High Five by Janet Evanovich

"Uncle Fred was someone I saw at weddings and funerals and once in a while at Giovichinni's Meat Market, ordering a quarter pound of olive loaf. Eddie Such, the butcher, would have the olive loaf on the scale and Uncle Fred would say, 'You've got the olive loaf on a piece of waxed paper. How much does that piece of waxed paper weigh? You're not gonna charge me for that waxed paper, are you? I want some money off for the waxed paper.'"

The speaker is Stephanie Plum, the glamorous if slightly ditzy bounty hunter from Trenton, New Jersey, and one of the most original creations in recent mystery fiction.

In this fifth entry in Janet Evanovich's increasingly popular series, Stephanie's problems are many and varied. She's not making enough money picking up FTAs (Failures to Appear) for her cousin Vinnie, of Vincent Plum Bail Bonds; her red-hot love affair with Detective Joe Morelli has cooled off; and her giant extended family is no help at all. For instance, Uncle Fred the cheapskate has disappeared, leaving behind some suspicious photographs of body parts in garbage bags and links to some really dangerous people.

When Stephanie turns to her friend and mentor, Ranger, for financial advice, he gets her involved in a gang of toughs doing instant evictions for landlords. (She complains to Ranger about the job and its dangers, prompting one of the hired thug to say, "Man, you don't like to get shot. You don't like to get arrested. You don't know how to have fun at all.")

Most of Stephanie's charm, of course, comes from her attitude--a combination of the brazen bravado that turns a failed lingerie buyer into a bounty hunter in the first place and the normal fears of a person in over her head.

Four To Score by Janet Evanovich

Stephanie Plum, the trash-talking New Jersey bail bondswoman of this popular series, is tracking Maxine Nowicki, who's wanted for skipping out on a car-theft charge lodged by her ex-boyfriend. Now the ex-boyfriend's very interested in getting back the love letters he supposedly wrote to Maxine. But what he's really looking for is the secret on which Evanovich hangs her screwball cast of colorful minor characters, including Sally Sweet, a cross-dressing drag queen; Lula, the 250-pound ex-hooker who works for Steph's boss; Cousin Vinnie, the bail bondsman; Grandma Mazur, who packs a Glock and is always looking for a little action; and Joyce, a wannabe bounty hunter who's been cramping Steph's style since she played pass the salami with Steph's ex-husband. The action doesn't get much farther from Trenton than the Jersey Shore, but when Steph's apartment and car are blown up by the others on Maxine's trail and she moves in with Joe Morelli, the handsome, arrogant cop she's been hung up on since high school, it gets hotter than the craps table in Atlantic City. Plum's fans won't be disappointed in this fourth outing in the series, and they're likely to be even more interested in the snappy patter and sexy shenanigans than in the mystery that holds it all togethe

Another Day

I've been querying All That I'm Living For since Friday. My goal is to submit at least one a day from my list of about thirty. So far so good. I haven't been working on All Because of You since last week. I need to do another read through and fix stupid mistakes. I've noticed this novel was more focused on the action rather than the romance and that just won't do. So this next read through is going to fix that. Then it's off to get reviewed. I'm still planning out the third novel as I do all of this. I have about 167 pages of that written and it just keeps growing. This one, like All Because of You, is a little more fun to write than my first novel, but I'm not sure why.

Dance Macabre by Laurell K Hamilton

"It was the middle of November. I was supposed to be out jogging, but instead I was sitting at my breakfast table talking about men, sex, werewolves, vampires, and that thing that most unmarried but sexually active women fear most . . ."

These days, Anita Blake is less interested in vampire politics than in an ancient, ordinary dread she shares with women down the ages: she may be pregnant. And, if she is, whether the father is a vampire, a werewolf, or someone else entirely, she knows perfectly well that being a Federal Marshal known for raising the dead and being a vampire executioner, is no way to bring up a baby.

All Together Dead by Charlaine Harris

Betrayed by her longtime vampire love, Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse must now not only deal with a possible new man in her life-the oh-so-handsome shapeshifter Quinn-but also contend with a long-planned vampire summit. With her power base weakened by hurricane damage to New Orleans, the local vampire queen is vulnerable to those hungry for a takeover. Soon, Sookie must decide what side she'll stand with. And her choice may mean the difference between survival and all-out catastrophe.

Day Seven

Edits and revisions are almost done. I'm working on the last two chapters and have run into a few road bumps. The nice thing about writing to an outline is your chapters can flow easily, but the problem, at least for me, is I don't write the chapters in order. I forget a lot of what I've already written, especially toward the end of a novel, but I will definitely have the second draft of All Because of You wrapped up by Friday. After that, I'll do another read through, fix some mistakes and hand it over to my trusted critic.

Micah by Laurell K Hamilton

There are lots of reasons to raise the dead - some private, some public. In this case, the feds have a witness who died before he could speak on the record. They want him raised so his testimony can be taken. So here I am, on a plane to Philadelphia, flying off to do my job.

But I’m not alone. Micah is with me. Micah, head of the St. Louis wereleopard pard. King to my Queen. The only one of my lovers who can stir my blood with just a glance from his chartreuse cat’s eyes. I was happy to have him at my side.

Until he mentioned that this will be our first time alone together. No Master Vampire. No Alpha Werewolf. Just me and Micah. And all my fears and doubts…

Day Three

In the past three days, I haven't had a ton of time to edit All Because of You. I'm planning on spending most of my time next week to get the second draft done, but I do have the first 5 chapters edited. Of course, these are the chapters that have already been edited at least once before I started writing the rest of the novel and I assume chapters 6-15 will take a lot more time and work.

Definately Dead by Charlaine Harris

Sookie Stackhouse is off on another supernatural adventure, and this time she is bringing along Quinn, an event planner who happens to turn into a tiger under a full moon. The vampire queen of Louisiana has requested Sookie’s presence in New Orleans, and when any vampire, especially royalty, asks for something, it’s definitely a good idea to accommodate her. Sookie was planning to go to New Orleans anyway; her cousin, Hadley, left her estate to Sookie after her second death. Hadley was a vampire who met another untimely end, and she was also a close, personal friend to the queen.

Sookie arrives to find her cousin’s apartment sealed under a protective spell of a witch. She is also unfortunate enough to find a newly bitten vampire in the closet. The stasis spell kept the apartment frozen in time, and Sookie’s arrival broke the spell - and awoke the extremely hungry vampire. His presence in Hadley’s apartment raises a multitude of questions, and the queen is determined to find out what happened to her lover. Sookie finds herself once again embroiled in vampire politics and the target of attacks by an unknown enemy.

First Day

Today was the first day of revisions/edits for All Because of You. It went as well I had expected. I was only able to get a chapter and a half edited, but that means I only have 13.5 left. The goal is to have the second draft done by next weekend. I should have plenty of time to do it.