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A Question for Your Nimble Minds…
Tuesday, December 8th, 2015

Update: The winner of the free download is…Kristin Arpin!

* * * * *

Bad Moon RisingI wrapped up Bad Moon Rising yesterday, and it’s in my editor’s hands. This time next week, it will be available at Amazon! This story was one I wrote and offered free, by the chapter, until life caught up with me and I had to scurry to keep up. For those of you who read through chapter five, I will send you chapters six and seven for free. Otherwise, it will be just $0.99 for exactly one week before I jump it up to $2.99 where it belongs—just so you have a chance to read the rest if you’d like to read the final, edited version!

Today, I have bits to catch up on, two stories to put down some notes on, because I have to begin writing them right away.

And did I mention I’m in the midst of teaching the Rose’s Write 50 Books a Year class? It’s a freebie and lasts all this week. If you need help planning, or just need a kick in the butt to get ‘er done, come join us. It’s not too late!

So, for the question…

For my next SEAL book, do you have any celebrity
recommendations for a light-haired hottie?
Answer for a chance to win one of these recent releases. 

How To Train Your Skjaldmaer Knight Edition

Her Next Breath SOWithTheBoss600

A. Catherine Noon: Bloody Mary Mix, a Holiday Parable or, How To Survive the Grocery Store on Black Friday
Monday, December 7th, 2015

acnACN-RW_SealedByMagic_coverlgFor many of us, the holidays are a time to reconnect with family, particularly if we don’t live near one another.  Our family is no exception to this, with folks scattered all over the States.  We were fortunate enough to be able to gather this Thanksgiving in Philadelphia and I couldn’t be happier.  It’s been a couple of holidays since I got to see everyone, and that made it even better.

It’s funny how moving and job churn can affect family time, isn’t it?

Well, okay, “funny” isn’t really the word, but I digress.

I got to connect with my sister-in-law, the lovely L…  She and I decided that we needed to make some cocktails and talked her husband into taking us to the grocery store.

On Black Friday.

Side note – I am not, in any way, shape, or form, a “shopper.”  In fact, I loathe the entire process and have been known to have anxiety attacks in front of the cucumber display.

Here, then, are some tips on surviving the market on days when every shopper, whether they like shopping or not, seems to decide simultaneously that they absolutely must try to disprove the law of physics that says two objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time.

First, know what you want.  Wandering around the aisles to browse means that you will probably get run over by people like me who are panickedatthethoughtofbeinginthestorewithyouandjustwanttheirstuffthankx.

Second, leave the family confab at home.  Now is not the time to clog the aisle of the Bloody Mary Mix and try to work out the solution to Life, the Universe, and Everything.

Third, I love my brother-in-law.  But one bottle of Bloody Mary Mix isn’t enough for ME, let alone several of us.  Be prepared, Boy Scout.  Buy more than one.

Fourth, you put celery salt in Bloody Marys, according to the lovely L…  And yes.  It’s as good as it sounds.

Fifth, when you leave the grocery store parking lot, getting your mini-van turned perpendicularly to everyone else, and the flow of traffic, is dumb.  Don’t do that.  Any more.

Yes, lady, I’m looking at you.  You know who you are.

And sixth, if you absolutely must head out on Black Friday, take an awesome sister-in-law with you and come home with vodka to which you add stuff.  It’ll make you a whole lot calmer about this whole thing called shopping.

Now.  Where did I put the celery salt?

Question for you, Dear Reader:  what do you like in your Bloody Mary?  Or, if that’s not your poison, what’s your favorite cocktail?

Sierra Summers: Rebooting
Sunday, December 6th, 2015

Thank you Delilah for hosting me today.

First I wanted to say my thoughts go to those who have lost their lives and been injured over these last few weeks. It really re-enforces the live every day to the fullest.

When I wrote under the name Violet Summers with a partner, I didn’t expect to sell much, or that anyone would be that interested in what I had to say. Lucky for me I was wrong and experienced some great years meeting wonderful readers as well as some of my favorite authors—blog Host included.

Then life happened and the bottom fell out of my writing. I fell ill, finally started healing and then bought a bookstore. My muse had taken off and I hated anything I attempted to write.

It’s taken me over a year to begin writing again but I’ve started.

I’m calling 2016 the year of the Reboot. The year of a new approach to my career as a solo writer. To finishing what I’ve started and to remember that everyone has to deal with something. It’s how we come out of it at the end that counts and you know you’re over the worst when you can see the good again.

To that positive end, I’m excited to announce a new series I’m working on—Tarnished Knights.

Dragon Shifters, motorcycles, tattoo parlors and dive bars all nestled in the small town of Wayne, Mi. Blue collar, gritty and ready to kill to protect what they love, the dragons will stop at nothing.

Cyn is the law in the dragon community and his life is getting way too complicated. First he has to deal with the Metallic clans trying to wipe his people out and then there is Ruby. A feisty barkeep who keeps everyone at arm’s length.

She’s hiding a secret behind her big brown eyes and the further she backs away, the more Cyn’s determined to discover what she’s hiding from. Add on top of that a case of serious dragon mating hormones shooting through his body every time Ruby smiles and you have a man ready to blow or worse a dragon willing to bring the whole world down.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season,

Sierra Summers
Books by Sierra

Notes from a Cinephile (Contest)
Saturday, December 5th, 2015

Cinephile:  a devotee of motion pictures ~ Merriam Webster

I’ll make an admission that most writers won’t. I don’t read very much for pleasure. Between my own writing and editing jobs, I don’t want to spend more time looking at the written word for pleasure. But I consider movies a legitimate alternative to reading.

MudThey really do help me fill my writer’s well. Last night’s movie night with my daughter is a case in point. We watched the movie Mud—not because we wanted so much to see a gritty depiction of life on the Arkansas river. We watched because it was filmed in Arkansas and a friend of ours sold a pickup truck to the film crew that was used by one of the film’s characters. 🙂

The acting was very, very good. Especially that of Matthew McConaughey, who played a man hiding on a tiny sandbar of an island in the middle of a river while he waited for his girlfriend (Reese Witherspoon) to join him on the run. He was wanted for murder. And even though he stole every scene he appeared in, he wasn’t the protagonist, the main character, of the story. This was a boy’s coming of age story, and the boy who was at the center of the story shared many parallels with MC’s character. Both characters had strong arcs, both had problems to work through and events to overcome before the end of the movie, and that’s what makes for good fiction.

winter boneI’ll admit this kind of realism isn’t my usual cup of tea, but I recently watched another truly amazing movie—also about “real” folk from my region of the country. In Winter’s Bone, Jennifer Lawrence plays an Ozark Mountain girl who hunts for her drug-dealing dad to make sure he shows up for his trial in order to save her home. I never appreciated her as an actress before this film. But she was so real, so dead-on in her performance as the girl who had so many hurdles to overcome in her quest, I now count myself as a fan.

The point is, I watched those movies, but used the same eye I would have reading a book to dissect the story/craft elements. I studied the director’s transitions from one scene to the next. In Mud, I noted the symbolism of Mud’s lucky shirt—that he wore it until it was rags, that he discarded it when he gave up on himself, and that he tore it into strips to save the boy’s life. I paid attention to their dialogue, their voices. There can be poetry in “real” dialogue. And I find that when I need to “hear” a Cajun voice in my ear, I reach for movies like The Big Easy and Little Chenier. When I want gritty and real for a K&R rescue for a book, and a hero who has issues but needs to reawaken his heart, I reach for Proof of Life. Not to imitate, but to climb into that world and pull the rich, visual and aural details around me.

And if I need to wind down and want straight entertainment, which is mostly why I watch movies, I want the latest Star Trek or Fast and Furious. I love the cheap thrills like anyone else. And those are mostly what fill my DVD rack.

Have any movies inspired you lately?
Answer for a chance to win one of these recent releases. 

With His Professor Knight Edition

HiredHand_600 Controlled Burn

Edie Ramer: A Love & Murder Christmas (Contest)
Friday, December 4th, 2015

Are you in the holiday mood? I have two Christmas books out—one new and one a little older. My earlier one, CHRISTMAS AT ANGEL LAKE, is on sale for only 99 cents! It’s book 2 of my Rescued Hearts series, and like all the books in the series, it stands alone. If you’re a dog lover, there’s a dog story in it that will touch your heart as much as the hero’s and heroine’s story. (There’s a cat, too, but the dog story is the one that will make you sniffle.) Get the book while it’s still on sale!

A LOVE & MURDER CHRISTMAS, book 3 of my Love & Murder series, is also a stand-alone. I just published it last week, and I’m so happy with it. This series is my contemporary romance/romantic suspense series. No paranormal. But early on in the book, I went to bed at night, and a word popped into my head: POOKA

I jumped out of bed, rushed to my office, and scribbbled down pooka. Sometimes you’ve got to listen to the crazy voices in your head. I’m so glad I did. I love the way this book ended up, even if it will be the only book with a five-foot cat pooka in my series.

Thanks to Delilah for inviting me to her lovely blog. 🙂

Below are the blurbs and links to the books, but I’m wondering what your favorite Christmas stories or movies are. I still love the Christmas scenes in LITTLE WOMEN, and my favorite Christmas movies are Love Actually and the original Christmas on 34th Street. What are your favorites? I’m giving away an ebook of A LOVE & MURDER CHRISTMAS to one commenter.

 

A LOVE & MURDER CHRISTMAS

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Good will to all, and peace on Earth. Even to those trying to kill you.

Adam Donahue lives in the perfect vacation place – Door County, Wisconsin. But his life isn’t perfect. His wife was killed by a drunk driver three years ago, and his twelve-year-old daughter has type one diabetes. Now his daughter claims a mythical pooka, in the shape of a giant cat only she can see, is living in her bedroom. It scares him enough to do something he hates – ask for help from his late wife’s best friend.

Lauren Finney’s insurance agent husband disappeared four and a half years ago. Good riddance. Her Irish wolfhound is better company than he ever was. And she misses her best friend more than the missing husband, though Adam – her best friend ‘s widower – makes her heart beat faster. Now it’s time to initiate divorce proceedings against her husband, before the prenup restrictions expire and he comes back to claim half her considerable assets.

As soon as she starts the proceedings, bad things happen. Very bad things.

Then Adam asks her help with his daughter, and good things happen. Very good things.

It might be their very best Christmas … or it might be their very last.

Amazon | AmazonUK | iBooks | BN | Kobo | GP

 

CHRISTMAS AT ANGEL LAKE

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A kitten saved her…

Broke, pregnant and deserted by her boyfriend, Maddie Barrymore swerves to avoid a kitten while driving in a Wisconsin blizzard—and her life takes another turn. Like Puss in Boots, she stays in an empty house. She has the baby, the kitten, gets a job and a degree…yet every day she’s ready to flee if the real owner shows up.

Five years later, he does…

Dumped by the woman he loves, film producer Logan MacLeesh’s heart is as dark as one of his movies. He plans to hole up in his grandmother’s old mansion and throw himself into his work…until he discovers the sexy squatter and her four-year-old son. Before he can call the sheriff, Maddie’s tale of how she ended up there entertains him. They make a deal that as long as she tells him a story every night, she and her son can stay. Even the cat, though Logan’s always been a dog person.

A dog in need of saving…

Far away in another state, a homeless dog lifts his head, sniffs…and smells him. The human who’s meant for him. As he heads through the snow toward the scent, his journey seems impossible, even though it’s Christmas, a time when miracles happen.

Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Angel-Rescued-Hearts-ebook/dp/B00FG92FOE/?tag=ediram-20

Amazon UK | iBooks | BN | Kobo

Thanks for stopping by! You can find me at www.edieramer.com, my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/edieramer.author/ or Twitter https://twitter.com/edieramer.

Jean Adams: GRATITUDE MAKES THE WORLD GO ROUND
Thursday, December 3rd, 2015

I struggled for a while for to come up with a post that we, as writers, could all relate to, other than the same-old, same-old, do-this-and-you’ll-be-a-success type of blog. Then I came up with, what I hope, was a blinding flash of inspiration.

At a time when Americans all over the world celebrate Thanksgiving, together with their many friends, maybe it’s time we focused on giving thanks for our dreams, ideas and talents. After all, not everyone is lucky enough to have dreams, or so we’re told, so we should be thankful.

Ask the naysayers how many of their dreams keep people employed? For example: have you ever thanked people who make the humble pencil, (some people still use them), those who make pens and paper, computer manufacturers, and the people who make all the little components that go into making up such an intricate device.

The list is endless. You can see where I’m going with this. I’ll leave it to you to add your two cents worth.

Be thankful for the people who deliver and sell those products to you and later, hopefully, sell the books you write using those very products.

What about our publishers? You are helping keep them in business simply by writing the best book you possibly can. In their turn, publishers are able to offer you more contracts because you put everything you had into your latest dream.

Then there are all the other authors, and soon-to-be-published authors, all doing the same thing you are. Together we are a formidable force, keeping the wheels of commerce turning.

And let’s not forget our wonderful readers, some of whom would not have been able to share your dream if you hadn’t shared your talent and written it down.

If you’ve been told by naysayers that your “little” dream is too frivolous, tell them to go take care of their own dream. Yours is doing very nicely, thank you very much.

Jean Adams

No Other Love

perf5.000x8.000.inddLucas Nelson, a man brought to his knees and humiliated by two women in his life, has given up on them. When he finds himself falling in love with Jenna, who he has problems avoiding, he knows he’s in trouble.

Jenna Blake is living the life of her dreams and has made it clear she’s not interested in a relationship with an ordinary man. She wants to marry an aristocrat, like the Earl of Kendal. Nothing must be allowed to get in the way of everything she’s worked for, not even true love.

But Jenna finds Lucas hard to resist. Will she follow her heart? Or will the earl and his aristocratic trappings win her over?

Find this story at Amazon

Lizzie Ashworth: Jarrod Bancroft
Wednesday, December 2nd, 2015

Hi Delilah fans! I hope you all are more ready for the season than I am—I haven’t bought a single gift yet. But I’ve got a list and am starting with a gift for you.

In keeping with the season, here’s a Christmas you’ve probably never experienced. Allow me to introduce masochist Jarrod Bancroft. In this first novella, A Gift for Jarrod, we meet him as he enters Stonybrook Academy for six weeks of training in submission. Here’s an excerpt:

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Several days after his session with Madam, Jarrod noticed the rhythm of the house changed. It was close to the end of his stay, and that knowledge sat in his chest like a rock. He had no idea what he wanted after this. He felt stirred up, his emotions on the surface. He almost wanted to go to the dungeon and ask for a beating so everything going on in his mind would be set aside.

Most of all, he was haunted by thoughts of Madam. Ms. Fitzgerald. A woman he’d desired since the first time he’d seen her, back when he’d been an adolescent with nothing but silly girls and masturbation to relieve the craving that came with thinking of her. A woman who could never want him. Christ, she had to be at least ten years older.

But she didn’t look that much older. She looked beautiful, her body athletic and voluptuous and… He swallowed and forced himself to think of anything else—the fire, the condensation on the window. How much longer could he stay here knowing he might never see more of her?

Damn it, he would see more of her, he decided suddenly. He wouldn’t allow this all to end without reaching some kind of agreement with her. He wouldn’t call it a relationship. But there would be ‘something.’

The girl came to help him relieve his bladder, and his breakfast arrived soon after. Then he and the other subs were scrubbed and groomed until every hair and nail shone. After lunch, massage with fragrant oils, deep enough to relieve any lingering ache, left him blissfully relaxed. His brief glances out the windows found a light snow falling on the already deep layer that banked around the evergreens and along the distant rock walls. The snow only added to his sense of pleasure.

By late afternoon, they were taken to the third floor to a large central space framed in soaring timbers and natural wood with an enormous Christmas tree standing in the center and reaching almost to the high ceiling. It glittered with multi-colored lights and a profusion of ornaments, nothing like the sedate monochromatic trees his mother preferred but instead an almost gaudy explosion of every color and shape imaginable. Quiet strains of music played in the background, some of it recognizable seasonal classics. He grinned, walking around the tree with the other subs, all of them enjoying a surprising recess from their normal discipline.

lab&w copyHe glanced around the massive room. Wreaths hung on four glass doors that led to a snow-covered deck which overlooked the same view he saw from his bedroom. Comfortable couches and arm chairs clustered around coffee tables in conversational groupings. Red candles burned here and there, sending off a tantalizing aroma of cinnamon and spice. Flames leapt from logs in an immense fireplace at the far end of the room where a long mantle hosted a row of colorful stockings, dishes of candy canes, and more evergreen boughs. He wanted to laugh out loud.

Platters of food spread over a large table draped in white cloth and positioned near the tree: smoked meats and salmon, trays of cheeses, fondue pots with bagna cauda, creamy rarebit and a smooth Swiss mixture, platters of crisp fresh vegetables for dipping, caviar and fresh crusty loaves of dark and light bread, olives and pickles, nuts and candied dried fruits. On the end under heat lamps were a ham wreathed in pineapple glaze and a roast partially carved to reveal the succulent pink interior. Bottles of wine, sparkling crystal glasses, ornate silverware and heavy china—he’d never seen such an elaborate set-up even at his parents’ home where they prided themselves on outdoing their friends. Two or three uniformed helpers worked in an open kitchen area at the end opposite the fireplace and more delectable smells escaped from there.

Ordered to kneel along the wall near the fireplace, he and the others watched as guests began to arrive. Surprisingly, none of them wore masks. Evidently they all knew each other. They were laughing and talking, wearing exotic flowing clothes of silk and velvet, supple fitted leather, or immaculately tailored suits of the finest tweed or worsted. The stream of arrivals amused and satisfied him in a way he had never expected. No one seemed to notice that he and the other trainees were without clothing. Anticipation fired through him. He felt free.

Madam—Ms. Fitzgerald—appeared along with workers he recognized from his stay. She looked incredibly beautiful, her dark hair piled up high, her cheeks pink with excitement. She wore a navy fitted suit, its jacket fastened with one button and evidently nothing underneath. The skirt hugged her hips and thighs and ended just above the knee. At her feet were very high heels in shiny black, and a wave of emotion rolled over him so strongly he felt weak.

How had six weeks flown by so quickly? How would he live now, away from here, away from her?

She circulated among the guests. Everyone talked in excited voices, standing in energetic knots or sprawled around on the chairs and couches. They were drinking, laughing, some of them passing joints. Jarrod tried to think whether he had never seen people like these. Maybe there had been a subtle undercurrent of such things at his parents’ parties, or at college, or at the firm—but he couldn’t recollect any specific details that would have hinted at such. It made complete sense that people like this—like him—had to be in a safe place before they could let their truth show.

He watched them touch each other’s bodies in casual ways in expressions of pleasure, attraction, fondness. Some of the women’s breasts were exposed, but after what he’d experienced here for so long, the sight of nipples no longer seemed like a big deal. Most of his attention followed Ms. Fitzgerald, and more than once, she caught his stare and the air between them sparked with something almost palpable. He resisted the urge to stand up and walk to her, damn the consequences.

He and the others who had been through the same training session had remained kneeling at the side of the room. At times, he felt one or another guest’s eyes raking over him. His and the other men’s cocks remained hard most of the time now, and he accepted that with a certain amount of pride, just as he felt sure that the women trainees felt satisfaction with the moisture rimming the inner crease of their denuded pubic mounds and the enlarged clitorises peeking from those enticing slits.

There were sixteen of the trainees and the guests many times more not counting the staff. The room buzzed with conversation, laughter, the clink of glasses. The faint scent of marijuana came to his nose every so often, and he inhaled with the hope of catching a bit of the high. He tried to imagine how he and the others would be of service in what was clearly meant to be a holiday celebration. So many delicious scents roiled in the air, so many beautiful lights dazzled his eyes, and the rise and fall of familiar musical strains tugged at his emotions.

You lucky cocksucker, you’ve gone through hell and emerged on the other side.

With an order to stand, one of the staff began working his way down the line of trainees with a bowl and a brush, painting the women’s breasts and mounds, the men’s nipples and cocks with some kind of solution. The freedom to look around had emboldened Jarrod, and Carson gave a quick grin at his questioning look.

“Peppermint candy,” Carson murmured as he stroked a drippy layer over Jarrod’s cock.

The effects came soon enough, a tingling sensation at first and then a deeper burning agitation that made him long to touch and rub. The guests drifted in their direction, and soon the row of subs were under assault as mouths sucked at the liquid candy. Oohs and moans rippled through the room, and in spite of the order to stand without moving, he couldn’t avoid the roll of his hips as one after another mouth closed over his swollen cock or nibbled on his sensitized nipples. The atmosphere became charged with sexual energy.

Soon the entertaining diversion ended, though, and the guests wandered off to cluster around the food table and pour more wine. His gaze, hungry for the visual feast after so many days of blindfolds and keeping his eyes cast down, roamed over the assembly finding one after another remarkable activity that only added to his excitement. One of the men leaned back in the couch as another man unzipped his pants. He looked away, not sure if he should be looking. Intrigued, he glanced back. The man’s cock stood in the air with the other man’s tongue sliding up and down it. Absurdly, he felt nothing but jealousy and desire.

Around them, people laughed in excited conversations. Other intimacies were underway, he realized, all very casual as if part of every-day life. Wine glasses clinked, drinks rattled over ice.

Someone approached him, and he realized it was Ms. Fitzgerald. Her skin glowed in the golden light of the room, all the reflections of ornaments, candles, the fire. Her green eyes sparkled as she neared. At the lapels of her fitted jacket, he could see the curve of her breasts. His chest burned as he struggled with how to express the avalanche of feelings coursing through him, how to thank her, how to make the connection he now felt desperate to make. If he had been alone, he would have seized her arms and crushed her lips with his own.

“Jarrod,” she said, smiling, “I trust you’re feeling well today.”

A shock wave ran over him at her use of his name. Instantly he was in a too-small desk in her classroom.

“Yes, Madam,” he stammered. “Thank you.”

Ignorant wretch, say something meaningful.

“How…are you…look beautiful,” he stammered.

Her gaze glimmered and narrowed, and for an instant, he allowed himself to think that some of the desire he felt might be reciprocated. But then, she backed up a few steps and addressed all the trainees.

“Congratulations on your successful stay here at the Academy, students. You’ve been excellent trainees, and I hope what you have experienced will serve you well. And now, I trust you’ll enjoy your evening with our guests.” She smiled. “We move on to the games,” she announced. And she signaled the staff.

The male students were lined up in what turned out to be a game of tossing wreaths. The small padded wreaths, less than a foot in diameter, were tossed by the guests with the objective of landing on erect penises. A line set by a long green ribbon held the guests ten feet away from their targets, and the room dissolved into laughter and catcalls as guests took their turns. Despite careful aiming and effusive advice, the contestants often failed to land their wreathes successfully even with three permitted tries. It then became a contest of how many wreathes would collect on any male’s particular cock. Less well-endowed males suffered a disadvantage, and the weight of the padded wreathes caused the organs to droop. More than one trainee lost his collection as gravity took its toll. Ultimately the length of the cock determined how many might fit.

Jarrod shuddered with the increasing need to ejaculate as the firm, cottony circles assaulted his groin and upper thighs. His long deprivation rose like a monolithic burden no longer to be endured. Each throw of a wreath resulted in some form of physical contact, even though few of them actually caught on his cock. The laughter of so many observers only heightened his humiliation which in turn added to his arousal.

At the end though, seven of the narrow rings collected on his still-upward pointing organ as its swollen tip oozed pre-ejaculate. To much applause and dressed in fine black leather pants and an open leather vest, Carson came over to hold up Jarrod’s hand and declare him the winner. As the wreaths were removed and his loins throbbed for release, he cast his glance around the room for Madam.

By god, he wouldn’t let this night end without having her.

 (More…)

lasmall jarrod 1 

Read what happens before and after this night for only 99¢ (free with Kindle Unlimited).  If you like the heat and kink, you’ll love the full collection of five novellas in Jarrod Bancroft: The Novel.

A Gift for Jarrod, Book 1 — http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GYGE3ZM

Jarrod Bancroft: The Novelhttp://www.amazon.com/dp/B00QR2SDKE

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