Blog Tour Stop: Talking Dirty With the Player by Jackie Ashenden

Please welcome Jackie on her blog tour stop for Talking Dirty with the Player. We're talking cristicim and deep dark secrets! Be sure to comment as Jackie will be awarding a digital copy of Talking Dirty to the CEO and a $50 Amazon GC to a randomly drawn commenter during the the tour.

 Interview

What is your name and where do you live now?

Jackie Ashenden and I live in Auckland, New Zealand.

First off, how has your week been?

My week has been busy! I have a novella to write, a book to edit, blog posts to finish, and two kids and a husband to wrangle.

Sounds just like my week! So tell us about your latest book, and if you had to summarise it what would you say?

My latest book is Talking Dirty with the Player. And it's about a photographer who has just got the world to her liking when her best friend's older brother – and the man who broke her heart – comes barging back into it again. She hates rugby and game-playing of all kinds, and he's…well, he's a player and he wants to play with her. Again. ;-)

Yum, rugby players... sorry you lost me for a moment there! Is anything in your book based on real life experiences or purely all imagination?

Well, I'd love to say I had a superhot rugby player taking his shirt off in my photographic studio but sadly not. It's all imagination. Except for the old cinema where the bachelor auction thing takes place. That's based on a real cinema called the Civic which is in downtown Auckland.

Damn, but what an imagination you must have! Can I live in there for a while please? So what was your favourite chapter to write and why?

It's a toss up between the first – because I love writing banter, especially when the banterees involve don't like each other. Or the chapter where they get it on, because, well…sexytimes! Who doesn't love writing that? 

I agree sexy times and banter is so much fun! Now where it came to publishing, did you have any say in the title / cover of your book?

I was allowed to keep the title – yes, it's my title. And I had to fill in an art sheet about my hero and heroine's appearances for the cover, plus anything else I'd like on there. I just told them I wanted sexy. And boy did they deliver!

I agree! Can you describe the feeling you had when you saw your published book for the first time?

I'm not sure I can. It took me five years to see my first published book and I'm pretty sure it was like seeing your baby for the first time. Well, okay, maybe not THAT special. But pretty amazing all the same. I cried. As you do.

What has been the toughest criticism given to you as an author? What has been the best compliment?

I like this question.  The toughest criticism was someone saying that 'magic sex cures all' about one of my books. My response to this: if you're going to have sex in a book, it had damn well better be magic sex, amiright? ;-)

My best compliment was from someone who told me that my book was an inspiration, a symbol of hope and a picture of love and strength to not let anything that happened in our lives destroy us. I cried when I read it that part. Yes, I cry a lot.

Hee hee, well us writers are an emotional bunch, but that's what makes us so awesome, right? Now what piece of advice would you give to a new writer?

Never. Ever. Give. Up.  While I was aiming for publication I wanted to give up at least 3 million times a day. But I didn't. I kept remembering this: the only authors who remain unpublished are the ones that gave up.

And finally... are you ready for this one...? Would you share a deep dark secret about you with us?

Don't tell anyone but I actually hate rugby. ;-)

Well I am shocked! :D Thanks so much for joining me today, Jackie. Readers do check out the great excerpt below.

Jackie has been writing fiction since she was eleven years old. Mild mannered fantasy/SF/pseudo-literary

writer by day, obsessive romance writer by night, she used to balance her writing with the more serious job of librarianship until a chance meeting with another romance writer prompted her to throw off the shackles of her day job and devote herself to the true love of her heart – writing romance. She particularly likes to write emotional stories with alpha heroes who've just got the world to their liking only to have it blown wide apart by their kick-ass heroines.  

She lives in Auckland, New Zealand with her husband, the inimitable Dr Jax, two kids, two cats and some guppies (possibly dead guppies by the time you read this). When she's not torturing alpha males and their stroppy heroines, she can be found drinking chocolate martinis, reading anything she can lay her hands on, posting random crap on her blog, or being forced to go mountain biking with her husband.

Twitter: @JackieAshenden

FB: http://www.facebook.com/jackie.ashenden

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6577006.Jackie_Ashenden

Website: www.jackieashenden.com

She was almost touching him now and it was all he could do to keep his hands to himself. “I don’t understand why you keep selling yourself short. You act like you’re this stupid playboy but you’re not.” She put out a hand, pressed it gently against his bare chest, and all the breath went out of him.

Her palm felt like a hot coal against his cold skin. A brand.

“Don’t,” he forced out, a bolt of pure desire shooting straight down his spine. “This can’t go anywhere, Jude. I’m not even going to be in the country for long. Once my contract with the club expires, I’ll be looking at a TV job in Australia. Understand? I’ll be leaving. For good this time. And then there’s Joseph. He’d kill me if I touch you.”

“I don’t care.” Her voice sounded faint but she didn’t remove her hand. “I don’t care about any of that. I just want to see...”

“See what?”

The blue of her eyes became lost in black as her pupils dilated. The black top she wore was stuck to her skin, outlining every delicious curve, including the hard points of her nipples. “See if the man I used to know is still in there.”

She was so beautiful. And so very close. He wanted to touch her so badly. “He’s not, darling,” he began.

She didn’t let him finish. Her hands splayed on his chest as she rose on her tiptoes and pressed her mouth to his instead.

Up-and-coming photographer Judith Ashton is pretty sure she has everything in her life under control. That is, until a blast from the past comes back to taunt her, in the shape of Caleb Steele, her older brother's best friend...and the man who broke her heart eight years ago. Their chemistry is combustible, but she's been fooled once by this player, and she's not going there again. To pro rugby player Caleb, Judith has always been his Kryptonite. But his former playboy lifestyle is the last thing she wants to be involved in. In the midst of her brother's threats to back off, and the deal of his career sending him far away from her, he knows he's playing with fire. And this is one game he's going to lose.

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