When the cover gods really smile on you

First of all, is that the most gorgeous wolf in the entire world?  And the woman...and the sense of movement and sensuality.  Hubba-hubba.  I love this cover.

Most writers are clueless about visual art.  Or at least, I am.  I asked Changeling for a woman standing next to a wolf.  What I had in mind would have been static and dumb.  A woman and a wolf standing in a field.

Give this to an artist like Angela Knight, and you get magic!  Yes, THAT, Angela Knight.  The woman who writes such fabulous books she's risen to the very top of the cream of the crop.

I am truly blessed.

Please welcome Claire Robyns, author of Betrayed

Thanks for having me here today, Alice. I’m so excited about Carina Press and all the wonderful books already released, I have to keep on pinching myself to believe that I’m really amongst such brilliant company!


My medieval Scottish Romance is now available from Carina Press.

Two Feuding Families

Amber Jardin has no taste for the bitter feud started before her father’s banishment. But now that he’s passed, she’s had to return to Scotland and his barbaric people. After her bloodthirsty uncle kidnaps one of the family’s rivals, Amber is in turn captured by Krayne Johnstone, the enemy laird. Despite their enmity, their attraction is immediate—and unfortunate, as Amber has sworn to escape.

One Lusty Temptation

Krayne is amazed at the wildcat’s repeated attempts to flee. He should steel himself against her beguiling ways—yet with time, he is driven more witless with lust. When the ransom exchange fails and Krayne is left with Amber, he finds he cannot tolerate the thought of her with another man—and she cannot tolerate the thought of returning to her uncle’s home.

Will passion and love win out over mistrust and betrayal in time to prevent an all-out war?

Tell us about your Carina Press release.

Betrayed is a medieval Scottish romance set in the period of the first King James I ~ always confusing because King James VI became King James I of England much later (sorry about the history trivia, I’m addicted)

Krayne Johnstone became laird of Wamphray at the age of 12. He’s a man shaped by the harsh land. His heart is for pumping blood to his sword arm and nothing else. Before he could even start to fall in love with Amber, I had to teach the poor man what love is. But he is honourable and noble, and he has excellent reasons for distrusting scheming women.

Amber Jardin has led a pampered life in England and is totally unprepared for the barbaric realities of Scotland. But she’s not one to simper and bemoan her fate. She’s determined to shape her future and use whatever means on hand to do it. In this case, it’s her body. Amber is not perfect, far from it, but then I’ve never liked my heroines flawless. I don’t necessarily approve of everything she does, but I admire her courage and determination.

I’m fascinated with how books get their start. Do you remember the spark of an idea that grew to become this book?

Strolling through the many castle ruins of England, Scotland and Ireland and devouring the history behind those sites, I quickly became enthralled by the atrocious antics some of the nobility got up to, especially the Scots. And since there’s nothing badder than a bad Scots, and I like bad boys, I really loved the idea of writing a romance steeped in the mayhem of medieval Scotland.

What kinds of stories do you like to read and write?

I read pretty much everything. The most important thing to me is really living the story with the characters. If an author can achieve that inside my head while I read, I don’t really mind what the genre. Having said that, I’m naturally drawn to romantic comedy and historical romance so this is what I write. I also absolutely love romantic suspense and would give my eye-teeth to be able to write it, but I’m terrible at keeping secrets and would never last until the end before giving away the bad guys.

Tell us a bit about yourself. Family, house, pets, hobbies, that sort of thing.

I grew up in South Africa and met my British husband out there. Ever since, we seem to be playing hopscotch between South Africa and England, but cross fingers, we’ve been in the UK for about 5 years now and my darling husband hasn’t mentioned dragging us back to SA for a while now. We have 10 year old twin boys who are just starting to act like angsty teenagers, so I’m hoping they get it all out of their system before they actually do become teenagers.

What kind of music do you like? Do you listen to music while writing?

Okay, now I’m going to give away my age  My favourite artists are Queen, U2, Lilly Allen and The Killers. I’ve tried writing to music, but it distracts me too much. I end up singing along and going into some sort of daydream instead of writing.

Who do you think is the sexiest man on Earth? What makes him sexy?

Ooh, can I choose two? Russell Crowe because he just has that right combination of rugged looks that isn’t actually good-looking, but more sort of lived-in hunky features. As to his personality, not sure I’d actually like him very much, but then I don’t have to live with him, I just have to gaze at him in adoration.

And my second would be Keanu Reeves. Totally opposite Crowe, but there’s something darkly mysterious about Keanu that fascinates me. Once again, not sure I’d like the guy in person very much.

Hmm, wonder what that says about me?

If you’d like to read a little more about Betrayed, you can read the excerpt at
http://www.clairerobyns.com/Betrayed.html

You can visit with Claire Robyns at

Website: http://www.clairerobyns.com/

FB: http://www.facebook.com/ClaireRobyns

Twitter: http://twitter.com/ClaireRobyns

Thanks again for allowing me to invade your blog today, Alice

Please welcome Jenny Schwartz

Hi, Alice. Visiting other authors' blogs is great fun. Thanks for inviting me.

I've been following your blog for a couple of months, enjoying your discussion of the interface between your faith and your writing. It's prompted me to choose a slightly weird topic for my guest blog post: Acedia.

Acedia is sloth--depression, disengagement, drowning in a sea of triviality. It was reading William H Willimon's Sinning Like a Christian. A New Look at Seven Deadly Sins that prompted my interest in acedia and I'm drawing a lot of this post from my notes on his book.

Sloth is the opposite of joy. Willimon calls it "a slow, cowardly suicide" (p.93). It is a turning away, a refusal to care.

You can't be passionate and slothful--and this is where I slide into talking about romance books, reading and writing them.

Romance novels are passionate. They are about the risks of intimacy and its triumph.

To read a romance novel is to celebrate the triumph of love, of reaching beyond yourself to be open to another person.

When people dismiss romance novels as escapism they make me angry. Romance novels challenge us to believe and live the power of love.

***

Duty will bring them together—and tear them apart!

As a guardian angel, Mischa must protect the one man who may be able to bring about lasting peace to the Middle East. As a djinni, Rafe must fulfill the wishes of a terrorist leader. Their duties colliding, Mischa and Rafe become foes, but the heat between them is undeniable.

When the terrorist learns that a guardian angel stands between him and his greatest wish, he orders his djinni to remove her. Taking creative license, Rafe spirits her away to his private oasis, where she will be unable to protect the peacemaker.

Beyond their mutual desire, they find common ground in honor and loneliness. Passion quickly grows into love. But it’s soon clear to Rafe that love cannot be bound, and Mischa must be true to her life’s purpose. Even if Rafe must sacrifice his own taste of freedom to grant hers…

***

Thanks, Alice, for this chance to think aloud about why I enjoy reading and writing romance.

http://www.authorjennyschwartz.com/ 

http://www.acquiring-magic.blogspot.com/ 

http://www.facebook.com/authorjennyschwartz 

http://twitter.com/Jen2late 

Welcome Joely Sue Burkhart, author of The Bloodgate Guardian

Welcome.  Let's let my readers get to know you.

Tell us about your Carina Press release.


Based on Maya mythology, THE BLOODGATE GUARDIAN mixes paranormal, thriller, and romance as Dr. Jaid Merritt must find—and survive—the Gatekeeper in order to rescue her father from the Maya hell, Xibalba. Official blurb:

Worlds within worlds await through the Maya Bloodgate…

Dr. Jaid Merritt doesn’t do digs. The last time she ventured into the jungle, someone died. Now she’s content to decipher Maya glyphs from pictures sent to her by her famous archaeologist father. But when he goes missing while trying to perform a ritual based on her translations of an ancient codex, Jaid must put aside her fears and travel to Guatemala to find him.

After misusing the Bloodgates to bring his twin brother back from the afterlife, the Maya priest known as Ruin was cursed by the gods to stand as the guardian for all time. He was unable to stop Dr. Charles Merritt from opening the gates, and now demons roam this world. The last thing he wants to do is hurt the beautiful woman who is somehow infused with his magic, but if she uses the codex to retrieve her father, Ruin must do his duty. And this time, he won’t fail. Even if it kills him. Again.

I’m fascinated with how books get their start. Do you remember the spark of an idea that grew to become this book?

There's a lot of hype about the Maya predicting the “end of the world” as December 21, 2012. I wondered what if instead of the world ending, the powerful Maya gods were returning to our world?

What kinds of stories do you like to read and write?

I love to read just about anything, and write just about anything too. Right now I'm reading a mix of non-fiction (Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku) and fairytale retelling (Nadia Lee's A Happily Ever After of Her Own). I write romantic SF/F for Drollerie Press, contemporary erotic romance for Samhain Publishing, and paranormal thriller/romance for Carina Press.

Tell us a bit about yourself. Family, house, pets, hobbies, that sort of thing.

I'm married with three monsters (girls) ages 11, 8, and 7 and two dogs. I love crafts, everything from knitting, crochet, and cross stitch, although I don't have as much time as I'd like to work on everything and still write.

What kind of music do you like? Do you listen to music while writing?

I always listen to music while I write, developing a “playlist” for each book. The Maya playlist included the soundtrack from Apocalypto and Willie Nelson & Ray Charles singing Seven Spanish Angels.

Who do you think is the sexiest man on Earth? What makes him sexy?

I love Sean Connery's accent and Clive Owens's distinctive face—all those canyons and lines and angles!

How would you spend your ideal day?

A big pot of coffee or iced tea and my laptop, writing frantically until it was time to fix dinner for the monsters!

Is there something else you’d like to mention that I haven’t asked about?

I have another contemporary erotic romance releasing from Samhain in October and I'm plotting and working on Maya #2 for Carina as I type!

Thanks for having me, Alice!

Review or rate THE BLOODGATE GUARDIAN (or any of Joely's books) by July 31st to be entered to win at least two $50 gift certificates! Details See here

Read the first chapter of The Bloodgate Guardian Carina Press

Joely always has her nose buried in a book, especially one with mythology, fairy tales, and romance. She, her husband, and their three monsters live in Missouri. By day, she’s a computer programmer with a Masters of Science degree in Mathematics. When night falls, she bespells the monsters so she can write. Find her on her Website, Twitter, Facebook, and check out and check out free reads for free reads!

Guest blogger -- Toni Anderson, author of Sea of Suspicion

 Hi, Toni.  Thanks for visiting.  Let me ask you a few questions about you and your book.


Tell us about your Carina Press release.

Thanks for letting me be on your blog today, Alice. I write Romantic Suspense and my latest book, SEA OF SUSPICION, has just been released by Carina Press and I’m thrilled! It’s a moody atmospheric sexy romantic mystery set on the misty shores of contemporary Scotland. This story is particularly special to me as I set it in the Scottish Marine Laboratory where I conducted my Ph.D. and met my husband in the early nineties. I was lucky enough to revisit the lab in April this year and, though it has grown and morphed into a much larger institute, the essence of the original Victorian building remains the same. The rugged beauty of the East Fife coastline and the hypnotic rhythm of the sea never fail to enthrall and I know I’ll never get enough of that gorgeous coastal region.

 
I’m fascinated with how books get their start.  Do you remember the spark of an idea that grew to become this book?

Yes—I do  The idea was sparked by the powerful emotions that surge through you after you become a mother. The theme of the book in many ways is the fierceness of that emotion. I’m an easygoing sort of person except when my kids are involved and then I become more lioness than pussycat.

What kinds of stories do you like to read and write?

I write Romantic Suspense and Romantic Mystery stories and that’s what I like to read. And although I haven’t jumped on the paranormal wagon I adore Karen Marie Moning’s Fever books. I also read fantasy, crime, police procedurals, thrillers, and a huge array of non-fiction—partly research, partly fascination with other people’s lives.

Tell us a bit about yourself.  Family, house, pets, hobbies, that sort of thing.

I’m the third child of four and grew up in rural Shropshire, tucked deep in the heart of England. Now I live with my family in Winnipeg and find myself enjoying Canada, despite the bugs and weather. Pets… I lost my best friend, Benn, a black retriever, last November and because we’ve been away from home for the last six months it hasn’t quite sunk in that he is no longer a part of our lives. Still find it hard to write about him. We were lucky to have him—oops, there we go, crying again!

What kind of music do you like?  Do you listen to music while writing?

I’m a musicholic, but I have no real preference in terms of type of music. At home I listen to a lot of country, Brad Paisley and the Dixie Chicks. In France we discovered Lily Allen and Owl Music. My hubby is Irish so U2 feature massively in our daily lives. I suppose my musical hero is Bruce Springsteen—if I need comfort music, Bruce is my guy  As for listening to music while I write—YES!! Even to compose this blog I’ve scrounged up a Rod Stewart CD from my father-in-law. For every story I write I have a soundtrack that plunges me straight into the setting and mood of the story. SEA OF SUSPICION rocked with The Rolling Stones (I’m a recent convert to their music) and Runrig (a Scottish rock band who almost brought down the stage—literally—in Younger Hall in St. Andrews in the early nineties).

Who do you think is the sexiest man on Earth?  What makes him sexy?

Eric Bana features heavily in my sexiest man alive list. He’s gorgeous, but it is that intensity in his gaze that makes him sexy—those intelligent eyes.

Is there something else you’d like to mention that I haven’t asked about?

I’ve set up a fan page for SEA OF SUSPICION with location photographs and anecdotes. I’d love to hear what readers think. My first Romantic Suspense, HER SANCTUARY, was released in 2009 to some great reviews.  I love to hear from people and I write about my travels on my blog and update on Twitter.  Readers can sign up for my newsletter on my website, or friend me on Facebook. 

Thanks so much, Alice, for having me!

SEA OF SUSPICION

Blurb…

Marine biologist Susie Cooper traded her life in America for a dream job on the rugged Scottish coast. Now all she lacks is the right man to start a family with. After their first meeting, she knows sexy Detective Inspector Nick Archer isn’t what she’s looking for. He’s the type of guy whose idea of commitment is staying the whole night.

Nick has returned to St. Andrews for one reason only—to fulfill his vow to find his wife’s killer. Relentless in his twelve-year quest for justice, he has no problem using Susie to get close to his primary suspect: her boss. But the passion between them smolders, and as it ignites, Nick finds himself torn between his past and his present—with Susie.

When one of her boss’s students is murdered, Nick’s investigation draws Susie into a web of madness and betrayal. They will have to learn to trust each other if they’re going to catch a killer…and come out of this alive.

********************************************************************************

Excerpt…

“What you got, Lewis?” Nick asked the square-faced policewoman. Her expression was serious. P.C. Julie Lewis was slow to smile, but smart and dedicated, with no pretensions.

“Those two found a body.” She indicated the girls, who sat crying. “I think we’re looking at a murder, sir.” At his raised brow, she added. “Pretty hard to smash in your own skull.”

Nick’s stomach clenched. Murder?

He looked along the footpath, dread digging claws into his stomach and trying to find purchase. He knew homicide. He’d done four years’ homicide after he’d finished his undercover stint, but St. Andrews hadn’t seen a murder in years.

Had this poor bugger been bleeding to death when he had broken into the Gatty? Had he tracked the vic’s blood into the building? Into Susie’s car? Could he have saved a life if he’d been paying more attention to the present, rather than wasting his time trying to avenge the past?

Nick looked up at the overcast sky and thought for one split second he heard Chrissie’s laugh. He was going to hell for a little B&E. Or maybe for wanting a woman in a way he hadn’t in more than a decade.

The wind blasted his cheeks, icy and raw. Twin flashlights beamed into his eyes and he was instantly blind.

“Get those things out of my face,” he yelled.

“Sorry, sir.” Two synchronous replies.

Nick smelled blood in the air, sharp and cuprous. His intestines flip-flopped as he took another step down the grassy slope. P.C. Eric Mosel and Sergeant Hammy Soothill ran their beams over the body of a young woman.

Christ. “ID?”

Both men shook their heads.

“We tried not to disturb the locus.” P.C. Mosel, or Mouse as he was known in the station, was normally a bit of a twat, niggling away at the division between CID and uniform coppers—the filth and the woodentops as they were called. But not tonight. Tonight he was all business. “I thought she might still be alive.”

The back of her skull was smashed like a broken eggshell, pale bone gleaming amongst gore. The flashlights picked out blood matting her hair, streaking her neck, staining the sand beneath her body a rusty brown. It was bloody obvious she was dead, but they’d still need a doctor for verification. A body could be trailed from one end of the beach to the other, but police officers still needed a doctor to confirm death. Rules and regulations of the God-almighty handbook.

Sobs reached him, but all Nick could do was stand and stare. This woman was his first homicide victim since leaving the crime-ridden streets of London. He hadn’t expected to feel quite so appalled, but St. Andrews was the one pure spot in a life of brutality and it had just been violated.

He nodded toward the wailing girls. “They report it?”

“Yes, sir.” Sergeant Hammy Soothill waved his flashlight as if looking for footprints, but the sand was too dry. There wouldn’t be any tracks down there worth saving. “The one lassie slipped and fell in the blood.”

The distaste on Hammy’s face was echoed by Nick’s stomach. There was none of the usual black humor that accompanied sudden death and no one prodded the corpse with a ubiquitous black boot.

They were all somber as they got on with the job, maybe because no matter how many cases they’d had in other places, this was the first of its kind in St. Andrews.

“Get the photographer down here when the doctor’s finished. See if we can get hold of floodlights for the forensics team. Mouse, we’ll need a scale drawing, and Hammy, I want you to oversee every piece of evidence and make sure it is catalogued like the Crown Jewels.” He glanced at his watch. His boss would want to be notified, and the Procurator Fiscal.

His gaze lingered on the young woman’s body. Her skirt was hiked up around her thighs, suggesting a possible sexual assault, arms outstretched over her head as if she’d tried to crawl away.

All that blood…

She’d taken time to die.



SEA OF SUSPICION released June 14th

Download from http://carinapress.com

Please welcome KS Augustin, author of In Enemy Hands

When Alice and I first emailed each other, we discovered that we were on the opposite sides of the spiritual fence. I'm an atheist, Alice is a committed Christian. And the first thing we decided is that we should give the other space on our blogs to perhaps say something about that, tying it in with our upcoming Carina Press releases.


So, hello everyone. My name is Kaz Augustin and I have an hard sf romance coming out with Carina on 7 June. It's called IN ENEMY HANDS, and here is its cover:

In Enemy Hands

The Republic had taken everything from Moon―her research partner, her privacy, her illusions. They thought they had her under control. They were wrong.

Srin Flerovs, Moon's new research partner, is a chemically enhanced maths genius whose memory is erased every two days.

While he and Moon work on a method of bringing dead stars back to life, attraction between them flares, but that poses its own problem. How can their love survive when Srin forgets Moon every two days?

When she discovers the lethal applications her research can be put to, Moon knows she and Srin are nothing more than pawns in a much larger game. Together, they must escape the clutches of the Republic before they become its scapegoats. But there are too many walls around them, too many eyes watching. They want to run, but they're trapped on a military vessel in the depths of space, and time is running out....

The story is set in Republic space, which is a far future where humans dominate their part of the explored galaxy. Every species that isn't human is regarded as inferior and treated as such. I have a few stories set in the Republic, so I suppose you could call IN ENEMY HANDS part of the Republic series, but every book is standalone and can be read without referencing any of the others.

None of the characters are religious, but they do vary in terms of moral standards, and I hope the reader will enjoy gauging the level of morality that each character displays. The characters don't always get it right, either. Moon Thadin, the heroine, quite frankly doesn't care how the Republic behaves as long as she gets the recognition she deserves. But when she's forced to confront the evil of her government, will that ambition be enough to comfort her? Srin Flerovs, a man kept imprisoned in his own mind, naturally wants vengeance for what has been done to him, but is that what he should seek? And what of the ship captain, who must know what's being done in his name? How is he able to reconcile his humanity with its lack around him?

These are all questions as deep as spiritual faith, yet not dependent on it. I think my biggest criticism of religious people as a whole is that they seem to regard atheists as people without morals. Yet, with only one life to live, and no afterlife to look forward to, it would seem to me that the compulsion to do good, to achieve something worthwhile, in that one life is at least as strong as the compulsion to live according to a list of set-down rules. Maybe even stronger, because you come to those rules yourself, they are not thrust upon you.

And so the time for fateful decisions comes to each of the characters in the novel, and the decisions each of them makes has a bearing, not only on the situation at hand, but on the rest of their lives. IN ENEMY HANDS is a look at one point in time, where all these characters converge, and what gets decided during a span of only a few months. It also contains romance, physics and assassination pharmacology, and I hope you enjoy it.

Kaz Augustin is a Malaysian-born writer of science-fiction, romance, and permutations of the two. Her website is at http://www.ksaugustin.com/ and she blogs at http://www.blog.ksaugustin.com/ You can also find her on Facebook and Twitter; just look for “ksaugustin”.

COMPETITION: I'm giving away two copies of IN ENEMY HANDS at my blog, Fusion Despatches [http://blog.ksaugustin.com]. To be in the draw, stop by and comment at the Competition post, telling me at which blog you read about my book. You have till 30 June!

And thanks Alice for having me here! :)

Miss Foster's Here

Click on either the image above or to the right to go to Carina Press where Miss Foster's Folly is live.  Also available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble dot com.