Tag Archives: books

Reading and Writing Romance Has Made Me, Well, More Romantic

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I was not a person who read romance books but two years ago a character, Lexi Maxwell, presented herself to me while I was on holiday in Ireland. It was chilly, windy, wet day as we rode through the rolling hills of the country. It is true that Ireland has more shades of green than anywhere and the dots of white sheep sprinkled in the fields made everything feel quaint and cozy. After the rain, rainbows appeared everywhere I looked.

That was when Lexi started talking to me. It’s how all my characters present themselves to me. They just show up in my “mind’s eye” and start telling me their story. You will hear some creatives refer to it as a download. “The music is in the ethers and I just capture it,” to paraphrase Bob Dylan when asked how he write his songs. Elizabeth Gilbert and Rick Rubin have discussed this experience as well. In fact Gilbert talks about how she sits at her desk every morning at the same time to “receive” her stories. Paul McCartney admits that is how “Yesterday” came to him. It was a complete song in a fast download. Such a complete song that, at first, he thought it surely must have been someone else’s song that he’d just heard on the radio.

Lexi kept talking to me all day in Ireland and, by the time I arrived at my hotel, I told her I’d write it. Four months later I completed her story and Under The Autumn Moon was published the next year.

Under The Autumn Moon has been described as “Finally, an adult romance. This isn’t puppy love. It’s a deep fulfilling love story.”

Another romance story immediately started “talking” to me and so, this fall, another romance novel is on its way to you.

What I’ve noticed about myself now that I’m writing romance, is that I have more scented candles in the house, I now have flowery bed sheets, I wear lacey tops (NEVER would I have done that before), my playlists I listen to while writing are love songs from all ages and cultures, and I seek quieter spots to sit alone or with a small group of family and friends.

The other delight is how many men, of all ages, have said things to me like, “I’ve never read romance and didn’t know I needed it!”

Maybe we all need a little more romance in our lives.

The Neighborhood Elders Are Dying

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Mareska Glass, Dot Lawson, Johnny Jarrell, Drudy Jarrell and, just yesterday, Euel Spriggs.

These are the neighbors who were twenty-five to thirty-five years older than me and became my friends. They have all died. Thee last three in just the past two months.

Mareska, aka Marsha, and I meet most every Thursday morning for coffee. She shared her life stories and how she survived World War 2 as a young Jewish girl in Poland after losing her entire family. (A story I still need to write for her).

Dot lived across the street. Her son was married to a friend I hadn’t seen since high school. A reminder we are circle back around one another in life. Dot made wedding cakes and my husband and son regularly benefited from her cast offs. I rescued a baby owl once who’d found its way down her chimney. We differed in how we interpreted God, but always respected the other.

Johnny and Drudy were the cute couple holding hands and walking their dog. More often than not, their evening walk timed perfectly with mine and so we’d stroll around together. Johnny loved his annual trip to Boston in the winter to represent his company at the annual fish market. Drudy never failed to ask about my son. They had two accomplished, good men as sons themselves.

Euel died yesterday morning. It was expected and his beloved great niece, Michelle, has been with him through it all. He and his late wife, Marie, weren’t able to have children, but they spoiled all their family. The strongest memory of Euel will be that he truly lived a life of kindness and respect for all. He LIVED it. He didn’t go around pontificating.

My childhood was spent around aging relatives and so that may be why I gravitate to the elders around me. They can often have a way of being that enriches my life in small and large ways.