HISTORY WITH A SIDE OF ICE CREAM

                                 Ice Cream with a history lesson topping.   

The summer sun is pounding down. Heat is shimmering off asphalt that's so soft the tar sticks to the bottom of your shoes. Add four hot, sweaty, and cranky kids to the mix. 

What are the parents to do but toss them in the car and head to Dairy Queen. The other three kids in the back of the station wagon, and me in the front between Mom and Dad. I got the best spot, this coveted spot, away from the pointy elbows of my siblings because I got car sick. Wink. Wink. 

This is where we learned the fine art of dealing with brain freeze as we gobbling down ice cream before it melted into a sticky mess.

To keep the air circulating in the non-air conditioned car, Dad would drive us around town. There were two places we always wanted to see. One was 'The Castle' overlooking Shoal Creek

 and the other was Bonnie & Clyde's hideout. 

Though my parents were quite young (7 & 9) when the Barrow gang came to town, they certainly remembered hearing all about the ruckus. These ice cream and history afternoons began my fascination with Bonnie & Clyde

(I compiled the following from the Joplin Historical Pages and Wikipedia. Note: It is because of this bust that the famous picture of Bonnie smoking a cigar and wielding a rifle became public.) 
      

                  Bonnie Parker & Clyde Barrow Hideout in
                                               Joplin MO
 
In April of 1933 the infamous outlaw lovers, along with other gang members: Clyde's brother, Buck, his wife Blanche, and William Daniel Jones, rented an apartment over a garage in Joplin, MO. Their plan was to use the place as a hideout after a series of robberies in the area. 

It wasn't too long until their furtive behavior aroused suspicions in the neighborhood and the local police were called. The cops,  suspecting bootleggers had taken over the apartment, were surprised to find the Barrow gang. A shootout ensued with the Barrow gang narrowly escaping. They left Police Detective Harry McGinnis dead and Newton Country Constable Wes Harryman fatally wounded.

Because the gang fled in such a hurry, they left behind many personal items. Though a large arsenal of weapons was confiscated, a camera may have been the most important and significant find. After the film was developed and released, the public got their first, intimate look at the couple.

These pictures thrust the outlaws into  national focus and fame.

Bonnie reputedly hated the picture of her smoking a cigar and was offended when newspapers dubbed her a 'Cigar Smoking Gun Moll.' It is said she regretted the gag picture so much, she once requested a hostage inform the press she didn't smoke cigars. 

The apartment survived the massive tornado that destroyed much of Joplin in 2011. Though it has been well preserved it is not open to the public.

REMullins



Amazon:
IT'S A WONDERFUL UNDEAD LIFE


It's been a rough couple of years for Cailey Kantor. Facing her first Christmas alone and bad financial news, she prays for an angel to fix her problems. Instead, a sadistic, sociopathic vampire, with the goal of starting a vampire war, attacks her and forces her to drink blood stolen from the Nosferatu Gabriel Blautsauger.
Gabe must complete Cailey's turning or she will die. In doing so he risks losing his yet unfound soulmate. But something about the lovely mortal speaks to his heart. Once her transformation is complete, he and Cailey find themselves embroiled in a battle that could cost them all they hold dear.
Faced with lies, abduction, and betrayal Cailey wonders if the vampire she is falling fangs over heart for is in it for love or if she's just a means to stop a war.

VAMPIRE IN THE SCRYING GLASS   

Rafe Blautsauger, vampire and enforcer, must put his feelings for the mortal
Morgan Maquire aside. The Nosferatu council who employs Rafe strictly forbids
their love. But he can't stay away from the beautiful woman who causes his blood
to beat with new life.Yet, she hides a secret, one he must expose in order to
protect her.
                            
Morgan keeps her unique gift of magic under wraps due to a spell gone horribly
wrong when she was young.  She is haunted by a nightmare where two malevolent
glowing red eyes stalk her. Can she trust the arrogant but oh-so-handsome Rafe
with her secret as well as her heart? Can he help her regain her power in
time to save the world of the living and the undead?
A VAMPIRE TO BE RECKONED WITH

Vampire Metta Blautsauger is known as the family airhead and she works hard to keep up the façade. It’s the perfect cover as she goes from dispensing her own brand of justice as a vigilante to an agent for Orcus, the Nosferatu shadow agency.

Captured, tortured, and left for dead, she is forced to leave both the agency and Lucas O’Cuinn, the mentor she’s grown to love.

For the last century she’s struggled with regret and boredom. Then her life is given new meaning when four mortal ministers ask her help in stopping a human trafficking ring. If Orcus discovers her unsanctioned involvement, they will brand her as a rogue. The penalty is death. It’s only a matter of time before Lucas arrives—stake in hand.

Lucas O’Cuinn has waited ninety-eight years for Metta’s return and he’s run out of patience. It’s time she remembers she belongs to him.

Also may be purchased at The Wild Rose Press:
The Blautsaugers of Amber Heights Series 
IT'S A WONDERFUL UNDEAD LIFE
VAMPIRE IN THE SCRYING GLASS
A VAMPIRE TO BE RECKONED WITH

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Rebel Without A Genre By Donna Michaels

Yep, you guessed it. I’m the rebel.

In the writing world, branding is a huge way to get recognized and to gain a following. I should know. It happened to me without even trying. See, I write romaginative fiction, romance mixed with comedy, contemporary, suspense, sci-fi, fantasy, paranormal, adventure, time travel. I love to read variety and write variety. My books range from short to epic, sweet to very hot, and I’ve even written a story in first person. Variety. It is the spice in my writing life.

But something happened almost two years ago. The Wild Rose Press released my contribution to their Honky Tonk Hearts Series, COWBOY-SEXY.

Amazon offered Finn for free for four days. This was all new to all of us. I made up promo, and advertised on Facebook and all social media I could think of, plus I handed out cards to anyone locally who would take one. lol The gals at the annual Vampire Diaries Party ( or as I like to call it-VD Party) were given special promo and, bless them, they all promised to download my free book and tell a friend. 

It worked. I had thousands of downloads. Who knew cowboys were so hot?

I do now. Those thousands of free downloads somehow got the book into Amazon emails and I actually sold a good chunk. Good enough to generate a royalty check that could pay for more than lunch. Yeehaw! It also generated fan mail and readers wanting more. This got me thinking. Cowboys sell. I love cowboys. I have more cowboys. I’m going to turn those cowboys in to a series and see if that makes the readers happy. It did, and does. My Harland County Series is an Amazon Best Seller. With four books out so far, I have plans for four more, and I already have another cowboy series talking in my head.

But I told them to simmer down, especially since the contemporary military series I put on hold to wrangle those Harland cowboys was starting to chant really loud. I was getting antsy. Variety. I needed to mix things up or I knew I’d start twitching. Probably develop an eye tick, too. So my cowboy heroes and military heroes starting talking and negotiating. Here’s what they came up with:

They’re sharing custody of me. ☺

I get to write a Harland County spinoff series that ties the National Guardsmen from PA to my Texas cowboys. There will be characters crossing over from both series. In fact, the hero and heroine in cowboy book #3 will be getting married in the first book in the Citizen Soldier Series.

Brilliant. I’m happy. They’re happy. Now, I just hope my readers will be happy. The PA Guardsman aren’t exactly the quintessential cowboys, but they are outdoorsman. They own a resort in the Pocono mountains, so there’s hiking, fishing, boating, white-water rafting, skiing, horseback riding. Those men are no slackers. And they have great bodies to prove it. They may not wear cowboy boots, but they do wear boots. Combat boots. 

As you've probably guessed, even though I write several genres, I’m mostly known for my cowboys. But that’s okay. I love writing them. I’m just not going to write them exclusively. That’s the rebel in me. Guess you could say the rebel made me do it. J

So, if you see me at a convention you’ll find two boots on my table, but they don’t match. One is a cowboy boot and the other is a combat boot. Too bad they didn’t make a suspense boot, or a sci-fi boot, or a paranormal boot…

What are your thoughts on branding and writing? I’d love to hear your input. Especially since my first book in the new series isn’t out until next month. I’ve no idea if it’ll bomb, or if my readers will embrace the change and go with the flow. I sure hope so. I really don’t want to twitch. And that eye tick thing doesn’t sound very fun.

My fourth Harland County book, Her Forever Cowboy is up for Book of the Month over at SSLY!

If you've read Kevin's story and would like to vote, I'd sure appreciate it. Click HERE. Thank you! I'll love you forever and back!

 

Pssst! Speaking of conventions, I’m in New Orleans right now...TODAY, this very minute! at the Author Reader Con at the Marriott. If you’re in the neighborhood, I hope you’ll stop by for the book fair today, it’s 2pm-6pm. You can’t miss me. Just look for the boots!

 

Visit me anytime at www.donnamichaelsauthor.com 

HOT OR COLD? Phew! It Can Be So Confusing!

 

When it comes to sensuality ratings in books, the hot or cold designations have always confused me.

 I’ve read wonderfully sensual passages where the couple reached the bedroom door and then..well, the rest was left to the readers’ (often very fertile) imaginations.

And I’ve read scenes where the writer has tried so hard to be outrageously hot that the love scene reads more like a sex ed manual.

And then there’s the totally I’ll-write-erotic-or-die scenes where I’ve wound up giggling in amazement and thinking, gee, that would be physically impossible unless you were eight feet tall and built like an Orangutan.

And who but another Orangutan would find that kind of sexy description hot?

Yep, in my humble opinion, writing really hot and sexy scenes that make the reader all hot and bothered is an art form and is done well only by really exceptional writers who have a knack for it. These scenes are usually highly emotionally charged as well as very physically hot.

I write romantic suspense, so the sexy hot and the murderously hot have to balance. It's also a mistake to try to forcer oneself to write hot - at least, it never works for me. Possibly because when I get to a certain point where it’s obvious I’m trying too hard to get  erotic - I’ll read it to my DH and we both fall about laughing.

My books usually have a couple of sensual scenes in them, but also a lot of banter between the hero and heroine which is both funny and sexy. I’ve been amazed when a couple of reviewers have described my heroines as bitchy, when they’ve actually been showing irritation or standing up for themselves with an Alpha male who’d swamp them if they didn’t. I wonder if these reviewers think women should always be meek and submissive and hide their true feelings?

Still, I’ve always considered my books to be in the ‘mild’ rather than ‘hot’ category, and I’ve often wondered if I should make them hotter. I’ve been surprised when publishers have put them in the ‘sensual’ category. And even more so with reader response. Here’s a few of the reader comments I’ve got:

“Phew – that book is sooooo hot!” Reader fanning herself with said book.

“Gee, I didn’t know sex could be like that!” Uhmmm, wistful reader….

“I marked the sexy parts in yellow highlighter to read to my partner.” What could I say to that?

"Hey, if you ever want help with the research, you know where to find me." Yeah, and I know where to find your wife, as well.

And the all-time most embarrassing of all? “I just loved the sex in that book. Do you think your husband would give mine some tips?” Okay, my poor DH is still squirming from that one, spoken loudly at a party.

Going sort of off-topic: when I was a kid, I used to watch old war movies with my dad. (Yes, I was a Daddy’s Girl). One of them involved a battleship slowly sinking in the freezing cold Atlantic. The Captain talks to the crew about abandoning ship. “We can either wait and hope we get rescued before she blows up, or we can take to the life boats. Would you rather freeze or fry?”

Freeze or fry. Be cool or hot. It’s a question I’ve wrestled with ever since.

Maybe I’ll solve it in the next book.

I'd love to hear comments about how other people feel on the hot/cool/cold issue! To get an idea of how I'm coping with the 'heat', click here to read the first chapters of  some of my books. :-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why Do Heroines Never Eat? Tell Me Why for a Chance to Win A Pre-Pub Copy of Saving Maggie!

Glenys O'Connell @GlenysOConnell

This is something that has bothered me for a long time, so I'm reposting from an earlier blog. Tell me what you think - would you like to see better fed heroines?

I read a lot of ‘woman in jeopardy’ and romantic suspense novels, and it really bothers me how emaciated and malnourished those heroines must all be by the end of the book.

Now, maybe it’s just those few extra pounds on my rear, caused by too much computer time and too little exercise, so I could just be bitter about this, but have you ever noticed how little these usually over-active heroines ever eat?

It’s not unusual for them to have coffee for breakfast, be stalked, run off the road, shot at, sprint through miles of woodland, swim a lake, have wild sex with the hero, have a massive fight with the hero, rush home to run into the arms of a crazed kidnapper, be rescued or get themselves out of a scrape, and then remember that they’ve not eaten since coffee at breakfast the day before.

Yeah, really. I’d be chewing off my own foot, I’d be so hungry.

Lovely Food from My Daughter's
 Wedding Reception!

And what do they do then? Set up a good meal with all the foodgroups? No, it’s usually just another coffee and maybe a bit of unbuttered toast. And the coffee’s not a Tim Horton’s double-double – it’s almost always black.

How do they do it? Why do they do it?

Is it the wild sex that keeps them going? Or fear that interfers with normal digestive processes?

Sadly, I get really cranky if I miss a meal, so I guess I’m just not good heroine material. I’d be more likely to shoot the first person to annoy me, rather than solve the crime, save my skin, and bring everything to a happy ending.

So, what do you think? Should we start a campaign to provide a healthy breakfast and organic snacks for malnourished heroines?

Certainly, I’ve been reading some of the neat cozy detective series that are around, and a few more writers are making their heroines a bit more gastonomically realistic, so maybe there’s hope yet.
By way of protest, and to do my bit for starving heroines, I'm adding two yummy recipes to my upcoming release, Saving Maggie, from Crimson Romance. The recipes are for a chicken stir fry delux and some decadent byut healthy cookies. You just gotta see them!

Let me know what you think – should heroines have normal meals like the rest of us, or is starvation an important part of their diet? One lucky commenter will receive a pre-pub galley copy of Saving Maggie!


Glenys O’Connell admits to a love affair with food, and isn’t above a junk food meal when she’s pushed on deadline. Her heroines eat well, everything from home made macaroni tuna and cheese casserole in Judgement By Fire to an elegant three course meal at an expensive Dublin hotel, in Winters & Somers, while Maggie Kendall & Detective Josh Tyler make a wonderful chicken stir fry together in upcoming release Saving Maggie.(Crimson Romance, December 31, 2012)

MEN ARE FROM EARTH, WOMEN ARE FROM EARTH. DEAL WITH IT. George Carlin

Romance – what a huge word with more meanings than I can fit in one short blog. What romance is to you may depend on your age, sex, life experiences, imagination and probably even your I.Q., to name a few variables. No two people would totally agree. And the widest chasm will be between men and women.

Nobody will ever win the battle of the sexes. There's too much fraternizing with the enemy.-- Henry Kissinger

In our romance stories, heroes know all the right words to say. They’re strong, yet fragile and certainly in tune to foreplay. And I don’t mean the physical kind, although they’re over achievers there, too. True foreplay starts hours or weeks ahead of time and melts a woman at his feet. Women understand sex and romance are not necessarily synonymous.

I'm always looking for meaningful one night stands.

-- Dudley Moore

As we mature, our view of romance may not change but the gestures that send our hearts soaring may. Flowers gave me flutters as a girl; a single compliment warms me now.

An archeologist is the best husband any woman can have; the older she gets, the more interested he is in her.

-- Agatha Christie

So here’s to romance in all its many forms. Whatever the word means to you, whatever gesture sets the butterflies fluttering, whatever glance sends your heart soaring and whatever caress prickles your flesh with goose bumps – it’s all good.

Sex without love is an empty experience, but as empty experiences go, it's one of the best.

-- Woody Allen

Be sure to check out Brenda’s novel, Sleeping with the Lights On. At fifty, with two marriages behind her, Sandra’s still searching and discovering. And a handsome country crooner may help her with a stalker, a millionaire and a secret admirer.

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Contact Brenda:

brenda@brendawhiteside.com

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