To celebrate Valentine's Day, I'm having a contest.  So you have a
cute story about how you met your loved one?  Or do you have a story
about some sweet loving incident between a couple?  Fill out the form
below to relate your story.  The deadline is February 11.  All
entries will be judged anonymously by an impartial judge and the
winner will receive a lovely gift basket as a prize.

Come on!  Valentine's Day is all about love and we never get tired of
hearing about it.  Let's get lots of stories.

I'm on the chat line now.  Come join me!

Andrea Jackson

If you'd like to have a chat session this evening from 1800 to 2000
ET, join me in our group chat area.  The web site is
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AndreaJackson   Then click on "chat" on
the left side of the screen.  You may have to download some software
if you've never done this before.

I just thought it would be fun to chat with you guys for awhile.  No
topic in mind, we can just hang out awhile.

Andrea

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com

I've got a mention in this article!

http://www.thunderandroses.com/virtualgirl.html

How to get your own virtual life:
http://www.thunderandroses.com/membership.html

On Monday evenings we can chat at the Yahoo chat area or in the
virtual world of Thunder and Roses.

Andrea Jackson
www.pbdiva.com

If you'd like to have a chat session this evening from 1800 to 2000
ET, join me in our group chat area.  The web site is
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AndreaJackson   Then click on "chat" on
the left side of the screen.  You may have to download some software
if you've never done this before.

I just thought it would be fun to chat with you guys for awhile.  No
topic in mind, we can just hang out awhile.

Andrea

I hope you all had a festive and safe holiday.  I'm looking forward
to another year of writing and personal growth.

Just wanted to let you know that I've updated the web page recently.
Check it out when you get a chance.

Andrea
http://www.pbdiva.com

SHORT NOTICE, SHORT CONTEST

WritersWeekly.com (www.writersweekly.com) is holding its quarterly 24-
Hour Short Story Contest. You can register now, but you won't know
the contest topic or word-count limit until the contest starts at
noon (CST), Saturday, January 22. You then have 24 hours—not one
minute more—to write and e-mail your entry to WritersWeekly.com.

Read rules and guidelines at the contest URL:

http://www.writersweekly.com/misc/contest.html

I hope that you are all preparing for a peaceful, joyful holiday.  I
know that everyone isn't going to have a Currier&Ives, Warm&fuzzy
Television celebration.  In fact, that isn't even desirable for most
people.  Some of you may not celebrate Christmas.  However, we all
need to pause occasionally and remember what's important to us, what
makes us whole.  Christmas is one of those occasions.  At least it
should be.  For Americans, it's become a stress-bound,
commercialized, overblown thing.  But I'm trying to keep it real at
my house.  I want to say hi to all of you, tell you that I'm thinking
of you.  (I also posted my family Christmas letter in the files area,
if you have any interest in reading it.)

God Bless You!

Andrea Jackson

Hello,

This email message is a notification to let you know that
a file has been uploaded to the Files area of the AndreaJackson
group.

   File        : /xmas 2004.doc
   Uploaded by : pbdiva99 <pbdiva99@...>
   Description : Jackson Xmas Letter

You can access this file at the URL:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AndreaJackson/files/xmas%202004.doc

To learn more about file sharing for your group, please visit:
http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/groups/files

Regards,

pbdiva99 <pbdiva99@...>

I'm beat!  I might as well admit I'm not going to catch up some time
soon.  I've only written about 12 new pages of material.  No way
will I make the 200 page goal.  I've heard there's a smaller
challenge in January.  A much better month to pour your life into
writing.

In the meantime, I've got another couple of weeks of classes, as
well as preparing for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I hope you all
have a blessed and peaceful holiday season.

Andrea

For those who joined in the last week or so, please feel free to
check out the files at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AndreaJackson/files/

I've uploaded Chapter one of Hand in Glove which is scheduled for
release by Genesis Press in December 2005.  I hope you enjoy it!

Andrea
www.pbdiva.com

Greetings!

It's the countdown to the holidays and I'm sure you're all busy with
planning, shopping and cleaning.  It's so easy to get carried away,
trying to create a perfect environment for ourselves and our
families.  Just remember that you don't want your memories to be
about you screaming and frazzled.  Don't over-extend yourself.  Take
some time to do something that makes you happy.  Bond with family and
friends.  The website www.flylady.net has helped me adjust my
attitude to housework and life in general.  I recommend it highly!

As for the National Novel Writing Month--I'm way behind.  I've only
produced 5 or 6 pages.  That's 195 to go by November 30.  *lol!*
I'll have to put in a couple of marathon sessions pretty soon.  But I
am getting into the writing groove which is a good feeling.
www.nanowrimo.com

Just finished a writer's conference this past weekend.  The speakers
were Leslie Esdaile (who also writes as L.A. Banks), Felicia Mason,
and Judi McCoy.  All these ladies were incredibly dynamic and
inspiring.  Three distinct personalities, three different approaches
to writing, but all caring and energetic.  I had a great time!
Everyone who attended said it was one of our chapter's best
conferences. http://www.geocities.com/crwrwa/

Part of the reason I haven't gotten a lot of writing done is I've
discovered a new place to play!  The world of Thunder and Roses at
Second Kingdom is a fun virtual community for writers, artists and
musicians.  It's in the early stages of growth, but more people join
us each day.  I spend at least an hour each day chatting and playing
with the virtual toys.  *lol!*
http://www.thunderandroses.com/interiorwalls.html

Have a great day!

Andrea
www.pbdiva.com

i thought since I'm planning to do all this writing this month, I'd
post on my progress.  I get lost and overwhelmed if I try to keep up
on the Nanowrimo forum.

So here I go.  The goal is 50K words in 30 days.  I hadn't spent a
lot of time planning what I'd do and so I got up this morning with no
clue where to start.  I had kind of thought of continuing a fantasy
romance novel I started and abandoned a while ago.  Then I thought
maybe I'd write a bunch of short stories for the confession
magazines.  Or maybe I should get started on a completely new novel.
I have several ideas kicking around in my head.  There's a YA novel I
really want to write.  I would be almost finished if I got to the 50K
goal.  Also I want to submit another contemp romance to Harl/Sil.
Those are about 70K.

So I should get busy with a story!  Um, maybe lunch first....


Andrea

WORLD OF THUNDER AND ROSES --A Virtual Chat Community for Authors,
Musicians, Filmmakers, and Friends
http://www.thunderandroses.com/interiorwalls.html

Andrea

It's been a while since I posted anything here.  I welcome all the
new members.  It's good to have you aboard.  After a dry spell of
writing, I'm slowly getting back into the swing of things.

My current WIP (work in progress) is about a woman, her roommate and
the roommate's brother.  It's got me to thinking about the meaning of
friendship.  Also we've been talking about David and Jonathon in my
last few Sunday school lessons.

Now that was a friendship.  Jonathon was the son of the Jews' first
king.  He was the heir, a formidable warrior, a well-liked dude with
everything going his way.  When David came to his father's court,
they had no idea that he was God's new anointed.  But Jonathan saw
his father's increasingly irrational behavior, his jealousy of David,
his hateful and cowardly acts.  And he saw that David was a great
warrior (that Goliath was no easy mark!) and a Godly man. More
importantly, we are told that he loved David like a brother.  Even
when his father sent him out to kill David, he couldn't do it.  At
first he couldn't believe that his father meant to commit such an
evil act.  But he met with David in hiding and promised to check out
the situation.  When his father went into a rant about David and even
threw a spear at Jonathon, he could no longer ignore the facts.  He
went back to his friend and tearfully told him that he'd better
leave.  He only asked for David's promise to always take care of his
descendants.  And the two young men parted, never to meet again until
David stood over Jonathan's dead body on a battlefield.  And David
kept his promise.

That's the kind of friendship I love to write about.  My heroine will
be torn between doing what's safe and what's right.  But how do we
ever know it's the right thing?  And what if what's right for our
friend will cost us that friend?

Stay tuned and have a blessed week.

I've uploaded to the Files area of the group, the first chapter of my
next novel.  Hand in Glove will be released by Genesis Press in
December 2005.  I can hardly wait!

Here's a brief summary:

Contemporary Romantic Suspense; in and around Atlanta, GA.

The ancient Staff of the Nakisisi is supposed to have religious and
magical properties.  Victor Santiago has agreed to recover the stolen
artifact for his old mentor.  Victor's Afro-Latin good looks and cool
manner are used to shield his unquenchable loneliness. His inquiries
lead him to a wealthy gigolo, a voodoo priestess and an eccentric
professor.  His search is further complicated by the volatile
attraction between him and Ty McAllister.  Ty's plain business suits
disguise a soul of passionate tumult and a heart longing for
acceptance.  Suspicion, lies, ambition, and murder can't thwart the
potent magnetism beetween these two.  Neither of them believes in the
voodoo attributed to the Staff, but something unexplainable is going
on.

When one of the suspects turns up dead, Ty becomes a suspect.
Despite her reservations, she must put her trust in Victor to help
find the real killer.  Victor's showdown with another practitioner of
the Nakisisi martial arts and Ty's kidnapping reveal the ultimate
betrayal of Victor's old mentor.  But Victor and Ty's ordeals have
also shown them that even when the ways of the world prove false,
love and honor make their souls fit together like a hand in glove.
Just a touch of psychic powers enlivens this twisted plot.

Just go to the groups homepage and click on FILES to get the first
chapter.

Andrea
www.pbdiva.com

These websites may be helpful.

Andrea

>
>
http://www.nj.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news-9/107450853949431.xml?times?nmx
>
>
http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,6109,1124790,00.html
>
> http://starbulletin.com/2004/01/19/features/story1.html
>
> http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=57&aid=59576
>
>
http://philadelphia.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/stories/2004/01/19/story4.html
>
> http://www.rwanational.org/member/rwr/Promotion.cfm
>
> http://www.patriciasimpson.com/promotion.html
>
>



__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Read only the mail you want - Yahoo! Mail SpamGuard.
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail

A member of the list recently asked me if I had any words of
inspiration. I'm not sure this will help, but I thought I'd share it
with you all.


INSPIRATION

People often ask me what's my inspiration as a writer.  It seems like
a pretty straightforward question, but I found it a bit difficult to
figure out.  There are actually 2 questions embedded in that
question.  The first -what inspired you to become a writer – is the
easiest to answer.

Like most writers, I started off by being an avid reader.  My love of
reading began in the third grade, when my teacher read to our class
every day.  I still remember that teacher with fondness and some of
those books are still my favorites. I can remember the entire class
in tears at the end of Charlotte's Web.  I'd check out each book she
read aloud, take it home to read it again.  As a shy child, I learned
to lose myself in the world of books.

I'm not sure when exactly I began to write but one of the first
things was a short humor piece that I wrote to entertain a
classmate.  She insisted on reading it out loud to our classmates.  I
don't remember how the class reacted, but the fact that she liked it
made me feel warm and powerful.

I continued to write throughout middle school and high school.  I
wrote a "fictional diary" through out high school. In my 20's I moved
on to endless fantasy novels.  They had no plot and no ending and I
kept them in my closet where they belonged.

It was another short humor piece that inspired me to begin sending
out material.  The Writer's Digest magazine offers a contest every
month.  I compulsively sent off an entry one month and to my
astonishment, I won!

That was when I began studying the markets.  I sent off my first
submission.  And after months of waiting, received a form
rejection.  "Dear writer, we thank you for considering our
publication but your submission is not right for us."  There is not
much that's more crushing than a form rejection letter.  You've put
your blood, sweat and soul into what you believe is the most special
piece of writing ever conceived and some editor won't even give you
the courtesy of a personal comment?????   It is the ultimate
rejection.  You don't know what you're doing wrong but you keep
trying.  But I kept sending out submissions and the rejections kept
coming.   I have two folders crammed with them.  And most of them are
form letters.

Which brings us to the second question- what inspires a person to
continue writing?
Someone once said that creative writing is ten percent inspiration
and 90 percent perspiration.  The sportswriter Red Smith once said
that writing is easy—just sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.
Both quotes are absolutely right.

So what keeps a writer going through all those rejections?  Most of
us aren't lucky enough to hit the jackpot on our first effort.  We
struggle through months and years of rejections.  But after awhile,
even the piles of rejections become a kind of inspiration.  I
wondered how big I can make my stack before I make a sale.
Another inspiration is the fellow aspiring writers you meet when you
join writing groups and take classes and attend conferences.  All of
them share in your passion.

It's the critique partners who read your work each week or month and
who write themselves through rejection and life.  It's their
encouragement and their successes.  When my critique partner made her
first novel sale, I was just as proud as a new father.  I was there
with her at conception and I helped her through the labor.

Inspiration comes from hearing stories of how your favorite authors
got their start.  Like Nora Roberts, a top romance writer, who wrote
her first story when she was an unhappy housewife with small children
and she got snowed in one week.   It's the generous writers at
conventions and workshops who are willing to give their time and
advice.  Like Heather Graham Posseszere who I drove to the airport
and who was so sweet when I got lost.  It's my mentor and hero,
Felicia Mason.  I can't imagine I'll ever be as competent and active
as her, but I appreciate her time and advice.

And just like at the beginning, it's reading.  It's the countless
books that I opened up which transported me to a new world, involved
me in the lives of people who became real to me for a few hours.
Those books made me believe that writing novels was a worthwhile
pursuit.  Even if I never achieved greatness, I believed that I could
learn to write a book which would entertain someone for a just a
little while, provide a little comfort and a little excitement to
someone like me.


Andrea

I've received a contract for my second Genesis novel, tentatively
titled HAND IN GLOVE.  I'm afraid it isn't scheduled for publicaton
until November 2005.  Yikes.  But if you'd like to receive chapter
one please reply to this message.

HAND IN GLOVE is a Contemporary Romantic Suspense set in and around
Atlanta, GA.

HERO: Victor Santiago – his Afro-Latin good looks and cool manner are
designed to shield his unquenchable loneliness. He's just left his
prosperous consulting firm in New York City to take over his
estranged grandmother's failing business.

HEROINE: Ty McAllister – her plain business suits disguise a soul of
passionate tumult and a heart longing for acceptance. Ty has just
been promoted to producer of a popular local tabloid-type TV show. Ty
is in desperate need of money to finance her sister in medical
college. She's never overcome the humiliation of her poverty-stricken
childhood, so now Ty strives to be as independent as possible and to
take care of those she loves.

SITUATION: When an ancient African artifact is stolen, murder, lies
and magic draw Ty and Victor deeper and deeper into a web of intrigue.


Andrea Jackson

Romance Slam Jam is an annual conference for readers and writers of African-American romance writing. It's one of my favorite conferences for a number of reasons. They conduct a contest for aspiring writers each year and in 2002, I placed in the top five! I had not attened that year but my friend Felicia Mason phoned me around 10 pm that night screaming that my name had been called. She was the one who'd urged me to enter and I think she was equally excited. I used that honor to leverage a reading by the editors at Genesis Books. They offered me a contract and the rest, as they say, is history. The next year I attended the conference in Atlanta. It was a blast. Writing is a pretty solitary process, but this gives you the opportunity to see what readers really respond to. I was awaed by how voracious, enthusiastic and discriminating the readers are.

This year the conference was in New York City, and this time I had a book to present at the mass autographing. It was a thrilling experience. BTW, Felicia Mason won TWO Emmas (award for published authors) this year. I'm so proud of her and she deserved it. I've put pictures of the conference up in the files area of our list for you to browse.

While at the conference I had a sign up for a drawing of a tote bag and some cosmetics. The winner is Dara Washington of Norfolk VA. Congratulations Dara!

The winner is Raquell Barton of Little Rock, AR.  Congratulations
Raquell!

Andrea

This is always a significant day for romance authors!  For all you
readers, I hope that if your day isn't spend with your honey, you get
to spend it with someone else you love.  Because Love isn't just
about a man and woman and hot sex.   There are so many kinds of love
that bring us joy.  Between friends, family, the love of child or
maybe some cause you're dedicated to.

I wish you all more love in your lives!

The drawing winner will be announced later this weekend.

Heres a review of my just released book.  I'm so pleased--my first
review!
http://romancefiction.about.com/cs/bookreviews/gr/bodyguard.htm?
terms=andrea+jackson
'
Andrea Jackson,
THE PAPERBACK DIVA     http://www.pbdiva.com

Go to the website and sign up for a prize drawing.  A handmade
totebag and some romance books-- including mine.   Free!!!!1


Andrea
http://www.pbdiva.com

I hope that everyone had a peaceful holiday, however you may
celebrate.

I mailed cover flats last week to those who requested them.  Drop me
a line if you don't get it soon.  I still have some copies I can send
out for anyone else who is interested.  Privately email me your snail
mail address and I will send them out until I reach the quota.

Andrea

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Greetings!

Andrea has sent you an E-Card -- a virtual postcard from
E-Cards.com. You can pickup your card at the E-Cards.com website.

-> If your e-mail is hot-link enabled, click here:
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-autho</a>

-> You may also point your web browser to: http://www.e-cards.com/
    Then, visit the card pickup page and input your pickup code:
    ca1483-ss-autho

Your E-Card will be available for 15 days from the sending date.
To keep your E-Card accessible indefinitely, you may want to join
"My E-Cards" -- an option to do so is provided in your E-Card!

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Good morning!

I wanted to let you know that my cover flats were supposed to be back
from the printer last week and my publisher will be sending me a
bunch of them.

If you don't know what cover flats are, they are simply a post card
like page that shows the front and back cover of the book.  They are
used for publicity, etc.

I really appreciate all of you who've shown enough interest to sign
up for my newsletter so early.  To thank you, I will send you each a
signed copy of the cover flat.  These will go to everyone signed up
on the list before Dec 31 or the first 12 members.

If you're interested, send your mailing address to AndreaJackson-
owner@yahoogroups.com.  Your address will not be shared with anyone
else.

Andrea