Fresh FIction Box Not To Miss
Layla Reyne | Southern Food Cravings
Author Guest / March 6, 2017

Thanks for hosting me on Fresh Fiction’s Romantic Suspense Monday, as I celebrate my debut release, SINGLE MALT, Book 1 of the Agents Irish and Whiskey male/male romantic suspense series. AIW features widowed FBI agent and Irish ex-pat, Aidan Talley, who falls hard for handsome, younger Cyber agent, Jameson “Whiskey” Walker, as they investigate cybercrimes and the murder of Aidan’s late husband. While there are plenty of car chases, gunfights and explosions in AIW, there’s also a lot of food. I’m a foodie, and a displaced Southerner, and I’d be lying if I said Jamie, a North Carolina native now living in San Francisco, didn’t bear some resemblance in those respects. And like me, Southern-boy Jamie’s got a hankering for certain foods he just can’t get in California. Jamie’s Top Five Southern Food Cravings North Carolina Barbecue When Tar Heels say “barbecue,” we don’t mean meat cooked on a grill. We mean pork, slow-cooked on a smoker, then pulled and chopped. Being from eastern NC, Jamie prefers whole hog style, vinegar sauce (little-to-no ketchup), red slaw, AND ALL THE HUSHPUPPIES (dipped in honey butter). A proper eastern NC barbecue plate right here: Southern Peaches While peaches in California are perfectly…

Living in a Small Town Rocks by Sonya Weiss
Author Guest / March 6, 2017

Living in a small town rocks. Living in a small town set in the South really rocks. I don’t live in one now, but I used to and it was awesome. There were some pretty quirky characters and a lot of friendly people. These people that you may have known all your life can sometimes be a little hard to put up with when the tell-a-friend chain gets going and nothing you do is kept on the down low. You can’t get away with anything because you know someone’s going to tell your mom or one of your other relatives. Of course, every town has that one person who hates change because “this is the way it’s always been done” and they’re resistant to anything that might shake up tradition. Yet, when one of their own suffers any kind of adversity, the townspeople rush to help, settling around you like a warm, comforting blanket of love and support. And you remember that they’re always there for you when it counts. That’s why I like setting stories in small towns which is what I did for my newest book WEDDING DATE RESCUE. I wanted to write a series about firefighters and…

Diana Rodriguez Wallach | Suspense in the Real World
Author Guest / March 6, 2017

Suspense—it’s just a fancy word for “drama,” and we’ve all experienced our fair share of drama. Whether you’re waiting for a career-changing email, sitting by the phone desperate for a text from you-know-who, or dreading going to a family party because you’re fighting with all your siblings, suspense is what makes life interesting. As much as we all might say we “hate drama,” life would be pretty boring if we just woke up, ate cereal, went to school, came home, and went to bed. So for me, writing suspense means letting the everyday grit of reality bleed into my novels. My latest book, PROOF OF LIES, is an international spy thriller and while I’ve never actually chased a dangerous criminal through the murky canals of Venice, that doesn’t mean I haven’t experienced my fair share of crazy. So here are three ways that I’ve used my own life to create suspense in the lives of my characters. No Instalove—I don’t know about you, but I’ve never spilled a milkshake on a guy in a food court and then instantly become obsessed with winning his heart. I need to actually have a conversation with a person and find something in common….

Amber Mitchell | Top 5 Fantasy Crushes
Author Guest / March 6, 2017

Fantasy has always been my genre of choice because of its sweeping scale and the idea that magic lurks around every unexplored corner of the world. Because most adventures are epic, it’s usually populated with robust characters, ones that feel special in a book or film where even the world is a character. And the romances are usually a slow burn, lasting over countless pages (or minutes) and miles of landscape. You get a chance to see these characters fall for each other as they struggle to survive and by the end of it, I’ve fallen for them too. Here are my top 5 crushes from fantasy books and movies in no particular order. The Darkling from The Grisha series by Leigh Bardugo- I’m not usually into the bad guy. I know some folks love them but I always root for the hero. Except in this book. The Darkling was one of the most charismatic and tempting baddies I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting in a fantasy novel and I was captivated. The moment he was on the page, I couldn’t stop reading about his darkly enigmatic presence and found myself skimming through the book for when he was…