Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Happy New Year

Happy New Year, everyone!


As the new year begins, I'm working on my resolutions. Less work, more writing (because that's not really work), and more cats! Just kidding. I really am working on my goals for the new year, but I haven't set them in stone yet. One thing I will be doing more of is going to the gym. I've gotta stay healthy so I can write for you guys! I will be posting soon where I'll be going in 2014. Go to my website marlamonroe.com or visit me on Facebook! As always, I love to hear from my readers, so don't be shy!


Friday, December 27, 2013

The Wranglers' New Chef

Don't forget that my newest spicy dish is going on sale Friday, January 3rd! I'm excited to hear your comments and opinions on it!

Description:
Soon to be homeless, Billy Jean swallows her fear of horses to accept a position as chef at a guest ranch in Montana. Laramie and Laredo don’t know what hit them when they get a taste of her—cooking. What’s an amazing chef like her doing out in the wilds of Montana?
While Laredo believes they should be concentrating on getting the ranch up and running instead of flirting, his brother is convinced they can do both. It doesn’t take long for Laredo to climb on board with his brother to woo Billy Jean into their arms. But there’s something going on with their sensuous chef. She’s got a secret and they’re determined to coax it out of her.
A little PTSD and a world of misunderstanding lands the brothers in a pot of boiling water where Billy Jean is concerned. It might take two to tango, but three can work things out if they will just take the time to listen.    

Monday, December 23, 2013

Writing What You Know: Menage a’Trois

Welcome Siobhan Muir to my blog!

There’s an old adage that says: write what you know.

Adages become something repeated in the vernacular because there is truth in them. What better subjects to write on than things that you know? But knowing things only takes you so far. If we wrote what we knew all the time, there’d be no fantasy or science fiction because who knows what will show up in the future. Or what dragons lie beyond the mountains of Mordor? LOL

For a long time I honed my storytelling skills and writing on science fiction and fantasy, preferring exotic and magical beings to humans and human issues. They just weren’t interesting to me. But at the heart of all my sci-fi stories was human interaction. How would this character react if I put them in that situation? How would you react if thrown into an alien world where dragons were allies rather than something to slay? I’d be saying, “Where can I get one?” :D

Adding romance into the mix suddenly made me interested in what humans would be doing. Particularly if they were doing it with vampires, werewolves, dragons, goblins, and demons. :D Old habits die hard. But again, it was human interaction and human issues at the core. I’ve written several M/F romances and I loved getting my characters into trouble in weird situations just to see what they’d do.

But I’d never written a ménage.

I don’t have the benefit of personal experience of a ménage to write from that place of knowledge. But I read a lot and learning doesn’t just come from experience. Why else do we have books and libraries? We learn from others’ experiences. I’ve read a lot of ménage romance and some of it I’ve believed and some I haven’t. But one thing is very clear when writing multiple partner romance: you have to get the human interaction right.

You have to know people. How they’d react, what they fear, what they desire, and what they’d do. Times three. Or four. Or more. In the end, romance with multiple partners is just like romance with only two partners, except you have that many more conflicts, emotional responses, and physical responses. Writing a convincing ménage means knowing people and knowing how they’d react in whatever is going on.

So, write what you know, and I know people.

Taking that knowledge and putting it into the ménage romance of The Navy’s Ghost was both intriguing and frustrating for me. I had to figure out three people and understand how they’d react. But it was exciting and fun, and so emotionally satisfying. Especially when one of them wants the ménage, but has been told it’s wrong and fights it with every fiber of his being.

THE NAVY’S GHOST
 
 

A SEAL is strongest with her Team…
Ensign Christiana "Ghost" Brickman is the only female SEAL to survive BUD/S training, a real Navy Jane. But when an ambush ends her career as an active SEAL, she’s free to pursue other interests. Like her two best friends Lt. Jim "Retro" Waters and Chief Warrant Officer Todd "Magic" Hunter. She's wanted them for over a year, but never dared to approach them while in the squad.

Retro has fought his dark desires since high school, certain the need to share a woman unnatural. Magic had never considered sharing before Ghost mentions it, but it solves his dilemma of choosing between his best friend and his woman. But Retro balks at Ghost’s offer to share and retreats from both when she marries Magic.
Everyone feels Retro’s loss, but he ignores the ache of their broken connection in favor of living ‘normal.’ When Ghost and the other wives of Beta Squad are kidnapped, Retro must reevaluate how much both Ghost and Magic mean to him. And he must decide how far he's willing to go to save the woman he loves, before she becomes the Navy's ghost.
 
BUY LINKS
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Navys-Ghost-Boys-Beta-Squad-ebook/dp/B00H22W8TU/
 
My tagline is Kick-ass Adventure with Hot Sex and The Navy’s Ghost lives up to the line. It was a wild ride and a new experience for me. I enjoyed writing it and discovering that special place where three people could find their Happily-Ever-After. I hope you’ll grab a copy and see how Retro, Ghost, and Magic make the magic work for them.

Siobhan Muir lives in Las Vegas, Nevada, with her husband, two daughters, and a vegetarian cat she swears is a shape-shifter, though he's never shifted when she can see him. When not writing, she can be found looking down a microscope at fossil fox teeth, pursuing her other love, paleontology. An avid reader of science fiction/fantasy, her husband gave her a paranormal romance for Christmas one year, and she was hooked for good.

 

Friday, December 20, 2013

Time of Year to Plan

Hi everyone. I'm settling down to write and realized that I needed to start planning for 2014. What do I want to write next year, where do I want to go to meet with readers and what do I want to accomplish during the year? There are a lot of different choices and options out there and trying to narrow them down to just a few is a daunting task.

How do you all plan for the new year? Do you plan at all? Do you set goals or just go with the flow? I don't make New Years Resolutions because I never meet them, but planning my writing career is a must.

Do any of you have requests? I'm working on the fourth book in The Protector's series. It's slow going with my contracts pulling on me. I'm also working on a sequel to Nina's Neighbor with Freak's story.

I have a bear shifter storyline I have in my head along with a paranormal world storyline jumping up and down to be let out, but the bottom line is that I want to write what you want to read. Yes, the characters will drive me crazy till I write them, but I get them out some as I go along so that I can write what is due at the time.

Here are a few of my favorite books over the years that I've written.




Long Lonely Nights was a favorite of mine also. I just forgot where I put that cover. :-)

Books I've read that I loved, I have to say the New Species series by Laurann Dohner are among my most favorite along with The Breed series by Lora Leigh.

Don't forget that A Taste of Cyn is out  http://www.bookstrand.com/a-taste-of-cyn and the next book out will be The Wrangler's New Chef, a new series on Montana. It will be out Friday January 3rd. I hope to hear from all of you out there.

If I miss saying it, have a very Merry and Safe Christmas!

Marla Monroe

Saturday, December 14, 2013

New Series Release January 3rd!

Soon to be homeless, Billy Jean swallows her fear of horses to accept a position as chef at a guest ranch in Montana. Laramie and Laredo don’t know what hit them when they get a taste of her—cooking. What’s an amazing chef like her doing out in the wilds of Montana? 

While Laredo believes they should be concentrating on getting the ranch up and running instead of flirting, his brother is convinced they can do both. It doesn’t take long for Laredo to climb on board with his brother to woo Billy Jean into their arms. But there’s something going on with their sensuous chef. She’s got a secret and they’re determined to coax it out of her. 

A little PTSD and a world of misunderstanding lands the brothers in a pot of boiling water where Billy Jean is concerned. It might take two to tango, but three can work things out if they will just take the time to listen.

That's right! A brand new series for my brand new book! Mark your calendars for January 3, 2014 because you're not going to want to miss this hot and steamy story!


And, while you wait, you may as well check out A Taste of Cyn, out now!

Best friends, Roy Simpson and Aden Dempsy, agree to share in order to have the chance to be with Cynthia Hawthorn, but will she be able to accept both men in her life? Gatlinburg is a small town. How will loving two men affect her business and her friendships?

With a stalker in the mix, Cynthia places her trust in the two men despite her fear of becoming too close to them. If she lets her guard down, she knows that she won’t be able to say no to them. Despite her resolve not to become involved, Cynthia loses her heart to the two men, but after the stalker is caught, she wonders if Aden and Roy are no longer as interested in her.

Roy and Aden want nothing more than to shower their sweet Cyn with love and affection. When a misunderstanding has her running away, they struggle to win their sweet Cyn back.