Hello, and thanks for inviting me to be part of Fresh Fiction. Have you heard of the INDY gene?  It’s a gene that scientists discovered about ten years ago in fruit flies that can be manipulated to double or triple their life spans.  This is real science mind you, not fiction (I’ll get to the fiction in a moment).  “INDY” stands for “I’m Not Dead Yet,” a Monty Python reference.  Remember the “plague” scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail: “Bring out your dead!”  Who says scientists don’t have a sense of humor? The protagonist in THE GENESIS KEY is a biologist named Kathleen Sainsbury, who is diligently studying the INDY gene in fruit flies, hoping to find a similar gene in humans.  She is the founder and CEO of a small biotech company near Washington DC, which is seeking cures for various age-related diseases such as dementia and Alzheimer’s.  Kathleen’s motives are both scientific and personal.  Her grandfather—who raised her from age seven after her parents died at an archeological site in Iraq—is suffering from Stage Five Alzheimer’s. Let me stop there for a moment.  Many people have asked me how I came up with this particular plot. …

There’s only one thing I like better than a man in a kilt: a man out of one.  The great thing about reading romance novels with Scottish heroes is that there are lots of Scottish actors that we can mentally cast in these roles.  I’m a serious Anglophile when it comes to those of the opposite sex, and men of the UK have always held a special place in my fantasies.  But no matter what nationality of man you prefer, few are more drool-worthy than the hunky Highlanders listed here. 5.  Ewan McGregor This Scot has a fine, braw shape to him.  I could swim in his gorgeous smirk and warm, blue eyes.  God help me if he decides to open his mouth up and sing—I would be putty in his hands.  This guy can be both tender and forceful, perfect material for those nocturnal daydreams, if you take my meaning.  And if you ever want to get a look at what he has under his kilt, check him out on Velvet Goldmine. Full frontal scenes reveal that this particular Scot is, shall we say, a remarkably healthy specimen of manhood. 4.  Sean Connery The King of Suave himself.  Whether…

Good Morning! Thank you for having me at Fresh Fiction. I’m happy to be with you today to talk a little about my new book A GENTLEMAN NEVER TELLS and along the way I thought it might be fun to talk about some bloopers I’ve had in my books. You know when you are writing somewhere close to one hundred thousand words it’s easy to write the wrong thing and over look it. Some of the easiest mistakes to overlook is she for he, there for their, and than for then. But those aren’t the kind of mistakes I’m talking about today. I’m remembering the time I first wrote a scene with the hero and heroine and put it outside. I later moved it inside the parlor but I forgot to take the lovely, shade tree out of the scene.  Luckily my editor noticed that blooper right away. There were some other memorable ones from my earlier books that I would have been mortified to see in print. In one of my books the heroine needed to tend a wound on my hero so she pulled out a small leather drawstring bag that was filled with slaves. Yes, slaves rather…

“Takotsubo cardiomyopathy…in which there is a sudden temporary weakening of the myocardium (the muscle of the heart). Because this weakening can be triggered by emotional stress, such as the death of a loved one, a break-up, or constant rejection, the condition is also known as broken heart syndrome… a well-recognized cause of acute heart failure.” – Wikipedia Yes, folks. You CAN die of a broken heart. I KNEW IT! You shout. That’s why I love romance. I’m addicted to the highs and willing to take the lows, because I BELIEVE IN TRUE LOVE, in a love so strong, I might just die if that person was to leave. Furthermore, I demand a happy ending! And that’s why I write and read romantic fiction. When I’m writing a love story I dredge up memories of what it is to be broken-hearted—that crappy, life-destroying, gut-wrenching, body-weakening level of misery. Then I go backwards. How did I first meet THE ONE? When did I first know how he felt? When did we first touch? I recall the dramatic beauty of that romance and the tragedy of it not working out. Then I add (fiction) a happy ending…and voila. A romance novella. Ah, if…

Vampires, vampires, all over the place.  These days you can’t walk into a bookstore, pick up a magazine, flip through the TV guide, or watch movie previews without being reminded that the vampire trend (“trend” going back over a hundred years to Bram Stoker) is still chugging full-bore ahead.  Vampires, I’ve decided, are like roaches.  Sexy roaches!  (Good thing that didn’t sound weird.) Which is great by me and better than great, since thanks to the fictional undead I’m now a full-time writer who occasionally sees my name on the New York Times best-seller list.  Thanks, hordes of fictional blood-sucking spawn!  No, really, vampires, thank you.  I owe you a solid. Not only is the trend letting me write what I love, it’s letting me talk about it on national television, newspapers, and magazine and blog interviews.  Which brings me to the Twilight series and how it relates to Queen Betsy and the gang.  Because what people don’t know is that Twilight is my stalker.  Twilight is the guy who breaks into my house when nobody’s home and sniffs my dryer lint.  Twilight’s gonna hound me to my grave.  I’m probably going to have to get a restraining order against…

Top Ten Reasons why readers will fall in love with Jarvis Swain, the hero of TOUCH IF YOU DARE. 10) He wears leather & carries a sword. A black leather jacket stretched across broad shoulders, worn from years and years of battle, his scent tangled deep inside those soft fibers, mixed with the smell of leather and soap. His hand fisted around the hand of a jeweled sword with a deadly blade. That flexed forearm as he readies the weapon. The creak of the leather as he raises his arm to defend the woman he loves…Um, yeah. Leather and sword. Always a good thing. 9) He’s the Guardian of Hate. Think of this way: this immortal warrior is keeping the most awful, most destructive emotion in the world bottled up inside him to protect all of humanity from it. It’s been eating away at him for 150 years, and eventually it will destroy him, and yet he will give his soul and his life for his duty. 8) He’s loyal to his team. You gotta love a man who will sacrifice himself for his teammates. Through torture, through death, through all the worst that life has to offer, it’s an…

I have always wanted to be a seal. During family holidays on the chilly English coast my childhood dream was to walk into the sea, magically become a seal and swim to the horizon  without  a backward glance at family and friends left on the beach.  My pale, thin skin had gone to be replaced by a grey pelt lined with thick blubber. My hands had become flippers and my legs had fused into a powerful tail. That small, round, funny face of mine had turned into a long sleek snout bristling with whiskers and capped with beautiful dark eyes. And I would be happy. I would have the freedom of the seas, the freedom to slide through the waves, hunt fish and frolic for the amusement of passengers on passing ships. This escapist fantasy has endured and led me to write my first novel, THE LANGUAGE OF THE SEA. It is set in Cape Cod where Leo Kemp loses both his job as marine biologist and his 10 year-old son in a boating accident. He takes his students on a last field trip at sea and is swept overboard in a sudden storm. He finds himself in the water…

More than once we’ve had a character who walked on to the page – the brother of the hero, a neighbor, an old friend – only to steal the scene and make readers want to know more about them. And they’re not alone. We want to know more about them too. In fact, the drive to know them better usually results in us writing an entire book to figure them out.  THE WOLF NEXT DOOR with hero Lord William Westfield and his neighbor Prisca Hawthorne is one example. THE TAMING OF THE WOLF with heroine Caitrin Macleod and previous book villain Dashiel Thorpe, the Earl of Brimsworth, is another. Matthew Halkett, the Earl of Blodswell – the vampyre hero of our current release IN THE HEAT OF THE BITE made his debut in an earlier book and played a fairly important role in It Happened One Bite. While Rhiannon Sinclair – the magical heroine has been around since our second book Tall, Dark and Wolfish and has patiently waited her turn through book after book to finally get a happy ever after of her own. But not all secondary characters are potential heroes or heroines. Some are too old, some…

Hi everyone – I’m excited to be on the Fresh Fiction blog today! Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live forever?  I think my fascination with immortals started with Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, carried into the Highlander movies and tv series, and finally culminated for me with my Night series. I’m intrigued to understand how a person (or being) can keep their lives relevant when the world around them is constantly changing, and they’re not. Anne Rice’s Lestat searched for pleasure and entertainment, but eventually found himself aching for meaning and redemption. In the Highlander television series, Duncan MacLeod, engrossed himself in learning languages and fighting styles while continuing on his “There can be only one” path in The Game. My hero, Calisto Terana, has walked the earth for over 200 years hoping for another chance at love and redemption. After his love was murdered in 1775, he gave up his soul to the night for a second chance to love her.  He had no idea he would wait centuries for her to live again, to see her face one more time. As the world around him changed, he amassed wealth and power, but his heart…

I’m sure someone out there will say I’m a Potterhead, I’m not sure it’s true but I do know I’ve enjoyed the last twelve years or so in the world of Harry Potter. I didn’t read the first book, HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERERS’ STONE as HARRY POTTER AND THE PHILOSOPHER’S STONE, the UK title) although I did become aware of the book after reading about it in Time or Newsweek when it first was being issued in the US after a phenomenal run in the UK. It sounded intriguing but not enough that I’d pay import prices for the book. I waited until it came out in trade paper at the my local Waldenbooks. (NOTE sad so many things mentioned no longer exist except in my memory: Newsweek, Time, Waldenbooks). And if I remember buying the first book followed closely by HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS. But I do remember I was hooked and quite excited because it seemed J.K. Rowling was a prolific and timely author, one book a year is a nice clip. I tried to get my children to read the books, they were both in the teens, one 19 the other 11, but…