Dear readers of this blog,

I am sorry I have not written in so long. There's this 88-page albatross hanging around my neck at the moment that lets me go to work, eat, and occasionally knit. Somehow it is hard to write here when I know I should be revising there.

But, that is not what I came here for today. My knitting-romance-writing friend Rachael wrote a book that is in a contest that will get her manuscript seen by some big wig publishing types. While I am not a reader of romance novels, I have read these chapters and found them quite enjoyable. More importantly, I believe that good things should happen to good people. Rachael is good people. If you also believe this, read her message below, read her chapters and go give her second chapter a 10 (they only count 10s in this contest). You will have done a good deed!

Here's Rachael:

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

Hi there.

Please forgive me for hijacking this blog (ed. I changed her text to say that--sorry, Rachael!) -- I have a favor to ask.

I'm in a competition you may have already heard about. I wrote a book, a romance, full of yarn and alpacas and sheep and hot knitter-on-shepherd action (no, really). I entered it in Gather.com's First Romance Competition. I posted the first chapter, and it garnered enough votes to move on to the second round (in the top 25 of more than 300), so I'm thrilled to say that I'm a finalist, with people now voting on the second chapter. It's kind of an American Idol type of thing, if you can imagine, and this second round is still vote-driven, and the the most important thing to know is that if I end up in the top three, with the most votes, I move on to the last round where THE WHOLE NOVEL IS READ BY SIMON & SCHUSTER and their favorite is published. Oh, my god. I would like that. I would love that.

So I need your vote. I *really* need your vote. I'm in the top four right now, and the three people ahead of me have LOTS of friends. I need to be in the top three to move on, and you will make ALL the difference.

Here's what you do: Read chapter one, but don't vote on it. That one is nice and content and voted on as it is. Please ignore the typos. They hurt my soul, but they're there.

Then read chapter two and please DO vote. If you like the chapter at all, please give it a 10, as they only count 10s (they throw out all votes of 1-9). The chapters with the most 10-votes win.

Even though I know you want to, don't vote more than once, since they're watching for IP fraud. And you DO have to register with their site in order to vote, but they won't spam you, and they don't share or sell email addresses. They will send you a daily email which you can easily opt out of.Oh, please, please? And will you forward this note on if you like the chapter? To all YOUR email contacts?

Thanks so much. Here you go:

Don't vote on chapter one:

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474977094360

DO VOTE on chapter two:

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474977126255

All my thanks. Really, ALL my thanks. It means so much. Whoo-hooo!

xo
Rachael

Comments

[Rachael]

MWHAH! You're the best, girl. Thanks.

[Penny]

Already done! I love Rachael's writing. It's so vivid.
Glad to see you come out of the wood work, if only for a bit!

[Catie Phillips]

I really enjoyed the two chapters, I hope you pass this round too.

[Excuses]

Nicole,
Your first sentence sounds like a lame excuse. Please leave that to me.
thank you

[Zapatillas Puma]

Siempre me pregunto qué tan frustrados Vincent Van Gogh debe ser. Quiero decir, él pasó por la vida de un mendigo, sin que ninguno de sus pinceladas obteniendo Zapatillas Puma