Sample Saturday: “Rose in Bloom”

Hi, everyone. Today is the official release date for the large print edition of Brief Interludes! I’m also thrilled to report that, after a lengthy wait, my friends-to-lovers contemporary romance novella, Rose in Bloom, is available for checkout on the Hoopla library app. Enjoy this snippet!

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I had spent much of my life waffling when daring opportunities presented themselves, and most of the time I said no. I prided myself on my practicality. Sensible business suits, sensible shoes, sensible angle bob hairstyle … always practical. Even my fingernails had a sensible French manicure.

It was a legacy of my parents, always reminding me to be sensible or practical when I wanted to do something out of the ordinary. Like just about any child, I wanted to make my parents happy.

Where had that gotten me, at the end of the day? Nowhere. I lived 500 miles from my parents, who were retired. My dad, who had been practical his entire life and saved to enjoy retirement, was now experiencing health problems with no firm diagnosis as yet. He’d never stepped outside his life plan.

The lesson was staring me right in the face: not all plans work out, and sometimes you should do something impractical.

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Want your own copy of Rose in Bloom? Click here!

Back cover blurb:

Rose Davis always prided herself on being sensible. But when she loses her job, she takes an uncharacteristic leap of faith and agrees to spend six months living in Wisteria Cottage, just outside of the tiny village of Shalbourne, England. It will give her the chance to fulfill her secret dream of writing a book, and an opportunity to figure out next steps.

What she doesn’t reckon with is Welsh gardener Gareth Llewellyn. With his long hair and scruffy beard, he’s definitely not Rose’s type. And yet, there’s something about him …

 

 

Sample Saturday, One Day Late: “Brief Interludes”

Hi, everyone. The large print edition of Brief Interludes releases next Saturday, March 18. Click here to order in your preferred format, via your favorite bookseller. In the meanwhile, enjoy this snippet from Betrayed by a Kiss, one of the titles in the collection.

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He came to me in my dreams.

At first, there was only a fog … a cool mist … and yet, in my dreams, it seemed almost sentient. I would awake with a surprising melancholy, as though I had been abandoned. And yet, I had dreamt only of fog … a fog whose tendrils caressed my skin with a lover’s touch. A fog that whispered my name, even though I knew it to be impossible. On the nights that the fog did not come, I dreamed of the distant, mournful howling of a wolf. Again, I could hear my name borne on the wind, discernible in the animal’s cry.

The first night I dreamed of his face will be with me always. Pale skin, green eyes, cascading black curls: his was the face of an angel. How I longed to kiss his full, red lips, entangle my fingers in his raven locks … to feel him at my very depths. I awoke in a tangle of bed sheets, awash with disappointment that my dream was quashed by the light of day. I went about my morning routine, haunted by the memory of my dream lover’s eyes.

To me, this entire sequence of nighttime phenomena was best ignored. I shook my head, hoping to physically cancel the reverie that I entered yet again. A stranger’s face could not possibly have meaning, any more than my name could be whispered by a teasing curl of mist outside the window.

Sample Saturday, “Pompeii Fire”

Hi, everyone. This work-in-progress is still on the back burner, but it’s definitely not forgotten. Here’s a bit from Draft Zero of Pompeii Fire. The usual caveat applies; the final version may look quite a bit different. Enjoy!

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The road to Herculaneum wasn’t long; with a cart full of Drusus’ belongings, it would take about seven hours to get there. The two men hoped they were not waylaid by bandits, although it was unlikely to happen in broad daylight. There was safety in numbers all the same.

“How different life is now,” Stephanus looked around at the countryside. “To think that, just a few years ago, I was buying my freedom and my business. All of those years being paid to pick up people’s nightsoil in town, and look at me! I’m able to help an old friend set up his new business with both my time and my treasure.”

Drusus nodded. “I can only imagine.”

“No, I don’t think you can, my friend. You were never a slave. You never had to say ‘yes’ to things that made you want to choke. You never had to stand knee-deep in piss to clean clothes. The day my former master gave me the nightsoil route was the day my life changed. Everyone in town had to pay me to pick up their chamber pots to collect the urine, and my master let me keep the money. Now I’m a free man with slaves of my own. I don’t have to obey orders anymore, and no one can deny me my wishes.”

Sample Saturday, “In The Eye of The Beholder”

Sir Andrew Lloyd Weber’s “Phantom of the Opera” celebrated its 35th anniversary on Broadway earlier this week (it will be ending its run in April). So, it seemed only fitting to share a snippet from In The Eye of The Beholder, the first book in my award-winning Seen Through the Phantom’s Eyes series. Enjoy!

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“Do I frighten you?” He seemed to revel in the idea, and the thought irritated me.

“No, Monsieur, you do not.” I spoke the simple truth.

I thought about what little I knew of this man as I finished braiding Cesare’s “mud tail.” Christine Daae, now the Comtesse de Chagny, had unmasked him on stage, revealing a face reputed to be so scarred and hideous that women fainted in fear. If he hoped to provoke that response in me, he would be sorely disappointed. Nothing could frighten me after Philippe’s burns.

I turned again to face him.

“I am finished, Monsieur. May I return to my quarters?”

“Of course, Claire.” His smile was a vicious slash in the beauty of his left side. “And please, call me Erik. It seems only right that we should use our given names with one another.”

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Back cover copy:

When French equestrian Claire Delacroix loses her fiance in a tragic accident, she comes to live at the Paris Opera during its 1890s heyday.

Whilst working at the opera, she meets a mysterious, masked stranger: Erik. Is it possible that the two of them will heal the pain of each other’s past?

Click here to purchase in eBook, print, or large print via your favorite bookseller.

Sample Saturday: “Rose in Bloom”

Hi, everyone. Here’s the last snippet for 2022. Enjoy!

“Uncle Gareth, Miss Rose sure is nice.” Timothy was playing on his iPad in the back seat of the Rover.

“Mmm. That she is.” Gareth kept his eyes on the road back to Berwyn, but his mind was on what Katherine Tremaine had told him about Rose Davis before she’d moved into Wisteria Cottage: a successful business woman who, if her aunt Susan was to be believed, hid her depression under a facade of hard-edged perfection and control. A woman who felt that polish and practicality were the answer to all problems. He’d presumed she’d be dour, possibly even matronly, with a pinched mouth.

I couldn’t have been more off-base if I tried.

“And she’s pretty. I like her red hair.”

“I think, technically, it’s auburn.”

Dark, rich auburn. That looks like silk. I’d love to run my fingers through it.

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Want your own copy of Rose in Bloom? It’s available free of charge on Smashwords through tomorrow.

Back cover copy:

Rose Davis always prided herself on being sensible. But when she loses her job, she takes an uncharacteristic leap of faith and agrees to spend six months living in Wisteria Cottage, just outside of the tiny village of Shalbourne, England. It will give her the chance to fulfill her secret dream of writing a book, and an opportunity to figure out next steps.

What she doesn’t reckon with is Welsh gardener Gareth Llewellyn. With his long hair and scruffy beard, he’s definitely not Rose’s type. And yet, there’s something about him …