose and held out like a mime, pressing against a wall ... or perhaps something soft.

“Momma?” Sienna’s whispered voice carried on a tremble of air. Hesitant, yet flushed with the deepest of emotions. “Oh, Momma, I’ve missed you so much.”

Pain closed Erin’s throat. Dear God, please don’t let the girl go on like this. It was too terrible, too cruel, far too much to ask her to bear. “Sienna, are you all right?”

Sienna didn’t look her way. Her hand stayed up, but her fingers closed over like she was holding someone’s hand. “You see her, don’t you? Momma’s come back.”

Shit. Erin unlocked the cell and moved around the girl to face her. The look of joy on Sienna’s face was beautiful and terrible. “I don’t see anyone, Sienna. Just you and me.”

“But she’s right here. Reach out and you can touch her too.”

After seeing the crazy graffiti Sienna had painted on the water tower, she’d wondered if maybe the girl had gotten a hold of some drugs. Now, drugs seemed like the better of two awful options. “She’s not here, honey. She’s gone.”

“She’s not! She’s right in front of me. Momma’s here.” Tears welled up in the girl’s wide eyes. Her body began shaking. Her hand finally lost its surreal handholding shape and slowly fell to her side.

Erin caught her even as the girl’s knees buckled. “Easy, honey.” Curled into her arms, Sienna’s sobs were soft and wretched. Erin moved them to the bench and cradled her, holding Sienna through the emotional storm. With fingers to Sienna’s wrist, Erin checked her pulse. She was pretty sure this was just wild emotions, but if there were drugs involved, better safe than sorry.

Her pulse was a little bit fast, but not dramatically so considering the rush of tears. Gradually the shaking subsided and Sienna pulled back, wiping at her face with her overlong sleeve.

“Sienna, I’m worried about you.”

“I’m okay.”

Right. “I’m worried enough right now that I’m considering dragging you down to Black Mountain Medical to have you drug tested.”

“What?” Sienna laughed, but the sound grated on the edge of hysterical. “I don’t do drugs. You can’t even get drugs here in Midnight Ridge.”

“I just saw you talking to thin air--”

“No, you didn’t. I was talking to my mom.”

Owen’s shadow cut across them. “Your mother is gone, Sienna.”

“Mom’s not gone. She’s dead, but not gone.” Sienna shot to her feet and stomped across to face her father through the bars. “She’s dead, but she was here. I talked to her ghost. She talked back.” Sienna’s voice rose on every word.

“Sienna, don’t...”

Hands fisted around the bars, tears streaming down her cheeks, Sienna shouted. “She’s dead. Mom’s dead. She didn’t leave us. She’s dead and someone here in Midnight Ridge killed her!”

END EXCERPT

buy Nothing but Ash at Liquid Silver Books

http://www.king-cart.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi?store=linda018&product_name=Nothing+But+Ash&return_page=&user-id=&password=&exchange=&exact_match=exact

Shannon

http://www.lshannon.net/

dark paranormal romance

Chances 5: Chance of a Lifetime

Chances: Chance of a Lifetime
ISBN: 978-1-60521-144-2
Erotic Urban Fantasy
L. Shannon - http://lshannon.net
Changeling Press - http://changelingpress.com
February 24, 2009

Blurb
The perfect gift, one hunk of an ex-lover wrapped in cuffs and a red leather bow set in a snow-filled corner of hell...

But will the gift be accepted in the spirit it was given? Or will the gift tear their love apart?


Excerpt

Josh leapt backwards when the hotel TV melted into an inky black hole and out stepped a business man in a smooth gray suit. With a deepening glare, the guy strode forward and grabbed Josh in one arm. "Chance owes me big time for this errand boy nonsense."

Before he could do more than drag his feet, they were both through the portal and stepping into a tidy looking hallway in front of an obnoxious red door. And just as quick, the man in the suit was gone again, leaving him alone.

He swallowed back the wave of fear. If Chance had sent for him, then surely he was supposed to open the door. After a light tap, he pushed the door open.

What the hell? He tried to say the words, but no sound emerged from his slack mouth. The decorations from his house were arranged around the cozy room. White candles danced on every surface. Red, white and gold streamers and roses in the three shades were all over. Two ice buckets with chilling champagne sat on the counter. Across the floor, which was covered in snow white confetti, dark red petals made a trail to a huge bed and on the bed…

Josh’s heart stopped and then thundered with the impossible thrill laid out before him. A very sexy man bound with his head covered kneeling in the center of the bed covered in white satin. Dressed in nothing but leather straps, he held an arched position that pushed his thick erection out in front like a flag waving surrender.

Blood rushed through Josh’s body.

The red leather straps across the man’s chest formed a bow. As in… a gift?

Heat flared behind him -- Chance’s heat. "You like your gift, love?" Chance’s warm breath feathered over his ear with every caressing word. "One of a kind. If you like him, you can keep him."

He turned, pulling Chance into an embrace. "Damn, I’ve missed you so much." He brought their lips together and set about devouring Chance the way he’d been dreaming of for the past week. On and on he kissed him, relishing the joy of just being with him again.

Then Chance’s words sank in… He pulled back "What do you mean, ‘keep him’?"

"He’s a gift. What kind of Indian giver would I be if I didn’t let you keep him?"

END EXCERPT

Buy Chance of a Lifetime at http://www.changelingpress.com/author.php?uid=77

Check out the other Chance books at http://www.lshannon.net/Chances.html
A Snowball's Chance
A Second Chance
Another Chance
A Chance Encounter
Games of Chance
Chance of a Lifetime


Shannon~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~L.Shannon ~ http://lshannon.net ~ Dark Paranormal Romance
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LShannon/ for contests & freebies
Eagle Clan: Father of the Wolf - now available in print!
Zeven Ways to Kill Your Lover is a Brava Contest Finalist! Available at Amber Quill Press!
FREE BOOK (Welcome Home) at http://www.lshannon.net/SCV.html
Find more L. Shannon books at Amber Quill Press, Changeling Press, Cobblestone Press, Liquid Silver Books & Noble Romance