Happy First Birthday, Genraistas!

Wow! One year old! Seems like just yesterday Judith and Sarah were talking about building this blog and I'm honored to be a part of it each and every month. Time certainly does fly when you're having fun. (although I suspect it's not so much fun to Judith when I don't get her my posts in a timely manner. heh) It's scary starting up a new project, especially one this big. As a writer I can certainly understand the joy and anxiety and the risks of seeing it all come together---it's a neuroses I face on a daily basis when I'm working.  Sarah and Judith have done an outstanding job here and it's been a privilege to be part of it.

This past year has been pretty busy for me as well. I not only released a new book, Forget Me Not--which I'm proud to say has been doing very well--but I also sold a new book to a new romance line. My novel Dark Obsession, a suspense with supernatural elements, will be one of the launch books for Crimson Romance and I can't tell you how proud I am or how excited that I can now share this work with you all. Like my first novel, Dark Obsession has been a labor of love that took eight years to publish. The book comes out June 4th, so I hope you'll look for it online.

Here's an excerpt from the book, to whet your appetite. :)

Ray awoke two hours before sunrise, his mind dazed and clouded from another restless night of dreams. He couldn’t blame it on alcohol this time since he didn’t have more than two beers all night. Maybe it had been Sylvia’s initial concern about Lexie playing at the back of his mind. Or maybe it was because he had to sleep on the sofa amid the creaking sounds of the house settling around him. His grandmother called the sounds the footsteps of their ancestors. As a child, the thought had terrified him. But whatever caused his fitful night, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the dream had not actually been a dream but a look into the life he was destined to live.

Christ, he was starting to sound like Sylvia now.

He knew what his sister thought, but he wasn’t ready to believe that the troubled woman asleep in his old bedroom was an evil force out to do them harm. He still hadn't decided if he chose to believe his crazy dreams at all.

Ray scrubbed his hands over his face and blew out a frustrated breath. He wasn’t enjoying these early morning wake up calls.

He pushed himself off the sofa and grabbed the shirt he had tossed over the arm of the love seat. He needed air. Maybe a quick walk in the fields would clear his head. He always found comfort in his fields.

He grabbed his boots and carried them with him outside. The temperature had cooled during the night, bringing with it a soft desert breeze. He stepped from the porch, careful to avoid the loose floorboard that creaked under pressure. Sounds of the predawn night surrounded him; crickets and frogs battling in a symphony of noise; rustling in the dried grass made by a snake or small animal.

He followed a path around the front of the house and continued to the edge of the field. The grooves he and his grandfather had recently plowed lined the earth. Dried dirt and fertilizer scented the air. He absently checked the texture of the soil in places with the toe of his boot. They would be planting soon, lining the land with stalks of sorghum this time instead of corn.

When he was a child he would spend hours playing among the tall stems, waiting for the sun to drop so he could listen to the sounds of the night as if they were speaking directly to him. Sometimes he would hear the soft beat of a drum or the whispered chant of a song. But those sounds stopped coming to him when his parents died. Or maybe he just stopped hearing them.

He knelt and picked up a handful of dirt, letting the dry earth spill out between his fingers. The land had been in his family for four generations and he spent his whole life working it with his grandfather. It was something he had been born to do and he never once doubted that this was where he belonged. Even the four years he spent away at college hadn’t been as hard as he anticipated because he always knew he would be back. And when Victoria told him she no longer wanted to marry him and called off their wedding, this was the first place he came for solace.

He picked up a clod of dried soil and stood, gauging the weight in the palm of his hand. Rearing his arm back he threw the dirt as hard as he could into the field.

It wasn’t comfort he sought now, but peace of mind. The dream that had awakened him, though somewhat sketchy now, had left him with a sense of foreboding he wasn’t sure he could shake off. But what bothered him most about the dream was that it hadn’t been just about him. It involved Lexie as well.

And in his dream, he killed her.

Available now for pre-order at Amazon.com