Heidi R. Kling | Slow Build Romance in PAINT MY BODY RED

All of my stories have a romance in them. SEA was a love-at-first-sight (or, at
the very least, crush at first sight) when Sienna met orphan Deni in Indonesia. It
was the immediate, palm-sweating, butterflies I Want To Be With This Person No
Matter What situation. The one we all want, or at least can relate to wanting.

My Spellspinners romances (WITCH'S BREW, The THE GLEANING, DEVIL's FROST, and BEAUTIFUL MONSTER) has that same immediate connection. Soul mates. PAINT MY BODY RED is a little different. First we have the inappropriate feelings between Paige and her stepbrother Ty in the “Then” chapters of the novel. In ordinary circumstances, Paige wouldn’t even look at Ty. He’s brooding, dark, sarcastic. He doesn’t care about school or people’s feelings. He’s everything she dislikes…at the beginning of the novel anyway. But when teens start stepping in front of the commuter train, and he seems to be the only one who “gets” how she feels, this new darkness. This foreign numbness in her life draws her to him. “An itch she wants to scratch” is how she describes it.

In Wyoming, Paige meets Jake (or re-meets Jake, she knew him as a child but has
forgotten him) a bit like Sienna with Deni in SEA, she has an instant feeling of
connection with him. She blames it on his relation to “home” to her father’s
ranch. But it’s deeper than that. He seems to know her. And he seems to want to
know her more. Paige fights her feelings for Jake as long as she can---she’s still
reeling from the damage with Ty back in California---but before long they wear
each other down---they just can’t fight it anymore. When Paige stops feeling
guilty about Ty she’s able to open herself up to Jake. Trust, once it’s broken, is
hard to find again---and Jake’s patience ultimately pays off. Jake tells Paige
that “you have to do stuff that scares you, that’s how you know you’re alive.”
She’s scared. And she has every reason to be scared after what happened to her,
but for Paige, Jake is worth the risk.

About Heidi R. Kling

Heidi R. Kling earned her MFA in Writing for Children from the New School and her BA in Creative Writing from UC Santa Cruz. A former playwright and director, the native Californian lives with her husband and children, right over the coastal mountains from the sea. SEA, coming June 10, 2010, is her first novel. Website | Twitter | Tumblr

About PAINT MY BODY RED

The world isn't just black or white. Sometimes it's red...

They think I'm next. That I'll be the seventh kid to step in front of a train and
end my life. With the rash of suicides at my school, Mom's shipped me off to my
dad's Wyoming ranch for “my own safety.” They think I’m just another depressed
teenager whose blood will end up on the tracks. They don't know my secrets...or
what I’ve done.

I wasn't expecting Dad to be so sick, for the ranch I loved to be falling to bits, or for Jake—the cute boy I knew years ago—to have grown into a full-fledged, hot- as-hell cowboy. Suddenly, I don't want to run anymore, but the secrets from home have found me...even here. And this time, it's up to me to face them—and myself—if I want to live...