HAPPY HOLIDAYS

I wish you all a safe and happy holiday and peace and love in 2010! I'll be back Monday, January 4.

HUMP-DAY HUNK -- Clive Owen

Who can resist a gorgeous Englishman? Born in the year of the dragon, 1964 (just like yours truly!) Clive is as hot as ever. Enjoy!

The King Arthur shot is my favorite...

MEET THE HEROTerrel Lee from An Ordinary Angel

A huge welcome back to the talented Kathy Otten! An Ordinary Angel, a very special holiday story, debuted last week at The Wild Rose Press. I had the honor of reading this story before it was published, and I fell in love with the strong, silent hero, Terrel Lee Parker. He's the ultimate example of "still waters run deep." I know you'll all love him as much as I do.

Kathy is a working mom who lives in the rolling hills and open farmland of western New York. Married for 27 years, she has 3 wonderful kids, five cats and two big dogs which she enjoys taking on long walks through the nearby woods. When she's not writing or folding laundry, she can be found curled up with a cat and a good book. You may contact Kathy through her web site at www.kathyotten.com.

Blurb:

A lifetime of polite indifference is all Julianne Spencer sees when she envisions a future with her current suitor, Mr. Terrel Lee Parker. She is looking for someone more passionate, more heroic, who can love her for who she really is, and not the proper young lady she pretends to be. Her future seems hopeless until Christmas Eve, when fate drops a wounded outlaw at her door and she comes to realize true heroes can be found inside even ordinary men.

Excerpt:

For a moment Terrel Lee believed God had given him a Christmas miracle. He looked toward the front of the church and Miss Julianne Spencer smiled at him. For a moment his heart soared. He had heard the rumors of her unladylike behavior, but only found her escapades mere expressions of the joy that usually radiated from her animated face. And in response to that joy, he smiled back.

When Avery stepped forward, his moment of happiness crashed inside him and fell like a lead ball inside his stomach. He should have known better. She’d told him she didn’t want him, but the same part of him that believed the South would never fall continued to hope that if he were patient, she would eventually appreciate him for the fine gentleman he strove to be.

Whirling around, he headed outside.

RELEASE DAYCome Chat with Me at the Cougar Club!

Today marks my seventh release in 2009! It's been a wonderful ride. The Cowboy and the Cougar, part of the Cougar Club series, is now available at Aspen Mountain Press.

I'll be celebrating with a chat at The Cougar Club Chatters loop from 12:00 to 4:00 p.m. EST today, and I'd love to see you there. You can join the loop here.

Join me also at Mama Writers and learn where the term "cougar" originated.

Happy Friday!

Blurb:

A hot time with a gorgeous young cowboy is just what the doctor ordered for forty-year-old Holly Taylor. But after a night of amazing passion, she leaves discreetly. Life has other plans for her at the moment.

After the best sex of his life, single father Jack Sherwood isn’t ready to give up his mystery woman. When he runs into her several months later, he’s relentless in his pursuit, and he doesn’t care a whit about their eleven year age difference.

Holly’s life has taken a new course since her first meeting with Jack, and she’s convinced she’s not what he and his adorable son need. Can her new friends at The Cougar Club persuade her to stop running? Or will she lose the best thing to ever happen to her?

HUMP-DAY HUNK -- Charles Paz

Today I'm thrilled to welcome back Mr. Romance himself, Charles Paz, who first blogged with me after he won the title in April. This is a very special post that he wrote himself, and its message holds true for all of us. Thank you for being here, Charles!


THE REDEMPTION OF MR.ROMANCE

"You have to fall, before you can rise..."


Redemption. An act of redeeming or the state of being redeemed. Deliverance. Salvation. At one time or another, we all have gone through this. We fault. We fail. We fall. We then realize what we could do to make things better. To right our wrongs. To redeem ourselves. To prove to ourselves just what we can accomplish. And to silence the nay-sayers. No matter how many obstacles come our way, we are fueled by the desire to break through those barriers in our quest for greatness.

This is just one example. This is just one story. This is my Road to Redemption...

Let’s begin this at the 2009 RT Convention. When most of you last saw me, I was onstage. Flashing lights. Holding trophies with a big smile on my face. Not only winning the Mr. Romance title, but also winning the Readers Choice Award. I have never won anything in my life! I was very grateful and humbled by the events that took place not only that day, but the whole week. It truly was an awesome moment of triumph in my life. Even afterward was great. People coming to me and saying they would love me for their bookcovers. Authors wanting to do interviews with me for their websites. I even had "agents" tell me all the things they wanted to do for me, how to market me and make me a star. I was on cloud nine. But, like a cloud, I had no idea this feeling of greatness would soon slowly evaporate and disappear.

Fast forward to the end of June. The time had come to where I got to shoot for the Dorchester cover. New York here I come. I was very excited. Had the plane ride, got picked up at the airport. Felt like a star! Things were great. I met the wonderful people at Dorchester before the photo shoot. Awesome. Had a blast during the shoot. The model was gorgeous. Atmosphere was great and I was still on that cloud nine from the RT Convention.

Before booking my flight back home to California, my "agent" convinced me to fly to Florida first and shoot for an author and do some other projects that would be "good for me" and “make me look better in the readers’ eyes". It was a financial struggle to scrape up enough money for the plane ticket. I got on the plane and didn't even have enough money in the bank to pull out a $20 from the ATM. But I figured it was an “investment.” These people wouldn’t steer me wrong.

My arrival in Florida was the beginning of the end. The story RT did about “behind the scenes of a cover shoot” got picked up by an online blog site with lots of readers. I could only stare at the screen when I was reading some of the comments people left. "What a Joke," one of them said. "Looks like Mr. Romance should be called Mr. Doughnut" said another. Pathetic. Lame. Fat. Worthless. The list went on and on. Reality was driving an 18-wheeler and blind-sided me from the back. I had had so much confidence for once, and had felt good about myself and who I am. The doubt grew greater while I was shooting in Florida. My "agent" told me “maybe when you are in a big budget studio and actually do a real photo shoot, you could be somebody."

The plane ride back home to Cali was a very long one. With thoughts of self-doubt consuming me, I sat in seat 22E between the mother with her crying baby and the businessman looking over papers. It was bad enough to have total strangers tell me I'm nothing while hiding behind a computer screen, but to have the people who I trusted with my career tell me I am worthless was a whole different story.


The following few days were hard. I spent most of the day looking at the ceiling while I lay on the floor in my bedroom. Knocks at my door from my mother seeing if I was OK. She knew what I was going through. She had seen it before. But she also knew that this was not the worst I have been, and the look of sadness in her face turned into a grin. "You’re planning your next move aren't you?" she said. I grinned. "Of course I am. And I know exactly what I'm going to do."

I decided to train for the Sacramento NPC Body Building competition. What better way to get my body back in shape than to set that as a Goal right? I went to my mentor and best friend, Sean Sangalang,, and told him what had happened and my plan to overcome this negative setback in my life. He said, "let’s do this," and began to get me on my diet and cardio regimen. Getting ready for a show takes a lot of hard work and discipline. I missed out on many barbecues, birthday parties, and even weddings. I was determined to redeem myself and silence the critics. I wanted to prove to people that I'm not a joke. That I am worth something. That I deserved the good things that had come to me in my life.

People in the sport of bodybuilding know that the last week is the most critical. Everything you have worked hard for can be lost within the last few days and in an instant, you can go from first place to not even finish over night. Late Thursday night I was awakened by some of the sharpest pains in my stomach I have ever had. I was supposed to eat nine times on Friday to help get my muscles full. I barely ate twice. "Do I have the H1N1 flu? Is this really happening? Not now. Not Now. Not.... Now." I didn't want to quit. On the morning of the show, I was weak and fatigued. At the beginning of the week, I had weighed 220lbs. By Friday, I was down to about 207. The morning of the show, I was down to 193. Fourteen pounds overnight. I was dehydrated and struggling. It finally came time to walk onstage with my group. Every step was agony. Holding each pose brought pain to the muscles. Everything ached. The pain in my stomach was damn near unbearable.


But at that point I realized I hadn’t been that happy in a long time. Each pose I hit drew a smile from my face. Why? I was onstage. I had achieved my goal. All the people who had doubted my potential and wanted to see me fail could not take that moment away from me. Although I was in pain, I still stood there on stage with my head held high, smiling. I ended up taking a respectable fifth place.

The Redemption of Mr. Romance was fueled by all the negativity thrown at me from the critics and people who I thought were on my side. But there was also a deeper and more important redemption. The Redemption of Charles Paz, which was fueled by all the positive things I have in my life.

I started this story off when I was at high point in my life. But what happened Before the “Mr. Romance?” Before the covers? Before the fame? I'm not from a modeling agency, nor am I an actor. I'm just me. The guy next door who took advantage of an opportunity that presented itself. Not too long before the RT Convention, I was at one of the all time lowest parts of my life. I started to think about the good things in my life. The little things that we take for granted such as our family. Our friends. Ourselves.


Mr. Romance is an award based on the physical look you have, to be able to create a character and sell it. The readers’ choice, on the other hand, was based on me being myself. I'm learning now that it’s not about the looks, or the trophies, or proving people wrong. It’s about being who I am, because in the end that is what matters most. I find myself now not necessarily trying to become a man of much success, but rather trying to become a man of value to the people I surround myself with.

Join Me at Sharon's!

Today I'm visiting my friend Sharon Donovan (and her luscious butler, Oliver!) Pop over where I'm sharing one of my favorite holiday recipes!

MEET THE HEROAlex from Full Disclosure

Back from Jamaica, fully rested, fully relaxed, ready to take on new challenges!

Today I'm thrilled to welcome my talented CP, Cari Quinn! Cari's debut release, Full Disclosure, is available at The Wild Rose Press. It's a steamy cougar story with a hot hero who's sure to please!

Blurb:

Thirty-eight-year-old divorcee Holly Burrows has had enough of battery-operated love. Prompted by an ad left at her law office, she investigates Hunk Du Jour, a website designed to foster ‘adult connections’. After weeks of sexy emails and phone calls with surf hunk Kent, she's ready to test their chemistry in person. But first she has to get through lunch with her colleague Alex, a man with a brain as agile as his body. When their consultation ends with a bang, she barely remembers the man she'd lined up for dessert. Now she thinks she's juggling two hot young guys. How can she choose between her two gorgeous cubs – and why do they remind her of each other?

Excerpt featuring hunky Alex:

“You get off on that, don’t you? Bossing people around? In court. In bed.” Changing his mind, he pivoted and backed her up against the mirrored closet door. “Against the wall.”

Her eyes fired. Indignation, annoyance, and lust flashed in their darkened depths as he loosened his hold and her heels hit the rough-hewn plank floor. He clamped his fingers around her wrist when her hand shot out toward the curtains. “Fine. Have it your way.” She heaved out a breath. “You close them.”

“Why?” He pressed against her and let her feel the full extent of his erection. "It’s more fun when someone can see. Didn’t you realize that earlier?” His teeth grazed her trembling lower lip. “Let’s leave the curtains open.”

Excitement flamed in her dark blue eyes, but she shook her head. “Close them.”

She didn’t want him to, not really. Already he could read her, and her command was more about control than a need for privacy. Like him, she got off on the thrill of being caught.

Perhaps he just needed to persuade her to forget her neighbors.

“Something you’ll discover about me, sweetheart,” he traced her cheekbone, “is that I don’t take orders. But I bet you’ll take mine.”

Cari Quinn wrote her first story - a bible parable - in 2nd grade, much to the delight of the nuns at her Catholic school. Once she saw the warm reception that first tale garnered, she was hooked. She attempted her first romance in junior high, long before she'd ever read one. Writing what she knew always took a backseat to what she wanted to know, and that still holds true today. Cari's genres of choice include contemporary, romantic comedy, romantic suspense, urban fantasy and paranormal. Recently she discovered erotic romance. Oh, how far she's come…

Visit Cari at www.cariquinn.blogspot.com.

HUMP-DAY HUNK -- Gabriel Garko

Gabriel was born on July 12, 1974, in Torino, Italy. This 6' 2" hottie has brown hair and green eyes, and can speak Italian, English, and French. So he'll be able to translate those sexy sweet nothings he whispers in your ear ;).