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Showing posts from November, 2015

Thursday Threads: The Highlander's Reluctant Bride by Cathy MacRae

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The Highlander’s Reluctant Bride ,  Book 2 in The Highlander’s Bride series by Cathy MacRae Genre : Historical Romance set in the Highlands of Scotland, 1377 Heat Scale : Sensual Cover blurb : Determined to keep the Macrory clan’s holdings out of the clutches of the Lord of the Isles and marauding pirates, King Robert II sends his man, Lord Ranald Scott, to hold Scaurness Castle. There, Laird Macrory lays dying, awaiting word from his son who is missing on the battlefields of France. If the son is not found before the old laird dies, Ranald will take over as laird—and marry Laird Macrory’s headstrong daughter. Lady Caitriona sees no reason she cannot rule the clan in her brother’s stead, and is bitterly disappointed with the king’s decision to send a man to oversee the castle and people. Not only is Ranald Scott only distantly related to the Macrory clan, but he was her childhood nemesis. She has little trust or like for him. Her disappointment turns to panic whe

Transcribing Our Emotional Maps

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In my third book of the “Hunted Series,” Hunted Dreams , my dreaming main character suddenly finds herself at a laden dinner table. She grabs a fork and digs in.  With each bite, she experiences an explosion of feeling, each one different than the one before: terror, disgust, and rage, to name a few. This scene was one of the hardest ones I’ve ever written. I forced myself to describe in intense detail every sensation of each emotion: the taste and color of each feeling, the bodily sensations, the resulting thoughts and intentions. Doing so, I discovered something rather profound: describing feelings is tough ! The illustration for the below-mentioned study, found here .  You can imagine my delight when I stumbled across this study . It uses self-reports to determine where people physically experience feelings. Looking at the picture, I’m flabbergasted by how our bodies literally feel more or less, depending on our current emotional state. For example, I find fascinati