Nicole Peeler belly dances, listens to baaad music, and still teaches at a prestigious university

So one day Rachael and Sophie and I were talking about great bloggers and --swear to God-- we all stopped, gaped at each other, and said, why hasn't Nicole Peeler blogged for the Pens? WTF? Do you think she could take time out of her busy schedule of belly dancing and molding young minds and writing smut to be our guest on Pensfatales?

Nicole said yes, of course, because she is all kinds of awesome and her superhero quality is to be funny and creative and genius on demand.

Check out her Jane True series of Urban Fantasy novels -- you'll thank me. Really. Nicole is h-o-t hot, and so are her books.

Nicole:

Well hello there, Pen Fatales and Readers! I am stupidly excited to be here. I haven’t had the chance to meet all of the Pens, yet, but if I were to begin waxing poetic about Juliet Blackwell, Sophie Littlefield, and Rachael Herron, I would have to write an EPIC. An epic, people. Because that’s how much I adore them.

So when Juliet asked me to guest blog here, I was super excited. I also knew I had to really dig deep, and really share. Nothing else would do for the Pens but brutal honesty. And so that’s what I did.

I like a lot of music. In fact, I would say that, for the most part, I’m pretty hip, pretty happening, pretty “in the now” when it comes to music. Except for one secret I keep buried . . . a secret so dark, so painful, I keep it hidden for fear of reprisal.

I freaking love Roxette.

I love them. I’m sorry. I know that’s like claiming allegiance to Twinkies, or to Hanson, but it’s true. I love the saccharine gooey sweetness that is Roxette. And here’s what I love about them:

• I love that I can take a power stance, and sing along with their songs in a REALLY dramatic way. The way I might, in other scenarios, herald the impending apocalypse, or sing of my lover having fallen on the battlefield, or announce that Sarah Palin has become our President.

• I love that the lyrics often mean absolutely nothing when you actually think about them. Roxette presents us with a philosophical conundrum akin to Schrödinger’s cat: If a song is sung about nothing, but with tremendous passion, does that song actually come to mean something?

• I love all of that spikey, spikey hair.

If you’re still not convinced, try it out. First, take a power stance--legs apart, arms akimbo, and head back so you’re READY TO WAIL. Now play this song and sing along as loudly as you can:

Enjoy the drama and the meaningless, all while imagining your own hair in all its potentially spikey glory. It’s infectious! Granted, it’s infectious in the same way that sexually transmitted diseases are infectious (caught doing things we know we shouldn’t be doing, with people we certainly shouldn’t be doing them with) and yet it’s SO MUCH FUN.

At least it is to me.

Stop judging, meanies.

Cuz I bet y’all have your own secret sin music! But who is brave enough to share?


Bio: Nicole Peeler writes the Jane True series of Urban Fantasy for Orbit Books. She’s also an assistant professor of English Literature and Creative Writing at Seton Hill University, where she mentors up and coming writers in SHU’s MFA in popular fiction. In her spare time, she travels compulsively and belly dances badly, but with great enthusiasm. You can find out more about Nicole and her books at http://nicolepeeler.com.