ARE SMART READERS ALSO LISTENERS? PLUS A GIVEAWAY.

Joan Reeves usually posts today, but she is moving and overwhelmed with life’s events. She asked me to post something in her spot. A perfect opportunity for me!

The AUDIO version of my award winning book, BRAZOS BRIDE, is now available. I have a couple of copies to give away FREE, my favorite price for anything.  The audio of this full length historical western romance is beautifully narrated by Valerie Gilbert.  To be entered in the drawing, all you have to do is leave a comment.

AUDIO BOOK COVER

Here’s the info on BRAZOS BRIDE:

Hope Montoya knows someone is poisoning her, but who? She suspects her mother was also poisoned and knows her father was murdered. Who wants her family eliminated? She vows to fight! She realizes she won’t last the eight months until she turns twenty-five and her uncle no longer controls her or her estate. Never will she be dominated by a man as she was by her father, as she has seen her mother and grandmothers dominated. If she marries, she gains control now, but only if she weds a man she can trust. Only one man meets her requirements. Can she trust him to protect her and capture the killer...but then to leave?

Micah Stone has been in love with Hope since the first time he saw her. But he was accused of her father’s murder and surely would have hung if not for his two brothers’ aid. Most in the community still believe him guilty. But the drought has him too worried about water for his dying cattle to care about his neighbors’ opinions. When Hope proposes a paper marriage in exchange for land on the Brazos River and much needed cash, her offer rubs his pride raw. His name may be Stone, but he’s not made of it. He can’t refuse her for long, and so their adventure begins. He and Hope have to stay alive and discover the killer before they become victims in the deadly assaults.

Palo Pinto Mountains from a valley

The novel is set in the Palo Pinto Mountains of North Central Texas. The Brazos River runs through these picturesque hills that are covered with cedar, post oak, live oak, and other native trees. Though by no means comparable to the Rockies, they are genuine mountains due to their geologic formation. Popular with the Comanche and Kiowa Indian tribes, they were not settled by anglos until the mid 1800’s. Indian raids against the whites continued until early 1870’s.

Real ranch house changed to a
hacienda in BRAZOS BRIDE

The ranch used as the location for Hope Montoya’s home is one I have visited on historic Palo Pinto County tours. I fell in love with the location and have used it in the Men of Stone Mountain trilogy, although I altered the home and fictionalized the town of Radford Springs. The ranch’s owner says the spot where the home is built was an annual Comanche gathering and camping area due to the convergence of two streams. The spring for one creek does not dry up even in drought times.

I love this book, this trilogy, and this part of Texas. Of course, I love all of Texas, but this locale is especially dear to my heart. The second in the Men of Stone Mountain trilogy, HIGH STAKES BRIDE, is currently being converted to an audio book and will be available in the near future.   

I hope you smart readers are also eager listeners.

Thanks for stopping by!

OUR PARTY AND WHY WE WRITE BOOKS

WooHoo! What a terrific NINE WAYS TO FALL IN LOVE Launch Party we had on Facebook on September 1^st!  Special thanks to the over 250 readers who attended our party. Don't forget that we'll be giving away prizes every day of September, some days more than one prize.

Brandy Crownover Dillon is the winner of the Kindle Fire donated by author DeLaine Roberts, whose book TWO SIDES OF A HEARTBEAT is in NINE WAYS TO FALL IN LOVE. Congratulations, Brandy!  

P. J. Nusbaum won a download of the Men of Stone Mountain trilogy from Caroline Clemmons (moi). My book THE TEXAN'S IRISH BRIDE is in NINE WAYS TO FALL IN LOVE. Congratulaions, P.J.! 

WHY WE WRITE OUR BOOK FOR YOU

Now, I’d like to remind you readers why we write and why we push our books so hard. Yes, that assures us of a royalty payment. I won’t pretend that’s unimportant. Most of us need that money.

While it’s true we would write even if we made no money, most of us can’t afford to spend our days working for free. We have the same expenses as others. Many of us have a “day job” and only write evenings and weekends. Fortunately, I am able to write full time and thank God for my good fortune!

But why we write is about so much more than money. We have these stories in our heads and in our hearts and we can’t rest until we write them.  So, even though we couldn’t spend as much time writing if we didn’t get paid, we would write regardless. We simply can’t help ourselves. 

There is no 12-step program like Alcoholics Anonymous for writers. There is no way to break this wonderful curse we bear—the one where the people in our heads become real to us. Where we "see" these people as if they were on the movie screen or a small mental screen. By the time we complete a book, those characters are like our friends. We like to write series so we can visit our characters again and again.

Yes, it sounds crazy. Maybe we are, but it’s a wonderful madness. We live for it, as much as we breathe the air. You can see why authors adore readers. We need you! Don’t pity us; just buy our books and leave nice reviews. When you enjoy reading a book, tell your friends. 

In return, we’ll write more and more books. We will fuel your need to read. We know your reading is also a habit that is impossible to break because we are doubly cursed. In addition to writing books, we are also readers.

All this month, join us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/events/567696843290957/ for the continuing launch party of NINE WAYS TO FALL IN LOVE. You can enter by commenting on our Facebook Launch Event Page or by signing up for our newsletter at www.southerncomfortromance.com. 

I hope by now you’ve purchased NINE WAYS TO FALL IN LOVE from Amazon. If you don’t have a Kindle, you can get an app for almost any reader via Amazon, or you can use Calibre free to convert the download for you.

Buy your boxed set of NINE WAYS TO FALL IN LOVE now at Amazon while the price is still only 99 cents http://www.amazon.com/Ways-To-Fall-Love-ebook/dp/B00ERAREBW/ref=sr_1_11?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1377740637&sr=1-11&keywords=caroline+clemmons

PASS THE POISON, PLEASE

My latest trilogy, Men of Stone Mountain, is about the three Stone brothers: Micah, Zach, and Joel. Aren’t brothers enough of a link for a trilogy? Yes, but there’s another link to these three books. Each involves poison in some way and is a mystery as well as a historical romance. No, I’m not bloodthirsty and I don’t intend to use my knowledge to wipe out any real people. In this trilogy, however, I wipe out a several people. Ah, the joys of being a writer! We are allowed to vent our frustrations by killing people on paper. And it’s legal. ☺ I love my job!

Studying herbal medicine is sort of a mini-hobby. I’ve taken the excellent herbal class Beth Trissel occasionally offers, as well as perusing my books on folk medicine. Pioneers relied heavily on their ability to recognize healing plants as well as those that discouraged pests and vermin. No Walgreens or WalMart around in those days.  Early settlers also learned that what can heal, if administered improperly, can harm. Cue eerie music.

Don’t you suspect a lot of so-called natural deaths were helped along before modern medicine and forensics discouraged using potions and tinctures to kill? Maybe I’m suspicious by nature, but I believe a lot of troublesome people died prematurely, helped along by a supposedly loving family member.

“My father in law Uriah? Why, he had a heart attack and up and died.”

“My first two wives? Each took sick and died on me.”

If you lived in the middle of nowhere, who was around to prove otherwise? If you lived in town, forensics had not advanced to today’s level. Even if a lawman or physician suspected murder, he had to prove it. A few poisons left tattletale signs, others left none. And that’s not even counting falls and other so-called accidents. You think life is dangerous now?

Often pioneers learned more about the local plants from friendly Native Americans. As people moved West and the topography and climate changed, they found many plants with which they were unfamiliar. They required help to discover which helped and which harmed. Have you wondered who first tasted this or that to see if it would make good food or medicine? I admit I often wonder trivial things like that.

I’ve heard that women are more likely to use poison than men. Perhaps that’s due to lack of physical strength. In this trilogy, both sexes are involved in using poison—some for evil, some for self defense. And I wanted each to be a natural poison found in the wild.

Here are the three books:

BRAZOS BRIDE’s heroine, Hope Montoya, is a smart woman and figures out that someone is poisoning her. Who and why are more difficult problems.  Until she knows, she can trust no one who has access to her food or medicine. She vows to fight for her life, but she’s so weakened by the poison that she can’t fight alone. Enter our hero, Micah Stone. Do you hear the “1812 Overture?” You know, I’ve heard a highbrow is someone who can hear that music without thinking of the Lone Ranger. But I digress.

In HIGH STAKES BRIDE, Alice Price is on the run from her less-than-bright stepbrothers who plan to hand her over to a man she considers the meanest man in Texas to settle a gambling debt. Enter Zach Stone to lend a hand. But in the end quick thinking Alice has to save herself, with Zach fast on her heels to the rescue.

In BLUEBONNET BRIDE, Rosalyn must escape an unjust death sentence for poisoning her husband with dried oleander from her garden.  She flees to the ends of the earth, or so it seems to her, and meets Joel Stone. Only he can save her, but his family helps. Those Stones stick together. I love that fact about them.

In the event you wish to buy any of these books, I’m happy to share that I have combined the three into a boxed set, MEN OF STONE MOUNTAIN: MICAH, ZACH, AND JOEL, at a reduced price that saves you two dollars at Amazon  http://www.amazon.com/Men-of-Stone-Mountain-ebook/dp/B00DTGQXLW/ref=sr_1_15?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1374026596&sr=1-15&keywords=caroline+clemmons

Individually, each book is also available at iTunes, Kindle, Nook, Kobo and at Smashwords.

Thanks for stopping by!