Samhain Publishing Ltd. Weblog

Driven To Distraction by Ashleigh Raine

Take two authors’ lifelong obsessions with the entertainment industry and romance novels, add a love of cars, throw in a stunt-driving class and lots of lust for hot men with hot cars, and it all adds up to author duo Ashleigh Raine having no choice but to write Driven to Distraction.

Lisa half of Ashleigh Raine: I’ve been an extra for about five years now, so I know my way around Hollywood sets. In fact, one of my first gigs was on Starsky & Hutch (the movie!), and I got to be a precision driver for a day. I’ve been on many sets where non-car stunts were being done, too. I soaked all that up like a sponge because it’s just so exhilarating. Seeing the Hollywood magic happen in the moment is awesome.

I now know how the slit-throat, arm-chop-off and various other injuries are done as well as flipping and/or jumping cars and trucks. I find it fascinating and whenever I call Jen from a set, she says things like “Oh, we gotta use that in a book somewhere…” and that gets our minds turning.

I’ve always been into cars (had my 1968 Mustang fastback for 15 years now and I’m always working on it!), so when I had an opportunity to take a stunt-driving class I jumped on it. I mean, it was taught by guys who’ve been in the business for 20+ years. I learned a lot about driving and about stunts.

And my experience with that class enabled me to get a temporary job where I got to drive a Porsche, Lamborghini and two Ferraris for a week and a half. (I would’ve paid them for the job, but whatever.) So, between my on-set experiences, stunt-driving class and test-driving gig, I had a ton of personal experience to draw from. In fact, the whole opening scene was a fantasized version of a real incident where I’d stopped to help a sexy man in a hot car.

Let's Go To The Movies

Jen: Everyone who knows me knows that I’m a TV junkie. I use and abuse my FauxVo on a daily basis. I love dramas, comedies, paranormal, sci-fi. I love to escape into other worlds. But come May, the TV season comes to a close, and I need to get my fix elsewhere. Thank goodness for the blockbuster summer movie season. And this year looks like it’s going to be a great one.

Today the fourth Indiana Jones movie releases. I’ve been waiting for this movie for years. Indiana was one of my first movie heroes. When I was young, I wanted to be him, on those wild and crazy adventures. When I got a little older, I wanted to be the woman at his side. Now I just want to be the woman at the theatre enjoying the ride for a couple hours. Indiana might be getting older, but so am I and I still enjoy watching his adventures.

Lisa: I wish I had time to watch TV and movies. Now, I pretty much only see the shows I’ve been in (as an extra) just to see if I can be seen. (I also just started as a specialty costumer, but the shows I’ve worked on so far won’t come out until next year.) But once in awhile, a movie comes along that I get excited about and want to see. And it’s not always a movie people would expect me to be crazy about.

Lost Boys: The Tribe. The original was awesome, so why wreck it with a sequel, especially twenty years later, but I was a fan from the moment that movie hit the theaters. I wasn’t allowed to watch it because it was rated R, but as soon as it hit video stores, I talked my parents into renting it. Eventually, Lost Boys was the very first video I bought with my own money. And I’m still a fan. I honestly don’t care if the sequel sucks. I’m gonna love it anyway. Edgar Frog rocked my world then and he’ll do it now. Before there was Buffy, there were the Frog Brothers.

Jen: You know I’m looking forward to that movie too, for the same reasons. It’s hard to believe it’s been twenty years since the first time I saw it—at Lisa’s house on my first sleepover there. It’ll be fun to watch the sequel just for the tie-in to my youth. Interesting, two movies I’m most looking forward to this summer have tie-ins to my childhood. I guess that type of marketing works!

The other movies I’m looking forward to seeing this summer are Hancock—Will Smith playing a reluctant superhero, it looks like fun!—and two movies to watch with my son: Wall-E (I love all the Pixar movies) and Kung-Fu Panda (just the title alone makes me want to see it).

What movies are you most looking forward to seeing this summer, and why?

It's All About The Kiss

The Jen half of Ashleigh Raine: I’m a sucker for a kiss. Whether it’s the first kiss in a new relationship, or the millionth kiss between soul mates who’ve been together for a lifetime or more, kisses are beautiful. My heart beats faster, my hands shake, and I get a little weak in the knees just thinking about that perfect touch of lips to lips. I think that’s one of the reasons why I love reading—and writing—romances. I get to experience the joy of kissing over and over again.

My husband and son both tease me because when I see a kiss on a TV show or in a movie that blows me away, I’ll watch it over and over and over again. It’s emotional porn to me. :) When two people get so involved in each other that the rest of the world disappears around them, that their passion sears the screen, I can’t turn away. Here are some of my favorite kiss moments in recent TV history.

1) Veronica and Logan from Veronica Mars; Season One; Episode 18; “Weapons of Class Destruction”. These two characters went from being enemies to sooo much more over the course of one season. Their first kiss starts as a simple thank you, but quickly evolves into one of the most passionate kisses I’ve ever seen on television.

2) Buffy and Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Season Six; Episode Seven; “Once More With Feeling”. I have a “thing” for enemies turned lovers. This kiss, coming at the end of one of my favorite episodes of Buffy ever, sealed the deal for me on their relationship. “I touch the fire and it freezes me…” “I died so many years ago…” [sigh]

3) Captain Jack and Captain John from Torchwood; Season Two; Episode One; “Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang”. Oh my, what to say about this kiss. It’s hot. It’s sexy. It’s so damn passionate I swear I can hear their teeth clicking together as they each fight the other for dominance. And then they break apart and the fight continues, this time with fists flying. [fans self] Wow, wow, wow… If this show hadn’t already won me over as a fan for life, this kiss would’ve done it.

The Lisa half of Ashleigh Raine: And this is why Jen and I work so well together… She loves the kissing moments, the passionate connection between two people. I do, too, but I’m not obsessed like she is! :) I like the more subtle ones, too. Or the surprise ones.

Valley Girl: When Randy waits for Julie in the bathroom at the party, comes out of the shower and talks her into leaving with him. At the end of that little conversation with him fixated on convincing her and her liking the attention, but unsure because he’s so strange, he goes in for a quick, surprise kiss and then he’s outta there, outta the bathroom while she’s still got a doofy grin on her face. Yeah, that’s my kind of kiss.

I don’t need to be ignited with passion while the curtains catch fire (this is probably why Jen has shutters instead of curtains—all those sexy kiss replays!). I see the kiss as an expression, a tease, a promise of more to come, an incitement of passion, yes, but it doesn’t have to set the world on fire.

First Knight: The kiss that made Guinevere force Lancelot to promise to never kiss her again…unless she asks. What’s great about that one is that it was such a part of the story. I mean, the guy runs the freakin’ gauntlet with all the slashing swords and heavy things that could kill him because the prize was supposed to be a kiss from Guinevere. And when he’s standing in front of her and she’s not asking, he doesn’t take the liberty. Now that’s another powerful kiss and it says a ton about the two characters in having kissed and then not kissed.

I dunno. I dig that stuff. (Of course that kiss between Captain John and Captain Jack in Torchwood was really steamy especially since it turned into a big testosterone-dripping brawl between the two of them. That was most definitely hot.)

So what’s your favorite movie or TV show kiss? Or what’s your favorite type of kiss?

Welcome To Talisman Bay...

It’s here! It’s really, really happening! The road to Talisman Bay has been a long one, but we’re there!

For the first time in months, we’re both in the same room and brawling over who gets Marlin. Lisa had to give in because Jen sat on her. But when the consolation prize is Freeze, what woman would complain? Now if Jen could just get up, we could both claim our prized men. Or does Lisa have to use her boney little elbows?

Wait… Lover’s Talisman is about Stephan and Mariah. Why are we brawling over Marlin and Freeze? Well, we know of more than one person who’d brawl for Jake. Dusty, too. And Ryan and Fiero—the man with the magical healing hands. I guess, you’ll just have to read Lover’s Talisman and find out why they’re so hot (and well worth brawling over)!

Welcome to Talisman Bay, where all hell breaks loose on a daily basis, especially when you fall in love.

Zork, 10-sided dice, and one out-of-this-world dress

It’s no secret that Ashleigh Raine is a writing team of two women. We’ve been friends since junior high. Yet what many people don’t know is that role-playing was at the heart of our friendship.

A Hollywood Obsession

Are You Ready to be Driven to Distraction?

He drove up on a sport bike and had romance hero written all over that tight, leather-encased body of his and especially in those cerulean blue eyes. Right there, near the catering area for the filming of a television show, I wanted to pull out my cell phone and call the other half of the Ashleigh Raine writing team to tell her about the amazing sight I was witnessing, but I couldn’t. I was standing in line waiting on what’s called a voucher and I was next in line. I work as an extra, a background actor, and have been doing so since 2003 when this whole Hollywood Heat series began.

Once through the line for my voucher, the wait through the wardrobe line and then finally being led to the set, guess who I got to stand next to for the duration of the 12 hour night shoot? Mr. Motorcycle and he was just getting into stunts.

This is one of the many people who unknowingly shaped the writing of Driven to Distraction.