Jordan Summers

Mr. & Mrs. Smith’s premise…the couple (two assassins) meet in South America (while both are on the job). They use each other as cover and end up falling in love. Trouble is both are lying. Six years later, they’re bored with their marriage and in therapy because they can’t be themselves. Their lies are shattered when they’re sent on the same mission and discover the truth. Let the War of the Roses begin.

Okay, so it may not have had the biggest plot or most realistic shootout scenes (think Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid), but I must say I truly enjoyed Mr. & Mrs. Smith. The dialogue in this movie is tight and the chemistry between the stars sizzles. Oh, and have I mentioned it’s funny? I fould myself laughing aloud in several places. They really look like they had a wonderful time shooting this film.

So if you like big dumb action movies with gorgeous characters and witty repartee, this movie is for you.

I’m still not happy about this. To read more visit Alison’s site.

In the past few days the RWA Board of Directors has received a veritable avalanche of e-mail from members about the recent adoption of Graphical Standards. This e-mail has fallen into three categories: Rage at us for what was perceived as censorship; total support for what was perceived as an excellent policy; and the usual middle: thoughtful, troubled, questioning; understanding of what wed tried to do but not liking it, disapproving of what wed tried to do but agreeing that there was a need for something.

On Thursday night the Board met by telephone, had an excellent two hours of discussion and passed two motions.

1. We temporarily suspended these graphical standards across the board.


2. We created an ad hoc committee to study this question and come up with suggestions. This committee will solicit input from the membership and will report to the Board by September 1.

What this temporary suspension of graphical standards means, in a practical
way:

RWR: We originally intended for these standards to provide specific criteria for the staff when dealing with potentially objectionable ads and
so that advertisers would know what types of graphics would not be accepted. In the interim while the standards are suspended, the office
will make the decision regarding acceptability of advertising in the RWR, as was previously done, and any decisions will be subject to the
definitions of sexually oriented advertising provided by the US Postal Service.

LITERACY SIGNING: Writers are free to sign whatever books youve agreed to sign at the Reno conference. We ask that you keep the promotional displays to a minimum, due to lack of space. As to any promotional materials and donated baskets, we ask that you please keep in mind that this is a public event and, as such, there will be people under eighteen there.

CHAPTERS: During the interim while the Graphical Standards are suspended, Chapters may continue to use RWAs Service Marks without regard to
graphical standards. However, Chapters may wish to visit the US Postal Service web site for more information about mailing sexually oriented
advertising.

The letters you wrote are filled with interesting and creative suggestions and we will pass those on to the committee for consideration. Thank you for caring so passionately about RWA. With all our diversity, with all the potential we have for disagreement, that passion is what makes our organization so special and so committed to supporting its writers and the Romance genre as a whole.

Sincerely,

Board of Directors,

Romance Writers of America

Permission to forward is granted.

I finally finished the mini-story I wanted to add to AQ4. I think this may be the most risque short story I’ve ever written. Stepping back and peeking out from behind the drapes. Not positive where it came from. I’m sure the lastest controversy had nothing to do with my sudden daring. I’m going to start editing it on Sunday and hope to have it ready to send to critique partners by no later than Wednesday.

I have made a few changes to my books page. The excerpts page will come down next, since I’ve moved them all to one page. Click on the book cover to see. It’s very raw. I haven’t tweaked the colors yet. Check it out.

I’ve heard the whispers about special RWA meetings happening. The rumors are once again flying as the winds of reversal fill the air. (shaking head) Was this all REALLY necessary?

This weekend I plan to go see Mr. & Mrs. Smith, since it looks like a fun movie. I personally don’t care if Brad and Angelina are shagging like bunnies. It’s their business, not mine. Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend. I’ll catch you on the flipside.

I guess this is the final response to all the brouhaha going on within the RWA.

Permission to Forward this letter is granted, provided you forward the letter in its entirety.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

To all who are confused about the recent Graphical Standards, we apologize.
Some of that confusion is our fault–we were not specific enough in our details, and we are working on that right now. Some of that confusion, however, is not our fault; there has been a lot of misinformation, gossip and misdirected rage out there. We ask for your patience for just a little while longer, so we can set everything straight.

We know this letter won’t contain all the answers you’re waiting for, but we’ll have them to you in a few days. You asked why we adopted the Graphical Standards–that one we can answer. Several things influenced that
decision: the feeling among the membership that we wanted to remain a romance-focused organization but also wanted to be more inclusive of new voices and trends; the current popularity of “erotica” and its much steamier covers; and the fact that we have long needed to set some kind of standards, beginning with what is acceptable to have in our magazine, Romance Writers Report. Bookstores have graphical standards, magazines have graphical standards, businesses have them. It was time we created our own. Adopting standards assured that all members were treated equally; everyone would have to adhere to those standards.

No one–and I repeat, no one–on the board wanted to engage in any kind of censorship. To a woman, we believe that there are no “shoulds” where writing is concerned. We believe in free speech and will defend that right with all the passion we put into our books. However, the question arose: did we want to run ads in our magazine which featured those “steamier”covers? Covers that were not suggestive, or sensual, or even titillating, but quite graphic? Through long hours of discussion, sometimes heated, we came to the conclusion that, no, we had to draw the line somewhere, and thus the Graphical Standards were born. We felt confident that we spoke for a large majority of RWA members when we set these standards.

We came to realize that these standards could not be limited to RWR alone.
We have spent years and money and enormous effort turning around the public’s attitude toward our genre. Our books were called “bodice rippers,”we had no respect, we were the stepchild of the industry. In the past few years, we have come to represent the voice of our writers; publishers respect us and have heeded some of our requests for better deals for our writers; scholars treat what we write as serious enough for study; even other genre groups come to us for advice on how we do such an effective job. We have come so far.

In realizing this, we accepted that those same graphical standards that we had arrived at for our magazine needed to be extended to everything to do with the official face of RWA–the face we want to present to the public, to the publishers, to our readers–under the RWA service mark. That meant that we didn’t want posters of those same graphic covers to be used at literacy signings, and that any web site that was officially associated with RWA needed to respect those same standards.

We feel today quite strongly that this is the right direction to be going in. And, no, we are not asking erotica writers to get lost. There is, as we speak, an “erotic romance” chapter forming within the parameters of RWA.
As long as it is a romance, it belongs here, under our umbrella. And we’re also aware that writers have very little control over their covers, so if they want to promote a book that has a cover that doesn’t meet our standards, it’s a problem for them. Even some publishers are beginning to understand that they are making a problem for their authors when they limit the venues that can feature their covers.

Now, as the standards encompass so much of what goes on at RWA, we are fine-tuning the details, so there will be no more misunderstandings. We’re on it, trust us, night and day. What we can say now is: Please respect these standards for any publication, conference, or web page that uses the RWA service mark. If there are specific questions, please e-mail a Board member. And, yes, we are setting up an appeals process, so everyone will have a say.

At a chapter level, we ask you to respect these standards, but we are not about to begin to police anyone or any chapter–that is not our job.We set the standards, we ask that you honor them. We’re all in this together, all 9000 plus of us. We want and need our organization to continue to serve its career-focused romance writers and to continue the path we’re on, to be the best, most proactive writers group there is.

Sincerely,

Nicole Burnham

Kathy Carmichael

Teresa Carpenter

Jennifer Crump

Geralyn Dawson

Peggy Emard

Karen Fox

Linda Howard

Linda Winstead Jones

Lisa B. Kamps

Dorien Kelly

Lynn Kerstan

Sherry Lewis

Jill Limber

Linda Lael Miller

Connie Newman

Diane Pershing

Patricia Potter

Tara Taylor Quinn

Gayle Wilson

This comes courtesy of Larissa. I’m not really sure if I’m doing this right, but here it goes.

Remove the #1 item from the following list, bump everyone up one place and add your blog’s name in the #5 spot. You need to… actually link to each of the blogs for the link-whorage aspect of this fiendish meme-age to kick in.

1. BTW


2. Soliloquy


3. Joely Sue Burkhart


4. Larissa Ione


5. Jordan Summers

Next, select four unsuspecting victims, list and link to them.

1. PBW


2. Jill Shalvis


3. Patrice Michelle


4. Alison Kent

Now the subject of “This Detestable Meme” is Five Things I Miss From My Childhood:

1. Summers with my grandparents. They were the greatest times of my life. Why? Because everything seemed so much simplier then. In reality, it wasn’t, but to a kid it couldn’t have been more perfect. I had the run of the property, including the woods where I created magnificent worlds. They had horses for me to ride everyday. (I had my own horses at home, but Grandma and Grandpa had more choices.) It took a lot of work to keep things ticking over, but we played as hard as we toiled. The relatives would meet up on the weekends, either at the river or at each other’s homes. They’d build bonfires and sit around swapping stories. Plenty of marshmellows to roast. No one played the radio or watched TV, enjoyment came from reminiscing and shared laughter. Everyone would cook, so the food overflowed on the tables. The kids could go swimming or fishing or a little of both. There was the guy up the rode who stole my heart and a few kisses along the way. It always reminds me of that country song, Strawberry Wine. (Probably why I can’t get through listening to it without misting up.;-) Oh, how I miss them all. I’m grateful for every minute I got to spend with them.

2. Living in the country. I miss the wide-open spaces. I miss the quiet. It was a lot of hard work, but I miss having the animals around.

3. Riding horses. Like Larissa, I miss horses so much. I got my first one when I was five. This is the longest I’ve lived without owning one.

4. I miss the excitement I got from the little things like Christmas and staying up all night with my mom watching monster movies.

5. My bestfriend, Jakey. He was my pony. Boy, the adventures we shared could fill volumes. May he rest in peace.

I’ll first start with a link to this blog. I will follow this gem with a letter sent to Allie McKnight from Tara Taylor Quinn, which can be forwarded only in its entirety. This is in response to clarification on the new graphical standards and the reasoning behind them.

I asked about the legal standards that RWA was applying, and was given a response from HQ which I wasnt given permission to quote. TTQ emailed me this morning, and I was given permission to quote her e-mail so long as I did so in full. You may repost this, provided that all information, including my name as the person who received the e-mail remains intact. Ill be posting it around, but Id say its hardly an appropriate response.

Allie McKnight

w/a Sage Grayson

www.sagegrayson.com

Allie,

You have my permission to say there was a misunderstanding. I spoke of the non-profit status in terms of our mission statement, only in that the IRS expects us to make our determinations based on our mission statement in terms of our expenditures - there were many questions being asked at once and many thought the graphical standards related to our mission statement - it did only in that we are romance writers and as such straight erotica does not fit our mission, but I also clarified that erotic romance does meet our mission statement. I spoke about positive correspondence from an erotica publisher who has assured us that she is publishing erotic romance.

After the meeting the Desert Rose website hostess came up to me with the chapter president in tow to clarify that the graphical standards did apply to the Desert Rose website. She explained that she had just spent a lot of time redoing the pages to include the RWA service mark on all pages. I explained that yes, that did, then apply.

If you or anyone else has any further questions on this, please contact me directly. Rumors take up far too much time!!

ttq

Tara Taylor Quinn,

President, Romance Writers of America

Is anyone else scratching their head and saying huh? To make it even more interesting this article was written back in 2000. Is it just me or has not much changed in five years? Oh, and for those who think this hasn’t already been applied, check out PBW’s blog for one author’s firsthand account.

You all have no idea how happy this makes me. I’ve been working on this book since 2003! :-O Of course, I have had to put it aside a half a dozen times to finish other projects along the way. I decided this time I wouldn’t allow anything to come between me and finishing this book. I’ve written 11,600 words in the last three days. Whew!

The book’s not ready to ship to my editor or my critique partners yet. I have to allow it to stew for a few days and then read through the whole thing to see if it makes sense. In the meantime, I may finish up a little story I started and I plan to work on my werewolf partial.

Today, I will read. Yes, I went to the bookstore AGAIN. Cringe. I bought more books. :-/ I’m telling you it’s an addiction. All that’s missing is a rubber band around my arm and me slapping a vein.*g*

Do you want to know what I grabbed? Do you? Do you? Huh? Huh? Okay, since you twisted my arm I’ll tell you. I picked up Christine Feehan’s ‘Oceans of Fire’, L.A. Bank’s ‘The Hunted’, Karen Kelley’s ‘Southern Comfort’, ‘Hero, Come Back’ anthology, and ‘Honk If You Love Real Men’ anthology. So now I’m off to read. Have a great rest of the weekend.

This weekend dh and I will be working on changing my website. I like my old site, but I want to be able to do a few more things with it. Not sure if it’ll be up by Monday, but hopefully soon.

A problem that seems to be occurring when people drop me a message in the comment box is that their link isn’t going through. If you’ve had this particular problem, please type in your full website address including the ‘http://www’ part. That should take care of the problem. If it doesn’t, please let me know.

The battle within and outside the RWA still rages on. I’m keeping my eye on it, but have decided to take a step or two back. It’s interfering with my writing and I can’t afford to have it do that right now. (I’m within a few pages of finishing AQ4.) Then it’s off to tidy my werewolf partial for Tor.

Have a great weekend. For those of us fighting colds, feel better soon. Ciao!

Well it looks like the RWA sites I belong to will have to take my website link down in the VERY near future. Why you ask? Apparently if you have objectionable covers (I have one.) or risque excerpts (I have several.), they can no longer link to you. (By ‘they’ I mean ANY RWA site or its affiliates-local chapters & special interest chapters.) If they do, they risk losing their affiliation. To make it more fun, even if you don’t have objectionable covers or excerpts on your site, you can still lose ‘linking’ privileges by having a link to a publishing house who has objectionable covers or excerpts on their site.

Here is what was said and it comes straight from the horse’s mouth so to speak:

Our Website Director got back with our board for those who were not in on the conversation or heard Tara Taylor Quinn speak.


“Tara spoke a little at the meeting about the graphical standards to which RWA — and us as a chapter of RWA — must adhere. Evidently, by showing certain things on our sites or even linking to certain “erotica” sites, we are violating federal rules governing nonprofits and it threatens our status as well as leads to us being blocked by schools and libraries using the new federal standards for pornography. Here is the quote from RWA (you can find it by going to here and going to the Members Only pages, then on that main menu, click Graphical Standards):

‘With respect to all RWA programs and services, the following shall not be depicted or represented: exposed male and female genitalia, exposed female nipples, cunnilingus and fellatio, hands or mouth covering naked female breasts, naked or g-string-clad buttocks, and bestiality. The following words: c*ck, c*cksucker, c*nt, f*ck, motherf*cker, sh*t, and t*t, will not be displayed.’

After the meeting, we discussed the local chapter specifically with Tara. She said all chapters would be getting emails very soon discussing this very fact. She did confirm for us that indeed, if we wish to retain our charter with RWA, we will no longer be able to show jacket covers that don’t meet the standard and we can’t even link to the websites of those authors who might show their own covers, have excerpts that include certain language, or lead to the publisher’s website.”


Read that last part again and then think about the repercussions. F*CK!!! Oh, I forgot, I can’t use that ‘word’ on my site anymore.

I currently have a whopper head cold. Have no idea who I caught it from, but thank you anonymous donor for sharing. (bastard) The carpet cleaners are coming today, so I guess I get to share my cold with them. They’ll love me come Saturday.

Because my head is full of cold, I don’t have much to say. I hope everyone is having a productive writing week. I plan to live vicariously through you all. I’ll get back to you once I return to the land of the living.