Books on Special – Just in time for the weekend

$0.99 for great reads – across multiple genres. Whatever you want, we’ve got. Get ’em while they’re hot from your favourite bookseller…

From the best-selling author of The House on Burra Burra Lane, comes a brand-new story about opposites, attraction, an outback pub, and a pink house…

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From the author of The Convict’s Bounty Bride comes a new Australian historical about a free settler and the wife he chooses from a workhouse…

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Their chance at love was lost in the harsh light of day. Is the romance of the majestic Snowy Mountains enough to heal the wounds of the past so that they get a second chance at a future?

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As the Black Raven, she’s cold, distant and alone…untouched by the gossip and scorn of her aristocratic peers. Until he enters her house — and her life — then suddenly her icy shell is no match for the heat of attraction…

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From Cate Ellink comes a sun-soaked, sandy, seaside erotic novel about a tropical paradise, two athletes used to getting physical, and a sex-filled, no-strings holiday fling.

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Smooth, seductive and savage: Lee Christine returns to the dark, criminal underbelly of Sydney with her follow-up to In Safe Hands.

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In Children of the Mist, we discovered the secret history of the Children. Now, in the wilds of Scotland, one of them has come of age…

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Traditionally, leather is an anniversary gift. One couple is about to take that in a very non-traditional way…

Three Books, Two Murders

by Lee Christine

I realized something the other day. I’ve only killed off two characters in my series, quite a low body count considering the novels are set around a fictitious Sydney law firm and feature two rival bikie gangs, the New South Wales gang squad and the Australian military.

Thinking about this, it’s not that I can’t bear to part with my characters, or that I have an aversion to writing graphic violence, it’s just that I find the lesser crimes a more realistic fit when weaving together the threads of a romantic mystery. And statistics show, at least in Australia, the likelihood of being murdered by someone unknown to you is very low. There’s a far greater risk of falling victim to a cyber-attack, carjacking, robbery, blackmail or extortion.

These types of crimes, when committed against the hero or heroine, are perfect for providing the characters with a common goal. That goal may be a race against the clock to prevent an internet crime, or a plan to escape from someone holding them hostage, or working together to uncover a blackmailer. The looming threat of danger heightens the senses, makes time the essence and forces the hero and heroine into a situation where they have to rely on one another, even trust each other with their lives. Hopefully, the escalating sense of danger will keep the reader on tenterhooks and turning the pages well into the night.

My latest release, In Safe Keeping, is a romantic legal thriller featuring a hero and heroine with a massive conflict of interest, a brash detective from the Sydney Gang Squad and an underlying mystery involving the Australian military. In Safe Keeping is the third novel in my loosely linked series. It features characters from the first two books but can be read as a standalone.

Check them out if you like your romance laced with a shot of ‘Grisham’.

A Dirty Half Dozen about Aussie Bikies

by Kate

Six things you don’t want bikies to help you with – and one thing you do.

1. Hair and wardrobe styling

Unless you’re into facial hair, the ponytail, and distressed leather, it would be best to seek another stylist. Also helmet hair is never a good look.

2. Transportation

Sometimes it’s just easier to get public transport.

3. Buying you jewellery

You might like your jewellery a little more discrete.

4. Specifying your tattoo

You might like your tattoo a little more – well anything really

5. Choosing your playlist

Unless you like to head bang to ultra hard rock you might like a playlist with less amps.

6. Planning your wedding

 

Unless you’re very confident or don’t hanker for something more traditional you probably don’t want a bikie wedding. Also the term Old Lady – enough said.

Although this is kinda cute

This is what you do want your bikie involved with: charity events.

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Two Escape Artists have written books featuring Australian bikie gangs: Lee Christine and Ainslie Paton.

Lee Christine’s In Safe Arms is the second book in her Grace and Poole series.

Legal secretary Josephine Valenti has no idea why a notorious bikie president would be contacting her, but when he is murdered in front of her eyes, she knows that she is in very deep trouble. Fleeing to her home, she’s intercepted by Nate Hunter, a man she used to know and lust after…a man she used to care about.

However, Nate has changed. His leathers and his bike tell of a lifestyle that Josie can’t begin to accept or understand. His is a life of drugs, money laundering and prostitution.

But all is not what it seems, and Josie must fight harder than she ever has before — for the truth, for what’s right, and, ultimately, for the man who still has a hold of her heart.

Ainslie Paton’s Floored features a road trip from Sydney to Perth

From the moment Fetch gets knocked off his Harley, crawls into Driver’s car and offers her an obscene amount of money to drive him from Sydney to Perth — no questions, no names, no chit chat — they’re stuck with each other. By the time they arrive, they’re stuck on each other.

It’s lust at full throttle, with no seat belts. It could be more, but he’s a fake and she’s a liar. They’re both neck deep in crime, and only one of them is on the right side of the law.

Inspiration Behind the Story – Lee Christine

Write What You Know

An agent once told me to ‘write what you know because it lends your writing an authenticity’.

In my case, I believe my experience working for a legal firm in Sydney during the height of the ‘underbelly’ years, provided me with the inspiration and knowledge upon which to base my romantic suspense novels.

During the course of any working day, notorious people I’d only read about in the newspaper, or watched on television, usually in the custody of police, or leaving the court house, were suddenly clients in the waiting room, or speaking on the other end of the telephone. As part of my job, I was typing their names into court documents, relaying messages back and forth, and making appointments for them to see the principal partner, for whom I worked. Politicians, brothel owners, and businessmen, it was an alien world of corporate greed, drug running, corruption, and bribery. And a real eye opener for a young girl who’d only previously worked for a very reputable small city firm.

But this experience gave me a unique insight into a foreign world and provided me with a wealth of material from which to draw on and formulate what I hope is a believable story.

‘In Safe Arms’, my second novel in the Grace & Poole Lawyer series was released on January 1, 2014. It is centred around a large legal firm in Sydney, who represent, among others, an infamous bikie gang I’ve named The Southern Cross.

Lee Christine