Okay, so I've been a sucker for handsome, dark-haired, angst-filled, soul-tortured men since I was 13 and very impressionable. I blame this malady on Robert Vaughn's role in The Ordeal of Dr. Cordell, an episode of Boris Karloff's Thriller TV series from 1961.I have a copy of this episode that I found on YouTube and if you are in the mood for cheesy, check it out.

My illness progressed to Michael Landon in I Was A Teenage Werewolf then bled over to Christopher Jones in Ryan's Daughter, Michael Sarazin in Frankenstein: The True Story, and at this point in time has settled firmly upon the broad shoulders of Antony Starr on Banshee and dribbled a bit onto the slender shoulders of Hugh Dancy on Hannibal. There is something very alluring to me about a tortured hero. After all, I write them better than most authors according to numerous reviewers. :)

So it was with supreme satisfaction that I began watching the new Showtime series Ray Donovan last night in a sneak preview of the series which begins next week. If you consider my ailment an addiction then I was on one helluva high watching the show. My enjoyment was two-fold: tortured, angst-filled handsome man with a hairy chest and the owner of that broad set of shoulders attached to that hairy chest is Liev (pronounced Lee' Iv) Schreiber. Actress Naomi Watts is a very lucky lady to wake up to that sexy mug each morning! I'm sure she enjoys letting her girls play on that crisp grass.

The premise of Ray Donovan is rather like a strongly pornographic, gory version of the TV series Scandal. Where Liv (coincidence? I think not) fixes things on the East Coast, Ray fixes them on the West Coast. She deals mostly with politicians. He deals with rock stars and athletes and actors and various other rich/famous folks who have more money and power than common sense. That Ray can and does resort to mayhem and murder to get the job done is an added bonus if you like your hero a bit tarnished. I see already I am really going to enjoy this show. The previews of future episodes made my mouth water.

There are a few observations I'd like to make regarding the actors.

Liev Schreiber is a very talented man. I've been a fan of his since the late 90s when he played a bad guy in Mel Gibson's movie Ransom. He can do comedy and mean-as-a-poked-rattler with equal aplomb. You've seen him in the latest rendition of The Omen, Salt, Repo Men, Defiance, and as Wolverine's brother Sabretooth in X-Men Origins: Wolverine. He has a heck of a colorful past and if you're interested check him out on Wikipedia. He's a man's man--and a woman's man--and he's rugged with  mega-watt sex appeal.

I don't like the woman who plays his wife. Her accent makes me cringe. It's supposed to be a Boston accent but I kept thinking of a tongue-tied Ukrainian with a bad cold every time she opened her mouth. I hope there's a messy divorce in Ray's future. Disliked the character enough I wasn't even tempted to see who was playing her.

Jon Voight--in all his brazen glory--plays Ray's father and you can see crap happening there a mile away. Though the coming evil has already been cast like a fly fisherman's line, you find yourself eagerly waiting for the fish to snag the bait. No one does Bad Dad like Voight. Ask daughter Angeline Jolie.

Another face I recognized was that of Steven Bauer. He's one of Ray's henchmen who does 'clean up' for the fixer. Don't know where you know him from? Bauer has gained enough weight to sink a battleship but at one time he was a svelte, hunky replacement for Ken Wahl on the long-defunct Wiseguy TV series (from which Ray Sharkey and look-alike Kevin Spacey sprang into instant stardom). Bauer was at one time married to Don Johnson's/Antonia Banderas' main squeeze Melanie Griffith.  There's a lesson to be learned from that, guys.

A character I'm hoping we will be seeing often is that of Tommy Wheeler, an action hero who has a thing for transvestites. Skillfully played by Austin Nichols, there is handsome angst there, too. 

On a scale of 1-10, I'd give Ray Donnovan a solid 9. It would have gotten a 10 if not for that annoying wife of Ray's.

 

I remember my mother repeating to me something her Jewish boss once said to her: "A mother can take care of ten children but ten children can't take care of one mother."

I always thought that was a sad commentary on the dysfunction of family life in America. I say sad because as a mother myself, I can't imagine anything more heartbreaking than to spend your life taking care of an ungrateful child. True, that child didn't ask to be born...and many who are crappy people to begin with will throw that up to their parents. Those are the children who will one day have bratty offspring of their own.

Mothers give up a lot for their children. Maybe their careers, their dreams. They do without things they want so Johnny can have a new skateboard he doesn't need. They put aside what they'd like to do to cart Susie to ballet practice or cheerleader camp. They put their life on hold until Johnny and Susie go off to college and even then the chances of those brats dragging home tons of laundry for Mom to do is a good bet.

What brought all this to mind is the plight of a very dear friend of mine. She was born on June 17th a year before me. Since we met at McCoy AFB in 1967 we have religiously sent one another birthday cards and Christmas cards and anniversary cards. She was at St. Joseph's hospital in Tampa when my first son was born and I was at Orange Memorial in Orlando when her first daughter was born. We left Orlando when Tom was sent to Vietnam and her husband was sent to Korea. It would be ten years before we saw one another again and that was in San Diego. By then I had two sons and she had two daughters and four sons. 

Many years later, we wound up together again at Chanute AFB in Rantoul, Illinois and it was as though we'd never spent time apart. We are as close as sisters and if I wasn't at her house, she was at mine. I preferred she come to mine because I couldn't stand being around her crappy children. Truth be told, I disliked every one of them then and I loathe them now that they are grown.

In 1982 Tom was sent to Diego Garcia and her husband retired after thirty years in the Air Force. I moved to Milton, Florida because that was where the Navy was sending Tom when he rotated back to the States. She and her husband moved down to Orlando. Though we were miles and miles apart, we kept in touch through monthly phone calls and the occasional visit. When we moved to Iowa in 1991, the phone calls got longer and longer and our phone bills higher and higher but that was okay. We had a lot of catching up to do.

Her husband passed away in 2006 and mine died in 2009. Tom and I attended her husband's funeral in Florida and she came to Iowa to attend Tommy's. In order to do that, she had to take out a loan against her house to pay for the airplane ticket. I didn't know that until two years later when one of her snotty, crappy brats threw it in my face. He took exception to her 'wasting money on a stupid trip for a silly reason'.

Okay so I will admit to you I used some very unladylike language that day. Those who know me well know I have a vicious temper when truly riled. It takes a lot to anger me but once anger arrives, it don't come in on little cat feet. But at least her youngest son now knows exactly how I feel about him and his siblings and that felt--God forgive me--very good. Did I mention this boy is an orthodontist? That two of his siblings are also doctors? That one is a lawyer? Another is an architect? And the twin boys own their own car dealership?  Yet none of them could loan Mom the money to come to Iowa?

Yes, she did ask and each of them turned her down because they thought it was a 'waste of money on a stupid trip for a silly reason'. Calling my beloved husband's funeral a silly reason makes me want to get on a plane and apply some much needed whupass on those crappy brats.

"Mother could have lost the house because of you," her son had snarled.

She didn't lose the house from that money she borrowed to attend Tommy's funeral. She paid it back. Every last cent. No thanks to her crappy children. Her house has a leaky roof...which isn't being repaired by her crappy children. She has a car that barely runs but she doesn't have the money to fix it and it sure as heck won't be fixed by her crappy children. Buy mom a new car? No, there's no money for that but there was money to buy a condo in Cancun and timeshares in Hawaii.

All of this is leading up the latest thing her six crappy children have--or rather have not--done.

She lost her job when she turned 65 so she's been struggling to make ends meet on just her husband's social security and military pension. Orlando is an expensive place to live and like all of us, she has bills. Thankfully she has military health care because she is diabetic and has been diagnosed with A-fib like me. I've sent her money a couple of times because she needs it more than I do.

Why?

Here's why....

Monday was her 66th birthday. I sent her a card with a gift card from Walmart tucked inside and I called her, settling down for at least a good hour's chat. The moment she picked up the phone I could tell she'd been crying. I asked what was wrong and what she told me made me so angry I wanted to put my fist through a wall.  Not a single one of her six kids had called to wish her happy birthday. Not a single one of them sent a card or flowers or a present.  There had been no Mother's Day presents or cards or flowers, eithers. All six of her crappy children live within twenty miles of her but not a one dropped by on Mother's Day or on Monday. As a matter of fact, she hasn't seen any of them since Easter when her youngest grandchild turned 16.

Before you ask if maybe she deserves such treatment, let me assure she does not. This is a woman who never worked a day of her life until her husband died. She was a stay at home mom who went to every piano and dance recital, attended every football, softball, basketball and soccer game. A woman who carted her kids from place to place without a single complaint. In all the years I've known her, I've never heard her use a vulgar word, heard  her curse, or raise her voice. If she has missed a single day of Church in all this time, it's news to me. Though she brought her kids up in the Catholic faith and made sure they went to Mass and CCD, they cut all ties to the religion as soon as they went off to college. Every moral, decent thing she ever tried to teach them vanished at Vanderbilt and Auburn and FSU to be replaced by abortions, drug addiction, drunk driving arrests, and three counts of shoplifting. Nice kids, huh?

BTW: the grandchildren...all nine of them...are no better than their crappy parents. I'd be sincerely surprised if a single one of them ever thanked gramma for THEIR birthday cards and presents. 

No, she has never failed to send cards to her children, children-in-law or grandkids. She might not can afford much in the way of presents but at least she gives them something every year and at Christmas.

I just got off the phone with my dear old friend. She'd called to wish me a happy birthday. As of today, there has still been no cards, flowers, or presents from her children. I look at the hundreds of birthday wishes I've gotten in e-mails and on Facebook and I want to cry. Only one birthday wish went to my friend who does not have the Internet. If she did, I'm sure she'd have received dozens upon dozens of birthday wishes. The folks on Facebook are very good about extending such greetings.

(To all of you who sent birthday wishes to me, thank you from the bottom of my heart.)

And if one of you crappy,  shitty, godforsaken kids is reading this...and I hope you are..Shame on you, you ungrateful, hateful brat and may your crotch get infested with red ants. 

                                              NICE TO MEET YOU

Facebook is many things to many people. It's a place to post pictures of cheating husbands for wives to be shocked over. It's a place to post political rants and to insult politicians. It's a place to post a recipe or a family photo or a prayer request. The myriad uses for Facebook most likely never occurred to its creator. I have often wondered if in private he doesn't suspect he created a monster.

A lucrative monster but a monster nevertheless.

Sometimes when Facebook does things such as suggesting people you know have found friends, it tickles me. The above picture is of one of my best friends since 2nd grade on the left and my daughter-in-law on the right. What were the odds of that happening?

Or what of this pairing a week later....

That's my DIL on the left and her son on the right. The odds increased on this one. Can't wait to see what good old Facebook comes up with next.

THURSDAY THIRTEEN: 13 ACTORS WHO HAVE INSPIRED CHARACTERS FOR MY NOVELS

Yes, I do have a 'type' of man. Must haves generally include dark hair, striking blue eyes, chiseled body with chest hair and...one can only hope...a crisp tiger line (look it up, ladies!). I prefer my men around 5'10" to 6'5". Nice, lickable lips are nice. A hard, tight rump. Thick thighs and hairy legs. Cute feet. Necks that say they intimately know how to bridge. Ears that don't stick out like Dumbo's is a must. Perfect age range: 35-40. The following men really fit the bill. What do YOU think?

1. ANTONY STARR
New Zealand
What you've seen him in:
TV show: Outrageous Fortune; Rush; Lowdown; Tricky Business; Banshee
Movies: After the Waterfall; Wish You Were Here
My inspiration for: Cynyr Cree (WesternWind Series); Misha Fallon (Dancing on the Wind); Dáire Cronin (HardWind); Maxim (Captive of Her Heart); Synjyn McGregor (30 Days to Syn); Viraiden Cree (BlackWind Series)




 
2. ANSON MOUNT
Tennessee, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Conviction, Hell on Wheels
Movies: All The Boys Love Mandy Lane; Crossroads; Sully; Cook County; SEAL Team Six: the Raid on Osama Bin Laden
My inspiration for:  Arawn Gehdrin (WesternWind Series); Saxxon Kell (WyndRaider);






3. WES BENTLEY 
Arkansas, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV show: Soon to star in a new cable series
Movies: American Beauty; The Hunger Games; Hirokin: The Last Samurai
My inspiration for: Glenn Kullen (WesternWind Series); 





 
 4. DAVID GIUNTOLI
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Privileged; Grimm
My inspiration for: Phelan Kiel (WesternWind Series); Samiel Brell (WindHaven); Brandy Fontenelle (Hot Georgia Wind);  Rory Quinn (Phantom of the Wind); Taylor Reynaud (A Reaper's Love)









5. GERARD BUTLER
Scotland
What you've seen him in:
Movies: 300; Attila; Dracula 2000; Timeline; Phantom of the Opera
My inspiration for: Gabriel Leveche (Ardor's Leveche); Lord Kheelan Ben-Alkazar (WesternWind Series); Kamerone Cree (BloodWind)







 
6. WES BROWN
Texas, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Hart of Dixie; Deception; 90210
Movies: Shadow on the Mesa; Love Begins; Storm War
My inspiration for: Owen & Eanan Tohre (WesternWind Series); Drakon Alexandrovich (Guardian of the Dragon); Sinclair McGregor (In the Wind's Eye)




 

7. CHRIS VANCE
England
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Rizolli and Iles; Mental; Prison Break; The Transporter
My inspiration for: Ryden Bakari (WindVerse Series); Emperor of the Wind








8. JAMES WOLK
Michigan, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Mad Men; Lone Star; Shameless; Political Animals
Movies: You Again;
My inspiration for: Bevyn Coure (WesternWind Series);  Conor Nolan (In the Teeth of the Wind)






9. BRANDON BARASH
Missouri, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV show: General Hospital
My inspiration for:  Iden Belial (WesternWind Series); Theissen (The WyndMaster's Son)

10. SENDHIL RAMAMURTHY
Illinois, USA
What you've seen him in:
 TV shows: Covert Affairs; Heroes; Beauty and the Beast
 My inspiration for: Kahlil Jaborn (WesternWind Series); Ardalan Jaleem (Desert Wind); Khenty Ben-Alkazar









 
11. CHARLES ESTEN
Pennsylvania, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Whose Line Is It?; Nashville; Big Love; The Office; ER
My inspiration for: Fontabeau Sorn (WesternWind Series); Daniel Gallagher (In the Arms of the Wind)








12. BRADLEY COOPER
Pennsylvania, USA
What you've seen him in:
TV shows: Touching Evil; Alias; Nip/Tuck;
Movies: Silver Linings Playbook; The Hangover movies; The A-Team
 My inspiration for: Kenny Farrell (Betrayed by His Past);  Kylan & Rylan Cree (Taken by the Wind)







13. ALEX O'LOUGHLIN
Australia
What you've seen him in:
 TV shows: Moonlight; Three Rivers; Hawaii Five-0
Movies: Whiteout; The BackUp Plan; The Oyster Farmer; Feed; The Invisible
My inspiration for:  Banefre (WesternWind Series)

NEW AND UPCOMING WINDLEGENDS NOVELS

 

“Sweet, Merciful Morrigunia,” he whispered as the dark tip of one breast peeped from behind the edging of lace. As the garment dipped lower and the lush thrust of her breasts appeared, he felt a lightning bolt of intense lust whip straight through his groin. He pushed himself up—laying there braced on his elbows—as she pushed the chemise all the way down her hips then let it join her gown. She discarded the lacy pantaloons so quickly it made his head swim. The moment the dark red patch of curls between her legs appeared, he couldn’t draw breath. 

Kalli did as he had—turning slowly for him to view her from all sides. When she faced him again he was sitting up in the bed with his wrists resting on his raised knees. The look on his face was one that would remain with her for as long as she lived.  

www.windlegends.org/DarkDaysoftheReaper.htm

“Help me, Fiona,” he said, obviously struggling to get his desire under control. “Help me to go slowly.” 

The trouble was Fiona didn’t want him to go slowly. She desperately wanted what the hard jut of his cock promised. Instinctively, she moved her legs apart—firmly pushing his—arched her hips toward him, and she saw the exact moment he lost his fight to command his body. 

He planted his knees between her spread thighs and pushed her legs further apart. His hands came down on her wrists to pin her arms to the bed beside her head then lowered his heavy body to hers, slithering down her so his cock trailed a line of pre-cum from her belly to her hot core. 

She moaned at the weight of him. Nothing had ever felt so good.

www.windlegends.org/guardian.htm

 She sucked on his tongue, pulled away then fused her mouth with his again and again. Her hands roamed his back—clutching at him as though she were drowning. The wedge of her heel pressed hard against the crack of his ass then traveled down it until he felt it against his rectum. The sensation drove him wild, which was a surprise for he didn’t like anything to touch him there. Her fingers found his ribs and she raked him with a light sting that brought his mouth from hers. The look in her eyes made the breath stop in his throat. 

Penthe flipped him to his back as easily as she would have a flapjack on a griddle. She tightened her cunt around him, squeezed hard, and then did it several more times, grinning when he put his hand on her hips to still her motion.

http://www.windlegends.org/sinfulreaper.htm

“Please.” Her plea made him chuckle and the fanning warmth of his breath against her ear caused her lower body to tighten. She tried to arch her hips up to him but his weight kept her pressed to the bed. 

“Patience, my love,” he whispered. “I promise I will make the wait worth it.” 

He moved her hands together so he could hold both her wrists in the powerful grip of his right hand then shifted atop her so he lay over the length of the left side of her body. His left hand began a tantalizingly slow descent from her wrist to her armpit then across her throat. He gently stroked her neck, the crease between his thumb and index finger dragging deliciously up and down her flesh—once, twice, three times. 

http://www.windlegends.org/windhaven.htm

Antony Starr is the cutest Reaper

It's been awhile since I updated my blog. Life has a way of interfering with the best of intentions. Since my husband's death in 2009, I lost the necessary direction to write. It wasn't until the summer of 2012 that I began to pay attention to the signs my Tommy was bombarding me with from the AfterLife.

I had always skipped merrily along the road less traveled. If there wasn't a path to what I wanted, I trampled one into existence. My determination to become a writer had been forged at the knee of my Irish grandfather whose dark fantastical stories thrilled me as a child. I wanted to spin yarns as well as PaPa could. To that end, I was one of the biggest liars in school but you know how the old saying goes: "When I was a child they called me a liar. Now that I'm grown, they call me a writer." 

Nearly every good writer I know was a habitual liar when s/he was growing up. Must have been something in the water that tainted us and skewed our moral compass, huh?

At any rate, I began to write again and since June of last year, I've written, submitted, and contracted nine full-length novels. I'm working on number ten. I have become a writing fool as my best friend remarked just yesterday. That the books were there all along I've no doubt. They were simmering on some back burner of my mind and finally boiled over. 

Reaper's Bounty: a book that needed to be written.

I am known for my signature Reaper novels which began with BloodWind in 1998. Since then I have written an entire franchise around these shapeshifting Alpha males. There are four series of novels in which these bad boys appear: WindVerse, DemonWind, BlackWind, and WesternWind. They also show up in a few other series, as well, but only peripherally.There are three major types of Reaper: Lupine (wolf), Hell-Hound (canine), and Panthera (feline). As of today at 12:15 pm CST, there is a hybrid Reaper who is part Panthera and part Ridge Lord. Makes for an interesting combo, trust me!

Most of my readers know that I have a penchant for patterning my characters after actors and actresses whose work I admire or who have entertained me, touched some chord deep inside my psyche. There are a few of these men and women who have inspired several different stories. One of them is a New Zealand actor named Antony Starr who is just now making a name for himself in the U.S. and gaining the dedicated notice of American viewers. He's been a Kiwi treasure since 2004 when he was cast as the twins Jethro and Van West in the dramedy Outrageous Fortune. He showed up in his first Charlee Boyett-Compo novel a year later. To say the man can act (he's won several acting awards) is an understatement. If you haven't seen him in the Cinemax series Banshee, you are missing one helluva tortured hero who can cry with the best of them. If you haven't seen his movie After the Waterfall, do it. I guarantee you will discover why the man intrigues this woman so greatly.

That said....

When I heard about the On the Hunt series about bounty hunters, I thought of Antony (or Ant to his friends and co-workers. Which begs a question: he has four nieces. Do they call him Uncle Ant?) I'd already made him a Reaper in Dancing on the Wind. I'd made him a black-ops superstud in HardWind. I'd given him a black Stetson, black silk shirt and black leather pants, a six-shooter and a laser whip in the WesternWind series of novels (he's Cynyr Cree, btw), so now I was going to make him a sex-on-a-stick new breed of Reaper in Reaper's Bounty.

I hope you will give Reaper's Bounty a try but if you do, first Google Antony Starr and let that handsome guy with the piercing blue eyes drift through your mind while you read. Put your own face on the heroine and have very pleasant, wet dreams!

Here's the blurb for REAPER'S BOUNTY:

Theron Sarandakos is a Panthera, a species of Reaper that shifts into black leopards. Ronnie puts his stealth and guile to work as a bounty hunter. His assignment is to catch a thief, and he’s determined not to fail. But when he sets eyes on his quarry, Celeste Wynth, he knows at once that she is his one true mate, destined to be his.

Their lust threatens to burn up the jungle world where he makes his home, but their illicit love means that Lettie will be shunned by her people unless she agrees to marry the man she’s been betrothed to since childhood. And Theron’s warrioress family have other plans for him as well. To be together forever, they will be forced to fight for their love.

Read an excerpt at http://www.windlegends.org/reapersbountyexcerpt.htm