I’m happy to say that I am now officially done with the first drafts for His Reluctant Lady and His Abducted Bride!  

Besides the titles being similar, I noticed a couple other similarities in these books.  Both heroes are rather cocky.  I don’t usually deal with the cocky hero, but both of these guys were determined to prove a point–this point being that the heroine loves them and can’t bear to be without them.  LOL  The heroines, however, aren’t the kind that admit any such thing at first, though they both had a different way of responding to their guys.  Sandy was more willing to give in to Gavin while Agatha pretty much ended up in a contest of wills with Christopher through most of the book.  When I started out writing these books around the same time, I didn’t plan the similarities.  They just happened.  I thought that was fun.  I can’t recall a time when two books I wrote at the same time paralleled each other so well in this way.

His Abducted Bride might be the one I get out first.  I was originally going to do His Reluctant Lady first because I was gaining momentum stronger on that one, but since I actually finished His Abducted Bride first, I think I’ll get that one out around July 1.  Plus, since it’s shorter, I will be able to go through the editing process on it faster.  This book will finish the Across the Stars Series.  I don’t plan to do any more books in the series.

His Reluctant Lady won’t be far behind.  I plan to also have it out in July.

We already know this book builds up to Perry’s book:

Perry’s romance is the next Regency I’ll write, and Christopher is going to help set up the scandal that will get Perry married.  I do leave a lead-in for Christopher to do this at the end of His Reluctant Lady.  The Earl’s Scandalous Wife begins right after His Reluctant Lady ends in the Regency timeline.

I plan to start The Earl’s Scandalous Wife either late in July or early August, which makes it a possible late 2013 – early 2014 release.

In addition to The Earl’s Scandalous Wife, His Reluctant Lady has led to two other books I want to write in the future.  You see, there’s a wager that I mentioned in His Reluctant Lady that leads to Christopher managing to secure Agatha’s hand in marriage.  This wager took place between Lord Pennella and Lord Davenport, and they agreed that whoever married Miss Giles first won the other gentleman’s estate and money.  This is the wager that has led to two other story ideas.  One is going to be Lord Pennella’s story, but I haven’t come up with a suitable plot yet.  I have a vague idea for one but nothing definite enough to mention.

However, this is my idea for Lord Davenport’s book, and I already have the cover!  I’ve decided to call it The Earl’s Secret Bargain.

The basic plot will be Lord Davenport arranging a marriage of convenience with Miss Giles (this is after the wager is discovered and she’s been disgraced).  I’m really excited about this one.  I’m not sure about the details of this bargain that the two reach, but I’ll figure it out as I write it.  There are some things I won’t know about a book until the characters tell me, and they won’t tell me until I’m writing their book.

I expect this book to be out next year, but I don’t know when.

***

Okay so those are books that I recently finished and plan to work on.  (And I haven’t forgotten Kent Ashton’s Backstory and Lassoing Her Groom.  Those are still on my “Word In Progress” list.  I just haven’t done anything with them for a few weeks so there’s nothing new to report.)

 Now for the books I’m co-writing.

Historical Western Romance that Stephannie Beman and I are working on.

This one is going fast.  We’re already at Chapter 12.  I love the way everything is coming together.  I’ll have to give a sample scene on Sunday to give you an idea of what this book is about.

The Anthology Janet Syas Nitsick and I Are Working On

Jan and I finally have titles and a plot for our novellas.  I still need to tweak on my description though.  (My novella will have a “steamy” heat level and Jan’s will have a “sweet” heat level.)

My novella: “A Wife for Pete”

I went with the deaf hero option.   In my novella, “A Wife for Pete,” the hero’s brother (and everyone else in the area) thinks the hero (Pete Kelly) is deaf.  His brother pays her brother to send her to Nebraska after seeing the ad her brother placed to sell her.  (And yes, the heroine Ada Wilcox, is pissed at her brother for doing this, but it’s not as dubious as it sounds.  Her family is so poor that the only way her brother can think of providing for her is to marry her to a man who can put food on the table.  So in his own way, her brother is doing what he believes is best for her.)  What her brother didn’t know is that the man she’s been arranged to marry is one that everyone believes has less-than-average intelligence.  So when Pete’s brother arranges the marriage, he is looking for someone to take care of Pete (as a mother would care for a child).  So the marriage does begin out as being platonic.  But as the story progresses, Ada starts to wonder if her husband is deaf and that people have mistaken his inability to hear and communicate with them, thinking he has a low IQ when he really doesn’t.

I can speak from experience on a point here.  I’ve had a couple people come up to me and tell me my deaf kid is “retarded”  or “isn’t right in the head” when they assume his inability to talk or understand what they speak means he’s incapable of understanding them.  I explain to them that he’s deaf and is smart enough at this point in his 8-year-old life to know when people don’t know signs.  If people don’t know signs, he won’t even try to sign to them because he’d be wasting his time.  I see the hero in this novella having the same situation.  The hero has been mislabeled for so long that he’s given up on trying to communicate with anyone.  Then Ada comes along and his world finally opens up.  🙂

Janet Syas Nitsick’s novella: “She Came By Train”

She came by train to a desolate land.  With mixed feelings, Opal Preston steps onto the platform to meet her employer, Alexander Boyer.  She accepts his hand and climbs into his wagon to begin her role as the governess to his two children.  As she executes her duties, she wonders how she’ll cope without the finery she left behind.

Soon two men are vying for her affections.  Alex can’t imagine his life without her and looks for a way to convince her to stay in Nebraska.  But a preacher from Virginia is also smitten with her and offers to take her back home.  She came by train, but only her heart can determine if she’ll return the same way.