A couple months ago — in the middle of the holidays and while editing Conflicted Interest — my partner called to tell me he’d be home late.

I did two things:

1. ordered take out for dinner
2. took a break from writing to do an indulgent deep dive into the mystery of how to pull off red lips — a lifelong mystery to me.

If we’ve spent any time together, you know that I don’t like the idea of looking sexy.  No, No!

Our mantra = feeling sexy beats looking it… any day!

I haven’t a clue whether my new red lips make me look sexy or not, but I’m certain they make me feel like a sexy kitten whenever I enter a room.

So here are the two most important things I learned about the art of red lips in those wee hours in December:

1 – Exfoliation is KEY! 

To pull off the red, your lips need to be hydrated and scrubbed. Find a nice lip scrub or use a washcloth to get those baby-smooth lips.

My favorite so far… is in the giveaway below!

2 – Warm or cool? 

Different reds look better on different people. How to tell if you have cool or warm tones?  Look at the veins in your arm:

• If they look blue, you have cool tones.
• Green = warm tones.
• A little of both, you say?  You have neutral tones.

There are endless blogs online about what colors look best for each tone.

Giveaway

My new favorite thing about book launches has quickly become the giveaways, so I have an extra special one for you this week:
The Sexy Lip & Book Box!

The box includes:

• a NARS Dragon Girl Velvet Matte Lip Pencil,
• a FRESH Sugar Lip Polish,
• a SIGNED copy of Conflicted Interest
• AND a Romance that Inspires book bag.

A total package value of $100!

Life is short, so let’s just go a little crazy while we can, right?

You can enter to win here.

Goodluck!  And happy reading this week!