Mmmm...What's Your Chocolate?

It's a delicious start to the week as the awesome MPax, Laura Eno, Brinda Berry and Ciara Knight are bringing us the What's Your Chocolate Blogfest. Journey 'round the blogosphere and find out all the tasty treats my fellow participants have in store for you. You can uncover the goodness by clicking here.

Also, I unleashed my werewolf, Maxie Briscoe over at my friend Sloane Taylor's blog today, so head on over and see what she's up to. 

Chocolate makes the world, heck the universe, spin as far as I am concerned. I love it in just about everything. Chocolate milk, chocolate martinis, chocolate cake, chocolate chips, chocolate, chocolate, chocolate...You get the idea. I think my favorite chocolate, though is dark chocolate. Plain, bittersweet, melts- in- my- mouth dark chocolate. I love to eat it in whole bars, chocolate chips, drizzled over fruit and you know, it makes great body paint. Close your mouth, you knew I would put something naughty in here, I am an erotica writer after all. LOL

Dark chocolate is also incredibly good in brownies, ice cream and almond bark. So very many ways to enjoy this gift from the gods. Plus, unlike it's milk cousin, dark chocolate is good for you. It's an antioxidant machine, it prevents arteries from clogging and can reduce blood pressure. Plus, for a diabetic like me, it has a low glycemic index which means it keeps my blood sugar from spiking. How's that for awesome?

So, I wanna know, how do you take your chocolate?

Celebrating Weighted, Ciara Knight's New Release

It's Tuesday and more importantly, it's a New Release Tuesday and we are celebrating Ciara Knight and her new release, the YA apocalyptic tale, Weighted. Congrats Ciara!

Here's a little bit about Ciara...

Ciara writes to ‘Defy the Dark’ with her fantasy and paranormal books. Her debut novel, The Curse of Gremdon, was released to acclaimed reviews, securing a Night Owl Top Pick and five stars from the Paranormal Romance Guild. Also, book I, Rise From Darkness, from her debut young adult Battle For Souls series, secured glowing reviews and won July Book of the Month from Long and Short Reviews.

Her first love, besides her family, reading, and writing, is travel. She's backpacked through Europe, visited orphanages in China, and landed in a helicopter on a glacier in Alaska.

Ciara is extremely sociable so please feel free to connect with her at her blog, website, Twitter,
Goodreads, or Facebook.

Weighted (Prequel Novelette)

The Great War of 2185 is over, but my nightmare has just begun. I am being held captive in the Queen’s ship awaiting interrogation. My only possible ally is the princess, but I’m unsure if she is really my friend or a trap set by the Queen to fool me into sharing the secret of my gift. A gift I keep hidden even from myself. It swirls inside my body begging for release, but it is the one thing the Queen can never discover. Will I have the strength to keep the secret? I’ll know the answer soon. If the stories are true about the interrogators, I’ll either be dead or a traitor to my people by morning.

Here's a short excerpt from Weighted

Subject: Raeth Arteres
Date: March 8, 2185
Species: Neumarian
Status: Captured

Tick-tock…tick-tock…I clutch the sides of the steel bed in my cell and push up on my elbows. The clock, with its bronze rim, hangs high on the wall, taunting me. The long black arm of the second hand struggles up the side of the enormous disc, ticking away the last few moments of my life.

Tap…tap.

Footsteps, two by two, march to the cell door. Sucking in a long breath, I embrace the rhythmic sounds of the airship, with the occasional interruption of an engine sputtering.

Tap…thump.

The Queen’s unmistakable gait interrupts my dream-like state. It matches the sounds of the ship, as if she is an extension of the heap of metal propelling us across the desert wasteland.

“Open the door.” Her voice echoes down the narrow hall.

Tick…

The hand struggles to reach the twelve. If it doesn’t make it, maybe the door won’t open. It teeters and shakes, then slides straight up in unison with the door.

…Tock.

“Be quick, before the parasite uses her curse on us.” Her raspy, artificial voice sends a quiver to my core.

A guard races in with a handheld device and points it at my neck. I’ve been collared like a dog. I clutch the slick metal ring around my neck, pulling it from my skin, but current zaps through my shoulders and my arm juts out to my side, shaking. Searing pain runs along my veins.

After all these years of my brother hiding me, it was inevitable I’d get caught.
Darkness swirls deep inside, brewing a storm. I can’t remember what it will do if I release it. Is it a gift, as my brother told me, or a curse, as the Queen believes? All I know is that if I unleash it, the Queen will have what she wants, so I push it down deep, keeping it hidden from her.

A man in a grey coat approaches with a syringe in his shaking hand. His left eye has been replaced by a bronze implant that clicks as it grows wide. I concentrate on remaining calm. “I-I see you s-still need me.” It is a struggle to speak against the rising will of the gift trapped inside me.

“Need you? I only need your wretched, cursed body. We must ensure your kind never threatens the world again. When I’m finished, you will serve me, and only me.”

Acid boils up in my throat but I force it down. The beast caged inside me longs for release.

You can purchase Weighted here

Smashwords
Amazon
Barnes & Noble

Upcoming books in The Neumarian Chronicles:
Escapement (Book I) - Early 2013
Pendulum (Book II) - Mid 2013
Balance (Book III) - Early 2014

Other books by Cara Knight:
Battle for Souls Series
Rise From Darkness
Fall From Grace
Ascension of Evil - Coming in October

Book Launch And RandomThings

It's Tuesday and I'm very excited because Ciara Knight's debut novel, Love's Long Shadow is now available. Yay!! Check it out.

Because I am busily preparing my post for the Insecure Writer's Support Group, here a just a few bits of randomness that make me smile, laugh or just go hmmm...

Mapquest really should start their directions at step 5 or 6 because I'm pretty sure I can get off my own street and out of my own neighborhood.

Nothing sucks quite like that moment in a heated argument when I realize I'm wrong. Doh!

Tylenol costs me $7.99 a bottle outside the hospital, but $17 a pill on the inside. Why? Do hospitals get the pure, uncut shit?

How many times is it acceptable for me to say "What?" before I just have to smile and nod like I understand even though I don't?

Bad decisions really do make the most interesting stories.

There is a fine line between boredom and hunger. I stomp over that line quite frequently.

I really wish Facebook would stop yelling at me about missing statuses. I panic and immediately log on, thinking I'll be kicked out.

I hate when I just miss a call, immediately call back only to have it ring ten times and go to voice mail. WTF? Did they drop the phone and runaway?

I have never understood the expression "cute as a button." To my knowledge, buttons aren't cute.

Shouldn't the pain scale have more numbers? Somehow that root canal pain seems more like a 1000 than a 10.

Why does cleave mean both to rip asunder and cling together?

Why did baseball and hockey helmets not come into play until the 1970's when testicular protection had been in use since the 1870's? Did men not think that their big heads were just as important as their little heads?

Have a great day and I'll be back tomorrow.