Plot Monkeys

I’m taking a poll on my Facebook page, and if you all have a moment, if you’d click on the link and give me your input, I’d really appreciate it!  I’m asking readers what level of heat they prefer in their romance novels.  I’m contemplating writing a new series later this year, and I’m interested in seeing what readers prefer.  You can choose from SWEET (Kissing and handholding only), SENSUAL (Traditonal sex scens that focus on the intimacy between the couple), SCORCHER (Explicit sex scenes and language between hero and heroine), OFF THE CHARTS (Graphic and frequent sex scenes considered erotic and/or kinky).

GO HERE TO VOTE!

Once you’ve voted, come back here and let’s discuss what level of heat you prefer in your romance novels, and why.  Personally, I like SCORCHERS. 

The winner of this week’s $20 Gift Card is…
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#99, Carol!
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Carol, please drop me an email (julie @ julie leto . com) and let me know if you prefer Amazon or Barnes & Noble!

And now for the funny (apologies to those of you on Facebook who have seen this a gazillion times…)

THIS IS A TEST: If you see anything other than a sleeping puppy the internet has ruined you! ~robin (should you fail this test you must share with friends lol!)

Have a great day!

So, I’m judging RITA books, so I can’t tell you what I’m reading. But it’s very good, my second favorite of the bunch I have, though the books were in different categories, so they don’t really compare. Still, I’m hoping to finish it this weekend so I can get to the last two books…because I’ve heard that a certain very favorite author of mine is sending me an ARC of her upcoming historical romance and I want to be ready!

What about you? What are you reading?

And I know many of you are tired of hearing about it, but my sexy romantic suspense, DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS, may still be available for only .99! (I say may because I’ve already directed the publishers to up the price for a little while–it will go back on sale when the third book is written–but it takes a while for the sale price to go away and you might still be able to get a deal.) If you pair it with the sequel, DIRTY LITTLE LIES, which is selling for $3.99, you’ll get TWO complete, full-length novels of intrigue, sex, action, humor and romance for under $5! That’s a heck of a deal…tell your friends! (Yesterday’s post has the links at the bottom…and you can still enter the contest for the $20 gift card…winner chosen tomorrow!)

First, the winner from my Wednesday contest…

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That’s right! Caption #1, Silver James! (Man, you should be a writer…) Congratulations! Drop me an email and you’ll get $5 gift card with which to purchase books! (With all the .99 deals going on right now, you could get 5!!)

And for today’s contest…I’m burying under to try and knock out revisions…what are your weekend plans? Leave a comment for a chance to win a $20 Amazon or Barnes & Noble gift card!

Oh! Meant to mention that the price of my sexy romantic suspense, DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS, will be going up soon…but if you act quickly, you can still get it for .99 from Amazon or B&N. If you pair it with the sequel, DIRTY LITTLE LIES, you can get two books for under $5! Perfect for those who plan to read this weekend!

I spent Sunday morning writing up website updates. When I do, I go through every page to see if I can think of new things to add. While there, I came across my “Carly @ Work Section” and thought I’d share my work space with all of you!

So where do I work? I have an office right off my bedroom. A separate room from my room that isn’t on top of the husband or the kids and yet is right in the center of things. I’m always around when they need me and they come whenever they please. It’s a good thing I can write with distractions. Awhile back, I bought a recliner, an idea given to me by author Vicki Lewis Thompson, who suggested I use it as my place to write with my Alphasmart on my lap. Unfortunately I started to use it to nap, instead. But eventually it did become my work space and I gave up the desk top computer for a laptop – a Macbook Air – that I can’t live with out.

The coolest thing about my office? I can do whatever I want there. I used to have my covers and Alias posters up, but a few years ago I redid my office and went for a more adult look. Although I still have stuffed animals I won’t part with, and a section of Buddy’s old things. I think a home office should be a personal space and I love making it mine.

The recliner is cornered so Bailey loves to go behind it and sleep or store her toys where Brady can’t find them. He’s still looking for his own “spot” … but if you’ll notice, the table beside the chair is really the top of a dog crate. And of course, sometimes the dogs steal my seat. :)

Buddy on my chair

So what do you think? Is my writing space as exciting as you thought it would be?

So today is the last day for you to get my sexy romantic suspense, DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS, for only .99!

Here’s a link to Amazon for your Kindle.

Here’s a link to Barnes & Noble for your Nook.

I’m not exactly sure when the other places (Kobo, Apple iTunes, Sony, etc.) will change, but the distributor has already been alerted, so it could be any day now. Also, if you stop by my Facebook Author Page and scroll down, you can get a sneak peek at the cover for TALK DIRTY TO ME. I do not have a release date (still haven’t written it!) but the cover is done and it’s FABULOUS.

Now to the caption contest. How many of you go to LOLcats aka I Can Has Cheezeburger? It’s a site that started with adorable pictures of cats and people adding funny captions. When I was showing a picture of my cat to author Kristen Painter at the Kresley Cole signing, she declared that I had to submit it to LOLCats. I will, but I thought it would be fun to let you all get a crack at it first!

What do you think?

Best one gets a copy of a book from my backlist (or a $5 gift card from an online bookseller)…or you can just comment about how pretty my cat is. That’s okay, too. :-)

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY!!

Hope you’re all having a wonderfully romantic day with your sweetie…and if you don’t have a sweetie, be sure to show yourself a little love with some self-pampering!

Now, I’m wondering, have you gotten into the fairy tale frenzy on TV this season?

I was super excited as soon as I heard about One Upon A Time, the ABC show where fairy tale characters are living in our world because they’re under the spell of an evil queen. And the show has lived up to my expectations–and all the hype. Everybody I know who watches it absolutely loves it. Believe it or not, my favorite character is Mr. Gold–aka Rumpelstiltskein–and the Beauty and the Beast episode of Sunday night just cemented that for me. I’ve loved that actor since seeing The Fully Monty, and he brings such a sliver of sympathetic humanity to the villainous character. Unlike the mayor–the wicked queen, who I never like at all–Mr. Gold is fascinating in both his incarnations. Especially now that we know his backstory.

I really don’t like infidelity, so I’m having a harder time with Snow White’s (Mary Margaret’s) relationship with Prince Charming (David.) Even if they are under a spell. So that’s not totally doing it for me–I wish they’d have come up with some other conflict between them rather than him having a wife.

Beyond that, I love Henry and Emma’s relationship. Really like Ruby (Red Riding Hood) and can’t wait to see what happens with her story. I also really like Archie (Jiminy Cricket.)

Interestingly, if you’ve missed the first half of the season, you can actually already get it on DVD. They’re releasing a half-season dvd collection this week, I believe. I will definitely be grabbing it!

Now, while I’m on the subject of fairy-tale TV shows, I should mention Grim. Believe it or not, I expected to like that show better before the TV season started. But it just didn’t click with me. I watched it a few times but just never really liked it so I gave up. I think part of it was the actor playing the main character–just never totally bought him in the role.

Oh, speaking of Grimm…my prediction is that the new writer in town in Once Upon A Time–the guy with the typewriter in the suitcase–is going to have the last name Grimm or something along those lines!!

Now, just a reminder, if you really like fairy tales, don’t forget to check out my current Blaze novella, ONCE UPON A VALENTINE. In case you didn’t know, I have been writing sexy fairy tales for Blaze for a few years now. The stories are set in the magical land of Elatyria, “just a few degrees away from our reality here on earth” where fairy tales are real. I did Red Riding Hood, The Princess and the Pea, the Prince & the Pauper, and now, the newest story (and my favorite!) is Sleeping Beauty. The book is called ONCE UPON A VALENTINE! (Click on the title to order it on Amazon Kindle for just $2.99!…just in time for Valentine’s Day!)

In case you haven’t decided on that one, here’s another fun excerpt! Click below!

Carly Here - My Annual Fresh Fiction Valentine’s Day Blog is up today where I’m both talking and giving away … CHOCOLATE (sort of!) READ LESLIE’S EXCERPT BELOW – and then come back and CLICK HERE to read/enter!

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Back at the beginning of January I was working on finishing a manuscript, feeling pretty good because it was the last few hundred words and the end was in sight. I was having some fun on Twitter with my Twitter friends and about to Tweet “Yay! I finished the WIP!” and then I saw the mention from Janelle Denison—yes THE Janelle Denison, LOL—that she had read my book One Wicked Night and she loved it! Holy crap! I was all bouncing in my chair and only a few minutes later one of my Naughty Nine friends DMed me to say “Dude! Janelle Denison! Congrats!” My reply: “I know!!!” Well, as if that wasn’t exciting enough the next thing I knew Carly Phillips had added a Tweet saying that she too had read the book and loved it. THE Carly Phillips! Now I was really bouncing with excitement! My Naughty Nine friend again tweeted me, something like, “I think it’s safe to say your year is off to great start! Holy crap!”

So I was still bubbling with excitement when my daughter came downstairs, but she was all, “Uh-huh, okay, whatever.” No offence Janelle and Carly — it’s actually my writing career overall that is not exciting to my daughter. When I started writing a few years ago, all my kids cared about was that I was hogging the computer when they wanted to check Facebook. (Now we have 6 computers for a family of 4, so no more conflicts about Mom hogging the computer).The most reaction I ever got from them was when I showed them a particularly big royalty cheque.

Then Janelle asked me to guest blog here at The Plotmonkeys with her and Carly and two other authors I also hugely admire— Leslie Kelly and Julie Leto— OMG! Me!

So then I had to come up with some kind of stupendous, brilliant blog post for this amazing opportunity. No pressure at all.

Having failed to come up with some brilliant and compelling idea, I’ll just tell you a little about my books. The book that Janelle and Carly enjoyed, One Wicked Night, is a m/m/f ménage à trois romance. They commented that it was hot and emotional. Janelle said she likes character driven romance and liked how the m/m relationship wasn’t at all gratuitous. As an author, it is awesome when a reader connects with your book and “gets it”. Let me tell you, it is even MORE AWESOME when that reader is another author of the calibre of Janelle and Carly, whose books I’ve read and enjoyed for years.

I do like to write character driven stories that are hot and emotional. If I was going to describe my own writing, those are words I would use. (I also like to think there’s a little humour in there to, lest you think they are dark and depressing!) Another thing I really work hard for is a satisfying ending, to leave a reader feeling “ah, good” when it’s over.

Tomorrow, my next book Rule of Three is out, and I think the above describes it too. It’s another ménage à trois story, but the relationship between the three characters develops a lot differently than in One Wicked Night. One reason I enjoy writing ménage stories (besides the obvious: it’s HOT!) is the complexity of the relationship. Two people falling in love is complicated and emotionally risky; three people makes it even more so. Sometimes all three people end up in a committed relationship; sometimes they don’t. Sometimes all three have loving sexual feelings for each other; sometimes they only love one other person, but they “share”.

The idea for Rule of Three came to me from an advice column I read, where a guy was trying to figure out what to do about his best friend…who was in love with him. The man writing for help wasn’t gay—he already had a girlfriend—and he didn’t love his friend back like that, but he did care about him as a friend. I started thinking about how the other guy felt…how painful it is to love someone who cares about you only as a friend. Are there any more awful words to hear from the person you love than, “Let’s just be friends?”

That was where this story started from. What if the guy spent time with the friend he was in love with and his girlfriend, hiding his romantic feelings for his best friend? How difficult and painful would that be? What would happen when the truth came out? Is there any way this story could have a happy ending?

The journey these three characters take makes them all look deep inside themselves and figure out who they really are, a journey that I hope is hot and emotional and ends up in a place that is “ah, good” satisfying.

I’m giving away a copy of Rule of Three here — leave a comment for a chance to win, remember to include your email addy. I’ll pick the winner tomorrow, Valentine’s Day and release day!

RULE OF THREE is available at Amazon , B&N, Samhain Publishing

If you’d like to know more about me and my books, here’s where you can find me: Website, Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads.

Congratulations to:

Comment # 126 REGINA ROSS!

You’re the winner of a $20 g.c. to B&N or Amazon. Please drop me a line, author @ lesliekelly . com (without the spaces) so I can get your gift card ordered.

So it’s Saturday, time to talk about books you’ve been reading.

After reading (and seeing) The Woman In Black, I definitely needed a light, witty, fun, sexy palate cleanser, and I definitely found it with one of my favorite authors, Teresa Medeiros!

I’m fortunate enough to have met Teresa and she’s just as wonderful, warm and delightful in person as she is in her books. So I’m more than happy to recommend the book I read this week, YOURS UNTIL DAWN.

The book is about a British Naval hero, Gabriel, who comes home from the war scarred and blinded. He is miserable, furious at the world and impossible to be around. But that doesn’t stop nurse Samantha Wickersham from moving right in and making him realize he does have a life worth living again.

Witty, charming, heart-breakingly tender…just very highly recommended.

Now what about you? What have you been reading?