Happy Valentine's Day everyone! I'm very happy to have author Ruthie Knox on the blog today!
Happy Valentine’s Day!
This is a more-special-than-usual Valentine’s Day for me, because it’s my first Valentine’s Day as a published romance author. My debut novel, Ride with Me, came out yesterday. Yay me!
Okay, sorry. Give me a second, and I’ll stop grinning like a fool and say something purposeful and wise about Valentine’s Day and contemporary romance.
*takes a deep breath*
*and then another one*
*grins like a fool some more*
Okay, never-ye-mind. There’s no chance that I’m going to stop the foolish grinning anytime soon. Purposeful and wise is well beyond my abilities at the moment. Instead, I give you a list of Five Romance Prescriptions to Cure Your Valentine’s Day Woes. Because, to be honest, I’ve kind of always hated Valentine’s Day. I was one of those girls who never had a boyfriend. In middle school, there was this carnation-buying fund-raiser, and none of the interesting boys ever sent me carnations. I attracted only weird, obsessive crushes. Then I got married, and now I make a pan of brownies on Valentine’s Day, cut them into a heart shape, and frost them pink. Voila! A symbol of my love in the form of baked goods!
A Hallmark gal, I am not. But I believe in the power of fictional love to cure what ails you on Valentine’s Day. So, without further ado . . .
(1) For the girl who’s in love with her best friend but refuses to admit it, I prescribe Sarah Mayberry’s Her Best Friend. This Harlequin SuperRomance is the best buddy romance I’ve ever read, and I’m a connoisseur of the buddy romance. It’s hilarious and cute and funny and touching, and the scene where the heroine, Amy, finally confesses her love to the hero will make you laugh until you wee a little. (Or maybe that’s just me.)
(2) For the girl who thinks she’s too much of a mess to find love, I prescribe Theresa Weir’s Long Night Moon. The heroine of this novel is an alcoholic and the victim of an abusive husband. The hero is a felon. These people are a train wreck. And yet the novel is warm and funny, and they go leisure-suit bowling, and the happy ending will warm your heart and make you feel better about humanity.
(3) For the girl who’s dating a nice, rather dull guy but would really rather be with a lumberjack, I prescribe Cara McKenna’s Ruin Me. Okay, technically Ruin Me is romantic erotica, not erotic romance. It’s verra, verra sexy. But it has a wonderfully passive-aggressive heroine, the sexiest wood-choppin’, Carhartt-pants-and-a-stocking-cap wearin’ hero ever to make it into print, and a lovely happy ending.
(4) For the girl who loves a guy who hates all things touchy-feely, I prescribe Kathleen O’Reilly’s Long Summer Nights. Because the heroine of this novel falls for a grouchy hermit novelist who lives in a cabin in the north woods and hates people, and somehow she manages to drag him back to the real world and fix him with the power of her love, and it’s a heck of a lot of fun to watch.
(5) And, finally, for the girl who has picked so many wrong guys she’s just decided not to bother with men at all anymore, I prescribe my own novel, Ride with Me. Because my heroine, Lexie, knows exactly how you feel. She’s given up on the institution of love and marriage. But then she meets Tom, and he’s a pain in her ass, and she falls in love with him anyway, and it all turns out okay.
Ride with Me available from Loveswept on 2/13/12!
Available at Random House: Ride With Me
In this fun, scorching-hot eBook original romance by Ruthie Knox, a cross-country bike adventure takes a detour into unexplored passion. As readers will discover, Ride with Me is not about the bike!About Ruthie: website
When Lexie Marshall places an ad for a cycling companion, she hopes to find someone friendly and fun to cross the TransAmerica Trail with. Instead, she gets Tom Geiger — a lean, sexy loner whose bad attitude threatens to spoil the adventure she’s spent years planning.
Roped into the cycling equivalent of a blind date by his sister, Tom doesn’t want to ride with a chatty, go-by-the-map kind of woman, and he certainly doesn’t want to want her. Too bad the sight of Lexie with a bike between her thighs really turns his crank.
Even Tom’s stubborn determination to keep Lexie at a distance can’t stop a kiss from leading to endless nights of hotter-than-hot sex. But when the wild ride ends, where will they go next?
Ruthie Knox figured out how to walk and read at the same time in the second grade, and she hasn’t looked up since. She spent her formative years hiding romance novels in her bedroom closet to avoid the merciless teasing of her brothers and imagining scenarios in which someone who looked remarkably like Daniel Day Lewis recognized her well-hidden sex appeal and rescued her from middle-class Midwestern obscurity. After graduating from Grinnell College with an English and history double major, she earned a Ph.D. in modern British history that she’s put to remarkably little use.
These days, she writes contemporary romance in which witty, down-to- earth characters find each other irresistible in their pajamas, though she freely admits this has yet to happen to her. Perhaps she needs more exciting pajamas. Ruthie abhors an epilogue and insists a decent romance requires at least three good sex scenes.
GIVEAWAY
One lucky commenter will be randomly chosen to win a digital copy of Ride with Me. Winners will pick up their copy through Net Galley. Good luck to all!Find Ruthie online:
Website
Goodreads
I was also one of those girls who never got any attention from the opposite sex, so I've never quite gotten the valentine's day fuss. Luckily, all it takes is one special guy LOL and maybe it's a good thing that I didn't have to kiss very many frogs. Best wishes on the release. I can't wait to read it.
ReplyDeleteJen(at)delux(dot)com
What a cute post. I like how you take care of the needs of all of us out here :).
ReplyDeletevsloboda(at)gmail(dot)com
Ugh, I remember those carnation sales! They turned to roses in high school. My best friend got a ton, and I got none. Oh well, they were cheap plastic anyway ;). Love your prescriptions. Congrats on your book! Looking forward to reading it
ReplyDeletedrpharmgirl(at)gmail(dot)com
(at)
I have loved reading for as long as I can remember. I can't wait to read Ride With Me.
ReplyDeleteCongrats on the release and I am looking forward to more books.
musicalfrog at comcast.net
Thanks, ladies! I'm glad I wasn't the only one suffering through the carnation sale, Sarah!
ReplyDeleteWell, I totally agree with at least 3!! At least!!I am taking note of her suggested reading. And I want this book! :-) \
ReplyDeletelisakhutson (at) [cox] {dot}
Congrats on your debut!!! It looks like a great story!
ReplyDeleteHappy Valentine’s Day!
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