November Book of the Month 
n​On Sale Kindle Price: $0.99 Buy on Amazon

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n nBe care what you wish for, because you just might get it. n nWillow should have taken heed of that familiar warning, because she wanted Dane’s attention and then got it. She wasn’t ready. n nOn assignment protecting a paranoid client at a convention, Dane Karl has finally found his mate, a very young sidhe ill-equipped to deal with a legendary mercenary warrior, fierce weretiger, and powerful sidhe all wrapped up in one big, badass package. n nHis plan for a slow courtship ruined by the catastrophe that destroys the conference hotel, he claims Willow as his mate to keep her safe from the demons hunting sidhe flesh and sidhe magic. Willow must find her strength to stand up to her legendary husband’s overbearing ways, deal with the shade of his long dead, sidhe wife, and survive the demons after them. n nCan an ancient warrior learn to love? Can a young, untried sidhe find her strength? n nThis is the third and final book of the Tree of Life trilogy. n​n n

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Excerpt 

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nWillow politely covered her mouth as she yawned and surreptitiously glanced at her watch. Only another two hours to go and then she could quit for the night … er … morning. She took another long drink of lukewarm tea from her thermos and smiled pleasantly at the convention attendees who drifted by the North American Vampire Association’s exhibit booth. She’d already registered fourteen new members and six new donors that night. Sales of member directories on CD were brisk. And she’d heard that the legendary weretiger Dane Karl was present, serving as bodyguard for one of the more paranoid vampire attendees. She’d heard him spoken of in awe, seen him from afar, and once caught his scent when he strolled through another conference exhibit hall a year ago and hadn’t noticed her at all. 
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nHe commanded respect, even from vampires who were utterly convinced of their own superiority over all living beings. He fascinated her, the sidhe who had not been able to get the memory of his scent from her mind. She’d scavenged the Internet and colleagues for information on him, information which was scarce. Incomplete tales whispered of a mighty Viking who’d bonded with a sidhe woman. As to what happened to the woman, no two versions agreed. But all versions concluded with the rise of an immortal weretiger—a weretiger with a sidhe soul. 
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nShe glanced around again, keeping that pleasant, meaningless smile on her face even though her cheek muscles ached and she wanted nothing more than to go to bed and sleep for the next twelve hours. But she continued to concentrate on staying awake, on doing her job, on hoping that he would see her. 
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nAh, there he was. Willow’s breath caught in her throat and she grew very still as she watched him, admired him. A tall man with straight shoulder length, dark blond hair, massively built of long, thick bone and hard muscle and no fat, he prowled slowly along the aisles of exhibits. She watched him pause beside the booth occupied by Night Life Magazine. He desultorily flipped through a few pages, exchanged a few words with the publisher’s staff person who manned the display, and moved on. His gait was slow and gliding, predatory. His heavily lidded eyes appeared sleepy until one took a second look and realized that they were sharp and hyper-watchful. 
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nShe concentrated, delicately calibrating her body and releasing the tiniest amount of tigress pheromones into the air. 
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nA convention attendee stopped to ask about membership benefits, commanding Willow’s attention. She smiled pleasantly, showed him the list of membership benefits and explained them, and described the membership fee structure.
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nDane stopped in front of a booth promoting eighteen karat gold fang caps, with and without gemstone embellishments. His nostrils flared and the back of his tongue tingled, detecting the stimulation of pheromones almost too faint to detect. He inhaled more deeply through his mouth and followed the whisper of scent to a slender brunette who seemed to be completely unaware of his presence as she addressed an attendee’s questions. There she is. A tingle of awareness shivered through his body as he studied her from across the aisle. He watched her thank the attendee for his interest, press some literature in to his hand, and slowly realize that someone was staring at her.
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nWillow grew very still, not having anticipated that the weretiger’s attention would be quite so unnerving. Since distress attracted a predator’s attention, she froze like a rabbit with metaphorical whiskers tasting the air for impending danger. She’d hoped to catch his attention and make his acquaintance and find out what this strange fascination meant, but she’d not thought that doing so might be detrimental to her health.
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n​She watched his broad chest expand as he took a deep breath, inhaling her scent, tasting it on the back of his tongue. His eyes focused on her, greenish gold and luminous like a tiger’s. The flat gleam concealed his thoughts, but she felt the powerful throb of his awakened interest. He didn’t stare at her with mild curiosity, but with heated hunger. And suddenly she regretted the crazy desire to make his acquaintance.  Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it, caution whispered through her mind.n

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Tree of Life Trilogy 
nBuy The Set

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nWho reads romance?
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nWe all know the stereotype of the bored (and frustrated) housewife with nothing better to do than fantasize about how her husband could shower her with gifts and romantic gestures, but that’s far from the reality of the demographics.
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nHuffpost, The Bustle, and Nielsen have all crunched the numbers to analyze who’s buying and reading romance novels. Huffpost reports that 18 percent of romance readers are men. All number-crunching analyses show that romance commands an enormous chunk of book sales, print and digital. No other genre commands the market as strongly as romance.
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nNumbers don’t lie. There must be something good about romance, even though the stigma of it being unworthy of the title “literature” persists. What the numbers don’t reveal is why people read romance.
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nRomantically Inclined Reviews is running a multi-article series spotlighting men who read romance, including a few who write it. Thus far two installments have been posted and the interviewed men offer some interesting insights as to how they became romance readers, why they like the genre, and the obstacles facing them as men who read what is universally considered a “woman’s” genre.
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nMen, believe it or not, like romance. Most just don’t acknowledge it or don’t recognize it. Case in point: Romantically Inclined Reviews quotes Greg Herron: Greg Herren: “The great irony is men already read books with romance in them — they just aren’t called romance novels. If you take Robert Ludlum’s The Bourne Identity, flip it and tell it from the woman’s point of view, it would have been published as a romantic suspense novel and would have had a completely different cover, a different marketing plan… but really, Jason Bourne meets a woman, she goes along on his big spy adventure, and they wind up together, with a happily ever after on a Caribbean beach at the end…. “
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nLook at Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood in The Raiders of the Lost Ark. James Bond actually gets married in In Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Aragorn’s love for Arwen endures throughout the whole The Lord of the Rings trilogy, as does William Turner’s love for Elizabeth Swan in the Pirates of the Caribbean series. Nathaniel Poe and Uncas suffer for their tragic loves for Cora and Alice, respectively, in The Last of the Mohicans. No man feels silly watching those movies. They don’t feel silly reading the books upon which such stories are built.
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nThreading through each of these adventures in all their violent glory is the special, romantic relationship between two people.
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nIn a comment following the first installment of Romantically Inclined Reviews’ “The Secret Lives of Male Romance Readers,” Reviewer Greg Meeks writes: “[H]ere is the thing you learn when you read enough romance at my age group 55-65 … you owe a lot of women an apology for your lack of skill, knowledge and emotional involvement.”
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nMeeks also goes on to say, “Younger guys are missing out a LOT on knowing how to act in a relationship if you actually care about your partner that you can learn through these books while being wondrously entertained.” That advice about young men learning a lot gives me chills when I think about the dark and abusive relationships romanticized in many romance novels. (See last week’s blog, “I Just Don’t Get It.”) I’ve harped on that subject before and won’t repeat myself for the time being.
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nLike Kate LeBeau, the blogger of Romantically Inclined Reviews, I don’t know any men who read romance. I’ve read particularly amusing passages from romance books I’ve read to my husband, usually with the result of him giggling with me. However, no man of my acquaintance has ever admitted to me that he reads romance.
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nA man I knew once admitted to me that he once picked up his wife’s Harlequin romance when he was desperate for something to read. He also said he didn’t like it. Fair enough. At least he gave it a try, which I doubt most men would do. Is it because they’d face ridicule from their peers? Or some other reason?
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nGranted, books within the romance genre–regardless of sub-genre–are marketed toward women. After all, pictures of muscular, bare-chested men don’t usually appear to other men, except on the covers of magazines such as men’s health and fitness magazines with bold headlines proclaiming that they, too, can look like that by following that issue’s diet and exercise regimens. I find it ironic that the covers of Gentleman’s Quarterly, that iconic lifestyle and fashion magazine for men, often have that romance novel cover feel. Maxim magazine’s covers usually feature barely clad, buxom beauties in provocative poses: another common staple on romance novel covers.
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nPerhaps it’s the flowing script and curling fonts and the words used in book titles that dissuades men from picking up a romance and reading it. Instead of “To Tame a Wild Duke” or some such title, would “The Duke Untamed” in block letters make a difference? Look at westerns: they often use stereotypical “Old West” fonts for the titles. Many of the Zane Grey and Louis L’Amour books incorporate strongly romantic themes, but neither men nor women shrink from picking up those books.
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nI really haven’t any answers. Only speculation. However, maybe you will chime in with your reasons for reading (or not reading) romance. Inquiring minds want to know.n

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