In my most recent two books – RESISTING THE REBEL and THE REPLACEMENT CRUSH – the heroes save the heroines from creepy guys. Both books are definitely rom-coms, but deal with an important issue facing girls and women – jerk guys who intimidate and bully girls to try to get what they want. While I consider myself a strong feminist and completely support girls standing up for themselves in every way possible, there are times when it’s not enough- when someone else needs to step in. Standing around as a disapproving spectator doesn’t cut it – good guys need to step in. In RESISTING THE REBEL, the hero Caleb has the school “bad boy” reputation, while the real bad guy Gus puts on a phony act to try to win over Mandy, the heroine. However, as the story progresses Caleb realizes what Gus is up to, so he sets out to 1) prove to Mandy that he’s the better guy, 2) protect her from Gus, and 3) demonstrate his superior kissing skills, because this is a rom-com, after all. In THE REPLACEMENT CRUSH, Jake the Snake is a more serious threat. He intimidates the heroine Vivian and threatens her, after…

About MAY THE BEST MAN WIN Opening five lines: On the upside, the prelude had already begun, and chances were good that Mozart’s Sonata in E-flat Major pumping through all those organ pipes would cover any sounds of distress emanating from St. A’s sacristy. Jase Foster crouched in front of Dean Skolnic, groom du jour, and cursed. This had to stop happening. “You think she’s gonna notice?” Dean asked, wincing as Jase pulled one strip of duct tape after another off the garbage bag of ice currently secured to Dean’s shoulder. “The arm?” Jase clarified, because while he wasn’t an every-Sunday kind of guy, they were in a church so he couldn’t flat-out lie. Theme: Enemies-to-lovers, second-chances Inspired by: An intense discussion over the myriad flavors of “HOT” guys came in…and the subsequent dive into Pinterest’s man-candy files that left me with a handful of “tuxedo-fine” morsels, and a story idea about a group of best men I just couldn’t ignore. Order: First in the Best Men Series MAY THE BEST MAN WIN Scrap book: https://www.pinterest.com/miralynkelly/may-the-best-man-win/ About Emily Klein… Emily’s first thoughts about Jase: Best man her butt. Seriously, how did Jase Foster keep getting this gig? Obviously, the guys…

  He’s quiet. My other characters made things (relatively) easy for me. They let me use their voices to establish personalities and explain things and move the plot forward and all that good—and necessary—stuff. George, though…George is not a talker. He made me work for it. Instead of words, I had to use body language and facial expressions and grunts to define him. Despite this, it was surprisingly fun to write George. Once he did start speaking to Ellie, everything he said had extra importance. He’s like that quiet person we all know in real life. When that person finally says something, we all go quiet and listen. He’s willing to change. There’s something so special about his conversations with Ellie. He doesn’t talk to anyone else, but he’s willing to push himself out of his comfort zone because there are things he wants to say to her. This shows how very important Ellie is to him. It was late in final edits (really, really late) before my editor realized that George never told Ellie he loved her. We hadn’t noticed that scene was missing because it was so obvious that he did. After all, he talked to her. Of…

My idea way to spend a Saturday? Is that a trick question? You’re asking a writer who works at home and whose kids are grown up and aren’t going to school any more. If I don’t look at the date up at the top of my computer screen, I rarely know what day of the week it is. And I only look at the date to see how much time I have before the next deadline. Even so, there is something special about Saturdays that goes back to childhood. When I think about Saturdays, memory transports me back to a time then I was about twelve years old. Saturdays were magical back then. School was over for the week, you could wear blue jeans instead of school clothes, and Sunday stood there as a buffer between Now and Monday. I don’t know if my Saturdays all had a sameness about them then, but I remember them all following the same pattern. My friends and I went to the movies. First we gathered at somebody’s house to decide which movie to go to. There were three movie theaters in our neighborhood, the Earle on 74th Street, the Colony on 82nd Street,…

There’s a fine line between love and hate. So it’s no surprise that “Enemies to Lovers” is one of the most popular tropes in all of storytelling. From Jane Austen to Julie James, from Shakespeare to soap operas, the push/pull between a hero and heroine as they go from “I hate you” to “I love you” can be entertaining to watch. Instalove, or love at first sight, definitely has no place here. Hollywood has certainly made a buck or two producing romantic comedies that put the hero and heroine at odds from the very beginning: The Proposal, Sweet Home Alabama, You’ve Got Mail. Kate Moseley, the heroine in The Cutting Edge described the trope perfectly: “Did you ever play with magnets? You know how you used to have to push them around and they’d push away. You’d push them around the table when all you really had to do was flip them over. And then suddenly… Don’t you see? That’s why everything has been so awful. All we needed was a little flip.” Aaah… the flip. Isn’t it glorious? That’s what has us all waiting on the edge of our seats. Or in the case of romance novels, turning the…

Hi! I write the Cookbook Nook Mysteries, which means I spend a lot of time researching cookbooks and recipes. Poor me! Also, because I include recipes in my mysteries, I do a lot of taste testing. Feeling sorry for me yet? Probably not. You would if I was a lousy cook, but I’ve been cooking all my life. I catered during high school, and I ran a restaurant in my twenties. However, my protagonist, Jenna Hart, a former advertising executive who moved home to the seaside town of Crystal Cove, California to help her aunt open the Cookbook Nook, a delightful bookstore packed with cookbooks and cooking items, is not a cook. She needs simple recipes, i.e., 5-ingredient recipes. To help Jenna, I include a simple recipe that she could whip up in each book. FYI, she’s determined to become a better cook. In fact, in GRILLING THE SUBJECT, she has advanced to ten-ingredient recipes. How? Because Katie, the chef at the Nook Café, is teaching Jena to think of dry ingredients as one “recipe” and the liquid ingredients as another “recipe.” Then she can combine the two recipes into one. Two fives add up to ten. Does that make…

David Misch was born in a humble log cabin in 1946, then again in a split-level thatched roof cottage in 1950. Growing a remarkable twelve inches a day (though, unfortunately, entirely in his shins), David was recruited by both the Boston Celtics and AAA Ceiling Repair before his fourth birthday, but opted instead for a career as a professional snitch. After ratting out literally dozen of ne’er-do-wells to the FIB, Mr. Misch realized he should have been dealing with the FBI, not Fellas In Basements, a special-interest group devoted to the study of La-Z-Boy armchairs. He then retired to an underwater colony of scuba gear scavengers who, unable to find scuba gear, drowned. He will be missed. Wait, he’s back!, this time with something roughly approximating the truth. And in the first-person yet. Quote… Though I’m now an internationally-recognized author (if you count one interview with Radio Ireland as international recognition), I began my career as a funny folksinger, back when such a description was accepted by the IRS. My big break was being clueless enough to think drunk college friends thinking I could write songs meant I could write songs. I sustained this delusion for five years before dropping…

I’ve had more changes in my life in the past few months, than the past several years. Small or large, change can be difficult and wreak havoc on your soul. Small changes can be easily shrugged off. Like after 25 years we decided to switch insurance companies. We had to cut down a huge tree in our yard. Then we switched the providers for our wireless cell phones. Then, (gasp) we disconnected our land line telephone. Obviously, these changes may cause some minor inconvenience, you might have to pay more, or you might save some money, but all in all you get through these changes unscathed. However, when a beloved pet dies, your youngest graduates from high school, and you part ways with a close friend; these changes are a little more difficult to get through without some pain. At the grocery store, I ran into a friend I hadn’t seen in years. We were talking about all the changes in our lives. I was feeling especially melancholy about it and probably had my sad face going when she said, “But you know, I love change.” I must have stared at her for a good five seconds with my mouth…

We found this store a few years ago. A surplus store where they sell discounted groceries – cans that are dented, food items that are almost-to-slightly expired, chicken nuggets that aren’t shaped exactly right. We love that place. We are really busy during the week and sometimes being able to pull out a huge bag of chicken strips to fry up really quick is a lifesaver. Plus everything is surplus or slightly irregular so it’s cheap. Cheap is pretty much my favorite thing ever. It’s also a handy place as it’s right across the street from the drive-in. So it’s a great place to stop in for big bags of popcorn and candy. Especially chocolate. I may or may not have a slight chocolate problem. If it’s in the house, I’m going to eat it. Oh, I try not to. But it calls to me…especially when I’m up until the wee hours either working or staring into space and pretending I’m working. My husband once said we should coat really important things in chocolate. That way if they ever get lost I’d be sure to find them. I’m not quite that bad. But…well honestly, probably not far off. So at…

John Wayne, Randolph Scott, Clint Eastwood, Alan Ladd…I am a sucker for a cowboy hero, and I am not alone. Since the days of Owen Wister and the Virginian, readers have been drawn to cowboy heroes. But what makes them so appealing? Here are a few ideas I have: The “Code of the West.” True cowboy heroes have a code of honor they live by that make them true hero-material. Things like: Your word is your bond. Ride for the brand. Don’t ask questions about a man’s past. Never miss an opportunity to keep your mouth shut. Don’t squat with your spurs on. Cowboys are men of action. Readers like heroes who DO things, and there’s not a much more physical job than that of a cowboy. Heroes look good on horses. J A man who can ride even better than he can walk? Yes, please! Cowboys are known for being chivalrous. Their code of honor extends to treating ladies like ladies. Cowboys give the impression of self-reliance, true loners who don’t need anyone…but every woman in the world knows this isn’t true. A real cowboy needs a good woman to look past the rough, tough exterior and reach the…