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Showing posts from September, 2009

Author Guest Post - Louisa Edwards (& a Giveaway!)

* Congrats to lucky winner - Virginia * Readers, please join me welcoming Louisa Edwards , debut author of Can't Stand The Heat (A Recipe for Love) who will be guest blogging here today! The first book in the Recipe for Love series, Can't Stand The Heat features a food critic going undercover to write an expose about a hotshot chef. Only she doesn't know how to cook, and the chef is determined to teach her a lesson..about cooking with a dash of delectable passion thrown in!   I’ve been reading romance novels since I was about 11 years old. When my grandmother came to visit, I’d sneak them out of her suitcase and secret them away to my room. Then, under cover of darkness, I’d creep out of bed and read them by the light of the bulb in my closet. Yes, I was literally a closeted romance reader. All through high school and the first few years of college, I kept my romances, with their covers depicting big-chested men and women in steamy clinches, under my bed and

Author Guest Post - Shobhan Bantwal

It's my pleasure to introduce you to today's guest blogger, Shobhan Bantwal , author of The Dowry Bride and The Sari Shop Widow . Bantwal calls her writing “Bollywood in a Book,” romantic, colorful, action-packed tales, rich with elements of her own Indian culture -- stories that entertain and educate. Pungent curry, sweet fried onions, incense, colorful beads, and lush fabrics - The Sari Shop Widow is a novel set on the streets of Edison, New Jersey's Little India, where a young businesswoman rediscovers the magic of love and family. When Anjali Kapadia's posh sari boutique in New Jersey is on the verge of financial ruin, her wealthy uncle from India comes to her rescue. But the wily, dictatorial uncle arrives with some unpleasant surprises--a young Indo-British partner named Rishi Shah for one--and a startling secret that disturbs Anjali. The Challenges of an Ethnic Fiction Writer As an Indian-American author writing for a primarily American audience, I c

Blog Tour - Bo's Cafe (& a Giveaway -- closed)

** Winner - Kayla ** About Bo's Café - High-powered executive Steven Kerner is living the dream in southern California. But when his bottled pain ignites in anger one night, his wife kicks him out. Then an eccentric mystery man named Andy Monroe befriends Steven and begins unravelling his tightly wound world. Andy leads Steven through a series of frustrating and revealing encounters to repair his life through genuine friendship and the grace and love of a God who has been waiting for him to accept it. A story to challenge and encourage, Bo's Café is a model for all who struggle with unresolved problems and a performance-based life. Those who desire a fuller, more authentic way of living will find this journey of healing a restorative exploration of God's unbridled grace. Brought to you by the folks who published THE SHACK. Read an excerpt. Guest Post by the authors - John Lynch, Bill Thrall and Bruce McNicol We three co-authors have been close friends for fifteen

Book Excerpt - In the Garden of Sin by Lousia Burton

In the Garden of Sin (The Hidden Grotto Series) 320p, Bantam About the Book Two linked tales are set in an ancient castle where four exquisitely beautiful beings who thrive on carnal energy entice and ravish their human guests. Hannah Leeds is The English Courtesan , a seventeenth-century maiden who apprentices herself as a courtesan-in-training to Venetian nobleman Domenico Vitturi, offering her body in exchange for his patronage. Don Domenico has resigned himself to a life without love, his once-handsome face having been disfigured by the scars of war. He brings Hannah to the Castle of the Hidden Grotto to be tutored in the arts of love by its insatiable and inventive residents, little knowing that she has come for more than just an erotic education…. In Hunger vampires Anton Turek and Galiana Solsa satisfy their voracious erotic appetites while feeding on their prey. Weary of playing lapdog to the powerful, sadistic Galiana, Anton renews his quest to possess Lili, the beaut

Author Guest Post - Cathy Maxwell (& a Giveaway!)

* Congrats to lucky winner - Bridget* Readers, it's my pleasure to introduce today's guest blogger, Author Cathy Maxwell ! Cathy is the NYT best-selling author of twenty adventurous historical romance novels. Her latest book is The Earl Claims His Wife from Avon Books (Oct ’09) and is part of her “ Scandals and Seductions ” series.     PILGRIMAGES And She Looked Longingly in His Direction-- Ugh! Blah! I don’t understand people who think “romance” is nothing more than heated feelings between a man and a woman. How boring is that? How long can it last? Eventually someone smokes that mental cigarette and we are d-o-n-e. A new reader to Romance commented to me that she was surprised by the action, the adventure, the fun she’d discovered in romance novels. And I said, “Of course, it’s romance.” And she didn’t get it. A lot of people don’t get it (and a good portion of them are reporters). Romance isn’t something that just blooms between two people and the

Author Guest Post - Jimmy Root Jr.

Today I'm pleased to welcome Jimmy Root Jr., author of Distant Thunder: Book One of the Lightning Chronicles . His guest post here today is part of this book's virtual tour, courtesy Pump Up Your Book Promotion . What Does Plausibility have to do With It?   Have you ever listened to a storyteller spin a yarn and all the while you were thinking, “This makes no sense?” The reason you came to that conclusion was either because that particular bard was terrible at telling a story or, the story itself didn’t promote plausibility. As my fingers were sending sparks flying from my keyboard in the writing of Distant Thunder, every ounce of grey matter in my head was pulsating. It was shouting, “Keep It Plausible Stupid. Make it believable!” So, I took the headlines being broadcast on the news and projected my story into the world of current events and how they align to Bible prophecy. The trick worked. My story immediately took on a level of believability that captivates the r

Author Guest Post - Julie Kenner

Readers, please join me welcoming Julie Kenner , author of the Demon Hunting Soccer Mom Series , who will be guest blogging here today! There is an old adage that instructs that a writer should “write what they know.” Frankly, I always thought that was a load of hoo-ey. After all, did Margaret Mitchell live through the Civil War? Did John Grisham sign on with a mob-run law firm immediately after law school? Did Madeline L’Engle travel by tesseract? And yet, despite the fact that a goodly portion of my books dive deep into the world of the paranormal, I can honestly say that with each and every book, I do in fact write what I know. Because the adage isn’t meant to be taken literally. Instead, it refers to those basic human emotions that drive both life and solid fiction. Emotions that make us laugh and cry and connect with the characters in a story. Of course, that doesn’t mean that real life experience never comes in to play. Back when I was practicing law and succumb

Author Guest Post - Allyson Roy

Readers, please join me welcoming Allyson Roy who will be guest blogging here today!   Allyson Roy translates into Alice & Roy, husband and wife collaborating authors. They both have backgrounds in the arts -- Alice in dance and Roy in theater and stand-up comedy. Their first Saylor Oz novel won a Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense. The second in the series, Babydoll , was just released.     Madcap Noir   In music it’s called a fusion genre -- the blending of two or more genres and not fitting squarely into any. Having spent years crossing over several areas of the arts, we like the idea of inclusion, of not being bound to rigid ideas of what a particular kind of book has to be. Of course this creates the risk factor of not meeting the expectations of certain readers -- and the challenge of branding our series without a traditional label. So in trying to come up with a way to define our Saylor Oz crime adventures, we chose to name our style Madcap

A Talk with Kris Radish, Author of The Shortest Distance...

THE SHORTEST DISTANCE BETWEEN TWO WOMEN is your first novel set in the South. Why did you choose to set this book in a small South Carolina town? I love to write about all the places in-between what some people think are the “real cities”—New York, San Francisco, Chicago. I think the heart of the world lies in the people and places of communities where there is a foundation of simple openness … where there’s a town snoop and people know what day you water your lawn. I also like to write about areas I want to visit. Ironically, much like my central protagonist in this novel, I got caught up with my own life and family and was not able to go to South Carolina for an extended research visit. Instead I relied on prior visits and research. I really do live my novels. Your central protagonist, Emma Gilford, is an avid gardener; in fact, the gardens in the novel have such a presence that they almost become a character in their own right. What role do gardens play in Emma’s li

Giveaway - The Laird Who Loved Me by Karen Hawkins

* Congrats to lucky winner - Margay * Author Karen Hawkins has generously put up a copy of her latest hit, The Laird Who Loved Me , to giveaway to one lucky reader here! By the way, the book's on it's third week on the NYTimes list - Kudos, Karen! About the Book - Handsome Alexander MacLean enjoyed his intoxicating flirtation with lovely Caitlyn Hurst...until she embarrassed him in front of the entire ton. Orchestrating Caitlyn's attendance at a fashionable house party, Alexander plots her downfall. But to his fury, her charm and wit thwart his plan to ruin her. Her disastrous London season left Caitlyn filled with regret and determined to make things right with Alexander. She's delighted to find him at the house party to which she's unexpectedly invited -- but it's clear that the sexy, arrogant Highlander hasn't forgiven her. So Caitlyn comes up with a bold scheme, proposing an unusual contest drawn from legend: each must complete a set of "myth

Author Guest Post - Michelle Moran (and a Giveaway!)

* Congrats to lucky winner - Beth * Readers, please join me welcoming Michelle Moran , author of Cleopatra's Daughter who will be guest blogging here today!     Michelle Moran has traveled around the world, from Zimbabwe to India, and her experiences at archaeological sites were what inspired her to write historical fiction. A public high school teacher for six years, Michelle Moran is currently a full-time writer living in California with her husband. She is the author of the bestselling historical fiction Nefertiti and its standalone sequel, The Heretic Queen . Her third novel, Cleopatra's Daughter , released September 15, 2009. Three Princesses For every novel I have written, I can look back and say that there has been a very specific moment of inspiration - usually in some exotic locale or inside a museum - where I’ve said, “Aha! That’s going to be the subject of my next novel.” I never began my writing career with the intention to write books about three diff