Please welcome guest author Diana Miller to the blog. Diana is visiting a bunch of blogs today, sharing the latest about her newest release Dangerous Affairs. Diana Miller will be awarding one $25 Amazon gift card to one commenter and to one blog host during her blog tour. Be sure to leave a comment to enter. Increase your chances of winning by going here for a list of other blogs hosting Diana Miller. Leave comments at those sites as well.
Cover Blurb For
Dangerous Affairs
by Diana Miller
When soap opera star Abby Langford leaves Los Angeles for her Minnesota hometown, she’s hoping to give her nine-year-old daughter the peaceful childhood she never knew. But instead of tranquility, Abby finds an old knife hidden between the walls of her new house. Then the nightmares start: a blood-soaked victim and a killer’s arm slicing through the air, again and again.
Abby wonders if she’s having the nervous breakdown the tabloids claim she already had, especially when sexy, skeptical police chief Josh Kincaid questions her story. When menacing hate mail arrives, Josh’s professional concern for Abby soon evolves into an intense attraction, and the feeling is mutual. And now Josh wonders if her psychic visions are of crimes past—or a premonition of terrors to come.
To survive, Abby and Josh must uncover the truth and stop a killer . . . before Abby’s worst nightmares come true.
An Excerpt From Dangerous Affairs
By Diana Miller
Abby rolled back the carpet, exposing the stain. “What do you think? Is this blood or just paint?”
Josh squatted beside the stain and studied it for several seconds, scratching it with his fingernail. Then he rolled the carpet back over the stain and stood. “Have you ripped up the carpet in the rest of the bedrooms?”
“I started here. This carpet’s the ugliest,” Abby said. “I also spend a lot of time writing in here.” None of that was a lie.
He nodded slowly. “So yesterday you pulled out a door, vacuumed behind it, and found a knife flecked with what could be blood. Then this morning you decide to rip up the carpet in one bedroom and coincidentally find more blood?”
It did sound a little fantastic, but Abby certainly wasn’t telling him about the dream. “You think I dumped it there myself?”
“Makes it seem more like you’ve got a mystery in your own house, doesn’t it? It looks like paint to me, but I guess it could be real blood. I’m sure it’s easy to buy the stuff in LA.”
She threw up her hands. “Do you honestly think I brought blood out here with me? Just stuck it in a carton with my dishes and had the movers load it up?”
“Or you could have ordered it on the Internet.”
“Or stolen it from the Red Cross. Look, I didn’t pretend to find the knife for publicity, and I didn’t plant this stain for publicity. I told you, I don’t want any more publicity.”
When Josh didn’t respond, Abby massaged her temples and concentrated on taking calming breaths. If she’d been able to hold her tongue the entire six weeks Vanessa Mason had guest starred on Private Affairs, she could do it now. “I was simply trying to do my civic duty by reporting it.”
“Next time don’t bother.”
About Diana Miller
When she was eight, Diana Miller decided she wanted to be Nancy Drew. But no matter how many garbage cans she dug through, conversations she “accidentally” overheard, and attics she searched, she never found a single cryptic letter, hidden staircase, or anything else even remotely mysterious. She worked as a lawyer, a soda jerk, a stay-at-home mom, a hospital admitting clerk, and a conference host before deciding that the best way to inject suspense into her otherwise satisfying life was by writing about it.
Diana is a five-time nominee for the Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Award and winner of a Golden Heart for Dangerous Affairs—a romantic suspense novel that shows not everyone in her home state is Minnesota Nice. She lives in the Twin Cities with her family.
My website link is dianamillerwriter.com. I have buy buttons for both Amazon and Kindle on my website, but have no idea what you have to do to insert them since my web designer did it. (But you can click here to go to the buy page.)
Visit my Amazon page here
I got some very vivid images from just reading the blurb. DANGEROUS AFFAIRS goes on my reading list.
Thanks for today’s super tour.
catherinelee100 at gmail dot com
Great question! According to the tabloids, Abby cheated multiple times, mistreated her husband, and was basically as big a manipulative bitch as the character she played. Her ex-husband claimed to have gotten so fed up with that, plus shopaholic habits that had them on the verge
of bankruptcy, that he’d divorced her. Josh believes that at least some of that must be true, in part because there were so many articles and Abby never denied anything–for reasons I can’t disclose without spoiling the plot–and because Josh has issues of his own that I also can’t disclose without spoiling the plot!
I’m always fascinated by where story ideas come from, especially stories with suspense elements.
Where did the idea for Dangerous Affairs come from and how did it grow from original idea to full blown novel?
One day I accidentally opened one of the pocket doors in our house past the stop, exposing the space between the walls. I realized it would make a great hiding space for something, like a kitchen knife that may or may not have been a murder weapon. As a recovering attorney, I’m a little anal retentive, so I actually got a knife, stuck it inside, and made sure that could still shut the door and that I could also fish it out with a broom. It worked, and the first scene of Dangerous Affairs was born. To be honest, I have no idea where the rest of the book came from!
I’m very fond of stories in which the characters have psychic premonitions or psychic experiences.
What did you find challenging about writing a character with psychic experiences?
The challenge was making sure that I wrote about that and a couple related issues realistically. I didn’t want my readers to all immediately dismiss my plot twists as something that could never happen! That involved doing quite a bit of research and was a little more complex than making sure the knife between the walls thing worked! Thank heavens for the Internet and that I live in a city with excellent public and college libraries.
Great excerpt, I want to find out what happens next.
Kit3247(at)aol(dot)com
You and me both Rita. This one is going on my Kindle.
I’m thrilled that you’re featuring my debut novel DANGEROUS AFFAIRS today on your blog. Thanks so much.
I’ll check back later to answer any questions.
Again, thanks for hosting me. I really appreciate it!
You’re very welcome Diana. It’s my pleasure to have you here today. I loved the excerpts from your novel.
There seems to be a lot of negative tension between Josh and Abby in the excerpt(s). Why is Josh so hesitant to believe Abby? Is it all based on the tabloids?
What can you tell us about those tabloid articles? They must have been really cutting to inspire such a lack of belief on Josh’s part.