NOTE: I know the first book is up at $0.99 already, but Reina is working with KDP to get the deal going for the other too! So check back!
Okay, so I want you to know he is still alive and breathing, but only because jail is real.
I’m used to the rolled eyes when I talk about romance, but hey… to each their own… and I love myself some romance. And there are people who are uninformed and then there are people who are willfully ignorant. I chose to believe he was part of the first group and asked him.
“Have you read stories about Greek Mythology?”
“Of course!” He seemed affronted that I’d even ask him such a silly thing. “Greek Mythology is classic storytelling!”
He knew I had him when I smiled. Not my normal smile, but that teeth-baring alligator grin that usually makes my son cringe and walk away, because he knows I’m about to take a bite out of someone.
“Oh good… well let’s talk about Greek Mythology. The obvious start is King Lycaon. Some forms of his myth tells the story of how Zeus turned him into a wolf as punishment for trying to trick him into eating human flesh.”
“Sure,” he shrugged, “but that’s just one—”
“Well, what about Arachne. Athena changed her into a spider.”
“Okay, but—”
“Apollo mourned the death of the youth Hyacinth, changing him into the flower we know today.”
He gave me a sullen look. “And?”
“There are a ton of examples, but let’s just remember how many times Zeus had to change his form or the form of others just to get some love… physical love. So…”
Yes, I verbally beat him into submission with examples of what he considered “real fiction” — but what am I getting at here…
Mythology… origin stories… are a human way of trying to understand ourselves and where we come from. We see ourselves in nature, sometimes ascribing attributes of nature’s other creatures to understand what we feel inside. We’re skittish as a colt. We’re hungry as a bear.
We even roar like lions.
We find animalistic characteristics as both desirable and undesirable in ourselves… of course we’re going to seek them in our heroes… our lovers…
I guess that’s why I love writing shapeshifters so much. Heroes and Heroines who can not just dabble in those behaviors, but come by them naturally.
A shapeshifter trio of brothers, bears from the Orsino family who search for their perfect mate and find them in equally amazing women…
A tiger shifter who finds himself with the Catch 22 of all time—keep the secret of his kind… or save the woman who is his perfect match?
Where wild nature and the cultivation of love collide and co-exist…
It gives me the warm fuzzies… You too?
*NANOWRIMO – November is National Novel Writing Month – the group of writers I’ve belonged for more than ten years started as folks who participated in this event
Her UnBearable Protector
The head of Orsino Security was hired to protect her for a week. Instead, his bear wants to claim her forever.
It takes one look for bear shifter Salvatore Orsino to know that Natale Durante isn’t just his client… she’s his mate. His first instinct is to lay Natale’s curvaceous body over his shoulder, find a den, and claim her with his bite. But, this beautiful head-strong woman only grudgingly endures his protection even as she welcomes him in her bed. He’ll have to set aside his bear’s need to mark her until he’s eliminated the threat to her life. Once she’s safe, he’ll turn all his energies convincing her that he isn’t after a short-term dalliance, he wants her, with him… forever.
Natale Durante knows that Durante Fashion House is on its last legs. Her new line, designed for women of every size and shape, is her last attempt at saving her family’s legacy. But there are those in high fashion who prefer that things stay the same—curves belong on the road, not the runway. When complaints and hate mail escalate to threats of bodily harm, her father hires a bodyguard—Salvatore Orsino. He’s over six feet of deliciously seductive muscular male and a distraction she can’t afford. One look from him and she wants her infuriatingly persistent protector to rip off her clothes with his teeth, or she might do the same to him.
Can Salvatore eliminate the threats to Natale or will he lose her before he has a chance to claim her?
The Tiger’s Innocent Bride
When he saw his mate for the first time, her life was in danger. Keeping his Tiger a secret was no longer an option.
Every day was a struggle for Tiger Shifter, Devlin Kerr. Booted from one Police Department due to his ‘questionable attitude,’ he’d landed in Sylvan City determined to give the career another go. What was an Alpha to do?
Three weeks of even more bull and inside politics was already souring him on law enforcement all together when his Captain suckers him into working extra security at a society event.
A society event that ends in gunfire and blood.
And smack dab in the middle of the crosshairs? His mate.
Secrets be damned, Devlin did what it took to save her and suddenly danger is coming at them from everywhere.
Death, he could handle. Mayhem? Sure, just another walk in the park.People going after his mate? That wasn’t going to fly. He was going to do whatever it took to keep her safe from danger…
…but who was going to keep Paige Lundin safe from him? Less than a day after they’d met, she was The Tiger’s Innocent Bride.*This is Book 1 of the Sylvan City Alphas Series. As the series goes on you’ll meet Alphas of a number of different species who will find their mates amongst the citizens of this city, complete with lush woods and fields as well as a concrete jungle. These hard-edged heroes and their lusciously-curvy mates are turning this island into a shifter paradise filled with Happy Ever Afters*
Comment
I love this analysis of the origins of shape-shifter stories and the Greek mythology they derive from. Thanks so much for defending our genre from the willfully ignorant.