I just received an early Easter Basket !!  My friend Vicki, from Reading At The Beach (readingatthebeach.com) sent me the sweetest basket, as sweet as a Hershey’s Kiss !!!! 

 

  And the best part is that Hershey has partnered with the Children’s Miracle Network (http://www.childrensmiraclenetwork.org)%20for/ over 20 years. CMN is a non-profit alliance of children’s hospitals dedicated to providing state-of-the-art care, life-saving research and preventative education across North America. This Easter season, Hershey is celebrating it’s new Easter products sold exclusively at Walmart and their legacy of making a difference and Hershey’s will donate up to a total of $5,000 to the Children’s Miracle Network together with bloggers.
  Please join in and help make this a child’s sweetest Easter ever !!!  Its easy to participate…
Participate to Hershey’s Better Basket Blog Hop of giving away virtual Easter Baskets by creating a blog post with specific rules described here.

*Hershey Company will donate $10 per each blog post to CMN, up to total of $5,000.
*One blog post per URL counts towards the donation, but you can give as many virtual Easter baskets as you want.
*The Hershey’s Better Basket Blog Hop will officially begin at 12 AM EST on March 18th and end at 12 PM EST on April 4th, 2010. Blog posts submitted to us before or after that time period will not be counted for.
*The blog post link has to be submitted to us for the donation to be counted.
*In addition copy and paste the following text in your blog post:

 HERSHEY’S BETTER BASKET BLOG HOP RULES
*Copy and paste these rules to your blog post.
*Create a blog post giving a virtual Easter Basket to another blogger – you can give as many Virtual Baskets as you want.
*Link back to person who gave you an Easter Basket.
*Let each person you are giving a Virtual Easter Basket know you have given them a Basket.
*Leave your link at BetterBasket.info/BlogHop comment section. You can also find the official rules of this #betterbasket blog hop, and more information about Better Basket with Hershey’s there.
*Hershey’s is donating $10 per each blog participating to the Better Basket Blog Hop to Children’s Miracle Network (up to total of $5,000 by blog posts written by April 4th, 2010).
*Please note that only one blog post by each blog url will count towards the donation.
 
I am passing this basket on to:
   Xmas Dolly
   Bermudaonion
   A Cup of Tea and a Cozy For Me
   Caiafa Craziness
   Dollycas’s Thoughts
   Libby’s Library News
   My 5 Monkeys
I am willing to share all the goodies in my basket, so if you would like to participate, please help yourself to my basket !!!
  

  I just received an early Easter Basket !!  My friend Vicki, from Reading At The Beach (readingatthebeach.com) sent me the sweetest basket, as sweet as a Hershey’s Kiss !!!! 

 

  And the best part is that Hershey has partnered with the Children’s Miracle Network (http://www.childrensmiraclenetwork.org)%20for/ over 20 years. CMN is a non-profit alliance of children’s hospitals dedicated to providing state-of-the-art care, life-saving research and preventative education across North America. This Easter season, Hershey is celebrating it’s new Easter products sold exclusively at Walmart and their legacy of making a difference and Hershey’s will donate up to a total of $5,000 to the Children’s Miracle Network together with bloggers.
  Please join in and help make this a child’s sweetest Easter ever !!!  Its easy to participate…
Participate to Hershey’s Better Basket Blog Hop of giving away virtual Easter Baskets by creating a blog post with specific rules described here.

*Hershey Company will donate $10 per each blog post to CMN, up to total of $5,000.
*One blog post per URL counts towards the donation, but you can give as many virtual Easter baskets as you want.
*The Hershey’s Better Basket Blog Hop will officially begin at 12 AM EST on March 18th and end at 12 PM EST on April 4th, 2010. Blog posts submitted to us before or after that time period will not be counted for.
*The blog post link has to be submitted to us for the donation to be counted.
*In addition copy and paste the following text in your blog post:

 HERSHEY’S BETTER BASKET BLOG HOP RULES
*Copy and paste these rules to your blog post.
*Create a blog post giving a virtual Easter Basket to another blogger – you can give as many Virtual Baskets as you want.
*Link back to person who gave you an Easter Basket.
*Let each person you are giving a Virtual Easter Basket know you have given them a Basket.
*Leave your link at BetterBasket.info/BlogHop comment section. You can also find the official rules of this #betterbasket blog hop, and more information about Better Basket with Hershey’s there.
*Hershey’s is donating $10 per each blog participating to the Better Basket Blog Hop to Children’s Miracle Network (up to total of $5,000 by blog posts written by April 4th, 2010).
*Please note that only one blog post by each blog url will count towards the donation.
 
I am passing this basket on to:
   Xmas Dolly
   Bermudaonion
   A Cup of Tea and a Cozy For Me
   Caiafa Craziness
   Dollycas’s Thoughts
   Libby’s Library News
   My 5 Monkeys
I am willing to share all the goodies in my basket, so if you would like to participate, please help yourself to my basket !!!
  

Please help me welcome Mr. Bill Walker, author of A Note from an Old Aquaintance

Author’s Thoughts:
One of the most difficult aspects of writing, in my humble opinion, is dialogue. It is also one of the most important. In fact, I would wager that most people wouldn’t care to read a book without it. So, how does one develop an ear for dialogue? After all, we hear people around us speak all day long, every day. Dialogue should be a snap, right? Wrong. In real life people speak in fragments that would look awful on the printed page and sound even worse in the reader’s mind, and I’m not even counting if it makes sense or not. Your dialogue must serve the story and can’t afford to waste time going off on tangents like all of us do in real life.

When I first endeavored to write professionally, while I could turn a decent descriptive phrase, or two, dialogue was my weak point, my Achilles heel, as it were. It sounded phony, stilted and wooden. No matter what I wrote, I hated the dialogue. And then I started using a technique that seems to work for me. I started casting my characters in my mind, using either real people, such as people I knew or famous actors and actresses, or simply vivid constructs, and assigned them voices and accents. I then deliberately imagined each scene as a little movie of the mind, to be played over and over again as I tried different lines of dialogue. Now, this may seem like a no-brainer, but this may not work for everyone. Because of my desire to be a filmmaker I tend to think cinematically.

Once you start doing this, and it will still take practice, the dialogue will flow more naturally, because you as the writer will inhabit the role of each character as you write them. In effect, you become the ultimate actor. One thing you should avoid, however, is too much dialect. While Mark Twain got away with it, modern readers don’t want to wade through pages of words with strange and unique spellings. Instead of making your characters more vivid, you distract the reader, pulling them out of the story. And you NEVER want to do that, if you can help it.

Through my little cinematic technique you can use normal language, slanting a word or two, or using certain phrases unique to that character to make him or her sound Irish, for instance. They don’t have to speak like the Lucky Charms leprechaun and in fact they shouldn’t, unless you want to stray into the land of cliché. In any event, give my technique a try and see if it works for you.

About A Note From an Old Acquaintance:
Brian Weller is a haunted man. It’s been two years since the tragic accident that left his three-year-old son dead and his wife in an irreversible coma. A popular author of mega-selling thrillers, Brian’s life has reached a crossroads: his new book is stalled, his wife’s prognosis is dire, and he teeters on the brink of despair.

Everything changes the morning an e-mail arrives from Boston artist Joanna Richman. Her heartfelt note brings back all the poignant memories: the night their eyes met, the fiery passion of their short-lived affair, and the agonizing moment he was forced to leave Joanna forever. Now, fifteen years later, the guilt and anger threaten to overwhelm him. Vowing to make things right, Brian arranges a book-signing tour that will take him back to Boston. He is eager to see Joanna again, but remains unsure where their reunion will lead. One thing is certain: the forces that tore their love asunder will stop at nothing to keep them apart.

Filled with tender romance and taut suspense, A Note from an Old Acquaintance is an unforgettable story about fate, honor, and the power of true love.

You can find my review dated 02/27/10….
Thank you Mr. Walker for stoppng by, sharing your thoughts and allowing me the opportunity of reading a very enjoyable book.  This reader will be awaiting your next novel.

Please help me welcome Mr. Bill Walker, author of A Note from an Old Aquaintance

Author’s Thoughts:
One of the most difficult aspects of writing, in my humble opinion, is dialogue. It is also one of the most important. In fact, I would wager that most people wouldn’t care to read a book without it. So, how does one develop an ear for dialogue? After all, we hear people around us speak all day long, every day. Dialogue should be a snap, right? Wrong. In real life people speak in fragments that would look awful on the printed page and sound even worse in the reader’s mind, and I’m not even counting if it makes sense or not. Your dialogue must serve the story and can’t afford to waste time going off on tangents like all of us do in real life.

When I first endeavored to write professionally, while I could turn a decent descriptive phrase, or two, dialogue was my weak point, my Achilles heel, as it were. It sounded phony, stilted and wooden. No matter what I wrote, I hated the dialogue. And then I started using a technique that seems to work for me. I started casting my characters in my mind, using either real people, such as people I knew or famous actors and actresses, or simply vivid constructs, and assigned them voices and accents. I then deliberately imagined each scene as a little movie of the mind, to be played over and over again as I tried different lines of dialogue. Now, this may seem like a no-brainer, but this may not work for everyone. Because of my desire to be a filmmaker I tend to think cinematically.

Once you start doing this, and it will still take practice, the dialogue will flow more naturally, because you as the writer will inhabit the role of each character as you write them. In effect, you become the ultimate actor. One thing you should avoid, however, is too much dialect. While Mark Twain got away with it, modern readers don’t want to wade through pages of words with strange and unique spellings. Instead of making your characters more vivid, you distract the reader, pulling them out of the story. And you NEVER want to do that, if you can help it.

Through my little cinematic technique you can use normal language, slanting a word or two, or using certain phrases unique to that character to make him or her sound Irish, for instance. They don’t have to speak like the Lucky Charms leprechaun and in fact they shouldn’t, unless you want to stray into the land of cliché. In any event, give my technique a try and see if it works for you.

About A Note From an Old Acquaintance:
Brian Weller is a haunted man. It’s been two years since the tragic accident that left his three-year-old son dead and his wife in an irreversible coma. A popular author of mega-selling thrillers, Brian’s life has reached a crossroads: his new book is stalled, his wife’s prognosis is dire, and he teeters on the brink of despair.

Everything changes the morning an e-mail arrives from Boston artist Joanna Richman. Her heartfelt note brings back all the poignant memories: the night their eyes met, the fiery passion of their short-lived affair, and the agonizing moment he was forced to leave Joanna forever. Now, fifteen years later, the guilt and anger threaten to overwhelm him. Vowing to make things right, Brian arranges a book-signing tour that will take him back to Boston. He is eager to see Joanna again, but remains unsure where their reunion will lead. One thing is certain: the forces that tore their love asunder will stop at nothing to keep them apart.

Filled with tender romance and taut suspense, A Note from an Old Acquaintance is an unforgettable story about fate, honor, and the power of true love.

You can find my review dated 02/27/10….
Thank you Mr. Walker for stoppng by, sharing your thoughts and allowing me the opportunity of reading a very enjoyable book.  This reader will be awaiting your next novel.

Hosted by Jennifer from CRAZY FOR BOOKS http://www.crazy-for-books.com/
Here are the instuctions from her site:
  Every day I seem to find another book blog that I start following. In the spirit of the Friday Follow, I thought it would be cool to do a Book Blog Hop to give us all bookies a chance to connect and find new blogs that we may be missing out on! It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs that they may not know existed!
  So, if you’d like to participate, just repost this on your blog, sign MckLinky below, and check out other blogs in MckLinky! Let’s connect and make new book bloggy friends!! So, if you consider yourself a book blogger, come join the fun!
  Pretty please – Your blog should have content related to books, including, but not limited to book reviews.

Hosted by Jennifer from CRAZY FOR BOOKS http://www.crazy-for-books.com/
Here are the instuctions from her site:
  Every day I seem to find another book blog that I start following. In the spirit of the Friday Follow, I thought it would be cool to do a Book Blog Hop to give us all bookies a chance to connect and find new blogs that we may be missing out on! It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs that they may not know existed!
  So, if you’d like to participate, just repost this on your blog, sign MckLinky below, and check out other blogs in MckLinky! Let’s connect and make new book bloggy friends!! So, if you consider yourself a book blogger, come join the fun!
  Pretty please – Your blog should have content related to books, including, but not limited to book reviews.