WIND RIVER RANCHER, Book 2, Wind River Valley series, is an emotional story that will suck every reader in. I’m known for gritty, visceral and emotional writing, and this book is no exception. It just happened to catch the eye of Publisher’s Weekly and it received a ‘starred’ review (like winning an Oscar) on 12.3.16. This series I’m writing is about military vets returning home from combat from all over the world, mostly focused on the Middle East. Having been in the US Navy during the Vietnam War era (I served stateside as a weather forecaster at USNAS Moffett Field (now known as Silicon Valley) near San Francisco, California. I know PTSD because I’ve lived with it all my life. I came out a dysfunctional family where when I went to bed at night wondering if I’d wake up the next morning to see the dawn or not. When you live in that kind of violent, unstable environment for the first 18 years of your life, you are branded with such constant threat of death and physical violence, for the rest of your life. I didn’t even know I had PTSD until it surfaced and was defined with a specific…

A Special Sneak Peek! ON SECOND THOUGHT by Kristan Higgins Following in the footsteps of her critically acclaimed novel If You Only Knew, multi-bestselling author Kristan Higgins returns with a pitch-perfect look at the affection—and the acrimony—that binds sisters together Ainsley O’Leary is so ready to get married—she’s even found the engagement ring her boyfriend has stashed away. What she doesn’t anticipate is for Eric to blindside her with a tactless breakup he chronicles in a blog…which (of course) goes viral. Devastated and humiliated, Ainsley turns to her half sister, Kate, who’s already struggling after the sudden loss of her new husband. Kate has always been so poised, so self-assured, but Nathan’s death shatters everything she thought she knew—including her husband—and sometimes the people who step up aren’t the ones you expect. With seven years and a murky blended-family dynamic between them, Ainsley and Kate have never been overly close, but their shared sorrow dovetails their faltering worlds into one. Despite the lifetime of history between them, the sisters must learn to put their differences aside and open their hearts to the inevitable imperfection of family—and the possibility of one day finding love again. Women’s Fiction | Romance [HQN, On…

MIRACLE ON 5TH AVENUE by Sarah Morgan From Manhattan with Love #3 Hopeless romantic Eva Jordan loves everything about Christmas. She might be spending the holidays alone this year, but when she’s given an opportunity to housesit a spectacular penthouse on Fifth Avenue, she leaps at the chance. What better place to celebrate than in snow-kissed Manhattan? What she didn’t expect was to find the penthouse still occupied by its gorgeous–and mysterious–owner. Bestselling crime writer Lucas Blade is having the nightmare before Christmas. With a deadline and the anniversary of his wife’s death looming, he’s isolated himself in his penthouse with only his grief for company. He wants no interruptions, no decorations and he certainly doesn’t appreciate being distracted by his beautiful, bubbly new housekeeper. But when the blizzard of the century leaves Eva snowbound in his apartment, Lucas starts to open up to the magic she brings…This Christmas, is Lucas finally ready to trust that happily-ever-afters do exist? Holiday | Romance Contemporary [HQN, On Sale: November 29, 2016, Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9780373789344 / eISBN: 9781460396131] Loving again can be as beautiful as falling in love for the first time Buy MIRACLE ON 5TH AVENUE: Amazon.com | Kindle |…

Do you live off coffee and wine exclusively? Depends who you ask! My coffee and wine budget is more than our food allowance for a family of five. Don’t judge me…I much prefer to drink my calories. Unless pizza is set in front of me, then I forget the coffee and wine and go straight for the beer—preferably Dos Equis with lots of lime and salt. But seriously, the only thing I love more than coffee is wine. Especially an exquisite Sangiovese, Malbec, or Pinot Noir. I’m shameless, I know…does anyone need my shipping address too? Are you wearing contacts? Your eyes can’t be that blue! They are that blue—and I can’t explain why except our mailman was a handsome guy! Just kidding if you’re reading this, Mom. Yes, my eyes are this blue and my mom got exactly what she wanted, a girl with dark hair, fair skin, and icy blue eyes. Okay, she doesn’t describe them as icy but I like it. No, I haven’t worn colored contacts since 2001 and they were a lovely lavender color. Are you a nanny as well as a writer? That kids looks nothing like you! LOL! I’ve gotten this question not…

A PERILOUS UNDERTAKING by Deanna Raybourn Veronica Speedwell Mystery Veronica Speedwell returns in a brand new adventure from Deanna Raybourn, the New York Times bestselling author of the Lady Julia Grey mysteries… London, 1887. Victorian adventuress and butterfly hunter Veronica Speedwell receives an invitation to visit the Curiosity Club, a ladies-only establishment for daring and intrepid women. There she meets the mysterious Lady Sundridge, who begs her to take on an impossible task—saving society art patron Miles Ramsforth from execution. Accused of the brutal murder of his artist mistress Artemisia, Ramsforth will face the hangman’s noose in a week’s time if Veronica cannot find the real killer. But Lady Sundridge is not all that she seems, and unmasking her true identity is only the first of the many secrets Veronica must uncover. Together with her natural historian colleague Stoker, Veronica races against time to find the true murderer—a ruthless villain who not only took Artemisia’s life in cold blood but is happy to see Ramsforth hang for the crime. From a Bohemian artists’ colony to a royal palace to a subterranean grotto with a decadent history, the investigation proves to be a very perilous undertaking indeed…. Mystery Historical [Berkley, On…

THE SEVENTH PLAGUE asks, if the biblical plagues of Egypt truly happened—could they happen again—on a global scale? In THE SEVENTH PLAGUE the leader of a British archeological expedition stumbles out of the Egyptian desert. Before he can explain what happened to his team, he dies. But his remains hold a terrifying discovery that only deepens the mystery: something had begun mummifying his body while he was still alive. Sigma must search for the truth, traveling from the plague-ridden streets of Cairo to a vast ancient tomb buried under the burning sands of the Sudan; while struggling to stop a mad genius locked within a remote Arctic engineering complex, risking the lives of all those he holds dear. As the global crisis grows ever larger, Sigma Force will confront a threat born of the ancient past and made real by the cutting-edge science—a danger that will unleash a cascading series of plagues, culminating in a scourge that could kill all of the world’s children . . . decimating mankind forever. James Rollins is one of the most inventive writers writing today, with the New York Times Book Review raving, “he’s what you might end up with if you tossed Michael…

I’m going to let you in on a little secret. Ready? Okay, here goes. I have a secret love affair with the best friend’s little sister love trope. Yep, you heard me right. I love it. LOVE. It. Madly, truly, deeply. There’s just something about a forbidden romance on that kind of level that gets me hooked on a story. Most of the time, the trope has an older brother (or four, if you’re talking about my newest release, THE CEO’S SEDUCTION, the first in an exciting new series) who absolutely does not approve of the sister and his best bud dating. Because of this, you have an automatic tension in your book that sizzles, snaps, and pulls you in. There’s the secrecy of the love affair, something both the heroine and hero will fight to keep… But you know it’s all gonna come out eventually, and when it does, which way will the cards fall? Will the hero bail, and apologize to his best bud, or will he stand by the heroine’s side, and take whatever comes his way, all in the name in love? If I’m being one hundred percent honest, I think that’s my favorite moment in…

Remember finals? The last-minute scrambling? The late-night pizza and Mountain Dew fueled explorations into complex topics that, when illuminated by morning and a couple hours of sleep, failed to retain that brilliant, panic-enhanced hue? And then handing in something you feared might just be garbage? You would have thought we’d have learned. But here we are, a couple of weeks from Christmas, madly surfing Amazon for gift ideas and tossing the decorations at the tree with Whoville efficiency. How does this happen every year? If you are a writer, or anyone else who works with deadlines, this time of year can be especially sleep-deprived. And it doesn’t help much that it’s now dark before dinner. Suddenly 5:00 feels like 10:00, and I spend a significant portion of my day dedicated to yawning. And I wasn’t there, but I’m relatively sure that when the gods of the work calendar congregated to decide how long we should have to accomplish any given task, they began with a blank calendar. If a job is to take three weeks, it should take three weeks in December just like it would in May. Not so much. At least if you have a life. So here…

GIVEAWAY: a copy of SLEIGH BELLS RING Admit it. You love Christmas romances just as much as I do. Why do these stories touch our hearts so profoundly? Because every page engages our five senses of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch. They evoke our memories of the scent of mulled cider sipped near a real Christmas tree. The way a warm sugar cookie melts on our tongues. Curling up under a cozy afghan in front of a crackling fire. Imagining the soft touch of his finger stroking the curve of our cheek. Christmas carols add the background music to our own romantic Hallmark movie. Christmas is the season of miracles, and we want to believe in miracles. But most of all, it’s the season of love. Sweet romance novels stoke our imaginations with the possibility that we, too, will live happily ever after with our one true love. SLEIGH BELLS RING is a collection of four contemporary Christmas novellas in which each Tucker sister is the heroine of her own story. The Tucker girls have inherited their father’s Kentucky horse farm for Christmas. Make that . . . a run-down horse farm. It needs some serious TLC in order…

Excerpt -Mated to the Vikens Erik, Planet Viken, Viken United Compound, Transport Center Nerves made my heart beat faster than I wished as I watched my two brothers-in-arms. Gunnar, with his black hair and blacker heart, stood silent and still as a statue as we waited for our mate to arrive via transport. He’d vowed not to love her, but Rolf and I didn’t need him to do so. “How long must we wait?” Gunnar turned on the Viken warrior behind the transport station, every line in his body screaming of his irritation. “For someone not interested in a mate, you’re fucking impatient,” I countered. While the other two stood near the transport area, I leaned against the wall. Gunnar regarded me over his shoulder with a look that screamed fuck you. “Not long, sir,” the attendant said. “The transport signal is strong. Your mate should arrive in the next few minutes.” “Relax, Gunnar,” Rolf said. He could always calm our friend. “Earth is a long way from here. A long, long way.” They stood shoulder to shoulder. Next to Gunnar’s darkness, Rolf looked like a beacon. Always smiling, his pale blond hair and bright green eyes nearly made him…