Review: Giving It Up, by Amber Lin ~ 5 of 5 Stars

GIVING IT UP
by Amber Lin
Erotic Romance
Loose Id, 2012
ISBN 13: 978-1-61118-843-1

Allie prowls the club for a man who will use her hard and then ditch her. Hey, it’s not rape if she wants it. Instead she finds Colin, who looks tough but treats her tenderly, despite her protests.

He tempts her, but kindness and a few mind-blowing orgasms aren’t enough to put her back together again. Allie has no hope for a real relationship. Two years ago her best friend betrayed her in the worst possible way – she’d be stupid to trust a man again. Besides, she has her daughter to think of, the only good thing to have come from that dark night.

But when her rapist returns, threatening her sanity and custody of her daughter, Allie turns to Colin. Under his protection and patient touch, Allie begins to heal and learns to hope. Colin’s no saint, though, and his criminal past draws danger of its own. Allie must fight to protect her child and the man she loves, hoping her newfound power will be enough to save them all.

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Let me preface my thoughts on Amber's book by saying that I typically do not read books with a darker storyline like this. I use reading as my escape from the real world, so I prefer lighter stories or ones with paranormal elements that are far removed from reality.

But after reading only 27 pages, I had to stop mid-chapter and email Amber to tell her how enthralled I was with her writing and the story. Here's exactly what I told her...

"Your writing is like...whoa. I don't even know how else to say it. I'm loving this and according to my preferences, I really shouldn't. Allie is so beautifully damaged. She doesn't come off as a simpering victim you want to throw some Xanax at and drop her off at a shrink. She just IS and deals with it. Your metaphors are amazing, your descriptions and how she feels...all amazing. Nicely done, chica. Very nicely done."

I meant every word of it, too. I stayed up until 5:30 in the morning reading, and only stopped because my eyes would no longer cooperate with me and stay open. I loved Allie's character. The way she deals with the horrible events from her past is believable and, though dark and self-deprecating, even admirable. She does what she has to do in order to get through her day-to-day life for the sake of her daughter.

Colin has dark secrets of his own, but he does his best to keep Allie protected from them. From the moment he meets Allie he does his best to take care of her, despite them being virtually strangers. Situations throw them together and they're forced to learn how to deal with one another in a capacity neither one have any experience.

This book is not your typical romance. Though it has the required HEA (Happily Ever After) for any romance, I was unsure how it was going to work, right up until the last minute. Lin masterfully created a plot with conflicts that carry through right up until the end. Nothing is predictable and there's not a deus ex machina to be found. Just real efforts of real people.

I don't want to give anything away, because I truly want each and every one of you to buy the book. It's gripping, intriguing, and utterly spectacular. Amber Lin is a debut author who has instantly made a name for herself with this book, and she's one to keep tabs on for sure.

To see what others are saying about Giving It Up, watch the book trailer, read an excerpt from the book, and have access to the buy links, go here. ----> http://authoramberlin.com/books/

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Amber Lin is repped by Jewelann Cone by Cascade Literary Agency. Her debut novel, Giving It Up, releases from Loose Id on June 19th. She also has a historical manuscript in the works as well as the sequel to Giving It Up.

Amber married her high school sweetheart, birthed a kid who’s smarter than she is, and spends her nights writing down her dirty thoughts. In other words, life is good. 

Visit her at...

Her website: http://authoramberlin.com/ 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/authoramberlin

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/authoramberlin

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5827158.Amber_Lin

Happy July 2012!!!

Hello out there! I know it's been a long time since I posted anything, but I've been a busy, busy bee. :) I'll do my best to fight my natural long-winded nature and give you a summary of what I've been up to the last couple of months. I'll use bullet points to ensure I stick to the short-n-sweet thing.

• My editor, Liz, and I came up with the perfect title for my category romance: Seducing Cinderella
• It was decided that SC would launch the Brazen line for Entangled, as opposed to being a part of the Indulgence line. Both lines are category romances, but the Brazen imprint is for books with spicier smexin in them. And apparently, yours truly writes things a little too spicy to stay in the Indulgence parameters. LOL
• Received mind-blowing positive feedback on those who had the opportunity to read SC in advance. This made me both super excited and extremely ill. I've been a jumble of nerves on an emotional roller coaster ever since.
• I worked with a friend from college--Laura Coleman, who is made of awesomesauce--on a new tagline for me as an author: Romance that moves you in more ways than one. (Anyone who needs a copywriter for anything, Laura is definitely your girl.)
• I'm currently working with a friend from high school--Brock Miles, who is totally amazeballs--on designing my official author website. Okay, so he's designing it and I'm just saying, "Yes, I love it!" (Anyone in need of a crazy talented web designer/photographer, let me know and I'll put you in touch with Brock.)
•  I worked with my good friend--Jamie Burch of Chasing the Moon Creations--on designing a unique anklet that is featured in the SC story for a special promotional giveaway, and also for anyone to order it who loves the book and wants a replica of the gift Reid gives to Lucie. (Click on the link to learn more about Lucie's Anklet & Jamie's custom jewelry.)
• I've ordered gorgeous promotional bookmarks in preparation for SC's release.
• I've been writing the book that comes after SC, called Rules of Entanglement, in hopes of selling the idea of a Fighting for Love series that will feature more MMA heroes for the Brazen line.
• Yesterday, I successfully sold Rules of Entanglement and two additional books (they don't have titles yet) to Entangled, making the Fighting for Love series 4 books in all so far.

So as you can see, it's been a busy, yet wonderful, two months! This is fast shaping up to be my favorite month this year. Not only is my very first published novel, Seducing Cinderella, releasing on the 15th, but the 4th of July is my absolute favorite holiday, plus I'll be celebrating my 13th wedding anniversary on the 16th. Combine all of that with the fact that I'll have finished RoE by the end of next week and my contract sales are now a total of 7 books sold to a single publisher in less than 4 months...I just couldn't be happier.

So please stick with me as I finally take the leap from unpublished writer to published author. You've all been so wonderful to me throughout this entire journey, and I thank you from the bottom of my literary soul.

God bless, and Happy 4th!!! Ciao, bellas <3

Grandma's Advice

Is anyone still out there? I'm sorry I've been away for so long. I've been trying to figure out how to do this whole "contracted author" thing. The first book I ever completed (Desires of the Soul, scheduled for release June 2013) took me 1 year to write and 2 years after that to get it right. Then I become contracted through my awesomesauce publisher, Entangled Publishing, and suddenly I find myself in a situation where I need to write an entire book in a fraction of the time it took me for DotS.

I'd wanted to write my As-of-Yet-Untitled Indulgence in less time that it took, but I still finished an entire book in less than two months!! So, for my first time, I'd say that's not too shabby. Hopefully I'll be a little more present on the interwebz now that the rough draft crunch time is over...you know, until I'm in editing crunch time. ;p

But today I want to share something with you I found earlier this week while going through a container of old kid projects and other such things. It's a letter from my grandma, dated October 19, 2004. 

She's referring to an email I sent to my family giving the blow-by-blow happenings of when I accompanied my baby sister to the American Idol auditions in Las Vegas. As you all know, short-and-sweet is not my thing. I think it was some 4 pages long detailing the crazy trials and tribulations of our amazing 3-day trip. Since my grandma doesn't have a computer, one of my aunts gave her a copy, and this is the letter she sent me after reading it. I didn't remember this letter, so it was a sweet moment to read it again.

(I'll leave out all of the impertinent things with ellipses, but the rest of it is just as she wrote it.)

Gina, Loretta sent me a copy of your experience in Vegas. The way you wrote it I could just see you girls with all the problems you faced. And the humor you faced it with... It is so well written and so much detail that I could see everything as though I had been there. We all agree that you should be a writer. Jerry had that talent too... Anyway, I wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed your story and I still think you should take up writing. Love, Gramma

Jerry was my father who passed away when I was 10 years old. His brother, Tom, is an incredible writer as well, so the writing bug is definitely in the family. I loved that I found this letter now, eight years later, just as I'm about to embark on my authorial debut.

When I finally signed my contracts I had called my grandma (who is now 95 years old and has a brain sharp as a tack) to give her the good news. She was ecstatic and told me how proud she was and how she couldn't wait to read my books.

O_o <---- That was the look on my face when I thought about my sweet, almost-century-old grandmother reading some of the scenes in my books!

Then my (wonderfully fantastic) Aunt Marlene tells me a couple of days ago that she was discussing my books with my grandma who again mentioned wanting to read them. My aunt told her that some of my romance scene descriptions were "hot and racy" and we weren't sure she'd feel comfortable reading things like that.

To which she replied, "Oh, well, I'm a big girl. That's not gonna bother me."

(Bwahahahahaaaa! I wonder if dear old Grandma Bisbee has any idea what she's in for. ;) I'll make sure to report back when I get her review.)

Anyway, thanks, Grandma, for believing in me years before I even knew what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I love you dearly. <3

Sincerely,

Jerry's eldest, Gina Leigh

Word Count vs. Words That Count

As many of you know, I'm in major crunch mode. I gave myself a deadline of finishing my first Indulgence category romance by Monday the 16th. As you can see by the handy-dandy word counter in the side bar, I still have a ways to go. BUT, I do my best work when under the gun, so I'm doing a-ok.

What's really been suffering is this blog! Poor bloggy has been grossly neglected as of late, since I just don't have the time to write epically long posts (What was that? Write short posts, you say? *snort* Yeah, right, as if.) while trying to exceed my daily word count goals in order to make my deadline.

SO...I decided to RE-post one of my oldies-but-goodies (originally posted on 5-25-10) that has a huge relevance to what I'm going through in my writing at the moment. I haven't edited the original content of this post even though I feel the writing is sub-standard and it's killing me not to make changes to make sure it's up to snuff. However, I think either way, it'll get my point across. Make sure you weigh in on the comments section! I'll take the time to respond and discuss. :)

Ciao, bellas!

P.S. Now that I'm a writer with contractual deadlines, I absolutely and positively understand the need for word count goals. But I still think we need to evaluate our obsession with high counts versus slightly less counts with higher quality. End verbal disclosure. :)

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It’s in the progress posts on our blogs. It’s in little widgets in our sidebars. It’s what we obsess over. It’s our Literary Odometer.

It’s our WORD COUNT.


As writers we measure our progress by this term. It’s universally understood in the writing community as the success – or lack thereof – of our daily, weekly, or cumulative progress on our current Works In Progress (WIPs).

It seems that the majority of writers have a specific goal in mind. Whether it’s 500 words a day or 5000 words a day, it’s a way of keeping oneself motivated and on-point with an estimated date of completion for a rough draft.

But at what point does that ever-present, ever-looming Word Count goal become counter-productive?

If we get wrapped up in how many words we can “put on paper” as opposed to the QUALITY of those words, we’ll officially be hurting ourselves when it comes time for revisions. I can write 2000 words in one day and feel like I accomplished a whole helluva lot, but when I go back to revise that section, if the words weren’t quality to begin with, I bet I’m going to be spending a lot more time trying to fix them than if I would’ve just taken a little more time to make sure they were somewhat decent to begin with.

I’m not saying that our rough drafts will be all but flawless and revisions will be a piece of cake with this method – the day that happens will be the day I turn down dark chocolate (NEVER). But what I am saying, is that maybe we should find a happy medium.

If I sit down to work on my WIP and I only have a few hundred more words than when I started, I shouldn’t have to feel that “OMG, I suck” sense of failure. I should be able to look at those few hundred words and say, “That was a really good addition to that section – nice job, Maxwell.”

So I propose that we change our concerns of a generic Word Count, to a positive mindset of putting down Words That Count.

What do you think?

Do we have too much emphasis on our Word Count? Do you feel that sometimes a high Word Count compromises the quality? Or do you feel that a strict Word Count goal is the only thing that keeps you moving forward at a steady pace?

**This post has a word count of 424, and THE shortest post I've ever written, ironically enough.**

Coolest Book Trailer Ever

I'm not a huge fan of book trailers. The fact of the matter is, they're expensive and tricksy and in my honest opinion, they don't do much to sell books because I don't think they do the books justice like a damn good back cover blurb does.


HOWEVER...

Tara Fuller, a fellow Entangled author, has COMPLETELY changed my mind. I'm not ashamed to admit (well, maybe a little) that I'm strictly an adult romance reader. I don't read YA because I prefer to read about adult relationships with all of the adult facets (if you know what I mean). But I will BUY this book. And I will READ this book. Because of  THIS book trailer.



Isn't it amazing? I love how it's told from the male character's POV. It's so incredibly compelling, so romantic. The thing that sets this book trailer apart from 99% of other book trailers I've seen? The video action of the characters. Usually stock photos are used which isn't as interesting for obvious reasons and also causes a problem with the subjects in the photos not being the same people, but merely people with similar traits (i.e. dark hair).

Congrats, Tara. This is phenomenal.

Here's the info for Tara's book, INBETWEEN, releasing 8-14-12 from Entangled Teen.

Since the car crash that took her father’s life three years ago, Emma’s life has been a freaky—and unending—lesson in caution. Surviving “accidents” has taken priority over being a normal seventeen-year-old, so Emma spends her days taking pictures of life instead of living it. Falling in love with a boy was never part of the plan. Falling for a reaper who makes her chest ache and her head spin? Not an option.

It’s not easy being dead, especially for a reaper in love with a girl fate has put on his list not once, but twice. Finn’s fellow reapers give him hell about spending time with Emma, but Finn couldn’t let her die before, and he’s not about to let her die now. He will protect the girl he loves from the evil he accidentally unleashed, even if it means sacrificing the only thing he has left…his soul.

For your viewing pleasure...Parker Hurley covered in grease. You're welcome.

My girl, Ruthie Knox, and I are a bit of what you might call Parker Hurley fans. You might also call us Parker Hurley obsessive, but we don't like to label things. Anyway, since we have slightly different tastes in men, adoring Parker works out perfectly for us because he's clearly two people rolled into one, amazing guy. And although I think I can safely say that Ruthie and I love both sides, we each favor one over the other.

Ruthie prefers Parker with his longer, wavy hair and a his brilliant boyish smile.

I prefer Parker with short hair and his serious, brooding, don't eff with me look. (I also kind of have a thing for guys covered in grease, if the title of this post didn't give that away. Which is probably why the hero of my 3rd PoS book is a mechanic and spends ungodly amounts of time, well, covered in grease. *sigh*)

That's why this video of a recent photo shoot of his is absotively, posolutely the best of both worlds for the both of us. It's simply Parker, in all his amazing glory. Enjoy.

P.S. Parker is the character inspiration for my debut novel for Entangled's Indulgence line, which is as-of-yet untitled, but you can check out the character image and the book blurb on my Project Pipeline page at the tippy top up there.


Parker Hurley from INVTmedia on Vimeo.

Update: Damn "the man" always tryin' to bring us down! Apparently they didn't like the video going viral & password protected it. Oh well. At least it's etched into my grey matter!

Wee-Bit Wednesday: Lucky 7 Edition

Faye Robertson/Serenity Woods tagged me in this fun little thing making the rounds on the writing circuit.

Here are the rules:

1. Go to page 77 of your current MS
2. Go to line 7
3. Copy down the next 7 lines – sentences or paragraphs – and post them as they’re written. No cheating.
4. Tag 7 other authors

For starters, both of my WIPs at the moment haven't reached 77 pages, so I had to go back to Desires of the Soul, which is technically still a WIP because it still needs to be edited by Liz and then fixed by yours truly (probably several more times) before it's considered a done deal.

I lucked out; this tiny snippet gives you a great snapshot of Dom's charm that Angelica brings out in him.

So, here's my 7, I hope you enjoy. :)

*******************************************

“So what are these powers you have?” he asked. “Just so you know, if they’re greater than mine I’ll probably suffer from severe emasculation issues.”

Angelica laughed. “I have no intentions of ever emasculating you. With my powers or otherwise.”

Suddenly his eyes turned smoky, and he leaned into her. “Good,” he rumbled, just before cupping her face and kissing her breathless. Hours later—no, it was probably only minutes…seconds?—Dominic pulled back and gave her a wicked grin. “You were saying?”

*******************************************

Now I tag:

1. Jessa Slade
2. Abby Niles
3. Charlotte Stein
4. Chloe Jacobs
5. Rachel Harris
6. Kate Douglas
7. Cari Quinn