I’m kind of surprised to find myself here today. I didn’t set out to write military romances, and to tell you the truth, I’m not sure I do write them. In my books, there’s darn little action of the military kind, though I try to offer plenty of the more intimate kind.

I write romance, pure and simple.

“If you didn’t want to write military romance,” you might ask, “what’s the point of writing a series starring the ultimate warriors, Navy SEALs?”

The point, dear friends, is that SEALs make great alpha heroes in a character-driven romance.
SEALs are real; my heroes are products of my imagination. It’s a distinction I never lose sight of, but anytime I need someone larger than life and yet engagingly, touchingly human, I troll through the many SEAL memoires I’ve accumulated. Though the stories they tell might be old, human nature doesn’t change. I’m reading for character—and by golly, I find it.

My mental picture Davy Graziano, the hero of SEALed with a Ring, began when I noticed how unselfconsciously aware SEALs were of other men’s attractiveness and how frankly they expressed their appreciation. I think its their competitive nature that makes them size up every man they meet, but it’s disconcerting the first time you read a description, by a clearly heterosexual man, of his admiration of another man’s butt size.

Being me, I instantly wondered, how would it feel to be a slam dunk winner in the looks contest on top of enjoying a SEAL’s über self-confidence?

Suddenly I could see Davy. Understanding full well that he has a Neapolitan masculine beauty that would have made Michelangelo reach for his chisel, Davy’s reaction is to laugh. See, Davy likes sex. Not seduction. Not the thrill of the chase. Sex. Being handsome confers no advantage at all in becoming a SEAL, but being a SEAL sends a handsome man’s ability to attract women off the charts. He gets the best of the best. Works for him.

My challenge as a writer was to show his unconscious sense of entitlement without making him look like a jerk. Because he isn’t….Well, okay, he is…a little…in the beginning. But he’s also an absolute sweetie.

That’s the other thing about SEALs. Although alpha to core, they are not stereotypical, emotionally walled-off, “make my day” Rambos. They easily admit that they have tender feelings.

And they have an extraordinary joie de vivre, an enthusiasm for all of life that fuels their never-say-die attitude.

Davy turned out to be perfect for a marriage of convenience plot I had in mind. Excerpt here.

A few days ago in these pages, Jessica Scott spoke of the difficulty of overcoming the perception that romantic suspense and military romance were synonymous. I understand. Even though I, of all people, know better, I wondered about my fitness to contribute to this blog since my books don’t fit the stereotype either. Fortunately as the TV series Army Wives has shown, there is a market for military stories that aren’t action-packed.

Now I’m thinking, this blog might be an excellent forum to discuss the subcategory: tender, of the subgenre: military romance. In your mind is military romance the same as romantic suspense except the hero is military?

Would a military romance without suspense appeal to you?

What catch phrases can Jessica and I use to let people know right up front what kind of reading experience we are offering?

Things are changing.  Fast.  3 April the iPad will be launched.  The parameters of the iBookstore are known by only a few.  Kindle will be doubling royalties come the end of June, BUT, only for titles priced under $10.  Fictionwise has gone from requiring ten titles to requiring 25 titles and 5 different authors.

What’s a writer to do?  Well, the way to go is still traditional publishing.  Latest book just came out this past week:  Wild Ride and we just found out yesterday it hit the NY Times list on its first week, which is nice.  But there are other options. So here’s an example of something we created just two months ago from nothing.

What is Who Dares Wins Publishing?

An independent Flex Publishing company specializing in military fiction and non-fiction, and narrative military non-fiction, especially authors who have rights reversion on their backlist. We consider new authors in Special Operations fiction and those interested in writing episodes for one of our series.

We publish Series Special Operations fiction and Military Science Fiction falling under the “season” and “episode” model.  Series fiction premieres with a pilot at approximately 20K word count with each additional episode at 10k word count.  We have established Series Lines and are looking to increase series options for our readers.

We want to give authors the opportunity to publish their backlist in both ebook and POD form without the cost and time intensive of creating and preparing manuscripts for upload and conversions to various ebook formats and ebook readers.  We provide our authors with cover art and will create a Print on Demand book that will be distributed on websites such as Amazon and Barnes and Noble and available via Ingram to brick and mortar bookstores.  Also, the author can purchase trade paperback versions of their book to hand-sell at discount, with us handling the orders and shipping.  We charge no fees and work with you to earn a profit via royalties.  If you don’t make a profit, we don’t.

Flex Publishing:  Authors are the producer of the product.  Readers are the consumer of the product.  Who Dares Wins Publishing offers a non-traditional option for authors to get their work to the readers.  The key is to build synergy in the brand among all the authors, each helping the others.  The bottom line that will make Flex Publishing a success is TEAM-WORK.  Authors who write similar material working together to promote each other.

As the publishing world undergoes some major growing pains, many authors are feeling the crunch and in many cases, being pushed right out of publishing.  Traditional publishers want authors to become a brand in themselves.  Many big names have, but most authors are struggling to even find a single slot on a bookshelf.  The day of the advance is coming to an end for many mid-list authors and nearly impossible for the new author.

Technology has provided readers with new options for enjoying the written word.  However, traditional publishers have not embraced the new technology and while the publishers are trying to figure out how to save their crumbling empire, reader demands are changing and it’s the readers who authors need to reach.

Who Dares Wins Publishing has been created with authors and readers in mind.  Our goal is to connect our author with their readers.  We realize we can’t compete with the Big NY houses as we don’t have their distribution abilities.  However, the distribution channels are quickly changing as well.  More and more readers today are buying their books differently as well as reading them differently.  Amazon is an online store.  There is no Amazon on your street corner, yet Amazon is one of the leaders in both the physical book market and the ebook market.  Barnes and Noble might be in your town, but with the addition of Fictionwise (ebook online store recently purchased by Barnes and Noble) and Barnes and Noble’s new ebook reader The Nook, even their sales are changing, leaning toward online sales.  The introduction of the iPad and Apple’s online digital bookstore will do for publishing what iTunes did for music.

Who Dares Wins Publishing currently cannot get physical books into your local bookstore unless they are ordered via Ingram (Lightning Press- a pull rather than push system).  However, we can get out POD’s to the major on-line bookstores and make ebooks available through major on-line ebook stores and support each ereader.  Ultimately, we want to get our books to our readers.

Anyway.  I predict a lot of similar start-ups in publishing across an area of areas.  I believe military has a better chance at succeeding because we know the value of working as a team.

Also, my new book Warrior Writer: From Writer to Published Author just came out and I’m really happy with it.  I recommend everyone who wants to write, start putting together their own writing book.  Just write down everything you know right now and then keep adding to it.  A similar concept is to write a book using your blog.  We invest a lot of time into blogging, if you can find an interesting topic reference your platform, schedule out the blog like chapters.  Just a thought.

www.WhoDaresWinsPublishing.com

Captain NarrAy Jorlan, Senth Antonello, and ... the Harbinger

Something I learned about marketing myself and my books is to never make the reader have to look for me. In our instant society we snap our fingers at the microwave and say “hurry up!” LOL Whenever I email anyone or post online, I always have links to books or chats, or whatever I’m discussing. Readers like to click on a link and find things without hunting for them.

I just did a twelve-day treasure hunt with my Edge of Peril group (20 hard core fans) and they absolutely loved finding the details. Everyone who took part in the quiz at the end got the questions 100% right. They are already hooked, and enjoyed the search. New readers might do that for a contest, but if you send them to your home page and they have to click and hunt through tabs to find the book you’re promoting, you may lose them by the second or third click. Remember, writing is our lifeblood, but it’s also a business.

On my Romance Lives Forever group, I host author chats several times a month. You wouldn’t believe how many post an excerpt and give only the name of the book. No publisher info, no author name (their email isn’t always Suzy-Author-Jones, but may be (making one up) spudchef4835, or their husband’s name because they haven’t made an email for their pen name – providing no clue who they are. Some don’t provide links to their books, either. This is like telling a buyer you have a house for sale in Chicago, and expecting them to hunt it down. *buzzer sounds*

I give the reader everything they need to make a decision and find my book. I have higher sales, and when people hit those pages they find exactly what I want them to find.

Here’s a sample I created for the book that came out this week *dances* at Loose Id. I paste this only at the end of promo excerpts.

Antonello Brothers 1: At the Mercy of Her Pleasure (a Tarthian Empire
Book)
Available at Loose Id
http://www.loose-id.com/At-the-Mercy-of-Her-Pleasure.aspx
ISBN 978-1-60737-552-4
Format: ebook in multiple formats
Genre: Erotic Science Fiction Romance, Action Adventure, Younger Hero
Older Heroine
Heat level: R=explicit sex
Editor: Heather Hollis
Cover Artist: Anne Cain
Warnings: This book is a substantially re-edited, revised edition previously released by another publisher, and contains explicit sexual content, graphic language, and situations that some readers may find objectionable: Anal play, dubious consent, menage (m/f/m), reference to rape offscreen.
Author website: http://kayelleallen.com
Author email: kayelle @ kayelleallen .com

I sign my name, give my tag, and links to important places such as another book, my yahoo group, or my blog.

The purpose of hanging out on groups is not *only* to chit chat, though that’s important. Readers are often impulse buyers. That’s why bookstores put genres together, so people interested in one author will find others who write the same thing, and pick up more books. Prepare your readers for that impulse buy. Never just sign your name. Readers will become accustomed to seeing your signature and recognize you by it. It’s not vanity to use a full signature, and it’s not mercenary. It’s business.

When I first started writing, my fabulous mentor Candace Irvin said go to the bookstore and figure out what you’re like. You need to know the market before you can start to see where you fit.

So I went. I read Joann Ross, Cindy Gerard, Suzanne Brockmann, Marliss Melton and others. I read Robyn Carr after Roxanne St Claire said maybe you’re more like her. After all, I’ve got military heroes, I’ve got to be like one of these great ladies, right?

Oh how wrong I was. Here’s the problem and its not one I’m sure I can overcome. I’m not romantic suspense. So my War’s Darkest Series is not like Suzanne Brockmann’s Seal Team series where there’s a cast of eight or so strapping men to pick a story from. None of my characters are Special Operations Forces.

My characters are also not prior military like Robyn Carr’s heros, who have all gotten out and headed up country to Virgin River, hoping to find a new life away from their military experiences. My guys are the Everyman, my women spouses, nurses and warriors themselves. No Special Forces, Navy Seals or Black Ops. Just regular soldiers, fighting the good fight.

So my books don’t fit. They aren’t small town based like Robyn’s and they’re not suspense like Joann, Cindy or Suzanne. In short, there’s nothing out there that I can compare to because everyone has either written prior military characters or Navy Seals.

When I wrote military romance in a query letter, little did I know I was speaking in code for romantic suspense. When agents are reading it, they’re looking for suspense. Fast pacing, action, action, romance, action. And that’s not what I wrote. I wrote a character based, contemporary romance with men and women who are all still in the military. I wrote books that were not suspense except that by putting military in the query, I was telling agents that’s what they were.

I screwed myself, apparently. I feel like when I sent out this last round of queries, I should have put in big bold letters, THIS IS NOT ROMANTIC SUSPENSE. I don’t know that it would have helped. I’m reasonably certain there are other issues in my current WIP but I’m also reasonably certain that the main problem agents are seeing is that they’re reading for romantic suspense and putting the book down when it doesn’t live up their expectations, wrong or not.

So, bluntly, I think I’m screwed. How do you pitch a book that doesn’t fit into a nice neat genre? Especially in this market? You can pitch to your hearts content but if you can’t get past the gatekeepers, you can’t get sold. I’m not complaining about agents, mind you. I’m simply stating that I think I pitched my books wrong to the fabulous agents who asked for the full manuscript and ultimately passed with great comments.

So that’s the end of this, for now. I’m revising once more because I’ve got a song in my head that is making me work on this book, even though I’m pretty sure it’s a dead end. I’ve learned a lot, but the one thing I don’t know how to fix is how to query the next project correctly. Maybe I’ll put in the query: this is not suspense.

Maybe not.

Jessica Scott writes for PBS POV Regarding War and is hard at work on her next novel. She recently returned from Iraq with the First Cavalry Division. You can read about her adventures in publishing and the Army at her blog http://www.jessicascott.net/blog

Today is release day for A Taste of Liberty, the second book in my Task Force 125 series so pardon me for being a bit excited.  Squeee! 

A Taste of Liberty follows The Path to Freedom and continues the story of Sarah Stevens and her team as they aim to take out a major arms dealer.

Following is the first chapter:

Sarah blinked back the sweat that rolled from her forehead and into her eyes. Her hair fell from her ponytail in long locks sticky with perspiration and clung to her cheeks. Her breath was hard and fast as she dodged hits and blocked kicks just to keep up with the man she was fighting.
My God! He’s a machine.
He had about thirty pounds on her but he was wiry and fast. He was throwing everything he had into the mix. He started with Muay Thai boxing, but, when he did a Capoeira flip and spun his body in mid air from a standing position, a chill raced up her spine. She’d never seen anyone as fast as this guy. She threw punches at his face, shoulders and stomach and never made contact. He’d dodge, twist, spin and jump just barely avoiding her hits and kicks. His years of training and experience in hand-to-hand combat were obvious.
Focus, Sarah. Focus.
The midday sun in the Nevada desert beat down with a steady blast of 102 degrees. Each breath was like taking a drag off a bonfire. The heat, dehydration and near exhaustion wore her down, and Sarah slid into a reactive, defensive mode where her movements were automatic. She knew she couldn’t win this way but the bright sun lulled her into not caring.
Her opponent flashed a wicked smile. His eyes sparkled like the trillions of grains of sand glinting around them. The relentless sun and heat slowed her down and he made the most of it. “Come on, sugarlips. Is that all you got?” He spun to his left.
The pain of a powerful blow to her right shoulder woke her from her daze, and her adrenaline surged.
Son of a bitch!
His teeth glistened as he grinned. “Papa’s gonna take you to school.”
Her jaw tensed. “Not today, Papa.” Sarah saw her opening for a kick and took it. She put all of her weight behind a roundhouse kick aimed for his neck and a clothesline takedown but the soft sand beneath her feet shifted and she slipped, kicking him in the head instead.
They both fell.
Sarah scrambled to stand quickly. As she did, she turned to see the man still lying on the ground, unconscious. She dropped to her knees beside him. A chill raced up her spine despite the heat. “Jason? Jason!” She placed two fingers on his neck.
Good heartbeat. Damn. I’m gonna need some help with this sandbag.
This wasn’t the first time one of them had been knocked out when they were sparring. It was becoming all too common as Sarah’s fighting skills advanced. She walked over to her Jeep and pulled her phone out of the door pocket. She pressed the number One and then the Send button.
I hope he answers.

The Path to Freedom and A Taste of Liberty are both available at Sapphire Blue Publishing.

I may be a writer about those amazing Navy SEALs during the day, but every Tuesday afternoon I become a Girl Scout leader. A few years ago, one of my Brownie’s father went to Iraq and we sent him Girl Scout cookies. Since then our girls have challenged themselves every year to send more cookies to our soldiers overseas. Here’s a note from a brother of one of the girls we sent cookies to, and is in Iraq right now:

“Thank you so very much to all girls in your troop! Me and my platoon buddies all enjoyed receiving the cookies that you all sent us. My favorite were the peanut butter patties. We really appreciate and are thankful for your support, there is nothing like knowing that the people back home care, especially when you don’t know all of them.”

PFC. Nathan

And you can help, too! Right now we’re taking donations to send cookies to our soldiers – we’re calling it Troops for Troops! What’s even better, it’s totally tax deducible. A box is $3.50 and a case is $42.00 – and all money is welcome!

If you’d like to donate contact kkloman@aol.com We’re hoping to make the next March 21st mailing – thank you so much in advance!

If you’d like cookies for yourself, you can easily find a troop in your area by going to: http://www.girlscoutcookies.org/

My favorite is thin mints!

Jill Monroe writes sexy Harlequins and can be found at www.jillmonroe.com

Last year I was the newbie to the Romance Writers of America National Conference. So now that I know what I didn’t then, I’m going to help you figure out a plan of attack for attending. Answer a few questions, do a little web browsing, and you’ll have a strategic plan of attack worthy of any military assault!

Why are you going? This basic question is your objective, what you hope to achieve by hanging out with 3,000 other authors. Are you going because you’re having trouble writing and need advice? Do you want to meet agents to see if there’s one out there for you? Or are you there to pick up free signed books? I think of RWA in terms of three levels: improving your writing (novice), getting your book published (intermediate), or becoming a business professional (professional). You can target more than one area, but focus will help you get the most out of RWA.

Who do you want to meet? Networking is an essential part of national. Whether you’re meeting with your local chapter, meeting your editor for the first time, or trying to find out what the key to Nora Roberts’ success is, you should have a mental list of people you want to contact. Plan or arrange to meet them at the workshops they’re presenting, at one of the meals that comes in your package price, or during book signings. However, no stalking or gawking please! You won’t look professional, and this is, foremost, a business conference.

What do you want to take away? Takeaways are both physical and mental. Free books, pens, bookmarkers, and notepads are some of the physical items you can pick up in the Goody Room. Use these for ideas of how you can market your book, or to give away to readers and other authors back home. Many workshop presenters will have handouts. Take copious notes on those that benefit you most. The major publishers will have signings, their authors autographing free books for all who wait in the lines. Besides the obvious books for reading, you can also give these away for personal or chapter promotion. As for your mental takeaways, the workshops will give you much to think about and help your writing business, and the inspirational and humbling speeches given by the speakers may give you that psychological boost to get your writing to the next step.

Using the answers you’ve given to the questions above, you’re ready for what we military types call a course of action (COA). You may have more than one COA, which is fine. You’ll need to refine your plan on arrival. Get on the RWA website early. You can start downloading handouts off the conference page to see which workshops you’ll want to attend. They fall into several categories: career, craft, research, chat, special (tends toward the philosophical/insprirational), publishing, writer’s life, and Publisher’s Spotlights. Shortly before the conference, RWA will upload the entire schedule. This is when the real work begins.

I used the Outlook calendar feature next, but you can simply write on a day planner if that’s your preference. Write down all the workshops and events you’re interested in and when they are. Why? Because you will change your mind about which ones you want to attend as the day goes by. Maybe one workshop gave you what you wanted and going to another similar one would be a waste of time. Or maybe you met someone who is attending a different workshop, but is turning out to be your best resource (or just fun to hang with). But since you have a backup plan, no need to read the entire catalog you’re given at registration.

If you’re directionally challenged, you’ll want to study the hotel map as well. Though there’s plenty of time between workshops, you don’t want to get lost trying to get to one that is standing-room only and end up trying to listen over the crowd squeezing in at the door.

If your goal is to snag an agent or editor, don’t miss your opportunity to sign up for appointments. Last year RWA posted a table of editors and agents and what they were looking for. Print this out—because they don’t have copies at the conference. Although you’ll only be given one agent/editor appointment, be prepared to hit up all agents and editors you’re interested in. You are allowed to sit in the waiting area for appointments, and if someone doesn’t show up, you can step into their slot. But do your research. It does little good to pitch your 150,000-word paranormal romantic saga to Harlequin.

Because you’re a first-timer, be sure to mark that on your registration. You’ll get a sticker for your badge saying “Newcomer.” This is an open invitation for agents, editors, authors and veteran attendees to strike up a conversation with you. Be prepared to talk about what you write and be proud of your status!

A good attack plan will help you reach your objective, and of course, result in that happily-ever-after ending we all strive for!

We are the new kids on the block and we have attitude but we back it up with years of inside information collected from both sides of the publishing table. Our sole purpose is to introduce books that make a statement with their unique voice, strong plot lines, and complex, well developed characters. At Accomplice Press our excellence shines through in the tiny details and this produces polished literary works.

After doing extensive research we know what the readers want and we are going to give it to them without worrying about selling millions of copies out of some mammoth warehouse. We are an independent, boutique style publisher and our focus is on the skilled authors and their target audiences, you the readers. The Partners at AP have decided to launch a series of specialty lines to answer the growing demand for something innovative and new. Curvalicious is our first endeavor and it will be a romance line spotlighting plus-size heroines but their size will not be the focus of the plot line. As publishers and women we feel that there are countless romance lovers who don’t see real life females, like themselves, portrayed in the books they read. We plan to change that with this specialty romance series.

Curvalicious women are voluptuous, beautiful, strong, sexy and intelligent. These inspirational main characters will always get the man of their dreams without losing weight or changing who they are on the outside. Romance is all about fantasy; our stories will keep the home fires burning even on the coldest night of the year. We are offering two different heat levels for our reader’s pleasure. Curvalicious Sweet is romance with sweet or sensual love scenes, but no explicit language or sex and Curvalicious Spicy is erotic romance containing explicit language and sex scenes. The stories will be available in e-book format with periodic print anthologies.

Accomplice Press is shaking up the publishing world one book at a time and you can be part of the revolution. We are holding a Curvalicious writing competition which began on Valentine’s Day and ends at midnight on May 14, 2010. We’ll be accepting stories for both Sweet and Spicy heat levels and on May 28, 2010 two winning entries will be contracted to be published in ebook format. The top three submissions of each category will also be included in the first Curvalicious print anthology. The specific guidelines for Sweet and Spicy submissions, word count and formatting requirements are all available at our website accomplicepress.com. All contest entries must be sent to curvecontest@accomplicepress.com. We are also holding an “open call” to all authors, so this is the perfect time to submit that manuscript you have written. Just remember Accomplice Press is NOT a self-publishing company.

It is an exciting time at Accomplice Press and we will be releasing more lines as the year progresses. There will be Silver Sirens, which will be romance about female characters over the age of 40, a Young Adult line called Fierce and a line dedicated to “men in Uniform”. Please check out accomplicepress.com for more information. Also we will be attending Romconinc.com in Denver this July, please look for us there.

Good luck authors!
Karen Jones
Public Relations Manager for Accomplice Press

In 2004, I began writing a novel about a lieutenant in the fictional APLA – All People’s Liberation Army. Since I’d been in the Navy, I knew the basic ranks there. I’d seen enough Star Trek episodes to know Navy ranks were used on the Enterprise. That was good enough for me.

The book was rocking right along, and I was more than halfway finished. I mentioned at dinner one night that I was using Navy ranks for the officers aboard the ship.

Did I mention that I have a rather opinionated son who happened to be in Junior ROTC – USAF?

My youngest son Joel is a stickler for details. He held a perfect score in ROTC, and was the pride of the colonel who taught the class.  

Joel informed me that the Air Force is in charge of the air, and by extension space, Star Trek notwithstanding. He suggested I change the ranks of my officers and offered to help with the conversion. We made them close approximations fitting with the work they perfomed.

My lieutenant became a captain. The character once designated captain now became a colonel (and in later books, a General). Joel gave me a print out of Air Force ranks to use for reference, and is still (six years later and post USAF service) my go-to guy on anything related to the military when I don’t know myself, or can’t ask a fellow member of RomVets or one of the authors here. Now you know how the APLA ended up with its current ranking system.

The book was At the Mercy of Her Pleasure, which is being rereleased 3/23/10 at Loose Id.

This week, the New York Times announced the recent death of Major General Jeanne Holm. Major General Holm’s contributions on behalf of women in the U.S. Air Force as well as women in all our U.S. Armed Forces are well documented. Her biography has a permanent place on the Official U.S. Air Force website. She is also a member of the National Women’s Hall of Fame. I won’t attempt to offer you a biography or an obituary of General Holm because they have both been done. What I would like to offer you is how General Holm, though never a personal acquaintance of mine, had a significant impact on my life.

When I joined the U.S. Air Force in 1991, I had every intention of becoming a linguist. I had the ASVAB & DLAB scores and the written job guarantee to prove it. As so often happens, the needs of the Air Force superseded my desire to travel the world as a brilliant linguist and I was given a career that needed bodies. It had only been six years since women had been allowed into the U.S.A.F. Security Police. They had been doing Law Enforcement duties prior to that but the Security Police (now Security Forces) were the infantry of the Air Force. They needed bodies and it didn’t matter what sex they were so I found myself in the Security Police. A “tread” or a “droid” as our Law Enforcement brothers and sisters preferred to call us but they always called us when the job was too big and they needed backup.

General Holm raised the female numbers in the Air Force. She also made it possible for women to be more than nurses. Security Police was one of the few holdouts when it came to women joining because of the combat nature of the job. We were trained in what was politely called “Air Base Ground Defense”. Over the years, the fluff has been removed from the title of our training and it is now simply called “Ground Combat Skills”.

It was because of General Holm’s work that I was able to do the many things I did to distinguish myself in the Air Force. I was a dead-on shot with an M-60 and frighteningly accurate with the Mark-19 and M-203 grenade launchers. I was also handy as a Fire Team Leader and Security Controller. I worked every facet of nuclear security during my eight years in the U.S.A.F.

I hardly think General Holm even considered me when she joined the Army Air Corps but the fact is that my personal history would be far less interesting had she not gone before me to pave the way for women in the U.S. Air Force. She will always have my undying respect and gratitude.

General Holm, I salute you.