Samhain Publishing

Hey everyone! Sorry for the late post. Afraid things ran crazy this weekend. I'm thrilled to talk about suspense and the paranormal in romance today. My historical Dark, Deadly Love came out in paperback this month. Dark, Deadly Love was created more than ten years ago and came out under the title Midnight Rose. I'm so happy Samhain was willing to take on this book under a new title. And that cover! Woot. I adore it. So what is different about Dark, Deadly Love? It's pretty dark.  Yeah, that's right. It's set during the Jack The Ripper murders of 1888. Never fear, it really is a romance, and no the hero is not Jack The Ripper. Why do I enjoy writing this kind of book? Well, let me give you some background.

I have to admit to fondness for the story that takes its time to scare the beejeebers out of me. Need an example? The Chain Saw Massacre might give a viewer bloody nightmares and thrills a minute, but Psycho (the original) has a building, creepy sense of fear that draws you in, keeps you hanging from the rope, strangling until the ending sets you free. I find myself liking Psycho more not only for the excellent acting, but the story approach.

As a kid, I loved to read, and given the opportunity, would much rather dive into a book than play outside with other kids. Loner, much? Yeah, and an introvert, too. My fondness for the written word extended into my own discovery that I wanted to create stories as much as I wished to read them. I’ve been writing since, like, forever. Okay, since I was fourteen. By that time I’d already read thriller/horror novels such as The Exorcist and Audrey Rose. My favorite reads even as a smaller child included scary books my mother would purchase every time the little Scolastic Book catalog came out. She didn’t have a problem with the books because she wanted me to read and scary books were my absolute favorites. Mom and Dad didn’t have a ton of money, but I always had plenty to read. I also loved spooky movies and soaked them up like crazy. Yeah, I’ll admit they gave me bad dreams. Yet I came back for more.

Okay, back to the more grown up reads like The Exorcist and Audrey Rose. They scared me spitless, and I loved them. I wanted more. As a teen, when the hormones started to blossom, I adored gothic novels and at that time they were in their heyday. Remember those book covers that screamed gothic? The mansion or atmospheric castle in the background with the young woman running away, her virginal white nightgown or dress flowing behind her as she escapes the unknown terror.  Mom and I would go to trade bookstores and I’d find a ton of gothics, contemporary romances and historical romances. Read, read, read. I still have some of those old books—I don’t want to part with them. One quality of novels at that time was that it took longer to “get to the point.” Perhaps this is why I wasn’t phased when I read archaic and scary as hell Edgar Allan Poe. The suspense was drawn out to a tight, almost unbearable unfolding of minute clues, horrible hints, and exciting drama. And as one of my English friends might say, “I bloody well miss it.”

The trend in the last twenty years with horror and romance novels has lead away from slowly revealed horrors and revelations to slam-blam-thank-you-ma’am. Don’t get me wrong. I can enjoy novels with extremely fast paces. Plus, I love thriller movies that grab you be the throat and dare you to hang on. An example would be Speed with Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. But what wonderful thing to experience a slower, more deliciously layered work that promises as much as it reveals until the climax gives you satisfaction that lasts far beyond the last page. One of my favorite spooky movies of all time, the 1962 version of The Haunting, is the epitome of taking its time to scare you until the hair really is standing up on the back of your neck. A recent, absolutely chilling movie that is one of the scariest I’ve seen in a long time is The Descent. If you like movies that are terrifying and yet smart and well acted, The Descent is for you. It also takes its time to build the tension, the characters, and the horror that awaits around almost every corner.

Back to writing and books.

So what does an author do when they discover they’re much better at writing the slowly unfolding suspense/horror than they are the fast-paced, in your face, slasher flick style approach.

In my case, I believe my best novels are the ones that aren’t quite so fast in their approach. For me this means historical novels. I think one of my scariest books (even though it is historical romance) is Dark, Deadly Love.

So what type of suspense do you prefer? In your face and get on with it? Or long and drawn out until your nails are dragging over the blackboard?

For an excerpt of Dark, Deadly Love, be sure to check it out here at Samhain or at my website www.deniseagnew.com where you can find more of my novels and excerpt. Plus, sign up for my newsletter and you'll be entered to win my monthly contest.
 

Hello everyone! Thanks for taking the time to stop by and say hello. I’ve got an excerpt for you today of Marshall’s Law, which is out in print now at Samhain. This book is a combination of humor, romance and suspense. I’d like to know what you enjoy most about the combination of romance and suspense, so comment below.
***
If Dana Cummings was inclined to list the best ways to meet men, having one arrest her for burglary—during a tornado, no less—wouldn’t be in the top ten. Dating isn’t high on her agenda, period. She’s sworn to never again fall for know-it-all men with fiery gazes and devastating smiles.

Besides, she’s only in Wyoming to help her eccentric aunt find out if horny ghosts really do haunt the family bed. And hopefully bust a hellacious case of writer’s block. Extracurricular activity with a gruff, hunky lawman is off limits, even if he does fire her libido.

Witnessing too much of life’s seedy side led Brennan Marshall to live by three simple rules: work hard, play hard, and never fall for a sweet-faced female with a witty tongue and snappy comebacks. Especially the ones with a dollop of vulnerability—like Dana. But their razor-sharp sexual tension cuts right through his defenses and leads them on a dangerous journey.

One that will test the limits of their beliefs—and could cost their lives.

**
It took a couple of breaths, then the boy coughed. Marshall turned him on his side as the boy struggled for air. Just then the ambulance arrived, sirens blaring. Three paramedics rushed to the boy and took over. Marshall stood, winced and moved away from the group while the mother huddled near her son.

“He’ll be all right, Brenda,” Marshall said, talking to the forty-something woman.

She seemed to come out of her shock and put her arms around his waist. The woman looked tiny against Marshall’s sheltering arms. Marshall patted her back and crooned a few words of comfort. Dana watched the drama and realized she felt more than relief at the boy’s recovery. She admired this man’s bravery. He’d never hesitated, not one second, to put his own life in danger to save the boy.

Once Tommy and the two women left in the ambulance, Marshall walked back to where Dana stood.

“You all right?” she asked as he reached her. She smiled. “You’re soaked again.”

“Yeah.” To her surprise another one of those wide smiles creased his face, then disappeared as he winced. Concern pushed her to grasp his arm. A powerful bicep moved under her fingers, warm and hard. Startled by the pleasure she experienced touching him, she let go.

“Are you sure you’re not the one who should go to the hospital?” she asked.

“No.” He rotated his arms and shoulders about the size of Mount Rushmore rippled and flexed. “Guess I’ll have to hit the tub tonight to get the kinks out.”

An image of him slipping into the tub naked dashed into her imagination and almost short-circuited her brain. Her cheeks flushed. Holy moly. Now there’s a thought. “But that log hit you.”

“It wasn’t that big.” He slipped his boots on, then picked up his holster and retrieved his flannel shirt.

A chill breeze raced through the trees, scenting the area with moisture and pine. “Maybe you should put a dry shirt on. Get out of that wet T-shirt.”

The moment the words came out, she wanted to bite her tongue clear through. Before she could retract the statement, he stopped next to the SUV and flung his flannel shirt into the back seat.

Throwing her a glance that burned right through her, he stripped off the T-shirt and tossed it in the back seat. In one glance he conveyed cocky sureness with something that looked like…nah…couldn’t be. Yep, there it was. Flirtatiousness and frankness. Her jaw dropped for a second, then she clamped her mouth shut.

“Hop in the car,” he said.

Just before she moved around to the passenger side of the car, she saw amazing muscles. Hard, carved arms. The kind of brute force that spoke of working the land rather than using a weight set. A generous amount of dark hair sprinkled around his pectorals and down his flat stomach.

“Heaven help me,” she said.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Okay. So he’s got a great bod. Big deal.

One hundred percent satisfied with that assessment, she sat back in her seat and tried not to wonder when he’d become heroic, intriguing and too mouth-watering for his own good.

Marshall Street, named after Brennan’s great grandfather, had flooded almost up to the middle of the tires on the SUV. As Marshall eased the vehicle back into the minimal traffic on Main Street, he gave his temporary companion a thorough look-see through stealthy glances.
Marshall had never met a more irritating woman than Dana Cummings. Well, okay, maybe two other women. But he didn’t have time or inclination to think about them right now.

Dana Sue Cummings according to her New Mexico driver’s license. Somehow, he knew if he started calling her Dana Sue, she’d hit him with that enormous, black leather fanny pack she’d strapped to her waist.

On second thought, Dana’s jump-straight-into-the-fire attitude reminded him of Tabitha. Tabitha, the precocious nine-year-old daughter of his friend, Eric Dawes, almost drove Marshall nuts with her antics.

No, the craziness he felt around Dana came from a different source. He was highly annoyed with himself for feeling so attracted to a woman he’d just met.

The woman had infuriating written in every inch of her carrot top, shoulder-length hair, wispy bangs and hazel eyes. It didn’t help that she possessed a killer body in a five-foot six-inch frame. He allowed a quick glance at her jean-clad form. Yeah, she might not be model beautiful, but that suited him fine.

Marshall had had it with bone-thin women with all the personalities of a cucumber. This woman possessed curves in places a woman should have curves. From the first moment he’d been close enough to smell her delicate, fresh perfume, he’d found her irksome. Irksome and driving me straight out of my ever lovin’ mind. A tight sensation centered in his gut.

Marshall slammed back the attraction. He couldn’t let down either his guard or open his heart. Besides, his heart had disappeared long ago.

As the Grand Cherokee dipped into a huge puddle of water, his cab companion grabbed at the dashboard like a lifeline. He glanced at her disheveled state and worried look. Worried about what? The storm? Did she believe that he still considered her a breaking and entering suspect? Her license and other identification indicated no known priors or outstanding warrants. She hadn’t tried to escape.

Yeah, Marshall. She just tried to argue you to death.

He understood her worry about her aunt, but he had a hunch Lucille was fine, and there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for why she hadn’t been at the house.

Marshall thought back to the strange things that had been happening at Lucille’s house and wondered about the woman next to him. Deep inside, he didn’t want to believe this doe-eyed, quick-tongued woman could be part of a plan to drive Lucille insane and away from her house.

When he’d first seen Dana Cummings trying to get into Lucille’s house, he’d thought she had to be the prettiest burglar he’d ever seen. The tornado took away other thoughts when the siren had blasted a warning. Run now. Wonder later.

When she’d lain in the tub, and he knew she’d fainted, he’d seen everything about her in a heartbeat. He’d seen a little mole just under her right ear, high on her neck. Her nose had a small scar over the bridge, like a permanent line from glasses. Eyes that snapped with curiosity, fear, and anger in less than a minute had added a weird charm he’d never encountered in a woman. Uh-huh. Now he knew he’d lost it. Maybe he’d lost a brain cell or two when his favorite baseball cap had been sucked away by the wind.

Now that really pisses me off. Tabitha had given it to him last year for his birthday.

As he headed for the sheriff’s department, he savored the unscathed area around them. “Doesn’t look like the tornado touched down here.”

Dana glanced over at him. “Where to next?”

He shifted his hands on the steering wheel and the SUV rolled to a stop at a traffic signal. “We’re going to the sheriff’s office first. It’s either that or the hospital.”

Dana straightened like someone had rammed a stick up her spine. “What kind of hospital? Are you having me committed?”
Marshall fought the urge to laugh. “Don’t tempt me.”
**
Please stop by my website for more at www.deniseagnew.com

A Writer’s Journey: Life Of A Panster

Rules? How many of you believe there are rules you must follow when writing a novel? How many of you are new writers? How long have you been writing?

*New writers often think there is a wrong way and a right way to write books. They eagerly join writing groups and devour how-to books with the idea that a gold answer on “how to write a book” will be dropped in their lap. There’s nothing wrong with this. Wanting to learn something new guarantees you’ll be curious enough to ask plenty of questions.

*In the process of learning, writers hear two words tossed around frequently. Panster and plotter. There are plenty of pros and cons for both types of approaches to writing a novel. Contrary to what a writer may hear, there is absolutely nothing wrong with writing either way.

*What becomes a problem is when an author tries to jam a square peg into a round hole and allows someone to tell them they should be a panster or a plotter. This doesn’t mean new writers shouldn’t learn craft. It means they have to take care that they are not writing according to so many strict rules there is no creativity left in the writing process.

Plotter vs. Panster

How many of you have heard of panster and plotter before you came here today?

What is your definition of each of these words?

*A plotter needs structure when they write. They often need charts, diagrams and outlines to feel comfortable. Many times they need to understanding what the beginning, middle, and end of the book before they start writing. Not knowing things ahead of time can create significant anxiety for the writer who is a plotter.

How many of you believe you might be a plotter? Do you do any of these things during your process and what are they?

*A panster needs varying degrees of freedom.

*A panster may have a title or an overarching idea for a book based on a time period, a concept, or an individual character. They may know one or two of these ideas up front. Or they may start with a single scene that intrigues them. They will rarely know the end of their book. (I only did this one time with one book…where I knew the ending.) Panster’s may have basic ideas about who their characters are.

*Most of the time outlining their books beforehand damages their ability to write. Writing a synopsis of their book beforehand can destroy the muse and create writer’s block.

How many of you think you are a panster? Why?

*Many authors discover they work best combining these two ways of doing things. It’s even possible an author may be a plotter for one book and a panster for another if it feels right.

The Controversy

*There is nothing wrong with either way of writing if it gets the job done. I have run into plotters who think panster writers waste time. They honestly can’t understand how not outlining or plotting up front can prove productive. Whole books have been written on if you “only do it this way, your book will be easier to write.” Well, it might. And it might not. No one ever said writing a book was easy. If it was, everyone would be doing it.

*In Anne Lamott’s BIRD BY BIRD, Anne describes the problem many pansters encounter if they try and force themselves into being a plotter when it isn’t natural for them, “Characters should not, conversely, serve as pawns for some plot you’ve dreamed up…I say don’t worry about plot. Worry about the characters. Let what they say or do reveal who they are and be involved in their lives, and keep asking yourself, ‘Now what happens?’…Your characters had something in mind all along that was brighter and much more meaningful than what you wanted to impose on them.” This is generally how I write a book.

Writer’s Journey

My journey as a writer has shown me that what is often true for one writer will not always work for another. Writing a book is wonderful, elating, fascinating, intriguing, frustrating, sometimes tedious process. With all those adjectives is a state of mind that most of us long for but find less than we would want: flow.

Writing In Flow

*Personal Definition of Flow: A sublime state of being unaware of your surroundings, steeped in ecstasy, contentment, a sense of well-being and rightness. A natural high when the entire universe seems to surge through your fingertips and onto the page. This state doesn’t materialize for most authors on an everyday basis, although it can be coaxed to emerge. What does all this have to do with the difference between a panster and a plotter?

*Recognize what type of author you are and honor that. If you are a new author, chances are you’ve started out as a panster. This doesn’t mean that you will stay that way. It may mean you decide later on that plotting, outlining, and diagramming everything from the get go is what you need to write the best book possible. If, however, you try to do all these things and find it gives you “creative constipation” where you can’t write a thing, chances are you are not a plotter. I decided some time ago that while I am mostly a panster, I am a bit of a plotter as well.

*For example, when I write a historical I start off by interviewing the hero and heroine. I ask them questions, write down their answers. This helps me to get inside their heads. If there is a bad guy, I question him as well. I also write down what my hero and heroine look like, their mode of dress, what they like too eat, etc. (I also do this with contemporary novels). I will often read a few books dealing with that time period or around the historical event in my book. This gives me ideas about some plot points I may want to put in my book, and I write these ideas down on notebook paper as they come to me. I also do some research before I start writing. However, I do not use researching relentlessly as an excuse not to start writing the book. I soak my head long enough to absorb the information into my bones. In that sense, I guess you could call me a plotter.

*When I write a contemporary novel I still sometimes soak my head in information before I start the book. A good example of that is my firefighter novel, COMBUSTION. I want to be accurate, so I made sure I had all firefighter resources I needed to keep my facts straight. With my SWAT series, HEART OF JUSTICE, I made sure I did the same by taping into police sources. This shouldn’t be mistaken as outlining a novel in my case.

*In conclusion, stay true to your writing dreams and don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t make this journey as a plotter, pantster, or a combination of both.

My question today is all about authors and promotion. I’d like your opinion, as much to appease my curiosity as anything. Authors are crazy creatures. We’re fruitlessly looking, pretty much all the time, for ways to catch a reader’s attention. I say fruitlessly because in some ways whether we catch a reader’s attention or not can sometimes be out of our control. The best thing we can do is attempt to write the greatest book possible, and then word of mouth can often do more to sell a book than anything else. So tell me…what types of promotion grab your attention?

Easy to navigate website?
Promo items such as pens, business cards, key chains, cover flats?
Email newsletters?
Printed newsletters?
Blogs on an author’s website?
A blog on a site like The Bradford Bunch?
Book trailers?
Reviews on a review site?
Reviews posted on an author’s site?
Other things I haven’t thought about? If so, please list them.

And here’s a last question…how does an author’s public persona (in person or on line) effect whether you buy their books or not? If so, how?

Post and you may win a download from my backlist! I’ll select one winner at the end of the day.

Until next time, I hope everyone is having a great New Year.

I’ve read a few suspense and paranormal novels that talked the talk but didn’t walk the walk. Why? They lacked passion, the true emotional heaviness which guarantees the reader becomes caught up in atmosphere and the inherent feeling of dread. Does a novel have to be blood and guts to scare you? It can, but it doesn’t have to in every case. Subtle layers of tension can also create a world as transfixing, as terrifying as blood splatter and rolling heads.

Before you craft your next romantic suspense or paranormal romance, take a look at some of the authors who have created truly chilling stories outside the romance genre. These authors can often teach you what it takes to draw the reader into your novel and keep them there. Among those writers who can teach female romantic suspense authors a thing or two are male suspense authors.

Who writes better suspense or paranormal oriented novels? Men or women? Neither. The next statement might sound a little sexiest, but it is something I’ve observed reading novels written by men and those by women. Men often know how to dig deeper for the emotions and situations that frighten us on the deepest level. Is it because men are just testosterone-riddled creatures with a taste for blood? For some, perhaps. Women, as a rule, seem to read fewer books of a thriller nature then men. I won’t analyze that to death-that is another article.

Stereotypically, women are better than men at expressing emotions. In truth, many great male authors can create heart-tugging emotions on paper. How many women do you know that can scare the beejeebers out of you with their writing and engage you in satisfying emotion?

If you’re a female author wanting to create top-notch romantic suspense, mainstream suspense, or horror, you must dig deep for emotions that frighten you. An inability to bring fear to the spine-tingling words in your book will doom your story. How do I know? I’ve done it myself. I love writing romantic suspense and paranormal novels. Excavating fear, loathing, panic, terror, apprehension and any other number of feelings is genuinely hard work. Investing gut-wrenching emotion into a piece can exhaust a writer mentally and emotionally. The mind knows the difference between reality and fantasy, but perhaps not as readily as we imagine. Authors who are willing to dig the deepest into the emotional well will have the greatest results creating stories readers will never be able to forget.

Just last week I blogged about my print release, INTIMATE ALLIANCE, but in case you missed that blog, I’ll chat with you a bit more about the whole idea behind the series, the HOT ZONE and where it started. Plus, INTIMATE ALLIANCE comes out at a perfect time for me because the first story within this book, MALE CALL, just won the Passionate Plume Award for best erotic romance novella for 2007. WHOOHOOO!

What is a hot zone exactly? No, I’m not talking about global warming, a great day spent on a tropical beach, or a heavy duty survival reality show where you’re stuck for weeks on end with hunky men who can make a raft out of palm trees and sunscreen out of an exotic combination of plant and herb. I’m talking about four novellas that lead you into hot and sexy heroes who are in the military or have been in the military.

When MALE CALL CAME out in May 2007, I didn’t have a notion of writing anything in a connected story or series. Bang! One day an idea just came to me. After writing the first story about an Army reservist overseas in Iraq falling in love with his pen pal back home, I knew I had to write more stories about men who experienced wartime and the women they would love. In the second story, UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER, I used the theme of old friends coming back together after twenty years and renewing not only their friendship but discovering a simmering romance and danger.

These two stories are what make up INTIMATE ALLIANCE.

The third story is PRIVATE MANEUVERS! Both the heroine, Marisa Clyde, and the hero, Jake Sullivan, showed up at the end of UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER and screamed for their own story. How could I refuse? Marisa wants nothing to do with the soldier who is acting as a temporary bouncer in her uncle’s tavern. Stoic and over six feet of smoldering masculinity, the hunk helped rescue her during a tour gone bad in Mexico. During those few short moments after she first met him, the tension between them screamed off the charts. A devastating hurt in the past blocks her willingness to surrender to him. If she can wait him out now, he’ll only be in town a month and then he’s out of her life. Jake watches Marisa like a hawk, well aware his need to protect is messing with his mind and making him care for Marisa way more than he should. Priding himself on clinical detachment in the game between man and woman, he figures once he’s slept with her, she’ll be out of his system for good. But that’s before he experiences her on a deeper level and learns she just might be in danger again.

In the fourth story called CLOSE QUARTERS, all hell breaks loose and sometimes you just need someone to cover you. Neena Williamson struggles to keep her high-pressure job from overwhelming her, and she thinks the demons of her past have long since disappeared. One night, she sees a man wearing the most hideous Hawaiian shirt on earth and vows he’d never fit her image of a hot bod for a local charity’s new hot male calendar. Then the evening erupts in violence, and he proves that first impressions can be dead wrong. Mitch Gilroy hides in plain sight, enjoying his low-key handyman job. His former life isn’t open for discussion, and Clarksville, Wyoming is the perfect place to find peace. Then a gunman forces his hand, and Mitch must remember everything he’s tried so hard to forget. Thrown together, Neena and Mitch quickly discover how tangled their emotions can become, and only by working together can they banish the monsters that haunt them and heal a lifetime of regrets.

With these novellas I tried to convey a sense of homecoming and what that can mean to someone who has survived a dangerous situation. Plus, I wanted the character’s pasts to catch up with them in some way, to have them stretch and grow and discover it is possible to find love even when you least expect it.

What types of stories make your blood race? Do you like stories set in dangerous situations, or do you prefer the more mundane and often more realistic home fire settings? Stay tuned to my web page at www.deniseagnew.com and www.myspace.com/deniseagnew for all my news!

Hey everyone. Are you the type of reader who enjoys hot military men? I mean in your fiction novels…unless you enjoy hot military men in your real life, too. (AHEM.)

I’m happy to blog today about my print edition of the first two novellas in my HOT ZONE series here at Samhain Publishing. INTIMATE ALLIANCE comes out August 26, though you can already preorder it at places like Amazon.com.

When I wrote MALE CALL, the first story in my HOT ZONE series, I didn’t intend to keep writing novellas set in a fictional town in Wyoming where military men return home. MALE CALL features the grown relationship between two people that start off friends and find their friendship is so much more. Her sexy letters are his only life line in the HOT ZONE. Eve Carmichael fears for soldier Sean O’Callahan’s life. And oh, how she longs for more of his flirtatious, hot letters. When Sean is wounded, her fears are realized. But fate serves up a wonderful gift that neither of them expected.

After that story, the germination of an idea for another story formed into UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER, the second story in the HOT ZONE series. She’s archaeology, he’s Special Ops, and both of them teeter on the edge of the HOT ZONE. Fredricka Bodine returns for her high school reunion and can’t forget the high school prom where she shared a revealing dance with Keith Wallace. Keith doesn’t want her to travel to a hot zone he feels isn’t safe, and the place where his sister was killed years ago. As they grapple with exploding passion between them, their battle of wills may just lead them to the truth living in both their hearts. You can read excerpts on these stories and all my work at www.deniseagnew.com

Generally I enjoy creating long novels. In the HOT ZONE series I felt a need to write stories that were less complicated and short captures of characters lives, their struggles, the things that make their lives meaningful, the loves they encounter through a struggle. I wanted to write novellas that were slice of life and sometimes they included a little adventure and danger and certainly a lot of romance.

If you’ve read MALE CALL and UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER, I hope you’ll want a print copy. Plus, I hope you’ll read PRIVATE MANEUVERS and CLOSE QUARTERS, the last two stories in this series. In celebration of the release of INTIMATE ALLIANCE, I have a contest up at my website this September that I hope you’ll take advantage of. Stop by September 1 at www.deniseagnew.com and see what it’s all about! Stop by my My Space page at www.myspace.com/deniseagnew and enjoy the cool song Darlin’ Denise by Val Emmich. I was tickled pink when he stopped by my My Space page and told me I could use his song for my page. How neat is that?

Until next time, live, love and dream.

By The Seat Of Your Pants

Humans are strange creatures. Very strange. Think about it. We say we don’t like real life danger, yet we spend time in front of the television watching Most Shocking or Most Daring (I do), or we thrill to the danger in an Indiana Jones movie or the psychological scare of Disturbia (love that movie.) Some of us take it a step further and actually sign up for the white-knuckle experience of skydiving, base-jumping, rock climbing, or white water rafting. Truth is that most of us want the excitement to be vicarious. Take me. When I was a little kid, I was a girly girl. On the playground, I would say to the kid hanging on the monkey bars, “You’re gonna fall off that.” What happened? The kid would fall off. I felt vindicated.

It wasn’t until about ’85, when I joined my local archaeological society, that I started to have relatively safe adventures, and I loved it. About the worst it could get would be heat exhaustion, sunburn and tangling with rattlesnakes. One scene in The Mummy Returns parallels my archaeological life. Remember the scene where Evie discovers a snake crawling across her boot? That really did happen to me. I looked down and there was this small dark snake crawling over my boot and my automatic reaction was the same as Evie’s. I simply swung my foot and flipped the snake away. For a minute I thought maybe I’d imagined it, and probably no one would have believed me if they hadn’t seen me do it. Heck, now that I live in the desert Southwest (I was in Colorado when I had the boot slinging snake experience), I have seen more snakes, poisonous and otherwise, than I want to see. Still, the archaeology continued to be awesome in Colorado and was awesome when I found a new group in the Southwest.

Other than that, I can’t say I’ve had too much adventure other than what I read, watch on the big screen, or create in my books. I’ve always thought the saying “by the seat of your pants” described as much about our daily lives than it did unusual circumstances. With pressures from work, social commitments, family, and cell phones, we can rest assured our blood pressure is high enough. Luckily for me, I don’t have much pressure in that respect, and I’m grateful.

One adventure I’ll never forget, though, came when my hubby and I ventured to Edinburgh, Scotland (we lived in England at the time) in the 90’s. We wanted to see New Year’s Eve celebrations (called Hogamany). Now we’re not that fond of big crowds of any type, so we should have realized that 250,000 people in a small space would prove overwhelming. We had a few hours to wander around in the city in the central area including the Royal Mile. That was great except for the cold and the hoards of roaming drunks. Don’t get me wrong. Scottish drunks seem to have less a propensity for outright skirmishes and violence than if you put American drunks in the same situation. Go figure. After the beautiful fireworks display presented from the top of Edinburgh Castle (still the best fireworks I’ve seen to date), we headed down the hill. We’d linked arms securely because of the huge crush of people. We quickly discovered that wouldn’t do the trick. The throng pushed in on all sides but it threatened to separate us. My hubby wrapped his arms around me from behind and held tight as he sort of maneuvered us like a big spider through the crowd. Basically he feared losing me in the mess of people, and I feared loosing him. We could have met up back at the tour bus, but it still would have been intimidating to say the least.

I did have another adventure in Edinburgh the night BEFORE this all happened, but I figure that is for another blog. In the meantime, you can stop by and find out more about the adventures of my characters in the HOT ZONE at www.deniseagnew.com. Plus, stop by and see the DANGER ZONE authors at www.dangerzoneauthors.com. We’d love to see you there.

Military Heroes in CLOSE QUARTERS

I know many of you enjoy Alpha heroes that are still Beta enough to cradle a baby and yet tough enough to protect a woman. In my HOT ZONE series at Samhain Publishing www.samhainpublishing.com, I wanted to introduce these heroes in “slice-of-life” stories set in a small Wyoming town. So far the response has been outstanding, and the next installment is CLOSE QUARTERS (released today). How did I get the idea for this story? Well, I was hanging around one day doing dishes by hand (boring). I saw in my imagination a man dressed in a Hawaiian shirt with horrible colors that was way too big for him. I saw him sitting in a diner being covertly observed by a woman. The woman thinks his Hawaiian shirt is ugly. A few moments later, her hasty impression of him is altered forever when the coffee shop is robbed.

Here’s a blurb and excerpt to give you a small taste of CLOSE QUARTERS:

Neena Williamson is positive the man who just walked into her favorite café is all wrong for the local charity’s new hot male calendar. For starters, he’s wearing the most butt-ugly Hawaiian shirt on the face of the earth. He doesn’t fit anyone’s image of a smokin’ hardbody, even if her friend insists he’s perfect for Mr. December. When a gunman robs the café, Mr. December proves that underneath his bad taste in clothes, he knows how to bring it. Clarksville, Wyoming is the perfect place for Mitch Gilroy to hide in plain sight. He enjoys his low-key handyman job, and no one pries into his former life. But in an instant, Mitch is forced to remember everything he’s tried so hard to forget. Thrown together by sudden violence, Neena and Mitch quickly discover how tangled their emotions can become. And the only way to banish the monsters that haunt them is to do the one thing they fear most. Become vulnerable—to each other.

• *
  She registered the heat and hardness of his body. Her breasts mashed to his chest, his hips and thighs pressed along hers. Close up, his face held the chiseled hardness of an old west movie hero, without anything fancy to pretty him up. A cut jaw, a nose slightly on the big side. Only his mouth was sculpted, lips just right on a man—not too big, not too thin. He felt so warm, so protective…

He released her and walked toward the door. He tried the knob. When it didn’t budge, he slammed one palm against it. He tried kicking it down, but the door wouldn’t budge. She realized the room was a huge pantry with shelves on three sides. No way out.

Handyman tried budging the door one more time to no avail. “Damn it!”

That’s when true fear slammed her. Like it or not, she was trapped in a locked room with a total stranger. Tears gathered in her eyes and spilled over her eyelids before she could stop them. Handyman turned toward her, striding across the room until he cupped her shoulders.

“Hey, it’s going to be all right.”

She nodded and buried her face in her hands. “I know. I just…”

Tears spilled, and a sob escaped her.

“Hey, hey. Easy.” He gathered her close once more, and she found her hands buried in his big shirt again. As tears spilled from her and she gulped and sobbed, she tried to regain control. Embarrassment sliced her with cruel fingers. His touch slipped through her hair, gently massaging her neck.

“It’s all right. He’s gone.” Velvet and husky, his voice held safety and comfort.
Poor fashion sense or not, his voice was to die for.

So was the body pressed along hers. She felt muscles. Lots and lots of glorious muscles. Or maybe the fear had destroyed her reasoning ability and she wanted the man holding her to play the hero. Right now, with a tenderness that put her off guard, he fit the lead part in her adventure movie down to a capital T.

Only difference is, he hadn’t whipped out a gun and gone Kung Fu on the bad guy’s ass. Which in reality made perfect sense. If Handyman had played knight on a white horse, they’d be dead. She shivered and then did another stupid thing. She slid her arms around his waist and held on. Yeah, he has a trim waist, too. Hmmm…

“When that jerk pointed his gun in your face, I thought he was going to kill you right in front of me,” she whispered through a sob.

“So did I.”

His voice rumbled deeply, so matter-of-fact she couldn’t believe how distant he sounded. His arms tightened around her in a gentle squeeze, the only sign that he felt anything about his near miss with death.

“You had a gun pointed at your head, and here I am babbling like an idiot.” She gulped back another sob.

“So did you, remember? You were looking right down the barrel for a long time.”

Right. She had. Her tears started to dry, and the fright calmed somewhat. She forced herself to pull back out of his arms. “God, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go all girly like that.”

“It’s okay. What just happened scared me, too.”

A man who’d admit his fear. Interesting. His expression might show no fear and his voice gave no indication of the trauma he’d faced. Yet he could speak the words.
Neena became aware of a shift in perception. Not a smidgen of change, but a whopping ugly belief that she’d altered in the last few minutes. That the world had undergone a drastic, nasty transformation. She’d never believed in a rosy world, but this one had sharp thorns. She held her hands in front of her. They shook. A heat wave and then a cold flash washed over her in relentless strokes. Her stomach curled. Shaking, she put her back against the one wall minus shelving and slid downward until she plopped on the floor. Cold and hard, the landing felt brutal against her ass. Incongruously she noticed a run in the right calf of her thigh-high stockings. A jagged, gaping slit that might have been there before the robber came into the coffee shop, or maybe happened sometime in between. Who knew? Who cared? For a second she gave a damn. A really big damn. Then she took a shaky breath. She was acting like an immature, shallow twit. She’d buy more. Ten pairs more if she survived her stay in this stupid pantry. Then she wanted to smack the robber across the face with her purse for the inconvenience.

Hope you liked that snippet and that you enjoy finding out what secrets this “Handyman” hero has hidden in his past.

As an aside, I hope you stop over at DANGER ZONE AUTHORS www.dangerzoneauthors.com when you get the chance. Danger Zone authors is comprised of several novelists who write novels with danger, suspense and action/adventure. Some of write romance, some not, but all of us love writing about the DANGER ZONE. If you stop by our website you can also sign up for our new readers group. Hope to see you there!

Tell me what you like about romantic suspense and action adventure novels, and if you like military heroes, why? What makes you hot for the military man?

No, I’m not talking about global warming, a great day spent on a tropical beach, or a heavy duty survival reality show where you’re stuck for weeks on end with hunky men who can make a raft out of palm trees and sunscreen out of an exotic combination of plant and herb. I’m talking about my series at Samhain Publishing.

My first story with Samhain Publishing was released in May 2007 and is called MALE CALL. At that time I didn’t have a notion of writing anything in a connected story or series. Bang! One day an idea just came to me. After writing the first story about an Army reservist overseas in Iraq falling in love with his pen pal back home, I knew I had to write about more men who experienced wartime and the women they would love. So, the HOT ZONE series was launched, and I haven’t looked back. In the second story, UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER, I used the theme of old friends coming back together after twenty years and renewing not only their friendship but discovering a simmering romance and danger.

Both MALE CALL and UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER will be packaged together in a print edition in late August 2008 called INTIMATE ALLIANCE and you can already preorder it at Amazon.

Today PRIVATE MANEUVERS is available! Both the heroine, Marisa Clyde, and the hero, Jake Sullivan, showed up at the end of UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER and screamed for their own book. How could I refuse? Marisa wants nothing to do with the soldier who is acting as a temporary bouncer in her uncle’s tavern. Stoic and over six feet of smoldering masculinity, the hunk helped rescue her during a tour gone bad in Mexico. During those few short moments after she first met him, the tension between them screamed off the charts. A devastating hurt in the past blocks her willingness to surrender to him. If she can wait him out now, he’ll only be in town a month and then he’s out of her life. Jake watches Marisa like a hawk, well aware his need to protect is messing with his mind and making him care for Marisa way more than he should. Priding himself on clinical detachment in the game between man and woman, he figures once he’s slept with her, she’ll be out of his system for good. But that’s before he experiences her on a deeper level and learns she just might be in danger again.

With these novellas I tried to convey a sense of homecoming and what that can mean to someone who has survived a dangerous situation. Plus, I wanted the character’s pasts to catch up with them in some way, to have them stretch and grow and discover it is possible to find love even when you least expect it.

What types of stories make your blood race? Do you like stories set in dangerous situations, or do you prefer the more mundane and often more realistic home fire settings? Stay tuned to my web page at www.deniseagnew.com and www.myspace.com/deniseagnew for all the news on this series and my other series and stand alone novels.