I HAVE THE WONDERFUL KERRIANNE COOMBS IN THE HOUSE TODAY!!!

I'm pleased to have Kerrianne Coombs in my crib to talk about her latest release, Running Home, from Secret Cravings Publishing.  Let's get a few questions out of the way first and get down to the fun stuff after.

CYN: What is your favorite part of being a romance writer?

KERRIANNE: That thrill you get when an idea comes together. I just love the whole magic involved with telling a compelling story. I get so wrapped up and involved with each book, I really do feel like I have experienced the emotions too. I just love writing, and for me, romance and love is what makes the world go round.

CYN: I feel the same Kerrianne. After finishing a story, I have to take at least a week's break before picking up on another WIP. What’s your typical writing day like?

KERRIANNE:  Get up, get kids ready for school, drop them off at school, come home turn on the coffee machine –tidy the kitchen while I wait (Boooo!) And then I disappear to my office and write for a couple of hours. After that, I have to get on with mundane stuff like food shopping and collecting the kids again and making sure everyone is where they need to be. But the whole time, I am planning my next scene. My brain doesn’t stop. I would write all day if I could.

CYN:  *Laughing* I understand. Can't never shut my brain off. Tell us about your newest release.

KERRIANNE: Running Home is a sweet little romance about an ex-military man who is now leading a pretty lonely life, and a woman who is on the run from an abusive husband. The story is about finding love at the most unexpected time.

CYN:  Gotta love a military man. I'm born, raised and married to the military. Do you have anything in the works?

KERRIANNE:  I have another romance coming out in April called The One That Got Away with SCP. And that is another sweet romance about a couple who were split up ten years ago by life and circumstance, and find each other again. Then, I have just signed a contract for my series of Demon Fairy Tale Romances, which will be released over the year, the first one—Beauty and the Beast-The Demon Tale--in May. I am so excited about everything coming up this year, I can hardly believe it. I am so happy.

CYN: That sounds so exciting. Best success with all of them. Where can we find you?

KERRIANNE:  I am on Fabcebook. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Kerrianne-Coombes/148877721876528  I am literally always on twitter Kerrianne_xx And I have a blog where I post regular—but mostly random stuff. http://kerriannecoombes.wordpress.com/

CYN: Thanks Kerrianne. Now for the dreaded personal questions.What would you consider a romantic date?

KERRIANNE: Anything that doesn’t include hanging out with friends. You can find romance in most situations as long as you are together and doing what you both enjoy, then romance should come easy. I am not a hearts and flowers type of girl. I like a good conversation, nice wine and kind words. Then, I am easy! LOL

CYN:  Ah a real romantic at heart. What is the best pick-up line someone has ever tried on you? Did it work?

KERRIANNE: OMG! I hate pick-up lines! They literally make my skin crawl. If one has ever been used on me, I have blocked it from my memory. My brother—before he met his partner—used to use them. I just used to die for him, but he never got embarrassed. I think it was part of his funny man, pick up routine… *Cringe*

CYN: LOL, I guess it finally worked for him. What is your favorite season?

KERRIANNE: Summer!!!! The bright sun, the heat, sitting in the garden with a glass of wine, and a good friend, talking about nothing and everything, all evening long. Ahh, summer, I miss you.

CYN: Me too! That's why we retired to Florida!! If you could have any car, which would it be?

KERRIANNE: Uh, I would want to be a sleek Maserati, but I fear I am more a plump, round Volkswagen Beetle.

CYN: Who is your favorite actor?

KERRIANNE:  Ok. I love to watch anything with Loenardo Dicaprio in, but I wonder if that is because of his acting skills or *Cough* something else entirely. But if he brings a film out, I make sure I watch it.

CYN: Yep, Leo does have a way about him. :)
Silk, satin, cotton, flannel. What is your sheet of choice and why?

KERRIANNE:Cotton! I like comfort. Silk= too slippy. Satin= Tacky! And flannel= NO!

CYN:  Nothing like the soft feel of cotton! When playing truth or dare, would you pick truth or dare?

KERRIANNE: Dare every time!

Okay, that was fun! I want to thank you for honoring me by stopping by today and sharing insight into your writing and newest release. Everyone, please give Kerrianne a bit of love and leave a comment. I'm sure she'd appreciate it.

BLURB:

Tom Cane, Ex-military man and self professed recluse turned farmer, wants
nothing more from life but the chance to wallow in his own pity.  The
shrapnel lodged permanently in his leg a daily reminder of his failings
during his last tour of duty.  On a cold, rainy, British evening fate
delivers a new reason to live in the form of Joanne Sloane, the daughter of
a socialite and abused wife of an up and coming businessman.  Desperate and in fear of her life, she flees her home and stumbles onto Tom's land.
Together their passions ignite and the need to rescue one another entangles
them in a bitter fight for their lives. 

EXCERPT:

“Tell me what he did to you, Jo.” Tom raised his hand and ran the backs of his fingers across her soft cheek. A blue bruise that he hadn’t seen before her shower glared at him from the perfection of her face. The cut in her lip still looked angry even though it was no longer bloody. He could see what the bastard had done to her physically, but there was something more that terrified her.

She shook her head against his question, even as she leaned into his touch. Her dark chocolate eyes pleaded silently with him. It hurt Tom to see her fear, her desperate longing for something that he was finding hard to resist.

“I can help you. I want to help you.” He leaned closer and flattened his palm to her cheek. The soft caress of her hair tickled at the back of his hand and Tom felt his cock stiffen. She sat perfectly still as he slid closer, closing the distance between their bodies, until their thighs touched. With one hand still on her face, his other caught the heavy tears that tracked down her cheek.

Her pain was obvious and hard to watch. Her hands twisted in her lap, even as she stared up into his eyes. He sensed a longing, a need, in her stare that he desperately wanted to fill. If only she could trust him with the details of what had brought her into his life.

    “Let me help you, Jo.”

Author of 'Running Home' and 'The One That Got Away' With Secret Cravings Publishing.

Coming in 2012

WEEKEND DIRTY DOZEN 2/24-2/26

Okay I thought I'd change it up this weekend and pull something from my latest accepted manuscript, Echoes in Eternity. In this scene, the heroine (Layla) is spending time with the older brother for the first time. They are in Cairo, at a restaurant, and dancing after finishing dinner.

TAGLINE: A Life Lived in the Past, A Present Life Lived in a Lie, One Woman in Love With Two Men, A Destiny Fulfilled for Eternity

Without a word uttered, Layla rose from the chair and walked with him to the dance floor.

Ronan pulled her close holding one hand and putting his other arm around her waist. She felt the warmth of his body as her heartbeat sped up. They moved around the parquet slowly, swaying to the beat of the music. Layla realized more existed between them than the accidental brushing of hands at the table. Chemistry. Embraced in his arms, she realized they fit well together. A definite attraction flowed between them, and she sensed he felt the electricity too. The sensation seemed familiar, like the time spent with Jake in Paris walking the along the Champs Élysées. Things were getting out of control. Attracted to two men, who were brothers, could be a volatile situation. Each had a sensuality that appealed to her in different ways and the mystery about each of them fascinated her as well.

Connect HERE to read other author entries.

I HAVE THE WONDERFUL LARION WILLS IN THE HOUSE TODAY!!!

I wish to thank Larion Wills for honoring me today and stopping by my crib to talk about her latest release from MuseItUp Publishing.

I've had the pleasure of meeting her on several different chat groups, getting to know her by Larriane, one of her other pen names as well as through MuseItUp. My darling hubby, Mike, also has published several books with them. Since then, she's also joined Secret Cravings Publishing where I've published the majority of my stories. So without further ado, take it away Miss Larion.

Poachers are stealing our heritage.

So many times an author is asked what inspired you to write the story. Most times, I can’t really answer, and I’m not a climb up on a soapbox type of person. I’m not, however, adverse to using fiction to bring an issue to attention. Illegal poaching is something I’ve been aware of for many years. When I realized it still happened, in the proportions it does, and what a dangerous job a game and fish agent and park rangers have, it surprised me. My awareness occurred back in the 70s, the reason I choose to use that time period for my story. Traps has our hero and heroine fighting against poachers in a Federal Park. Though the story is fiction, the atrocities of poaching are not. The preface of Traps is a summary. “The Federal Park Service's mission is to preserve the United States' natural resources and wildlife. Poaching has been and still is a serious problem. The time period for this story is in the 1970’s when a bear gall, or gall as it is commonly referred to, sold for eight hundred dollars and upward. In the year 2000, those found in Asian shops across the United States carried a price tag as high as twenty-eight hundred dollars.  Neither of those figures take into account, nor include, the profits on those smuggled out to other countries. You can imagine what a single gall would bring on today’s market with price escalation through the years. The greed of those feeding the belief in the “powers” of dry and ground gall is one example of practices putting those who enforce hunting laws into one of the highest level of fatalities in all of the law enforcement agencies. They also endanger the survival of bears in their natural habitat, adding to the loss by killing a nursing mother without consideration of the orphans left starve to death.  Nor are bears the only animal in danger or does this happen only in the United States.  In Africa, elephants are slaughtered for the tusks, rhinoceros for the horn, both hacked off the animal and the carcass left to rot just as the bear carcass is left to rot here.  These are only three examples of natural resources in our world that can never be replaced, being lost through greed.”

The problem has not gone away. Here’s a report by fish and game in California in 2010: Black bear market sales of gall bladders range from $500 to $5,000 each when exported. Personal use of bear hide for rugs and clothing also has encourages the illegal take and waste of this species.

 USA Today reported a new threat has been added: Deer, elk and even raccoons have a new type of predator to worry about: Poachers who kill increasingly for the thrill of it. The thrill killing usually involves youths ages 14 to 23, who gather in groups with the intent of killing as many animals as possible. Read the entire report at: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-01-26-wildlife-thrill-killing_N.htm

 An update on the poaching described in Traps wouldn’t be complete without including the very real modern threat: Unregulated internet provides ease with which poachers are able to find customers willing to pay premium prices.  International Fund for Animal Welfare surveys reports over 7,000 species were sold via auction sites, classified ads and chat room in 2008.

 When I say poaching, like Ward in Traps, I’m not talking about an occasional deer taking out of season to put food on the table. I’m talking about people without conscience who are stealing from us something that can never be replaced.

Tag: Saved from one trap, caught in another, Callie and Ward must work together to survive the final.

BLURB:

Veteran, Ward Overland’s wanted nothing but quiet, his wildlife book published, and to stop poachers. Being saddled with a woman to retake his photos was the insult. Acting as her guide to said animals was the injury. Worse, falling for a poacher’s trap and being saved by her. Still, he couldn’t let her just walk away.

Tragedy locked Callie away from life. Only the need for money convinced her to take the job. The sooner it ended with the abrasive and rude loner the better. Saving him from death changed everything. Watching him regain strength for the journey home, she found one part of her still alive…passion. The rules…no strings, no relationship.

The poacher wanted Ward dead. He didn’t figure on Callie, either time.

Excerpt 1:

“I’m Ward Overland.”

She stepped back to let him in.  “There’s coffee on the stove.”

He stayed where he was.  “I want to get started.”

She hesitated for a moment before saying, “I’ll only be a few minutes.”

“You aren’t going with us,” he told her flatly.  If Bennett wanted to have his bed comfort handy, that was his business. Ward was not dragging her along.

“Us?”

He didn’t care for stupidity, either.  “Is he ready or not?”

To further irritate him, she asked, “Who?”

“Cal Bennett: that is who I was supposed to meet.”

She shifted to face him more directly.  “I am Cal Bennett. Cal is short for Callie.”

 A kick in the gut would have gotten much the same reaction from Ward.  He jerked before exploding.  “What the hell does he mean, sending me some powder puff woman?  You can’t keep up with me out there.”  Before she could answer, another question shot out of his mouth. 

“Cal? Cute trick.  He knew damned well I wouldn’t agree to any woman.”

Excerpt 2:

       “Is it against the law to trap with those?” she asked.

“It is here,” he said darkly.  “Damn poachers!”

She wasn’t sure if he meant it was against the law because he was there or because it was against the law in a federal park.  She decided not to ask for clarification.  “I take it from your tone of voice you aren’t referring to the occasional deer out of season.”

“I’m not.”

 “Are many endangered species lost this way?”

“Yes.”  He turned and walked off again.  

Thinking he was too mad to give her more than the shortest of answers, she followed and received a surprise when he started talking.

“When the trappers started in this valley, it was teeming with otter, beaver, mink, and fox, anything with a pretty fur.  Their numbers have dwindled to what you can count on your fingers. The same assholes poach bear primarily, cut out one small part of their guts, the gallbladder, leave the rest to rot. Other assholes powder the gall to sell as an aphrodisiac, both for money with total disregard to the fact they’re driving them into extinction.  A single gall will be worth hundreds of dollars in the right market.” 

Callie made no comment, watching as he veered off, climbing up the bank to a tangle of logs left by some long ago flood.  One hand went up to hold the lens he carried for her inside his shirt from sliding when he ducked beneath a log.  His knitted cap brushed the log and started a cascade of snow. 

Callie had an unobstructed view of him reaching up to brush the snow off he as stumbled slightly and the log above him fell.

For a moment, Callie couldn’t comprehend what had happened.  One second he was there; the next he was gone from sight, under a log and snow falling from the surrounding brush and trees dislodged when the log fell.  He was buried.

She took a step forward and tripped on the ski she forgot she had attached to her foot.  Kicking off both skies, she ran, floundering several times to her knees in the snow.  When she reached the log, it wouldn’t move.  She dug and found his head, buried face down in the snow, and he was unconscious, not breathing.

The log had his arms pinned under him, and the weight of it was close enough to his neck he couldn’t lift his head free of the snow even if he hadn’t been knocked out.  He was suffocating, and she couldn’t turn his head far enough to free his face.  Nor could she turn it far enough to give him mouth to mouth to start him breathing again.

She put his cap under his face to keep his mouth and nose free of the snow and scrambled over the log.  Reaching under it to press on his ribs in an awkward attempt at resuscitation, she accomplished nothing.  The log was too wide to reach high enough to force air out of his lungs, and his backpack was in the way. She could see why the log wouldn’t roll on down the hill over him.  His pack held it.  She emptied the pack ruthlessly, splitting open the bottom with the knife from his belt.  Indifferent to the cost of the contents, she tossed everything out of the way, scrambled back over the log to his head and pushed with her shoulder.  The log slid to his hips.  The weight off his lungs might have enabled him to draw in air, but the snow in his mouth and nose kept him from breathing freely.

She straddled him, working her arms under him to jerk her fists up into his diaphragm.  Water from melted snow and snow crystals sprayed from his nostrils and lips.  He still didn’t breath.

Changing positions again, she moved back to his head.  His arms could be broken, and moving them could maim him.  She had to move them, pulling them above his head to draw air into his lungs.  She knew he could have broken ribs and pressing on them to force air out, clearing the passages more, could also drive jagged bone edges into his lungs.  With no other choice, she pressed.  Press on his lungs; drive the air out.  Pull up his arms; draw air in.  She could be killing him by doing it, but he would die if she didn’t.

Fear and panic didn’t hit her until he had coughed and sputtered his way back to breathing.  She sat with her hands in fists on her knees, staring down at him.  “Damn you,” she told him.  “I don’t want to feel.”

Her voice choked, and her eyes filled with tears.  Her body shook while she pulled in deep breaths catching in sobs.  She wouldn’t feel.  Any emotion was a hole in the dyke, letting others flood through.  She wouldn’t allow it.  She hadn’t for three years, and she wouldn’t again.

She had the dyke repaired when he began to stir back to consciousness.  She had to get that log off him, and the job wasn’t going to be easy.  One end was hung up against a standing tree.  The log wasn’t going to roll or slide any further.

Since its release day, let's run a contest, free download of Traps. Go to my site, tell me what my next release will be in an email to larriane @ hotmail.com with Traps in the subject line and I'll draw one for a free download of Traps. (hint: it's on the coming soon page)

Thanks Larion for honoring me today by guest blogging. Everyone let's give her some love for stopping by and entering her contest by leaving a comment below as well as following her directions for entry. Below are all the ways you can contact her:

Larriane AKA Larion Wills,  two names one author, thousands of stories

https://museituppublishing.com/bookstore2/  White Savage, Chase, Tarbet

http://store.secretcravingspublishing.com/  Mourning Meadow

my links:

http://www.larriane.com         

http://www.facebook.com/people/Larriane-Wills/1535007230

https://twitter.com/#!/LarrianeWills/status/161954144549212160

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY - 2/19/2012

Ramsey noted that her eyes widened as she verbally assaulted him. He sensed the fear that had begun to edge her demeanor, brought to the surface by the knowledge of who and what he was. For a moment, he stared into fascinatingly beautiful deep emerald eyes contrasted against pale skin and soft light-colored red hair. What he caught a glimpse of within sent lust rushing over him instantly. Earlier in the evening, he’d not given much conscious thought to the woman other than she was Giselle’s aunt, and a royal pain in the arse. But obviously his body had a mind of its own because he now wanted her fiercely, the power over his libido became hard to tamp down.

To view other entries for this week, click HERE.