Today is Halloween in the U.S. and it is fitting for me because I am possessed. Totally, completely possessed. Not by a being, but by an idea. I’ve had this idea circling in my brain for months, and like a good wine, I’ve left it alone to mature. Finally I have a little time to work on it and now I’m eating, sleeping and breathing this idea.

Even weirder, the synopsis was too easy to write. I’ve gotten the comments back from one of my critique partners, and I’m eager to go back and work on the changes. I can see them in my head. I’m telling you this is too easy. I must be possessed.

Don’t believe me?

I’ll show you. First you have to know that I am NOT artistic. I can’t draw. I can’t paint. In fact, I am so artistically challenged, I can barely sign my name. But on Saturday, after I finished the first draft of a synopsis and sent it off for a critique, I decided I’d carve a pumpkin. I haven’t carved a pumpkin in years! There’s a reason for that. In the past, my pumpkin carving attempts have been sad and made me feel like a Halloween loser. They always consisted of sloppy triangles and a weird mouth—the whole thing always looked like a four-year-old did it.

But Saturday, I had to carve a pumpkin! I even went to the store and bought a pumpkin, and I normally avoid the store on weekends. I came home and told my husband.

He grinned and tried really hard not to roll his eyes. But nothing could spoil my mood. I wanted to carve this pumpkin! So I did, and this is the result:

While this is not, by any means, great, it is a shocking improvement from my previous attempts. My husband—the man who has known me for decades, was stunned.

See? I’m possessed by this idea!

From that pumpkin, can you guess what this new idea is about? I have two extra copies of SINFUL MAGIC up for grabs! Leave your guess in the comments and I’ll put you in the contest. I’ll randomly pick two winners. All guesses count!

I buy and download music to my iPod to workout. It’s predominately what I use my iPod for. More than once, I’ve discovered a “theme song” in the process. Let me explain…

One day, I trudged to the gym in the morning, entirely discouraged with my current project. I’m revising a proposal, and I was lost in the middle. Every way I looked, all I saw was hot sand, rocks and tumbleweeds representing my plot, subplot and characters being tossed around by the howling wind.

There I am chasing one way after that small tumble weed because I think I can catch him. But wait, if I lose that big one over there, everything will collapse! I drop the little guy and chase after the big one. But when I reach for the big one, he crumbles into four new tumble weeds and they all blow off in separate directions.

And there I am, panting, dripping sweat with my hair sticking to my face and neck. I’m turning in circles looking at all those tumble weeds, and it’s just impossible. How do I gather them all up and make a freaking story out of tumble weeds?

More tumble weeks blow by me, and I start looking for a bar. Seriously, there has to be a bar in this desert…I’m going to go in that bar and drink until I can’t remember anything about tumble weeds, plots, characters or why I ever thought I could write a book.

In other words, this is the place where I want to give up. Part of me really, truly, wants to give up.

This is where Theme Song comes in.

So that morning when I am utterly, hopelessly discouraged, I go to the gym. I’ve downloaded a new set of music, and most of my choices are random songs I’ve picked based on the beat. I start playing the iPod, get up to speed on the treadmill and a song comes on. Lose Yourself by Eminem. I chose it mostly for the fast beat that will keep me going.

But this particular song gets my attention and I begin really listening. Say what you want about Eminem, but this song throbs with his passion. The words are gritty, sometimes foul, and the beat is harsh, but this song that I’ve heard before suddenly hits me with meaning. It’s all about timing. This song is about Eminem’s passion to succeed. It is exactly what the writer in me is feeling.

The song resonates so deeply with me, my own passion to write rekindles inside me, then flares into flames that make me burn to write. I am seared with the need to find the true story of my characters in that mess of tumbleweeds. Determination heats my blood until I. Have. To. Write.

These are the two sections of the song that hit me deep in my writer’s soul:

Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity
To seize everything you ever wanted in one moment
Would you capture it or just let it slip?

You better lose yourself in the music, the moment
You own it, you better never let it go
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime yo

That became my “theme song” as I fought through the middle of my revisions to the end. Every time I needed inspiration and felt me fire dwindle, and the desert I was lost in grew dark, I played that song. And every time, that barren desert would light up with the reignited flame of my passion and determination.

And that’s my tip of the day to you. Are you struggling with something? It could be writing a book, searching for a job, getting a promotion, losing weight, learning a new craft.

Get a theme song for motivation. Exclusively for that one problem or goal, find a theme song, and use it. Pick the lyrics in that song and play them in your head when you feel yourself slipping on the road to your goal. Use that song to keep you motivated and working toward your goal.

As for me, I’m going to edit and polish my revised project and send it off sometime this week.

So have you ever had a theme song for anything in your life?

In my books, magic is a superpower that I make my hero and heroines earn.

But in real life, magic is something else entirely to me. It’s a gift to be embraced and cherished.

I’m thinking about this because my husband and I were looking at the rose tree we planted after my mother died. I’ve written about this before, but it tends to bloom on her birthday in October and her death in January.

Yesterday we saw the tree had a dozen fresh buds ready to bloom. My mom’s birthday is October 11th.

I think this is a gift of magic. These gifts are all around us in life. They are the things that quiet all the white noise of struggle, worry and stress, allowing souls cherish the gift, recording it so deeply we never forget.

They can be small, like the day at a large family party, my oldest son yelled out, “Hey mom, do you know how to drown a blonde in a swimming pool?”

I yelled back the answer, and added that I’d just read the same book. The two of us busted up laughing. It was random coincidence that we had both read the same book, and had been saving the joke to tell each other. The moment was funny, but the connection between me and my adult son in our shared love of reading?

A gift of magic.

My husband never told me he loved me before our wedding. We had dated well over a year. I know this sounds weird, but I trusted that he truly cared about me. I trusted him. We married, had the reception, and went to our hotel. I’ll never forget walking into our room, bone tired. He turned, took the small bag I was carrying out of my hand, and pulled me into his arms. “Now I can tell you that I love you. Today, and every day for the rest of our lives.”

And he tells me all the time. My initial trust in him, paid off in…

A gift of magic.

These are moments, or events, or unexplainable things that happen to us and are the true magic in our lives. Their affect on his is profound enough to mark our souls and can never be lost.

Like the moment I woke suddenly at 4:30 a.m. and stared at the phone. Calmness rolled over me, and I thought, “Oh mom.” I waited, and knew. Fifteen minutes later the phone rang. My mom was in repertory distress. But I knew the truth, she was already gone. I’d felt her last touch like a gentle breeze across my soul.

A gift of magic that she is gone from this life, not gone from me.

Or when I had my second son, the cord had been wrapped around his neck, and things got very tense in the delivery room. Thankfully he was delivered safely with only a small fracture to his clavicle that healed fine. I remember looking down to his face and I saw my father. Felt him surround me and my baby. My dad had been dead for at least 10 years then, but for a brief moment, I saw that had he lived, he and this boy would have been close. And then he just melted away and I was left holding my son and a lifetime of looking at him and imagining him and my dad hanging out. Sure, maybe just a dream, a fantasy of what could have been. But I think it is…

A gift of magic.

I could fill a book on these gifts. There are so many, and I just randomly listed a few.

And here’s a point I’m going to make. I see people frantically searching for “magic.” In a diet, in success, in self help books, following Dr. Phil or Dr. Drew or the latest Guru, trying to connect with lost loved ones, just searching and searching. And missing out on what is here with them now—life. The energy they expend has them going at a frantic pace of growing desperation I think they often miss the true gifts of magic that come right here. In the life we have.

Do you have a gift of magic, however big or little, you want to share? I’d love to hear them!

I’m currently revising a huge proposal for my agent, and while I’m struggling with that, I have 1½ other ideas screaming for attention in my brain. It’s too crowded in my head for me to squeeze out a thoughtful blog, so today where going to learn some random things for each other.

And I’m giving away a $15.00 Starbucks gift card to one commenter, so play along!

Here are five random things about me.

1) I prefer to go barefoot at home. In the winter, I wear tennis shoes, but often, I kick off my shoes and end up in my socks. Last year, I managed to break my little toe, just by walking by my husband. I’m not kidding. He was just standing there, I walked by in a hurry to get the manicotti out of the oven, caught my little toe on his tennis shoe and broke it. I have witnesses that saw it happen! And yet, I still go barefoot. My husband has pointed out that if I would JUST WEAR SHOES this wouldn’t happen.

2) I have a tendency to drop stuff and bump into solid objects. The other day, I dropped a sharp knife while chopping vegetables, and did a pretty impressive dance to avoid the knife slicing open my foot. I was fine. Unfortunately, I took about ten years off my husband’s life. When he recovered, he snapped, “Either were shoes or stop dropping knives!”

3) I give advice MUCH better than I actually take it. That’s why I’m barefoot right now, and will still be when I chop up lettuce and tomatoes for tacos tonight. Although, I will seriously try not to drop the knife. I kind of agree with my husband on that one.

4) I’m pretty organized in my life, except when it comes to plotting a book, and writing it. Then I write random notes all over the place, and just sweep it all into my “working drawer.” I can plan a party with methodical precision, the same with a moving to a new house, or most anything. But I have never successfully plotted and written a book in anything resembling an organized manner. I am mystified and frustrated by this on a regular basis.

5) I am also mystified by giraffes. What is their place in the universe? Why are they here? I mean snakes are here to terrorize me and puppies to make me smile. But giraffes? Yeah…that’s a puzzle.

Okay for a chance to win a $15.00 gift card to Starbucks, tell me one random thing about yourself!

As I write this blog on Sunday, I’m trying to get ready for a pool party we are hosting on Monday, Labor Day (in the States. So I have pool parties on my mind.

What totally slipped my mind was that the Anthology, THE BEAST WITHIN, written by Erin McCarthy, Bianca D’Arc and myself is being released in mass market paperback. It was originally released in trade sized paperback in 2010.

So what better way to celebrate than with A Virtual Pool Party! With prizes! I’ll give away the mass market copy of THE BEAST WITHIN to three commenters.

So, here’s the plan: We’ll all arrive to the MSW virtual community pool, and bring our must-haves for The Perfect Pool Party.

This is what I think all pool parties require:

A Bartender:

A Sunscreen Concierge:

A lifeguard to keep us safe:

A little scenery:

And I’ll bring a huge tray of homemade chocolate chip cookies and brownies.

Now it’s your turn. For a chance to win a copy of THE BEAST WITHIN Anthology, tells us what you require at your perfect pool party. I’ll randomly choose three winners.