We’re kicking off our Susan Elizabeth Phillips Read-Along this week with BREATHING ROOM, and Loretta Chase is here to discuss why she loves this particular SEP title. Welcome, Loretta! 1. The pristine beauty and simplicity of the first line, and the anticipation it awakens: Isabel Favor prized neatness. I could not possibly say another word about this. It’s perfect. 2. Enter the hero: Lorenzo Gage was viciously handsome. You know, killer gorgeous. Which is what he is, in the movies. Sometimes a serial killer, sometimes not, but but always bad, bad, bad. “And sadism has made me famous.” 3. Also, he’s Italian. Be still my heart. 4. Fifi. 5. The Four Cornerstones and the various Rules, like “the Healthy Relationship Rules of Fair Combat, not one of which advocated yelling ‘shut up.’” 6. Dialogue, dialogue, dialogue. The gift of the screwball comedy snappy comeback muse: Sparks of happiness rushed through her. “Watching me eat this is turning you on.” He looked irritated. “I’ve been a little sex-deprived lately, so it doesn’t take much.” “Sure. It’s been, what? Five days?” 7. Tuscany. You can see it and smell it and hear it. And taste it. Especially the gelato. 8. The subplot–no,…

No cozy is complete without a cat. Mysteries have talking cats, crime-solving cats, and in Sofie Kelly’s Magical Cats series, felines walk through doors and materialize in strange places. Sofie’s cats transported her series to the New York Times bestseller list. My Dead-End Job mysteries also have cats. Thumbs is a six-toed polydactyl cat who belongs to South Florida private eyes Helen Hawthorne and Phil Sagemont. Thumbs is a more earthbound feline, but he has practical magic. CATNAPPED!, my 13th Dead-End Job mystery, is set in the world of cat shows. A pedigreed Chartreux show cat has been kidnapped for half a million dollars. Helen and Phil, the husband and wife PI owners of Coronado Investigations, are waiting for the catnapper to call. During this tense time, Thumbs uses all his feline powers to comfort Helen Hawthorne: Cats are magical creatures, Helen thought, as she sipped her coffee on the couch in Phil’s apartment. Her own cat, Thumbs, was curled up next to her, purring. Cats can’t talk or walk through walls, though they seem to have those powers. But they are calming. Since nine o’clock this morning, I’ve downed four cups of coffee, waiting for the catnapper’s call. Phil’s…

One of my favorite historical western romances, THE BAREFOOT BRIDE, was just reissued and is now in stores in paperback with a fabulous new cover. This is yet another mail-order bride story, about a Boston widow who comes all the way to Fort Benton, Montana to meet her country doctor husband. Read more… For so many of you who have asked about UNFORGETTABLE, I’m not done yet. AAACK! I know how much you’re looking forward to reading it. Probably as much as I’ve been looking forward to writing it. I thought I’d be able to finish up sooner, but the plan is to have it available in August. Check with my Facebook page or website where I will post the release date as soon as it’s finished. The good news is that SINFUL is finished and due for publication on April 28, 2015. It will be followed by SHAMEFUL in late June 2015. Next I’m off to San Antonio, Texas, to attend the Romance Writers of America annual conference where I’ll be speaking and also participating in a literacy signing with hundreds of fellow authors. It’s open to the public, so if you’re in the area, please come and say…

When people ask me what I do for a living, nine times out of ten I tell them I’m a stay-at-home dad. And that’s true, mostly—I do watch my son most of the day. I’m only a writer from about ten at night to midnight when my wife and little boy are asleep. When my wife and I came up with this arrangement, I never expected it to help me become a better writer, but it has. I write crime novels mostly, but I enjoy reading psychological suspense, books that are exciting not because they’re filled with car chases and gunfights, but for the uncertainty they evoke in their readers. They leave us on edge the entire time we’re reading them. Gillian Flynn did this marvelously in Gone Girl. Sometimes it’s hard to root for her deeply flawed [but superbly written] characters, but it’s hard not to feel a pervasive sense of angst while reading her books. About two years ago, I came up with what I thought was a brilliant idea for a psychological suspense novel. To save her life, an average guy helps his girlfriend disappear and then frames her evil and quite powerful stepfather for her murder….

The staff here at Fresh Fiction are excited to wish The Page Girls a happy first birthday week! The Page Girls is a new online mag with an emphasis on books, cocktails, and female friendships. Each week, they publish a themed issue containing short stories, book reviews, personal and funny essays, videos, cocktail recipes, and more. Some sample issues include The Craziest Thing I Did For Love and LYLAS (Love You Like a Sister). From July 21-25, The Page Girls is celebrating its first official “birthday week,” which means a giveaway every day plus other goodies. As part of the birthday festivities, the brilliant ladies behind The Page Girls have joined us for an exclusive interview. What’s the story on how you ladies met and started your fabulous online magazine? Emily: I know April and Cecily through India, who I lived with in a small mice-infested apartment outside of Washington Square Park. Nothing bonds people like living in squalor. I met Jasmine in South Africa. We shared a bottle of red on a beach side boulder and watched the sun set. The stuff of great romances. Regardless of how we met…these ladies are my people. I love them. We all come from different backgrounds and…

Over the weekend, The Dawn of the Planet of the Apes raked in a staggering 73 million dollars. The majority of the audience was over the age of 25. Part of this could be the nostalgic appeal of the series. The Planet of the Apes first appeared in print in 1963 and film in 1968. The audience consists of people who can remember seeing the original movie on the big screen or on TV when they were growing up. Another part of the appeal could be that the filmmakers stayed true to the themes and tones of a movie series that has spanned generations and has quite the cult following. When The Planet of the Apes was first written, the young adult genre was just gaining a foothold in the market. Novels published for young adults were still a relatively new and risky venture. Over the years, the young adult novel has evolved and grown into a large and profitable market with a readership that’s willing to wait in line for hours for a new release. There’s nothing like the excitement of getting the newest book in a long await series, and right now it’s dystopian series readers want. Here…

When I was eight years old, I fell hard and fast for Jordan Knight from New Kids on the Block. I wallpapered my bedroom with his face, slept on a pillow with his likeness, and even owned a doll—complete with unfortunate rat-tail. Many summer days were spent daydreaming that the group’s tour bus would randomly break down in front of my house, forcing them to stop inside to make a call, and he’d see my prepubescent self and fall madly in love. Any surprise I became a fiction writer?? No surprise, that dream didn’t quite pan out. One dream that did was that I became a published author. I began the journey with my young adult time-travel series and then last summer, I decided to enter the exciting world of adult romance. My debut, TASTE THE HEAT, introduced readers to the world of Magnolia Springs, a fictional small town based on the real ones I grew up in around New Orleans. That hero was a widowed father fire captain and he instantly stole my heart. Next up was a crooning restaurant owner/tatted up math nerd, and once again, my heart was a goner. When it came time to write book…

One of the dynamics we’re told characterized Regency society was that the young ladies desperately hoped for a handsome swain to be smitten with them, and propose marriage. Marriage was the great prize, so worthy in itself, that a husband’s specific characteristics were details in comparison. To be without a fellow was a sad, sad fate, so any proposal of marriage was a form of salvation. Ha. In my recent release THE CAPTIVE, Gilly, Countess of Greendale, has had the benefit of a proposal, and it was by all lights, a “good” match. She married an earl, became the lady of grand manor, and hostess over many a glittering affair. Widowhood befalls her, and she finally, finally can order her life as she pleases. She does NOT please to remarry. Husbands are a burden, at best, and for eight years, Gilly endured a husband who fell far short of “best.” All the bended knee and moonlit waltzes in the world won’t make any hay with her. Christian has also been married, and has a child in need of a mother. When it occurs to him that Gilly could fulfill that role well, he naturally assumes becoming a duchess will be…

The middle of July in Arizona means it’s been steadily creeping over a hundred degrees for the last two months. What better time to dive into a book that’s set in the snowy winter wilderness of far northwestern Canada? While a lot of you live in areas of the country where you’ve got to shovel snow and de-ice your windshield, I assure you, after twenty-plus years of living in Arizona, I’d trade in a heartbeat! My heroine, Cecily Knight, went a step further. After getting out of the Marine Corps, she moved up to the middle of nowhere, Canada, so far outside the little town of Pinelake that she uses a small plane to do her grocery shopping. Everyday chores for her are a matter of life and death. She has to have enough fuel and firewood to stay warm through the winter. Every time she goes out, she’s surrounded by threats, from falling and breaking her ankle to encountering a bear face-to-face. Living under a constant challenge is her coping mechanism. By surviving, she proves that she’s strong enough to get through another day without anything bad happening to her or anyone else around her. It’s not a healthy…

Part one of bestselling erotic romance author Cynthia Sax’s new novella series, SINFUL REWARDS, released today, and we at Fresh Fiction had the pleasure of chatting with Cynthia about all the steamy details. Thanks for joining us, Cynthia! Was it difficult to transition out of writing The Seen Trilogy and into your new novella series, Sinful Rewards? Cynthia: It is always difficult to leave a beloved world and say goodbye to characters I adore. A couple of things helped me with this transition. We change settings, moving from LA in the The Seen Trilogy to Chicago in Sinful Rewards. I love both of these cities but they are VERY different, having a completely different feel and rhythm. I also wrote a couple of delicious SciFi erotic romances between the two series. That was a fun palette cleanser. Billionaires are a hot topic in erotic literature. As a writer, what draws you to the billionaires for your leading men? Cynthia: For me, billionaire is a short form for alpha of the business world. What this label communicates is the hero is successful and (usually) the boss. He has reached the top of his game (likely expecting that this achievement would fix…