Review: Giving It Up, by Amber Lin ~ 5 of 5 Stars

GIVING IT UP
by Amber Lin
Erotic Romance
Loose Id, 2012
ISBN 13: 978-1-61118-843-1

Allie prowls the club for a man who will use her hard and then ditch her. Hey, it’s not rape if she wants it. Instead she finds Colin, who looks tough but treats her tenderly, despite her protests.

He tempts her, but kindness and a few mind-blowing orgasms aren’t enough to put her back together again. Allie has no hope for a real relationship. Two years ago her best friend betrayed her in the worst possible way – she’d be stupid to trust a man again. Besides, she has her daughter to think of, the only good thing to have come from that dark night.

But when her rapist returns, threatening her sanity and custody of her daughter, Allie turns to Colin. Under his protection and patient touch, Allie begins to heal and learns to hope. Colin’s no saint, though, and his criminal past draws danger of its own. Allie must fight to protect her child and the man she loves, hoping her newfound power will be enough to save them all.

*     *     *     *     *

Let me preface my thoughts on Amber's book by saying that I typically do not read books with a darker storyline like this. I use reading as my escape from the real world, so I prefer lighter stories or ones with paranormal elements that are far removed from reality.

But after reading only 27 pages, I had to stop mid-chapter and email Amber to tell her how enthralled I was with her writing and the story. Here's exactly what I told her...

"Your writing is like...whoa. I don't even know how else to say it. I'm loving this and according to my preferences, I really shouldn't. Allie is so beautifully damaged. She doesn't come off as a simpering victim you want to throw some Xanax at and drop her off at a shrink. She just IS and deals with it. Your metaphors are amazing, your descriptions and how she feels...all amazing. Nicely done, chica. Very nicely done."

I meant every word of it, too. I stayed up until 5:30 in the morning reading, and only stopped because my eyes would no longer cooperate with me and stay open. I loved Allie's character. The way she deals with the horrible events from her past is believable and, though dark and self-deprecating, even admirable. She does what she has to do in order to get through her day-to-day life for the sake of her daughter.

Colin has dark secrets of his own, but he does his best to keep Allie protected from them. From the moment he meets Allie he does his best to take care of her, despite them being virtually strangers. Situations throw them together and they're forced to learn how to deal with one another in a capacity neither one have any experience.

This book is not your typical romance. Though it has the required HEA (Happily Ever After) for any romance, I was unsure how it was going to work, right up until the last minute. Lin masterfully created a plot with conflicts that carry through right up until the end. Nothing is predictable and there's not a deus ex machina to be found. Just real efforts of real people.

I don't want to give anything away, because I truly want each and every one of you to buy the book. It's gripping, intriguing, and utterly spectacular. Amber Lin is a debut author who has instantly made a name for herself with this book, and she's one to keep tabs on for sure.

To see what others are saying about Giving It Up, watch the book trailer, read an excerpt from the book, and have access to the buy links, go here. ----> http://authoramberlin.com/books/

*     *     *     *     *

Amber Lin is repped by Jewelann Cone by Cascade Literary Agency. Her debut novel, Giving It Up, releases from Loose Id on June 19th. She also has a historical manuscript in the works as well as the sequel to Giving It Up.

Amber married her high school sweetheart, birthed a kid who’s smarter than she is, and spends her nights writing down her dirty thoughts. In other words, life is good. 

Visit her at...

Her website: http://authoramberlin.com/ 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/authoramberlin

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/authoramberlin

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5827158.Amber_Lin

Coolest Book Trailer Ever

I'm not a huge fan of book trailers. The fact of the matter is, they're expensive and tricksy and in my honest opinion, they don't do much to sell books because I don't think they do the books justice like a damn good back cover blurb does.


HOWEVER...

Tara Fuller, a fellow Entangled author, has COMPLETELY changed my mind. I'm not ashamed to admit (well, maybe a little) that I'm strictly an adult romance reader. I don't read YA because I prefer to read about adult relationships with all of the adult facets (if you know what I mean). But I will BUY this book. And I will READ this book. Because of  THIS book trailer.



Isn't it amazing? I love how it's told from the male character's POV. It's so incredibly compelling, so romantic. The thing that sets this book trailer apart from 99% of other book trailers I've seen? The video action of the characters. Usually stock photos are used which isn't as interesting for obvious reasons and also causes a problem with the subjects in the photos not being the same people, but merely people with similar traits (i.e. dark hair).

Congrats, Tara. This is phenomenal.

Here's the info for Tara's book, INBETWEEN, releasing 8-14-12 from Entangled Teen.

Since the car crash that took her father’s life three years ago, Emma’s life has been a freaky—and unending—lesson in caution. Surviving “accidents” has taken priority over being a normal seventeen-year-old, so Emma spends her days taking pictures of life instead of living it. Falling in love with a boy was never part of the plan. Falling for a reaper who makes her chest ache and her head spin? Not an option.

It’s not easy being dead, especially for a reaper in love with a girl fate has put on his list not once, but twice. Finn’s fellow reapers give him hell about spending time with Emma, but Finn couldn’t let her die before, and he’s not about to let her die now. He will protect the girl he loves from the evil he accidentally unleashed, even if it means sacrificing the only thing he has left…his soul.

So there's this guy who reads romance novels...

No, this is not the set up to a joke...although I'm sure if I thought about it long enough I could make one up...but that would take away from the fact that there's ACTUALLY A GUY WHO READS ROMANCE NOVELS! And I'm proud to say I now call him "friend." And sometimes "fucking nutjob." But mostly the former.

His name is Romance Man, or RM for short. But if you're like me and you're not real fond of calling people by initials (like with my friend Lea Ann who also went by LA, but it made me think of the city and it didn't roll off the tongue properly, so I decided to pronounce it Ella, which is how she got her pen name--yay me!) you can call him Remy. I'm now 2 for 2 on creating successful nicknames. Let me know if you're in need of a new identity. Apparently I rock at giving them out.

Anyhoo...

I found Remy when he did a review of my BFF, Ruthie Knox's debut novel RIDE WITH ME. He totally loved it, by the way, and loved the heroine so much that his wife now goes by the online personality of Lexie, which is the heroine's name in Ruthie's book.

At any rate, Remy is a total hero in the romance world (pun intended). He's not a literary buff in touch with his feminine side who can relate to the female psychosis. He's ex-Navy, swears like the sailor he is, and is just as naturally insensitive as the next guy.

What I mean to say is, HE'S A REGULAR DUDE!

So why would a regular dude read romance novels? Excellent freaking question. But I'd rather you get the story from him here because he tells it better than I ever could paraphrasing him. Since he began this strange journey of discovering that romance novels are indeed worth their weight in gold when it comes to understanding the opposite sex, he's blogged almost daily and accrued a group of women followers who eventually named themselves the BBL--Braless Bawdy Ladies.

Remy has accomplished with his blog something I've only seen with one other blog, ever. He averages over 100 comments per blog post! But whereas that other blog I'm referring to has thousands of followers with hundreds of regular commenters, Remy has a lot of lurkers but only about 15 regular commenters. But his topics spur conversations, like an open forum. So these women go back again and again to read the latest comments from the other BBLs and then put in another two cents themselves.

But these are not boring conversations, nor are they for the timid and meek. Besides the obvious cursing, words like pussy and cock are thrown around occasionally. Okay, maybe more than just occasionally. And a lot of these women are my mother's age who are discussing things like sex, blow jobs, and bedazzled vaginas. They're fearless in their candid openness with the rest of the online group. It's a place where they can remain anonymous or take on an identity like Lady Godiva, Vibrating Vixen, or New York Girl, and discuss things that are normally too taboo to ask even their closest friends without getting strange looks.

And the best part? Getting a guy's point of view in the mix! And what's even better than that? Getting the guy's wife's point of view on things! Lexie doesn't pop in often (we're trying to change that), but when she does, it's a real treat. One night she gave her husband the acronym nickname of NGL, which stood for Not Getting Laid because he was in the doghouse for something. We all thought it was hysterical. Him? Not so much. LOL


To give you an idea of his topics, here are some post titles:

• WHY CAN'T I STARE AT YOUR BREASTS
• THINGS MY WIFE HAS SAID TO ME DURING SEX
• HOW TO PLEASE YOUR WOMAN EVERY TIME AND GET LAID WHENEVER YOU WANT
• HOW NOT TO BE ROMANTIC
• BLOW JOBS AND THINGS THAT KEEP ME UP AT NIGHT
• WOMEN WHO READ ROMANCE NOVELS AREN'T STUPID, EXCEPT FOR ONE I MET YESTERDAY
• THE ROAD TO NO ORGASMS IS PAVED WITH FAKE ORGASMS
• AN OLD BOOK, A NEW FRIEND, A NEW BOOK AND A POSSIBLE MISTAKE (this one is about me and my book, Desires of the Soul)

And those are only a handful of the posts he has in his BLOG ARCHIVES. I highly recommend you go and check some of them out. And if you're really brave--and have literally hours with nothing better to do--you can read through the comments as well. Sometimes they're just as funny as the post itself.

For those who are interested in Remy's specific thoughts on the books he and his wife read (they now read together at night, which has brought them closer together both in and out of the bedroom), he has a REVIEW PAGE.

What Remy is doing is nothing short of amazing for those of us in the romance world, whether we're readers or writers. I, for one, am extremely thankful to have found him and gained his (and Lexie's) friendship. I predict it won't be long before he goes completely viral. His readership grows every week. Pretty soon me and the rest of the BBL will have to share him with the rest of the world. But for right now, we're enjoying the hell out of our little group. I guarantee if you read his stuff, you'll be wanting BBL membership in no time. So come on over and join the party. We'd love to have you. :)

Romance Man...

Able to read an entire book without turning the page (I have an e-reader). 

Can easily identify cheesy romance cliches, such as  "they hate each other so much that they end up ripping each other's clothes off."

Understands the phrase "throbbing love muscle."

Manly enough to admit he reads romance novels and has an anonymous blog to prove it.

V-Day Review: DOUBLED by Charlotte Stein ~ 5 of 5 stars!

Book Stats: 

• Genre: Erotic Romance
• Steam Level: Ménage (m/f/m)
• Length: Short Novel (88 pgs)
• Publisher: Ellora's Cave
• Publisher Line: Moderne
• Book Type: Ebook

Book Blurb:

Bobbi has been friends with the Hoffman twins for one long, glorious year. They’re sweet, funny and kind, but there’s a problem…they’re also hotness personified. Times two. And when they lure her into a kinky little game involving a blindfold and some rather unexpected fondling, she finds them much harder to resist than she’d imagined.It seems they want to be something other than just good friends. They want a hot, steamy ménage, and all Bobbi has to do is decide if she’s up to the challenge. One big, gorgeous guy is enough for her.Two might be more than she can handle…

My Review:

Before I begin, can we just gush about this cover for a second? The more I look at it, the more I love it. 

1. I love the font of the title and how its mirror-image is below it, playing on the word's meaning. 
2. The female model is a total Doppelganger for Christina Ricci and just has a classic beauty to her that makes her sexy and alluring. 
3. The twins in the book are swimmers--as in, swim team swimmers--and I really appreciate that Ellora's Cave kept that in mind and went with these two "hotties with the swimmer bodies" and not the typical "beefy-boys" gracing most of the genre's covers (Note: I am NOT knocking the "beefy-boys." I happen to love them just as much as the toned and streamlined.) 

The cover alone gets 4.5 stars of 5! (The only reason I've deducted a half-point is because I'd prefer for the one twin to be mostly-headless like the other one. That's how I like my cover models because the eyes make a man too specific, so I like them shown only from the nose down.) So I say "Bravo, Ellora's Cave" on a great cover, which we all know is so crucial to our stories.

And now on to the review!

I think my favorite part about this book is Bobbi's internal dialogue. Stein does such an amazing job making Bobbi a down-to-earth character we can love and adding in an awesome sense of humor. The book grabs you immediately with Bobbi guessing correctly--and very nonchalantly--which twin is which after they've secretly switched clothes and hairstyles during their weekly poker game. She's the only one who can always tell them apart, and it both intrigues and baffles them.

"I think you could come out of there naked with Twizzlers up your
asses and I'd still know who is who." ~ Bobbi to a frustrated Sebastian

But it also frustrates the hell out of Sebastian and as he hates losing at anything, insists on trying things to see if she can still tell, until it eventually leads to Bobbi being blindfolded to see if she can guess when she only has her sense of touch to rely on...which is when things get interesting real quick. ;)

In any book with twins, the personalities are going to be vastly different. Only an idiot would write about two people who are essentially the same person. But what I absolutely loved about these boys is how their personalities completely reverse in the bedroom.

Ordinarily, Sebastian is the twin who takes center stage with Tobias following comfortably behind. Not that Tobe is a wuss who needs his brother to forge ahead for him. Not at all. He just prefers to hang back and observe, until such time he needs to step in and check his brother when Seb gets a little too blunt or over-eager (which Tobe feels is often).

"We want to make love your brains out." ~ Sebastian to
Bobbi after Tobias tells him not to 'fuck-talk' her.

However, once they get into the bedroom, Bobbi discovers new things about her best friends that she'd never known. Like how Sebastian loves to draw things out and tease his lovers until they're ready to explode, whereas Tobias is more hungry and aggressive like a starved tiger who's just been thrown a steak.

But this is not only a book with amazingly great sex in it. It also brings a new dynamic to the male/female/male menage scenario that's very real and very human. This relationship is NOT formed out of some base need to get college-kinky, or a crazy bet or experiment gone wonderful. In fact, of all the m/f/m books I've read (and I've read a LOT) this is the ONLY story where the guys haven't done a threesome before. In every other book (of the ones I've personally read) threesomes are old hat to the guys. There are of course different reasons as to why (which could be an entire post all on its own), but the point is, they've done it more times than they can count.

Their first night of fooling around is a result of the number two reason people hook up spontaneously: classic Heat of the Moment (with the number one reason being alcohol)* We've all been there. You reach that place where Reality takes a back seat in the stretch limo (cuz it's waaaaaaaay back there) and oh, looky, Fantasy is riding shotgun and he's throwing Rules right out the damn window. Stein is great at showing Bobbi's conscience pop up often to poke her and basically say, "Girl, what in the eff are you thinking?!" which adds that humor I mentioned earlier.

Of course she'd occasionally thought of them since, in a halfhearted wouldn't it be nice if they accidentally rammed into one of my boobs sort of way, but nothing with this intensity. ~ Bobbi on her feelings for the twins

Steamy sex aside, I adored the inside look we get of Bobbi's struggle with coming to terms of what a permanent relationship with the twins means and how she'll handle it when people find out about their unconventional trio. And even though the book is told strictly from Bobbi's POV, Stein does an excellent job at showing us where the twins are coming from and what motivates them to take a chance on starting the whole shebang in the first place. It absolutely broke my heart when Tobias quietly states, "I wish we were one person," during one of the glimpses we get of their predicament of being so identical and yet so different, causing them to put the woman they love in an uncomfortable situation within society.

In conclusion, I read this book twice and eagerly give it 5 of 5 stars. It has all the usual qualities of a great read--relateable characters, realistic motivation, internal conflict, and steamy sex--plus a snarky heroine, witty twin banter, and rev-your-engine dirty talk. Run, don't walk, and get your very own copy. I guarantee you won't be sorry.**

Click here to buy it at Ellora's Cave and view awesome excerpt!

or

Click here to buy it at Amazon and shoot it straight to your Kindle!

* This is not based on actual facts, but rather a quick assumption made at 4am as I write this.

** This guarantee is not actually backed up by anything. If for some insane reason you are sorry you purchased your own copy of DOUBLED, we probably can't be friends anymore. (Just sayin')

Charlotte Stein has written over thirty short stories, novellas and novels, including entries in The Mammoth Book of Hot Romance and Best New Erotica 10. Her collection of short stories was named one of the best erotic romances of 2009 by Michelle Buonfiglio, and her first novel, Control, was recently called "...a non-stop crazy hot sex book". When not writing non-stop crazy hot sex books, she can be found eating jelly turtles, watching terrible sitcoms and occasionally lusting after hunks. She lives in West Yorkshire with her husband and their imaginary dog, and can be found here: www.themightycharlottestein.blogspot.com

Happy Release Day, Ruthie Knox!!!

I cannot tell you how excited I am to promote the
debut release of one my all-time favorite people, Ruthie Knox.

I met Ruthie early last year in the Romance Junkies writing contest we had both entered. After reading her entry, I totally fan-girled her on my comment sheet (the first round was judged by romance readers and the other contestants) and gave her my email address in case she ever wanted to chat about writing.

Imagine my surprise when she actually emailed me as opposed to thinking I was a total nut job! (I totally fooled her. heh heh heh) I'm happy to say we became fast friends. I've done some beta reading for her (mostly I just gush about how great her stuff is) and she's taught me so much, like:

• How to use "urtext" in a sentence
• How to properly place a comma
• How to cut 10K+ words from my manuscript.

 

In short, she's a genius.

But the real purpose of this post is not for me to go on and on about how totally orsum she is. It's to give you a taste of her contemporary romance, Ride with Me. This is the book that she entered the RJ contest with (and won 1st place, btw) which made me all ga-ga for her. Below you can read the first chapter and at the end you can click on one of the icons to purchase your very own copy for a mere $2.99. 

That's less than a Happy Meal, and Ride with Me won't clog your arteries. Such a deal!

If you missed my interview with Tom, the hero from this book, you can check it out HERE. I absolutely love Tom. He's grouchy and supah-haht. LOL

Okay, without further ado, I give you Ride with Me, by the wonderful Ruthie Knox...

 Scribd.Ride With Me Excerpt - by author Ruthie Knox

Happy Release Day, Ruthie! 

(I totes love you!)

Wee-Bit Wednesday: Pussy Cat Edition

Hi everyone! Sorry I've been a tad M.I.A. lately, but I've been busy moving across the country. I now reside in sunny San Antonio, Texas! So, I might a little discombobulated for a while (how long can I get away with using the move as an excuse for being flighty?) as I try to get us settled in and back to a routine.

I debated on whether to post a Wee-Bit today, but my Twitter friend, Serena Bell, encouraged me to share, so here it is. (You can catch the previous snippets of my WIPs here.) In this excerpt, Gabriel has driven Ava to her broken-down 1970 Barracuda on a stretch of desert road. She fell asleep on the ride over, and when they get there, Gabriel sees a gigantic cat lounging inside her car. Ruh-roh!

#     #      #

Uma Purrman: Ava's pet kitty

“Here kitty, kitty, kitty,” he called. “Be a good boy and get out of the car. It’d be a shame to ruin something as beautiful as that.” Adrenaline raced through his veins and his heart beat a rapid tattoo as the big cat leapt through the open window and landed soundlessly in the dirt.

“Gabe, what’s going on?”

Trying not to react to Ava’s sexy sleep-induced voice, he gave her a soft order. “Ava, don’t move. Stay right where you are.”

As expected, she didn’t listen to a damn thing he said, choosing to sit up in her seat instead. Great, that’s all he needed: a hysterical woman. He hoped she didn’t scream.

“Gabe,” she said in a careful tone, like she was trying to talk him down from a ledge. “Put the gun down. You’re going to make him mad.”

Interview with a Hot Biker

I am so excited to share my interview with the smokin' hot bicyclist extraordinaire, Tom Geiger. Tom is the hero in Ride with Me, an original romance by the incomparable Ruthie Knox, about a cross-country bike adventure that takes a detour into unexplored passion. As readers will discover, Ride with Me is NOT about the bike!

I hope you enjoy this sneak peek at Tom's amazing abs personality. 

**Make sure you read all the way to the end to find out how you can win your very own copy of Ride with Me.**

GLM:  Tom, thank you so much for taking the time to join us here at Passions on Paper. I know you're busy with your new bike tour business up in Oregon, and I'm sure things are crazier than usual with all the publicity your story is getting due to Ruthie's book coming out next month.

TG:     Thanks, Gina. Yeah, it's been intense. I never really expected the book to be that, ah, lewd. Probably wouldn't have agreed to it if Ruthie had told me what she had in mind. I figured she was just doing a piece for some bike magazine.

GLM:  Believe me, we're all extremely glad for your ignorance. RIDE WITH ME is as hot as they come! I should know. I've read it several times already, and I'm sure those won't be the last. There's just something about all that hot tent sex...[fans face & clears throat] But I'm getting ahead of myself. In the beginning, your relationship with Lexie didn't start out with much heat, did it?

TG:      No, and that was my fault. I was pretty much a dick to her. She didn't talk to me for three days. [Tom smiles.] Stubborn woman. She came around, though. I just had to apply some heat.

GLM:  Speaking of heat, my favorite scene in the whole book is the hot sauce contest, which Lexie instigates in an attempt to win the days-long silent treatment war. What was going through your head when you figured out what she was doing?

Wee-Bit Wednesday: Desert Walker Edition

One of my regular posts, uh, back when I posted regularly, was what I called Wee-Bit Wednesdays. This was my take on the Teaser Tuesdays that everyone in the blogosphere did at the time. Same premise, different day. [side note: now some people do WIP Wednesdays, like my phenomenally talented friend, Ruthie Knox - check her out too!]

Now that I once again have WIPs (two to be exact) I want to bring this back as an opportunity to show you guys what I'm working on and bring you along on my journey as I attempt my second and third books in the Prophecy of Souls trilogy.

(Also, I'm hoping to draw you into my web deep enough that you'll put on the velour sweat suits, drink the kool-aid and eventually purchase my books when they're published. But, you know, semantics.)

So, to kick off this awesome weekly (or bi-weekly, or bi-monthly...okay, really the only guarantee is that it will always be on a Wednesday...which Wednesdays will be a fun surprise, much like finding the center of a tootsie pop) here is a Wee-Bit from the final book of the trilogy, Soul Seduction.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Gabriel took several long pulls of his cold beer, not even taking the time to enjoy the taste, just needing it to quench his thirst and give him the false sense of hydration. Looking out at the dusty highway and stretch of desert beyond, he wondered how his family was doing back in Chicago. How long had it been since he’d called? Six months? Nine? He reached down with one hand and absently scratched Czar’s head as he tried to remember. Well, however long it had been, it’d been a while ago. He should probably call. They didn’t have his number or his address. Their only regular proof of life was the unmarked package he had to ship them once a month. His mom was probably having fits and ranting about stress wrinkles, which was impossible, considering she’d stopped aging twenty-six years ago before he’d even been born.

Yes, But How Does He Smell?

Hola!  Notice anything different?  Go ahead and take a second to think about it...no, it's not my hair...no, I haven't waxed my eyebrows (recently)... It's all the extras on the blog, sillies!  Check out the "follow me" options on the right: twitter, facebook, email.  Awesome, right?  I know, so go ahead and click on them...yeah, right now...no, I'll wait.  Did you also notice the additional couple of pages at the top?  I now have my future projects listed (in case you were dying to know what my Muse has in store for me) and a very lengthy essay that answers all of your hard-hitting questions about moi!  You. Are. Welcome!  *lol*

Okay, enough of that nonsense.

Today's guest (I'll write my own post soon, I promise!) is my writing friend, Ruthie Knox. I met her through a mutally entered contest where, after reading her entry, I shamelessly wrote an entire essay in the comments section on how much I loved her writing and gave her my email address in hopes she'd contact me to talk shop.

Fortunately for me she wasn't put off by my mild stalker behavior and we've been corresponding ever since. I've read a couple of her finished manuscripts and, believe me when I tell you, she is an absolute genius when it comes to contemporary romance. Not only did she sign with her dream agent in under four days, but said agent is in the process of pitching her books in AS IS condition. (I know, right?!)

I asked Ruthie to share one of her writing tips with us and she definitely did not disappoint...

Yes, But How Does He Smell?

There’s this scene in When Harry Met Sally where Harry and Sally are strolling in Central Park and talking about fantasies. Sally confesses to Harry she’s had this recurring dream ever since she was twelve, but it’s too embarrassing to tell him about. Then she tells him.

“Okay, there’s this guy,” she admits.

“What’s he look like?” Harry wants to know.

“I don’t know, he’s just kind of faceless,” she says.

“Faceless guy. Okay, then what?”

“He rips off my clothes.”

“Then what happens?”

“That’s it.”

Harry is flabbergasted. “That’s it? A faceless guy rips off your clothes, and that’s the sex fantasy you’ve been having since you were twelve. Exactly the same.”

“Sometimes I vary it a little.”

“Which part?”

“What I’m wearing.”

*insert rimshot here*

I love this scene. I love it because Harry finds the dream fantasy so disappointing, and I love it because Sally doesn’t.

I love it because it perfectly captures the way real-life fantasies often consist of very little -- just one detail, one image or action that makes us go Unh, or Ooh, or whatever internal brain-noise you make when you see something or read something or think something that revs your engine.

And I love it because it also perfectly captures that when you have an audience, just describing the Unh moment will never cut it. The scene reminds me that as a writer of erotic romance, I not only have to provide the Unh moment, I also have to furnish the rest of the fantasy, or Harry will be disappointed.

The mechanics of writing sex scenes, or at least sexy ones, have been on my mind lately as I’ve been revising an 800-word sex scene from my second manuscript into a 2,700-word one. I tend to write short and then layer up later on. The dialogue comes first, and the actions, but when I’m deep in the first draft I have a hard time remembering to consider what the characters are thinking, and even more so what they are experiencing -- the sights, sounds, smells, tastes. My writing brain wants to skitter right over those details, because thinking them up, those just-so descriptions, is really hard work. And yet those are the details that so often matter in a novel. Those are the details that make the reader go Unh.

Take smell. In romance novels, smell is sexy. Women like the way men smell, and vice versa. So how do you write it? How does your hero smell?

He smells good.

Well, yeah. But nobody’s going to go Unh over that line.

He smells fantastic.

Keep trying.

Here’s where a lot of authors default to cologne, aftershave, or perfume:

She caught the scent of his cologne, and it made her pulse race.

The light scent of her perfume drove him wild.

Okay, fine, we’re getting somewhere, but not anywhere especially original or interesting. What does his cologne smell like? As a reader, I refuse to be titillated by such vague description, so as an author I try to do better.

Also, here’s where I confess that I can’t stand any artificial scents, so I find references to cologne and perfume and aftershave mildly repulsive. I’m constitutionally incapable of writing heroes and heroines who repulse me, so I have to seek alternative smells.

There are two directions to go from here: get more specific, or find an analogy/simile/synecdoche to do the work for you.

Getting more specific requires thought, but it can be worth the trouble. You can try pinpointing actual, recognizable scents from the fragrance panoply. Sandalwood (not my favorite, but very popular). Lemons. Mint. Pine. Wintergreen. Whatever floats your boat, really.

I think it works better, though, to look for smells that link to your character. What does your hero do? What is he like? Would it make a difference to how he smells? Karen Foley has a novel for Harlequin Blaze, Flyboy, in which the hero is an Air Force jet pilot. He comes home from work reeking of jet fuel, and the heroine practically passes out with lust. I loved that detail. It made me go Unh. It made me want to find a jet-fuel-smelling man and sniff him.

It also reminds me that smells don’t have to be exotic to be sexy. The smell of sawdust from fresh-cut lumber is one of my favorites. Find me a hero who smells like sawdust, piney and resinous, and I will melt for the guy. You can make him a handyman or a lumberyard foreman or a construction worker or whatever you want. Just make him smell good. (And give him a toolbelt while you’re at it.)

Also, you don’t always have to tell the truth. Ranchers probably smell like sweat and animals, dirt and manure. But if you want to get my attention, find me a rancher who smells like leather work gloves and rust. Sage crushed under a boot heel. Sun-warmed denim. Paint me a picture of the way he smells that tells me who he is, what he is, and why the heroine wants him.

Or give me somebody more ordinary. Give me an office guy in a suit who smells like coffee and clean cotton, like photocopier toner and the peppermints he keeps in a jar on his desk. Give me a painter who smells like linseed oil and turpentine. Now I’m paying attention.

You can even get fancy if you want to, take the reader on a little sense journey. I wrote this the other day:

He smelled like his soap, spicy and exotic, bringing to mind peppercorns and trade voyages and the mysteries of the East. But beneath that he smelled like a man, like himself, and she buried her nose in the crook of his neck and inhaled, wanting to taste him on the back of her tongue. Wanting to memorize this indelible marker of who he was.

I’m not claiming it’s poetry--it’s actually still a little sneaky and vague--but at least it’s not “He smelled great.” At least it’s not “He rips off my clothes.”

Of course, smell is just one sense. We’ve got a bunch of other ones. Guidelines for writing a good sexy scene often say you have to bring as many senses into the scene as possible, and it’s great advice. But I try to take it one step further and submit my descriptions to the Harry test. If Harry is disappointed, I figure my (future, theoretical) readers will be too.

Ruthie Knox figured out how to walk and read at the same time in the second grade, and she hasn’t looked up since. She spent her formative years hiding romance novels in her bedroom closet to avoid the merciless teasing of her brothers and imagining scenarios in which someone who looked remarkably like Daniel Day Lewis recognized her well-hidden sex appeal and rescued her from middle-class Midwestern obscurity. After graduating from Grinnell College with an English and history double major, she earned a Ph.D. in modern British history that she’s put to remarkably little use. These days, she writes contemporary romance in which witty, down-to-earth characters find each other irresistible in their pajamas, though she freely admits this has yet to happen to her. Perhaps she needs more exciting pajamas. Ruthie abhors an epilogue and insists a decent romance requires at least three good sex scenes. You can find her at http://www.ruthieknox.com.

FAN-tastic Friday: Shannon Whitney Messenger

GLM: Hello, I’m Gina Leigh Maxwell and you’re listening to Passions on Paper on WPOP, the blogosphere’s hit station for paranormal romance and beyond.

The theme of today’s show is FAN-tastic Friday and I’m very excited to have one of my favorite fans with us in the studio today. She’s the Cat Girl from Southern Cal and a fellow triple-namer. She hates blogging and loves vlogging…please welcome Shannon Whitney Messenger to the show! *recorded track plays of applause and cheers*

Thanks so much for being here today, Shannon! It’s so great to have you with us.

SWM: Aw, thanks for having me Gina, it’s great to be here. Oh, but one tiny thing—I don’t actually love vlogging. It terrifies me. Like, a lot. And I love blogging. Reading comments from my followers is always one of the highlights of my day.

GLM: *exaggerated sigh* I’m so sorry, Shannon. I’m working with a new production assistant and he seems to have copied my notes wrong. *knocks on the glass of the studio* DL! Shannon hates vlogging. Not loves. Hates. *DL shrugs his shoulders and gives apologetic grin*

Okay, moving on, let’s start at the beginning. We actually have something in common, you and I. Although you studied art and film in college out in Hollywood, I studied musical theatre and dance in college in the hopes of one day making it to Hollywood. It wasn’t until halfway through my college career when I realized I was a terrible actress and abandoned that dream for another.

What was the deciding factor in changing from chasing the stars to writing about your own? And as a follow-up question, why don’t you have a studio filled with your artwork? The portrait sketches you feature on your blog are so amazing!

SWM: Oh boy, you start with the big guns right away, don’t you? :)

GLM: *DL flexes biceps proudly and waggles his eyebrows at Shannon* No, DL, she wasn’t referring to your guns. Sorry, Shannon. Go on.

SWM: Well…there were a lot of reasons why I left Hollywood, but I guess the major one was that I came to realize that I just didn’t love it enough. Hollywood has to be your LIFE if you want to be a success, and I wanted more than that. I didn’t want to spend 18 hours a day on set—and yes, the screenwriter is required to be on set most of the time. And I hated how all consuming the stress was. My poor boss—who was VP of Production for a television production company—used to leave himself voicemail messages at all hours of the night, because he’d wake up and realize there was something he needed to do and he needed a way to remember it. One of my first tasks every day was to try and decipher his half asleep mumblings. I didn’t want my life to become that way. I knew I couldn’t take the stress. So I walked away.


And aw, thank you for the compliment on my drawings. I actually did sell prints of my portraits for a while, but if there’s any business tougher to break into than publishing, it’s art. Plus I’d rather dedicate more time to writing.

GLM: Your super awesome blog, Ramblings of a Wannabe Scribe, is so much fun to read. Not only do you have great posts about all-things-writing, you have tons of other great things on there as well. Some of my favorite posts are what you like to call Shannon Shame. Can you give our listeners the history of how Shannon Shame came about and some examples?

SWM: Ah, Shannon Shame, how do I hate thee? You know, it actually happened very gradually. I started to notice that the posts my followers seemed to enjoy the most were the ones where I’d relate some horrible, humiliating experience I’d had. So I created the label as a way to keep track of those posts. Then my followers started pushing for it and it just sort of became a thing, like, ‘how can we make Shannon humiliate herself this time?’


For example, I made the mistake of posting about the time I went on a game show and lost—horribly. After reading it, my followers made me promise that I would post a clip of it on my blog when my book sells, as a way of balancing the Universe for the success I’ve found. It almost makes me hope my book doesn’t sell. I’ve already endured the horrible vlog they made me make after I signed with my agent, and the game show clip is going to be so much worse. I mean, I have bangs in it. BANGS!

GLM: *LOL* Holy funny shite! I’ve never heard someone so distraught over bangs before. Now I have one more reason as to why I can’t wait for your book to sell!

You recently had a guest post on the Guide to Literary Agents blog on how you acquired your agent, Laura Rennert of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency. Can you give us a brief synopsis of how it all went down and you ended up being the super agented author you now are?

SWM: Ooo—you said the “s” word. Don’t you know that word strikes fear into the heart of writers everywhere? It even sounds evil. Synopsisssssssss *shudders*

*DL yelps and hides under his desk.*

No, but seriously, it was a whirlwind process that I still have a hard time wrapping my head around. I met Laura at a conference and pretty much fell in love with her—even before I pitched my project and she requested a partial. She was just so sweet and approachable, which amazed me because she’s LAURA RENNERT—uber agent extraordinaire. I’d expected her to act more like she knew it.


But even though she’d been so awesome, I was still terrified to send her the pages she’d requested. I kept thinking there was no way someone like her would want to rep me (um…self confidence isn’t one of my strong-suits—just ask my CPs) and I wasn’t sure I could bear her rejection (given that I’d become such a Laura fangirl at the conference). So my friends had to kick my butt into gear on Twitter, with a #hitsend campaign that somehow got about forty people—including one of my favorite writers—pressuring me to send out my queries. Took about half an hour to convince me (and #hitsend came very close to trending) but I finally caved in and sent the emails.


Two weeks later I had an offer of rep from Laura in my inbox and even three months later I still have a hard time believing it.

GLM: That’s amazing! A couple of years ago who would’ve ever thought a sentence like, “And I owe it all to Twitter” would actually make sense! *recorded track plays of applause and cheers* Uh, DL, that wasn’t really needed right there, but thanks anyway.

Shannon, you write Middle Grade Fantasy. I know your current book is super hush-hush until it sells, so instead can you give us a description of the genre itself and some generic examples of what one might find in a Middle Grade Fantasy?

SWM: Well, it’s probably one of the most well known categories out there, thanks to a little series called Harry Potter—maybe you’ve heard of it? And there are a lot of different approaches to the genre, but my favorite are the books where you follow a kid who finds out about a secret world within our world, where magic and fairytales all come together. My project *hopefully* puts its own spin on that, but you’ll have to decide when you can finally read it.

GLM: I have to admit I’m really excited that my kids are at the perfect age for that genre. I can’t wait to buy your book and say, “Here’s a book you’ll love! It was written by Mommy’s friend.” :) My daughter already thinks she’s a celebrity because she made friends with a Pittsburgh Pirate pitcher who lives next to us.

As I mentioned in your introduction, you’re a fellow “triple-namer”. A lot of writers (including myself) struggled with their author names, or even whether or not to use a pen name. Did you consider using other names before settling on your full name? Was there a specific reason for going with a triple-decker?

SWM: LOL. Funny thing: I actually haven’t decided on my publishing name yet—which is why I’m a triple-decker. I’ve had a few people tell me that Shannon Messenger doesn’t have the right ‘ring’ to it (yeah, I know. I always try not to be insulted by that). I have no idea if a publisher will feel that way too, but if they do, I always figured I’d go with Shannon Whitney. So I use my middle name in my profile so everyone’s used to seeing it—just to cover my bases.

GLM: That was good thinking! When you sell your book (which, seriously, should be any day now) and you’re officially a published author, will you change the name of your blog since you’ll no longer be in the “wannabe” category?

SWM: Ha! I’ve wondered about that myself. When I started the blog I never thought I’d make it out of the ‘wannabe’ stage, so I didn’t really consider that I might run into problems someday. But honestly, I think I’ll always feel like a wannabe. Whenever I read other people’s writing it makes me want to throw rocks at my own (or delete my draft and flee to Mexico to start a new life as a maraca player.) So I think I’ll probably keep the name. It’ll remind me of my roots--that once upon a time I was just a rambling nobody telling the stories in my head and hoping that somebody would read them someday.

GLM: Wow, it’s no wonder you didn’t feel comfortable in Hollywood. You’re way too sweet and grounded for a dog-pit like that.

You and several other bloggers recently announced a breakthrough idea called WriteOnCon. For those who don’t yet know about it, tell us what that is exactly and how it’s going to work.

SWM: The seven of us are all about paying it forward—and we all had friends tell us they wished they could go to writer’s conferences, but simply couldn’t afford it. So we decided to create our own, a totally, 100% free writer’s conference, held online so everyone can attend.

GLM: *recorded track plays of applause and cheers* Thanks, DL! That was actually really appropriate. A totally free online conference – that’s such a phenomenal idea, Shannon! Do you think the founding group will branch out to hosting other genres as well? And if not, would you be terribly upset (like have you patented this idea and can I expect to hear from your attorney) if other genre-like-minded got together and did their own version? *strokes chin and looks off into space as the wheels begin to turn…then slaps self as a reminder that self is busy enough as it is!*

SWM: It sort of depends on the success of the first conference—though it’s looking like it’s going to be AWESOME. We have some amazing things happening, but we’re waiting to announce until it’s been finalized a bit more. *smiles mysteriously*


And sure, the more free online conferences, the better. Though I warn you, this project is not for the feint of heart. I knew it would be a lot of work, but WOW is it ever. We’ve all pretty much planned on not having lives until the conference is over—but that’s okay. Seeing everyone’s enthusiasm, and knowing that we’re creating something that will help so many writers is definitely worth the effort.

GLM: Let’s play a quick little game I like to call “Tomato-Tomahto”. Ready? Here we go.

I say: Dark Cherry Mocha from Starbucks (favorite drink)
You say: Pepsi. I can’t drink coffee, so it’s my primary source of caffeine.
I say: Chocolate Devotion from Cold Stone Creamery (favorite treat)
You say: Cupcakes. Any flavor. Any time. Preferably with extra frosting.
I say: Gena Showalter (favorite published author)
You say: Rick Riordan
I say: The Sweetest Thing (favorite movie)
You say: Pirates of the Caribbean (um, hello, Johnny Depp AND Orlando Bloom?)
I say: Shannon Whitney Messenger (favorite unpublished author)
You say: Gina Leigh Maxwell. Obviously! :)

GLM: Fantastic! I haven’t had that much fun since I laughed at all of the Pittsburghers trying to drive in the snow!

Well, folks, I’m getting the “wrap it up” signal from DL – oh, wait…no, sorry, he’s just got himself tangled up in a roll of packaging tape. At any rate, it’s time for all of you who aren’t already one of the hundreds of Shannon followers to head on over to her blog and click that button. I guarantee you, you won’t regret adding her to your blog roll (if only for the frequent viewings of Shannon Shame *stage-wink*).

Thank you so much, Shannon, for joining us here at Passions on Paper. It was an honor having you with us and I hope you’ll come back to visit when you’re finally allowed to tell us all about your super-awesome book!

SWM: Definitely! And thank you so much for having me. I hope I haven’t lulled all your followers to sleep with my rambling answers.

GLM: You’re right. We need to work on your self-esteem, girl. Get with the program - you so totally rock!

Until the next episode of Passions on Paper where I’ll be featuring another lucky fan (and most likely another production assistant), this is Gina Leigh Maxwell saying, “May all your passions be paranormal ones. Good night, everyone.”

FAN-tastic Friday: Elana Johnson, Super-Author

More quick-witted than a comedian on speed…busier than a bee in a field of poppies…smarter than the average bear in the literary forest it’s…it’s…


SUPER-AUTHOR, ELANA JOHNSON!

*Elana flies into the studio, cape flapping behind her, and lands gracefully despite her skin-tight super-suit*

GL: Wow! I can’t tell you how excited I am that you’ve taken time out of your busy novice-aiding schedule to be with us today at Passions on Paper. I am a HUGE fan. Love the suit, by the way.

EJ: Well, I look my best in capes.

GL: I can’t disagree with that. Considering where you are now, it’s hard to believe you never set out to be a writer. Instead, you discovered your authorial love and talent through chronicling your life’s story. How did you make the transition from personal memoir to fiction and what made you desire publication?

EJ: The transition was pretty easy. I was basically an emotional mess, and writing helped get those things out. And when I was done, the angst in my real life had translated into a teenage girl (and what creature is more angsty than that? Uh…no one).

As for the quest for publication, let’s just say that I’m like a pitbull. Once I get a grip on something, I don’t let go—ever. So publication came naturally after finishing a novel.

GL: Well, that vice-like super jaw of yours definitely paid off in the end. How long did you query before you signed with your Super-Agent, Michelle Andelman?

EJ: 8 (very long) months.

GL: I’m sure that period of time wasn’t the most fun for you, but the rest of us get to benefit from it. You have an ebook called From the Query to the Call available on your Query Ninja blog, which has garnered excellent reviews as an inexpensive and invaluable tool for writers – not to mention each purchase comes with a FREE QUERY CRITIQUE from the one and only Query Ninja…YOU! When did you decide to moonlight as a ninja and how did that book come about?

EJ: Well, if you have to moonlight as something, a ninja is the way to go. When I decided to query my first novel for the second time, I needed a new query. And that’s when my quest for “the perfect query” began. About six months later, I started writing for the QueryTracker blog, and I shared what I’d learned about query letters. And that snowballed into the whole ebook, which discusses how to write a query letter, how to research agents, how to submit to them (electronically and snail mail), how to handle The Call, all of it. The ebook is based on my own experience and the experience of authors who’ve been through it all.

GL: What is the most common mistake you see when new writers create their queries?

EJ: Including too much information and forgetting to state the consequence.

GL: Hmm…too much information? I haven’t started writing any queries yet, but I’m pretty sure I won’t have a hard time with that particular issue. As you can tell, I’m not long-winded in the least. (Crap crap crap!!!)

Simon & Schuster is publishing your debut novel Control Issues in the summer of 2011! What did you do when you heard the news?

EJ: Well, I was still on the phone with my agent when my husband came home (he knew she was calling that day) and I wrote on one of my beloved sticky notes “Simon Pulse offered!” and held it up to him. Chaos ensued, silently, until we went to dinner that night. Guess what I ordered with my pot roast? A side of bacon. Yum.

GL: Mmmm, bacon – the food with which you gain all of your Super Strength, I’m told. If I had to guess, I’d say bran muffins would probably be your equivalent to kryptonite. I know they’re mine! Now that I’m on the whole yummy food kick, can you give us a tasty blurb about Control Issues and your super delicious main character, Jag Barque?

EJ: Control Issues is set in a world where Thinkers control the population and Rules aren’t meant to be broken. But one fifteen-year-old girl decides to shatter them all.

And to get a taste of Jag you can read his character interview from my blog. It starts with me being flustered and ends with him using mind control to stop me from talking any more! 

GL: That interview totally rocked! (Mental Note: bribe Super Villain to extract Jag Barque from Elana’s mind and keep him as mine…ALL MINE! Muuuaahahahahaaa!...)

*notices the weird look Elana’s giving me, clears throat*

Control Issues sounds amazing (and so does Jag) and I can’t wait to (read about Jag) snag a copy next summer (so Jag can live in MY head)!

Along with your Super-Author blog and the Query Ninja blog, you also contribute to The League of Extraordinary Writers, What Writers Read, the Query Tracker Blog AND maintain Facebook, MySpace and Twitter accounts! All of that is ON TOP of writing, critiquing queries and keeping up appearances with your alter ego as a regular human with a regular life. (Did I leave anything out, like saving stranded kittens in trees?) How on EARTH do you do it?!? Give us the rundown of a typical day in the super life of Elana Johnson, Super-Author.

EJ: Ha! Well, here’s my 24-hour schedule. We’ll start with sleep, since I enjoy sleeping more than anything.

11 PM – 7:00 (okay, 7:30) AM: sleep
7:30 – 8:30: get ready for work, kids for school
8:30 – 9:00: travel to work
9:00 – 2:15: work. Sometimes this means actual typing instruction. This is where I read most of my blogs. I hardly do any blog reading at home, so if it doesn’t get done at work, it doesn’t get done.
3:00: home with kidlet. Reading hour.
4:00: Boy kidlet home from school. I write/read/make dinner/get on forums, facebook, twitter, etc.
5:00 – 9:00: Family time. TV. Some more writing-related activities, usually answering emails or writing blog posts or doing a quick query crit. That kind of stuff.
9:00: Kids in bed, husband asleep on the couch – me, writing. Or chatting. Or whatever.
11:00: Bed.

That’s a weekday. Saturday – Monday, I don’t work, and that’s when I write all my blog posts, keep up with housecleaning, and get my Super-Suit repaired.

And I only saved that kitten that one time…

GL: That’s an unbelievable schedule! Mine is just like that…with the exception of the organization and the times and the fact that yours apparently works. Otherwise, totally identical. *sheepish grin*

Last, but not least, if you could choose any pre-published Paranormal Romance author to be your sidekick-in-training – based purely on writing talent and blogging charisma (and whether or not you want to leave this interview with a new nemesis) – who would it be?

EJ: Well, duh, Gina. You have the coolest cape on the planet. And I’ve heard rumor of some sweet shock spit, so yeah. The choice is pretty easy – you!

GL: Woo Hoo! My grandma will be so happy to hear you like the cape she crocheted for me! And I do have some pretty wicked shock spit. It puts a damper on kissing my husband, but comes in really handy when smiting one’s enemies.

Thanks so much for being here today, Elana. Your drive and success are beacons of hope against the gloomy clouds of doubt for all of us here in Pre-Published Metropolis.

EJ: Well, Batman has a cape too, so it’s pretty cool to be a beacon—right? Right.

GL: That’s all the time we have for today, but I’d like to remind everyone of where our blogosphere Super-Author can be found:

• Her Super-Hideout where you can find “all things Elana” http://www.elanajohnson.com/

• A forum where she mingles with her followers http://www.elanajohnson.blogspot.com/

• Her Ninja School of Queries where she helps karate chop your query into top ninja shape http://www.queryninja.blogspot.com/

• The location which she helps track the queries http://www.querytracker.blogspot.com/

• Her Super-Space www.myspace.com/elanajohnson

• The book her face is on www.facebook.com/elanajohnson

• The place from which she perches and tweets to the masses www.twitter.com/ElanaJ

• Where she posts her literary treasures http://www.what-writers-read.blogspot.com/

• The Super-Headquarters of the literary faction she belongs to, The League of Extraordinary Writers http://www.leaguewriters.blogspot.com/

If you haven’t already, head on over to her sites and click as many follow buttons as you can find! And if you’re new to Passions on Paper, make sure you click MY Follow button over in the sidebar! (don’t make me beg people, just click on the button already, okay?)

Tune in next week – same PoP time, same PoP channel – for another episode of FAN-tastic Friday when I interview the lovely, agented Shannon Whitney Messenger!

We’ll return to your regularly scheduled blog-hopping after your brief messages in the comments section...

FAN-tastic Friday: Tiana Smith

GL: Hello, I’m Gina Leigh Maxwell and you’re listening to Passions on Paper on WPOP, the blogosphere’s hit station for paranormal romance and beyond.

The theme of today’s show is FAN-tastic Friday and we have a very special guest in the studio with us. She’s the first girl from Montana who’s managed to steer clear of ever getting on horseback, she loves the outdoors, hates bugs and knows how to build a mean fire (probably in hopes of repelling the bugs!). It’s aspiring author and renowned blogger, Tiana Smith! Welcome to the show, Tiana, it’s so great to have you with us.

TS: Thank you Gina. I’m so excited to be here today. I even wore my sparkly shirt. What? You can’t see it? Well, I’ll look fabulous anyway.

GL: Like most of us, you’re an aspiring author. When did you decide to write with intention of publication?

TS: After I graduated from college, I figured I should probably do something with my life. I’ve always wanted to write (well, not always, but since second grade), but it wasn’t until graduating that I thought I might have a chance at publication. After all, I had read a lot of … less than worthy … stuff from my peers, and I just needed the kick in the pants.

GL: I know you originally started out writing in the YA genre, but recently changed to writing Children’s Books. What prompted the switch?

TS: I really love children’s books and even read them for fun on my own time. No, I don’t have any kids, and yes, I know that’s a little weird. I promise I’m not a crazy person. I started out with YA because I wanted to fit in with all the cool kids, but had to be true to myself. Hey, that sounds like it would be a great theme for a book… ;)

GL: Ooh, can I be one of the cool kids in the book? I’ve always wanted to be one of those. Do you ever think you’ll go back to your YA book?

TS: Maybe I’ll name one of the dragons in my book after you. They’re pretty cool, I must say. Eventually I might go back to writing YA, but it would take a very large candy bar to entice me.

GL: Note to self: Stock up on king-size candy bars for bribing purposes with Tiana. Okay, so what fabulous book are you currently working on?

TS: I’m writing a chapter book called “Dragon Secrets”. I would tell you what it’s about, but then it wouldn’t be a secret anymore. ;)

GL: Well, I can certainly resp –

TS: Ok, ok, since you are SO PERSISTANT, I guess I can spill a few details. It’s a children’s book about a land of animals that all get along, except for the dragons of course. One very naïve horse vows to figure out what secret they are hiding, but she may have to give up more than she bargained for, like her frequent bathing schedule. Oh, and she ends up with a buzz cut in the end.

GL: Boy, if I had a dollar for every time a night on the town ended up like that… *ahem* I mean, that sounds like an awesome story. I have an 8 year old son who LOVES reading about dragons. Throw in a horse with a buzz cut and he’d be hooked for sure!

Alright, let’s have some fun. Give us three fun Tiana facts that we don’t already know.

TS: 1. I’m probably the least athletic person you’ve ever “met.” I was playing racquetball with my husband, and I swear I almost hit myself with the racket. It was like something straight out of Twilight.

2. When I take those “what political party are you?” tests, for some reason they keep telling me I’m tied between the green party and a communist. I’ll let you interpret that how you will.

3. I’m a geek. I mean, I like playing around with HTML in my free time and I work for SEO.com (search engine optimization, that’s what gets your site to rank high in Google.) So, I’m constantly on a computer, and as a result, my skin is very pasty. I should probably get out more often.

GL: Wow…*laughs nervously*…an awkward computer geek of the communist party – your husband’s a lucky guy. Aaaaaand moving right along…

You recently decided to cut back on a lot of your social media outlets due to the major Time-Suck we all know them to be. What made you decide to keep your blog and what do you love most about blogging?

TS: I like my blog because it is my own little space. I can control it. (I may or may not be somewhat of a control freak. I’m just sayin’). With my blog, if I don’t want to post something, then I don’t have to. I don’t feel the kind of pressure that I do with Twitter or Facebook. Another reason why I kept my blog is because I feel like I can create genuine connections with awesome people (you are of course, on the awesome people list).

GL: Aww. Thank goodness no one can see me blushing. Crap, I just said that out loud. I completely agree with you. The connections I’ve made through blogging are amazing. And you’re at the top of my awesome list, too!

Alright, we’re just about out of time, but I really want to ask you: What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever heard or read?

TS: “The way you write a novel is one word at a time.” I have no idea who said it, so, yeah … :)

GL: Well, at least the phrase stuck with you! And I really like that. Sometimes we can feel really overwhelmed when we look at the project as a whole, so it’s great advice. I don’t mean to put you on the spot, but of all the blog interviews you’ve participated in, which would you say was your favorite?

TS: Yours of course! (Would it burst your bubble if I told you that I’ve never done a blog interview before this? Nah, best not mention that…)

GL: (I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that last part.) Oh, I’m so glad! And I can safely say you are definitely in the TOP *looks back to see how many FAN-tastic Fridays this makes* FOUR guests I’ve ever interviewed!

Well, folks, I’m getting the “wrap it up” signal from my (pretend) producer. But before we head out of here I want to remind you to head on over to Tiana’s blog at www dot Tiana Smith dot com. As she mentioned before, she’s an HTML geek and it shows in her blog. She has a beautiful site and posts really great topics, so make sure you click on her “Follow” button!


Thank you so much, Tiana, for joining us here at Passions on Paper. It was a lot of fun getting to know you better.

TS: Thanks Gina, it was a pleasure.

GL: Don’t forget to tune in next week when I welcome published author and all-around Superwoman, Elana Johnson! This is Gina Leigh Maxwell saying, “May all your passions be paranormal ones."

Good night, everyone.