I love the beauty of winter, but not the season itself. Not really. And this winter has been one of the most unlikable winters I can remember. I don't mind the snow, but the dryness and cold are unpleasant. Very unpleasant.

It's been such a cold winter in my part of the world that today it was 22 degrees and it felt like a heatwave. The hardest part was that the sun was so bright it reminded me of spring, and I started thinking spring thoughts.It didn't help that the groundhog predicted an early spring on February 2, because I've been thinking about it ever since.

Thoughts about planning vacations and wearing flirty dresses and having April breezes whip through my hair have infiltrated my brain, and spring fever has set in. Oh, I know that spring is still weeks away, whether a few or several, but I can still feel it in the air.

Maybe you can, too. If so, why not enjoy a read about nature and all its beauty, including the passion between a nature spirit and the woman he decides to claim as his mate? My novella, erotic novella, Second Nature, is available if you like books that take you into the great outdoors and into a magical place where there is nothing more natural than love. Here's a brief description:

"Mate with me."

This is the insistent demand wealthy tycoon Graham Norton makes on passionate activist Claret McDaniel. Never, "Make love to me." Never, "Let's have sex," or even a crass, "Let's do it, baby."

But whenever he sees her, whenever they meet to argue over his recent land development plans to destroy her beloved forest, the only place she feels at home, Graham urges Claret, "Mate with me."

And all of Claret's attempts to remain professional and pure are slowly melting away under the persuasive gleam in his eyes. She begins to sense under his carefully groomed businessman's exterior beats an untamed heart. There's something primitive about Graham. Something mythical. Something not entirely human. And whatever it is, she is about to find, deep within her unnatural human body ... its mate.