Please welcome Meg Benjamin to the blog, author of Venus in Blue Jeans, Wedding Bell Blues, and Be My Baby. Thank you for agreeing to answer my nosy questions and share them with everyone visiting today.

Q: To begin, please share which genre(s) you write in…
A: I do contemporary romance, mostly set in the Texas Hill Country. But Be My Baby, my latest, also has some mystery/thriller elements.

Q: How long did you write before you received your first contract for publication?
A: (groans) Several years. After I switched to romance from mysteries (where I had absolutely no interest from anybody), it took me two or three years to break through.

Q: Out of all the stories you’ve written, which is your favorite?
A: Ah gee, that’s hard. It’s usually whichever one I just finished, but I love them all.

Q: Do you need to be in a specific place or atmosphere before the words flow?
A: I write in my study because that’s where the computer is, but I’m not particular. I’ve written in hotel rooms and offices, and even in the car waiting for some family member to come out of wherever it was they currently were. All I really need is a quiet place—noise distracts me.

Q: What’s the strangest source of inspiration you’ve found for a story?
A: The wallpaper in a restaurant inspired the (significant) wallpaper in Docia’s bookstore in Venus in Blue Jeans. On the other hand, I was looking for some kind of hook at the time, so it may have been a little more than serendipity.

Q: If you could offer one tidbit of information for new writers, what would it be?
A: Join a critique group. You really need to have extra eyes looking at your writing, and those eyes shouldn’t belong to someone who loves you. Your mom is terrific for support, but probably not the best person to read your stuff critically. Having other writers look at your stuff is invaluable, although you have to develop the ability to separate the helpful suggestions from the ones that are based on different writing styles rather than real problems.

Q: Do you have an evil day job or do you write full time?
A: I retired from my evil day job this year. So now I write full time, when I’m not cooking, cleaning, shopping, working out at the gym, shoveling snow, etc.

Q: Name one thing readers would be surprised to learn about you.
A: I love to cook. And I love wine. Both of these loves show up a lot in my Konigsburg books because the Texas Hill Country has a lot of good food and a lot of great wineries.

Q: If you won the lottery tomorrow, what would you spend the money on?
A: Travel! I’d love to spend a lot of time going to wonderful places first class. Just rode home on a Boeing 767 and I was salivating over the seats up in the front of the plane (needless to say, I was stuck in the back).

Q: Which household chore do you abhor and why?
A: I’m lousy at cleaning the kitchen. My DH and I have a deal—I cook and he cleans up after me. That way we play to both our strengths!

Q: What’s your favorite comfort food?
A: Mashed potatoes and gravy. Not imaginative, but when you need comfort, stick to the classics I always say.

Q: Do you have a favorite book or movie?
A: More than I can count! I love Loretta Chase’s Lord of Scoundrels and Susan Elizabeth Phillips’s Dream a Little Dream and Jane Haddam’s My Bloody Valentine and Susan Smith’s The Knowledge of Water and Jennifer Crusie’s Welcome to Temptation and, well, you get the idea.

Q: If you don’t mind sharing, would you tell us about your latest work in progress?
A: I’m working on my fourth and fifth Konigsburg books, sort of simultaneously. The fourth features the fourth Toleffson brother, Erik, who becomes the Konigsburg chief of police, falls in love with a winery manager, and has to fight off the nasty mayor’s attempts to get him fired. Number five is my first non-Toleffson. The heroine is Docia’s cousin Deirdre, who’s striking out on her own by working as a barmaid while she opens her own coffee shop. The hero is Tom Ames, who owns the bar. Tom shows up in Erik’s book.

Q: In closing, tell us a bit about your latest release (& share a yummy excerpt for those who aren’t yet familiar with your work)
A: Be My Baby is my third Konigsburg book.

There’s no room in her life for love. Love has other ideas…

Konigsburg, Texas, Book 3

If Jessamyn Carroll had only herself to consider, staying in Pennsylvania after her husband’s death would have been a no-brainer. Her vindictive in-laws’ efforts to get their hooks into her infant son, however, force her to flee to a new home. Konigsburg, Texas.

Peace…at least for now. She’s even found a way to make some extra money, looking after sexy accountant Lars Toleffson’s precocious two-year-old daughter. She finds it easy—too easy—to let his protective presence lull her into thinking she and her son are safe at last.

Lars, still wounded from enduring a nasty divorce from his cheating ex-wife, tries to fight his attraction to the mysterious, beautiful widow. But when an intruder breaks into her place, and Jess comes clean about her past, all bets are off. Someone wants her baby—and wants Jess out of the picture. Permanently.

Now Jess has a live-in bodyguard, whether she wants him or not. Except she does want him—and he wants her. Yet negotiating a future together will have to overcome a lot of roadblocks: babies, puppies, the entire, meddling Toleffson family—and a kidnapper.

Warning: Contains Konigsburg craziness, creepy in-laws, a conniving two-year-old, a lovelorn accountant, a sleep-deprived Web developer, and lots of hot holiday sex.

Excerpt:

Here’s an excerpt about the heroine and her baby. She’s just met the hero and taken a job as his babysitter. And, of course, she’s got problems of her own—a nasty set of former in-laws who want to steal her baby son.

Jess put Jack into his jumper seat, listening to him crow as he danced back and forth in the doorway to the living room. She slid into the chair at her computer and fired up the Paloma Gaming site. The e-mail from the site owner said that the win-loss ratings kept going flaky. Jess opened her console window and began checking code. The jumper seat usually kept Jack occupied for twenty minutes or so. With any luck she’d find the bug in less time than that.

The encounter with Lars Toleffson still rankled. Obviously, he was looking for June Cleaver. Obviously, as far as he was concerned, she was closer to Britney Spears. Tough. She’d do a good job with his daughter, no matter what he thought of her.

Toleffson wasn’t exactly what she’d expected. Weren’t accountants supposed to be wimpy? He was at least six four or five, given the way he towered over her five-foot-ten. And his shoulders were broad enough to block the light from the office window when he leaned back. He’d worn a predictable gray business suit, but his dark hair had the kind of curls that never stayed put, inching down slightly over his forehead.

The type of guy who probably made female hearts go pitter-pat, if one were susceptible to that kind of thing. Which Jess definitely was not.
She wondered briefly what had happened to Mrs. Toleffson. Probably a divorce, given the lack of sympathy he’d shown when she’d mentioned Barry. Not that she wanted sympathy. But why didn’t people ask single fathers where their significant other had gone the way they asked single mothers?

Jack gave a shriek of delight and Jess turned to look at him. He danced across the doorway on his tiptoes, bouncing up and down enthusiastically.

She remembered when she’d brought him home from the hospital. Small and wrinkled and rosy. Totally vulnerable. Totally dependent. Hers to protect. And love.

She bit her lip. “Oh, lord, Jack, don’t grow up too fast, okay? Let me savor this just a little.”

Jack grinned up at her and did a baby plié. Jess closed her eyes a moment, willing herself not to tear up, then turned back to the monitor.

“Okay, time for Mommy to earn us some bread, kiddo. You just keep working on those dance moves so you’ll be ready for your big break when you decide to keep me in style.”

Assuming I can keep you to myself that long. Jess shivered, then concentrated on her screen. Maybe Lydia Moreland had just walked across her grave.

---

To learn more about Meg Benjamin, please visit http://www.MegBenjamin.com/
You can also follow Meg on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/meg.benjamin1), MySpace (myspace.com/megbenjamin) and Twitter (http://twitter.com/megbenj1). Meg also loves to hear from readers at meg@MegBenjamin.com