RITA-nominated giveaway: Tote #2

[Ed. note: We continue our RITA® giveaway with our next tote. Be sure to leave your comments on the posts for a chance to win. One tote per winner will be awarded, but you can comment on any post throughout the contest period.]

Colleen Thompson, Triple Exposure
2009 RITA® Finalist for Romantic Suspense

“Triple Exposure marked the second book of mine to reach the finals for the RITA® in Romantic Suspense, but this year’s call couldn’t be more special. While writing the book, I was stricken with a mysterious virus that left me hospitalized, as sick as I’ve ever been. During the long, slow recovery, I continued working on the book whenever I was able, but I was very afraid my physical condition might prevent me from doing my best work. Because of that fear, I worked extra hard on ‘quality control,’ sending it out to my ‘beta readers’ and listening closely to their comments before revising. The book’s strong reviews and RITA® nomination serve to remind me it’s very possible to do good work in bad times; in fact, the work helps get the writer through periods of adversity. And I’m very happy to report that I’m now well recovered, too!”

About Triple Exposure:

A mother's love. A son's life snuffed out. A killer at large. Snapshots of reality, except sometimes layered images do not add up to a whole picture of the truth.

Better than anyone, photographer Rachel Copeland knows the camera can lie. That's how lurid altered pictures of her appeared on the Internet, starting a downward spiral that ended with her shooting a nineteen-year-old stalker in self-defense. Fleeing the press and the threats of an unidentified female caller, she retreats to her remote hometown in the Texas desert. In Marfa, where mysterious lights hover in the night sky, folks are used to the unexplainable, and a person's secrets are off limits. But recluse Zeke Pike takes that philosophy even further than Rachel herself. In her viewfinder Zeke's male sensuality is highlighted, his unexpressed longing for human contact revealed. Through a soft-focus lens, she sees a future for them beyond their red-hot affair, never guessing their relationship will expose the lovers to more danger than either can imagine.

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Judy Duarte, Mulberry Park
2009 RITA® Finalist for Inspirational Romance


“Three years ago, during an RWA conference, I was sitting in my hotel room, resting between workshops. I was a long way from home and waxing nostalgic. Memories are often linked, and as one flipped to the next, I remembered the day when, as a child, I wrote a heartfelt letter to God. Wouldn’t it be interesting, I thought, if I wrote a book in which a little girl wrote a letter to God? Oh, wow. And wouldn’t it be cool if someone found that letter and wrote back, as if he or she were God? And what if the child began peppering that poor person with more notes…? In the pages of MULBERRY PARK, the characters learn, as I have over the years, that sometimes God’s voice is a whisper in the wind, a peace within the storm. And sometimes He speaks through others.

This is my very first RITA® nod, so needless to say, I’m thrilled and honored. But what makes being a RITA® finalist even more special is that MULBERRY PARK is the book of my heart—and probably the one story I was truly meant to write.”

About Mulberry Park:

Every letter deserves a reply--even when the questions it contains are difficult to answer. In Judy Duarte's heartwarming and inspiring novel, a woman shattered by grief responds to a little girl's urgent note to God and sets in motion a chain of events that helps to heal the lives of all those around her, in wholly unexpected ways...

Each day after work, Claire Harper drives to Mulberry Park and jogs for miles, hoping to find a respite from her sadness. It's a futile effort, until the evening a letter falls from its hiding place in a nearby tree. Inside the bright pink envelope emblazoned with the words "To God From Analisa" is a note written by a seven-year-old girl, urging God to look after her parents in Heaven and help those she loves on Earth. On impulse, Claire writes back, hoping to preserve Analisa's innocent belief in answered prayers--even if Claire lost her own faith when her young son was killed in a hit-and-run accident three years earlier.

Since that day, Claire has watched numbly as her life lost its meaning and her marriage dissolved, unwilling and unable to engage with the world around her. But Analisa's letters gradually draw Claire out of her cocoon and into the companionship of other Mulberry Park regulars--all, in their own way, in need of comfort. Aside from Analisa and her elderly nanny, Hilda, there's Sam, Analisa's attorney uncle; Trevor, a young boy in need of companionship; Walter, the chatty old man who plays solitary chess games; and Maria, a single and pregnant young mother of two struggling to keep her family home. As friendships grow, sorrows lift, and lives and hearts connect, each will discover just how far and how high one simple letter can reach...

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Kimberly Killion, Her One Desire
2009 RITA® Finalist for Best First Book

“When Kelly St. John called to inform me I’d been nominated for a RITA® in the Best First Book category, I told her she had made an error. It was impossible to believe, yet my name keeps appearing on that list and it’s first every time. :) Since receiving that call, I’ve had an odd attack of self-doubt. I’m terrified I’m going to be like Vanilla Ice—a one-hit wonder if you will. I question every sentence I write in my current WIP, but I’m moving forward because that’s all a person can do in this business.

So what does the RITA® mean to me? It means I can write. It means I am capable of stringing together words that stimulate a reader’s emotions. It means I am capable of starting something and finishing big. I’m proud to be nominated for a RITA®, and I’m especially grateful to those who have encouraged me along the way. Thank you RWA for giving me friendships that will last a lifetime.”

About Her One Desire:

England 1483--A time when the nobles would do anything to steal the crown.
Proof of a conspiracy lies in the hands of the executioner's daughter. Her quest to save her father's soul endangers her life along with the Scottish spy she frees from the Tower of London.

FOR HIS LOVE....
Astride a stolen horse, encircled by the shackled arms of Broderick Maxwell, a Scottish spy escaping certain death in the Tower of London, Lizbeth Ives rides to the north, hidden by the merciful darkness. By stealth and by cunning, the daughter of the Lord High Executioner has undone her father's cruel work, compelled to save the innocent man with her. There is no turning back--they are bound as one in his iron chains. Consumed by mortal fear, driven by passion, they disappear into the night...

A single raven follows them. Is it an omen? Or only the first of those who would capture them? They must ride on. If captured, they will face death together. But if they reach Scotland, he will claim her for his own...forever.

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Linda Warren, Texas Heir
2009 RITA® Finalist for Contemporary Series Romance


“As a self-taught author who learned to write by reading, I was ecstatic by the RITA® nomination. It’s a dream come true and hard to put my feelings into words. For every author who writes and is a member of Romance Writers of America, there is a glimmer of hope that one day he or she will make the list. When the call came, it was an unbelievable surreal moment. My heart pounded so loud I could barely hear or breathe, but I was smiling.

I had that same surreal feeling when I sold my first book in 1999. All I could think was I did it. I finally did it. That same thought ran through my mind on March 25th. With hard work and perseverance I did it. This prestigious nomination is an honor and an accomplishment beyond my wildest imagination. It has lifted my spirits and boosted my confidence—not only in my writing but in myself. On July 18, win or lose, I’ll still be smiling. I reached a goal in my writing career that exceeded my expectations.

I did it.”

About Texas Heir:

Stranded... With the Man of Her Dreams

Cari Michaels has known for a long time that Reed Preston is the only man for her. Until her boss—the dynamic CEO of a family-owned department store chain—announces his engagement... to another woman.

It's just the reality check Cari needs to get over Reed. But when a plane crash strands her in the west Texas desert with the man she loves, she can’t hide her feelings. And now they have only each other to depend on for their survival.

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Sharon Sala
2009 RITA® Finalist for Romance Novella – “Penance” in Aftershock [in Tote #1]
2009 RITA® Finalist for Paranormal Romance for The Healer [in Tote #2]


“… THE HEALER is a book close to my heart. My fiancé, Bobby, who died in 2005, was very much like this hero. He was Native American - of the Muscogee - and had such an affinity with all living things. He could discern a liar as quickly as he could see the good in someone's heart and connected with animals almost instantly. I started the story in Alaska, because it was a place that Bobby loved. When he was a very young man, he helped lay the great Alaska pipeline and always wanted to take me there to show me the beauty of the place he'd come to love. Unfortunately, he died before we could do this, so the story is somewhat of an homage to him.”

About The Healer:

It is a gift that may cost him everything

All his life, Jonah Gray Wolf has had an uncanny connection to animals and the power to heal the sick and wounded. Driven from the only home he's ever known by those who wish to harness his gift for profit, he becomes a drifter, working in out-of-the-way towns, never staying long. It's a lonely life, but Jonah knows he's still being hunted—he can't afford to get close to anyone who might learn his secret.

In West Virginia he finds Luce, a tough but beautiful loner who knows all about keeping people at a distance—a kindred soul with whom he might dare to make a life. But the hunters have caught Jonah's scent again. Danger is coming to their mountain refuge—a confrontation that will be decided only by a force of nature.

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IMHO: That's it for today. Be sure to leave a comment for our authors if you want a chance to win this tote and tune in all week for more featured RITA®-nominated finalists.

TJB