Archive for the ‘Carina Press’ Category

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I have a website—now what?

Patty Anasco | April 18th, 2013

When people see me walking down the street, they immediately rush over and ask: “Patty, what can I do to make my website better?”

First, I smile and tell them, “Get out of my dream, silly.” Then I wake up and see the cat from next door trying to open my window with his paw. Every. Single. Day.

Seriously though, as a member of the Harlequin.com team, I am surrounded by wise web wunderkinds (alliteration high five!) who always ask the question “how can we make our site better, more accessible, more user friendly?” Here are a few key principles we’ve been following for the last few years:

1. Offer your audience new content regularly. You don’t have to blog every day or tweet every hour. Work off a weekly or semi-monthly schedule, if you’d like, so your followers know you’re around and will keep you top of mind. There are some content management systems like WordPress or Tumblr that will allow you to schedule content in so you don’t have to worry about remembering to post once in a while. Placing your tweet stream on your home page is also a great way of bringing new content in.

2. Make sure your readers can subscribe to your updates with one click. Keep your newsletter subscription button on the home page and “above the fold”.  Make your Twitter/Facebook/Goodreads icons large enough to spot on the header or footer.  This way, your audience can connect with you without the hassle of rooting through your whole site to find that info.

3. Keep your page design fresh and up-to-date. Rule of thumb is usually a new look every two years and it doesn’t have to be the whole site. Consider updating your header graphic or your background image to start. Honestly, it doesn’t have to be expensive either. There are also low cost template options available if your site is running on WordPress or Joomla.

4. Speaking of design, keep your site uncluttered and be generous with your white space. The busy home page went away with the nineties. A simple design with a good text-to-background colour ratio for easy reading will engage your site visitors and keep them on your site longer!
(Note: Web usability experts are united in saying that white space improves comprehension, at least 20%!)

5. Are you using analytics? It’s a lot easier than you think, with services like Google Analytics (free!) and Woopra (free for non-commercial use). Find out how people are finding your site (i.e. search terms, or where they’re clicking through from) and what they gravitate toward. How do your readers/followers use your site? Do they read your updates or are they stuck on the home page? Are any of your promotions leading potential new readers to your site? These analytic tools not only help you understand your site visitors, they also provide handy charts and graphs to help plan your own brand/marketing efforts.

Whether you’re published or aspiring to be published, a solid web presence is always a good thing to have. Building a following—a community, if you will—takes time but at least you have a professional, up-to-date site to use as a launch pad for all things YOU!

Now it’s your turn: what’s the best website tip you’ve ever received?

———————

Patty Anasco (@pattyanasco) is Assistant Manager, Website Operations for Harlequin.com and is juggling simultaneous addictions to Candy Crush, the Lizzie Bennet Diaries and The Voice. An intervention is imminent.

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Posted in Behind the Scenes, Carina Press, Marketing | 2 Comments »

WHAT’S FOR DINNER?

Jean_Harrington | April 17th, 2013

How often have you heard that a kitchen is the heart of a home?  Many times, probably, for it’s a saying that’s been quoted forever, embroidered on tea towels, needle-pointed and even hung on walls, for gosh sake.   So in Killer Kitchens when a stove explodes, killing two men, destroying the chef’s livelihood, and blowing Deva Dunne and Lieutenant Rossi out onto the sidewalk, you know something has gone terribly wrong.

The catch, though, is that this particular kitchen isn’t located in anyone’s home.  It’s in the La Cucina Restaurant, the first commercial project of amateur sleuth and professional designer Deva Dunne.  And now it’s blown all to, well—smithereens.  The reason?  An accidental propane gas leak.  Or was arson the cause?

Lieutenant Rossi is suspicious, and Deva is worried.  Her old friend Chef Chip was injured in the explosion and has lost everything.  Her worry doubles when she learns her latest client, a certain Francesco Grandese, owns the building that blew up.  Later, when Chip caters a dinner party for him and a guest drops dead of cyanide poisoning—before dessert–Deva is both worried and suspicious.

Killer Kitchens is Deva’s latest romp in the Murders by Design Mystery Series.  (You may already have met her in Designed for Death and The Monet Murders.)  This time, Deva’s super stressed.  Along with her kitchen woes, she has bedroom troubles too.

“Don’t ask,” she says when questioned about her problems, but the fact is she’s struggling to help solve a murder, keep an interior design business alive, and settle a relationship issue that’s driving her crazy.

Finding solutions for all these complications isn’t easy.  Among other things, it takes some prying into a dead man’s secrets, but, oh my, the effort is well worth while.  Ask Lieutenant Rossi.  He knows.

For a first chapter excerpt of Killer Kitchens visit Deva at www.jeanharrington.com.

 

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Posted in Authors, Books, Carina Press, Cover Art, Excerpt | 3 Comments »

Small Towns, Big Hearts and Brides by Fiona Lowe

Fiona Lowe | April 16th, 2013

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“You want to go where everybody knows your name.”

And so ended the theme song on the sitcom CHEERS and I think small towns are a bit like that bar. They’re a community. Everybody knows your name and usually every indiscretion you ever committed ;-) For some people that’s enough of a reason to flee to the city but for others, it’s why they stay.

I live in a moderately sized town but even so, every time I go shopping I run into someone I know, which means I really should rethink dashing into the grocery store for milk wearing my gardening clothes or my sweat pants…please.don’t tell my mother!

Small towns are doing it hard.  Everywhere was hit by the economic downturn but rural areas got hammered harder and had less resilience because they usually have less industry.  In both cities and small towns, people have had to relocate to find work and with that in mind, I created Whitetail, Wisconsin, a small north woods town which is languishing on the shore of a pristine lake.

Whitetail’s filled with well-intentioned people who care for each other and their town, but they to are doing it tough and they don’t always agree on what is the best way to save their town.   Annika, the acting-mayor cares for her town but she also has a personal reason to work toward the town’s survival and she’s thinking big. She can see a manufacturing plant which will provide employment. The rest of the town, on a post-wedding high after one of their own has married, sees weddings as the saviour of the town.   Annika can’t see that working at all!

I’ve lived  in small towns with passionate people who come up with an idea that at the time may seem impossible but with hard work and some luck and determination, not to mention a few melt downs and hissy fits, they pull together and succeed. Whether it be a live theatre show, a three day music festival, a harvest festival featuring the area’s produce,  a cowpat throwing festival* or a writers festival, it is always an  event which attracts visitors to the town. Visitors who will come, stay a night or two and spend their money.

Saved By The Bride is the first book in the Wedding Fever trilogy and it sets up the cast of characters who all get their stories in subsequent books. There’s Nicole the young widow who finds herself becoming a wedding planner, Luke Anderson, a sixth generation farmer who’s suddenly questioning everything in his life, Mrs. Norell, the energetic senior who lives to help and John Ackerman the market owner, just to name a few.

Have you ever visited a small town festival? I’d love to hear your stories!

*BTW, the small town that hosts the cowpat throwing competition is Prarie du Sac in Wisconsin :-)

I hope you enjoy spending some time in Whitetail as much as I’ve loved creating it. To give you a feel for the town, here is the gorgeous book trailer.

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Welcome to Whitetail, Wisconsin, future home of Weddings that WOW!

 

As acting mayor, Annika will do anything to revive the economy of the town that’s been her refuge ever since her art career imploded and her fiancé walked out. Even if it means crashing an engagement party to talk business with the bride’s billionaire father. But the evening starts with a kiss from a gorgeous stranger—and ends with a night in jail.

 

Finn Callahan can’t believe his sister is getting married, not after their parents’ disastrous track record. And he’d rather be anywhere than working from his family’s vacation home. Until he catches a leggy blonde sneaking in the window, and suddenly telecommuting for the season is very appealing.

 

Unable to resist their mutual attraction, Annika and Finn are soon mixing business and pleasure—just for the summer. Too bad Annika’s heart missed the memo about not falling in love…

Book one of Wedding Fever.  99,000 words. $2.99

Saved By The Bride is available from Carina Press, Amazon, Nook , Kobo and where all digital books are sold!

 

photo fionalowe02_zps331377c5.jpgFiona Lowe is a RITA® and R*BY award-winning, multi-published author with Harlequin and Carina Press. Whether her books are set in outback Australia or in the mid-west of the USA, they feature small towns with big hearts, and warm, likeable characters that make you fall in love. When she’s not writing stories, she’s a weekend wife, mother of two ‘ginger’ teenage boys, guardian of 80 rose bushes and often found collapsed on the couch with wine. You can find her at her website, facebook, Twitter and Goodreads.

 

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Posted in Authors, Books, Carina Press, Excerpt | 4 Comments »

Carina_Press | April 12th, 2013

The Carina Press authors are “Getting in Character”!

   

What is your character’s favorite way to unwind/relax?

Rachael Hamilton is a twenty-three year old post-grad living in Brooklyn and attempting to turn her unpaid internship into a job.

I am all about relaxing, especially after a crowded commute home from Manhattan. Eva – my roommate and college friend – is an actress, so sometimes I’ll join in on the songs from her new show, Pride and Prejudice: The Musical! But if it’s just me, I like to collapse on the sofa with a pint of ice-cream (Half-Baked, clearly, because who can resist brownie chunks AND cookie dough?) and binge watch disaster movies. Preferably ones with bad CGI. There’s something weirdly comforting about bridges collapsing and people who can outrun earthquakes. I guess it’s nice to know that no matter how weird my life gets (and it’s getting pretty weird, what with all the football players) at least it’s not the end of the world.

Rush Me by Allison Parr is available now!

***

Vadim Morosov, Gorgeous Russian shapeshifter-well- that’s his current identity. If you find out the truth, he’ll probably have to kill you,

I like to cook a really nice meal, which is high in protein, and has good carbs and low fat. I can’t sit down to eat until the kitchen is spotless. To accompany my meal, I appreciate an excellent glass of red wine, and preferably some opera. Unfortunately, since I now share my living space with a slob who prefers convenience food, reality T.V. and beer, these relaxing moments are increasingly rare…

Soul Sucker by Kate Pearce is available now!

***

Sherry Adams’ hippie-dippy parents owned Adam’s Adult World, an erotic superstore located just off the interstate in the foothills of the Ozarks.

What do I do to relax?

Are you kidding me? I have a hundred square feet of storage space filled with, uh…personal massagers in every shape, size and color and you want to know my favorite way to unwind?

Television.

Seriously, there’s nothing I like better than coming home at the end of the day, opening a bottle of wine, and curling up with my favorite cop and our Reno 911 DVDs. Did I mention how hot Trevor looks in a pair of Lt. Dangle shorts?

Look for Sherry in D Is for Detained by Maggie Wells, part of Love Letters, Volume 1: Obeying Desire, available now!

***

Marc Thibaud is an academic studying and teaching BDSM in New York City when he meets the student he can’t resist.

Marc, now that your doctorate has been awarded, what’s your favorite way to relax?

I like to cook. My father is French and my mother American, but I grew up in Paris, so French cuisine is second nature to me. I love the finesse and control of creating a fabulous dish. Each ingredient has to be treated with respect. At the same time, there’s magic in the kitchen. When you add some ingredients you didn’t think would go together, they combine their best characteristics, offset their inadequacies, and the result is so much more delicious than one would have expected. I find that happens in life. Cooking is like love—pick well, and the result will stay with you for a lifetime.

Read more about Marc in B Is for Bondage by Christina Thacher, part of Love Letters Volume 1: Obeying Desire, available now!

***

What is your favorite way to relax? Tell us in the comments!

Posted in Carina Press, Getting In Character | No Comments »

Sealed with a kiss!

Maggie Wells | April 10th, 2013

The first volume of the Love Letter Anthologies released this week. Yay!

This project has been quite the undertaking – 4 authors, 6 volumes and 26 steamy stories. Uh huh. Yeah. We didn’t sleep, but had a blast creating them.

The conversations were epic. And, at times, mildly disturbing.

We shared a fictional (but frighteningly realistic) transcript of one of these conversations on the Harlequin blog yesterday. Here’s another glimpse into the inner workings of the Love Letters Team and what you might find in Love Letters Volume 1: Obeying Desire.

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Maggie: So how was it we all wrote BDSM for the first Love Letters volume, anyway? In my case, I thought it would be cute for the daughter of the sex-shop owners to encounter her high school crush, only he’s a police officer in their town. Could have been pretty vanilla, but when he whipped out those handcuffs…

Emily: Characters will do that to you.

Christina: Handcuff you?

Emily (rolling her eyes): I meant, characters will surprise you like that.

Ginny: I don’t know about characters, but you three all surprised me when you sent in your stories.

Maggie: I guess we all wanted to try something new.

Christina: Speak for yourself. The “something new” for me was writing a story with first-person point-of-view. The BDSM was same-old, same-old for me.

Emily: That’s our whips-and-chains girl!

Ginny: I liked the contrast of our four stories. We have distinct voices, but I could tell our stories would mesh well.

Maggie: You mean, they could be tied together easily.

Emily: With Ginny, everything’s easy!

Ginny: Hey! I mean, hey, Chris, tell me more about this same-old, same-old…

Maggie: Heh. Tied together.

Christina: Well, it all starts with a safe word. Let’s say yours is “alphabet”…

Emily: Focus, ladies!

Ginny: Oh, fine, spoil our fun. I’m thinking back to our first Skype session. Or, as I like to think of it, the one where Christina bothered to show up. She seems often “tied up” with other things. ;)

Christina: I’m never going to live that down, am I?

Emily: Oh, I don’t know. If you showed up on time, we might forget your previous lapses.

Christina: Moving on. Yes, I remember that discussion too. When we realized that we’d all written BDSM, we thought we should branch out, try new themes.

Maggie: As I recall it, Chris, you were the most nervous about that idea.

Christina: I’d had so much fun writing about Rachel going to “bondage school” and having a crush on her French instructor, Marc. Who’d want to give that up? But I came around.

Emily: I enjoyed exploring the BDSM dynamic between two women. I thought about how weird and intriguing it must be for a young woman to work as the receptionist at a BDSM club and have a crush on a gorgeous Domme.

Maggie: So what inspired you, Ginny?

Ginny: I thought about how a little bit of kink could get together two people who might otherwise never have hooked up. I liked the idea of cops being undercover, but I wanted Lane to be something other than a police officer. Cameron’s got a couple issues, so I liked their layered dynamic. In real life, he has to submit to her as the department shrink, but undercover she has to do what he says. And in the bedroom…

Christina: Yes, that’s true of all our stories: In the bedroom…

Emily: Or, in my case, in the dungeon…

Maggie: In the sex shop…

Ginny: So that’s what brought us together. Our love of the ellipses (sorry to Deb, our editor, we’re working on it.) Those three little dots that suggest sexy times wherever the characters might find themselves. We hope that you enjoy the spicy new twist on the alphabet that we’ll be bringing you this year, and that you love reading what comes after the ellipses as much as we loved writing it!
Love Letters Volume 1: Obeying Desire by Ginny Glass, Christina Thacher, Emily Cale and Maggie Wells

available NOW at the Carina Press bookstore or your favorite ebook retailer!

Hang out with the Love Letters ladies on Twitter!

@GinnyGlass

@ChristnaThacher

@EmilyCale

@MaggieWells1

Posted in Authors, Behind the Scenes, Books, Carina Press, Cover Art, Random conversation | 4 Comments »

A new venture!

Kate Pearce | April 9th, 2013

I first had the idea for Soul Sucker about five or six years ago, and floated it past my agent. She went, ‘Huh? What is that?” We had no idea where it would fit in the publishing market, so I went ahead with something else. When I had time to look through my folder of ideas last year, (I think every writer has one somewhere), I found the single sheet of paper entitled Soul Sucker and read it through again. I still liked it.

I tend to write really angsty emotional characters, and I was looking for something different, and Soul Sucker fitted the bill. It was part Urban Fantasy, part Paranormal romance, and yet neither of those things, because the main character, Ella Walsh was funny as hell in a sarcastic anti-heroic way that appealed to me. Unlike most heroines in these sub-genres she was neither leather-clad, gun toting or ass-kicking material. She’s blond, short, a little unfit and tends to think most of life’s problems can be solved with a joke, a beer and some junk food.

Of course her hero, Vadim Morosov is the complete opposite. Tall, handsome, not quite human, and neat as a pin, some might say too neat, and the stage is set for a clash of egos and ideals that carries the pair from instant antagonism to attraction as they try to police their two worlds and prevent humans from realizing what’s really out there. I was asked to describe the book recently, and I said it’s like Moonlighting meets the X-Files, full of wit, weirdness and odd partnerships that somehow work.

Who are some of your favorite onscreen partnerships?

One randomly picked commenter below will win an Amazon gift card for $15. Thanks for having me, Carina Press Blog!

Kate Pearce x

 

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Posted in Carina Press, Contest/Giveaway | 17 Comments »

Fish Out of Water

Allison Parr | April 9th, 2013

I took a cultural anthropology class in college that focused on the concept of The Other – the way societies and groups categorize anyone different than themselves. It fascinated me. I’d long been a fan of stories in unfamiliar settings, be it Dorothy in Oz or time-travel romances or accounts of exploration. Anything that threw the character out of her comfort zone.

So one rainy day (okay, probably not, but poetic license) when I sat down to write Rush Me, I drafted up a tale of a girl I knew, and a world she’d never even imagined.


The girl, Rachael Hamilton, was easy. She was the familiar protagonist who fell through the looking glass. I based her on the people I’d known in college and afterward, heavy on the artsiness and suburban New England. For her fish-out-of-water experience, I decided to have her run into Ryan Carter, a quarterback for a professional football team. It sounded great in my head. A total cultural clash. I’d get to write an exciting love story about a girl navigating an entirely different way of life.

Of course, I’d forgotten that meant I had to be able to navigate the waters.

It’s one thing to watch football on TV. It’s entirely different to write a protagonist whose life revolves around the game. So I took out autobiographies from the library and read articles by football players’ wives. I started spending every day on sport websites. I watched old games, documentaries, TV shows, and interviews. I read reports about how teams traveled and if they had curfew and what happened after they retired.

And it was probably one of the best armchair traveling experiences ever. I expected to have a fun ride while writing Rush Me – I didn’t expect to learn so much. And Rachael learns even more as her life shifts to include her new friends.

Have you ever been such a fish out of water? It’s part of the reason I like to travel so much – you meet so many people with their own stories and perspectives. Who have you met or what have you learned that made you totally rethink your world?

 

  Allison Parr grew up in small town New England, where she developed an incurable case of wanderlust. When she’s not traveling or writing, she’s making a mean chocolate cake or bad historical jokes. She’s also amassing enough books to rival the library in Beauty and the Beast, though she is still looking for a permanent castle in which to store all of them. You can find her at:

Homepage / Facebook / Twitter / Goodreads

Posted in Carina Press | 2 Comments »

Childhood memories

Carina_Press | April 5th, 2013

The Carina Press authors are “Getting in Character”!

 

What is your character’s favorite childhood memory?

Ashley V isn’t a bad girl. Sometimes she makes bad decisions through some compulsion she has yet to figure out, but Hollywood hasn’t forgiven her yet. Masquerading as a scientist and hitching a ride on an alien space ship is step one to redemption for those bad decisions. Step two—Tabloid Disaster Ashley becomes Serious Actress Ashley. If she makes it back to Earth. Her favorite childhood memory:

Before my dad took off, he and my mom and I all went to this traveling carnival they set up outside of town. I got lost because I wandered off, as my mom is fond of telling me. But I had the most magical time by myself , looking at all the booths and I rode the Ferris wheel like ten times in a row. The ride operator kept passing me up and loading the cars in front and behind, with a wink each time. I loved that sense of being in another world.

Mindlink by Kat Cantrell is available now!

***

Cole is a wolf-shifter and executive of one of the pack owned businesses. Because his pack’s territory is in an urban area, he only occasionally gets to let his wolf run free. His favorite childhood memory is of a family camping trip to Yellowstone National Park. He slipped away to chase a rabbit while his siblings were fighting and quickly became as lost as a cub with wolves for parents can be. Once he realized he was on his own, he decided he liked the peace and quiet and for the rest of the day did his best to avoid recapture. The experience gave him an abiding love of wild and open spaces which is one reason he accepted the dangerous mission into the Amazon rain forest where he meets Taya.

Lost City Shifters: Rebellion by Eleri Stone is available now!

***

What’s your favorite childhood memory? Tell us in the comments!

Posted in Carina Press, Getting In Character | No Comments »

Mi Kindle Es Su Kindle

Adrienne Macintosh | April 4th, 2013

Hi, I’m Adrienne Macintosh, an associate editor at Harlequin, member of the Carina Press acquisitions team and a Carina Press blog virgin. I figured I’d introduce myself by explaining why I love my job…and occasionally hate my boyfriend.

You see, my boyfriend and I are in that lovely period in our relationship where I’m constantly going back and forth between his place and mine. And I’m constantly leaving something behind with him—earrings, clothing, embarrassing hygiene products, and, this week, my Kindle.

He called to say I’d forgotten it, adding he was glad it was there because he needed something to read. And then I thought, crap. What exactly is on my Kindle? I’d just downloaded a bunch of Carina books recommended to me by my fellow Harlequinites. Let’s see, I had a cozy mystery, a contemporary romance, a fantasy, a BDSM erotic romance, a historical erotic romance, a paranormal erotic romance…

This, actually, is what I love about working on the Carina Press acquisitions team. There’s such a huge variety—of genres, of lengths, of sensuality. And at the core of each book is always a great story that renews my passion for publishing every time. Which is great for me, and all the readers of Carina Press books.

But what about my boyfriend who reads techie thrillers? I figured a little romantic fiction could go a long way, so I told him to go ahead and open whatever he wanted to.

He chose the mystery.

What about you, would you let someone open your reading device?

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Posted in Books, Carina Press, editorial | 3 Comments »

Would You Be On The List?

Kat Cantrell | April 3rd, 2013

I’m a hard-core science fiction fan, especially when it comes to movies. Minority Report, Total Recall and of course Star Wars and Star Trek in all their iterations are some of my favorites. But the premise of one stuck with me for a long time—Deep Impact (hmm…I guess it was aptly named, no?) In the movie, an asteroid is projected to destroy the Earth within a certain period of time but the human race believes it can prevail by securing a select few in underground bunkers. Fascinating. How do you choose?

Well, asteroids are both overdone and depressing. So I thought it would be fun to put a more positive spin on the same basic idea. In Mindlink, aliens make first contact and invite ten humans to participate in the first universal summit between the two species. But with a twist. My aliens ask for very specific humans who have knowledge of certain scientific principles.

I spent hours devising the aliens’ list…presumably, aliens have been studying us for a long time. What would they consider notable achievements? Cloning? Particle physics? The micro-processor? Jersey Shore? (They’re aliens. They might find Snookie compelling, right?)

Researching some of these areas was a blast and I’m afraid I read more about the Large Hadron Collider than a normal person should. (…well, maybe I’m not ACTUALLY normal…) Finally, I had what I thought was the perfect list of specifications. Then, because I’m tricky that way, I spent a lot of time figuring out how Earthlings would thoroughly mess up in interpreting the aliens’ list and then threw in deliberate human agendas which had nothing to do with adhering to the spirit of the list.

Mindlink_finalThat’s the premise for Mindlink. It’s what happens when aliens and humans try to outsmart each other. And then I made the heroine an actress just because.

If you were in charge of selecting ten representatives from Earth, how would you choose? What human qualities would you consider important to convey to another species?

Buy Mindlink- Kindle | Nook | Carina

Kat Cantrell read her first Harlequin novel in third grade and has been scribbling in notebooks since she learned to spell. What else would she write but romance? When she’s not writing about characters on the journey to happily ever after, she can be found at a soccer game, watching Friends or dancing with her kids to Duran Duran and Red Hot Chili Peppers. Kat was the 2011 Harlequin So You Think You Can Write winner and a 2012 RWA® Golden Heart® finalist for best unpublished series contemporary manuscript. Follow Kat on Facebook and Twitter or visit her website.

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Posted in Authors, Books, Carina Press | 6 Comments »

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