Blogging with Kristen Callihan

TRRC Reading welcomes new author Kristen Callihan whose debut book, the historical paranormal, FIRELIGHT, begins the exciting Dark London series...it only takes one encounter in a darkened alley in Victorian London for Miranda, a down on her luck aristocratic thief and the cursed and wounded Lord Benjamin Archer to feel the connection between them...Beauty and the Beast who together find love and trust...and when their love overcomes dark magic and evil, salvation. Below Kristen writes about Insta-Love, or Love at First Sight...Visit Kristen at her website: www.kristencallihan.com

Debora Hosey


Insta-Love? Do you believe in it?

Insta-love. If you’ve read enough romances, you’ll know what I am talking about. This occurs when a couple sees each other and “bam!” they are in love. Insta-love bothers some readers because they either don’t believe in it, or they’re sick of that trope.

As for me, do I believe in insta-love? No, I don’t. Insta-LUST, however, yes, yes I do.

My husband also happens to be my best friend’s brother. We met late in high school. The story he likes to tell me is that my friend had a picture of me in her room. My husband saw that picture one day and pronounced that we would be together. Understandably, my friend –his sister- was irate. You don’t even know her, she argued. You could hate her when you meet her. This didn’t faze him. He just knew.

But did he love me? No. Love comes later. Love develops through mutual connection and understanding. You have to get to know someone to really love them.

In FIRELIGHT, my characters, Miranda and Archer, feel an immediate and strong attraction to one another. This isn’t love –not yet- but a connection that I think happens now and then to people who are destined to belong together. But as the story progresses, and Miranda and Archer learn more about each other, learn that they both have much of the same fears and longings, they fall in love.

Perhaps you’d like to join them for the ride? And what of you? Have you ever fallen into insta-lust? Did it evolve into something deeper? Or perhaps you had the opposite reaction. Insta-hate that gradually turned into love.