#NewRelease - KING STUD by Liv Rancourt @livrancourt

Blurb

Danielle’s got three months to make her Grandmother’s rundown Craftsman house livable. Her game plan is to get in, get grubby, and get back home to L.A. She needs a carpenter, and her best friend’s younger brother is a good one. It’s hard to ignore the buffed body under Ryan’s paint-splattered sweatshirts, but her friend declares he’s off-limits so Danielle reluctantly agrees.

Ryan doesn’t have the cleanest record, anyway. His recently ex-ed girlfriend wants him back, and he has a reputation for brawling. He’s also had a crush on Danielle since he was a kid. Despite their nine-year age difference, he knows she’s worth pursuing.

Soon the paint under Danielle’s fingernails starts feeling more natural than the L.A. sunshine. She’ll have to navigate plumbing disasters, money problems, and one seriously cranky best friend to find something she hasn’t had before: a real home, and a man who loves her.

Excerpt

“Right.” Ryan flipped the ice pack from one hand to the other. “Why’d your grandmother leave you the house?”

 “Because I’m cute.” She scraped back a stray hank of hair, her smile as blank as she could make it. Danielle suspected her grandmother had left her the house because it had always been her safe place, but Ryan didn’t need a rehash of her poor-little-rich-girl saga.

His eyes still held a question, but after a moment he nodded and stepped farther back. “Let’s get those boards.”

“Cool.”

They carried in the two-by-sixes, silence buffering their actions. Over the weekend, Ryan had widened the doorways on either end of the dining room, though the rough edges needed to be enclosed in trim. Once they carried in all the supplies, Ryan stroked the molding she’d sanded. “Nice work with these.” A half grin showed off his dimples. “This place is going to be sweet when we get it done.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” She went over to the kitchen sink, looking out over the old wooden porch to the Puget Sound. A single light moved across the blackness. “Was it hard to open up the doorways?”

“Just had to work around the king studs.”

I bet I could work around your king stud just fine. “The what?” Danielle broke out a super-plastic smile, hoping Ryan couldn’t guess what was on her mind. 

“The extra support beams framing the doors and windows.” He glanced at her, doing a quick double-take. “What?”

She dredged up willpower from some deep internal source, in need of every shred to keep pretending he was just a remodeling buddy. “Nothing.”

“The homeowner’s always right.” He chuckled and headed back into the living room. “If you’re happy with my work, next summer you can hire me to rebuild that nasty old porch out back.”

Danielle’s feet stuck as she got a sudden visual of Ryan, shirtless and sweaty, working in her backyard under the sun. By the time she could move again, he had his jacket on and was headed for the front door. 

“Well, thanks for dropping stuff off,” she said.

“Need more ice on my shoulder.” He paused with his hand on the doorframe, assessing her with that perfectly controlled heat, an expression way too grown up for only twenty-four. “I’ll swing by tomorrow and work on the trim.” 

Her fluttery response demonstrated all the maturity of a teenager.

“Oh, and while I’m thinking about it, Mom said to make sure you know you’re welcome to join us for Thanksgiving dinner,” he said.

Since she couldn’t hug Ryan, Danielle hugged herself. “Really? That’d be awesome.”

“Maeve didn’t mention it, did she?”

“No, but it’s not the night before.” She laughed, because Maeve had always sucked at planning things in advance. Her laugh made Ryan laugh, and then things were better.

Almost.

Buy Links

Amazon - Evernight Publishing - ARe - Barnes and Noble 

Bio

I write romance: m/f, m/m, and v/h, where the h is for human and the v is for vampire…or sometimes demon. I write funny. I don’t write angst. When I’m not writing I take care of tiny premature babies or teenagers, depending on whether I’m at home or at work. My husband is a soul of patience, my dog’s cuteness is legendary, and we share the homestead with three ferrets. Who steal things. Because they’re brats.

I can be found on-line at all hours of the day and night at my website & blog , on Facebook, or on Twitter. Come find me. We’ll have fun!

Cast of Characters - Part One

Let's talk characters. If you write fiction, characters are generally pretty integral to your story. You can't tell much of a story without them, right? What are you left with if you subtract characters from the story equation? A setting? Maybe weather? An overgrown castle?

A Wyoming winter is the setting for one of my books. Kind of boring without characters, huh?

Without characters, you got nada.

So when you sit down to write a story, probably one of the first things you come up with is who the story will be about. I know that's the case for me. Sometimes story ideas begin with a single character and a what if?

The first book I wrote was: what if I tried to write a paranormal romance like Twilight, but better, and with faeries? (I wrote the book, it hasn't sold yet. Thinking about indie-pubbing.)

I'll make copious notes to flesh out the story, adding and scratching out details as the plot takes shape. At this point, the characters are usually just amorphous ideas rather than having any shape of their own. Of course, sometimes I'm inspired to write a character based on a photo I've seen, or an actor portraying another role in a TV show or movie.

Which brings me to casting your books.


How many of you cast your books using photos of actors or models?

I'd guess a great many of you. I know I do. My Pinterest account is full of the results of those casting efforts.

Inspiration for character of Gwyn in Hero for Hire, our co-authored zombie apocalypse retelling of Snow White.

Some of those Pinterest pages contain only character pictures, but some are much more in depth and include clothing, setting, homes, food, etc from the story.

Sweet place to ride out the zombie apocalypse. I can just imagine all of L.A. in the background awash in zombie chaos.

Aside from the fun of ogling gorgeous actors and models (for hours, because it's important to find the one that's just right), I find that casting my novels helps me focus on the characters and understand them better.

I have no idea who this guy is, but he's the inspiration for my hero, Isaac, in Gambling on the Outlaw (to be released by Entangled in June 2015)

Again, no idea who she is, but she's the inspiration for my heroine, Beth, in Gambling on the Outlaw.

Human beings are very visual creatures, and we pay attention--and put a lot of value (right or wrong)--in what things look like, including people.

Kate Beckinsale is inspiration for my heroine, Lydia, in book two of my western romance series.

So it's helpful to have those faces and other story elements to look back at when I'm crushing my characters' fondest dreams, throwing obstacles between them, dashing their hopes...and then giving them a happy ending (because I mostly write romance, so after torturing them, I have to give them happiness).

David Gandy is inspiration for my hero, Emmett, in book two of the western romance series (can't you just imagine torturing that poor handsome man?)

The point of all this is that storytelling should be fun. Even if you do it for a living and it's how you earn your paycheck, you started doing it because you like telling stories, and you like telling stories about people. Those people have to look like something, and the internet and Pinterest have given us the glorious means by which to cast the characters in our stories.

I even managed to cast one of my cats (remember Rufus? I had another ginger tabby before him named Bamboo) in the paranormal fae romance. Bamboo is the heroine's pet and he's just as grumpy, taciturn, and philosophical (I imagine) as the original.

Bamboo: doesn't he just look like he wants to tell you to fuck off?

In part two of Cast of Characters, we'll talk about how important names are for your characters, once you have a face for them.

So tell me, do you cast your books? Do you have Pinterest pages loaded with characters, clothes, settings, food, and other bits of your stories? What do you think is the best part of casting your characters?

~Margaret

Writing Partners

This is what I woke up to this morning:

That's Rufus. He's my feline writing partner, not to be confused with Merissa, my human writing partner:

But I didn't wake up to her this morning, though we do chat just about daily. Unfortunately, she's not here with me to hold my hand every day when I write. She has a job and family and just doesn't have time to babysit me 24/7.

Sure, I have a family, and they're supportive, but they have jobs and school and extracurricular activities, and they can't sit by my side and pat me on the back when I'm frazzled, or listen to me whine because I've hit a wall, or stay up into the wee hours with me when I'm trying to meet a deadline or a writing goal. The novelty of mom being an author wore off a while ago.

Rufus, on the other hand, has nothing better to do. I figure it's the least he can do in exchange for food, water, a clean potty box, and a roof over his head. He's gotta be good for something, right?

This is his favorite way to help:

Clearly I can't reach the keyboard when he's hogging my lap like that. But he's sneaky. It looks like he's just getting in my way, but really he's calming me down, helping me focus, allowing me to pet him and rub his belly and talk to him in a voice suggestive of blithering idiocy requiring institutionalization. See the tolerant expression on his face? He loves me (He's very patient).

Recently, Rufus lost his brother-from-another-mother, Klitschko (named after the Ukranian boxing brothers), who passed after a battle with diabetes and dental infection. Here they are together:

So when Rufus starts doing the I'm-a-cat-so-I-knock-shit-off-everywhere routine, or wanders the house aimlessly, meowing like he's looking for his pal, or climbs on my lap and gets in the way of my writing, I cut him some slack. I figure, at least for now, he needs me as much as I need him.

I can't be the only writer who has a furry partner. Who's yours?

~Margaret

To Indie-Pub or not to Indie-Pub?

 

I don't know about you guys, but I'm usually working on several projects at once.  Right now books one and two of the historical romances are with my editor. While I'm waiting on those, I should be plotting book three, but I kind of need a breather from historical western.

I've been working on a contemporary romance, which I love because it's sassy and yet kind of a women's fiction crossover, which is surprising for me since I don't generally care for women's fiction. It's really nice to write about different issues without having to worry about being anachronistic. I can use current slang, my characters have cell phones and cars, and I don't have to research 19th century fashion just so my characters can get dressed.

But the first book I ever wrote was a paranormal romance. It's a different take on fae, and it has a special place in my heart. I adore the characters and the series arc, but as many of you know the paranormal market, at least in traditional publishing, has fizzled.  Sure, lots of readers still crave it, but agents aren't signing it anymore, and bigger publishers aren't buying it.

So what are we supposed to do with those stories? Stuff them in a drawer and hope the genre experiences a revival in a few years? Try selling it to a small publisher? Indie-pub?

I'm in the process of submitting to smaller publishers, but I'm really intrigued by the idea of indie publishing, specifically serialized indie publishing. What do you all think about serialized novels? Have you read any, or do you write them?

Unfortunately, I'm a complete newbie where indie pubbing is concerned and know absolutely nothing about it, not to mention the fact that I've got very little platform or following (yet), and I'm still working on branding. I assume all that would make it easier to sell indie published work.

Nonetheless, successful indie publishers had to start somewhere teaching themselves the process, so I suppose that's what I'll do, too.

For those of you who have indie published, what kind of advice do you have to offer?

~Margaret