Monday, December 23, 2019

BOOK DEALS - FREE & ALMOST FREE!!!

πŸŽ„Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays Readers!πŸŽ„

This week, I've lowered and obliterated prices as a gift to you. I know how important reading is, especially if this time of year leaves you lonely or wanting. And for the rest, just grab a book and curl up in a big chair to enjoy the adventures.





All my books are on AMAZON over here:
Kim on AMAZON



The Dream Jumper's Promise - 99 cents this week only

Christmas in Crystal Creek - FREE Dec 23rd and 24th

Christmas Cookbook - FREE this week

Christmas in Love (Set of 4 books) - $1.99 this week

Girl of His Dream - Always FREE

Moody Books - Always 99 cents

Christmas at Mistletoe Lodge (Set of 10 books) - 99 cents until Dec 26th


     FROM KIM πŸŽ„



KIM HORNSBY is the bestselling Amazon Author of The Dream Jumper's Promise, Book 1 in a Supernatural Suspense series. She lives in the Seattle area and writes stories for women about overcoming tragedy, adversity and coming out the other end. She also writes Christmas Romances, several in production to be TV movies in 2020.

Find her on Amazon Books.

Sunday, November 24, 2019

CHRISTMAS IS COMING

For some, winter is upon us with snow, Christmas decorations, gift shopping and more.
If you're like me (Last minute Lulu) the only thing Christmasy around here is my reading material. I love to read holiday Feel-Good books at this time of year.
Christmas is a time when goodwill is alive and kicking more so than any other time of year and I like to revel in that. So many women (and maybe men?) love watching Hallmark movies and this year that network started earlier than ever with more choices than in past years. The Lifetime Channel has It's a Wonderful Lifetime, a lineup of Christmas movies that began right after Halloween.

It's for this reason I write Christmas Romances for the holiday season. I usually write Suspense Mysteries with the possibility of Supernatural (ghosts and such) but this time of year, I head into those heartwarming stories like nothing else will do.

For anyone who appreciates a heartwarmer, I have 3 short novels published this year as stand alone books.
And, I have a novella inside Christmas at Mistletoe Lodge, a box set of 10 Holiday stories from USA TODAY Bestselling Authors. All books are under $1.00.

I hope I bring a smile and some goodwill to you in my romances. Crystal Creek is optioned to be a movie in the lineup next year and will film in a few months!

Christmas in Whistler 
Daria Stark faces a lonely Christmas with her two young children promised to her recent ex-husband and his competitive girlfriend who’s out to ruin Daria’s Christmas. Hoping for distraction, she leaves Seattle for the picturesque Canadian ski resort, Whistler Mountain, where a friend has a gorgeous mountain lodge. A second house guest has Daria tempted by the attentions of the charming vintner, Pierre Charbenaud. With her ability to read auras, Daria fears this man is too good to be true. Days spent skiing the mountain with Pierre and nights in front of the fire have Daria under the mistletoe with the dashing vintner. Falling for the mysterious man who rescues dogs and speaks four languages has Daria worried it’s just a vacation fling and that it’s not.
Christmas in Whistler is a Sweet/Sensual Romance, with implied moments of intimacy. No swearing, no violence.

Christmas Cookie Recipes are included at the end!
99 cents
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00PF2OXLA/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1


Christmas in Crystal Creek
A road closure and snowstorm traps country music star, Luanne Billings in a small town at Christmas and she finds herself at Crystal Creek Inn's Holiday Extravaganza while waiting to fly out to an important performance in New York City in Time Square. Nick Dales, the town doctor, befriends Luanne, helping her realize what the real Christmas spirit means when she meets his young patient waiting for a heart transplant. When a brief opportunity to escape presents itself, Luanne must decide between a career-changing performance and helping a child in need.
99 cents


Maui Kalikimaka
Lena Patterson's ex-husband has the children for Christmas and things are looking lonely for the young mother. Her friend, Pepper, is housesitting a beachfront home on Maui and invites Lena, and her new rescue dog, to fly over from Kona.
Big Island coffee farmer, Kalani Shipton must evacuate his house as Kiluaea's lava flow threatens to take his home. He ends up on Maui and finds himself in the company of a woman he once propositioned in a drunken stupor. And told he was a stud in bed.
Thrown together by circumstance, the two realize that there is more beneath the surface of their first impressions. Once a playboy partier, Kalani is now sober and working towards atonement and Lena is a soft-hearted mother, not just a sexy divorcee. As Christmas approaches, hearts open and secrets are revealed to make the possibility of love even more complicated as Lena falls hard for the handsome Hawaiian business man with a suspicious past.
99 cents


The Christmas Challenge inside the Box set Christmas at Mistletoe Lodge
A hermit psychologist, Tori Jackson, takes her blog's Christmas Challenge to be more sociable and attends her BFF's destination wedding in Mistletoe, Oregon. At the lodge, she tries to stay in the shadows but Matt Kingfisher, a handsome and benevolent doctor with a cute dog, has the room across the hall and encourages her to leave her room for the festivities. After a year of hiding, Tori finds that Matt gets her heart racing again only to discover he has a game-changing secret—about her.
2.99 
www.bit.ly/MistletoeLodge

And for anyone who likes a little edgier Christmas story (with Suspense)

Dream Come True
Picturesque Carnation, Washington seems like the idyllic Christmas vacation until Jamey Dunn has a prophetic dream of his father’s house burning to the ground. When Jamey and Tina rush from Maui to Washington State, they discover suspicious neighbors, creepy pranks, and explainable occurrences that lead them to use dreams and intuition to determine who wants Jamey's likable father dead, and why. But, what they are up against is something they couldn't have ever imagined, something sinister and beyond their collected pool of experience with not only criminals, but the after life. In a mad rush to Christmas Eve, the twosome are desperate to prevent the prophetic dream from becoming a heart-wrenching reality and to save not only the Dunn family home but the patriarch- Pops.
99 cents

OR Check out this set of 4 books for a better deal 

Christmas in Love
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07KPNQHCQ/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i8

MERRY CHRISTMAS & Happy Holidays! 
Kim

www.bit.ly/kimamzn


Sunday, November 3, 2019

How I Became a USA Today Bestseller

We made it to #88 of the top 150 books in the Nation last week, according to the USA Today Bestseller List.
Many authors have sought this title in the last few years with a targeted campaign to sell a ton of books in one week through the specific retailers that report to the publication. I once turned up my nose at the authors who banded together in box sets to offer their 10 book sets at 99 cents to cash in on this phenomena of making the USA Today Bestseller List with a deal most romance readers can't resist.

That was years ago and now I'm one of those authors. The sad reality is that you can buy your way to the Bestseller list with either enough money or a nice deal with a big publishing company who will promote your book. The lists aren't a true reflection of the best books, nor are they stacked with Indie authors spending advertising dollars to reach the list (money that the big publishers spend on their new releases).
It's a game just like all advertising. That's not to say that many of the books that reach the top 150 aren't worthy of the accolades. In our week, there were books by investigative reporters, super megastar celebrity writers, reality show star memoirs, children's books by beloved children's authors, cookbooks, SAT exam guides and of course, us. We have a Box Set of 10 Christmas Romances.

How did we make it? We started early knowing if we waited until November to release our Christmas books, we'd compete with all the other Christmas Romance box sets going for the list.
In past years, I've started late. I also did a box set of Christmas Suspense books with an ominous cover and that did not even get close to listing.

I contacted authors mid-August and got 9 commitments to write a new novella with a Mistletoe Lodge in the story somewhere. I needed a couple of really successful heavy hitters in contemporary romance at the head of the line to pull people in. Sabrina York, Tamara Ferguson, Jen Talty, Natalie Ann all have pedigree in the genre and box set followers.
The common theme of having a Mistletoe Lodge  in each book would be our catch. That and donating to St. Jude's which was something we did last year as well, but did not make the list. The years before we donated to Breast Cancer Research.
We knew if we launched our book in late October to get ahead of the pack, we only had two months of presales to accumulate for dumping day on Oct 21st. We didn't have the 3 months allowed on Amazon for presales, or more, if you publish wide at Nook and iBooks. Longer presale periods are allowed over there, which is recommended if you're hoping to make the USA TODAY list. We had 60 days before launch.
We had a cover done quickly, wrote a blurb and published as a presale with launch day October 21st, a Tuesday. We chose that day of the week because we knew USA Today tabulated sales Sunday to Sunday and sales tended to trickle late in on Monday as well as presales dropping early sometimes on a Monday night instead of a Tuesday. We needed to include those presales. Tuesday is the day.

I compiled a FREE cookbook with Christmas recipes and crafts to advertise the set, calling it by the same name with the words Cookbook at the end. 50 recipes plus additional bonus craft ideas. I put the buy links on almost every page for our box set and we included recipes talked about in our books (that weren't finished yet.) I launched the cookbook everywhere and it shot to the top of the FREE lists everywhere.
While I set up the main ads, saving the best ones for launch week, we wrote our stories and promoted on Facebook, Twitter and BookBub. Getting a #1 BADGE on Amazon early helped. Our categories were obscure, giving us the best chance to reach #1 faster. We could see our numbers in presales and knew which ads helped the most.
Each author had contributed $500 so we had $5,000 to work with to support our book. A lot was spent on FB ads. Amazon ads weren't all that effective, nor were BookBub ads, we found. The ROI was not good. For USA Today, you need at least 500 sales combined from B&N and iBooks (we were told Kobo didn't count but it does, it turns out) so we spent a lot of money to try to get those sales at sites other than Amazon. Certain ads did better than others. Book Doggy had a great ROI, Robin Reads, Fussy Librarian, and some others. We found a Facebook Nook site and used that twice. Some ads that don't allow you to post more than every two months, were used twice. Once at the beginning of presales and again launch week.
We concentrated on e ads but did make up postcards to give out at several writers' conferences where we raffled off Xmas gift baskets. We offered Nook users bonuses on Facebook and we set up a presale bonus to try to drive sales to dump on launch day.

On launch day we loaded over 3,000 sales to our Kindle site and saw we had over 1,000 reported on Draft 2 Digital. Our biggest, most expensive ads were stacked all launch week, some days having 2 biggies. The ads went out Tuesday to Sunday, to get as many sales as possible. We ended the week (6 days) with 6500 sales on Kindle. Sunday, all day, we were gifting books on Amazon to anyone with an email address who wanted one. Several of us attended a big FB reader party and got our gift recipients there. We just wanted to do everything we possibly could do so that if/when we didn't make the List, we could say we tried everything.
Launch week, we started spending our own (extra) money for FB ads. Before we launched we'd set up a link on BookFunnel with nine FREE books (including a chocolate cookbook) for anyone who ordered the book in presale or bought during launch week and advertised bonuses to buy early. We weren't beyond bribery, at all! Beautiful posters were created by our authors and we even had a terrific video!

By Sunday night, several of us had been online for pretty much 48 hours selling, promoting and giving away books.
We couldn't figure out how to give away Nook books if the recipient didn't have a B&N account set up and iTunes/iBooks is just about impossible to figure out even if you have the iBooks app. As well as needing a 2D cover, iBooks also will not take a placeholder book until the day you need to upload the actual book so remember to leave the book file empty at D2D! We lost a week of iBook sales just before we launched because they delisted it due to the placeholder book not being the correct book. I'd uploaded last year's box set to hold the place and show a set of 1200 pages.

We also had contracts drawn up, giving me, the publisher, permission to use the author's individual books until the agreed upon delisting date. Each author signed the contract and sent it back to me in case I got into any copyright problems. I sent these in to Customer Service and to Contact Us just to be safe weeks before launch. We'd heard of sales being halted for a week while Amazon straightened out copyright rights and didn't want it to happen to us.
Then, knowing there was nothing else we could do, we waited for the list to come out. Although the official list is released Thursday, the PDF comes out Wednesday afternoon. We discovered it around 2 pm, PST and although I only checked the last 50 of the 150, and saw we hadn't made it, I later looked at the whole list and realized that I'd been wrong. I never thought we'd do better than 100, so I only checked the bottom 50. I was disappointed to not see our title and started processing that it hadn't worked out for us. Imagine how happy I was to see us on there at #88.

https://www.usatoday.com/entertainment/books/best-selling/

Five minutes later, I saw our title was at #88! We made it. Not only made it but were in the top 100! With roughly 8,000 sales, 1200 of them not Kindle, we'd made the list.

Our group started texting, calling, emailing, posting our happiness. It was such a great feeling. I almost cried. I texted my agent and my husband first, then the other authors.

Days later, we were still in awe that we made it. Starting early had worked in our favor. Several others in our group had hit the list with box sets earlier in the year and never without less than 10,000 sales so we weren't sure how but we were so grateful that everything lined up and our box set landed somewhere in the middle of the pack.

Now, after a week of good sales, we have delisted on Draft 2 Digital in preparation of raising the price and entering the book into Kindle Unlimited Select to help recoup costs so we can eventually make money to send to St. Jude's. On KU, counting page reads in a 1200 page book, will help us as will the $2.99 price as Christmas gets closer. We're able to advertise that all authors are USA Today Bestselling, the book is a USA Today Bestseller and we've maintained #1 in many categories for several months, including dog breeds, medical romance, Christmas books and Christmas Kindle. Dog breeds is a category that doesn't have a lot of bestsellers and there are a lot of dogs in our books!


It was a marketing game with $5,000. to spend. I estimate 4 or 5 of us spent an extra $100 - $200 to support the book on launch week, but I don't have exact numbers. Some wanted to make the list more than others. I was at the top of the pack in desperation because it was a professional milestone I wanted. This is why I put the set together and dropped everything for 2 months to devote myself to this book. I pretty much ignored my own book's launch in late September, didn't speak to my family much for a month and was very hard to live with towards the end while we waited to hear if we'd made it.

Was it worth it? For me, it was. I hope the other authors think so too.
Writing is such a solitary profession and any time you can band together to work with others, it's a joy. We've had a lot of fun on our Facebook page posting anything and everything to communicate with each other. It's how we share information, ask questions, share ideas and feel a part of a club.
The USA Today Bestselling Author Club!


KIM HORNSBY is the bestselling Amazon Author of The Dream Jumper's Promise, Book 1 in a Supernatural Suspense series. She lives in the Seattle area and writes stories for women about overcoming tragedy, adversity and coming out the other end.

Find her on Amazon Books.










Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Halloween BOOKS!

Do you love this time of year? Do you like spooky but not too scary? Me too.

I write somewhat spooky stories but am always aghast to be clumped with Stephen King on book lists. No horror here. No gore. No ghoulish stuff. Just some ghostly action and suspense.


I have a number of books that are perfect for reading at Halloween time.
ROCKY BLUFF is a Maui Murder Mystery that takes place over October leading up to Halloween and is set during the ROCKY HORROR SHOW at Maui's Iao Theater. A new Maui cop who's out to prove herself infiltrates the cast of ROCKY to find out how one of the cast members died on stage opening weekend.
Detective Maya Flores works the case with the help of a floating entity in the spooky underground dressing rooms of the historic theater and finds that she's now become a target for the murderer.
The book is a police procedural, a mystery, a suspense with elements of romance and supernatural. It's 2/3 the size of a full novel and the edition you see on Amazon is the second. Rocky Bluff was previously published with reviews and a different cover a few years ago. I revised the book, rewrote the protagonist and republished with a new twist at the end that will curl your hair. It was a book in the Lei Crime Kindle World and Kindle Worlds dissolved over a year ago, leaving our books unpublished and floating in nowhere land. All books had to be rewritten to be republished.

If you like Maui, mysteries and trying to guess the end, you might like ROCKY BLUFF!

Click Here  AMAZON BUY LINK  

I write a continuing mystery series about a Paranormal Investigator, Bryndle Moody, who's recently lost her eye sight and her sixth sense when she mysteriously inherits a house on the Oregon coast where the resident ghost offers something she desperately needs.

Moody & The Ghost is a fun, snarky, fast series with 4 books (so far) that are only .99 each, allowing anyone hooked on the series to keep going!

I like to write strange occurrences in my novels when I'm not writing Christmas Romances.

In The Dream Jumper Series, Jamey Dunn can enter dreams and uses that ability to solve the mystery of his ex-girlfriend's new husband's disappearance. This story is a mystery, a supernatural thriller with dreams and weird happenings. It's a 5-book series so if you get hooked, you can get to know the characters really well!


Check out my Amazon Books page to see what grabs your fancy.


www.bit.ly/kimamzn


Friday, October 4, 2019

Need Escapist Entertainment this Weekend?

Life is tough, my mother always said, optimist that she was.

In these days of strangeness and worry, we need entertainment.
Badly.
For this reason, I keep on writing Christmas romances. Christmas embodies a simpler time when the world is at peace, when we focus on love rather than hate and when we get to let go of our worries and get back to remembering the good times.

I have several Christmas Romances novellas for sale at etailer book stores like Amazon, Nook, Kobo, iTunes etc and although they aren't Pulitzer Prize winning works of art, they are entertaining. And romantic, another part of life we all need to believe in.

Every year, I put together a box set anthology of Christmas stories that are heartwarming and guaranteed to leave you smiling. This year's set is Christmas at Mistletoe Lodge for sale at AMAZON, Nook, Apple, Kobo and pretty much everywhere. It's in preorder until launch on October 22nd. Then, the price goes up. Get your copy of 10 books for 99 cents by Award-Winning Authors while you still can!



As an author and screenwriter, I love to adapt my books for the screen. Christmas at Snowflake Lodge sold last spring to a production company who plans to make the film this winter. I'm not involved in the project at this point because we sold the screenplay outright for them to do with it what they wanted, including changing the name.
But now, I'm involved with the development of another Christmas screenplay I adapted from my book Christmas at Crystal Creek as we do screenplay revisions and look at who will play the leads. Crystal Creek, or CC as my producers, agent, and I now call it, is looking good for filming this winter with an up and coming star attached who can sing like the country music star she'll be playing. I'll be announcing her name soon, once the contracts are signed.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07L6QL15X/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i8

Enjoy the book if you'd like to read the story of the country star who gets stranded in a tiny town in Maine during a snowstorm.

Feel free to follow this blog to keep up on news of the movie.

Or, join my beach club site on Facebook where I post news... no membership fees or commitment.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/188081488503196/

As we head into colder weather and Christmas approaches, remember to read those heartwarming stories and stay positive while you wait for the Hallmark Channel to air the movies that even the most snarky, skeptical cynic seems to love to watch.

www.bit.ly/KimHNews



Thursday, August 29, 2019

FREE COOKBOOK!

Did I catch your attention with the title?

It's true there's a FREE COOKBOOK now on several ebook sites that I compiled in an effort to draw attention to our 10-Book Box Set - CHRISTMAS AT MISTLETOE LODGE.
(If you think it's easy typing mistletoe try doing it 3x fast. I often leave off the first e)

The cookbook has recipes for:
Easy Delicious Turkey, Cranberry Sauce, Scalloped Potatoes, gooey Mac & Cheese, Vichy Carrots, Seafood Chowder, Wild Rice Stuffing, Meatballs, Crab Dip, Beef Skewers, Bean & Beef Dip, Chicken Poppers, Potatoes O'Brien, Popcorn, Praline Bacon, Pumpkin Cheesecake, Toffee, Thumbprints, Macaroons, Divinity, Tarts, Shortbread, Fudge Sauce, Creme Anglaise, Fudge Cake and More.

It's an awesome collection, recipes given to me by some great authors and obviously good cooks. The last few pages has craft ideas with photos. Like these!
If you make any of these recipes, I love to hear what turned out so well your neighbors and friends thought they'd died and gone to heaven.


Keep in touch over at my Beach Club on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/groups/188081488503196/

Or my newsletter
www.bit.ly/KimHNews

FIND THE COOK BOOK:

NOOK
iBooks
Amazon
Everywhere





Monday, August 12, 2019

Connecting Writers With Hollywood 2019 - Seattle!


Hollywood loves book adaptations. And Hollywood loves unique storylines.

Do you have a story that would translate well to the screen?

Myth #1: You have to be a screenwriter to pitch to film people. Not true!
Producers are open to authors pitching books. They know screenwriters who can adapt your amazing book to a screenplay if you haven't already. You do need to have a story that speaks to the producer as the wheels turn in their heads imagining if they could make a blockbuster movie with your concept.

This year Connecting Writers With Hollywood is partnering with the prestigious Pacific Northwest Writers Association in hopes of inspiring writers and producers in the creative community of the Pacific Northwest.

This conference is usually held at the Historic Davenport Hotel in Spokane Washington where producers, script doctors and film people fly in to get a slice of that Pacific Northwest Storytelling Factor we are famous for. Yes, Seattle is famous for turning out excellent authors, writers, storytellers. Maybe it's the rain but in Hollywood, the PNW is known as a region of creativity and that includes novels, music and films. The two big movies advertised on my TV this month are The Art of Racing in the Rain and Where'd You Go Bernadette. Both great books written by Seattle authors, set in Seattle.

Let's talk about Connecting Writers with Hollywood

Who comes to events like this to hear these people speak?
Anyone jazzed on having their story made for the big screen. 

Why pay all the money to hear Hollywood people talk?
You might learn something valuable, you might meet someone valuable, you might get so inspired that you go home and write something valuable.
Aristotle said: There is only one way to avoid criticism. Do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. I believe the same is true for anyone wanting to do something special. You will not achieve that dream without some jumping off cliffs and hoping to fly.

Note: I borrowed my son's pizza delivery paycheck 4 years ago to afford a trip to Hollywood to pitch at Universal Studios. I didn't get a film deal for my novels that weekend, but many baby steps later, I have a literary manager, am a sold screenwriter with a film in development, and have had an optioned book series. Also, my TV pilot was pitched at both Fox Studios and the CW last week and as my agent said, "That's not something you see every day!"


Who are the speakers at CWWH?
They are producers, script doctors, screenwriting teachers, movie people who are connected in Hollywood. In the film industry connections are as important as typing skills are to a writer. Gotta have connections. It's a business of who you know and building connections starts exactly this way. Listen to someone speak, get inspired, tell them, ask if you can give them a one sheet of your project.


Why Seattle?
In Los Angeles these conferences where you listen to producers speak, happen all the time. Hollywood heavy weights are inundated at these events with ideas from the thousands of waiters, shop workers, crossing guards, everyone in Southern California who is a secret screenwriter. What makes this opportunity in Seattle different is that things are bound to be less desperate that day, fresh, and possibly more unique to them. In a smaller crowd of writers, your idea might get more attention. You still need to have an awesome story but you won't be competing with the back biters of Hollywood to hand over a one page. Last week there was a pitch fest in Hollywood with hundreds of producers and thousands of writers. Think about how confusing that must've been for a minute.

Myth #2: You need to be an extrovert to get something looked at.
Not true. If you bring your one sheet to leave with a producer or producers, that should speak for itself.

Memorize your succinct log line just in case someone asks what your story is about. Know your genre, your audience. eg) I was told to stop pitching once, when I started my log line by saying "It's about a guy who enters dreams to solve a murder." There was so much more I wanted to say but the producer cut me off and took my one page.

That leads me to my next point: Do some research ahead of time if  you're coming to CWWH. Read the bios of everyone, see who might be producing a story like yours or might be in a position to pass your one sheet to someone who is producing movies. Everyone on that page but me, because I am only the Emcee, is producing or in a position to pass along your one sheet.

Then, make an awesome one sheet for your project, or projects.

What's a ONE SHEET, you say? A ONE PAGER?
Here's some links!

 http://www.nobullscript.net/creating-the-perfect-one-sheet/

https://www.scriptmag.com/features/career-features/how-to-create-loglines-queries-one-sheets

https://www.scriptmag.com/features/career-features/fearless-feature-film-writers-creating-one-pager


So, yes, CWWH costs money and yes, it takes a day of listening and absorbing. Don't come if you don't believe in your story. Don't come if you simply want in out of the rain or sun.

Come to CWWH if you are one of those people who go for the gusto, get things done, work hard for your successes and believe that someone is going to get a movie deal - Why not me? Come because the idea excites you!

Here's the link to register

See you there...




KIM HORNSBY is the bestselling Amazon Author of The Dream Jumper's Promise, Book 1 in a Supernatural Suspense series. An awarded author and screenwriter, Kim lives in the Seattle area and writes stories for women about overcoming tragedy, adversity and coming out the other end. Some are funny, scary, romantic, suspensey but all are hopeful.


Find her on Amazon Books.



Tuesday, August 6, 2019

Kim Hornsby Novels


If you've ever wondered what I write, I put together an easy-to-read list of my novels and novellas.





Dream Jumper Series - 3 Novels - 2 Novellas

The Dream Jumper’s Promise - A Suspense Mystery set on Maui with Romance elements

             The Dream Jumper's Secret - A Suspense with Romance, set in Seattle & Afghanistan

The Dream Jumper’s Pursuit - A Suspense Manhunt to Central America to find a child

 Girl of his Dream - A Romantic Suspense - Jamey & Tina's sexy beginning

               Dream Come True - Set in Carnation WA at Christmas, a Supernatural Suspense



Moody & The Ghost Series - 4 Novellas

Dead Ahead - Moody inherits a house with an elusive ghost

Batten Down - Moody gets a skeptic off her back while falling for Caspian

Coming About - Caspian disappears and Moody is desperate to get him back

Hoist the Jib - Moody time travels to figure out the mystery of Caspian


Necessary Detour 
Romantic Suspense Novel - Rock star hides from a stalker at her lake house



Rocky Bluff 
Crime/Suspense Novel - A female Maui cop goes undercover in the Rocky Horror show to catch a killer


Christmas Romances - Novellas

Christmas in Love – 4-Book Anthology - Sweet to Sexy


*Christmas in Crystal Creek
*Christmas in Whistler 
*Maui Kalikimaka 
*Dream Come True


Christmas in Crystal Creek - A country singer is stranded over Christmas  
SOON TO BE A TV MOVIE!!!!!   


Or: Find a little nugget of a book that Kim wrote at the beginning of her career, not available on Kindle but everywhere else! THE HUSBAND HUNT

https://books2read.com/u/3n9Rob


If you READ FAST, this Christmas 2019, some author friends and I have a 10 book set for only 99 cents!
Christmas at Mistletoe Lodge


CLICK HERE: AMAZON PAGE Where all Kim's Books Are Listed!


            Or Find out more about Kim on her website:

                       www.bit.ly/KimHornsby




KIM HORNSBY is the bestselling Amazon Author of The Dream Jumper's Promise, Book 1 in her Bestselling Supernatural Suspense series. With 9 published novels and screenplays circulating Hollywood, Kim lives in the Seattle area and writes stories for women about overcoming tragedy, adversity and coming out the other end triumphant.




Sunday, July 21, 2019

I Was in a Movie!





This is me. Right here, at the table. Look how focused I am!






I'm not sure if I'll be up for an Emmy Award next year, this time, but my acting skills look amazing in this TV movie, from what I've seen, which is only this photo.
The Producers

In early June 2019, I drove all the way across the state of Washington to be an extra in a movie by two women producers. One is JD, my agent/literary manager and the cracker jack who sold my Christmas Romance screenplay recently to a company who will film in the next months, the other, Robin, is a producer who bought the option to make The Dream Jumper's Promise into a feature film. (Both really want to make that movie and I absolutely love them for that!)
So when they had a shooting schedule for their TV movie about a barista falling for a guy who builds houses for poor people, I really wanted to be any part of it they might tolerate. I didn't write the screenplay but I still wanted to be on set.

I got in the car the day before my casting call and drove across the state on my adventure. I was getting over bronchitis, still coughing and hoped that my hacking cough would settle down by tomorrow. There wasn't much that was going to stop me from being in this movie, or at least supporting these two #womeninfilm because I was so excited I was creeping them both on social media for on set photos every day.
Stopped at a Rest Stop to show how flat E. WA is

I checked into my Air B&B, settled in for the night with takeout dinner and watched Always Be My Maybe on Netflix, a film that made me laugh out loud a lot.
The next day, I woke and got ready for my big day on the set of Home Sweet Home, a few miles away. It was a lovely sunny day in Spokane Washington, something that was beneficial when you have scads of electrical equipment outside a coffee shop while you film inside.
Snafoo: Pulling on my jeans, I realized they no longer fit. I'd recently gained a few pounds and although the jeans were stretchy, they weren't that stretchy. Dang. My other pants were white, a movie no-no color. I covered the front with a long top, did my hair to try to get some height from my increasingly thinning dome and realized I'd forgotten hair spray, something my wispy, thin hair cannot go without. Another dang.
I left the little cottage I'd rented and set out for the drug store for hairspray and Ross's Dress for Less to buy jeans. I'd seen the clothing store when getting takeout the night before. If I skipped a Starbucks run for caffeine, I'd have enough time to buy jeans and get to the meeting place for extras to sign in at 10:15.
Pulling in to Ross's parking lot, I realized my jeans had stretched enough on the drive that I could fasten them closed so I got back in the car and went for hairspray. Once I had my hair sorted out, I still had time for coffee. I believed. One grande latte later, I was on my way to the set of the movie.
Our meeting place was a big church parking lot but upon arrival, I didn't see anyone out and about. Nobody with a clipboard, no movie looking people. I drove around looking for signs of actors, directors, wardrobe people but nothing.
Outside the coffee shop 
I was right on time. Where was everyone? After checking my emails to see if I got the location wrong, I saw someone who looked like movie crew enter the church. They were inside the church? I hadn't gotten the memo.

I parked and ran through the parking lot to the church door, now ten minutes late for being slightly early. Inside, I found a big room with a kitchen and people and snacks and clipboards and I realized this was Command Central for the movie. I checked in with Suzanne, the casting director, and ran back to the car to get my clothing choices for the day so the wardrobe lady could choose. I thought I was dressed exactly like the photos sent the night before as a guideline however, I had a rip in the sleeve of my cute green jacket in the back and had to change, which was perfectly fine but slightly embarrassing to arrive on set looking like a hobo with a ripped jacket.
Working the camera
Once I got changed, I went to the makeup room for face powder and then we were shuttled in a van to the coffee shop where the stars were waiting. Shots were set up, and I was eventually moved inside the coffee shop to a table where I could watch and listen to the Director, DOP, prop people, Assistant Director, actors. Inside I could really see how a movie is made. Most of the extras had worked on a zombie show called Z Nation which shot in Spokane, so it was interesting talking to them about their experiences as zombies and towns folk.

Observation: Those poor actors have to say the same line 20 times over and over sometimes, not because there was anything wrong with their execution the first time, but to get the correct lighting, positioning, camera angle. I realized that movie making is more about lighting than acting. The real diva of the day seemed to be the camera and its need for good lighting.

When my day inside the coffee shop was done and the extras were shuttled back to the church, we gathered up our stuff, signed a bunch of paperwork, said our goodbyes and headed off to real life.
Ben Elliott, the star

I didn't get a chance to meet the female lead that day. Natasha Bure stayed quiet and in character, plugged into her phone and music when not working. I did meet the two male leads, one being a lovely young man from Spokane named Gabriel who plays the suitor who is all wrong for the girl and the other being the polite young man, Ben, who plays the guy who gets the girl. When I sat down beside Ben on the curb, he got up to offer his chair, which was a gallant gesture. Chivalry is not dead. I didn't need his chair but it was nice of him to ask.
Producers JD & Robin, Stars Natasha Bure & Ben 

Home Sweet Home is a movie about a young man who builds houses through his church and meets a somewhat superficial barista woman who pretends to be handy with a hammer to get on the build site to meet this man. It's a cute story, written by a fellow Seattle author and screenwriter, Lesley Ann McDaniel, and with a distribution deal, it's scheduled to be released Valentine's Day 2020. I, for one, can't wait to see what the rest of the story holds. I know the coffee shop scene pretty well but it'll be fun to see the movie in February and watch the story unfold.


If you ever get a chance to be an extra on a set, you'll be surprised how long it takes to film a page of screenplay and what goes in to making a movie. The camera is the star, the diva, the one they pamper, not the actors, and not the extras who are sitting on the periphery watching the pieces of the puzzle fall into place to make a story. But together, we all contribute to make the story come to life to bring it to you on the screen. Let me know in February if you think my performance is Emmy worthy.
I'll just be happy to not end up on the cutting room floor!


KIM HORNSBY is the bestselling Amazon Author of The Dream Jumper's Promise, Book 1 in her Bestselling Supernatural Suspense series. With 9 published novels and several screenplays circulating Hollywood, Kim lives in the Seattle area and writes stories for women about overcoming tragedy, adversity and coming out the other end triumphant.


     Find her on Amazon Books