Who's Your Daddy? by Caren Crane, Jeanne Adams, and Nancy Northcott

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. The authors will be awarding one copy each of Kick Start by Caren Crane, Dead Run by Jeanne Adams, and Danger's Edge by Nancy Northcott to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Caren Crane is visiting with us today to share 5 things we may not know about her.

Thanks for having me on today!

Let me start off by saying, I posted on the Romance Bandits blog for years, so there are lots of things that were shared there that will not shock followers of the Banditas! That said, here we go:

1. I am a serious devotee of true crime. You won’t see it reflected anywhere in my writing, but I love really gritty true crime. My favorite true crime podcasts are My Favorite Murder and True Crime Obsessed. I love both for their mixture of comedy and true crime, but always done with respect for victims and victims’ families. I never steer clear of a 911 recording, a gruesome crime scene photo or a wrenching documentary. I am fascinated by the dark aspects of human nature, but only to consume and not to create.

2. I am originally from Nashville, TN, the home of country music. However, I have never liked country music. I spent lots of time at the country-music-themed amusement park that was near my childhood home, Opryland, and I learned to appreciate what is now called “classic” country music, but I never listened to it and still refuse to. Growing up surrounded by great musicians spoiled me for less-than great music, but never led me to appreciate country music. I’m surprised Nashville hasn’t revoked my birth certificate.

3. My father was a veterinarian and I spent summers working in the clinic. This was grunt work: cleaning kennels, cleaning cages, cleaning test slides, running the autoclave, bathing cats and dogs. More than anything, it made me appreciate how clean things need to be for surgery (incredibly sterile) and convinced me that I really did not ever want to have my own dog for a pet. We had many dogs and cats (and gerbils, hamsters, fish and birds) growing up. I loved all of those dogs. I also never want another dog as long as I live. As an adult, I’ve had three wonderful cats, but no dogs. I understand why people want them, love them and cherish their company, but dogs are toddlers who never grow up. As someone who raised three humans to competent adulthood, I never again want anything that requires the sort of attention dogs require.

4. I am a hard-eyed pragmatist. This may seem strange for someone who writes romantic fiction, but it’s true. I tend to write stories that address the elephants in the room. I never cared for stories where the primaries didn’t have frank conversations about the most important issues between them. How could they expect to build a relationship if they didn’t talk about that stuff? So when I started writing, my writing took a lot of people by surprise. I force my characters to have those really uncomfortable conversations. I make them confront each other and those causing issues in their lives. Things don’t stay swept under the carpet. I am also that uncomfortable person in real life. I want to talk about things that other people want to bury. I want to address what we disagree about and understand where the other person is coming from. I want to know what I don’t know. Because of this, I tend to have friends with similar traits and those who appreciate frank honesty. I do exercise tact, but it’s very “what you see is what you get” with me.

5. Like many people, I am obsessed with Animal Crossing: New Horizons for the Nintendo Switch. I started playing at the beginning of May and am still only a 4-star island. At this point, I am ready to put Isabelle in Resident Services in a choke hold. If anyone is a player and wants to visit, please email me! I will happily connect with you and leave all those DIY recipes I don’t need scattered outside the airport for you to take!

Presenting three tales of secrets revealed and histories uncovered by DNA testing.

Brown-Eyed Boy by Caren Crane

A carpenter discovers his father isn't actually his father. Coming to terms with the truth reaffirms his place in his family, but it also leads him to love with an old friend's sister and helps him find a path for his life.

Lost in Time by Jeanne Adams

A lawyer learns his grandmother had a secret marriage before his father was born. With the help of a talented genealogist, he tracks down his ancestry. Will he find the truth about his grandmother's secret before whoever's trying to kill him succeeds?

Worth Waiting For by Nancy Northcott

A burned-out spy goes home for a holiday and re-encounters the woman he never dated but never forgot. As he and she grow closer, he learns her niece, his ex-girlfriend's child, bears an uncanny resemblance to him. When the truth comes out, it will alter three lives.

Read an Excerpt from Brown-Eyed Boy by Caren Crane

Eric Burns had simple tastes. He loved cold beer, working with his hands, and hanging with his big, rowdy family. He didn’t have much use for trendy things.

So when his brother Tim gave everybody in the family DNA test kits for Christmas last year, Eric wasn’t thrilled.

But he set up a profile on the testing website. He spit in the test tube and mailed it off. When he got the email saying his results were ready, he clicked the link and logged into his account. It showed he shared half his DNA with his mother, Bebe, of course. Among his siblings he saw most of them shared about half their DNA with each other.

Then he saw he only shared about 25 percent with his sibs. That he shared so much less with all of them than they did with each other made no sense to him.

Then he saw two other people in his list of DNA relatives who shared about the same amount of DNA with him as his siblings did. Two people with the same names as kids from their neighborhood. He felt all the blood drain out of his head and a roaring sounded in his ears as he realized the only thing that could mean.

The mother he adored, the one who had given birth to him and his five siblings, who had mourned his daddy so much that she basically couldn’t function for most of his childhood, had cheated on his father.

About the Author:

Caren Crane began writing warm, witty contemporary romance and women's fiction to save herself from the drudgery of life in the office. An electrical engineer by training, she longed to create worlds where things were any color except cube-wall gray. She still works in a cubicle, but gets to hang out with witty, fabulous people whenever she's writing, which greatly encourages butt-in-chair time.

Caren lives in North Carolina with her wonderful husband and semi-feral rescue cat. She has three fiercely intelligent, gorgeous grown children, having neatly side-stepped her mother’s threat that she would have children Just Like Her. You can find info and excerpts at http://www.carencrane.com.

The other authors of the book:

Jeanne Adams writes award-winning romantic suspense, fantasy/paranormal, Urban Fantasy and space adventure that’s been compared to Jack McDevitt and Robert Heinlein. She also knows all about getting rid of the bodies. Both traditionally and indie published, Jeanne has been featured in Cosmopolitan Magazine. She teaches highly sought after classes on Body Disposal for Writers and Plotting for Pantzers, as well as How to Write a Fight Scene with her pal Nancy Northcott.

Website: http://www.JeanneAdams.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/JeanneAdams
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/JPAGryphon Facebook: http://www.Facebook.com/JeanneAdamsAuthor

Nancy Northcott’s childhood ambition was to grow up and become Wonder Woman. Around fourth grade, she realized it was too late to acquire Amazon genes, but she still loved comic books, history, and genre fiction. A sucker for fast action and wrenching emotion, Nancy combines the romance and high stakes (and sometimes the magic) she loves in the books she writes.

She’s the author of the Light Mage Wars/Protectors paranormal romances, the Lethal Webs and Arachnid Files romantic suspense series, and the historical fantasy trilogy The Boar King’s Honor. With author Jeanne Adams, she co-writes the Outcast Station space opera series.

Website: http://www.nancynorthcott.com Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/NancyNorthcott
Facebook: https://facebook.com/nancynorthcottauthor
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/3468806.Nancy_Northcott

Amazon Buy Link: https://www.amazon.com/Whos-Your-Daddy-DNA-Anthology-ebook/dp/B07T4K4VKT

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