This isn't a love story. It's a story about love. 

This story of love starts with a failed life plan and a sick father. That's how Helen Whicker finds herself back in her hometown of Portstown, Illinois, living with her parents and working as an obit writer for the town paper. Throw in a car accident and a neurotic sister-in-law, and Helen's life is pretty much a disaster. 

Benson McCormick is just what she needs to turn things around. He's funny, uses foul language even more than she does, and he can't seem to get enough of Helen. But they live in different cities, and they both have family drama and relationship baggage. 

Helen's gotten used to life on her own, but as she faces her worst fears, she wonders if she's really been living at all. The more she gets to know Benson, the more she believes that falling in love is the sweetest possible surrender. She just has to decide if she's strong enough to survive the fall.

You may remember that I mentioned starting a new job back in August. I blame that job for my lack of posting. I've been crazy busy, but still loving the job. Unfortunately, with the increased travel component and some big releases, I haven't had as much free time as I would like for writing.

Good news though- my job gives me a winter break, which started yesterday. So with 11 days off, I hope to make some excellent progress on my current work in progress, the follow up to CASTLE. I also managed to get the final details wrapped up on the third and last installment in The Shadows Trilogy- The Warriors. It was a lot of fun to write, and very cathartic to be able to wrap up the stories and give the characters some closure. It's up and available on Amazon if you'd like to check it out.

What else is new... I had a recent trip to DC and NYC and finally got to see both the White House and the big tree in Rockefeller Plaza. I did the Christmas thing with my family yesterday and today, and now I have a lot of movies and books to catch up on these next few days. We got the first snow of the season (and I'm not particularly happy about it). We had a holiday office party that included not one, but two after-parties.

I'm still hanging out with the fam, watching the new Total Recall movie. So I'll include a much longer post later this week but just wanted to wish everyone happy holidays.

I just made my second young-adult novel, CASTLE, available for purchase on Amazon. I've mentioned it before, but I'm super excited about this book. It has a lot of stuff going on and the characters are pretty cool. Shane is personal fave of mine because she's clearly someone you don't want to mess with (I may be channeling some of myself in her character.)

An interesting thing I've been thinking about is if a writer has favorite books that they've written. CASTLE is my second book to be published, but I was writing it off and on while writing other books including The Shadows. And so far I've loved all my books equally which leads me to believe that books are just like children- you love them for different reasons, but equally.

Anyway, enough random thoughts. Thanks for humoring me. Check out CASTLE if you are so inclined. It's the beginning of a great series.

My first book is up on Amazon and ready to be read. I wasn't planning to publish it for a few more days but after a final read thru yesterday, I decided to go for it. I know it's not perfect, but then neither am I. But I do think it's an enjoyable read so please check it out.

I started writing the Shadows three years ago when I was between jobs and bored out of my mind. The first version was certainly "rough" but I knocked it out in about ten days. The subsequent versions took a lot longer to write, mostly because I'm now working full time and putting in an insane amount of hours at work. But it is also taking longer because I've got a lot of writing projects going on right now. I'm about halfway done with another YA novel that will be published in July and I will also be following up soon with the sequel to The Shadows so expect to hear much more from me in the coming months.

If you would like to buy The Shadows, please check it out on Amazon Buy The Shadows