For fun, I decided to knit the Regency scarf that Gerard, my hero, gives to my heroine in my Christmas short novel, The Spinster's Christmas . I can’t remember if I posted the finished scarf on my blog, including any changes I made to the pattern, so here it is. I chose A Gentleman’s Comforter from The Ladies’ Knitting and Netting Book, First Series by Miss Watts, originally published in 1837. You can download the .pdf of the Fifth Edition, with additions, which was published in 1840 . I’m pretty sure this pattern was in use in the Regency, because most patterns had been passed down by word of mouth long before they were published. So Jane Austen could have gotten this pattern from a friend or family member and used it when making a scarf for her father. :) Here’s the original pattern: I wasn't entirely certain what “coarse steel needles” and “5 skeins of fine wool yarn” mean, so I just guessed. I used US 1 needles and fingering weight wool yarn, but you could use a

I’m over at Team Love on the Run talking a bit more about my hero, Clay, from Gone Missing . He’s a bit close to my heart for several reasons. :)

Yes, anime again. :) I’ve been watching a lot of anime lately, although this one I saw a while ago. It’s called Kyoukai no Kanata or Beyond the Boundary . I loved it so much that I bought it on iTunes . It’s a supernatural humorous romance adventure, which really just hit me in all the right places. Each character has some type of hangup, including some weird perverted ones which the show makes fun of, but which are a bit weird for my American-cultured background. But aside from that, the action and adventure is really entertaining. And the heroine’s sense of being alone, mirrored in the hero in a different way, really resonates with me because I’ve felt that way. I found this AMV video on YouTube, and it just really expresses the tragic/humorous romance of the two characters, Mirai and Akihito. It may not make sense if you haven’t seen the anime show, but it’s still a great AMV.

I’m over at the Suspense Sisters blog talking a bit more about my heroine, Joslyn, from her introduction as a minor character in Treacherous Intent to her love story in Gone Missing .

To celebrate the release of my latest romantic suspense, Gone Missing , I’m giving an interview over at the Suspense Sisters blog . You might learn something weird about me. :)

Photo credit: lalalime.blogspot.com I was over at ChristiansRead.com today talking about the chapter on prayer that I read for my Bible study group on Friday. It’s made me more hopeful about improving my prayer life, and I’m taking prayer requests, too! How can I pray for you?

My latest romantic suspense, Gone Missing , releases this month! Some of you may have already seen the book in your local stores. I'm super excited about this book, and to celebrate its release, I'm giving away 3 copies to 3 lucky winners (US only, sorry) at the Suspense Sisters blog .

I admit I’m on the fence about the TV show, The Blacklist . On one hand, I absolutely LOVE James Spader. He has such a presence on screen that’s really exciting to watch. On the other hand, the writers have a lot of little things that bother me, some “too stupid to live” moments. Every so often I’ll get so disgusted that I threaten to Captain Caffeine that I’m going to stop watching it … and then the show has some neat twist and I want to keep watching. So like an idiot, I keep watching. There was a prediction I made at the end of Season 1, but Captain Caffeine said I should blog about it and put it out there. So here goes. The man everyone thinks is Red Reddington is not Red Reddington. Let’s call him Mr. X. He’s Lizzie’s father. The story about the real Red Reddington was that he was an officer who suddenly disappeared one day, then turned up 4 years later as a criminal. The real Red Reddington died or was killed. Mr. X assumed Red’s identity and resurfaced 4 years after t

I watched this Japanese anime show on Netflix called Psycho-Pass , and I have to say, I think it’s my favorite one so far. The story premise is a futuristic, isolated Japan which is ruled by the Sybil system, which is a massive computer that can scan and calculate a person’s potential to commit crimes. People who have a high criminal potential become second-class citizens because of their psychological imbalance, called “latent criminals.” But some latent criminals with a good aptitude become secondary detectives in the police force. Their sociopathy comes in handy when apprehending other criminals in society who have already committed crimes. It enables their inspector superiors to keep their criminal potential lower since the latent criminals are the ones who do most of the violent work in capturing or eliminating the criminals. The Sybil system has created a utopian society that has not been exposed to much violence or crime, but this lack of moderate stress in their lives make