I’ve truly enjoyed writing baseball romance. I love the combination of sports and love in any medium. This is likely why some of my favorite movies are of the sports variety. For Love of the Game, in case you hadn’t picked up on that yet, is the inspiration for my series name. As this is the third baseball romance I’ve written, I’ve spent some time researching and Googling the lingo. There are a surprising number of metaphors and idioms within baseball language that are a very recognizable part of our regular speech. For those of us who don’t actually watch baseball or pay close attention to it, it’s interesting how common some of these phrases are. Here’s a list of the top ten I feel like we use (as speakers, readers, and writers) frequently. I’ve put an asterisk next to the ones I think can be of specific use for romantic moments in a book. Grand slam* Sweet spot* Hit it out of the park Play ball Raincheck* Step up to the plate* Homerun* Play hardball First/Second/Third base* Grandstanding What do you think? Did I miss any others that are a regular part of conversations? Any you think make a…

Thanks for having me on the Fresh Fiction blog! I thought, since my new release, COVERING ALL THE BASES, is a sports romance, I’d share my five favorite sports romance books and five favorite sports romance movies. Ready? The list is not in any particular order: Books (You might see a theme): See Jane Score by Rachel Gibson The Trouble with Valentine’s Day by Rachel Gibson True Love and Other Disasters by Rachel Gibson For the Win by Sara Rider No Limits by Lori Foster Movies (they aren’t necessarily romantic but they’re all awesome): For Love of the Game Invisible Blind Side Remember the Titans Blue Crush Only one of these are related to baseball but the three sports romance I’ve written (CAUGHT LOOKING, COVERING ALL THE BASES, and CATCHING HER HEART) have ball playing, or former ball playing, heroes. When Isla tries to get to the deathbed of a grandfather she didn’t know she had, she finds comfort in the kindness of a stranger. But that stranger ends up being so much more. Liam Cruz has never felt such a strong and fast connection to anyone as he does the woman who comes into his bar. The two fall…

Thanks so much for having me here on Fresh Fiction. I’m a huge fan of your site. I’m excited to be celebrating the release of my book, Story of Us. In the book, Sophia Strombi is the younger sister of a lifelong friend of Declan James. That isn’t the only thing that’s supposed to keep her off limits for his heart; he also hires her to be the manager of his pub, On Dec. With a background in marketing and promotion, Sophia is eager to bring in new business for the local establishment. One of her ideas is to bring in a speed dating company. I thought, for this post, it might be fun to have both of my main characters answer a ‘speed dating’ questionnaire. I’ve selected ten questions from an online questionnaire that I’ll put below and answer in character for each of the questions. Let’s see how well suited they are after the fact! Sophie Strombi 1. What makes you happy/sad/angry? Creating a really successful marketing campaign makes me happy professionally. Personally, being with my family and just sitting back and watching them all interact with each other brings me a sense of happiness. It makes me…

Thanks for having me on Fresh Fiction. My newest release in the Love Unexpected Series is NEVER EXPECTED YOU. This story features two veterinarians. Obviously, they love animals, but more than that, they both find comfort and strength in them. When Stella is hurting, curling up with her dogs soothes her. When Zach needed an outlet for his teenage frustration, helping Stella’s dad with the animals in his clinic brought him a sense of peace. I think that’s what animals can do for a lot of people. I will admit that I have not always been the biggest animal person. While I was growing up, we had a LOT of dogs. Actually, we had dogs, cats, fish, a ferret, gerbils, and hamsters. Sometimes all at the same time. When I got older, I wasn’t sure I wanted to have animals, but my now-husband really wanted dogs. In our twenty years together, we’ve had six dogs together. Each of them made an impact on us and our family. While I was finishing up the first draft of this story, last June, we lost one of our two dogs. Though we’d lost animals before, this one hit harder because she used to sit…