Guest Post/Excerpt/Giveaway–Model Position by Kitsy Clare

         Published February 20th 2014 by Inkspell Publishing – Add it on Goodreads

In Manhattan’s glitzy gallery scene love and art are perilous games.
Will Sienna dare to play?

All too soon, artist Sienna Karr will graduate art school and be flung out into Manhattan’s glamorous but cutthroat gallery scene. Luckily, she’s just met Dave Hightower, heir to the hippest gallery ever. He’s asked her on a date, and offered to introduce her to the gallery owner, his intimidating aunt Lydia. Sienna’s excited! Now she’ll be able to climb the ranks and make those all-important art connections.

Trouble is, she’s falling hard for the sexy live drawing model, Erik, whose sizzling green eyes seem to pierce right into her soul. Dare she risk losing those potential art contacts for love? Erik insists that Sienna is a real talent and her painting stands out above all the
others. But she worries that he whispers this come-on line to every pretty art student who flocks around him during breaks. And her friends worry, is Erik up to her pay grade? What kind of guy chooses modeling for a living? Who is he, really? Her choice may be her ruin—or not—but she must decide fast. Everything in Sienna’s super-organized life is turning to terrifying yet sweet chaos.

Sometimes before you read a story it’s fun to get a sense of the characters. So today, Kitsy Clare is sharing a glimpse into the major players in Model Position:

Sienna is a beautiful and dedicated artist, about to earn her grad degree from a prestigious art school. She’s excited but also terrified because she’s in NYC, which is incredibly competitive and expensive. Her art medium is abstract computer art because she loves how organized and clean it is, having barely survived a chaotic and messy home. She longs for a meaningful relationship, but doesn’t want to ever feel as much turmoil as she did growing up. As you might imagine, she’s in for some challenges!

Erik is a live drawing model who also has a secret hobby. He’s blond, tall and buff in all of the right places. When he models he wears only a suede loincloth, so horny art students fall all over him during his breaks. He has serious aspirations but very little money. His problem? Who takes a live drawing model seriously?

Dave is a rich, jaded art student who grew up in NYC and dresses more like a Wall Street trader. He’s dashing, with coiffed black hair and equally striking black eyes. He is also quite well connected because his Aunt Lydia owns the trendiest gallery in Manhattan. His perennial obstacle to romance is that he never knows whether women like him for his money and contacts or for his actual personality.

Merry and Harper are Sienna’s besties and fellow classmates at the Museum School in NYC. Merry is into graphic novel art and Harper paints emotionally evocative environscapes. During their weekly cooking events, they talk romance, and they are extremely protective of Sienna. But sometimes even the best advice is destined to backfire.

Lydia Hightower is a diva art dealer, whose Chelsea Gallery is top of the line. Everyone would kill for a show there. But to penetrate her inner sanctum is nearly impossible. She’s scary, snobby and as frigid as a Siberian lake in January.

Erik is like an early birthday present, wrapped in that loose silk bathrobe. When he leans over me to check out the progress of my painting, my senses infuse with his clean-scented warmth. He must’ve taken a shower just before he came to work, because the tips of his hair are still damp. It brings an instant fantasy to mind of us in his shower, lathering each other in sensitive areas. “Madame Muse, you’re more mysterious than the Mona Lisa,” he whispers in my ear. His breath sends chills through me.

I lightly touch his hand, resting on his knee. “Monsieur Muse, you are sexier than the Greek god statuary in the Met,” I parry back. It’s all I can do not to kiss him. The taste of his mouth would fill me with an aching desire, make me want to go back for seconds and thirds. I sense he feels the same thing, because the sexual tension between us is thick, yummy, edible. But it wouldn’t be proper here in the studio. After all, this is Erik’s “office”.

As he bounds onto the stage, I see Dave glance my way and then quickly turn to his easel. Taffy and a few of the other girls are gazing longingly at Erik. The gleam of lust in their eyes is crystal clear, because it mirrors my own! I’ll need to keep a hawk-eye on the situation.

Erik adjusts himself on the leopard rug and stretches out his legs, inspiring his pecs to ripple in all the right places. I can’t help it; my gaze lands on the loincloth and the satisfying bulge. It’s a heavenly indulgence to stare at Erik in order to catch all of the light and shadows. I apply a mixture of brown ochre and midnight blue to the darkest areas. For his tight abs under his pecs I blend flesh, rose madder, brown ochre, and a dash of linseed and paint these parts in. After about twenty minutes of this, I’m getting turned on for real from stroking on the creamy paint and layering the second denser areas of muscle. It’s as if every stroke of paint on canvas is really a stroke on his warm flesh.

"Kitsy Clare paints a provocative picture with words - a sexy montage of art, beauty, lust and love as colorful as any artist’s canvas." -Share my Destiny, romance book blogger

"A captivating and sensual work of art!" -Jaycee DeLorenzo, author of The Truths About Dating and Mating

“Model Position is sexy, suspenseful and oh, so hard to put down. Kitsy Clare mixes a skillful, fast-moving story as Sienna, a talented but uptight art student takes on the trendy New York art scene. She’s caught between the pull of ambition and the possibility of steamy, but true-blue love in the form of Erik, a delicious male model with no connections. Or is he true? And is Erik really all he seems to be?”- Helen Mallon, author of Indecent Exposure & other short stories; Book Reviewer, Philadelphia Inquirer


Amazon/B&N/ARe/Kobo/Inkspell

When Kitsy Clare isn’t creating romances on her Mac Air, she teaches writing workshops. She also loves to draw, travel, read spicy romance, sci-fi and all kinds of thrillers. She divides her time between New York City and her Catskills studio, where she enjoys the sounds of birds, bullfrogs and the random coyote.

She also writes young adult fiction as Catherine Stine. Her YA futuristic thriller, Fireseed One won finalist spots in both YA and Science Fiction in the 2013 USA Book News International Book Awards, and was an Indie Reader Approved notable book. Her YA Refugees, earned a New York Public Library Best Book. Ruby’s Fire, the new companion novel to Fireseed One, is receiving high praise from reviewers. She’s a member of RWA, SCBWI and SFWA. She loves her readers and enjoys hearing from them.


Website/Facebook/Inkspell/Goodreads

Prizes:
2 Art of Love wristlet bags (US & Canada)
One Kindle with built in Wi-Fi plus 5W USB Charger (US/Can)
Ebook bundle of Ruby’s Fire and Fireseed One (INT)
$50 Amazon Gift Card (INT)
1 ebook of Model Position (INT)


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