And the winner is....

LASTNERVE!! Congratulations and thanks to everyone who stopped by and helped me give Jane Leopold Quinn a warm welcome. Lastnerve, please email me at wendi@wendidarlin.com with your mailing address and I will get your prizes in the mail. If anyone else would like some bookmarks, please email me with "bookmarks" in the subject line and I'll send those out too.

I wish you all a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving! Below is one of my favorite turkey recipes ever. I think the instructions are evident. :)

Book Giveaway and Excerpt!

Today, my friend, Jane Leopold Quinn is sharing an excerpt from her latest release, WINDY CITY LOVE AFFAIR. There's a cowboy in it! You know how much I love that! To celebrate I'm giving away two paperbacks to someone who leaves a comment. The prizes are What A Lady Wants and A Little Bit Wicked by Victoria Alexander. They'd make great Christmas gifts or nice winter reading for you. Check out Jane's excerpt below and leave a comment! The winner will be drawn on Wednesday. Good luck!



WINDY CITY LOVE AFFAIR
by Jane Leopold Quinn

July 18, 2005

“Ma’am?”

The rumble of the deep, rich, masculine voice with its western twang speared her heart. And lower.

“Ma’am?”

Being a Chicago girl, Lorren Samples at first tried to ignore the stranger’s tall, broad-chested body crowding too closely. You had to watch out for yourself in the big city. A man touching you on the street could spell danger. Then she made the mistake of glancing up at him.

Holy frickin’ cow! The man was the closest thing to beautiful male perfection that she’d ever seen. Not in the movies, not on TV, nor on stage. Certainly, she’d never seen anything like him in person. A passerby bumped her, throwing her against him. Her hands automatically reached for his forearms, his gripped her shoulders. She stood stiffly, silent and unexpectedly breathless.

Wow. Brown eyes. Rich chocolate. Warm cocoa. All those good, lickable, delicious, sensuous flavors. Burnished dark eyes surrounded by lush long lashes gazed back at her.

A horn blared. She gasped, brushing her breast against his forearm as she turned to see what the hell the problem was. The sound, the brush woke her to the city around her.

“Sorry,” she muttered and stepped back to try to establish some distance between them. It was a cab that had pulled in at the curb at Union Station for a pick up. That’s when she noticed the luggage at his heels. A soft, black leather satchel.
Heels? Heels on cowboy boots. Tan, stitched-toe cowboy boots. Well worn and slightly scuffed as if he lived in them. Speechless again, her gaze tracked the blue, faded jeans hugging long, long legs up to lean hips and a flat belly. Holy Christ! Her head jerked up. He had a hard on. It was pretty difficult to hide that in snug jeans. Her face flamed hot in embarrassment.

He stared back, a smug, aware expression on his handsome face.

I guess he’s not embarrassed about his humongous hard on. That’s when she noticed that she still held on to his solid-muscled forearms. Bare forearms. Bare, hairy forearms. Okay, stop it. You’re acting like...well she didn’t know what she was acting like. She’d never been in this situation before. It was like a scene from a movie. The “meet cute.”

Jess Croften covered the woman’s hand with his. It wasn’t like he’d planned on picking up a pretty woman, but he had watched this one all the way from the intersection, willing her to cross over and continue straight toward him. He’d squinted a bit to sharpen his focus, and the closer she got, the more he could see that she was all prime.

He didn’t normally think of women in beef-related terms, but he wouldn’t mind having this fine lady on a plate and eating her up. Literally and figuratively.

CLICK HERE TO BUY!

Nice n' Naughty

I blogged today over at Nice n' Naughty about when I cheated and why it was worth it. Drop by and check it out. It's probably not what you think. :)

For everybody at Talking Two Lips!

Sorry for the tease! Here it is! Big thanks to cover artist, Tamra Westberry who totally ROCKS! She also designed my Hired Hands cover.

MSA Endless Romance Contest

CLICK HERE TO VOTE!

True Confessions!

I'm blogging today over at Nice n' Naughty. Come see what kind of dirt I've dredged up. :)

Home sick/homesick

My little guy is feeling under the weather today, so he's home from school. Right now, he's watching The Clone Wars movie on dvd so I've got a little quiet time.

I spent most of the morning cleaning the house and now I'm going to settle in and write a little if I can. But I admit I'm a little distracted. My little guy is home sick, but I'm a little homesick. It happens this time of year if I know we're not going to spend Thanksgiving with my extended family. And now it's official. Thanksgiving will just be the three of us this year. We were invited to a friend's house for the big meal, but my husband doesn't really want to go. I'm itching to plan my menu, even though I know most of the food will go to waste.

For now, I'm ignoring the call of my cookbooks and trying to concentrate on work. Anybody else having a small Thanksgiving this year? Are there any traditions that your family has?

Today

No school today for my son and only a little home office work for my husband, so you know what that means....my routine is shot to hell and back...I mean, FAMILY TIME! LOL! I am looking forward to having some fun with the boys today, but I'm also determined to squeeze in some writing. I'm finally on a roll with my WIP, and I'm not about to let it get away from me again.

I hope everyone has a great day. Stay warm.





To all the veterans I know and love, and those I don't, thank you.

Monday again!

Monday...the day I always swear I'm going to write thousands of words, clean my house, run errands...you know do IT ALL! Hah! You can imagine how often that happens. This morning I spent some quality time with my husband. That was nice. Just the two of us. We don't do that enough. So I'm getting off to a late start, but it was worth it.

I've been struggling to find that work/life balance that I know has to exist. So for the past couple of months I've devoted weekends to family time. And it really has been great to keep the computer turned off (most of the time.) This weekend I planted lemon, lime and avocado trees behind my lanai. Eventually, I'll have a tropical orchard of sorts. I've already got pineapples out the wazoo - thanks to that hot bartender in Key West who taught me how to grow them. :)

I also went to a book signing and picked up autographed romances from Virginia Henley, C. L. Wilson, Ann Jacobs, Linnea Sinclair and fabulous debut author, Elissa Wilds. If you like paranormal check out Elissa's new book, Between Light and Dark.

Hope you all had a great weekend and found a way to relax and have a little fun. Now I'm off to tackle that ambitious to do list I mentioned. Wish me luck!

A message from Cori

My son got a message from Cori yesterday. I blogged about it at Nice n' Naughty this morning. Come see what she to say.

Cori

I had to put our 14 year old Sheltie, Cori, down this morning. She was her fiesty self right up until the very end. Bless her heart. It's a sad day in the Darlin house.

Witty and Wicked Readers!

Hey ladies! This is the photo I used as an inspiration for Gavin...(fanning myself)...

New cover!

Check out my hot new cover! Big thanks to cover artist, Tamra Westberry who totally ROCKS! She also designed my Hired Hands cover.