Andrea Downing's Blog, page 5

GHOST WRITING

We hear an awful lot about ghost towns in the West, but maybe not so much about ghosts themselves. Have you ever seen a ghost? My own, personal encounter with a ghost was actually in Hampton Court, King Henry VIII’s favored residence outside of London. I was walking down the long corridor (known as the Haunted Gallery) and, just at the very moment a tour guide was saying it was haunted and some folks might feel a chill, I got such a chill I nearly jumped out of my skin. Let me make it clear: this was not a chill like one might get on a cold day; this was a true spine-tingler! Even my daughter, who was with me, looked at me and asked what was wrong.

On a ranch down in Texas a few years back, having attended a writer’s retreat, I decided to stay a few extra days before going onto a conference. The ranch was now empty and out of season, but the owners wouldn’t let me stay alone in the guest house—because it was haunted. They had to have someone stay in the building with me. A man had been hung somewhere on the ranch and his ghost walked the guestrooms. I was rather disappointed not to see the cowboy, actually, though I’m not sure what I would have felt if I had.

And that’s the thing—I think we like to hear ghost stories, and the idea of an afterlife certainly is appealing, but whether anyone truly wants to come face to face with the dead is quite another matter. The road I live on is said to be haunted—Whooping Hollow is named for a Native American killed nearby. I’ve never had the pleasure of encountering him, however…thank goodness…and I’m not sure what I’d do if he appeared. Living in a village founded in the 1600s, however, certainly makes one aware of the lives that have passed down these roads.

With Halloween just around the corner, as the catalogs coming through my mail seem to indicate from around July onwards (!), you may feel like settling down with some good ghost stories to get you in that seasonal mood. You’ll be encountering the ghosts only on the page, I promise. The Good, The Bad and The Ghostly brings together my favorite setting of the Old West with something very new and different for me—ghosts, or the paranormal, and, of course, there’s romance. Our anthology contains eight very individual stories, some from authors who normally write western romance, and some from authors who normally write paranormal. I thought that was an exciting idea, and I hope you do, too. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be introducing the authors individually to tell you about their stories.

For now, keep both the Halloween costume and Stetson to hand, and a bowl of corn candy. And if you’ve ever seen a ghost, please comment below. We love ghost stories!

 

Click to order now!

My own story is LONG A GHOST, AND FAR AWAY  Here’s the blurb:

When Lizzie Adams returns as a ghost to a life she led in the 1800s, she is surprised to find herself on a ranch in Wyoming, but delighted to learn she was married to a handsome and loving man. The reasons for her return become clear when she discovers how she died, yet the unresolved issues surrounding her death leave her unable to either live in the 1800s or return to her present life.

Colby Gates misses the wife he loved, yet a ghost is a poor substitute. Re-married to a woman he doesn’t care for, and with outlaws searching for buried gold on his ranch, the spirit of his wife is a further complication.

But perhaps if the questions surrounding Lizzie’s death can be answered, the two can be together.

For all time.

And an excerpt for you:

“OH! I do beg your pardon. What year are we pretending this to be now?”

Colby raised a brow in what looked like slight irritation. “It’s 1897.”

“Ah! Of course! 1897. That would explain a whole raft of things. No cell phones. In fact, no phones—”

“Well, there are phones, but not here.”

“I see.” Lizzie shook her head as if she would go along with this whole pretense. “And so I can’t phone a friend to collect me in their car because, of course, there are no cars.”

“Well.” Colby hesitated. “I’m afraid I have no idea what a ‘car’ is other than the car of a railroad train but, yes, there aren’t any. Or do you mean automobiles? We have them—”

“But not here,” Lizzie finished for him. Unable to help herself, she burst out laughing. Jason had really done a good job, and this Colby fellow was a really good actor. He stayed in his part throughout, gave nothing away. “Okay, listen….” She tried to take in a breath but the corset was really biting into her now. “Is there someplace we can go, is there someplace I can go and get the hell out of this corset or whatever the heck you call it, and then perhaps you can give me a cup of tea or something, and we can sort this out?”

“Elizabeth, there is something you should know.” His voice was strained, hesitant.

“There’s a lot I should know, Colby Gates, but what specific item have you got in mind?”

“I’m married. I re-married.”

Lizzie covered her eyes with her hands and sighed with the weight of the universe on her shoulders. “Okay, listen. Really. I don’t want to intrude on you and your wife, I don’t want to be part of this ridiculous farce any more, and I sure as hell don’t want anything more to do with Jason Beeme. Just let me go home, all right? Let me go home? Please? Pretty please?”

Colby blew out a breath and shook his head. “Elizabeth. Lizzie. I have no idea who Jason Beeme is, and this ‘farce’ as you call it, it puzzles me as well. I don’t know how you are here; I only know what I’ve told you. We were married, happily married—very happily married and then….”

“And then? What?”

“You…died.”

“I died. I’m dead. I see.” Hysteria was now setting in, and Lizzie couldn’t help the small giggle that escaped. “I’m dead, but I’m here, is that it?”

“Yes.”

“Soooo, like, if I’m dead, but I’m here, I’m a ghost?” This made her laugh out loud.

Colby didn’t answer. It was as if he hadn’t thought that at all, just been confused as much as she by the situation. He seemed to mull this over now.

“Am I now a ghost as far as you are concerned?”

His “yes” came out almost as a breath.

“Hmm. Well, I’m not a ghost, you’re not a cowboy, and this, for sure, isn’t 1887.”

“Ninety-seven,” he corrected her.

She looked him in the eye, nose to nose. “I don’t give a good flying…you-know-what, what year you think it is. I want to go home, and I want to go home now, so just let’s stop playing around with this shit and—”

“You never used to use such language.”

“Mister! Colby! Please stop! The year is 2016 and I can say whatever the hell I please. Women are liberated. We’re free.”

“But…it isn’t lady-like.”

“Well, excuse me! ‘Lady-like’! Okay, I’ve had enough now. Take me home, please.” She rubbed her face with exasperation; this whole sham was un-be-lieve-able.

“Elizabeth…Lizzie…you are home, you know that. Only now…now—”

“You’re married.”

“Yes.”

“Well, good for you. I’m glad. I hope you’ll both be very happy. So, just take me to my apartment on Washington Avenue in St. Louis.”

“I….”

She thought he was gagging as he rubbed his forehead.

“Lizzie: you’re in Wyoming. We’re on a ranch near Buffalo, Wyoming. You’re miles from St. Louis.”

Lizzie could feel her eyes grow big; she thought they might pop out of her head. “Wyoming? Boy, Jason really did a job on me. Brother, how long was I out?”

Colby shook his head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. As I said, I don’t know a Jason, I can only tell you it’s 1897, you’re in Wyoming, you’re my wife—or were my wife—before you…you…died.”

Lizzie felt the breath was being pressed out of her, and if she didn’t get out of this barn, and out of the corset soon, she would, indeed, die for real. “Okay,” she said giving in, “I’m dead. But this corset is killing me, so can we go some place and let me take it off. Maybe your wife could help?”

“Sylvia is visiting her aunt over in Kelly. She won’t be back for a few days.”

“How convenient!” Ha! One less actor to deal with.

“I’ll take you in the house and we can sort things out there.” He offered her his hand, which she took, looking up into his pale eyes, and let him lead her out of the barn into chill air. The sun was laying its colors on the horizon and she figured it must be late afternoon, wherever she was.

“So, I’m dead,” she said conversationally.

“Well, you were. You seem very much alive at the moment, I have to say, but that’s quite impossible.” He stopped.

Lizzie glanced over at what was no doubt the house, a log structure of good proportion, with a lantern lit and glowing through a window. The last rays of the sun elongated their shadows, and for a moment, she tried to breathe in the cool air deeply.

“Impossible,” she whispered. “To be here like this.” She turned to him, the attraction so great suddenly she wished this wasn’t all some huge act laid on to fool her. “So, I’m dead,” she repeated once more.

“Yes. I think so.” There was a depth of sadness in his voice she couldn’t fathom.

“And how did I die, may I ask?”

Colby Gates stood stock still beside her and let her hand go. He turned to her in the fading light, and Lizzie could see him swallow hard as he removed his Stetson and brushed an invisible speck from its brim before replacing it on his head. Then he looked her in the eye.

“I shot you.”

Native American Slavery

 

Fellow member of Women Writing the West, Alethea Williams is the author of Willow Vale, the story of a Tyrolean immigrant’s journey to America after WWI. Willow Vale won a 2012 Wyoming State Historical Society Publications Award. In her second novel, Walls for the Wind, a group of New York City immigrant orphans arrive in Hell on Wheels, Cheyenne, Wyoming. Walls for the Wind is a WILLA Literary Award finalist, a gold Will Rogers Medallion winner, and placed first at the Laramie Awards in the Prairie Fiction category.

“In sofar as the taking of captives and reducing them to slaves was concerned the Apache acquired this custom from the Spaniard or Mexican, and it is safe to say that during the period of which I write there was not a settlement in the valley of the Rio Grande that did not number among the inhabitants a large number of Apache and Navajo Indian slaves.”

—Ralph Emerson Twitchell, The Leading Facts of New Mexican History, Torch Press, 1917

The primary female character in my novel, Náápiikoan Winter, is abducted as a child and later traded into slavery. She is abducted by Apaches, sold by Utes, and enslaved by other tribes including the Piikáni. Was it true that Native Americans learned this practice from contact with the Spaniards, as the quotation that opens my book asserts?

Although it’s true Christopher Columbus started an unholy tradition by enslaving over 500 Indians, an article on the website Oxford Research Encyclopedia: American History by Christina Snyder says, “The history of American slavery began long before the first Africans arrived at Jamestown in 1619. Evidence from archaeology and oral tradition indicates that for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years prior, Native Americans had developed their own forms of bondage.” Indians captured women and children to replace the up to 90% of their people killed by war and diseases they had no defense against. In an article for Slate, Rebecca Onion says “Native types of enslavement were often about kinship, reproductive labor, and diplomacy, rather than solely the extraction of agricultural or domestic labor.”

All Native tribes that I know of were called “The People.”

photo of a Blackfoot by Edward Curtis, hairstyle described in Naapiikoan Winter as a similar one worn by the character Saahkómaapi (Young Man), Beaver Bundle Man to the Inuk’sik band of the Piikáni, the band’s Dreamer

What this common nomenclature implies is that the people of one’s tribe were People, and all others were something less. Captives were outside society, but slaves were even further outside the social order. So as a slave passed from tribe to tribe, my character Buffalo Stone Woman would have had many instances of rejection and neglect. For most of her adult life, she would not have been accepted by anyone as a true person, but a creature somewhere on a level with a dog or other tamed animal.

There were ways to escape the status of captive, enshrined in solemn ceremony, that could make of a mere captive a real person by adoption or marriage. Slaves were of a different nature, “distinguished by the extremity of their alienation from captors’ societies and the exploitation of their labor to enhance the social or material life of the master,” according to Snyder. Slaves often had a lot of freedom to come and go in the performance of their duties. And slavery wasn’t a hereditary condition: children of Indian slaves were not themselves enslaved.

So in Náápiikoan Winter, when Buffalo Stone Woman finds a home at last among the Piikáni at the base of the Rocky Mountains where although a slave she has attained the status of a distant wife to the powerful Orator, she wants never to have to leave this safe haven. She is tolerated, even accepted. She brings to her new people her skills and her knowledge, which makes them, already powerful, an even more potent force on the Plains.

Alethea has graciously agreed to give away one copy of Náápiikoan Winter to one person who leaves a comment.  Winneer will be announced on or about 25 July.

At the turn of a new century, changes unimagined are about to unfold.

THE WOMAN: Kidnapped by the Apaches, a Mexican woman learns the healing arts. Stolen by the Utes, she is sold and traded until she ends up with the Piikáni. All she has left are her skills—and her honor. What price will she pay to ensure a lasting place among the People?

THE MAN: Raised in a London charitable school, a young man at the end of the third of a seven year term of indenture to the Hudson’s Bay Company is sent to the Rocky Mountains to live among the Piikáni for the winter to learn their language and to foster trade. He dreams of his advancement in the company, but he doesn’t reckon the price for becoming entangled in the passions of the Piikáni.

THE LAND: After centuries of conflict, Náápiikoan traders approach the Piikáni, powerful members of the Blackfoot Confederation. The Piikáni already have horses and weapons, but they are promised they will become rich if they agree to trap beaver for Náápiikoan. Will the People trade their beliefs for the White Man’s bargains?

Excerpt:     CHAPTER 1

ISOBEL, A LIGHT SLEEPER, woke in darkness to the sounds of her parents’ habitual nighttime dispute.

“Will you do nothing? Stupid, lazy bitch! No better than a dog in heat—you breed bastard children from different men and leave them to raise themselves. You’re like a mangy cur bitch on a leash of gold. I wish I’d never set eyes on you!”

Graciela, Isobel’s mother, said something too low for the child to decipher.

In reply, Isobel’s father, Armando, growled, “It won’t work this time, Graciela. Have you no pride? You resemble the commonest prostitute on the streets of Cádiz!”

Suddenly Graciela cried out in pain. Isobel, listening, shivered, imagining that her father perhaps twisted her mother’s arm, or pulled a handful of her long hair, both of which she had seen him do.
“Whore! Look at the paint smeared on your face.”
The sound of slaps to bare flesh resounded down the hallway. A tear slipped down the listening child’s cheek.
Then a brief silence ensued, soon replaced by the rhythmic creak of bed ropes emanating from the room of her parents, and Isobel dared to think another truce called between the combatants. Armando and Graciela often scrapped late into the night, frightening Isobel, their unintentional eavesdropper. Sometimes she thought Armando might kill Graciela, but the rasp of their bed against the wall usually signaled that her father had once more been pacified. Now that she had found out how to connect the sound to its corresponding action, she began to wonder why the act of the making of babies should cause adults to stop fighting. She thought long and hard on it, until she decided that the exertion must surely make her parents too tired to continue fighting.
At last all sound ceased, and Isobel concluded her parents must be settled in for the night at last. She had just about returned to slumber when she became aware of the sound of harsh breathing inside her small room. Her father stood over her bed, his boots in one hand, shaking with an apparent effort to stifle his emotions. He whispered, “Get up. Get dressed. We’re leaving.” She started to say, “But where are we going?”
Her father put a shaking finger to his lips to quiet her. “It’s a…an aventura. Just you and I. We will ride out of here tonight, and you will come back an educated lady someday—and show them all. No one will ever be able to look down on my daughter, Isobel Ochoa! Now, get dressed. Quietly! Don’t wake your sisters.”

To purchase Náápiikoan Winter, go to  http://www.amazon.com/Naapiikoan-Winter-Alethea-Williams-ebook/dp/B01EIQNCMO/ http://www.amazon.com/Naapiikoan-Winter-Alethea-Williams/dp/1532710569 https://www.createspace.com/5786432 http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/naapiikoan-winter-alethea-williams/1123779705

To find out more about Alethea and her books, please go to

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AletheaWilliams.author
Twitter: https://twitter.com/actuallyalethea
Blog: http://www.actuallyalethea.blogspot.com/
Website: http://aletheawilliams.weebly.com/

NOT Happy Trails

Patti Sherry-Crews

I met Patti Sherry-Crews when we each had a story in the Come Love a Cowboy anthology, and we are continuing to work together on a second anthology for Hallowe’en as well as a third one for Christmas. We’ve bonded over the fact we have both spent time in the U.K.—Patti studied anthropology and archaeology at Grinnell College and the University of North Wales.

While she now lives with her husband, two children, a bad dog, and a good cat in Evanston, IL., her four steamy romances, written under the pen name Cherie Grinnell, take place in Dublin and Wales.

However, whether it is because she watched too many western TV shows with her grandmother or because her bag of cowboys and Indians was her favorite toy, Patti also writes historical western romances. Her book, Margarita and the Hired Gun published by Prairie Rose Publishing, came out April 2016, and she has two novellas out now in anthologies by the same publisher.

When I set out to write my first historical western, I knew there were a couple of things I wanted to include in my western romance: most of the story would take place on the trail, and there would be a scene in an outlaw hideout. I’ve been interested in Hole-in-the-Wall

At Hole-in-the-Wall, WY

since seeing ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’ decades ago. There’s something about self-contained worlds within worlds that captures my imagination, whether it be an arctic research station or an outlaw hideout. I knew I wanted to incorporate the hideout into my story.

My decision to set most of the action on the trail evolved because I’m a fan of the quest or journey tale. I like a set goal the characters are reaching for and to see how the journey changes them. I had my storyline: Hired Gun, “Rafferty”, is given the job of escorting untested, rich girl, Margarita, from Flagstaff, Arizona, to her relatives in Durango, Colorado, a journey which will take weeks on horseback–and she must arrive “safe and intact.” To break up the action, the couple has to make an unexpected stop at an outlaw hideout.

I had my story in mind, but first I had to answer a lot of questions, starting with how does a girl from the suburbs of Chicago think she can write an historical western? I had to hit the books before I could begin. In researching, I discovered

Hole-in-the-Wall seen from above

Hole-in-the-Wall in Wyoming wasn’t the only outlaw hideout. There were a number of hideouts strung out along the Outlaw Trail stretching from Mexico to Canada.

With improvements in transportation and communication in the late 19thC, a gang on the run needed safe places to hole up, get fresh horses, and stock up on ammunition. So the hideouts were born. And shared! Different gangs used these hideouts for decades. As it turned out, finding information on the hideouts was easy. The challenge was finding information about life on the trail. There is plenty written about folks navigating the west in wagon trains or on cattle drives: what they ate, the equipment they packed, how they dressed, and even recipes they used. But how would two people traveling for weeks on horseback take care of their basic needs? I could not find the details I was looking for.

I read other “on the trail” books, including True Grit. I rewatched all the movies I could think of that took place on the trail, but still I didn’t know how my characters were going to take care of business in the wild. It’s not like they had a chuck wagon following them around.

I obsessed about this aspect of my story because I hate camping. When I was a kid, camping was the family vacation. I saw a lot of the country through tent flaps. Then one fateful day that all changed. We had already pitched the tent and set up camp when the storm blew in, and we needed to get out of there fast. My parents checked us into my first motel. I looked at the nice motel room, and thought, “Why have we not been doing this all along?”

So, I was well aware of possible discomforts. I could have skipped around those details and focused on a story of love and adventure, but in my heart I knew I’d have to deal with those details. Especially as my heroine, Margarita McIntosh, had led a sheltered life living much of her life in boarding schools. I knew she’d be just miserable at the start of her journey. Or let me put it this way, I made sure she was miserable.

Not finding the kinds of information I wanted in books, movies, or the Internet, I turned to the outlaws next and read many tales of their exploits and escapes. As detailed as these accounts were, they still didn’t tell me how the outlaws managed to exist from day to day on the trail.

Then I found a book, Riding the Outlaw Trail, by Simon Casson and Richard Adamson, two Englishmen who set out to ride the Outlaw Trail.

Bryce Canyon on the Outlaw Trail

I gathered useful information. Like, how long you could ride before you had to stop to rest up the horses? How do you take care of the animals? What was the terrain like?

A horse in Margarita and the Hired Gun even meets its demise in much the same way as one of the Casson and Adamson horses. I was sorry to kill that animal, but I needed a traumatic event to change the dynamics of my characters’ relationship–I also wanted to put them on horseback with their bodies pressed together.

Food on the trail: To my surprise I learned through my research that canned peaches were a favorite in that time period. That stuck me as a luxurious thing to have in the saddlebag. I also learned how cowboys made coffee on the trail. And, of course, we all know, beans were on the menu (Thank you, Blazing Saddles).

Other than that, I had to fall back on information gleaned from watching survival shows. Surviving in the wilderness hasn’t changed much over the centuries. Even though Margarita and Rafferty had a pack mule, I didn’t know how many tins of canned peaches they could carry. I reasoned they’d have to live off the land some of the time. Because of these survival shows, I knew there would be dangers aside from the bad men chasing them that my characters might face. They would have to battle the elements, travel over harsh terrain, find water, and try not to die of hypothermia.

So, in the end, I was happy with my end product. I hope my readers enjoy reading Margarita and the Hired Gun as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thanks to Andrea for allowing me to visit today.

Beautiful Margarita McIntosh escapes Flagstaff with a hired gun, Rafferty, as her only protection from her father’s powerful enemies who are hot on their trail. Giving up her life of leisure is nothing compared to the passion she finds in Rafferty’s arms. Together, they face a perilous journey that becomes a fight for their very lives—and a dream of the future neither of them could have imagined.

Excerpt:

He saw her long lashes flutter and then her lovely eyes lifted. She watched him intently as he shaved, her brows knitted together in concentration. It was hard to work with her watching like that.

“Remember how we had that conversation about staring and polite behavior?” he asked.

“I’m fascinated. I’ve never seen a man shave before.”

He rasped the blade under his chin.

“I was wondering what it must be like to start each day with a straight razor held to your throat. I suppose starting the day that way might make men the way they are.”

He met her gaze, looking to see if she was threatening to slit his throat, but she was only looking at him quizzically. “I never thought about it that way before. But as long as I’m the one holding the razor to my own throat, it’s pretty much routine.”

“You have a very steady hand.”

“I do. That’s one of those qualities a person likes to have in my profession. I do prefer to have someone else do this for me—and no, that isn’t an invitation. I go to a barber when I’m in town. I’ve seen your blade handling skills today. I’m not letting you anywhere near me with a razor.”

“I thought I did a pretty good job with that rabbit,” she said, a little smile on her lips.

“You did all right with the knife. It’s your skills with a gun, which worry me.”

While they’d been talking, the temperature dropped noticeably. He watched her start to shiver.

She caught him watching her. “It’s cold!”

“I told you it was going to get cold. You thought it was cold at night in the desert, you wait until you spend a night sleeping on the ground in the mountains.”

“I know you warned me about the cold repeatedly, but honestly, Michael, you’re such an alarmist.”

“Alarmist, am I? Coming from the lady who’s seen the inside of one room and then the inside of another room. Listen to me when I talk. I know what I’m doing out here!”

She waved her free hand dismissively at him. He stood up, impatient with her now, and tossed the soapy water into the woods.

“Well, we’ll see how you do. You haven’t slept through the night yet, and I expect even I’ll have trouble sleeping tonight in the cold, so let’s just see how you fare. I can tell you I’m looking forward to listening to you thrash and moan all bloody night long.”

He wiped his face and snapped the razor shut.

“Is it time to check the traps yet?”

“No, it is not time to check the traps. Animals don’t conveniently wander into traps just because you have a free moment to check them. Ground squirrels are not all that considerate. We leave the traps out overnight to catch them on their schedules.”

He could tell by the look that came into her eyes, she was about to retort with some sharp remark, but she seemed to think better of it and checked herself.

“Alarmist, am I? Coming from the lady who’s seen the inside of one room and then the inside of another room. Listen to me when I talk. I know what I’m doing out here!”

She waved her free hand dismissively at him. He stood up, impatient with her now, and tossed the soapy water into the woods.

“Well, we’ll see how you do. You haven’t slept through the night yet, and I expect even I’ll have trouble sleeping tonight in the cold, so let’s just see how you fare. I can tell you I’m looking forward to listening to you thrash and moan all bloody night long.”

He wiped his face and snapped the razor shut.

“Is it time to check the traps yet?”

“No, it is not time to check the traps. Animals don’t conveniently wander into traps just because you have a free moment to check them. Ground squirrels are not all that considerate. We leave the traps out overnight to catch them on their schedules.”

He could tell by the look that came into her eyes, she was about to re-tort with some sharp remark, but she seemed to think better of it and checked herself.

Buy links:

https://www.amazon.com/Margarita-Hired-Gun-Patti-Sherry-Crews-ebook/dp/B01EAS7F50?ie=UTF8&ref_=asap_bc

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/margarita-and-the-hired-gun-patti-sherry-crews/1123670611?ean=9781532777318

And you can find Patti at:

http://pattisherrycrews16.wix.com/author-blog
http://www.amazon.com/Patti-Sherry-Crews/e/B01C7L8QUU/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1

NOT QUITE A COWBOY

I want to make this clear straightaway: I don’t believe, by any stretch of my imagination, that visiting a guest ranch gives me any idea whatsoever of the real life of a rancher. Imagine that a curtain is hung across a window and that curtain is worn a bit thin, or perhaps even has a small tear in it—that’s the sort of view you get of ranch life. And that includes being a guest on working ranches as well. I have no idea what it’s like to get up at 5 am on a winter’s morning, saddle up, and ride out in temperatures of -27 or below to see to cattle, or stay up all night with a mare having a hard time foaling. I can’t look back on ancestors who have homesteaded the same patch of earth for four or five generations and dealt with changing governments and the BLM and leases and so on. But like dabbing your finger into the batter to get an idea of what the cake may taste like, I’ve stayed at numerous guest ranches throughout the west that have given my daughter and me that taste, that slightly gauzy view.

The first ranch we visited some twenty-six years ago was outside of Estes Park

My daughter Cristal, ready to ride

and, flying in from London, we combined that with a week at a ranch outside Jackson, WY. My husband was a keen hiker and took on Long’s Peak while my then-six-year-old and I took off on horses, she with a children’s group and I with the adults. We were immediately hooked: what other vacation offered the three of us our own interests and gave us the opportunity to share the experiences with like-minded people, as well as each other, at the evening meal? The second week with that trip to Wyoming, the visit was more humorous than relaxing. On one ride, my daughter called out and I turned back to see her literally perpendicular to her horse as her cinch had come loose. Then the owner also saw fit to criticize her for not finishing her dinner. And there was the dog who got hold of my jean cuff and wouldn’t let go. But there were good times too—we made friends there, a French family living in Florida, who were in the other half of our cabin, and with whom we went on to have further ranch vacations for years after. Because we all shared the same hot water heater, we got in the habit of being very naughty and running the horses in, jumping off and seeing who’d get the hot water first. The wild rides through the sagebrush—which the French called ‘bush washing’ instead of

Watching branding in Nevada

bushwhacking—were something that soon went by the board at other, more conservative ranches. And there was the float trip on the Snake River where our guide was the one who fell in, lost his glasses, and thereafter couldn’t tell us what we were looking at.

With the British schools giving my family a month at Christmas and Easter and only two months in the summer, we got into a routine of visiting the same ranch in Arizona every spring. We escaped the damp that took hold of Britain in late March or April, and then visited different ranches in the northwest states in the summer. Arizona offered a unique terrain; rattlesnakes were regularly removed from front porches and, with that in mind, we made checks every night, searching under and in beds to make sure none were there. Riding

Our ‘makings’–for S’mores

in the Saguaro National Park was a dusty affair, and I hold an image of myself heading straight back to our casita and grabbing a coke from the fridge as if I’d been crawling through the desert for days. But the biggest annoyances were always those other guests who just didn’t ‘get it.’ The one who spoke on his cell phone while riding, and then got upset when he (happily for us) lost the connection. The ones who complained, the teens who didn’t want to be there, the riders who overestimated their abilities.

If you ask me what my favorite memory is, I cannot pinpoint one. I know that I loved those breakfast rides, heading down to the corrals to mount up early on an August morning in the northwest when the air hinted at autumn, clear, crisp, fresh. Riding for a couple of hours to a cook-out breakfast, that weird mix of the smell of blueberry pancakes drifting out through the pines. Through the years,

Learning archery in Montana

we learned many different skills—archery, barrel racing, team penning, clay pigeon shooting, fishing. It galls me, totally galls me that my daughter, who cares nothing for guns, turned out to be a crack shot. I kid her now there’s not a squirrel in the state of Nevada that doesn’t fear her name since she stood up on the back of a truck and picked them off one by one, and then went on up to Montana and hit nine out of ten clay pigeons to boot.

Best of all were the horses, such different horses at each ranch. There was the one I call The Ugliest Horse in the West at a ranch down in Texas, and the Pasa Fino who threw me half way down a mountain in Colorado and left me with a two inch gash in my knee, while he went off to happily graze. I loved them all, loved the rides.

On the Ugliest Horse in the West

However, I was never one to do the pack trips. Though I listen to ‘Cowboy Take Me Away’–“I want to sleep on the hard ground…in a blanket made of stars…”—there was something about being thrown together with 15 or 20-odd other guests, snoring together through the night and lining up, toilet paper in hand, to use the portapotties at the conveniently selected camp site. Instead, I opted to let my husband and child ride out while I stayed back, happy to have alone time, eat the rehashed dog and macaroni salad, and sit out on the cabin porch with the stars to myself before turning in to my comfortable solo bed. So maybe I wouldn’t make a great cowboy. The heart is willing, but the body ain’t…

These days, with my daughter about to get married and my old bones less able to sit on a horse for long periods, the ranch vacations are shorter and the rides briefer. But the photos are all here—starting in albums and moving onto discs and then computer. And the memories are where they’ve always been: tucked away to share with grandchildren until I can tag along one year to at least smell that horse and leather scent down by some ranch barn and eat the blueberry pancakes while sitting among the pines.

To have a small look at life on a guest ranch from the other side of the divide, please get yourself a copy of Come Love a Cowboy and read my novella, Bad Boy, Big Heart.

CLICK TO BUY!

When New Yorker K.C. Daniels heads to Wyoming for a summer job, she wants nothing more than to fit in with the staff of the Lazy S Ranch. Yearning to be independent of her mom and dad, and have a taste of the west before she starts her Master’s degree, getting involved with a cowboy is the last thing on her mind—especially when she’s greeted with warnings about ‘Bad Boy’ Chay Ridgway.

High school dropout Chay Ridgway sees summer as his time to be a rodeo star and win a girl in his life, while facing the responsibilities he has for his father. Although working to bring in cash to help his dad, he’s never had a problem finding a woman who’s happy to be that summer love—until K.C. Daniels appears on the scene.

As two different worlds collide in a season that will end all too soon, is this going to be another summer romance or a love that will last for years?

Excerpt:

K.C. was licking her lips over a piece of cheesecake when Breezy ambled over.

“I heard,” she said in an undertone. “I’m so sorry, K.C. I really didn’t know or I certainly would have told you. All I knew was Jamie could be very unpleasant but nothing like that. You know, spoiled brat unpleasant.”

K.C. gulped down another mouthful. “Well, he certainly was ‘unpleasant’ and a ‘spoiled brat.’”

“Are you all right? You know if you ever want to talk about it or need a shoulder, mine is at the ready. And you know where to find me, though I suspect you have another shoulder in mind.” She tipped her head toward Chay, who had just come in and was chatting with one of the guests.

K.C. glanced across as he squatted down to speak with a little girl, tilting his hat back off his face and giving the child a wink as he rose again. Her stomach did a back flip.

“So how do you like the cheesecake?” Breezy was saying. “It’s my own recipe—chocolate mocha cheesecake. You seem to be doing pretty well with it but, of course, you may only be eating it to be polite.” She sauntered off in a stream of giggles.

And then a second fork was coming from above into that cheesecake.

“Do you always just take what you want?”

“Oh, shit, I’m supposed to ask! Sorry.” Chay slid into the chair opposite her at the long refectory table. He looked her in the eye. “May I please have a bite of your cheesecake?”

“Why don’t you get your own? In fact, shouldn’t you be starting with lunch and then dessert?”

“Had a sack lunch and got in earlier than expected.” His fork dangled threateningly over the waiting slice before he swung the fork like a pendulum.

“Oh, go on then. I guess you deserve it.”

Chay shoved a forkful into his mouth, having obvious difficulty chewing as he was smiling so much. Finally he got it down, stretched to grab a napkin from another clean place setting, and gave a wide grin to K.C. “Am I your hero, then? Riding in to save the day? How are you?”

“I’m fine. Thanks. Fine, but reluctant to keep telling everyone I’m fine.”

“Okay then, message received.”

K.C. studied him for a moment, melting at his pale green eyes. She suddenly reached across and gently poked the small dimple in his chin. Oh dear, what was she going to do about this man?

“You’re supposed to ask, aren’t you? You can’t just go around poking people in the chin, can you?”

“Golly. What have I started?”

“I don’t know. What have you started?” The smile was replaced by a very direct look.

“I…I’ve been told things about you. I don’t want to be a summer romance. And I do have to leave at the end of the summer, and the summer is fast fading.”

“It’s only June, K.C.” He hesitated before, “What sort of things were you told?”

K.C. looked around to make sure they weren’t being overheard. “That you like to…to date the girls who work in the office because we leave at the end of the summer, and it makes for a clean break.”

“True.”

K.C. blinked at his honesty.

“But it doesn’t mean it will always be the case.” Chay fidgeted on his chair. “What time do you get off? Let’s go for a ride. You do ride, don’t you?”

“I ride…English.”

“Oh, yeah. Bob said something about that. That can be fixed. So what time?”

“Five-thirty weekdays, Saturday noon as long as the check-outs are complete. Sunday is hit or miss; I work virtually all day until all the check-ins are done.”

“Hmmm. I’m taking out a pack trip tomorrow, back Friday. Meet me down at the barns as soon as you’re off Saturday.” Chay swung out of the chair and stood, then leaned in and stabbed one more bite of cheesecake. “Saving you calories,” he said. “You’d be amazed at what goes into this.” And with that, he stuffed the piece in his mouth and was off.

K.C. sat there, turning over Chay’s words in her mind: ‘It doesn’t mean it will always be the case.’ Yet the fact was, her Master’s degree meant two years…oh, what was she thinking? That was way ahead and, while she knew she was deeply attracted to Chay, it didn’t necessarily mean…. She stared at the remaining cheesecake on her plate, then pushed it away.

What was ‘the case’?

Purchase Come Love a Cowboy at http://www.amazon.com/Come-Love-Cowbo...

or http://myBook.to/Come-Love-A-Cowboy

Julie A. D’Arcy-The Shape of Destiny

DOWNLOAD A SAMPLE BOOK–WITH RECIPES!–OF COME LOVE A COWBOY NOW!

Julie A. D’Arcy was born in Bendigo, Australia in 1957.   She began writing her first novel in 1994.

Julie is an author of seven full length novels, and three novellas, and a short story, with two more works in progress. Her genres include Fantasy, Fantasy romance, Urban Fantasy, Paranormal, Ghost, Witch, Vampire romance and Erotica Romance and an M/M. Romance.

Julie’s first published novel won the 1999 Dorothy Parker RIO Award for Women’s fiction. The same novel and her second were nominated and shortlisted for  several other prestigious Awards, including the Australian RWA R*uby Award (Australian), and in the U.S.A,  the P.E.A.R.L. Award for Paranormal fiction and the  SAPPHIRE Award for Science Fiction.

Julie has written for publishers such as ImaJinn books, Mundania Press, Moongypsy Press, Eternal Press, Noble Romance Publishing LLC, Secret Cravings Publishing, and is now writing for I Heart Book Publishing, LLC, and indi publishing.

Her novella, The Shape of Destiny, is part of the Come Love a Cowboy anthology.

A handsome shape-shifter. A beautiful ranch owner. Can love be born in a web of deceit?

 

EXCERPT:

“So you’re glad you came?” Shannon rose to clear the table, scraped the dishes, and stacked them in the sink. “The sooner we get this cleaned up, the sooner I can show you the spreadsheets.”

“You show me yours, I’ll show you mine.”

She tossed a laugh over her shoulder. “You’re in a good mood.”

“And why shouldn’t I be? What could be better than a good meal and a beautiful woman to share it?”

Shannon concentrated on running the water for the dishes, a blush heating her cheeks, but the scrape of a chair made her turn. He walked toward her. “What are you doing?”

She took in the sensual slant of his lips, the intense look in his eyes, and knew the moment she’d longed for was coming.

“I think it is about time, don’t you?”

“For what?” Her words escaped on a whisper.

“For this.” His arms came around and drew her close, his mouth claiming hers, his hands slipping down her back to clutch her bottom.

“He tasted of the chardonnay they’d had for dinner and smelled of the lemon soap from the shower in the bunkhouse. He deepened the kiss, his tongue slipped into her mouth, and her insides melted. The muscles in his shoulders tensed under her hands as he picked her up and swung around to sit her on the end of the oak table she’d cleared. His gaze met hers and held as he slipped free the top button of her shirt.

Finding she had no voice, she nodded. She’d only been with one other man and he’d been a boy at college.

The second button popped open and then the next. Cole was a man in every sense of the word.

He took her lips in a deep languid kiss that kindled an ache in the pit of her stomach, and he found the small pulse in her neck. Her hands slid through his thick dark hair; his lips trailed small kisses down the side of her throat. The strap of her bra slipped from her shoulder as he laid her back on the table and reached for the buckle of her belt, pulling it free. Next came her boots and the fastening of her shorts….

You can find out more about Julie A. D’Arcy at:

Web Page: http://www.julieadarcy.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/JulieDarcy57

Blog at WordPress: https://julieadarcy.wordpress.com/

Blog at Blogger:

http://juliedarcystoryweaver.blogspot.com.au/

Face Book:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/215926495426133/

Amazon Author Page: www.amzn.to/1Qx7RMi

 

Women Only!–Barrel Racing in Rodeo

Hebby Roman is the multi-published, Amazon best-selling author of both historical and contemporary romances. Her first contemporary romance, SUMMER DREAMS, was the launch title for Encanto, a print line featuring Latino romances. And her re-published e-book, SUMMER DREAMS, was #1 in Amazon fiction and romance. Her medieval historical romance, THE PRINCESS AND THE TEMPLAR, was selected for the Amazon Encore program and was #1 in medieval fiction.

She was selected for the Romantic Times “Texas Author” award, and she won a national Harlequin contest. Her book, BORDER HEAT, was a Los Angeles Times Book Festival selection.

She is blessed to have all her family living close by in north Texas, including her two granddaughters, Mackenzie Reese and Presley Davis. Hebby lives in Arlington, Texas with her husband, Luis, and maltipoo, Maximillian.

My latest release, “Border Affair,” is one of the eight books in the contemporary western anthology, “Come Love A Cowboy.” The second book in my On the Border Series, this book takes place on the Texas-Mexican border and features a heroine who puts her college education on hold in order to compete at the national level as a barrel racer on the rodeo circuit.

Barrel racing is a rodeo event where a horse and rider attempt to complete a cloverleaf pattern around preset barrels (typically three 55 gallon metal or plastic drums) in the fastest time. For professional rodeo purposes, barrel racing is primarily a rodeo event for women. It combines the horse’s athletic ability and the horsemanship skills of a rider.

Professional barrel riders are usually members of the Women’s Professional Rodeo Association (WPRA). The WPRA was developed in 1948 by a group of Texas women who wanted to be recognized as professionals on the rodeo circuit. Today, barrel racing is a part of most rodeos. The WPRA is divided into 12 divisional circuits.

In barrel racing the purpose is to make a run as fast as possible. The times, in most nationally-recognized rodeos, are measured by an electric eye, a device using a laser system to record times. The timer begins when horse and rider cross the start line, and ends when the barrel pattern has been successfully executed. Beginning a race, the horse and rider will enter the arena at top speed, usually through an alley. Once the electronic beam is crossed, the timer starts running and keeps running until the beam is crossed again at the end of the run. Modern barrel racing horses not only need to be fast, but also strong, agile, and intelligent.

The approach to the first barrel is a critical moment in executing a successful pattern; the rider must rate her horse’s speed at the right moment to enter the correct path to make a perfect turn. The rider can decide whether to go to the left or to the right of the first barrel. Each turn in barrel racing should be a relatively even half circle around the barrel. In approaching the second barrel, the rider will be looking through the turn and focused on the spot to enter the second barrel, across the width of the arena. Now the horse and rider will go around the second barrel in the opposite direction, compared to the first, following exactly the same procedure and switching to the opposite limbs. Next, running toward the backside of the arena (opposite the entrance), the horse and rider will tackle the third and final barrel, in the same direction as the second barrel was taken. Completing the final turn sends them flying “home,” which represents crossing the timer line once more to finish.

Standard barrel racing patterns call for a precise distance between the start line and the first barrel, from the first to the second barrel, and from the second to the third barrel. The pattern from every point of the cloverleaf will have a precisely measured distance from one point to the next. Usually, the established distances are as follows: 90 feet between barrel #1 and barrel #2; 105 feet between barrel #1 and #3 and between #2 and #3; and 60 feet from barrels #1 and #2 to the score line. Distances can vary, especially based on size of the arena or for juvenile events, although, the National Barrel Horse Association (NBHA), has established minimum distances for the pattern.

Barrel racing is based on the fastest time. Running past a barrel and off pattern will result in a “no time” score and disqualification. If a barrel racer or her horse hits a barrel and knocks it over there is a time penalty of five seconds.

No specific bits are required for barrel racing, though bits with longer shanks are often used. Reins are fully intact, unlike split reins, for easier recoveries. Knotted reins are also common, allowing for a better grip. A lightweight saddle with a high horn and cantle is ideal. Forward strung stirrups are ideal for the rider’s proper positioning. Typically, riders choose a saddle that is up to a full size smaller than one they would normally use.

For you western lovers, I hope you have enjoyed this explanation of the sport of barrel racing in professional rodeos, which features talented riders and agile horses. And I hope you will read more about barrel racing in my story, “Border Affair.”

BORDER AFFAIR:  When his partners’ daughter is kidnapped in México, a self-made millionaire must confront his feelings about their affair and the future of their relationship.

 

Excerpt:  “I worked my ass off, getting him to canter,” Rusty said. “And you can’t be bothered to watch.”

“I was watching,” Camila protested.

“No, you weren’t. What’s so damned interesting in the dirt? Mining for gold or something.”

“Oh, Rusty, get over it.” She wiped her forehead with the back of her arm. “I was just resting my eyes.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, and do you mind catching him before he gets tangled in the tether and manages to lame himself.”

“I can see being your assistant is going to suck,” he muttered loud enough to hear. “And we can’t keep calling this horse ‘him’.” He stretched his arms wide and cracked the switch again, driving the sorrel into a corner of the corral.

He bent over and grabbed the rope.

The breath stopped in her lungs. Por Dios, was he one gorgeous hunk of man. Forget his age or that he’d lost too much weight. Just looking at Rusty made her heart go pitter-patter. So much for a girlhood crush that refused to go away.

“What are you going to name him?”

“Huh?” She’d lost the thread of concentration, wishing she and Rusty were in bed together, rather than hollering across a dusty corral. “Oh, name him. Hmmm. How about Calypso?”

He ran one hand over the stubble on his jaw. And she wished she could run her tongue over his jaw and neck and lower. Wished she could explore every inch of him with her mouth and tongue.

“Not bad. I like it,” he said.

“I’m glad you approve.”

He pulled the gelding forward by his halter, stopping on the other side of the fence. “Calypso, meet your new trainer.”

She fished a slice of apple from her pocket and handed it to the yearling. “Never too soon to start rewarding him for good behavior.”

Calypso lipped the apple slice and crunched it. She stroked the white blaze running from his forehead and tapering off at his muzzle. He had three white socks, too.

Rusty hooked his free arm over the fence post and gazed at the yearling. He stood within inches of her but towering over her by a half a foot. He was so close to her, she could smell his perspiration and the earthy man-smell of him. His down-to-earth scent was far more arousing than the expensive cologne he usually wore.

He patted the horse’s neck and said, “Well, what do you think? Does he have possibilities?”

“Yeah, sure, but he’s too young to pigeon-hole as a barrel racer or cutting horse or whatever yet.”

He pursed his mouth. “You’re probably right. Hard to tell until they’re under saddle.”

She gazed at the thin line of his pursed mouth. Hard and masculine, just the way she liked a man’s mouth. All these years of dreaming about kissing him and they’d shared nothing more than pecks on the cheeks.

He was looking straight at her. Did he feel the same pull, the same attraction as she did? Or did he still see her as a child?

He stared at her for a long time, his gaze riveted on her mouth. Was he thinking about kissing her, the way she’d been thinking? She hoped so.

He patted her hand on the fence rail and said, “I’m going to walk him around ‘til he cools down. Chuy will help me get him settled in his stall. You should get some rest, put your leg up. Okay?”

She nodded and closed her eyes, wanting him so bad, she hurt.

 

You can find more about Hebby’s books at: http://www.hebbyroman.com or her Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorHebbyRoman  You can find her Author Page on Amazon at:  http://www.amazon.com/Hebby-Roman/e/B... For more beautiful pictures of barrel racing, visit her “Come Love a Cowboy” Board on Pinterest at: https://www.pinterest.com/callofmuse/.

And find the western contemporary romance anthology, “Come Love A Cowboy” at:  myBook.to/Come-Love-A-Cowboy

or    http://www.amazon.com/Come-Love-Cowboy-Kathleen-Ball-ebook/dp/B01D5876UK/

Dude for a Day: the Unique American Guest Ranch Experience

DOWNLOAD A SAMPLE BOOK–WITH RECIPES!–OF COME LOVE A COWBOY NOW!

Patti Sherry-Crews’ studies at the University of North Wales in the U.K. led to her running an Irish and British Import store for fifteen years. This proved to be a great excuse for occasional buying trips abroad and reading books during the day. Currently living in Evanston, IL, with her husband, two children, a bad dog and a good cat, she has written a memoir, novels, and steamy romances. Whether it is because she watched too many western TV shows with her grandmother or because her bag of cowboys and Indians was her favorite toy, Patti also writes historic western romances. Her book, Margarita and the Hired Gun comes out this spring, and she has two novellas out now in anthologies, all with Prairie Rose Publishing.

The dude or guest ranch is interesting concept. Is there another type of vacation in America where guests trade life-styles? If so, I’d like to sell people in Florida on coming here to my home in the Midwest for an authentic “snow removal” experience during the winter. See how we dig our cars and houses out in Chicago. I’d even feed you. How would that fly? Something is missing.

Dude ranches have a special ingredient. They are a product of the romanticizing of the Wild West that came about in the late 19thc. Nostalgic Easterners, encouraged by the ad campaigns of the Union Pacific Railroad headed west–a safer west, to be sure—for the cowboy experience.

When I was thinking about my characters for Desert Heat in the contemporary western anthology, Come Love a Cowboy, I was trying to imagine interesting lives for them, which after naming them, is sometimes the most challenging part of writing for me. I knew the hero, Boone Donovan, was going to be a fireman, but I wasn’t sure what the heroine, Angel Harper, would get up to.

Then I remembered our family vacation to a guest ranch outside of Phoenix and decided to make Angel a single mom trying to keep her small guest ranch afloat.

I based Angel’s guest ranch on the place, we stayed at years ago, The Saguaro Lake Guest Ranch http://www.saguarolakeranch.com/.

We’d already booked a suite of rooms at a fancy resort in exchange for sitting through their pitch about time-sharing. We weren’t interested in buying a time-share but money was short, it was spring break, and we had two young children to entertain. But we were only going to be there a few days and needed somewhere else to fill out the week. By chance we found The Saguaro Lake Guest Ranch using Google maps.

I admit when we first arrived at the ranch I was reminded of the movie Psycho. This quirky hotel in the middle of the desert consisted of a main lodge and a string of small guest cottages, unchanged from the 1940’s. Other than the built-in pool, there weren’t many clues to what century you were in. And we were the only guests.

The interior of the main lodge was filled with heavy western motif furniture with vintage fabric. On the shelves and walls was the kind of bric-a-brac my grandmother would’ve had. My kids were in awe of the four-sided fireplace standing in the middle of the common room made out of river rocks. It was cozy and inviting.

There was so much to see and do, none of us even cared there were no TV’s. We explored the area, went horseback riding, and ate fantastic meals, which were included in our plan. Because we were the only guests, it was like having our own private chef. Much of the food on the menu was from the hotel’s garden.

The history of the hotel was documented in photos on the walls of the lobby. The place started life as a work camp in 1927, a place to house workers building the Stewart Mountain Damn on the Lower Salt River. The main lodge was the mess hall, and the workers were housed in the small cabins on the property.

In the 1930’s when work on the damn was completed, the camp became a fishing lodge. Later in the 1940’s a new family bought the property and turned it into a guest ranch, putting in miles of trails for riding.

We left there and went on to the fancy resort, which was in town, surrounded by other resorts instead of mountains. At first the kids liked the change I have to admit. There were a number of pools with slides, a game room, and of course, the familiar TV. But we could have been anywhere. There was no unique flavor. I got to really hate being there after a couple of days and missed the wide-open spaces of guest ranch.

Back to writing Desert Heat, I generously gave Angel a guest ranch like Saguaro Lake Guest Ranch; only I made her financial situation precarious. I also gave her a good-for-nothing ex-husband who left her with a son to raise on her own.

I drew on my memories of my own vacation in creating the setting, including the guest cabins and main lodge. I gave Angel a fantastic cook, Rosa, left out the TV’s, and gave her lots of riding trails—though her stables are in sad shape.

I have a very clear memory of sitting on the edge of the pool surrounded by desert and mountains, and feeling like I was part of the landscape, growing out of the ground. I used that scene in Desert Heat. I did make the mountains redder though. I like red mountains.

Boone is a fireman but he’s also a cowboy. His family has had a cattle ranch for generations. I thought it was reasonable he and his brothers would run a trail riding business on their ranch as a sideline, and coming from two generations of firefighters myself, I knew firemen often had other businesses on the side.

Too bad Boone’s stable is in direct competition with Angel’s. That’s going to create some hard feelings.

 

Blurb for Desert Heat:

Sometimes it seems like Angel Harper is going to spend the rest of her adult life making up for her youthful transgressions—like running away with a two-timing, irresponsible cowboy on the rodeo circuit.

Now she’s trying to make things right. It isn’t easy for a single mother trying to run a small hotel on her own. She’s always two steps ahead of financial ruin, but determined to prove to herself and the memory of her parents she can do it.

A chance encounter with handsome cowboy and firefighter, Boone Donovan, awakens a desire she’d rather bury. But he isn’t going to let her get away that easily. Angel has been twice burned by love, and it’s not only her own heart she has to protect now. She has a son to think about.

Can she trust Boone enough to let love into her life again?

 

Excerpt from Desert Heat:

Her face was flooded with heat. When she fell back to sleep this morning, she’d overslept. Normally, Angel would have been up a couple of hours ago and had the stables mucked out by now. The flies were thick and buzzing in the air ripe with manure. She fought back the urge to explain all this to him. She owed this man no explanation, she reminded herself.

“When’s the last time you had the fire inspector out here?” he asked, his back still to her, his hands on his hips.

“I don’t remember. Maybe a couple of months ago.”

He turned around to face her, his hands still on his hips and his coat pushed open to show the tight t-shirt underneath with suspenders riding up a lean torso.

“You want to try that again? I can look it up, you know?”

“I’d have to check. It’s been a while.”

“That would be my guess. I can see at least five violations just from where I’m standing.”

With a tight throat, Angel watched him walk around and inspect the horses one by one. “At least your horses look healthy. I can tell you take good care of them.”

He walked back over and stood in front of her. Too close. She stepped back. His eyes went to her chest. She looked down and saw to her horror her nipples were not only very visible beneath the thin t-shirt, but were standing at attention.

His eyes grew dark, and he swallowed hard. She could see a vein throbbing in his neck. Angel crossed her arms across her chest, feeling weak at the knees with this big hunk of a man standing before her.

Boone took a step closer, eyes now lifted to hers, lips parted. She could hear the breath coming hard out of his flared nostrils. He was so close, she could take in his scent. All man.

Her arms fell to her sides. She took a step closer so their faces were inches apart. A familiar thrumming moved through her body. Desire rearing its head.

“Mom! There are firemen in the yard! They said I can climb on the truck if that’s all right with you.”

Boone took a big step back. He practically jumped away from her.

Rory stood framed in the door, still in his pajamas, dark hair, sticking out all over his head. There was a dried patch of milk in the front of his top. On top of everything else she now looked like a negligent mother. He pushed his glasses back and looked at her.

“Yes, go on Rory, but then get dressed.”

Angel looked back at Boone, the look of lust in his eyes replaced by a blank expression. She was used to that. Men were interested in her until they heard she had a kid. Her anger, which had been at a slow simmer, went up a few notches to boiling.

“Not so interested in getting to know me better now, are you? Kids have a way of taking the mystery out of a woman.”

“I don’t have a problem with kids. It’s husbands I have a problem with. Are you married?”

“If I had a man around here do you think things would be in such a state? I’m trying to do this all on my own, which is why I don’t appreciate you stealing business away from me. You know that, right? The contract you signed with Star was formally mine,” she spat out.

“Hey, first off I didn’t steal your business away from you. I didn’t go out looking for it. Clint came to me. And yes, Clint told me who you were after you left. Then when I was left holding two bowls of ice cream last night, I guessed you had it all figured out by then. I wanted to talk to you. To clear the air.”

“There’s no clearing the stench out of this air,” she said, instantly regretting her choice of words, because the un-mucked stalls reeked of urine and manure.

“I’m going to call the fire inspector and make sure he comes out here next week.”

“You spiteful…You’d do that to me because I stood you up?”

“I’m going to call him, because I’m worried about your horses. If there’s a fire, you’re in danger of losing more than a contract. Tomorrow when I get off my shift I’m coming back out here and bringing this place up to code. The brush needs to be cleared away from all sides of the stable, and these cobwebs are a fire hazard.

He gestured overhead. “You don’t have cages around those bare bulbs. You have extension cords running all over the place not to mention all the other things scattered around that would make clearing the horses out in an emergency a problem. And when we pulled in there was a low branch over the drive we weren’t sure the engine could clear. You’re a disaster waiting to happen.”

With that he pushed past her, brushing against her as he walked by.

“You don’t have to do that!” she called after him.

“Gonna do it anyway,” he said walking away, his back to her.

“I don’t want you…”

Without a glance back he waved to her.

You can find Patti Sherry-Crews at:

http://pattisherrycrews16.wix.com/author-blog

www.facebook.com/Patti-Sherry-Crews-Author

www.pinterest.com/patsherrycrews

https://twitter.com/CherieGrinnell

 

 

WHY WE LOVE COWBOYS

Fellow author from Come Love a Cowboy, Margo Bond Collins, is addicted to coffee (mmm…caffeine) and SF/F television, especially Supernatural (mmm…Winchesters). She writes paranormal and contemporary romance, urban fantasy, and paranormal mystery. She lives in Texas with her daughter and several spoiled pets. Although she teaches college-level English courses online, writing fiction is her first love. Margo’s story in our anthology is titled Leaving Necessity and, despite the fact she is into vampires, ghosts, and werewolves, she knows a good man when she sees one–a cowboy!

 

Margo Bond Collins

I grew up in Texas, in a small town housing the only college in the country that offered a degree in rodeo. (Technically, it’s a degree in agri-business, with a specialization in rodeo. Still, it was the only one—and may still be!)

So I grew up around cowboys. I went to rodeos to watch my cowboy friends rope and ride, winced when they were thrown by a bull or a bronco. I helped toss hay out of the back of pickups while my cowboy friends lured the cattle in with their own special call (I didn’t even know the term “cattle call” meant anything other than calling cows in for dinner until I was an adult). I’ve been to cattle auctions and I’ve watched cowboys guide their animals onto trucks after a sale. I learned to dance—the two-step (fast and slow), the waltz, the Cotton-Eyed Joe—from cowboys.

But I didn’t really learn to appreciate those cowboys until I moved away from Texas for several years. They were just part of the background, part of the world I lived in. Until I wasn’t around them any longer, I didn’t really know how much the cowboys I grew up around had shaped my ideas of what makes the ideal man. Now that I’m back in Texas, I’ve spent some time thinking about what it is that is so appealing about a cowboy.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that all that hard work—the roping calves, riding horses, hauling hay, mucking out stalls, and such—generally leads to a great body. Most cowboys are lean and muscled, and I could spend hours pinning cowboy pictures to my Pinterest page (and maybe I have, once or twice . . . ).

But I think there’s a lot more to our long-lasting cultural love affair with cowboys than just their toned muscles.

The cowboy represents the epitome of American masculinity, I think. He’s the quintessential strong, silent type. But while he might not talk too much about how much he loves someone, he shows it in every action.

Even if a woman might not know how a cowboy feels about her, his huge capacity for love shines through in the way he treats his family, the animals under his care (who doesn’t love the way a cowboy tends to his horse?), even the very land he works.

And he works hard—often from sunup to sundown, often for little pay. That kind of dedication comes from a deep belief in the value of the work he does, and his ability to value actions above words often translates to his treatment of the people he loves. Every move he makes says “I love you,” even when the words never pass his lips.

He can play hard, too—he might not let loose often, but when he does, he can be loads of fun. All that Saturday night dancing can be exhilarating!

He has faith—usually in a God, but almost always in the world around him. Even when things seem bleak, a cowboy generally knows (even if he doesn’t talk about it) that with some hard work, some play, and a little attention to the people, animals, and land he cares for, things will work out in the end.

And with an attitude like that, who wouldn’t love a cowboy?

 

 

Can they strike love again?

At nineteen, Clara Graves left Necessity, Texas, to try to heal her broken heart. She swore she would never come back, and she’s kept that promise. Until now. When she returns for her uncle’s funeral, she inherits a small oil company that may keep her tied to Necessity for a few days longer than she expected. But as soon as she can close or sell the business, she’s pointing her boots toward greener pastures.

To this day, Mitchell MacAllan regrets letting Clara go without a fight. But his whole life was in Necessity, and leaving town wasn’t in the cards. As the foreman of Aerio Oil and Gas, he works hard to keep the townspeople employed and maintain the business, despite a recent downturn in petroleum prices.

Now Mac has less than a week to convince Clara that she should give Aerio a chance, and maybe even forgive him in the meantime. Otherwise, she will once again be leaving Necessity—and taking his heart with her, this time for good.

Excerpt:

I’ve inherited an oil company?

Maybe she had misheard. After all, her attention had drifted away a little in the midst of a long list of small assets Uncle Gavin had left to friends. Not family, though—Clara and Gavin were each the only family the other had.

Her eyes had misted up a bit at that thought, until she was jerked out of her thoughts by the sound of her name and something that sounded suspiciously like a business name with “oil and gas” in it.

Clara stared at the attorney sitting behind a desk at the front of the room, and had to remind herself to close her mouth before she spoke up to interrupt the older man’s reading of the will, waving her hand in the air a little to catch his attention. “I’m sorry, Mr. Pritchard. Could you back up a little?”

He blinked at her from behind rounded glasses. “Certainly, Ms. Graves. What part should I repeat?” Clara had known John Pritchard for most of her life, and even when she was a child, he had called her “Ms. Graves,” as if she were as important as the adult clients of his law firm. She had adored him for that. But at the moment, she wished he were less courtly, and more direct.

“The part where it sounds like you said Uncle Gavin left me some kind of oil company.”

“Ah. Yes.” Mr. Pritchard pushed those glasses up on his nose, scanning the papers in front of him, then read the passage again. It said something about the company and its holdings and rights and some other things that didn’t quite make sense to Clara about the company’s vitality and viability and conferring with the company’s current foreman.

“Just to clarify: that means that Aerio Oil and Gas, LLC, belongs entirely to me?” She tried to keep her voice from squeaking, but she didn’t entirely succeed.

“We can discuss it in detail momentarily, but almost, yes,” the attorney replied. He raised an eyebrow at her, as if making certain she was ready for him to keep reading.

Almost? What did that mean?

Slumping back into her chair with a surprised whoosh, Clara nodded and waved her hand again, this time motioning Mr. Pritchard to keep reading.

An oil company? What had Uncle Gavin been thinking? When had he acquired an oil company? More to the point, why hadn’t he told Clara about it?

She listened with only half her attention as Mr. Pritchard finished out the reading of the will.

The rest of it was pretty simple. With the exception of a few mementos and monetary gifts left to people like the woman who had cleaned his house every week for as long as Clara could remember, Gavin Graves had left everything to Clara. Much of it was specified in the will—the house and all its contents other than those otherwise disposed by the will, an old Mustang he had restored years before, a new Dodge pickup truck, and several bank accounts—but the document also closed by noting that everything not otherwise mentioned went to Clara.

“Thank you all for coming,” Mr. Pritchard said, standing. “In the next few days, I will be contacting those of you to whom Mr. Graves bequeathed personal gifts.”

Clara kept her seat as several townspeople came to offer their condolences, some for the second or third time that day. A cynical part of her couldn’t help but wonder how many of them were more interested in getting a better look at her after ten years in order to add fuel to the gossip fire than their sincere expressions and kind words might otherwise suggest.

That’s not fair, Clara. She could almost hear her uncle’s kind voice chiding her.

With a sigh, she finally stood up. “Tell me more about this oil company, Mr. Pritchard?”

The attorney nodded. “Of course. But really, Mac will be able to tell you more.” He gestured behind her.

When she turned to look, though, all she caught was a bare glimpse of a dark-haired man in jeans and a cowboy hat as he shut the door behind him.

 

For more about Margo and her books, you can find her at:

http://www.MargoBondCollins.net

For updates about publications, free fiction, and other goodies, be sure to subscribe to her newsletter: https://confirmsubscription.com/h/d/03A21E5E161401F0

Amazon Author Page: http://www.amazon.com/author/margobondcollins

Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/MargoBondCollins

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MargoBondCollin @MargoBondCollin

Goodreads Author Page: http://www.goodreads.com/vampirarchy

Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/mbondcollins/

 

 

 

 

GRANT ME THE MOON

CLICK TO BUY!!

My next colleague from Come Love a Cowboy is best-selling, and award-winning author, Caroline Clemmons.  Caroline writes both historical and contemporary western romances. A frequent speaker at conferences and seminars, she has taught workshops on characterization, point of view, and layering a novel.

Caroline and her husband live in the heart of Texas cowboy country with their menagerie of rescued pets. When she’s not indulging her passion for writing, Caroline enjoys family, reading, travel, antiquing, genealogy, and getting together with friends.

Her novella, Grant Me the Moon, takes place in and around Post City, Texas.

For several years, the story in GRANT ME THE MOON has nagged me to write it. The idea first occurred on a trip from our home in the DFW Metroplex to visit family in Lubbock. We drive through Post on that trip. I’d written one story set in this area, BE MY GUEST, but my interest in the town continued.

I can’t explain why this setting appeals to me as it does. Post is a small town of approximately six thousand people and the county seat of Garza County, Texas, at the foot of the Caprock, the start of the Great Plains also known as Llano Estacado. Perhaps the fact that I grew up in nearby Lubbock explains why the area fascinates me.

Post City was founded by cereal magnate Charles William Post as a utopian colonizing venture in 1907. He designed the community as a model town and laid out the streets logically. After he purchased 200,000 acres of ranchland, he established the Double U Company to manage the town’s construction.

The Double U Company built houses and numerous business structures which included the Algerita Hotel, a cotton gin, and a textile plant. They planted trees along every street. In addition, they sold farms and houses to settlers. The town shortened its name to Post when it incorporated in 1914, the year of C. W. Post’s death.

My husband Hero and I love visiting ancient ruins and pre-history dwellings and remains. The Garza site, named after the county, is on private land and not available to the public. I’ve always wanted to see that dig, which is a Clovis site. So, I decided to have a similar fictional site for my story, GRANT ME THE MOON, discovered by the hero, Grant Grayson, on his ranch. High school history teacher and sponsor of the History Explorers’ Club is Victoria “Tory” Fraser. Naturally a good history club sponsor would want her students to visit this recent discovery. Trouble starts with Grant’s innocent statement to the students.

Here’s the GRANT ME THE MOON blurb:

All Tory Fraser intended was to show her high school history club students a local archeology dig. How could she know the excursion would involve a murder? Or that one of her students would be suspected as the killer? And she had no idea she would meet the man of her dreams.

Grant Grayson has taken over management of his family’s Grayson Ranch near Post, Texas to give his grandfather a less arduous schedule. A flash flood washed away an old talus slope on the ranch to reveal a prehistoric cave that is a Clovis site. Being a good citizen, Grant invited the nearest large university archaeology department to excavate the cave. When a gorgeous blonde high school teacher asks his permission to take her students to the site, how can he deny her? Especially when he’s instantly attracted to her as he’s never been to anyone.

Tory and Grant are drawn in to the investigation to clear her student but unintentionally make themselves a target. Now they must evade the killer to live and celebrate their new found love.

Here’s an excerpt from GRANT ME THE MOON:

After they’d eaten, he drove under the speed limit on the way back to Post. Her company fascinated him and he wished he could prolong the evening. When they reached the edge of the Caprock above Post, he pulled over at a wide space on the shoulder and opened the sunroof.

“I love this spot. You can see the lights of our little town below and the stars above.”

She relaxed against the seat and head rest. “The almost full moon tonight obscures many of the stars. This is a beautiful vantage point, though. As if we’re divine and are hanging above the world. I could almost reach out and touch the moon.”

He reached for her hand and entwined their fingers “Should I grab it for you?”

She offered a whimsical smile. “Let’s leave it there so everyone can enjoy the moonlight.”

“Tory, I’m having a hard time resisting making a move on you like some teenager. I think we’d better get you home.” After releasing her hand, he shifted to drive and pulled back onto Highway 84.

In the moonlight, her eyes shone like stars. “I don’t need rescuing, Grant. I can fend for myself.”

You can find Caroline on her blog, website, Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Google+, WattPad, Shelfari, and Pinterest. Subscribe to her newsletter here to receive a FREE novella of Happy Is The Bride.

 

 

Luke’s Fate by Kathleen Ball

HAVE A TASTE OF COME LOVE A COWBOY!  YOU CAN DOWNLOAD A SAMPLE BOOK  WITH LOTS OF GREAT RECIPES AND HAVE A SNEAK PEEK BY GOING TO http://digioh.com/em/21875/75252/rfwtugbtpk?demail=%5Bemail%5D

One of my fellow authors in Come Love a Cowboy is Kathleen Ball.  Kathleen writes contemporary and historical western romance with great emotion and memorable characters. Her books are award winners and have appeared on best sellers lists including:  Amazon’s Best Sellers List, All Romance Ebooks, Bookstrand, Desert Breeze Publishing and Secret Cravings Publishing Best Sellers list. She is the recipient of eight Editor’s Choice Awards, and The Readers’ Choice Award for Ryelee’s Cowboy.

She was the winner of the Lear diamond award for Best Historical Novel- Cinders’ Bride.

 

Meg O’Brien hoped never to lay eyes on the one man who broke her heart. To her dismay, Luke Kelly arrives at her ranch a much different and broken man. Can Meg ever forgive his callous treatment of her and help Luke become the man he used to be?

Excerpt:

“You’ve changed,” he said, his voice soft and low.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He hesitated. “You used to be easy to read. You wore your emotions on your sleeve. Now I don’t know what you think except you want me gone. I can understand why. I mean I left you just as we were starting something good, something I had hoped would be permanent.”

“Permanent?”

“You must have known how I felt about you. I was just waiting for you to grow up so I could start dating you.”

Tears filled her eyes. All this time she had thought he didn’t find her appealing. “You left without a word.”

“I know, and I’ll be forever sorry for hurting you.”

Tears trailed down her face, and she closed her eyes willing them to stop. “Why?” Her voice squeaked.

Luke shook his head. “I wish I could tell you but I can’t.”

Meg wiped away her tears. “Can’t or won’t?” She waved her hand at him. “You know, don’t, just don’t. The whole town thinks I drove you away. I’ve lived the last five years with people whispering behind my back. I don’t even bother going into town unless I have to. Now I’m foreman of this ranch, I’m perfectly content with my life. I do what I love, and people stay out of my way.”

Luke’s stare was intense. “Is that what you want? You want people to stay out of your way? Hell, Margaret Mary, I thought you’d gone on with your life. I expected to find you with a husband and babies. Even I got married.” His face shuttered as he turned away.

Married? No one had told her. Her mouth opened but there were no words. She folded her arms in front of her trying to keep from flying apart and her stomach threatened to rebel. What a fool she’d been, thinking all this time that something tragic had happened to him, thinking he’d be back for her if he could, and the whole time he’d been married.

Of course, he would have dated while he’d been gone, but marriage… Her thoughts had never strayed that far. How stupid, of course he’d be married. If imagining it would have been too much for her, the reality was shattering. Her body began to shake, and she clasped her hands together trying to still herself. After a few large swallows it worked, but the lump in her throat stayed.

Well, where the hell was his wife now? She should be here wiping her husband’s nose instead of leaving it to others. He had the gall to come here when he had a wife? Her stomach dropped. Was he planning to build a house on his land and live there, raising a family?

Everyone had told her to get on with her life but she refused to listen. Damn my stubborn hide!

Kathleen can be found at:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Kathleen-Ball-Western-Romance/121300767916947

Twitter: @kballauthor

Author Home: http://www.kathleenballromance.com