Sweet Nothings

by Michelle Douglas

Sweet Poison: Why Sugar Makes Us Fat

This is the name of a book I’ve been reading by David Gillespie. I’m not usually drawn to these kinds of books. I think they can send out the wrong messages to people, especially women. Our value is not defined by our weight. However, weight (of the excess kind) has been on my mind lately.

I’m now in my forties and I’ve definitely found that my metabolism has slowed these past couple of years. Last month I attended a wedding. When I pulled on my lovely black dress pants I discovered they were too tight. Oh, I could’ve gotten away with it, but they were far from flattering. Vanity is not generally my besetting sin (please don’t ask me about sloth and gluttony), but even I have to draw the line somewhere. I went out and bought a new pair of pants. And while I love clothes shopping, I don’t when it’s because I’ve outgrown clothes that I love.

Obesity has been a big problem on the maternal side of my family. When my great grandmother (a wonderful wonderful woman) died, she was so large it took four grown men to lift her out of her bed. Her daughter, my great aunt, cannot walk any great distance due to her excess weight. She needs two knee reconstructions but surgeons refuse to operate on her because of her weight. My mother is five foot nothing and has tiny legs, but a very round apple shaped middle. She has type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

I’m not obese, but during my lifetime I have fluctuated from a size 10 to a size 14 and back again. I’m roughly a size 12 at the moment. Problem is, over the last couple of years my weight has been steadily increasing.

Denial also runs in my family :-) so I’m refusing to bury my head in the sand about this issue. I do not want to develop my mother and aunt’s health issues.

Maybe that’s why Sweet Poison captured my attention (though I fear it may have more to do with the fact that the front cover bears a picture of a doughnut—my favourite food in the universe). I read it with a very healthy dose of scepticism, but…

So much of what Mr Gillespie said made sense, and he backs his claims up with research from reputable sources. His primary message is that our bodies have not evolved to process large amounts of fructose. Fructose is a sugar. Table sugar—sucrose—is half fructose and half glucose. Our bodies are designed to deal with glucose and lactose (the sugar naturally occurring in milk), but not fructose. Fructose is not detected by the appetite-control centre of our brain either, which means it’s very easy to overeat foods containing fructose. If that news isn’t bad enough, fructose is converted into fatty acids and released into our bloodstream. There is a lot of growing evidence that diets high in fructose are responsible for cardiovascular diseases, type 2 diabetes, and other metabolic diseases that have been previously blamed on diets high in fat.

So, for the next two months I’m going to conduct an experiment and, to the best of my ability, give up fructose (this actually means not exceeding more than 10 grams of sugar per meal). This doesn’t mean giving up fruit or suddenly eating a diet high in fat. If Gillespie had promoted either of those things I’d have run for the hills (actually, I don’t like running so it’d be more of a lazy amble, but I’m sure you get my drift).

I do think women can obsess too much about their weight and I think rigid diets do more harm than good. What I want to achieve with my experiment is to promote good health in myself and, hopefully, avoid some of the health issues that plague other women in my family. I’m not going to deny myself the occasional treat if I’m craving one. It just won’t be a sugary treat. It might be some lovely Camembert instead. Also I am going to have a piece of birthday cake in July to celebrate my DH’s birthday. Will be interesting to see what a sugar hit will do to me after having abstained so long. :-)

In August I’ll report back and tell you how I’ve fared—if I’ve lost weight, if I feel healthier and more energetic…or if there is no discernible difference.

But I’d love to know if any of you have ever made a “healthy” change to your lifestyle, and what the outcome was. Or maybe you have a tip or two you could share about how I can avoid sugar for two whole months? Come on folks, I need all the support I can get. :-)

Michelle's latest release, The Man Who Saw Her Beauty, is currently available in Australia and New Zealand

Sunday Smooch!

Welcome to another LoveCats DownUnder Sunday Smooch!


Today we have a smooch from The Man Who Saw Her Beauty by Michelle Douglas, but first ...

the winner of last week's Sunday Smooch Giveaway is – Ella A!

Congratulations, Ella! Can you please contact Natalie at natalie (at) natalie-anderson (dot) com and she'll send you a copy of First Time Lucky.

And now for today's Sunday Smooch from The Man Who Saw Her Beauty by Michelle Douglas ...

Blair Macintyre's daily routine: put on a brave face, and try not to be so distracted by unnervingly gorgeous Nick Conway...

All Blair wants is to be normal. To be the Blair B.C. -- before cancer. She's determined to show her friends she's okay...even if it means bluffing.

There's only one person who doesn't treat her with kid gloves. In fact, Nick Conway doesn't treat her with any gloves whatsoever--especially when saying exactly what he thinks of her helping his daughter in a beauty pageant!

Soon Nick is getting under Blair's skin--and defences. Maybe he's the one to show her she's just as beautiful as before.

[Blair and Nick have developed a tentative friendship. In this scene they're on a picnic, but the rest of their picnic companions have gone for a bush walk...leaving them alone.]

She glanced up...and drowned in the sight and scent of her picnic companion, at the expression in the warm brown depths of his eyes—sympathy, understanding, hunger. The pulse at the base of his jaw pounded. She watched that pulse, counted the beats, felt her own body quicken in answer and fall into tempo with it.

Ba-boom. Ba-boom. Surely he must hear it?

The expression in his eyes heated her flesh. The heat started in her neck, her cheeks, and then flashed down through the rest of her body, stealing her strength. Even though she'd promised herself that the warmth would not beguile her.

But the heat cascading though her now was like nothing she'd ever experienced, and Nick smelled of sun-warmed grasses and soap and cotton and it made her forget bad things. It made her remember she was only thirty-six.

He leaned closer, slugging her anew with his scent and his heat. She could see a tiny nick on his chin where he must have cut himself shaving this morning. And still the pulse in his jaw pounded. His eyes darkened. His gaze dropped to her lips. Her breath caught and her lips parted the merest fraction. The merest fraction, perhaps, but he noticed.

His gaze lifted back to hers, his eyes dark and fiery. 'I'm going to kiss you city girl.'

He wrapped a finger around a lock of her hair and she didn't even flinch.

'Why?' She reached up to press the flat of her palm against his cheek.

'Because you're beautiful.'

Not any more she wasn't. Even if his eyes told her otherwise. She moved her hand experimentally. Beneath her hand his skin was firm and hot. Her fingers prickled with the urge to explore further.

'And because I like you.'

Her mouth dropped open.

'And because I can't get the thought of it out of my head.'

Pity, she told herself as his lips swooped down to hers. This was a pity kiss.

And then all thought fled, because this was no tentative I-might-hurt-her kind of kiss. It was strong and sure and hungry, and it demanded that she take part or back off now. The strength of his passion knocked her preconceptions sideways. She hadn't meant this to go beyond a brief touch of the lips. But...

There were no kid gloves as he cupped her face with both his hands to drag her lips more fully against his, as his tongue swept across hers, daring her to dance and revel and enjoy. This was straight man-and-woman passion. No hiding, no games...and no pity. It was so heady and so liberating that Blair found herself kissing him back with a fervour she hadn't known she had.

She shuffled closer to him on her knees. Her hands crept around either side of his neck, revelling in the strong column of his throat. The short hair at his nape tantalised her palms. Her hunger built and built and he matched it, kiss for kiss, caress for caress, until she found herself needing to get closer and closer. She crawled right into his lap, straddling it. His hands caressed her backside as their bodies strained against the barriers of their clothes towards each other until there was barely an inch of space between them. And not once did they break the kiss.

Finally she had to drag her mouth away to draw much-needed air into oxygen-starved lungs. Nick pressed slow, drugging kisses to her neck, and she couldn't hold back a moan or the wanton way her body arched against his mouth.

It was magic, like Sleeping Beauty coming to life at her Prince's kiss. And she wanted more!

And then something wrong, out of place, made her still...

She realised what it was—her prosthesis. An alien and ugly thing, pressing against Nick's chest and her even uglier scar.

Blair flung herself off Nick's lap, unable to meet his eye as she readjusted her clothes with fingers that shook.

'What the hell...?'

'That shouldn't have happened.'

The Man Who Saw Her Beauty is out now in North America and will be released in Aust/NZ in June.

To be in the draw to win a signed copy of The Man Who Saw Her Beauty, have you ever had a memorable picnic experience, or do you prefer 5 star dining?


Come back next Sunday, when the winner of today's giveaway will be announced -- and a smooch from Undone By His Touch by Annie West will be posted!

A Charmed Life

by Michelle Douglas

When my third book was released for publication, my DH—wonderful man that he is—surprised me with a Pandora bracelet complete with two charms to represent my first two books.

His Christmas Angel

The Loner’s Guarded Heart

He didn’t know what to get me for Book 3—The Aristocrat and the Single Mum. So he presented the bracelet to me with the promise that we would go shopping for the third charm…and for every charm thereafter.

Yes, that’s right. He buys me a new charm for each book as a celebration and acknowledgement of an accomplishment achieved. And, yes, each charm does have its own little story.

This is the charm for my May book—The Man Who Saw Her Beauty. (June in Aust/NZ).

Isn’t it the sweetest little teacup? Here’s the reason why I chose it...

Set up: My hero has come to apologise to my heroine for bawling her out earlier. She finds him VERY unsettling, but has offered him tea.

“Tea would be great. If you’re sure it isn’t any trouble.”

He’d donned his very best manners. And just like that Blair didn’t want him to apologise any more. She wanted him and his disturbing presence and her even more disturbing reaction to him to walk out through that door and leave her in peace.

For a brief moment today she’d experienced something she hadn’t felt in quite some time—optimism. She’d felt she had something of value to offer someone. And then this man had come along and deflated it with his harsh words and dismissive attitude.

Still, it had been refreshing to be abused rather than mollycoddled.

She snapped herself back into the present and put the jug on to boil, spooned tea into the pot. Nicholas and his unnerving masculinity weren’t going to walk out through that door just yet, because she’d offered him tea as hospitality demanded. The sooner the tea was done, the sooner he’d leave.

She chose her aunts tiniest teacups instead of her usual generous mugs.

Of course, Blair then can’t help noticing how: His big hand on the tiny teacup should’ve looked clumsy, but it didn’t.

And a little later Nick can’t help thinking: Blair’s aunt would’ve given him tea in a mug, but Blair had sophisticated city ways. She had gloss and elegance.

Somehow the tiny teacups in that scene became symbolic to me of the conflict between my heroine and hero. Every time I glance at the charm on my bracelet I find myself smiling.

I can’t tell you how much I love this bracelet. Not because of its material worth or how cute and pretty it is, but for what it represents.

I'd love to know if you have a piece of jewellery (other than wedding or engagement rings because they have a special significance all of their own) that has a special significance…or that just makes you smile?

Sew Good. Sew Profound.

by Michelle Douglas

Amazing, amazing thing... Back in February I bought a sewing machine.

Why is this amazing?

Because I have always said that I hate sewing. Admittedly, I can’t remember ever actually using a sewing machine, but at school I never finished a single hand-sewing project. My sewing teachers shook their heads darkly and said I was ungainly and inept.

And I believed them.

For the thirteen months between school and university I worked in a clothing factory sewing the crotch in men’s knickers. That involved using an industrial overlocker. Production line work. Not creative. Not inspiring. Oh, yeah, and I had a seriously mean supervisor.

Can you see now how amazing it is that I’ve bought a sewing machine (and, no, I didn’t just get it because it was on a half-price sale)? Look, here it is. Isn’t it pretty?

Now, because I was on deadline I wasn’t allowed to use it until March, so I spent several weeks stroking it whenever I walked past.

What inspired me to buy it? Ah, good question, dear reader. I’ve been reading a daily blog by Kristina Douglas (aka Anne Stuart), Jenny Crusie and Lani Diane Rich (aka Lucy March) called Reinventing Fabulous (here’s the link if you’re interested: http://reinventingfabulous.com/) and these women love craft and sewing and are so enthusiastic about it that it started me thinking how wonderful it would be to be able to make things—clothes, cushions, curtains, bags. Oh my, the possibilities seem endless!

And you know what I’ve discovered? I am not inept and ungainly. I am a goddess! This is what I’ve made so far.

A tea towel cushion cover. This taught me that it is SERIOUSLY EASY to make something that looks good!

A t-shirt tote. This taught me that if I don’t put the presser foot down when I try to sew, I will make a mess… but also that I have the ability to fix said mess.

And a shoulder bag. This has a lining and fusible interfacing in the straps and everything! Fusible interfacing? Oh, believe me, I’m learning a whole new language. This…umm…also taught me why people use patterns instead of just measuring in from one edge of fraying material and cutting the required length out. :-)

This is what I’m attempting next and the material I mean to use. Wish me luck!

The sewing has been so much fun! Remember the sheer joy of play when we were kids? Remember how proud we were when we made something? There seems to be something joyful in this kind of play—it’s a refilling of the well and keeps our joy in life alive.

So I’d love to know—have you been playing lately? Is there something you’ve been doing that makes you smile and fills you with joy. And if anyone would like to leave a sewing tip or two for this enthusiastic beginner, I’d be terribly grateful. :)

[And for interested readers, I’m running a contest at the moment for an advanced copy of The Man Who Saw Her Beauty + a packet of Tim Tams + a packet of loose-leaf tea from The Tea Shop. And, yes, there’s a story to the Tim Tams and the tea but you’ll have to read the book to discover what it is. :-) For more information check out www.michelle-douglas.com]

You Can't Stop the Music

by Michelle Douglas

Reading: Everything I know About Love I Learned From Romance Novels by Sarah Wendell

Watching: Jam and Jerusalem

Listening to: Kate Fagan

Making Me Smile: my afternoon walks in this gorgeous spring weather

I’ve heard that a lot of authors create a playlist of songs for their stories, and I’d always thought, Good for them. Whatever works, I say. But it was never something I’d tried for myself.

That is, not until The Secretary’s Secret (out now in the UK). I’m not even sure why I did give the playlist thing a whirl. Except, I’d given myself a whole wonderful fortnight to play with the story before getting down to the nuts and bolts of actually writing it, and a playlist seemed like one of those fun, playful kind of things to do.

So I spent a week perfecting my playlist and another week playing it over and over, and it really did help me visualise certain scenes in my book. It helped me find the right tone for the story. What’s more it acted like a form of brainstorming and had new scenes occurring to me too.

Funnily enough I didn’t play it at all once I stared writing the story. But it had already done its job – it had helped me imagine my story world.

The process for every book is different and I didn’t create a playlist for The Man Who Saw Her Beauty (out in the UK in April 2012). I did, however, have a theme song for that book—Jesse by Carly Simon. Now, the book changed quite a bit so the reunion story I had in my mind became something quite different (so plaudits to anyone who can find even a skerrick of the song in that book now). But, again, the song helped me find the right tone and atmosphere for the book, even if the lyrics no longer applied.

For the story my editor has in her hot little hands right now I had three theme songs – Jesse James by Cher (for my heroine’s attitude), Summer Rain by Belinda Carlisle (for that all important tone) and Captain Zero by The Mixtures (for my hero’s realisation of his thick-headed doofusness and accompanying need to make amends).

One of my favourite things in the world is to lie on my sofa and stare up at the canopy of trees that soars over the backyard and listen to music. I quieten all the white noise in my head, and savour the view. Invariably, however, a line of music will catch my attention and suddenly I’ll be off playing the what-if game and creating scenarios in my mind.

And it seems to me that some songs lend themselves more to this than others. Here are three songs that persistently intrigue me:

1. My Girl by Hoodoo Gurus (She’s fallen out of love with him. Can he make her fall back in love with him? Has she really fallen out of love with him? Are his friends trying to cause trouble? If so, why?)

2. Living Next Door To Alice by Smokie (OMG, Alice is leaving! Hmm…but will Sally make the loss bearable? Actually, I play a whole load of scenarios with this song. Exactly how many love-pairings can I make? For a start there’s the narrator/singer and Alice, the narrator and Sally, Alice and the guy who’s sent the limo…and perhaps even Alice and Sally.)

3. Insensitive by Jann Arden (Is this jerk redeemable? And if so, why is he acting like such a jerk?)

Oh, and here’s another two:

The Day You Went Away by Wendy Matthews (The film clip breaks my heart)

Don’t Look Back in Anger by Oasis (I haven’t worked out exactly what this song is getting at, but I really like it.)

I don’t know if I will ever write a story based around any of these songs, but then again… :)

Songs are a great source of inspiration and I love collecting them. Do you have any favourite songs you think could be turned into great stories?