Raine Balkera - Romance Author

Today I review Heartbreak and Honor by Collette Cameron, Book Three in the Highland Heather, Romancing a Scot series. Pages -  257  Publisher -  Soul Mate Publishing  Published -  December 2, 2015 Sold by -  Amazon Digital Services LLC Genre -  Historical, Regency Romance Series -  Highland Heather, Romancing a Scot #3 of 6 Language -  2/5 Sexual Content -  4/5 Narrative -  3rd P Would you risk your life to rescue a woman you don't know? Abducted by a band of renegade Scots, Highland gypsy Tasara Faas blackens her rescuer's eye when the charming duke attempts to steal a kiss. Afterward, Tasara learns she's the long-lost heiress Alexandra Atterberry and is expected to take her place among the elite society she's always disdained. Lucan, the Duke of Harcourt, promised his gravely ill mother he'd procure a wife by Christmastide, but intrigued by the feisty lass he saved in Scotland, he finds...

5 Authors (Dead or Alive) whom I'd Like to Meet Hi! It's Week 6 already, and today our Challenge Question is:  Five Authors (alive or dead) I'd Like to Meet This will be a post I'm going to kick myself over in a few days (if not hours) because I only came up with three. When all is said and done, the other two are going to come to me, and I'm going to be like, "You dumbell, of course!" Also, and while this has zero to do with today's topic, it at least possibly explains my brain fog: we are currently under a Severe Winter Storm Warning through tomorrow afternoon. (sad face) We've had at least 3 to 5 inch snowfalls for the past seven days now, but tonight, starting at around 1:30 a.m., we're supposed to get another 7-10" before noon tomorrow. I've lived here all my life and still haven't adjusted to the weather in winter, so I've been pondering such things as getting my Diet Coke (fountain only) tonight or cha...

Hello everyone, and welcome back to another MFRW Author Blog 52-Week Challenge, and with this being Week 51, the challenge posed is: Advice to New Authors . I laughed when I saw this week's challenge because I define myself as being a New Author! Well, maybe not technically, but most definitely literally because while I've been 'writing' since the 5th grade, I am only recently ePub established. It takes me far, too long to accomplish what others simply decide to do, do it, and keep going like it's supposed to work that way. #1 I guess I am my own worst enemy (in that regard and a few others), so advice-wise, it might be best for aspiring authors to dig deep down into their soul and decide if this truly is their life-long passion, and if so, grab it with gusto, confidence, and a willingness to slog through a number of dry spells, rejection issues, and unfavorable critique. #2 Study, study, and study some more as well. Write What You Know does...

Genre: Contemporary/Adult/Fantasy Sexual Content: 3/5 Release Date: July 5, 2015 Pages: 276 Syndication: EPub/Self On Amazon: Kindle At Smashwords: Others List: $3.99 Blurb A chance encounter at the airport is innocent enough, but it sets in motion a chain of calamitous events that leave photographer, Kaisa Dalen, badly shaken and jet pilot, Perry Lindstrom, reluctantly determined to protect her at all cost.  She believes in fate and that an ancient curse still affects the women in her family, but Liv is determined to find a way to break the spell and finally experience true love without the fear of that love being destroyed by tragedy.  He believes in vicious cycles but is determined to live a better life than the heartless, cruel one his father and grandfather taught him. Perry refuses to fall prey to the cruelty gene, so Love is out of the question . . . until his resolve is put to the test via a series of unfortunate events that force ...

Facebook Life CHAOS is the word of the day. Social Media has made life come to this, but now that I am back in Writer's mode, it is a blessed relief to step off that noisy, over-crowded bandwagon of info overload and concentrate on things less Mayhem and Madness. Less time spent on FB and Twitter has helped to lower stress levels dramatically. I can feel it health-, sleep-, and attitude-wise. The more you write (and READ) the better your skills become. This is a proven fact that also makes me feel a lot more confident about, and proud of, my work. After doing a ton more reading than Social Media browsing, I am getting a better grasp of the Show versus Tell dilemma. It doesn't elude me as much as it once did, but I am still not quite there yet. At least now when it crops up, I am better able to recognize it and remedy the situation. It would be a terrific time for me to join the #NaNoWriMo gang and crank out the 50k all month, but I opted out for the same reasons...

Welcome, and thank you for dropping in to read my 8-line Hook from my latest work, Love Over Time -- an Adult Contemporary Romance about two strangers with a very distant shared past who cross paths a few times before slowly making a connection as that ancient, shared past starts to unfold, offering both agony and ecstasy along with much-needed understanding that is meant to lead them to a lasting love. About Love Over Time This second novel was published back in July and is available on all formats through Smashwords, and for the Kindle at Amazon. Blurb A chance encounter at the airport is innocent enough, but it sets in motion a chain of calamitous events that leave photographer, Kaisa Dalen, badly shaken and jet pilot, Perry Lindstrom, reluctantly determined to protect her at all cost. Buy Links Amazon Nook, Kobo, ePub, etc. 8-Lines While he stood staring at her, she focused on his big, dark eyes that were locked onto her; making her fee...

Publisher: Avon Original Release Date: September 27, 2005 Series: The Wallflowers, Book 2 Pages: 391 pages Language: English Genre: Regency Romance Sexual Content: 3/5 Synopsis Headstrong American heiress Lillian Bowman has come to England to find an aristocratic husband. Unfortunately, no man is strong enough to tame the stubborn beauty's fierce will. Except, perhaps, the powerful and arrogant Earl of Westcliff—a man Lillian despises more than anyone she's ever met. Marcus, Lord Westcliff, is famous for his icy English reserve and his supreme self-control. But something about the audacious Lillian drives him mad. Whenever they're in the same room, they can't stop themselves from battling furiously to gain the upper hand. Then one afternoon, a stunningly sensuous encounter changes everything . . . and Lillian discovers that beneath the earl's reserved façade, he is the passionate and tender lover of her dreams. What neither Westcliff nor L...

When it comes to being organized, efficient with time, and disciplined in my endeavors, the word FAIL always springs to mind. Articles about writers and how they write (wrote) gives clear indication that some were extremely organized while others possessed peculiar habits and still more remained staunch believers in superstition. Truman Capote is relate-able because he, like me, never wrote a word on a Friday -- his being a superstition thing, and mine being because that's my day off. In the book  Odd Type Writers   by Celia Blue Johnson, I discovered that I can also relate to James Joyce and Dorothy Parker: A minority, however, measured quantity as inversely proportional to quality. James Joyce proudly considered the completion of two perfect sentences a full day of work and Dorothy Parker, an obsessive reviser, even skewed to the negative, once lamented, “I can’t write five words but that I change seven.” My kind of people, them. ;-) From Writer's R...

This is both easy and difficult to answer, as there is more than one answer involved. I'll start from the very beginning and say  The House on East 88th Street by Bernard Waber, published back in 1962. It is 48 pages of cute! This delightful story arrived via my mother's book club and is one of the very first books I could read by myself. I read, re-read, and then read to my children this sweet tale about a family who move into a really cool brownstone in New York and find a talented crocodile in their bathtub. The drawings were as captivating as the story. In the second grade, making that first-ever trip to the library was a milestone and memorable moment I will never forget. We had twenty minutes to browse, find, and check out a book, and I'll never forget walking up to the check-out counter with too many books in both hands. After I set them down on the counter, my heart racing and my face smarting from the permanent smile, I was...

I use a pen name and I write romance novels. And, I use a pen name BECAUSE I write romance novels. :D However, this doesn't mean that I'm embarrassed about my chosen craft. Were I to be embarrassed, it would soon become tedious and even sooner that it would lose its luster (with me). I would find myself gravitating toward another genre simply because I couldn't handle the amount of stress incurred by writing what I deem embarrassing. I chose a pen name for several reasons, and one is because of the genre I write in, but is meant to save my immediate family -- not me -- from bearing the brunt of the stigma attached to romance novels. An act of kindness on my part, I think. I am no longer involved in the church or with its parishioners, but my children are, and the people there are a nosy bunch who can't help but ask how I am, what am I doing now, and exactly how far gone am I that my soul is irrevocably damned to hell. My daughter tends to be ho...