Really Hot Things that Go Bump in the Night By Megan Hussey,

Really Hot Things that Go Bump in the Night: The Wonder of Incubus Vampires

By Megan Hussey, Fearless Erotic Vampire Author (well, kinda)

         OK, um, I admit it; I’m an official, certifiable fraidy cat (to use only the most sophisticated terminology available) when it comes to scary movies.  Screen a horror film at a party and I’ll take a convenient trip to the ladies room; one that lasts, oh, roughly two hours.  Mention the names Jason, Freddy, Michael (that’s Michael Myers, not Michael my ex-boyfriend), and I’m under the nearest convenient piece of furniture, pronto.

     So how in the dickens did I end up writing vampire stories, like my new release (shameless self-promotion coming!) “Angel on Fire: The Second Book of Nuit” from Phaze?  Well, it’s complicated….

     As a teen-ager, one of my dearest friends proposed that we watch a vampire film called, “The Lost Boys.”  I replied that, in all likelihood, I would be watching the film between two fingers; leaving only eight available for popcorn clutching and nail biting.

     Then she showed me the box cover, one that featured the luminous likenesses of Billy Wirth, Jason Patric, Brooke McCarter, and the rest of the Lost Boys.

     “Wow!”  I marveled.  “I simply didn’t know that vampires could be so ridiculously hot!”

     After viewing the film, I learned that vampires also could be funny, suspenseful, and a whole lot of fun.  And I became inspired to write my own vamps; to contribute my own vampire stories to the world of romantic literature.

     Eager to nurse my newfound interest, I read the works of authors like Amanda Ashley, Sherrilyn Kenyon and Laurell K. Hamilton.  I watched numerous other vamp movies, from various versions of Dracula (I’ve watched everyone from Frank Langella to Christopher Atkins to Gary Oldman to Gerard Butler to Miles O’Keeffe play the count) to Fright Night and Interview with the Vampire.  And while I enjoyed all of these works, I still found it a bit, well, icky and morally repugnant that vamps had to kill (or at least borrow a pint or two of blood off of you, which can’t leave ya’ feelin’ too spry) to survive.

     Then I discovered the supernatural wonder that is the incubus vampire; the vampire who feeds from the sexual energy of others.

     “OK, now we’re talking!”  I enthused.  “I could write some tales that feature seductive vamps who seduce and entice everyday women, fulfilling their ladies’ every desire while nourishing their own lust.  Certainly works for me!  Thumbs up!”

     So Meg’s incubus vampires were born.  If you read my book Vampire Nights from Midnight Showcase Fiction, you’ll meet the sexy singer Sylvan in the story “Song of the Vamp” and Hayden, the hot spoiled rich guy with a dark side.  You’ll also make the acquaintance of their strong, no nonsense heroines, Antonia and Silvana.

     And then there are my Nuit boys; oh, those Nuit boys.  Club Nuit is a male strip club/bordello where hot incubus vampires seduce and cater to average, everyday women.  How do Ramon, Xavier and Rainyn look so good after centuries of living?  They’re incubus vampires of course!  Read Ramon’s story in Under Cover of the Night, and Rainyn’s in Angel on Fire; both available from Phaze.

     During the last few years we as a culture have come to accept the concept of kinder, gentler vampires.  (Some of them even sparkle!  Who knew?!)  Yet they remain manly and sexy; and when you hear something that goes ‘bump’ in the night, it just might be an incubus vamp!

     To read more about the erotic fantasy books of Megan Hussey, please visit http://goldenmuse.tripod.com.

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Under-Cover-of-the-Night/Megan-Hussey/e/2940000146217/?itm=8&USRI=megan+hussey    Giving away copy of Under Cover.

Blog-a-Thon 2010 where the depraved and dirty minded come to gather for the weekend.

Da Rules

• Every hour a new blog will go up until midnight. Saturday Noon to Midnight then Sunday 9 AM to Midnight.
• Each blog will have a simple draw contest. DON'T FORGET YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS.
• For the NOOK contest you need to answer the following seven questions and SEND your answers to paranormalromantics@yahoo.com
• All answers can be found in the blogs.
• Contests close at 10:00AM Monday morning. Winners will be posted at Noon.

Da Questions

1. How would Annie Nicholas catch a vampire?
2. What kind of wolves does Rebecca Royce write about?
3. What does Sandra Sookoo love about October?
4. Who does Sara Brookes think is the Master of Halloween?
5. What animal is J. Hali Steele writing about recently?
6. What kind of photos is DL Jackson showing?
7. Does Stacey Kennedy want to be bitten?

Don't post your answers here. E-mail them to paranormalromantics@yahoo.com

Marie Treanor’s Halloween Haunt

Happy Halloween! Or should I say Scary Halloween, because after all, that’s why we love it. Halloween’s fun where I live. It’s a village and so the kids are pretty safe to roam around knocking on doors – one of the crowd always knows someone in most of the houses!

 Although Scottish tradition has got a bit mixed up with American in recent years – our kids will now greet you with “Trick or treat!” when you open the door – they’ve kept the basic Scottish concept of “guising”, which is that you have to do something for your goodies. In the last few years we’ve had singers, some amazingly well choreographed dancers, the odd short and gruesome play, and joke-tellers galore. The deal is, they do their act and you reward them with sweets etc – I suppose it’s a hangover from medieval travelling “mummers” who would disguise themselves and entertain.

They wouldn’t be kids, of course, if they didn’t try and scare each other witless in the process, and I suppose that’s what we lose as adults. Even at Halloween, catching sight of all your neighbours’ kids, however ghoulishly they’re dressed up, just doesn’t frighten you. For that, I think you need atmosphere. A nice, gothic ruin of a church, maybe, surrounded by an old graveyard, where the creatures of the night can play undisturbed…

Like this one, maybe: St. Andrews Cathedral, which was the setting for my climactic Halloween battle scene in Blood on Silk. It’s a huge ruin of what must have once been a magnificent structure - as befitted the ecclesiastical centre of Scotland – dotted and surrounded with graves. Begun in the twelfth century, defiled and deserted in the Protestant Reformation, then neglected and cannibalized for a couple of hundred years more, this building has seen a lot of history!

You feel that today, wandering through the grounds. Especially at night, the Cathedral has an atmosphere all its own, at once peaceful and awe-inspiring, with just a hint of menace. It’s one of these places where the past can’t help but intrude on the present. The perfect place to encounter ghouls, ghosts and maybe even vampires, in the misty darkness of Halloween…

Leave a comment to be entered to win an ebook from Marie's backlist.

A blog by Gwenny the witch as told to Kate Richards

Hi Everyone,

 I am Gwenny, and Kate has asked me to tell you a little bit about what Halloween means to me as a witch. Halloween, Samhain, is the Witch’s New Year. In our coven, we always have a special ritual to raise energy for the coming year. We usually have a big party, as well, but the ritual is the most important part of the celebrations for us.

We do indeed complete our ritual skyclad – naked – which can be a little on the chilly side at this time of year. But we don’t like any separation between us and the Earth at this time. So, if it’s absolutely freezing we may wear our cloaks, but otherwise, it’s goose bumps all around. I’ve noticed, though, that once we get going, we rarely notice the chill. Waves of energy bind us together and we work in one mind to bring good, positive things for the coming year.

Our high priestess, Ariel, guides us through the ritual, making the circle, calling the quarters; you can really read about this stuff mostly anywhere. What makes it different on Samhain is that the veils between the dimensions thin. Other beings are so close you can feel them, and sometimes communicate with them. My grandmother has reached out to me some years, and some of the other coven members have mentioned similar experiences.

Kate is also a witch, although she isn’t in a coven. She loves to be close to nature and does spells of all kinds. Well, most kinds. The kind that most people ask for is the one she won’t do. A love spell to force someone to love another is a big no no in her book. I agree with her, but I will do the kind to help someone find their true love…the right person for them. As long as they’re open to the magic, amazing things can happen.

I guess I’m just a little bit romantic. Have a wonderful Halloween, and if a ghost comes to call, remember, it might just be a relative stopping by to say hello!

Kate Richards can be found at http://katerichards.wordpress.com, katerichards09@gmail.com   and Demons Love Cinnamon, at www.breathlesspress.com

Leave a comment to be entered to win an Amazon 10$ gift certificate and a copy of Demons Love Cinnamon.

You Don't Know Jack by Hailey Edwards

Jack O’ Lantern that is. Or maybe you do know Jack. I didn’t receive a formal introduction until my daughter turned four and decided she wanted to grow her own pumpkins for Halloween. To which I replied, “Let Mommy get back to you on that.”

See, I grew up on a horse farm way out in the country. We had no neighbors for miles, and the ones we did have were more likely to shoot at a trio of Power Rangers than consider the date and the fact most burglars don’t show up in red, pink, and green spandex holding loot bags.

So when my little girl gave me her patented “Momma-I-want” look, I knew things were about to change. I learned how to grow and when to harvest pumpkins, even though we lived in an apartment at the time. And I learned that the sight of pumpkins growing in a planter was so mystical that kids from next door were compelled by forces beyond their control to pluck the unripened fruits from the vine and smash them on the pavement.

I was not amused, but I persevered. After all, I had a four-year-old hanging her Halloween hopes on me. (I also had a baby girl armed with good aim and a water pistol guarding our pumpkin-filled planter through a crack in the window above it.)

Once we finally had a good candidate for carving, I hit my next road bump. Now, even a country bumpkin like me had seen her share of jack-o-lanterns and paper luminaries. Though I’d never made either, I felt confident I could make nose and face-like holes. I had tealight candles and a carving knife. I had craft books and matches. I had a drop cloth and a recipe for baked pumpkin seeds. I was ready. It was go time. After all the hard work and study, Jack was getting O’Lanterned that night.

I called my daughter into the kitchen and she took a seat across the table from me. I lifted the knife and lined the blade up on the outline I’d carefully drawn earlier. I gave her a triumphant smile and sank the blade into the meat of the pumpkin…and she started screaming bloody murder.

It had never occurred to her how those holes got into jack-o-lanterns. She had assumed we would plant pumpkins and they would ripen into the gap-tooth grinning Jacks she saw on other people’s porches. When our only usable pumpkin turned out to be plain, she assumed all the Jacks had been smashed. So when I started to carve the little guy, she was horrified.

To make a long and painful story about how you try to do for your kids what wasn’t done for you a little shorter, I’ll close with saying our Jack that first year was a very unique gentleman. He had two My Little Pony band aids on his noggin and his eyes and smile were drawn with Crayola’s best.

Leave a comment about pumpkins, carving, parent-fails, or pretty much anything else and you’ll be entered to win a $10 gift card to My Bookstore and More.

To see what other mischief I manage, check out my website at http://haileyedwards.net/

Happy Halloween!

Blog-a-Thon 2010 where the depraved and dirty minded come to gather for the weekend.

Da Rules

• Every hour a new blog will go up until midnight. Saturday Noon to Midnight then Sunday 9 AM to Midnight.
• Each blog will have a simple draw contest. DON'T FORGET YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS.
• For the NOOK contest you need to answer the following seven questions and SEND your answers to paranormalromantics@yahoo.com
• All answers can be found in the blogs.
• Contests close at 10:00AM Monday morning. Winners will be posted at Noon.

Da Questions

1. How would Annie Nicholas catch a vampire?
2. What kind of wolves does Rebecca Royce write about?
3. What does Sandra Sookoo love about October?
4. Who does Sara Brookes think is the Master of Halloween?
5. What animal is J. Hali Steele writing about recently?
6. What kind of photos is DL Jackson showing?
7. Does Stacey Kennedy want to be bitten?

Don't post your answers here. E-mail them to paranormalromantics@yahoo.com

“I need a hero! Or at least a man who remembers the milk!” by Stephanie Beck

There are a few schools of thoughts on leading men. Back in the day of romance writing (I’m thinking two decades ago) the main man had a few distinguishing qualities. He was usually wealthy, powerful and had a certain edge about him that made other men look tame. Then about a decade ago metro-ness took over and those tough heroes all of a sudden weren’t so tough. They had feelings. Lots of them and—gasp—some of them even cried.

In the last few years, the super dominant, alpha to the point of a$$ hole character-type has become popular. And you know, after that time when all of our heroes were sissies, I can completely understand why the difference is so intriguing. There have been plenty of really well written alpha male characters who have thrilled me, but just like the sissies, they get old after a while.

So where is the perfect middle in all of this? What kind of characteristics do women really want in their leading men on paper? I’d say, for the most part, we want in stories what we really wish we had in real life.

*a man with a job he is capable of doing without bitching constantly

*a man who knows how to converse but doesn’t monopolize every conversation

*a man who makes a pair of jeans look good

*a man who knows his way around the bedroom, or at least is oh so willing to learn

*a man who isn’t afraid to speak up when it counts (like defending his lady when the occasion

demands it, that never goes out of style)

*a man who, when asked, remembers to get milk. And should he forget, he’s the one who gets up early to make sure there’s enough for everyone’s cereal (that’s pretty darn alpha to me)

Of course, there’s no such thing as a perfect hero for all readers. But when the leading man and leading lady (or any combination of genders) get together and the relationship sparks and the personalities meld, the reader wants it to work. So I’m thinking the perfect hero depends on his counterpart, when they match up and the reader grabs their pom-poms, whether he’s an alpha, a sissy or somewhere in between, he’s just right. 

Excerpt from Cross Stitch and Brimstone: Available from Breathless Press October 22nd

The cat hissed again, and Beth sighed. "Fine, I'll let you out, you stinking beast," she muttered, going to the side door that released to the wraparound porch she loved. "Go on now, and don't you— Who's there?"

The figure at her front door, only three feet away from her, froze. It was the middle of the night, so she'd long ago turned off the porch light. Terror welled. Her longevity was a given, but she was still as easily broken as any human woman under five feet tall and just as susceptible to villains of the night.

"Elisabeth?"                  

The figure turned with her name on his lips. That voice. It sounded familiar, but she couldn't place it. She flipped on the light switch for the hall behind her, but it didn't help much, not until he came into the light.

"Marcato? But...how...how?"

She ran for him, the three steps taking only a heartbeat before she launched into his arms. He felt just the same as when she'd given him one final embrace before he'd gone off to fight with his brothers so long ago. How she'd loved her soldier boy, though before the war he'd been sweet and gentle, a young man on his way to the seminary to be a preacher.

She ran her fingers down his face, the same face she remembered in her dreams. Not so often anymore, but there was no way she could have forgotten about him. Not him.

Stephanie Beck is a romance writer who bases all of her heroes on her husband in one way or another. She has yet to hear a complaint from either characters or her husband. Check out www.stephaniebeck.net for her latest releases including her newest stories, BDSM themed David’s Angel and a little Halloween fun with Cross-Stitch and Brimstone.

Make a Witch Bottle this Samhain…Halloween by Cherie Desues

A friend reminded me lately of a very ancient way to draw in and trap forever the evil lingering outside your door. This wicca device is the witch bottle and making one can protect you against evil spirits and attack by magick or from black witches and their spells against you.

Traditionally, a witch bottle was a jug or flask. They were made of stoneware or green, amber or blue glass depending on the available ingredients of the witch. The stoneware was glazed with salt with evil looking bearded men to ward off evil. A replica of any earlier time, of a tyrant who killed witches.

Historically, the witch's bottle was filled with the maker's urine, hair or nail clippings and red thread from sprite traps. In more recent years, witch's have filled their bottles with protection herbs like rosemary, nails, needles and pins, and red wine.

The bottle has always been buried at the farthest corner of the maker's property, beneath the hearth, or placed in a secret spot in the house, like inside the walls. After being buried or hidden, the bottle captures evil by impaling it with the sharp objects, drowning the negative energy with the wine, and sending the evil packing from the rosemary.

Seawater or earth may be used if you know what kind of evil is looking for you. Other types of Witch bottles contain sand, stones, knotted threads, feathers, shells, herbs, flowers, salt, vinegar, oil, coins, or ashes. A similar magickal talisman to protect yourself when you travel is the "lemon and pins" charm.

When you've captured an evil within the confines of the witch's bottle, cast it into a fire and when it explodes, the spell is broken and the evil dies.

Bottled spells date back hundreds of years to Elizabethan England, when witches were in vast numbers and not always conjuring "white magick". In ancient buildings, people find witch bottles buried under the stones of the fireplace, under the floorboards, and plastered inside walls.

As long as the witch bottle remains buried, hidden and unbroken, the spell is strong. The tradition has it's origins in the 16th century. In very ancient times witch bottles were made of stone and were filled with rusty nails, urine, thorns, hair, menstrual blood, and pieces of glass, wood, and bone.

To make a witch bottle today, choose ingredients that will benefit you the most. Seal the bottle with wax to make sure the contents stay within and bury or hide your witch bottle.

Phantom Fears by Rhonda Print

Something chases you down the darkened streets like phantom footsteps while the moon silently watches and stars quiver in anticipation. A set of glowing eyes peer from beneath the bushes at your side then darts in front of you as nothing but shadowy form. Despite the chill night air, sweat beads across your forehead and your heart rate quickens and beats a desperate staccato against your chest.

The painful howl of some wretched beast echoes through the night.

It’s October and All Hallows Eve is looming. Something vile and wicked stains the air giving even the most bravest of souls cause to pause…and wonder.

Darkness swallows the last comforting rays of sun and the wind whistles it’s eerie warning to stay behind the locked doors and drawn curtains. Set a match to the fireplace, light a candle and huddle beneath a warm blanket with a good book.

Enjoy a bit of Nightwalker, A Leah Wolfe SINS Novel, rated 5 stars by The Romance Reviews and earned 4 Hoots from The Paranormal Romance Junkies. Read the Prologue and First Chapter Free or Buy Nightwalker at: http://www.king-cart.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi?store=linda018&product_name=Nightwalker&return_page=&user-id=&password=&exchange=&exact_match=exact

BLURB:

Leah Wolfe has retired from serious police work in favor of seeking a normal life. Her unique, yet not fully

discovered supernatural abilities allow her to speak to the souls of the dead, providing vital information in the search for their killers. Her abilities have also cost her almost everyone she has ever loved including her mother, who abandoned her to fend for herself on the streets, and, most recently, her ex-fiancé Joaquín Wildhorse, Chief Detective of the Native American Reservation Police Department. But when Joaquín’s new lover is found brutally murdered on the reservation, he turns to Leah for help. The hunt for a vicious killer leads Leah to sexy Ian Nightwalker and Leah is unable to walk away from the case that may cost her her most guarded possession of all.

Her heart.

Blog-a-Thon 2010 where the depraved and dirty minded come to gather for the weekend.

Da Rules

• Every hour a new blog will go up until midnight. Saturday Noon to Midnight then Sunday 9 AM to Midnight.
• Each blog will have a simple draw contest. DON'T FORGET YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS.
• For the NOOK contest you need to answer the following seven questions and SEND your answers to paranormalromantics@yahoo.com
• All answers can be found in the blogs.
• Contests close at 10:00AM Monday morning. Winners will be posted at Noon.

Da Questions

1. How would Annie Nicholas catch a vampire?
2. What kind of wolves does Rebecca Royce write about?
3. What does Sandra Sookoo love about October?
4. Who does Sara Brookes think is the Master of Halloween?
5. What animal is J. Hali Steele writing about recently?
6. What kind of photos is DL Jackson showing?
7. Does Stacey Kennedy want to be bitten?

Don't post your answers here. E-mail them to paranormalromantics@yahoo.com