Heart in a Box cover, launch party & preorder link

Hi peeps,
I am super-excited to show everyone the cover of my new YA contemporary romance Heart in a Box. I have an animated version, too. Also, the official blurb, a party invite to my Facebook launch event, plus, most exciting: the 1-click PREORDER is LIVE.

Here's the cover and the blurb...

Each heartbeat leads Joss closer a shocking truth that will change everything.

Joss Olstad has finally talked her clingy, stoner mom into springing Joss from her stifling private school and into the labyrinth of a prestigious Brooklyn public high. Searching for “a way out, a way in, and something I can’t even put into words, yet” Joss longs to find missing pieces of herself she lost when the father she never met died on a faraway road in India. All she has of him is a painted box he made. Joss is also itching to escape the hippie hell of her mother’s bong shop, and the hypocrisy that is her life. With her honey skin, and long brown hair, she passes for white, even though she’s half Indian. This culturally diverse school will be her chance to find out who she really is.

Day one, and Joss is terrified by how different things are. Has she made a horrible mistake? Before long, she gets into the pace. Her sights are set on her own “Bobcat in black denim”, the tall, handsome Will Torres. She’s met Katya too, a popular glam queen, who’s a blast to hang out with. She’s even joined an Indian Culture Club, who invites her to live music clubs. Life is perfect!

Or is it? Her friend, Katya starts acting like a royal slut, her mom’s flinging insults and lies at her, and the Club girls are pressuring Joss to reveal her sketchy pedigree. Joss finds herself spinning stories about her past to fill in the holes. Even Will becomes leery of her. And the Personal Iconography class that Joss signed on for because kids claimed the teacher was “nuts in a good way” is the toughest class she’s ever taken. In it, Joss starts to make her own, heart-shaped boxes, with private messages in them. They help guide her forward. Not only is she forced to figure out who she is beyond the “nice girl” she always hid behind, her search leads her to the fringes of the outer boroughs, to a scary industrial section of Queens, and a shocking family secret that changes everything.

Preorder Heart in a Box here.

Put Heart in a Box on your Goodreads TBR list.

Come to my Heart in a Box Facebook launch party on Tuesday, December 8th (3:30 pm to 10:30 pm EST). We'll have tons of games, giveaways & guest authors, who write YA & sweet NA, both contemporary & fantasy. Join here.

Want to see the animated cover? Click here to view it.

Release Day for Model Position! Party & More

OMG! It's actually happening. Model Position has launched. A huge thanks to everyone helping with features, tweeting, joining my street team, or who has donated a giveaway item to the launch party. I also want to thank the blog community in general because you've all helped keep me going with your posts and blogs and savvy author talk!

If you like romance, stories about art and artists, and tales about striving to live out your dreams, please consider loading your kindle or iPad or Nook with Model Position! It's a fast-paced novella, inspired by my actual days showing my paintings in NYC. Now I'm writing Private Internship, the second in the series, and hopefully it will be a series you'll want to follow!

Find Model Position here: Amazon, B&N, Kobo, Inkspell

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

Sienna is a beautiful, talented artist poised on the precipice of soaring into the glamorous, yet cutthroat Manhattan art scene.
Dave Hightower is a hooked-up, handsome heir to the hippest gallery in NYC, Gallery Hightower.
Erik is the live drawing model with his sizzling green eyes fixed only on Sienna.
Three’s a crowd, so Sienna must make a choice: date Dave and ride the fast track to landing a show at Gallery Hightower and hobnobbing with the art glitterati, or follow her heart and take a chance with Erik, the stunning male model who’s stealing her heart. But Erik has some worrisome secrets, and who in their right mind would make live modeling their career? 

"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

Here are the bloggers helping to celebrate:
Christine Rains' blog
Nevaeh's New Adult Books
Books Books Books!
Lexa Cain
Karen Pokras Toz
***more bloggers to come & tour in March!

Also I invite you to PARTY & WIN MAJOR SWAG today, Feb 21 at a Model Position party on the  Romance Novel Promotions blog There will be multiple giveaways and fun Q&A, so do pop in! Click on the invite to join us!
The Friday party lineup:
9 am CST : Kitsy Clare
10 am CST: Piper Malone
11 am CST: Kennedy Layne
12 PM CST: Elizabeth Arroyo
1 PM CST: Lee Strauss
2 PM CST: Lisa Casia
3 PM CST: Stephanie Keyes
4 PM CST Lisa Voisin
5 PM CST: Final post from Kitsy Clare

Here are two tweets to choose from if you feel like tweeting about the launch. Thanks in advance!

"I imagine myself posing with him. It has me blushing as permanent rose as the paint on my palette." http://tinyurl.com/oetbu8o  #NA #romance

"A sexy montage of art, beauty, lust & love as colorful as any artist’s canvas."-Share my Destiny http://tinyurl.com/oetbu8o #NA #romance

Sizzling Ruby & Blane encounter, how to brainstorm & MULTIPLE PRIZES & freebies as Ruby's party blazes on.

Ruby's party blazes on with links to my posts on brainstorming, excerpts on Ruby's drug struggles, hot character sketches of Blane and Ruby and more. Enter the Rafflecopter for prizes! Plus there's a bonus prize for the most creative guess as to what the Red critter is in the picture below. But first, here's where you can find Ruby. Big hugs to all who buy, read, review and tweet about her, because readers make the world go around for us indies.

Ruby with a Dragon Lizard, by Catherine Stine

Ruby on Kindle, the illustrated paperback, on Nook

Today (Friday's) revelers! 
Donna Galanti has a scary Ruby medical excerpt
Book Whirlwind has a Ruby excerpt on her drug struggles
Beth Fred has my post on brainstorming
Kelly Hashway has a sizzling Ruby & Blane encounter Mom With a Kindle has a Ruby & Blane character sketch Twilight Sleep has a snippet of Ruby's first frightening encounter at The Greening & an extra prize! Always Jo Art has two special giveaways! Buried Under Books is a cool blog too, A Chick Reading has two mega-giveaways! The Bookish Owl, an extra Owlish giveaway!

Thursday's blog revelers: Oops, I Read a Book Again & Hot off the Shelves
Wednesday's Ruby blog revelers: Crystal Hicken Collier (where you guess which of my three "truths" is a big fat lie), Alex J Cavanaugh, Whimsically Yours, Wintry Words, Fresh Pot of Tea, Eclipse Reviews, Katie Clark Writes & Michael Ventrella.

Can you guess what this red critter is? Hint: it's NOT a bird. Most creative answer gets you a special, bonus prize!

Lastly, which of these Ruby lines most intrigues you? It's fascinating to know what others feel about our characters and stories.

#1: I reach for the velvety sack in my cloak and feel the reassuring give of the powder. It’s diminishing with every dose, and I won’t be able to make more here. I need to ration it carefully. My heart hammering, I flutter into the bathroom, inch open the drawstring and shake a line onto my wrist. I inhale greedily, desperately.

#2: When the man sees my face and my electric haze of hair, his eyes soften. That spark of wonder that men get whenever they gaze at me is in his eyes. That spark I almost always hate. Somehow with this stranger, it fills me with unexpected lightening.

#3: My arm is smarting. I turn it over gingerly to survey the damage, and gasp. It’s not bleeding red—rather some thin, greenish liquid. My insides freeze. “Armonk, I need to find that doctor now.” 
He rushes over. His pale, frightened expression tells me he agrees.

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