Maggie Shayne's Blog: Maggie's Coffee House Blog, page 5

My Passion

Wings in the Night is the signature work of my lifetime. It is the series of books for which I want to be remembered.

The first novel I ever submitted to a publisher was Twilight Phantasies. It was rejected, with a note suggesting specific revisions and inviting me to resubmit. While I was doing that, a different novel, Reckless Angel, a romantic suspense novel was contracted to Silhouette Books. And when I resubmitted Twilight Phantasies, it was purchased too.

While Reckless Angel (Now “Reckless”) was published in Silhouette’’s long-running “Intimate Moments” line, Twilight Phantasies became part of Silhouette’s groundbreaking paranormal romance imprint, Silhouette Shadows.

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Shadows was a line ahead of its time. Paranormal Romance hadn’t caught fire yet, and sadly, the line folded before it really had a chance to take off. Some of the best writers in the business wrote for Silhouette Shadows. Chelsea Quinn freaking Yarbro did a guest spot in an anthology! And there were other brilliant storytellers; Evelyn Vaughn, Anne Stuart, Rachel Lee, Jane Toombs, Marilyn Tracy, Lindsay Longford, Heather Graham, Barbara Faith, Carla Cassidy–if you don't know, these are some of the romance genre's goddesses. We were all yearning to write paranormal stories, we'd been flooded with ideas for them and had been told they were not marketable for years, so we dove into this line like runners when the starter-pistol goes off. We were so excited to have a place to publish these woo-woo books, as some started calling them. We had a blast!

That’s where Wings in the Night was born, with three books and a Novella at Silhouette Shadows. Twilight Phantasies, Twilight Memories, Twilight Illusions, and the novella Beyond Twilight which appeared in the first Silhouette Shadows Anthology

The design of the newest covers are a deliberate homage to that line. And yes, I ran it past Harlequin to make sure it wasn’t a problem. They not only okayed it, but loved the new look.

After Shadows folded, and my editor told me there would be no place to publish more vampire novels, I wrote Born in Twilight in eight weeks flat. I think the working title was “Twilight Forever” as in, don’t tell me this series is done.

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That book, Born in Twilight, found a home as a Silhouette Single Title, and after that I was invited to continue the series at the “big sister” imprint, Mira. These were bigger, fatter, “single title” (as in not category) novels.

[image error][image error][image error] Wings in the Night Tidbit: I had penned 8 or 9 vampire romances with “Twilight” in the title before Meyer’s book of the same title was published. It was hard to be miffed about it, however, since my titles suddenly got a lot more traffic.

I wrote eleven more Wings in the Night novels for Mira, plus several novellas for various publishers and lines. When I left Harlequin (which had absorbed Silhouette and has since melded with, I want to say, Harper Collins) they kept the rights to all those books.

I couldn’t let the series go, however, so I kept going, self-publishing three more titles. I couldn’t call them Wings in the Night, since the publisher owned it, so they were "Wings in the Night: Reborn.” During that time I also published a Wings novella for Penguin Putnam that was published in an anthology with Christine Feehan.

Wings in the Night Tidbit: Christine Feehan’s blockbuster Carpathian Series was inspired by my own Wings in the Night series

Last summer, something I’ve been working toward ever since 2014 happened. The rights to my *entire Wings in the Night series reverted to me.

There are two exceptions. The novella I wrote for Penguin, Dead By Twilight, did not revert and is still being published by them. And there’s a very short novella that’s really a glorified prologue to Prince of Twilight. It’s titled “Before Blue Twilight” and it was written as an online-read for Harlequin.com. To this day that’s the only place you can read it. You have to register for the site, but it’s entirely free.

Wings in the Night Tidbit: Did you know Lori Herter was the only other author with a true, vampire-romance novel out before my own Twilight Phantasies? It was called “Obsession,” and was one of a 4-book series. I have signed copies!

Anyway, with the rights to all the books back, I undertook the biggest project of my entire career. I needed to scan, update, proofread, format, package, cover, and upload all 24 Books to five different outlets each and in paperback to some.

I decided to release a Wings in the Night novel every other Tuesday until they were all done. I re-packaged the three self-published “Reborn” titles as Wings in the Night 20, 21, & 22, part of the main series as they were always meant to be. In the process, I wrote an 8-part serial, Fear the Reaper, and another entire novel,Young Rhiannon in the Temple of Isis, which are Wings in the Night 23 and 24.

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On April 14th, I finished this project. While the books are still in the process of releasing, and will continue until June 13th when Young Rhiannon drops, my work is finished. Everything is formatted, proofed and uploaded. I even re-designed the Wings in the Night Universe title, Fiona: Origins. It’s book 1 of The Fiona Files, which will continue on. And the new novel is finished, edited, proofed, and uploaded as well.

All that remains is promoting them as they release.

Book 1, Twilight Phantasies , is still FREE. Book 22, The Rhiannon Chronicles releases Tuesday April 18th. Wings in the Night: The Fiona Files, Book 1 - Fiona: Origins releases May 2nd Book 23: Fear the Reaper releases May 16h On May 30th, download and enjoy “ Dead By Twilight ” in the anthology Edge of Darkness with Christine Feehan and Lori Herter. Book 24, Young Rhiannon in the Temple of Isis releases on June 13th.

And that, my friends, adds up to a title every other Tuesday for a year. Are you even kidding me right now?

I might take a couple days off.

The Ending that Wasn't

TWILIGHT PROPHECY (Wings in the Night 19, on sale today!) and TWILIGHT FULFILLED (coming in 2 weeks on March 7th!) were intended to be the two-part Wings in the Night series finale. And I wrote them just as if they were--huge, bold, epic, above and beyond anything before--even though I knew in my heart this series would never end as long as I drew breath.

These are the stories of the twins born to Edge and Amber Lily in EDGE OF TWILIGHT. James Willem (J.W.) and Brigit were born to a mother who was herself an anomaly--half vampire, half mortal, and soon it became clear they were unique. James has the power to heal. Brigit has the power to destroy.

In these tales, the mortal world has learned of the existence of vampires. Vigilante groups have sprung up nationwide, burning the homes of suspected vampires by day, killing as many of their own as of the undead. DPI is empowered anew to help manage the situation.

A prophecy, pieced together from bits of ancient Sumerian stone tablets, suggests this will be the end of vampire-kind, and that these two are the only ones who can prevent that from happening.

In part one, TWILIGHT PROPHECY, James must take his healing gift to the next level. He's expected to restore life to a pile of ash that was once antediluvian priest-king Utanapishtim, the flood survivor. He was the first Noah, in flood stories far older than the biblical versions. And he was the first immortal. It was from him that all vampires descended. But first, James must locate the ancient one's remains, and for that, he'll need the help of mortal archaeologist Lucy Lanfair, whether she's willing or not. The survival of his people is on the line.

TWILIGHT PROPHECY is on sale now in ebook. Paperback is coming within a day or two. It's a big, fat book originally published by MIRA, and runs more than 380 pages in the paperback version. It also includes another episode from the ongoing adventures of Rhiannon in the Temple of Isis.

You're gonna love this one.

Fatal Phantasm

I was at the 6 month point in a long hiatus from writing. I'd been blocked for months at the beginning of the pandemic. Three of my daughters are nurses, and the other two are teachers, so they were on the front lines, face to face with the virus daily. All of them got it multiple times. Many of my grandchildren got it. My three-month-old great grandkids got it, and then later got it again. It was, as you remember very well, quite a traumatic experience.

I was trying to get my muse to talk to me again, and failing miserably, completely blocked, when I the contract for one of my favorite stories expired, and I reclaimed the book from the publisher. That story was a RITA® Award winner, coming after 13 nominations, so it meant a lot to me. I added scenes, polished it up, and sent it off to my editor, who pointed out that I had a ready made Scooby gang by the end. She said if she were me, she would write as many sequels as possible. And she was right.

The books that became The Fatal Series are shorter reads about the length of a Harlequin Temptation. They're light, but spooky! They're breathlessly romantic, but funny as hell to boot. And I just love them. So I took my editor's advice and penned a sequel, and then another, and another.

The fourth in this series, FATAL PHANTASM, is in stores today, and I couldn't be happier. The first review said it reads like a Scooby Doo mystery for grownups. I think that's pretty accurate, except instead of a dog, my gang has the ghost of 1960s jazz singer, Lady El and lots of romance.

Early reviews are looking very positive, and the book is already generating buzz.

So I hope you'll enjoy this story from the series that broke my writer's block!

You can get FATAL PHANTASM in paperback and ebook at Amazon and Barnes & Noble

You can download FATAL PHANTASM in ebook at Amazon, BN, Kobo, Google, and Apple

BLOODLINE

Scroll down for an excerpt!

As I continued creating Wings in the Night stories, my former publisher felt the series was getting long, and wanted me to write a book specifically designed to be new-reader-friendly. She wanted a book you could read even if you hadn't read the rest of the series, an entry point. She wanted me to slow down the merry-go-round to let new riders jump on.

I replied that any of these books could be read and enjoyed on its own without having read the rest of the series. I write them all that way on purpose. Intended it that way from Day 1. But, because the publisher is always right (because they write the checks) I tried to take this one even further from the existing series canon, to allow it to be filtered in anew.

The best way to do that was to create a character with amnesia.

The vampire Lilith came to me in a single vision; I saw a nude woman, lying outside in the pouring rain, waking as if newly born, not a hint of who or what she is in her mind. She only knows she has to run for her life.

I had no idea what had happened to her, why she had no memory, or what dangerous villain was after her.

Because of her memory loss, she has to learn everything about herself. And so as she discovers each new thing, the reader discovers it too, or re-discovers it all over again, which is always incredibly gratifying to me as a reader.

So she learns, and we learn with her, about her heightened senses, about her increased sensitivity that can turn pain into torture and pleasure into ecstasy. We learn about her strength and speed. The more she learns about what it is to be a vampire, the more bits and pieces of her memory return. And that's something Ethan, her rescuer wishes he could prevent. Because she's going to remember him, and the place from which they both escaped, and she's going to insist on going back.

EXCERPT BELOW

BLOODLINEChapter One

My first thought upon waking was that maybe I was dead. It wasn’t until much later that I realized how accurate that initial, intuitive and seemingly irrational notion was. It popped into my consciousness as soon as consciousness itself appeared. It made no sense. It was based upon no reason. It was just there.

I must be dead.

And just as quickly as it had come, the thought was gone again. I wasn’t dead. I was cold. But it was an odd kind of cold, because it didn’t make me shiver or feel uncomfortable, it was just an awareness of the fact. I was cold. And I was wet, too.

I opened my eyes slowly and blinked to wipe away the blur of sleep, for I must have been asleep. It was dark. Newborn darkness, though. It had that sense to it, though I wasn’t sure at that moment how it was I could sense newborn darkness from any other kind. It wasn’t something I would have thought came naturally to ordinary people. And it was certainly nothing I’d ever noticed before.

Or had I?

Oddly, I didn’t remember, but I dismissed the slightly queasy feeling that notion brought to my stomach and focused instead on my surroundings. The immediate ones first. Beneath me, dirt. Solid packed, damp, but not muddy. A few scraggly patches of crabgrass and dandelions struggling for survival here and there, and looking proud of their triumph in such inhospitable conditions. All right, then. I was on the ground. Not flat ground, but a hillside that sloped precariously downward to a stretch of pavement at the bottom. And on the other side of that pavement, another patch of ground, sloping upward—a mirror image of the one on which I lay. And above them both...a ceiling? A bridge. I was on the sloping ground beneath a bridge.

On either side of the bridge, rain poured from heaven’s open spigot, soaking the road at the bottom, except for the part of it that was sheltered.

Why, I wondered, am I lying outdoors, on the ground, under a bridge, in the rain, at night?

Naked.

Refocusing my attention on the things in closest proximity, I noted the damp sheet of cardboard that lay over me, like a makeshift blanket, and noted further that, aside from that, I wore nothing. It had that wet-cardboard smell to it, and as I flipped it off my body, I thought my skin did, as well.

I started to shake. Not from the cold, because the cold didn’t bother me and that had me worried. Maybe my nerves weren’t working just right, but at any rate, I was scared and I could feel panic creeping like ice water through my veins. I closed my eyes, firmed my spine, held my breath, then told myself, “Easy. Just take it easy. Just take it easy and figure this out. It can’t be all that difficult to figure this out.”

Nodding in response to my own advice, I opened my eyes again, and this time I looked down at my own body. I was long, and I was thin. Perhaps athletic, I thought, and it scared me that I didn’t know if that was true or not.

Maybe I was just sickly. Although I didn’t feel sickly. And my body seemed more lean than skinny. In fact, I felt… Strong.

I opened my hands to see if they worked, then closed them again. I studied my slender arms, lengthy legs, small waist and hips nearly the same size, and my compact, round little breasts, as if I’d never seen them before. And then I noticed a lock of hair hanging over my shoulder, and I grasped it, lifting it to look and feel and smell it.

It was copper in color, the kind of hair they call auburn, thought, and it was curly and long, long, long, just like the rest of me. But also like the rest of me, I had the feeling I’d never seen it before.

I stood up to see how long my hair was, and also to move around a bit. Maybe if I woke up more thoroughly, this fog in my head would clear and I would know who I was and what I was doing here in the middle of nowhere on the cusp of night, naked and alone.

So I stood there, noticing that my hair reached to the tops of my hipbones, until a sound jerked my attention away from it. Something running, scampering off in the distance. My head snapped toward the sound fast, and I felt my nose wrinkling and realized I was scenting the moist air. My eyes narrowed, and I thought, rabbit. And then I saw it, scurrying from one clump of brush to the next, far in the distance, Perhaps as much as a half mile from me.

There was no possible way I could see a rabbit a half mile away in the dark, in the rain, much less identify it by smell.

And yet I had, and I realized, as my senses came to life one by one, that I could hear many things and smell even more—the flitting of a little bird’s wings and the scent of the leaves in his nest, the hushed flight of a moth and the smell of the fine powder on his body, the bubbling of a stream somewhere beyond sight and the smell of its water and even the fish that lived in its depths. I smelled autumn. There were decaying leaves, their aroma so pungent and wonderful and evocative that it overwhelmed almost everything else. It was comforting, that scent. I heard the sound of cars that had not yet come close enough to see, and I could smell their exhaust.

My brows drew together, and I pressed my fingertips to my forehead. “What am I?” I whispered.

Lights came into view then. Headlights, as a vehicle rolled closer and closer on the road below. I started to move carefully down the hill. My feet seemed extremely sensitive to every pebble, and I sucked air through my teeth, tasting everything it carried in its breath, but I hurried all the same.

I stopped halfway down just as the car rolled under the bridge, and I heard the brakes engage as the vehicle came to an abrupt stop, still ten feet from where I stood. I didn’t move toward it. I just stood there, naked and waiting. There was something tingling up the back of my neck that felt like unease. Like a warning.

The car was black. Big and black. An SUV, I thought. An expensive one. My eyes slid toward the manufacturer’s logo on the front of the thing, and I saw laurel leaves encircling a shield, with blocks of color on its face.

I thought I should remember it, though I wasn’t certain why. As I stared, unsure whether to move closer or turn away, the driver’s-side window, which was deeply tinted, moved downward just a little. A man’s voice said, “Get in.”

The chill along my nape turned icy. I shivered, and everything in me went tense and tight. I felt as if I were coiling up inside myself in preparation for flight, though I didn’t know why I should feel the urge to run. I ignored the impulse, but still I didn’t move.

And then, through the tiny gap in that window, I saw the black barrel of a gun, pointing right at my head, and the voice was cold this time. “I said get in.”

The spring that had been coiling up inside me released all at once. My body sprang into motion as if propelled by some outside force. I turned, I lunged, I leapt, soaring from the embankment to the pavement beyond the bridge, behind the car, where the rain was pounding down.

Barely had my feet settled on the macadam before I was moving again. I accelerated into a dead run, the speed of which astounded me.

I heard tires spinning behind me, and then gunshots, three of them, so loud I thought my eardrums had split, but no pain came with those shots. The bullets, though certainly fired at me, had missed their mark. And when I dared to glance over my shoulder, I saw those headlights falling farther and farther behind me as I ran.

That didn’t make any sense at all. The car was chasing me, speeding after me along the same stretch of road. And I was on foot, running through the pouring rain. And yet

I was pulling away. Almost as an afterthought, I veered left, away from the pavement, and sped over uneven terrain, through an open field that was lush with grass and far easier on my tender feet. I ran until the car was long out of sight, and then I kept on running, because there was an ecstatic rush to it that I couldn’t understand.

I leapt over boulders and limbs that appeared in my path. I jumped over the stream I’d heard from so far away, expecting to land somewhere in the middle of it, but clearing it instead. I ran alongside a doe that I startled, and while she flared her nostrils and bounded away with her white tail flying its warning, I passed her, and kept on going.

God, what was this? How was this possible?

Finally, when I began to tire at last, I stopped and again tried to take stock of who and what I was, but I found nothing there. Tabula rasa. The phrase echoed in my mind. Blank slate. It was as if whatever I had known or been before had been erased.

So instead of searching within me for answers, I took a look at my surroundings, because I would need, I thought, food and shelter and probably some clothing, if I hoped to survive long enough to figure out anything more.

Those were the immediate requirements. And they were easier to face than the emptiness inside my mind. Thinking on that brought me to the edge of panic, and I had the feeling that, should I give in to it, I might never return.

I had run into a stand of forest, a woody little paradise, its floor lined with fallen leaves, and its trees awash in russet and scarlet and gold. I walked through it now, following my senses to its edge, where I could look out and see what lay beyond.

Another stretch of pavement, curving into what appeared to be a small town. I saw a tall pointed church steeple. I saw several oversize barns, and lots of little houses. They were clustered together in some places, farther apart in others.

Smoke wafted from chimneys, and I smelled the wood burning, and the oil, too. But my eyes fell on one place in particular, a place well beyond a cluster of homes. I didn’t know why. It was far away in the distance. A red house with white shutters. It had a red barn and a lot of green land around it, all of it enclosed by white wooden fences.

And then a flash in my mind. A man, kissing me. Unfamiliar, powerful, wonderful feelings rushing through my body. Lips on mine. My hands tangling in dark hair. And then it was gone. Gone, just that fast.

I wanted it back. I wanted more of it. But it had receded into the deep black waters inside my mind.

Sighing in disappointment, I returned my attention to that little red farmhouse. It was that place that drew my attention, though I had no idea why. Another place would have been far easier to reach. That one, the one that caught hold of me and held me in its grip, was well past the rest of the town, situated on a hillside and only visible from here because of the angle at which I stood. The town itself was close at hand. That place...that place was miles from me. Isolated. Lonely. Calling out to me.

I had to go. And I had no idea why I was so compelled.

Yet, I rationalized, I’d had no idea why I’d felt a sense of panic when that car had stopped. And that feeling had proven accurate. So common sense dictated I should pay attention to my feelings. If my senses were somehow heightened beyond normal—which certainly seemed to be the case, since I could see and hear and smell things I shouldn’t be able to—and if my physical speed was also magnified—which it clearly was, since I had outrun a deer and a Cadillac...

Yes. A Cadillac Escalade. That was what that car had been. I smiled a little, slightly gratified to think tiny things were coming back to me.

But the point was, if all these other senses and strengths were somehow heightened, then maybe my intuitions were sharper than usual, as well. Though I couldn’t, just then, have said what “usual” might have been for me.

I would, I decided, trust my intuitions. I would go to that red farmhouse—no, I would go to its barn, which would be safer. That would be my shelter for the moment. And from there I would plan my next move.

So I walked down the slight grassy incline, away from the autumnal beauty of the woods, to the curving country road, and then, keeping to the softest part of the shoulder, I began walking, naked, toward that tiny town. And as I walked, I began to feel aware of a demanding, urgent hunger unlike any I had ever known before.

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One Resolution

I always pick a touchstone word or phrase for the new year, one that reflects my wishes, hopes, dreams, and yes, resolutions for that year. This year my touchstone is JOY, NOW.

Usually, I find, if I take everything I think I want the year to bring and examine them carefully, I'll find a common denominator. And it's almost always the same. Everything we want, we want because we think we'll feel better for having it. I dare you to think of one thing you want that you don't think will make you feel happier? So at the heart of all our wishes and goals, is that. Feeling better. Even if we feel really great to begin with, we can always feel better.

I feel really good almost all the time, but I tend to work a lot and be in a hurry a lot, and feel pressured a lot. On New Year's Eve day, as I was working, I was inspired to put on some music. My husband has become the new caretaker of his late step-grandpa's music collection. He doesn't have all of it home, yet. There are well over 1000 albums. But he brought the first few dozen home and has been digitizing them. One of the collections is John Denver.

I grew up on John Denver, and I find his music spiritual, soothing, uplifting, and joy-inducing. So I put on the John Denver collection while I worked. As the songs played, and my words filled the screen, I kept pausing and looking inward and feeling this sense of bliss just wash through me. And that's when my them for the year revealed itself to me.

JOY, NOW

In the beginning, it wasn't so brief. It was more like, "Milk every moment of time for all the joy I can." And then I thought on that a bit more, and changed it to, "MAKE every moment joyful." I like the second version better because it puts the power in my own hands. I'm not just squeezing existing joy out of random moments. I'm the one making the joy either by finding existing joy in each experience or adding my own joyful touched to it. Usually both.

Then I decided "Make every moment joyful" was a bit too long, and shortened it to "Joy, now." Because it's not a thought, "This will happen and I'll be happy, and then this will happen and make me happier." It's all about now, the present moment, the only time that ever truly exists--because the past is gone and the future has not come and who can guarantee it even ill? But this moment, this one right now (and now, and now, and now) is real, and it's here and it's the only one we have.

I don't want to feel joy later, I want to experience joy in every moment of my life, and so that means I must always find joy in the now.

JOY, NOW, BUT HOW?

It's not as hard as people make it out to be, it really isn't. I can feel joyful during any task or experience. One of the ways is to put on music and dance my way through that task. Another way is to have a phone call (on speaker) with somebody I thoroughly enjoy. Another is to burn my favorite incense and light candles. Another is to add some magic to whatever I'm doing, add a little mysticism, a little spirituality, a little spell. I might have an audiobook or a favorite documentary playing. I might sing or whistle or hum. I might focus on doing the most spectacular job ever on whatever task I'm about, and beam in satisfaction when it's done. There are dozens of ways to add joy to any moment of any day. Put on thick, cushy socks or warm, cozy sweats, or soft, comfy jammies for a given task. Everything's better in jammies. Oh, line up my favorite chocolates and intermittently enjoy one to make the task more pleasant. Or sip a freshly brewed cup of coffee while doing the task.

Pause and look around and feel and experience. There's always joy just waiting to be discovered. We just tend to look past it in our rush to get stuff done.

REMINDERS...

I'll make an artful poster of my touchstone phrase for 2023, and hang copies of it in the places where I spend the most time and will see those words often. JOY, NOW. And I'll write it in large block letters on every weekly page of my 2023 planner. JOY, NOW. Whenever I see or think those words, they will remind me to notice all the joyous little miracles that are constantly bouncing around me (and all of us) trying to get my (our) attention. I won't take as many of them for granted this year. I'll try to notice and appreciate every single one of them.

Even if it's toilet cleaning day, I will experience joy! There's just too much joy around us to ignore.

No matter how bad you might think things are, I promise you, there are always 1000 joyful miracles around you. We just get into a state where they become invisible to us. Let's not let that happen. Notice those joy-bits. Relish them. Make notes of them. Give thanks to them. Tell your friends about them. Post about them. Tweet about them if you're still doing that.

I know some who feel they can't think of a single thing to be joyful about. So let me suggest some.

You're alive. Your miraculous body is functioning. Your powerful heart is beating and your lungs are breathing. Your blood is circulating, your skin protecting you, your bones supporting you, your organs running your body like a finely tuned machine. Maybe not every part of your body is working perfectly but there is one thing you can know for sure. You have purpose or you would already be gone. There is a reason for you to be here.

Here are some more joy-bites. The earth is alive, and the sun came up this morning, and it will come up again tomorrow morning. There are planets and stars lighting the night sky. The sun is still working just fine. The moon, omygosh, the moon is such a source of joy, from its first slender crescent to its full glowing beauty. Thunderstorms and snowstorms and rain on a tin roof are reasons for joy. Sunrises and sunsets. A dog or kitty companion's silken soft coat beneath your hand. I get a rush of joy from walking barefoot through patches of tiny, springy clover in the spring.

That first cup of coffee in the morning. A piece of dark salted chocolate with caramel. The fact that every morning when we wake, it's a chance for a brand new beginning. Every single morning we can be born anew.

Do you have ways to make mundane tasks joyful? Share your secrets in comments.

,What does the new year hold for you? What will you read next? ,,The Fatal Series ,,Wings in the Night ,,The By Magic Series [image error][image error][image error]

,The Texas Brands - ,T,he Oklahoma Brands

,The McIntyre Men - ,The Immortals

,Brown and de Luca - ,Shattered Sisters

,Secrets of Shadow Falls - ,Short Reads

The Year Gone By

It has been a year of transition and challenges for us here at Serenity. Big changes have happened. I entered a partnership with Oliver Heber Books for many of my title. We took the ebook editions of the Texas Brands, Oklahoma Brands, and McIntyre Men to Kindle Unlimited, but we also got them back into mass market paperback editions via bookstore-friendly Ingrams, which means they can be carried by every bookstore out there in one form or another. This has been a positive change, and I'm seeing a much needed uptick in revenue from these moves.

I also got back the rights to my entire (mostly) Wings in the Night series, the books of my heart. This was the one series I didn't partner with OHB on. I decided to self-publish them and see what I could do. I came up with incredible, eye-catching new covers, and decided I would re-release them every other Tuesday for about a year. I wanted to give old readers a reason to buy the new editions so I committed to writing an original short piece as a bonus read in each one. Naturally, they're about Rhiannon, and they are gradually telling her origin story (to me as well as to you!)

We had some injuries this summer, too. My husband started a new business and almost immediately suffered a hand injury with minor nerve damage that required surgery. The day he got his stitches out, I broke my wrist. I am still meditating on the metaphysical reasons behind those things. But we recovered, and came back more productive than ever--both of us.

Now we are looking ahead to 2023 and here's what I have in mind for the new year.

Obviously, my breakneck pace of every other Tuesday releases for Wings in the Night will continue until the entire series has been re-launched, which should happen in June. I plan to release both Fear the Reaper (a serial, currently in Kindle Vella) and Young Rhiannon in the Temple of Isis (all in one book) at that time as well. I have a half-written sequel to Fiona: Origins I'd like to finish and another Brown and de Luca novel as well. The Fatal series has nice momentum I'd be dumb not to follow up on the minute the next plot comes to me, too.

I'll be able to get a LOT more writing done once the Wings re-launch is complete, so I expect a highly productive second-half of 2023. Maybe after a few days off. When I upload the final existing Wings in the Night, I'll be tempted to head to a spa, or at least pop the cork on some sparkling cider. This has been a major undertaking!

However, the new stuff can't be put off. I have two new projects in the pipeline.

First, FATAL PHANTASM, Book 4 in my Fatal Series, releases in just over 4 weeks on January 31st. I finished work on this just at the cusp of the holiday season and decided not to start the next project until after the 1st, so I'd have time to enjoy the holidays. However, the Wings in the Night books did not give me a break.

The second thing is the next project. I've been waiting for inspiration to come to me on what to start writing next. It is really difficult with so many series, each with its own set of fans who want more. This is the best "problem" any writer could imagine having, mind you!

I have very few series I consider "done." The Oklahoma Brands are complete. The Secrets of Shadow Falls and linked Mordecai Young series are done. I think the By Magic series is done. The Portal series is done.

But Wings in the Night, The Immortals, The Texas Brand, and Brown and de Luca, all have more books to go. And you will get all of them, providing I live long enough.

You know what's even harder? I get new ideas all the time for books that aren't part of an existing series. New stuff, brand new. I'm dying to write some of those, too. There are a dozen new notions in my "idea file" just waiting for me to find time to work on them. And some of them are going to be amazing.

I think I have to give myself permission to play around with the new stuff. But at the same time, I'm feeling inspiration for a new story--a new set of stories, actually--in one of my oldest series. But I have to play with this notion a little to see if it's going to take root before I'll know for sure. So I won't get into details just yet.

I'd like to have a list of new releases with dates to leave for you here today, but I'm not there yet, other than a Wings in the Night every other Tuesday for the first six months of 2023 and FATAL PHANTASM at the end of January.

And I'll be writing something new starting this Monday. A brand new book for 2023. Weee!

I hope your Christmas, Kwanzaa, Solstice, and Hanukkah were amazing. I hope you are home, snug and warm, safe and well-fed. I hope all of you whose travel plans turned into nightmares are able to look beyond the "problem" to see its deeper meaning. I always find that helpful. Sometimes being stuck away from family just makes us appreciate being stuck with family a little bit more. There's a reason for everything.

In the midst of disaster, instead of freaking out, look for the deep, spiritual message it has brought.

That's all for today, and probably for this year.

Thank you for the ride, 2022. Go with thanks and love.

Welcome in 2023! Let's make this the best year yet!

Holly & Humbug

To get you into the spirit of the season, here are the first three chapters of my holiday romance Holly and the Humbug. If you love holiday romance flicks on Hallmark, you will adore this story.

HOLLY AND THE HUMBUG

Prologue November, 15 years ago, Flint, MI.

The man in the overalls picked up the boxes, as instructed. He knew the situation. It was no surprise that the lady of the house wasn’t at home. Looked like a nice family. It was too bad, it really was. He left the check, safe in its sealed envelope, stuck through the crack in the door, then carried the final armload to the truck. Just as he shoved the boxes into the back with the others, a hat fell out. It rolled past his feet in a most unusual way. He went after it, but it kept rolling, and then just as he bent to grab it, a big gust of wind came out of nowhere, and swept it up, way, way up. It was carried away, over a house’s roof and out of sight.

The man in the overalls rolled his eyes. Hell, an old worn-out hat like that wouldn’t have brought much anyway. He returned to the truck, pulled the door closed, and secured the latch. Then he drove back to the secondhand shop with the dead man’s clothes.

Chapter 1 November, 15 years ago, Flint, Michigan

“You sold it? All of it?”

Matthew stared up at his mother in blatant disbelief. Wasn’t it bad enough that Dad had to die the day before Thanksgiving? That they had to bury him the day after? That their big meal on the day in between had consisted of deli meat, rolls, and about six casseroles brought over by neighbors and relatives?

She had to go and sell his stuff, too?

His mother blinked down at him. She seemed kind of in a daze, not all there, mostly numb. It seemed to him she could hear just fine, but what she heard wasn’t making its way to her brain.

“I had to, Matt. The money situation isn’t...it isn’t good.”

Yeah, he’d picked up on that much. He was twelve, not two. And he resented that his mother didn’t seem to think he could understand things. He did understand. He heard and saw and understood. Dad had died broke. He’d racked up debts that Matt’s mom hadn’t even known about. There was no money. There were bills due. And the funeral had cost a bundle. He got all that.

“I know the money situation isn’t good, Mom. And I could see selling the guns, the tools, the computer. But geeze, Mom, his clothes!”

“It was either sell them or give them away. And we need every penny right now. Christmas is coming.”

And that was Mom. She wasn’t worried about bills or taxes or losing the house or the car or even paying for the funeral. She was worried because Christmas was coming.

“We don’t need Christmas this year,” he told her. “We’re not gonna feel like celebrating anyway.”

“Oh, you’re so wrong, Matt. We need Christmas this year more than ever.”

He rolled his eyes, but thought about his kid sister, Cindy. She was only six, and yeah, she probably did need Christmas. But he didn’t.

“There must be something you want for Christmas, Matt,” his mother pressed on. “One gift. One special gift that could make this time a little bit easier for you. There is something, isn’t there? Tell me.”

He pursed his lips, cleared his throat because he didn’t want her to hear his grief in his voice. He was fine. But...

“Yeah, there is something. Or was. Dad’s hat.”

“His hat?” She blinked, still blank, but a little less so. “That silly felt fedora he was always wearing?”

Matt nodded. “He used to joke about that hat being my inheritance. Anytime we were doing anything fun, he would be wearing it. Don’t you remember? It was like—I don’t know, it was like his trademark. He loved that stupid hat. Remember how he wrote his initials in it in permanent purple marker when we went on vacation, just in case it got lost?” He paused there, remembering the road trip, the theme park, the fun. And that hat, at the center of it all. “I want Dad’s hat, Mom. It’s a part of him.”

His mother’s dull, numb expression changed then. It changed right before his eyes. Her face crumpled, and a rush of tears flooded her eyes and splashed onto her cheeks, and then she lowered her head into her hands. “I’m sorry, baby. I...it went with all the other stuff. I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, I figured.” He sighed, wanted to be furious, but he couldn’t stand to see her crying like that. Her shoulders were shaking.

“How am I going to do this?” she moaned. “I’m screwing everything up already and he’s only been gone a few days. How am I going to do this by myself?”

Matt reached out and put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s okay, Mom. It’s just a hat.”

“I’ll try to get it back,” she said. “It all went to a used clothing store, downtown. I can probably still find it.”

“Just don’t worry about it. It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does,” she cried. “Matt, I’m so sorry. I thought I could use the money to get you something nice for Christmas.”

If he had to pick the moment when he’d decided to hate Christmas forever, that would probably be the closest Matthew could come. That moment, right then. Matt hated Christmas. He hated the entire holiday season. It had taken his father away from him, and then it had doubled the blow by taking the only thing of his dad’s that he’d really wanted. And yeah, it was just a stupid old hat. But it was his dad’s stupid old hat.

He hated Christmas. And he vowed that day that he would always hate Christmas.

* * *

November, 15 years ago, Oswego, N.Y.

12-year-old Holly opened her eyes, and saw that she was in a place that was all white. Sunbeams spilled through the window like liquid gold, and angels stood all around her.

But they were not angels. There had been angels, only moments ago. That much, she knew. As she blinked her vision clear, the blurry shapes she’d mistaken as wings faded, and the men and women in white took on ordinary forms. The room really had been filled with angels and she had a feeling it still was. She only stopped being able to see them when she woke fully.

A nurse was writing on a chart. Someone warm was holding her hand, and Holly looked up to see her Aunt Sheila sitting there in a chair beside her hospital bed. She looked like she’d been there awhile. Her hair was messy and her eyes, red and puffy. She was staring down at Holly’s hand as if she wasn’t really seeing it.

Holly looked all around the room, and realized that what she’d been dreaming hadn’t been a dream at all. “Aunt Sheila?” she said, surprised that her words came out in a hoarse croak.

The nurses in the room stopped what they were doing and turned to stare. Aunt Sheila’s head came up, eyes met hers, and then filled.

“Baby,” she said. “You’re awake.” She shot a look at the nearest nurse, who hurried out of the room muttering that she would get the doctor.

But Holly clutched her aunt’s hand harder, and held her eyes firm this time. “Mom and Dad...and Noelle? They’re dead, aren’t they?”

Sheila didn’t say anything. Instead she gathered Holly into her arms, and held her hard. She held her tight. Holly tried to be brave like her mom had asked her to, but she couldn’t stop herself from bursting into tears. And in a second Aunt Sheila was sobbing, too.

They held each other and cried for a long time. They cried until they just about couldn’t cry anymore. And then finally, Holly sat up in her bed, and wiped at her eyes. “You all thought I was going to die, too, right?” Holly said.

Aunt Sheila blinked her red eyes dry. “What makes you think that?”

“I think—I think I did, for a while. I was with Mom and Dad and little Noelle. They’re okay.” She met her Aunt Sheila’s eyes. "They really are, they’re okay. You don’t have to worry.” 

Sheila’s tears spilled over anew, and she pressed her palms to Holly’s cheeks, and kissed her forehead. And then she whispered, “Honey, do you remember what happened? There was a car accident. You were all in it. The doctors tried, honey, they tried their best.”

“I know,” Holly said. It seemed Aunt Sheila wasn't getting what Holly was trying to tell her, and it was important. “Mom wanted me to tell you that they’re okay. I saw them. I was with them for a little while. But Mom, she told me I had to come back. She said there were really important things for me to do. She said everything happens for a reason. And she said you needed me, Aunt Sheila. She said death isn’t real. And I know it’s true, because I was there—only it’s not really there, it’s here. She’s still here, she’s still with us.” She lifted her eyes, staring around the room, her lips pulling into a watery smile. “Can’t you feel her?”

Sheila gathered Holly into her arms and held her gently. Her tears were used up, but her grief remained.

"They’ll be okay as long as they know we are. I don’t know if I could have been if I hadn’t seen it all for myself. I crossed over with them. It felt like I was walking them home. And it was beautiful, Aunt Sheila. If we fall apart, it’s going to break their hearts, but we don’t have to fall apart, because they're great. They’re perfect, they really are.”

Sheila nodded. “You’re amazing, Holly. You know that?” She kissed her again. “So much like your mom.”

“She wants us to remember her at Christmas,” Holly said. “That was the one thing she made me promise to do for her. To always treat Christmas the way she did. She said she’d be there with me, every single year.”

Sniffling, Sheila murmured, “She adored Christmas.”

“She never missed a Midnight Mass,” Holly said. “Or a Christmas special on TV. Rudolph, Frosty, The Little Drummer Boy.”

“And then there were the decorations.” Sheila took a rumpled tissue from her pocket and blew her nose softly, shaking her head.

Holly nodded hard. “She shorted out the power last year when she added that full-sized sleigh and reindeer to the roof. Remember? Santa waved and the reins lit up and the bells jingled and the reindeer moved? But only for about a minute and a half. Then everything went black.”

“I remember how mad your dad pretended to be when he had to hire an electrician to put the holiday lights on their own separate breaker. He wasn’t really mad, though. He loved having the house everyone wanted to drive past every night from Thanksgiving to New Year's.” They both laughed softly, sadly, but warmly.

There wasn’t a nurse in the room whose eyes were dry. “Sheila, look,” Holly whispered. Sheila lifted her head and followed Holly’s gaze to the window. Snow was falling outside. "The first snow of the season,” Holly said. “Mom always said it has magic in it.”

“We’re going to be okay, Holly. You and me, I promise.”

Holly nodded. “We will be. And so will they.”

“They will. And we’re gonna have a Christmas to beat them all,” Sheila promised. “One to make your mom smile.”

“She’ll love that,” Holly said. “I love Christmas, because she did. That’s kind of what she left me, I think. I’ll always love Christmas, for Mom.”

Chapter Two Present Day, Binghamton, N.Y.

Holly made her way from the kitchen to Table Six, balancing two breakfast platters, a carafe of coffee, a bottle of ketchup and a decanter of real maple syrup, all without missing a step or spilling a drop. She delivered the food piping hot and, as always, accompanied by a brilliant smile. “Anything else I can get you boys?”

Bub Tanner, as he was called, and that was the only name she knew, grinned at her and rubbed his unshaven graying stubble with one hand. “I like how she calls us boys,” he said.

“She’s just flattering your ego, Bub,” Tater said. And that was the only name she knew for him. “She knows we’re both older than dirt.”

“Speak for yourself, Tater.” Bub reached for the carafe, but Holly beat him to it, filled his cup, and then Tater’s, with the decaf they hadn’t asked for.

“Enjoy your breakfast.”

“Here, take this with you, hon, will you?”

Holly looked back to see Tater holding out his thoroughly read newspaper. She smiled and took it from him. 

“Happy to get that outta your way,” she said, and then she paused, because the paper was open to page three and folded in just such a way that one particular story was looking her right in the face.

“Oswego Welcomes Natives Home for Holidays,” the headline announced. The story was a feel-good piece about all the people traveling in from out of town for the season, how good it was for business.

But that wasn’t the way Holly saw it. Frowning, she carried the paper with her behind the counter and into the kitchen. “Aunt Sheila?”

Sheila turned her wheelchair around–she’d been parked right next to the short-order cook, probably lecturing him on his technique–and smiled at her. “What, babe?”

“Look what Tater just handed me.” She thrust the paper toward her, and Sheila looked at it, saw the story, lifted her brows.

“That’s the fourth time this morning, Aunt Sheila.”

Sheila nodded, tilted her head. “And how many signs did you have about your hometown yesterday?” she asked.

“Six.”

“Right. Including the billboard for the school play, To Oz We Go.”

“Oz We Go. Oswego. Come on, Aunt Sheila, it’s almost blatant.”

Sheila nodded. “You need to spend this Christmas at home.”

“I don’t know that I need to. And I don’t want to leave you, but I feel like something– I don’t know–wants me to.”

“Which is why I called the Realtor.”

“You did?” Then, "What Realtor?"

Sheila nodded, and wheeled across the kitchen, toward the office door, with a quick glance back at Will, the new short- order cook. He met her eyes and there was... something.

Holly lifted her brows. “Was that–?”

“Office, Holly,” Sheila said. She’d opened the door and held it, waiting. So Holly obediently went inside. 

“The old place, your family home, is empty,” Sheila told her. “It’s in rough shape, being that it’s been empty the past fifteen years, but it’s habitable. Barely. If you want to go up there for a few days over the holiday, I think you should. Maybe...maybe it’s time.”

“But you’d be alone for Christmas. And we always do Christmas together. For Mom, you know. And–”

“We can do it up separately just as well. And I won’t be alone." She said it with a meaningful glance through the still open office door, toward Will. He was whistling as he flipped flapjacks. He looked back, caught her eye and smiled at her in a certain way.

Holly blinked and shot her aunt a look.

“I have MS, Holly. I’m not dead.”

Holly smiled from ear to ear. Her aunt really did embrace life, in every possible way. She loved that about her. It reminded her of the way her mom had been. It was the way Holly tried to be, too. It must run in the female line.

Or maybe losing someone so important had made them all realize how precious and fragile a thing life was, so they cherished it a little bit more.

“I could take part of the decorations up with me,” Holly said, mulling it over as she thought it through. “It would be kind of cool to decorate the old house like Mom used to. Even if it is in rough shape.”

“I think she’d like that."

"Oh, but is there even heat or electricity?" Holly gnawed her lower lip, wondering if this was really even possible.

"The Realtor said she could have the power turned on, a fresh tank of LP gas hooked up, and the furnace running when you arrive. All we have to do is call and give her the go-ahead. And she'll leave the key in the mailbox.”

“You, really did talk to the Realtor, didn’t you?”

“I thought it could be my gift to you this year. I think you have to do this, Holly. You haven’t been back there since you lost them. And your eyes are lighting up just thinking about it,” Sheila said with a smile. “You’ve been taking care of me, taking care of everyone around here, ever since you came home with me from the hospital. It’s time to do something for yourself, even if it’s only for a few days. Give yourself what you really want, this Christmas. Okay?”

Holly heard the rumble of a motor and glanced up and through the window, just in time to see a bus go past. Plastered to its side was an ad for the State University of New York at Oswego. She smiled, shaking her head. “I don’t think the Universe is going to take no for an answer. My hometown seems to be calling me. Guess I’ve got no choice.”

* * *

Present Day, Detroit, MI.

“Yes, I do have to go now,” Matthew told his sister. “Yes, Cindy, I know it’s Christmas week. But this is business.”

She sounded heartbroken, but honest to God, if he had to sit through one more warm, cozy, family dinner at her house with her idyllic life and her doting husband and her chubby babies, he was going to swallow a stick of dynamite, chase it with a lighter and hope for the best.

She was whining, applying guilt, pleading with him, ending with, "You know how I feel about the holidays, Matt."

“And you know how I feel about the holidays, Cindy. I get it, Christmas is important to you, but ‘to you’ is the operative part of that sentence. To me, it’s torture." She sighed heavily, inhaled to try again, so he spoke first. "Besides, this place is a bargain. I can’t miss out, and if I buy it this week, when every other person in the market is taking the holidays off, I’ll have the kind of edge you never get in real estate.”

Combine that edge with the phony-baloney goodwill of the season, and the Realtor needing one more fat commission check before the end of the calendar year to cover her holiday overspending, like everyone else he knew, and he had it made.

People were idiots this time of year. He was smart enough to take advantage of that.

“Yes, Cindy, I’m flying. Right away? Well, yeah, seeing as how I’m calling you from the airport, I would say it’s pretty much imminent. Yep, I’m renting a car when I arrive in Syracuse and driving up from there. And yes, we’ll celebrate when I get back, I promise. There’s no reason in the world I shouldn’t be back in time for Christmas dinner. My flight leaves Christmas Eve, three p.m.” He almost grimaced at the thought, but tried to make his words sound sincere all the same. At least it would be the final holiday feast of the year, and he could skip his sister's week-before-Christmas seven-day pre-game show. Ice skating with the kids who couldn't stand up, going to the mall to see the big guy, caroling, school concerts and plays, last minute shopping, days of gift-wrapping. He shuddered at the thought. “Have a great week, hon." He certainly planned to. "They're calling my flight. I’ll call you in a day or two. Bye.”

He disconnected, cutting her off before she could dole out any more helpings of guilt and dragged his roller bag toward the concourse, where his flight had just begun boarding.

As he got into his seat, he leaned back, closed his eyes, and told himself he really would do his best to get back to Cindy’s in time for Christmas. Cindy needed Christmas.

And that thought brought to mind the other. The one from long ago, his first Christmas without his dad, and his mom’s tearful explanation about how she’d gone to the secondhand clothing store and tried to find the hat, but that it was already gone. And the proprietor not only didn’t remember who had bought it, he didn’t even remember ever having seen it.

The hat was beyond recovering.

Just like his dad. Just like his childhood after that. Just like everything eventually was. Gone.

Which just validated his belief that getting too attached to anything was a bad idea. Things were fleeting. There and gone again. So were people. There was no point getting too used to anything. Ever.

And holidays, he added mentally, were just plain stupid.

* * *

November, 15 years ago, Flint, MI.

The wind blew the hat until it came to rest outside a truck stop just a few blocks from the dead man’s house. And there it waited. Eventually, a long-distance driver came out of the establishment, burping in a very satisfied way and carrying a clipboard, a set of keys, and a travel mug full of joe, piping hot and twice as strong.

He walked toward his rig, and almost tripped over the hat on his way. Then he paused and looked down at it, tipped his head to one side, and shrugging, bent to pick it up. It wasn't a bad hat. Nothing he’d wear, but the thing had character. He didn’t really want it. He wasn’t sure what possessed him to take the thing, but take it he did. He set it on top of the CB radio inside the truck, and let it ride there as he headed for his next stop in New York’s southern tier. It was almost like having a friend along.

Chapter 3 Present Day, Binghamton, N.Y

All week long, Holly had been seeing signs telling her to go home. And now that she’d arrived, she wondered why.

The house was not what she remembered. She hadn't really expected it to be, of course, but the difference was more stark than she'd expected. It hadn’t been painted or occupied in fifteen years. It showed the signs of neglect, too. There were a few shingles missing from the roof. One shutter had come loose and hung by its bottom bolts while the top of it veered out to the side as if threatening to jump. The white paint was peeling and chipped.

A car horn blasted behind her, and Holly damn near jumped out of her seat, glancing reflexively into the rearview mirror. She saw a dark-colored sports car behind her, and even before she managed to put her own sunshine yellow VW Bug into gear to move out of the way, the hot little black car was pulling out and around her. It roared past, its windows too tinted to let her see the impatient jerk who was behind the wheel.

Taking a deep breath, she gently corrected her thoughts. For all she knew, the driver might have been late to pick up his little girl from some event, or maybe he was rushing a sick relative to the hospital. He could have a very good reason for his impatience, and she shouldn’t judge.

She let the tense feeling run off her shoulders like water off a raincoat, and eased her Bug into the worn dirt driveway. It used to be pretty solid and bare. Now, grass and weeds had come up, and they brushed the underside of her car noisily as she drove over them.

She brought the car to a stop and got out, then stood there for a moment as memories tried to sweep in. She could hear childish laughter–her own, and her baby sister’s–drifting in from a happy past. She could almost see the two of them bundled in snowsuits to the point where Holly could barely bend and little Noelle looked like the pink version of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, her cheeks, cherry red, her nose and mouth covered by a scarf with snowmen all over it. She was walking, but only just, and holding Holly’s hand, both of them in mittens as they tromped through the snow toward the place where they’d left their sled the day before.

She sighed and stared up at the two-story house. It was an ordinary frame house, nothing fancy, no real style or design to it. It was over a century old, drafty, poorly insulated, and probably needed a new roof and wiring and furnace and God only knew what else. It hadn’t been in great shape when she’d lived in it as a child. She remembered her dad calling it a fixer-upper.

“Why do you want me here?” she asked the house, or maybe she was asking her mom. She wasn’t sure. “What’s the point?”

There was a roar, and then a horn. She didn’t jump this time, just turned slowly to look toward the road where that same black sports car had returned, and sat there, growling like an agitated panther. Its tinted window slid slowly down, and she saw a man’s face, hidden behind dark sunglasses.

Something wafted from him, a feeling like a breeze filled with tiny electric sparks.

She lifted her brows. “You again?” she asked

He frowned, glanced at her car, and then back at her. “Yeah, sorry about that. I was in a hurry.”

“Didn’t do you much good, though, did it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, wherever you were in such a hurry to go, you’re still not there.”

He tipped his head slightly to one side, reached up to pull off his sunglasses, as if it would help him to interpret her foreign language if he could see her better.

“You should slow down. Learn to enjoy the journey. You never really get where you’re going, anyway.”

“Uh–well, where I’m going is the Best Western. And I sure as hell hope I’m going to get there.”

She nodded, and thought he was only pretending not to get her deeper meaning. He looked intelligent enough. Dark hair, nice face. Deep chocolate eyes that made her tummy tighten up if she looked directly into them. And his mouth–well, she just wasn’t going to look at that anymore at all. There was something way too sensual about those lips.

“I haven’t been back here in fifteen years,” she said, “but unless they’ve moved it, you’re pretty close.” She pointed. “Back the way you came, five miles, then take a right at the light. You won’t see it until you get around the big bend in the road.”

He nodded. “Thanks.” He slid his glasses back on, giving her a more thorough look from behind them. It felt like it, anyway. Though she supposed she could have been imagining it.

“Merry Christmas,” she called.

“Yeah.” He glanced at her, lips pulled tight, then pulled away.

She shrugged, and went up to the mailbox. The key was right where Aunt Sheila had told her it would be. So she took it out, went to the front door, and let herself in. She didn’t even take time to look around, at first. She knew herself well enough to realize she’d get lost in memories if she did, and it would be dark in a few hours, so she settled for a quick glance at the note Ms. Sullivan had left on the door.

Welcome home, Holly. It was short notice, but I did what I could to give you a comfortable stay. The electric and water are on, but the furnace isn’t. No time for the repairs it apparently needs. So I had a face cord of firewood delivered for you. It’s stacked around the side. You can use the fireplace to keep warm. I stocked the place with lots of bottled water in case the tap tastes rusty. Hot water heater isn’t lit yet, but if you want to, go ahead. It’s been checked out, and while not terribly efficient, it is safe. If you need anything else, don't hesitate to call. Merry Christmas!”

Ms. Sullivan had been a friend to Holly’s mother. Aunt Sheila said she wouldn’t accept any payment for all she’d done, not even for the cost of the gas and electricity, but Holly would find a way. Either that, or she would pay it forward by doing something extra-nice for someone else.

She folded the note and tucked it into her pocket to keep, taking only enough time to start a small fire in the hearth before she headed back outside. She still needed to unload her personal things, groceries, and supplies from the car. She’d bought the fixings for a traditional holiday meal and all the decorations she and Aunt Sheila had inherited from her mom. She had a ton of lights to string before dark. The long night ahead would give her plenty of time to reminisce and explore her childhood home.

* * *

The “For Sale” sign in front of the house where he’d stopped to ask for directions should have given him a clue, but Matthew had brushed it off as meaningless. The house he’d come to look over was unoccupied and had been owned by the bank for fifteen years. Its asking price had just been reduced by a bundle. It could not have been that house. That one had a Beetle-driving hippie-type in residence. Tree hugger. He could spot them a mile away. Even leggy, blond tree huggers with eyes so blue you could fall into them.

Her looks had floored him. Her attitude had irritated him. He’d asked for directions, not a seminar on enjoying the journey. The nerve. And she’d capped it by tossing that useless, meaningless phrase he hated beyond all others, “Merry Christmas,” onto her farewell.

At any rate, he checked into the Best Western, which he’d been assured was the best hotel in the area–not that there were many. He was in a hurry, and starved to boot, so he didn’t even look at the room. Just checked in, got the key, and asked the desk clerk the best place to get a decent meal that wouldn’t take half the damn night.

She pointed to a chain restaurant across the parking lot. Matthew rolled his eyes, and headed there, walking because there was no point in driving that short distance, and the Carrera was probably safer where it was. He’d paid a premium to rent a Porsche for the two-hour drive up from the airport, and more for the insurance. He didn’t want to have to use it.

He ordered a meal, then killed the time waiting for the food to arrive by phoning the Realtor to set up a showing.

Her reaction surprised him. “Uh–Mr. Reid? I, um, it’s the day before Christmas Eve.”

“Yes, I’m pretty clear on the date, Ms. Sullivan. Do you refuse to show houses during the holiday season?”

“Well, no, of course not, I just–I had no idea you were coming in.”

“I didn’t think it would be a problem. You said the place was unoccupied. Look, if you’re too busy with your...holiday plans...I can swing by and pick up a key and some directions, and show myself around the place.”

“No, it’s not that.”

“Well, what is it then?”

“I have a tenant there. Just for the holiday.”

“A tenant?”

“Well, not exactly a tenant. More like a guest.”

He blinked, completely puzzled.

“She lived there as a child, Mr. Reid. Her parents were friends of mine, and when she called asking if she could spend Christmas there, I thought there’d be no harm. It’s her first time back here in fifteen years and I thought—”

“Her first time back in fifteen years?” he asked. And he immediately thought of the hippie chick in the bright yellow Bug, dispensing pearls of wisdom to hapless strangers. For some reason, thinking that it was her made him a little more irritated than he already was. And he ignored the other feeling. The little trickle of liquid heat that simmered through him at the thought of seeing her again. That made no sense whatsoever. So, as he did with all things that made no sense, he ignored it.

At least he knew where the house was now. “So, are you saying you’re going to give up a sale because you don’t want to inconvenience a freeloader for an hour or two?”

“She’s not a freeloader, Mr. Reid. And of course I don’t want to jeopardize a sale over this. I just want to give her fair warning first, before traipsing in there with a stranger in tow. This is probably a difficult–”

“I have cash, you know. No financing needed. If I buy it, I can pay you just as fast as you can draw up the contracts.”

“If the weather’s not too bad tomorrow–”

“Weather?” He looked out the window. “It’s as clear as a bell outside.”

“We’re supposed to get lake effect tonight. But once the roads are cleared tomorrow, I’ll take a run over there and talk to her. I’m sure she won’t have any problem letting you come in and see the place later in the day, again, weather permitting. All right?”

He rolled his eyes. His food arrived. At least the wait-staff in this town were fast. It didn’t look as if anyone else was. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he promised. Then he ended the call and looked up at the waitress. “You keep things rolling this fast, and you’re going to get a nice, fat tip.”

She frowned at him, maybe a little insulted, but pasted a smile over it and filled his coffee mug. As she walked away, she paused to speak to another waitress, and he caught a few words.

“What are we supposed to get tonight? One-to-three?”

“I heard three-to-five.”

He shrugged. It didn’t sound so bad to him. He focused on his meal, which wasn’t half-bad.

Thanksgiving Day

Today my hubby and I will be gathering with our gigantic family for food and fun and love. Our gang has grown so big we rent a venue now, to fit everyone comfortably, and we all bring food and gather there, and talk and laugh and enjoy just being together and inevitably we'll share our gratitude for the good things in our lives and for each other as we bask in each others' company.

The real power of gratitude

There are actual studies out showing that people who consciously express their gratitude on a regular basis tend to be happier and healthier, which makes sense. Gratitude reduces stress, which is the core source of most illnesses. Before anything is happening in our bodies, something is happening in our minds.

The law that powers the entire universe is, "Like attracts like." Spend your time focused on what you're worried about and you create more to worry about in your life. Spend your time focused on what you're happy about, and you create more to be happy about in your life.

Everything in existence begins as a thought, a belief, an expectation, before it becomes a physical thing. This is true for big things and small, inventions and conditions, health and money, love and blessings.

A life-changing act to begin today

The easiest and most life-enhancing thing a person can do is keep a gratitude journal. Take a nice blank book and a favorite pen, and before you go to sleep each night, write down everything you can think of from your day that felt good. Everything you feel glad about, relieved about, happy about. Everything that made you feel fulfilled or appreciated or loved or blessed.

Doing this before you sleep changes the chemistry of your brain, and alters your energy. The invisible electromagnetic field that surrounds your body, which some call the aura, but which is a scientifically proven to exist, changes. This field both transmits and receives. It beams out and it attracts. It sends out the signal of who you are to the world, and it brings in signals that match it. Start a gratitude journal today, and just see how different your life is after a few weeks of keeping it. You'll be so thrilled you'll keep it as a permanent part of your practice.

You're near the top of my own gratitude journal

Without readers, what good would storytellers be? You are in the word, storyteller, because one cannot tell a story without someone to hear the story.

So thank you.

Thank you for reading the stories I weave.

Thank you for buying the books and downloading the freebies.

Thank you for telling your fellow story-nerds about them. (Story-nerd is a term of endearment, by the way.)

Thank you for writing Amazon reviews, or BN reviews, or Goodreads reviews, or Apple or Kobo or Google reviews, or reviews in your blog posts.

Thank you for sharing my posts on social media.

Thank you for caring so passionately about your favorite series and campaigning for me to write another book within it. You never let a series die. You keep after me until I produce another book and I appreciate that so much.

Thank you for your letters, and your emails, and your comments.

Being a writer is like playing a symphony to an audience you cannot see or hear. We finish the performance and never hear the applause. Our applause comes in one email, one comment, one review at a time, and each clap means the world to us. To me.

Thank you for sharing the worlds I create. I love making up stories for you.

Thanksgiving Romance

Thanksgiving is one week from today, and I don't know about you, but I am not ready! Somehow it sneaks up on me every single year. I think that's a common complaint, though, and it's not a time for complaining. It's a time for gratitude and appreciation.

A spiritual moment

There's a difference between gratitude and appreciation. Discovering that was an Oprah-worthy aha moment for me, and one I often ponder at this time of year. Gratitude is feeling grateful for something, feeling thankful, being glad for having that person, experience, or thing in my life. But appreciation goes deeper. When I appreciate something, I do more than feel thankful for it. I pause in my busy life long enough to bask in it for a moment.

For example, I'm always grateful for the little waterfall my hubby built in a place where I can see it every day. I thank him for it over and over. But when I'm sitting beside it, listening to its musical sounds, watching the sun glint off its sparkling cascade, feeling the cleansing and peace it brings--those are the moments when I'm truly appreciating it. I'm sharing a short video of it here so you can bask a little yourself.

https://youtu.be/T0uvDJmj1Uo

So this time of year, I make lists of things I'm thankful for, and then I try to spend a little time appreciating each of them. Even if I can't be near them, I can close my eyes and imagine them, replaying in my mind everything I adore about them, and truly appreciation them.

Thanksgiving Romance

I've penned a lot of holiday romances; Halloween and Samhain, Winter Solstice and Christmas. But so far, only one true Thanksgiving Romance exists in my collection, and it is a special one. It's called Shine On Oklahoma, and it's about what I fondly call a "bad girl gone good" tale.

Kendra's con-man father is out of prison and right back in trouble. He's made powerful enemies who say that Unless Kendra can con Dax into accepting an inheritance he never wanted, they'll kill him. The problem is, she's played Dax before. She's never been able to get him off her mind, and he's the only mark she has ever regretted. The notion of hurting him again is tearing her apart and she can't figure out why. But she heads back to Big Falls, her hometown, where her sister has settled down to lead a respectable life with a hometown hero husband whose huge, wholesome family make her gag. Sort of. They want to think the best of her and make her a part of their loving, happy clan. But Kendra knows it's not where she belongs. There's nothing respectable or wholesome about her, and Dax deserves better than the game she's about to run on him. But she's in too deep to turn back now.

Here's the video trailer featuring Stay with Me by Steve Collum, which is a fabulous song, so turn up your volume.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mONeZQcgBxQ

Shine on Oklahoma is part of The McIntyre Men series.

Paperback editions are available wherever books are sold, including Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Books-a-Million. Ask your local bookstore to order it if you don't see it on the shelves.

Ebook editions are available exclusively at Amazon. You can read it free in Kindle Unlimited. Not a member of KU? You can still buy the ebook (or the paperback) at Amazon.

BRAND NEWS!

Scroll down. Trust me. But on the way, enjoy this freakin' gorgeous new cover art on my three most beloved series; The Texas Brand , The Oklahoma Brands , and The McIntyre Men . More news below.

As you might already know, I have partnered up with publisher Oliver Heber Books, and the first thing they did was put fresh new cover art on The Texas Brand series, The Oklahoma Brands series, and The McIntyre Men series. 21 stories, each series spinning into the next. Aren't they gorgeous?

You've been asking...

For years, readers have been pleading for paperback editions of these books. Now, thanks to my new publisher, every single title is available in mass market paperback–that's the regular-sized ones. Every brick & mortar bookstore can carry them, because they are back in the catalogue of the nation's largest book distributor, Inrga. You can also buy the paperbacks online at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Books-a-Million. This is a major change, and I couldn't be more excited!

Read them all for FREE!

You can buy the ebooks just like always on Kindle. What's new is that, because the ebooks are now Amazon exclusives, you can also read all 21 of them FREE in ,Kindle Unlimited,, a subscription service that lets you read all the books you want for FREE. You can get the first 30 days free, and the next 60 days for 4.99 in Amazon's current promotion. If you spend more than $10 a month on books, this might be a more affordable option for you, and I know we're all looking for those these days!

Christmas, Christmas, Christmas Stories!

Three of the six Oklahoma Brands series books are Christmas stories, just like three of the six McIntyre Men series books feature Christmas and miracles, while one, Shine on Oklahoma, is a Thanksgiving romance. You don't see those every day.

Yes, that special time of year is rolling into our lives again. Never fails, does it? And doesn't it feel wonderful? I'm eager to begin putting up my Yuletide decor now that Halloween and Samhain are all but in the bag. (At this writing, astrological Samhain is tomorrow, November 7th.)

Just so you know...

Some of the paperbacks are still in progress, though most are already available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Books-a-Million and more. The middle series of the three, The Oklahoma Brands, are taking the longest to process.

If the paperback you want isn't available, try again in a few days or a week. As I've said, every single story is returning to mass market paperback and it's happening as we speak.

At Amazon, older versions might also show up, but be sure to click on the one with the covers shown here–the same cover as the ebook version.

And with this news, I have just launched the holiday season at MaggieShayne.com!