I think because classes started this week at Purdue, I've been in a race to read some good books. The above are just a few of them that I've inhaled and recommended. Here's why I loved them: The Price of Valor is Susan May Warren at the top of her writing game. Susie is a master of creating characters and plot that will not let me go as a reader. This book is no exception. From the opening … [Read more...]
Family readers (and a Cyber Monday deal)
My family members were some of my earliest critics, reading my manuscript before I ever even tried to get published. Ken, the world's most supportive husband, first read the prologue of the manuscript that would become my first novel, A Vow to Cherish, and deeply encouraged me. I'm not sure I would have continued without his affirming words. But he gave me the courage with his words: "This is … [Read more...]
Have you visited the Chicory Inn yet? (A giveaway!)
[This giveaway has ended. Thank you for all the wonderful comments. I just drew a winner for the five-book Chicory Inn series and it is...drumroll, please... MARY TULLILA.] No, the Chicory Inn isn't a real place, but after writing five novels set in the charming bed and breakfast run by the Whitman family (alas, they aren't real either), the setting in fictional Langhorne, Missouri feels very, … [Read more...]
Raney Day Press (and a giveaway!)
I hope you'll forgive a bit of a commercial, but I wanted to take a chance to let you know about an aspect of my writing that I'm really excited about. My talented husband, Ken Raney, started Raney Day Press to get some of my older books back out in print (and e-book). Now that I've been writing almost 23 years, I've begun to get the rights back to some of my titles that were published by … [Read more...]
Keeping Track of Books
Twenty years ago, in 1996, I started keeping track of how many and which books I'd read. It was the year my first novel was published, and I had quite an impressive list of books I'd read—55 books over the course of twelve months. In 1997 I was working on writing my second and third novels, but I still managed to read forty books, recording each one in a pretty spiral journal. In the years between … [Read more...]