HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Well, I didn't intend to be away from my blog for so many days! But life, stress, pain, and the holidays decreed otherwise, unfortunately. I hope you all had happy holidays and are looking forward to a prosperous new year!

One of the gifts I received this year for Christmas was THE SIMS2. My husband, John, gave it to me---a trifle early, so that I would have something with which to occupy myself while laid up in bed, due to my suffering very badly from my fibromyalgia. I enjoy playing computer games and, having often played THE SIMS, was looking forward to THE SIMS2. It didn't disappoint, and I have had a great deal of fun building my first house in the new game.

The front of my first SIMS2 house:



The back of my first SIMS2 house:



A closeup of my house's summerhouse in the backyard:



One of the benefits I receive from building SIM houses is that they enable me to actually produce 3-D models of many of the houses I write about in my novels. This particular SIM house (built on a 5X5 lot), for example, is a manor house in THE CRYSTAL ROSE, the book I'm currently writing for MIRA Books, and which will be published in 2006. In my novel, it's called Drayton Hall, and it sits on Dartmoor.

I also make SIM people who are actually characters from my novels. Sometimes, in the game, they do things differently from the way I had originally envisioned they would behave, and I make changes in my books as a result.

I don't know any other writers who play THE SIMS or THE SIMS2. But for me, it's not just a game; it's one of my favorite writing tools!

Happy New Year!