Where the heck's Estonia?

That was my first thought when I heard from the subrights agent at my agency about an offer on The Assassin. I actually thought Estonia had disappeared from being years ago, but I was oh, so wrong. (Though Robert did have to find a map to show me its location. South of Finland.) Hopefully, I'll get a copy of the book in . . . Estonian? I know they speak Russian there -- and something else, I think -- but have no idea what language the book will be in. Hey, it's a sale -- a foreign sale -- to a place I've never sold to before. That's enough to satisfy me!

Have been working on a synopsis for the next Selena book. I wrote the first one -- agents said great subplot! Where's the main plot? So I wrote another -- agents said great plot . . . but where does it fizzle out to? So I'm reworking that to keep the suspense in the forefront. Already have an idea what #4's going to be about, too. Hmm . . . book 3, like books 1 and 2, will take place in areas I'm already familiar with. Wonder if I could possibly get some travel out of #4? Surely Selena needs to return to Puerto Rico or to Key West for something. Rachel10:58 AM

Okay, now here's Chance.  Rachel10:52 AM

Meet our new pups! Chance, the rather scruffy one, is the most adorable golden Labradoodle you'll ever see (our vet thinks he's part yellow Lab, part golden retriever, and part wire-haired something). And Olivia . . . pup with an Attitude. We've got five males in the house, and the newest contender for alpha is the smallest and the only female. 'Nuff said.  Rachel10:50 AM

DEEP COVER cover flats

I got the cover flats for Deep Cover yesterday and they are so cool! This is the best cover I've ever seen! (Well, okay, maybe among the five best.)

Quoting from the back cover:

Undercover -- and totally exposed . . .

Tall, lithe Selena McCaffrey turns heads on the streets -- and hides an assassin's knife beneath her clothes. In another life, Selena would have chosen a peaceful career as a painter. But as a child, fate plunged her into a fight for survival -- and a trusted father-figure forced her into a life of crime.

Now the feds want Selena to go undercover. Her assignment: break up the criminal empire once run by her protector and mentor. But playing a double game threatens the first good thing she's ever had with a man -- an honest Tulsa cop -- and draws Selena into a high-stakes sting filled with deception and shocking violence.

Surrounded by danger -- and coming closer to uncovering a chilling truth about herself and her past -- Selena is about to find out just how much deeper she'll have to go . . . to get out alive.

Doesn't that sound like something you just have to read? Doesn't it make you want to hustle over to Amazon or B&N and order a copy now? Rachel8:46 AM

Cool bookmarks!

Hey, I finally got around to having bookmarks made. My excellent web diva (www.websbymary.com -- if you're looking, check her out; she's fabulous!) designed them for me and I got them in the mail a few weeks ago. They're gorgeous! So, if you'd like to have one for yourself to tuck inside your already-read and much-loved copy of The Assassin (hey, there's no room for modesty in this business!), send a SASE to:

Rachel Butler
c/o Happily Ever Authors
P O Box 643
Sapulpa OK 74067-0643

I'm so jazzed that I'll be getting the bookmarks for Deep Cover BEFORE it comes out! Stay tuned here. Rachel8:13 AM

Mortar Girl, Round 2

I had such success with my steps that I went to work on the area in front of the house that poses as a grossly undertended flower bed. You know the kind of space -- the sidewalk runs parallel to the house, but can't be right up against it, so you get a couple feet of dirt there that pretends to be a flower bed.

My particular fake is three feet wide -- too wide for a good flower bed because I can't reach the far side without getting into some pretty precarious positions -- and it grows nothing as well as weeds, rocks, and roots. (In this part of Oklahoma, we all grow our own rocks.) Oh, yeah, and of course it's a prime gopher and mole attraction.

The mortar work was actually the easy part this time around . . . well, except on the second row of rocks. If you ever really look at a rock wall, you'll notice that the stones they use have one thing in common: they're mostly flat on all the edges. There's a reason for that (I know now). Being a creative person (or inexperienced mason, some might say, though then I'd have smack them), I was drawn to the odd-shaped rocks. They're different. They're cool looking. They're a bad choice. A really bad choice. It's very hard to get the second row of rocks to stay in place long enough to mortar them when they're balancing on a point here and a bump there.

Building the 3 X 14' border didn't take too long. (That's about half the flower bed; a crape myrtle that volunteered to grow in the middle of the bed necesitated dividing it into three sections.) Silly me -- I thought the hard part was done. Little did I know that the real work was just beginning.

I won't bore you with all the details. Suffice it to say, my nails may never recover, I need an adjustment or three from my chiropractor, I now have a farmer's tan to go with all the scrapes and bruises, and I have a killer flower bed, all planted in zinnias. I love zinnias (especially the apricot ones -- too gorgeous!.

And by the time the next crop of rocks is ready, I'm starting on the rest of the bed.

Like I said before, just call me Mortar Girl. Rachel8:07 AM