ROSE QUARTZ

ROSE QUARTZ RELEASE DATE AT CERRIDWENPRESS.COM:MARCH 20.

Rose Quartz Contest

For a chance to win a Rose Quartz T-Shirt send me an email at sandracox1@gmail.com and tell me if Bella Tremaine was talking to you would she address you as sweetheart, darling, honey, or sugar. Just put the correct answer in the header. Need a hint? Check out the quote of the day at Sandra’s Blog: sandracox.blogspot.com.

ROSE QUARTZ BLURB:

Isabella Tremaine's credo is always look your best even when you're running from the bad guys.

This modern Southern Belle has an ancient secret. Bella, as Isabella is known to her friends, is the possessor of a primeval amulet empowered by the gods with creativity and beauty, and this spunky blonde has an abundance of both. Unfortunately a madman has discovered Bella's secret and is determined to gain possession of the amulet, even if he must kill her to do so. It will take every wile in Bella's formidable arsenal of tricks to outwit the megalomaniac who is after her.

At the same time the madman is trying to steal her amulet, a ranch hand is trying to steal her heart. Bella is determined to not only stay alive but to keep her size five stilettos foot loose and fancy free. Who will prove the greater danger? The madman who wants her amulet or the ranch hand who wants her heart?

Excerpt

The big jet’s engines droned. Outside the windows, stars glittered like diamonds against black velvet. Isabella Tremaine—Bella to her friends--glanced at her watch. Ten p.m. She leaned her seat back and snuggled into the blanket provided to offset the cool air flowing through the plane.

The tangy aftershave of a passenger walking down the aisle tickled her senses. Pleasantly drowsy and drifting toward sleep, it took several moments for her mind to register the insidious unease pricking her body. The hairs on her nape rose. Needles of tension ran skeletal fingers up her spine settling in her neck. Someone was watching her.

She could sense the malevolence of the gaze crawling across her like a spider. Victor Price? Of course not he was in prison . . . wasn’t he?

The feeling of being watched had to be connected with the amulet. She could feel it in her bones. Under the blanket, she touched her forearm. Beneath the expensive mint green silk of her blouse, she felt the cool molten-gold band and its three raised stones. Who on the plane could possibly know about the piece of jewelry she always wore on her forearm and the power it gave the wearer, the power of both creativity and beauty?

With a click, she pulled the seat up and looked around. There were no first class seats available on her flight from Rome to Atlanta so she sat smack dab in the economy section with rows of drowsing people in front, beside and behind her.

She looked at the young woman seated next to her. Her companion had spiky black hair and black fingernails bitten to the quick. The last time she’d returned from the restroom she had smelled of an illegal substance. Eyes closed, mouth open, and headphones on, the young Goth snored softly. No, the threat Bella sensed wasn’t coming from the young person at her elbow…at least she didn’t think so.

Straightening, Bella glanced around. Her sweeping gaze barely registered the admiring and occasional leering glances from the males on board. She had dealt with that sort of thing since she was thirteen. What she sensed and was looking for was the cold icy sheen of depravity. But evil was never that easy to recognize.

Spring time

Friday, March 7th and my turn to blog about ... spring time. On southern Vancouver Island we are enjoying lovely spring weather and flowers galore. The first of the flowering trees lining Victoria's streets are in bloom. Early rhododendrons are masses of pink blooms, hundreds of daffodils are blooming in our garden and soon the birds will be nesting. This is the time to put fingers to keyboard or pen to paper and start a new book. Sigh. I've just finished wrapping up the edits for my romantic suspense, Too Young To Die and need a break. Below is the cover. No release date as yet. But my time travel, Ring Around The Moon will be released on April 8 so I've dropped the cover in as well. That's FIVE BOOKS with Cerridwen Press. Not in the best selling league yet but it's early days.
Actually I have tentatively started a new book about three sisters, not young, middle aged, who for various reasons have decided to try living together in the old family home. Something will happen to shake them up. I hope there may be a market for stories about older women who are not perfect but interesting and worth knowing.

Sorry about the short blog. I've had a busy few days and almost forgot it's Friday and my day to blog. I promise to do better next time. I may write about SEX and the ideal duration for intercourse. Seriously.
Anita
www.anitabirt.com

Don't Forget the First Annual Cerridwen Spring Giveaway is Underway

Are you ready to win an ebook reader?
Or downloads of fantastic romances, including a copy of Prophecy of Vithan?
Have you wanted to buy some romances from Cerridwen Press, but haven't got around to it.

Now all you have to do is participate in a scavenger hunt and you will be eligible to win downloads of romances from Cerridwen Press and an ebook reader.

Going on Right Now from March 1 through March 15 you will have the opportunity to hunt for a tree icon and for secret words. Go to www.charleneleatherman.com and check out the rules.

Be a winner in the First Annual Cerridwen Spring Giveaway.

NOW IN PRINT!!!

One Good Man
by Lacey Thorn and Cindy Spencer Pape

Book Length: 164 pages
Book Type: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Ellora's Cave Publishing
ISBN: 9781419957420
Price: $8.99

Blurb: An enduring urban legend is the story of the phantom hitchhiker. Young or old, male or female, in need of help or just needing a ride, the legends vary. A helpful driver offers a ride and the passenger gives directions. When they arrive at the destination the passenger vanishes, sometimes leaving behind a memento to mark their passing. A stormy night, a deserted country road, a blown tire, and a woman on the run from a killer. Is the handsome young Marine here to save her? Or is he just a figment of her imagination?Casey is caught between a murderer, a ghost and the wounded soldier who could save her life or break her heart. Grant can deal with Thanksgiving snowstorms and determined killers but not his brother's ghost, and not a woman who makes him start thinking about the future. Can Grant let go of the past to embrace the explosive passion he finds with Casey? He's willing to risk his life for hers, but what about his heart?

Excerpt:
She didn’t cry, like some women did, in a cute, chick-flick kind of way. He was immune to that. His ex-wife had had it down to an art from. This woman cried from the gut—and if he didn’t miss his guess—from the heart. Her shoulders jerked and she wheezed for breath as she sobbed and sniffled, then wiped her face roughly with the back of her hand.

He didn’t even realize he was moving ‘til he was there beside the bed. Then it was the most natural thing in the world to sit on the edge and gather her into her arms. Whoever she was, whatever game she was playing, right now, all he could do was hold her in his arms and stroke his hands down her back while she cried.

After a few minutes the sobs dissolved into hiccoughs, then faded away to one locker-room loud snort. She pulled away from his soaked chest and used both hands to swipe at her face, shove damp strands of hair out of her eyes.

“S-sorry.”

“For what?” His own voice sounded rusty, even to him. Now that she wasn’t falling apart anymore, his cock had registered the fact that there was a real live woman sitting in his lap, all warm and soft, for the first time in almost a year. Down boy! He tried to remember that he didn’t know her, couldn’t trust her. Too bad it wasn’t working.

“Everything.” She looked around wildly. It dawned on him what she needed and he handed her the first thing that came to hand, which turned out to be a pillowcase. She nodded her thanks and used the cloth to wipe her face, then finally, blow her nose. “Including the extra laundry.”

“That would be the least of my worries. Probably should have put clean bedding on a while ago.” Would have, if he’d known there was going to be a woman in the cabin. But he knew, or thought he did, what she was really apologizing for. Unless he missed his guess, Casey—her name was engraved in his mind from earlier—was a strong, independent type. And he knew very well how much he hated to fall apart in front of anyone else. He figured he might as well say something to put her at ease. They had a lot of talking to do. It would go easier if they didn’t start out in confrontation. “Trust me, I’m no stranger to nightmares. They happen to the best of us.”

Pick up a copy today at: http://www.jasminejade.com/p-3938-one-good-man.aspx

Conflict vs conflict

This week I had another chapter in the ongoing discussion with my adult son aboujt conflict in books and in television. I'm always complaining to him that the minute I become emotionally attached to a couple in a televisions program, boom! the writers decide it's time to break them up. Then they take forever to get them back together...if indeed they do. I'm a Grey's Anatomy fan, so my heart has been following Meredith and derek (a/k/k Dr. Mcdreamy) and they are doing terrible things to that relationship, enough that it ruins the entire program for me. My son, of course, insists that the writers and producers don't think we can be happy withiout constant conflict.

Writers, on the other hand, have a bit more latitude, because there can be a definite conclusion, usually a happy one which is why I read and write romance. The happy couple is sure to break up. separate/ be in conflict when they meet, but by the time you read The End, the author has delivered you to a staisfying conclusion.

Most of the time.

I'm sure I'll never forgive Karen Slaughter for killing off her hero, Heffrey, in her Grant's County series after four books. I grieved as if I'd lost my own lover.

I don't believe 'art' requires a depressing ending or a depressing arc in a story, but of course that's just me. So tell me, everyone, what do you think? Does it bother you when television shows scramble relationships and drive you nuts? Does it bother you when authors kill off main characters? (James Patterson is another on famous for doing this?

Or is the conflict that is merely part of the journey to the end of the rainbow enough for you. Is the method used to bring about happiness enough to make the story interesting?

I'd lopve to know what y'all think, so please leave me a comment.

RT 2008

It is already March and that means that the 2008 Romantic Times Convention is just around the corner. This will be my first time at this event and I can hardly wait. I'm looking forward to meeting my fellow authors and hope to even get the chance to meet some of the people who have read the Bare Love series, Island Guardian series, Debtor's Daughters series, or some of my stand alone work.
I'll be traveling with fellow authors Cindy Spencer Pape and Brynn Paulin, and rooming with Brynn and Carol Lynne. I know that we will have a blast. So if you are planning to be there as well please say hello! I'd love to meet you. I should be signing book flats at the e book event and then copies of One Good Man with Cindy at the book fair. It will be fantastic to share this first time with Cindy. Especially since we are already working on a follow up to One Good Man.

Hope to see you all there!

Lacey Thorn

Excerpt from Rose Quartz

Excerpt from Rose Quartz

Release date March 20

He sat at the prison library scrolling down the computer screen, his dark eyes glazed and feverish. “Yes, yes, yes, I know all that,” he muttered as he scanned the article, reading:

’Legend has it that out of all the mortals on earth five women found favor with the gods:

Olympia a poor widow with children to feed,

Zoe a young queen whose village was razed and plundered and she herself taken as a slave,

Pelagia who had the body of a woman and the mind of a child,

Helen, who lost four of her children to the plague and begged the gods to spare her remaining child,

and
Sophia whose face was pitted and ravaged by pox.

Moved, the gods created five special amulets in the form of armbands for the women to wear on their forearms.

To Olympia an amulet forged with wealth.

To Zoe an amulet forged with power

To Pelagia an amulet forged with knowledge.

To Helen an amulet forged with healing.

and

For Sophia they forged a molten gold amulet with a lovely rose quartz at its center flanked with deep blue tourmaline stones then infused it with beauty and creativity.

He clicked on the mouse and flipped to another screen…

“It is believed that tourmaline enhances artistic creativity and the rose quartz beauty. The ancient Japanese believed that quartz was formed from the breath of a white dragon and represented perfection. And what more representative of feminine perfection than the lovely pink of rose quartz?”

He stopped reading and leaned back in his chair trying to quell the unholy laughter bubbling in his throat. Yes, Isabella Tremaine represented perfection. Even in death her features would look like chiseled alabaster.

Death would become her, he thought as the laughter he’d tried to swallow spewed over and echoed in a wild parody of sound through the quiet library.

I'm running a contest between now and March 19th. To win a tee shirt stop by: sandracox.blogspot.com