Sugar-Free Chocolate Report for Valentine's (and any other!) Day

Being pre-diabetic means looking for new versions of my favorites sweets. Chocolate is an important part of life, so it's vital to find good-tasting alternatives to lots of added sugar. And it's good to remember with all bagged or boxed chocolates bought at a grocery or pharmacies, check the "best by" date for freshness.

Here are my faves! [Note: There are some affiliate links on this blog.]




RUSSELL STOVER CHOCOLATES makes very tasty sugar-free chocolate. You can find it in most of the large-chain grocery stores and pharmacies, so this is my go-to chocolate that I know can be found quickly. For the very freshest chocolate, try their online store. I've got two great links here to check out.

Russell Stover Daily Deals!  Check out the site for a new deal every day!

Sugar Free Chocolates and candies from America's Favorite Candy Store



If you've been following this blog, you've read about the Million Dollar Chocolate created by American Heritage Chocolate, a brainchild of the Mars family of M&M's fame. ETHEL M CHOCOLATES comes from that same family, but this is their hand-crafted chocolate line, named after the matriarch of the family, Ethel Mars. I visited the chocolate factory and store in Henderson, Nevada, and the lovely botanical cactus garden there. We bought a lot of chocolate, needless to say. 

Shop Holiday Deals at Ethyl M Chocolates!

My favorites are the chocolate-covered almonds. Here's a link.

$12 Sugar Free Milk Chocolate Dipped Almonds!

ASHER'S CHOCOLATES
This company hails from Souderton, Pennsylvania, and I discovered their product on a trip to the local Southern Season specialty food store. In the store, there's a whole candy case dedicated to ASHER'S CHOCOLATES, half of it sugar-free. I love their pecan caramel patties, but truly you can not go wrong with any selection. If you want to order online, here's a link!

Asher's Chocolates, Sugar-free Selection

I hope you'll try some of these sugar-free mouthfuls of joy and let me know what you think. If you have any other sugar-free favorites, please share. I'd love to hear about them.

Have a wonderful day!

New Release! for Christmas in July

For several weeks in the United States, one of the top news stories has been the HEAT. 

Not political heat (which is a long-term story) ,...

and not tempers (though hot tempers flare in this weather)...

but HEAT of the Mother Nature kind. 



Everyone is searching for relief -- in air-conditioning, in front of fans, in movie theaters, in swimming pools, and in cool shelters. Cold temperatures and the Spirit of Christmas seem a long way off.

I felt a deep need for snowy days, holiday lights and brighter times. Christmas was never meant to appear for just a few weeks at the end of the year, but to live in our hearts every day.

This year, I decided to create a tangible reminder of holiday wonder by launching RESTORE MY HEART, the third book in the Pittsburgh Connections series, on July 10th. Read the book description below:

Click on Cover to buy now from Barnes and Noble!

  

Christmas miracles don't happen.

Sally Myers's alcoholic mother never celebrated the holidays. Her father and all the men who followed abandoned her, leaving her broken-hearted before she knew what whole-hearted felt like. From this rocky start, Sally has built a successful professional life. Still, she guards her heart against romance and love.

Now she has to work with appealing newcomer Jeff Campbell, a traveling restoration craftsman, just the wrong type of guy for her. In the hours of striving together to meet holiday deadlines, Jeff reveals himself to be both attentive and trustworthy. Maybe he could be the right man for her after all. 

Longing to believe in the miracle of Jeff's love, Sally drops her guard. When he leaves for his next project, her biggest fear is that he'll never come back.

~~~

Let this sweet contemporary story open your heart to the romance of the holidays. This third installment of the Pittsburgh Connections series delivers a deeply-felt story of real people falling in love. 

Catch the holiday spirit with Sally and Jeff! Buy RESTORE MY HEART from your favorite e-retailer today! (Head to my website Now for more information.)

And have the coolest Christmas in July ever!

Novella Review: MIDNIGHT IN DEATH, Holiday Heat

I love a good mystery and one of my favorite authors is J. D. Robb (Nora Roberts’ pen name for her In Death series). The series features Lieutenant Eve Dallas, a detective in the New York City of the near-future, and the friends and family she eases into her life as she solves the city’s toughest murder cases. The length of this series (45+ books and growing) gives us an opportunity to dive deep into Eve and Roarke, her financial magnet husband. I’ve enjoyed getting to know this cast of characters over the years, and occasionally take the time to dip back into an old favorite.

Midnight in Death is a novella set between books 7 and 8 of the series. It’s the first holiday Roarke and Eve have celebrated together as husband and wife. The plot of Midnight in Death is straightforward: David Sinclair, a serial killer Eve put away years ago, has escaped – and he has targeted everyone who took part in his downfall. Eve must work against David’s deadline to bring him down before the ball drops on New Year’s Eve.

Robb draws me in with her vivid descriptions of Eve’s emotional landscape – this steely detective used to be all about the job. Now she struggles with the strong feelings she has developed for her new husband, her trainee/partner, and the tentative connection she has begun with the motherly department psychiatrist.

The series is definitely HOT (see my Sensuality Content Ratings), and this story is no different — gritty tone, explicit violence and language, graphic sex — some readers find the series too dark. I read it for the deep, emotionally charged characters the author has created who leap off the page and stay with you long after the story is finished.  

In less than 100 pages, I can live and adventure 15 minutes into the future and sit on the edge of my seat while Eve fights to save those she's come to love (though she'll hardly ever admit it!). It’s a terrific post-holiday break.  I’ll take mine with hot chocolate, please. 

See this and other reviews on my Goodreads page.