This week's Romance Writers Weekly question is: "What is your favorite kind of weather? Does it inspire your writing?"
I used to love weather. Beaches in summer, skiing in winter, picking apples in the fall and flowers in the spring... Blizzards were an excuse to stay home from school. Hail in the summer was magical. Fierce storms were exciting (especially at night or early morning when you knew you didn't have to go out in them). But a year and a half in Tampa--with its one-million-plus lightning strikes a year cured me of my love of storms. And thirty plus years in coastal California has turned me into a certified Weather Wimp.
Hands down my favorite weather is found in California. Never too hot or too cold. No such thing as thunderstorms. Virtually no humidity. And blessedly predictable. If it's morning, there'll be fog. If it's summer, it's not raining. And almost every day is perfect. It is, quite literally, like Lerner and Loewe's version of Camelot. I don't understand why anyone would choose to live anywhere else and the fact that I'm not currently living there... Well, the weather's been a struggle.
California weather completely informs and inspires my Oberon, California series, which I'll be re-releasing starting this year; and it plays a big part in my Children of Night series, which is set primarily in San Francisco.
When I started writing the Games We Play series, which is set at the Jersey Shore, I relied heavily on my memories of growing up in Jersey.
My current WIP (work in progress) is Christmas Angel. It's a sweet, second chance, M/M, fantasy romance set primarily on a Christmas tree farm in Central Texas, close to where I'm currently living. I have been having fun exploring this new world of weather in my book.
Evelyn Smith, a nurse, has just escaped from an abusive husband and bought a small cottage in Florida. It is in shambles and the previous owner, the handsome Donovan Hawkins, feels guilty and offers to help with repairs. Evelyn slowly begins to trust again and even love.
Evelyn discovers there is something about the house itself that feels welcoming. Through conversations, she finds that another woman in a similar situation lived there during the Civil War.
The woman from the past was Rebecca Faber, a healer who stumbles on a Yankee soldier who had been injured in a battle. Taking care of him leads to love, but he must flee before he is captured. And she is forced into marriage with a vicious man.
Parallel lives, more than a century apart, unite these women as they navigate danger and must take risks to survive. And find true love.
COMING SOON
You’ve heard this story a hundred times before. Well. A dozen times, anyway. It’s a Christmas classic: Cranky guy dies without learning the true meaning of the season, gets turned into an angel and is given the job of saving someone else from suffering the same unhappy fate.
Usually it’s billed as a romance, or at least as feel-good, family fun. Which is ridiculous. Even Dickens, the man who invented cheesy Christmas stories, knew better than that. His Marley was miserable, as who wouldn’t be in his situation? Which also happens to be my situation.
Hi. My name is Jacob. I’m an angel. And this is my story.
Releases May 16, 2023 in the limited edition anthology Redemption: a Fallen Angels Paranormal Romance Collection available for pre-order now. https://books2read.com/b/br1JkE
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