Ah, let's talk about The Future. That's what The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come is all about.
Today is the day before New Year's Eve. What better time to reflect on the Future -- the Christmas Yet To Come, as Dickens eloquently named it in A Christmas Carol?
Many people fear the Future because it's all about change. Nothing stays the same as Father Time marches on. One can be dragged along kicking and screaming, or one can plan for the change. Embrace it. Celebrate it.
Before tomorrow arrives, when we'll be eating, drinking, and generally making nuisances of ourselves, join me and some of my author friends as we look forward to the year ahead... to the Christmas Yet To Come.
Nicole Zoltack is the author of Love Before Honor. A medieval knight and a Regency lady find themselves together one Christmas, for better or for ill.
Nicole Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
For a future Christmas, I'd love for our family to be complete. We would love to have another child. We have three boys already, so I'd especially love to have a little girl, but as long as the baby is healthy, that's all that matters.
Buy Love Before Honor by Nicole Zoltack: Amazon Kindle * B&N Nook * iBooks
Judythe Morgan is the author of Claiming Annie’s Heart. Sometimes your heart knows what’s best.
Judythe Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
By next Christmas, I hope to finally have written my Christmas novel. The last novella in the Fitzpatrick family novellas. I'd wanted to have it out this year, but I broke my wrist and couldn't type fast enough. Now I have something to wish for next Christmas.
Buy Claiming Annie's Heart: Amazon Kindle * - B&N Nook or Paperback * iBooks
Liv Rancourt is the author of The Santa Drag. Santa has a secret only true love can reveal.
Liv Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
I wish that... everyone in the world will have access to fresh water and good food... everyone in the country will be able to marry who they want, without artificial limits that are a carry-over from different times... everyone here at Chez Rancourt will move closer to their dreams... that my daughter will find her way as she faces high school graduation... that my son will rock his sophomore football season with a 4.0 GPA... and that my husband will have enough work to keep himself out of trouble.
Finally, I wish my stories will reach new readers, making them laugh and think and giving them a break from everyday life. Peace ~Liv
Buy The Santa Drag by Liv Rancourt: Amazon Kindle
Laura Haley McNeil is the author of Crystal Creek Christmas, Book 2: Crystal Creek Series. Another man placed a diamond ring on Noelle’s finger, but that doesn’t stop the feelings she’s harboring for Dr. Jake Whitloch.
Laura Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
A few years ago, my husband and I spent a couple of weeks in Prague. It has always been our dream to return and live there for awhile.
Prague is a beautiful city with wonderful people. I always thought it would be the perfect setting for a romantic suspense novel.
Buy Crystal Creek Christmas by Laura Haley McNeil: Amazon Kindle
Kelly Rae is the author of Every Other Wedding, Book 2: One Day at a Wedding. What is Dan to do when he finds the woman of his dreams -- just as his life is falling apart?
Kelly Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
Looking ahead to next years Christmas, I have a few goals and dreams I will be working towards. By this time next year I would like to make a big book list; USA Today Best Sellers and/or New York Times Best Seller. The lists are important, not necessarily for the notoriety, as much as it means that my work, my writing, is reaching more people. It would mean that my stories are resonating with a mass audience, who liked my book enough to tell a friend or make it their book club book for the month. It's every writer's dream, I think, for people to fall in love with their characters and stories; the same way they did when they were writing them. So, my goal in one year is to have hit a major list and be the kind of writer who makes a career out of touching people's hearts!
Buy Every Other Wedding by Kelly Rae: Amazon Kindle
Martha O'Sullivan is the author of Chance Encounter, Chances trilogy #2. Will time run out for Mike Savoy when blackmail turns to ransom and will Delaney Richards' trusting heart betray her again or save her life?
Martha Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
This time of year we often find ourselves concerned with reflection and resolution. And in so doing, the past invariably come to mind. But since you can’t know where you’re going without knowing where you’ve been, I can’t think about Christmases Yet To Be without first reminiscing about Christmases Past. My daughters are teenagers now, so Christmas has lost some of its magic. I feel like we’re in a holding pattern again, like newlyweds, with the joy of childhood Christmases behind us and the promise of Christmas as parents in front of us. After many years of enjoying Christmas morning at home, waking up in our own beds to a living room exploding with gifts from Santa, I find myself oddly looking forward to traveling at Christmas. And being a midwestern transplant in Florida I also find myself curiously wishing for snow on Christmas (just for that one day, then I’d give it back). And fortunately for me, our favorite place and one we hope to call home one day, usually obliges.
If you’ve read my books, you already know I’m talking about Lake Tahoe. A wintertime jaunt to the Sierras has eluded me to date, so I can only imagine the splendor of the milky-white mountain peaks giving way to the triple-tiered, snow-laden evergreens against the sapphire blue sky. And how the warm glow of dancing Christmas lights illuminates the blue corduroy runs and chalky slopes after the Alpenglow has put the star-scattered sky to bed. The third book in my Chances trilogy, Last Chance, takes place Lake Tahoe in the wintertime, and that took some real imagination on my part. I look forward to giving myself the gift of Christmas in Tahoe to see how I did. And hopefully someday share it with our grandchildren yet to come.
Merry Christmas to All!
Buy Chance Encounter by Martha O'Sullivan: Amazon Kindle * B&N * Red Sage
L.A. Sartor is the author of Forever Yours This New Year's Night, Book Two: Star Light~Star Bright Series (a Bestseller on Amazon). They have one week to complete their assignment, one week to trust each other, one week to fall in love.
L.A. Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
Christmas is my favorite holiday, hands down. It seems to be a more gentle time, or maybe I see this season through rose-colored glasses as the world in general is becoming more hostile. This next Christmas, I'll have the third book of the Star Light~Star Bright Series out. This one will be tough to write as it's Mitch's story. Mitch, who lost his sister to cancer, is now watching his brother-in-law fall in love again. Mitch isn't the nicest guy in my first book, Be Mine This Christmas Night, but as true to romance, his journey will allow him to find love and thus finally reconcile the fact that his brother-in-law didn't betray Mitch's sister's memory by falling in love again.
Love is a powerful healer. It's quite naive of me to assume that love can heal our hostile and fractured world, but Christmas is the season of hope, so for each Christmas Yet to Come, I hope for a healing, a gentleness to blanket all of us. Even Mitch. Happy New Year and here's to Christmas Yet To Come…2015
~L.A. Sartor
Buy Forever Yours This New Year's Night by L.A. Sartor: Amazon Kindle * Paperback from Amazon
Jina Bacarr is the author of Come Fly With Me, a sexy contemporary romance. When a bad boy billionaire hooks up with a lonely good girl on New Year’s Eve, anything can happen.
Jina Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
I want to continue the story of my heroine in Come Fly with Me and bring to life her story and her two sisters. I love stories about sisters and how different they can be, but in the end they stick together. I want to show how these three girls struggle to keep the family B&B from going belly up. Known affectionately as The 3 Bees, Bennett’s Bed & Breakfast is located in Forgotten Valley, a Shangri-La-like small town in Northern California. What better way to start the new year than in Shangri-La?
Buy Come Fly With Me by Jina Bacarr: Amazon Kindle/Kindle Unlimited
Rebekah Ganiere is the author of Jamen’s Yuletide Bride. When you leave a woman at the altar to become a Vampire Slayer, a simple apology isn’t enough to win her back.
Rebekah Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
I would love to see, next Christmas, myself with over two dozen books published. I published 6 this year and have 8 slated for next year. I have so many ideas in my head that I can’t spend years working on just one book. My goal is to have 4 more books in Fairelle, my Fantasy Fairytale Retelling series, released. As well as 2 more stories in my Otherworlder Series, and then 2 more that are due to my publisher from a third series. That would be the most wonderful gift of all next year.
Buy Jamen's Yuletide Bride by Rebekah R. Ganier: Amazon Kindle
Stacy Juba is the author of Twenty-Five Years Ago Today. When rookie obit writer and newsroom editorial assistant Kris Langley investigates the unsolved mystery of a young artist obsessed with Greek mythology, not only does she fall in love with the victim's sexy nephew, but she must also fight to stay off the obituary page herself.
Stacy Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
By next Christmas, my goal is to have released the first book and a couple of short stories in my new Storybook Valley romantic comedy series. I also want to have the next few novels in the series outlined and to have at least one of those books in the editing stages. One of the stories will have a Christmas theme, and I'm very much looking forward to writing that! I recently launched an editing business. By next Christmas, another one of my goals is to have helped many writers to develop and fine-tune their manuscripts.
One thing I'm asking Santa for that has nothing to do with my writing is for the bionic pancreas to be ready within the next couple of years. Engineers from Boston University have developed a bionic pancreas system that will greatly reduce the impact of diabetes on those who live with it every day. Adults and children who have participated in trials have reported that it is amazing, and I will be thankful when it is approved so that the burden of Type 1 Diabetes will be greatly reduced for my own child as well as all the other kids dealing with this disease. Other than a cure, that would be the best Christmas present that I could receive.
Buy Twenty-Five Years Ago Today by Stacy Juba: Amazon Kindle * B&N * iBooks
Mina Khan is the author of A Christmas Wish. Can one gigantic wrong lead to two rights and true love?
Mina Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
For me, the holiday season runs from Thanksgiving to Valentine’s Day, and is all about spending time with loved ones. It’s not about creating the perfect experience or lots of gifts, but being present and letting people you care about know that you love them. It’s not about what holiday you celebrate, it’s about who you celebrate with. It’s big, boisterous family gatherings and quiet, one-on-one moments. So my hope for Christmas Yet to Be is making wonderful memories with family.
Buy A Christmas Wish by Mina Khan: Amazon Kindle
Only 99cents
LuvU4Ever, a romance short story, is my latest release. Published on Christmas Eve, this begins a new short story series, A Moment in Time Romances. LuvU4Ever--that's what David promised--but how long is forever?
Joan Looks Ahead: Christmas Yet To Come
The last two years have been challenging for me because of major family crises. I haven't been able to follow through with my writing and publishing plans.
My plans for 2015 involve finishing these series: Texas One Night Stands and The Good, The Bad, and The Girly as well as publishing Cinderella Blue, the second, and what was to be the last book, in the San Antone Two-Step series. (I've had a lot of emails asking that the characters first introduced in Nobody's Cinderella and continued in Cinderella Blue, be given stories of their own. I'll give serious thought to that.)
I also plan to write and publish another All Brides Are Beautiful Novella: You Had Me at White Roses and at least 3 more short stories in the new A Moment in Time Romance series begun with LuvU4Ever.
I'll continue writing and publishing SlingWords, my readers' newsletter WordPlay, and my writers' newsletter WritingHacks. Throw in a few goals about publishing print editions of all my ebooks and audio books of the new works, and I have enough work to last for 2+ years, not just one. How much will I manage to accomplish? I may blog about this occasionally in 2015.
Buy LuvU4Ever by Joan Reeves: Amazon Kindle * Smashwords (Available at other ebook sellers after the holidays.)
FREE Book
Post Script
I want to remind you of the free book that's still in the Top 100 Decorating Books. I compiled Holiday Decorating as a companion book to the Christmas on Main Street Romance Collection.
Each of the authors in the Christmas Box Set contributed a favorite craft or holiday decorating idea to the book. You can even watch the YouTube video I created to show you what the craft book is about.
If you haven't downloaded Holiday Decorating, free to all, get it now. It's available at Amazon Kindle * iTunes * Kobo * Nook
Takeaway Truth
It's the Eve of New Year's Eve so I know you're looking ahead. May I encourage you to gird yourself in optimism? Be hopeful. Be happy.