"I Spy" A New Series by Jo Davis!

interview with Suz

We're welcoming my very good friend, Jo Davis, back to the Lair today, not to talk about firefighters, but SPIES! I've been looking forward to the debut of this book and bringing Jo here to give us the details. Be prepared dear readers, you'll need a fan and the air conditioning to help you get through reading this erotic suspense series!

Suz:With your latest foray into the world of Erotic Suspense you've delivered a new series for our readers to devour. Care to give us a look into the world of sexy spies?

Jo: The idea for the SHADO Agency series resulted from my love of spy thrillers. I'm a fan of James Bond and the BOURNE thrillers, and just about any spy story out there. When faced with creating a new series, I thought what fun it would be to write a spy series, and seriously turn up the sexual heat to scorching levels?and the SHADO Agency was born. My visit this previous summer to the Spy Museum in Washington, D.C. fueled my imagination even more. What an intriguing world of disguise, subterfuge, and danger! There was no way I could resist.

The mission: Seduce…and Eliminate.

Jude St. Laurent is a former assassin for SHADO, a covert homeland security agency. After a mysterious accident causes gaping holes in his memory, he embraces his career as an artist, pouring vibrant, colorful life into his erotic paintings, and he often seeks solace in the arms of his subjects. But when he’s haunted by visions of the past, he turns to his new personal assistant for help—and she knows just how to make him forget.

Lily Vale is not what she seems. An agent as deadly as St. Laurent , she uses sex to manipulate her targets—and always gets her man. When she’s sent on a mission to kill Jude, she’s startled—and aroused—to find that he’s not the monster she expects. As Lily succumbs to Jude’s decadent sexual lifestyle, one wicked sin at a time, she realizes that there’s more to this case than meets the eye—and if she’s going to save them both, she’ll have to found out who’s pulling the strings.

Suz: The book starts off with a bang:

Prologue

“Sweet Christ.”

Elbows on the ratty desk, John Sandborn dropped his face into his hands. In the wake of this terrible exercise of connect the dots, he’d be goddamned lucky if he didn’t wind up at the bottom of the Atlantic. In five different oil drums.

Because a traitorous, murdering bastard was coming for him. No doubt about it.

If he had a whisper of a prayer of avoiding a grisly fate, he had to work fast.

Clicking the X in the top right corner of the laptop’s screen, he closed the classified file and opened another. Fingers flying, he activated a program he’d hoped never to use, but was damned glad he’d put into place. Next, he composed a simple coded message a ten-year-old couldn’t decipher, yet not so difficult a trusted operative couldn’t, either.

“Okay . . . got it.” He blew out a deep breath. It wasn’t perfect, but would have to do.

Last, he opened his e-mail and hit Send. He waited, every muscle tense, while the new files, along with the classified one, shot to six different destinations and burrowed into six different hard drives. A high-tech worm that would make any hacker cream in his shorts—and just might save his ass.

Action complete.

Sandborn attacked the keyboard again, clicking rapidly. His instincts screamed Get out, but he didn’t dare leave the last two tasks undone.

Precious seconds were whittled away, scraping his nerves raw, as he accessed the script file he’d written to initiate the virus that would destroy his hard drive. The final box popped onto the screen, and he executed his CTRL+F+U command.

Sandborn gave a grim chuckle at the double entendre in his chosen three-finger salute and wiped the sweat from his brow. Time to make like a ghost.

The door to his motel room burst open, hitting the inside wall like a gunshot. Sandborn spun, the SIG from the desktop already in hand, arm leveling at the leader of the traitor’s cleanup crew.

Too late. A pop split the air, and pain blossomed in his chest. He stumbled backward, managing to get off a shot, the explosion deafening in the tiny space. The leader went down with a grunt as Sandborn trained his gun on the second man, tried to squeeze the trigger. And couldn’t. His arm fell limp and useless to his side.

The second man crossed the room, a smirk on his ugly, pockmarked face. Cold overtook the pain, spreading from Sandborn’s chest to his limbs. Numbing every muscle. Looking down, he stared in fascinated horror at the dart embedded in his left pectoral.

He swayed, speaking quickly. His life depended on it. “Tell your boss I know everything. I put safeguards in place, and he’ll never find them without me,” he rasped, the drug freezing his vocal cords, fast. “If I die . . . the whole world will know . . . what he’s done.”

Sandborn’s legs buckled and he slumped to the floor, completely nerveless. Aware, but paralyzed, along for the ride and at their mercy. A nightmare.

A pair of heavy-soled leather boots appeared in his line of vision as the second man paused, obviously peering at the laptop. “You smart-ass sonofabitch,” Crater Face hissed.

John Sandborn’s last image was a snapshot of the man’s right shitkicker rocketing toward his face.

Suz: WOW! Jude St. Laurent, the hero of I SPY A WICKED SIN, is a very damaged hero. What is it that makes wounded men so sexy and how did you come about giving him the flaws in this story?


Jo: I think there's something about a tortured or damaged hero that brings out the caring and nurturing side of a woman. At least that's true for me. I want to fix it, make it all better-but not before he's put through the wringer. With Jude, I knew from the beginning he was blind and had holes in his memory due to the villain having his mind swept. (Think Bourne Identity) I said to myself, "A blind former assassin/spy? Are you nuts? He'll be such a difficult hero to write!" But it didn't matter. Jude was what he was, period. As with all my heroes, once he introduced himself to me, that was it. And on top of memory loss, can you imagine having one of your most relied-upon senses denied you, while becoming increasingly aware that you're not what you believed and that your life is in terrible danger? The challenge was too much fun to resist.


Suz: In I SPY A WICKED SIN Lily Vale is a very beautiful operative of SHADO. What is her area of expertise?

Jo: Like Jude, Lily is an assassin, and she's posing as Jude's new personal assistant. Her job in this case is to locate computer files that Jude hid regarding the theft of a weapon of mass destruction, a theft he was supposedly instrumental in pulling off. Then she'll eliminate him. Lily uses her sex appeal to bring down her targets in a much more?hands on manner than most agents. In particular, she's very proficient in using poisons that don't leave a trace?


Suz: A Jo Davis erotica wouldn't be complete without a ménage. Liam O'Neil is the third member of this trio. Is he also a spy for SHADO?

Jo: No, our sweet Liam is Jude's in-house chef, companion, and sometime lover. He's a young man with a big, open heart and almost stole the story from my clutches before I quite knew what happened. I adore Liam, and completely balked at a suggestion while writing the book that I kill him off! SO not happening! I hope readers love him as much as I do.

Suz: Since I SPY A WICKED SIN is the first of this series, will we be seeing these characters in the other books?

Jo: The two characters that will carry over from the beginning of the three-book series are handsome SHADO leader Michael Ross and the villain, ex-SHADO right-hand man and traitor Robert Dietz. The first two books in the series will have a conclusion, but Michael and Dietz will have their final showdown in the last book. Also, book two will introduce someone very important to Michael's story.

Suz: And I can't have Jo Davis in the lair without asking? WHEN will we be seeing the next firefighter book?

Jo: I'm so glad you asked! Tommy Skyler's story, LINE OF FIRE, will be released on May 4, 2010! The team's youngest hottie will get his story, and it sets up an explosive plot for the final book, RIDE THE FIRE, Captain Sean Tanner's story coming in December! In Tommy's story, lives will be irrevocably changed. Think of these last two books in the series as dominos falling, setting off a chain reaction?

Suz: Jo, thanks for being here today. We love having you with us. Do you have a closing question for our readers?

Jo: Sure do, Which type of action hero is your favorite in books, TV, or movies (cop, firefighter, Navy SEAL/other military, spy, etc.) and who is your favorite action hero of all time?

Jo will be giving away a signed copy of I SPY A WICKED SIN to one of our commeters today!

A Taste of Spy Candy

by Nancy Northcott

Today we welcome Kensington author Gina Robinson into the lair. Gina's celebrating the release of her first novel, Spy Candy. A two-time Golden Heart finalist and a Pacific Northwest Writers Association finalist, Gina will discuss Spy Candy and the long road that brought her to its publication. Welcome, Gina! Tell us a little about your hero and heroine.

Jenna, the heroine, is kind of a librarian archetype. She’s a cautious, conservative banker who doesn’t see herself as attractive. But on the inside, she longs for adventure and has a real thing for all things James Bond and spying. That’s why her best friend gives her a fantasy vacation to spy camp.

Torq, the hero, is an adventurer. He’s one of the instructors at the spy camp and the farthest thing from cautious and shy.

They don't seem to be natural allies. How do they clash at spy camp?

No, they aren’t. At first, Torq just shakes his head at Jenna’s cautious nature and naïve ineptitude during the spy training exercises. He really pushes her to the limits.

Jenna’s actually a little afraid of Torq and his confidence and sex appeal, while at the same time, longing to be more like him.

What draws them together?

Raw animal magnetism! But seriously, at heart, they’re both adventurers. Jenna just needs to realize it.

Here's an excerpt:

Making sure I had his full attention, I slowly unzipped the jumpsuit. Down to the tops of my fake breasts. Pause.

His pen stilled.

Zip. Over the girls, past the hips, down to the crotch. I gave one shoulder a shimmy shake sending the silicone girls bouncing as I stripped the jumpsuit off one shoulder. Then the next. I’d watched Logan’s strip aerobics DVD a time or two and it was coming in handy now as I worked up to the grand finale.

I gave my bottom a healthy wiggle as I scooched the overalls past my hips and stepped out of them, one elongated leg at a time.

His gaze was glued to my crop top. When I looked down, I realized it was plastered with sweat against my body in much the same way as a wet T-shirt clings. I kicked the coveralls into the corner and stepped directly in front of him, feigning trying to get a glimpse of my chart. In reality, I was just giving him a better look down my blouse.

“Hey, you were a real trooper.” His tongue was thick on his words. He was looking down at me. I was looking up at him, standing way too far into his personal space. “Five times isn’t bad. Great big, brave policemen don’t do any better.”

Our gazes locked.

“Thanks.”

He cleared his throat. “You probably better send the next CT in.”

“You’re probably right.” I reluctantly stepped back and turned to leave. I paused at the door to call to him. “Bet no one else is as good as me.” I winked and raced out, giving him a wave over my back, being careful not to turn and let him see the big, fat grin on my face. Let him figure me out.


Tell us about your road to publication.

I waited twelve years for the call. Nearly exactly. I made my first submission in late August of 1995 and got the call on October 4, 2007. During those twelve years I received hundreds of rejections. Along the way, I made every mistake known to writerdom. I started out writing Western historical romance. Just as I began to submit, the bottom fell out of that market. I beat my head against that door for awhile before I gave up and switched to contemporary, then chicklit and that market died. As you can tell, I had great market timing . Finally I wrote romantic suspense.

Back in 1995, there was no internet, not for the general populace, anyway. But as soon as I made that first submission, I just knew New York would be calling me, or maybe even faxing me. Faxing was big back then. Important things were faxed. So even though money was tight, my wonderfully supportive husband bought me a fax machine. I put it on my writing desk...and waited. It was lovely. Very high tech for the times. I liked staring at it and dreaming of the fax that would be coming any day. I started with anticipation whenever it roared to life or the phone rang. Sadly, the only faxes I ever got were a few junk ones and messages from my family and friends. Eventually that first rejection came in the mail, followed by many, many more.

Fast forward twelve years, much jaded cynicism and many close calls later. The fax machine is now in the garage, awaiting antique status. My agent called me on October 3rd. That conversation went something like this:

She said something to the effect of, “Great news! We have interest in the book.”

Me, “Interest?”

Her, “Yes. We have an editor who wants to buy the book. He just has to take it to the editorial committee.”

Me, *heavy internal sigh* I’m thinking to myself, yeah, we’ve been here too many times before. Call me when something interesting happens. Aloud to her, without much enthusiasm, “That’s great.”

Her, sensing my lack of enthusiasm. “You don’t understand. This time the Editor In Chief wants to buy.”

Me, still skeptical, not wanting to hope. “When do you think we’ll hear for sure?”

Her, “A week or two.”

Me, thinking to myself, “That’s agent-speak for months. We’ll be lucky if we hear by the end of the year.”

Less than twenty-four hours later, my agent called me back with an offer. I was so stunned, I could barely speak. My reaction was so understated, she had to ask me if I was happy. You know how we always wonder about ourselves and how we’d react in certain situations? I used to ask myself the eternal question, “If I was on a game show, would I be one of those bouncy, jump-up-and-downers? A crier, maybe?” Now I knew--I was a deer-in-the-headlights. After I hung up, then I started screaming and punching the air in victory with tears of joy flowing down my cheeks. I’m just sorry my agent didn’t get to see all that. Fortunately, I got a chance to tell her later how happy I really was.

That's a wonderful testament to the value of persistence. What's next for you?

My second book, another humorous romantic suspense, will be a December 2009 release from Kensington. Right now, we’re still searching for the perfect title for it. It’s another spy camp story set at a different camp with a completely new cast of characters.

Gina will be be signing books at the Southcenter Borders in Tukwila, WA on Saturday, November 15th from 1PM to 3PM. For more information about Gina and her work, visit her website, http://www.ginarobinson.com/.

What do you like about spy novels? What's your favorite? Have you ever wanted to try your hand at the spy trade, just for a little while? Gina's giving away a copy of Spy Candy to one commenter chosen at random today.

The Thinking Woman's Spy

by Christine Wells



Fiction writers take inspiration from everywhere--real life, research, classic stories, legends, even fairytales.

And I must admit ::hanging head:: that sometimes my inspiration comes from television.

I don't watch much TV but lately, I've been hooked on a UK television series about some dangerous men and women. Spooks is the colloquial term for British MI5 operatives, the spies who deal with threats to national security on a domestic level. This series about a small handful of top operatives, run by spymaster Harry Pierce, makes for compelling drama.

A stellar cast over 6 series (so far) includes:

Matthew McFadyen (Darcy in the 2005 Pride & Prejudice movie)

Rupert Penry-Jones (who also starred in the wonderful production Cambridge Spies) (right)

Hugh Laurie (House, Blackadder) makes an appearance as the snobby, insufferable head of MI6. I could watch Laurie in anything. He's such a versatile actor. Although if you happen to have only seen him in House and then watch Jeeves and Wooster, you might be in for a shock!

Soon to arrive on Spooks is Richard Armitage--that alone is enough reason to watch, quite apart from brilliant writing, masterly acting and edge of the seat action. I cannot WAIT for the next series!

Be prepared for casualties on the way--many of them central characters. Sad as I am to let beloved characters go, it definitely adds authenticity and an edge to the danger and suspense to know that no one is safe.

And while they're good at what they do, these Spooks are human, too. They struggle to maintain normal relationships outside the service and they question the morality of their choices and their methods every day. What's equally interesting is that they're not James Bond-style superhuman types. They can fight, but they tend to use intelligence, resourcefulness and a few dirty tricks rather than muscle to achieve their ends. Sometimes they don't win. And sometimes they win, but at immense personal cost. Can you see why a fiction writer would lap this stuff up?

And did I mention Richard Armitage will be starring in the next series?

In The Dangerous Duke, my hero Lyle works for the Regency era Home Office in a capacity very similar to these Spooks, until he unexpectedly inherits a title and the responsibilities that go with it. He's ruthless and competent, and his mantra has always been that the end justifies the means.

Then he meets Lady Kate, who is powerful in a different way. She has been the confidant and advisor to many important men in government. When she decides to wield her power to protect someone she loves, she becomes a formidable opponent for Lyle. But it's the danger each senses in the other that they find so compelling, and it's not long before they're playing the most dangerous game of all...

Do you like danger? In movies, books, real life? What's your favourite dangerous thrill?

I'm giving away a signed copy of The Dangerous Duke and assorted Dangerous Duke stationery to a handful of lucky winners!