Lori Devoti, paranormal romance and urban fantasy author

I KNOW I have been very very bad here lately–not posting…at all. My only excuse is, well, life. Here’s my plea…I’m under deadline. I have a book due to Nocturne November 1. Before that I had a Bite due September 1 and Amazon Queen due August 7. Mixed in there I revised Amazon Queen, revised The Hellhound King (Nocturne February 2010) and now have AA’s (author authorizations, known as galleys with other publishers) for The Hellhound King. I also had some odd jobs like writing reader letters for Nocturne, etc.

I have been a busy girl.

Add to that the whole darn H1N1 thing. As I think you know, both of my kids have cystic fibrosis. This puts them as high risk and darn it all if some kid in my son’s class didn’t get H1N1. So, we pulled both kids out of school until the vaccine is available. I have been home schooling them…ahhhh!

So, anyway all that is why I haven’t been blogging here although I have been blogging elsewhere. Kind of the cobbler’s children having no shoes I guess.

As to where I am now…Still writing Nocturne due November 1. I’m a bit behind where I would like to be, but staying basically on track. It’s not in the Unbound world. I’m afraid that series is ending. The last one THE WITCH THIEF, a dragon book, will be out next year. This book is a stand alone with werewolves and another creature I’m keeping to myself for now.

I’m also leaving for the Novelist’s Inc. Conference in St. Louis on Wednesday. It’s a great group of multi published authors and I always learn a lot. I also get to show friends a bit of my home state. I’ll try and post pictures.

And finally I got a new review today for my short story When Gargoyles Fly in the Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance. This was out earlier this year. I really liked this story. It probably could have stood to be longer, but well there is that darn thing called contracted word count…Anyway, here is the review from Bitten By Books…

Aside from that I’ll be blogging at Romancing the Blog on Wednesday (actually I’ll be driving the length of Illinois, but words I write today will be posted there then) and on Friday at Something Wicked (probably Ninc pictures).

And eventually, I’ll be back here and hopefully, once life settles back down we’ll do another event with fun guest blogs and prizes!

Lori

Got this in my mail box today…

Harlequin is excited to bring you Freebie Fridays. Each Friday of the month Harlequin gives away a free feature book with the purchase of two books.

Freebie Friday, 9/11
Purchase two or more books and recieve the feature book for free! This week’s book is the Harlequin Superromance “Someone Like Her” by Janice Kay Johnson

Use the link below to get your Freebie Friday deal!
FREEBIE Fridays. Treat yourself every Friday to something FREE including FREE Shipping, FREE print and eBooks and much more!

By Jeri Westerson

In my blog tour to promote my latest Crispin Guest Medieval Noir novel, SERPENT IN THE THORNS, I’ve been talking about medieval myths, that is, those tired saws that many people believe about the Middle Ages. Two of my personal favorites have got to be chastity belts and iron maidens. Though they sound like something that would go together, trust me, they don’t.

First, let’s talk that ultimate of contraceptive devices, chastity belts.

We owe the Victorians a lot for what they preserved of the medieval period. They were in love with it, partly due to authors like Sir Walter Scott for his tale of knightly chivalry, Ivanhoe, and partly because the chivalric code came to mean a lot to proper Englishmen of the time. Archaeological digs turned up new and interesting finds. Architecture in the form of castles, monasteries, and churches were preserved from permanent decay. With this surge in interest in all things ancient—including an abiding interest in the classical—the Middle Ages became the next target, and many histories were written. Sometimes these histories were quite valuable with new insights and impeccable research (and there are even some that are still used by scholars today). But many more of these “histories” were romanticism at best, pure fantasy at worst. Their “idea” of the Middle Ages as a sweepingly romantic period run by Dutch-boy coifed Arthurian knights meeting maidens gowned in velvet with pointy sleeves in sunlit meadows—a veritable Rivendell of sunbeams and blossoms—often tipped the scales into the absurd.

Along with this (and with the Victorian ideals of marriage and fidelity) comes the Crusaders in need of keeping the homefires burning…but not burning quite that much! To dampen a few of these homefires, knights, it was said, created these metal devices in which to encage their wives to ensure their fidelity. Like a Maidenform girdle…in metal. This might discourage anyone—except for, perhaps, an enterprising tinker—from giving it a go with the knight’s wife.

Later Renaissance devices in leather were created to discourage masturbation. But we are not going there.

Even the British Museum was not immune from being deceived. They had a chastity belt on display up until the ‘90s, placed there originally in the 1840s…which is probably when it was made! A museum spokesman was reported saying about the item in question, “It is probable that the majority of existing examples were made in the 19th century as curiosities for the prurient or jokes for the tasteless.”

But that’s not the only iron maidens we have to discuss. The one I’m talking about now is supposed to have been a torture device (not that the other one wouldn’t have been!) These iron maidens were wooden cabinets with iron spikes inside. They were shaped rather like large bowling pins with the image of the Virgin’s face on the head part. Closing the hapless victim inside would pierce him in innumerable holes all over the body. Blood loss, possible asphyxiation, and the horror of it, could cause death.

Except that it didn’t exist in the Middle Ages. It doesn’t appear to have been invented until the late 18th century, and even then it was all in the mind. The earliest account of this device can be found in 1793, but even that was a hoax! It was possibly confused with a “cloak of shame”, something that was used in the Middle Ages. But this was more of a portable stocks, a barrel that one was forced to wear, humiliating oneself by walking around town, letting everyone know that you had been naughty, where citizens could hurl ridicule as well as rotten vegetables at you (where were folks keeping all those rotten vegetables they are always throwing at people?)

So there you are. Two myths laid to rest, I hope. As disappointing as that might be. Perhaps next we’ll investigate the rotten vegetable conspiracy.

You can find out more about Jeri’s medieval noir series and her newest release SERPENT IN THE THORNS on Jeri’s website www.JeriWesterson.com

I’m sure I’m not the only person here that can lose HOURS on the Internet. Sit down for a second and get up literally hours later…and the word “lose”…it’s appropriate, right? Because you have no idea where those hours went and while you were totally engrossed in whatever you were doing/reading you actually got nothing done.

And that would be OK, if you got up refreshed and ready to take on a new challenge, but I’m betting you don’t. I’m betting you get up feeling more tired or even angry than when you sat down.

Why is that and what can we do to combat it?

Personally, I think we all need to take back life’s little joys. Those little things that have no “get something done” value, but that bring us that hard to describe sense of peace, where just for a few seconds or minutes everything feels all right. Where we know we are OK and we are just happy to be.

When is the last time you felt that? I’m betting it wasn’t while trolling blogs.

Now, obviously, we are all individuals, but I’m going to give a few suggestions of how I think you can bring a little joy back into your life and it would be great if you could add to the list too. Because, honestly, can we have too much joy and peace?

• Buy fish–the live kind in a tank. Okay, I know cleaning the tank can be a pain, but there is something about watching fish that is just restful. This summer we bought a tank for my daughter–her fish, her tank. Two guesses who cleans it. Uh, yeah, me, but guess what? I don’t mind because I truly enjoy taking care of the little critters. And bonus last week one of them have babies. Now we have fish available to share the joy with others.
• 
  Grow a plant. Plants can be a pain, but they can also be quite rewarding, and some just bring you joy by looking at them. Have you heard of moss terrariums? My cousin has started selling them and while at first they seem a bit silly, I can really see the appeal. They just make people happy.
• Hug a tree. It’s become a joke, but honestly there is nothing that makes me feel more a peace than standing in a grove of trees, especially old trees. I’m a big believer in energy and it is almost as if trees soak up all the negative things we carry around with us. If you don’t believe me go sit outside under a big oak one afternoon. See if you don’t just feel better.
• Go for a walk, but somewhere in nature. I take my dog for a walk every day and one of our special joys is seeing a heron that has taken to fishing in a local pond. It’s a bird…see birds all the time, but seeing that heron makes me smile.
• Wander…discover. When I was little my grandparents had a farm. It was around 360 acres of fields and woods. I wandered that land a lot and I discovered a lot. My family were not the first people on that land. I found signs of Native Americans, and old farm houses, cemeteries with slaves and deserted hidey holes (root cellars built to hide from tornadoes), persimmon trees and walnut trees. I found all kinds of things I wasn’t looking for and every discovery brought me some kind of peace. When is the last time you wandered where you didn’t know what you were going to find?
• Snuggle with your children if you have them. My kids have both gone through their afraid of the dark/can I sleep with you stages. And I have given in at times to both of them, but here is the real secret…I never feel safer and more at peace than when my kids are snuggled up next to me. Everything just feels okay.
• Watch a puppy (or for some maybe a baby). They get such joy out of everything. How can’t a little of that rub off on you?

Okay, now your turn. What can you do today to bring yourself a tiny bit of joy. (Not fun, not pleasure…joy.)