women’s fiction

Cover Reveal and a Giveaway!

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Every once in a while a story comes along that slams into you like a bulldozer  and demands that you write it. That was Wildwood Healer and Miss Sicily Rossi. She’s known in Silsbee, Texas as a healer. A few call her the Witchy Woman but she’s far from being a witch. Miss Sicily collects plants, roots, herbs, and things from the woods and makes her remedies. She’s the only kind of doctor these people have for their many ailments.

Come on this journey with me to 1930.

This is in the middle of the Depression and food is very scarce. Starving people worries Miss Sicily. But how to help so many people is beyond her meager resources. It makes her heart sore and weary.

Then a young wife keeps appearing at her door after beatings she suffers at the hands of her raging husband. That’s something Miss Sicily can’t ignore and she has to try to save her.

Throw in a fourteen-year-old orphan boy who’s eager to learn what Miss Sicily can teach him about plants their power to heal.

At times, this book reminded me of the book Fried Green Tomatoes that was made into a movie back in 1991. I loved that story of the Whistle Stop Café and those women who ran it. Wildwood Healer is sort of like that but quite different. It’s set in the deep Piney Woods of east Texas. They don’t barbeque the bad guy and serve him in the café. I still laugh when I think of that sheriff and detectives eating it and raving about how tender the meat was. Maybe I’m weird for laughing.

Anyway, this book has a lot of humorous scenes to lighten the darkness. Albert is an 80-year-old who thinks every young woman is after him and wants to marry him. And the preacher in town who has a wicked sense of humor. Then a man who once asked Miss Sicily to marry him returns after forty years. This book doesn’t lack for side stories.

When everything comes to a head, who will live and who will die?

Miss Sicily has her work cut out for her and it takes all her expertise and skill to save the town. It’s a quirky, fun story where everyone gets what they need.

I just love this cover that was again designed by Dee Burks who made Love’s First Light. It’s up for preorder HERE. It releases October 8th.

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Here’s the opening passage:

The Piney Woods surrounding Sicily Rossi’s small dwelling whispered stories to her as she milked her cow and fed the chickens. She was luckier than most; she knew that. Everyone seemed to be starving these days unless they had a garden. Before she went inside, she studied the dark shadows of the forest that spoke of secrets and mysteries—some as old as time. She was a part of this land and knew she always would be. Here she was born and here she’d die. There was comfort in that.

Christmas wasn’t far off but it made no difference to her. It would call for nothing special.

The sun was just making an appearance when a soft whine outside drew her attention. Sicily often had sick folks appear at her home asking for her help, but they always knocked. 

Curious, she opened the door to see the cutest, ragged dog tied to her porch railing.

 A sign hung from the pooch’s neck that said: Will yu please feed Gypsy? Got no food.

 Of course, she’d feed her, no question about that. She never turned away anyone or anything in need.

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I have a free copy available for ones who want to read and review the book. Click HERE for the link and put it on your ereader.

And Click HERE for the Preorder Link. Again, it releases October 8th.

 

What do you look for in a cover? What grabs you? Or is a cover really not that important to you? Lots to ponder. The book isn’t out yet but I’m giving away a $10 Amazon gift card to one lucky commenter.

 

The Difference Between Romance & Women’s Fiction

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I’ve been thinking about this lately, because I’ve written a women’s fiction that is with an editor now (cross your fingers for me!).

I’m very familiar with the subject, because my first book, The Sweet Spot, I wrote as Women’s Fiction. Half the editors who read it thought it was romance, half, WF. It finally sold to a romance line, so I had to make some changes.

The difference is mainly in the focus. In a romance, the focus is on the relationship, and ends in a ‘happily ever after’. In WF, the focus is on the woman’s journey and emotional growth. It may or may not have romance, or even a happy ending.

I learned that in Romance:

  1. The bad-boy hero can’t be TOO bad. In my debut novel, the couple had lost their son in an accident, and it tore them apart – they divorced. To deal with the pain, my heroine developed a Valium habit. The hero’s drug was young and blonde. In my original version, he was still with the blonde when the book opened. I had to change that; my editor told me that if the readers met the bimbo, the hero would be irredeemable, no matter what he did down the line.
  2. I had to soften the heroine as well – she could be damaged and flawed, but she couldn’t be seen as cold, or uncaring.
  3. Because I wrote the book as a WF, most of the scenes involved the heroine’s point of view. I had to add a couple of scenes with the hero’s, and even though they weren’t together in the same scene in the first third of the book, I had to add thoughts each had of the other, showing how they were changing.
  4. Sexual tension. It’s not critical that the couple make love but there still needs to be escalating sexual tension as the book advances. Inspirational romances do a brilliant job of this.
  5. I had to be more careful with graphic scenes (not talking sex, here). My hero raised bulls for the bull riding circuit. In one scene, the heroine helped a cow with a breech birth. My editor had me reduce the level of gore, blood, etc.  I also had to be careful how I covered breeding details like selling semen (can I say that here?)
  6. And, of course, there must be a HEA (happily-ever-after.) That was no problem, because I originally planned for my couple to end up together!

In my Women’s Fiction:

  1. There is a romantic interest, but it’s a small part. The guy is mostly there to show her issues with commitment. I leave it open-ended as to whether they end up together.
  2. The focus is on a grandmother and her granddaughter who, due to the past, doesn’t like or respect the family matriarch. 
  3. So it’s about the main character’s growth. When she learns her grandmother’s past, and her secrets, she not only accepts her grandmother – she learns more about herself, and what was holding her back.

So tell me – do you read Women’s Fiction? Romance? Which do you prefer, and why?

I’m giving away a copy of The Sweet Spot to two commenters!

The Wickedest Town in the West; Jerome, Arizona

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Dear Readers… Jerome, Arizona earned its reputation as the wickedest town in the west after three catastrophic fires within an eighteen-month period. The pious people of the sinful town attributed the fires to Devine retribution and pushed to incorporate Jerome. Once building codes were passed, a fire department was established and laws were put on the books to rein in Jerome’s wild ways.

Who wouldn’t want to visit the wickedest town in the west after a description like that?

This past summer hubby and I drove Route 89A to Jerome, which lies between the towns of Prescott and Flagstaff. The trip through the Prescott National Forest was breathtaking and well worth the slow climb in elevation to 5,000 feet above sea level.

Jerome was founded in 1876, its population peaking at 15,000 in the 1920’s. I’ve been to this ghost town three times in my life. Once when I was fifteen on a family vacation out west and twice since hubby and I moved back to Arizona. Jerome, a former copper-mining town, sits on Cleopatra Hill overlooking the Verde Valley. Today it’s a tourist stop and a favorite haunt of ghost hunters. All of the various hotels and B&B’s are reportedly haunted.

   

 

Famous Bartlett Hotel

 

The remains of the famous Bartlett Hotel on Main Street brings in as much as $6,500 a year for the Jerome Historical Society. Tourists stop to toss their coins between the bars hoping to hit the old outhouse and pieces of rusted mining artifacts below. My days playing basketball in college did not help me hit the toilet.

 

          

 

The Connor Hotel

I entered the lobby of the Connor Hotel to look around and the desk attendant was happy to tell me about the place, saying several guests had seen the Lady in Red while others reported being touched, feeling a draft of cold air sweep over them, lights and TV’s flickering on and off—the “usual ghostly things” she said.  Behind the motel are the remains of the 1918 haunted Liberty Theater, which played silent movies in the 1920’s. It’s the light tan building next to the red hotel in the picture below.

   

If you’re a paranormal enthusiast, you’ll enjoy the youtube video of photographs taken in the Connor Hotel that show ghostly orbs.

 

Years ago a department store sat across the street from the Connor Hotel, but now its an  empty lot with only department store safe remaining.

 

Sliding Jail

The Jerome Historical Society is working on restoring the famous sliding jail, which slipped 200 feet downhill from where it originally stood. The ground shifted in the area after Phelps Dodge purchased the copper claims during WWII and began dynamiting the mountains. The mine, still owned by Phelps Dodge, closed in 1953.

 

Just for fun!

I get excited when I find something taller than me like this old gas pump.

Books

I don’t write historical romances but if I did, I’d definitely use Jerome, Arizona, as the backdrop for a story. And speaking of books… I have two releases out this month…so here’s my shameless plug!

Twins for the Texas Rancher (Cowboys of Stampede, Texas)

DOUBLE TROUBLE! 

Sadie McHenry and her twin sons are heading home to Stampede, Texas. Sadie wants a chance to start over after being laid off—and she might have found it with rancher Logan Hardell. Logan instantly bonds with her boys, especially with Tommy, whose ADD makes him a handful. But Logan seems to understand the four-year-old’s needs and seeing them together melts Sadie’s heart.

Logan’s ranch is at risk, so Sadie agrees to help with their books—putting Logan on twin patrol! With his fun-loving approach to the kids and his rugged appeal, Sadie can’t understand why he’s ruled out a family of his own. But she’s not giving up on him just yet. Because Sadie’s convinced Logan is exactly what she and her boys need!

  The Future She Left Behind

One woman’s journey home gets derailed by her soon-to-be ex-mother-in-law in a novel filled with humor, small-town charm, rekindled love, and the resilient ties of family.

Cast aside by her cheating husband, Katelyn Chandler is ready to pack it all in and drive home to Little Springs, Texas. She wants a chance to regroup, reconnect with her mother, and get back to her art.

But Shirley Pratt—master manipulator, elitist snob, and Katelyn’s terror of a live-in monster-in-law—has other ideas. Shirley insists on joining Katelyn’s trip after her son tries to pack her off to a retirement community. Katelyn has no choice but to play peacekeeper between the ornery old woman and the proud matrons of Little Springs. Yet the small town seems to be changing Shirley. And as Katelyn weighs the wisdom of picking up where she left off with Jackson Mendoza, the town bad boy and her high school sweetheart, she must find a way to believe in the strength of her dreams.

GIVEAWAY ALERT!

Tell me about a strange place you once visited for a chance to win a signed paperback or digital copy (reader’s choice) of the first book in my Cowboys of Stampede series, The Cowboy’s Accidental Baby. I’ll announce the winner in the comment section of this post sometime on Saturday Sep 9th. 

Until next time…Happy Trails!

 

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