Progress Friday: A New Contract!

Hey peeps!

Can you believe it's already Friday??? And lol, I spent this morning online...but ended up getting nothing done. How is that possible? True though that there is always something shiny on the Net, and it's so easy to get waylaid. That's why I prefer to have the wifi off when I'm writing or have work to do. Less temptation towards time perdition.

#HeartHop Why Heartbreakers Make The Best Heroes (& how you, the reader, can be featured in my upcoming series)

Hey beautiful people!

Absolutely delighted to be back on one of Carrie Ann's fantastic hops. And Heartbreakers... *swoon* Where do I sign up?

Seems like I'm not the only one with that wicked train of thought, because - get this! - there are about 300 participants in this hop! Nope, not kidding you. Check the hop's page and see for yourself.

Not only this - meaning like 300 giveaways, with one at every stop, there are also 3 fabulous Grand Prizes to win!

1st Grand Prize: A Kindle Fire or Nook Tablet

2nd Grand Prize: A $100 Amazon or B&N Gift Card

3rd Grand Prize: A Swag Pack that contains paperbacks, ebooks, 50+ bookmarks, cover flats, magnets, pens, coffee cozies, and more! (US only)

So what's the whole fuss about Heartbreakers, eh? How can a man who breaks a woman's heart be considered a hero?

Well, that's what it boils down to for me - a hero has to have the capacity to break the heroine's heart. Otherwise, he's not her hero, and he's not the love of her life.

Imagine a ho-hum guy with a written-in-stone routine who never notices when you've changed your hair colour from black to pink and shaved half your head in a faux-hawk. One day, he stands up and says, "I'm leaving."
You'd say, "Good riddance", innit? His leaving would totally not break your heart. Why? Because you never were in love with him, and he never seemed to love you or care enough to notice.

Now imagine a man who can, with a simple smile, turn your world upside down. A man who doesn't need to bring you flowers every day but shows his concern and feelings in more tangible ways. Like knowing you had an awful night so he wakes up early and takes the baby out on the run for your favourite coffee all so you can wake up to a great pick-me-up after getting some much needed shut-eye.

This man has the potential to break your heart, and you love him. You love for that, you love him because of that. He's your hero because he holds your heart, and he cares...


But what happens when the man you fall in love with really does break your heart... like Leila experiences in my latest 1NightStand romance, Once Upon A Second Chance.

This man saved her from a personal Hell and promised to love and cherish her. Through their short moments spent together, he's showed her he'll be her protector, that she's finally safe... And then he leaves without a word, Leila finding herself alone and not understanding what happened while trying to come to grips with living in a foreign country.

Does he redeem himself? Why did he leave?

Find out in Once Upon A Second Chance.

Leila Hassan Al-Nadir spent ten years in a forced, abusive marriage in the United Arab Emirates, before her husband divorced her... and another man stepped into his place to make her his wife. But before she can look at a future with this new man, he abandons her, dropping her off on the island of Mauritius in the care of his stepmother.

Khalid Al-Nadir wants nothing more than to be with Leila, his wife. But he hides a deep, dark secret – his intentions when he made her his weren’t noble. Despite falling in love with her in the end, he knows she will be better off without him.

Leila craves answers; Khalid desires salvation. Fate, in the form of Khalid’s stepmother, intervenes and sets this estranged couple up for a one night stand date with Madame Eve’s agency.

Can Leila and Khalid have a second chance, once they both face the truth that brought them together?

Genre: Multicultural/Interracial/Inspirational (Muslim) Contemporary Romance
Length: Short (45 pages/12,000 words)
Publisher: Decadent Publishing, LLC

Available on:

Amazon, Amazon UK, Decadent website, AllRomance Ebooks, Barnes & Noble (Nook), Smashwords


What do YOU think? Does the person you love have to have the capacity to break your heart, for it to be called love?

Answer in the comments, and don't forget to leave your email address! Both Carrie Ann and myself cannot enter you into the draw and contact you if you're the winner without it.

And what am I offering in my giveaway? I'm doing something different on this hop. Here it is:

I'm currently penning a contemporary series about 3 sisters set in a fictional little village in North Yorkshire, England. This place is the unofficial hiding place for most of the young, hunky, and eligible billionaires of England, with a ratio 3:1 where the male population v/s the female is concerned. Mecca of hot, handsome goodies up for the taking for all single gals out there, innit?

My giveaway - the winner gets to create a character in this village. Whether a hot, hunky, and eligible billionaire, or one of the lucky girls who gets to come there and pick her choice of rich and intelligent beefcake.
OR - winner gets to make a cameo in one of the books.

Don't forget to check the other participants in the hop. You can find the list with all their names here.

Thanks for dropping by today, peeps, and I hope you're having a great Friday and an even lovelier weekend.

From Mauritius with love,

Zee

I write because... (a rant amid an affirmation & progress)

Hey beautiful people!

Lol, doing my best to have posts up regularly here. Though my brain goes awol sometimes, I have a whole crew of guests lined up for the coming weeks to keep the postings flowing. So this week might've been some hit&miss, after the staggeringly knackered kinda day I had yesterday, I missed the Links posting. Forgive me, and here's a glimpse of what I went through.

Imagine dealings with an ISP to make sense of their contract; banks conveniently 'forgetting' to cancel your standing order payments even after we've rolled into 2013; muggy heat and scorching sub with temps in and around 38degC at barely 10AM - and you have my day yesterday. On top of that, I had a scene to write in Inescapable, Book 1 of the Eternelles series, so my bestie and collab partner, Natalie G. Owens, could progress with her part on the project. Oh, and edits to finalize for not 1 but 2 clients.

In the middle of all this, I come across an email from my pub house's accountants, informing me that, as from February, they will be withholding taxes from all royalty payments, and any non-US citizen could fill in form whatever number to claim a refund under tax treaty laws.
Amount withhold? 30%
Issue for me - I'm from Mauritius... which doesn't have a tax treaty with the US.

Consequently, the IRS and US government just sent me a reeling 'up yours!' by chucking 30% of my earnings without any hope of me getting that money back.

Which made me wonder - if I lost 30% of what I made, was it worth it to continue working to earn a pittance? For a minute, I stared my projects in the face... Wouldn't it be the same for me to offer them all for free? After all the blood and sweat and time and energy that went into them, I also had to forego 30% of everything I would've made?

I must've hit the lowest pits of despair and self-doubt possible for an author yesterday. I had tons of projects lined up; in fact, so many projects I could derail my (somewhat fragile) health in trying to get them all on the rails. Was it all worth just 70% of what I can make on them?

But then I remembered. I recalled why I wrote, why I started writing, why I powered on when rejections were slamming me down from left, right, up, and down.

Why do I write? Because I want to share my stories with readers.

As simple as that. I won't go as far to say that I bring something totally unique to the book world - every author worth his/her salt does that. I won't say that my take on the cultural world of Indian-origin folks and Muslims in Mauritius is not seen elsewhere. Trust me, I know I have tons of competition out there.

But I also know that I have opened countless emails, and even met 'live' fans, who have told me I brightened their day with my stories. That they've loved reading what I have penned down. That my writing brought them something 'special' (whatever that might happen to be.)

I never thought I'd write for money. Yes, it's a dream of all authors to be rolling in the moolah brought in by fantabulous sales and a movie deal and all that hoop-la, but that's just what it is. A dream. Something we all aspire to. Doesn't mean we'll make it... I remember a quote that I'm gonna hash up badly coz I don't recall it exactly and also who said it originally, but the gist was:

"Knowing we'll never reach the stars doesn't mean we can't chart our paths by them."

I don't know if my sales will ever be fantabulous. I don't know how much money my writing can and will bring me. I don't know how many fans I'll ever get, how many lives I might get to touch...

I do know that I have stories in me, and that I'd die if I didn't write, and if I didn't share them with the world. If I can do that, and still earn something beside those lovely words from fans, then awesome. If not, well... It's all God's work, and I accept it. I know who I am and where I stand, and that's what matters.

And speaking of writing, there is some progress to show this week! Worked on Book 1 of the Eternelles series, that takes a jump of nearly 6,000 words this week through my addition to the plot. Now Natalie G. Owens must work her magic. Who knows - by next week, we might've crossed the half-way mark on this project!

Oh, and Leila, the heroine from my upcoming 1Night Stand release, Once Upon A Second Chance, (releasing February 5) is in the demon Bunny's hot seat today. Come read a bit about this Muslim girl who's not had an easy life till now, but who, nevertheless, allows nothing, and no one, to cull her spirit! Here's the link!

Looking forward to a nice weekend with the hubby & hyenas now. Hopefully, these temps will lower and we'll be able to sleep at night.

Hope ye all have a lovely weekend!

From Mauritius with love,

Zee