Z.A. Maxfield

Happily. Ever. After.

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Meet Gabe!

January 25, 2020 by Z.A. Maxfield

Gabe: Partners in Grime

I Finally finished Gabe’s book!

Seriously, this has been a very long time coming. I started writing the Grime series and then got caught up with the My Cowboy Heart series. But I always had in the back of my mind that Gabe and Dave needed their story told. I simply needed the time to tell it.

I honestly don’t feel finished with the Grimeverse yet. There may be more to follow. It feels good to write a book that takes place in my hometown, even though I don’t actually live there, anymore. I’m close enough. My dentist is still there, all my friends. There’s an advantage to setting a book where you know all the sights, sounds, smells…well. Maybe the smell thing isn’t an advantage when you’re writing a book about crime scene cleanup. I loved living in the “OC” when I did, and I miss it. Especially being ten minutes away from Disneyland.

Speaking of which, I have never written a book about Disneyland. Hm… That is a thing I could do, even if only to create characters who visit Disneyland together. When you live as close as I do, Disneyland plays an important part of your life. You perform there if you’re in the orchestra, as my kids did. Often, adolescent pre-daters go there in groups. I had my first date at Disneyland, as well as first dates with several boyfriends. I probably got my first real kiss on the Haunted Mansion ride. I’ve lost my car in the parking lot, lost my temper in lines. I breastfed my babies in the Carnation “Mother” room. (Which is both comfortable and air conditioned!!!)

So maybe my next visit with the Grimesters will be a Valentine’s Day short, including a trip to Disneyland, free to all my fans.

I invite you to Stay Tuned…

Buy Gabe, Partners in Crime today, click HERE

Filed Under: Breaking News! Tagged With: Friends to lovers, Gabe, new release, News, The Brothers Grime, Z.A. Maxfield

Generosity of Spirit – My List

June 5, 2018 by Z.A. Maxfield

Generosity of Spirit has been the rule, not the exception in the author community as I’ve experienced it. I have been privileged to see my name on lists of authors who have helped with other authors’ careers, and I want to make my own list, here.

At first, I was tempted to put our willingness to help one another down to the obvious–writers cannot stop talking about writing or they’d have to do it.

But that’s not all this is about, is it? Because I have a theory that every real writer starts out as a reader. And for them, books aren’t simply commodities that can be packaged and marketed like the latest celebrity perfume, using a hint of this. A touch of that. People like this color this year so why not use that on the box?

Every reader/writer wants books to be good.

Most important, every real writer wants to do the impossible: Write the book no one has ever written before, so brilliantly that it breaks all sales records, without being a commercial success, because ew. Amiright?

When writers talk ideas are born.

There’s no reason your ghost written-in-a-week novel, dressed up with a fabulous cover, stuffed with fifty backlist titles, can’t be good. But the statistical chances of it being as good as a novel by a proven author are unlikely.

Marketing those books, buying ads, generating sales is hard work. So is day trading, or running a Ponzi scheme. So is grinding Texas hold ’em in Vegas, don’t ever let anyone tell you the life of a professional gambler is easy. But buying a book someone wrote and putting your name (or a fake name that pays into your PayPal account) on it, has to be the ultimate delusion.

Books enlighten us, inform us, and direct our future actions. They create empathy for our fellow travelers on this planet, even if those people are not like us. They are own-voice stories, and fiction, and fantasy. They speak of faith, and ethics–of the possible dangers of rigorously applied morality or cutting edge science, because writers can make hard concepts easy to understand. They invite discourse. They challenge perception.

Like cameras, they kill fascists.

And in my experience, writers have preferred lifting their fellows quietly, relentlessly, and lovingly rather than attempt to gouge or steal or bully or set attack dogs on their colleagues.

Twenty people without whom I would not have a career*, are:

***I knew I’d forget important people. Edited to add the amazing Heidi C. and Marie S. who came into my life with Coffee and Porn (figuratively speaking.)

  1. Terry Black
  2. K.A. Mitchell
  3. Josh Lanyon
  4. LB Gregg
  5. James Buchanan
  6. Louisa Edwards
  7. Samantha Kane
  8. Deidre Knight
  9. Treva Harte
  10. Laura Baumbach
  11. Kris Jacen
  12. Belinda McBride
  13. Lynn Lorenz
  14. Heidi Cullinan
  15. Marie Sexton
  16. Damon Suede
  17. Caitlyn Willows
  18. Christopher Koehler
  19. Amy Lane
  20. Rhys Ford
  21. Louella Nelson
  22. Debra Holland

*Many more are not listed here as I gave myself a not so hard limit of ten… headdesk.

Filed Under: about me, real life, writers, writing Tagged With: blog, News, Romance, talking with friends, writers, writing

The Writer’s Police Academy

August 26, 2015 by Z.A. Maxfield

WPA_LogoIt WAS Awesome!

I got to play with handcuffs and a thermal imaging device. I got to see a K-9 officer (Franz) and his handler in action. I watched a bank robbery and car chase, a couple of rescues, and some really interesting speakers talk about things that ordinarily don’t come up in polite conversation (why a corpse might burst, for example.)

Wisconsin weather could NOT have been more lovely, and I found myself wanting to look for real estate in the Fox Valley. After all, we’re in a decades long drought in California, and when I saw all that green–green trees, green grass, green, green, green, I fell instantly and irrevocably in love. I’ve always loved Wisconsin because that’s the great state that produced Mr. ZAM, so I of course, I had to get my cheese curds and my Packer Backer T-shirts and my Bucky Badger sweatshirt.

Fox Valley Technical College has to be the most exciting place for the kids who go there. They have a whole fake village, complete with motels, bars, banks, and an actual airplane in which to experience these dramatic rescue and criminal apprehension scenarios. So much thought was put into this little school, it’s truly, truly a gem. I’d love it if my kid, the one who wants to be a firefighter, could go there.

The only problem I had was an iffy ankle (that I had to walk on constantly) and the fear that I wouldn’t know anyone when I got there! But on the very first day, I found Piper Vaughn, and on the second, I found Jamie Lynn Miller and J.D. Ruskin! Could I have been more lucky? I got to see my M/M cohorts there!

At any rate, I had a wonderful, wonderful time. A huge thank you to everyone who worked so hard to make that happen, especially Lee Lofland, Joe Lefevre and those amazing Sisters In Crime! I hope someday, once I’ve taken all this to heart, I’ll write a great scene with accurate technical details and make all of you proud.

Or maybe I can simply keep some of you from tearing your hair out!

I’m back at home now, but plot bunnies seem to be boiling out of the woodwork!

Filed Under: Adventure, real life, writers, writing Tagged With: News, Writer's Police Academy, writing

I’m hosting an exclusive contest!

July 14, 2013 by Z.A. Maxfield

 

Name That Hunk!

Man Landscape

I’ve created an exclusive contest for subscribers to my newsletter — name that Hunk!

Get your favorite man’s name into one of my books! Tell me what you want my next hunky main character’s name to be and why you love that name so much! Look to the July newsletter campaign for details.

 

Filed Under: Breaking News!, Contests Tagged With: contests, News

Lost/Broken Links and Other News

September 9, 2010 by Z.A. Maxfield

Crazy day! I’ve only just discovered that the image links on my “Links” page have disappeared! If I hadn’t been linking to an author whose book I recently read and enjoyed I would never have noticed. So, for now, my website “Links” Page and “Books” Page are under construction. Soon — All too soon, I have to add more books and every single slot on that page is full, at this point. I have no earthly idea how to put in more. Since I plan to write more — many, many more books, I’d better be searching out a solution. So in the meantime, please pardon the dust on those pages while I work on them. If anyone has a question that isn’t addressed on this website feel free, PLEASE, to email me personally at zamaxfield@yahoo.com, and I’ll try to help.

While we’re talking about links, if anyone wants me to link to their author page on wiki or their website please let me know, send me a banner and a link and I’ll put it up there, you can link back or not as you like.

In the meantime, I’m about to update my coming soon page with news about two Christmas stories, so be on the lookout for news about upcoming releases.

And finally, the biggest news of all, my editor really LIKES the title “The Pharaoh’s Concubine.” She believes it’s fun and different and attention getting, and so I’m happily placing myself in her capable hands and leaving the title As Is for the moment, at least until she tells me otherwise.

(Did I mention I LOVE all my editors and they have the last word?) I got such great suggestions for titles, one or two might actually end up as books, just because I liked the title!

A GREAT BIG thank you again to everyone who tried to help me out of my title slump, I have a little something planned in the near future for you all, a little something extra in the nature of a just for giggles story to thank everyone for their kindness… Keep an eye out around Halloween for that, I’m thinking of a free Fall holiday read centered around my favorite time of year!

Filed Under: Books, website, writers Tagged With: News

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