There be dragons by Nancy Lee Badger

Castle Urquhart on Loch Ness,
 the background of Dragons in the Mist

This week Adventures in Authorland takes a break from the usual questions to tell you all bout dragons and their sex.lives.

Welcome once again Nancy Lee Badger. Leave a comment for Nancy and you could win a copy of her book, DRAGON BITES 

     Paranormal romance opens doors to all kinds of creatures, be them vampires, shape-shifters, sorcerers, the Fae, Hobbits, gnomes, unicorns…or dragons. Writing a romance novel in the paranormal genre means taking a chance that your characters will be accepted by your readers. Making my characters sexy, while keeping to the code when describing their shape-shifting traits, is how I create a sensuous adventure for my reader.

     A romance writer usually follows a few rules, and one taboo is against using bestiality. So, I can mention two dragons having sex, but I must tip toe away from even suggesting my dragon will mate with a human. Ergo, my characters can shape-shift. Sometimes this shifting is unmanageable and can make for a great story plot point. In DRAGON BITES, my collection of several Scottish dragon tales, Dragon’s Curse is the story of Draco and Brianna. My hero was cursed by a witch to turn into a dragon at inopportune times. Here is what happens when he attempts to make love to the beautiful Scottish seer, Brianna:

Higher and higher Brianna flew. Her vision dimmed and her body arched. She heard the sound of moans and grunts.

Mine, or his?

She forced both eyes open. All the muscles of Draco’s face strained and his skin flashed a pale green. His closed eyes snapped open and she stared into red-hot orbs.

     Needless to say, their day was ruined because Draco left their bed so fast, Brianna was left speechless. He wants to keep his curse a secret from the woman he has grown to love. To have his body start to morph into a terrifying creature when all he wants is to make love, pulls the reader in to the story, and makes them want to see if these two can get past this stumbling block.

     I turned the tables in my next two books by making my heroines the shape-shifting dragons. In Southern Fried Dragon, I set my story in and around Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. I gave my dragon a history of fear and a yearning for love, which propels her to fly far from her home and to search for love among humans. I wrote the opening with an attack on my heroine by drunk humans while she is also in human form. How she reacts gives my readers a sense of what she really is:

Dru kicked until her booted foot met bone. A dark shape dropped to the dirt.

Dru smiled. Her tongue licked the tips of her lengthening fangs still hidden from her assailants. A third man stepped back, his eyes wide.

Maybe, not so hidden.

The sudden splitting of thin human skin tore a scream from her dry throat. The pain increased each time her talons escaped from beneath her human fingernails.

     Showing a near rape is allowed, and the scene goes on to include my hero, a federal soldier, who scares away the attackers. Why couldn’t my heroine be a Scottish dragon looking for love while hiding from a rogue dragon? I am the writer, and the paranormal world is where a writer suspends belief. The addition of sexual innuendo and romance heats up each plot line.

     The other story came about while researching historical dragons. I stumbled on a listing of Loch Ness. Some Scottish folklore assumes that the Loch Ness monster is actually a dragon. I turned this information into my award-winning short story, Dragon in the Mist. My heroine has lived her life as a wingless serpent living beneath the surface of Scotland’s famous lake. Nessía is lonely, and the last of her kind. She becomes human and meets an American scientist who has come to study unusual earthquake activity. Neither is looking for romance. They realize they are too different. I give them problems to overcome by literally throwing them together:

     Nessía tripped over the hem of her dress and a steaming plate of food and a mug of foamy ale went flying. A cry of surprise filled the suddenly silent pub interior. The American with the broad shoulders and muscular calves, whose stare had startled her, jumped from his chair. He stood, still staring, covered in food.

Mac, the tavern owner, appeared at her side.

     “What ye trying to do, lass? Drown the man?”

     Nessía couldn’t sputter one word in reply. Heat rose along her neck and cheeks. Embarrassed at her clumsiness and, knowing she had been watching Rory’s eyes when she should have been watching her feet, she backed away.

     “Fetch this feller a fresh meal. And bring some of my best whisky.”

     Nessía turned and stumbled toward the kitchen.

     “And bring a new tablecloth and some towels, ye clumsy wench!”

     Nessía’s eyes burned, humbled by a mere human for her ineptness. “I heard ye, Mac,” she snapped, intimating she wasn’t upset. A lie, of course, but a dragon never shows its weaker side.

     And I have a weakness for sea-green eyes.

     All three of these stories are available individually in ebook form, but I recently bundled them into one book that is also available in print.  

BOOK BLURB: Dragon Bites

     This is a collection of three novellas. DRAGON’S CURSE, set on the Scottish island of Staffa in the late 16th century, features a young man cursed to transform into dragon at inopportune times and the woman he protects. SOUTHERN FRIED DRAGON pairs a Scottish dragon-turned woman and a federal soldier at Ft. Sumter on the eve of Civil War. DRAGON IN THE MIST is a contemporary love story on the shores of Loch Ness.

     What do you like about dragons? Leave a comment for a chance to win an ebook copy of DRAGON Bites. Please make sure to include your contact info and format preference. I will choose the winner on Oct. 24th!

More About Nancy Lee Badger

     She loves chocolate-chip shortbread, wool plaids wrapped around the trim waist of a Scottish Highlander, the clang of broadswords, and the sound of bagpipes in the air. After growing up in Huntington, New York, and raising two handsome sons in New Hampshire, she moved to North Carolina where she writes full-time. Nancy is a member of Romance Writers of America, Heart of Carolina Romance Writers, Fantasy-Futuristic & Paranormal Romance Writers, Triangle Area Freelancers, and the Celtic Heart Romance Writers.  

Connect with Nancy:

Blog                                http://www.nancyleebadger.blogspot.com

Website                           http://www.nancyleebadger.com

Twitter                            https://twitter.com/NLBadger

Facebook                        https://www.facebook.com/#!/nancy.l.badger

Goodreads                       http://bit.ly/Vd1Usg

Amazon Author Page     http://amzn.to/13ICHLq

DRAGON Bites, a 3book Collection of Dragon Tales

Amazon Ebook       http://amzn.to/15LqV24

Amazon Print          http://amzn.to/17Ynsni

NOOK Ebook         http://bit.ly/16aZFuP

B&N Print               http://bit.ly/15vYjhG

Smashwords            http://bit.ly/17GB6K3

iTunes                     http://bit.ly/1hbfbw1