Morning, my lovelies.

It is now 54 hours, 8 minutes, and a few seconds to the official beginning of FandomFest.  The first panel will be the meet and greet, and I intend to be there.  I’m still extremely jittery and doing the OMGWHATHAVEIDONE dance, but that should pass.  I think my biggest problem is going to be locating the perfect passage to read Friday night.

I have to read in front of people.

EEK.

S0, about last night…

I stumbled upon that “review” completely by accident.  I’ve had a few people ask me where to find it, so I’m going to do my best to re-locate it, but it was on a personal blog somewhere, and I don’t even really remember how I got to it.  I’ll find it, though.  I am the Google-guru around this office.

Aaaaanyway, yeah.  I have very thick skin when it comes to criticism, but it really upset me to find that.  Not because I have a problem with someone not liking my work… it isn’t that all all.  My problem is with the intentionally cruel way in which said opinion was presented for the rest of the world to read.

I whole-heartedly believe in every single person’s right to have an opinion.  But I also believe that those who wish to share their opinions should seriously consider the way they do so BEFORE hitting the “publish” button.  Heaven knows I’ve stuck my foot in my mouth enough by accident to learn that lesson.

If you don’t like me, that’s fine.  Feel free to tell the world that.  I don’t care.  Just don’t do it in such a way that not only demeans me, but makes you look like a fool as well.

<Insert 10-minute Intermission Here>

So I went back through my history on my computer and looked at all the things I went through last night – and let me tell you, I was like 20-pages deep in the Google search results… and I have found nothing.  I followed the link to the page in my browsing history.  I get “Page Cannot Be Displayed,” so either the site is down, or the author deleted the post.  Maybe she even went so far as to see my comments about the rude way in which she ripped my story apart.

No matter… I’m past it.

In fact, I’ve not really written much romance at all in the past few weeks.  I guess I burned out on it, like I do on everything else.  Maybe it’s the chemical imbalance in my brain, but I’ve moved more into writing horror.  I enjoy having complete control over someone’s fate, and I can be a lot more creative when I’m doing evil things to people.

Plus, it makes me feel better.  Horror writing is fantastic stress relief, because I can do absolutely anything I want to the people that irritate me.

One of my favorite books to this day is Stephen King’s The Dark Half.  I understand the schizophrenia that comes through in that story.  And even though he doesn’t truly exist even in the story, George Stark is one of the most compelling characters I’ve ever read.  That was the first “adult” book I ever read, and 19 years later, it still stands out in the forefront of my mind.  It’s the ultimate game of cat-and-mouse, the ultimate fear, because the fear is of your own creation. Of yourself.

I like that.

On another totally random note, I’ve spent the last 10 minutes arguing with Lexxx over which of us is a better writer… as in each of us telling the other one she’s better.  I’m waiting for Lucy to reach out and slap the hell out of both of us.

Yes, I’m all over the place today.  I’m going to blame nerves, because I can’t very well blame myself, now can I?