Angel’s Guilty Pleasures

Hello and Welcome All!

Today I’m very lucky to be interviewing Christi Barth author of Bad For Her.

…and I’m very lucky to be here. Thanks for letting me chat about my book!

What do you do when you are not writing?

Hahahahaha. Not writing? What is this concept of which you speak? I adore cooking. Big, complicated, multi-course meals and reading cookbooks for fun. (Before you ask, my husband does all the dishes.) 

What was your best read of the month?

I just finished In A Dark, Dark Wood by Ruth Ware – a completely twisty mystery that I couldn’t figure out at all, so it was great! But back here in Romance Land, it’d be Blood Guard by Megan Erickson – a whole new vampire world. Wait – can I do three? The Wedding Date Bargain by Mira Lynn Kelly – a super fun contemporary.

Of course you can do three. We readers like verity and options when it comes to picking our our books….

 

What types of scenes are your most favorite to write?

Witty, hysterical banter. Whether sexy/flirty between the hero/heroine, or laugh-out-loud funny between best friends/bromance. So. Much. FUN!

If you could have dinner with any three authors (alive or dead, who would you choose and why?

Agatha Christie, to find out what really happened when she disappeared for 11 days; Brad Meltzer, because I think he knows a ton of secrets that I’d worm out of him about D.C. and the Masons; and Ernest Hemingway (whose books I can’t stand) because I think he’d be an amazing dinner companion. 

If you could swap lives with the heroine of any romance book, which book would you choose? 

Hmmm – it is always a toss up between being royalty and being magical…. Mia Devlin, from Face the Fire, in Nora Roberts’ Three Sisters trilogy – because she has kick ass powers and runs a bookstore!

 

A LOOK INTO BAD FOR HER

Please share the opening lines of Bad For Her….

Ronan Connolly had a talent for sizing up the mood in a room. More than once, hell, more times than the thirty-one years under his belt, it had saved his life. Because when you worked for the Chicago mob, sometimes all the heads-up you got that a situation was going south was a squinted eye or a tightened mouth.

Is anything in the book based on real life experiences or purely all imagination?

I will freely admit that I’ve never had sex on a forest floor—or been in the mob—so this one is 100% pure imagination. But when I wrote my wedding planning Aisle Bound series, there were several true-life experiences in there (with the names changed to protect the happily married). 

Tell us all about your main characters — Who are they? What makes them tick? 

Rafe Maguire (at least, that’s his name now that the WITSEC program has changed it five times) lives and dies for his family. Specifically, his two brothers. He’s given up his entire life—literally—to keep them safe. He used to be the Chicago mob’s fixer. Money, women, power, all his. Now Rafe’s an auto mechanic in a beach town the size of a sneeze, trying to lay low. And trying desperately not to fall for a gorgeous doctor who makes him almost want to second-guess this life of lies he’s building.

Doctor Mollie Vickers loves her small town—she just doesn’t want to date anyone in it who already knows her too well. So she’s thrilled to meet a handsome stranger on the side of the road. Especially one who doesn’t want a relationship, either. Her plate’s full already, living with a pot-selling grandmother and a juvenile delinquent nephew. Rafe’s the perfect guy to laugh with and do all sorts of rated R activities with…as long as she can resist falling for his big heart…

The main couples first kiss…

Ha! I took a risk with this one – especially since it is in the first chapter and would make editors decide whether or not to buy the series. It’s…um…on the side of the road. Rafe stops to help Mollie change her tire, they flirt outrageously, and he goes for it.

Rafe moved to cage her against the car with his arms. They weren’t touching anywhere, but he hadn’t left room between for daylight to pass. “How good you are. Better yet, how bad you are.”

Then he waited. Didn’t move a muscle. Because it needed to be Mollie’s choice. Mostly because they were on the side of a semi-deserted highway. The sun—or Oregon’s pale version of it—was streaming down from overhead, and they were still on the blacktop. Rafe knew, though, that it could be seen as a potentially risky situation. He didn’t want her to feel pressured or scared. He just wanted to keep having fun with her.

But he’d read all the signals right and didn’t have to wait long.

“Stop flirting. Start doing,” she ordered. And then Mollie crooked her leg around his calf in an invitation about as subtle as a gun to the head.

Please share a few fun facts about this book…

• A piece of the series arc is the town’s Cranberry Festival (lots of small town hoopla that you know my big city ex-mobsters just don’t understand), and it is real! I was thrilled to discover – accidentally – that this is a big deal in Bandon, OR.
• It is not easy to come up with detailed information on protectees in the WITSEC program, even for someone with my advanced level of Googling. (Way to go, U.S. Marshals – your secrets are safe!) But for a fascinating read about how it started (it only began officially in 1971!) check out WITSEC: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program, by the founder of the program. I’d hoped for inside details, but I’m not sad with the origin story instead.
• If there was video of me, in my office chair, trying to figure out the exact logistics of sex in a hospital bed with all of its movable parts, I guarantee you would die laughing. I also guarantee that no such video exists. 
• I gave my heroine a male BFF. Why? Because I went to junior high in a school that was all boys until the year I joined. The ratio was 45 boys to 6 girls that first year (and it didn’t increase much over the next two) and I discovered just how awesome it is to hang with guys – no flirting, just friendships. Men are terrific! 

 

Thank you very much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to take part in this interview.

 

USA Today bestselling author Christi Barth launches a sexy new series about three bad-boy brothers in Witness Protection who are about to learn that going good is harder than they thought…

Doctor Mollie Vickers loves the tight-knit community of her tiny Oregon town. But she’s not a fan of the limited dating options. Sleep with a guy who tried to copy off her in junior high? Pass. Mollie’s sex life is flatlining… until a deliciously handsome man she’s never seen before stops to help her fix a flat tire.

As an ex-mobster, Rafe Maguire’s no saint. But he’s trying to turn over a new leaf. Although he probably shouldn’t kiss the hot doctor on the side of the highway. Or suggest a no-strings fling with a woman he has no business pursuing. Rafe’s life is too complicated for love—his new WITSEC-provided identity doesn’t fit him at all and there’s a U.S. Marshal watching his every move. He can’t tell Mollie the truth… but their chemistry is scorching and being good doesn’t mean he can’t be a little bad.

Mollie can’t resist the guy who looks rough, talks tough, and is loyal to the bone. But it’s obvious Rafe is keeping secrets. When the truth comes out, Mollie must decide if she could ever love an ex-mobster… or if this bad boy has truly gone good.

Purchase at: Amazon – B&N – iBooks – Kobo 

 

 

 

 

USA TODAY bestselling author Christi Barth earned a Masters degree in vocal performance and embarked upon a career on the stage. A love of romance then drew her to wedding planning. Ultimately she succumbed to her lifelong love of books and now writes award-winning contemporary romance, including the Naked Men and Aisle Bound series. 

Christi can always be found either whipping up gourmet meals (for fun, honest!) or with her nose in a book. She lives in Maryland with the best husband in the world.

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