Very BAD boys

Let's face it, bad boys have an irresistible allure. We love to read about them and see how love transforms them. But my good friend, Jay Crownover, pointed out that her Marked Men boys are labeled bad boys just because they have tattoos and get around. I think that's the "bad" comfort zone for a lot of us. We could imagine ourselves with a tattooed bad boy.

But could we ever picture ourselves with an actual bad boy--a boy who was seriously bad? Like, criminal bad?

I've always thought those women who start writing to serial killers on death row needed psychological intervention, but I've found myself taken in by two boys who are seriously bad over the last few months.
One is Shane Baxter, or Bax, as he's known on the street. He is Jay Crownover's boy in the upcoming BETTER WHEN HE'S BAD, that releases one week from today. If you've followed this blog at all, you know Jay's boys do it for me, and Rule is one of two boys (along with Gayle Forman's Adam Wilde) who ruined me for all other fictional boys. But I will tell you, Bax is right up there. I might have to make room for all three in my heart. We meet Bax on the day he's released from prison, and immediately I was smitten with him. He's basically made the best of a bad situation, and he makes no apologies for what he's done (or is yet to do). This is one bad boy you will definitely want to get to know.

Another is by my bud, Katy Evans. His name is Greyson King, and you get to meet him in her upcoming ROGUE. (Releasing July 29th.) I will tell you right up front that this boy has a truly black heart. He kills people, plain and simple. He does it in the course of the novel and he's not even conflicted about it. But he's just so damn hot you can't help but fall in love with him right along with Melanie. As bad as he is, I found myself instantly taken by him, and you will too.

Click on the covers to pre-order, because I swear to God, you want to.

Wow *deep breath*

I'm taking a second, now that A LITTLE TOO HOT is out in the world, to reflect back on the last year. It was one year ago last Friday, January 17th, that I woke up with Lexie in my head. She told me she thought she might be in love with her stepbrother, Trent. I grabbed my laptop and started typing, and by that night I had the first 10K words of A LITTLE TO FAR. A couple of days later, I shot my omnipotent uber-agent an email with the pitch and asked her if NA was a thing now. (She'd always said it wasn't, but she'd just sold Cora Carmack's LOSING IT to Harper the month before.) She emailed me back and said it was a thing, but that it was still a tough sale. I sent her the first 80 pages of ALTF, which she read and loved, and we agreed to try to sub it. A week later, I'd finished the first draft. We took a few weeks to clean it up, then subbed to editors. It went to my lovely editor at HarperCollins on Friday and on Tuesday we were speaking on the phone. By Thursday we had a pre-empt we were happy with and I had a crazy deadline schedule for the next two books in the series. And that was my year.

So, I find it sort of karmic that the final book in the series would publish exactly one year from when I sent the first feeler to my agent about the idea--a year and four days after I first opened a clean Word doc and started writing Lexie's story. It's been sort of a fairy tale year, and I've met so many awesome readers and fabulous authors--people who have turned into some of my closest friends. (I'm looking at you, Jay and Katy!)

It hasn't always been easy, but it's been wild in the best possible way. It's a ride that I wish could have lasted forever, but instead of looking back, I'm looking forward.

When I wrote A LITTLE TOO FAR, it was in the two weeks that my agent had a new young adult novel that I'd written in December. We put that on the back burner when things started happening with A LITTLE TOO FAR, but I finally had a chance to go back and clean that up before Christmas, and I'm hoping for good things there. I also have some fun new adult ideas knocking around in my head that I'm looking forward to getting on paper, so to speak, in the next few months. I've contributed to a really cool anthology coming out next month, FIFTY FIRST TIMES, with Jennifer L. Armentrout, Molly McAdams, Sophie Jordan and a whole bunch more of us. So, there's not much chance I'll stop writing. But...I will slow down a little. Life got a little crazy in the last half of last year, so I'm taking some time to enjoy my family and just breathe.

Thanks to all you readers who have been along for the ride. You're the reason I love my job. The notes and Tweets make all the insanity worth it. You are the absolute best! xxoxoxoox

The 20 Days of Alessandro Man Candy Holiday Celebration, Day 14 (and OMG Katy Evans blurbed A LITTLE TOO HOT!)

So, honestly, I have no idea if it mean anything to readers at all when an author gives a book a blurb. But I've got one that's going on the front cover of A LITTLE TOO HOT. Here's what it says:

“Every page is deliciously breathtaking, wickedly sexy and sensational. A LITTLE TOO HOT is wonderfully unique and a LOT HOT! I am a HUGE Lisa Desrochers fan.”
   — Katy Evans, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of REAL, MINE, and REMY

This makes me ecstatically happy because I love Katy and her Remy to death! As does this:

“Lisa is brilliant at creating sizzling sexual tension and impossible circumstances that make the reader hold their breath all the way to happy ever after. Sam and Harrison are more than A Little Too Hot, they are scorching!"
   — Jay Crownover, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of RULE, JET, and ROME

If you've followed this blog at all, you know what a HUGE fangirl I am of Jay. Rule Archer will forever be my co-favorite book boy. (Along with Adam Wilde from WHERE SHE WENT.) To have these amazing authors say such incredible things about A LITTLE TOO HOT puts a smile on my face that will not be fading anytime soon. But that's not all, because there's also this:

“Lisa Desrochers’ best yet! A LITTLE TOO HOT is hotter than hot with all the emotional punch to back it up!”
   — Sophie Jordan, USA Today bestselling author

Sophie is an awesome person and author, and I loved her FOREPLAY so much, I blurbed it!

So, that all makes today's Alessandro Man Candy just a little bit sweeter! And a BONUS is that A LITTLE TOO MUCH just went on sale for only $1.99!!! That means you can have my beautiful French-Italian-American boy for less that two bucks!

I've so loved putting together all the Holiday Man Candy for you, and there's still more to come. Six more days to be exact! So keep checking back!