Kurt loves to cobble

I’m over at The Pop Culture Divas blogging about Kurt and his love of cobbling. This is him here (he photographs very well). So head over now to read some wisdom about Kurt the Cobbler. I first posted a helpful tale of hard work and tenacity, originally subtitled How to Succeed in Publishing. Then I revised Kurt’s story to a more erotic telling, subtitled How Romance Writers Can Find their Voice and Their Tongue.  The hits for the erotic version are, not surprisingly, more robust.

Seven Souls A Leaping selected.

Joyfully Reviewed, a rockin’ romance review site, selected SEVEN SOULS A LEAPING–an anthology I wrote with Heather Long and Lisa Pietsch–as a BEST OF 2011. Woo-hoo! Yowza! and Hip-Hip-Hooray! ….followed by a heavy sigh and a lowering of the raised fist. Seven Souls A Leaping is no longer available to readers because the publisher has since gone out of business. The anthology has three really good stories. Really. My contribution was a novella entitled Star Light, Blood Bright.

My story nestled between the other two stories, all of which were connected by the theme of a serial killer, Jeffrey Wiles. In the first story by Lisa Pietsch, entitled Frozen Hell, Wiles is a living killer on the loose.  Pietsch’s main character, Duncan MacDougall, is the brother to my main character Samantha MacDougall. Together with their cousin, Tara Conroy (who is the star of Heather Long’s 13th Night), they run the New England New Age Investigations company. By the time I catch up with Wiles, he’s been killed by Lisa’s character, Detective Danyelle Roy. But my character can see auras and soon realizes that wicked Wiles is hopping bodies to continue killing. In 13th Night, Tara uses her connection to the ghostworld to battle Wiles to obliteration.

Star Light, Blood Bright is the 2nd tale.

So, the book is gone. But the story lives on. I’m rewriting Star Light, Blood Bright as a standalone. The best news is that I can change the title. What do you think of Starry Nights? Here’s a blurb and an excerpt. Hopefully, the story will live on. Stay tuned…

Samantha MacDougal can see auras. Her gift usually helps her pursue rascals and wraiths for her family’s business, New England New Age Investigations. But when she begins to  track Satanic serial murderer Jeffrey Wiles along icy Boston streets, her own life’s light is in danger of being extinguished. She is alone in her struggle until handsome Boston detective Ike Marshall mysteriously provides a supernatural shield of light that warms her as never before.

EXCERPT:

Ike and Sam stood face-to-face in front of the fireplace, her elbow still gripped in his fingers.  A log hissed in the flames.  He released her arm.  Sam gazed back at him, searching his head for the spikes of tall light she had seen before.  He was invisible, not as in the auras that were lost because of encroaching death but because she knew Ike’s aura was somehow inaccessible to her.

Isn’t this what she had wished for?  A relief from the constant burden of auras.  Yet, she still pulled back from him.  She had to get away from him and from everyone.  She would find Wiles on her own, because she was the only person who saw him as he truly was.  Raw, splintering hatred that was visible only in that ceaseless guttering of charcoal sparks.

Sam smiled and absently massaged her elbow where the feel of Ike’s fingers was still warm.  “I don’t think so, Ike.  Stow the pity for me.  I don’t need you.  I’m better by myself.”

“You’re coming with me, Sam, even if I have to carry you out of here.”  He gestured with a sweep of his long arm toward the kitchen, now cluttered with both uniformed and plainclothes law enforcement.  “And not one of these guys will do anything to stop me.”

Sam half-smiled in spite of herself.  She cocked her head and the look of earnest intensity on Ike’s stern face, like a warrior who moves forward to the front lines of a battle and will not surrender, sent a lariat of energy through the air that linked them one to the other.

“Give me one good reason why I should.”

Ike stared at her and the thin skin beneath his eyes tensed as though he felt the same energy and didn’t quite understand it.  Sam was entrenched in her decision to go it alone, determined to send well-meaning Ike on his way, until he spoke the only words that made sense.

“I think we’re stronger together.”

Love is in the air at Boroughs Publishing Group

The romance fiction industry has a rival for its affections.

Boroughs Publishing Group offers some heart-captivating romances that throb with the best of them. In the interest of full disclosure, I will tell you that Boroughs is my publisher. But that is advocacy as much as admission. I like what they do.  I think you will, too. Spring is here and love is in the air.  See what’s happening at Boroughs and meet a surprise guest at their very romantic blog….

The Big Thrill over a genie

As a member of International Thrillers Writers, I’m in some storied company…most of whom I’ve read and many of whom I’ve met: Lee Child, Joseph Finder, Gayle Lynds, James Rollins, Sandra Brown, Rebecca Cantrell, Sophie Littlefield, Allison Brennan, JT Ellison, Harlan Coben, Vince Flynn, Doug Preston…the list goes on and on. So it was a “thrill” to get a brief but magical write-up in The Big Thrill webzine recently to announce the release of The Genie Ignites.  And it goes like this:

When your past reaches for you across 3,000 years, there’s only one thing you can do…remember. Bethany O’Brien is a D.C editor suddenly embroiled in a Middle Eastern mystery that she can solve if only she can recall why she once betrayed Zubis, the nearly 4,000-year-old genie who loves her still. Job in jeopardy and citizenship in shambles, she plunges through London, Italy, and Egypt into Saudi Arabia, with no hope of overtime.

THE GENIE IGNITES is available from Amazon and Smashwords, and will be released soon from Barnes and Noble and Kobo.

*****

A story about the force of love

Thank you, Kellyann, for having me as a guest at Cultural Arcana & Mystical Tidbits.  I love reading paranormal romance…the more mystical the better.  However, paranormal romance is not yet in my writing repertoire.  My newest erotic romance, Off Limits, contains nothing mystical except love.

Love is the most powerful mystical force known to man.  In fiction or true life, nothing can surpass love.  This is true for all humans as well as for my characters, Senior Chief Hank O’Mara and Lieutenant Bethany Morton.

My publisher describes the story this way:  For Senior Chief Hank O’Mara, no woman compares with the sea until he meets Lieutenant Bethany Morton. Only the sea can draw two such opposite and passionate people together. Only US Navy regulations keep them apart. Fraternization between Officer and enlisted is forbidden. Beth and Hank do their utmost to resist their mutual attraction. Can love prove stronger than either the sea or the USN? To find out, Hank will sacrifice his career, and Beth will risk her professional dreams.

For those of us who believe in the power of love, the question posed above has only one answer.  For non-believers, or if you simply want to know how Hank and Beth overcome the considerable obstacles in their path, you can get a copy of Off Limits from Red Sage Publishing.  Want to read an excerpt?  Follow this link to the Rue Allyn website. Please leave a comment and share your own story about the mystical power of love.  Happy reading!

Here’s the rest of my schedule. Every day is a different blog or interview. No two the same. I hope you’ll meet me somewhere along the road.

• Tuesday, March 6th: The Examiner
• Wednesday, March 7th: Motherhoot
• Thursday, March 8th: The Plot Thickens
• Friday, March 9th: Paranormal Haven
• Sunday, March 11th: Barry Eva’s A Book and A Chat Radio Show (airs 6:30 pm Eastern Time)
• Monday, March 12th: Five Alarm Book Reviews
• Tuesday, March 13th: Literarily Speaking
• Wednesday, March 14th: The Hot Author Report
• Thursday, March 15th: Blog Critics
• Friday, March 16th: Always A Book Lover (book review)
• Monday, March 19th: Love Romance Passion
• Tuesday, March 20th: Hott Books
• Wednesday, March 21st: Book Marketing Buzz
• Thursday, March 22nd: Darlene’s Book Nook
• Thursday, March 22nd: Review From Here
• Friday, March 23rd: The Dark Phantom

The Genie Ignites Is Here!

The Genie Ignites released today, Friday, March 2nd!

We’ll have a whirlwind weekend of celebrations and Zubis will be my date on Monday at the  5th Anniversary Bash at Beyond Her Book, a blog hosted by Publishers Weekly. The event is a huge gathering of authors and readers who love books and have suggestions for great titles. Best of all are the giveaways. I see that this year there are several ereaders being given to some lucky people who leave  comments. I’m offering a free copy of The Genie Ignites as well as a $30 Barnes & Noble ebook Gift Card. Please stop by…..

Meanwhile, download your copy today!

Best Wishes,
Kellyann 

The Genie Ignites releases on March 1st

Writing a book is one thing…a challenging, exciting, engrossing and, at times, all-consuming journey. Promoting the book is quite another thing…an exhilarating whirlwind of sharing that journey. I’m in the midst of the whirlwind now. THE GENIE IGNITES releases next week from Boroughs Publishing Group, but the magic carpet ride has already begun. Come visit me today over at The Revolving Book, where Zubis and I will tell you a little about his story. Bethany is there, too, but I usually elbow her out of the way so that I can sit next to Zubis on the carpet. I’m also over at The Pop Culture Divas today. Please visit; they do such a great job of bringing the newest and best titles to their reading audience.

My book blog tour starts in a little over a week. Stop back next week for the dates and locations. Meanwhile, if you feel a whoosh of air, that could be me flashing by with my genie.

This is how a story should be told: heroes and villains, trials and tribulations, hope and joy. An engrossing, layered plot and captivating characters. I especially enjoyed Delaney’s masterful juxtaposition of bygone tales and current drama. When THE storyteller Ben MacCarthy meets up with happy-go-lucky gadabout Jimmy Bermingham (and we soon learn, he’s in the IRA), they come upon Emma Sloane who is on the run from a father who whips her and would marry her off to a wealthy but ancient and heartsick man. This unfolding catastrophe mirrors the old tale that Ben’s mentor, John Jacob, has just told him about the lovely young Emer being betrothed to the hoary but heroic Malachi MacCool. Ben sees the parallels immediately, which commits him all the more to the constancy of storytelling. The meeting of Ben and Jimmy and Emma occurs early in the novel. With this encounter, Delaney sets the hook of what makes a story a great story: “And so three people, complete strangers to one another, set out on a coldish rainy afternoon in County Kilkenny in the year 1956, not knowing what on earth lay ahead.”

What was most enjoyable about this novel for me was that Ben was not just the storyteller of Ireland’s history and myths, he was telling his own story. Divided from his beloved Venetia and their two children, his tale is the tale of a quest. As a reader, I was drawn in and held fast as Delaney weaves the journey.

A compelling tale that you shouldn’t miss.



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