Private Places Book Trailer . . .
9:25 AM PDT, September 11, 2008, updated at 9:36 AM PDT, September 11, 2008
I absolutely love the book trailer for PRIVATE PLACES. The heroes from all four novellas speak out, so please be sure to turn up your volume! I'm not a big fan of the generic music some of the book videos incorporate, so I suggested we use actual sound bites instead of music to compliment the voice-overs. My segment opens up with the toll of Big Ben, which plays an important role in my novella "The Men and Women's Club". Indeed, all the sound bites capture the essence of the individual novellas. When my mom first saw the book video, she said, surprised when she heard Claudia Dain's "A Night at the Theater": "I can hear clapping!" And so she could. After all, we're at the theater! And when Claudia's hero whispers what he wants. . . . Well, let's just say it's very, very sensuous! Allyson James's sexy hero who plays a very high stake card game with the heroine talks over the sound of dropping coins. And Shiloh Walker's hero. . . . Wow. COS and the actor who did the voice-overs outdid themselves! So what do you think of the book trailer for Private Places? Do you enjoy book trailers? If not, what don't you like about them? What would you do to improve the book trailer for Private Places? . . . I'm going to be doing a very special book trailer for CRY FOR PASSION, my March 2009 release, so any suggestions are greatly appreciated! Read an excerpt of "The Men and Women's Club" by Robin Schone. Read an excerpt of "A Night at the Theater" by Claudia Dain. Read an excerpt of "The Decidedly Devilish Duke" by Allyson James. Read an excerpt of "Hunter's Mercy" by Shiloh Walker.
"The Men and Women's Club"
1:50 PM PDT, July 14, 2008, updated at 4:32 PM PDT, July 14, 2008
 Private Places will be released August 5 . . . not even three weeks away! I'm looking forward to its dubut, and hope you are, too! So far I've seen two reviews: Coffee Time Romance calls "The Men and Women's Club" "profoundly emotional and sexual;" Romantic Times Bookreviews says it's "complex."In my previous post I summarized "The Men and Women's Club." I don't think I've ever angsted so much about which excerpt to use. It seems like every chapter gives away key information. But I think this sets the story up nicely. So . . . as promised, here is an excerpt to "The Men and Women's Club," my novella in the anthology Private Places. Please let me know what you think! Or if you have any questions, don't be shy, ask away! "The Men and Women's Club" Chapter One ...Memory gouged the throbbing twilight. One man questioning. One woman responding. What does a woman desire? Yet the woman had not asked what it was that the man needed. And now they must each appear—every single member of the Men and Women’s Club—in a court of law. “Tomorrow we stand before a judge and jury.” Cold mahogany wood pulsed against Joseph’s fingers. “What do we tell them?” The feather-tipped silhouette visibly stiffened, even as distant laughter mocked his impotence, everything he had ever wanted lost in this room: His reputation; his position at the university. The hope for love. “Do we tell them about the French postcards we didn’t look upon?” Naked men and women doing things he had imagined but never performed. “Do we tell them about the pornographic shop we refused to visit?” In his mind’s eye flashed the print of a woman who sat backward across a man’s hips, wearing only a smile of unfathomable mystery. “Do we tell them we sat here while five men and six women flaunted every decent moral known to man”—the first in a series of dull bass bongs, Big Ben spitting out the hour, underscored his words—“and we did nothing to stop them?” “We did everything in our power to direct those meetings,” shot through the deepening gloom. Joseph was not fooled by the publicist’s righteous indignation. “Do we tell them, Miss Dennison,” he asked, fingers choking the gavel that he had as president of the Men and Women’s Club wielded unsparingly, but which on the morrow would be used to direct jurisdiction in a court of law, “that when I had you on this table two years earlier, you were not a virgin?” One final bong fell onto the sudden silence: It was seven o’clock. A shudder vibrated the air, the public doors shutting. The sing-song hum of passing carriage wheels emphasized the dead stillness permeating the museum. Ardelle Dennison’s voice, when she spoke, was arctic: “How dare you bring up that night, sir!” Joseph would dare many things this evening. “Did I give you no pleasure at all?” he rasped. In the thickening dusk he could for one fleeting second make out two shadowy figures: A man . . . a woman. Reaching. Embracing. He knew that Ardelle Dennison also saw the two ghostly figures, a professor and a publicist who had for one brief moment dared to be a man and a woman. “This lawsuit is a farce!” she lashed out with sudden anger. “We can not be held responsible for men and women who cannot control their animal lusts.” “Like us?” Joseph rejoined.
PRIVATE PLACES is available for Pre-Order!
6:36 PM PDT, March 29, 2008
Private Places is now available for Pre-Order! Well, actually it has been for some time now, but I wanted to wait to post until the cover was up. Isn't it gorgeous? Private Places will be published August 5, 2008. It's my first publication with Berkley, and my first lead in an anthology, so I'm doubly excited. Other contributing authors are: Claudia Dain, Allyson James and Shiloh Walker. The origins of the exclusive club that features in Scandalous Lovers - and the shocking truth about the man and woman who founded it - are revealed in my novella, “The Men and Women’s Club." My new editor loves it: I hope you, too, enjoy this very emotional - and sexy - story about a man and a woman who, confronted with exposure in a notorious London trial in 1887, must find the courage to overcome the past and embrace the happiness that is their due. I'll be back later and post an excerpt. Please let me know what you think of the cover! I think it's gorgeous. The black lace look is very elegant. And I love the colors! But that's me. What about you?
THE LOVER: Same Book . . . New Look!
4:58 PM PDT, October 16, 2007, updated at 6:29 AM PDT, October 18, 2007
 The Lover has been repackaged with a brand new cover! Everything else is the same . . . size, price and ISBN. Even the quote! Except . . . there's an error on this cover that slipped through the editorial department and made it to print. Can you find it? (Click here to see an enlarged picture.) This new edition is a collector's item: no other copies will be printed with this error, so get your copy while they last! The new cover marks its 5th Brava printing. Don't remember the old cover with the beautiful peacock feather? Then check it out here, and vote for your favorite! The Lover - which has been published in Czech, Germany, Poland, Russia and Spain - marked my debut on the USA Today Bestseller list way back in 2000. It is the prequel to Gabriel's Woman, and opens from the POV (Point of View) of Michael/Michel, my scarred angel (an excerpt of Chapter One is available here at Amazon). So I thought I would give you an excerpt from the second chapter, which is from Anne's POV. I hope you enjoy it! BOOK DESCRIPTION Thirty-six-year-old Anne Aimes is a spinster whose only attraction is her wealth. But her plain looks mask a passionate woman who yearns to know a man's intimate caresses. Michel des Anges - Michael of the Angels - is renowned for his ability to bring women to pleasure. All it will cost her is ten thousand pounds... Driven by vengeance, Michael seeks to lose himself in a woman who will demand only physical pleasure. A woman who won't suspect his own aching needs - or his true motive for accepting her terms. Unable to resist the lure of Anne's guileless desire, he plunges her into a deadly web of deception and revenge where the price of carnal ecstasy is life itself... Chapter Two Excerpt "Penetration is not possession, mademoiselle." Fleeting light lit up the right side of his face—it starkly delineated the ridge of scars edging his cheek—and then once again he was swallowed in obscurity. "Then I am afraid I do not understand your question." "Physical penetration will vary—five to ten inches, depending upon the size of a man's erect penis. A woman can take a man into her body and still remain in control of her emotions. But when she lies underneath him gasping for air with only his breath to sustain her—with only his body to give her the orgasm that her very life depends on—at that moment, chérie, that man possesses that woman." Anne gulped air—his breath. She imagined his body filling her—five to ten inches—as his breath filled her lungs. Completely. Unconditionally. A frisson of fear raced down her spine. "That is only if a woman is not in control of her emotions. This is a business arrangement, monsieur, not an affaire de coeur." "You hired me to overcome your control, mademoiselle." Her heart skipped a beat, raced to catch up. "You make it sound—" Dangerous. Not at all like the business arrangement that they had. "I hired you to give me pleasure. As a man hires a woman to give him pleasure. No more. No less." "There is a difference between a man's pleasure and a woman's pleasure." Yes, men were freely allowed to pursue theirs while women were not. "And what is that, pray tell?" "A man only needs a woman's body; he does not need her to bring him to orgasm. His own motions will do that." Anger flicked along her nerves. "Do you think that a woman needs a man only because of his male appendage, monsieur?" "If that were so, mademoiselle, then you would not be here with me in this carriage." His silky response was a parody of her own. Anne gripped her reticule. "I do not understand the purpose of this conversation." "I am trying to prepare you for the coming night." "By telling me that a woman needs a man and not vice versa?" Sharpness spiked her voice. "I never said that a man did not need a woman; I said that a man does not need a woman's motions to bring him to release. But you will need me in the coming hours, mademoiselle. Your needs will render you far more vulnerable than my body will. No matter how deeply I penetrate you. And I assure you, chérie, I will penetrate you very deeply." ©Robin Schone P.S. I just returned from Madrid, where my wonderful publishers at Suma de Letras/Manderley and I presented La Mujer de Gabriel (Gabriel's Woman, the sequel to The Lover) to my readers in Spain. I will shortly add to my website pictures of this amazing event, as well as links to the newspaper articles written by the very talented and courteous Spanish journalists who interviewed me (I had my own personal translator!). So please do keep checking my website for more information, as well as for upcoming books! Scandalous Lovers is OUT!
9:29 AM PST, January 31, 2007, updated at 6:57 AM PST, February 1, 2007
 Scandalous Lovers is now out in bookstores everywhere . . . even here, at Amazon.com!I've thought and thought about what to post on this momentous occasion, but really, I think I'll let Scandalous Lovers speak for itself. I hope you enjoy the below excerpt, and the unique movie trailer that Fraasa Films and Circle of Seven Productions produced. What makes it unique? you are no doubt asking. All I can say is . . . watch it and see! EXCERPT from Scandalous Lovers: "My wife is dead." The words ripped through the chill spring air. She paused, head snapping upward. James's gaze was waiting for hers. "I will never know which of my touches excited her, or which ones repulsed her. I will never know how I failed her, or even if I failed her. I will never know what she needed, because I never asked." "Why not?" The rejoinder was swift. The woman's body remained poised for flight. "Because I was afraid," James said. Feminine gasps greeted his admission: a man could do or say many things as long as he didn't admit fear. "I am still afraid." A masculine protest overrode the feminine gasps. "I say, there--" James ignored the accountant's objection. "I am forty-seven years old, and I have never experienced a woman's passion." "Mr. Whitcox, sir!" the suffragette sputtered over the hiss of the gas chandelier. "I need to know that it's not too late." The woman with the vivid red hair remained motionless, her expression arrested. "I need to know that men and women share the same needs." A shudder vibrated the wooden table, a door slamming below. "I need to know that there can be honesty between men and women." A short, urgent shout sounded from the street outside. The solitude that dogged his every waking moment stretched out before James. "I need to know that a man and a woman can live in the same house, and lie in the same bed, and be more than two strangers." ©Robin Schone WATCH THE MOVIE: A Question . . . and a Wish!
12:58 PM PST, January 5, 2007, updated at 1:28 PM PST, January 5, 2007
It doesn't seem like we're five days into the new year, but here we are. It's hard to believe that the next holiday is Valentine's Day. Wow. How time flies. . . . Carol Stacy, Publisher at Romantic Times BOOKreviews, kindly invited me to be their guest author on their online forum "Ask the Author." So if anyone wants to visit and say hi, please do so! I love questions. "Ask the Author" Robin Schone at Romantic Times BOOKreviews Which brings me to my question to you. NYC Reader ~waving~ kindly asked why I don't post more on my Amazon plog. I answered. . . . I'm really not sure what I should post. I hate duplicating myself, that is, posting the same info on my message board, in my "Robin's News" section on my website, and then here. Or does it matter? Maybe you only visit the Amazon plog? So my question to you is: what do you like to read on Amazon plogs? Do you think it's a place for authors to ask questions of readers, or to digress about events in their (the author's) lives, or do you prefer that authors cut the chit chat and just post news about books? Do you want to know if an author receives rave reviews for an upcoming book? Do you want to be linked to fun things, like a mini movie made from an author's book? What, exactly, do you want to read about at AmazonConnect? Wishing you the very best in 2007! Robin
Happy Holidays . . . and a healthy, prosperous New Year!
6:06 AM PST, December 13, 2006
Scandalous Lovers is now available at Amazon.com. I was beginning to think it would never happen, but look, there it is! And just in time for the holidays, too. In order to spice up the festivities, I’ve added an excerpt to my website: read the excerpt to Scandalous Lovers here! Many of you have taken the time to share your likes and dislikes, and I thank you. Posting an excerpt is rather like going through baby pictures. There are so many precious moments captured in a book - well, to the "mother/author," at any rate - that it’s difficult to choose just one. Hence my request for your assistance below! And because of your responses, I decided to go with the first chapter. I hope you enjoy! I would also like to take this opportunity to share some wonderful news: Scandalous Lovers is a Featured Alternate Selection for both Doubleday Book Club and Rhapsody Book Club. I’m very excited! In addition to which, I finally got my mom to move nearby, so for the first time in almost 10 years, we'll be spending the holidays together. This is a wonderful time, indeed. Wishing you much love and laughter throughout the holidays and the coming new year! Robin  El Tutor Oh! I am also happy to announce that Amazon.com is now offering El Tutor, my first novel to be translated into Spanish . . . but not my last!See AND Hear SCANDALOUS LOVERS!
5:15 PM PDT, September 19, 2006, updated at 8:09 AM PDT, October 2, 2006
Yes, you read correctly. Not only can you see the cover to SCANDALOUS LOVERS, but you can now hear what the characters in my novel say about my two scandalous lovers. When designing my new website, I wanted the colors to reflect the gorgeous cover to SCANDALOUS LOVERS. But more than pretty colors, I wanted to make SCANDALOUS LOVERS as real and vital to you as it is to me. To that end, I've been working with Sheila Clover English from Circle of Seven Productions and Victoria Fraasa of Fraasa Films to produce "Listen to what they're saying!" sound bytes. Starting September 14, a new sound byte will play every week for 9 weeks thru November 16. Each sound byte was specially chosen to bring to life different aspects of this long-awaited novel: the drama, the passion, the life-altering effect Frances and James have on each and every character. Victoria Fraasa graciously solicited my input when recording the bytes. It was truly a breathtaking experience to hear real live people speaking with the emotions I had tried so hard to incorporate in my writing. I hope you enjoy listening to these talented actors as much as I did! SCANDALOUS LOVERS was formerly titled THE MEN AND WOMEN'S CLUB, which was never published, of course, although it did have a pretty green cover and was available for preorder. Just for fun, I've put the two covers side by side in a poll over at my Retreat. THE MEN AND WOMEN'S CLUB or SCANDALOUS LOVERS: which do you prefer? :::Please note that everyone is welcome to vote and post on my bulletin board, but in order to do so, you must first register::: Do please let me know what you think about my new website and the special "Everybody's Talking . . . Listen to what they're saying!" presentations. I think my webmaster did a wonderful job, per usual, although please be advised that a few of the pages are still down, but they will be up and running soon! I'm getting increasingly excited - and impatient - for February 6, 2007 to get here. I can't wait for you to meet Frances Hart and James Whitcox!
A Title By Any Other Name
4:31 PM PDT, July 31, 2006, updated at 4:48 PM PDT, July 31, 2006
It's official: THE MEN AND WOMEN'S CLUB has been renamed. It's now called: SCANDALOUS LOVERS. SCANDALOUS LOVERS has a pub date of February 6, 2007. I have a countdown clock on the Coming Soon page over at my website. Five whole days have already passed since my webmaster started the countdown, so the release date is getting closer. Which brings up another issue. . . . I will at some time in the not too distant future be posting an excerpt of my new book, but which chapter? Do you prefer an author post the first chapter, so that you get a feel for the set-up of the book? Or do you prefer to be teased and tantalized by a sexy scene in a later chapter? Or do you even read chapter excerpts, preferring, instead, the anticipation of not knowing until you actually read a book?. . . Please don't be shy . . . let me know what you like! I posted a poll over at my bulletin board (Robin's Retreat), and have thus far been rather surprised by the results. Your feedback here will be greatly appreciated.
Awaken, My Love: Romancing Reality
9:04 AM PDT, June 19, 2006, updated at 6:36 PM PDT, August 6, 2006
Awaken, My Love is my first published novel, as well as my first work of romance. While I have always been fascinated by paleontology (dinosaurs rule!) and ancient history, it is this book - a time-travel tale of a 20th century woman who is catapulted through time and space into the body of a 19th century woman - that started my love affair with Victorian England. When writing it, I started out with the same concerns that any modern-day traveler would have: Elaine, a born Chicagoan, is used to sweltering summers: what is the weather like in Victorian England? She wears control-top pantyhose: what kind of underclothing will she be expected to wear in another time? Modern conveniences include flushing commodes, toilet paper on a roll, and sanitary napkins/tampons: what necessities will she find in the 19th century . . . ? Little did I know how bumpy my journey to Victorian England would be. Tons of books exist regaling us about weather, fashion and food, but whoa, you just try researching personal hygiene. After awhile I really started wondering if perhaps our "moral" ancestors did indeed have different needs than we do. My library inter-loaned books by the boxes. The curator at the Chicago Museum of History brought out a "napkin" dated c1860, and suggested it would have been pinned inside a woman's drawers. There's only one problem: the women's drawers referenced in fashion books were seamless (crotchless)! And then I stumbled upon a sentence . . . one sentence! . . . under a topic that bore no relation to personal hygiene. It proved that the information I needed existed, providing I was willing to dig deeply enough to find it. And find it I did! The more research I did, the more I learned about the day-to-day details that history books neglect. Theirs was not an idyllic time: rape, incest, etc., were as prevalent then as they are now. We could learn so much from the Victorians, if only their voices would be heard. I remember that Don and I did not discuss Awaken, My Love; indeed, we barely talked while I was writing it. He felt, that by penning a "romance," I was selling out, because how could a romance story contain the intense plotting, complex characterization, and moral ambiguity that had characterized my previous writings? Set in Victorian England, how could a romance not be complex and multi-layered? Awaken, My Love was originally published by Avon Books in 1995; Kensington Brava published my "Author's Edition" in 2001. I am happy to announce that it's back . . . and with a brand new cover! It's interesting to follow the evolution of romance books over the last eleven years. I posted a poll on my bulletin board where you may see the different covers side by side. Please note: you are welcome to vote and or post on my bulletin board, but in order to do so, you must first register. Below, when discussing the artwork for Gabriel's Woman, I mentioned that I cried uncontrollably upon receiving one of my book covers. It was one of these three. Can you guess which one . . . ? Yes, it was the 1995 cover. When my editor telephoned that she was overnighting it, I was ecstatic. Remember, Awaken, My Love was my first published novel. Visions of an artist devouring my story (yeah, I was really naive) and painting a masterful rendition of passion awakened dancing through my head, I purchased a special bottle of wine for the unveiling, so to speak. The purpose, of course, was to celebrate with Don when he got home from work. But when FedEx arrived, I couldn't wait. I ripped open the envelope . . . and gaped in dismay. The longer I stared at the cover, the more convinced I became that my career was ruined. Not that it's an ugly cover - the woman's naked shoulder pressing into that 6-pack abdomen is rather sensuous - but my book is full of intense sexuality, and the cover is so . . . tame. I cried for three hours. When Don got home, I got drunk and cried for another three hours. It's strange how things don't change: before Awaken, My Love was published in 1995, 28 agents rejected it, one claiming I simply could not start off a romance with the heroine masturbating. When CBS 2 Chicago News aired my interview on May 3, 2006, the anchorwoman stated that my book is the first romance to start off with the heroine . . . Well, she couldn't say 'that' word on television. Oops! They're working again. I hope you enjoy the links!
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Bio
My grandparents were very poor: they did not have indoor plumbing. When I was with them, I lived pretty much like our ancestors did in the 19th century. The experience gave me a very practical mindset regarding history and the people who lived it.
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