K.C. Burn – Erotic Romance Author

The book I’m reviewing this month for the DIK Reading Challenge is Collision Course by KA Mitchell.

Collision Course by KA Mitchell is, in my opinion, an opposites-attract story. Joey Miller is a man who maybe hasn’t quite finished growing up and Aaron Chase is a man who has raised his younger siblings and has no interest in taking responsibility for anyone else. Joey’s a romantic looking for ‘the one’ and Aaron has no interest in settling down with anyone. Joey is a social worker and Aaron’s experience taking care of his siblings make him suspicious of the system. And although Aaron is a paramedic, he doesn’t trust Joey’s ‘do-gooder’ nature. That doesn’t stop them from wanting each other, and they find themselves trying to find some common ground.

A potentially fatal situation brings them both to some serious self-realizations. Aaron’s spent so much time trying to raise his siblings that he fails to see that caring for someone new, a partner, isn’t a burden. Joey realizes that as much as he wants love, he’s been afraid of it; he needs to take responsibility for his own actions and stop sabotaging his relationships.

I love Joey. I loved Joey after his brief appearance in Diving in Deep, and I was happy to see him get his own story. He’s totally adorable, and throughout it all, I kept rooting for him to get what he wanted, and in this case, he wanted Aaron. Aaron is, in many ways, a typical alpha – gruff, demanding, unwilling to show emotion. But Joey thawed him throughout the book, and the ending was so sweet I almost cried (and I HATE crying). The emotional growth of these two men, alongside the development of their relationship, was beautiful, and something KA Mitchell excels at. And the sex was completely hot as well – can’t forget that! Collision Course was a great read.

Come visit me today at Dawn’s Reading Nook!

I’m guest blogging about about swear words in Fantasy & Sci-fi, and I’ll be giving away a copy of my book, MIA Case Files: Wolfsbane.

While there are a lot of great things about living in Florida, there are plenty of things I miss about Toronto. Besides the obvious friends and families, I mean. One of which is gaming. Not the total geeked-out gaming (although I’ve played a few of those on occasion) but board games. Like Settlers of Catan, Puerto Rico, Betrayal at House on the Hill. If you’ve never played some of these games, they’re more involved than the board games you played as a kid, but they’re also a heck of a lot more fun (IMO). They do take more time to play and require a bit of dedication to assimilate the longer rules.

As far as I’m concerned, there are definite pluses for that time invested. For instance, in Betrayal and Settlers, the game board changes every time, which is something I enjoy. I like the variety, it keeps the game fresh every time we play. In Betrayal, the players start out playing as a team against the creatures and supernatural beings in the house, but at a certain point (which also changes with each game) one of the players becomes a traitor and competes against the rest of the players. There are fifty different possible traitor scenarios, and even when those are repeated, the layout of the board affects the outcome of the game, so it is not predictable. Hubby likes these games because winning often relies on strategy rather than luck (he’s VERY unlucky with dice, so it’s not a surprise, really).

So, why do I miss these games? What difference does geography make? Most of the games we own (and… er… it might actually be a closet-full) require a minimum of three players. Hubby and I have made friends since we moved, good friends, but for the most part, we feel a little like pushers, trying to convince people to invest time in learning the intricacies of the rules and the hour or two required to play a single game. We worry they won’t have as much fun as we do. Although, maybe I shouldn’t worry. Even if they hate whatever game, it’s still cheaper than going to see a bad movie.

We’ve started to grab some two player games, and there are some good ones out there, but for the same reasons I haven’t had time to write lately, I haven’t had time to play games either. Soon, though. There’s a GREAT game store in Orlando and we’ve got three new games calling for a test run.

Pens and pencils – are they completely defunct tools for a writer? I use a computer and netbook (although I’ve yet to get a multimedia phone) but I have to say, I’m still a little old school. Editing on the computer is almost impossible or me. I try to make the font and margins really small so I use less paper, but I NEED the paper.

I use a pencil to edit. One that needs sharpening. It just feels right in my hand, in a way that a mechanical pencil never does. Is that an echo of the uncomplicated life in kindergarten? Maybe. Probably. I may… er… have a large collection of sparkly pencils.

Pens I’ll use for writing longhand. I don’t write longhand very often (I’m not truly a dinosaur or a luddite) but there’s times when you gotta write even if using the darling netbook is impractical. Like when I’m flying. Invariably, I sit behind someone who needs to recline their seat. Which I’ve never understood. Do those two or three inches of “reclining” make any improvement at all? All it does is make it impossible to set up a computer on those itty, bitty table trays.

So, I write longhand on planes. Fortunately, my handwriting is sufficiently hieroglyphic-like that my seat mates are unlikely to determine what I’m writing about. It takes twice as long, because I also have to transcribe what I wrote. And sometimes I can’t even read what I wrote.

This weekend though, we went to a wedding in Detroit. On the way home, not only did no one sit in front of me, hubby and I got the row to ourselves, so I made him move over one. I got to use TWO table trays – and I transcribed the stuff I wrote longhand on the plane on the way to the wedding. Awesome.

I’ve thought about getting a digital voice recorder, but I can’t imagine too many situations where I could actually discuss aloud options for stories. Probably I’ll just stick with pen and pencil. And my netbook, of course. It’s worked so far.

I’ve been a little down in the dumps lately – probably because I haven’t had any time to write. It’s amazing how radically that can affect my mood. Because of it, though, I thought I’d share some of my “go-to” sites for when I really need a laugh.

Candyboots’ Weight Watchers Cards from 1974 and James Lileks’ Gallery of Regrettable Food have a similar theme. They take old recipes, cookbooks or other food-related images and add biting, sarcastic and highly amusing commentary. For Candyboots, I recommend ‘taking the tour’ (one of my favourite stops is the Fluffy Mackerel Pudding) and for the Gallery, there’s several options but generally the ones that involve meat are the most hilarious, IMO. If you manage to make your way through the Gallery without actually dying of laughter, James Lileks also has the Institute of Official Cheer, where his commentary expands beyond food-related images into topics such as advertising and interior design.

Now, if I’m feeling like I need to pretend I’m working, but still need a pick-me-up, Evil Editor can always be relied on for a laugh. People submit the first two hundred words of their stories and readers of Evil Editor’s blog will ‘continue’ the submission, probably not in the way the author intended at all. Also, people submit query letters for books they’re trying to sell, which Evil Editor will critique. He’s very up-front about the fact the site is designed for entertainment first, and he succeeds admirably in providing consistent amusement. Regardless, I’ve actually learned a lot about query letters (and what doesn’t work) while laughing so hard, I’ve cried. Like just now – I got totally sidetracked while writing this. It’s addictive stuff. And it’s a blog, so it has new additions all the time.

Yay! I’m already in a better mood than I was an hour ago. Worked again!