Heart to Heart

[#1]

You don't live to be almost 30 and not build up a little resentment.  

OK, so 30 waved adieu a while ago, but I can remember being put out even then by the smug, sanctimonious folks whom most everyone agrees are some of the most annoying specimens of humanity in existence: people who have their holiday shopping done before Halloween.

Perhaps I overstate things, but you know who you are, and those of us who barely can get Christmas together by New Year's have just one question:  Can it possibly be the case that you're wrapped in holiday spirit while buying Hanukkah gifts in August? Because the same question crosses my mind about reading holiday romances before, say, December.  Do they really get you in the mood?

Well, I know at least one that certainly'll get you in the sort of mood that makes any time the most wonderful time of the year, if you know wh'am sayin'.  It's the sizzling n' sassy new holiday "duology" from Kresley Cole and Gena Showalter, "Deep Kiss of Winter  ."

If the title and cover aren't enough to make a girl want to cuddle up w/ a frothy mug of hot, this big 'ol handful of even hotter'll turn any romance fan not already a believer in the preternatural powers of Cole's and Showalter's paranormal romances into zealots for the homegirls' home team.

In Cole's "Untouchable," we meet Daniella the Ice Maiden, a gorgeous little Valkyrie warrior whose skin is so cold she experiences excruciating pain when touched by someone other than her own "icy" kind. That makes it kind of tricky for vampire Murdoch Wroth to claim Danii as his Bride, and especially stinks for a guy known back in his medieval day as a rake who "touched" just about everything in skirts.

Murdoch doesn't want to hurt Danii, but he's also running a little scared of the whole mated-for-afterlife thing.  And Danii may have spent centuries dreaming of getting next to someone, but she's too modern a woman to be played by a confused "leech," even one who may share with her some of the most uniquely sensuous lovemaking seen on the pages of a romance novel.

Yet there's more exceptionally creative sensuality and entertainment to be had in Showalter's "Tempt Me Eternally."  TME's Aleah Love can "shift" into any individual's image simply by touching his or her skin.  In her latest bod, she's become an agent for an organization that investigates and removes aliens (AIR).  Sent to capture deadly warriors, Aleah instead is taken prisoner by their leader, Breean Nu.

Breean's race of peace-loving people was decimated by a terrible virus, and he's brought the only men who survived to Earth to rebuild their lives.  He may be able to help Aleah's team thwart the evil aliens for whom they've mistaken Breean's peeps.  But first, Breean's got to get Aleah to trust him enough to help them parley with AIR.  He's pretty sure he can use the innate erotic appeal he and his men are known for to capture her attention, but is driven to have her willing and eager affection.  And Aleah's thinking it might not be so bad to let a guy touch her who seems unafraid to see her as she really is.

Just writing about "Deep Kiss of Winter" gets me in the holiday mood, 'cause both of these stories have lovely Christmas-y imagery, and are great fun, to boot. It almost makes a girl wanna' do some gift shopping.  Not for anyone else, but, you know, anytime's a good time to add to one's To Be Read pile.

What do you love about Kresley Cole's and Gena Showalter's novels? When do you start your holiday shopping?  How likely are you to buy yourself books when you head to purchase reads for someone else?

[#2]

Lol, Michelle, you had me cracking up about Danii and wanting to 'get next to someone"! Love it! I'm just psyched about this new novel and wholeheartely look forward to a weekend exactly as you described curled up with this book.

Oh, I just love Kresley's novels! If you haven't already guessed, hehe. They are just so outstanding! When I start one I simply cannot put it down! And her wit, humor and smart-mouthed heroines, not to mention her blazing hot mens, are just to-die-for! Brilliant!

Hmm, if I'm shopping for books, someone else or not, I'm definatly going to be buying one for meself! I don't delude myself on that score, no sirree!

[#3]

Aaaargh, Michelle, would you please stop talking about that book?!? I've got six or seven others lying here in front of me, but I won't start because I will read DKOW next (stubborn me, I know). Well, Amazon's been saying ever since I ordered it that they'll sent it to me on the 15th (meaning tomorrow), but when I look it up it says it will only be delivered in one to three weeks. Hach, that's really bad. Can't even go into the next bookstore and simply grab it. Crap.

Honestly, what I like most about KC and GS's books are the love scenes (c'mon, you know I'm a sucker for these, Michelle! ), or, more generally talking, the sexual tension and interaction between the characters. And the worldbuilding in general. I LOVE mythical creatures/storylines, and those two have a bunch of them. Simply love 'em.

I could (if I had any idea whatsoever what I'll buy anyone) start buying Christams gifts now - we'd have the landscape for it since the day before yesterday it started snowing here (the Alps start where my village ends, so you can imagine that!). Not the cool Xmas-feeling you get in December, but it gives hope for white Christmas since folks are predicting it will be a long and harsh winter.

My all-time-fav Christmas-anthology is Snowy Night With A Stranger which came out last year. Won-dah-full stories, definitely recommandable. And the one I'm looking forward most at the moment is A Highlander Christmas - he Cover alone makes this book buy-worthy (you hafta check it out - sa-hexxy!). I've only read books by Cindy Miles before (and love 'em, too) but until now I've only read positive reviews, so I'm excited!

[#4]

Hi Michelle - AnnB here - I loved the blog - of course it helped that I just got back from the bookstore (who's name shall not be uttered !!!) with Deep Kiss of Winter clutched in my hot little hand.  However, I have to take exception to the description of those of us who do our holiday shopping early - "smug" maybe, sanctimonious, hardly ever !! I can't wait to curl up with this book - I have to admit that while I am a huge fan of Gena Showalters, I don't think I have ever read Kresley Cole. I have a feeling that this will change (OMG the TBR pile has now reached gargantuan proportions. Anyway, great blog, Michelle...

Anne

[#5]

Lisa Kroener, I have 'Snowy Night With a Stranger' In my TBR pile waiting to be read. Definately will be doing so on some snowy-can't-go-to-work day! Glad to hear it's so good.

Also, since I can't seem to stop gushing about Kresley Cole (no one's noticed, I know), first of all 1AnneB, I hate you that you get to read it and I don't, but, anyway, that her heroes are so overprotective of the heroine and totally have to chase after her, (sometimes literally, hehe) not to mention that they're usually brooding and hot! and the heroine herself is fun, sexy, smart and strong. She doesn't need a man but falls in love, anyway. Both hero and heroine have faults, to be sure, but we love them for it! And, instead of the man saving the female-in-distress all of the time, they both save each other, physically as well as emotionally, and help each other grow! Example: Lachlain and Emma. Lachlain was tortured and enraged and Emma soothed him, while  Emma was timid and because of him learned to tap her Valkyrie roots and become a fighter. Love it!

I know, I could go on and on about her, but, honestly she's so great! One simply can't help it!

[#6]

Oh, and if you haven't seen the trailer for DKOW, you have to go to youtube and check it out. It's awesome!

[#7]

What means this "Christmas shopping"? 

Okay, you had me at "most uniquely sensuous lovemaking seen on the pages of a romance novel."  Who couldn't use some of THAT for Christmas?  I'm encouraging everyone in my family to opt out of shopping stress and just make all their puchases in one place: A bookstore.  Great adventures for super cheap. 

Of course, if someone wanted to splurge on an e-reader, my Christmas stocking would be very grateful.

[#8]

Hi, principessa.  You know, you've hit the nail on the head about Cole's heroine's and heroes.  The thing I love is that since the heroes are so ooooold, they kind of are behind the times. They're always a little befuddled and kinda old fashioned.  And the chicks are always hipper and, like, sheesh, don't be such a medieval warlord womanizer!  You're in for a great weekend of reading.

Oh, Lisa, I forgot about your little, em, problem with reading books in the order they were released.  But at least w/ Cole's IAD books, a lot of the action goes on concurrently in books, which is really nifty.  And while you may learn that a couple hooked up in another book, you never understand how it happened til you read that one. Then you go, 'oh, so that's what was going on in that scene in that other book that mentioned this couple.'  If that makes sense as you're translating my convoluted English into German.

And don't you just love the Valkyries?  They're so different from what we think of with, like, Wagner's, no?  I love how they're always stealing each other's clothes and playing pranks.  My fave is that they love gifts and diamonds.  I feel like that sometimes, like I could conquer the world, as long as you don't wave something pink or sparkly or which says Nordstrom in front of me. In that case, I turn into a slavering magpie.  Do magpies slaver?  Maybe paranormal ones do...

[#9]

 When do you start your holiday shopping?  When ever the hell I feel like it, and since my kid is an adult I don't spend hours trying to find the right gift screw that they all just get gift cards. So fa-la-la-la-la-la-freaking la.

How likely are you to buy yourself books when you head to purchase reads for someone else? Uh Micelle I'll buy myself a book for any reason, at any time and sometimes the books I buy for other people don't make it to them they may just get a gift card instead. ;-)

Deb 

[#10]

Thanks, AnnB! Oh, I meant those other sanctimonious early holiday shoppers!      Actually, the real question I wanted to ask was: Will someone do my holiday shopping for me?  You can be our Gena Showalter expert, because we're kind of Immortals After Dark crazed here.  I haven't read a ton of Gena's, but I'm psyched for the AIR now. ARe there more of them?  I've heard her YA stuff is great,too.  And the covers of her Pandora's Box-themed books are gawjus, those tatted young men.  Perty.

Principessa, Emma was the witchling, right?

Hey, Jessa!  Saw your "Seduced by Shadows"  featured on the index of the Romance store here at BN.com!  Sweet.   Yeah, the whole icy, winter theme of Cole's novella is just wild.  I'm guessing you'd like your family to shop in the 'gift card' section of the book store?

[#11]

Hi All!  You ladies have me smiling from ear to ear!!! 

Michelle, I have an aunt whose shopping is done by October, sometimes August.  How disgusting is that (smile)!  Me, I'm a last minute girl and no matter how I try, it always seems to go that way.  I've gotta say that I somehow get it all done and it doesn't seem to bother me in the least that I'm rushing around like a crazy person.  I seem to thrive on it! 

I can't wait to read DKOW.  Since, your description of the love scene being so unique to romance,  I can't imagine what KC wrote, but I know it's darn good!  She has some of the best love scenes I've ever read.  I kept wondering how she was going to bring the h/heroine together intimately, since the heroine is so cold she can't be touched.  Well, leave it to her to come up with a solution that sounds uniquely Kresley.  Can't wait to read that.  Thanks Michelle for whetting my appetite for this.  Now I'm really going to be a blubbering mess in a good way until I read that story!

Princess, you go right ahead and be psyched about KC!  I'll be there right along with you girl!  Her books are not to be missed.  Definitely can't put them down and destined for my keeper shelf!  Love her brooding heroes and her sassy independent heroines.  Your description of how they come together in love for one another is right on!  Just started Gena's Darkest Night.  Great so far. I've gotta agree about her covers.  That cover art on those guys is absolutely beautiful!  Those tats are hawt!  Hey, like they aren't gorgeous enough!  Ooo la la! 

I haven't read any of those Christmas anthologies.  I'll have to get them too!  I don't have any kids, but a two great nieces and a great nephew to shop for.  Love doing that!  When I go to the toy section, I don't want to leave.  How bad is that (laughing)!One of my teenage cousin's loves to read, so I'll be getting her something of the reading kind.  I hadn't thought about a gift card, but that sounds great!  As for me ... a book anytime of year just knocks my socks off!

[#12]

1la, I get to the Barbie aisle, and I don't want to leave. So there it is, my deep dark secret.  And my daughter is not, and never has been a Barbie girl. So I have no excuse.  and I'm with you on the book gifts. Books were such a luxury growing up.  of course, i lived in the library. But to own a book meant you realllllly loved it.  So even though I receive books from publishers for my job, I still am kind of wowed by it after 4 years.  And, you know, a friend gave me a paperback a while ago that I didn't have in my collection of fave series, and it was an amazing gift, really special. 

[#13]

Michelle, I'm with you on books as gifts. The books I own are the ones I really love too. I treasure all of my personal library and have special shelves for my favorite authors and books that I've had the great pleasure of the author signing.

Deb

[#14]

Michelle, I love that the Valkyrie are like that, too, like a bunch of frap girls, hehe. Who aren't afraid to kick some butt, hehe.

Oh, Emma is Lachlain's  mate, half-vampire and half-Valkyrie in 'A Hunger Like No Other". You're thinking of Marikita the Awaited, the witch, Bowen's mate in "Wicked Deeds On A Winter's Night". Yeah, sometimes it's hard to keep track!

Thanks for your support, 1love! I keep bothering them here at work "Has it come today?" hehe

[#15]

Michelle - Here's the deal with Barbie and me. I had one of the first bubble-cut Barbie's, which, if you didn't know it already, tells you how far past thirty I am. I think I may have had one other Barbie, but I also had two younger sisters, who quickly decimated my Barbie twins -- smashing their boobs (which used to cave easily) and ripping their heads off. I have one of the heads left, God knows why I kept it. Maybe the fate of my Barbie's warped me, but I never really got into dolls. I have the "big doll" I got when I was three, but that's it.

My daughter is the Queen of Dolls. NO ONE has dolls like she does. It's not just the quantity, it's everything. But, I believe I lost the topic of your blog somewhere in my Barbie rant.

Kresley Cole? You know I have it. Her books are preordered the second they are available. I don't care if they are in or out of season, I. Need. My. Cole. 

And it's a good thing writing has made me less organized. I used to be that person who had my Christmas shopping done by Halloween, but those days are long gone.