Beyond the Book: Good News

Congratulate me, dear readers. I've signed two contracts for new books. The first, The Captain and the Cheerleader, will be out in mid November. Before that time I'll share a few things about the book here at the blog.

The second book is titled Fortuna, and it's in the editing process now.

An important part of writing a book is choosing the right name for your characters. I always think long and hard before I make a final choice. My heroine in Fortuna is named Aimee which is a French name. It means dearly loved or beloved, and it fits my heroine beautifully.

My Heroine in The Captain and the Cheerleader is called Susan which is a Hebrew name meaning graceful lily, and would you believe it too is a perfect fit.

Want to read just a small snippet to see what I mean? Okay, you talked me into it. Let's do The Captain and the Cheerleader first. Don't you think graceful lily fits her? Susan is a teacher, and this is one student's description of her.

She looked good, you’d have to give her that. Tall, slender, and elegant. She seems so perfect I’ve always hated her. No matter what she wears, she looks like some designer dressed her, and even though she doesn’t really need makeup, I’ve never even seen her with smudged lipstick. Why does she bother with makeup anyway? Her skin is beautiful.

All of that was plenty of reason to dislike her, but the real problem was her attitude. She acted too darned self-confident and poised. Nothing ever seemed to bother her, at least not until now.

This excerpt is from Fortuna. See if you don't think Aimee's name fits.

It would have been nice to have a ray of sunshine this dark, windy night. Hot blood stained his cheeks. He hoped no one ever found out that whenever he thought of Aimee he pictured sunshine and warmth. That just wasn’t a guy thing to admit to. Maybe her blonde hair was the reason, but no, it was everything about her. 

More coming later, readers. I think you'll like both of these stories.