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Agony/Ecstasy – the Release!

bettie — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 17:02:15 +0000

Agony/Ecstasy is out today. I wish I had more time to do promo-y things, but life, work, family, and the holidays keep getting in the way. So, if you don’t have your copy yet, go forth and buy.

Visit the official Agony/Ecstasy website
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kindle | Book Depository
ISBN-10: 0425243451 | ISBN- 13: 978-0425243459

Tomorrow Janine and I are going on an expedition to find A/E in the wild (a.k.a. a local Barnes & Noble’s). I’ll post pics if there are any. Also, look forward to interviews with fellow A/E authors Lily Daniels and Cameron Belle. Their stories are two of my favorites in the antho, and both have given me permission to ask them questions.

P.S. I’ve moved my blog. http://www.bettiesharpe.com/betties-blog

Guest Post

bettie — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 04:50:24 +0000

At Shiloh Walker’s Blog. The topic is fairy tales. Comment to win a copy of Cat’s Tale, and while you’re there, check out Shiloh’s blog for more awesome posts about fairy tales, rules for the big contests, and excerpts from her latest.

Ember Plagiarized?

bettie — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 17:33:25 +0000

Color me surprised when my handy, dandy google alert told me I was being discussed on fanfiction.net. Apparently, some idiot calling herself Lady Sephi had taken Ember word-for-word, done a search and replace on the names, and passed the story off as her own original Final Fantasy fanfic.

Normally, an incident like this might make a gal disappointed with humanity. You go to the trouble to share your work for free, and then some jerk comes along and steals it? That sucks!

But I’m not disappointed with humanity because of the way the fanfiction.net community reacted to the plagiarism. When a reader pointed it out to them, they took down the story and closed the plagiarizers’ accounts. Fans of the story spread the word among themselves that the story was stolen, and linked to my web page for the original.

This incident shows that while there are some dishonest jerks out there in the world, there are a whole lot more wonderful, honest people who care about giving credit where it is rightfully due.

Bettie’s faith in humanity? Restored. Thanks fan fictioners.

The Agony/Ecstasy Cover!

bettie — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 18:57:55 +0000

Here’s the cover for the Agony/Ecstasy Anthology due out from Berkley Heat in Fall 2011. I love the color scheme, and was, in fact, contemplating redoing my website in hot pink, white and black when Jane sent the cover image.

After a Long While…Update

bettie — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 17:59:47 +0000

Wow, I haven’t posted since December. Happy New Year, everyone. So far 2010 has been pretty eventful. I got my master’s degree. I wrote a couple of stories. I painted my office. I crafted like mad.

I’m still looking for a home for “Cat” the novella I wrote back in December. To be honest, I haven’t been looking very hard, though, with everything else that’s been going on.

Last week, I wrote a short story based on “The Little Mermaid” called “Each Step Sublime.” I read the original story, which I hadn’t done before. And you know what? “The Little Mermaid” is one seriously effed-up story. Really. It’s scary and dark and heartbreaking, and not even the “positive” ending Anderson tacked on after the fact can make it less depressing.

I loved it. And hated it. And I knew I had to write my own version. So I did, and had a grand time doing it.

My reader cover, closed.

Another thing I have been doing is making random stuff. As an example, check out this cover for my Sony ebook Reader. Because I am a fabric whore, I made the whole thing out of silk. The fabric is black-and-white silk broadcloth. The ribbon is also silk, and has the added advantage of matching the new color of my office walls. It’s highly impractical–and I love it.

The eReader cover, open.

In the Spirit

bettie — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 21:12:32 +0000

With the economic situation being what it is, we won’t be giving or getting a lot of gifts this Christmas, but I’m feeling Christmasier than I have in a long time. Maybe because we won’t be giving or getting a lot of gifts. Instead of spending money, we’re spending time.

For the first time in several years, we have a Christmas Tree. It’s not a live one–the one and only time we had a live one, I was still vacuuming little needles out of the crevices in the floor in June–no, our tree is a fake we got on after Christmas sale a few years back. Last week, my sister came over, and we fired up the Christmas tunes on Pandora and made gingerbread cookies, and a gingerbread house, and decorated the tree.

So, anyway, I’m all aglow with the Christmas spirit. I don’t know how long it will last–my guess is it fizzles out around 5pm on the 25th–but it is rather pleasant. Heartwarming, even. I’ll enjoy this happy holiday haze while it lasts, and use it to wish you a heart-felt, warm-and-fuzzy Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good write!

Cat: A Fairy Tale by Bettie Sharpe

bettie — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 17:33:24 +0000

So, remember that new novella I mentioned in the last post, like, two minutes ago? Here’s the heads-up, the low down, the, uh, blurb.

Once upon a time there was a scheming, lying tart who cared for nothing but her own beauty, her pleasures, and her shoe collection. Please, do not decide to hate her just yet, for she is the heroine and narrator of our tale. She is the delightfully wicked Lady Catriona, who will, before this story ends, lose all, gain all, make a friend, and find true love. Oh, and somewhere in the middle she gets turned into a cat.

The story is one you may think you’ve heard before. It’s the story of a hapless miller’s son and a clever cat with a fetish for fine footwear. It’s the story of Puss-in-Boots—but don’t you dare call her Puss. That name is far too ripe for ribald puns. The lady prefers you call her

Cat

After a long while

bettie — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 17:29:14 +0000

Thanks to school and work, I haven’t posted in forever. I have some free time now, and have used it to write a novella. More on that later. I just wanted to break the blogging ice. First post in 11 months. woo hoo!

Today…

bettie — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 19:50:57 +0000

Today I saw something that I never believed I’d see in my lifetime, and that my father never believed he’d see in his. Maybe the inauguration of President Obama didn’t change the world, but it changed my world. It challenged the scope of my vision and changed the shape of the future I would let myself imagine.

The word hope has been thrown around a lot over the last couple years–so much so that it sometimes feels trite–but what else do you call this feeling? What else do you call it when your cynicism is wiped away, and the perilous world suddenly seems full of possibility?

Hope. I think I’m hopeful.

Coming Soon…The Post RWA Round-Up

bettie — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 07:39:26 +0000

I want to write a round-up report to tell about how awesome everyone I met at conference is, and to post pics, and all that. But, unfortunately, I am still on the road with SmartAss. Which is not to say there is anything unfortunate about being on the road with him. You know it must be true love when the road trips rock. Anyway, next week I’ll be home and stationary and back at my regular sized keyboard (the laptop kb bugs). I’ll make with the conference pics, and some pics of the beautiful, beautiful Pacific Northwest (including Powell’s City of Books in Portland, OR — squee!)