As the new year begins, and I review my writing calendar, I've been giving this question a lot of thought.

Michelangelo used to say he wasn't shaping the blocks of marble, he was freeing the form inside, cutting away the extra stuff. Is that what writers do? Let's find out.

Every writer has different ways of talking about how they write, where the actual story comes from, who those weird imaginary people are that inhabit their heads. Some writers say their characters speak to them. For other writers, the story is kind of 'downloaded' into their head. For yet others, they describe it as being a medium who channels the story energy into this world.

What do all of these have in common? Notice how I didn't put that any writers said "I know I want to write a story about X falling in love with Y, and I know exactly how they will fall in love, and how it will end". That's because writers don't have a lot of control over the stories we write.

For me, writing a story is like hearing a song in my mind. I hear those kind of songs all the time, all day long. Some of them are interesting, some have a good beat, and some I just tune out. Every once in a while, a song comes along, and I think, "Oh . . . I have to hear this one. What's it saying to me?" Those songs become stories.

The songs I hear that lure me into writing stories are usually pretty dark. I hear the equivalent of Within Temptation (a band I love) or Sting (Every Step You Take) or Phil Collins (In the Air Tonight). I've never heard Shirley Temple sing The Good Ship Lollipop, and I probably never will.

The men I write about won't win any awards for romance hero of the year. They've been in very dark places in their lives. They have very dark shadows over their hearts. They've done bad things for good reasons, or so they tell themselves. The songs of these men lure me irresistibly, because with all that darkness in their souls, they yearn to be loved and to love.

My story worlds are dark, sensual, and nowhere near the middle of the road. You will not find a "good" hero in the writings of Ryssa Edwards. You will find a hero who thinks that maybe this new love he's found might be worth the effort it takes to be good.

To get down to the hard dollars and cents of this conversation, here's the bottom line. If you enjoy dark worlds, if you are lured into worlds where the line between good and bad is blurred beyond recognition, if you enjoy a read that makes you feel like you've walked so far down a dark alley, you may never see light again, then your dollars will be well spent on a Ryssa Edwards dark romance.

So, back to the original question. Do I write romance?

Oh yes.

The men are hot, their hearts are dark, and when romance comes their way, they'll give it all they've got.

Presenting Ryssa Edward's dark men of 2012 . . .

Jezrel . . . shadow warrior trained for seven years in Ironstone Castle to be a deadly mercenary. After he fights to build an empire and becomes king, he falls in love with Sciontes. . . who could threaten everything Jezrel has spent his life building

Death . . . the angel of Death has a little bit of a hard time in the romance department. But when Lucifer sets him up with an investigative reporter . . . let's just say that things get interesting.

Harlon . . . you remember him, right? Deep sky pirate on Midnight Hour. Trouble's brewing in the skies, and of course, Harlon and Khoda are right in the middle of it.