Six Sentence Sunday - A Knight in Cowboy Boots #9

This doesn't follow last week's SSS sample immediately, but it's pretty close behind.

            

When someone knocked insistently on the door at her back, Maddie’s hands clenched, her finger tightening on the trigger. The explosion sounded like a cannon going off in the room and the sharp smell of gunpowder filled the air. The bullet spun Zach around. He fell against the bed, and slid down until he was sitting on the floor beside it, facing away from her.

             

“Oh my God!” The gun fell from her numb fingers and bounced across the floor.

Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.


If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants. (If you're a participant, I try to always comment back.)


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Six Sentence Sunday - A Knight in Cowboy Boots #8

 Back for another Six Sentence Sunday.


Who would guess that this would lead to a romance? Some guys are just impossible to drive off.




She jerked the gun free and, with both hands throttling the grip, pointed it as she turned.

 “Whoa!” Instinctively, Zach backed up another step, his hands rising in the air, not in surrender, but as though denying he was any kind of threat.

He looked at her cautiously. If he had any sense, he’d look a lot more scared, Maddie thought. Couldn’t he see the way her hands were shaking?




You can find a longer excerpt here. A Knight in Cowboy Boots is available at Amazon and other ebook vendors.


Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.


If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.


If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.

Six Sentence Sunday - A Knight in Cowboy Boots #7

Another Six Sentence Sunday. This is from A Knight in Cowboy Boots which, to my delight, is now available on Amazon. You can read an excerpt here or download the opening at Amazon.

This is the moment after their first time together. Maddie has just made a comment about Zach's "equipment."

“Assault  weapon?” Zach repeated. “That there’s standard equipment, darlin’.”

“There’s nothing standard about that,” Maddie said.

“I didn’t hear you complaining.”

“Of course not. You sprang it on me when I was mentally incompetent.”

 I love when you comment.

Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.

If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.

If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.

Six Sentence Sunday - A Knight in Cowboy Boots #5

This is the "afterglow" moment from A Knight in Cowboy Boots. Hm. I guess that says it all.

Maddie felt as though someone had just hit a long-overdue pressure-release valve inside her. Or like she’d dropped a couple of fifty pound weights and been filled with helium. 

She felt like melted ice cream.

Her second coherent thought was that Zach was damned heavy.

The phrase “dead weight” ran through her mind. If he weren’t breathing in her ear like an asthmatic steam engine, she would have thought she’d killed him.

From a Knight in Cowboy Boots, releasing from Pink Petal Books August 4, 2011. 

Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.


If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.


If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.

Six Sentence Sunday - A Knight in Cowboy Boots #4

Before we get to the snippet, I have a question. I've notice a lot of folks choose steamy situations to pull their 6 from, others lean toward humor. So I'm taking an unofficial poll: Do you prefer steamy or humorous when you visit 6 sentence Sunday sites?

Now that that's out of the way . . .

In celebration of A Knight in Cowboy Boots coming out at Pink Petal Books next month, I've posted another snippet for your reading pleasure.

This occurs after Zach's sister Rachel made sure both Zach and Maddie went to church with her, so she could decide if she approves of Maddie. (Yes, Rachel has control issues.) When Zach and Maddie end up at her place afterward, things get a bit steamy until . . .

Zach closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. Lord, give me strength. “I don’t have a condom.”

“You don’t have a condom?” Maddie repeated as though he’d said he’d forgotten to bring his balls.

“Hey! I thought I was going to church with Jake and Rachel," Zach said. "Somehow it seems like God might doubt my sincerity if I start packing condoms to church!”

Thanks for stopping by, and I love it when you comment.


Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.

If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.

If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.

Six Sentence Sunday - A Knight in Cowboy Boots #3

Since A Knight in Cowboy Boots will be released soon, I thought it would be a good thing to continue sharing snippets from it so you can decide if you'll like it. Hopefully, you'll be intrigued because I can't imagine anything finer than sharing these characters with readers.


This is fairly self explanatory. Zach's family is in the business of breeding rodeo bulls, so he needs to check out a bull they're thinking about buying. He wants Maddie to go with him. So okay. I snuck in a couple of extra (short) sentences. We'll all pretend we didn't notice, right? And yes, that is a sexual innuendo.

“I’m thinking I oughta go to the Gladewater rodeo this week. I gotta make a decision about a bull. Since you ain’t seen a Texas rodeo, why don’t you and Jesse come with me?”

“Because everything is bigger and better in Texas?”

Zach wagged his eyebrows and smiled suggestively. “Ain’t I already proved that?”

Maddie laughed. “The evidence has been persuasive.”

A Knight in Cowboy Boots will be available in August. (Did I mention that already? Don't worry. I'll mention it again when the time is right.)




Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.


If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.


If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.

Six Sentence Sunday - Knight in Cowboy Boots #2

After a brief hiatus, I'm back with Six Sentence Sunday.

In my initial SSS post, I lamented about the challenge of finding six sentences that conveyed something worth anyone's time to read it. Finding that nugget seems to be getting easier. Maybe I've just figured how to recognize snippets that have possibilities. Anyway . . .

This if from A Knight in Cowboy Boots due to be released from Pink Petal Books in August. I should have a cover next month. So Excited. And a little nervous though I don't know why. I love their covers. That's what got them considered for the short-list when I decided to epublish.

The setup is simple. After spending several months on an offshore oil rig, Zach is spending a few days in Galveston before heading home to the family ranch. The woman he's just met intrigues him enough that he wants to stay a few extra days. He's just called home to tell his old-fashioned mother that he's going to be arriving later than anticipated.

“Have you met a woman?” Her tone was suspicious.

Zach closed his eyes and groaned silently. In his mamma’s eyes, nothing but a good paying job or a woman would keep one of her boys away from the ranch. And since he was in the city, undoubtedly, she would be a woman of loose moral character. Exactly the kind of woman her sons appreciated far more than their mamma did.

Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.

If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.

If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.

Six Sentence Sunday

    I'm trying something new. It's called Six Sentence Sunday. Basically, the Six Sentence project is a bunch of writers who, on Sunday, post six sentences from something they've written. Six sentences aren't much so it's a bit challenging finding six sentences that are sufficient enough to convey something significant.

What I've picked out for my first venture is six sentences from my story of Maddie and Zac,  A Knight in Cowboy Boots (now contracted to Pink Petal Publishing) and it occurs shortly after they meet in a hotel bar in Galveston where Maddie is considering applying for work as a bartender. From the first moment, they flirt heavily.

      His lips brushed hers lightly. 

      “My daddy says sometimes it’s better to ask for forgiveness than for permission.”

      “Does he?” Maddie forced out.

      “Oh, yeah.” His tone was heartfelt. “And I think I may need a passel of forgivin’,” he said just before he kissed her again.

 


Did I mention this is a romance? (Like you couldn't figure that out.) 

It was interesting, looking for six sentences to post. I kept thinking, "Oh, this is a fun scene. I'll pull something from this," only to realize as I read it that any sample that would interest readers would be considerably longer than six sentences. 

This might be a result of my voice. I like understatement. Once the story progresses enough that the reader knows my characters, I like to have them make subtle gestures that signify emotion. Having read from the start, the reader will know how to interpret the gesture (if I've done my job right). Of necessity, a six sentence sampler doesn't have the advantage of that history. It's like walking in on the middle of a conversation.

I'll try this for a few weeks . . . or until I can't find six sentences that have a hope of giving you a picture of what my writing promises. Or until you tell me it's too painful and ask me to stop.

Other six sentence excerpts of mine can be found here.  

If you want to see more Six Sentence samples, go here for the list of this week's participants.

 If you want to participate in the future, here's a FAQ.