Karin is traveling today, so the remaining gals here at Murder She Writes thought it would be fun to have another “Ask Us Anything!” Q&A. The rest of us will pop in all day to answer questions — about our books, reading, writing, television, movies … just ask.
“My floor-length candy apple red sequined jersey gown is strapless, has a big bow in back, and fits me like a second skin. It looks great with my sleek chin-grazing platinum blond wig.
If I find myself in trouble, my ring has a Roofie prick, and my heels truly are stilettos.
Not to mention that I’ve got a two-inch-long Swiss MiniGun tucked in my bustier. It fires bullets at a speed of 399 feet per second.
In that particular scene, my heroine, Donna Stone, is crashing a swank Valentine’s soirée being thrown by a terrorist cell, the Quorum. I wanted her to carry a gun, but with a glove-tight gown, it had to be tiny.
When I saw the description for the Swiss MiniGun, I laughed out loud. I couldn’t imagine firing something so tiny, let alone loading it! But hey, apparently it’s a proven killing machine, so who am I to scoff?
Besides, I’m sure it’s easier to carry than strapping even the smallest LadySmith to your inner thigh, then maneuvering a sexy walk in heels a la Emily in this week’s episode of REVENGE (See below).
AWKward.
You can catch more of Donna in the first book of the Housewife Assassin series, The Housewife Assassin’s Handbook. The second book, The Housewife Assassin’s Guide to Gracious Killing, launches this Mother’s Day (May 12, 2012).
Just so you know: Donna owes her existence to one of the ladies on this blog: Karin Tabke. Had it not been for Karin laughing at Donna’s antics — both domestic and espionage — I would not have had the courage to put her out in the world–
And see her enjoy a bidding war among editors.
As fate would have it, those editors who were excited about acquiring her were shot down (figuratively, if not literally) by their editorial committees, who deemed Donna too dark a character. Housewives killing people? Unheard of!
Read the excerpt below, from The Housewife Assassin’s Bloody Valentine, for a chance to win a $15 eGiftCard from Amazon.com.
All you have to do is send me an email with the correct answer to this question:
What name does Donna use in order to get inside the prison?
Email that answer to MailFromJosie@gmail.com. Be sure to put in the subject line” MSW Bloody Valentine Contest”.
____________________________
WINNER TO MY LAST POST’S CONTEST: What’s a great “Bond Girl” name?
Lynn V., from Texas
THE HOUSEWIFE ASSASSIN’S BLOODY VALENTINE
by Josie Brown
(Excerpted from GUNS AND ROSES (A Murder She Writes Anthology)
Valentine’s Day, 2:14 pm
Isla María Madre rises higher and steeper from the turquoise Pacific Ocean than her sister islands, María Magdalena and María Cleofas.
Am I the only one who finds irony in the fact that Mexico’s notorious prison was built on an archipelago named after the three saintly women who attended the Resurrection?
That’s okay. My mission is a resurrection, too, of sorts:
When I leave, I’m taking the prison’s biggest bad-ass with me.
That would be Hector Negrónde la Moraga, who runs the Diablo Blanco drug cartel out of Mexico’s Baja peninsula. This Forbes 100 billionaire’s cash flows in from the tons of methamphetamine he smuggles stateside. His drug mules are many of the American socialite junkies who hang at his Cabo San Lucas nightclubs and resorts.
But because the gangbangers known as Los Corazónes Rojos are jonesing to take over his territory and have put a price on his head, the first six months of his prison sentence have been spent in solitary confinement.
No wonder he felt it was time to cut a deal with the United States. Spill his guts, as it were.
Before they are spilled for him, all over the prison yard.
He got the Feds’ attention by explaining that he launders his dirty drug money through a blind corporation: a real estate company which builds Mexico’s many gated communities and private stucco palaces. Not only does he know where his rivals live, he’s also got the floor plans of all their estates.
Including the security codes.
Even more important is the fact that he built the villa used as the south-of-the-border headquarters for the most heavily funded terrorist organization in the world:
The Quorum.
The United States, Great Britain, France, Germany and Japan want to put the Quorum out of business, once and for all. But some crooked Mexican politicos have halted Hector’s extradition.
Their allegiance is with Los Corazónes Rojos, which has a hit out on him.
That’s where I come in.
My employer–Acme Industries, a black ops agency, which buries all skeletons that the CIA deems worthy of ghost protocol—has been hired to pull off his prison break. In return for pointing out the Quorum’s safe house and providing us with its floor plan and security system data, the Feds will let him live stateside, where he’ll be put in the DOJ’s Witness Protection program.
Hector’s financial portfolio may be humongous, but his physique is petite, which is why his nickname is El Chihuahua. Here’s hoping he lives down to it, since smuggling him off the island won’t be easy under any circumstances.
Now that the prison is within sight, the tug’s low, sad bellow puts all hands on deck. The Mexican flag flaps loudly on the stern pole. I presume no masts are half-raised inside the prison, either.
Certainly not El Chihuahua’s, now that his paid-by-the-hour puta is here.
That would be me.
The other women standing with me on the tugboat’s deck—all wives, girlfriends and whores on their way to their monthly conjugal visits with the murderers, thieves, and drug dealers who live within the prison’s walls—adjust their lips upward into smiles, while tugging the necklines of their too-snug blouses even lower.
In lockup, orifices may be readily available, but bountiful cleavage is not.
My breasts are already propelled high, front and center. My skirt is short and tight, whereas my high heels are long, pointy and packed for a punch: one is tipped with a knockout drug, the other with a serrated blade.
So yeah, I guess I’m ready, too.
There are at least forty guards on the grounds, and another six in the turrets of the towers topping this castle-like compound. Their whistles and catcalls can be heard loud and clear as we women maneuver our way up the chipped stone steps leading to the prison’s two-story solid steel gates.
Being manhandled (ostensibly for hidden weapons or breakout tools) has many of the ladies wincing. But those who, like me, are looking for an extra half-hour with their menfolk smile and purr a few promises they hope will be forgotten when it’s time to leave this hellhole.
The metal detector beeps when I saunter through. The guard on duty smells as if he’s taken a hit off every bottle of tequila that’s been smuggled in today. He presumes it is the thick-ribbed bracelet on my arm that set it off. All the same, he fondles my breasts between his rough palms, as if they’re a pair of ripe melons.
Tit for tit, I pinch his breast harder than he tweaked mine.
“Usted me está haciendo caer en amor con usted,” he says, with a smirk.
Why am I not surprised that he actually likes a little rough play?
“What a douche,” my team leader, Jack Craig, mutters into my tiny diamond stud earpiece. He witnesses that bit of womanhandling through my contact lenses, which are really digital mini-cams. Obviously, he doesn’t like what he sees.
No boyfriend would, right?
“Seriously, Donna, you have my permission to kill him, now, if you want.” By his tone, I know Jack means it.
“Mas tarde, mi amor,” I murmur. Then I lick my lips, knowing that the guard will hear my soft taunt as a come-on.
Later my love…
First things first.
My act is working. The guard is too distracted to notice all the toys, which will get my ass, and my asset, off this godforsaken island. In my clutch bag are my ID (a Mexican driver’s license that identifies me as “Lucinda Gutiérrez”, a nondescript lipstick, a seemingly innocent compact, a change purse that holds a few coins, and a rosary with a small metal cross.
Here’s the plan: Once we’re alone in one of the prison’s flimsy straw love shacks, I’ll clue Hector in on the fact that nookie is out, but a run for the gate is in. Unfortunately, that should keep the smirk on his face. Then I’ll slap one of my tiny, but strong, neo-magnetic earrings onto the shack’s center pole before shooting the other earring—attached to the zip line hidden in my rosary—out the shack’s window with my lipstick case, which is really a miniature missile launcher. The missile’s GPS system will lead it to a three-person submarine anchored about thirty feet below high tide and about two hundred feet offshore where Jack is waiting for us. Once the zip line’s magnet has locked onto the exterior antechamber of the sub, we’ll roll off this hot hunk of rock using my GPS-driven ribbed bracelet as a pulley.
Since subs are the new vehicle of choice for running drugs between Mexico and the U.S., El Chihuahua should feel right at home.
Besides, prison has given him time to get used to tight quarters.
Between the sub’s cloaking system and a submersion depth of sixty feet, we will be able to maneuver past any Mexican patrol boats. At a cruising speed of eighty nautical miles per hour, we should surface at the dock of our safe house in the posh tourist enclave Cabo San Lucas in three hours, tops. There, we’ll debrief El Chihuahua as to the whereabouts of the Quorum’s villa and get the necessary entry data.
After turning Hector over to his Witness Protection detail, Jack and I will break into the villa, download all files on the master computer’s hard drive onto a flash drive and then plant a worm that will allow us to monitor all data going in and out of it.
So that, finally, Acme will learn who is funding the Quorum and break it up, once and for all.
Five years ago, the Quorum took my husband, Carl, away from me and our children.
Time to get even.
And not a minute too soon. It’s Valentine’s Day. My aunt Phyllis is watching my three children—ten-year-old Jeff, his twelve-year-old sister, Mary; and kindergartner Trisha–so that
Jack and I can have a romantic getaway.
Jack isn’t their dad, but he’s the only father they know.
If I have my way, it will stay that way.
Happily. And ever after.
We’ve dodged a hell of a lot of bullets together. Both literally and figuratively.
I lost Carl to the Quorum. I won’t lose Jack, too.
In fact, something tells me that Jack is proposing tonight.
If he does, I have no idea how I’ll answer him. My hesitation has nothing to do with what I know about Carl’s fate, and the role the Quorum played in it.
Maybe I’m afraid of tempting fate twice.
Granted, our version of hearts and flowers is a bit skewed from the norm. More like guns and roses.
My slow stroll through the prison courtyard is serenaded by the jeers and come-ons of the prisoners who, for this month anyway, are unlucky in love. “Siéntate en mi cara, perra…” and “Quiero que me chupe…” are the two most common ones shouted so often, and by so many that, to my ear, they sound like a mantra.
I ignore them, and I certainly won’t translate them now for you.
I’m too much of a lady for that.
Hector’s lawyer has arranged for his client to be assigned the last love shack on the left. I’m sure Hector is in there now, waiting for me. It’s perfectly situated for this mission because it is the closest one to the island’s north shore, where the submarine is anchored.
I’ve almost reached the shack when a guard prods my backside with his semi-automatic rifle. “No no no, puta! Para ahi! El Chihuahua se encuentra en la torre, allí.”
Ah, hell.Turns out that our little tryst has been moved to another location.
He’s pointing to the rickety stairwell that leads to the top of the tower, which, unlike the shack, is made of solid rock. It’s too narrow to hold more than one room at the very top, which has only one high, tiny window barred with wrought iron.
As if that matters. If we’re in there, the zip line will never reach its final destination: the sub.
“Plan B?” I whisper, just loud enough for Jack to hear me. The wooden staircases are steep, and rickety.
“Dollface, there is no Plan B. Frankly if it was up to me, you’d take a shiv to the slime bucket and waltz out of there. But orders are orders.” I hear Jack clicking away on his netbook as he tries to figure another way out for all of us.
Including the odious Hector.
There is just one outdoor landing before the ground floor: on the fourth flight of stairs. I try to keep my head up so that Jack’s reconnaissance is easier, but it’s difficult because my heels are getting caught on every other step. To hell with that. As I bend down to slip out of them, the guard bringing up my rear murmurs, “Culo lindo,pero sus piernas son tan flácidas.”
Should I be flattered he says my ass is cute—or pissed because he thinks my thighs are flabby?
“Hey, what did I tell you? Just twenty minutes on an elliptical would do wonders for you,” Jack says. “No more of that tiny jiggle of cottage cheese on your upper thighs—”
In any language, the extension of my middle finger tells both of them what I think of their opinions.
Happy Valentine’s Day! Guess what we have for our readers?
Ladies and gentlemen, we are thrilled to announce the first ever Murder She Writes anthology, Guns and Roses…a collection of ten never-before published short stories and novellas, each penned by one of the Murder She Writes authors.
Guns and Roses will be available in digital format at all e-retailers next week, a rocking 150,000 word collection for just $4.99!
Fire up your Kindles and Nooks, ereaders and iPads, because you are going to love this one. This project has been months in the making, inspired by our shared love of suspense and romance, our desire to work together on something completely unique, and our excitement about the magical synergy we’ve discovered as co-bloggers and great friends.
Guns and Roses wasn’t always easy; we all have deadlines, contracts, and, of course, our blog posts to write. It wasn’t always smooth; there have been no less the four quadrillion emails exchanged. And, heaven knows, it wasn’t always painless…can you imagine ten, count ‘em ten, opinions on one cover? But creating this collection was always fun! We’ve had a blast putting together what we hope is the first of many anthologies that showcase our characters and series and give our loyal community a chance to discover all of our voices in one place. We don’t think any other group blog has ever done a project like this, so we’re extra proud to be first out of the gate with this type of collection.
Guns and Roses promises thrills, chills, romance, intrigue, passion, danger, murder, and a whole lotta love. Some of the stories connect to our most popular series (Rough Riders! Housewife Assassin! Bullet Catchers!), and others will introduce you to an entirely new and unforgettable cast of characters. Ranging in length from 10,000 to 25,000 words each, the stories run the gamut from deeply dark and intense to, well, there’s a Bobbie Faye novella! Laugh-line alert. We’ve also included a Lorelei James short story, so you know it’s gonna get hawt in here, and Allison Brennan makes sure you sleep with the lights on. And rumor has it Bullet Catcher boss Lucy Sharpe makes an appearance…with her baby.
These short stories and novellas are not samplers or excerpts; each is a complete tale of suspense and romance. Nor are they reissues: every one has been written exclusively for this collection. Our only criteria — other than a fabulous romantic suspense — is that each story mention a gun (natch!) and a rose (love!). Here’s what you can look forward to reading in Guns and Roses:
Dead Flowers by Lori Armstrong
Cynical, bad girl PI Julie Collins isn’t the hearts and flowers type, especially not after she’s spent the last few weeks spying on cheating spouses. So when Julie suspects her man, Martinez, may be stepping out on her, she sees red and decides to take matters into her own hands. Let’s just hope Cupid’s Bow gets to Martinez before Julie does.
Above Reproach by Allison Brennan
Sex crimes detective Selena Black knows high-powered government attorney Greg Keller is the River City Rapist; proving it is another matter. Keller enjoys the cat and mouse game with the blonde detective, and makes sure she knows she’s exactly his type. As every possible avenue of investigation is shut down by the courts or her boss, Selena realizes that if someone doesn’t do something to stop Keller, more women will suffer–and she may be next.
The Housewife Assassin’s Bloody Valentine by Josie Brown
What is CIA contract assassin Donna Stone’s idea of a Valentine’s Day getaway? Certainly not orchestrating a jailbreak out of a Mexican prison for a notorious drug lord. But because he has intel as to the whereabouts of an international terrorist organization planning a Valentine’s massacre, there will be no intimate dinner for two or couples massage for Donna and her ops leader, Jack Craig. Just plenty of sun, surf, submarines, sharks… oh yeah, and sex.
Bobbie Faye’s Whacked Out, No Good, Really Sucky, Hot Mess of a Wedding by Toni McGee Causey
Bobbie Faye Sumrall, Cajun Contraband Days Queen, gun expert, and ultimate professional in being in the wrong place at the wrong time, absolutely positively does not want to go through with the ridiculous wedding that Trevor’s forcing her to agree to, but she soon finds out she has more important things to worry about–like surviving the plot to make her disappear when she’s set up as a fall guy for the theft of a priceless religious icon. And that’s the good news.
Blood and Roses by Sylvia Day
When insurance investigator Anastasia Miller sets out to retrieve the rose-hued pink diamonds stolen in a recent heist, she finds herself working alongside former flame, deputy U.S. Marshal Jake Monroe — the man she loved enough to leave behind.
Nightfall by Laura Griffin
Stranded on an icy road as darkness falls, Holly Henriksen knows she is in trouble. A charming stranger stops to help and Holly decides to trust him, but soon finds out he is harboring a deadly secret.
King of Hearts (A Rough Rider Short Story) by Lorelei James
Deputy Cam McKay is devastated after dealing with a Valentine’s Day murder/suicide in his small county. Will allowing his family to see the dark past that haunts him, help heal him?
A Punishing Night by Sophie Littlefield
Detective Joe Bashir returns to his alma mater to investigate the stabbing death of a male college student. Rumors of date rape and fraternity hazing complicate a sensitive case as Joe tries to balance the demands of the investigation with caring for his elderly father. Help – and possibly romance – come from an unexpected source.
Pick Your Poison (A Bullet Catchers Novella) by Roxanne St. Claire
Benjamin Youngblood’s only chance to prove he’s worthy of being a Bullet Catcher is to find and stop an assassin. On probation from the elite security force, Ben has to rely on instinct and brains…and one feisty flower farmer. When Callie Parrish discovers her entire crop of rare black roses has been stolen, she’d partner with the devil himself to recoup her loss. It doesn’t take her long to realize she’s done just that…and the road to hell is paved with poisonous petals and deadly kisses.
Rebel Rose by Karin Tabke
For Detective Cash Cantrell, hunting down a University serial killer is as routine as strapping on his gun each morning. Until he comes face to face with meddlesome coed, Rebel Yell Culpepper. He doesn’t know if he should arrest her or kiss her, but one thing Cash knows for sure, Rebel is key to finding the murderer, and the killer knows it too…
HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY FROM US TO YOU! Stay tuned over the next week or so for excerpts and highlights. Guns and Roses will be live and available for purchase next week! In the meantime, leave a comment and FIVE LUCKY WINNERS will receive a copy of our new e-book on release day!
One of the things I love about the Murder She Writes authors is that the women they write about are strong and self sufficient. I’m guess that my own skewed vision of “the damsel in distress” may have been irrevocably altered by a lifetime love of James Bond movies.
It’s been over half a century now since the very first Bond Girl — Honey Ryder, played by Ursula Andress in a white belted bikini accessorized with an assassin’s blade — graced the silver screen and launched a million erections. Sauntering in from the surf just in time for the Sexual Revolution, Bond Girls weren’t considered sexist, but sexy.
But these women were much more than arm charms. When they were good, they were great: not just in bed, but in the field, too. And when they were bad, they weren’t just naughty minxes, but deadly villianesses as well.
The films’ screenwriters (adapting Ian Fleming‘s’ classic spy novels) never met a double entendre they didn’t like. Seriously: with names “Pussy Galore“, “Holly Goodhead” “Plenty O’Toole“, “Bibi Dahl”, “Kissy Suzuki”, “Strawberry Fields”, “Molly Warmflash”, “Xenia Onatopp“, “Fatima Blush”, “Bambi” and “Thumper”– and let’s not forget “Mary Goodnight”), what guy isn’t going to get the wrong idea?
(Note to all aspiring thriller writers: think porn, not corn…)
My own favorites were “Solitaire”, “Domino Vitali, “Jinx” “Paris Carver” and “Vesper Lynd”. Those names have an air of mystery about them, a promise that trouble is just around the corner.
Have a great Bond Girl name?
Post it below, for a chance to win a copy of my book THE BABY PLANNER.
BONUS POINT!
When writing The Housewife Assassin’s Handbook, I considered giving my heroine a name worthy of a Bond Girl. But because the series is also a tip of the chapeau to
television’s domestic goddesses of the 1950s,
I chose the name Donna Stone.”
Email me at MailFromJosie@gmail.com
with the television show that also had a heroine by that name!
As you read this, I am in Pennsylvania at Seton Hill University where I am joining authors Juliet Blackwell and Rachael Herron as guest lecturers in the popular fiction program. One of our topics is “Gender in Publishing.” As you might suppose, there are many ways to come at this subject, and we all bring our own biases. I wanted to be sure to prepare with care, so I was as fair and thorough as possible. I thought I’d share a few of my thoughts and findings today.
Before I start, though, I’ll just say that I never felt much gender bias in my early days as an aspiring writer. I think that’s largely due to the fact that I joined Romance Writers of America twenty years ago and did my apprenticeship among a group of smart women. I wasn’t anti-man – in fact, I’d guess that the majority of my favorite authors at that time were men, and those few I’d actually met struck me as perfectly reasonable characters. As I got rolling, got an agent and sold my first book, I was neither pleased nor displeased to find that my team (agent, editor, publicist) consisted of all women. I didn’t spend a lot of time worrying that my own gender would affect my chances.
I *was* certainly aware of a pervasive and enduring anti-romance bias, however. But, surrounded by strong and independent female romance authors, I just dismissed all those voices – male and female – as belonging to idiots. I joined SistersInCrime, aware that it had been formed to address concerns about bias two decades ago, but figured they’d gotten it all worked out by now.
If I had paid attention to the numbers, I would have been in for a surprise. Let’s start with some bracing statistics about reviews: how many male vs. female reviewers there are in top publications – and how many male vs. female authors are reviewed. Go ahead, click here – I’ll wait. (Thanks to VIDA, the online publication of Women in Literary Arts.)
The Atlantic! Harpers! The New York Times! The New York Review of Books! Oh, my fallen idols. Is it really so hard to find books written by women to review? Or is the problem that women are reluctant to share their opinions? Seriously, given numbers like those, I think not.
What about the publishing industry itself? Neither authors nor reviewers, there are many roles to be filled in the production of a book, from agents to editors to marketing and productions and art experts, to management. According to Publisher’s Weekly’s salary survey, 85% of publishing employees with less than three years are women. Great for women, right? Well – yes and no.
For one thing, those 85% are making far less, on average, than their male counterparts. To quote the survey, “The overall gap between men and women in 2009 was roughly $40,000, about $10,000 higher than in 2008…The only area where men outnumber women is in management, where the highest paying jobs are found.”
So the answer to that’s easy, right? Head for those management positions, sisters! – only it’s kind of hard to get there, especially if you want your career path to wend through the ranks of the publishing house. Those early-stage salaries are famously low. Granted, most of us in publishing are earning less than we could in other disciplines – in many cases, far less – but I don’t think it behooves us to construct our industry on a foundation of salaries that cannot support people. How many of you authors have had a beloved editor or publicist leave because she needed to earn more money? I certainly have, and I wished her well, and missed her ever after.
Please note that I’m not pointing the blame cannon – yet. I am vociferous in my opinion that the business of publishing should attend to its own interests – and act like a business. The more profitable they are, the more likely they’ll continue to employ me. (Granted, we are bound to continue to disagree, argue over, and negotiate many of the finer and not-so-fine points, like changing royalty rates, etc. But that doesn’t mean I see them as the enemy.) I have not seen evidence of gender bias from the top down in the publishing houses for whom I write, except on a case-by-case basis that has, in my opinion, a lot more to do with individual douchebaggery than with broad-brush generalizations.
However…I have seen gender bias of a far more insidious sort. It has to do with reader behavior, and there’s data to back it up. It starts with the problem of getting young boys to read. It takes side trips into surveys that show that in certain genres, readers shy away from female authors. It continues through a maturing population in which the majority of book purchasers are women, but expectations of writers vary depending on their gender. I’m collecting my thoughts on the subject, and I hope to learn from my colleagues and the students in the Seton Hill program, and to return here in a future post to explore this subject some more.
Meanwhile, I’ll end on a positive note. If you’ve never seen the Romstat survey, you’re in for a treat. Take a few minutes to read about yourselves, because romance readers – it can now be proved! – do indeed rock.
Because I’m on the road, I may not be able to respond to comments. But I have just received my advance copies of HORIZON, the third in the Aftertime series! I’ll choose a random commenter to receive a signed copy. I’d love to hear your thoughts on any of the above – even if you take issue with the statistics. There’s plenty of room for discussion, and I have a feeling that this subject isn’t going away any time soon!
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