Pricing Changes

I am in the middle of making a TON of pricing changes on my books.

The following stories are coming off of Amazon (you can still get various formats via Smashwords) because they are being offered FREE now:

* Castles in the Sand
* Cup of Josie
* Exposed -- if you haven't read this one, it is one of my FAVORITES of my short shorts!
* Just A Nibble vol 1 and 2
* Just A Taste vol 1 and 2
* Longing For You
* Love Among the Stars
* Nine Ball, Corner Pocket
* Paradise Valley
* Spankology 101
* Their Harem Girl
* Wandering Where Led

I have also discounted almost all of my stand alone stories (like Her Majesty's Maiden, All Alone in the Night), Private Eyes, and even my short-short story collections to $0.99 (it might take Amazon a couple of days for the price change over).

This change also affects all of my Animal Attraction, Kinky Girls Do, and A Second Chance at Love stories.  So if you have been eyeing one of them - now would be the time to check them out.

New Releases ...

 DIGGIN' UP BONES

The first time around they weren't ready.  

Now star-crossed lovers get A Second Chance At Love ...

Secrets forced Alisa to push Zach away - can she handle letting him back into her life, knowing he is going to keep digging until he finds out what they are?

All Alisa wanted was to be left alone with her writings.  But the discovery of Native America bones on her property made that wish impossible.

The last man she wanted to see was back in her life, and with him Zach Bradford brought a whole lot of memories and some questions she really didn't want to answer.

Now besides digging for bones, he's digging into their past as well, searching for answers to why she broke up with him suddenly, two years ago.  And Alisa has to decide if she is going to keep living in the past, or if she's going to let it go and reach for a possible future with Zach.  The future she should have had.

Includes the short vignette: Writing of Love

Word Count: Novella

Sexuality: M/F

All Romance eBooks   *   Smashwords   *   Amazon

* * *

BLOOD SLAVE

Sometime in the near future, vampires have been found to exist and have been hunted down and systematically infected with a virus that causes them to lose their sight. But they have found a way around it, through the use of blood slaves.

Where The Blind Leads: Brandon is one of those possible slaves, and if his interview goes right, he will become his master's new eyes, food supply, and lover. After his master is done whipping him and testing his sexual abilities.

Leading The Blind: Nicholas used to be one of those slaves, but through the slow infection of the virus, he has been turned. Now he is facing a future he knows nothing about--dominating another. His old master decides to step in a find a new master for Nicholas, a mortal man who is not only willing to dominate a blind vampire, but also to be his blood slave.

Word Count: Novelette

Sexuality: M/M

Content Warning: D/s, BDSM, vampire blood play

All Romance eBooks   *   Smashwords

* * *

PARALLEL ATTRACTION

Anna-Marie Dallas is having a bad day. She's in a hostage situation where the odds aren't in her favor. When the gunman detonates the bomb he's been threatening, her fears are realized--she' s going to die.

Instead of waking up in the hereafter, she finds herself in a parallel reality, that split off sometime during the second world war. In the alternate universe, a third world war decimated their population, and they're struggling to rebuild. Adjusting to the shift in reality, Anna-Marie also struggles with her growing attraction to Alex Brent, and finds that her life is not done changing.

Word Count: Novelette

Sexuality: M/F

All Romance eBooks     *     Smashwords     *     Amazon

New Review for Parallel Attraction

The Romance Studio has recently reviewed PARALLEL ATTRACTION and rated it 5 Hearts.

Here's what they had to say ...

"Michelle Houston crafts this tale well. It's almost like a hopeful "what if" scenario as well as a love story. What if a third world war wiped out over ninety per cent of the population? Would it be a world like she paints where people have learned from their mistakes and seem calmer, more able to be cognizant of how actions in the present can shape the future? For Anna-Marie it seems to be a world where she can finally let herself feel and show emotion rather than hiding behind numbers and formulas. Ms. Houston builds a sweet sense of the possibilities that may result from the world destroying itself and starting over again."

Read the full review at:
http://theromancestudio.com/reviews/reviews/parallelattractionhouston.htm

New Reviews -- Whoohoo!

Part of the voting for Parallel Attraction that is being done at Whipped Cream Reviews is based on the review that they did. Ergo, I have a new review of Parallel Attraction to share. : )

"This book starts with a bang, literally -- beginning with a hostage situation and a bomb detonating and then, Anna-Marie finds that she hasn't died, but has instead awakened over the rainbow. Okay, not really, but that is how she feels. Alex Brent is beside her bed when she wakes and tells her a story of the String Theory, World War III, and genetics. Anna has sworn to kiss the first first available male she comes across, and Alex looks really fine despite the fact he is very possibly crazy.
I enjoyed the love story as it developed. It is a simple but sweet story of two lonely people who cross universes to find each other. " ~ Hibiscus for Whipped Cream Reviews

__________

I also receieved word today of another new review, this one for A Change of Pace.

"A Change of Pace is a fast paced short story. Michelle Houston did an excellent job of loading the 21 pages of this story with a lot of emotion and passion between Nicole and Alan. I could relate to Nicole and her despair over her life and the direction it has taken. It was heartwarming to read of the rekindling of an attraction long lost between Alan and Nicole. If you are looking for a short read loaded with passion to heat you up for bedtime, I highly recommend this book!" ~ Melissa for Fallen Angel Reviews

Vote for Parallel Attraction

PARALLEL ATTRACTION is up for Book of the Week at Whipped Cream Reviews.

Voting is tomorrow (Saturday) at www.longandshortreviews.com/WC/recentrev.htm

There also look to be a lot of wonderful books up the award, so I'd like to encourage you all to go and vote - even if it's not for my book.

Although, I will admit, I would love to win. I have never been up for anything like this before. : )

Michelle Houston
www.michellehouston.com

New Review: Parallel Attraction

Just got the email about a new review for Parallel Attraction.

"Parallel Attraction is a captivating science-fiction romance." ... "This story is interesting and hot but it also made me think. I enjoyed this novel a lot and I hope there is a sequel. " ~ Chrissie, for Coffee Time Romance Reviews

You can check out the full review at: http://www.coffeetimeromance.com/BookReviews/Parallelattraction.html

New Review: Parallel Attraction/The Story Behind The Story

Manic Readers has reviewed another of my recent titles. This time it was PARALLEL ATTRACTION - which came out March 10th from Phaze.

Julia C had this to say about Parallel Attraction:

At 28 years old, Anna-Marie Dallas was sure she had a long life ahead of her-until she ended up as a hostage during an armed bank robbery. Things go from bad to much worse when she sees the gunman press the detonator on the bomb he's holding. Imagine her surprise when, instead of death, she's confronted with a gorgeous green-eyed blonde doctor, tending her in a hospital room. Unfortunately, she decides he must be one of the inmates instead of a doctor, when he tells her she was pulled out of the bank explosion into an alternate reality, because she has psychic genes!

In Alex Brent's reality, a third world war decimated the population, and they're trying to rebuild. They are accomplishing that, in part, because they can access Anna-Marie's world, identify likely candidates, and bring them over during disasters - like the bank robbery. Now Anna-Marie must adjust to a new world, a new life - and a new chance for love.

Going into this story, I expected more of a 'science fiction' feel, due to the alternate reality premise. But this is really a fairly straight forward romance, albeit with an unusual setting. Anna-Marie;s transportation to another realm really functions as the means to unite her with Alex, as opposed to playing a major role in the story itself. Still, the concept is interesting and the characters are likeable, and I'm always a sucker for an HEA.

Parallel Attraction has a science fiction / alternate reality background, but it serves mostly as that - background. The action is simple, the story progresses with sureness through the initial threat, and the adjustment to a new reality, to reach a satisfying conclusion. While it doesn't deliver any great surprises, it does provide the reader with an entertaining and enjoyable tale inhabited by warm, likeable people.

http://manicreaders.com/index.cfm?disp=reviews&bookid=153

I am SO glad that the reviewer got this story - and liked it. I do understand that deeper sci fi elements might be expected, but when it comes to things like String Theory (alternate realities) and electrons moving among them, matter existing simultaniously in muliple places, etc I worried that the romance would get lost in the techno-babble. And as my husband says - I can techno-babble with the best of them. LOL So that was a decision I had to make early on - how much of the science of it did I want to add. As a biology major I could add a lot, especially since I am also taking classes in chemistry, physics and earth science. But if I did, would the romance still dominate?

The idea for the book was started by my watching a show on String Theory. I am fascinated by it, and knew it deserved at least one story, if not more. But how was I going to make it so that they needed to pull people across them. I didn't want her to just "wind up there". I wanted it to be deliberate, since I already had an idea for a second story. The idea came to me for that based on a set of stories I had just finished writting not to long before - the stories in Celtic Love Knots volume 8 (from Whiskey Creek Press Torrid). I dealt with Sidhe folklore in them, and with my LOVE of psychic/paranormal stories (and my own Scotch-Irish ancestry), it wasn't a leap to have a gene unique to Scotch-Irish descendants that when activated resulted in psychic abilities.

Then running through scenarios and knowing some about human nature, it wasn't a leap to deduce if psychic abilities existed, there would be those who viewed them as a threat. Thus - war would eventually result. In this case, it needed to be big, so a world war took place. Their population is decimated as a result.

That's where the elements of both the psychic gene (the Sidhe genes) and the alternate realities come together. I didn't go in to detail about how it plays in - but basically a mutation in the gene structure gave them something unique to search for. It was also the same gene that was mutated in them by the medicines they created to eradicate disease wound up awakening psychic talents.

Genetics has always fascinated me. How one slight addition/deletion in a sequence of billions of nucleotide bases can change so much about a person, including resulting in a terminal in-utero situation. How one slight change in which base fits which spot can result in a mutation, and thus an evolution if it is continued on, adding more changes with each generation.

But like I said, I didn't want to go too much in to that, because I understand that not all readers have a love of science and/or an understanding of it. So I kept it light, and focused on the romance.

Knowing that the characters were found to be likable and warm, the story found to reach a satifying conclusion, I'm sure that I made the right choice.

Just Released: Parallel Attraction

Whoohoo! PARALLEL ATTRACTION is now available for purchase at: http://www.king-cart.com/Phaze/product=Parallel+Attraction+by+Michelle+Houston.

It's the first in a series of stories set in an alternate reality. I still have to come up with a title for the series, but I am thinking of calling it "What If ...".

Anna-Marie Dallas is having a bad day. She's in a hostage situation where the odds aren't in her favor. When the gunman detonates the bomb he's been threatening, her fears are realized--she' s going to die.

Instead of waking up in the hereafter, she finds herself in a parallel reality, that split off sometime during the second world war. In the alternate universe, a third world war decimated their population, and they're struggling to rebuild.

Adjusting to the shift in reality, Anna-Marie also struggles with her growing attraction to Alex Brent, and finds that her life is not done changing.

The first review has come in, and in case you missed the post about it, is was a good one. You can check it out at: http://literarynymphsreviewsonly.blogspot.com/2008/02/parallel-attraction.html

If you have any suggestions for a series title, feel free to suggest it.

New Review: Parallel Attraction

Whoohoo! The first review for PARALLEL ATTRACTION (my upcoming March release from Phaze) is in, and the reviewer loved it!

You can read the review here:
http://literarynymphsreviewsonly.blogspot.com/2008/02/parallel-attraction.html

New Cover Art: Parallel Attraction

I received the cover art today for the first in what I am hoping will be a series of alternate reality stories.


Parallel Attraction is scheduled for a March 2008 release from Phaze.

Anna-Marie Dallas is having a bad day. She's in a hostage situation where the odds aren't in her favor. When the gunman detonates the bomb he's been threatening, her fears are realized--she' s going to die.

Instead of waking up in the hereafter, she finds herself in a parallel reality, that split off sometime during the second world war. In the alternate universe, a third world war decimated their population, and they're struggling to rebuild.

Adjusting to the shift in reality, Anna-Marie also struggles with her growing attraction to Alex Brent, and finds that her life is not done changing.