More Contest News!

For those of you who missed my earlier blog, I am holding a contest in which you can win a:

• $300 Sephora gift card
• $200 gift card for a gourmet San Francisco Chocolatier (to be named later)
• $100 Starbucks gift card

But the grand prize will be A LABOR DAY WEEKEND TRIP TO SAN FRANCISCO! And it’s this last prize that I wanted to write about today. I now have the name of the hotel the lucky winner will be staying in. After being flown into the city by the bay (or driven if you live within a 100 miles of SF) on Saturday September 5th I personally will drive you to The Parc 55 Hotel where you will stay until Labor Day, September 7th.

The Parc 55 is a luxury hotel located in the heart of San Francisco’s main shopping district (Union Square). It boasts beautiful views of the city and (I know this is going to sound strange) insanely comfortable beds. Seriously, I know people who stay there just so they can sleep on those suckers.

As some of you are aware, the way to enter this contest is to promote Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss. To find out how scroll down to my March 5th blog post titled: How You Can Win A Trip to San Francisco!

Be sure to pre-order your copy of Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss (or request a copy from your library) today so you can prepare your entry as soon as possible!


Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
The Sophie Katz Murder Mystery Seris,
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING
Pre-order LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS on Amazon or Barnesandnoble.com today!

Check Out What A Little Creative Thinking Can Do

An Israeli DJ was checking out amateur musicians on Youtube and all of a sudden he got an idea: “What if I combine the sound of this Youtube video and another and another and make it one big musical composition? “
So after a couple of months of serious editing he came up with a series of videos that he titled Thru You. ALL the music and imagery is from the videos he selected, he didn’t add anything.
Here’s just one of the Thru You videos. Maybe it’s just me but I think it’s pretty awesome.





Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
The Sophie Katz Murder Mystery Seris,
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING
Pre-order LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS on Amazon or Barnesandnoble.com today!

It's Still Hard For Me To Grasp

My first book, Sex, Murder And A Double Latte came out in June 2005. I was so excited I could barely see straight! I prayed that it would be the first of many books. I hoped against hope that I was beginning a new career. But I was also scared. I was scared that the book would fail, that no one outside my own circle of friends and family would buy it. Even now I fear that my career as an author is going to disappear in the blink of an eye. And yet when I look at my body of work it seems...substantial. Like maybe I can stop worrying so much. That maybe, just maybe the reason my books have been translated into so many languages and continue to be carried in book stores around the world is because some of you actually LIKE what I do.

For that I really need to thank you. Thank you for giving me license to exhale. I've been holding my breath for a little too long.

My Celebrity Crush List

The other day I took my son to see Race To Witch Mountain. The movie was fine. The storyline was passably entertaining, the action sequences were okay and Dwayne Johnson was oh-my-God-can-I-eat-him-up-with-a-spoon-fantastic. Seriously, there is simply nothing wrong with the man. He's charismatic, he has chiseled features, he's tall, his smile is flawless and his body is...well, there are no words for what his body is. Perfection just doesn't cover it.

Needless to say The Rock has moved up to the number one spot in my celebrity crush list. I'm pretty sure everybody has a celebrity crush. Yes, some people may have crushes on famous scientists or politicians rather than movie stars but I'm pretty sure that we've all found ourselves admiring some woman or man with enormous cache who we probably won't ever meet let alone date. And that's what's so freeing about the celebrity crush. Since you most likely won't have a chance to hook up with the object of your crush under any circumstances the circumstances become completely unimportant. You don't have to worry about whether or not the celebrity is single (or if you're single) or if he or she likes blondes or brunettes or even if the celebrity is gay or straight. It's all total fantasy so those inconvenient bits of reality don't matter.

That said, here's my list of celebrity crushes:

1. Dwayne Johnson (but we already established that).
2. Anderson Cooper (a well informed smart environmentalist...and have you SEEN him wearing those fitted tees when he's doing those Planet In Peril shows?!)
3. Blair Underwood (As soon as he moved into Amanda's building in Sex and The City I started counting down the days until she got his shirt off)
4. Johnny Depp (Only man in the world who can make a brilliant, drunk lunatic pirate seem hot)
5. Antonio Banderas (tall, dark and with an accent...do I need to say more?)

Those are my top five. I honestly don't know who number six would be...or maybe I do but I'm too embarrassed to admit it ; ) Again, this is fantasy. It has absolutely nothing to do with who I want in my reality. But when these guys are in a movie you can count on me being in the theater with a bucket of popcorn and a big smile on my face.

So what about you? Who makes your celebrity crush list? Inquiring minds want to know!

Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
The Sophie Katz Murder Mystery Seris,
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING
Pre-order LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS on Amazon or Barnesandnoble.com today!

It's Just So Silly

While at Starbucks I noticed a woman who was wearing an outfit that didn't so much shout as scream "I'm the stereotypical, Martha Stewart loving, suburban mom!" I immediately knew she had just left an audition. A few minutes later she came over to talk to the guy at the table next to me (who she apparently knew) and sure enough she had just finished reading for a mom role in a Disney TV show. The thing that surprised me was that the kids she was supposed to play "mom" to were in their teens and there's no way this woman was much older than 32.

"I went straight from hot girl in car to mom of fifteen year olds," she laughed (but not too merrily). "I never even got to be mom of toddler. I skipped that stage."

That's the weird thing about Hollywood. Here mid-thirties is middle aged. There are a few actresses who manage to hold onto their sex-symbol status after thirty: Angelina Jollie, Halle Berry, Eva Longoria...Angelina Jollie. It isn't a very long list. But it SHOULD be a long list. I can't tell you how many gorgeous, totally fit, thirty and forty-something women live in this city! I can pretty much guarantee you that the woman dressed like the cookie-cooking-housewife would still be considered hot by any guy lucky enough to put her in his car. This idea that moms of teenagers need to look like they're 30 is the whole reason why everyone around here is running out and getting their face filled with age-defying snake venom.

But personally I would prefer to keep all needles away from my face. But maybe, when the wrinkles come, I'll go another route. For instance I could start telling people I'm four years older than I am. That way I'll spend my life hearing people say, "Wow! You look so young!"

Hey, it's better than snake venom.

Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
The Sophie Katz Murder Mystery Seris,
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING
Pre-order LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS on Amazon or Barnesandnoble.com today!

How You Can Win A Trip To San Francisco!

Books are in trouble. Barnes And Noble’s chairman and co-founder Leonard Riggio has said that he has never seen “a retail climate as poor as the one we are in. Nothing even close.” In addition to that the opportunities to promote a book are drying up. It was only four years ago that Sex, Murder And A Double Latte was introduced to the reading public. It was written up in The Washington Post’s Book World, Seattle Post Intelligencer and the Rocky Mountain News just to name a few publications.

You know what isn’t around anymore? The Washington Post’s Book World, The Seattle Post Intelligencer and the Rocky Mountain News.

So what’s an author to do to get the word out about her next book?

She turns to you, the readers of course. I need your help spreading the word about Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss and I’m ready to reward your efforts.


The following is a contest in which I dearly hope you will all participate.

The grand prize is a stay in San Francisco over Labor Day weekend. I will buy you a round trip Southwest plane ticket from anywhere in the continental United States to the City By The Bay. I’ll put you up in a four-star hotel to boot.

But it doesn’t end there. I will be giving you the Sophie Katz Experience tour. I will take you to many of the places Sophie has gone to throughout the series. We’ll eat at the restaurants that Sophie has eaten at with her friends; check out “The Bitches Circle” where Sophie saw her first dead body and the bars and clubs (assuming your over 21 AND CAN PROVE IT) that Sophie frequents.

Other prizes will include:

A $300 gift card at Sephora
A $200 gift card for one of San Francisco’s best chocolatiers (you can choose your chocolates online)
A $100 gift card for Starbucks

So now your next question should be: How can I get in on this?

Get ready to start reading, blogging and filming.

For every blog that you write about Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss you will be entered into the drawing for the SF trip. Every time you write a review on Amazon, Barnesandnoble.com or Borders.com you will be entered into the drawing for the SF trip. If you read my book in your book group and have me speak to your group via speakerphone (or via Internet if it’s an online group) when you meet to discuss it everyone in the group will be entered into the drawing. If you put together a book trailer for Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss suitable for posting on YouTube you will get TEN entries into the drawing. If you're unfamiliar with book trailers click here and here for examples of some good ones.

I will draw ONE name for the SF trip. I will then look to see who has the most entries and if I didn’t draw his/her name as the winner of the trip I will give that person the $300 Sephora gift certificate so they can get as much lip gloss as they want ; ) The person with the second highest number of entries will win the gift certificate for the chocolates and the one with the third highest level of entries will win the Starbucks card. No one person will be awarded more than one prize.

There are of course some limitations to this contest. If you happen to live in Canada or England you will have access to Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss at the same time the people in the States will and you are free to participate but unfortunately I will not be able to provide for your airfare should you win the trip. You must be 18 or older to win the trip to San Francisco (although you can be under 18 and still win the gift cards) and you must be prepared to show proper identification to PROVE your age. The one nice thing about being a mystery novelist is that I’ve gotten to know a lot of helpful cops during my research and they’ve offered to help me check the validity of IDs and whatnot. You can bring a friend or family member with you on your trip and they’re welcome to share your hotel room but unfortunately they will be responsible for all other expenses including airfare and meals. If you live within 100 miles of San Francisco I will provide ground transportation for you to get to your hotel room and back home. The hotel stay will be for the nights of September 5th and 6th 2009. If you are going to post a review on Amazon, B&N or Borders you must email to tell me 24 hours ahead of time and give me the screen name the review will be posted under. If you blog under an alias the same rule applies. You must show me the Book Trailer before posting it on YouTube for my approval. This SHOULD go without saying but if you break any laws while making a book trailer or make a trailer that is inappropriate for a PG-13 audience you will not get my approval nor will you be entered in the drawing. I do not need to see Anatoly's Mr. Happy.

The contest will officially begin at midnight June 1st and will go on through midnight August 15th. Unfortunately I won't be able to count late entries and I won't count blogs or reviews posted before the book's release date because I do actually want you to READ the book before you write about it. Of course the official release date is June 1st and I realize that you won't be able to read the book in an hour. But those who pre-order Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss should be able to get it before June (approximately May 26th) and will have the chance to start reading early.

I will continue to release more details about the contest within the coming months. I'll be letting you know the name of the hotel, the names of some of the places we will be going to and the names of the businesses who will be sponsoring the contest. So go out there and start putting together your book groups and start pre-ordering now!

Good Luck!!!!


Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
The Sophie Katz Murder Mystery Seris,
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING
Pre-order LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS on Amazon or Barnesandnoble.com today!

It's Not THAT Bad (The Trick Is Remembering That)

Yesterday I was looking at something that resembled a child's drawing of a slide: a shaky pencil thin line that started near the top of the page and then went down, down, down, down.

Of course it wasn't a child's drawing. It was a line graph of my stock portfolio. Once upon a time I had this silly idea that I would make some "conservative" investments so I could afford a good college education for my son and maybe even a house for myself. Now....well, all I can say is that it's a good thing he's smart because he's going to need that scholarship. And the upside of renting is that I don't have to try (and probably fail) to refinance a mortgage like everybody else around me.

As I considered if I needed to start selling stocks or shifting things around I began to wonder what companies were still doing well, or at least less badly than everybody else. I've heard Coca-Cola is doing okay. Nice to know that when all is said and done people will still spend their money on carbonated corn-syrup.

Disney is doing better than pretty much any of the other Hollywood studios (although that's not saying a lot at the moment). The studios are now suffering from excessive diversification. GE owns Universal along with a lot of financial holdings which are weighing the whole company down. Fox is suffering because Rupert Murdoch went around taking over all the country's major newspapers, many of which are now failing. But Disney, they have always been and always will be all about Disney. Feeling depressed about the economy? Why not forget your troubles at the Happiest Place on Earth with their buy four nights get three free package? Still can't afford it? Well, if you live within approximately 100 miles of one of their parks Disney will happily let you pay as little as $8.75/month for an annual pass (after you buy one ticket). Of course you'll probably want to buy yourself the $16 mouse ears and a $3 bottle of water and a $14 balloon while you're there. And let's not forget the Mickey shaped soft pretzel and that really cute Pooh Bear for your new nephew but when you think about how much you're saving on a ticket it's all good, right? Well, you can pretend it is. Just think of the necessary justifications as being part of the "fantasy experience." And the movies they've been making are quintessential Disney films aka feel good movies with a happy ending. Just what we all need during this troubled time.

And then there's Target. With both Meryvns and Circuit City gone it's impossible not to turn to Target for something, be it a new bluetooth or a new sundress. And now Target has once again made it possible for all of us to have those designer clothes that we quietly covet but could never before afford. As of today Target is selling a line by THE Alexander McQueen. Even if you're struggling to buy groceries a $40 outfit by McQueen might make you think about pulling out the check card.

I'm not saying that people should run out and buy stocks in these companies (although they're certainly a better bet than AIG) but I do think you can count on them being around next year and even the year after. Considering what's going on in the world that's saying something.
As for me, well I'm trying not to get too stressed about things. I have to remind myself (often) that the very fact that I HAVE a stock portfolio means that I'm better off than about 3/4 of the world's population. Seriously, next time you feel bad about your dumpy apartment turn on The Travel Channel and watch Andrew Zimmern tour some hut in a third world country so he can taste the freshly killed bats that the villagers are cooking up in an almost-clean pan. Yes, we've all had to cut back, many of us have had to cut back A LOT but the standard of living in this country is still insanely high and I don't see that changing any time soon. In this country when someone is forced to build themselves a make-shift hut to live in with no electricity or plumbing we call them "homeless."

It's just a good thing to keep in mind next time you're upset about having to cancel the family vacation. And if that isn't enough to soothe you go see a Disney movie.

Kyra Davis
Bestselling Author of:
The Sophie Katz Murder Mystery Seris,
and
SO MUCH FOR MY HAPPY ENDING
Pre-order LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS on Amazon or Barnesandnoble.com today!