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Getting There!
Hello! It has been a long 4+ years since my last post. An even longer 4+ years since I’ve had a new release.
2015 was a difficult year. Life threw a couple of major curveballs at me and I struck out. (An ironic analogy, since my last release before I disappeared from writing life had a baseball theme.) But I’m off the bench and I’ve been working on my swing, getting back into condition to rejoin the author roster.
I’m twelve scenes away from the end of an OW/YM (older woman/younger man) romance that still doesn’t have a title, but promises to turn up the heat wherever you’re reading it while also making you chuckle and tug on your heartstrings a little. This couple has a few curveballs of their own to deal with before finding their happily ever after. But I promise they will. And so will I.
Sam & Leigh’s love story is book 2 in the Very Personal Training series. Though you meet the hero as a secondary character in Body of Work, the new book completely stands alone.
I’m super excited to share it with you! For now, how about a totally unofficial, unedited, subject-to-change blurb, just to give you a taste of the story ahead?
When personal trainer Sam bumps into his favorite former client, their chemistry reignites instantly. Leigh is everything he pictured in his “sometime down the road” woman. Sexy, funny, independent, mature—in more ways than one. He never cared about their age gap, he just wasn’t ready to get serious before. He’s ready now. But when his prior playboy ways come back to bite him in the ass, it’ll take more than sizzling sex and charm to convince Leigh to stick around.
Leigh’s life is humming along according to plan. Her custom bakery is thriving. Her daughter is a well-adjusted ten-year-old. Romance is the one area that’s lacking. Completely. Until the universe fulfills her request for some hot lovin’ and puts Sam in her path—for a second time. Sam gives her exactly what she was missing, and more. Maybe more than her well-structured life plan can handle…
Sound good? Are you as pumped to read it as I am to release it? I hope so!
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Sunday Snippet – Damn Ties
Thanks for stopping by to read my Sunday Snippet, part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme.
Today I’m posting the opening eight sentences from my WIP #4 (pretty awesome working title, right? 😉 ) You can read more about it at the bottom of my WIP page. I honestly never thought I’d write a wedding scene. This one popped into my head one night and demanded I add it to the beginning of the book.
“Fucking ties. What idiot invented these things?” Derrick snapped the strip of gray silk from its stranglehold around his neck. “To hell with it, not doing it,” he said, launching the thing at a garbage can.
Jeremy’s dark eyebrows rose, but Derrick’s best friend left the tie where it’d landed. “I have a solution. We pretend I won the coin toss that night. I get the girl, you get to avoid the marital noose.”
How do you feel about weddings in books? Love them? Hate them? Indifferent? Tell me what you think. Have a great day! 🙂
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Sunday Snippet – Work in Progress
Welcome back for another Sunday Snippet, part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme. Make sure you click over to that list once you’re finished here. 🙂I’m still picking my way along, nowhere near done this WIP. But it’s Sam (the hero’s best friend in BODY OF WORK) and Leigh, and they’re fun to hang out with (and torture), so it’s all good. Here’s eight more (unpolished) sentences I plucked from their story. The opening line of dialogue belongs to Leigh.
“You look hot on a bike — though you always look hot.”“Thanks.” Nothing he hadn’t heard before, but coming from Leigh, it sounded better than usual. Maybe because he’d waited so long to hear it, or because the last several hours had left him aching to get naked with her, and the ‘hot’ comments boded well for that goal. Yeah, that was probably it. “You like to ride?” Boom, her cheeks went from peachy-pink to scarlet, as he’d hoped they might. “Don’t answer that, I’d rather find out for myself.”
Well, what do you think? Should I keep going and finish the book?
If ‘yes’ is the answer and you’d like to get to know Sam right now, go grab BODY OF WORK, because he’s in there quite a bit. (Yes, yes, that was a shameless plug for my most recent book. 😉 )
Have a great day, everybody, and thanks so much for stopping by!
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Everybody’s Doing the 7 Meme
Over on Facebook, three of my awesome author friends — Cara Bristol, Stacey Kennedy and Siobhan Muir — tagged me to participate in a “7” meme. In this game, you go to page 7 or 70 in your Work in Progress and post 7 lines that include dialogue. Well, if you know my writing style, you know I love dialogue! But since this my blog, I decided to cheat a little…don’t count the lines, because there are a lot more than 7. 😉
So here goes. An unedited excerpt from page 7 of my untitled, almost-finished WIP:
“Hey dream girl.”
That voice. She turned—gravitated, really—toward the rich sound. Several people stood between her and the owner’s twinkling, deep-blue eyes. She silently mouthed the words ‘hey asshole’, but her face betrayed her yet again by smiling. Without apologizing, he detoured around the customers separating them and deposited his armful of products behind her heaping pile.
“You just cut in front of four people.”
“I wanted to be behind you.” He took his time perusing her body before meeting her eyes again. “I’m sure nobody blames me for that.”
“She does.” Paige pointed at the somewhat-shrunken woman chirping at him in Italian. Or maybe Portuguese. Hard to tell which, but the lady was definitely peeved.
He showed zero concern, didn’t even bother to look. “Did my t-shirt keep you warm last night?”
“Very.” She leaned closer to him. “Especially when I was lying on my sheepskin rug…watching it burn in the fireplace.”
He barked out a laugh, attracting the attention of everyone in their line and beyond. “That was my favorite t-shirt.”
“I don’t think you’ll miss it.” She nodded at his current apparel—an identical, plain black t-shirt.
He shook his head, still smiling. “Big attitude for such a tiny thing.”
“I’m not tiny.”
“No?” He stepped closer. Invaded her space with his massive everything.
“I’m average. You’re just—” Her eyes drifted across his shoulders, then down. “Huge.” Heat flared in her cheeks as the last word slipped from her mouth in a breathy tone that belonged in the bedroom, not the superstore checkout line. Shit. “Don’t even go there.”
He shrugged, a wolfish grin spreading across his stubble-shadowed face. “You said it, not me.”
And now they both knew she was thinking about his cock. Awesome.
That’s all for now. What you think… Like it? Hate it?
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Sunday Snippet-04/07/2013
Welcome 🙂 Today’s eight-sentence snippet is part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme, and comes from my childhood friends to lovers WIP. After thirteen years apart, Matthias and Caroline have gone out for dinner to catch up and, at this moment, reminisce about the summer before ninth grade when they shared their first –and only– kiss in a classmate’s garden shed. Matthias has suprised Caroline by describing specific details from that day, twenty years earlier.
“Guys remember their first kiss too.”
Maybe so, but she doubted the majority of them remembered what the girl had worn or which variety of Herbal Essences shampoo she’d used. “After I shut the door, I stepped closer to you, like, really close. Do you remember what happened next?”
“I do, but I’d rather not say.” His grin didn’t look embarrassed in the slightest.
“Oh, really…you were, um, excited?”
“Nerds do get stimulated in places other than their brains.”
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Sunday Snippet-03/31/2013
Welcome back 🙂 Today’s eight-sentence snippet is part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme. Click over for a complete list of participants.
This is the last week (for now) that I’ll be posting from my childhood-friends-to-lovers story. This excerpt follows very closely after last week’s snippet. Matthias and Caroline haven’t seen each other for thirteen years, and they’re about to go out for dinner. As friends? Is it date? Caroline’s not entirely sure. (P.S.: it’s a frigid November night.)
His hands curled around her lapels and he pulled her into his space. She gasped and he smiled—the same amazing smile she’d inwardly melted over years ago. He maneuvered the top button of her coat into its corresponding hole, then the second. The third button slipped through its slot, his hands lingering before sliding sideways to cup her waist. Not once did his eyes stray from her face.
“I might’ve been a nerdy nobody, but I was still a teenage boy, and you were the most beautiful girl in school. Of course I thought about touching you.”
“If you wanted to, why didn’t you ever try?”
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Sunday Snippet-03/24/2013
Sunday snippet time again. Thanks for stopping by — I appreciate & love all your comments! Today’s eight-sentences are part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme. Check out all the participants by clicking that link.
This week, it’s a bit more from one of my works in progress, the childhood friends to lovers story of Matthias and Caroline. You can find other snippets by clicking here.
In this excerpt, Matthias and Caroline are about to go out for dinner. To catch up after thirteen years apart, or maybe it’s a date, Caroline’s not sure. As a gentleman should, he’s helping her into her coat, and…
“You have very soft skin—just like I always imagined it would be.”
Caroline turned in his arms, sacrificing the touch to see his face. “You thought about how my skin would feel?”
“Remember all the times I was in your bedroom?”
Oh god, this was it. “Every one of them, yes.”
“You had all those bottles of lotion on your dresser. That either meant you had the softest skin in the world or some sort of eczema problem.”
I hope you’ve enjoyed these early snippets. I’ll get back to posting from this one in the future, but starting next week, I’ll be switching to my soon-to-be-released book, BODY OF WORK. I hope you’ll come back to check out the hulking, ginger-haired personal trainer and the petite photographer who both think it’d be best to stay away from each other, but can’t seem to do that.
Have an awesome day! 🙂
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Sunday Snippet-03/17/2013
Happy St. Patrick’s Day! Thanks for stopping by. Your visits & comments are always appreciated. 🙂
Today’s Sunday snippet is part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme. You’ll find the complete list of participants by clicking that link.
This bit is from one of my works in progress, the former-friends-to-lovers story of Matthias and Caroline. We’ve spent the past few weeks in Matthias’ head. This week, we’re in Caroline’s.
His old glasses had disappeared, giving her an unobstructed view of those incredible, dark-brown eyes. She’d always loved his eyes—she’d just been scared to look at them too long. Holding his gaze for more than a couple of seconds had made her want to do crazy things. Like hug or kiss him, and in their later years together, kiss him while she flattened him to her bed and squirmed on top of him. Matthias hadn’t shown that kind of interest in her. And he’d been too important to risk losing him by making a move.
Still, she’d always wondered. What if.
♥
One more week of this story, then, in April, I’ll be changing it up, sharing snippets from my upcoming release, Body of Work. Get ready for some hot excerpts. 😉
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Sunday Snippet-03/10/2013
Welcome! Today’s eight-sentence snippet is part of the Weekend Writing Warriors meme. Click that link for a complete list of participants.
I’m continuing with a bit from my current WIP. Childhood friends Matthias and Caroline (who both harbored deep crushes but never declared their feelings) are meeting for the first time in thirteen years. Matthias has a lot on his mind.
Matty — nobody else called him that. Not ever. The affection in her voice sliced at his resolve to keep her at arm’s length. Memories of the other times she’d used the nickname floated to the surface. Always innocently, but so damn sweetly. Had things gone differently back then, she wouldn’t be waiting tables in this shithole today. She’d be living like a queen. His queen.
That’s it for now. Have a great day, and thanks for stopping by. 🙂
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Sunday Snippet-Write Club 03/03/2013
Welcome, and thanks for stopping by. Today’s snippet is part of the Write Club meme, hosted by the lovely and talented Skye Warren. You can find a list of the participants here, and if you haven’t read any of Skye’s books yet, you absolutely should, so click here to check them out.
Today’s six-sentence excerpt is from my current WIP, a former-friends-to-lovers story whose hero and heroine lost contact for thirteen years before reconnecting. In last week’s snippet, Matthias was seated in the diner where Caroline works as a waitress, appreciating the view. (Find previous snippets here, here and here, chronologically.) This week’s offering follows shortly after last week’s, with Caroline taking his order.
“I’ve never eaten here — what’s good?”
“Fries and gravy.”
“That’s your suggestion in a Chinese food restaurant?”
Some things hadn’t changed. He’d watched her eat fries and gravy in the high school cafeteria nearly every day for five years. Even from two tables away, the process had been agonizingly erotic — her tongue darting out, swirling around the length of a fry, scooping the gelatinous brown goop with its tip… good god.
