Category: Romance Novels

bull riding, Cowboys, Romance Novels, writing romance

Classic Romance Tropes: the older brother’s best friend

I was thoroughly enjoying procrastinating my work to read this blog post on Confessions of a Romance Reader when it nudged me into finally writing a post of my own that I’ve been putting off doing. I’ve blogged about classic themes in romance before–the marriage of convenience, opposites attract, and enemies to lovers. But there are a few more themes I find myself turning to again and again in my own writing, and one is the older brother’s best friend and/or best friend’s little sister. You know the stories. The plots have been written and rewritten… Younger sister has a lifelong crush on her older brother’s best friend but he sees her as a kid. Younger sister of the hero’s best friend is suddenly all grown up, but she’s off limits out of respect for his friend so he fights his own attraction. The conflict is inherent in the plot and makes the story even juicier. I must like this trope a lot, because look how many of my stories employ a variation of it! Bucked (Studs in Spurs series)- Sage grows up with a crush on the neighbor boy who ends up dating her older sister before leaving home. Years […]

Romance Novels

Menage A-Z 2013 Reading Challenge

The Menage Readers group on Goodreads.com has a fun reading challenge. The details are HERE but in a nutshell readers are to read one new-to-them menage themed book for each letter of the alphabet before the end of the year. So, to help you all out, here are my books that will fit the menage or more requirement, some of them will fill a few hard to fill spots in your alphabet. B – Bucked (Studs in Spurs) E – Educating Ansley F- Fireworks (short story available in the free Cat Snips compilation) R – Rough Stock  – The Rookie (short story available in the free Cat Snips compilation) T – Texas Two-Step – Two For the Road (available July 2013 in The Cowboy’s Bed anthology) U – Unridden (Studs in Spurs) V – Valentine Cowboys

Cowboys, Romance Novels

Countdown to One Night with a Cowboy

42 days until the official release of ONE NIGHT WITH A COWBOY, and even though it’s been on preorder at Amazon and BN for a while, and the paperback ARCs (Advanced Review Copies) have been out for review for about a month now, and the digital ARC is going up on Netgalley any day, release day is still the most exciting time for an author. The launch of a new book in a new series with a new publisher is even more so. I’ve already shared an excerpt of the hero and heroine sneaking off to a hotel together, and the hilarity that ensues. You can read that here. I’ve shared the real life story behind the infamous fried bologna sandwich scene here. You can read a portion of that fun, sexy scene on my Facebook Page in the Exclusive Fan Zone. But One Night with a Cowboy didn’t end up to be all fun and sex. The hero is a cowboy, yes, but he’s also a soldier. My non-fiction research for the chapters that take place in Afghanistan took me to a very dark place, and because of that, some of the scenes are deadly serious. I think it’s […]