I randomly discovered my next book appearing in this article (linked below) today. Am I the only one who didn’t know they did a remake of West Side Story?
This is the first time I’ve been in a promotional piece where The Landowner’s Secret wasn’t the book featured. I feel a little sad that it’s time to move on to the next one!
Today is the one-year anniversary of Harlequin making me an offer for the manuscript that would become The Landowner’s Secret. A lot has happened since then, and in that time I’ve worked on a number of other books. So much has changed in the past twelve months.
Just in case you’re interested, here’s the book’s information again:
The Landowner’s Secret
New South Wales, 1885
When Alice Ryan wakes to find thugs surrounding her cottage, on the hunt for her no-good brother, she escapes into the surrounding bush.
It is wealthy landowner Robert Farrer who finds her the next morning, dishevelled, injured, and utterly unwilling to share what she knows. With criminals on the loose and rumours that reckless bushrangers have returned to the area, Robert is determined to keep Alice out of danger, and insists on taking her into his home-despite the scandal it may cause. Convincing her to stay on with him for her own safety, however, is going to take some work.
What Robert doesn’t expect is his growing attraction to the forthright, unruly woman staying in his home. Before either of them can settle into their odd new situation, their home and wellbeing come under threat and they will need to trust each other to survive. But they are both keeping secrets, secrets that have the potential to ruin their burgeoning love, their livelihood … and their lives.
I was waiting to get a file from my publisher before I put this up, but The Artist’s Secret, the second book in what is now named the Brindabella Secrets trilogy, has started to appear online for preorders, so I’m sharing it!
I LOVE this cover. It was supposed to be an orangey-red colour, but was changed to blue, and I couldn’t be happier. The scenery in the background looks just like the region the story is set.
I’ll share more preorder links in a few days, but the book’s page on romance.com.au links to Amazon etc.
So, here it is (and the blurb is beneath it):
Despite their growing attraction, both Peter and Elizabeth have secrets that will come between them.
New South Wales, 1887
Peter Rowe’s life is in the city, but his soul is in Australia’s southern tablelands-a place he’s never seen. Taking the new land manager’s position on the thriving estate of Endmoor is the chance he needs to discover what happened to the family he has never met. What he doesn’t expect to find in the bush is his employer’s talented, beautiful sister.
Elizabeth Farrer’s world is changing rapidly. An artist whose work has begun to gain acclaim, her brother’s marriage has made her redundant in her own home and she intends to leave the country and make a life of her own. Her plans would take her far from her beloved New South Wales, but with the arrival of Endmoor’s newest employee-a man unlike any other she has met-she discovers there might just be a reason to stay right where she is.
Just as they conquer their most difficult obstacles, old prejudices rise up and threaten to keep them apart …
Readers in Australia and New Zealand! The Landowner’s Secret is on sale for only $1.99 until the end of the month!
New South Wales, 1885
When Alice Ryan wakes to find thugs surrounding her cottage, on the hunt for her no-good brother, she escapes into the surrounding bush.
It is wealthy landowner Robert Farrer who finds her the next morning, dishevelled, injured, and utterly unwilling to share what she knows. With criminals on the loose and rumours that reckless bushrangers have returned to the area, Robert is determined to keep Alice out of danger, and insists on taking her into his home-despite the scandal it may cause. Convincing her to stay on with him for her own safety, however, is going to take some work.
What Robert doesn’t expect is his growing attraction to the forthright, unruly woman staying in his home. Before either of them can settle into their odd new situation, their home and wellbeing come under threat and they will need to trust each other to survive. But they are both keeping secrets, secrets that have the potential to ruin their burgeoning love, their livelihood … and their lives.
I SO badly wanted to share my new book cover this week, but I’m still waiting on the high-quality, official version. It’s very, VERY pretty!
I was in two articles for Valentine’s Day:
We asked Romance Authors how they like to spend Valentine’s Day
Romance Authors give their Recommendations for Valentine’s Day Reads
Despite the world’s (and half of Australia’s) media reporting that all the fires in this country are now out, as of yesterday afternoon there were still twenty-four bushfires in my region.
Below is a map from a few hours ago. The grey bits with the blue fire symbols are fires (duh!). The little section with the green ambulance crosses is my city. And I live on the southern side!
It *is* much better, but I’m sick of hearing how great it is that this nightmare summer is over when I still have firefighting aircraft over my house day and night … “Contained” is good news, but “extinguished” would be much better.
And now the Canberra region has had a landslide! What’s next?!
Here’s your periodic reminder that Harlequin’s website is full of free online reads!
HarperCollins website Romance.com.au has featured my books (and me!) in several articles in the last few weeks. And today – my birthday – I was happy to discover I was in *two* pieces, alongside a bunch of amazing authors.
Below are links to the three most recent pieces, and I’m due to be in two more in the next few weeks.
11 historical romances to read while you wait for Outlander season 5
We asked Romance Authors how they like to spend Valentine’s Day
Romance Authors give their Recommendations for Valentine’s Day Reads
For the last article I recommended Never Deny a Duke by Madeline Hunter – reviewed HERE.
I have something wonderful for my next book, The Artist’s Secret, that I desperately want to share, but I can’t yet! The book’s release date has been changed, so you’ll have to wait a few extra weeks.
However … Yesterday, after a crazy-long wait, my editor sent me the cover for approval, and I LOVE it. As with the cover of The Landowner’s Secret, the background image is perfect. And the main image? Well, I’ll give a spoiler: the cover took so long to reach me because it was rejected by the Harlequin team and sent back to be redone a couple of times.
The problem was that the colour scheme wasn’t working, so they changed it completely. The spoiler: now it’s blue. And anybody who regularly reads this blog probably noticed that’s a colour I have a little obsession with – especially on book covers!
Hopefully I’ll be able to share the cover very soon.
Bushfire view from my back deck. Flames crossing the ridge.
I’ve avoided writing weekly summaries for a while now because so much has been happening, and Canberra has been hit by natural disaster after natural disaster (which have been routinely knocking out the internet). We’ve had two freak hailstorms that destroyed large parts of the city, and fire after fire after fire. My brother was trapped in Canberra Airport a few days ago, when a fire burnt into the city from the east.
It’s been frightening to spend the last few nights watching flames coming into our valley – and it brings back memories of the horrific firestorm that hit us in 2003.
My apartment view in Brisbane.
I was also in Brisbane for a while – how strange to be in a part of Australia where there’s no evidence of fire when your own region is burning!
In Canberra we’ve had record-breaking, relentless heat, smoke, and waterbombers flying over the house all day and all night. Seeing the giant American DC-10 water tanker flying low over your house is surreal and scary.
EDIT. The DC-10 from Alabama flying over my house just before 3pm today:
A plane dumping fire retardant flies over my house, back from the fires. It looks like the evening, but that’s the middle of the afternoon.
My local library is now an evacuation centre as a massive fire sweeps in towards Canberra. Today is expected to be catastrophic, and the army is door-knocking in my area to prepare people for what’s to come.
None of us know what’s going to happen over this weekend …
The Landowner’s Secret for $1.99!
Writing Inspiration: Victorian Queanbeyan
Happy 207th Birthday, Pride and Prejudice!
My review of Have a Little Faith in Me by Sonia Hartl
Book Feature: The Perfect Wife by Katherine Scholes
Just a reminder that my book, The Landowner’s Secret, is on sale for $1.99 on Amazon Kindle for the rest of this month, and from other retailers until the 1st of March!
New South Wales, 1885
When Alice Ryan wakes to find thugs surrounding her cottage, on the hunt for her no-good brother, she escapes into the surrounding bush.
It is wealthy landowner Robert Farrer who finds her the next morning, dishevelled, injured, and utterly unwilling to share what she knows. With criminals on the loose and rumours that reckless bushrangers have returned to the area, Robert is determined to keep Alice out of danger, and insists on taking her into his home-despite the scandal it may cause. Convincing her to stay on with him for her own safety, however, is going to take some work.
What Robert doesn’t expect is his growing attraction to the forthright, unruly woman staying in his home. Before either of them can settle into their odd new situation, their home and wellbeing come under threat and they will need to trust each other to survive. But they are both keeping secrets, secrets that have the potential to ruin their burgeoning love, their livelihood … and their lives.
