Archive for the ‘Excerpts’ Category
Because I write contemporary romantic comedy, my books have no carriage sex. There are a few sexy moments in cars — but the scene I’m featuring for this week’s My Sexy Saturday post isn’t one of those, either.
This scene is from SLIDING INTO HOME, Book 3 of my All Is Fair in Love & Baseball series, published by Turquoise Morning Press. I went the short route this time — only 7 sentences. The better to share it in a fun, pinnable quote card!
Sliding into Home is available now at Turquoise Morning Press, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, All Romance eBooks, Smashwords, Kobo and iTunes (Sliding Into Home – Arlene Hittle)
RWA14 was a blast—not that I doubted it would be. For me, it was a true road trip. Two of my chapter mates and I carpooled from Flagstaff to San Antonio (more on that soon). I caught up with friends old and new, and learned so much from the workshop sessions I attended. I went to so many marketing/social media sessions that my head threatened to explode.
One of the key points emphasized in many of them? You need a blog.
Umm … Does it count if I have a blog but post sporadically?
The experts’ answer, of course, is a big, fat “NO.”
So now that I’m back in Flagstaff, trying to resettle into what passes for a normal routine, I’m going to aim to blog more regularly. (How is it possible that my last post was in mid-June?) Blogging is heaped on top of all the Twitter/FB/Pinteresting things I should be doing—and none of them are as important as actually writing the next book.
Anyway …
It occurred to me that My Sexy Saturday is a great way to guarantee I post something fresh on my blog every week.
A quick refresher on the rules:
Post 7 paragraphs or 7 sentences or 7 words ONLY. The choice is yours. It can be from a WIP or something you already have published. Your post should be live by 9 am US Pacific Time on Saturday. Put those lucky 7s to work for you!
Here’s a snippet from my June release, BLIND DATE BRIDE. Who needs “Married at First Sight” when you have Kari and Damien?
***
Damien leaned across the table, and for a second, Kari thought he’d kiss her again. Her lips parted in anticipation. However, he merely turned her hand over, palm up, and ran his thumb over the skin at the base of her fingers. She watched it move back and forth, fast then slow, fascinated by the friction-generated heat.
His eyes never left hers, so she saw the instant his desire flickered back to life. Her thighs clenched as her body answered Damien’s call.
The dampness she felt provided a rude wake-up call. She clamped her knees together as she jerked her hand out of his grasp, ruthlessly reminding herself how badly her last run-in with lust at first sight had ended.
Seemingly undeterred, he grinned. “You ready to head to my place?”
“Y-your place?” Surely he wasn’t a mind reader.
“Or yours, I suppose.”
“My place?” This time, Kari’s voice came out in a panicked squeak.
Blind Date Bride is available now as an e-book at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Kobo, and in print at CreateSpace or Amazon.
Isn’t “Beauty’s Release” the title of an Anne Rice book? Haven’t read it, but I was in high school when I first heard of it. I remember being intrigued by the mere idea of her Sleeping Beauty Trilogy, written under the pen name A.N. Roquelaure. I’d just read—and fallen in love with—THE VAMPIRE LESTAT, and wanted to read all the Anne Rice books I could get my hands on.
You can imagine that, in small-town Indiana in the late 1980s, the Beauty trilogy wasn’t readily available on the library shelf. I wonder if they have it even now …
Ahem. File that under “jaunt down memory lane.” Funny how the strangest things send you down that road, eh? When I typed in my blog post title, I was off.
Welcome to the My Sexy Saturday in which I get to celebrate the release of BEAUTY AND THE BALLPLAYER. BEAUTY, which went live Thursday, has been many things to me — my first manuscript set somewhere outside the Midwest (in Flagstaff, Ariz), the first one with a baseball player hero, the first (and only) one to final in the Golden Heart (and win the FCRW Beacon).
Yet it’s the second book in my All Is Fair in Love & Baseball series. How’d that happen?
Not only was BEAUTY the second book I sold to Turquoise Morning Press, it fell second in my Arizona Condors timeline. Dave and Mel had already bumped into one another and reconciled by the time Matt meets Meg. In fact, Dave’s experience, which Matt went through alongside him, plays a role in Matt’s reasons for doing some of the things he does to piss Meg off. (DIVA IN THE DUGOUT came out of Matt’s explanation to Meg.)
You know the My Sexy Saturday drill by now, right?
Post 7 paragraphs or 7 sentences or 7 words ONLY. The choice is yours. It can be from a WIP or something you already have published. Your post should be live by 9 am US Pacific Time on Saturday. Put those lucky 7s to work for you!
This scene, from the early chapters, finds Matt kicked out of his hotel room while his brother, super-stylist Stan, cuts Meg’s hard-to-manage hair. Roping his brother into cutting her hair was Matt’s “in” to see her again. While he kills time in the lobby, one of his teammates tries to pick up the hotel restaurant’s hostess. The kid enlists Matt’s help, and Matt realizes she’s a baseball groupie just as Meg and his brother get to the lobby. But Meg doesn’t know he’s a ballplayer, and that’s the way he likes it … so he has to get her out the door before the hostess exposes his identity.
****
Matt pushed the door open and dragged her through it just as flashes started going off behind them.
Desperate that she not turn around to try to see what—or rather who—someone was attempting to photograph, he wrapped an arm around her waist and bent his head to kiss her.
Her lips were soft. Extremely soft. Beyond that, she tasted like something he couldn’t put his finger on. Slightly salty, but comforting.
As he maneuvered her away from the doors and into the darkness, he deepened the kiss. She responded in kind, and he forgot where he was. Forgot everything except kissing this woman who didn’t want him only for his talent.
Oh, she wanted him all right, but not because he could play baseball. That couldn’t be why; she had no clue.
Spurred by the thought, Matt pushed Meg against the wall. He was about to hike her leg up over his hip to draw her closer when his brother’s voice whispered in his ear.
“Matty, you don’t want people to see you out here like this, do you?”
Beauty and the Ballplayer, available now from Turquoise Morning Press and other e-tailers.
Hi, all. It’s been a while since I’ve jumped in with a My Sexy Saturday post. But with BEAUTY AND THE BALLPLAYER set to release in mid-March and SLIDING INTO HOME in mid-April , it’s high time I get back in the habit.
Blog hops like this are a fun way to share info about a new release, don’t you think?
A quick refresher on the rules:
Post 7 paragraphs or 7 sentences or 7 words ONLY. The choice is yours. It can be from a WIP or something you already have published. Your post should be live by 9 am US Pacific Time on Saturday. Put those lucky 7s to work for you!
BEAUTY is my newest release, but it’s far from a new story. It’s the manuscript secured me my first (and only) RWA Golden Heart finalist title, way back in 2011. (Wow 2011 seems like forever ago …) It’s the second book in my Love & Baseball series, and the only one set in my adopted hometown of Flagstaff. The Arizona Condors are in Flagstaff for spring training. Matt, the team’s catcher, is feeling every one of his 28 years now that the manager has added a rookie catcher to the roster.
Here are seven paragraphs from the opening scene, in which Meg, who just that morning discovered she’s pregnant, and Matt meet in a bar. What’s a pregnant woman doing in a bar, you ask? Drinking 7-UP and commiserating with her coworkers, all of them glad they’re still employed after a fresh round of layoffs at the ad agency where she works.
Hard to say which of them is having a worse day, eh?
***
After enduring his appraisal, Meg had no qualms about completing one of her own. She slid her gaze from the tuft of thick, chestnut hair poking through the back of his burgundy-and-white cap downward, over his golden-brown eyes, straight nose and smiling mouth. She took in his toned arms, broad chest, tree-trunk thighs and—oh my.
Perhaps he had good reason for his arrogance. She jerked her eyes back to his face. After they’d mentally stripped each other, it didn’t feel right to not know the man’s name. She extended her hand. “I’m Meg.”
He eyed her outstretched hand and his lips lifted again. She grinned back as she rescinded her offer. He was right. They already knew each other too well for a mere handshake.
Awareness jolted through Meg when he rested a hand on her knee. “Matt.”
“Well, Matt, I’d like to say it’s nice to meet you, but I can’t say that to the guy who took my table.” She shifted ever so slightly, hoping to break the strange hold he had over her.
Matt chuckled. “Would it help if I told you I’ve had one hell of a day?”
BEAUTY AND THE BALLPLAYER, coming from Turquoise Morning Press in March 2014.
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