UPDATE: The winners are…Colleen C and Mary McCoy!
*~*~*

“Turn to your shoulder partner and tell them three things about yourself.” These words always sent horror and dismay coursing through me. As if Professional Development days weren’t bad enough, I now had to talk about myself. Sigh.

You see, the fact is…I’m boring.  I’m just a rather ordinary person who often has the great luck to do interesting things. So, I’ll get the formalities over with and get to the intriguing parts as quickly as I can:

1. I have an amazing husband and four equally amazing, fully grown children, two of whom have Significant Others who mesh seamlessly with our loud, nerdy, fun-loving madness.
2. Two dogs and four cats bedeck every surface of my home with fur and love.
3. Um…I’m struggling with the third thing. How about this: I’ve published 8 novels, 8 novellas, and 2 short stories. At the moment, I have several irons in the fire, including a graphic novel. (You would read a steamy graphic novel, right?)

On to the (hopefully) interesting bits.

Travel is a passion of mine, and I take nearly every opportunity to go someplace new or to see something new in a place I’ve been many times, and if I’m completely honest, wonderfully odd things happen when I travel. My son and I got lost in Florence and found the best gelato and Dante Alighieri’s house. A late train meant I missed a matinee, on Broadway (boo), but for the evening performance I ended up sitting next to Liam Neeson (mega yay). Every time my husband and I go somewhere, we see at least one wedding. This past week in Chicago, we saw two different wedding photo shoots. Weird, but also really cool.

And all of these things go into my brain and come out in a novel. Florence eventually became my reworking of Dante’s Inferno, but instead of moralizing about sin, it’s a journey through one woman’s sexual awakening. Trips to Ireland became steamy stories about their gods. Prior Chicago adventures are morphing into a tale of vampires, witches, and gangsters. Who knows how New York and Liam Neeson will appear?

A Bucket List trip for my husband was Japan. Though only nominally interested personally, I threw myself into preparing a trip of a lifetime for him, and in the midst of hours of research and language learning… (Maybe I should put that into quotes: “learning” Japanese is really hard.) Anyway, at some point Yume appeared in my head and asked me to tell a tale about him and his world. Thus, “Matsuri” (my story inside Secret Identities) was born.

Weeks later, I was thrilled to discover the Japan he told me about exists, with its kitsune, shrines, and landscape so magical it feels like anything could happen, even a one-night stand with a god.

Yume is the best kind of bad boy—assured, confident, and oh so sexy. I can’t wait for you to meet him.

In the meantime, I’ll introduce two winners to either Virgil (Lordie, that man still makes me sweat) or Declan, if you’re hearing Irish pipes calling. Just tell me in the comments what your Bucket List trip is (or are)! Have more than one.

And come visit me on social media. There you can see all of the wild, weird, wonderful journeys I take.