"It Started With A Kiss ..."

Giveaway Result:

The midnight hour has passed so it's time to close off the giveaway and make the draw, by Random Number Integer (as always since the Sorting Hat went back to Hogwarts!)

And the result is:

• The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh: to blackroze37
• Graveminder by Melissa Marr: to Yearning Mermaid
• Thornspell by Helen Lowe: to Kathleen Peacock

Congratulations to the winners and thank you all very much for participating--I'll see you again on 'the other side': 1 January 2012!

Winners: if you haven't left your email contact with your comment then email me through my website, contact[at]helenlowe[dot]info with your postal address and I'll get the book in the mail to you.

---
I’ve recently finished proofing the manuscript of The Gathering of the Lost, the second in my Wall of Night series (publication day 27 March) and have begun working on the third book, (working title) Daughter of Blood. Being between two books in a series is a pivotal moment—and a big part of what is on my mind as the author is how all the events and action in Books One and Two are going to transition into the new storyline. Now, like the two protagonists in the old Hot Chocolate song, “It Started with a Kiss”, the central characters in the first book, The Heir of Night, are young. Not quite the eight and nine year old of the song, but still: young. In the second book The Gathering of the Lost Kalan and Malian are older and—without giving anything important away—“springtime love” is an important background motif of the story.

So now one of the things I have to think about going into Book 3 is what part romance is going to play in the narrative. Is it going to occupy center stage, slip into the background, or exit completely via stage left—and assuming we decide on center stage, should the romance start with a kiss (as in the song) or end with one? (Do you remember those old style romances, where the hero and heroine never kissed until the very end of the story?) Or is romance—and of course, the kiss—going to be a vital stepping stone through the heart of the story?

See what life-and-death decisions we authors have to make? In fact, we do have to make real life-and-death decisions for characters as well, but sometimes the circumstances of that first kiss can be vital to the romantic success of the story.

Take Snow White, for example: she might never have lived to fight another day if the prince hadn’t kissed her and shaken the slice of apple from between her lips. And then there’s Sleeping Beauty—no waking up for her either without the prince’s kiss. In The Frog Prince it’s the princess’s kiss that transforms the enchantment and frees the prince. And then there are the movie kisses: Scarlett & Rhett in Gone with the Wind, Leonardo & Kate on the bow of the Titanic, Princess Buttercup and the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride.

So many great stories, so many famous kisses … But what about you? Is there a kiss that you feel “makes” a story, whether in a book or in a film or TV show? And why is that kiss ‘the one’ for you?




This Month’s Giveaway

This month I’ve got not one but three beautiful books to brighten the ‘bleak midwinter’ by giving away to readers: Vanessa Diffenbaugh’s The Language of Flowers, Melissa Marr’s Graveminder, and my own Thornspell, which is a retelling of Sleeping Beauty—and yes, indeed, the kiss does feature. :)

To enter the draw all you need do is post your “kiss and tell” comment here.

As always you can earn points by

+1 Linking to this post on Twitter
+1 Linking to this post on Facebook
+1 Linking to the Supernatural Underground blog on your own blog/website
+1 for visiting me and commenting on my blog, here.

The giveaway will close at midnight, US Eastern Standard Time, on Saturday December 3—after which I shall post the results here, so don’t forget to check back. And have fun until next month; I’ll be back here again on New Year’s Day.

---

Supernatural Underground author Helen Lowe is a novelist, poet and interviewer. Her latest novel, The Heir of Night, the first of THE WALL OF NIGHT quartet, is published in the USA, UK, and internationally and recently won the Sir Julius Vogel Award 2011 for Best Novel. Her first novel, Thornspell, is published by Knopf. Helen blogs every day on Helen Lowe on Anything, Really and on the first day of every month right here on the Supernatural Underground.