And the Winner is . . .

Thanks to everyone who left a comment on my post celebrating the release of the excellent resource for writers The Emotion Thesaurus by Becca Puglisi and Angela Ackerman of the rockin' site The Bookshelf Muse.

The winner of a SIGNED paperback copy is . . . RUTH DARRINGTON.  Congratulations, Ruth!

Check back soon for more giveaways and other fun posts.

'Cause You Can't Work All the Time . . .

Kayaking with my niece, Nicole, who was visiting from Philadelphia.

Docking on Munyon Island (MacArthur Beach State Park) for a picnic of peanut butter and strawberry jam sandwiches. 

While hiking through Munyon Island, we learned there was a 5-story, 21-room, 8-bath hotel built on the end of the island in 1903.  It burnt to the ground in 1917. 

Nicole and I decided it would make a great setting for a horror story, where ghosts from the hotel still inhabit the tiny island.  And visitors, like us, are sometimes lured to the hotel . . . and never leave.

Hmm.  I guess when you're a writer, even when you're not working . . . your imagination is always on call.