RaeAnne Thayne's Cranberry White Chocolate Chip Cookies

Welcome, guest author RaeAnne Thayne! RaeAnne is the USA Today bestselling author of more than 40 romance novels, including her latest, WOODROSE MOUNTAIN, the second book of the Hope's Crossing series.

Three Random Questions for RaeAnne Thayne

You worked at your local newspaper after getting your journalism degree. What’s the most interesting story you ever covered?

Tough question! I wrote hundreds of stories and can only remember a handful, alas. That part of my life seems like another world, since I’ve been writing fiction full-time for nearly fifteen years! One that has stuck with me was a story I did on how effective music therapy can for people with dementia. I observed a woman who was basically non-responsive most of the time but when her family would hand her a violin, she would play this gorgeous, heartbreaking music. She couldn’t remember her husband of more than forty years but Bach and Mozart somehow seeped out of her subconscious.

What kinds of activities were you involved in when you were in high school?

I was very involved in drama and debate in high school. We had a great program at my high school and actually had an off-campus repertory-type theater, where we put on a different play every month of the school year and a couple in the summer. It was a great experience and taught me so many skills I find myself using today as a novelist, like dialogue and character blocking. I intended to be a drama teacher until my junior year, when I was ended up on the school newspaper staff and decided this was where I belonged. Little known fact about me, I was also the scorer for our high school baseball team and traveled with the team. My first actual professional newspaper job was as a part-time sports writer while I was still in college.

In WOODROSE MOUNTAIN, your heroine Evie Blanchard moves from Los Angeles to Hope’s Crossing in search of a more peaceful life. Is your town more like L.A. or Hope’s Crossing? How so?

My town is very much like Hope’s Crossing, except we’re not really a tourist destination (though we should be!). I live in a gorgeous small town nestled in the mountains of northern Utah. We’ve lived in two different houses in this town and in our first home, we had a pasture next door. More than once, we would wake up to find the cows next door had broken through a fence and were wandering across our lawn. The main similarity between my town and Hope’s Crossing is the quiet pace and the inherent goodness of the people who live here. They might have the same weaknesses as everyone else, but most of my neighbors are genuinely kind people.

Recipe: Cranberry White Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon almond extract (can omit and add one more teaspoon vanilla)
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup white chocolate chips
1 cup dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets or prepare with parchment paper. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and brown and white sugars until smooth. Beat in the egg, vanilla and almond extract. Combine the flour and baking soda in a separate bowl; stir into the sugar mixture. Mix in the white chocolate chips and cranberries. Drop by heaping spoonfuls onto prepared cookie sheets. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven. Don’t overcook. Allow cookies to cool for 1 minute on the cookie sheets before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

Linda Goodnight's Light Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Cookies

Linda Goodnight is the author of heartwarming, inspirational romance novels, including her latest, THE CHRISTMAS CHILD. Linda has won the RITA Award for excellence in inspirational romance. Visit Linda online at www.lindagoodnight.com.

Linda, I love Christmas romances! Reading them is one of my favorite ways of getting into the holiday spirit. Would you please share the back cover blurb of THE CHRISTMAS CHILD?

Linda: I'd love to!

Who is little Davey?

A young boy is found huddled in a Dumpster in Redemption, Oklahoma, hungry, dirty and clutching a Christmas book. The scared, mute child captures Kade McKendrick’s guarded heart, and the undercover agent is determined to find answers. All he has is a name-Davey-and the boy’s trust of teacher, Sophie Bartholomew. As Christmas draws near, can sweet Sophie help the battle-scarred cop and the silent boy learn to smile-and maybe even to love-again?

In Redemption River, where healing flows...

Three Random Questions for Linda Goodnight

1. Share a random happy memory from childhood.

Let me tell you a story about a book, a mulberry tree, and a mama hog named Sally Ann. I have always been a bookworm and one of my secret escapes from two brothers was to take a book, hide somewhere on the farm and read all afternoon in peace and solitude. Sometimes I hid in the peach orchard and sometimes in the barn loft behind stacks of peanut hay with the barn cat, Bright Eyes. But this particular day I headed for the mulberry tree to indulge my taste buds in the sweet, ripe berries while I indulged my imagination in a book.

Everything went well that afternoon until my book ended and I was ready to climb down. You see, I’d forgotten one thing. The mulberry tree was inside a fence—a fence which happened to house a large Poland China sow and her six piglets. (To a nine year old she looked enormous.) Sally Ann was known to have a fierce temper but at the time I’d climbed up the tree she was nowhere around. Now, as I descended she spotted me and came squealing with jaws agape and evil intent. After scrambling back up, I hovered in the branches for a while and then tried again. Sally Ann was not to be challenged. She charged. I retreated. This went on for some time until I gave up the battle and decided if I was destined to die of old age in a mulberry tree at least I wouldn’t die hungry. After what seemed like hours, Sally Ann lost interest and wandered far enough away for me to escape.

Now, you’re probably wandering why that’s a happy memory. Truthfully, I don’t know why, but it is. I loved those lazy, innocent childhood days on the farm.

2. What kind of commercials make you cry, if any?

My family claims that I cry at anything-which is pretty much true. I am painfully sentimental which means sweet Christmas commercials from Hallmark and the Budweiser Clydesdales get me every time. I particularly love commercials where someone returns home after a long absence, especially if the returnee is a soldier in uniform. The minute I see him walking up to the door with that duffel bag in tow, music playing in the background, snow on the ground and a wreath on the door, I’m sniffling. I also get teary at commercials where the father of the bride fights emotion as gives his little girl away. Though I never remember what they’re advertising, I love those moments. Don’t you?

3. In what ways do you relate to the heroine of your latest book, and how are you different?

The heroine of THE CHRISTMAS CHILD, Sophie Bartholomew is a fifth grade teacher who loves Christmas, kids and baking cookies. That description fits me too, though I’m no longer teaching. We’re also both small town girls, but the similarities end there. Sophie is the eternal optimist, a character trait I envy but don’t have. She has a big, sweet smile and is a doer who thinks she can make the world a better place by giving to others. I wish I was more like her!


It seemed only fitting that I share a cookie recipe that Sophie and her students would make for their annual cookie sale. These are a light, sweet chocolate just perfect with a glass of cold milk.

Recipe: Light Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Cookies

1/2 cup (1 stick) margarine
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 squares of unsweetened chocolate melted
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/4 cups self-rising flour
1 cup peanut butter chips
½ nuts optional

Preheat oven to 350°. Cream the butter and sugars. (I use a mixer.) Beat in the egg, chocolate, and vanilla. Mix in flour. Add the peanut butter chips and if desired, the nuts.

Drop by teaspoonfuls onto lightly greased or sprayed baking sheet. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes.

Christmas Crackers

Last year for the first time, I made Magic Wands, which are pretzels dipped into melted white almond bark and then sprinkled with colored sugar. The salty-sweet flavor made them a big hit. Such a simple treat, and yet they were the first thing that many people reached for when they approached the plate of cookies. (You can find a printable version of the recipe for Magic Wands at www.susanmallery.com/recipes.php.)

So this year, when I decided to try to make up a recipe for a new Christmas treat, that salty-sweet combination was on my mind. I opened my pantry, and there sat an unopened box of Ritz crackers. Perfect! I would create something using the Ritz as a base. Its shape and size would make it both pretty and portable.

I didn’t want to just dip it in almond bark and sprinkle it with sugar, though, because that would be cheating. This needed to be a whole new recipe, something that would make people slap their foreheads and say, “Why didn’t I think of that?!”

Often when I’m writing a book, I start out with a really great title and then try to come up with a story to fit the title. (And then my editor or the marketing department ask me to change the title because it turns out that I do not have a talent for titles. Even so… ) Before I started contemplating ingredients, I thought about what I could name my new treat.

Christmas Ritz?

Putting on the Ritz?

On Britzen?

Somehow, I stumbled upon Christmas Crackers, and felt that thrilling “Aha!” rush through me. I’ve always found the British tradition of Christmas crackers to be charming, those brightly colored little pockets of wrapping paper, which pop open to reveal candy and toys.

So I would make my own version of Christmas Crackers with a Ritz cracker as the base with melted chocolate hiding a surprise inside.

On the outside, these treats look nearly identical, but each one contains a different surprise under the layer of chocolate. I experimented with several options. Pictured below are Parmesan cheese, caramel bits, marshmallows, and chopped peanuts.

I tried both Parmesan on its own and Parmesan over a layer of orange marmalade. Both were okay, but they weren’t as good as the four options I settled upon for the recipe. (The printable version of this recipe with its multiple fillings is also available at www.susanmallery.com/recipes.php.)

Christmas Crackers

1 box (4 sleeves) of Ritz crackers
1 36-oz bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips
1-2 T vegetable shortening or coconut oil

Line four cookie sheets with parchment paper. (If you don’t have four cookie sheets, you can just lay the parchment paper out on any flat surface. You only really need the cookie sheet for the sleeves of crackers that will have the marshmallow filling.) Lay all four sleeves of crackers out on the parchment paper and cover each of the crackers with one of the following fillings.

Melt the chocolate and shortening in a double-boiler. If you don’t have a double-boiler, then boil water in a small saucepan and carefully balance a medium-sized saucepan over it. Stir constantly until chocolate is melted.

Cover each cracker thoroughly, hiding the filling. Refrigerate until set.

Caramel Filling:
1 C caramel bits or caramel candy
½ T heavy cream

In a microwave-safe bowl, combine the caramel and the cream. Heat in 30-second increments until melted, stirring after each time. Drop by scant spoonful onto each cracker.

Marshmallow Filling:

Place 3 mini marshmallows of half of one large marshmallow on each cracker. Broil for one minute, then flatten with a spoon. I overdid the broiling a little bit, but they still tasted great.


Peanut Butter Filling:
Spread a thin layer of creamy peanut butter on each cracker, then sprinkle heavily with chopped peanuts.


Mint Crème Filling:
¼ C butter, softened to room temperature
1 C powdered sugar
1 T green crème de menthe

In a mixer, cream together butter and sugar. Add crème de menthe and mix thoroughly. Spread a thin layer on each cracker.

Happy holidays!