It's weekend, and time for more Rainbow Snippets. The Rainbow Snippets group on Facebook asks its members to share six sentence snippets from their work each weekend. Check out the group's Facebook page to read all the snippets and add lots of great books to your TBR. You'll find all sorts of books with the common thread that the main character identifies as LGBTQ+.

For the first Rainbow Snippet of 2019, I thought I'd share something from A Harmony of Fire and Earth, which is currently with the copy editor and set to be released by NineStar in March. I shared a snippet a couple of months ago, and this one takes place not long after it. Rhys and his sister Briallen have joined Gaz and Meraud, and they're talking about Rhys and Briallen's travels and wanting to get home before the winter snows strand them somewhere.

More about A Harmony of Fire and Earth soon, but if you'd like to know more about the first book in the Elemental Magicae series in the meantime, you can fine it here. Thanks for reading!

In December, I generally throw myself into reading and rereading holiday stories. This December was no different. I mentioned a few in a holiday reading recommendations post last month, but here are others that I read for the first time this month.

Mr. Winterbourne's Christmas by Joanna Chambers: This was a lovely follow up to Introducing Mr. Winterbourne, a novella I'd hoped the author would revisit since I first read it. Read that first and then jump into the Christmas story, which gives the couple their sold HEA.

Santa Daddy by Keira Andrews: A light, age gap Christmas romance with some kink. It also has a grumpy guy who has to dress up as Santa.

Mr. Frosty Pants by Leta Blake: Perhaps slightly more angsty than I usually like in my holiday romances, but it was still an enjoyable romance between two estranged friends.

Christmas Angel by Eli Easton: This book is the first book in the Christmas Angel series, standalone books written by different authors and connected by the magical angel ornament. I only read a few of them, but this one and The Magician's Angel by Jordan L. Hawk are the two I enjoyed the most.

Love Around the Corner by Sally Malcolm: This was a sweet romance that managed to be both friends to lovers and sort of enemies to lovers with the same couple. Two men become friends and fall for each other online while talking books, but don't like each other in real life. 

Gaudete by Amy Rae Durresson: I'd somehow managed to miss this Christmas romance, though I love the author's others. This one was no different. It was a beautifully written story of a second chance between two men who'd been friends years earlier.

Merry Inkmas by Talia Hibbert: Everyone has been talking about Hibbert's books for ages, and I finally read one! I enjoyed this story between two good people with very real baggage.

Love Blooms by Stephanie Hoyt: A cute fantasy about Santa's son, who has to fall in love and be loved in return by his 30th birthday in order to be eligible to be Santa one day.

Color of You by CS Poe: Romance between the bowtie-wearing new high school music teacher and the older parent of one of his students who owns an apple orchard/Christmas tree farm. There's some insta-crush turning into insta-love here, but it was really sweet.


I also like to do a list of my favorite reads for the year. 2018 was a strange year for me with reading (and with everything else—last year was rough). I read a lot of books, but many of them were rereads and some didn't quite work for me—I found myself not able to get into a lot books. Also, last January feels like a hundred years ago, so it was tough even remembering what I read early this year. Here are some favorites that I read for the first time last year, though they might not have been written in 2018.

Band Sinister by KJ Charles
Unmasked by the Marquess by Cat Sebastian
Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust
The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee
Balefire by Jordan L Hawk
A Gentleman Never Keeps Score by Cat Sebastian
Salt Magic, Skin Magic by Lee Welch
The Wolf at Bay by Charlie Adhara
How to Bang a Billionaire by Alexis Hall
Wild Beauty by Anna-Marie McLemore
If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo
The Queen of Ieflaria by Effie Calvin
Caroline's Heart by Austin Chant
The Doctor's Discretion by EE Ottoman
Breathless by Beverly Jenkins

What were your favorite 2018 reads?

Happyy New Year, my dears! I've been trying to think of something profound to say, and I don't think I've managed that at all. 2018 was a difficult year for many of us. The world has felt as if it's burning down around us, and last January feels as if it was eighty years ago. For me, personally and professionally, the year had its ups and downs, and I'm trying not to dwell as much on the bad parts and the losses right now, trying to start the new year with hope and optimism. 

2018 saw two of my books published. I love and am so proud of The Merchant's Love and A Dance of Water and Air, and I'm so happy they're out in the world where you can enjoy them too. These stories and characters have a special place in my heart. I also wrote two books, though for a while I wasn't sure I would ever finish the second. Writing was difficult the second half of the year, maybe the whole year. But, A Harmony of Fire and Earth, the sequel to A Dance of Water and Air, and The Spymaster's Secret, the next book in the Tournai series, were both finished somehow. Harmony is already in edits and should be out in March. I submitted The Spymaster's Secret to NineStar just before Christmas. I took a writing break after that, to clear my head and clean the house and get ready for the holidays, but it's time to start writing again—and it's felt very strange not to be writing for so long! I have a contemporary royalty romance on my agenda and also Tournai 8, which is Griffin's book (with more dragons). We'll see what happens from there. I'd love to write more this year...I have far too many ideas that want to be written.

Sometimes I feel like the accomplishment is that we survived 2018 with our sanity mostly intact. I hope 2019 is a better year for everyone, that it's kind to us all, that it brings health and happiness and love and wonderful new books to read and so many good things. That's my new year's wish for all of us.