New Release! Blue Moon Over Texas

New Release! Blue Moon Over Texas

Finally, the much anticipated sequel to Blame it on Texas is available on Amazon. Go check it out!

Book Two of the Lone Star Cowboys Series and the sequel to Blame it on Texas

Carol Tanner makes the decision to move home to Morris Springs, Texas, where everyone she loves now lives. And that everyone includes Jake Reilly, though she hasn't decided if she's going to forgive him. She and Jake were high school sweethearts, but he refused to understand why she'd had to leave Morris Springs--and him--in the first place. When Jake is injured and needs help, Carol makes the decision to move into his house to take care of him. In doing so, she puts both her reputation, and her life, in danger.

Jake Reilly is always ready to lend a helping hand to his neighbors, but he finds accepting help is a lot harder than giving it. Especially when that help comes from the Tanners. Carol had walked out on him twice--once right after high school and again two years ago. He wasn't too likely to give her a third chance to break his heart. He has to face his own shortcomings when Carol's life is threatened, because one thing every cowboy knows is that you have to protect what's yours.


Excerpt: 

    "Good Lord, ladies. I do believe I've died and gone to cowboy heaven." Carol Tanner glanced around the decorated dance hall at the local cowboys, decked out in their Saturday night best--tight-fitting, starched blue jeans, brightly decorated shirts, hand-tooled leather belts, and boots that probably cost them a week's pay. She deliberately skipped her gaze over Jake Reilly, whose intense gaze hadn't wavered from her face since she stepped into the building. Tonight she'd forget about Jake and enjoy herself, or die trying.

    But as hard as she tried to ignore him, she had to admit he did look hot tonight. Pissed, but hot.

    "Now that is one fine example of prime male physique." Jean Sutherland sighed as a tall, muscular cowboy passed by.

    "Just another reason to love this town," Nancy Phillips drawled, with a wink aimed at the cowboy under discussion. "So why are we just standing here? Let's go see what kind of trouble we can stir up."

    Logan and Megan Tanner shook their heads and laughed as the three single women headed into the crowd on the dance floor. Logan took baby Charlie from Megan's arms and kissed his wife's cheek. "I'm glad I married you before that bunch had a chance to corrupt you with their wild ways."

    Megan grinned. "Who said I wasn't corrupted? I married you, didn't I?"

    "So you did." He turned to his daughter, Katie. "Listen, you can go meet up with your friends, but do not go outside after dark, do you understand? Most of these cowboys are harmless enough, but some are drifters that we know nothing about. And check in with Megan or me every hour."

    Katie sighed. "I'm not a kid, Dad. See you in an hour." She hurried off, waving at a group of girls gathered around the groaning buffet tables.

    Logan watched her go, wishing she was still young enough that he could keep her by his side. She'd grown into a beautiful young girl. No longer a child, but not yet a woman. "Remind me again that she's still only fourteen?"

    "Fourteen going on twenty," Megan said. "It's all uphill from here."

    "Logan, Megan. Good to see you stepping out for a change." Jake Reilly handed Logan a beer. "You want me to get you something to drink, Megan?"

    "I'd love a root beer, Jake. Thank you."

    When he came back with the icy drink, his face was stormy. "That sister of yours is asking for trouble," he told Logan.

    "Why? What's Carol up to?"

    "Out there on the dance floor, making eyes at those range rabbits. Don't even recognize some of those men. Asking for trouble, I'm telling you."

    "She'll be okay. We'll keep an eye on her. Why don't you go ask her to dance? You're the one she wants to be with, anyway, and you know it."

    Jake shook his head. "I'm going to sit this one out."

    For the next hour, Jake watched from the edge of the dance floor as Carol two-stepped her way across the room with first one cowboy, and then another. Every once in a while, he caught her glancing his way--whether to see if he noticed her or hoping he'd ask her to dance, he didn't know. But he noticed, all right. How could he help it? With her skin tight jeans outlining her curves, the close-fitting sweater accentuating her breasts…

    His hands clenched into fists as yet another man cut in and swung her away, out of his sight.

    "You'd better go get her, Jake, before you decide to take out half the town with your fists." Logan leaned against the wall with Charlie tucked against his chest. The baby was sound asleep despite the loud music.

    "What makes you think she'd dance with me? She hasn't spoken to me in two years."

    "You ready to tell me why?"

    "No." Jake scowled at Logan. "It's none of your business."

    "Maybe, maybe not. She is my sister, so I expect anything that has to do with her happiness is my business."

    Megan moved between the two men. "Will you two just stop it? Y'all are neighbors, friends. You work side by side nearly every day. You can't afford to get into a pissing contest and risk that friendship."

    Jake ducked his head and nodded. "I don't want to fight with either of you over this. It's between me and Carol. If you want to know so badly, ask her."

    "Believe me, I have. She's not talking either," Megan said with a sigh.

    Katie passed by, dancing with a young man. Logan scowled. "What's she doing dancing with a boy? She's too young."

    Megan laughed. "Would you rather she was dancing with a girl? Relax. That's Dean Neiman. He's a good kid. He brings his horse Dancer into the clinic every once in a while. If he treats Katie as well as he does that horse, you have nothing to worry about."

    "Why don't I know him? I know most of the Neiman clan."

    "Because he's only been here a few months, living with his grandparents, Hugo and Leona. His parents are working in Abu Dubai for a year."

    "Hmmph. She's still too young for a boyfriend."

    "Who said anything about a boyfriend?" Megan shook her head. "It's just a dance, Logan. Don't make a big deal out of it."

    Jake smirked as he listened to them. "I can't wait until she goes on her first car date. You planning to deck her first date like you did me when I took Carol out?"

    Logan shot him a warning look. "Watch it, Jake. I can still take you down."

    "I'd like to see you try." Though the banter was joking, it still rankled that Logan had taken him down with one punch all those years ago.

    "No one is taking anyone down tonight." Megan said. "Now, let's just enjoy the party, okay?"

    Katie came back to join them. "Want me to hold Charlie for a while? Y'all haven't danced even once since we got here."

    Megan smiled her thanks at Katie, then ran a hand up Logan's arm. "Ready to dance with me, cowboy?"

    "Always." Logan passed the baby to Katie, then swung Megan into his arms and they moved onto the crowded floor.

    Jake watched them for a minute before his gaze strayed back to Carol. She had a new partner now, one that seemed to be holding her awfully close. He wanted to cut in, to stake his claim. But he had no claim. He didn't even have the guts to tell her how he felt.

    He'd tried, God knows, he'd tried. But he'd never been good at discussing feelings. He'd been raised to keep them to himself, and he couldn't recall a single time his father had expressed any feelings toward his mother. But Carol was all about feelings. She used to ask him how he felt about everything from a new calf to a summer breeze.

    A calf was a calf, money on the hoof. Cute, maybe, but you couldn't let yourself get attached because sooner or later you would have to sell it or butcher it. As for a summer breeze, it kept your blood from boiling under the unforgiving West Texas sun. But those weren't the answers she'd wanted to hear.

So how did he explain the way his chest got all tight when he saw her with someone else?

    Katie moved away to sit in a chair, the baby's weight obviously getting to be too much for her. He should offer to help, but he'd never held a baby before. He'd probably wake the child and it would cry, and then what would he do? Even a fourteen year old knew more about babies than he did. He could handle delivering a calf, but he couldn't handle a small boy.

    While Jake watched her pat the baby gently on the back, a rough-looking young ranch hand sat beside her. He said something that made Katie visibly uncomfortable, so Jake edged closer. When the man reached out to touch Katie's hair, she jerked her head away and Jake moved in.

    As soon as the man saw him, he started to leave. Jake grabbed his arm. "Leave the girl alone."

    "Hey, don't mean no trouble. Just wanted to see if she wanted to dance."

     Jake's brows drew together. "She's just a kid. Unless you want to deal with me, I'd suggest you go find someone closer to your own age."

    The cowboy shrugged his hand off and wandered away after one last look at Katie.

    Jake sat beside her. "You okay?"

    "Yeah, but he gave me the creeps. Thanks for making him leave, Uncle Jake."

    "Anytime, kid. Let me know if he causes any more problems, okay? I'm going to go find your dad and let him know so he can keep an eye out, too."

    Katie gave him a grateful smile. "Thanks."

    He found Logan and Megan and as soon as he told them what happened, they left the dance floor and returned to the children. Jake continued across the floor, sidestepping when he nearly collided with Carol dancing with the same piece of scum who'd bothered Katie. He had to exert all his self-control to keep from yanking her out of the man's too-tight embrace. He settled for another beer.

    After twisting the top off the bottle, he leaned against the wall and crossed one booted foot over the other. From this vantage point, he could see most of the dance floor. If the cowboy got out of hand, he'd take care of it.

    Nancy two-stepped past him, hand in hand with a local doctor. Jean was right behind her, laughing at something her dance partner had just said. Jake thought he recognized the man, but he wasn't sure who he was.

    Seemed like everyone was having a good time. Everyone but him. Why had he even bothered to come?

    He pushed away from the wall and headed outside. He needed to clear his head, get some perspective. What right did he have to be jealous because Carol was dancing with other men? He couldn't give her what she wanted, what she needed, so he couldn't blame her for looking elsewhere. He had no idea what she did and with whom back in Austin. He was just pissed because he knew most of these men, and they knew Carol was his.

    Or should be.

For this Version of Author Monday, we welcome author Wendy Ely. Thanks for joining us, Wendy!

Writing Dreaming of Him!

I usually don't like paranormal anything. I don't watch paranormal anything and the genre itself scares the crap out of me. The whole ghost subject freaks me out. I believe in spirits but if something odd happens in my home I go into total denial or we will be packing our stuff. I do have a fourteen year old daughter who has a darker personality than I do. She is a paranormal and horror buff. She also writes novels already. After she finished writing her first book at age twelve she decided that maybe we should write a book together.

We set out plotting Dreaming of Him. We agreed that we'd both write it but I'd do a lot of the romance in the book because the thought of romance made her want to gag.  After we plotted most of the book, I wrote the opening scene and had her read it. "Mom," she had said, "I love it, but you need to write the whole thing." She decided that her talents weren't as good as mine (she is wrong!) and couldn't write with me.

Nanowrimo (National Novel Writing Month) was coming up and I figured that writing Dreaming of Him would be the perfect project to do in that month and an awesome gift for my daughter. I accomplished the task of writing the novella in one month (surprising since I know nothing of the genre!), edited it, and had a contract from my publisher shortly after.

Here is the opening scene of the book:


I stood by the lake’s edge and tossed a rock, trying to make it skip across the water as my father had once taught me when I was a little girl. My lips twisted in a frown as the rock plopped against the water and quickly sank. Obviously, rock skipping could be added to my list of failures.

“Hey.” The sudden sound of a deep voice cutting through the silence should’ve startled
me, but it didn’t at all.

Curious, I turned toward the sound.

He stood there with a strand of dark hair falling down against his tanned forehead. He
brushed it back and smiled, revealing a brilliant set of teeth.

“Have we met before?” I asked, trying to place him from somewhere.

Instead of answering, he stepped next to me. “Let me show you how to do that.” He
picked up a rock and twisted his wrist just right, sending the rock skipping across the water. Once the rock sank, he turned to me again. His dark eyes stared into mine as he slid his finger down my cheek.

“Amber--”

The blaring alarm pulled me from my dream, jerking me straight up in bed. The
obnoxious sound came from a little blue box sitting on my dresser, set far away from my bed to force me up from the comfort. I groaned as the day’s reality set in. The manager of Rich Chick expected me to be there for work in an hour. I hated not only the annoying beep-beep that ripped me from my dream, but also knowing that I’d be behind a counter pretending to be someone different. Then again, I hated most everything about my life. I glanced over to the bottle of prescription pills on my dresser. Should I go another day pretending everything was fine without taking the mood-altering drug people swore by? I shook my head at the notion. No more pills. Not today. Not ever again.

***

Buy link: http://www.amazon.com/Dreaming-of-Him-ebook/dp/B006ZKBZD0/ref=pd_sim_sbs_kstore_2?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2

Like me on facebook:  http://www.amazon.com/Dreaming-of-Him-ebook/dp/B006ZKBZD0/ref=pd_sim_sbs_kstore_2?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2 

or twitter: 

@WendyElyAuthor

I have the best husband ever! I asked for a flower garden and this is what I got. This is my Mother's Day present from him. And he did it all himself (with a little help from yours truly). I absolutely love it. I can sit on the patio and watch the birds (who also love it). Best of all, we didn't have to buy a single piece of lumber. He built it all from materials we had here.

The before and the after.

Today we welcome MJ Fredrick to Author Monday. MJ has one of my all-time favorite book covers--the one you see here for Midnight Sun. And she has great stories inside all her covers. Take the time to say hello and then be sure to check out her books.

Thanks for joining us today, MJ!  

Thanks so much for having me, Tori!

The other day I was sitting at my desk at school and suddenly got a whiff of the used book store I visited so often a few years back (before Amazon and ebooks). I don’t know what brought the scent to mind, but suddenly I was so happy (and not just because I had a blog topic, lol!)

So many happy memories have to do with books, from getting the Scholastic order forms to book orders in the mail.

When I was in elementary school, our librarian would open the school library one morning a week (or maybe every two weeks) so the kids from the neighborhood could keep reading over the summer. I was there every time. I can still remember the smell of the cool, dark building that had been closed up. The library was in the center of all the classrooms, and carpeted, with a sunken area that I think was for little kid books. I had my favorite books in the library, so I’d check those out first, before venturing to find others to try. Then I’d go home and stretch out on my bed in my bright room and read the rest of the day.

When I was in middle school, I guess, we’d stay with my grandmother during the summer while Mom went to summer school. Once a week or so we’d go check on our house and check the mail and go to the local five-and-dime, Winn’s (where I eventually had my first job). The book racks were up front and loaded with all kinds of books, from thrillers to movie novelizations to Harlequins. My grandmother would buy me a Harlequin every time. I told her I liked the horses on the covers. I think I read most of the Janet Dailey books this way.

The summer after fifth grade, I think it was, my dad and stepmom took my brother and stepbrother and I to California in the back of a Cutlass Supreme. I remember my dad getting mad because I brought my entire Trixie Belden collection with me. But I also remember going into the five-and-dime in Paso Robles, where my other grandmother lived, and finding a Trixie Belden book I didn’t have and buying it. (When I went to go visit my dad a couple of summers ago, I reminded him of the Trixie library--I think it was even in a paper bag--and showed him my Nook with hundreds of books on it.)

Fast-forward a dozen or so years, and I was hooked on romance. It started out with an obsession about Ireland, so I read a Karen Robards book. Then every book that she wrote. Then every romance I could find set in Ireland (not many back in those days). Then England, because, heck, close enough. I read every one of Catherine Coulter’s books. Hard to believe I didn’t used to have a TBR.

And then I discovered the used book store, the one I got a whiff of earlier this week. HEAVEN! I spent many summer and Saturday mornings in the store, adding to my stack, then going home and reading. The cool air, the freedom, the rows and rows of stories--I discovered so many treasures there--Anita Mills, Betina Krahn, Amanda Quick (still my go-to comfort read).

Books have played a huge role in my life, and continue to be important as I add to my TBR and keeper shelves, and as I write more, pouring out the stories I want to tell.

Thanks MJ! What about you? What got you hooked on reading? Are there books from your childhood that influenced your adult reading? Is your Kindle or Nook loaded with treasures like Midnight Sun?

MJ's books on Amazon

Get Midnight Sun Free for Kindle: http://amzn.com/B0054QZPD2

MJ's books on B & N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/MJ-Fredrick?store=ebook&keyword=MJ+Fredrick

MJ's books on Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/MJFredrick

Follow MJ:


Twitter  @MJFredrick

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MJ's Blog

Heartthrob Haven: Just Who Exactly is Jacob Littlejohn?

Heartthrob Haven: Just Who Exactly is Jacob Littlejohn?: Tori Scott here, to introduce you to Jacob Littlejohn--soldier, warrior, mercenary? Which one is it, Jacob?

Come over to Heartthrob Haven to see what Jacob has to say about himself. Comment for a chance to win a copy of Superstition and a $10 Amazon gift card.

EReader Daily News is running a weekly Twitter competition to win a prize package of eBooks (value $25+ or more) to an entrant who will be drawn at random. This will run for 4 weeks only. You could be a lucky winner with some great  beach reading for your Kindle this summer.

To enter, just “Like” Ereader Daily News on Facebook, then follow them on Twitter & RT with hashtag #eReadersROCK. The week’s winner will get emails from the authors for the FREE eBooks. Also, on week 5, all entrants will get the opportunity to get a signed book package from the authors who donated their books for the contest.

This week’s selection of books:

 Blame It On Texas by Tori Scott

Jockeys & Jewels by Bev Pettersen

The Pearl Witch by Theda Hudson

Mending Fences by Lucy Francis

Shattered by Jesebel Jorge

Let Us Prey by Jamie Lee Scott

Deadly Offerings by Alexa Grace Shattered by Kate Kelly

The Throwbacks by Stephanie Queen

Redeemed by Jill Hughey