Raven's Quest

As a special promotion for a fellow author I am announcing the release of her newest book, the first in the exciting new QUEST series,

RAVEN'S QUEST. 

 

             The Quest Series revolves around three women who are worlds apart but connected in more ways than one.  

            The first book is Raven’s Quest

We embark on Raven working as a Marketing Director at Stage Records who gets caught in a love triangle with the new CEO of Stage Records. She starts to fall in love with him as his old flame returns to the picture. With a broken heart Raven runs to Napa Valley to heal her wounds, and see her family.

Fate has other plans; she falls into the arms of an old crush that broke her heart as a teen. The GQ Race Car Driver that she met so many years ago. Raven has always had eyes for Tony Fox. How could she forget how he broke her heart with her best friend.  

Now that he has matured, he sees her in a different light. She is a gorgeous, successful woman that he can’t be without. He will stop at nothing to have her.

About  W.L. Sexton

Wendy grew up in Norwalk, California adopted at the age of two days

 At the age of 44 Wendy found her Birth Mother. They are making up for time lost.

When Wendy is not Drag Racing, with her husband of twenty two years; she is running the Racing team, working as a Trade Show Coordinator, or shopping at the Coach Store.

You can find her running the highways between; Phoenix, Arizona.  Las Vegas, Nevada.  California  You will always find her with some-kind of coffee product in her hand.

She loves Fast Cars, Music and Tattoos.

Wendy loves to hear from you. Twitter @wendy_sexton.

Raven's Quest  is available at Amazon, Nook, and Barnes & Noble

Her blogspot: http://wlsextonauthor.blogspot.com/

Email: wlsextonauthor@gmail.com

Facebook : W.L.Sexton Author of Raven's Quest;

Goodreads

 

Hey, guys.  Have a look!

We Fucking Redheads

I am quite old.  Almost as old as I would ever want to be.  I like finite goals.  Sometimes.

I went on a trip.  It was a long weekend.  It was an out of  this world experience.  It was a place I imagined, but the reality trumped my imaginings.  I didn't worry about how I would look in all these new places.  I didn't look to see how old that guy was riding that Harley.  I didn't even bother to notice if he was fat.  I worried about my shoes and which socks were the most comfortable with which shoes and I worried about whether I would be hot or cold.  I do not remember at this point if I was ever hot or cold during the vacation. I must admit to all of you who are so quick to hold me accountable for my every word that  I do remember gently harping at my semi-saintly daughter about the settings on the car heater thing.

But one day I looked in the mirror and instead of peering closely to see if the new deep wrinkle minimizer or the new skin tightening cream were working, I said to myself, "Yup.  Still red.  Looks good."

Lately there are a lot of blogs and websites and Pinterest sites, not just postings, about redheads.  I was asked to participate in a documentary about redheads, but I haven't sent in the tape yet.  I may or may not do that. The word 'ginger' is thrown around a lot.  I do not know if it is an insult.  Look at Prince Harry for God's sake.  I wanted it to be my nickname when I was six cuz I was named Virginia and a redhead, but that didn't take.  Thank God.  I think it started when someone said redheads would be extinct in 150 years.  From the look of my subdivision that is not likely.  Someone commented that people were deciding it should be an insult and not let others get away with calling them that, pushing the Politically Correct agenda and commenting on the combination of letters in the word, emphasizing that the attention being drawn to redheads was deliberate and hinting that certain ethnicities were deliberately promoting the agenda which is ridiculous because I think just about every ethnicity, except maybe Asian, has redheads.  Anyway, it is fun to participate, especially when they go after the dye jobs.  Not that I could blame someone for that. But I did have a point to this ramble when I started out.

One of the questions on the interview for the documentary was about whether you felt that redheads were distinctive in any way, or felt distinctive.  I don't know how old I was when I realized I was a redhead.  I don't think I ever realized it.  I think I just was.  I think I am a redhead before I am a caucasian or even a human.  I don't know if I am a redhead before I am a female.  I think maybe that distinction is equal.  I also think it is synergistic. I am sure it has defined me and I am glad that I am now old enough to not even want to check out the guy on the Harley, now that the white part of my hair is growing to a larger percentage. I am pretty sure that if I was in the mood to check out any guy or had any interest of that sort, I would probably resort to dye, or as my wholly-sainted grandmother said, "tinting".  When she got sick her hair grew out white as snow.  She stayed a redhead til her last conscious moment.

I searched for an illustration for this post with the term "scribe".  There were hundreds.  One was a female.  She has red hair.  Honestly, I feel that it is something someone who is not a redhead can never understand.

When I was three and my brother was teaching me the letters he learned at school, I knew I was smart and clever and me.  Once, exactly once, and this I recall distinctly, I hollered at my mom for giving someone more attention than I got.  It was when her fifteen year old god daughter got pregnant, and she couldn't stop talking about darling Peggy and what trouble she was in and how could that happen, etc.  I said that it was really weird that someone had to do the thing she thought was the most horrible of all, getting knocked up outside of marriage, in order to get her attention.  She never said another word about Peggy.  Every time I had a friend  that was red-headed, there was this distinctive camaraderie but also this unstated but painfully obvious sense of competition.  I had a fight with Judy Schilf who was a redhead when I was about eight and she drew blood.  It was historical.  I hung around with another redhead, Marie Daugherty, and that sense of competition was very obviously not there.  Probably cuz my ten year old brother was in love with her so there was nothing to compete over.

I never wanted to be anyone but me.  I had a friend who wished she was a boy. (I think I covered this subject elsewhere.)  I never even wanted to be or wished I was a movie star, Shirley Temple or Lucille Ball, for example, that is how fucking old I am, unless the movie star could be me, Ditty, The Movie Star. Yeah. I could've handled that.

"You fucking redheads.  You blink on and off like a fucking Christmas tree."

I don't believe you only go around once.  I think you get lots of chances to get it right.  God is a good Christian and He firmly believes in recycling.  But I think I must have earned good karma in my past life in order to live with this distinction I so cherish.  This time around, I don't know.  Maybe I lived up to the Plan, or maybe I will come back as a house sparrow.  Or something else rather drab and colorless, but really kind of cute in its own way.

****

I was so concerned that I haven't blogged in so long.  But thanks to the very loyal plumbers in New Zealand, my wonderful numbers have held up very well in my absence.  Big, big, sincere Thank You, guys.  Even if you are not a plumber in New Zealand.  Or a redhead.


Photo Attribution:  www.camlann.org

Inside My Head

We are going on a little vacation for mother's day and I am trying to not get too anxious about that.  I am greatly looking forward to it.  Perhaps inordinately so.

I was just browsing through Linked In, some group I belong to, and one person's remarks about Rape Culture, just blew me away.  I feel totally on edge.  My mind so needs to be deeply exploring something and I will not let it.  He talked about how your attitudes are predetermined by your peer prejudice and your culture's attitudes.  And I got to thinking, how can your attitude toward something be based on pure reason?  And I don't think it can.  I can't find anybody around here to talk to about that, so I write sarcastic little books about it and throw them before the public.  It helps a little.

I happened on a feminazi blog once that was arguing about rape culture with a male novelist whose forte is speculative fiction.  He had made some remarks that the blog admins took umbrage at and he rose to his defense as did many others.  Of course, I went in with my etymological resources and my glaring generality remarks and the conversation came to an abrupt halt.  It had been going on for days and I would have loved a little feedback, or at least to have felt included.  But no.  Once again I slammed the door shut in my own face. Yet, I do not abandon my search for intellectual stimulation.

I hardly ever watch television.  We have Starz, and I tried to watch Spartacus, but I can't pay attention, and if you turn it on and they are gazing at Spartacus's dead body, you kind of don't feel like there is any point in trying to catch up.  Besides, I, yes, even I, consider some of the sexual footage gratuitous.  So I have been catching up with Walking Dead by utilizing Netflix on my cell phone and my ear pieces, one side of which is dead.  But one or two episodes of Walking Dead per day is quite enough.   I have also  been watching that Netflix Production of that Kevin Spacey political thing.  It is interesting how he successfully employs that aside to the camera thing and Robin Wright is fascinating to watch.  She is amazing.  What the heck did she ever have to talk to that douchebag Sean Penn about?  But that was also on the cell phone.  And sometimes I would fall asleep in the middle of it, which is, for me, a good thing, except for when the cell phone falls on my face.  And I feel like I am not making good use of the enormous amount of money I give to Comcast.  (It really is ridiculous.)

So I was looking at On Demand and noticed Starz On Demand had some good recent offerings.  I kind of want to watch Brave again.  It was amazing and wonderful, especially the little triplet mimicking the dad at the supper table, and I also want to watch the new Bourne thing with Jeremy Renner.   But, finally, I selected Men in Black Three, and I was absolutely riveted for the length of the entire movie.  I did pause it once to go and get a popsicle, but I was so thrilled to be able to concentrate on it and be interested and follow the plot. I enjoyed it, all the little father-son subtleties and inside jokes.

I think it says something about the state of my mind and I don't think I want to know what that is.

Photo Attribution:  tiffanysally.blogspot.com -

Review for The Maze

At Barnes and Noble.

 

 

  Well, this was thought provoking, but nice.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0061SB3TC

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/158247 

Stirring the Pot

That Shakespeare thing?  "Me thinks the lady doth protest too much."

Wow.  Let's all get in a big circle, bunch up our skivvies, and then after our skivvies are in a big enough bunch, hold hands and form a gigantic example of a stereotype.

I am a grandmother.  I used to be a mom.  Well, actually, I am still a mom.  I am also still a daughter.  So  if I was in the mood to jump on bandwagons, I would be pretty busy, and knowing me, I would end up with lots of bruises.

The Wall Street Journal wrote an article about how mommy blogging is such a biggie nowadays, and how much money companies are spending to appeal to this group as they  see them as cash cows, plainly and simply.   I didn't think the article was terribly biased as WSJ articles can be.  I felt it was a commentary on a phenomenon. Lots and lots of people got pissed about it.

I don't care if someone says I blog for this and that altruistic reason, and I know this is gonna lose me a passel of followers, but when you go to read about someone's latest cute caprice with their darling family and it is a repost of a three year old article but still has all the latest ads and product updates, you gotta wonder.

I used to have ad sense ads on my blog, and they are missing out on a good deal here.  I have asked  what is  the deal since the spaces show up but the actual ads don't.  (I referred to the canary story previously.) So maybe I am just trying to use my own blog as a cash cow.  But it isn't.  It hasn't had an ad for years, and I am not pelting Google with complaints cuz the ads are not there.  I blog mostly to vent, and I make that very clear from the get go.

I don't care how much you shout about how you are just trying to give other mommies a heads up with some of their issues.  Some of them are very serious about that and do a service, but many of the mommy blogs are ADS.  Like the one's that crop up on yahoo that tell you they are going to give you the straight dope in thirty seconds and then another long blah'blah'blah starts after the thirty seconds.  Or that darling video about the mom and dad rapping.  It was a little too well produced you all noticed.  And then you found out, if you clicked and watched the video you had some woman blabbing in your mail box about her marketing company every day.  Misleading.  Don't like it.  Do you?

STATE YOUR BUSINESS.  I feel like a monkey when I respond to some story some one wrote in their blog only to realize later that the story was just a back drop to get you interested in these swell pots and pans. If you want to sell stuff, fine.  Lots of people want to buy stuff.  I would LOVE to sell stuff.  But I don't think shoving the product down someone's throat or mixing the Milk of Magnesia in with the Nestle's Quik is the way to do it.  But maybe that is just me.  I have taken up a lot of space here over the past year or so talking about the buy me, buy me phenomenon that is becoming so wide spread.  Okay.  I am just jealous.  Happy?  Does my saying that make you a little less angry about the WSJ article?

I think someone just poked you in that tender spot you have been trying to pretend wasn't there.

I want to build a huge literary metaphor about the panhandlers on Clark street wearing clean clothes and make up, and the shabby guy on the street corner in Wheeling with the okay but kind of old winter coat holding the sign "will work for food".  But I guess that would be putting too fine a point on it.  It is really just another internet meme, and when one leaves, another one pops up.


Photo Attribution:  restoringthoughts.blogspot.com 

The Good Part Is At The End

 

I have this internet acquaintance that lives across the ocean in a very charming place.  He recently lost his wife and he took us through the journey with such love and compassion and his usual acerbic wit, that we were all able to share with him and offer our support.  Of course, we couldn't even give him a real hug or kiss his beloved wife goodbye, but he knew we were there for them, and I hope it helped him a little.  He is charming and has a wonderful way with words.  He doesn't tell "jokes" as such , but he gets me laughing and often crying within the same post.  I won't tell you his name or even what country he lives in because, (I hope this is not too disrespectful to say so soon), when the ladies realize he is "back on the market" they will throng to him, and a certain airline told me to watch my step.

Someone gave him the Leibster Award.  Yeah, I know, the f-ing Leibster award again.  He knows as well as I do that these "awards" are just to put up a few more poorly painted road signs along the unpaved side roads of Blogdom, but I am all over that as I hold my self-earned title of blog whore close to my heart. (Hey guys, you wouldn't believe how well it works,) So I am jumping on this band wagon.  God, how I do love me a mixed metaphor.

 Lots of cut and paste here, so I guess we might be seeing those annoying little white strips.  Think of them as highlights, okay?

As with all awards there are rules.
1. Accept the award, post the picture of the Liebster Award on the top of your post and say who nominated you for the award and list their blog site.
2. List 11 random facts about yourself.
3. Nominate 11 other bloggers for the Liebster Award and list their blog sites.
4. Notify the bloggers of their award.
5.Ask the award winners 11 questions to answer when they accept their Liebster Award.
6. Answer the questions left for you by the blogger who gave you the award.

OMG.  It is waay worse than I remember.  If you don't want to do this, move on.  I won't even remember long enough to forgive you.

I was nominated by Lord David Prosser.  Spoiler there, but pretend you didn't see that.
Here are the eleven random facts.

1.  I have never died my hair.  I even tried to put highlights in it with clorox but it wouldn't work.  Alien hair.
2.  I have difficulty coping with the aging process.
3.  My maiden name is NOT Irish.  It is Scot.
4.   I always said I am almost five-seven.  I was a shade over five -six.  I am now five-four.
5.  My knees are titanium and ceramic.
6.  I'm addicted to coca-cola.
7.  My eyes are gray.
8.  My Alfredo sauce is the best in the world.
9.  I'm insomniac.
10. I love banana popsicles.
11. I worry randomly.

Here are my nominations: I am listing at least two that said they refuse to do these things.  That's okay with me. Some I am garnering randomly because I don't think I can come up with eleven.

1.  Sherry Riter at The Redhead Riter
2.   (Anne Kimball) at Life on the Funny Farm -
3.  Cindy Mai at In This World Of Books
4.  Ty Johnston: life on the written page
5..  pascal at pascal campion
6.  Jonathan Wilhoit at I Read a Book Once
7. (Marie) at Burton Book Review
8.  B. Wildung at Two - Tall - Tales
9.  Kelly Hashway at Kelly Hashway
10.  RM York at GrandpaYork
11.  jambalian at jambalian

Thank God those are click throughs or I'd be outta here.

I am totally copying David's questions, which I must tell you, he copied.  It's not as if you have even read this far, is it?


1. What teacher from your youth or childhood had a profound impact on you?  How?
2. Who is your greatest literary inspiration?
3. What is a favourite quote from another person, and what do you like about it?
4. What is a favourite quote from your own work, and what is the story behind it?
5. Tell us about one of your pets.
6. What is the greatest barrier in your life?
7. Where is your favourite travel destination?  Why?
8. What is the most interesting place near where you live? What makes it interesting?
9. What is your writing space like?
10. When you were eight, what did you want to be when you grew up?
11.  What is your goal for your writing?

And here are the answers.
1.   Sister Mary Alfred in first grade was very condescending.  A friend of mine from first grade recently told me she spent years in therapy cuz Sr. MA tore her down so bad in public.  We had a phonics book and we were going around the room, each child had to say a "P" word.  I said, "Pea Coat."  Sr.MA said, "And tomorrow it will be a q coat and then an r coat."  My friend said didn't that make you feel awful?"  I said, "No.  I just thought, 'Well, her dad's not in the Navy." Having self-confidence is one thing.  But KNOWING you have self-confidence when you are six is priceless.

2.. Ruth Rendell.  She is a peer and uses the "f" word in her books and is terrific looking.  Writes great also.

3.  "Though she be but little, she is fierce."  Shakespeare.  My only bow to feminism.  I don't need you to carry my flag for me, but thanks.

4.  I have used the heck out of this.

  "Why is it so much to you to find me willing

To swallow down the souls

 Of some potential kingdom?"

It scans beautifully.

5.  Oh, Poor Henry.  Trying to give him peace in his waning years is so difficult.  He is okay, though, thanks to my wonderful daughter.  It is hard to love something so annoying.  Kind of like marriage.

6. Reticence.

7.  I am going to Mt. Rushmore for Mother's Day.  I have always wanted to see it.  I also like Florida's West Coast Beaches. 

8.  My backyard is amazing.  I have seen so much wildlife, including, I insist, a wolf, which my husband also saw.  There is  a dedicated Nature Preserve bordering my lot with a creek. I have already written elsewhere today about the cool snake I saw yesterday.

9.I am usually at the dining room table since I got this laptop.  I am trying at present to consolidate all my note scraps and notebooks.

10.  Eight.

11.  I have achieved it.  One male reviewer, a stranger,  said, "Crazy good read" about my longest sexiest book.  I can die happy.

Man, if you got this far, you deserve some new kind of award.  Thanks for stopping by.

WAAAY TOO SERIOUS

I have not been able to pull the strings of my WIP together.  I have used every excuse in the world to dilly-dally.  I have made myself sit down and added a few sentences, and edited.  But could not propel the story to where it needed to go.

I simply did not want to take these people there.  I have a life that is a certain way and causes me to be a certain way.  I have gone into way too much detail in other posts on my blog, so most of you that stop here with any frequency know that I am a raving nutcase most of the time.

My stories are fluff. I am not reaching for the stars here.  Maybe I should be.  Maybe I should take it all a little more seriously.  But mostly, lately, it as been an effort and a drag.  The last 3,000 words were drawn out of me with a block and tackle.

I kind of didn't know why I started doing this.  But it has been fun, and I am not ready to stop. I have just enough positive feed back and revenue to keep me in the game. But this time, and maybe from now on, it has been too much like work.  I am pretty sure my fiction is all revisionist history on a very personal level.  Some people would read some of these stories and get highly pissed off or strangely elated.  But that is neither here nor there.  Well, actually it is maybe the whole here and there.

Bunch of troubling stuff going on in the real life.  Nothing we can't handle.  We have pulled through the worst of it.  "And when the hardest part is over, we'll still be here."  I think that is why I am holding the strings of this story so closely to myself.  What will I do when it is out of my head?  Where can these people go?  I am way too much in love with them.  I am god for them and they are my creations.  I control what they say and do.  I think.  Tonight, it kind of poured out and I had to close  the Word file, because tears were running down my cheeks.  You know how sometimes you are by yourself and no one can see you,  but you still feel like an idiot?  Yeah.  That's where I'm at.

I guess it is nice to have a totally imaginary place to go when reality sucks.

Photo attribution:  grlonthemuv.blogspot.com