Tag: RWA

2019 RITA Award Winners

Posted July 27, 2019 by Holly in News | 2 Comments

NEW YORK, NY —Romance Writers of America (RWA), the trade association for published and aspiring romance fiction authors, announced the winners of the 2019 RITA® Awards on Friday, July 26, at a black-tie awards ceremony at its 39th Annual Conference in New York New York.

The RITA® Award is the highest award of distinction in romance fiction and recognizes outstanding published romance novels and novellas.

Up to 2,000 romance novels and novellas from 13 different categories are judged each year in the RITA® competition. After the first round of judging by fellow published romance authors, the competition narrows to approximately 100 finalists. Then, final round judges, also published romance authors, select one winner in each category from among the finalists.

The 2019 RITA® Award winners are:


Romance Novella: Bad Blood by M. Malone

Contemporary Romance Long: Long Shot by Kennedy Ryan

Young Adult Romance: My So-Called Bollywood Life by Nisha Sharma

Historical Romance Long: A Wicked Kind of Husband by Mia Vincy

Romantic Suspense: Fearless by Elizabeth Dyer

Paranormal Romance: Dearest Ivie by J. R. Ward

Erotic Romance: Three-Way Split by Elia Winters

Historical Romance Short: A Duke in the Night by Kelly Bowen

Romance with Religious or Spiritual Elements: The Saturday Night Supper Club by Carla Laureano

Contemporary Romance Short: The Bachelor’s Baby Surprise by Teri Wilson

Contemporary Romance Mid-length: Advanced Physical Chemistry by Susannah Nix

Mainstream Fiction with a Central Romance: How to Keep a Secret by Sarah Morgan

Best First Book: Lady in Waiting by Marie Tremayne

The list of winners, along with author photos and book covers, can be found on the RWA website at www.rwa.org.

Romance Writers of America’s mission is to advance the professional and common business interests of career-focused romance writers through networking and advocacy and by increasing public awareness of the romance genre. Romance fiction is a $1 billion industry, and it’s a consistent, top-performing category on the best-seller lists. To learn more about romance fiction and RWA, visit http://www.rwa.org or call 832-717-5200, Ext. 128.


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2017 RITA Award Winners Are In

Posted July 27, 2017 by Holly in News | 0 Comments

ORLANDO, FL —Romance Writers of America (RWA), the trade association for published and aspiring romance fiction authors, announced the winners of the 2017 RITA® Awards on Thursday, July 27, at a black-tie awards ceremony at its 37th Annual Conference in Orlando, Florida.

The RITA® Award is the highest award of distinction in romance fiction and recognizes outstanding published romance novels and novellas.

Up to 2,000 romance novels and novellas from 13 different categories are judged each year in the RITA®competition. After the first round of judging by fellow published romance authors, the competition narrows to approximately 100 finalists. Then, final round judges, also published romance authors, select one winner in each category from among the finalists.

The 2017 RITA® Award winners are:

Romance Novella: Her Every Wish by Courtney Milan

Contemporary Romance Long: Miracle on 5th Avenue by Sarah Morgan

Young Adult Romance: The Problem with Forever by Jennifer L. Armentrout

Historical Romance Long: No Mistress of Mine by Laura Lee Guhrke

Romantic Suspense: Repressed by Elisabeth Naughton

Paranormal Romance: The Pages of the Mind by Jeffe Kennedy

Erotic Romance: Off the Clock by Roni Loren

Historical Romance Short: A Duke to Remember by Kelly Bowen

Romance with Religious or Spiritual Elements: My Hope Next Door by Tammy L. Gray

Contemporary Romance Short: Christmas on Crimson Mountain by Michelle Major

Contemporary Romance Mid-length: Carolina Dreaming by Virginia Kantra

Mainstream Fiction with a Central Romance: The Moon in the Palace by Weina Dai Randel

Best First Book: Once and for All by Cheryl Etchison

The list of winners, along with author photos and book covers, can be found on the RWA website at https://www.rwa.org/page/2017-finalists.

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Romance Writers of America’s mission is to advance the professional and common business interests of career-focused romance writers through networking and advocacy and by increasing public awareness of the romance genre. Romance fiction is a $1 billion industry, and it’s a consistent, top-performing category on the best-seller lists. To learn more about romance fiction and RWA, visit http://www.rwa.org or call 832-717-5200, Ext. 122.


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What I Read Last Week

Posted July 30, 2012 by Tracy in Reviews | 11 Comments

Happy Monday!
It IS a happy Monday even if I had to come back to work today after some time off last week.
On Wednesday RWA had their Literacy Signing and it was HUGE. Seriously. There were so many authors there and the ballroom was massive. I loved that the authors were given so much space to work but man, trekking that thing was exhausting. lol I got to meet and talk to a lot of great authors and get pictures with some of them. I had a handy sheet with all the authors and the table layouts and I STILL managed to miss some of the authors I wanted to talk to. Pooh. But here are some pics I got:
LB Gregg – Always beautiful with a wonderful smile on her face!
HelenKay Dimon – Such a cutie
Holly, Jodi Thomas and moi.  Jodi is so very sweet and I loved listening to her accent.
Kira Brady – Haven’t seen her in years (since SF RWA).  Love the hair!
Julie Anne Long – OMG total fan girl moment.  I tried not to make a complete fool of myself but it wasn’t easy.
Sabrina Jeffries – Sweet and funny – she was cracking me up
Jessica Scott – So good to finally meet her after emailing back and forth.  She’s adorable.
Elizabeth Hoyt – Another total fan girl gush over Elizabeth.  Yes, it was embarrassing.
Sarah MacLean – We saw her right after she had her own meltdown over meeting Linda Howard. 🙂
On Friday I drove back down to RWA (after taking Thursday to recover) and the So Cal Bloggers had lunch with Thea Harrison and her agent, Amy Boggs. We had a great time talking about Thea’s books, paranormal reads in general, books that we were looking forward to releasing and just lots of great stuff. Julie James popped by near the end and we all managed to get a picture together.
Renee, Wendy, Holly, Rosie, LB Gregg, Me, Julie James, Rowena & Thea Harrison
I loved just hanging with my buds.  I love talking books and family and just “being.”  That’s almost the best part of these things.
Wendy & LB Gregg
Rosie and her drink (ok, it was only a Pellegrino)
Rowena, Holly and I had lunch with Julie James on Saturday and then dinner with Carina editor Mallory Braus and Vivian Arend. OMG talk about a roaring good time. I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in a darn long time. Vivian kept Rowena and I in stitches, lemme tell ya.
Me, Holly, Mallory Braus, Vivian Arend & Rowena
I of course got to see all of my wonderful blogging friends, Renee, Rowena, Holly, Rosie, Wendy and honorary So Cal blogger, Lisabea aka LB Gregg and I met new ones as well. Overall it was a really fun time and I’m so glad I went. Next year I think I’ll have to save my money and register for the conference, I think it will be worth it.
Wendy, Rosie and LB dressed to kill for the RITA’s.
While everyone was at the RITA’s, Holly Rowena and I went back up to our room where Rosie texted us to the minute info on the RITA winners (she’s such a giver, that Rosie). Somehow Holly and Wena got on a conversation about multiple partners and they started telling me about Coulter’s Woman by Maya Banks and how the men were all brothers. Now, the girls ask me, when said brothers are all doing their woman at the same time, wouldn’t one brother be tea-bagging another? And then went on to describe positioning, etc. I played dumb and they decided to reenact the scene for me, how gracious of them. Wena’s the woman, Holly is 1 brother, the pillow is another and well, the invisible one is behind Wena. Do you see the pillow tea-bagging? I gotta hand it to them, they did a fine job showing instead of telling. lolol 
Wena and Holly and their teabaggin scene.
Because of all this wonderful fun I had I didn’t get much reading done but it was all good.
I started the week with Return of the Viscount by Gayle Callen. This was the story of a woman who marries an old friend of her father’s by proxy as she’s in England and he’s in India. She never thinks to see him and frankly thinks he’ll be dead soon as he’s old. Yeah, he’s not old and he shows up on her doorstep. You can read my full review here but it was a really good story. 4 out of 5
Next was Now or Never by Michele Bardsley. This is the second book in the Wizards of Nevermore series and while it was a great paranormal it had basically no romance to speak of. Yes the hero and heroine were drawn to each other and it was made to read at the end like they would be together but really, no romance. Bummer. The story of the House of Ravens trying to take over the world was really good though and that saved the book. I read this for Book Binge. 3.5 out of 5
The Short and Fascinating Tale of Angelina Whitcombe by Sabrina Darby was a short historical novella having to do with an actress and courtesan who is hired by a man’s mother to bring him out of his war induced shell. I’ll post my review for this one tomorrow.
Last for the week was Men of Smithfield: Mark & Tony by LB Gregg (previously released as Gobsmacked). Yes, the Men of Smithfield are being re-released by Carina Press and this first book comes out next Monday. I’ll post my review of this one this week.
Well that’s it for the week. I KNOW not a lot of books but it’s hard to read when you’re having so much fun! 🙂
My Book Binge reviews that posted this week:
Happy Reading!


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RWA 2011: Attention Bloggers – Harlequin Tea

Posted June 22, 2011 by Holly in Reviews | 3 Comments

Unfortunately I’m not going to be able to attend RWA this year. I’m totally bummed. I am determined to go next year. It should be easy since I’m in So Cal and the conference is in LA.

Anyway, Harlequin is hosting a tea party for bloggers in NYC during the conference. If you’re a blogger you’re invited to go.

Are you a book blogger going to the RWA conference in NYC? Harlequin wants to meet you! Join us for a Book Blogger Tea on Wednesday, June 29th from 4:30-5:30 in the Times Square room at the conference hotel. Join us for tea & scones and ‘fascinating’ conversation! Fascinators, hand-made by the Digital team, will be provided to set the mood – or bring your own tea-party appropriate headgear 😉

I work with the digital team quite often and I had a chance to meet some of them at RT this past year. I have to say, they’re lovely. I’m super jealous over the fascinators, too.

Anyway, I hope you bloggers are able to attend. And I hope you come back and share with me how awesome it was. 🙂


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What I’ve Been Reading This Week

Posted July 28, 2008 by Tracy in Features | 4 Comments

This has been a great week..well, if I don’t count today! (lol – nope, not talkin about it!) I read some really good books, which is always nice, and life was just, well, normal. I like normal. I’m kind of a homebody during the week so it was nice to hang with the fam and not have drama.

I had a great time over at DIK this week, too. Sarai will be posting hot menz Mon-Wed. of this week so if you need to drool, head on over. 🙂

Tomorrow I’m off to San Francisco to meet some great blogging friends who will be there for RWA. I can hardly wait. I won’t be attending the conference but I could hardly pass up the opportunity to fly up since I’m so close, even if it’s just for a day or so.

My dad came and got the kids for a few days and my husband left for the incredibly crazy Sturgis bike rally in South Dakota. He’ll be gone for a couple of weeks so it will be quiet around here.

Alright – first up was a novella called Gone with the Wolf by Loribelle Hunt. Interesting story with shapeshifters, witches, zombies and a Vegas casino. It was ok…let’s just say I’m glad it was short.

Pleasure Unbound by Larissa Ione was up next and I loved this book. I have to say I let it sit on the shelf for a while and when I first picked it up I wasn’t so sure about it, but it sucked me in. There were a few issues that I had with it but overall a really entertaining read. Can’t wait for Shade’s story.

I always try to mix up my contemporaries, historicals and paranormals so I don’t get into a rut so next up I chose Never Trust A Scoundrel by Gayle Callen. This was an impulse buy at Borders when they were having one of their 4 for 5 romance book sales. It looked good but it did sit on the shelf for a while before I dug it out. It was really good. I was so pleasantly surprised at the story. It started out with the typical “let me make a bargain with you” type thing that always ends in sex but it was done in a great way and I thought it was charming. Towards the end it got a little too predictable but it ended well and I was very pleased with it. I hadn’t read any of her work before but I will definitely be reading more of it in the future.
Into the Shadow by Christina Dodd was my next choice. I read the first two in the Darkness Chosen series but they were just ok reads for me. I really had no plans to read the last 2 books in the series but for some reason I caved when the 3rd book was published. I really enjoyed it. Yes, it had some completely unbelievable parts in it but overall I thought it was pretty entertaining.


Ready or Not by Anara Bella – a novella was cute. Boy thinks girl is a flake but likes her anyway. Girl has had crush on boy forever. It wrapped up pretty quickly for me but it was cute.

Last one for the week was Into the Storm by Suzanne Brockmann. You thought I was gonna go an entire week without reading a Troubleshooters novel? Yeah, right. I mean there are only a few left! What the hell am I gonna do then? Oh, yeah, move on to her other series! 🙂 This was an interesting story. I thought the romance started off really well, but then it didn’t develop as well as I think her others romances have. Still a great book.

Happy Reading!

What have you been reading this week?


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