Port Calypso Daily News As we reported last week in the Society pages, Dane Martin of the popular men’s dating advice website virile.com and author of soon to be released self-help book, Coming On Strong, was seen in a compromising position with another local celebrity, Holly Winters. Ms. Winters, whose popular blog girlnextdoor.com gives relationship advice to women struggling to find commitment among the monogamy-shy Virile sycophants, seems like the last woman Martin would dally with as both bloggers’ philosophies are in direct opposition with the other. Winters’ own self-help book, as yet untitled, is to be released next year. Though neither would comment on the romantic nature of their relationship to PC Daily, stating they were “just friends”, they agreed to a joint column this week answering reader questions from their unique perspectives. Each day, we’ll be posting a new question with the He said/She said response. Port Calypso will certainly be watching these local experts as they navigate their “friendship.” We can’t help but wonder if the Girl Next Door has tamed the most Virile man alive…or is she just another notch on the bedpost? Dear Mr. Virile and The Girl Next Door, I’m a twenty-five year-old virgin….

Port Calypso Daily News As we reported last week in the Society pages, Dane Martin of the popular men’s dating advice website virile.com and author of soon to be released self-help book, Coming On Strong, was seen in a compromising position with another local celebrity, Holly Winters. Ms. Winters, whose popular blog girlnextdoor.com gives relationship advice to women struggling to find commitment among the monogamy-shy Virile sycophants, seems like the last woman Martin would dally with as both bloggers’ philosophies are in direct opposition with the other. Winters’ own self-help book, as yet untitled, is to be released next year. Though neither would comment on the romantic nature of their relationship to PC Daily, stating they were “just friends”, they agreed to a joint column this week answering reader questions from their unique perspectives. Each day, we’ll be posting a new question with the He said/She said response. Port Calypso will certainly be watching these local experts as they navigate their “friendship.” We can’t help but wonder if the Girl Next Door has tamed the most Virile man alive…or is she just another notch on the bedpost? Dear Mr. Virile and The Girl Next Door My boyfriend goes camping every…

Port Calypso Daily News As we reported last week in the Society pages, Dane Martin of the popular men’s dating advice website virile.com and author of soon to be released self-help book, Coming On Strong, was seen in a compromising position with another local celebrity, Holly Winters. Ms. Winters, whose popular blog girlnextdoor.com gives relationship advice to women struggling to find commitment among the monogamy-shy Virile sycophants, seems like the last woman Martin would dally with as both bloggers’ philosophies are in direct opposition with the other. Winters’ own self-help book, as yet untitled, is to be released next year. Though neither would comment on the romantic nature of their relationship to PC Daily, stating they were “just friends”, they agreed to a joint column this week answering reader questions from their unique perspectives. Each day, we’ll be posting a new question with the He said/She said response. Port Calypso will certainly be watching these local experts as they navigate their “friendship.” We can’t help but wonder if the Girl Next Door has tamed the most Virile man alive…or is she just another notch on the bedpost? Dear Mr. Virile and The Girl Next Door, I was on a date…

Welcome, everyone! Today I’ll be interviewing the hero from my fourth “line” story, the sexy, confident firefighter-slash-restoration specialist, Aaron Fisher. Aaron never says no to helping out a friend, but when his buddy is injured and asks Aaron to take a construction job restoring the town’s local sweet shop after a kitchen fire, he gets more than he bargained for in the shop’s feisty new owner, Harper McGee! Aaron (breaking into that super-sexy grin): Hey…I wouldn’t say I got more than I bargained for. Maybe just more than I expected at first. Me: Mmmm-hmmm. You and Harper did have quite the interesting meet-up. You two didn’t quite get along at first. Aaron: Yeah, we definitely had a few differences of opinion. We’re both pretty headstrong people. I don’t think I could’ve gone for an opposites attract thing—I need someone who’s tough enough to give me a run for my money, you know? So in the end, we turned out pretty perfect for each other. Me: Aw, you’re still a tell-it-like-it-is kind of guy, huh? Aaron: Yup! Harper says it’s her favorite thing about me, actually. Me: Well, she’s got a long list of things to choose from. How’s she liking…

I received an email today that made me positively giddy. No, I didn’t get a great review. Well, I did, but that’s not what caused the main giddiness for this morning. I got an email from my 9 year old’s school. I get an email every time he takes a test on a book he has read. It’s called an “AR” test, which stands for accelerated reading. It’s kind of like book reports used to be when I was young. I would read a book and write a report. Well, now they read a book and take a quiz, and they get points for each quiz. My son’s school emails me every time he takes a quiz. He used to take the quizzes and I would get emails about how poorly he did. He hated reading worse than he hated taking a bath. And that’s saying a lot. He hated it worse than cleaning the bathroom. Or washing dishes. The tests came back at 20%. 40%. 60%. They were low enough to rock a writer’s world. Imagine the horror of having a kid who hates to read. You can’t, can you? I make my living on books. I grew up…

I remember watching Romeo and Juliet on TV for the first time and loving it. This was a long time before the Baz Luhrmann production (which I also really like). The one I first saw was the Zeffirelli version. I was about 14 at the time so of course the idea of having this amazing love was fascinating. However I always hated the ending. I love a happily ever afters. Years later I discovered Tristan and Isolde (another love story that ends in tragedy). I love the film and hate the ending. I want it to work out for the lovers. They’ve struggled so much they deserve to be happy! Both tales are about forbidden love. I think they are meant to be a morality tale about crossing lines and loving the wrong person. Personally I see them as epic love stories that ended in tragedy because of a few bad decisions. They could have been together if they’d done it differently. When the idea for Lord of the Hunt first came to me I knew that Taryn and Verden shouldn’t be together. And I knew the black moment was going to be the point where Romeo and Juliet, and…

My latest book, THE PURCHASE, is being called historical fiction. And I suppose it is. But writing historical fiction is a mug’s game. Are we recreating the past, or creating it? While writing, I am imagining things that never happened, trying to make it seem like they did, like they were part of the actual pageant of history, like they make as much sense as the history we all learned in school, some of which was also a fiction. While writing, I am leaning backward from my 21st century chair and hoping to smell things that no longer even exist, to create medicines and foods and conversations I have never heard or seen or tasted. So, I am turning myself into the past! I am becoming a way in which it can exist in the present. And if all events are with us forever, as causes and effects, then I am translating something from a language I’ve never heard. As I would translate the work of a stranger who speaks a language I don’t understand – a stranger who provides me with a dictionary. How can I enter the mind of a slave, male, black, his mother an African captured…

I’m having an affair with the male protagonist in my first love story, MARRIED IN THE NICK OF NINE. The novel, about a woman who wants to meet, fall in love with, and get married to The One within nine months, features the couple,  Cassandra (Cass) Whitmore and Nicolas (Nick) Harte. Cassandra has a special place in my heart, but Nick has stolen my heart. Yes—Nick—tall, dark, and ridiculously handsome, is a figment of my imagination, but after writing four books featuring him, (MARRIED IN THE NICK OF NINE, THE BABY IN THE WINDOW, ONE HARTE, TWO LOVES, debuting June 2014, and RENEE’S RETURN, debuting September 2014) I’ve come to know, love, and adore him—flaws and all. I’m a married woman and have been for fourteen years, but in my fantasy world, Nick’s my lover. There have been times when I’m in the throes of passion with my real husband that I have to be careful not to call him Nick. I guess I’ve done too good a job creating Nick. When I create my characters, I start by imagining what they look like. Once I have a general Idea, I Google images and choose individuals who resemble the character…

WHAT THE HEART WANTS Winner of the HOLT Medallion Is the January 5 Amazon Deal of the Day Download for only 1.99! January 6 is Twelfth Night, or Epiphany, if you will. In Upper East Tennessee where I come from, my momma called it “Old Christmas.” There are a couple of theories regarding Old Christmas. I always heard that Old Christmas was the date that for centuries had been celebrated as Christmas by Europeans. History bears this out. It was in 1752 that Britain moved from the Julian calendar to the Georgian calendar. In doing so, eleven days were eliminated from the year. Thus making Christmas December 25 instead of January 6. I suppose celebration of the Twelve Days of Christmas ensued, concluding with the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6, which in some Christian traditions is thought to be the day that the Magi arrived to view the Christ child. Whatever you believe, here’s what I remember about Old Christmas. It was bad luck to do laundry, to wash or iron, on that day. My mother, who always said, “Now, I’m not superstitious, but…” just before she’d prove that maybe she was. And washing was not permitted on…

My new e-novella releases on Jan 7th. It’s a sexy story of a housekeeper who finds love and lust with her employer, a Scottish earl. Love those guys in kilts! Here’s the link to an excerpt and buy buttons. Oh, and here’s the cover. Isn’t he hot? Yup, that’s Harvey Stables on my cover and he’s not only a nice guy, he’s great fun to look at. So I thought-since he’s great fun and all-that I’d let you all vote on which of his covers you like the best. So here you go: a short Harvey Stables retrospective! Oh, and by the way, one lucky commentor will get signed copies of the earlier Bridal Favors novels. That’s three books, by the way: WEDDED IN SCANDAL, WEDDED IN SIN, and WHAT THE BRIDE WORE. I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until next month to get WHAT THE GROOM WANTS. That’s the fourth and possibly final book. Excerpt and preorder links here. Wedded In Scandal Bridal Favors #1 March 2012 Wedded In Sin Bridal Favors #2 August 2012 What the Bride Wore Bridal Favors #3 August 2013 What The Groom Wants Bridal Favors #4 February 2014 The Groom’s Gamble #3.5 January 7,…