Thursday Thirteen - 13 Ways to Feel Sexy

It's a busy week so I've chosen to rerun an old favorite. Enjoy!




Busy schedules and unsuccessful diets are the primary reasons many of us don’t feel sexy. Who can feel sexy when they feel tired and frumpy? Women are beautiful creatures; we just need to remind ourselves of it periodically. Now put the chocolate away (well, maybe not) for this one and take notes.

1. Do your make up and/or hair. Have you ever noticed how good you feel after a visit to the beauty shop or when you get all dressed up? You can capture that same feeling by paying a bit of attention to your self for a simply dinner at home.

2. Visit a spa, take a long bath, or give yourself a facial. Take a break to enjoy your own skin. Touch it, caress it… then let your honey touch it and caress it.

3. Work out. Go to a gym, join Curves, or just get a couple of girlfriends to walk with daily. The effort not only makes you healthy (may or may not lose weight), but you’ll notice little things about yourself that make you feel sexy. Sometimes, just actually working out fires you up.

4. Wear sexy clothing. I don’t me movie star red carpet stuff or even hooker style. A nice tight silk t-shirt that feels good when you wear it. Or an old worn pair of jeans that really flatter your assets. Look in your closet, take a close look at your favorites and think about how you feel when you wear them. If they all make you want to take a nap… go shopping.

5. Find a material that makes you feel good. I don’t mean flannel because it makes you cozy; I’m talking about silk or cotton and how it feels against your skin. When you find yourself feeling sexy in a particular fabric, purchase more items made with it. Instead of your old blend button down shirts, try an inexpensive machine washable silk blouse. It will go with everything from jeans to a pair of dress pants.

6. Wear lingerie that flatters you. Don’t buy something and wear it because it looks good on the mannequin or honey’s eyes bug out. Wear it because it feels good and looks good on you.

7. Don’t worry about your appearance. Everyone has flaws; just no one else cares about them as much as you do. So what that you have a scar from a surgery or a little pouch from having kids.

8. Plan at least one sensual experience a week for you love. Planning a sensual escapade can be very arousing. Add a little teasing in there to build confidence.

9. Take a shower together. Hmmm… water, wet, skin, slippery… oh, ah…

10. Dance seductively with your partner. Turn on the music just for the two of you. Have fun and do some dirty dancing.

11. Try being the dominant one in the next love-making session. Being in control can be a rush and very sexy.

12. Accept compliments regarding you looks and abilities. This can be a simple lesson in building confidence; and confidence is very sexy.

13. Allow yourself to feel sexy. Take time to reconnect with yourself. Try to find things that work for you, that make you feel good about you and sexy… and then do them.


What makes you feel sexy?

Humpday Help - A poem

In this busy week, take a moment and enjoy the world around you. I love the day, but I prefer the night and the midnight sun. My favorite is when I can see the moon during the day. Sit back and enjoy my rambling.


The Moon

I looked up from the cement world
and saw the moon today.

What a pleasant surprise!
He may have even looked my way.

I stood in my white cloak
Made of angels small.

I wanted to find my voice
But my body headed the call.

Every night I look to him
Wondering if he looks back at me.

Perhaps when I turn around,
He casts a glance to see.

Did I give him a smile?
Did my heart jump on my sleeve?

He graciously walked away,
Oh, the webs that we weave!

My mind tells me that he is dead,
My heart calls out to him.

I pray for him each day,
My hope never grows dim.

Only at night to I stand to gaze
In my cloak of white.

The small angles sleeping
Hidden from sight.

I speak in soft whispers
I’m sure he never hears.

I just wish for him to know
How I hold him so dear.

He loved me once then
Cast me to earth.

But my love remains,
And admiration grows from this dirt.

Memories of tenderness come
Rays of moonlight caress my skin.

Emotions never forgotten
But hidden within.

With my arms, I reach to the moon
Embracing the light cast below.

I’m sure he does not see me,
To him I am only a shadow.

I was surprised to see the moon
In the daylight, alive and well.

Tonight I will send him a smile
And in the shadow’s I will dwell.

Tempting Tuesday - Free Samples

Everybody enjoys a free sample! How many times can you resist the lady at the market holding out a yummy fresh baked pastry for you to sample? What about those little sampler boxes of chocolate? Yeah... admit it... we all like that little tease!


Well I'm offering a little tease, a sampler of my own and it's lower in calories than a pastry and better than chocolate.



It's a free sample of the Soul Series. You send me an email maryquast@yahoo.com with "Tasty Sample" in the subject and I'll send you a PDF of the book covers and first chapter from the first three books of the Soul Series.

The Soul Series
Contemporary romance with a twist... lots of creative... sensual...twist.



Painted Soul is Book One of the Soul Series. ISBN-13: 978-0-9814739-3-2

"A contemporary romance that takes the reader on a wonderful ride in an artist’s life, through the streets of London, and into the shadows of the underground."

Elizabeth McAlister was only eighteen when she met the art student, Puzzola in a London nightclub and gave him her heart. Ten years later, they meet again when a summer of intense passion and dark secrets begins.

As Elizabeth falls deeper in love with Puzzola, she tries to rescue him from tortured memories he refuses to discuss. Eventually, his double life and erotic past are exposed in a local newspaper just as he is involved in a life-threatening accident. Will their love survive?


Tormented Soul - Book Two of the Soul Series. ISBN 978-1-935407-22-5

Erick McAlister is known as London’s Most Dangerous Bachelor; he enjoys scotch, women, and spending time in the London underground club, The Skunk’s Den.

He’s never had a real relationship; women only want him for one thing- he desires more. When the one he vowed he would never toy with, Lynn Westmore, gives him an unexpected proposition, his life takes an enjoyable turn.

Just as he is beginning to find happiness, tabloids headline him, a woman from his past announces she’s expecting his child, someone is trying to kill him, and he finds himself questioning his relationship with the young courier he’s hired to teach him to ride his new motorcycle. Even though his life is in torment, he begins to believe in love, something he never thought he’d feel.

Unfortunately, Lynn doesn’t think Erick could ever be faithful to one woman, let alone be in love with her, so when she finds herself in love with him she runs. Erick falls into a spiral of depression, and it takes his brother and closest friends to bring him to his senses. When he finds out a magazine has rated him as the World’s Most Dangerous Bachelor, he agrees to do the interview only if Lynn is the photographer and he uses the opportunity to let Lynn know how he feels; he offers his heart to her one more time...


Lonely Soul - Book Three of the Soul Series. ISBN 978-1-935407-94-2

"The eldest of the McAlister siblings is a man with a deep sense of family and honor, yet at times could be manipulative and very controlling, always doing what he thought was best for others. Now that his brother and sister are enjoying their married lives, the time had come for Michael Casey McAlister to find his soulmate."

Featured on The Most Dangerous Bachelors list with his brother, he prefers daring outdoor activities and hanging out with his obnoxious friends than courting a high society princess. With his good looks, wealth and sexual prowess, he has attracted many ladies but when the one he thinks is Miss Right doesn’t like his dog he shows her the door.

Lonely and discouraged, he dedicates himself into a New York City community garden project with his friends and busies himself with his comic strip he has created under the name of Mike Casey. Mike meets Lauren “Wren” Avery with the help of their dogs in the park while he’s working on a cartoon. He sees her as a chance to improve himself and not follow his father’s path of unhappiness. He certainly didn’t expect to fall in love with the graphic artist. Wren falls in love with him as the cartoonist not knowing he is the co-owner of McAlister Enterprises, the same company she works for.

He knows he’s wrong not telling her the truth, but his world falls apart when she's transferred to the London office and she finds out who he really is. He realizes that in while building the company and interfering in other interfering in other people’s lives he may have lost control of his own life and what truly matters.

The Soul Series by Mary Quast

Interview with April Morelock

A: Today’s interview is with the incredible Mary Quast – one of the founders of Romance Writers Behaving Badly. I’m so glad to have her here today to talk about her writing and her books.


Known for writing sensual romance with creative soul, I’ve known Mary for a few years now through Romance Divas. Welcome Mary!!!!

There are so many things I want to ask… how’d that conversation with the pastor turn out??? Just how much do you make those old biddies in your community blush??? And so much more; but let’s start with the basics :>

What’s the kinkiest, sexiest thing you’ve ever done:

MQ: Let’s see…. Chocolate syrup, whipping cream, silk scarves and a blindfold…I think you have to buy the book to find out more. But I can add that it’s wonderful making love in a hammock in the middle of the day!

A: I’m envisioning humid air, a southern back porch looking over a sleepy creek, and loonng summer days. Sigh. Having been on a hammock, I imagine things were “hopping”. :> So while you were a bit cryptic in your response to kinkiness in real life (I mean … wow… you left a lot to the imagination there)… How bad do you get with your writing, are we talking just suggestion or down right bondage?

MQ: It depends on my characters. Sometimes a bad boy simply wants to feel loved while the good girl wants to be ravished. I haven’t put bondage in my work… yet.

A: Heck, you don’t need bondage – you have chocolate and whip cream and… oh, that’s real life. We’re talking fiction. Just for a bit of non sequitor What’s the best thing you’ve ever written—the best line?

MQ: I’d have to say, “Lonely Soul” is my best work from a technical point so far. The best line? Hmm….Painted Soul is full of sensual lines but I favor sexy and funny. So that would have to come from Matt Keller, he has a “special way” of wording things, they’re called “Mattisms”.

For example: “Nothing much,” he munched on his burger. “Just grudge fucked my ex-girlfriend’s best friend. I feel much better; I suggest you try it sometime. Hey, are you going to eat that pickle?”

A: LOL… I love that. Best line so far in the interviews. I especially loves the “Hey, are you going to eat that pickle?” as if there’s nothing much he just said. I wish there were more people that were that glib in the world. Instead we’re stuck with people using snappy comebacks from best-selling books, block-buster movies, and Robot Chicken.

If you could have any movie star take on a role as one of your heroes, who would it be?

MQ: Stuart Townsend… the way he looked in Queen of the Damned, would be Puzzola.

A: Man, all the authors have some unique tastes. I need to expand my repertoire. I’m stuck on Dong Bang Shin Ki ---Junsu, Changminnie, JaeJoong, Yunho, Yoochun. Sigh… But alas, no one I know shares my compulsions. Although Changminnie is now almost 6’4…. He’s got huge hands and feet… makes you wonder… Ahem… So what do you think? Does size count? Size counts… on average how loooooonnnnnggg do you like your (um, how do we put it delicately) manuscripts to be ;> ( in words silly, not inches) and how steamy?

MQ: I can’t seem to write anything short so they end up being around 300 pp in print. Steamy? I want readers to feel the need to strip down and fan themselves from the heat.

A: Well, I’m still stuck on that porch overlooking some South Carolina tributary with a sexy Hugh Jackman. Sigh. Mind back on track April !!!!

Thinking of hot, sexy porch hammocks and the fact that some people think sex scenes are the hardest -- the more I write them, the more I would agree. It’s just so hard to come up with something new and unique every time.

What are the hardest scenes to write for you?

MQ: Ah… the first page. Really! I love writing the sex scenes – if I get stuck I pull out a Penthouse Letters and ask hubby to help out. LOL. I have an evil streak in me and it shows when I “hurt” my characters. But that first page kills me every time!

A: And you say you’re not into bondage!!!! You must get enough satisfaction out of your own form of torture. Just how much hotter than that porch hammock do you get? Or maybe I should ask: How close in real life have you gotten to one of your fantasies?

MQ: Heh, heh. Do I have to answer that? I’m an artist and a romance writer. Any more questions?

A: You leave that wide open to the imagination. Ugh…. Details woman!

No? Okay. We’ll keep those questions for another time.

What would you want other writers and your readers to know about you?

MQ: Don’t bug me on a bad day, I might have to put you in a book and kill you. But if you feed me chocolate, you’re forgiven.

A: Hmmm… should I keep the chocolate to myself or avoid death on the page? That’s a tough decision. I really like my chocolate. ;> Before I start on my long list of other questions that aren’t writing related… anything you would like to share with us, an excerpt, a tidbit, or anything else about yourself?

MQ: My first book, “Painted Soul” was based on a journal entry I wrote while I was in England at the age of 16. I saw a real punk on the subway and created a story about him. Years later, I created Painted Soul and the character Puzzola from that experience. From that one book, came a series of four.

A: Wow… thank you Mary for such a great interview. Anyone else want to read more about Mary or check out Painted Soul, Tormented Soul or Lonely Soul, check out her website at: http://www.maryquast.com/

I also just HAD to add the picture here from Mary's sight. Now, that's HOT and ever so naughty!