The winners of a copy of my latest German release, MIT DEN AUGEN MEINER SCHWESTER, are Jennifer, Karina Hoppe, and @linshealy (on Twitter).

Thank you for all the lovely messages, in German and in English, for my mother! She really enjoyed them.

I’m thrilled that my German publisher, Diana, will also be publishing my next book, DEAR THING, in Germany. A bit of wonderful news to start out the week!

Fecklet, age five, took me out* for sushi for US Mothers’ Day. (Mothers’ Day in the UK was back in March; we went out for sushi then, too.) We sat at the bar and took plates off the conveyer belt as they went by.

This was what our table looked like after we’d finished. The stack on the left is Fecklet’s. The stack on the right is mine.

*I paid.

MIT DEN AUGEN MEINER SCHWESTER is out today in Germany. It’s the German edition of GETTING AWAY WITH IT and the title translates into the wonderful “With The Eyes of My Sister”.

I received author copies today and I think they’re beautiful.

The book is dedicated to my mother, and appropriately enough, today is her birthday! Happy birthday, Mom. I love you and I wish I could be with you to share some cake.

If you are a German speaker and would like a chance to win a copy of this book, you can do one of two things. Either leave a comment below, saying happy birthday to my mother (in German, or indeed any language you wish). Or if you’re on Twitter, you can tweet the following:

MIT DEN AUGEN MEINER SCHWESTER by @julie_cohen published today. “Klug, witzig, überraschend.” German speakers, RT for chance to win a copy!

I have three copies to give away between the blog, Twitter and Facebook and I’ll choose the winners at random.

One of my most popular posts on this blog is Post-It Plotting, but as one writer pointed out, my normal Post-It plots don’t include any sort of a calendar or timeline.

I’m working on Dear Thing, which is the story of two women and one pregnancy. It has two points of view, which is something I haven’t done for a while, and it has to be plotted out over the course of ten months which, because one character is a child and one is a teacher, must include three school terms and three school holidays.

My brain is far too small to process all of this, so I decided to do a bit of keeping track. I went to Staples and bought a financial year planner (I would have bought a normal year planner, but my novel just happens to start in March and finish in January, so an April to April one is much better). I coloured in the school holidays, determined what date one of my characters would have conceived, and wrote in 40 weeks’ worth of pregnancy. Then I started to plot events, from two points of view, on the calendar.

I had to cut the Post-Its into smaller strips to fit on the calendar. That is a down side.

It’s very rough as of yet, and only covers half the novel so far (because—ahem—that’s all I’ve written). But I’m finding it extremely useful.

And then some stuff happens. Yes, there's a character called Jarvis. I'm quite excited about that.

On Twitter, @suefortin1 was asking for tips on writing one-sentence blurbs for her novel, and I suggested that Twitter was a really good tool for producing these. When you only have 140 characters to get your ideas across, and when the messages are read whilst zipping down a tweetstream, you have to be both brief and catchy.

These are also called ‘elevator pitches’ because they’re the sort of thing you can tell to an agent or an editor, or indeed to any old half-interested stranger, whilst in an elevator between one floor and another. They’re extremely useful for selling your book—not only to a publisher, but to the book buyers once it’s published. They’re also useful at parties, when being interviewed, or basically any time you want to tell someone what your book is about without boring them to death.

I volunteered to tweet some elevator pitches for my three latest books, all of them 140 characters or less long. Here they are:

A woman tries to escape tragedy in her real life by pretending to be in a Regency romance.

(The Summer of Living Dangerously)

An erotic science fiction romantic comedy about a woman falling in love with a big blue robot.

(Love Machine, by Electra Shepherd. I used these exact words in my query letter.)

Dear Thing follows a couple as they try to have a baby, and focuses on their best friend’s decision to carry one for them as a surrogate.

(This is taken from The Bookseller article about my next book.)

They’re all quite different, but they sum up the book’s premise, outline the main conflict, and give some idea of the genre and the tone. One of them starts with the main character; one starts with the book’s genre; one starts with the title. So there’s no formula. It’s whatever works.

Some other writers have taken up the challenge and tweeted theirs as well. Here’s one for Veronica Henry’s (@veronica_henry) The Long Weekend:

Eight people check into a Cornish seaside hotel for a long weekend,bringing their emotional baggage with them.

Lovely word play on that one, and emphasis on setting, emotion, and the fact that there are multiple, possibly connected, storylines.

This one is from Catherine Miller (@katylittlelady):

When there are more than miles keeping Grace and Adam apart, will they ever go the distance?

Catherine tells me that this is for a women’s fiction novel, but to me it reads like a straight romance, probably on the lighter side of the spectrum. I love the play on words, though. What do you think?

This one is for Sophie Hannah’s (@sophiehannaCB1) latest thriller in progress, and is quite different in style as well as genre:

Plane delay. Hotel overnight. Share room frantic stranger whose friend’s charged with murder. Who? Only man you’ve ever loved.

This is from Shelley Harris’s (@shelleywriter) debut novel, Jubilee, and combines subject with period and also major symbol:

Iconic photo of street party taken on Silver Jubilee day – but only British Asian boy at its centre knows truth behind picture.

If you take up the challenge yourself, please post what you’ve done in the comments. No more than 140 characters please (including spaces and punctuation)! I’ll try to add some more from Twitter onto this post. The discussion is hashtagged #elevatorpitch

Today is Shakespeare’s birthday and it’s also World Book Night.

Last year, I gave away 50 copies of Rachel’s Holiday by Marian Keyes at my local hospice and hospital. I loved being able to share one of my favourite feel-good books with women who might need a bit of escape in their lives.

I also decided to follow Nicola Morgan’s idea about a complementary World Book Night. I bought a copy of a book from an independent book shop, and gave it away. I bought a copy of John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany from WordPlay in Caversham, and left it for anyone who wanted it in Picnic Cafe, in Reading.

This year, I bought a copy of Veronica Henry‘s Marriage and Other Games from Jaffé and Neale bookshop in Chipping Norton, where I was for the Chipping Norton Literary Festival (of which more later). Yesterday I left it on an unoccupied stool in The Lyndhurst pub in Reading, where the Rock God and I were enjoying a gorgeous Sunday lunch and board games with the Fecklet.

If you’re very lucky it might still be there…run, go have a look! And enjoy.

Are you doing anything?

I’m thrilled to announce that THE SUMMER OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY has been shortlisted for the Novel with Strong Romantic Elements category of the Romance Writers of America’s National Readers’ Choice Awards, run by the Oklahoma chapter of the RWA.

What’s even better is that my dear friend and amazing writer Susanna Kearsley has also been shortlisted in my category, with her novel THE ROSE GARDEN.

Susanna and I have decided to settle this matter in the only honourable way: by drinking tequila shots.

We may be some time.

(The winners will, in fact, be announced in California on at the RWA National Conference in July. My Harlequin buddies Donna Alward and Christyne Butler have been shortlisted too in their category. They may, or may not, also be having a tequila duel.)

Kate Hardy tagged me with this Lucky 7 meme.

Rules: go to p77 of your current work, 7th line down, and paste the next 7 sentences. Then tag 7 others.

I’m working on Dear Thing. It’s the story of Claire and Ben, who can’t have children, and Ben’s best friend Romily, who offers to act as a surrogate for them. Romily’s a single mum, and Posie is her daughter.

This is when Claire comes to Romily’s flat for the first time:

            ‘This is nice,’ Claire said, trying to hide the implication that she hadn’t expected it to be.

          Claire followed Romily’s gaze as it settled on the worn carpet and then glanced over two dying potted plants on the windowsill. ‘Well, it does all right for me and Pose. Cup of tea?’

            Romily scooped up Posie’s crumpled school uniform from the sofa and kicked a pair of stray trainers aside on her way to the kitchenette, which was fitted into an alcove in the main room. Posie appeared in the doorway, her face wreathed in smiles, and ran to Ben to give him a hug, and then Claire.

            ‘I didn’t know you were coming over!’ she said happily. ‘Come to my room, I need to show you my base camp—I’m in Peru today.’  

This is actually an interesting exercise. It can show you whether you’re lacking tension in your work. I’ll admit that after cutting and pasting, I did a little editing out of unnecessary sentences, so that this extract would show what I wanted it to: the contrast between Claire and Romily, how Romily feels that Claire is judging her, and Posie’s imagination and love for the other couple. I’ll probably keep the edit in the ms.

I’m rubbish at tagging people, but if you’re moved to do this on your own blog, add a link on the comments so I can come and see. Or if you don’t have a blog, put yours in the comments!

I don’t often have interviews on this blog, but today I’m making an exception. I met Electra Shepherd this past summer, in the middle of Hurricane Irene. My family was holed up in our cabin on the shore of Roxbury Pond in western Maine. The wind was howling, the trees were swaying, the pond was rising, the roads were flooding, and the power was out. We were huddled up in bed, using candles for light to see, with a bucket of pond water near the toilet in case it needed to be flushed.

In walked Electra. She picked up my laptop. She said, ‘Hey, does this have any charge in it?’

It did. She opened it up. And by the light of a Yankee Candle, she started writing.

The result is LOVE MACHINE,  an erotic science fiction romantic comedy novella about a woman who falls in love with a big blue robot. It’s out now, from Ellora’s Cave, and in honour of its release, she agreed to do an interview with me.

Who are you?

I’m a carbon-based lifeform with some interesting attachments.

Tell us about your debut novel, LOVE MACHINE.

It’s about good-time girl Cally Morgenstern. Cally’s father was a genius who invented many things before he died, including house robots to take care of his children’s every need. Cally, who knows the family genius genes have passed her by, is more interested in meeting hot real men than hanging out with tin ones. But one night, during a snow storm, she can’t hook up with any of her play partners. And when her vibrator runs out of batteries, house robot Blue offers to take its place.

Blue is six foot three, immensely strong, bald, and (obviously) blue. Following some recent adjustments by Cally’s geeky sister Ilsa, he seems to be rapidly gaining a personality. And, it turns out, he’s very curious about human sexuality. Cally decides to teach him everything she knows about sexual pleasure.

Even if she has to build him a few necessary parts in the process…

Why robots, Electra?

Robots are sexy. They will not rest until their Prime Directive is accomplished! And what if their Prime Directive is giving you sexual pleasure? Yeow!

If you agree (or even if you don’t), you can take my poll about who’s the sexiest robot. It’s only about male robots. There are too many FemBots around already; any old perv can make up a FemBot. What we need more of in this world are hot robotic men.

But why a blue robot?

Blue is also sexy. I refer you to this evidence.

Hmm. Fair enough. What inspired you to write this particular story?

I really, really wanted to write a scene about building a robot a penis. So I had to make up a story where that would be inevitable.

What’s next for you? 

I’m planning another two books about the Morgenstern family. Ilsa, the computer geek sister, finds love in a very unexpected place in MR ROBOTO. And Jonathan, the financial whiz eldest brother with no time to play, is introduced to novel ways of having fun in SHE BLINDED ME WITH SCIENCE.

I’m hoping there will be another hurricane soon, so I can write them.

You can visit Electra here, or fan her on Facebook here, or buy her book here. And do go take the poll about sexiest robots…

Personally, I voted for Data.

Ah, well, as I was typing the below post, the following announcement came up on The Bookseller:

Transworld has acquired a novel about a couple’s struggles to conceive a child by author Julie Cohen, whose previous books were published by Headline.

Corgi and Black Swan publishing director Catherine Cobain bought UK and Commonwealth rights to Dear Thing and one other novel. Bantam Press will publish in hardback in June 2013 and in paperback by Black Swan in 2014.

The first title follows a couple as they try to have a baby, and focuses on their best friend’s decision to carry one for them as a surrogate.

Cobain said: “Julie is an incredibly talented writer whose books I have always been passionate about. Dear Thing touched all of us at Transworld who read it—it’s brilliantly written, with a complex story that is quite simply heart-rending.”

I’m so excited that Transworld have given me the chance to write this book. It’s a new challenge for me, I’m in love with all of the characters, and I’m enjoying every minute of it.

And now I’m off to the aquarium. Fecklet tells me there will be sharks.

It’s quite an exciting time…I’m waiting for the announcement of two bits of news, and I’m not sure which one is coming first.

Publishing is such a strange business. You write and write and write and submit and submit and submit, and nothing at all happens. You get used to long periods where you hardly talk to anyone, and work all the time, and spend most days doing mighty battles with crows of doubt.

And then…suddenly…it does happen. All at once. All at the same time.

Anyway, a lot has been happening with me, publishing-wise, and I haven’t been able to talk about any of it. I can soon. I’m just not sure which bit I can talk about first.

Meanwhile, I’m going to the aquarium today to see some sharks.

Liz reminded me yesterday that, according to this blog, ten years ago this month I started to write a book that I titled Delicious, and that exactly nine years ago yesterday, on 21 March 2003, that book was rejected for the second time. (It had already been rejected once in August 2002.)

I don’t know how Liz remembers these things—she claims it’s because she’s secretly installed video cameras in my house*—but her comment sent me to my Rejections File to have a look.

My Rejections File is quite large. It’s yellow. It lives at the bottom of my desk, next to (ironically enough) my Publishing Contracts file. At this point in my life, my Publishing Contracts file is bigger than my Rejections file (largely, it must be said, because rejections consist of one page, and contracts consist of about twenty). But it wasn’t always that way. For a very long time, my Rejections file was by far the biggest file in the pile.

I’ve been rejected by publishers, by agents, by magazines, by contests I didn’t win. The weight of these rejections came from the time before I was published and agented, but I’ve had rejections since then, too. My last two rejection letters were for a short story and for a novella. They were both form rejections. They stung. I wish I could say they didn’t, but they did.

Rejections do sting…at the time when you get them. That’s why when you get a rejection, you have to rant and rave (not to the rejector or in public, but quietly, in private) and drink wine and eat chocolate until you are drunk and sticky. But they do something else too.

Today, I looked at my 2003 rejection for Delicious and it didn’t sting at all. It wasn’t a form rejection; it was a two-page letter detailing where I’d gone wrong and possibly the best rejection letter I’ve ever had in my life. And everything that was in that letter was exactly correct. That book didn’t deserve to get published. It wasn’t ready. I wasn’t ready.

Two years later, I rewrote that novel from scratch, using the advice I’d been given in that rejection, and I sold it.

My most recent form rejection, for the novella, got me thinking too.  I tried to think about why it had been rejected, even though the rejection gave no specific reasons. I gave the novella a thorough edit, to address the issue I thought it probably had, and sent it out somewhere else, where it sold.

Lesson number one: you can learn from rejections.

Some of the rejections in my Rejection File came from editors whom, later on my career, I ended up working with. Some of them came from agents whom I now know on a social basis, or whom I’ve run into in a social setting. A couple of times I’ve said, quite cheerfully and without rancour, ‘Ah yes, you probably don’t remember, but you rejected me ages ago.’ The reaction has either been polite forgetfulness or embarrassment, accompanied by a complete shift in topic. I’ve usually felt rather foolish.

Lesson number two: specific rejections are best forgotten, at least in public, even if you don’t care about them any more.

I’m proud of my Rejections File. Each rejection in there is proof of a time that I tried. It’s proof that I’ve been working hard and getting better. I don’t think that my fragile ego could deal with reading all of the rejections in one go, but I’m glad I’ve kept them. They still have things to teach me.

*If that video camera thing is true, I really feel sorry for poor Liz, because I am NOT a pretty sight about 98.4% of the time and sometimes I am also scratching my butt.