Larissa Ione Book Winner!

We have a winner! The winner of Larissa’s post is……..

Susan!!

Congrats Susan!

Please email me your snail mail addy at mad @ romancereaderatheart.com and let me know if you’d like a copy of PLEASURE UNBOUND (which ROCKED, IMO! *G*) or a copy of HOT NIGHTS, DARK DESIRES.

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NATURE OF THE BEAST ARC Winner Part 2! :)

I just realized I never heard back from the winner of Eve Silver’s post and as it’s been six days since I posted the original post, I’m picking a new winner.

The new winner of the NATURE OF THE BEAST ARC is………………

Limecello!!

Congrats Limecello!

Please email me your address at mad @ romancereaderatheart.com (without the spaces) so we can get the book out to you. Enjoy!

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A Visit from HelenKay Dimon :)

Thank you so much for inviting me here! I love guest blogging. Also love talking about my books. That can be annoying, I know. I apologize in advance. To ease the pain and thank you for dropping by, I’ll be giving away a copy of my current release, HARD AS NAILS, to someone who comments here.

HARD AS NAILS is actually an anthology of three related novellas. The stories center on the rehab of a house in Washington, D.C. It’s a follow-up to the first novella I ever sold (notice how I did not say the first I ever wrote…ahem). The original novella was Hardhats and Silk Stockings in the WHEN GOOD THINGS HAPPEN TO BAD BOYS anthology with Lori Foster and Erin McCarthy. That novella introduced two secondary characters – Cole Carruthers and Adam Thomas. Some readers asked for their stories and, well, who am I to say no. J

I actually considered writing this book as a single title. Problem was, I didn’t know who would be the main hero. See, I had these three guys who all demanded top billing. Men are just like that sometimes. First I had a relaxed-on-the-outside, compulsive-on-the-inside businessman house rehabber, Cole. Then I had Adam, an attorney who spent one amazing night with a woman at a legal conference months before and wanted to find her again. Finally, I had a younger, works-with-his-hands construction foreman with a not-so-blue-collar history who fell hard for a difficult woman and needed to win her over before he went nuts. That’s Ray Hammond.

Really, how is a woman supposed to choose…?

Well, rather than make one poor female soul pick between those guys, I decided I needed three fabulous women to show these men how to be even better men. That meant novellas. Now, I know some folks don’t love novellas. I happen to enjoy them. Still, as an author I kind of want to write things people want to read because the good people at my mortgage company get testy when I try to pay in ARCs instead of cash. Go figure. That meant trying to put the novellas together in such a way that they almost read like a single title.

Are you intrigued yet…? [please say “yes!”]

In the end, I came up with this scenario in the three novellas:

–This Old House: Aubrey Matheson has hunkered down in her aunt’s house. Aubrey isn’t supposed to be there. Cole’s company now owns the house. He’s sent to get Aubrey out…instead he stays in.

–All About Adam: Adam Thomas and Becky Carter met at a boring legal conference. A few drinks later and – Boom! – they missed every lecture. She left the hotel right after. He got ticked. Now they’re on opposite sides of a house sale negotiation.

–Man At The Door: Erin McHugh spent a lifetime in the press thanks to her parents. She’s ready for a little quiet in the new house she bought and is in the process of fixing up. What she’s not ready for is job foreman Ray Hammond who moves in…and never wants to leave.

I hope you enjoy the stories!

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A visit with Melissa Mayhue :)

When is Enough really Enough?

Now, there’s a leading question! I could be talking about almost anything…

Hi, my name is Melissa Mayhue and I write paranormal/Faerie/Time Travel romances for Pocket Books. The latest in my Daughters of the Glen series, SOUL OF A HIGHLANDER, is on sale now.

What I’m talking about today is research. Oh my! Was that a collective groan I heard? Surely not!!! I absolutely love research… every frustrating, time-consuming minute of it. In fact, I have to use considerable self-restraint to know when to stop hunting and start writing.

Why do I think research is so wonderful? Because some of my best, unplanned story ideas have come from stumbling across a gem of a fact while researching something perhaps only vaguely related.

Want an example? In my second book, HIGHLAND GUARDIAN, I was killing time…er… researching, trying to find the perfect chocolate candy a wealthy half-Faerie secondary character [who was actually written to be the bad guy but just plain refused to cooperate…but wait, that’s a subject for another blog entirely!] would send to my heroine to impress her.

I bumped into a gold covered chocolate made in Switzerland, in a valley which legend says was inhabited by Faeries! I’d already found Faerie legends for Switzerland in earlier research and knew the creatures were called “servans” there. Before I knew it, my evil Faerie had a surname [Servans] and a place to come from…a chateau in Switzerland, along with the perfect chocolate to have delivered to my heroine, even though I didn’t go into the legend surrounding the candy company in the story.

And that brings me back to my question ~

For writers – how do you determine how much research is needed on a particular book and, if you’re like me and end up with pages and pages of information – how do you decide what to include and what to leave out?

For readers – have you read a book that made you feel it needed more background/research? What about one that drowned you in too many facts?

I hope you’ll all take a moment to visit me at my home on the web, www.MelissaMayhue.com for more information, including excerpts, on all my books! … and don’t forget to comment here for a chance to win an autographed copy of Soul of a Highlander!

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