You know, after a book has been out for a year or so, you’re encouraged to move on. I’ve written quite a lot since my RT nominated Poisoned Kisses, but it’s still one of my favorites. So here’s an oldie but goodie:

He might think otherwise, but he couldn’t resist her. She was sure of it.

“A drink for the lady,” Marco said to the bartender.

“And what if I’m not a lady?” Kyra asked, with a provocative smile.

“That’s okay,” Marco murmured, his hand grasping the nape of her neck. “I don’t plan to be a gentleman tonight.”

About Poisoned Kisses

He can wear the face of anyone who has ever hurt him…

Buy Now | Add to Your Goodreads To Be Read Pile! | Excerpt

Update 12/27/2011: A Winner Has Been Chosen. This Giveaway is Closed.

I’ll be honest. I’ve been in a scrooge-esque mood lately. I haven’t wanted to enter anything, win anything, read any samples, click here, vote for this or that, promote anything, link to anything, comment on anything or even answer my email.

But if there’s a time of year to embrace the madness and get into the spirit of the season, this is it!

Now, I love that scene at the end of a Christmas Carol when Scrooge has seen the light and starts handing out gifts willy nilly. Consequently, I’ll be giving out a digital copy of my debut novel, Poisoned Kisses, a Greek mythology-inspired paranormal romance that received an RT nomination for best first series. (I can give it as a gift through Amazon or a Nook/Kobo compliant format through Kobo’s store.)

I’ll also give away a sneak preview, an Advanced Review Copy, of my forthcoming paranormal erotica, The Fever and the Fury (PDF)…which should really keep you warm on a cold winter’s night.

And what am I asking you to do to win this prize? An arm? Your first born? Must you recite the secret password? No. All you have to do is post in this thread that you want it and I’ll randomly choose one person to win. If you want to sign up for my very infrequent but often snarkilicious newsletter, that’s great, but you don’t have to. If you want to review my books (especially on Amazon or Goodreads) that’s even better!

But really, you don’t have to do anything.

That’s right, Tiny Tim, this is a free gift from me to you, no strings attached!

In Other News…

I happen to think that there’s no reason everyone in the country can’t own an e-reader at the rate that authors are dying to give them away. To that end, I’m happy to host Mistletoe Madness in which we’re giving away a Nook. (Entry form here)

Folks in this blog hop are giving away e-readers and other goodies galore. So have fun on the hop!

So, it started out like this. My mother decided to buy a Nook a few weeks ago. And then, after hearing me tell her about all the authors who give away free books or offer very reasonably priced novels, she couldn’t find any. Now, she’s not exactly technically savvy, so in complete frustration with her, I went onto the B&N site to look myself.

One thing that B&N does is try very hard to hide its cheap and free books. Try navigating around on your nook to find them. It’s a pain. It’s certainly not impossible and my mother should have been able to do it, but it does take a little effort.

This got me to thinking about the plethora of Amazon/Kindle sites out there devoted to promoting cheap kindle reads. They are huge promotional machines. I’ve seen indie authors shoot up onto the lists just because they were featured on a Pixel of Ink or Kindle Lovers or somesuch. But a quick google search for an equivalent Nook Book site I could send my mom to yielded…um…nothing.

Obviously, there’s a hole in the market, so I aim to fill it. Together with Eliza Knight, we’ve started a new Nook Lover’s site just in time for all those folks who are opening their Christmas presents and finding Nooks under the tree. Sites like these take a little time to build so we’re not charging anything for anyone to be featured there. In fact, if you are featured now, when the site is still tiny, we will feature you again when we’re booming, at no cost.

So do you guys have any feedback or advice to give? Anybody want to try it out?

Baklava is a flaky mediterranean desert comprised of butter, walnuts, phyllo dough, sugar, honey…and did I mention the butter? My mother makes a version that is so rich my mouth starts watering just thinking about it and since we’re heading into the holidays, I thought I’d share my thoughts on this desert with my readers.

Another reason I’m thinking about Baklava is because it’s the favorite sweet of my Arab-American hero in Dark Sins and Desert Sands, a paranormal romance novel about a modern day minotaur who intends to use his mind-control powers for revenge against those who have destroyed his life, but ends up falling for a modern-day sphinx instead. Here’s a little snippet from the book, then stay tuned for a delicious recipe!

“It’s sooo good,” Layla said, with a sensual moan. She literally writhed in the passenger seat, her elegant fingers flexing around her soda bottle with pleasure.

She’d been doing that with every bite of the cookie Ray had picked up for her in a convenience store and her enthusiasm was starting to turn him on. He glanced over in time to see her licking chocolate from her fingers in a way that made him twitch. She aroused him so easily, under any circumstance, without even trying. Maybe especially when she wasn’t trying.

For as long as he’d known her, she’d been a serious woman, but now she started laughing. It reminded him of how she’d sputtered with joy in the bathroom of that crappy little motel when she’d first touched him. The pleasure of the memory—of being touched in a way that didn’t bring pain—set him off-balance. “What’s so funny?”

“It’s just that I can’t believe I’ve gone two years without eating anything sweeter than a bran muffin!” Her laughter cut off suddenly, and she stammered, “Oh—oh, Ray. I’m sorry. Next to what you’ve been through…”

“Don’t do that,” he said. It’s true that he’d spent two years eating any slop they shoved through the slats of his prison cell, but she’d been in a kind of prison too. He was glad she was finally free of it.

“Don’t walk on eggshells like you pity me, Layla, or like you think I’m going to explode at any moment.”

“Okay,” she said, offering him a bite of the dessert as a peace offering. “Do you want some?”

“No, thanks. I’m not big on sweets unless it’s my mother’s baklava. The way she brushes the phyllo dough with butter and spices the nuts… My whole family goes crazy for it.”

Layla stared at him. “What’s it like to have a family?” It was an odd question, and his expression must have said so, because she explained, “When I didn’t have my memories, I always hoped that there was a family out there somewhere looking for me. Now I know that I don’t have parents. I don’t have siblings or children. Just Seth.”

“What’s it like having family?” Ray repeated, struggling for an answer. “It’s like asking someone what it’s like to have an arm or a leg. You can explain what it’s like to lose it, but you take it for granted when you have one.”

So let’s see if we can reproduce Ray’s childhood memory for our holiday tables!

Holiday Baklava

• 1 (16 ounce) package phyllo dough
• 1 pound chopped nuts
• 1 cup butter
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 cup water
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup honey

1. Preheat oven to 350. Butter bottoms and sides of a 9×13 inch pan.
2. Chop nuts and toss with cinnamon. Set aside. Unroll phyllo dough. Cut whole stack in half to fit pan. Cover phyllo with a dampened cloth to keep from drying out as you work. Place two sheets of dough in pan, butter thoroughly. Repeat until you have 8 sheets layered. Sprinkle 2 – 3 tablespoons of nut mixture on top. Top with two sheets of dough, butter, nuts, layering as you go. The top layer should be about 6 – 8 sheets deep.
3. Cut into diamond shapes. You may cut into 4 long rows the make diagonal cuts. Bake for about 50 minutes until baklava is golden and crisp.
4. While baklava is baking, boil sugar and water until sugar is dissolved. Add vanilla and honey. Simmer for about 20 minutes.
5. Take baklava from oven and drizzle sauce on it. Cool. It Freezes well.

To visit the other sites on the blog hop and get more delicious recipes, go here!