Want to taste a Virgin?
Life in General|Excuse the innuendo. LOL.
I remember laughing whenever I heard an author complain that they had been asked “Where do you get your ideas?” I was still laughing…until it happened to me. The truth is there is no simple answer to this. Writers get their ideas from anywhere and everywhere. Sometimes something so simple as a phrase or a title can do it. Perhaps that’s why the Del Fantasma series available at Aspen Mountain Press has proved so inspiring. Set around a bar run by a vampire called Cody Warren, the inspiration for each story comes from the title of a drink. The authors currently working with AMP have produced some fabulous stories using just a couple of words as a springboard for their muses. These stories are part of a series but can equally be read individually, although they should perhaps all come with a warning on the cover as they are highly addictive. Read one and I almost guarantee you will want to read another!
“Virgin Special” released last week and is my latest offering for the series. It’s also my first m/m/f novel for AMP as well as my first vampire paranormal. So where does one come up with the idea for a very special kind of virgin?
While holidaying in the Caribbean many years ago, I came across a little cocktail book that I still possess to this day. Wanting to write another book for the ‘Del’ line, I flicked through the pages seeking inspiration, and it definitely found me. Then, as many authors do, I started playing the old ‘what if’ game. What IF my main character was not only heartbroken but a virgin? What IF Cody set him up with two vampires equally heartbroken? In that moment Virgin Special came into being.
I’m afraid that aside from reading my novel, the only Virgin Special I can invite you to try is the cocktail. Here’s the recipe. I have to admit I’ve not tried it and I’m trying to imagine how it tastes, but the book describes it as: “A very pleasant and refreshing summer drink.” If it’s like most things I drank in the Caribbean it’ll taste deceptively fruity or watery, and then it will suddenly knock your socks off!
Virgin Special Cocktail
Take a glassful of fresh raspberries, bruise them a little and pour upon them:
2 glasses of Old Brigand Rum
2 glasses of Brandy
1 glass Redcurrant juice and half glass sweetened lime juice.
Let steep for half an hour, then add 1 glass sherry and some ice.
Shake and serve in 6 cocktail glasses.
Decorate with a cherry.
Ever Fallen for a Virgin?
Fall for one now at Aspen Mountain Press.
