Thanks to everyone who made the release of Defiant so special. There’s been an incredible buzz around the book, and your excitement, your reviews, and your word-of-mouth recommendations for the book are responsible for that. Thank you!

Some quick Defiant news:

All About Romance gave Defiant a fantastic review with Desert Island Keeper honors. Click here to read that review.

For those of you who’ve read the book and want to be part of an ongoing chapter-by-chapter discussion, come join the closed Defiant discussion group on Facebook.

And, yes, Joseph will get his own story. That’s the question I’m being asked most frequently in emails these days.

Some quick travel news:

I will be attending the Romance Writers of America conference in Anaheim, Calif., July 25-28. I signed up too late to participate in the big public literacy signing on July 25, but I will be there with romance trading cards from Defiant to sign and share. If you’re in the area, please stop in, find me, and say hello. I am looking forward to face-to-face meetings with my agent, my editor and good friends: Jill Shalvis, Julie James, Marie Force, Joyce Lamb, Jenn LeBlanc and others.

Bar tenders, prepare yourselves.

But back to books...

I’ve gotten a start on the next I-Team #6, which is titled Striking Distance. I’m under an extreme deadline crunch, which means I won’t be online nearly as much as I have been until the book is finished. I’m behind on reader emails, and I doubt I’m going to catch up. So sorry about that! Please know, however, that I do read everything you send me.

So what’s Striking Distance about?



It tells the story of SWO Chief Petty Officer Javier “Cobra” Corbray, an active-duty SEAL, and Laura Nilsson, a popular broadcast journalist nicknamed The Baghdad Babe by troops. Laura was taken hostage by terrorists while reporting in Pakistan and is dead. Or so the State Department thinks. When Corbray discovers during an op that she is very much alive and has been held prisoner for the past year and a half, he puts his life on the line to rescue her.

That’s how Javier and Laura meet.

From there, the story takes place back in Denver and revolves around Laura putting her life back together after 18 months of being a prisoner. I won’t tell you how Javier and Laura are reunited, but it was fun for me to write. The suspense thread of the story explores the circumstances of Laura’s abduction. Was it her own fault? Was it a random act of violence against a journalist? Or was she betrayed? Most importantly, who is trying to kill her?

It’s my first time writing an active-duty military hero, and so far doing the research for that has been a lot of fun and very interesting. For the prologue where we actually see Javier on a mission in full combat mode, I had to use a vocabulary that is completely new to me. As someone who sees words as toys, I found it refreshing and exciting.

Yes, some of us get our kicks in weird ways. Don’t judge.


As I’m writing, I see actor Jon Huertas as Javier — a man of mixed descent, including Puerto Rican (Taino Indian and Spanish), Scottish, African American and Cherokee. Laura is a dual citizen of Sweden and the United States — my first heroine with European ties. I’m really enjoying that because, of course, my sister has dual citizenship (Swedish and U.S.), and I have a deep love of Scandinavia.

I see Swedish model Petra Silander when I think of Laura. It’s hard to find photos of Ms. Silander wearing clothes, but I did manage to find this.




I’m having a lot of fun learning bits and pieces of Puerto Rican Spanish, which is apparently different than the Mexican Spanish with which I am nominally familiar. Thanks to Arlene and Beatrice Rios and their friend Wilson Cruz for their help. So far, we’ve focused mostly on swear words and how Javier would talk to his beloved Puerto Rican grandmother.


The I-Team crew are back, including Nate, Megan, Emily and Jack West from Skin Deep.

So there’s a quick glimpse of the next I-Team novel.

In addition to writing, I’m very busy with the garden, getting up at about 5:30 a.m. each day to do work outside while it’s cool, then coming inside, washing off the mud, and getting to work. Growing our own food — or as much of it as we can — is important to me for so many reasons, not the least of which is health. I will admit that by the end of the season, I am usually looking forward to that first hard frost so I can STOP working outdoors and free up more time for things like sleep.

I won’t be blogging as much over the next several weeks, but I do hope to bring you weekly random sexcerpts from my books — clips of sexy, funny or romantic scenes — as well as some fun in the form of a MacKinnon’s Rangers trivia contest. So stay tuned!