Kieran Kramer's Blog, page 10

If You Give a Girl a Viscount Crossword Puzzle!

Oh, I love crosswords! Of course, I'm not good at them…which is difficult to admit as my mother and sister do the Sunday New York Times one every week! Have you ever tried that one? It's brutal!

But anyway, that's okay. I can have my little crossword from If You Give a Girl a Viscount , can't I? 

I hope you enjoy it, and if you finish it and send the scan to kkramerbooks@aol.com, along with your snail mail address, I'll send you a bookplate and an "autographed by the author" gold sticker that you can put on your print version of VISCOUNT. If you bought it in e-book format, I'll send you my four romance trading cards from the Impossible Bachelors series.

Have fun! First one to finish also gets a $10 Starbucks card!!!

Love, Kieran XOXO

Here's a link if you'd rather print it from the source:

If You Give a Girl a Viscount crossword puzzle

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The Oatmeal Incident and a Fun Giveaway!

Come join me today at the website Blame It on The Muse! I'll be telling a story about one of my most embarrassing moments, and it involves–yes, you guessed it; we all know how dangerous it can be–

Oatmeal.

Doesn't that gentleman on the label looks so friendly and unassuming? Hah. He's actually laughing at me, I think. Laughing at me for being so trusting!!!  

:>)

So anyway, after I fill in the mortifying details at Blame It on The Muse today, I'll be giving away a copy of one of my books to three different commenters! The winners can choose from When Harry Met Molly; Dukes to the Left of Me, Princes to the Right; and Cloudy With a Chance of Marriage. Each book also comes with a Regency-inspired porcelain tea rest, a small tea tin with a few packets of my favorite teas, and some of my favorite tea biscuits. I'll include my romance trading cards as well!

Come join in the fun!

Halloween! Tell Me Something You Like About It!

Boo!

I've got an extra Halloween surprise. I told my Facebook friends to leave a comment about Halloween to be eligible to win an advanced reader copy of If You Give a Girl a Viscount.

But I've got one more thing to add if you're in the continental US…I'll throw in a beautiful "Bonfire" scented Nature's Wick candle and mini-infuser gift set!

I wish I could send the gift set to other places in the world, but it's too complicated to post because there's liquid involved and customs doesn't like packages like that, LOL!!!

But if you're overseas, I'll be happy to send you the ARC, along with some American Halloween candy tossed in the envelope!

Hugs, everyone, and I'll leave you with my favorite Halloween memory…my brother Patrick, who's a year older, was very, very young. One Halloween night, he dragged around his sack of candy from house to house, which made a hole in the bottom of his bag. So all the candy leaked out. I remember feeling traumatized when this happened to him–I couldn't even imagine how awful he must have felt! But everyone rallied round and gave him some candy. Since six of the seven siblings were trick-or-treating that night, it wasn't hard to do! :>)

Welcome, Theresa Romain, Debut Regency Author!

I'm thrilled to have my fabulous friend Theresa Romain here with us to celebrate the release of her first novel…drumroll, please…the Zebra Regency historical Season for Temptation!

I love a romantic tale in which someone is caught between duty and passion. A handsome viscount named James must choose between two sisters: Julia, the outgoing one, and Louisa, the shy one he's betrothed to already. What's he going to do? Who's he going to choose?

You'll have to read this scintillating story to find out!

Meanwhile, since I'm a big fan of tea, and tea is a big part of any Regency lady's lifestyle, I thought I'd ask Theresa what her tea-drinking habits are…and to share a few delicious tidbits from her book.

Take it away, Theresa!!!

Kieran, thanks so much for hosting me today! I'm delighted to visit about tea and the release of my debut, SEASON FOR TEMPTATION—which have more to do with one another than you might think.

When I started thinking about tea, my first thought was, "oh, I'm actually a coffee drinker." But that's only somewhat true. Coffee is my morning drink. Coffee gets my day started. Coffee is for work. But tea…tea is for fun.

Tea to me is the drink of coziness, and it's what I like in the afternoon when I need a little extra boost.  I love Celestial Seasonings Bengal Spice tea, which is an herbal blend that smells like gingerbread in a cup.  For black tea, I like Bigelow's Constant Comment, which is another sweet and spicy blend.

Since I drink tea to warm up and wake up, I associate tea itself with fall and winter. When I see the leaves of our Autumn Blaze maple turning flame-red, and when the wind starts to blow chilly instead of hot (because there is ALWAYS wind in the Midwest, where I live), then it feels like tea season.

I like to wrap my hands around a big mug of scalding tea and sip at it slowly.  This has two benefits:

1) it keeps my hands warm, and

2) no one else in my family can take it away and drink it themselves.  (In our house, making tea is apparently a specialized skill that only I possess, but drinking tea is a skill everyone has.)

So you see that, for me, tea has lots of associations with leisure, comfort, and family power struggles.  And it's the same way in the first chapter of my romance debut.

SEASON FOR TEMPTATION is a lighthearted Regency-set historical romance featuring family scandals and a love triangle.

What? Lighthearted scandal? A lighthearted love triangle?

Well…yes. The hero, James Matheson, tries to save his family's reputation by making an engagement of convenience with the serious Louisa. But when he travels to the country to meet Louisa's family, he falls into a very inconvenient love with her impetuous stepsister and closest friend, Julia.

In this love triangle, all three people mean well. All are very devoted to their families, and all do their best to act nobly despite their own feelings.

Since it's a romance, you know it'll end well. But how does it begin? Well, I promised you tea. The first time James meets Julia, she offers him tea to smooth over the unconventional way her family has greeted him. Let's see how it goes:

*          *          *

She laughed softly as she poured out two more cups of fragrant dark tea.

"Heavens, we are coming at you all wrong. I am so sorry, my lord. The only explanation I can think of is that we are out of practice in receiving Louisa's fiancés." She smiled at James. "Milk or lemon?"

James blinked. Surely she hadn't just said what he thought she'd said. "Er…have there been many?"

"Many what? Lemons? I suppose so. We all like them prodigiously."

"No, fiancés." He held his breath waiting for her answer.

Julia looked puzzled for a moment, regarding the tea tray as if looking for the fiancés in question. Then understanding broke over her face.

"No; you're the one and only, which I would have thought you'd have known. But it is so much easier to throw Louisa to the wolves than to blame the whole household for our topsy-turvy welcome. Especially since that option includes my own poor greeting."

She laughed, and James let a relieved breath whoosh out of his lungs. He settled against the sofa back again, considering this thought process.

No, it still didn't make any sense to him, but the distraction was delightful. After a moment, he gave up and just chuckled. "Miss Julia, your logic is impressive. Lemon, please, and one sugar."

*          *          *

There you have it. In any century, tea heals all wounds. At least for a few minutes, anyway.

Thank you, Theresa, for sharing some time with us! I wish you tremendous success with your first book, and I hope someday we can share a cup of tea together at a writers' conference!

Okay, dear reader friends, in honor of Theresa's debut, we'll be giving away a signed copy of Season for Temptation to one commenter. Here are two questions to get you started: 1) What do you like best about love triangle stories? and 2) Have you ever been caught in one?

Sssshhhh, don't tell, but I have!! 

And in light of James's and Julia's tête-à-tête over the tea tray in Season for Temptation, Theresa has another question you might like to consider: "Has tea (or coffee, or any other non-alcoholic drink) ever helped you get through an awkward situation?"

Pipe up to win!

And there's more…

I mentioned on Facebook that I have another prize to give–

To the first commenter to tell me 1) where McVitie's Digestive Biscuits were first produced, and 2) why they have such an unusual name, I'm going to send you a box of Theresa's two favorite teas–Constant Comment and Bengal Spice– as well as a Regency-inspired porcelain tea rest so you can feel all 'la-di-da' when you squeeze those steeped tea bags. :>)

I'm also going to throw in a package of my favorite Pepperidge Farm Gingerbread men cookies and some of Theresa's favorites: McVitie's Digestive Biscuits! I had a choice: plain or chocolate covered? Take a wild guess which kind I got!

***Note: Since someone already won the tea package–good for you, Tanja!!–I'm going to give away another identical prize to a random commenter who visits today.  :>) 

Theresa's Bio & Buy Links!

Theresa Romain holds degrees in psychology, English literature, and history, an impractical education that allowed her to read everything she could get her hands on.  She has worked, interned, and translated for libraries and universities, all of which fed her love of books and her fascination with the past.  She lives with her family in the Midwest and lives online at http://theresaromain.com. You can also find her on Facebook and Twitter.

Order Theresa's book: Amazon • Barnes & Noble • Indiebound • Powell's

Order ebook: Kindle • nook

A Lump of Sugar, Please…and Two Tea-Inspired September Giveaways!

Are you enjoying the start of the new school year? At the end of summer, I'm just teetering on the brink of craving a schedule again, so September is my month for getting back into my routines. A big part of my day is drinking tea. I'm mad for it! I grew up with an English nanny and an Irish mother, so no wonder.  

My books wouldn't be Regencies without the ritual of drinking tea included somehow. Nothing like a heroine fumbling over the tea tray in the presence of her worried mother, the snooty duchess who lives next door, and the hero (the duchess's son, perhaps?), who is watching our tender heroine's every move from a strategic position at the fireplace mantel.

I could start a story right from there, couldn't I? We could talk it out over a cup of tea! And some delicious chocolate-covered tea biscuits, of course.

:>)

But back to September fun…I'm giving away two tea-inspired gifts on both my Facebook page and on Writerspace.

For Facebook: Click here if you'd like to win the darling teapot and matching cups you see at the top of this post, along with my favorite tea and buscuits.

And for Writerspace: Just click on this contest link and follow the directions to enter my September contest. In anticipation of the November release of If You Give a Girl a Viscount, I'm offering one reader friend a Regency-inspired porcelain tea bag rest along with some "tea time" goodies and a signed copy of Cloudy With a Chance of Marriage, plus a set of my Impossible Bachelor romance trading cards.

Oh, and just in case you're wondering, Joon, my cat, is not included in the Writerspace prize you see here! She likes to pose for prize giveaways, however. Kind of like the models on The Price Is Right:

Thanks for visiting me here today, and I wish you many cozy cups of tea–and romantic Regency tales–this autumn! 

Kieran XOXO

This Is Where I Grew Up (& Grew My Imagination)

I grew up in South Carolina's Lowcountry, the place Pat Conroy often writes about. Funny, neither Pat nor I are natives. But once you move in, the Lowcountry gets under your skin and never lets go. It's a magical place, and my childhood home provided the perfect setting for my imagination to flourish.

My beloved sister-in-law Sharon Wray, of whom I'm vastly proud, is a writer of military romantic suspense novels and has garnered many awards on her path to publication. She's also a talented photo essayist. I hope you'll enjoy the story she tells in this photo essay she created about our most recent family reunion at the height of summer in the Lowcountry.

Faith, Hope, and Publication–A Study in: Summer Family Reunion by Sharon Wray

Enjoy!

Meanwhile, I want to show you a picture of Sharon. She's as sweet as she looks, but she's spunky, too…she has to be to put up with my family, LOL!

And here's a short, fascinating bio of her:  A librarian/archivist who also studied the art of embroidery in the couture houses of Paris and designed custom wedding gowns, Sharon is now a mother of twins and an RWA 2010 and 2011 Golden Heart romantic suspense author of the Black Ops Brotherhood series.

P.S. She's also now a Maggie finalist in Single Title with her latest manuscript, JULIET'S ROGUE! Congrats, Sharon!!!

If any of you would like to leave a comment about Sharon, her photo essay, or tell us about YOUR childhood home(s), I'd love to hear from you. How much do you think the setting you lived in as a child shaped who you are today? 

Thanks for stopping by!

Hugs,

Kieran :>)

August Contest! $50 Gift Card to Amazon or B & N!

Just click on this contest link and follow the directions to enter my August Writerspace contest! I'll be giving away that $50 gift card and a signed copy of Cloudy With a Chance of Marriage, plus a set of my Impossible Bachelor romance trading cards.

I hope you have a wonderful last month of summer: lots of watermelon, iced tea, and grilled burgers; swimming, if at all possible; relaxing time with friends and family; and of course, time to read!

Hugs,

Kieran :>)

Turn the Corner and You're in Another World

When are you too old to stop pretending? Is a senior in high school too old? I was 17 when my friend Ted and I would walk down Calhoun Street, the main drag in Charleston, SC, to Norm's sub shop during our free period at school. On the way, there was a tiny alley between two buildings–so tiny, we used to imagine that if we walked down that little lane, we'd enter another world, the Narnia world we'd read about in those books C.S. Lewis wrote.

It was a fun fantasy. Ted and I acted as if this "alley to Narnia" was a big joke, but somewhere inside us was this delight in magic, in alternative worlds that shimmered somewhere beyond our ordinary reach.

Even now, when I roam the picturesque streets in historic Charleston, I look down tiny alleyways and imagine them opening on to another story, another place and time.

Which is why I loved writing Cloudy With a Chance of Marriage so much. I got to invent a street that doesn't exist. It's in London's wealthy Mayfair section. My fictional Regency-era passersby don't even notice it's there. Overgrown bushes frame the entrance–all anyone knows about Dreare Street is that it's unlucky.

Of course, once Stephen (my devil-may-care naval hero) and Jilly (my feisty bookseller heroine) move in, the dispirited neighbors on Dreare Street aren't going to stay content with being called the unluckiest residents in London!

Once hope takes root, all kinds of good things can happen–even to those among us labeled unfixable and unlovable. I write the kind of stories that make you feel that anything is possible…if you believe. Even the residents of Dreare Street, once they commit to following their dreams, have a happily ever after, my favorite kind of ending.

Here's a secret: part of me–the quirky, imaginative part–insists the street my characters lived on really existed and still does. Next time I go to London, I'll know exactly where it is. No one else will see it, but I will. I'll look for the two overgrown bushes. I'll wait to feel that familiar flash of magic and mystery ripple through me. I'll touch that part of me that still feels wonder.

And I'll keep walking–refreshed, renewed–into that ordinary world that's not so ordinary, after all.

Click here if you'd like to read Cloudy With a Chance of Marriage, a fun, romantic Regency tale sure to warm your heart, and thanks for stopping by. I'm always on Facebook and Twitter if you ever want to say hello. Or feel free to leave a comment below. I'd love to hear from you!

Hugs from Kieran :>)

Redeeming Romance–Accentuating the Positive!

I have an essay up at Book Addicts' special website, "Redeeming Romance," where folks are standing up for romance!

Why should any of us have to hide that we enjoy reading and/or writing about love and its amazing power to heal, to bring people together, and to change the world for the better?

I know I don't want to hide! And I hope you'll join me in standing proud for something we all love.

Each week or so, a different person will write about why they love romance; I really enjoyed reading the other essays that came before mine (you'll see links to them at the bottom of my post there). I encourage you to stop by and check out what everyone's saying in their own way…that ROMANCE ROCKS!

(Imagine all kinds of good crowd noise here, and maybe a brass band!)

:>)

At any rate, I hope you enjoy what I have to say about the matter. I'll be giving away a signed copy of Cloudy With a Chance of Marriage and a set of my romance trading cards to someone who leaves a comment beneath my essay at the Redeeming Romance site.

Thanks for supporting romance–as a reader, a writer, or both.

Hugs,

Kieran :>)

Facing the Fear: Learning How To 'Live Healthy,' Part 1

Subscribers to Self and Women's Health aside, how many of you are anxiously awaiting the next article about getting healthy–or the next TV diatribe about the epidemic of obesity/heart disease/blah, blah, blah in America?

I know I'm not.

And I know why I'm so prickly about the whole subject. It's not because I'm being deluged with health factoids 24/7, which I am. No doubt you are, too. 

It's something else entirely, which I'll address in a minute.

Meanwhile, I must admit I'm addicted to my morning cereal and milk. Yes, it's Great Grains, which is fairly healthy, but I find that if I eat something with more protein in the morning, I don't snack as much.

So with that in mind, I've been having the occasional scrambled egg, and I also bought several little 6 oz. containers of plain Greek yogurt and placed them front and center in my fridge. But I've been ignoring them for a week because when I tried one, it tasted awful. 

Today, however, I added honey, walnuts, and a smidgeon of vanilla extract–all because of a boring health article I read in the morning paper. And the yogurt concoction was delicious. (Bravo, morning paper health pundit!)

Here's the thing I alluded to earlier about all this obsessive reporting on achieving good health: it's not so much the facts that discomfort me. It's this: when I was mixing that yogurt, I felt almost a little afraid. I think it's because I really, really don't like to think about food and limiting myself that way.

But the main thing I fear is trying to make myself change. 

I don't like change. Everything in me is crying out to stay the way I am. I've never been a person who likes to practice self-discipline about anything. It bores me, usually, and I want to move on to my loosey-goosey way of approaching life.  

But at a deeper level, I'm afraid I won't be the same person. I worry I'll become a sleek, smug health pundit. I won't be me anymore.

Well, if I really, really get truthful with myself, I realize that's just silly–as silly as thinking that people who care about their health are smug know-it-alls.

I'm glad I'm acknowledging these irrational thoughts to myself, though. It frees me up to focus on the important thing–taking care of my health. Every day, I'm getting older. I want to have more adventures and write more books, and I don't want a sluggish, unhealthy body holding me back.

So I'm gutting through my fear of change. I'm going to ignore those excellent rationalizations I have for ignoring the health pundits (although occasionally I still find myself wishing Cream of Wheat upon them every day for the rest of their lives).

The other way I'm changing is through exercise. I'll talk about that next post.

What's your experience with food? I know that's a broad topic, but it's a big issue for a lot of us! Please feel free to share your thoughts here. I'm going to send the magnetic bookmark pictured above to a random reader who leaves a comment.

I love what the bookmark says: "She was on a journey back to her wings."

I like to think that message applies to all of us. We're each moving toward becoming our best selves, every day.  It's what makes life so challenging and exciting.

If you want to read another blog addressing food issues, check out this entry in the always interesting and lively Bettyverse. And also check out author Ashley March's blog–the Romance Biggest Loser competition is coming!

Hugs from Kieran :>)