New Additions to my House

         Hello, gentle readers! And happy Halloween!

Those of you who read my blog regularly know that I lost my furry, four-legged companion a few weeks ago. Schatzie was a special girl…sweet, funny, loving. She loved everyone and everyone loved her. The DH and I are grieving her loss and yes, I still see her out of the corner of my eye.

I knew coming home to an empty house would be hard (I’ve been through this before) and I know my DH as well as myself. We don’t deal well with that feeling so…

Lacey

I have puppies. Not one but two. Little German shepherd puppies because I love the breed for their loyalty, their intelligence, and even, their goofiness (they can be very goofy!).

So, without further ado…meet Lacey (that's a mesquite leaf on her nose). When she came to us, she was shy and demure. Now, after being with us for two weeks, she’s has grown confident and comfortable, and that bashful, reserved little girl has become…a hellion. Don’t be fooled by her sweet face. If there is mischief to be had, she will find it (and she’s really good at it).   

Pepper

And this is her sister, Pepper. She’s more adventurous and definitely more vocal. She’s also the cuddler and loves to have her belly rubbed (and I can’t resist rubbing that little belly).

I will admit I had forgotten what it’s like to have essentially toddlers in the house. Like human babies, everything goes in their mouths. Everything! Sticks, rocks, feathers, the pods from the mesquite tree…whatever they find in their big back yard. The little tags on blankets and such that says Do not remove under penalty of law? Yup, those, too! Ripped from their moorings and chewed until they are not recognizable (don’t report me to the government for this infraction…truthfully, as vigilant as we are, what one doesn’t get into the other does, and we can’t be in two places at once).

Oh, and my carefully constructed routines? You know, the ones I live my life by? Gone. Utterly destroyed from day one. And I'm loving it!

Wish me luck with my two new girls. I’m going to need it.

Until next time, remember to spread kindness wherever you go.

Marie

E.D. Walker's Bajo Cat in her Story in PETS IN SPACE #3 Anthology

When I was invited to be part of the latest Pets in Space anthology, one of the first things I knew I had to do was design my pet. I waffled back and forth between creating something very alien and something a little more recognizable for my story The Bajo Cats of Anteros XII. Eventually, I found some great inspiration from The KittenLady, Hannah Shaw, on Instagram. She runs a fantastic rescue operation for orphan kittens, and her videos are not only full of adorable kittens but also lots of fantastic information on how to take care of them. (Someday I will convince my husband to let me foster kittens, someday…) Slowly, the seeds of my story were planted, and the inspiration for my own science fictional bajo kittens and their dedicated rescuer began to take root.

(The Kitten Lady just set up a newcharity to help with her work, by the way. Please consider donating if you can.)

Another inspiration for my kittens was the crazy technicolor art of Lisa Frank. I decided if I was going to have alien kittens in my story I wanted them to be something out of the ordinary. And what could possibly stand out more than those crazily colored Lisa Frank illustrations come to life?

Here’s a description of the kittens in the story:

“The kittens were a little blue and a purple. The blue was a puff ball with silky fur of a startling electric blue. His tufted ears were tipped with a darker blue and his hide was spotted with paler blue spots. The purple was smaller, fluffier, and more purple-blue in color, with darker spots and a white belly. Both cats had eyes of bright gold like old-fashioned coins shining out of their faces.”

Lastly, I ran a poll on twitter to see which wild kittens people thought were the cutest. Because if I was going to have kittens in my story I wanted to have the cutest kittens. Caracal kittens edged out pallas cats and sandcats for the win. (Google all of those for pictures by the way. They are adorable.)

And that’s how you make a bajo cat: one part Instagram for behavior + Lisa Frank for some flair, add a little caracal for cuteness and then voila! You’ve got a bajo cat!

Pets in Space Buy links:

Amazon: https://amzn.to/2Jp86ic

BN: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/embrace-the-passion-se-smith/1129099896

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/embrace-the-passion-pets-in-space-3

Google: https://play.google.com/store/books/details/S_E_Smith_Embrace_the_Passion_Pets_in_Space_3?id=JghkDwAAQBAJ

iBooks: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/embrace-the-passion-pets-in-space-3/id1414010304

Author Bio

E.D. Walker, a native of Los Angeles, is the author of The Fairy Tales of Lyond Series that begins with Enchanting the King. As a child, she grew up knowing all the words to the songs in Disney’s fairy tale retellings. (Sleeping Beauty was always her favorite.) Lo and behold, she eventually grew up to write fairy tale retellings of her own.

By day, E.D. helps corral engineers for NASA (without doing any of the tech stuff herself, of course). By night, she loves to write her clever heroes and heroines bantering their way to true love. E.D. is a total geek, a movie buff, and a mediocre swing dancer. E.D. and her family live in sunny Southern California with one of the neediest housecats on the planet.

For more information about E.D., please visit her website, “Like” E.D. on Facebook and follow her on Twitter, Instagram, and Goodreads. Make sure you also join E.D.’s newsletter to be the first to hear about the next book in The Beauty’s Beast Fantasy Series. She’s always thrilled to hear from her readers. Email her directly at e.d.walker.author@gmail.com.

New Release: Breaking Point

Breaking Point was just released. Yay! It's the third book of the Metal Girls Trilogy. Breaking Point is a thrilling romantic suspense you won't want to miss. If you haven't started the series, check out the first book in the series: Melting Point. Melting Point is on sale for a limited time for only 99 cents. 

Excerpt from Breaking Point:

Reed Taylor had been hit before. As an ex-FBI agent, he had even been shot before. But nothing prepared him for the honey-haired, denim-eyed devil who stormed over to him wearing nothing but a dripping-wet bikini, followed by six pudgy piglets.

“Reed, you jerk!” 

A right-hook swing had his head whipping to the side. He cursed, holding his jaw from the blow.

He glared at Greer Brennan. “What was that for?”

“You know damn well what it was for,” she snapped.

“I take it you’re still mad.”

“Mad? I’m furious!”

It had been a full year since he’d seen her last. He thought for sure she’d have cooled off by now.

The piglets raced around his ankles, thinking nothing of the altercation, then they tore off to the lake, splashing and grunting.

“What’s with the pigs?” Reed asked . . . Continue the story and find out what happens next. It will be a bumpy, thrilling adventure full of sparks.

Get my copy of Breaking Point!

The Monsters that Inspired my Halloween Romances by Lexi Post

I don't know about you but I love this time of year. There is a coolness to the air that wasn't there before. The leaves are turning colors. School has started (yes, I always loved school). And Halloween starts off a season of celebrations! For me, it's extra special because my birthday falls between Halloween and Thanksgiving, so I lucked out!

I also find a lot of inspiration for my paranormal stories at this time of year. Hmmm, I wonder why? 😉 I have three paranormal romances that were strongly inspired by this time of year as well as by the classic. The first one I wrote was Masque, which was inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death." I decided to use the character of the Red Death from the 1800's as my hero and he's trapped in an old Pleasure Palace when a modern day woman buys the abandoned place.

After having fun with Poe's characters, the next year I turned to Washington Irving and his short story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Most people know it has the Headless Horseman story. Since I'm inspired by classic literature, I stay true to who the real hero is and in Irving's case it was Brom Bones, not Ichabod Crane. So I trapped the original Katrina in the 1700s when the story was written and had her village appear in modern day only one weekend a year. That's when she meets a direct descendant of Brom Bones, the man she was waiting at the church for when he disappeared...at least in my story.

After tackling those two creatures, I finally felt ready to give Mary Shelly's monster his own love story. He'd been begging me for it since I first taught the novel Frankenstein to my World Literature class at the University of the Virgin Islands. It was my pleasure and honor to give this particular creature a happy ending, and one I hope Mary would approve of because her story really is a masterpiece.

So if you like your romance with a few classic creatures, I hope you'll check one of these out. Have a great Halloween!

Always, Lexi
www.lexipostbooks.com

Buy links

Masque $3.99:
Amazon |Barnes & Noble| iBooks | Kobo| Amazon UK | Amazon AU |Amazon CA

Passion of Sleepy Hollow 99¢ for 5 more days:
Amazon |Barnes & Noble| iBooks | Kobo| Amazon UK | Amazon AU  | Amazon CA

Heart of Frankenstein $3.99:
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iBooks| Kobo| Amazon UK|  Amazon AU| Amazon CA