Casey Dawes's Blog, page 2

Summer Romance Reading

[image error]When I was a young teen, living in Framingham, MA, once a week I’d get on my bike and head to the library to bring back the teen romances, mysteries, and westerns I’d read. It was the best day of the week as far as I was concerned. I could collect my library stickers and come back with a whole stack of new books.

The fact that there was an ice cream store nearby didn’t hurt.

Even when summers required work, I read. It was only when I had my first child that my time for reading really took a hit.

How about you? Were you an active reader as a kid? Did you work for those stickers?

Do you participate in the Goodreads’ Reading Challenge?

If not, I encourage you to set aside time in your life to read. Reward yourself with stickers! Plan something nice if you reach your goal.

Finally, try to read eclectically. Throw a tougher book into the mix. If you normally read romance, try women’s fiction … or something even more daring like sci-fi. Even if you wind up swearing you’ll never read another one, you’ll get to see the world from another person’s point of view. It took me an entire year to read [image error]">Ron Chernow’s Hamilton, but I’m grateful I did. It taught me a lot about how our government creaked its way into existence.

[image error]I’d love to know what you’re reading … Shoot me an email at casey@caseydawes dot com.

And if it’s one of my books, I’d be ever so grateful.

 

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Spring in Promise Cove Is a Hit!

Promise Cove Book 2

Spring in Promise Cove is the second in the Promise Cove series of later-in-life (or seasoned) romances. In the first book, Kelly returns to Promise Cove and rekindles her friendship with childhood mates, Maggie and Alex. She also runs into her old boyfriend, and … well, you’ll just have to read the book!

This second book belongs to Maggie. She’s facing a crisis as her mother flies off to Paris and her daughter goes to college. Is it time to take a break from Promise Cove? Or time to take a good look at what’s already in her life.

I’m nearing completion of the third book: Hope in Promise Cove. This is Alex’s story. Readers of the first two books know Alex is a prickly character who is dead set against any more relationships in her life. Will Sal Rivas, a new man in town, be up for the challenge?

The series won’t end with that book! Everyone loves the community of Promise Cove. Once you’re there, you’ll want to stay a while. I’m already letting the next book simmer in my brain.

The Reviews Are Coming In!

What a wonderful journey that pulled me in and made me feel like I lived in Promise Cove.

Mary Jo Toth

This book is beautifully written. You will love each and every character. You will want to live in Promise Cove. Trust me.

Kelly D.

This series is like a warm blanket that makes you laugh, roll your eyes, cry with sadness and happiness

Fleur W.

The characters are as real as my friends and neighbors. The emotions they feel and the situations they find themselves in are natural and legitimate. It is wonderful to read about women entering their second and third acts of life.

Margaret A. Guerrera

(If you’ve read the book, a review is a wonderful “thank you” for this author!)

Get It Now!

Available on Amazon

Books in the Promise Cove Romance Series

 

 

 

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Romance Characters, Spring in Promise Cove

My romance characters evolve from who I am, where I came from, and the people I’ve experienced in my life.

In a box somewhere, there is a small black and white picture of some relatives on my father’s side of my family from the 1900s (not the picture to the left). He was born in Czechoslovakia when there was still such a place, and I can see a strong Slavic look in these relatives. It’s the same look I see when I look in a mirror. The same that I remember well from my father’s sister.

She was a little shorter than I am, but our build is the same: short waist, tendency to be round, and somewhat … er … top heavy. But as I grow older, my movements echo her mannerisms, and the tendency to put my fisted hands on my hips has been passed down from the women in the picture through her to me.

I think all of us have that realization at some point as we grow older. There’s something that we do or say that echoes our parents or older relatives. It’s part of what makes us what we are.

This is a roundabout way of getting to Maggie, the heroine of Spring in Promise Cove. Because she’s my “child” in a sense, she does have a few of my own characteristics, a drive to get things done being one of them. She’s also a child of her parents. I think some of her grit comes from Elaine, her mother; while a sense of duty is obviously something her deceased father passed down to her.

When I plan before I write a book, I spend some time on my romance characters, especially the main ones. Some of the questions I ask my characters is who or what influenced them. While growing up in Promise Cove made Maggie appreciate her small town life, she also dreams of a life bigger than the one she has. The two men in her life, Tom and Justin, reflect that push-pull within her. Will she realize that she has everything she’ll ever need in Promise Cove? Or will the call of big city lights pull her away?

Find out what kind of romance character Maggie turns out to be.

Start reading Spring in Promise Cove today.

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Spring in Promise Cove: Background

There’s a small town in Montana that has a bigger reputation than its size would indicate: Philipsburg, affectionately called P-Burg. They’ve invested a great deal in recapturing the Victorian feel of the original town, while hanging on to the quirkiness that reflects the people who live there.

If you’re ever there, you can have a brew at the Philipsburg Brewing Company, catch a trout in a nearby stream, explore antique stores, gorge on candy at a hand-crafted sweets store, or paw through rocks looking for a Montana sapphire.

If you’re there on the right day, you can also attend a concert.

A while ago, the town built an ice rink. Great in the wintertime, which is long in Philipsburg, but kind of useless in the summer. Except that some innovative person—someone a lot like Maggie, the protagonist in my next book—came up with an idea to make it a summertime concert venue.

It’s a bring-your-own-chair type of concert. There are many grassy levels that you can settle into for a picnic. Beer is often plentiful, as well as food offered by local groups. As time goes on, people move closer and closer to the stage, dancing, clapping, and generally causing a ruckus.

Mission Mountain Wood Band in 2016

In Spring in Promise Cove, Maggie decides one of her closest friends, Kelly, needs a place to perform. After all, the town is known for its visual artists, why not expand the idea. Since Maggie is the mayor, she pulls together a committee and starts the ball rolling.

Philipsburg was the inspiration for the idea. I hope you enjoy Promise Cove’s version of a small-town performance space.

People in small towns can accomplish anything they put their minds to do!

Spring in Promise Cove comes out June 14, 2022. Get your copy now!

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Kat Martin’s New Novel: The Last Mile

When Abigail Holland awakes to the sound of a nighttime intruder in her rambling Denver Victorian, she knows exactly what the black shrouded figure is after—the map she recently inherited from her grandfather. Whoever he is, the man who grapples with her, then escapes, is willing to kill for the location of a treasure King Farrell hunted for more than ten years. The Devil’s Gold has claimed hundreds of lives, and it was her grandfather’s obsession.

With a killer pursuing her and her own family not to be trusted, Abby decides to take up the search herself. But she’ll need help to do it, and there’s no one better than renowned explorer and treasure hunter Gage Logan. Despite the instant chemistry between them, Gage is reluctant. Innocent people have been hurt on his watch before. But when Abby shows him a genuine gold ingot she found with the map, his curiosity is piqued. Before long they’re heading into the flash floods and brutal winds of the Superstition Mountains, straight into a passionate entanglement—and the dark heart of danger.

Buy Now

Amazon Kindle  | Amazon Hardcover | Amazon Paperback

Barnes & Noble

Kobo | Google Play | Apple

IndieBound

From Kat

Since my new book, THE LAST MILE, the second book in my Blood Ties Series, Gage Logan’s story, is set in Arizona, I thought it might be fun to talk about a place I’m only just getting to know.

Most of the year, I spend my time in the mountains of Montana. I’ve never been much of a desert person, but on a drive from California back to our Montana home, we took a detour that led us to Northern Arizona. It’s far different from the rest of Arizona, over 5,000 feet in altitude, with mountains and pine trees all around. So I felt a connection right away.
We ended up buying a winter home there, and as I grew to love the area, I decided I wanted to write a story set in that location. Since I hadn’t written a treasure hunt book in years, one idea morphed into another and eventually became my new novel, THE LAST MILE.

One of the most famous missing treasures, not just in Arizona, but the world, is the Lost Dutchman Mine. The legend says it’s located in the harsh and dangerous Superstition Mountains of Arizona.

But no matter how much I researched, I couldn’t get a clear idea of what it would be like to search for treasure in such a hostile environment.

Located forty miles east of Phoenix, the mountains have been designated a wilderness area, with no motorized vehicles permitted. Even from a distance, it was a chilling landscape of rocks and sheer cliffs. With its spiky cactus, rattlesnakes, scorpions, and deadly reputation for the deaths of over two hundred people through the years, the place was definitely a good place to set a romantic thriller.

Though we didn’t hike or ride horseback into the hostile interior, I was able to investigate the area around the mountains–the massive cauldron of a long dead volcano, and speak to old Dutch hunters, men who spend their live hunting for the rumored Peralta gold.

In the novel, Gage Logan is a world renown explorer and treasure hunter. When Abigail Holland inherits a treasure map from her grandfather, Gage is the only man she’ll consider hiring to help her find it. It’s high action, plenty of twists and turns, and of course a passionate romance.

Fighting flash floods, brutal winds, and men willing to kill for the treasure, Gage and Abby face the dark heart of danger–but nothing will stop them from finding the Devil’s Gold.

About Kat Martin

New York Times bestselling author Kat Martin, a graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara, currently resides in Missoula, Montana with Western-author husband, L. J. Martin. More than seventeen million copies of Kat’s books are in print, and she has been published in twenty foreign countries. Fifteen of her recent novels have taken top-ten spots on the New York Times Bestseller List, and her novel, BEYOND REASON, was recently optioned for a feature film. Kat’s new novel, THE LAST GOODNIGHT, a romantic thriller, will be released in hardcover on October 26th and is the start of her new Blood Ties series.

WEBSITE
http://www.katmartin.com/

SOCIAL MEDIA

Twitter: https://twitter.com/katmartinauthor

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KatMartinAuthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/KatMartinAuthor

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52293322-the-ultimate-betrayal

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Friends to Lovers Romance

Creative Common License. Photo by woodleywonderworks.

You remember them: the boys who were friends, but who would never be lovers.

The one boy in elementary school always ready to share his half-melted candy bar with you. The unsigned Valentine. Big round eyes watching you as you opened it and whispered to your best girlfriend.

In high school, they were the ones to scared to ask you out. The guy on the track team who sat next to you in history class. He was easy to talk to and not bad looking. But he wasn’t the one you wanted.

No, you wanted the guy who was quarterback of the football team, all lithe boy beauty and an easy smile. The smarted boy in the class, the one with the real estate developer father, the one all the other girls hung on.

So you let the good guys go, never realizing the ones you chased weren’t at all right for you. The question is, did you ever figure it out? Or did the good one get away?

That’s Maggie’s story.

Spring in Promise Cove is available on June 14. Pre-order yours now.

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Book Research for the Beck Family Saga

As a lifelong learner, my curiosity has been an asset as I developed the Beck Family Saga. Each book has required research into topics that weren’t usually on my radar.

Rosie the Riveter is familiar to many people. (She’s even got her own national park in Richmond, California:  (https://www.nps.gov/rori/index.htm). The story of women working in factories as men went off to war doesn’t begin and end with her. The idea of having a parallel story of CJ Beck’s grandmother intrigued me, so I did some research as I wrote Home Is Where the Heart Is. It turned out that Great Falls, Montana, was the scene of a lot of factory jobs for women.

My mother was in her twenties in the 1940s, so I had lots a photos from the era to draw on for women’s styles. It was a glamorous era!

Finding Home led me into the world of training horses for rodeo. Even as a kid, barrel racing and calf roping were exciting events to watch. At age seven I was quite determined to be a cowboy when I grew up. (Nope, not a cowgirl.) My dad gave me the biggest treat of my life when he took me to the rodeo featuring the TV stars of “Annie Oakley” and “Rin Tin Tin.” (See a playbook of the event here: https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/rodeo-ad-poster-vintage-annie-oakley-rin-tin)

 

I was already a knitter and spinner when I started Leaving Home, so that didn’t require a great deal of research. But my knowledge of raising alpacas (I love their fleece!) was limited. One of my friends from my computer days had become a knitter who developed and sold patterns. She blessed me with a pattern for the book. (https://www.ravelry.com/designers/brenda-castiel)

 

An article in Nature Conservancy magazine sparked the idea of Coming Home. While I generally knew of the problems facing our veterans as they return home, I needed to uncover details of what they faced. The subject of the interview in the magazine was gracious with her time. The conservancy is actively recruiting veterans, but she spoke of the difficulties of working for an organization whose culture didn’t always mesh well with her background in the military.

For this book, I also had to understand the techniques and equipment that could be used by a disabled person to fly fish. Project Healing Waters (https://projecthealingwaters.org/) was also gracious with their time to provide background for Coming Home.

 

Starting for Home was definitely a challenge! Not only were my main characters climbers, they also worked in an oil field in Wyoming. So much research! I have to admit learning about climbing was much more fun than learning about pump jacks. Much as I love the idea of challenging my body to scale a cliff, I’m simply not built to hoist my leg over my head! (https://mojagear.com/rock-climbing-destination-guide-information-lander-wyoming/)

 

As I wrapped up the series with Finally Home, I knew I had to solve the mystery of the mine that I’d teased my readers with throughout the saga. And of course, that meant a lot of digging (ahem) into mining. Montana is known as the Treasure State, so there were lots of possibilities to choose from. And because it’s a mining state, there have been numerous environmental (https://clarkfork.org/our-work/what-we-do/restore-the-best/confluence/) and human (https://www.asbestos.com/jobsites/libby/) disasters.

Fortunately, there are people working to extract the elements we need without destroying the planet in the process. You’ll have to read the book to find out who they are.

I hope you enjoy the series. If you would like a free sneak peak of the series, click here to get a free copy of Crossroads, a novella that takes place in the small town of Choteau, Montana on the edge of the Rocky Mountain Front.

 

 

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The Quilting Saga

I’ve been making quilts for my grandchildren for over a decade now. I only have two left.

But quilting on the road is a lot more difficult than having a dedicated space! RV Parks often have community spaces where women gather, but Covid squashed that for most of the last year or so. Like many, I am finding I am suddenly starved for the company of women. Luckily I’m in a place that has a group and the spacious community center is open again.

There might be a finish date for quilt number eight.

The idea was presented to me that it would be wonderful to have a quilt of blue triangles. Triangles! They are tedious to make, and for me the points are a hit or miss. I pawed through my stash as we did the mad dash to leave our rental home in June of 2020. But I didn’t really begin until October of 2020 while we were Manila, Utah. If you look up the town on the map, you’ll see there isn’t much in the area. The nearest quilt store was in Green River, Wyoming, nearly an hour away.

Nonetheless, we went. And I set up my temporary quilting studio a few days later at the KOA in Manila, UT. And on it went over the next year and a half. I cut triangles inside, outside, and sometimes in friend’s house’s. The pile grew. I went to quilt stores from the mountains to the Atlantic. In July 2021 I added my sewing machine to the stack of stuff we carted around the country. Occasionally, I counted triangles to see if I had enough.

Then I started assembling. There seemed to never be an end to triangles. But gradually the rows grew, and in Savannah I declared victory over them. Now, three months later, I have a completed top in Tucson.

Ironically, I haven’t written about any quilters or people who live in RVs. But there are some ideas percolating in the back of my mind. In the meantime, cozy up with my free book of short stories: To sign up and get your free book, click here: Newsletter Signup.

And I’d love to hear about your craft journeys. Drop me a line at casey@caseydawes.com.

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Books Ahead in 2022! 4 New Women’s Fiction and Romance Titles

Welcome to 2022!Dismal Swamp, VA

 

I’m excited to begin this year’s blank slate and see what I can write on it. This means not only books for you to read, but new chances for me to improve my own life, explore the country, and add a bit of joy with at least a smile to others.

Promise Cove

On the last day of 2021, I began a new series: Promise Cove. This is a series of later-in-life romances set in the small, fictional town, of Promise Cove. In my dreams, it’s a place nestled on one of Montana’s pristine lakes, northwest of the ski town of Whitefish. (I did ski those slopes in the 1970s, but that’s another story.) I had fun populating the town with quirky and interesting characters. The first book is about Kelly, a Californian who returns to the area when her grandmother leaves her a retreat center. The next two, available in 2022, are about her two friends, Maggie and Alex.

Return to Promise Cove

A dead husband with secrets. An unexpected inheritance. Will she play it safe? Or take a chance on happiness and second-chance love?

Available now at multiple online retailers: https://www.caseydawes.com/return-to-promise-cove/

Spring in Promise Cove

One small town mayor with dreams as big as her heart. Two very different men vying for her affection. A distraction? Or a chance for true love?

Release date: June 14, 2022. Pre-order now on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Spring-Promise-Cove-Triangle-Contemporary-ebook/dp/B09NRWYDCJ

Books 3 and 4

The titles and more information on these books will be available in 2022. Stay Tuned!

Beck Family Saga

The final book in this series arrives April 18! This was an interesting series to write, as I got to explore all different facets of life in Montana, as well as the people who make up the state. We are a diverse lot, although for a long time there were a set of unwritten values that held us all together.

Finally Home

She’s going to be fabulously rich. No one will look down on her ever again. But will success cost her true happiness in life?

Pre-order now on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Finally-Home-Inspiring-Western-Fiction-ebook/dp/B09HVCD4RT

Thank you for joining me on this exciting adventure! If you want to be notified the moment these books come out, as well as enjoy the opportunity to become a Beta Reader, please sign up for my newsletter today. You will also get a free book as a welcome gift!

To sign up and get your free book, click here: Newsletter Signup.

 

 

 

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The Christmas Blues

This may seem like an odd topic for an author who promises to inspire, but bear with me.

For better or worse, the Christmas holiday, along with Hanukah and Kwanzaa, are tied with the fading of the light in the Northern Hemisphere. I, along with others who need sunlight in their lives, experience a profound loss of joy with the shortened days. Add to that, the second year of a pandemic, the violent weather events occurring as global warming changes our planet, and economic weirdness, (By traditional economic figures, the economy is improving, so why doesn’t it feel that way?) and many people are experiencing some level of depression.

Christmas doesn’t quite feel like Christmas this year, in spite of a panoply of tinny Christmas songs emanating from your local Walmart.

One song seems to express the angst many are feeling right now: Where Are You Christmas?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1qXL1cEgi4

The song seems to indicate that finding the spirit of Christmas (or whatever light you turn to in the darkness of the year) is an inside job. The tinsel, glitter, presents, and even family gatherings aren’t going to do it for you, especially if you aren’t truly present yourself.

Spanish Moss

In my case, I will need to draw on unfamiliar resources. I am in a small trailer, my Christmas tree and boxes of ornaments from my parents and a lifetime of gathering from around the globe, are in Montana. I’m in Georgia, which is proving to be a very different place from anywhere I’ve spent significant time. My instinct is to crawl under the covers.

Instead, I must look outward. Nature is all around me, even if I don’t recognize the tall pines or abundance of egrets. Reaching into the faith tradition of my choice, I find some lines from Luke, “…the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” The dawn will break each day. It’s my job to look up to see it.

I wish you all the blessings of the season, whatever path you may be on, whatever traditions you follow. May you find the light to keep you going in whatever darkness you may be experiencing.

And, no matter who or where you are, may you be showered with an abundance of love.

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