The Voodoo Doll contest continues! Post a comment today for another chance to win!

I’M NOT MY CHARACTERS BUT MY CHARACTERS MAY BE PEOPLE

by Cat Johnson

There’s been some noise in the romance community lately which only reinforces my opinion that non-writers truly do believe erotic romance authors are—or at least do all the things their book characters do. Of course that’s ridiculous. First of all, unlike my heroine in UNRIDDEN where in New York State just an hour from Manhattan am I finding bull riders to have threesomes with when I rarely leave my PJs or my laptop long enough to go out and buy food for my family? Second, if I wrote murder mysteries would they assume I was killing people for research? Of course not, but apparently researching sex scenes is a different story in people’s minds.

So no, I am not my characters, however my characters are often people. Not verbatim but at least in part based on or inspired by real people. Case in point Jared, the hero of my latest release of the same name, the fourth book in the Red, Hot & Blue series with Samhain Publishing.

Jared was written into JACK (Book 2) and JIMMY (Book 3) in the Red, Hot & Blue series as a side character, the younger brother of SpecOps Jack and Jimmy Gordon who chose his first love, horses, and stayed home to run the family breeding farm while his brothers were off saving the world in the military.

Writing the character of Jared was a pleasure. I mean, who doesn’t love a man who loves horses? And the image of him working his farm, shirtless and glistening in sweat, wearing not much more than cowboy boots and jeans, is pretty nice too.

So who inspired Jared, you may ask, since I already confessed I don’t get out all that much. It was the son of the farmer who delivers my hay. See! I didn’t even have to leave home to find him. Gotta love when characters fall in your lap like that. Seeing that hay truck pull up with 200 plus bales stacked high and tight, and the farmer’s son jumping up on top of all that hay to fling the bales (weighing at least 30 lbs each) two at a time through the hay door high up in the wall of my barn, was some nice inspiration.

If I didn’t have to stack those bales once they hit the floor inside I would have just stood and ogled him. I guess I did pay too much attention to the vision since I nearly got pummeled by a few bales flying in from above when I wasn’t paying attention. It was a bit like that game Frogger but I didn’t write that part into my story. In the book the heroine isn’t sweaty, hacking and covered in dust like I was. Oh no, my heroine gets to enjoy the scene from afar. See how we authors create a fantasy from the facts? You’re welcome! LOL.

Anyway, I know what some people are thinking about me and the farmer’s son all alone and sweaty on my 5 acre farm—but no I was not alone here with the farmer’s son. His dad was here too, helping stack those bales and huffing and puffing pretty heavily, enough to make me wonder if I still remembered my CPR training. You see the son was here because his dad had recently had a heart attack. But when you make a living being a farmer, you’re back on the horse—or the hay truck—or you don’t pay the bills. So there you have it, life is not nearly as nice and clean or hot and sexy and we write it, and aren’t you grateful for authors taking those liberties.

Cat Johnson
www.catjohnson.net

Check out the newly released JARED (Red, Hot & Blue, Book 4) available in eBook now.

Everything is just right…until she turns his life upside down.

It doesn’t take anything fancy to make Jared Gordon a happy man. A slice of his mama’s pie, a pretty girl, a well-bred horse. Life on the farm is just how he likes it. Simple. Until a big city girl blows into town like a tornado hitting a trailer park.

Quintessentially small-town Pigeon Hollow has everything LA producer Mandy Morris needs for her new reality show. A smoldering deputy sheriff, a quirky diner owner and a horse farm complete with a hunky horseman. If her own instant attraction is any indication, Jared will have the female demographic glued to their sets.

Except the red-hot cowboy is cool to the idea of cameras in his face. And the harder she negotiates, the deeper he digs in…until their head-butting strikes sparks that fans a prairie fire of unexpected passion. She doesn’t usually mix business with pleasure, but as Pigeon Hollow’s charm works its magic, the youngest Gordon brother has Mandy rethinking many things.

Like happiness doesn’t have to end with the word “cut.”

Warning: Contains one hot shirtless cowboy taking a city girl for a roll in the hay…and a few other places.
This book has been previously published and has been revised from its original release.

I found out yesterday that my story, Begging For It, will be released by Ellora’s Cave this coming Friday! It’s part of the 1-800-Dom-help series, but a stand-alone story. Click on the cover to read an excerpt!

She needs punishment…before she deserves pleasure.

Tragedy scarred TJ Lipton. Now, the only way she can find pleasure is when its delivered with a heavy-handed dose of S&M. But finding a lover who can give her what she needs proves an elusive quest—until she finds the sex club Unfettered and a Dom named Cross McNally.

Cross understands all too well what drives TJ. He takes command of her body to give her everything she needs—restraint, the stinging kiss of a flogger, the thrill of a three-way—a sexual adventure that pulls her beyond her painful past and has her begging for more of his tender brand of domination.

Yeah, there’s plenty of sexy punishment, boys tying a girl up and down for her pleasure, and a story. What a deal! I hope you’ll check it out this Friday—then let me know if you want Tyler’s story.

In the meantime, I need to wrap up the Dark Fairy contest. Who gets that pretty little trinket? Christina Freas is this week’s lucky winner! Christina, send me an email with your snail mail addy and I’ll get it into the mail. I have to do ALL my mailings this week or I will be woefully behind. So be quick!

As to this week’s prize? I went to Memphis a couple of months ago and bought up some fun things at Tater Red’s on Beale street. This week’s prize is a very cute voodoo doll. Doesn’t everyone need one of these? Be sure to post a comment to enter the drawing. And you can post here or on Facebook over the coming week so that you’ll increase your chances of winning!

Branded

The concept for Stormy Wedding was simple. Ellora’s Cave put a shout out about their new Branded line of erotic stories. Branded is a series of erotic tales set within the confines of a marriage.

One of my pet peeves about romance is that the story ends when the marriage begins. And that is where I began my story…at the end…with the wedding. My first-ever erotic story starts at the rehearsal dinner of a wedding and ends in bed. In between dinner and bed, a storm rages outside the wedding venue while a tempest of passion erupts inside.

Why Branded? According to my handy dandy dictionary, branded means (1) a mark burned with a hot iron, as upon cattle, to show ownership. Ouch! And may I say, double ouch. And not the image I want to portray. (2) A trade-mark to show quality or kind. I like that better. (3) To impress deeply upon mind or memory. I like that best. But I do still hear the sizzle of that hot iron, which isn’t all bad.

What do you think? Does the romance and passion end when the vows are said? Feel free to tell me about your wedding, your wedding disaster or your dream wedding. Leave me a comment and email address and I’ll put you in a drawing for a free e-copy of Stormy Wedding or a deck or Ellora’s Cave playing cards. And don’t forget to check out the other Branded titles at Ellora’s Cave. To read an excerpt pop over to my blog: www.kelliscottbooks.blogspot.com

Today’s the last day of the Dark Fairy contest! Post a comment today to win!

I’m Day 8 of a blog tour to celebrate the release of Carnal Machines! Folks ask me all the time why I write for these collections. They’re short. The pay stinks. My name’s not on the cover. What I tell them is that I love being in the company of great writers. That readers who’ve never read me might discover me. That shorts give me a chance to try something new.

I’ve never done Steampunk. To me, it’s a fascinting, frightening genre. So much to learn. A huge world to build. And I’m not very mechanically oriented. So writing a story for this particular collection was a challenge I couldn’t resist. A chance to dip my toes in strange waters. I was thrilled when my story made the cut!

I will admit, I didn’t fly very far from the truth in my fantasy. I researched Victorian sexual practices, remembering from an old Amanda Quick book a common treatment for “female hysteria”, then researched machinery that actually was used to stimulate women into orgasm in those times, for purely medicinal reasons, and then building on those. Yes, my story’s all about sex. I hope you’ll enjoy the excerpt I’ve provided here from Dr. Mullaley’s Cure.

If you’d like a peak at the other authors and stories that are part of the collection, edited by D.L. King, here’s a list of blogs and dates. Some have already past so you’ll have plenty to sample already!

May 1 D. L. King
May 2 Teresa Noelle Roberts
May 3 Kathleen Bradean
May 4 Jay Lawrence
May 5 Kannan Feng
May 6 Essemoh Teepee
May 7 Elizabeth Schechter
May 8 Delilah Devlin
May 9 Tracey Shellito
May 10 Renee Michaels
May 11 Elias St. James
May 12 Lisabet Sarai
May 13 Janine Ashbless

The Victorians wrote some of the best and most enduring erotica. For such a tightly-laced age, people spent a lot of time thinking about things carnal. Jules Verne, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mary Shelley, H.G. Wells, et al enthralled us with their visions of new possibilities. The rich and slightly decadent visuals of the steam age lend themselves perfectly to the new carnality of post-punk era. And, of course, what is repressed will be even more exciting once the corset is unlaced. Steampunk, even without sex, is erotic; with sex, it’s over-the-top hot. A widowed lady engineer invents a small device that can store the energy from sexual frustration and convert it to electricity to help power a home. Teresa Noelle Roberts shows us what it can do, confronted with sexual fulfillment. What volume of steampunk would be complete without a tale of sailing ships and the men who sail them? If your taste runs to sexy pirates in space, Poe Von Page will delight you with the mutinous crew of the Danika Blue and their new captain.

Then there’s the very special room on the top floor in the House of the Sable Locks, a brothel where sexually discriminating men go to have their fantasies fulfilled. Even if a man daren’t put those fantasies into words, Elizabeth Schechter’s “Succubus” will give the madam all the information she needs with which to make her clients happy. There are brothels, flying machines, steam-powered conveyances, manor houses, spiritualist societies. The following stories afford intelligently written, beautifully crafted glimpses into other worlds, where the Carnal Machines won’t fail to seduce you, get you wet or make you hard so, lie back, relax; a happy ending is guaranteed.

I’d been warned that the doctor was a bit eccentric. That he dabbled in machinery and had been ostracized by others in his profession for the lengths he went to please his patients.

“You’ll never find another employer,” I was told. “Not once they see your only reference is Doctor Mullaley.” The mad Irishman. The charlatan who promised cures to bored housewives and whose waiting room hadn’t been empty since I arrived for my first day’s work. If I hadn’t already been turned away at every other respectable physician’s practice, I might have heeded the advice. However, those warnings only served to stir my interest.

I was intensely curious about the nature of the doctor’s cures, and even more so about the conditions he treated, but they were only spoken of in whispers and never in the presence of an unmarried woman. Which made me wonder why he’d hired me. Not that I complained. One glance at his tall rangy frame, frosty blue eyes and dark, slicked-back hair, and my misgivings evaporated.
Read the rest of this entry »

Comment here today to be entered in the Dark Fairy contest (details in Monday’s post)!

Writers have favorite books they’ve written. Seduced is one of mine. The book took only five weeks to write. The fastest I’ve ever written a full-length novel. It wasn’t fully plotted, but developed as I wrote, surprising me at every turn. Nic and Chessa were both so damaged, so in love, but sooooo denying it. The story had everything. A haunted past. Steamy, desperate sex. A maniacal demon they had to chase. For Nic, this demon had to be taken down. He was responsible for both his brother’s and his wife’s deaths—centuries ago. If you’d like to see more of his past, more of what drives him, click on the cover and read the first chapter of the book.

“…The electrifying follow-up to INTO THE DARKNESS is a breathless read. Devlin’s intricate vampire society is filled with compelling personalities. The chemistry between the characters is explosive, and the horrific villain will give you goosebumps…the ending will leave you begging for more.” 4 ½ Stars and TOP PICK!, RT BOOKreviews

“…This is a deliciously edgy series with mind-blowing sex scenes that sizzle…Ms. Devlin’s DARK REALM series is devastatingly erotic and pushes the boundaries in both premise and sexual explicitness. Ms. Devlin pens in uncharted territory that will leave the readers breathless and hungering for more…” Paranormal Romance

For eight hundred years Nicolas Montfaucon has dedicated his life to preventing the rebirth of an immortal evil. But now a terrible storm has assaulted unsuspecting New Orleans—and the beast walks the earth once more. “The Devourer” has been awakened, and there is only one in the besieged city who can help Nicolas defeat the foul creature—a mysterious and beautiful enigma who haunts the handsome Revenant’s erotic waking dreams and enflames his passionate obsessions.

Chessa Tomas is not an ordinary policewoman. A vampire, she works only at night, patrolling a seamy and unseen underworld of roiling chaos. Though Nicolas is sensuality incarnate, Chessa wants no part of him or his kind—but she cannot close her eyes to the unholy malevolence that would consume their world. And Nicolas has uncovered the secret lust that rules her—a steaming, uncontrollable desire he intends to unleash, bending Chessa to his will by making her most forbidden fantasies real.

Nicolas stuck to the shadows, standing beneath the long fronds of Spanish moss trailing from an ancient oak. He watched as the cops combed the bayou bank with their flashlights, looking for clues, photographing the victims, and grieving over their friends’ bodies.

He waited patiently, knowing Chessa would be here sooner or later. Since the night was burning away fast, he hoped for sooner.

The carnage had begun. The Devourer had fed and would grow stronger and more frighteningly cunning as he cut a swath through New Orleans.

A squad car pulled up and Chessa climbed out, looking rumpled and wearing a man’s wrinkled white shirt beneath her leather jacket.

Nicolas stiffened, his gaze darting to the tall man climbing out to stand beside her in the glare of headlights. As though the gesture was an old habit, the man’s hand settled at the small of her back.

Chessa didn’t deliver him a blistering glare, just a quick worried glance.

Merde! Bitch! Nicolas drew a deep breath, stunned by what he saw. Only hours ago, she’d begged him to fuck her, but here she was with another man—one she seemed to know rather well.

His hands fisted at his sides, readying to drive them through the handsome face of the human standing beside her.

Nicolas forced himself to think, drawing a deep cleansing breath.

He’d never been a jealous lover—knew all vampires craved sex almost as much as they did blood. A blood fuck with a host wasn’t considered an infidelity. But vampires left their hosts behind. They didn’t consort with them afterward. Courtesy among lovers meant seeking strangers to feed the two hungers. Comfort and affection were drawn from those you loved.

Only Chessa didn’t love him. Regret washed through him. Maybe she never would.

But who the hell was this man?

He stepped out of the shadows and strode toward the cozy couple as they conferred with several officers beside a long yellow stripe of crime scene tape.

“Halt! Get your hands above your head or I swear I’ll pull this damn trigger.”

Nicolas rolled his eyes, tempted to flash by the young officer faster than he could blink.

Chessa’s gaze landed on him, and her eyes widened for a moment. She gave him a subtle shake of her head.

He paused, then raised his hands obediently.

“It’s okay, Len,” she said, her voice husky. “Let him through.”

Len gave him a narrowed glance that swept him up and down. A warning not to cause any trouble because he’d be watching. Then he holstered his weapon and stepped back.

Nicolas gave him a mirthless smile and ducked beneath the tape to join Chessa and her “friend.”

“I’m Nicolas Montfaucon,” he said, ignoring everyone else as he leveled a glare at the man standing beside Chessa.

The man’s lips curved in a slight smile, his expression slyly amused, and he held out his hand. “I’m Alex, Chessa’s new partner.”

Another bloody partner! Although he would have preferred to ignore the hand held in his direction, Nicolas gripped it hard, gauging the other man’s strength.

“Good grief, Nic,” Chessa muttered. “If you wrestle him to the ground, I’ll fucking clout you.”
Read the rest of this entry »

The Dark Fairy contest continues! See Monday’s blog for details, then post a comment today!

Fly on the Wall…yes or no?

by Elle James

If you could be somewhere in spirit, but not body, or if you could be so tiny no one would notice you, like say a fly on the wall in a room full of people, would you do it?

So many times I’ve wanted to be a fly on the wall, a voyeur in my children’s lives, to see how they interact with others or to live vicariously through the fun activities they get involved in. Then again, to see them make the same mistakes and the social guffaws I made at their ages only makes me glad I’m not a fly on the wall in their lives.

But if I could be a ghost, floating in an out of rooms, seeing things without being seen, would I want that ability? Maybe not. What good would it do? If I saw a tragedy about to happen and I could do nothing to warn the people, I’d feel a lot worse than not having been there at all. But then again, if my body was out of commission, I’d like to be able to get around without it…Hmmm…bears considering.

The book I released last week HAUNTED is about a woman who is in a coma, but her spirit is free to roam. It has a similar concept to the movies JUST LIKE HEAVEN and GHOST DAD, with a different storyline. I wanted to write a mystery about a car crash that took two lives and almost a third. The victim who “isn’t quite dead” gets to help solve the mystery of who was responsible for the crash. Needless to say, the ghost character had many frustrating moments when she was powerless to help those who needed it most.

What about you? If you were in a coma, would you want your spirit to roam while your body lies in a vegetative state?

About the Author:
Elle James spent twenty years livin’ and lovin’ in South Texas, ranching horses, cattle, goats, ostriches and emus. A former IT professional, Elle is proud to be writing full-time, penning intrigues and paranormal adventures that keep her readers on the edge of their seats. Now living in northwest Arkansas, she isn’t wrangling cattle, she’s wrangling her muses, a malti-poo and yorkie. When she’s not at her computer, she’s traveling, out snow-skiing, boating, or riding her ATV, dreaming up new stories.

You can reach Elle James at www.ellejames.com or email her at ellejames@earthlink.net.

May 1st, I thought I was back in my writing groove. I made new pages on a new story, was busy reading through the galleys of my upcoming Berkley release. All was chugging along nicely.

The next day, however, was a complete nightmare. I went to my daughter’s for a cup of coffee before beginning my day. We sat in the sunshine (it’s back, at last!) while we watched the two-year-old run around the yard. She slowed down as she approached us, but somehow twisted up her feet, rolled on a pine cone and came down. My daughter and I heard a snap. I hoped like hell it was the pine cone, but the little one screamed like a banshee. Because of floodwaters, we couldn’t take her to the emergency room seven miles away. Instead, we drove back roads to the next town to get her to an emergency room where they confirmed she’d broken her tibia. A “toddler’s fracture” they called it.

They took x-rays, contacted the children’s hospital in Little Rock, then off again we went with the little one moaning pitifully in the backseat the whole way. At their emergency room, they splinted the break, gave her tylenol laced with codeine for the pain, thank god, then late afternoon, we were finally on our way home.

Since then, it’s been so complicated. The little one doesn’t understand she can’t stand on her leg, and picks constantly at the cotton padding surrounding the splint. Mama has to keep her close. The six-year-old is feeling neglected and acting up. Whew!

Today, I took a break to try to get some things off my desk. So, sorry this isn’t an entertaining blog post. Tomorrow, I have a guest blogger, my own sister, filling in.

My Dark Fairy contest is still ongoing (see Monday’s post for a picture of the prize). Be sure to post something here or on facebook for another chance to win.