Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category

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Books With Buzz: Lauren Willig Interview and Giveaway

Friday, April 19th, 2013

Willig_Lauren_00198_final _ credit Lauren Willig’s Pink Carnation series is already much-beloved among readers and when news broke that she planned to release a standalone work of historical fiction set in another time period, readers really started buzzing. Ranging from Edwardian England to 1920s Kenya to modern-day (or at least 1999/2000) New York, The Ashford Affair tells an engrossing story of romance and family secrets that spans generations. The novel got a DIK review here and when we got a chance to interview the author, we jumped right on it.

And we also have three(3) copies to give away! If you would like to be entered to win a copy of The Ashford Affair, please comment below by 11:59 pm on Monday, April 22, 2013. And without further ado, here is Lauren!
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Posted in Books with Buzz, Interviews, LinnieGayl AAR, Lynn AAR | 44 Comments »

Kristen Ashley – The Best Kept Secret in Romance?

Wednesday, April 3rd, 2013

own_the_wind Have you read Kristen Ashley? Have you even heard of Kristen Ashley? As the romance world has been buzzing on about other authors, Kristen has been in the background furiously writing book after book and self-publishing them on Smashwords. A search of her name will bring up multiple review sites where she has thousands of comments and reviews and her work has been widely described in the online romance community as “cracktastic” and “crackalicious” – yet, if you ask around offline you’ll find that your acquaintances have never heard of her. This has been going on for years, but may finally change now Kristen has been picked up by Grand Central Publishing. The highly anticipated (by her fans) first book from that pairing, Own the Wind-Book One of the Chaos series, was released Monday night.

The reason for the low name-recognition outside the online romance community may be in due in part to the fact that the author is somewhat of an enigma. One would think that with, by my count, thirty-seven works in her backlist, there would be a bibliography published somewhere with titles and release dates. For purposes of this blog, I looked everywhere and couldn’t find one. (more…)

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Posted in Authors, Wendy AAR | 54 Comments »

Harlequin KISS imprint launch – Interview and Giveaway!

Wednesday, February 13th, 2013

kisslaunch Just this month, Harlequin officially launched their new KISS line of books promising readers modern stories that are fresh and fun. Sometimes when I read contemporary romance, the characters seem very old-fashioned so I was curious to see what I would find in the new line. I ended up having The One That Got Away as a review book and I picked up the other three to read on my own. While the tone and stories varied, they did all feel believably modern. I was able to interview two of the launch authors, Kelly Hunter and Kimberly Lang, and this is what they had to say about the new line: (more…)

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Posted in Interviews, Lynn AAR, Publishing | 43 Comments »

Dabney Interviews Jennifer Lohmann

Wednesday, February 6th, 2013

lohmann Not quite two years ago, I emailed Jennifer Lohmann (we share a mutual friend and live in the same area), introduced myself, and asked if I could interview her about being chosen as the 2010 RWA Librarian of the Year.

It’s clear Jennifer’s not one to rest on her laurels. In 2011, Jennifer entered a manuscript in Harlequin’s “So You Think You Can Write” contest and was offered a contract for her first book, Reservations for Two. The book came out yesterday.

I asked Jennifer if I could interview her again and she, graciously, said yes.

Jennifer, I understand you were “discovered” by Harlequin after you entered their 2011 “So You Think You Can Write” contest.

I don’t remember where I saw Harlequin’s “So You Think You Can Write” contest posted—Twitter probably—but I remember reading about it and thinking, “I don’t have to win, to win.” Author Kat Cantrell won my year, but I got offered a contract. (more…)

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Posted in Dabney AAR, Interviews | 6 Comments »

Interview with Ruthie Knox + Cover Reveal!

Friday, January 4th, 2013

Followers of the Loveswept line – and fans of contemporary romance in general – have kept Ruthie Knox’s name buzzing in romance circles for the past year since Ride With Me came out. Her latest project, the Camelot series, is being eagerly anticipated by many readers. The first novella, How to Misbehave, comes out January 28, 2013, and the second, Along Came Trouble, will be available on March 11. The final Camelot story, Flirting With Disaster, isn’t out until June 10, 2013, but we’re very happy to be revealing the cover for this one today. Something about seeing the cover of an anticipated book makes it seem more real, no? (more…)

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Posted in Authors, Dabney AAR, Interviews | 4 Comments »

Speaking of Audiobooks: Laura Kinsale is Coming to Audio!

Tuesday, December 11th, 2012

Romance audio enthusiasts have something splendid coming their way in 2013 – the ever so loved and admired Laura Kinsale. I’m not talking about our usual experience of seeing an audio release here and another there as we wonder about the timing of the next release and especially the chosen narrator. It’s much bigger than that.

How about seeing her entire backlist in 2013? That’s the plan – twelve extraordinary tales as only Laura Kinsale can deliver. And our wait won’t be all that long with five to six of those titles released around mid-year followed by the balance before year-end. As one of my favorite authors in print, I was thrilled with this news. After all, I’ve been wishing for Kinsale audios out loud for several years now.

We won’t need to wait anxiously for the choice of narrator either as Ms. Kinsale chose, with great care, one narrator for all of her titles – Nicholas Boulton. An accomplished British actor, you can explore his background over at IMBD as well as listen to sound bites at Audible. After listening to samples from A Battle Won and David Copperfield, I’m convinced his gorgeous sexy voice combined with obvious talent and excellent material will spell scrumptious listening!

You may recall that Laura Kinsale was chosen by our listeners as one of the Romance Author’s Backlist You Most Want to See in Audio in the 2012 Speaking of Audiobooks Favorite Romance Audiobooks Poll. How exciting to see another of our choices actually make the move to audio!

If Laura Kinsale is a new name to you, it’s a good time to check out her books in eBook format as Amazon currently has six of her titles priced at $2.99. If you are looking for a place to start, I recommend The Shadow and the Star, Flowers from the Storm or Uncertain Magic. Don’t expect anything ordinary – these are intricate stories packed with emotional depth and unusual characters.

Here’s a toast to all the Kinsale listening in our future!

– Lea Hensley

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Posted in audio books, Authors, Lea Hensley | 14 Comments »

Books With Buzz: My Kind of Christmas by Robyn Carr

Monday, October 15th, 2012

A new release by Robyn Carr is a fabulous reason to celebrate. When you add into the equation that her latest is a new Christmas release plus it features hunky Patrick Riordan, then it is triple the delight as far as I’m concerned. I had the opportunity to interview one of my favorite authors about her writing career, and her very successful Virgin River series. In addition to some great insights into Ms. Carr’s varied writing history, her publisher Harlequin MIRA is providing copies of Carr’s November 2012 release, My Kind of Christmas for some lucky winners. The details on that are listed at the end of the interview. But enough from me. Let’s get to the good stuff.

Leigh: I am very excited to have you here today, as I’ve been reading your books since the late 1990s. You have been writing a long time, first starting out with historicals like Chelynne published in 1980. Was it the change in the industry that made you switch from historicals to contemporary books or just your own internal voice?
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Posted in Books with Buzz, Interviews, Leigh AAR | 96 Comments »

Sequel-itis: Where Do You Stand?

Thursday, September 6th, 2012

regencyIn her recent review of A Lady by Midnight by Tessa Dare, Sarah of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, mentioned something that caught my attention.  A certain group of supporting characters who arrive in the heroine’s village, early in the novel, were seen by Sarah as being “a carriage full of sequel-bait…[not] so much individual as they are at times like an assembly of future characters and convenient plot devices.”  This jumped out at me, because I have felt this sentiment before, reading various books by various authors.

For me, the carriage full of characters in A Lady by Midnight worked, and I personally did not feel that they were sequel-bait.  (Incidentally, in a Goodreads chat to celebrate the book’s release, Dare mentioned that there are only two other planned stories in this series, a novella and a novel, neither of which will be about any of the carriage characters…  Although Dare did not rule out the possibility of revisiting one of the characters at a much later date.)  But I don’t mean this as a critique of either Sarah or Dare.  Rather, this is just a recent example of a phenomenon that I have been experiencing myself – the expectation of sequels.  In this case, I happened to read Sarah’s review just after reading Dare’s comment that she did not intend to write books for these new characters, and it got me thinking.

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Posted in Authors, Books, Characters, Elizabeth AAR, Heroes, Heroines, Relationships | 22 Comments »

Fall Non-Romance Preview

Wednesday, September 5th, 2012

j_k_rowling_casual_vacancyYeah, I read non-romance.  Not much, but I do.  That being said, with romance reading and review books, plus grad school coursework, I have to be really choosy with what I read.  At the same time, I’m determined to branch out from romance and YA, and I’m going to make it my goal to read at least one non-romance book each month.  Since fall is big publishing season, here are three non-romance books that caught my eye, in no particular order:

The Casual Vacancy, by J. K. Rowling

Her first book since Harry Potter.  There is no way this is not going to be a publishing phenomenon, and canny for her, she’s going into adult contemporary fiction.  It looks good though – satire and small town secrets, and all that – and I like the cover.

Sweet Tooth, by Ian McEwan

Ian McEwan does 1970s espionage and romance.  Needless to say, I doubt it’s going to end happily, but I’m really, really looking forward to this one.  Features an Oxford mathematician as a heroine, who gets recruited by MI-5 and falls in love with the guys she’s spying on.  It’s already out in Canada (although not until November in the States), and the reviews are fantastic.

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Posted in Authors, Book news, Books, Jean AAR, Publishing, Reading | 10 Comments »

Copyediting Boobos

Friday, August 24th, 2012

pencilThey can be of the hysterically funny variety or they can drive you nuts.  Yep, I’m talking about copyediting errors.

Poor Susan Andersen.  Earlier this year in the pages of her reprinted book Baby, I’m Yours, there was this doozy:

“He stiffened for a moment but then she felt his muscles loosen as he shitted on the ground.”

Ummm, that’s supposed to be shifted.

The author handled it very well, posting on Facebook and everywhere she could to reach out to readers and let them know about this unintentional error.  But, honestly, I had a good laugh – and, hopefully, the author did too.  Eventually.

More common are the sloppy errors that let you know that a book wasn’t copyedited at all or, on the other hand, was copyedited by an idiot.  Either way, it’s irritating as hell.

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Posted in Authors, Books, Books with Buzz, Characters, Reading, Sandy AAR, writing | 51 Comments »

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