romance or love story

 

 

To write about romances is to lose some readers with the very word as the stories have been ridiculed so much, with a fair number poorly written with a formula or using silly wording. Yet, romance is at the heart of many emotions. What makes two people decide to tie their lives together-- including legally? But then again, how many real life romances end, sometimes even in tragedy?  So, when writing such books, to avoid being ridiculed, what should a romance be about?

First of all, separate romance from love story. Love stories don't have to have happy endings. Some examples from the past include Gone with the Wind, Wuthering Heights, and most of Shakespeare's plays. Love can be a violent emotion when is not accompanied by other behaviors. There are many books where love or even romantic feelings are in the story, but they aren't love stories or romances. An example of that would be Where the Crawdads Sing. Different examples of passion for someone but not a love story or a romance.

Romances, on the other hand, always end happily-- or are supposed to. The teasers might suggest they won't, but they will-- or they're not romances.

The issue though for a writer is what makes two people drawn together and then have the probability the relationship will last? A writer can't just set them up and assume they'll fall in love and it will (after some crises) work out. It has to be believable to the reader. Well, unless someone is writing formula and then they just follow the pattern; but what if the author wants it to feel real and bring the reader along for the ride?

All of Jane Austin's books are romances. Her own life never got that happy romantic ending but her lead characters always did-- despite the problems to getting there. 

Romances can be and usually are about more than romance, but it does have to be at the heart of the book. A writer can't just say they fell in love. Readers have to believe it would have happened. I often read reviews for other authors of romances and readers get quite irked when they don't believe those two people would have chosen each other.

One of the things that makes a couple feel real is when they have things in common to draw them together. But, there should also be those opposite elements that lead to conflicts between them. Otherwise, there's just -- and they lived happily ever after. I'll write more about that in the next blog as this one is already getting too long.

You know, relationships are not just about humans. It's what makes the world go round and species survive-- or not.
 

What is a Dark Angel?

 

The blog  title asks a question. What is a dark angel? Well, in this book, it's not a supernatural being, but rather what the heroine has come to call the hero. Dark for what he seems like he might be, dangerous, a life on the edge, but angel for what he looks like and what she believes is under the cover of the dark side.

The story begins in Reno, when a young, wealthy, widow, Katy Brown, has come to help her uncle, while her small daughters are at a summer camp. She can organize his business's books, which appear in disarray. She also wants to clean up the office, as clutter bothers her. When her dark angel comes in, Dill Delaney is not pleased at all to see her there, which adds to her suspicions about Uncle John's business partner or is he?

While Katy has no interest in the Reno night life, it's where Dill lives, in a tiny apartment with his adopted feral cat, McGee. What makes Dill's life
even more dicey is he's been forced into working undercover for the federal government to nail a crime boss. Dill hates every part of what he has to do to accomplish this, but he's trapped in it as a way to protect John O'Brian, who he has come to love. 

Worried about Katy getting caught in what is about to go down, Dill does all he can to get her and Johnny out of Reno. He didn't need the warning of his errant father, Finn Delaney. He knows danger is ahead with no real help from the government.

Thus, begins the book when Dill and Katy come together with a strong attraction, which both know they should ignore. I don't want to tell more about what's coming, which could ruin the suspense, but due to the violence, Dill's near death experience, Katy gets her father's private jet to take them to Portland (along with McGee and Dill's motorcycle), where waits a specialist, her home where Leah and Jesse will soon return.

When Dill finally realizes what's happened to him, it's more than just ending up in Portland. There is a lot involving family (a totally

disapproving mother-in-law), friends, unknown enemies, and some black swans. 

If people love each other, they can overcome so much that will end up making them even closer. I could say would they overcome it, but this is, after all, a romance. It's how it all comes together where the fun of writing and reading Her Dark Angel will be found.

Dill has to fit into a wealthy family, where he has known nothing like it. There is that and a hidden enemy.  Fitting in with the wealthy set is challenging to him as much as the world he's been more used to with danger outside his door.

------ 

Available exclusively at Amazon as this will be the first of my contemporary 7 books in KU, which means for readers having subscribed. You can though read the blurb, free sample, or buy the book also at that link:

Her Dark Angel

Finding your pearl of great value

  

Some might think that the title of this romance came from the Bible. Well, it could be thought that way, but there is way more to the meaning of pearls than from Scripture.

“As a pearl is formed and its layers grow, a rich iridescence begins to glow. The oyster has taken what was at first an irritation and intrusion and uses it to enrich its value. How can you coat or frame the changes in your life to harvest beauty, brilliance, and wisdom?” – Susan C. Young 

. “Life is made up of a few moments all strung together like pearls. Each moment is a pearl, and it is up to us to pick the ones with the highest luster.” – Joyce Hilfer

“Some give up under pressure, while others rise up and undergo life-transforming experiences. Oyster responds beautifully to external pressure, giving birth to a priceless pearl.” – Mukhtar Aziz 

“A pearl is worthless as long as it’s in its shell.” – Native American Proverb 

These quotes, along with many others, especially the one on the Gospels, speak to what a hidden pearl can mean as well as its value. It also is why it was right for a title in this book. People can seem whole and strong and yet have fought against opening up the hidden part inside themselves. Does that fit romances? I think it very much does as the closest relationships make us face ourselves in ways we won't when not faced with challenges.

 So how does that work with this book? By the way, that sculpture is one of mine. 

 When architect/builder S.T. Taggert returns from a morning run, he finds a call waiting from his Navajo mother. She is concerned that his sister, Shonna, is missing. She asks him to find out if she is okay. This represents a part of his mixed heritage, drunken, white father, and a mother who deserted them to return to her land. Reluctantly, he agrees to see what he can find out about his sister.

Going to his office, S.T. finds something else unwanted. A photojournalist, Christine Talbot, is waiting to do photos of hm, for a series of up and coming young men in Oregon. He doesn't like the idea but finally agrees only because she appeals to the respect he has for those who work.

Christine has another shoot for the series lined up in Roseburg of another man who is making a splash, evangelist, Peter Soul, who has a growing group called Servants of Grace. 

Hence the book begins with conflicts and connections. All will come together, along with S.T.'s search for his missing sister, who had been in the Servants of Grace, with her admiration for Peter Soul, who also wants S.T. to design a larger facility for his growing congregation.

Besides the mystery, the romance, the beauty of Oregon, there is more to explore in this story. One, of course, is what is spiritual truth, how does one find it, is it sometimes corrupted, and if so, how to be aware of that corruption, especially when it might be emotionally very pleasing?

Then there is the question of ancestral heritage. Even if we never lived like modern family members, do we still carry in our DNA their truths? How will that impact our lives if we are living in a very different culture? Is, as this hero believes, there  prejudice against those who carry dual heritages?

It's not like the book presents these questions as some kind of class instruction, but more that the questions are entwined in a heated romance between two very different people, but who find out they have more in common than they thought. Romances can be a lot more than just the basic love story at its heart. How and where do people work out the rest of their lives? More critically, in this book, if there is danger out there, how do they survive it?

To read the blurb, free sample, or buy the book:

Hidden Pearl 

 

 

  

Bannister's Way -- contemporary romance

 If you read Desert Inferno, you will know that its hero, Jake Donovan, was sure Rachel O'Brian would fall for the handsome federal agent, sent to help shut down an important, smuggling operation on the border. David Bannister is handsome, blond, smooth, and brave as he tries to protect Jake from an enemy determined to kill him. That effort leads to the federal agent nearly being killed.

Bannister now shows up as a hero in his own book, Bannister's Way, where his assignment, now working for a private detective agency, is to solve a murder in a prestigious liberal arts university, just outside of Portland, Oregon. The local police have found no evidence. An important political man wants this crime solved.

 The book opens when David confronts his ex-wife where he'll be the model for her life drawing class in that university. This has been set up for him by his partner, Richard Vance, as his way to get inside to find evidence of the killer. Karen, who now calls herself Raven, is infuriated as they did not part on good terms. David, wants her back, hence, he has two purposes in taking the assignment and solving the murder is not highest on the list. 

However, he has no idea that a life drawing class involves nudes. He and his partner have enjoyed playing pranks on each other. David does not find this one humorous, but the only way out of doing it would be to give up this long-shot chance to get back with his ex, as well as find the motive of the killer-- a way to solve the crime with no physical evidence left behind. 

As with many books in the contemporary series, Romance with an Edge, a few characters pop up from an earlier book. This book though has many elements in it, all part of how life can be complicated -- to say the least.

Because I had taken art as a minor in college, I was familiar with life drawing classes. I also, have had an interest in art history, for how forgeries complicate that world. Having been a sculptor myself, with a lot of fired clay figures in my life as evidence, writing about a heroine, who did that work, added to the fun (the image alongside here is my digital painting with one of my sculptures being worked on Raven's stand).

Writing about a long-estranged couple, but where the sparks were still there added to this creation, which is fiction as is the fine art college. That house on the river though, that was real as I stayed in one like it when I was a kid and swam in that river. 

I'd mention all the tropes, which they say can attract readers (like friendship between two bros), and there are many, most off the lists, but I think are relevant to how detective work happens, art is created, people are treated or should be, and finally the beauty of that part of Oregon.

Since one reviewer at Amazon didn't care for the title, I should mention here that it fit David, who was known as a headstrong, risk taker--- one of the things Raven had disliked about him was a belief, it all had to be his way. David has emotionally grown since those early years, but his stubborn determination to do what he sees as right is still part of him and again could cost him his life-- hence the title that could not be changed. :) 

Check out the link to the book where you can read a free sample as well as an extended blurb. 

Bannister's Way 

 

Desert Inferno -- contemporary romance

image we took in 2011 on one of our desert hikes. The rattler is not in the book, but it is a symbol of the danger that is.

 

Next in my series, Romances with an Edge, is a contemporary romance where I wrote the first draft in the 1990's for the sheer satisfaction of creating it. I didn't think whether it was salable as back then, I wrote a lot of my contemporaries because I had read others; then wondered what would I write if I did them.

Desert Inferno broke one cardinal rule I had seen in most romance novels of that time. The hero was not handsome, not in his eyes or in those of many he arrested. Jake Donovan was a border patrolman and worked the desert along the rugged land between Arizona and Mexico to arrest those committing crimes and turn back those with no right to enter the United States. 

Even then, it was not popular with many people, but he had come from a difficult upbringing and chose this as his way to contribute. As backstory, his brother was in prison when this story begins. He chose the other way, and Jake had helped put him there for his crimes.

Back to writing, when the option to be an indie writer arose, the books took some changes to fit the time (communicating had changed a lot in those years. I brought out the first in 2012, it was Desert Inferno, which opens with the heroine, Rachel O'Brian, a successful artist with a career painting Southwest landscapes, many of her works in prestigious galleries.

The reader meets her when she has gone out from her family's ranch on the border, to do a plein air painting-- alone on the desert with her paints and her faithful truck, who she has named Matilda, (I by the way, never have named a vehicle, but I knew some did).

Action begins when she sees movement, believes it might be a person in trouble. She grabs a canteen, her gun, and walks out to see if help is needed.  She does know the dangers of this land. Assistance might have been earlier, but now the man is dying and soon dead. The desert can be deadly for the unaware.

Back at her ranch, she notifies the police that she needs someone to come out. The one who gets the notice is already on the border and shows up to assess what happened. It is Jake Donovan. This is the beginning of a beauty and the beast type story, though she does not see her beast as he sees himself or even as others see him.

Click on the link to get the free sample of how this begins and the flavor or the book.

The problem with this book, once I wanted to bring it out, was a cover. There were simply no male models that fit what I saw Jake as. Easy to get the beauty of the story in an image, but not the kind of man without perfect features and yet who has charisma, power, and the kind of energy that was attractive to many others, especially women.

I finally solved the cover problem with this image that does not show his face, but does that body she admires so much. It hints at the violence with the lightning.

Desert Inferno at Amazon

 With their very different upbringings, figuring out what would work for a relationship, where only one wants it, takes some time. Meanwhile, Jake has an enemy out to destroy him-- an enemy not safe for Rachel either. The ranch she has been raised on with her single father was in earlier historic romances in Winds of Change.

There is a lot of the desert in the book because of my love of it, not ignoring the dangers it can present, especially in wilderness. I also called Border office in Nogales, Arizona, to make sure I was keeping that part accurate for its time 2000. Being a painter myself, Rachel's part was easy to write. 

With twists and turns in the story, it kept the book interesting for me to see all this couple went through to get a happily ever after (you know, with romances, that's part of the deal for readers-- unlike how life too often works out...). 

Because I enjoy writing more than a couple, other characters crop up, including family, but always the romance is central-- again part of the deal with this genre. 

Moon Dust

  created by Elena Ray & purchased at CanStock

Before I get to the gist of this blog, I have to say, relating to Iran and nuclear weapons-- I believe that given their current regime, they should be blocked from such weapons. I do not know if the recent attack on their facilities will do that, knowing there can be suitcase nukes, I do not know if that can be stopped. I know the US, nor other nations have not used these bombs since WWII. I think most nations who had them felt it would be destructive to all humankind to use them. If nukes become part of modern warfare, I think we as a human race are done for. Let's hope others value life more than killing. Sadly, not sure that's true...

 .....

If you are a creative person, who takes the work seriously, seeing it as a career, you already understand how the marketing of it goes. If you have had success whether in what are called the fine arts or writing, you've seen the pressure to keep doing what you saw working through sales or praise. 

Why mention this now? Because I have a set of contemporary romances that have had a hard time getting even readers, ones who liked my historicals, to give these a try. I guess they didn't see the danger, intensity, relationship problems could be as strong in a set of characters living ordinary lives and then beset with black swan events that changes everything.

When I got the website, I did not feel the covers for these contemporaries, some with connecting characters, and some without, suited the stories with various dynamics to what each character was experiencing. Once I got the covers right, we asked the website creators to add this series at the bottom. After a few confusions of terms, we got what was wanted and I like it a lot. While the website gives the general idea, I think, the list of books is better. 

Rain Trueax Books

What I intend to write in the blogs for a while will be why contemporary stories were of interest to me. Maybe they won't bring with them original fans of earlier historicals books, but maybe new readers. Either way, succeed or not, I believe in them. Each offers challenges for characters and readers. It starts with Moon Dust. 

The book begins with a woman facing divorce-- not exactly romance territory but can be part of relationships where they no longer seem to be working. 

She sees no hope for a solution since her husband, a high school principal in inner city schools, avoids emotional confrontations.

He is facing his own set or problems with those wanting their way where it comes to teaching. He is blindsided by his wife wanting a divorce and this is where this romance begins. Two people, still in love but cannot meet each other's needs.

Who would think a high school principal would be a hero, but most doubting that have no idea of the complex problems faced in,
especially, inner cities.

As the couple work through their difficulties, with the heroine an interior decorator, there are secondary complications like a youth leader who has been brainwashing the youths he wants to use as an army to change the culture. 

Moon dust comes into the story as a kind of fairy tale of how culture can also be changed but by love and attention to others-- sometimes just hearing what they say.

Romances might seem simple stories; but in reality, they can deal with many often complex emotional needs. Maybe that's not appealing to all readers, but when it is, meet the challenge to learn maybe something more as to what others face. Often, not what we expected.

 

Currently only available on Amazon: 

Moon Dust

 

 

 

 

 

 

Acquiring a Webpage.

 One thing that has worked out amazingly well, was the offer we saw from a company that creates websites; something I have never had out of not knowing how to do it. Well, PI Webworks knows how and did a fantastic job. Some of what they did, I did not realize would be so important. Well, I believe it now. 

The link for this website is alongside here, but I wanted to say more about what has pleased  me so much with their work. At this point, it's not finished but that's not due to them. It's because I wanted new covers for my contemporary romances, which are based in the West of today. When I first brought these books out, they'd been written from the 1970s, up into the 2000s. To make the earliest ones fit modern times , took a year, 2011 to bring them up to date. You only realize how much things had changed during those years, when you edit the way we communicated.

 

I thought it'd be fun to put one of those books, written in the 1970s, here as a demonstration of how books evolve. When I first wrote this story of a rodeo romance set in Pendleton, Oregon, I typed it out with the usual corrections made with white-out. I stuffed it into a box from which paper had come, and never submitted it anywhere.

It was set in 1974, about when I wrote it, because I knew a lot about rodeo then, but practically nothing about it today. Resetting books works with many as it doesn't matter about the main stories. Where it comes to rodeo, rules change, and it changes the stories. It's the only one, aside from historicals where resetting the time would have mattered.

When I got interested in the option of being an independent writer, I dug it out from under the bed. It was all there except the last three or four pages, the climax lol. How could I have lost them? Well, I had to think long and hard what I had originally written. That was just the beginning of writing it all again, this time on a computer, and editing it multiple times in the future. 

As I said, communications have changed so much and maybe will even more. With more edits, the essence of this book stayed the same regarding young love and its pitfalls especially with the drama of rodeo, and two people coming from very different backgrounds. The last time I edited, it, I added an epilogue for how it worked out for those two and where they ended up. Were their dreams fulfilled or lost? That's the fun of writing. 

How to buy it will be in the website if I can get the contemporaries added. For now, it's on Amazon: Luck of the Draw.

Because the contemporaries came out, most of them in 2012, I had no clue how to help readers find them. They have since fallen into Amazon's black hole, to disappear to an average search. I believe in them for their characters and the reason each was written. As I have said, I don't follow popular themes for romances, which might be a mistake in terms of marketing, but I believe in it where it comes to increasing my own creativity.

So, hopefully we can get Romances with an Edge added to the webpage, leaving only the three Diablo Canyon novellas not there. And, of course, the books I have yet to write, the ones churning around in my head.

 Here is the URL for the webpage: Rain Trueax Books to see the creative collaboration that led to a place for potential readers to find the books and maybe increase their own creativity.

 And for those needing a website for many kinds of businesses, check out what  PI Webworks offers. I totally trusted them as Period Images is where I've gotten many of the images for heroes and heroines.  To me, they have always seemed honorable and trying to do a good job for writers.

Writing and Emotions

 

While the world has gone on with many issues impacting many lives, mine stays much the same. It's one of the advantages of being old maybe. Some panic regarding that too, of course. Will Social Security continue, Medicare, investments, pensions, how about bank accounts? And the always reliable thing to fret over-- will crime hit my street or my family? 

For a writer, it's not hard to escape into other worlds, ones we created, and have some control over. If a black swan hits my characters, I am there to deal with it. Of course, there is the nervousness that always goes with-- what will be the next sentence or did that make sense for the characters to do? At least though it's something I have some control over... kind of. It takes me into an imaginary world and out of the one so many people are flipping out over.

With the books I have written (30 at this point), most are novel length with a few exceptions that were novellas. With one series, eight Arizona western historicals, set between 1883 and 1905, I ran into trouble with changing their titles one too many times. I have earlier written how that happened due to not reading Amazon's emails with new rules regarding title changing. Oops.

What I hadn't realized then was that when Amazon pulled my books or I did, they would also disappear from readers' devices. Ack!  I have notified those who had earlier purchased these books, that I'd send them the new versions, when they came out, at no cost to them. 

Except for it doing that to readers, there was an advantage for me. I could edit and improve the stories, adding more scenes that I saw would be beneficial. I was in no hurry to bring them back out after having all eight to do. I still didn't know better ways to promote them. Another drawback was I lost all their reviews. Nothing I could do about that. Getting new reviews has been difficult to impossible as they came out. Many readers don't like to do reviews. 

Today, with the five I now have out, with their new series name, Winds of Change, I still have had no idea how to promote. Marketing is not something I am good at. With the new versions, their titles were either totally changed or tweaked to satisfy Amazon rules. Never again not reading emails from Amazon.

I actually enjoyed the editing and had them also edited by Ranch Boss, who is good at looking to the masculine side of what happens. Men are an important part of my stories and usually have a point of view. Ranch Boss also does the technical side of publishing and running the few ads we run for books, some of which have never had an ad, hence the Amazon black hole is their fate. 

The historical novels ran 80,000+ to 100,000+ words. They have improved covers to fit their new titles. I had esited five of them last spring. Because of our being in no hurry to bring them back out, I was in no hurry to edit the next three. 

The two novellas, which I had originally seen as being better if shorter, because so many readers today like fast reads. Except, as I edited them, I was dissatisfied with the length of their stories, felt there was more to tell. I had the same feeling regarding their covers. They were pretty enough, but I wanted the lovers on the covers. 

That presented a problem, in the main sites I have been using, there are very few images of middle-aged or older people. The sites mostly go for younger models. Fortunately, several sites, which I had first bought into, did have older faces possible to use. I won't go into details here, as that's not what the blog about, but I got my couples, the first one below here. It's now a book long enough to be a novel, but not as long as the other novels in this series. I though was able to bring to the book the additions that added to my interest in writing it-- and hope it will for readers, whenever we figure out how to let them know. *s*

The images on the cover came from one of ours and others I had purchased. On the title page, credit is always given as to from where the pieces have come.

When enlarging a book, I had earlier published as a novella, I ran into an aspect of writing, that readers might also experience. How the scenes, the chapters and their emotions can impact our own lives. I don't always have that happen when I create characters, but maybe because these were older, I related more to their issues.

For me, the hardest emotionally can be when I need to have a very nice, even beloved, character die. i might know it would happen, even should, to feel right for the story, but it's still hard. The most satisfying, emotionally, is when love works out, maybe a wedding, but more important is when the couple commit themselves to each other. 

One thing I never do is kill off a pet or a horse/donkey/mule. I don't even like to read books or watch films that do that. Yes, it also happens in life, but emotionally, I don't want to live with the pathos. If I have to accept a beloved animal has died of old age, it will happen between books. I'm not saying it makes for superior writing. It's just how the emotions work for me-- positive and negative.

Next blog, I'll write about the second enlarged, novella. These two couples do know each other but their romances are five years apart. There are important differences despite similar ages. The cultural times are similar, but the four characters have different economic levels and pasts. 

For this one, Rose's Gifts, both hero and heroine had been in the three books ahead of theirs. They were not, at least in my thinking, a couple that others might expect to fall in love. That's the fun of being a writer, who is open to such possibilities. I've written before about the enjoyment for me of writing a series and that all came to play with this book, more a "relationship novel' probably than a generic romance for the issues that arose.

For more about Rose's Gifts, check out the link for the blurb and the free sample. I especially like the cover now, as bringing an older couple to a story was a challenge but also fun. Their experiences and expectations, through lifetimes, were woven into the plot.

This link is to Amazon, but alongside here are the Universal Links, for those who prefer to buy from other sites.

Rose's Gifts for Kindle 

 

 

 

Hate: Where Does it Lead?

 image purchased from CanStock.

After writing about love in how it impacts life and my books, it seemed logical to look at its opposite and how does it impact life and fiction. What is the opposite of love? Some have claimed it's fear but I think it's hate. I thought it'd be easy to write about hate. Not so fast.

First of all, I have never personally felt hate for anyone or anything. I thought about this, long and hard after I decided to write about it. I am not sure I ever had anyone hate me either. If they did, I didn't know it. I do experience dislike and some claim that is on its way to hate. If it is, I never let it go that far on a personal level. I also don't worry too much if someone dislikes me unless they would take it to a physical level.

So what makes someone go to the point of hate? I see examples of it happening a lot in what I read is going on in the world and my own country. When people kill strangers, is that a product of hate? Do wars come out of hate, maybe of one nation for another. How about terrorism? Or even saying bad things about another, who may not be personally known but who the person hates? Does emotional abuse come out of hate?

Every so often, we read of a husband or wife killing their partner. How does love turn to hate or was it ever love? Was it possibly narcissism?  Using the pretense of love to get what one wants from another? We do see that a lot with frauds, but does that come out of the perpetrator's hate?

I looked for definitions of hate and found extreme dislike, among a few others, possible synonyms. What makes someone or even a whole nation go from dislike to the point of killing what they now hate? Or even someone resembling that object of hatred?

Probably I won't come up with defining hate, other than a recommendation. Do not let dislike turn to hate. Hate is generally more damaging to the hater than to the one they hate. I believe, like with love, hate is an internal feeling where one can enrich someone's soul and the other eat it up until they become effectively soulless.

If someone moves to hate from dislike, can they go back? I believe so when they realize hate is bad for themselves and the world. Unfortunately, some find hate empowering and don't want to go back to what I'd call the light and a healthier view of life. But if they wish to get rid of their hate, first stop going where hate is sold as a virtue. Beware of pundits who might claim they care about others, but who constantly spew anger and rage. Also avoid such people or groups. Look for where love, which is not remotely a weak emotion, is taught and expressed. You can't be fed one thing and hope to project another.

Where it comes to my writing, I often have villains in my books but rarely go very much into what turned them into one. I don't go into their backstories as I do with other characters. There was an exception in two of my novels. The character was in Beyond the Broken Road where he felt abused and constantly blamed others for whatever went wrong.. He returned in The Beckoning Flame where his hate and self serving (as he thought anyway) behavior had gone to another level entirely. That beckoning flame can be for good or not good. We decide what to follow. Sometimes, I think there can come a time when there is no further choice. The hater has lost any desire to change.

Next Saturday's blog will be out of a chapter showing how a flame that beckons us can lead to positive or negative results-- both for what love can do and unfortunately hate.

 

what love is

When writing romances, it's part of the deal to care about relationships and the subject of love itself. With a romance, the requirement is a happily ever after-- in short, it has to work out in the end. An example would be Pride and Prejudice where however unlikely it might seem, they're going to be with each other at the end of the book. 

image purchased from Deposit Photos.

With love stories, this is not necessarily the case. An example of that would be Gone with the Wind. One might hope he'd come back but didn't seem likely when the story ended.

Romances are fantasies, not to say love stories cannot also be, but one is satisfying even when it might not feel realistic. Still, does it seem believable that this couple would fall in love to begin or did the writer just throw them together and tell readers that it happened. The best romances make the reader believe, yep, it could make sense. 

I wrote one of my contemporary romances where it began with a couple divorcing, which one wanted and one did not. Divorces do sometimes end with a couple back together in what we call real life. Not always and definitely not needed in a love story.

Always when I begin a romance, I have in mind at least one of the protagonists. Then who seems likely for that happily ever after, with, of course, some major glitches along the way. That is required or there is no interest. When I come up with the second protagonist, I have to believe it's more than seeing each other and bam. If I don't believe in it, the readers will not.

Music speaks a lot about love-- sometimes as a romantic fantasy and sometimes with sad endings. I particularly like this song from the 80s where it speaks of someone wanting to know love, wanting to find someone to teach them.

I want to know what love is

Here's the thing about love. It's within us. Relationships in romances can begin many ways, from friends to lovers or even enemies to lovers, but the real life deals, which last. love for each other, and not in the romantic sense of the word but more the in depth caring for that person and what is good for them as well as one's own self.  

People looking for love in their lives have to be logical as well as emotional. Do I share life goals with that person? Do our backgrounds make it likely that we will understand each other? It can't be just lust, though that might be a beginning. If that's all it is though, don't expect it to last. Real love goes through good and bad times with a desire to work together for a good life. I try to write romances where that seems likely for the protagonists.

Romantic love is lovely in books, soothing to read through dark times, but the kinds of relationships that last take genuine love and that takes the emotion and logic to make it through the dark times-- and I believe all relationships have those. I know something about those long term relationships as I am in one. Not that I don't have dreams that add to what I write.

Choices

This subject began with a dream. I saw three men vying for a post at the Air Force Academy (remember it's a dream and hence does not have to be historically accurate for names or anything). The obnoxious one, with a terrible smile, won the opportunity to get his education there. These were high school age guys btw. 

I woke up thinking how Ranch Boss had done that and lost out to another guy, though he'd gotten close before that happened. I hadn't actually thought of this before; but his choice to try for that school would have meant we'd have never met as we did in our reality. If he had gone elsewhere, both of our lives would have been so different without the same children we later had after marriage. So much would have been different for him especially with likely a career in the Air Force.

I'd have married someone else, as there had been someone else before him, who was still around in an off and on sense. My life though would have not been the same. There'd have been a different family, and it'd be unlikely I'd be typing at this house in Arizona right now. 

Choices are what life is about. Many are tiny. Others big. We often have no idea where a choice will land us. Turn down one road and we get where we're going. Turn the other and some idiot runs as red light. 

Often, we have no idea how choices will impact our future. Marry wrong person and divorce or worse. Marry right person and celebrate over 50 years of marriage. Do we totally know when we make that choice. We try to make it on facts and experience. Sometimes though, it's emotions or even limitations based on our culture.

Writing romances is a lot like that, other than we might have more control over the outcome, but not if the characters dictate the results. I've mentioned how themes play into what we write, followed by a plot to get our story there. Characters are a huge part of that. With that theme, what kind of characters will work with the plot. Will they feel right to us or the later (hopefully) readers.

I do generally have a theme in mind but choosing the right characters, especially the primary protagonists, that's where real thought comes into play. There are several ways the need for a certain type of characters emerge especially in romances. One of the popular tropes is enemies to lovers. I don't use that, but it could work for me when it's two different cultures or tribes-- something outside the couple. When it's though supposed to be between the two of them as enemies to lovers, I don't buy it for what I will read. I think it's a big mistake to write a romance where one person 'fixes' the other. It doesn't encourage healthy ideas for life as it doesn't tend to work out there. People fix themselves, or it doesn't happen from what I've seen.

For my books, sometimes it's friends to lovers. As in, couples who grew up together and then realize-- wow, it's more than friendship (Round the Bend). I have some where the couples broke up and come back together-- or not (Bannister's Way) Mostly, when it's a case of meeting for the first time, physical attraction is a factor. Let's be honest, that begins a lot of so-called real life relationships. It might not be what someone  else regards as good looking (happened in my Desert Inferno) but it's attractive to the smitten one. 

What attracts us in the beginning is not what makes a relationship work. Physical attraction only carries the relationship so far in real life or books. There has to be something else that cause a couple to make it work for a happily ever after. Books need that to satisfy readers. I read a lot of negative reviews for books and that's a big one to irritate a reader.

Ranch Boss and I are very different for how we see things. He's the scientist ,and I'm the artist. When the kids asked once what makes fog. He went into a scientific explanation. I said it's clouds stuck on trees. 

If we didn't respect each other for our differences, that could have been a big problem in our choices, but we did. Something else became important. We want the same things out of our life together, the same kind of life. We just came at our choices different ways. We had another advantage in that we came from similar backgrounds. Different backgrounds can make for interesting stories but also can make for a lot of complexity in what we call real life.

With romances, I think there has to be some similarities and differences for the two primary characters to be believable and interesting. How, as writer, does someone pick those people and then make what they go through work for them. Romances usually have difficulties from outside which could be the black swans of life, a villain, but also those differences between them where compromise has to happen or it's all over-- in fiction or life.

Next blog, I'll discuss some of my characters and how I decided on them as well as how it would make sense they would get a happily ever after, which romances require. I should add-- on only one of my 30 books did my hero and heroine not get that guaranteed happily ever after as I just saw too many problems for them in the future. That book was Sky Daughter. It ended well but with the understanding it might not be permanent due to major lifestyle differences for where they could live or do their life work.

manipulation

 

Something stirred my interest this week (though, it should not have) and finally I realized I had to write about it or it'd not let me go lol. I tend to be that way with a lot of things. If they are on my mind, I can finally go on, once I do whatever the feeling had me needing to do... even when I had other things to do that 'I' regarded as more important.

This one related to a 'trans' group in Norway that decided Aretha Franklin's song, Natural Woman was offensive to trans and they wanted it taken off Spotify, etc. For reasons beyond my understanding, the media picked up the story from what I gather was a 'new' group. The group doubtless knew that and hence tweaked it. The media is so easy to manipulate. I have no idea what Spotify, etc. did about it, but I know what they should have done-- ignored it.

Whether you are sympathetic to trans causes, are trans, this should have been ignored as it's not about trans at all-- not in its message or its timing (came out in 1968). I think they pushed it to get their group known. Maybe it worked and maybe not but wish it would not and wish our media would be less gullible.

I had to listen to the song again as though I remembered the melody, I'd forgotten the words. If that is your case, here's a link to hear it on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jCFzreP1ng

Listen to those words and do you hear anything about a man becoming a woman? You do not, as back then it was far less a 'cause' than it has been recently. But if a man wants to become a woman, does he not want to be a natural woman? 

What the song speaks to is this woman finding someone who makes her feel all she hadn't felt before. She has found the one who brings out the female in her. Could not a trans-woman also feel that way when they had the 'right' person come along? It's about an emotional reaction to loving the right person and what it did to the writer's heartstrings. 

A feminist might disagree with that message-- feeling we should not need someone else (notice song never said male or female lover) to feel all our own inner strength and being. We should do it for ourselves as most recently Miley Cyrus sang about in her new song-- Flowers. I can do it for myself was her message. It is probably the strongest way to be when we don't need someone else, but when we do, is that bad when it's the right person? When other people bring out the best is us, isn't that a good thing?

From Here to There

 

For the holiday season we often put books on sale that relate to it. I added one this year that introduced some of those characters and explained from where they had come. It will stay on sale longer than the others (until January 3, 2023) as it has a different set of purposes. 

From Here to There is the story of two romances-- one told through an old journal and the other alive at the time. It's also the story of a romance for Montana and ranch living. Today, not many know about ranch living as our culture is so urban oriented. That is logical, but it means many have no idea from where their food even comes-- other than the grocery store.

We redid the cover for the book (for the umpteenth time) as it seemed to never quite catch the zeitgeist of the book. It's not easy to capture a book's deeper purpose when it's a romance and a novel (over 90,000+ words). So if you decide, give it a try for 99¢ for another week. It's not like a novella in that there is a LOT more story to it that depicts what that life is like as well as the relationships. Still, I think for those who enjoy love stories, it will satisfy. For a family, as well as two individuals, it teaches something for the characters and the reader!  

It's a fun read. Although it is tough, I "much love" that life, and have lived it many years.

 From Here to There

Holiday Sales

With the holiday season rapidly approaching, we once again have put the books I've written, regarding this time of year, on sale for Kindle at 99¢ each. They'd be free except that is not an option when writing for Amazon and not in Kindle Unlimited. Still 99¢ isn't much for fun reads on what the holiday can mean for people in various relationships.

First comes Diana's Journey-- about a woman who gets a life-rewrite when her husband wants a divorce. She sells what she has, shocks her grown children, and takes off in a small Class C RV with her two chihuahuas to explore places she's only read about. What about Christmas though?  She doesn't even want it to come, but it always does She decides to spend it in Utah, far from where she expects memories could ruin her day-- except, what she finds is the meaning of Christmas when it comes to community and friends-- another rewrite for her life.

Second is not about Christmas, but is included because it introduces the characters where it is. From Here to There -- When a wedding doesn't lead to a marriage but instead to a bride leaving her new husband before he can be one, the story moves to Montana ranch country, and two romances-- one in the past as the bride learns more about love from an old journal and when her groom follows her to the ranch to convince her she made a mistake. Ranch living and Montana are key to this story.

The third was written because I began to think-- how'd it work out for these characters and can the holidays heal family rifts or can its expectations make them worse? The story delves again into the reality of ranch living-- holidays or not. A Montana Christmas --  uses the beauty of Montana against the difficulty of family dynamics. New relationships are developed with others deepening-- will some be totally destroyed?

Diana's Journey and A Montana Christmas  are novellas with  From Here To There a full length novel. It is a romance, the other two are about the healing energy of relationships, holidays, love, and the celebration of the earth's regenerating cycles. 

      There used to be an ability to create links here but whenever I click on that, it sends me to another blog. grrrrrr.  So, below are the books and their links. The first two are novellas, with their correct links behind them. You have to copy paste to make them work given what's going on with my ability to create live links. The last one is a full length novel that introduces the characters in A Montana Christmas. At worst, you can look alongside here where the links will take you to the books... I haven't used Blogger for a while for linking, hence, not sure what's going on. The books are fine though...

Diana's Journey -- https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M5IA26Y

A Montana Christmas -- https://www.amazon.com/Montana-Christmas-Rain-Trueax-ebook/dp/B00AOU0IQ2

From Here to There -- https://www.amazon.com/From-Here-There-Rain-Trueax-ebook/dp/B006PNS7EC

The sale lasts through December 31st.

A lifelong friendship

 by Rain Trueax

Oregon Coast at Yachats

There are things that a person just does not know how to write. Losses are among the hardest of those. Sometimes we prefer to let such times pass without words. Sometimes words are needed.

We have had a long time friendship with a couple that goes back to 1962 (we think) for one of us and him. Fisherman and Ranch Boss met as freshmen through a combination of working for a chemistry professor at the college and a fly fishing class. The class required taking some fishing trips. Twist their arms. From that time, they formed a friendship that lasted until he died this week. 

In the fall of '62, I met what would be my future husband from my making up a dance class due to schedule change. We were pretty instantly attracted with dating, though not going seriously for a few months at least-- neither of us remember the exact date. I though, of course, met his fishing friend through him and later his girlfriend, Diane.

The relationships processed though the usual stages from engagements to our wedding in September-- theirs in June. That summer, we got together at their town apartment to discuss future plans since both men had applied at University of Arizona to work and study for a Master's Degree. In Tucson, we found an apartment complex that suited us all (can't remember who found it either). 

From Oregon, we caravaned down the small roads of Oregon, Idaho, Utah, to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon where we shared a cabin along with our small black cat, Sheba.

 Once in Tucson, life settled in very comfortable routine. They'd go to class and after a while, Diane and I would meet every morning at either her apartment or mine for coffee and to talk for a while on politics, culture, life, art-- not always agreeing but always stimulating. Then we'd break for the day while she painted and I wrote. 

 

A painting Diane did down there and gave us for Christmas.

We each had a small patio, which they did theirs one way and ours another. The four of us played in the desert washes, even took an Easter break to rent a log cabin on the Rim (along with our black cat, of course), which led to this painting, which we have in Oregon.

Diane painted this one in the White Mountains on that trip. We bought it at a price she generously made possible for what we could afford.

Eventually, the four of us headed back north for jobs-- us first to Oregon-- later, them to Washington. We continued to get together as our babies were born. We shared interests and differences. It worked. Then he also got a job in Oregon which led to more opportunities to get together. For years, it led to sharing cabins on the Oregon Coast, going for hikes, and a lot of dinners together. And then he got sick and...

When you lose one half of a partnership like that, it's a hole out of your heart. You basically have shared your lives and done so much together-- always free to have other friends and other interests.We didn't expect it to end this way until we learned Fisherman had ALS. It is a disease that isn't easy to diagnose in the beginning. Later it meant an inevitable end. He fought it though as bravely as he did everything else. Finally it ended his life but not his spirit. He smiled to the end.

He was a good, strong friend. He contributed to the community by his volunteer efforts to help more people find joy in nature and fishing. He was a mountain climber, part of rescue teams, a scientist his whole life, and of course, always a fisherman to the very end as he shared its satisfaction and joy with others-- especially his family, which was always at the heart of his life. 

Sometimes saying someone was a good man just isn't enough to describe all that means. He expanded his life with travel and always with his life partner, Diane, with whom he shared a long marriage from being virtually kids to old age. They were the kind of partnership; where he encouraged and helped her with her art as she did him with all his outdoor interests. To say he will be missed isn't to say enough. It's a loss but also a blessing to have had him in our lives.

I decided to  create a small video of the photos we had with them. I don't have all the pictures I would have liked as most are still in Oregon but this represents part of a long friendship. Three of us go on, but he will always be part of who we are.

https://youtu.be/lho-dgzDnJs

 

We were no longer in Arizona when Diane painted this one. Years later I had told her my regret at not having one of her big cactus paintings. It turned out one of her family members was redecorating and this one didn't work. We bought it. Later we brought it back to Arizona where it is hung in the living room.