Kelly Jamieson's Blog, page 29

Hot Ride - out today!

My hot biker gang book, Hot Ride, is out today! To celebrate I'm going on a blog tour. I'm giving away a Kindle as a grand prize at the end, plus a couple of cool little motorcycle USBs with some books loaded on them, so I hope you'll check out some of my blog stops where I talk more about Hot Ride and my kickass heroine Sera and badass biker hero Ryan.


Here's where I'll be:



9/ 11 Caribbean Accent Book Reviews9/14 Sweet, Sexy, Scorching Blog Hop(12 Stops)9/16 Harlequin Book Blog 9/18 Book Whore9/20 Ms. Romantic Reads9/24 Book Obsessed Chicks9/26 Cari Quinn 9/27 The Autumn Review 9/29 Under The Covers9/30 Harlie’s Book Blog 10/1 Ana’s Attic

Now in print: ONE WICKED NIGHT

One Wicked Night is now available in print!



I think this book has to be my bestselling book every. And I've been so thrilled with reviews I've gotten for it, one of them this 5 STAR review from Long and Short Reviews: "The plot in this story was just as extraordinary as the characters. From the wedding of Tyler’s sister, to the romance between the main characters, to a family torn - the author really incorporated everything. It made this story a very easy read, which seemed to make time fly. I was so enthralled by the storyline I quickly found myself at the end of the story and still wanting more.

It has been a while since I have found a story to truly entrance me and for that, I have to rate this story a 5 and recommend it to anyone who enjoys a great romance novel with a little kink."
Also check out the author blurb on the front cover - if you can see it! Carly Phillips! Yay!
Buy it here:Amazon Barnes & NobleSamhain Publishing 
 

Guest blogger: Ann Grant

Please welcome Ann Grant to my blog, to talk about her new release, Saving Grace!

Hello and thanks for having me here!


While Kelly writes steamy romance, I write women's fiction. Saving Grace is a love story - but it's a love story between a husband and a wife as they are forced to face the problems in their marriage by a seemingly minor accident. There are also some pretty steamy scenes between Grace and Rob!

There's also a lot of humor in Saving Grace. Despite the serious topics, like chronic pain syndrome, anxiety disorders and marital breakdown, Grace is a funny woman (I think, lol!) As she goes through this journey she reflects on how she got to this point in her life, especially at the point where she seems to have lost everything - her husband, her kids, maybe her job. But Grace is a strong, smart woman, and comes to see how she's contributed to the disintegration of her life.

For those of us who are married and have been for a while, we know how that spark sometimes fades. How husbands and wives start to take each other for granted. How we don't show appreciation for each other, even though we still love each other. We take on roles in our marriage and sometimes those work really well, and sometimes they don't. And when one partner is feeling dissatisfied but keeps it all tightly contained inside, those feelings can come out in dangerous, destructive ways.

When Grace falls down the stairs on a typical busy morning trying to get her family out the door to school and work, her injuries are pretty bad. But everyone believes she'll get better quickly. She's young and healthy - why wouldn't she? But she doesn't get better and minor injuries turn into a  life-changing disorder called chronic pain syndrome. She descends into a downward spiral of doctor-shopping, addiction and denial. But she has a lot to fight for, and eventually she does. She fights for Rob and in the end, he fights for her too.

Have you ever been in a relationship where one or both of you started to take each other for granted? How did you deal with that? Leave a comment -to celebrate the release of Saving Grace, I'm giving away a copy and I'll draw the name of one commenter (please include your email addy if possible so I can contact you!).

Contest is open until Sunday August 26/12.


Here's a short excerpt from Saving Grace:
 
I nodded, his fingers still on my bare skin, sending little sparking shivers over me.He leaned forward slowly, and I closed my eyes as his mouth touched mine, so gentle and warm. I opened for him and kissed him back, a long, soft kiss full of questions and hesitant desire.His hand came back up to my face, holding me while we kissed, our mouths moving against each other. His tongue licked inside my mouth softly, and I touched my tongue to his. He gave a little groan and slid his hand around to the back of my head, into my hair, holding me tighter.I realized I was still holding my cup of coffee, and I pulled back and leaned over to set the cup on the table. I turned back to him, and again, our eyes met. I had a million wordless questions that I sought answers for in his eyes, but all I saw there were more questions.Then we were kissing again, deeper, hungrier, and he pulled me up against him. I gave a little gasp, of both pain and pleasure, and he lifted his mouth from mine.“Are you okay?”“God, no,” I gasped. I grabbed his neck and pulled his head back down to mine, seeking his mouth, almost crawling into his lap.He made a muffled sound and wrapped his arms around me, holding me close. It felt incredibly good to be held by him, so big and strong and warm. His heart thudded in his broad chest pressed against mine, and his hands trembled just a little as they moved over me.When his hand closed over my breast, I arched into it, aching and needy. We kissed more, mouths wet and sliding. He tasted faintly like coffee and smelled so good, like him, the sporty aftershave that he’d used forever. I moaned into his mouth, and his fingers tightened on my breast.My skin was hot and tight, my clothes constricting. I wanted to rip them off and rub my naked body against his. Then his hands slid beneath the T-shirt onto my bare skin and I quivered with pleasure. He slid his mouth from mine, down the side of my neck, and sucked a little. Oh, God.It was like we were back in college, making out on the couch, and it was so hot I was afraid we were going to melt the furniture. My head fell back to let him lick my throat, my whole body shivering with delight.I wanted to feel his skin, too, and I pulled at his shirt until I found the bottom of it and pushed it up. I slid my hands up over his chest, over the hard muscles and crisp hair there.“Ah, Christ, Grace,” he muttered, and he nipped my shoulder and made me jump. Then he moved back and grabbed hold of the hem of my shirt and pulled it up and over my head, leaving me sitting there in my bra.He eyed the new turquoise lace bra appreciatively. Well, it was no longer new, but he hadn’t seen it.“My panties match it,” I told him in a not very subtle invitation.He groaned. “Grace,” he said. “You’re so sexy.”And here I thought he’d been admiring my lingerie. My heart squeezed a little and softened. He pushed me down, gently, onto my back and leaned over me to undo the button of my jeans and tug down the zipper. I lifted my hips (now all those pelvic tilts paid off) to allow him to draw off my jeans.“Very nice,” he said.“The panties?” I clarified. His mouth curved up.“The panties too,” he said. “Very pretty.”“I still have a lump,” I whispered, suddenly self-conscious.“Huh? A lump?”“On my hip. It’s still not gone. It’s gross.”He examined my hip and rolled his eyes. “It’s barely noticeable,” he said. Then he bent and kissed it. “Does it hurt?”“No.”He pressed a kiss to the little lace panel that covered my curls. My fingers curled into fists at my sides. I was breathless, excited, dizzy. I yearned for him to touch me more there. It had been so, so long. I struggled to open my eyes to look at him. His face was tight, his eyes dark, his beautiful mouth open just slightly as he gazed down at my body.“I don’t know how I could have forgotten,” he said, his voice low and husky, “just how gorgeous and sexy you are.”

Ann's website
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Goodreads

Scorching Book Reviews BDSM Event

I'm excited to be part of the Scorching Book Reviews BDSM Event! Today's my day and I'm talking about my book Power Shift and the dominant hero who's very alpha, very successful in his career, experienced sexually and wealthy, who  instantly falls for  the sweet and innocent (well, less-experienced if not virginal) heroine...come see what I have to say! I'm giving away a copy of winner's choice of my three connected BDSM romances - Power Struggle, Taming Tara and Power Shift.

Giveaway! One Wicked Night

One Wicked Night comes out in print September 4, so I'm doing a giveaway at Goodreads - 4 copies are available!

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Goodreads Book Giveaway One Wicked Night by Kelly Jamieson Giveaway ends September 03, 2012.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter to win

News!

Okay we're all set to announce exciting news about a new series coming from Samhain Publishing!



From cakes2011We're not 100% sure of the series title yet, but it involves a wedding...sort of...that takes place in Promise Harbor, Massachusetts (Population 20,121). (And I still can't type Massachusetts without using Spellcheck.)

There are four connected stories:   JILTED (written by ME!) BOLTED (written by Meg Benjamin) BUSTED (written by Sydney Somers) and HITCHED (written by Erin Nicholas).

Release dates as always are tentative, but the plan is to release the books close together in March and April 2013! We're totally excited about this project, which has been in the works for longer than we probably want to even say, but 2012 was the year we all buckled down and did it. I for one, having read the other three books, can say I LOVE them all and this is gonna be great! Stay tuned for more details!

New favourite song...

Kiss You Inside Out by Hedley...

On the outskirts of Stressville going down Rant Lane

 

The last week or two, I've been watching a number of dramas unfold on the internet, dramas like soap opera from hell drama. It's entertaining but also makes me feel a little sick. It's also kind of fascinating. I'm curious about human nature and the personalities of people who like to stir up shit soup, and the people who then jump into them seemingly without any apparent knowledge of what's really going on. I'm curious about why some people don't see the bigger picture and can only focus on the miniscule issue that appears in front of them. And I'm curious about the level of judgement and hypocrisy that exists on the internet and how people who are so quick to lash out at others for doing certain things are completely blind to the fact that they're doing the same effing douchebag thing. 

It spirals and multiplies, from the initial "wrongdoing" and the first response to that, to someone attacking the responder which is repeated by someone else and someone else until it's a whole bunch of people behaving like “That unprofessional flaming shit-bird who did that really unprofessional shitbird thing and now it’s a stain on his career like a permanent skidmark that bled through his tighty-whities and onto his khaki shorts.” (as Chuck Wendig said so eloquently). As a social phenomenon it's kind of fascinating. Is it the anonymity of the internet that leads people to do this? Is it the fast pace of the information that flows online that makes people react so quickly to information that's not even true, without even checking the facts? Does it make people feel better about themselves to criticize others, perhaps because of some deep-rooted insecurity or lack of self-esteem?
I've seen things tweeted that were then completely twisted into something else, retweeted with outrage, which someone else sees and retweets with more outrage until a whole bunch of people are all angry shitbirds about something that never really happened.
I've seen people stir up conflict between two groups of people by tweeting things that are their own perception of something and not the reality, which other people then see and assume is reality and then respond with more outrage and indignation and turn it into an us vs them thing that never really existed except in one person's own mind. Or, again thanks to Chuck Wendig, they are “Fighting In The Trenches Of The Any Imaginary War” (sic).
I've seen authors tweeting awful things about other authors. An author who is wildly successful is mocked and scathingly criticized. Someone who promos too much is (in one author's opinion) "douchy". Could she be referring to me? I don't know. I don't think I promo too much, but I do retweet a compliment about my book or a good review. Am I douchy for doing that? I guess a lot of us might be. Thanks. Thanks a lot.
Stories about authors choosing to self-publish instead of going with the traditional publisher's deal, stories about authors "outing" a pirate who stole their book, stories about librarians concerned about how ARCs are given out at conferences — are tweeted about with vitriol, hatred and anger. Tweets are twisted to mean something else. People often don't name names. Is that better or worse? You can hide behind the fact that the person you're tweeting about may never see what you said. Or if they do, they'll wonder if you're talking about them or someone else. But often it's not hard to follow a trail and find out who it's about. Would someone say those things to someone's "face" i.e. an @ message saying those same things? Why would you tweet them "anonymously" then? Does it make people feel better about themselves, bigger and more important, to judge other people and call them names?
Oh wait, I actually haveseen people saying those things to someone's face, with @ messages on Twitter — and it looked like they were a shark going on the attack. But you know what? You wouldn't see that unless you happened to follow both those people.

And the "outing" of personal information about people - saw it happen twice in the last week, and once by someone who vociferously denounced someone else for doing that same thing.
Another us vs. them was started (okay, actually re-started as this has happened before) between reviewers and authors with the "a negative review is not bullying" meme that sprang up. A group of people started a blog about "bullying" on Goodreads. The group states they aren't even authors (I have no idea who they really are). They aren't  talking about negative reviews. They're talking about specific behaviours on a particular website (whether it's bullying or not is questionable, but I'm not going down that path here). But someone sees a tweet that says "a negative review is not bullying" and says "Hell yeah! That's true!" (because it is true, right?) and they retweet it, and that happens over and over until so many people have seen it and it gets all twisted and spun into "authors hate reviewers" and "authors are too sensitive and can't take criticism" and lots of angry, vicious tweets. Then people start reviving old stories about authors responding to negative reviews. One author even used the Twitter hashtag #morebadauthors to tweet about another author who'd responded to a negative review — six months ago! WTF? What purpose does that serve, dragging up old crap like that? It just propagates the whole conflict. Why? Do we really need to all hate each other? Do people just like the attention they get for doing this?
And then when someone reasonable steps in to ask why or to present a different viewpoint, I've seen people (including an author!) respond with rudeness and defensiveness and the comment "feel free to unfollow". Um. Nice.
People do bad things. People make mistakes. I live in sick fear of making some kind of mistake that someone will turn into a huge internet "scandal" that grows and grows until I'm so demoralized and humiliated I have to disappear. Nobody's perfect. I'm not a religious person, but that biblical passage "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" comes to mind. If you've never done anything wrong or made a mistake in your life (Really? Really?) feel free to attack and deride and denounce and ridicule someone online. But just know this — attacking and deriding and denouncing and ridiculing someone, to their face or even if you don't name them, makes you look kinda like a douchy douchebag unprofessional shitbird.

Hot Jocks in July Blog Hop

Welcome to the Hot Jocks Blog Tour! I'm giving away winner's choice of one of my "hockey books" - Breakaway, Faceoff, and One Man Advantage.



These books feature hot hockey player heroes - the Heller brothers, Jason, Tag, and Logan. They're connected stories that do stand alone, but if you haven't read them you might want to read them in order. You can find blurbs and excerpts and reviews of these books at my website.
I grew up watching hockey with my mom and my grandma (her mom) on television every Saturday night – Hockey Night in Canada. Strangely my dad wasn’t all that interested in hockey and used to nap on the couch during games. As a teenager, my first boyfriend played hockey and I used to go watch some of his games. He also liked to go to live games, and our local team was the Brandon Wheat Kings (yes, we lived on the prairies J). I remember sitting in the Keystone Centre watching the Wheat Kings while my boyfriend patiently explained what icing was, why they just gave a penalty and what made a play offside. I think I tried to be interested mostly because I wanted him to like me, but it somehow turned into a real love of the game!
When I started writing romance, I wanted to write a story with a hockey player hero, but hesitated because I kept hearing you shouldn’t write about heroes who are professional athletes. Athletes are big and muscular and strong. When they’re successful they’re confident, wealthy and famous. Are these heroic qualities?
Well, big muscles and a sexy smile are important for a romance hero, but qualities of determination, passion, loyalty, dedication, sacrifice and courage are important for heroes too. And don’t professional athletes have all those? 
What athlete romance heroes have you fallen in love with?

Sizzling Summer Reads

Yes it's the Sizzling Summer Reads Event at The Romance Reviews! Today I'm up with a Q&A for a chance to win! Go to the party site here to enter!