Happy New Year!

Gosh, it's been quiet around the blog this holiday season. I hope that means everyone is busy spending time celebrating with loved ones. I've done a bit more celebrating than is good for me, and I fear that 2014 must start with a resolution to stop eating all that crazy holiday food and get back to the gym more often each week. Oof!

If you're looking for a calorie-free way to ring in the new year, check out the year-end sale at Torquere Books. Just use the code "hello2014" to get 20% off EVERYTHING. But hurry! It's only good through WEDNESDAY! I don't have many titles left there, but you can get Rose & Thorn for a little while longer. (I believe it's about to go out of print, and after that you'll have to wait to pick up it whenever I can make the time to re-release it.) And there's also the anthology I Put a Spell on You where you'll find a short-story of mine that you won't find anywhere else. So go shopping and have a sexy New Year!

Rebate offer and a little background on Sonoran Heat

All Romance eBooks is spotlighting publisher Amber Quill Press until October 31st with special rebates on all AQP titles! This includes LGBT imprint Amber Allure, so now might be a good time to stock up on M/M titles for the winter. For example, ahem, my novel Sonoran Heat is currently $5.25 after eBook Bucks rewards:

http://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-sonoranheat-454572-144.html


A little background: I wrote Sonoran Heat on the tail-end of a rather rough Midwest winter, one that challenged me physically, emotionally, and creatively. I found I needed a quiet respite, with thoughts of sun and warmth, while returning to the roots of writing for the sake of the craft itself. That's exactly what Sonoran Heat provided. It grew from Sunrise at Mama Irene's, a free short story I'd posted almost a year earlier. I asked myself "What happens next?", changed the setting to the Sonoran Desert where I've lived twice, and wove the story from there.

This tender romance focuses on the relationship itself, minus some of the crazier elements I've explored in other works (like, oh, forest fires, train wrecks, or Balkan mobsters). It's also low on angst and conflict, themes my regular readers know I often explore to the point of sadism, but this is one story where I needed a break from all of that. (Hey, even I can't be dark all the time!)

So...if you're in the mood for a hot but mellow story that's been praised by one reviewer for "gentle pacing" and cited by others as not being *too* squicky for a May/December romance, Sonoran Heat might just be what you're seeking. (If a tamer approach bores you, or isn't the sort of escape you need right now, well, that's what my wilder stories like Blue Ruin are for!)

Misc. Goodies

First Blood won't be out for another two months or so Dreamspinner got the ball rolling early with this fantastic cover art. I'm loving the look Paul Richmond came up with for these books. (you can check out the first one Clean Slate over in the sidebar)

What's fun for me is the way the names lined up beneath the characters we each created. Aleks and I do share and cross write all the characters but tend to concentrate more on certain ones.

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Noble Romance is have a special subscriber's only 15% "subscribers only"discount until the 22nd.

Subscribe to the Noble Romance Newsletter by July 22 and use code RXVJWR for 15% off your total order Sign up for the newsletter here (below new releases)

If you're feeling daring you may just want to use that 15% off to put a Copsucker in your Kindle. ^_^