The following Berkley Heat Trade Paperback Originals will be available on June 1, 2010.

Tempting Eden by Margaret Rowe — Eden Emery is no stranger to sin. To keep her sister safe from harm, she paid a steep price with her body—and very nearly lost her soul. Now Baron Ivor Hartford, the man who owned her, is dead, and Eden vows to never again cede her destiny to a man. But when the baron's nephew arrives, Eden realizes her troubles are far from over.

Major Stuart Hartford was raised to marry a proper, honorable wife, but when he is instructed to take care of the matter of his Uncle Ivor's ward, Eden, he begins to question the virtues of being proper. For Eden ignites in him an all consuming passion that burns away his inhibitions and inflames his heart. Now Hart has to show Eden that the sins of the past can be healed, and is left with no choice but to tempt the temptress herself.

Sounds undeniably tantalizing…what do you think?

Wedding Favors by Nikita Black, Allyson James, and Sheri Whitefeather — New Orleans proves to be the perfect setting for these three nice-turned-naughty stories of three nice-turned-naughty bridesmaids who each make a wish at an infamous fountain. Before the night is through each woman finds her wishes granted as they become entangled with passionate partners who free them of their desires.

Here come the bridesmaids…in a tantalizing trio of never-before-published erotic novellas.

In these steamy romance stories set in New Orleans, before the night is through, the wishes come true, the gowns come off, and the games begin…

Nikita Black goes behind the closed doors of a bordello and a masked bachelorette party where anything can—and does—happen.

Allyson James explores a ménage a trois as a bridesmaid is locked in a house with two men who introduce her to sensations that are out of this world.

Sheri Whitefeather reveals a secret room under a French Quarter B&B where a bridesmaid's forbidden erotic dreams become a reality.

I love novellas and these sound great! I guess I need to get to reading since this book is actually on my bookshelf… :)

Today I finished an update to the Heat book lists I've had in the works. I split out the NAL Heat and the Berkley Heat titles since I've discovered that the books can actually be quite different.

I hope to have some reviews to post soon.

I started I Spy a Wicked Sin last night, and so far it's been hard to keep myself from revisiting it today even though I've got stuff to do. ;)

Books are like that sometimes—they make it hard to concentrate on the real world!

It's that time again. Although I still have many, many updates to do to bring my book lists up to date for 2010 (Berkley Sensation, Heat, Brava, Blacklace, Avon Red, Aphrodisia, etc..) I have brought the Harlequin Blaze books up to date with all the Blaze-y goodness from February and March.

I'm also trying to update some of my audio and ebooks links, so my formats available lists for each book will be accurate. If you notice in the Blaze lists, I've already done some of this and you'll see lots of new audio links for the 2010 books.

Hope you enjoy the site! — TER

Does that make sense to you? What I mean is that there are plenty of books I read that are romance or romance related but that don’t have anywhere near the heat level to truly be classified as erotic romance. However, I love them, and I am planning to post the reviews here on the blog instead of on the site. However, I’ll be sure to preface the review with a note about the heat level, so you don’t waste your time reading them if you’re not interested in anything except spicy hot, steamy romance!

That’s really all there is to this post. I just wanted to warn you… :)

I just added the first of the 2010 books to the site, for Blaze! I can’t believe it’s already this close to being next year. 2009 has gone by so fast…

• Blazing Bedtime Stories, Volume III (#513) by Tori Carrington, Tawny Weber
• Moonstruck (#514) by Julie Kenner
• Midnight Resolutions (#515) by Kathleen O'Reilly
• Sexy Ms. Takes (#516) by Jo Leigh
• Her Secret Fling (#517) by Sarah Mayberry
• His Final Seduction (#518) by Lori Wilde

There’s also a new Spice book out this month.

• The Moonlight Mistress (Spice Books) by Victoria Janssen

I’m also gearing up to input some reviews I’ve been working on. I’ve read several good books lately, and I’d like to get the reviews up soon.

I just received an email from eHarlequin promoting their ONE DAY ONLY buy-one-get-one-free sale. There are several Blaze books featured, so if you've been wanting one but have been holding off, this might be the perfect opportunity for you. :) For every featured book you buy, get a 2nd title FREE* with coupon code TWOSALEONE. (*They have a few restrictions, but nothing out of the ordinary…)

However, it was kind of tricky to get it to work, so here's what you need to do. Pick one (or more) of the featured books you want, then go to the regular books, and choose one (or more) of them. Then, when you go to your shopping cart, type in the coupon code in the coupon code box and “apply discount.” At that point, it should show your regular book(s) as free. :)

If you want to check it out, the link is below.

I’ve just updated the Blaze list for the August 2009 books. Many of them are already available for order on the eHarlequin.com website.

August’s books include:

• Unbridled (#483) by Tori Carrington » , Ebook
• The Personal Touch (#484) by Lori Borrill » Paperback, Ebook
• Hot Under Pressure (#485) by Kathleen O'Reilly » , Ebook
• Sliding into Home (#486) by Joanne Rock » Paperback, Ebook
• Storm Watch (#487) by Jill Shalvis » Paperback, Ebook
• The Mighty Quinns: Callum (#488) by Kate Hoffmann » Paperback, Ebook

Only the first two (#483 and #484) aren’t part of a Harlequin miniseries. August’s Harlequin Blaze books are part of these miniseries:

• Where You Least Expect It
• Encounters
• Uniformly Hot!
• Quinns Down Under
• The Mighty Quinns

You can check out other series on the site on the series list. I also put up the titles and authors of the upcoming September – November Harlequin Blaze releases, but my information is incomplete at the moment. I’ll update when I get more details about the books!

The July Harlequin Blaze print books are still available, so get them new while you can. :)

I had a friend point this out to me today: http://www.scribd.com/Hazellea.

You can find many Harlequin books to read on Scribd, but if you do so, you’ll probably be breaking the law. Ethically speaking, I certainly wouldn’t be comfortable reading these books from the site.

I enjoy finding new and interesting websites, and I think Scribd is that, but I was disappointed to see what appears to be so many books on the site that probably shouldn’t be there… If you know any of the authors of these books, you might want to let them know about the site so they can take steps to be sure their books aren’t illegally posted.

Today I quickly updated the site to include the June 2009 books from Harlequin Blaze. Lots of great authors have books out this coming month, including Tori Carrington, Rhonda Nelson,  Kate Hoffmann, Crystal Green, and Cara Summers. There was also new Blaze author in the lot, Heather MacAllister.

I always enjoy seeing new authors and reading their books to see if they’ve brought anything fresh to the series.

What about you? Do you enjoy trying the new authors or do you avoid them?

There's a sad truth in my pile of to-be-read books. Some of the books in my pile just aren't the kinds of books I enjoy reading.

Even some of those that were good just couldn't hold my interest long enough for me to make it to the end of the book. Some books stalled sooner than later, and some I consider only temporarily stalled.

I've been known to stop in the middle of a book and then go back to it later and enjoy the book more than ever. I've even recommended some of those books, because who knows why I stopped reading in the first place? When I went back, I really did enjoy the book.

When I pick up a book I've put down unfinished, I never start reading back at the beginning. I prefer to make my way through the book from where I stopped previously. And maybe that's some of the problem. If a book is that easy to start reading from the middle why was all that stuff included at the beginning anyway?

Don't you often find that many books start too early in the story? I enjoy the occasional slow build up in a book, but most often, I find that some authors don't want to leave anything for me to assume or conclude on my own. They want to explain every aspect of the story and characters, to the point where there's no mystery left in the book at all. But I enjoy just jumping in and figuring out some of this stuff for myself.

In fact, I enjoy mystery in my reading, and I'm not talking about whodoneit. I'm talking about the mystery of uncovering character motivations. I don't want to know everything at the outset of the book. I enjoy coming up with my own thoughts about why the characters might be doing whatever it is they're doing and to have those assumptions either confirmed or ripped apart later by a great author who's willing to leave a few things up to my imagination. What about you?

I thought it might be interesting to list a few of the books I haven't finished so far this year and give some of the reasons why I put them aside. I make no judgment of the books that haven't held my interest, because I haven't finished them and because someday, I still might make it to the end.