Laurel O'Donnell's Blog, page 80
November 29, 2012
5 Stars for Angel’s Assassin!
My Devotional Thoughts has given Angel’s Assassin 5 of 5 stars! Read the review – http://www.mydevotionalthoughts.com/2012/11/abg-reads-angels-assassin-by-laurel.html
“This is the quintessential historical romance–practically perfect in every way.”
“This was crafted in such an amazing way, and I think most romantics would love it”
“This author is absolutely amazing.”
Made my day! 
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 27, 2012
Review of Angel’s Assassin! 4 Stars!
My Cozie Corner gave Angel’s Assassin 4 stars! Drop by and read the review.
http://coziecorner.blogspot.com/2012/11/angels-assassin-by-laurel-odonnell-book.html
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 25, 2012
Inspirational Quote Monday! #44 of 2012
It’s Inspirational Quote Monday! Here’s the quote for the week – “You may not always end up where you thought you were going, but you’ll always end up where you were meant to be…” – Unknown
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 22, 2012
First Kiss Friday – Sass Meets Class by Jill Hughey
Today’s First Kiss Friday featured guest is Jill Hughey, author of sweet romance Sass Meets Class. Welcome Jill! Here’s the first kiss between Susan Mellott and Alexander Dorcester.
In Jill Hughey’s sweet romance, Sass Meets Class, an English aristocrat finds himself unexpectedly drawn to a simple American girl in 1880s Arizona Territory. Despite their growing affection, he decides to stick to his plan to return to England. Susan is broken-hearted and angry, and is not afraid to tell him so.
“Hang your chivalry!” Susan shouted in his face. “Hang it until it turns purple and its eyes bulge out. Chivalry and all your other rules are just an excuse, an excuse to treat women like they can’t think for themselves, like they can’t sort out their own feelings and see the truth. I see the truth.” Susan scrambled to her feet to tower over him. “You want me. You said it in your oh-so-uppity way and you meant it. You meant it from here.” She poked her chest. “You’ve never said you want Furnivall with a spark in your eyes like when you look at me. I’ll bet you never sat around the dinner table there and laughed as hard as you did when Pa told us about meeting up with that skunk. How can you choose a life centered on what you should do instead of what makes you come alive?”
He leaped to his feet too. “That you make me feel vital and invincible is irrelevant. I cannot have you.”
She stepped forward to stand toe-to-toe with him. “I am telling you that you can. But you aren’t choosing me. The only salve I’ll have on my soul is that when you are married to a woman as cold and flat-faced as your marble floors then you’ll know it is because you didn’t believe enough in either of us to choose me.” A fierce wind blew down the valley. Her hair streamed around her face, battering them both with whipping strands.
He grabbed it harshly, collecting the locks and wrapping the rope around his hand until her head tilted back on her neck. “Curse this hair.” His eyes fixed on her mouth. “Curse it.” He covered her lips with his own, the wet heat clinging and taunting until she clutched his shirt to keep standing. He slid his free hand to the small of her back, pulling her tight against him. She couldn’t breathe, she didn’t want to breathe, she had to breathe as her heart threatened to burst from her chest. This was a life-changing event! Here and now, he’d finally accepted the two of them as they should be. Together.
When he pulled away, his eyes seared into hers. But then, slowly, in a nightmare from which she could not awaken, they frosted to ice blue, flat, frozen and harder than she’d ever seen them, harder than any stone floor could ever be. “Goodbye, Susan,” he said as he turned resolutely away, leaving her alone at the cypress tree.
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 18, 2012
Inspirational Quote Monday! #43 of 2012
It’s Inspirational Quote Monday! Here’s the quote for the week – “The family is the corner stone of our society. More than any other force it shapes the attitude, the hopes, the ambitions, and the values of the child. And when the family collapses it is the children that are usually damaged. When it happens on a massive scale the community itself is crippled. So, unless we work to strengthen the family, to create conditions under which most parents will stay together, all the rest – schools, playgrounds, and public assitance, and private concern – will never be enough.” – Lyndon Baines Johnson
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 15, 2012
First Kiss Friday – Battle-Born Love by Lynda Bailey
Today’s First Kiss Friday featured guest is Lynda Bailey, author of contemporary romance Battle-Born Love. Welcome Lynda! Here’s the first kiss between Rory Dawson and Kane Williams.
Here’s the blurb and set-up for the First Kiss of Battle-Born Love; available through Amazon.com.
Spirited repo owner, Rory Dawson, agrees to be what she isn’t in order to save her father from a prison sentence. Now Pop is safe, but is her heart?
Handsome banker, Kane Williams, has made a deal with a most provocative devil in hopes of securing a coveted promotion. All his life Kane has endeavored to be the best, to erase the failure of his father. Will years of work be forfeited for a woman, albeit the sexiest one he’s ever known?
From opposite sides of the tracks, Rory and Kane forge an unlikely friendship. Soon, that friendship becomes a steamy relationship. Through trial and pain, they battle to have the love of a lifetime.
After turning down Kane’s proposal to be his “girlfriend” in exchange for Pop’s bail money and failing to get Kane to kiss her—twice—Rory corners him after work one evening. Her intent is to put her repo business up as collateral for a personal loan from Kane. But he still insists she be his “girlfriend.” She agrees, on one condition…
Silence swelled in the car, seeming to gobble up the oxygen. Sweat beaded on her lip and it wasn’t from the heater working overtime.
Kane cleared his throat. “So, now do we have a deal?”
Still studying the traffic pattern on the street, she asked, “You sure you won’t take my business as collateral?”
“I’m sure.”
“When will I get the money for Pop’s bail?”
“I’ll have a certified check to you first thing in the morning.”
“Will we sign a contract?”
“I don’t think that’ll be necessary.”
At that, she turned to him. “You’re gonna loan me ten grand without a contract? Aren’t you worried I’ll rip you off?”
“Is that how you normally do business?”
Her shoulders stiffened. “Of course not.”
He shrugged with a boyish grin that rippled through her stomach. “Okay, then.” He extended his hand. “Is it a deal?”
She drew in a sigh. “Yeah. On one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“I want you to kiss me.”
In the bluish dashboard lights, she watched his eyes bug out. “You want me to kiss you? Why?”
“Because I want to know if we’re compatible.”
He shifted in his seat. “We don’t have to be compatible. This isn’t a real relationship.”
“But I have to be all goo-goo eyed over you, right? How can I do that if I don’t know what it’s like to kiss you?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t expect you to be goo-goo eyed over me.”
His protest might have sounded convincing if his voice didn’t carry the rough edge of desire. She leaned across the center console. “What’s the matter?” she goaded. “Afraid?”
A muscle jumped in his cheek. “No.”
She moved in as close as she could, given the bucket seats. The clean scent of aftershave surrounded her. After working all day, Kane still smelled like he’d just stepped from a shower. She placed a hand on his leg and he jerked. She bit back a grin. “Then prove it.”
A growl rumbled in his chest. Baiting this guy probably wasn’t a good idea, but she wanted to crack his perfect, I’m-in control-of-everything exterior. She wanted a reaction from him.
She leaned closer, her hand smoothing down his muscled leg. She came to within a hair’s breadth of his mouth, and waited.
With each passing second, the hard plastic of the seatbelt receptor dug deeper into her hip and her confidence waned. When it became humiliatingly clear he had no intention of kissing her, she rolled a shoulder in hopes of appearing nonchalant. “Suit yourself.” She settled back into the passenger seat. “Coward.”
An irate snarl resounded in the small interior, shrinking it further. In the next instant, Kane hauled her across the console and into an embrace of banded steel. He crushed his mouth to hers, plunging his tongue forward. The ferocity of his kiss stunned her, but she recovered fast.
She snaked her arms around his neck and thrust her tongue into his mouth in a battle for dominance. A groan rumbled in his chest and against her breasts. His stubble abraded her skin as he curled his hand around to hold her head immobile so he could deepen the kiss.
Tentacles of heat lashed through Rory’s belly at the fierce mating of their mouths. Her nipples beaded to stiff, aching points. Liquid fire flowed through her veins.
This was not what she had expected, this animalistic, uncultivated reaction. She’d wanted a reaction from him and she got one. In spades.
As quickly as the storm started, Kane ended it. He wrenched away from her, his gasps for air mixing with hers. Draped across his lap, she rested her forehead against his chin and worked to steady her erratic pulse. By inches, his tight embrace loosened. He eased her back into the passenger seat and she pulled shaky fingers through her hair.
He coughed. “Guess I proved it.”
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 11, 2012
Inspirational Quote Monday! #42 of 2012
It’s Inspirational Quote Monday! Here’s the quote for the week – “We do not quit playing because we grow old, we grow old because we quit playing.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 8, 2012
First Kiss Friday – Broken Identity by Sarah Jae Foster
Today’s First Kiss Friday featured guest is Sarah Jae Foster, author of inspirational romance Broken Identity. Welcome Sarah Jae! Here’s the first kiss between Mona and Brian.
He was such a man of faith. Her fervent hope was that he never lost it, as she had. Living without a relationship with God, even temporarily, had been a nightmare and she’d not wish that on anyone, especially Brian. It was a place she never imagined herself to be in and yet, here she was. Absurdly, she felt it within her power to ruin him as a man, to take that faith away, and that was something she just wouldn’t risk.
With Bible and notes in one hand, jacket draped over the other, she watched him walk toward her and the children, whose heads were down in math problems and science projects, oblivious to their father leaving for the night. Such routine it was on a Tuesday.
She waited for the perfunctory kiss she knew was going to be placed on her cheek and offered it in his direction. “I love you, Mona.”
She’d always melted when Brian said her name and to his advantage, he knew it. So on occasion when he’d say it, she was aware that all of his attentions were on her, the woman he loved. The love she felt transfer in that moment warmed her from toes to heart, she caressed the five o’clock shadow bristling his face. “I love you, too.” A pang of guilt went off in her chest.
She decided to walk him to the door and stood. “Kids, say good-bye.”
Ben’s focus remained on the dead beetle carcasses in his lab dish but Zoey raised her head enough to catch her daddy’s eye and mumbled. “Bye.”
Brian laughed, shrugged his shoulders and flashed a mischievous grin. He swung his wife behind the hat rack cloaked with fall coats and murmured into her neck, “I’ll be looking forward to coming home to you tonight, Mona Leigh Anderson.” And the next kiss she received wasn’t a perfunctory one at all; it held nothing but passion and anticipation.
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 4, 2012
Inspirational Quote Monday! #41 of 2012
It’s Inspirational Quote Monday! Here’s the quote for the week – “Good character is that quality which makes one dependable whether being watched or not, which makes one truthful when it is to one’s advantage to be a little less than truthful, which makes one courageous when faced with great obstacles, which endows one with the firmness of wise self-discipline.” – Arthur S. Adams
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
November 2, 2012
First Kiss Friday – A Lover For Rachel by Lynn Crain
Today’s First Kiss Friday featured guest is Lynn Crain, author of fantasy romance A Lover For Rachel. Welcome Lynn! Here’s the first kiss between Rachel Hamilton and Dewin Kingston.
Rachel Hamilton comes to Stonehenge to celebrate her birthday on Summer Solstice, only to find herself trapped beneath the massive rhyolite bluestones with sexy wizard, Dewin Kingston, who convinces her that she is the key to their escape.
“You do realize that the world isn’t what you remember it to be, don’t you? That is, if what you are saying is true.” She placed her hand on his forearm and appreciated the strength it held. Just touching him brought an awareness of her body that she’d missed. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, taking in his warm, woodsy scent. Her baser needs were going to take over in this small but comfortable room. Before she could allow herself to feel anything, she needed to get her mind around the facts that currently brought and held her here.
“I have told you my name is Dewin. It means wizard.” His gaze held an honesty she couldn’t deny.
“You’re a wizard?” she questioned lightly. If there is a fairy, there can certainly be a wizard.
He gazed into her eyes then and ran a gentle finger along her jaw. “You are beautiful.”
Rachel leaned into his hand, her body’s wants and needs taking over. “No, I’m not, but it’s nice to hear you say it. Still…I have to hear your story first. Please continue.”
He withdrew his hand. “Yes, I am a wizard. I was trained by Merlin himself.”
“So he did exist?” Her hand wandered to his thigh, rubbing up and down, as she felt her control slipping.
“Umm…that feels good…Did Nora sprinkle any dust on you while you were on the outside?” His apologetic tone did little to dampen her desire.
“I don’t think so but I really wasn’t paying attention. She buzzed me a lot.”
Dewin frowned and looked over her shoulder toward the fairy now sitting on a high shelf. “Nora, did you sprinkle Rachel?”
She turned, watching the small light bob up and down in the farthest corner of the chamber. “I guess she did then. So what does being sprinkled with fairy dust do?”
“This.”
His mouth swooped down to kiss her deeply. His kiss was extraordinary as he tugged on her lower lip with gentle nibbles. She leaned into him and snaked her tongue into his mouth, trying to elicit a response from him. She was rewarded with his tongue coming together with hers to war for supremacy. Deliberately, she pulled herself from the ever-enticing ritual.
Rachel gulped in a few deep breaths, her hand holding him at bay. “Okay…we’ve established that fairy dust heightens one’s sexual response. Is that all it does?”
He pulled up from kissing her neck, his large hand caressed her face. “No, the dust has a lot of magical properties. We will have to complete what we start. I hope you do not mind…it has been a long time for me. The fairy dust makes our lust palpable, like a living thing until the need is fulfilled we can do little else. Not doing so will only lead to torment everlasting.”
While she looked at him, his eyes darkened. Leaning in, she gave him a quick peck on the mouth without lingering. It was hard for her to stop as she wanted to learn every aspect of this man’s body. Yet, she needed to know just why she was here. “I don’t mind at all, but I need to know more first.” She ran her hands up his arms and was rewarded with a shiver.
He closed his eyes as if to still his wants, his desires. “You will have to stop doing that if you want me to tell you anything.”
She looked around the room to see if there were any place else to sit and didn’t find another. “It’s going to be hard since we’re both on the couch.”
He lifted his hands from her. “I will try to restrain myself. Promise.”
You can buy A Lover For Rachel at the following estores:
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/116658
http://www.amazon.com/A-Lover-for-Rachel-ebook/dp/B006QYWQHO/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1
http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/a-lover-for-rachel/id492302160?mt=11
http://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-aloverforrachel-752055-340.html
Laurel O'Donnell - Author - Medieval Romance Novels, Paranormal Romance Novels and Urban Fantasy
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“What do you want from me?”
Perhaps it was ridiculous, Ryen thought. Men never seemed to have a problem with taking what, ...more
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