I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend!!  I confess–I ate too much junk food, and laid around reading too much when I have a lot of work to do.  Oops.  But this is a new week, and the WIP is moving forward!  In the meantime, I forgot last week was release week for my new book, The Runaway Countess (Book One of The Bancrofts of Barton Park!).  I am sooooo excited to talk about it here today, and also to give away a signed copy to one commenter….

runaway0813Wed to Wickedness….

In Society’s eyes, Hayden Fitzwalter, Earl of Ramsey, and Jane Bancroft have the perfect marriage.  But what can’t be seen are the secrets hidden behind closed doors.  Believing Hayden will never renounce his dissolute ways, Jane flees to her family’s dilapidated estate in the country.

Years later, Hayden longs to win back the only woman who has ever touched his heart.  But first he has to convince her that this rogue is ready to be tamed….

Bancrofts of Barton Park

Two Sisters, Two Scandals, Two Sizzling Love Affairs….

“I really loved this story, the gentle pace of the story along with a couple making it a go at it to heal their broken hearts proving that Happy Ever After does take work but it well worth it when she share it with the ones you love.
I’m looking to reading about Jane’s sister and the trouble no doubt she’ll get into!”–Goodreads review

We love to talk here about “risky” books (both reading and writing!), and this book felt very risky to me when I was in the middle of it.  It was really the first time I tried an Austen-esque setting.  Not an Austen-esque style, because that would be way too scary, but a setting much like Emma or Sense and Sensibility, a small country village and a few estates, with neighbors and families who knew each other well.  Jane and her sister Emma have taken refuge at her father’s old estate, Barton Park, and it’s like many people going home as grown-ups–comforting and awkward at the same time!  It was a challenge to get to know all these people and the dynamics of their lives together.

It was also the first time I have ever tried a “marriage in trouble” story.  The hero and heroine are married for the whole story, but are sadly estranged.  They married too young, too quickly, with no realistic idea of how a marriage partnership between them could work.  They needed time and patience to realize what went wrong–and how to win each other’s hearts all over again.  I admit I really ached for Hayden and Jane!  I wanted so much for those two crazy kids to make things work, and once or twice I was sure they never could….

I loved spending time in this Regency world, getting to know these characters!  I hope readers enjoy it too.

I’ll be giving away a signed copy to a commenter on this post today.  Do you like marriage in trouble stories?  Austen-esque stories of country settings and families?  Speaking of families–what are you plans for the fall and all the holidays coming up???

Runaway Countess at Amazon

At eHarlequin

Info at my own website (covers, excerpts, etc)