Best Erotic Romance Series Debut!

Have you ever tried to herd cats? It’s hard, I tell you.  Getting all those beautiful, headstrong felines to walk in the same direction, to behave and get along…. Whew! Exhausting!

What does herding cats have to do with books?  Well, editing an anthology of erotic romance is a bit like rounding up cats. Finding stories that are beautifully written and complement each other and organizing them in a way that makes the entire book flow naturally is a challenge, to say the least. But it’s a challenge I love and as I was editing my fourth anthology for Cleis Press, I found myself with an added challenge—to not only find stories that blended together well, but to find stories that were the very best of erotic romance.

Best Erotic Romance is the inaugural edition of a new series from Cleis Press. I received so many amazing stories that the challenge became narrowing those wonderful submissions to the seventeen stories I ultimately chose.

Here is my introduction to the collection:

Introduction: Simply the Best

What does it take to be the best? That’s the question I kept in the forefront of my mind as I edited Best Erotic Romance 2012. And so, when I sat down to sift through the submissions, I found myself reading many of the stories two or three times. It’s a complicated process, trying to determine what makes a story the very best of the genre. Obviously, excellent writing and storytelling are key, but I also looked for stories with characters I could believe in and root for. Characters I could fall in love with, just as they were falling in love (or finding ways to stay in love).

I am delighted to present this inaugural collection of Best Erotic Romance, the collection that I hope will set the bar for future editions. These are the stories that touched my heart and ignited my libido, that made me think about the nature of desire and the unpredictability of the human heart. Each of these seventeen stories weaves love and passion so tightly that one cannot be separated from the other. And isn’t that what a lasting relationship is all about? The need for connection and commitment, memories and history—and hot, wanton, uninhibited sex with a partner who knows us better than we know ourselves.

From tales of love (and lust) at first sight, such as Delilah Devlin’s “Drive Me Crazy” and Nikki Magennis’s “Dawn Chorus” to stories of established couples still passionate for each other, such as Andrea Dale’s “Memories for Sale” and Kate Pearce’s “Cheating Time,” the stories in this collection show that true love lasts, real passion never waivers, and lovers who are meant to be will always find their way back to each other. These lovers aren’t afraid of going after what they want, whether it’s long-lost love in “Blame It on Facebook” by Kate Dominic or a hot threesome among a married couple and a female friend in Erobintica’s “Till the Storm Breaks.”

The authors in this collection know that opening one’s heart comes with great risks and often greater rewards and that open communication and a spirit of adventure can make for a scorching sex life. They have created characters who believe all is fair in love and war and who take no prisoners in their quest for emotional and sexual fulfillment. Here you will find lovers exploring their desires in bedrooms, heating things up in the kitchen, splashing around in the bathtub, playing with sex toys, drinking champagne, getting it on in hotel rooms, staying warm in winter cabins, flirting in trucks and bars, making out in the great outdoors, and making love at dawn and midnight—all in the name of that greatest of all human desires: true love.

So, dear reader, I invite you to explore this delicious collection of erotic romance selected especially for you. I think you will find that what makes a story the best of its kind is based on the same intangibles that make people fall in love. It’s magic, I think. And when it comes to love and war, there’s only one thing I know for sure: love wins. Love always wins.

Kristina Wright
In love in Chesapeake, Virginia

This is the kind of book that is a delicious treat at the holidays—or a terrific gift for someone who is new to erotic romance and looking for a sampling of stories. And in that spirit, I would love to send one lucky commenter a copy of Best Erotic Romance! Winner will be selected at noon on Friday, December 23.

Happy holidays to all of you and thanks to Delilah for letting me take over her blog today!

I swear my life would make the best reality show. A house full of eccentric elderly people. Pets who act like children. A Red-Headed Hellion with children who would frighten The Children of the Corn. I’m the one in the middle of all the chaos.

I’ve been trying to simplify my life. However, the older of the two little girls has some learning issues. I’m going to be helping with homeschool. I already babysit quite a bit, rush to town to help with emotional bedtimes, etc. For a year, my daughter lived in a trailer she’d bought and put in the pasture beside our house. It was to be a temporary housing solution. We hoped the house across the road would come available and be reasonable priced, but when that didn’t happen fast enough, I found a very nice, cute little house that needed a few renovations in town, five minutes away. Problem solved, or so I thought.

A week after her family moved in, the house across the road was offered to us, along with 8 acres of land. No more driving to get where I’m needed. No more worrying about the hellions escaping the front door and running into the street (the two-year old moves step stools to reach the upper latch of the front door). But the house was built in the early 80’s and was occupied by an old lady who lived alone until her family moved her into a nursing home. We pretty much have to plan to gut the bathrooms and redo them, replace the roof, the carpet, the tile…

So, I’m buying that house, along with everything still inside it, selling the other, and this weekend we are holding a massive garage sale to get rid of all the items the woman horded in her house for thirty years.

We have found some treasures. I scarfed up two lovely old blue carnival glass bowls. My daughter found a Beatle record in mint condition. My mother, aunt and grandmother swarmed the crocheted afghans and a multitude of coats and jackets the woman barely wore.

Yesterday, my grinning son-in-law walked in to present me with a Teen Wolf doll whose eyes glow red and growls when you flip the switch.

The sale starts early tomorrow morning, so be thinking about me, setting up tables to pile with clothing, toys, dishes, crocheted toilet tissue covers, a dozen bibles, statues with Jesus standing at the bottom of the sea beside a conch shell, dressers crammed with linens, picture frames with photos of smiling people who are no longer living and whose relatives didn’t care enough to save.

My daughter has a box for the photos she’s sure some long-lost grandchild might someday return to find. She’ll keep it along with the dead husband’s Mason uniform and her Mason wife’s pin. Maybe when the old woman finally passes, she’ll return and be happy about the fact we saved something she treasured. While we renovate, we’ll respect.

But she’s not getting the Teen Wolf doll back.

Psst! Remember, continue to post in order to increase your chances to win
The Dragon with a Cup of Joe Contest!

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‘Tis the Season

‘Tis the season of giving. And it’s still a season of thanksgiving, as well as a season of reflection.

I have done a few things this year outside my comfort zone. I’ve learned a lot, changed a lot, and I’ve met some wonderful people this year. One of them being Delilah. She is down to Earth, open, kind, patient.

I’d started reading her cowboy stories before the Lori Foster Readers and Authors get together in June and when I had the chance to meet her, I zoomed across the room and accosted her. I told her I loved her books and that I’d love to pick her brain some time. She was gracious and offered to sit down with me at breakfast the next morning.

That kind of willing and open kindness is something I find missing a lot in this business and in life in general. I don’t understand it. Delilah let me ask questions and never made me feel like a lesser author just because I didn’t have the right publishing credentials or didn’t know the right people. There was nothing I could do for her in return for her sitting and talking with me.

She’s professional and she’s quick with a smile. Her sister, Myla Jackson, is the same way. Both of these women are incredibly successful yet don’t treat others any different for not being quite so… They gave of their time and their lessons learned. They gave of themselves and in the spirit of giving, that’s something most reserve for the holidays, but they gave it in the middle of the year. They touched me and I know they touched others. We should all strive to be less full of ourselves and willing to talk with, spend time with, and help each other. We should all strive to talk less about ourselves and our successes, and listen more.

These two authors are not the only ones like this. I’ve met others this year who are just as quick to take a moment to talk, to offer their time, to do something that may not benefit them in any way at all but to make someone else smile or feel better.

I do a lot of reflective thinking at this time of year. What could I do better, how could I be a better friend, a better author, a better mother, daughter, wife, a better all around person? I think I know and it starts with saying thank you to Delilah and Myla for showing me the kind of author/person I want to be toward others in this business.

Throughout the holiday season this year, I’ve been emailing people I’ve met in this business to thank them for their friendship, to thank them for any help they’ve given me, to tell them I miss them, that I love their books, and in some of my guest posts I am doing it, too. Just like in this one.

What about you? Have you told those that mean something to you or that have come into your life and changed you in some way, thank you?

Of course, now, I get to plug in a bit about my upcoming Samhain Publishing release, Twisted Up. It’ll be available on December 20th for purchase, however it is available for pre-order now at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Samhain Publishing.

One rope. Three days. And two hearts on the line.

Justin has had enough. Ella, the woman who healed his broken heart, has been cancelling on him for two months straight. Sure, she’s busy with her job, which has her traveling far and wide. But that never stopped her from sharing nights of trivia, long conversations and blazing hot sex—until now. Truth to tell, he misses their easy friendship, the way her sighs fill his ear as he fills her body.

What he can’t figure out is, what’s changed?

At work, Ella finds it easy to talk to rooms full of strangers. Once back at her lonely apartment, though, she’s back to her painfully shy self—until Justin. Their chance meeting grew over the months into a year-long affair, but she can’t shake the feeling that rejection and pain are just around the corner. Best thing to do? End it now, before their intimacy digs too deep.

Suddenly he’s at her door with a length of neon-green rope and a naughty proposition, daring her to say no. Just how good could it be? There’s only one way to find out.

Product Warnings: The sheets are tangled, the hat is crumpled, and the jeans are worn low on the hips. The cowboy is hot, determined, and helpless in the face of bunny slippers. Readers may need extra batteries to get this one out of their system.

For more information, please visit my website or blog, and sign up for my newsletter. You can also find me on Twitter and Facebook.

I want to thank Delilah for having me! I wish you all a very happy holiday season.

Best Erotic Romance officially releases today! You can’t go wrong—just take a look at the list of wonderful authors who contributed to this anthology: Sylvia Day, Donna George Storey, Heidi Champa, Delilah Devlin, Saskia Walker, Justine Elyot, Angela Caperton, Andrea Dale, Kate Dominic, Craig J. Sorensen, Shanna Germain, Emerald, Kate Pearce, Rachel Kramer Bussel, Erobintica, Kristina Wright, and Nikki Magennis

Buy at Amazon * Buy at Barnes & Noble * Buy at Books-A-Million

This inaugural collection of erotic romance features the very best of the genre. In erotic romance, the sexual component is critical to the development of the romantic relationship. Each of these masterfully written tales contains the essence of true romance: a central love story and an emotionally-satisfying, optimistic ending. What sets Best Erotic Romance apart is the scorching hot sex and the happily-ever-after (or happy-for-now) ending. Award-winning romance writer and editor Kristina Wright and her cast of terrific romance writers have crafted stories that touch the hearts and minds of readers, and linger in the memory for a long, long time.

An excerpt from my story, “Drive Me Crazy”:

Just a glimpse of him standing in profile, arms crossed over his well-developed chest and leaning his firm, round butt against the dispatch counter, was enough to shore up my weakening resolve. Dressed in faded blue jeans, a black, chest-hugging t-shirt, and a red Razorback ball cap turned backwards on his dark shaggy hair, he was every woman’s blue-collar fantasy. My mouth dried as I glanced down his tall, muscled frame. What woman in her right mind wouldn’t want one night with all that ripped hotness?

And that’s all it could be—one night. I’d waited until the last possible moment to make my move.

The midnight drive to the dispatch office had given me plenty of time to argue my way out of what had seemed like a good plan earlier when I’d realized that the planets had aligned to give me this one last chance to fulfill my long-standing fantasy.

There’d never been the right time. For the longest time, I was married. When my husband dumped me, Danny had been living with a woman with two kids, and seemed to be heading down a straight road to marriage.

We’d flirted; he’d issued lazy invitations for dates or a quickie at the Motel 6 down the road. But I’d never detected even a hint of serious interest. If something was going to happen, I had to be the one to make a move. Today had been my last day at Henderson Transport. It was now or never.

All the reasons why I was crazy to consider it fell away as I ticked through them in my mind:
He’s too young—He’ll be happy because I won’t have any expectations, I said to myself. Well, none beyond a really good time.

I’m management and he’s a driver—Midnight had just ticked past, so not true anymore. We were both free agents. Both consenting adults. All he had to do was say yes.

“You’ll never see him again,” I muttered under my breath as I rubbed my cold hands together. “If he turns you down, you won’t have to live with his smug smile.”

I sucked in a deep fortifying breath, adjusted the neckline of the red Lycra top to show my breasts to their best advantage, and pushed through the glass door.

His head turned at the sound, and then he straightened away from the counter and dropped his arms. “You cuttin’ my route, Angel?” Read the rest of this entry »

I love posting questions because the answers y’all give me are always so much fun! And if you need a bribe, remember that next Tuesday I’ll choose the name of the winner of that pretty dragon mug from all commenters!

I was making my Christmas list yesterday. It’s Christmas in this house, although some of us are atheists/agnostics, some Christians, some Catholics…some still exploring our options. Off topic, but do you know some Protestants don’t recognize that Catholics are Christians? I get, “What church do you belong to?” “Not any at the moment, although I’m baptized in the Catholic church.” “Oh, so yer not Christ-y-in?” When I get that from someone that ignorant, I want to say, “To Catholics you’re all a bunch of cultists!” But I refrain—especially given my ambiguous relationship with any higher being.

Anyway, I’ve bought a few gifts, but not in any organized way. In fact, my daughter had to remind me I had some things tucked away I’d bought during the summer. So, now I know what I have and who I still need to buy for. I’ve made notes for most of the people on my list, except for one.

My father’s gift is ALWAYS the hardest one to purchase. He loves tools, but he has every tool known to man. He loves John Wayne, but he owns every John Wayne movie ever made and has a collection of John Wayne clocks, lunch boxes, coffee mugs, toilet paper—yeah, rough and rugged stuff for the rough and rugged man. I’m still stumped about what to get him, but I’ll figure it out.

So my question to you is who is that person in your life for whom you can never find the right gift? What have you gotten him/her in the past
that he/she loved or hated?

My friend and sometimes travel buddy, Sasha White, has a brand new story out this week! It’s the next in the Alluring Tales: Night Moves series! Enjoy!

A Highlander who was trapped for centuries discovers carnal freedom when he finds the reincarnation of his soul-mate…and her husband.

When Dougal MacNeil refused to do an evil Druid’s bidding he saved his honor, but lost the chance of a life with his soul-mate. Now, almost three hundred years later he has a chance to finally have what he’s always wanted, a life with the woman he’s always loved, or the re-incarnation of her anyway. In this life, she’s already married to man he calls friend.

Dougal is shocked when the couple asks him to join them in their bed, but unable to walk away. Will sharing her love with another man shatter his heart forever, or can this traditional Scotsman find his happy ending with a new beginning?

Now Available at:

All Romance eBooks * Amazon * Smashwords

He heard them before he saw them.

The soft moans and rhythmic slapping of flesh on flesh penetrated seconds before Dougal turned and saw the couple on the landing above. He halted with one foot on the next step, closed his eyes, and sucked in a deep breath. His neighbors were at it again.

For a moment Dougal simply stood there, listening to Katherine’s sighs and John’s grunts echo through the otherwise empty space as his fought to control his own emotions. He should’ve taken the elevator, but why bother to get in a lift he didna trust when he could use the emergency stairwell to walk up to his fourth floor apartment? He never used the lift, and his friends knew that. They’d laughed at his ‘quirk’ before, and now they were using it to torment him.

He opened his eyes, intending to turn and go back down the stairs, but instead, he moved forward, up the steps until he had a clear view of where John had pinned his wife to the wall, and was thoroughly fucking her…right next to the door Dougal needed to go through.
Read the rest of this entry »

This Saturday’s theme is family. The one that stands out most in my mind, of the books I’ve written, is the Kinzie family. You remember the boys, right? Ezra, Josh and Cade made such an impression in Four Sworn, I couldn’t rest until I gave the boys their own happy-ever-after with their dream girl, Chrissi. Here’s an excerpt where you see all three brothers in the same scene soon after Ezra kidnapped Chrissi. Enjoy!

“…Put into the mix three sexy brothers who happen to be cowboys and who are hot for one lucky female? You have a sexual, erotic masterpiece!”
5 Stars and Top Pick!, The Romance Reviews

“…Delilah Devlin just makes this type of story such an adventure as well as a hot ride… You will never go wrong with a Delilah Devlin story and you will never be disappointed.”
5 Cherries, Whipped Cream Reviews

“Cleverly written, Breaking Leather breaks the mold when it comes to ménage stories… Highly recommend.”
Sizzling, 4 1/2 Stars, Sensual Reads

One for remembrance…one for healing…and one to seal her heart forever.

Chrissi Page has tried to find one man who heats her bed the way the Kinzie brothers did one shameful night years ago. She’s failed miserably, leaving her with no choice but to bank that inner fire—and keep a lid on her inner bad girl.

She’d been weak, unable to choose between three men who appealed to her in different ways. And when they’d confronted her as a tease, anger had boiled over into a passion so wild, she’s still trying to live it down.

Since that night, Ezra, Cade and Joshua have individually sown their wild oats with pretty much the entire available female population of Two Mule, Texas. Yet nothing erases the attraction they still feel for Chrissi. And when she ends up stranded on the road near their ranch, it’s their last chance to turn their mutual obsession into an unusual proposition.

One weekend, three on one. If she can’t stand the heat, they’ll let her go on with her life. And try to find a way to live with the hole she’ll leave behind in theirs.

Warning: A girl who thinks she can’t have it all, and three brothers who set out to prove otherwise. One on one, two on one, and three on one; bondage in the wild; a bit of riding crop action. And a pickup truck load of emotion.

Josh Kinzie watched the truck drive along the last hundred yards of gravel road before bumping over a cattle guard and into the fenced yard. He made out two figures in the cab—the bear-like figure of his brother and a slender, dark-haired feminine one sitting beside him.

Ezra had done it. Gotten Chrissi into the truck. With a little help from him. While Chrissi had been busy with Ms. Dunstan, he’d been busy making sure her radiator hose sprang a leak.

He pulled the reins to the right, whipping his horse around, and let out a loud “Yee-haw!” before racing toward the house. He pulled back when he neared the front porch and slid from the saddle to the ground in one fluid glide.

Cade sat on the top step, squinting against the sun as he watched the truck come to a stop. “We may still hit a snag, bro.”
Read the rest of this entry »