Coffee Klatch: Spicy Coffee

It's pumpkin spice season in the U.S., and I do love me some pumpkin spice. (Not available where I live.) I love all the fall spices. In fact, I add cinnamon to the coffee I make at home everyday. 

Fall spices are more than that, though, pumpkin spice, mulled coffee, mulled wine... I enjoy making a big pot of mulled wine so much that, when I couldn't find mulling spices here, Brett ordered the individual spices to be delivered so that I could make it. 

I still have a lot of cloves left over, so when a video about adding cloves to coffee crossed my YouTube feed, I clicked on it. Apparently, adding one to three crushed cloves to a cup of coffee can act as an antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and a bunch of other good stuff. 

So I tried it. 
I enjoy a little spice in my coffee. 
It works. 

 

I'm not such a fan of spicy books, though. Not in the traditional sense of spicy = racy = sexy. There's other spice, though, wouldn't you say? 

Take Agatha Christie, for instance. Her books often include a romantic element, but that's not the spicy part. Murder, secrets, betrayal, fighting over inheritance - that's the sharper spice in an Agatha Christie.

That's the kind of spice I like in a book: whatever stirs things up. I've tried reading spicy romance. I have. Just can't get through it. I struggle enough with regular romance!

And when I'm writing, the romantic part often goes sideways. The protagonist ends up better off on her own or in a different relationship, or just more self-aware. If the romantic element survives, it's a sidebar.

So I'm curious - What makes a book spicy for you?

Is it romance? If so, what makes romance relatable or interesting?

Is it a dramatic situation or plot twist? 

Is it secrets, betrayal, or murder?