Bonnie: I started writing romances as a way to balance the emotional strains of constantly seeing poverty and suffering. For the day job, sometimes there are no happy endings. I work as a writer for a large international charity and interview poor people about their lives. In the books I write, no matter what the characters suffer, all is well in the end. It's not always like that in real life.

Missy: I have noticed a decided "social comment" in many of your books. Does that stem from your journalistic work or is there another genesis for it? What do you want to convey to your readers in this context?

Bonnie: Interesting, honestly, I don't know where it comes from. Maybe it is the journalist in me that finds exploring cultural differences so fascinating, and the author in me that finds the subject rife with conflict for the characters. For example, in THE COBRA AND THE CONCUBINE, I was drawn to writing about Kenneth/Khepri and the prejudice he encounters as an English duke after being raised as an Egyptian warrior. He's torn inside between two vastly different cultures, especially since many of the ton consider Arabians to be "heathens." He wants to sit on the floor as the Bedouin do, but he's forced to dine with heavy silver at an elaborate table to fit in.

I do want to entertain and provide readers with books that are a little different than the usual fare. I did write an author's note in COBRA about how slavery is still present in today's world. It's a very emotional subject for me because I've met former child slaves in my travels, and you can see it in their eyes, the haunting pain.

Missy: You have centered your books around a Bedoin Tribe. What do you want your readers to take away from these people and from the area? Do you feel there is any inherent romance to the desert?

Bonnie: Oh there's plenty of romance in the desert! Think of "The Sheikh" with Rudolph Valentino, the silk tent billowing in the wind, the dashing, exotic danger of the powerful sheik as he abducts Diana and takes her into his tent to ravish her. I tried to make my Khamsin warriors romantic with a touch of realism. I also wanted them to be powerful and very, very protective of their women and when they marry, devote themselves exclusively to only their wives. It's the desert life threaded with fantasy, because in reality the desert life is very harsh and men usually have separate quarters from the women and have more than one wife.

Romance is about fantasy. There's a scene I love in THE SWORD AND THE SHEATH, where Tarik is drumming and Fatima is belly dancing to his music in the moonlight. It's very exotic and romantic and epitomizes these two, who are true children of the desert, moonlight and passion.

Missy: Your heroes are all very strong men, but very different. Do you use "role models" for these men or are they completely made up?

Bonnie: Thank you, what a nice compliment! My husband is the role model for all my heroes. He's courageous, and extremely romantic and tender, and very supportive. On our first date, he gave me a single long-stemmed red rose. I start off with him, and then sculpt my heroes into individuals based on their various personalities. It's fascinating watching them emerge. Like Ramses, in THE TIGER AND THE TOMB. He's very sensual, yet the jokester, and that carries through to all the books.

Of all my heroes, I like Rashid/Graham in THE PANTHER AND THE PYRAMID the most because he's the most wounded, the most emotionally vulnerable and the most ruthless. It makes him very sexy and very dangerous, like a panther with a thorn in his paw. He wants desperately to be loved, and thinks he doesn't deserve love. He was the first male virgin I ever wrote, and I had a terrific time making him lose his virginity to the heroine in the brothel. It's a very tender scene, because though he knows he's paying for her services, he still yearns for love, so he gives her roses to woo her. So I guess you could say Graham's meeting Jillian mimics my DH and I first meeting, except we met on the beach playing volleyball instead of in a brothel!

Missy: Your heroines are strong and yet still vulnerable. Is it difficult to find and maintain that balance?

Bonnie: Thanks! I don't want to make them weak, yet I want to show their softer side. Ironically the heroine I had the hardest time with showing that balance turned out to be the one I liked writing best. That's Fatima, in THE SWORD AND THE SHEATH, my upcoming March release. She trains to become the first female Khamsin warrior, and literally has to fight her way to prove herself among these fierce, proud warriors. Yet inside she's very vulnerable, because she's psychic and thinks she's a freak, and because she's conflicted between proving herself as a man would and showing Tarik she's very much a woman.

Missy: Who is your favorite couple and why?

Bonnie: That's not a fair question! LOL! Okay, if I had to pick one couple, I'd pick Fatima and Tarik from THE SWORD AND THE SHEATH. I'd choose them because they're both so strong, they face new, difficult challenges in the twentieth century (the book is set in 1919 Egypt), and they've been in love really since childhood. I've woven them through the other books and it's been fun watching them grow, dropping hints about their future relationship. Plus I had a real blast writing the papaya sex scene where Tarik demonstrates oral sex to Fatima because he tells her all warriors must know how to pleasure their virgin brides. ;-)

Missy: How did you manage to establish the fine balance in Jabari (the hero in THE FALCON AND THE DOVE) between leader, lover and friend? Was this balance in Jabari the most difficult in all the men or was another character more problematic?

Bonnie: Jabari was actually easier to write, the arrogant sheikh who is a tender lover and a good friend. The most difficult balance I had with a hero was with Graham in THE PANTHER AND THE PYRAMID. He's so dark, and so tormented, he does things that aren't quite nice. I had to show both his inner struggles and yet make him sympathetic to the reader. He's fascinating because he slides into the role of English duke perfectly after a year of training, yet beneath lurks the ruthless Egyptian warrior who will not hesitate to kill to protect his own. In the first half of the book, he's the cool, reserved English duke. In the second half, you literally see him change when he goes to Egypt with the heroine and morphs into this dangerous, edgy Egyptian warrior. He transforms before Jillian's eyes and she's both excited and afraid of the change. She has to find the strength to deal with him when he's like that, and she finds it in her love for him.

There's a very difficult scene later in the book where he forces Jillian into having sex. The reasons are totally justified, he does it to save both their lives, but it's near rape and he knows it. I wanted to show him as being tender as well, so during the act, which is pure sex and not making love, he's whispering to Jillian to think of a beautiful garden to take her mind off the ugliness of what is transpiring. It becomes a very pivotal scene because it leads to his ultimate confession of his past. Graham is tender, arrogant, sexy and very complex. He's probably the most three-dimensional guy I've written.

Missy: Have you ever been to Egypt and does that answer impact the richness that we find in your background?

Bonnie: I wish! One day, I keep promising myself. Because I've never been there, and I want to make my books as rich and authentic as possible, I do lots of research. I want readers to feel the burning sun on their cheeks, hear the wind sweeping sand across the desert plain.

Missy: What is your favorite part of being a romance author?

Bonnie: Watching my characters have lots of great sex. LOL! No, seriously, it's creating stories that I want to read as much as I want to write. That's why I wrote about Egypt. When I finish a book and get that weepy feeling because I don't want it to end, and I've been so wrapped up in the story, that's when I know it's "there." And when readers feel it as well, that's the best feeling in the world for me as an author!