I'm a bitch... #CabalofHotness

That's right. I'm a bitch. I'm a lover. I'm a child. I'm a mother. I'm a sinner. I'm a saint. I do not feel ashamed.

What am I talking about? My theme song, of course. It's Bitch, by Meredith Brooks.






People have asked me how a lovely woman like me can have "Bitch" for a theme song. (I see you snickering over here. Pipe down.)

I think it's an accurate reflection of me. I am many things to many people. For instance, I really am a nice person. Until you threaten someone I love. Then I am your worst enemy. I'm a child when I run around Chuck E Cheese with my four-year-old. I'm a lover with my husband. I'm a mother when my four-year-old wants to have ice cream eight times a day.

All woman are like this. All adults, really. So while Bitch may seem like a negative song, it's really not. It's a reflection of the life we all lead.

How philosophical, I know. Don't get used to it.

Before I go, I wanted to tell you about a new release I have out. It's an anthology I wrote with two friends, Isabo Kelly and Stacey Agdern. Here's the blurb:

Going All In-
Professional hockey players Marcus, Alex, and Chris attend their team's Vegas Night fundraiser unaware

their lives will change forever. Can they face their difficulties and win the most important game of their lives – the game of love? These guys are going all in…

HEDGING HIS BET: Cassandra Carr
Marcus Mitchell never thought he’d find the love of his life with champagne dripping from her shirt rather than walking the runway at Fashion Week like the models he usually preferred, but you can’t always plan these things. Annalise Alonso isn’t going to make it easy for him, though—he’s going to have to work for her love. Now, Marcus is taking a shot and hedging his bet on love.

CASTING THE DIE: Isabo Kelly
After she sees his murder in a vision, Nathalie Mendez has to warn star hockey goalie Alexander Semenov of the danger. To keep him alive, she risks exposing her many secrets. But once the die is cast, her biggest gamble involves her heart.

PLAYING HER GAME: Stacey Agdern
Melanie Gould has been dubbed ‘The Girl in the Lace Corset’. But she doesn’t always like to be the loud mouth defender of the romances she writes, and is definitely not good at playing the games relationships require. Of course, she’s never gone head to head with a guy like Chris Emerson. Chris is trying to behave, and someone like Melanie would destroy his plans to stay under the radar. So what happens when the ‘Girl in the Lace Corset’ and the NHL’s most infamous bad boy go one on one?  Will they play her game?  Will they play his? Or will they both end up in the penalty box?

Until 9/12/13 it's $2.99 - that's less than a dollar a story, and each averages 28k so it's a great deal! Going All in is on Amazon and Smashwords and should be distributed everywhere else soon.

http://amzn.to/145t6mG
http://bit.ly/15ebHsQ (Smashwords)

I also have a free read that's a bridge story between two books in my Storm series. It's titled Moving Day
and features characters from Should've Known Better and from Underneath It All, which releases this fall.

Here's the blurb for Moving Day:
It's moving day for Sebastian, who's making a home with Sarah. Though Rob couldn't be happier for his friends, after the move has been completed he finds himself at loose ends, questioning the direction his own life is heading. Unbeknownst to him, Sebastian and Sarah are worried about the same thing and hope he can find someone special. Will he ever get his happy ending, or is Rob doomed to eternal bachelorhood?

Download it now at:

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/moving-day-cassandra-carr/1116394706?ean=2940045205016
https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/moving-day-storm-series-1.5/id686796518?mt=11
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/345118
http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/moving-day-storm-series-1-5

And remember, there's a little bitch in all of us!

Ideas - the bane and lifeblood of every writer's existence

It's funny - I rarely remember exactly where I got the specific ideas for my books. They come from so many places. Some pop into my head as I'm writing the book and others are stewing in there for weeks or months. Additionally, if I was smart (and sometimes I am!) I might've written down the idea to get it out of my head.

Some writers are plagued with too many ideas and not enough time. I'm one of those. Others are plagued by the opposite problem - they finish a book and then say "Uhhhh, what next?" But no matter which camp you fall into, your ideas, or as they're known in writing circles, your "high concepts", can make or break your career.

When I decided to write about bull riders, I tried to come up with a unique angle. Other, more well-known authors were already writing about them and I didn't want people to pick up my book, roll their eyes and put it back down. I've mentioned this before but perhaps not here, so I'll go over the story behind my bull rider books again.

Collision, book 2 in the series, was originally book 1. I thought about the idea of two athletes together, but wanted to do something different than, say, a female barrel racer and a male bull rider. I wanted people from two different worlds. How about a figure skater and a bull rider? Bingo! And Collision was born. I wrote Impact, which became book 1 of the series, right after Collision, and honestly, my high concept wasn't as unique. But my readers seem to like the book, so I must've done something right. I have a feeling Conner, the hero, has a lot to do with that. Tall, dark, and smoldering. Yum.

The idea for my most recent release, On Display, didn't even come from me. Picture the scene: Ellora's Cave Romanticon conference, October, 2012. Just in case you don't know, Ellora's Cave hires hot guys to pose for their covers exclusively. They're called Cavemen, and let's just say they can be intimidating when you first meet them. Not because they're not friendly -- they are -- but because these guys are MELT YOU INTO A PUDDLE AT THEIR FEET GORGEOUS.

You can see where that might be frightening. But being the brave little soldier I am, I walked into the meet and greet Thursday night armed with an icebreaker question... "Tell me about something I can put in a book." Well, one particular Caveman, David, told me about two things, both of which are now in books. The first thing was a sexual position and ended up in Velocity, book 4 of my bull rider series, and the cover David is on. Yes, I knew that he'd be my cover model when I wrote the scene with the position he told me about. I ain't no dummy. It's called inspiration. ;-)

The other idea was a little more vague. He mentioned an encounter he'd had in the past against a semi-private fence. That idea festered, and I do mean festered, in my brain for months. Finally I knew I needed to get it out of there since it wouldn't leave me alone. These wonderful, irritating ideas are called plot bunnies. They're like an earworm, only an idea rather than a song. And they can drive a writer crazy. So I wrote On Display, which features a sex scene against a semi-private fence. I think I'm going to have to buy David a drink at this year's Romanticon. Hmmm, maybe he'll give me more ideas if I do...

The Armchair Traveller

For the last...three or four years, the closest thing I've come to a vacation has been the trips I take to conferences. Don't get me wrong, I adore going to conferences and meeting writers and readers. It's fun and it gets me away from the house. (which is always good)

Since I had shoulder surgery three weeks ago though, the only things I've seen have been the doctor's office, the physical therapist's office and my house. Oh and television. I've been watching a lot of television and reading a lot. And napping. Napping has been happening a lot as well. And as I watch those shows about far off destinations, of uncluttered beaches, of sparkling blue seas, all I can think of is some place cool and quiet.

I dream of snow, of not melting into a heap of skin and bones the minute I step outside my door. Hello summer. I hate you so much. It reminds me of the year I worked on the riverboat cruise. It was July and we were in Wisconsin. I walked four miles with another boat worker. We were both from south Louisiana and were completely stunned at how cool the weather was. We didn't sweat. We didn't have to stop frequently and rehydrate. We marched and walked and it was fabulous.

So where would I like to be right now? Someplace where the temperature is roughly around 70 degrees at the most. Cooler would be even better. Especially if I have to stay in this bloody sling. I've had the a/c in my house on 65 and a fan on me for three weeks. Can we say I'm hot? Because I am and not in the "Omg, did you see how sexy D looks with her bandana, no make-up and pjs on?" because that'd be a total lie.

Hope everyone has a great Friday! Enjoy this song from Depeche Mode because I don't have pictures to dazzle you with.

I'm rambling, but you have to understand this is the first time I've blogged in three weeks. And I'm quite possibly still tripping on painkillers. Oh! I also have a book coming out next week. Woot-woot! The third book in the Cajun Heat series comes out July 3. Is it a coincidence that it's being released the same day as The Lone Ranger? I think not. I think they planned it because they knew Primal Flavor was coming out and Disney wanted to cash in on my release day. *snort*

Anyway, here's a little bit about Colette and Zach's story: 

Book three in the Cajun Heat series.

Being a human in a parish filled with shifters, Colette Robicheaux has learned to be tough as nails. A hunter with the kind of lethal skills that make most men nervous, all it takes is a single hot look from Zachary Trahan to make her melt into a puddle of goo. And this tiger shifter doesn’t fight fair, using his hot body and his many skills in the kitchen to melt her panties. But there’s a danger in the swamps that threatens to tear them apart, an evil that could turn this hunter into prey.

When chef Zachary Trahan took a break from work to hunt, the last thing he expected to find was his mate. A human huntress with a hot temper, a quick trigger finger and the kind of body destined to keep him up at night, Colette makes his tiger purr. He’ll have to fight his stubborn mate, her impossible family and the threat hiding in the swamps before he can finally claim her for his own.