So Laura (or LLG as she is to be known) is up to her eyeballs in a deadline, but I wanted to do an interview with her since she has a great new book out, Secret Desires of a Gentleman.  So instead of bugging her and risking a scud attack from Boise, I decided to just mine our emails that we send back and forth for dirt on the esteemed and talented Ms. LLG. And besides, I thought you might want to know what authors really talk about when no one else is reading . . . Here it is, the unvarnished truth . . . .

We gossip about those who get the great positions in the stores . . .

Email from EB to LLG:

I thought you would like to see this photo from my trip to Tennessee.  This was at the Barnes & Noble.  Check out the display on this end cap.  Don’t you hate those be-yatches who get the entire endcap . . . oh, wait, who’s the be-yatch now? Don’t tell Quinn that they used her as filler at the bottom.

LLG responds:

Yeah, I used to really hate those be-yatches who hog the endcaps. But you know, I’ve had a serious change of attitude about these things. I’ve become a better person, more tolerant, more understanding… (Imagine me snorting my coffee all over my keyboard as I read this) By the way, you need to send a book to Kim C. for my week eight contest. Did I already email you about that? My brain is so fried from deadline hell, I can’t remember if I did or not.

EB responds:

No you didn’t tell me.  Great, now I have to remember to send in a book.  (BTW, anyone reading this can go over to LLG’s contest page and enter to win a book.)

We stress about titles . . .

Email from LLG to EB:

Oh, Brilliant Title Guru, I need thy help. (She’s sucking up here, but I’m not complaining) You know the premise of my next book. Does anything spring to mind? I am, as usual, stumped. Any “twists that give that historical touch Art can work with” would be very much appreciated.

EB responds:

I love to share great titles with my fellow authors, because I have a plethora of them in my desk drawer. And of course, titles are so easy to come up with.  For you LLG, only my best titles. How about:

The Duke of Viagra
The Duke with an Itch
The Duke who Loved His Sheep Too Much

For whatever reason, LLG didn’t respond to this email. Must have been overcome with gratitude.

We stress about covers:

Email from LLG to EB:

They are kind of dodgy about sending me the art until the lettering’s done. I have no idea why, and the longer they wait to send it, the more scared I get that it’s awful. I’m trying not to make too much of this, but after the Donald hero, I’m a bit paranoid. I wanna see the damn thing.

EB to LLG after she gets her cover and forwards it on to gloat share:

Yeah, I can see why you were stressed.  Doesn’t it suck when you get a freakin’ awesome cover?

So folks, that’s it. The secret emails of authors and my good friend, Laura Lee Guhrke.  Say “hi” to Laura and feel free to ask her anything about her “Girl-Bachelor” series, wake-boarding, or what she’s currently working on.  Well, maybe not her current WIP ’cause she gets a little twitchy during the last 30 days of writing.  So stick to the safe stuff, like her Girl-Bachelor Series, which I must say is great fun to read.  I adored And Then He Kissed Her.  I mean adored it.

Coming up: More on covers on Thursday!

from my September contest:

•  Dalene P. of Bremerton, Washington
• Cindy M. of Harleysville, Pennsylvania
•  Vicki K. of Thorndale, TX
• Wendy B. of Easley, SC
• Holly of Lake Cormorant, MS

Congratulations on winning autographed copies of Julia Quinn’s The Lost Duke of Wyndham
and Laura Lee Guhrke’s And Then He Kissed Her. Copies will be in mail soon–I have to meet up with the infamous Ms. Quinn and get her John Hancock on your winnings.

Don’t despair if you didn’t win, because a brand new Contest posted today. Enter quickly to win a Jane Porter Flirty with Forty fun pack.

between a Chrysler Sebrise and Ford Mustang at the rental counter (for the same price, mind you) which would you choose?  Yeah, I thought so. Man, did this ride rock.  Realize, I spend most of my days behind the wheel of a minivan, with one kid with a penchant for car sickness.  I don’t care what Febreeze or the guy at the detail shop says, there are just some odors that you can’t get out of a car. So it was an extra treat that this rockin set of wheels even smelled new.  I was completely channeling my 70s vibe, the golden age when a hot Mustang was the car of choice.

And yes, I do believe that it can go upwards to 90 miles, not that I would have tested such a thing because that would have been wrong.  Very wrong.  At least it was until until the police lights came on behind me.  I thought I was going to have a heart attack.  And of course, Teresa Medeiros, who was riding shotgun, says very cooly, “Well, it isn’t like we have a body in the trunk.” Leave it to another writer to get the best line in.  So I slow down, and wait for the officer to pull in behind me and really ruin my day.  Because I wasn’t speeding.  Not at all.  But then he drove right by us because he was escorting a pick up truck pulling a bass boat.  We nearly died laughing then, because we couldn’t fathom the sort of bass emergency that required police escort.  (Of course later that day we discovered that the very officer and boat we saw were going out to drag a lake to find a missing woman–which sort of makes my dilemma look rather ridiculous.)

But onward from the rockin’ car and our near encounter with the police.  I can tell you that while we were testing how well a 2008 Mustang could corner and do donuts, (which came in very handy, ’cause Teresa turned out to be rather hopeless at navigating Knoxville–I finally learned to just go the opposite direction of where ever she pointed, unless it looked like a good place to spin a U)  Teresa and I managed to sign copious copies of our books at the Books A Million in Oak Ridge and Knoxville, and both Borders and the one Barnes & Noble in Knoxville.  So if you live in the area and want a signed copy, descend upon them and snatch them up while they are still available.  Go in and say “hi” to Tammy at the Oak Ridge store.  I thought we were going to be adopted and held in the store, she was so darn friendly.  In fact, the people of Knoxville on a whole were some of the friendliest and nicest people I’ve met in ages.

And here was the cool part of the weekend, the Food City Food Show at the convention center. We even met someone very famous, someone you wouldn’t have believed—yes, you are seeing who you think that is.  That international man of infamy, The Rug Doctor.  And yes, you are reading his nickname correctly.  And honestly, you never forgot the moment you first meet “Steamy.” Oh, yeah, he fit right in at our booth.

So what else was there at Food City Food Show, you might ask. There was, well, food everywhere.  You name it and it was there.  Teresa and I signed book after book after book.  It was too much fun.  And then when we weren’t signing we checked out the booths and compared notes on where the good samples were. They were even making cakes with pictures on them–and here is the one they did for Teresa with her cover on it.  I’d show you mine, but it met with an accident . . . believe it or not it got hit by a fork clocked at doing 90. . . And no, the police weren’t involved.

Okay, I’m a little out of it.  The quick trip to Portland, combined with coming down with a fierce head cold Friday night after the signing and not sleeping at all (is there anything worse than having a great hotel room and not being able to enjoy a peaceful night’s sleep because your head feels like a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day balloon?) has all made me feel like I’m running late for a bus.  Or rather late for my usual Monday morning blog.

So forgive me for the Tuesday afternoon edition.  I have to kick this cold before I fly to Tennessee on Friday morning and get my revisions in for Memoirs of a Scandalous Red Dress before I leave.  I’m pretty much done with those–so that will make going to Tennessee sort of my time to read and knit on all the planes and think about what I am going to write next.  Of course, I fried my laptop yesterday.  Note to self:  Don’t put the electric pencil sharpener on of the laptop and use said pencil sharpener.  Apparently this creates a magnetic field that leaves your poor Macbook giving you nothing but a flashing file with a big “?” on it.  So last night I had another reason to sniffle other than my stuffed up head.

Yes, it’s only Tuesday and already its been a week.

But enough of my fussing, let me tell you about the signing at Powells, which was, IMHO, great fun–and I would love to show you how much fun it was, but I forgot my camera at home. I had my camera packed until I came around the corner and spotted this on Friday morning–what is it? you ask.  Well, the little hero was home from school on Friday (I know, only two weeks into school and already the teachers get a day off) and he kept watching me scurrying around and packing and kept asking “Beach condo, Mommy?” (Translation: Seaside, Or.) “Uh, no, Matthew.”  He’d watch some more and then ask, “Papa’s House?” I shook my head.  “No, we aren’t going to Papa’s house. I’m going to Portland.” That really didn’t float his boat, so when I wasn’t looking, he went downstairs, packed his own suitcase (and did a good job for a 7 year old with autism–2 toothbrushes, toothpaste, a pair of underwear and his portable DVD player) and had put it by my car.  Quite plainly, if Mom was leaving, he wasn’t going to miss out.  That is until Dad came home early from work and he realized he would have Daddy all to himself.  Then it was “don’t let the car door hit you on your way out, lady.”  And I think he’s the same little piece of business who gave me this wretched cold. Ah, kids.

So to bring a long, meandering story along, I took the photo of the suitcase in the carport and then promptly put my camera down on the table in the entryway and it didn’t make to Portland.  But when I got to Powell’s, to my shock and surprise, Ciara arrived! (Is it me, or does that girl get around?!) And she’s carting a camera and took all kinds of shots for me.  (Okay, I sort of badgered her to help me out.) Here she is with her friend, Carrie and on the left, fellow Avon author, Samantha James.  And quite frankly, I am too tired and tired of reaching for the kleenex every other line, to give you all the great pics and all the dirt from the signing.  But voila, Ciara has it all over at her site. So thank you, Ciara, for doing a much better job of recaping the signing than I will ever do (at least this week!) and if you want to see everyone and get all the talk, I suggest you meander over Ciara’s way.

Oh, BTW, congrats to the winners of the blog posting contest!  Michael has promised to send those books along to you pronto!

Now if you will excuse me, I have an appointment with a hot cup of tea and the aspirin bottle.

As a mom of boys, I deplore the lack of good fiction written for boys.  My son loves to read, but the bulk of fiction out there is aimed square at girls and like most boys he has his own ideas about what makes a good book.  So when I found out my good friend, Michael Spradlin was writing a book about a young Templar knight, I was thrilled.  So I asked Michael to drop by and tell all of you about his new book/series, The Youngest Templar.

1) Michael, how exciting to see The Youngest Templar, the first in your new YA series coming out!  Congratulations!  Tell us all a little bit about the story.

It’s always a thrill for any writer to see their newest book published. It’s a little bit like letting your children loose in the world. You shine them up, give them everything you can to make them succeed and then open the door and let them out into the world. The Youngest Templar: Keeper of the Grail is the first book in a new trilogy. It’s set during the Third Crusade and features a young orphan named Tristan who is raised by monks at a quiet abbey in England. One night, a troop of Knights Templar stops to rest at the abbey and Tristan is offered the chance to join them as a squire. He travels with the Knights to the Holy Land and during a critical battle, as the Templar’s are about to be overrun, is given the Holy Grail and ordered to return with it to England for safe-keeping. On his journey his joined by a war weary young archer on his way home to Sherwood Forest and by a young Muslim girl who is a member of the mysterious warrior cult Al Hashshashin (the Assassins). They team up and along the way have to fend off evil Knights, Saracens, and agents of King Richard the Lionheart.

It’s full of action, adventure, suspense and humor. The kind of book I loved to read when I was a kid.

2) What was the spark that ignited for The Youngest Templar and this series?

I  read an article in a magazine about the Grail Cathedral in Roslin, Scotland. Supposedly the Holy Grail is hidden in the castle somewhere, or else the construction of the Cathedral is said to hide clues as to the Grail’s whereabouts. I was fascinated. I started to think: What if the Grail were real and actually hidden here? If so, how did it get there? I started working backward and came up with my characters and story.

3) What do you think are the challenges for writing for the YA market?

I  think the challenges are the same as writing for any market. You have to tell a good story that will grab readers and get them to invest their time. I do think one of the special challenges today is getting kids to put down the Ipods, and turn off the computers, and the television and pick up a book. Don’t get me wrong, I love technology and I use all of those things. But kids today have so much more competition for their time than I did growing up.

4) I hear you on the electronics.  Those things can be a blessing and a curse.  But nothing beats a good story, not even Nintendo!  And what makes a good story, IMHO is research, and my favorite: history. Favorite tidbit of research about the Templars you want to share?

Well, I like to call the Templar’s the Hells Angels of the Middle Ages. They are fascinating group and there is enough history to fill thousands of books. I guess what drew me to them is the mystery surrounding their origin. The name Knights Templar comes from the fact that the very first members of the order, were barracked in the Temple of Solomon. They were originally known as the Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and King Solomon’s Temple. Shortened later to the Knights Templar. When they first occupied the Temple the began to excavate beneath it. And they must have found something very valuable for they suddenly went from being this simple, poor, monastic order of monks to arguably the wealthiest and most powerful group in Christendom. Almost overnight. That is where all the legends and conspiracy theories come from. What did they find beneath the Temple? Was it the Holy Grail? The One True Cross? No one knows, but it must have something that could use to gain power and influence.

5) Hell’s Angels?  I love that! Michael, where can my blog readers go to read an excerpt and order copies–for themselves or for the kids in their life?

The Youngest Templar is published by G.P. Putnam’s Sons and is available wherever books are sold, as well as through my website www.michaelspradlin.com or www.theyoungesttemplar.com.

Thanks, Michael!  Take a peek inside The Youngest Templar and let me know what you think!  Five lucky posters will win a copy of Michael’s earlier book, Spy Goddess.  Get your comment in before Monday’s blog posts to be entered to win.

Last week was sort of a surprise.  I received two awards in one week.  It’s not every week that you snag even a single award, but two in one week?  Well, that is cause to celebrate.  We went out to Canlis and had a wonderful meal on Friday night.  Well, the Canlis thing was for his job and had been in the works for weeks, so my awards had nothing to do with it, but really when you are in Seattle’s finest restaurant with a roomful of engineers, it is much nicer to imagine that the entire affair is to celebrate your greatness than to have to listen to what happened on “the MD-10 program when they went down to Edwards for that testing!” Like that was earth moving or worthy of guffawing for hours on end about.  Engineers!  If they had just eaten their crab legs and goat cheese appetizers for a few moments, I would have had the perfect opening to share really cool news. About something other than testing wind sheer on a 747.

Now the first award was for Love Letters from a Duke which was named one of the Top Ten Romances of 2008 by Booklist.  Booklist is the review publication of the ALA (American Library Association) and is a very respected magazine in librarian circles.  To say I was shocked would be no exageration. I mean Top Ten? Wow!  There were some good books over the last year, so getting named in that company is an honor.  If I had explained this to the engineers they would have had the same polite, glazed look I wore most of the evening.

The second surprise was being given The Hoyden Award over at the blog, A Hoyden’s Look at Literature. The Hoyden Award may not be as famous as an Oscar or an Emmy or even a RITA, but gosh darn, it sure fits me to a T.  Or rather it fits Something About Emmaline, which actually won the award, but I sort of hog the awards away from my books.  I consider them separate entities until they do something great, and then there I am, on stage, pushing them aside and taking credit for all their glory. Which goes along perfectly with the Hoyden Award, since it is given out to “swashbuckling, silly, or general feel-good books with well-disguised Growth (if they bother with any).”  Yeah, that sort of fits me to a T.

Of course the problem with the Hoyden Award is when you go to brag about it to your family and friends is that they are all happy for you even as they then turn to each other and ask, “What the heck is a ‘hoyden?'” And that is exactly what happened.  I told the DH as we were getting in the car to go to Canlis and he murmured his usual “Oh, congrats, honey.” And then about five minutes later piped up with the hoyden question. His reply was that “all my heroines are hoydens, because look who created them.” Lucky for him we were on our way to Canlis. But to his credit, it was an awarding week and he was sort of numb over trying to keep them all straight.  Happily, I’m hoyden enough to remind him when flowers and applause are due.

So there is my awarding week. And I think everyone should win an award from time to time.  What award would you like to win?

Powell’s Books in Beaverton is having their second Rose City Romance event next Friday, September 19th and I am thrilled to get to go join the crowd! If you live in the greater Portland area, please drop by, ask questions, take pictures, and get autographs . . . . oh yes, there will be lots of books.  Always a great lure–especially after reading all the comments from Monday’s Blog. I’ll be there signing Tempted by the Night, along with Samantha James signing Seduction of an Unknown Lady, my friend Terri Reed  with her book, Double Jeopardy, as well as the author of the hour, Delilah Marvelle with Mistress of Pleasure, along with numerous other authors.  Here are all the details if you can attend:

Friday, September 19th @ 7pm
Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd.
Beaverton, Oregon
(800) 878-7323

Now I realize that there a lot of you who can’t take a weekend jaunt to Portland all that easily, so Powell’s is offering to anyone who orders Tempted by the Night online before the signing an autographed copy, which I will sign next week and then will be shipped promptly to your doorstep. Or you can call the (800) number above and get your copy reserved. I love going to Portland, and Powell’s, and seeing all my friends and making new ones.  Do drop by if you can.

So just for giggles, tell me your three authors you’d want to come to a signing at your local bookstore.  Dead or alive. Romance or not.  Pick your three.

I think books were meant to be shared.  At least that was what I learned growing up as I watched all the adults in the family pass along good reads.  And if a book was particularly good or popular, then there was the bartering that went into who got it next.  My husband and I did this on our honeymoon–I was reading a Grisham novel and he picked it up when I wasn’t looking.  Then the tussle began as to who got to read it.  I solved the problem by ripping the paperback in half before my horrified husband’s eyes. He got everything up to the point I’d read.  I’ve done this with travel books that I plan on taking with me.  I take a razor blade to the spine and cut out the sections I need and toss them as I go. Now I wouldn’t recommend this if you intend to pass the book along, and qualify this act of barborism as only intended for a vacation book–because any book I travel with is going to be set free where ever I finish it. However, I do have to admit to feeling some guilt over the fact that some poor soul in the Cook Islands may have only gotten to read half of the Pelican Brief.

Now you may think there are some books that shouldn’t be shared–we all know the ones–the story that just makes us sigh and shake our heads.  How the heck did this dreck get published? Here’s the shocker.  One reader’s dreck is another’s manna from heaven.  I’m always amazed when my mother hands me a “great” book and I find it horrible. She adores reading Nora.  Personally, Nora’s books aren’t my cup of tea.  But mom persists, convinced that one day I’ll see the light. Probably not going to happen, but the good thing is, I can always find a home for them.  I had a few books stacked up recently that I couldn’t get through.  Conference books, books from the RITAs, other ones that I had collected along the way and a friend was complaining about having nothing to read.  “Help yourself,” I offered, feeling guilty about letting her loose in my “came in fourth” pile. (Know you, the books that didn’t make the medal round). She called me a few days, happy as a pig in mud.  “Loved those books, thanks so much.  How could you give those up?” How could I indeed?

Right now I am reading two books:  The Heir and the Spare by Maya Rodale and Twilight by Stephanie Meyers.  I started both books for the usual reasons.  I’ve recently met Maya (albeit online), and I rather like her chatty, friendly style and figured her writing would have the same charm.  It does.  If you haven’t read her before, do find a copy of The Heir and the Spare, especially when the follow up book, The Rogue and the Rival is coming out in November.  Heir is charming, fun with a warm heart.  I reach for it first when I sit down.  Which is probably why I’m not finishing Twilight, which I started for other reasons.  Interestingly enough, I got emails from both of my sisters-in-law within a week of each other which began, “Have you read . . . ” No, I hadn’t read the Stephanie Meyers shooting stars, but with them pressing me for opinions, I got a copy and dug in.  I can say that I am engaged, but quite frankly, I like my Vampires a little more grown up. Teen angst is one thing, but I want the big bite if you know what I mean.  I wrote them both back and suggested they try big girl vamps.  Like Lara Adrian’s Midnight Breed series.  I’m just saying, books should be passed along.

And if you liked Tempted by the Night, and even if you didn’t, do pass it along.    Truly, I’ve never understood the notion of a keeper shelf.  Or bookcase.  Or room.  I see all those books just sitting captive and I feel sorry for them.  I loved working in a library in high school (yes, me, I was a budding librarian) because you got to see books move.  Like they were intended–from reader to reader.  Quite frankly, I don’t write so my books can be dusted periodically.  I want them read, their spines cracked, the pages held together with a rubberband around them, proclaiming to all the world that this is a story meant to be shared.  I want to know that the book has led an active, good life before it finally succumbs to its inevitable end. Not yellowing and on life support in pristine shape on a shelf.  How lonely.  How dull. How unread. Would you want to live an unread life?  I thought not. Now do a book a favor and pass one along today.

Who do you pass books along to?

So this week brings the arrival of a debut author, Delilah Marvelle and her wonderful new book, Mistress of Pleasure. I asked Delilah to drop by and meet all of you, so without any further ado:

1) Delilah, how exciting to see your first book Mistress of Pleasure coming out! Congratulations! What was the spark that ignited this story? In other words what came to you first?

Thank you so much for the congrats, Elizabeth, and for having me on your blog! I’m definately thrilled to see my first book in print.

Ah, yes. The spark that ignited this story. I have to say my sparks come to me the way all of my stories always come to me. By my relentless lust for reading out of print history books. I happened to come across the fascinating biography of Ninon de L’Enclos, a 17th century French courtesan. Her approach to men and to life was unlike any I’ve seen. She had a philosphy that was almost too modern for her time period. What was more, she kept her bedroom door open to many aristocratic men for more reasons than sex. She actually held meetings and formal classes and discussions all evolving around the topic of sex, love and philosophy. And it really got me to thinking. Why not turn the idea of her “meetings” into an actual school. For men. Which of course made me only laugh at the absurdity. What sort of men would actually attend something like that? The idea wouldn’t leave me alone. Especially because there hadn’t been anything like it written.

At the same time when this was all bubbling in my head, my grandmother re-appeared in my life after 2o years of absence. That is a whole other story altogether. Nonetheless, she became the perfect inspiration for the grandmother and creator of the school, Madame de Maitenon. My grandmother, you see, is a retired, eccentric opera singer who speaks with a heavy accent and always refers to sex matter of factly. She amused me so much so that I fused her characteristics with the idea of a retired French courtesan and a school that educates men in the art of love and seduction.

2) Since we’ve known each other for years, I know that you wrote for a long time before you were published and even gave up for a time, what kept you coming back to the computer and kept you writing during that time?

This industry is truly a tough one and can literally make or break you. It’s just a matter of how tough your skin is and how much you believe in your creativity and your writing. I gave up on my writing, not because I was altogether fed up with the industry, but because of a heartbreaking incident involving my husband. It’s a sad and long story (a whole seperate blog’s worth…) but my husband was almost murdered in front of me and my two children. My mind and creativity was blocked completely. The last thing I wanted to do was write. Reality settled in on me and I realized being a stay at home mother and a writer wasn’t going to support me or my kids financially should anything ever happen to my husband. So I went back to pursue a different dream. One that I knew I could make happen. To become a chef.

A month after entering culinary school, I found out that I finaled in the Golden Heart and I was thrown back into the writing world I loved and desperately missed so much. At Nationals in Dallas, a wonderful friend and fellow Golden Heart finalist from 2005, who had not only won the Golden Heart but sold, Victoria Dahl, demanded to know why I hadn’t sold considering I was going on my second Golden Heart final. She then asked me what I was working on. Before the incident with my husband, I had finished Mistress of Pleasure, which is all I felt I really had to offer. Victoria loved the concept, and bless her heart, pitched it to her editor. A little over a week after her pitch and my sending off the complete, I received “the call” that I had sold. So I would have to say, the Golden Heart is was what drew me back. Without a doubt.

3) If you were going to do a Hollywood style pitch for Mistress of Pleasure, what would it be? And who would star in the movie?

I’m so horrible at pitches. I swear to you, I could write a 400 page book, no problem whatsoever, but something that is less than a page frightens me… Regardless, I’ll do my best. Granddaughter of a renowned courtesan, Maybelle de Maitenon has absolutely no interest in her grandmother’s school where gentlemen receive instruction – in the art of seduction. But when her grandmother falls ill, leaving her to run the school, and see to the education of five men, including the one man who taught her a thing or two about sex, Maybelle discovers that her life, and her heart, will never be the same. So it’s interesting you ask me who would star in the movie. Because I always like to use stars to describe my characters to the art department. Then everyone knows what you really want, as opposed to tall, dark and handsome. Because everyone’s idea of tall, dark and handsome varies. Greatly. So the heroine, Maybelle de Maitenon would be played by Jessica Biel. Edmund Worthington, the duke of Rutherford, would be played by Hugh Jackman (oh be still my beating heart!).

4) Okay, just for fun–your book features the School of Gallantry, what lessons in love do you think most modern men could stand to learn? And remember, this is a PG-13 blog. Most days.

LOL. What can’t men stand to learn? I truly believe that a good man in his heart of hearts wants to please his woman. To ensure not only her happiness, but all of her bedroom desires. The trouble men run into is that pride steps in from time to time and they never really get around to “asking” how to go about doing that. And therein is the problem. For as Madame de Maitenon would say, “Even the King of England requires help from his subjects in order to retain his throne…”

Questions for Delilah? Ask away! Then make sure you go out and get a copy of Mistress of Pleasure–I loved it and I know you will too.

Maya Rodale asked me her infamous “Six Questions I Always Ask.” See how I fared on her blog.

BTW, what would be your six questions?