Cover Reveal!

I'm so excited! I received the cover for my April release Two Cowboys in Her Crosshairs today!

I think it looks pretty awesome. Harris Channing did an amazing job yet again. Thanks Harris!

Two Cowboys In Her Crosshairs is the first book in the Hellfire Ranch series about a group of ex-marines turned cowboys, sheriffs, FBI and  more who find themselves in more danger on home soil than they did while deployed. I hope you'll join me on my journey to Freedom, Texas and the men and women of Hellfire Ranch.

Here's a little about Olivia, Jake and Hudson's story:


Marine sniper Olivia Martinez's injuries from Afghanistan aren't all visible. She's carrying scars on her heart as well, compliments of Jake Logan and their all-too-brief battlefield romance. Damage to her eyesight during an ambush has derailed her field work, but the gutsy Marine is still in the Corps and working for JAG.
Jake Logan retired to the quaint town of Freedom, Texas and the Hellfire Ranch he named after his unit. With his best friend Hudson Walker at his side, he's trying to forget that final mission gone so horribly wrong...and forget Olivia.

A mysterious package, coupled with the recent deaths of other members of the squad, force Olivia to track down Jake as she investigates. Sparks immediately fly, confirming the passion between them didn't die in the desert.

The only problem for Olivia is she's getting sparks from Hudson, too.
When the trio find themselves under siege and taking fire, they know they have to solve the mystery of the package's contents, or wind up dead.

Unraveling the clues lead them to suspect ugly things about someone on their team.

But it's hard to focus. All Jake wants to do is love Olivia again. Hudson, who loves Jake like a brother, likes seeing his buddy vibrant again for the first time since returning from Afghanistan.

Olivia, in bed between them, makes them all feel alive.

Now if only they can stay that way.

In the end, it's going to come down to Olivia's ability to overcome her injuries, both physically and emotionally, to save the three of them.

But once a Marine sniper has you in her crosshairs...say your prayers.

She's way more accurate — and sexy — than Cupid.

The book isn't available for pre-order yet, but you can peruse some of my other books at Siren by clicking here. And of course, they are all available on Amazon and B&N.

Happy reading!

Jennifer

Gonna Party! 'Cause It's My Birthday!

Woohoo! Happy Birthday to me!

I hope y'all have as great a day as I'm going to have. Family and friends and presents and cake and Mexican food. Can it get any better?
As the years pass by I think of all the things I've learned, the things I've done, the things I wish I'd done or said and the things I can't wait to do.
I truly believe you wake up each day and choose what kind of mood you're going to be in. Most days I'm a happy girl. I've weathered my share of trials and tribulations but I've always made it through.
Here are a few of my birthday brain ramblings:

Treat everyone with respect unless they do something to make you lose it.

Love yourself. If you have issues and you beat yourself up for whatever it is, think about your sister, best friend, mother, grandmother. Would you ever say anything like what you're telling yourself? If you heard her saying something horrible to herself, wouldn't you stop her and tell her she's crazy? Then do it for yourself.

Take a moment to breathe every single day. Sit, relax, decompress and de-stress. Taking five, ten, thirty minutes or more for yourself is not a crime. You need to re-charge your batteries to be your very best self. Think of all you can do if you have the energy and the mental fortitude.

Don't take a minute for granted. Life is short. Life can be unfair and it's damn sure fragile.

Mend fences when you can. Apologize to those you've hurt. Forgive those who've hurt you.

On the flip side of that -- know when to let go. Of things, of grudges, of people who've moved on from you.

Tell your friends and family how much they mean to you.

Hug a cat or dog or bunny or bird or whatever pet you own. Love them as much as they love you.

Drink water.

What about you? What wisdom do you have that you'd like to pass on? Leave a comment and you'll be entered in a random drawing for the book of your choice in my backlist.

Happy Reading!
Jennifer

The Sunday Quote

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!

Whether you're celebrating with someone special or practicing some self-love by taking yourself out to dinner and a movie, I hope you have a wonderful day today!

I often wonder how traditions start and what keeps them going. I'm pretty sure the chocolate and flower industries as well as Hallmark are responsible for the success of Valentine's Day. Consider the facts: over 1 BILLION Valentine's Day cards are sent each year. Lest you think they're all the same boring stuff, there are over 1,300 different Valentine's Day cards of which about a quarter are humorous. I like funny cards but sometimes I want romantic. Romantically funny?

As for the chocolate industry... ah, apparently on V Day (Not to be confused with V-J Day. Not to be confused with BJ...nevermind) anyway, on Valentine's Day, 36 million boxes of chocolate will be given as gifts. Which is good because American women say they'd prefer to receive chocolate over flowers. I am not one of those women. Give me chocolate roses and I'm perfectly content. So, does this mean that chocolate is the new gold?

Cards? CHECK!

Chocolate? CHECK!

That leaves roses. How about 110 million roses (most of them red, of course) will be distributed on this romantic day. How about them apples? Er, flowers? And something I find even cooler is that about 15 percent of those flower orders are sent by women to THEMSELVES. That is some awesome stuff.

I will leave you with two strange Valentine's Day bits of trivia:

1. Valentine's Day was originally associated with the mating of birds.
2. In Victorian times, it was considered bad luck to sign a Valentine's Day card.

These days I think it's bad luck to FORGET to sign a Valentine's Day card.

Have a sweet and wonderful day no matter how you spend it or who you spend it with!

Happy reading,
Jennifer

Focus On One Step At A Time

           

I have the worst habit of over-expectation from myself. I think if I can do five things, then really why not ten? And if I make ten, why not fifteen? As you can see, it's a self-perpetuating cycle of potential destruction. When things don't get done, I get grumpy and often feel like I've let myself and others down. However if you ask "the others" they are likely to tell you I'm doing a great job and shouldn't be so hard on myself.

It's actually something I'm aware of and have been trying to break but it's slow going. However, the other day when I was loading the dishwasher, I was hit right in the face with a clear reason why it's important and more effective to slow down and focus on one thing at a time. It really wasn't anything earthshattering -- it was a dirty frying pan of baked-on, caked-on eggs that led to this epiphany.

You see, we have this awesome and great dishwasher with all sorts of features like sanitize, jet clean, power wash and normal. But each time you add something to the cycle, it takes more time for it to run (Ah, a parallel!).With this dishwasher, adding more things could mean it runs for four hours. That's not cool. I didn't want it to run that long and the only item in need of super cleaning was the egg pan.

I grabbed a scouring sponge and started attacking the pan. It's one of those heavy duty, copper bottomed aluminum pans without teflon. That means everything sticks to it (unless you use an entire stick of butter to cook in) and getting it clean takes an act of Congress. So there I am scrubbing all over the bottom furiously. Swipe. Swipe. Swipe. Nothing is really happening. Oh sure, a little bit is coming off here and there but not enough to make a visible difference. I could feel my tension rising and I was getting grumpy. At one point, I threw the sponge down and let fly with a few choice curses. Then I took a deep breath and picked up the sponge again. I looked at the pan and saw a spot on the edge that really wasn't all that bad. While I waited for my calm to return, I scrubbed the spot. A couple of swipes and it was gone. Poof! Just like that. I moved to another small spot and had the same success. Well, it didn't take me long to figure out that if I concentrated all my efforts on one small area I was getting excellent and fast results. I focused on spot to spot to spot and within five minutes the whole bottom of that pan gleamed like it was rolling off the showroom floor.

I was rather astounded especially when I equated the experience of washing that pan with tackling my various projects whether it's writing, cleaning, exercise or planning a wedding. I'm super impatient so I think casting a wide net will get me better results. Less time and energy, right?

Wrong.

This whole week since the "Pan Incident," I have practiced focusing on ONE thing at a time.  To my delight, I found that it works really well in many areas. Laundry doesn't count though. You can't really focus on doing laundry and nothing else until it's finished or you're  going to be staring at the washer then the dryer for a very long time. Which would make me even more tense because I'd be thinking of all the time I'm wasting that I could be using to do something else!

I haven't perfected focusing by any means. I still flit from project to project but at least now I'm becoming more attuned to focusing on the right now project instead of letting my mind wander to what I'll be doing next. This amazing trick really showed itself well last night when I sat down to plot Enticed, book four of the Sexual Magic series. I had a vague idea of what I wanted to happen in the book and who the characters were. When I sat down to put it to paper, I tuned inward and listened to what they had to say and did nothing but that. Within two hours I had the entire book plotted, character sketches drawn and even found a rather awesome bad guy quite unexpectedly. All from focusing on one thing instead of nine.

I think I like this focusing on the small stuff idea.It's working so far!

Happy reading,
Jennifer

That's a tree name?

(Photo courtesy of Krystle Fleming)

 The other day I was doing some research for my upcoming book series Hellfire Ranch. It's an eight book series set in the Hill country of Texas about a group of ex-marines turned cowboys, sheriffs, FBI agents, etc. The first book is Two Cowboys in her Crosshairs and comes out in April.
I am a Texan and like most other Texans, I love my state with a passion that teeters on banana bat-shit crazy pants (to borrow a phrase from Prof Fish. We won't discuss the fact that he was talking about me when he used it).
I love America.I bleed red, white and blue. I am as patriotic a person as you will meet. But there's just something about being a Texan that is just awesome.
Okay, so, back to the research... This series is set in Texas and my fictional town of Freedom was founded by a disparate group of people seeking acceptance and a bit of anonymity. They came from different walks of life and had their own trials and tribulations. This small group drifted from town to town and never really fit in. Finally they hit upon the idea of creating their own piece of personal heaven. They scoured all of Texas, which at the time was still a Republic, and finally settled upon a little slice of green rolling hills, fertile soil and wide open spaces. They named their newly formed town Freedom and declared that any who should come seeking refuge would be welcome with open arms and closed mouths. No questions, no probing, no judgement.
They didn't realize just how popular this concept would be and soon the town was populated with people from all walks of life looking for a fresh start. The town grew in leaps and bounds. In fact, it grew so fast they  didn't do a whole lot of smart street planning. The center of town where the courthouse used to stand isn't a square as is the normal. Instead, it's called the Hex. It's a six sided monstrosity that is ringed with shops, restaurants and offices. Smack dab in the center is a wonderfully out-of-place giant Neoclassical structure called the Hitching Post. It's become a destination wedding spot for many in Texas. It drives a lot of business to Freedom and its businesses and they play it up for all their worth.
Because there are eight books in the series, I had to create this town from scratch and make it come alive in my mind's eye. I have drawings and floor plans scattered all over the place. But it wasn't until book two was nearly finished that I realized I'd never named the six streets that create The Hex.
I decided I wanted them to be named after trees native to Texas.
Oh, boy. I had no idea what I was getting in to.
I scoured the interwebs and found this incredible site run by Texas A&M University's horticulture agency. It provided me with hours of entertainment. I giggled like a fool because my mind is dirty (a shocker, I know) and I was surprised by some of the names that people came up with for trees. TREES, people. Here is a sampling of some of my favorites:

Beaverwood - Really, any explanation necessary? I also find it giggle worthy that it's known alternately as Sugarberry. As an erotic writer, I've often written that beaver is extremely sweet.

Bullnut - This is a hickory tree that grows large and does well in a dry landscape. TAMU reports the fruit is a small, sweet nut encased in a four valved husk. I think anything named bullnut can't be small.

Cowlicks - Of course this had to come after bullnuts. Cowlicks bullnut, isn't that how they propagate?

Devil's Claw - I get the feeling some of these names are intended to ward off unwanted visitors. This particular tree also goes by the name of Una de Gato which makes me sing In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,. Baby.

Elderberry - come on, say it with me "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!" Thank you, Monty Python for your comic genius. This tree is very rare in Texas which makes it even cooler in my opinion.

Farkleberry - no, it's not a dice game, it's a real tree. A real tree!

Hognut - just to show we're both a cow AND pig equal rights state.

Inkberry - I love this name. Makes me think of all sort of creative ways people of the old days might have used the fruit it bears. Did they squash them up and use them to write papers while trapped in the Alamo? Maybe. You never know.

Lady's Leg - Um, huh? It doesn't look like the leg of any lady I've ever seen. Another name is also Naked Indian. <squints> Nope, still not seeing it.

Manzanillo - Say it loud and echo out that last o like you're the announcer at a wrestling match. Sounds good, doesn't it? But you have to draw out every syllable for maximum effect: Maaan-zaaa-kneeee-ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! Fight!

Nutall Oak - Cows, check. Pigs, check. Everything else? Throw 'em in the nutall!

Punk Oak - I can imagine a lynch mob forming around this tree with their victim. "Feelin' lucky, punk?" Except they're talking to the tree, not the criminal they're about to hang. Hey, Texas justice was brutal, remember?

Shittamwood - No, actually, I'm not kidding. Just... wow. Does a bear...? Well, does a bear use this tree if he does?

Sparkleberry - because this tree is Fabulooooooous! And pretty and sparkly and glisteny!

Tickletongue - Alternate names for this tree confuse me: Toothache Tree and Prickly Ash. Neither of those would tickle my tongue.

Wahootree - contrary to popular belief, this tree does NOT have money coming out of its wahoo nor is it a cherry kind of tree.

So, those are some of my favorites. Is it any wonder I love Texas? Our sense of humor rocks.

Do you think I used any of these names for the streets of The Hex in Freedom? You'll have to read the series to find out! Stay tuned!

Happy Reading,
Jennifer

The Sunday Quote