Wild Card Weekend : FREE BOOKS!

If there are two words in the English language that thrill me (well, as a writer, there are several, but these ARE definitely two top contenders), the words FREE and BOOKS would be it. Put them together and it's pure heaven.

Recently I went to the mall and spent a fair chunk of change. I did love how on the receipt it said "Today you saved: " . The amount I saved was equivalent to what I spent - half price sales all day were GREAT. I love a good deal. It gave me glee.

(Now don't get me wrong, I'm also all for giving people their due, which is why I feel duty bound to put in a public service announcement against pirating books. I'm happy to report that what I'm blogging about today is completely legit and authorized.)

So, here's your chance to snag some free books, enough to keep you occupied until the end of the month which is important, and you'll see why in a second.

First of all, if you haven't yet, head over to http://www.harlequincelebrates.com/ and download the 16 e-books they have up for grabs to help celebrate their 60th Birthday. There's one from each line so you get a wide variety - something to suit every romance reader's taste.

Then, venture on over to http://www.everyonesreading.com/, where Mills and Boon are celebrating one year of e-books. They've offered 10 for free download, and they are different titles than are offered at eharlequin, so already you're up to 26 titles.

If this is your first foray into e-books, and you don't have an e-reader, there are links on both sites to Adobe Digital Editions (which is what I use to read on). The cool thing about Digital Editions? It also has a smattering of free books you can download after you get the software - so if you're hankering to read something more of a literary classic - like Bram Stoker's Dracula or a little Hemingway - off you go.

And if you've finished all of those by the end of the month, then pop back over here on September 30th. The Pink Heart Society is also celebrating a birthday - number three! And to celebrate, we're offering a prize pack to a lucky reader. You'll get more details on the 30th, but the prize already includes:

Invitation To the Boss's Ball - Fiona Harper

Two Weeks in the Magnate's Bed - Nicola Marsh

Temporary Boss, Permanent Mistress - Kate Hardy

One Night Love-Child - Anne McAllister

The Savakis Mistress - Annie West

Montana, Mistletoe, Marriage - Donna Alward and Patricia Thayer

Taken By The Viking - Michelle Styles

Her Cinderella Complex - Jenna Bayley-Burke

Come back on the 3oth to find out how to enter...and for now, enjoy the freebies!

You can catch up with the Pink Heart Editors at their sites:

Donna Alward

Jenna Bayley-Burke

Michelle Styles

Must Watch Friday - Music and Lyrics

Please welcome Barbara Hannay with her thoughts on the Romantic comedy, Music and Lyrics!

When I first saw this movie, I enjoyed it very much. I thought Hugh Grant was at his most charming, that Drew Barrymore played her role very well and I thoroughly enjoyed the witty dialogue. But whenever I watch a romantic movie I can't help thinking how similar they are to our books and I can nearly always learn something from them. They're also useful for teaching others in workshops about the structure of romance.

So, I did a quick analysis of the plot of M&L. I may have some scenes a little out of sequence and my method of analysis relies on a hotchpotch of different theories, but in case anyone finds it useful, here it is:

My Hotchpotch Analysis of Music and Lyrics (Hugh Grant plays Alex Fletcher and Drew Barrymore plays Sophie Fisher).

1.Hero has a problem
Alex Fletcher is an aging rock star from the group Pop! And he’s at a meeting with TV producers of a show called “80’s Has Beens,” when he discovers he won’t be asked to sing, but to box! Horror!

2. The mentor’s solution introduces a new problem and a time limit.
Horrified by the idea of boxing, Alex discusses alternatives with his agent, who tells him that the latest young megastar Cora, is a fan of his and wants him to write a song for her to sing with him. Only problem, the song has to by produced by Friday and Alex is no longer on working terms with his lyricist. (Ticking clock starts now!)

3.Mentor tries to help again
Alex’s agent produces a lyricist, but he and Alex can’t get on at all.

4. Arrival of the heroine
Sophie arrives to water the plants (replacement for regular), spikes her finger on a cactus, then disappears.

5. Call to adventure for the heroine
Sophie waters the plants again and Alex is still trying to come up with song lyrics with the lyricist. She overhears and sings a couple of lines, which Alex really likes. He discovers she has a talent for lyrics and wants her to stay.

6.Heroine refuses the call.
Sophie doesn’t want to get involved. Alex runs after her and begs her to help him and eventually persuades her. Her sister is a huge fan of Alex’s!!

7. They work together and begin to get to know each other.
This period takes at least thirty-six hours of working closely together. Sophie rearranges Alex’s furniture, reveals that she was a literature major and has a past in which a university lecturer/lover hurt her (didn’t tell her about his fiancée). So we see potential inner conflict for her. The lecturer has since written a book about her, thinly disguised as Sally Michaels.
At the very end of this period of getting to know each other and sharing secrets etc, Alex and Sophie make love.

8.They achieve their goal.
Cora loves their song.

9. A celebration and a set back that brings a reversal of who helps who.
Alex and Sophie, the agent and his girlfriend have a celebratory dinner, but this is spoiled when Sophie sees Sloane Coates, the university lecturer she loved and who treated her so badly. She hides in the toilet. Alex wants to help her to confront this demon. He persuades his agent’s girlfriend to swap her glamorous red dress for Sophie’s jeans. He helps Sophie to rehearse what she must say to Sloane. But although this helps Sophie to face up to Sloane, she still can’t let out her anger and tell him how she really feels. Alex (emerging hero) attempts to do this for her, but Sloane manages to put him down.

10.Another setback and an extension of their goal
They view Cora’s rehearsal of their song and Sophie is horrified by the way Cora wants to perform it. She sees it as a total travesty of their art. Alex is more philosophical and prepared to go with the flow to at least make some money. On several occasions, (including a huge, glamorous party) he has to restrain Sophie from confronting Cora. Cora also insists that they write another verse.

11.Emotional connections.
Alex is tired of performing at third rate venues to aging housewives. Sophie reassures him that he is doing something meaningful, putting fun in the lives of ordinary people. His little songs have worth. He is grateful to her. She feels very emotionally connected to him. There is a moment where he might progress their relationship, but he holds back. This is where they might take the next step towards love or stay apart.

12.Heroine refuses another/ last “call to adventure”
Sophie is very upset about Cora’s mistreatment of their song and says she can’t help Alex. Alex desperately needs her help to write the last four lines, but she simply can’t.

13.A moment of reflection.
Time is pressing, nerves are frayed, and emotions are involved. Sophie is seen listening to Alex’s ‘big failure’ CD at home. Alex is at his flat reading the book Sloane wrote about Sophie.

14.Black Moment
Alex is becoming increasingly more desperate, but Alex can’t think of any lyrics for the last verse. He and Sophie fight. He tells her that Sloane Coates’s assessment of her in the Sally Michaels book was accurate and she’s devastated. Leaves.

15 Resolution in which Alex reveals that he’s been transformed
At the final rehearsal, Alex discovers that Sophie faxed through the last verse to Cora.
Sophie comes to the concert against her will (persuaded by her sister). But when Alex is introduced and it’s announced that he wrote the lyrics to the next song, she is so incensed that her name has been left out, that she begins to walk out. However, Alex is singing a different song, a song he wrote just for her in which he apologises, admits he has a bad track record, but asks her to understand that he loves her.

And then, after a brief but passionate reconciliation, Alex and Cora sing the song Sophie wrote and they sing it the way Sophie wanted them to, because Alex convinced Cora that he needed her help to win Sophie, and because Cora is a romantic at heart.

So there you go. It sounds very basic when it's pared down like that, but as a romance writer, I find it interesting to look at the bare bones of a story. Mind you, I don't like to write in analytical way, but it can useful at the editing stage to look at one's own plot to see if it has sufficient development.

You can learn more about Australian romance author Barbara Hannay and her books either on at her website or on her blog. Her latest Romance is Expecting Miracle Twins -- out this month in North America and the UK. It is the first in her Baby Steps to Marriage duet.

What Are You Reading : : Mary Balogh

Anne McAllister is just getting started on a new book. So while she's thinking about her people in their situation, she's catching up on some great books in her TBR pile.

I love linked books. When I find an author whose work I love has created not just a story, but an entire world, I rejoice. I also have a hard time resisting the temptation to jump right in.

Usually I don't resist.

As I write linked books and whole worlds myself, I know that each book has to stand on its own. And since I have a brain like a sieve and can't remember what happened in earlier books, even when I'm the one who has written them, I don't mind reading books out of order. They simply have to be coherent unto themselves. That's all I ask.

With Mary Balogh's recent trilogy, which has been followed by a fourth book now out in hardcover and a fifth to come next year (so I guess it's not really a trilogy, is it?), I haven't been disappointed. Not a bit.

I bought them in order. First I bought First Comes Marriage. Then I bought Then Comes Seduction. And recently I bought At Last Comes Love. I'd even intended to read them in order.

But because I had a book of my own that first required writing, and then needed revising and last, wanted one ultimate tweak, I didn't get around to reading any of them when I bought them.

This past week, though, I have.

I started with the third one, At Last Comes Love. I don't know why. I think it's because I liked the hero's name -- Duncan. And I have a thing for heroes who are 'misunderstood.' Duncan had done something terrible -- by society's standards -- five years before. He had basically been persona non grata ever since.

But now circumstances have altered. He's back in society. But he's still not explaining himself. Nor is he apologizing. What he is is looking for a wife. He runs into Meg who is, at that moment, rather desperate for a betrothed. They'll marry, but it won't be easy. The marriage of convenience that he and Meg contrive has plenty of obstacles for them to overcome before their reach their happily ever after.

I enjoyed it because I liked the characters, and because while their situation is unique to them and the period in which they live -- their issues with love and marriage are real. Mary always gives her characters plenty to talk about. They don't just stare at each other and yearn. They confront each other. They tackle their own and each other's insecurities. It makes for great reading.

Which next? I wondered. And I went back to the beginning to read First Comes Marriage. I identified with "plain Jane" heroine Vanessa, though I think she's much more of a saint than I would ever be.

That's the thing about Mary's books -- they call upon their characters to act heroically in not just in great tragedies, but in everyday difficulties. Vanessa did that. And it was lovely to watch Elliott discover he loved her.

I am just about finished with Then Comes Seduction. I'm dragging it out -- making it last -- because I think I really love Jasper most of all. He is the qunitessential bad boy hero. But there's a most inconvenient conscience in him that at the worst possible moment takes him by surprise. Blake Snyder would have called it a "save the cat" moment. It's that par excellence.

So Jasper has won my heart. Now he just has to win Kate's. I know he will, of course, because they were together in Duncan and Meg's book. But it isn't the happy ending I'm looking for -- it's the journey they take to get there.

These three books have made my 'down time' a most enjoyable week.

I'm looking forward to Seducing an Angel, Stephen, Lord Merton's story, which is out in hardback now. And I'm even more eagerly awaiting Con Huxtable's story, A Secret Affair, which is coming in summer 2010. It's a long wait. But I'm sure it will be worth it.

What have you read lately? I may still have a pile of books to get through, but I'm always willing to learn about more -- especially linked books. Got any suggestions?

Anne's next Harlequin Presents, One Night Mistress...Convenient Wife is coming in both US and UK (Modern) in November.

It's loosely linked to her previous Savas-Antonides stories -- well, there's a Savas hero in it -- and introduces Sophy who will be George Savas's heroine if Anne ever stops reading Mary Balogh and gets back to work.

Writer's Wednesday - Playing Hard to Get

This Wednesday, PHS Editor Donna Alward goes in search of new ideas in several places - including her dirty oven.

The first of the month saw me a bit conflicted. There was the celebratory side that was cheering that I had a brand new contract, and then there was the down side that realized that my editor wasn't keen on my latest ideas and I needed to come up with something different, with lots of emotional depth and something, well, fresh.

Problem is - I wasn't feeling very fresh at all.

In fact, that Friday night I was wracking my brains trying to come up with a concept until the old grey matter started to hurt. I was kind of wishing I could just hit a button and some beautiful, wonderful high concept idea would come rushing out. But nope. With the hurting brain came stress. And as many of us know...the crows of doubt absolutely FEED on stress and hurting brains.

I had to stop thinking. Or at least stop thinking for a little while.

You see, I learned long ago that sometimes the answer comes when you are not looking for it. It's that whole watched pot never boils thing...forest for the trees....you know the deal. But how do you turn off your brain, especially when it's racing, pumped up with insecurity and desperation?

Well, I thought, if the ideas were playing hard to get, then I would too. Saturday morning I got up and began cleaning the house. I made sauce in the morning and built a lasagna in the afternoon. I cleaned the oven, of all things! I worked on a knitting project and did some reading.

Sunday I did three loads of laundry and the mending and cleaned out the kitchen desk drawers and baked an apple crumble. I finished the book I'd been reading and also that knitting project. And at the end of it all, I had the seeds of a new book idea.

Sometimes you have to let go and let things come to you rather than go searching with a big club, that's all. I don't know if I'm one of those vulnerable to the power of suggestion, but I do know that when I free my mind, the answers will come. I've had it happen time and time again - though usually it doesn't require the desperate measure of obsessive cleaning. Yuck!

What about you? How do you get your answers?

Donna's next book is her novella, A Bride for Rocking H Ranch included in Montana, Mistletoe, Marriage. Check out an excerpt here!

Travel Tuesday: Capri Italy

Editor Michelle Styles explores the magic of Capri, Italy.

The first time I can remember hearing about Capri was in history class when we were studying the Romans. It is where Tiberius famously retreated and went mad. However after the Romans, Capri went into a gentle slumber and it is not until the last decade of the 19th century that it became an in spot to visit. Alexandre Dumas and Oscar Wilde visited while German industrialist Krupp commissioned a switchback road to the Marina Piccolo (the road was just restored but is as hair raising as ever) Today, Capri is more noted for its celebrity lifestyle and discrete glamour. Certainly the shopping area is stuffed of designer boutiques and expensive jewellery shops. Although you can rapidly feel overwhelmed by day trippers, once you get out of the main shopping area, everything quiets down.

There are not many cars on Capri. The roads are very narrow and twisty. The bus service is good and Capri is famous for its convertible taxis. The locals appear to drive about in golf carts. or very occasionally small cars. But mainly it is a place for walking and for taking life at a slower pace.

The names of the houses and the streets are painted tiles -- white with blue, green and yellow to reflect Capri's personality.

When you arrive by ferry, you can either hike up the stairs (far easier to walk down) or take the funicular railway up to the main town. The train goes very quickly and lets you out by the clock tower. There is also a decent view back towards the mainland.

There are a number of hikes on Capri -- you can quickly walk out to Tiberius's villa (Villa Jovis) where you can see the infamous Tiberius drop -- a spot where Tiberius's victims were pushed in to the sea -- or down to the Marina Piccola where according to Noel Coward -- Life called to Mrs Wentworth Brewster from the main square. With Marina Piccola, again it is better to walk down and then take the very rickety bus up as the bus service is very frequent. From the Marina Piccola, it is possible to get a good view of Monte Solare as well as the I Faraglioni, Capri's most striking off shore rocks.

It is also possible to join a boat tour to the Blue Grotto if the weather is fine. The Blue Grotto is justifiably famous for the way the light turns the water in the cave blue. It was proclaimed to the outside world by poet August Kopisch in 1826. If you visit, you need to be prepared to lie down in the rowboat as the entrance is very low hanging indeed.

As you walk down to the Piccolo Marina, you pass by a bougainvillea covered villa where Lenin and others plotted the Russian Revolution. It seems that such a peaceful and tranquil place where air is scented with jasmine and lemon would have inspired such a thing.

There is a small added attraction as you walk around of checking to see if you can spot any of the celebrities who often visit the island. A very good ice cream place is near the boutique shops and serves fantastic strawberry sorbet.

Capri is one of those places that does exert its spell.

Michelle Styles visited Capri last October. She currently hard at work on her latest early Victorian. Her next release in the North American market is The Viking's Captive Princess in December 09.

Male on Monday - Confessions of a Cover Model

The Pink Heart Society is THRILLED to have with us special guest Robert Nuzzie- a hard body with a soft center gracing the covers of billboards, magazines, and our favorite romance novels. You may recognize Robert from his television commercials, such as Bud Light, Ford Lincoln Mercury, Colombian Coffee, and others, or from his roles in Lipstick Jungle, Dostana, and Guiding Light.

We had the chance to interview this handsome hunk to see exactly what it is like behind the scenes of our romance covers…
How did you get started in romance modeling?

I started working with a couple of agencies in NYC for print modeling. My agent called me and asked if I wanted to do a romance cover, I said “Yes”. It all began from there.

So everyone wants to know, what are some of the things that happen behind the scenes when shooting a cover? It must be exciting shooting in such romantic settings.

It is exciting, but almost all of the shots take place in a studio. The settings are often very primitive- the photographers use lighting, and the illustrator will drop in the background later. We get a breakdown of the setting, and we have to use our own instinct and creativity to imagine that we are really there. I remember working on A Place Called Home (Margaret Watson); they gave us two wine glasses, and we had to imagine that we were sitting in front a fire, cozy and warm, but in actuality we were in front a couple of background lights with amber gels giving a warm look to the scene.

It seems more difficult to shoot than I imagined! Do you have any funny stories, or have you experienced anything unusual during any of your shoots?

Well, on the cover of Reigning in the Rancher (Karen Templeton), I got to experience working with a newborn baby, Joseph. At first, it seemed like it was going to be a challenge because Joseph was crying while the photographer was getting the lighting set, but when I picked him up, he instantly stopped crying and smiled at me. It was great that he took a liking to me because it made the shoot go much more smoothly. We got the cover shot in just a few snaps!

You star on many covers where the women are pregnant. I gotta know, are they really pregnant?

(Laughs) That’s a loaded question! None of the girls who I shot with are actually pregnant. They have these maternity stuffing things, like a pillow with spandex, that the girls have to strap under their clothes.

Haha, which book cover was your favorite to shoot?

I really enjoyed making all of them, but my most favorite was Claimed by the Secret Agent (Lyn Stone). I really like being the action hero. The danger of being in that dark alley, with your adrenaline flowing, protecting a beautiful girl; It’s exhilarating! It doesn’t get much better than that! (Laughs) Guns and beautiful women…It’s like James Bond!

How long does it take to shoot a cover?

From start to finish, it doesn’t take anymore than an hour. A half hour of prep, getting the wardrobe and lighting right…and a half hour of shooting.

And how long until you get to see the final product in stores?

Generally speaking, it takes about six months before you get to see your cover out there on the shelves.

Wow that’s pretty long! Tell me, what's something people would never guess about you based upon your book covers?

Most people wouldn’t guess that as a hobby I enjoy a lot of outdoor adventure sports. Surfing is one of my favorite. I try to go whenever I get a free chance.

Are you as romantic as you portray yourself to be on your covers?

(Laughs) What kind of question is that?! Of course…even more romantic!

Any big projects in the making? What is the next cover we should look out for?

Currently, I am on the cover of Diagnosis Daddy (Gina Wilkins). The next one will be coming out in a couple of months, it is called Wild Fire. I will be playing a shirtless Tarzan type character wearing only a loincloth! (Laughs)

If you are interested in knowing more about Robert Nuzzie or would like to stay up to date on what Robert is working on, please visit Robert’s blog at:

http://www.robertnuzzie.blogspot.com/

or his website at: http://www.robertjohnnuzzie.com/.

A special thanks to Donna Alward for making this article possible. Robert recently graced the cover of Donna’s book, Hired: The Italian’s Bride.

Next up? All scruff and biceps, Robert Nuzzie is a surrogate in the upcoming Bruce Willis movie “Surrogates”, which opens in theaters on Sept. 26th, 2009.