Welcome Crusaders and New Music from the Whisky Trench Riders

elcome fellow crusaders!




It's such a treat to meet so many new bloggers at once. Thanks so much to Rachael for organizing it, and to Zan Marie and the authors at All The World's Our Page for calling my attention to it.

I'm off to a Cheese Festival this afternoon – at which wine may or may not – but hopefully will – be served – and before I go, I thought I'd do a little introductory post about myself and what I write.

I'm sorted into two groups for the crusade, the MG/YA group and the romance group. Seems a little disparate, no? In fact, romance is my first love, when I write novels, and MG is something I'm more used to tackling when I write short stories. My last complete novel, The Face of A Lion, was the first full length MG I ever wrote.

When thirteen-year-old Austin's parents drag him along to a villa in Turkey they've rented for the summer, he hunkers down and counts the days until he can get back home to his friends in England. But that's before he rescues a talking cat, witnesses a bloody ritual that causes two people to disappear, and finds himself whisked back in time.

Nearly two thousand years in the past, he makes a new friend--and a new enemy. A powerful evil wants to prevent Claudius the Emperor's invasion of Britain. Austin has to act fast to ensure that the invasion does take place--or time and civilization as he knows it will never be the same.

I'm currently querying agents for Austin's story and working on Rosa's – the historical romance novel, Out of the Water, set in 1492-3.

Exiled from her Spanish homeland by the Inquisition and separated from her family as they flee their home, 18 year old Rosa must place her life in the hands of a stranger from the Ottoman Empire. Baha, estranged from his own father and returning to his homeland after ten years, is her one hope of reaching Constantinople and reuniting with her family. The fact that he's attractive and tender is an unexpected pleasure.

As they travel together, her burning drive to be reunited with her loved ones is matched by a deepening desire for the man at her side -- but all too soon they may run out of time to be together. Rosa's family will likely not accept her marriage to a man of different faith, let alone one who has been renounced by his family. Yet before she can even introduce them, their reunion is cut short by the arrest of her father and brother at the hands of the Sultan's Grand Vizier. Rosa and Baha are the only ones that can rescue them, and together prove that their love can withstand their differences.

Looking forward to visiting and getting to know all of you and your projects! Thank you to all my new followers.

The Whisky Trench Riders have a new album out! The song Nightingale is one of my favourites and makes me think of Rosa and Baha from Out of the Water every time I listen to it. And Canadianthem is just a rocking tune!