Shira Anthony (writing as Sarah Alexander)

Sometime in her formative years, Shira decided to skip any story without an HEA. A die-hard romantic, she discovered the world of M/M romance when a fellow writer convinced her to co-author a love story between a violinist and a conductor.

Shira is a former violinist professional opera singer. She adores anime, manga, yaoi, sushi and anything remotely Japanese (not to mention sake!). She's given up TV for evenings spent on her laptop, and doesn't go anywhere without her pile of unread M/M romance on her Kindle.

Shira is married with 2 children and 2 insane dogs, and when she's not writing, she's in the courtroom trying to make the world safer for children. When she's not working, she can be found aboard a 30' catamaran at the Carolina coast, with her favorite sexy captain at the wheel. Shira also writes heterosexual erotic romance under the pen name, "Sarah Alexander."

Website: http://shiraanthony.com
Twitter: @WriterShira
Facebook: Facebook profile
Blog: http://shiraanthonydotcom.wordpress.com/

• Captive in the Dark (The Dark Duet) on Oct. 06, 2011
  
  C.J. Roberts' debut novel is a dark and sexy tale of the relationship between captive and captor. Well-written, with an alternating perspective, we get to peer inside of the minds of both Olivia, the young captive and Caleb, the tortured man who feels compelled to "train" her for sexual slavery. Note: I read this book as a beta, before publication, so the final, published version may differ slightly. MILD SPOILERS FOLLOW: Caleb's life has been anything but easy. Sold into slavery as a young child, sexually abused and treated like a dog (literally), he knows nothing but the dark underworld in which he grew up. He wants nothing more than vengeance upon the man who destroyed his life, and the unsuspecting, naive Olivia is the tool for that revenge. Olivia hasn't had such an easy time of it herself. She comes from a family that has its own share of darkness and she is trying to pull herself out of that darkness by going to school. But when Caleb kidnaps her and takes her to Mexico to "train" her in how to be a pleasure slave, she fights back at first, all the while drawn to the enigmatic man who holds her captive. Make no mistake about it - this is a dark universe Ms. Roberts has created. And yet, within that darkness lies light, or at least the possibility of it. Although the novel does not resolve completely the relationship between Olivia and Caleb, it poses some interesting questions which I look forward to seeing resolved in the planned sequel. Ms. Roberts' writing is clean and engaging, and the shifting perspectives in the work are intriguing and not distracting to the reader. I enjoyed seeing what made Caleb tick the most, and how Olivia begins to get under his skin in a way that none of the other women he has trained before ever have. Seeing Olivia's growth from naive girl to a woman with a sense of her fate was also an appealing progression. Erotic, yes, but with an appealing darkness that will make you shiver at times and look for the light.