UPDATE: The winner is…Toni!

* * * * *

Our Rules is out next Tuesday……Seeing that gives me a thrill like I can’t even tell you and it’s not just because it’s the first book in a new kink series!!

1. It’s because this series has been in the works for more than two years!
2. Because this series idea was born from a VERY DIRTY conversation I had with a customer of mine at my day job. (Psst which Book 4 will be based on!)
3. And because it makes me think of the rules I adhere to within my kink relationship.

Some of my rules just might show up in Our Rules…..*insert angelic smile here*

Amazon – https://goo.gl/Bej8UX
Amazon UK – https://goo.gl/J7CFsA
B&N – https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/our-rules-jennifer-kacey/1125990974?ean=9781786511478Totally Bound – https://goo.gl/GqQidk
Kobo – https://goo.gl/8qerH8
Itunes – https://goo.gl/UUDZrd
Print Totally Bound – https://goo.gl/yO8YXY
Website – https://jenniferkacey.com/books/hotwife/oururles.html

When the foundation of their marriage falters, Michael and Tabitha must rediscover what it means for her to be his hot wife.

Tabitha is a hot wife. Not just a sexy wife. A hot wife. A wife allowed to be with other men with the permission of her husband.

Michael couldn’t love his wife more. Which is exactly why he shares her with others. Because she’s his.

On the cusp of everything they’re worked for—years in the making—a shattered promise threatens the foundation of their marriage. A foundation Michael had thought unbreakable until he lets Tabitha down in more ways than one.

Taking her submission for granted could lose him everything he’s strived for, and winning back her trust is the only thing that matters.

The Giveaway

In honor of the above kinkilicious debauchery I’m going to have a HUGE giveaway! Three print books by some of my favorite peeps and lots and lots of other swag and kinky goodies!

**GIVEAWAY – US ONLY** – Just look at all the awesomeness you could win!! Tell me one kinky rule you’d LOVE to live by! And this can be anything you’d have to do or something someone else would have to do to/for you! (Give a blow job everyday….be naked when your man/woman got home every day…anything!)

I’ll pick a winner on Monday the 24^th!! Good Luck!! PS –It’s always great to leave your email address in your comment so I can contact you! Hate not being able to give winners their goodies!!

Decadently Yours,
Jennifer Kacey

About the Author

Jennifer Kacey is a writer, mother, and business owner living with her miniman in Texas. She sings in the shower, plays piano in her dreams, and has to have a different color of nail polish every week. The best advice she’s ever been given? Find the real you and never settle for anything less.

Website – Newsletter – The Decadent Divas– Amazon Page
Facebook – Facebook Author Page – Twitter – Goodreads – Pinterest

A few years ago, I had an idea for a story about Sherlock Holmes and how he became the “world’s most famous detective.” During my research, I discovered his fans (referred to as “Sherlockians”) are highly organized. Since 1934, these devotees have met to commemorate the great detective.  From the original group, interest spread throughout the world. Today, local organizations hold monthly or quarterly meetings to share their admiration for the man in the deerstalker. Beyond these meetings, a number of fan conventions occur throughout the year.

Large-scale fan events are considered a relatively new phenomenon, with the Star Trek convention considered the basis for modern fan culture. Long before the fan convention wave the 1970s, however, Christopher Morley and friends formed the Baker Street Irregulars (BSI) and assembled for an annual dinner in New York City each January. As part of the fan wave of the 1970s, additional events were initiated for those not invited to the BSI dinner and offered more ways to celebrate all things Holmesian. The Agra Treasurers of Dayton, Ohio, for example, hold a “Holmes, Doyle, and Friends” convention in the spring; the BBC have organized a “Sherlocked USA,” based on the Benedict Cumberbatch series in Los Angeles in May; and A Scintillation of Scions will occur in Baltimore, June 9-10. Other events occur in Minnesota and Indiana every three years.

I recently attended the 221BCon in Atlanta. Spread over two and half days (from Friday evening to Sunday late afternoon), fans attended panels on a variety of topics (I spoke on world building, Sherlock in alternate universes, and writing for an anthology), viewed Sherlock Holmes films (continuously running in one room), browsed vendor tables with a variety of Sherlock-inspired items (from full Victorian costumes to autographs of famous Sherlock Holmes actors to items with Victorian-style wallpaper prints), or attended invited celebrities’ talks. This year Curtis Armstrong (Booger from Revenge of the Nerds), Martin Powell (author of both prose and graphic novels), and Lyndsay Faye (author of a collection of short Sherlock Holmes tales) ran panels or Q&A sessions. In all, more than 600 people celebrated their admiration for the great detective.

The convention offered participants an opportunity to “let their hair down” and share a common interest in Victorian England and Sherlock Holmes in their many manifestations—including alternate realities and crossovers into other “worlds” like Harry Potter or Dr. Who. Not only did I share my insights on writing pastiches (as Sherlock Holmes tales are called), I even strutted my stuff as a Victorian woman in the costume exhibition (and even showed a little ankle in the process).

All in all, the weekend allowed fans to share their common interest all while having a good time.

If this sounds like some people you’d like to get to know better, you can find out about upcoming Sherlockian meetings and events on this Website. I’m sure I speak to all fans when I say, “The more Sherlockians, the better!”

About the Author

Liese Sherwood-Fabre has been writing fiction for more than twenty years, the past three with a focus on Sherlock Holmes and Victorian England. She recently released The Life and Times of Sherlock Holmes, a collection of non-fiction essays, and has a short story “The Case of the Tainted Blood” in the alternate universe anthology Curious Incidents: More Improbable Adventures from Mocha Memoirs Press. You can see more about her books and sign up for her newsletter on her Website: www.liesesherwoodfabre.com

Liese Sherwood-Fabre
“Gimmick-free, old-fashioned storytelling”

Curious Incidents: More Improbable Adventures
Kindle | Paperback

The Life and Times of Sherlock Holmes
Paperback

Website | Facebook | Twitter 

The 2017 NFL draft is just weeks away, and OTAs are kicking off next week, so I decided the time is ripe to run a super sale on my 4 ½ book series, CALLING THE SIGNALS.

I love football. More accurately, I adore hot signal callers, quarterbacks whose stars have shone over three generations of fandom!

Be they fresh out of college or inductees into the Hall of Fame, they’re all my idols, so I decided to write a series about four fictional stars whose careers overlapped my youth, my young adulthood, and my middle age. These highly sensual/mildly erotic romance ideas became Calling the Signals, and a short introductory story sets up a fictional small Texas town that produced all four heroes.

Born in the dog days of Ellora’s Cave Publishing, these books started life as The Gridiron Lovers series there, but they underwent major changes as well as getting new titles and covers. I’m proud of them, and I hope readers will take advantage of the very special prices beginning this very week.

Happy reading!

Ann Jacobs

A passerby could miss it if he blinked at the wrong time, this tiny west Texas town that had only one claim to fame—its amazing record of having produced not one, not two, but three MVP

quarterbacks in the past thirty years. Rumor had it that Bobby Anthony, now a senior at Tulane, would soon become the fourth one.

Some folks said it was something special in the water that bubbled up from a spring outside the town limits, but Bobby’s mom, Melanie, knew better.

Hedgecock was a brawling blue-collar town full of roughnecks and cowboys. Over the years, a dedicated, talented coach had molded a ragtag assortment of boys into teams that won state championships in spite of the school’s small size. Those teams had provided the town with pride—an identity neither drought nor dry holes could take away from its residents

Melanie stared out at the field, the rotting bleachers where so many of her memories had been made, hoping the committee she’d been asked to join would be able to find a way to raise the money to spruce up the fields, and maybe put a spark of life back in a town whose sources of income had all but dried up.

In “Hedgecock, Texas: Home of the Signal Callers,” school secretary Melanie and bank president Cal Tate conceive a moneymaking reunion of the four past, present and future NFL stars—and discover their own second chance at love in the process. Here are snippets from the four novels that tell the stories of each man’s career—and his discovery of lasting love.

THE ROOKIE

Bobby…fresh out of college, multi-million dollar contract in hand, ready to show what he can do on the field—and off

Melanie…football fan, cheerleader, ready to hitch her star to the promising, super-hot Gamblers rookie

After he’d gotten to camp and spent a few minutes thumbing through the biggest playbook he’d ever seen, Bobby decided the chicks would have to wait. He’d have to spend most of his waking hours studying, not checking out the incredibly hot young women who were on one corner of the second football field, trying out for the Gamblers’ cheerleading squad. He noticed one, though. A gorgeous girl with a hot body, creamy skin, big brown eyes and long black hair that looked so soft he wanted to run his fingers through it. And he couldn’t resist making a point of running into her on the training center parking lot.

“Hey there!” he called out, and she turned and shot him a thousand-watt smile.

“Hello to you, too.” She stepped over closer, close enough that the sweet smell of her perfume wafted into his nostrils. “Good luck making the team, rookie.” Her gaze slid slowly up his body, and it was all he could do to resist pulling her close and seeing if he could rest his chin on top of her head.

“Thanks. I’m Bobby Anthony. And you are?”

“Marly Ragusa. Gamblers fan forever.” She paused for a minute, her pretty mouth gaping open. “Omigod, you’re the new quarterback the Gamblers took in the first round.”

THE MVP

Keith…NFL MVP, unbeatable on the field, his private life has known tragedy and disappointment

Tina…hometown girl signed on as nanny to Keith’s motherless baby, knowing he’s way out of her league

Something was bothering Jack’s dad. Tina sensed it, though Keith was going through all the right motions, playing with the baby on the carpeted nursery floor and riding him piggyback before helping feed him an early supper. She hoped it wasn’t something she’d done to upset her moody employer.

Of course it wasn’t. Tina scolded herself for her lack of self-confidence. If Keith was angry with her, she was certain he’d have said so. It must have been something that had happened while he was at practice. And she’d guessed from his silence and his scowl last night that he’d come home unhappy about yesterday’s game. If she hadn’t watched most of it on TV, though, she never would have known he’d thrown two or three interceptions or that the Gamblers had lost, because he hadn’t uttered a word about the game while helping tuck Jack in his bed.

THE CLUTCH PLAYER

Dave…beat-up, playboy quarterback at the twilight of his storied career, who’s hot in the clutch in his final swan song

Diane…Keith’s older sister, victim of an abusive marriage but open to a fling with playboy Dave

Diane knew Dave Delaney, the Savannah Rebels’ quarterback, from way back. Despite being past forty years old, Dave was holding on to a lead in the tight game. Or at least he had been until a minute ago when two Gamblers defenders turned him into the filling for a human sandwich. Without his helmet, Dave looked a lot like she remembered from long ago. Older now, obviously, he still had the wavy black hair and electric blue eyes that proclaimed his Black Irish ancestry. Pain registered on that handsome face as two of his teammates helped him off the field.

Why was he still punishing himself? Diane shuddered as she watched the coach, a doctor and a trainer on the sideline, looking at Dave’s right knee. If she wasn’t mistaken, that was the same knee he’d had surgery on a couple of seasons ago.

THE COACH

Colin…Hall of Fame golden boy, now retired, he can still sling it with the best of them

Susan…small-town bad girl, has it bad for the smokin’ hot coach who’s up for all the games she has in mind

Colin Zanardi leaned back in his desk chair at the Rebels’ Savannah headquarters. He’d obviously been too damn busy lately. Otherwise he wouldn’t have been half hard, wondering if Susan Anderson were as soft and submissive as she sounded on the phone.

During the last few phone calls they’d shared, the sexy widow had clearly been making a play for him. That didn’t surprise him—a good many groupie types still wanted a piece of him even though he’d hung up his cleats thirteen years ago and moved over to the coaching side of football. What intrigued him was the element of raw need he heard in her voice each time they’d spoken—and a hint of the feminine submissiveness that appealed so strongly to his dominant nature.

For the first time since agreeing to take part in this reunion, Colin found himself actually looking forward to his first return to the tiny west Texas town since he’d graduated from high school almost thirty-two years ago.

Website: https://annjacobs.net
Blog: https://annjacobs.net/blog
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AnnJacobs
Author Twitter:
https://twitter.com/annjacobs
Buy links for Calling the Signals and all of Ann’s available books can be found at her website:
https://annjacobs.net/ (click on individual book titles).

What are you looking forward to this Spring?

I always look forward to the flowers and the great weather.  It’s my favorite thing about spring.  I am an avid photographer and makeup artist in my spare time.  I have worked many fashion shows and photoshoots in the St Louis area.  I’ve had my photos in magazines and in Art Galleries but the most fun I have is just going out with my camera in hand and taking photos.  Be it street photography or pictures of flowers to doing fashion or cosplay shoots.  Photography is creating a story in picture much like creating a story from one idea or even a photo.

Much of my stories come from personal experiences or just images that pop in my head and some are a combination of both.  I love the Art of writing and I love the Art of photography.

What is something you love that inspires you? 

I was recently signed to a publisher and have been over the moon excited I think my writing and storytelling skills will only get better.  It is all a new experience for me but one I am looking forward to.  With spring everything is new and I am looking forward to this new Chapter in my life.

I wrote a Novella back in Feb that released Feb 28^th that is somewhat considered a new start.  Although it’s called Snowed In Its about getting away and reflecting on your past and moving forward with a future.

The Bryant’s of Milwaukee, Wisconsin were famous for their wealth, their brewing skills and the exploits of their oldest son – the infamous Andrew Bryant, Jr. Andrew was the heir apparent to the family business and fought the title every chance he got. Doing anything he could by any means possible to avoid becoming his father he did the opposite of what they wanted. His parents had always planned that Andrew Jr take over just as Andrew Sr had. His parents plan- once Andrew Jr graduated from college, they would retire and enjoy their life knowing the family business would be in their son’s capable hands and would continue for many more generations.

Andrew Jr. had plans of his own, it was just his parents didn’t know them yet. He, like his grandfather, would join the Army and run as far away from the brewery and his family as possible. The problem was leaving his younger sister Annabelle; although, he knew Annabelle would be ok she was a Bryant for God’s sake and a Bryant through and through. Annabelle, a strong-willed and intelligent girl with a mind of her own. It seemed Janice and Andrew Sr. had raised the independent thinkers they had so desperately wanted. But for Andrew Jr leaving Annabelle to face their parents alone was not the easiest decision he would have to make he didn’t know it yet. When the day arrived, he had to be selfish and do what made him happy not what made his parents happy.

Get your copy here! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N36FNW3

Add to your Goodreads TBR:
 https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34016961?source=ebfg_fb

I’m an erotic romance writer and a yogi.

A yogi is someone who practices yoga.

Yoga and an erotic romance novel – how does that work? Simple. It was through the calming meditation at the end of class that broke the block that was keeping me from finishing What Happens in Bangkok.

I adore yoga. I go to a minimum of 3 classes a week. I’d go to more, but it’s a very long drive into the yoga studio. I do Hatha, Yin, Restorative and the occasional Power yoga class.

Yoga is great for your body and your mind. It is especially beneficial to writers as we spend a large amount of time sitting hunched over our laptops.

Hatha and Power yoga are more physical. Restorative is bliss and Yin is a head game. Yin is my favourite. Partly because of the incredible personality of the teacher and partly because I recognize how good it is for me.

In Yin, you hold a posture for about 5 minutes. IF you can. That’s what’s so important. You have to listen to your body. Most days I can hold sleeping pigeon for longer than 5 minutes. I could probably fall asleep in it. Then there is the odd day when after a minute, my mind is screaming, “This hurts. Get out. Lay down.”

That’s the head game. Am I just being lazy and don’t want to do the work? Or is something really hurting? New people in Yin class fidget and distract everyone else. They don’t get it and they can’t relax. Yin isn’t physical. It isn’t like running a marathon or doing a hundred push ups, but quite often my body feels like it’s worked that hard.

So when my body/mind is protesting, I try talking to myself, inhale deep calming breaths and try to relax the sore spot. If that doesn’t work, I concede and relax into savasana until the teacher tells us the next pose.

A while back, I damaged my knee. I sprained, strained every ligament and tendon and ripped the meniscus. Did it in a belly dance performance, but that’s another post. It has taken months of physiotherapy and yoga to get back to where I was before I hurt myself.

I let my physiotherapist know, the goal was to be able to get down into sleeping pigeon and hold it for 5 minutes and not be cringing in agony. And I am there.

I know there will still be days when the knee protests and I can deal, but I credit my physiotherapist and my yoga teachers for getting me out of pain and almost completely back to full recovery.

You don’t have to be flexible. You don’t have to be super thin. Yoga is for everyone. Everybody type. Don’t say – I’ll drop 10 pounds and then join. Go find a beginner class. If it doesn’t work for you, go find another studio. At some point, you will click with the teacher – it’s like a bond. And once you are going to yoga and feeling yourself come alive and opening up then you will understand how fabulous this is for you.

Photo – me on vacation. Took my mat to Florida and did class on the deck. This is sleeping pigeon. The damaged knee is the bent one.

There is another connection between yoga and What Happens in Bangkok—Erika and Darien do a class together. So yoga is not only part of my life, but my characters’ as well.

What Happens in Bangkok

To save Darien’s life his brother asks, “Can you walk in high heels?”

Erika Bailey, owner/manager of a drag queen club in Bangkok, Thailand has happily settled into all aspects of her new life, except for her lack of a love life. When a new diva auditions, Erika is bewildered over her instant attraction to the blond God, Apollo.

Darien Scott is on vacation after a world tour and mistakenly figures the safest place to be is at The Black Dragon with the head of a Triad. When the club is hit, Darien is the only person to get out alive. Now   he’s running from the police and a Triad. Mistake number 1.

Disguised as a drag queen, he’s hired by Erika, but falls hard for his new boss, then struggles with not coming clean with her. Mistake number 2.

Can he fix his mistakes and find a life filled with love or is he headed straight for mistake number 3?

Find the book here!
eXtasy Books
Amazon
Amazon – Paperback
Amazon Canada
KOBO
Book Strand

Follow me—@daryldevore

5 Stars—Really must read this one…., (1 line review)

“I thoroughly enjoyed this book, the chemistry between Darien and Erika was so hot that I thought my kindle would melt!”

Excerpt

Scene set: Erika is doing a strip for Darien – they are both in the shower. You have to read the book to find out why – lol

Erika straightened, reached up and slid off her right bra strap. Darien’s fingers ached to peel down the left strap. She lowered it to the side, releasing the front clasp. Pulling it open, she flipped it off and let it drop to the floor. Darien hissed. Having forgotten about the shower, he tilted his head back and sputtered when the water poured onto his face. He shook his head and blinked, then groaned. She’d turned, facing him, but had crossed her arms and covered her breasts with her hands.

That was wrong. It was his hands that needed to feel her nipples pebble against his palms. He shifted to move, but caught himself. He didn’t want to break the spell. WTF? Who was he kidding? He wanted to shatter the spell, grab Erika, and back her up against the shower wall, drowning her in kisses. After nibbling his way up her thigh, he craved burying himself deep inside her and when both had screamed out a release, he wanted to do it all over again.

In romance novels, as readers, we quickly decide if we like the hero. More times than not, at first we may not find much to like. After all, the author needs to give him some serious issues to overcome before he can win the heroine and achieve a happily ever after.

Every woman in the world, at one time or another, may have fantasized about making a bad boy good. I know I have. But in reality, few of us want a certified bad boy. One who is self-centered and incapable of love. No, we want one who falls so hard, he’ll do anything to win the heroine’s (our) heart.

I say “our” because, I don’t know about you, but I actually become the female lead in every book I read (or write). I put myself right there in those uncomfortable situations. Those smoldering hot, tension gripping, heart stopping, tongue sticking to the roof of my mouth scenes where everything is humming and strumming like a honky-tonk country band on a Saturday night.

The deal is, maybe the heroine doesn’t know her hero is actually beginning to change because he doesn’t show her….yet. But as the reader, we get to know that before she does.

For example, in my latest book, Chirp, the hero, Rance shows up at the house his grandmother left him and finds a strange girl living there. He’s determined to make her leave but he’s met his match. He’s rude, messy, and gets rid of the four cats living in the house, (which belonged to his grandmother, not the girl). Yeah, and I’m sure when that happened, cat lover readers everywhere wanted to scratch his eyes out.

As time passes, he starts to change. Then, he gets her a puppy but doesn’t take credit for it. Just lets her think it’s a stray and agrees to let her keep it. Holy crap! When that happened, I wanted to rip his clothes off, throw him to the floor, and have my way with him.

For me, nothing makes a man hotter than showing an act of kindness expecting nothing in return.

So what makes you think a hero is hot? Is it a chiseled body? Gorgeous eyes? Money? Tight jeans?

Let me know in a comment. I’ll choose one answer in a random drawing* and send the winner a “Come Fly With me to Bluebird, Texas” tee-shirt. Just like the one Rance gave Blaze.

*Sorry, due to out of country postage rates, the contest is for US residents only. 🙁

However, if I have an out of country winner, I’ll send an audio of my best-selling book, Tell Me a Secret. 🙂

Be sure and go here to enter my Rafflecopter giveaway to celebrate the release of Chirp, April 4. Giveaway runs until April 15. Below is the code for your site.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Chirp

A woman hiding from her future…..

Heiress to the largest steel company in America, twenty-year-old, socially awkward Blaze Bledsoe hides out at Dessie Bishop’s farm. For the last three years, Blaze has eluded one investigator after another, but just when she thinks she’s safe, a PI closes in. Her luck is about to run out in more ways than one.

A man running from his past….

Rance Keller, a tough, hard-living ex-con, fresh out of prison for a crime he didn’t commit, arrives to claim the house his grandmother left him. Finding a strange girl living there, his plans for a solitary life take a turn. Her lack of modesty, no filter, and word of the day fetish baffles him, but those big green eyes and sweet mouth have him losing sleep.

Welcome to Bluebird, Texas

Where two damaged people with secrets, discover trust can lead to passion.

Get your copy here!

About the Author

Award winning and Amazon Best-Selling author, Ann Everett embraces her small town upbringing and thinks Texans are some of the funniest people on earth. When speaking at conferences and to writing groups, businesses, book clubs, and non-profit organizations, she incorporates her special brand of wit, making her programs on marketing, self-publishing, and the benefits of laughter, informative and fun.

Website:  https://www.anneverett.comwww.anneverett.com

Her short stories have appeared in The Green Silk Journal, Snag Today, and Story Teller Magazine.

A top reviewer on thenextbigwriter.com, she lives on a small lake in Northeast Texas where she writes, bakes, and fights her addiction to Diet Dr. Peppers.

She’s been featured on:
Proud of East Texas with Joan Hallmark, KLTV-TV, Tyler, Texas
East Texas Live and Mid-day, KETK-TV, Tyler, Texas
KTSS-TV, Hope, Arkansas
The Authors Show with Don McCauley, Internet radio show
The Chandler & Brownsboro Statesman, Chandler, Texas
The Daily Tribune, Mt. Pleasant, Texas
Tyler Morning Telegraph, Tyler, Texas
InMagazine, East Texas

Ten things you won’t know about Ann by reading her bio:
She’s been married to her high school sweetheart.
She loves shopping at thrift stores.
She doesn’t remember her first kiss.
She hates talking on the telephone.
A really sharp pencil makes her happy.
She secretly wants to get a tattoo.
A charter member of National Honor Society in high school remains one of her proudest moments.
She’s thankful wrinkles aren’t painful.
She sucks at math.

Ann’s Books:

Tizzy/Ridge romantic suspense trilogy

Laid Out and Candle Lit
You’re Busting My Nuptials
Tied With a Bow and No Place to Go

Contemporary romance companion books

Tell Me a Secret
Two Wrongs Make a Right
Say You’ll Never Love Me

Non-fiction

Strong Verbs Strong Voice: A quick reference to improve your writing and impress readers (Amazon best seller)
Body Language: A quick reference for character action and description
Sweet Thangs: Southern Sweets from Two Sassy Sisters

Hi, Delilah. Thanks for having me here today. And greetings to your readers.

I’m one of those writers who actually holds degrees in writing. Because I have a master’s degree, I’m qualified to teach on the college level, and I did so for a couple of years. The moderator of one of my critique groups was fond of saying that degreed authors as well as writing professors wrote terrible novels. That was two strikes against me. Three and I was out before I even started.

Funny thing is, writing was always a stress-reliever for me, so it was never something I considered as a career. Because of that, when I started college, I was a business major. Hated that—math, statistics, optimization. Ugh. Despite having no design portfolio, I managed to switch to architecture, which I loved then. Still do, actually. But they were training us to be commercial designers, and I wanted to design homes. That necessitated another change. I thought about interior design or landscape design, but again, I had no portfolio. Then I seriously considered art history or archaeology, because I thought working in a museum would be amazing. But I also wanted to graduate before I was fifty. I was two years into my college career, and I didn’t have any course credits that would apply toward those degrees.

So, I did the only thing that made sense to me. I became a writing major. If I overloaded for a few semesters, I’d be right on track and would graduate in my four-year window (which I did, by the way). Once I had my bachelor’s degree, I could get a graduate degree in art history or archaeology and go on to be a curator.

Two things wrong with that. First, curators spend a lot of time in the business aspect of museums, and I already knew I hated that. Second, I freaking LOVED writing. So, when it came time to get a master’s degree, I stayed with what I knew and loved.

Why am I boring you with this biography? Because it’s relevant to fiction.

I wrote a novella (When We Finally Kiss Goodnight) with characters who are archaeologists. One works in the field, the other in a museum. I got to explore the parts of archaeology that interest me while avoiding the tedium of business management.

I’m also in the middle of a four-book saga (the Medici Protectorate series) with characters who are in the building business. I have an architect in Bleeding Heart and a construction pro in Mind Control, and when I finish the series, I will have an interior designer in Body Armor and a landscape designer in Tortured Soul.

Maybe my critique moderator was onto something. It’s not that writing majors and professors can’t be good authors. It’s just that people from other professions have different experiences and interests to draw on that make their writing richer.

Doctors write medical dramas. Lawyers and police write crime fiction. Military personnel write war stories. You get the idea.

I have plenty of interests. Maybe I shouldn’t have become a writing major. Maybe I should have studied architecture or archaeology. I might have been professionally content. (Note the stress on might.)

But this way, writing fiction, I can be all those things—be anything. Writing lets me live vicariously through my characters. I can be a sea captain, cryptozoologist, doctor, or astronaut. Maybe a wizard or an alchemist.

Actually, I get to be an alchemist in the Medici Protectorate series, too. As well as a mergers and acquisitions executive, a lawyer, an IT guru, and a security specialist. Yep, those of you who have been counting have it right. I’ve got nine different vocations going on in that series, and I get to have fun with each and every one of them.

What is an alchemist like, especially one who mastered immortality and has been alive for five hundred years? Is he experienced, wise, and benevolent? Maybe jaded, calculating, and bored with society? How do you think an architect gets along with a business mogul? A construction foreperson with a lawyer? An interior designer with a hacker? A landscaper with a security expert? Do opposites attract? Do careers even impact interpersonal relationships?

If you’re interested in finding out all those things and more, I’m running a sale right now. For a limited time, Bleeding Heart is on sale for 99¢ and Mind Control for $1.99.

Medici Protectorate Series Premise:
The four Notaro sisters are the secret legacy of the Medici, famed rulers of Italy. Michelangelo promised his Medici-benefactor that he’d always watch over the family, and as such, he formed the Medici Protectorate to guard them throughout the generations. Now, Italy is in political turmoil and revolution is imminent. The people are calling for new rulers, and the Notaros are poised to assume control. But a nefarious opposing faction wants the power for themselves. Never was the family in more jeopardy. The four sisters are protected by the Brotherhood—four elite warriors of the Medici Protectorate prophesied to keep the family safe until they fulfill their destinies. They journey around the world in an effort to keep the family safe and the future of Italy secure.

Reading fiction is fascinating because it lets us escape our personal realities and become someone or something else. Writing it is even better, though. It’s the best of both worlds because it allows us to do what we’re good at (telling stories) while exploring our other interests.

It took me a while to declare my major, but I’m convinced I made the right choice. I get to be something different every day. How many careers offer that kind of flexibility and excitement?

Looks like the only third strike I’ll be getting is if I write a baseball-themed novel.

About the Author

Staci Troilo has always loved fiction, ever since her parents read her fairy tales when she was a young girl. Today, her interests are much more eclectic. She loves getting lost in sci-fi battles, fantasy realms, horror worlds, suspenseful intrigues, and romantic entanglements.

As goes her reading, so goes her writing. She can’t pick a single genre to focus on, so she doesn’t even try. She’s proud to say she’s a multi-genre author.

When she’s not reading or writing, she’s spending time with family and friends, possibly cooking for them, or maybe enjoying an afternoon in the pool. To learn more about her, visit https://stacitroilo.com/.

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