FOR AUTHORS! Guest Blogging on the Delilah Devlin Website July through September 2022.
Have a new release coming out? An older title you’d like to highlight? A special event on your website you’d like to let readers know about?
NOTE: Email me directly at delilah@delilahdevlin.com with your response!
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Hey there, Authors! I like to host a guest blogger two to three times a week on my blog (www.delilahdevlin.com/blog/). Right now, I need to line up bloggers for dates from July through September 2022.
I will need bloggers for the following dates: July 6, 7, 11, 13, 14, 17, 18, 21, 27, 28, 29 August 1, 3, 4, 5, 10, 11, 14, 18, 21, 25, 26, 28, 29 September 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 12, 15, 16, 18, 21, 25, 26, 28, 29
If you are interested in being a guest, please look at the available dates and let me know if you would like me to pencil you in. I advertise the daily blogs widely. I have 2,971 blog subscribers, who get posts sent straight to their email inboxes every day. My blog also feeds to my Facebook page, which has 4,968 friends, and my Fan Page, which has 4,336 follows. I also post the blog to my Pinterest—total followers 21.2k. If a date isn’t listed but is particularly significant for you, ask me about it anyway! I do try to work people in.
I prefer posts that talk about something more than just new or older releases, but you have room at the bottom of the post for covers, blurbs, links, and short excerpts. You can talk about hobbies, what’s important to you, what inspired this particular book—the field’s wide open, but remember, we wish to appeal to readers rather than other writers. Please keep the number of pictures you want posted to no more than 2, although that’s not a hard and fast rule. And readers love contests and love questions only they can answer that allow them to interact with you!
If you’re interested, contact me! Give me your preferred date(s). First come, first served.
Delilah Devlin New York Times and USA Today Bestselling Author & Freelance Editor
“Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me”…! Well, I prefer the Beatles’ birthday song! If the Stones had only done one… LOL
Yes, that’s me a 64, sitting at my desk, getting a few wrinkles, letting the silver in the blond just happen, and yes, that’s the devil looking over my shoulder. What you can’t see is God on the left and Jesus to the right! Of course, the watercolor painting of the little girls is my sister and me!
My dd is trying to make the day special. I’ve already gotten a bag of goodies from her, and she’s talking about a trip to the flea market (the only shopping I love—oh, the “treasures” we will find!). I hope you all have a wonderful day!
As a writer, I’m fascinated by women who use their agency to tell their own stories or stories others need to hear. This is particularly true of formerly enslaved women like Ida B. Wells Barnett, Harriet Jacobs, and Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley. I’d like to share today about Elizabeth.
In 1818, Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley was born into slavery in Virginia. The family that owned her allowed her to learn to read and write. She also learned sewing, the skill that eventually set her up in her own business. While still enslaved, her owners moved her to Missouri in 1846 where she used her sewing talent to raise money for her owners. It was here that she first caught Mary Todd Lincoln’s attention.
Elizabeth’s owners agreed to set her and her son free if she could raise $1,200. By 1855 with the help of vigilance committees, she was able to raise the money. She used her skills as a seamstress to pay back these loans. In 1860, she moved to Washington D.C. and built a dressmaking business thanks to referrals from Varina Davis, the wife of Jefferson Davis. One of Elizabeth’s patrons ordered a dress from her for the inauguration of Abraham Lincoln. This patron recommended her as a dressmaker to Mary Todd Lincoln. The rest as they say is history.
She was an integral part of the Lincoln household and recounts her life with them as part of her memoir, Behind the Scenes: Or Thirty Years A Slave and Four in the White House. However, the work was not as well-received as the narratives of other former slaves. Her recounting was seen as a breach of trust between her and Mary Lincoln. The book had poor sales, and she lost customers because of the controversy it created. The White House Historical Association has a fuller account of her life as a slave and her time in the White House on their website:
She did not let the book’s reception get her down. She defended what she did and continued to help others by teaching other Black women how to sew and founding two organizations to aid other Blacks: Â the Contraband Relief Association, a relief organization for Blacks freed by Northern troops and had come to Washington D.C. as “contraband of war,” and the National Home for Destitute Colored Women and Children. In 1892 she moved to Ohio to accept the position as head of the Department of Sewing and Domestic Science Arts at Wilberforce University. It is believed she suffered a stroke and returned from there to Washington D.C. where she died in the hospital she helped found. She was eighty-nine years old.
I love learning about women like Elizabeth Keckley, women who used their abilities to make life better for themselves and others. Her life is a witness to perseverance and encourages me to press on at a time when parts of our society seem hell-bent on stripping women of their rights. Share a story of your own about persistence in the comments for a chance at a $10 Amazon gift card.
One Breath Away
Sentenced to hand for a crime she didn’t commit, former slave Mary Hamilton was exonerated at literally the last gasp. She returns to Safe Haven, broken and resigned to live alone. Never having been courted, cuddled or spooned, Mary now fears any kind of physical intimacy when arousal forces her to relive the asphyxiation of her hanging. But then the handsome stranger who saved her shows up, stealing her breath from across the room and promising so much more.
Wealthy freeborn-Black Eban Thurman followed Mary to Safe Haven, believing a relationship with Mary was foretold by the stars. He must marry her to reclaim his family farm. But first he must help her heal, and to do that means revealing his own predilection for edgier sex.
Then just as Eban begins to win Mary’s trust, an enemy from the past threatens to keep them one breath away from love…
An excerpt from One Breath Away…
Home at last, she’d see if meeting Eban meant this night would be good.
Since her ordeal, her sex rivaled the Chihuahuan Desert in dryness. Yet Eban’s gaze had summoned the fragrant flow that even now moistened her core. Could it be her body had finally healed? She swayed, dizzy with expectation.
The squeak of the indoor pump provided no distraction from the lingering tingle where Eban’s fingers had rested against her spine, where his lips had kissed her hand. She focused on her task to temper her excitement.
Fill the bucket. Lift the bucket. Carry the bucket. Empty the bucket. Fill the bucket. Lift the bucket. Carry the bucket. Empty the bucket.
The pans she filled slowly simmered then steamed on her small, pot-bellied stove.
Her heart seized as she fingered the simple gingham curtains covering Harvest Home’s windows. Harvest Home’s humble kitchen contrasted sharply with the trappings that had graced Mary’s Manor, her Weston restaurant expansion.
She’d looked up the word manor and decided her place would imitate that kind of luxury as much as possible. Brocaded drapes and white, linen tablecloths had dressed up the Manor’s supper room. Slipcovers made from the same linen covered the cushioned chairs. White, bone china and delicate silverware completed the picture of elegant dining she hoped to draw.
A Franklin stove, indoor pump, double sink, polished counter tops and spacious storage cupboards made the Manor’s kitchen a dream made true. Nothing lacked for the grand opening. Picturing couples enjoying themselves in her simple but elegant setting had become her favorite pastime.
Then Judah Little and his lies thwarted her plans. Thwarted. A good word. A true word.
“But not for long,” she whispered. “That dream will come true just as this dream might come true tonight.”
Hum the subject line to the music of “Singing in the Rain”… That’s what I’m doing in my head.
That picture isn’t me, my girls, or my pool, but that’s what I was doing today. I took a break from an editing project and hit the pool. The temperature was in the mid-90s until some clouds rolled by and dumped a bunch of rain. Since there was only thunder in the distance, we all ran out to the pool. Lord, it felt so good.
That’s all I’ve got. I finished up the edits a little while ago, and I’m going to close down my computer and do NOTHING for the rest of the evening. I’ve earned some laziness. I don’t even have the energy to break out the paints.
I hope y’all had a wonderful weekend—that you’re recharged and ready for another week. I start on my next book tomorrow! Whee!
It’s Saturday, and I have edits, edits, edits. Not the fun stuff. I can’t start the fun stuff (my next book) until I get this job out of the way. But onward!
Before we get to the puzzle, I want to say a huge thank you to everyone who purchased and read Victoria’s Six. And thank you to all who posted reviews! They matter!
Puzzle-Contest
I chose today’s puzzle image based on the fact that today is International Day of the Seafarer! So have fun! Solve the puzzle and tell me who your favorite seafarers are for a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card!
Psst! There are four open contests besides this one!
Hit “BLOG” above and scroll down to find them!
I’ve used this art before. I love it. It reminds me of the Batman graphics from the old TV show and comics. Are you old enough to remember them? I loved how cheesy/campy that show was. Blap! Zok! Pow!
Fridays feel like they need that sort of emphasis. Fridays are days I typically look at what I should’ve accomplished during the previous week, and I get a final adrenaline surge to finish it up! Blap!
So, what’s still on my plate? I have a set of edits that were tossed over the fence at me—at the last minute—that I have to concentrate on to complete ASAP (that deserves its own Batman graphic!).
So, for a chance to win your choice of a downloadable book from my backlist, tell me whether you use weekends as a chance to finish up projects or do you look at them as a time to relax? Also tell me whether you think I should do my own Batman-style graphics to describe my superhuman efforts? (Just kidding.)
My favorite romance trope of all time is Beauty and The Beast.
One love interest is scarred and surly and believes they are unlovable. The other love interest is beautiful and optimistic and is bursting with love.
They are complete opposites, yet they work. They’re magical together.
I can read this trope again and again, whether it is the classic Brothers Grimm fairy tale version or a steamy paranormal romance with a beast shifter in the beast role.
And I write this trope again and again. Each couple (or more) is different because each character is different. They have different histories, different traumas, different ways of withdrawing or hiding themselves from their unique worlds.
Often the beasts in my stories are the heroes. I tend to put myself in the place of the heroine when I read or write and my fantasy is being with the beast.
In Provoking Odium, my latest Cyborg Romance, however, the human heroine claims that role.
Briella is nicknamed Beast for several reasons. She appears fearless, taking on missions deemed too dangerous by others. She is a skilled pilot, a “beast” in the air. No one can fly a freighter through space like she can. She is also scarred, both physically and emotionally. Having been rejected in the past, she now pushes other beings away. She doesn’t allow anyone to get close to her…in any way.
Odium, in contrast, is physically perfect. He’s a cyborg, and they don’t manufacture unsightly cyborgs. (grins) He isn’t, what I would view as, optimistic or sunny in temperament. But he does have quite a few friends and most beings like him.
He wants to claim Briella as his female more than he has ever wanted anything or anyone else. She is his genetic match, and she is also his soul mate.
She’d realize that IF she stopped avoiding him. Odium is persistent and he is determined to care for Briella and protect her. He’s willing to give up his lifespan to do that.
What is your favorite Beauty And The Beast romance?
Provoking Odium
A Beautiful Cyborg
While accompanying his leader on a mission, Odium, an E Model cyborg, hears a distress call over the communication lines. The voice on that message makes his circuits surge with energy and all his systems light up. He has to respond to the mysterious female, would risk his lifespan and the lifespans of everyone on board their ship to protect her.
A Human Female Others Call Beast
Briella gained her nickname due to her flying abilities, her fearlessness, and her scarred countenance. Her verbal-only relationship with the sexy cyborg who answers her distress call is a steamy yet short-lived fantasy. His kind is physically perfect, and she is…not. He will uncover that truth when…if they survive the attack upon her freighter.
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Provoking Odium is a STANDALONE Cyborg SciFi Romance set in a dark, gritty, sometimes-violent universe.
It features a human female intent on remaining mysterious, a cyborg warrior determined to uncover her identity, and an enemy seeking to destroy them both before they have the opportunity to meet.
USA Today bestselling author Cynthia Sax writes steamy Cyborg, Alien and Contemporary Romances. Her stories have been featured on TV, in Star Magazine, and numerous top ten lists.
