First of all, Happy St. Patrick’s Day! I hope all of you are having a lovely day and have that crucial bit of green on so you don’t get pinched. (Unless you want to get pinched, but we’re not going to go there.) No matter what, you should go celebrate with a Shamrock shake. Yummy!

And while you’re slurping up that frosty minty goodness, make a note that this weekend I’m going to transition my blog over to PamelaCayne.wordpress.com to correspond to my updated website at PamelaCayne.com. Don’t worry—there’s going to be lots of warnings and directional signs and the PamWritesRomance sites aren’t going to be taken down for quite a while so everybody has a chance to get acclimated to the new digs. Just doing some housekeeping I’ve been needing to do for a while now. (Which, as you know, I tend to do in furious bouts every few months or so…)

I’ve been revising, revising, revising and couldn’t be happier. I’m super-excited to show it to my agent and hear what she has to say. (Hopefully it’s a conversation filled with words like “stupendous” and “spectacular” and “amazing”, or at least on her end!) And after that, I get to dive back into my new WIP, another dark Victorian that I just can’t wait to immerse myself in! Maybe we’ll have to go see Sherlock Holmes again and call it research, hmm? God, I love being a writer.

See you all again this weekend and whatever you do tonight, be safe! If you’re in Chicago and get to watch the river being dyed green, tell me only if you want to hear me bitch and moan in jealousy. Or, if your town has a cool St. Patrick’s Day event, tell us in the comments below—I’d love to hear about it! So, from my 1/8 Irish heart to yours…

May love and laughter light your days,
and warm your heart and home.
May good and faithful friends be yours,
wherever you may roam.
May peace and plenty bless your world
with joy that long endures.
May all life’s passing seasons
bring the best to you and yours!

Whew! Wowzie was that a party! I’m still finding M&Ms under the sofa and an occasional lime slice in my shoes (and I don’t even want to know what happened to that stick of butter!) You people know how to celebrate, that’s all I’m saying!

I’m knee hip shoulder deep in revisions, but am actually loving it. These changes are making my book so much stronger, and I’m finding new and better ways to torture my characters (and the payoff is that much better!) It’s just an amazing time.

And speaking of which, I need to get back to them now. I promise to post an actual blog next week, but in the meantime, does anybody know how to get salsa out of cat’s fur?

It is with great joy, delight and excitement I announce that I have been signed with an agent!!! I am now a client of the amazing and spectacular Barbara Poelle of the Irene Goodman Agency. I could not be happier and look forward to a long and successful partnership with her and IGLA.

So when you’re at Nationals this July and see a tall blonde with glasses wearing the biggest smile in Nashville say hi, because odds are that’s me.

Call it the fresh new feeling of the Year of the Tiger, call it the crazy way I celebrate any holiday based on fathers, founding or otherwise, but I did something fabulous last night.

I cleaned.

And I didn’t just clean—I organized, I recycled, I threw away, I moved, I filed, I stored. I was a cleaning fool in pink Crocs and woe be to the area of my focus for that 90 minutes.

You see, a few years ago, I finally drank the Kool-Aid and got a MacBook. Then, with my handy-dandy laptop of Apple love, I discovered I write much better when I’m comfortable than I did at my Staples $109 tower with my (then) five-year old Dell thunked on pre-fab shelves. So as part of an amazing Christmas gift, Montana helped me transform my catch-all spare room into a blissful writing space. Soft and comfy moss-green chair in the corner, bookshelf under the window, new curtains, small table in the other corner for those times when workspace is needed—it was delightful! (And I noticed an upswing in my writing, so it worked!) I did keep the tower and the Dell (along with a filing cabinet) because we still used it all—maybe not as much, but it was still needed.

You know what’s coming next, don’t you?

Yes, just like an exercise bike or treadmill, things stacked up on that tower until it looked like a home office version of this:

Until last night. (Faster than a cross-cut shredder, stronger than a Rubbermaid file sorter, able to dust high shelves with a single wipe—it’s Cleaning Girl!!!) Yup, it was time. Time to take that area back, to make that area into what felt right to me, what I needed it to be, and into something that made me feel that little ‘click’ deep inside and just know it was soooooo much better.

Now, I’m not saying I have super powers or anything, but it also happens that last night I was thinking of my hero in my WIP and just not feeling him. I started to think about some other heroes I had in mind for future books, and when one total long shot popped into my head, I heard that ‘click’ again.  It turns out my cleaning wasn’t limited to my writing space, but also included my writing.

And I just know it’s soooooo much better.

The idea for this post grew out of one discovery this weekend, so 10 truly awesome writing things may be a stretch (especially on only one cup of tea), but for you, my wonderful and amazing blog readers, I am going to give it one heck of a rah-rah try! So let’s get started!

1. Are you like me and have been looking for music to write to, but tunes without words? Try Vitamin String Quartet. I’ve had their String Quartet Tribute to Pixies for years, but didn’t know this was the same group until I was looking up another song this weekend. Check out their YouTube channel. I am just quivering with all of this new music!

2. Need something to jar you loose, goose your muse? Try StumbleUpon–it’s not a deep dark time-suck, it’s a tasty buffet for the creative neighborhoods of your brain! (And don’t blame me if you get pulled under–blame L.A. Mitchell, because she’s the one who infected me!)

3. Speaking of L.A., visit a group blog she’s associated with, the Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood.  This is an amazing group of writers who have one thing in common–they were all finalists in the 2009 Golden Heart competition. They run a blog that I think could benefit anybody who writes–fabulous lessons, Q&As, tips and tricks–you name it, it’s there.

4. Twitter. No, I’m serious here. Get thee over to Twitter and follow or bookmark authors, agents, editors, organizations, groups and more. I have learned more about the publishing world in those 140 little characters than I have in days of blog-surfing. The recent kerfluffle with Amazon and MacMillan? All I needed to know I could find through my Twitter feeds. Start with Publishers Weekly and Writers Digest. 

5. Check out this great post from legend Teresa Medeiros. I’m especially fond of #5.

6. You know of my love for Blake Snyder and his Save the Cat method of screenwriting. Even though Blake is gone, his site lives on, and somebody over there recently did a beat sheet for Inglourious Basterds. As much as I love Blake, I love Quentin Tarantino, so this was amazing to me. (There’s also beat sheets for Avatar, Precious, and The Hurt Locker, and it looks like more to come–check them out!)

I’m starting to feel like this now:

Okay, onward and upward!

7. Speaking of awesome writing sites/blogs, get thee over to J.A. Konrath’s site. Not only is his blog amazing, but his whole site is. Do yourself a favor and spend some time there exploring what he’s offering. It is a-maze-ing!

8. One cool site I picked up from J.A.’s blog was Genrefinity. Now, I have to admit I don’t visit the site that much, but I do subscribe to their podcasts. They discuss primarily sci-fi, fantasy and horror so where I’m not looking to them to provide me with the newest and greatest in historical romance, I do love listening to their reviews on tv shows and movies.

9. Go to google and search for whatever town/city you prefer along with ‘book festival’ and then go to it! (Usually they’re free.) I adore book festivals and they are excellent chances to meet authors–anywhere from NYT bestsellers to debut authors excited to talk to a potential reader. Go listen to the presentations, get your books signed. I have discovered more great reads this way and every author has been so nice!

10. And how could I not have a little funny for #10?

Well, the rain worked. Wednesday (when I was home because the tree guy was pruning our storm-damaged tree) I wrote 7 pages, and if I may say so, damn were they good pages! Once scene was especially heartwrenching for my heroine and I kept tearing up. I prayed for peace during those moments so not only would I not have to break that emotional hold on my character, but so the tree guy wouldn’t wonder why the heck I was crying in the middle of the afternoon!

So, the book has picked up again, and if you follow me on Twitter, you’d know I had a fabulous, drool-causing idea pop into my head last night, so I have my laptop scheduled for life beyond the WIP. (Yeah, like I wouldn’t have anyway.) Life is delicious, my friends.

And, since it’s Friday, and since I’m in such a rockin’ good mood, I’m leaving you with a video from my #1 favorite band in the entire world–Great Big Sea. (This is the song that got me turned on to them, so maybe it’ll have the same effect on you, eh? *insert cheeky New Foundland wink here*) Have a great weekend, and enjoy!!!

P.S. The lead singer is Alan Doyle, who plays minstrel Alan-a-Dale in the new Russell Crowe Robin Hood movie. How’s that for perfect casting?

I was never able to see the sailboat in those 3-D posters that were such the rage some years back, but that’s okay. My characters have finally popped out of the background to become complex, crunchy, flesh and blood, dark and twisty hopeless cases. And it’s gray and rainy.

Dang, it’s a beautiful day.

Wow. It’s only Tuesday, but I must say “What a week!” The universe is sending some nice things to me, and I am paying attention. It feels nice, too. December had some pea-green and baby-puke orange shades of craptacular, so this new colorful and sparkly rainbow is a pretty pretty thing, indeed. And I thought, what better way to acknowledge this than to bring out the old chestnut Tuesday Ten?  So my list today is things to be happy about—it’s all about sharing the love, people.

1. Got an email yesterday that just made my day. Can’t say much more about it at this point in time, but I’ll be smiling for weeks over this one.
2. The third book in Heidi Betts fabulous Chicks with Sticks trilogy is coming out in exactly two weeks, and I am busting at the seams to read it. I loved Tangled Up In You, I devoured Loves Me, Loves Me Knot, so it only follows that Knock Me for a Loop is going to be as sexy, funny, and sassy as the first two!
3. On a similar note, registration for RWA Nationals opens on February 1^st. (That’s a day under two weeks.) Since I had to miss last year’s conference, I am twice as stoked this year and cannot wait to see all of you again (or for the first time, as some cases may be.) And it’s in Nashville? It’s-Gonna-Be-A-Hoot-Ville, party of 2,000!
4. Glee won the Golden Globe for Best Television Series, Comedy or Musical. That was a fun moment to watch. April cannot come soon enough for me!
5. I’ve had some other books start talking to me recently, and it feels good. I think those voices are also freeing up my WIP, so the butt’s been in the chair more, the fingers on the keyboard, too.
6. Got to go to the Apple shop on Sunday for a few extras for the laptop. Not only do I always love a visit to the Apple shop, I’m excited to get my baby purring even better.
7. It is gray and rainy here, and being such a rare thing (plus a weather state I love like cookies), I am enjoying it to its utmost. It’s supposed to last all week, so break out the sweaters, tea, and umbrellas! (I know, I always have tea, but somehow it tastes different when it’s raining.)
8. I got to see somebody very special this past weekend, somebody I haven’t seen in years, and once again, I find myself wishing she lived closer, or vice versa. However, I’ll take a little bit over none at all any day!
9. Let’s go for some everyday fun and happy–CakeWrecks, CuteOverload, GraphJam, and in one of the best video/posts/events in human history ever, click here.
10. Did I mention Nationals? In Nashville? In a hotel with its own indoor boat? Yeah, that’s absolutely worth a second listing.

 Here’s to a great week for everybody, and thanks for stopping by!!!

So, I’ve been struggling with MySpace for a while, and since no answers have hit my brain, thought I’d turn to you wonderful people for some insight.

In a nutshell, MySpace–Dead or Alive? (You spin me right round baby, right round, like a record baby…sorry. 80′s flashback.)

I find months go by that I’m not on (being sucked into Twitter and Facebook instead), but when I do log on, I see people have checked out my page (or the blog, at least.) I also see a lot of friends still on there, so either it works for them or they just enjoy being on there.

So here’s where I need your help–please vote on the poll (great for you lurkers!) or post a comment below on your thoughts and opinions on MySpace. I’m just curious to hear what other people think about this once mighty site.