Thursday, October 10, 2024

The beauty of fine china

 


I've been deep in the research rabbit hole for a new series I'm writing. The first book will release in time for Christmas.

One of the things I spent considerable time looking at for this story was fine china. 

The story takes place in 1892 in a newly constructed mansion. The "lord of the manor" has very distinct tastes. After searching and searching for a china pattern I could envision him choosing, I gave up and described one from my imagination.

But it was still fun to look at pictures of antique dishes. 


I loved the pink flowers on these Limoges A. Lanterniern plates.


The rosebuds on this Aynsley China, England delicate bone china are so delicate and pretty, but not what my hero would have in his house.

He'd go for something blue.

This W H Grindley - England transferware china dish in the Teresa pattern wasn't exactly what I was looking for, even though it was blue.



The dishes that seemed the most like my hero aren't antique, although they certainly were designed to look that way. Andrea By Sadek created The Vanderbilt Service. It's so gorgeous. If the flourishes on this were silver instead of gold, and all the flowers were pink rosebuds, it would be exactly how I envision the china in the story. 

Do you have a favorite china pattern?




Just for fun, I hope you'll download this little gift I'm offering. It includes a sweet historical short story, a recipe and some other fun goodies. 




USA Today Bestselling Author Shanna Hatfield grew up on a farm where her childhood brimmed with sunshine, hay fever, and an ongoing supply of learning experiences.

Shanna creates character-driven romances with realistic heroes and heroines. Her historical westerns have been described as “reminiscent of the era captured by Bonanza and The Virginian” while her contemporary works have been called “laugh-out-loud funny, and a little heart-pumping sexy without being explicit in any way.”

When this award-winning author isn’t writing or testing out new recipes (she loves to bake!), Shanna hangs out at home in the Pacific Northwest with her beloved husband, better known as Captain Cavedweller.

Tuesday, October 8, 2024

Nothing Says Romance Like A Sleigh Ride

By Kimberly Grist



While researching my new release, A Sleigh Ride for Georgia, I was reminded of "One Horse Open Sleigh" by James Lord Pierpont. The sleighing song was first published in 1857 and originally written for Thanksgiving. It became associated with winter and Christmas in the 1860s and 1870s. In the 1880s, it was featured in various parlor songs and college anthologies. Its popularity increased as the song became known as "Jingle Bells."



https://americanheritageusa.com/new-designs-and-images/jingle-bells-sheet-music-open-sleigh-ride/


To a potential mail-order bride and native to Tennessee, Georgia is thrilled when the man she is corresponding with entices her with the promise of sleigh rides. “My heart is full as I dream of experiencing our courtship in person. I look forward to the sleigh ride you promised, where we will speed across the snowy landscape underneath a thousand stars sparkling against the midnight sky.”

She can well imagine snuggling underneath multiple blankets and embracing the serene beauty of the snow-white fields as they make their way to her new home. The ride is smooth, the landscape looks bright and clean, and the jingling sleigh bells make the ride feel magical. 

Sleigh runners gliding over the snow traveled quickly without making a sound. Horse harness bells were introduced to warn others on the road about the approach of a sleigh. The use of bells was considered so important that many states passed laws requiring their use. Eventually, sleigh bells became a symbol of status and wealth, and they were used as decorations on horse harnesses and tack to display the owner's wealth. Some vendors also used bells on conveyances to signal they were in the area, much like our modern ice cream truck.

https://www.authorsden.com/ArticlesImage/83745.jpg


Like Georgia, we may consider riding in a horse-drawn sleigh romantic. Still, in their day, their usage was primarily utilitarian, necessary to get around on business or errands or to church on snow-covered roads. An essential tool, sleighs had to be removed from storage when the snow began falling; in Spring, they were washed and stored away. An early winter visit to the blacksmith or farrier was necessary for your horse or team because studs were needed on horseshoes to get through the snow.


https://www.northcountryatwork.org/archive-items/240/

New Release: A Sleigh Ride for Georgia
Free on Kindle Unlimited

Abandoned as a child, Georgia knows first-hand the results of chasing rainbows, searching for the proverbial pot of gold. That same lure called her father to California, leaving her to grow up in a children’s home. Even though she knows that there is little value in depending on anyone but herself, buried in her heart is the dream of her own happily ever after – a husband and family. Desperate, she accepts the advice of her pastor and applies to a matchmaking agency. If only someone would look past her inadequacies and see her potential, she would devote herself to ensuring his happiness and love him wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, she is out of time.

“Who was it that said desperate times demand desperate measures? The Lord forgive me if I’m wrong, but the next letter I write, I’m omitting the fact that I limp.” 


https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D32LX394

Livery owner Joshua Jenkins admittedly enjoys horses more than people. Since his father and stepmother’s premature death, his focus expanded to caring for his younger sisters. The last thing he needs is a wife. Unfortunately, his family thinks differently and interceded on his behalf.

"It was my family's idea to invite this woman to marry me under false pretenses. Now, they need to help get me out of this mess. I don't have time for romance. I'm sure not about to traipse around on a star-gazing sleigh ride. My sleighs are for renting out to the locals or hauling heavy loads. The only time I venture out in the winter at night is for an emergency."

Connect with Kimberly:
Fans of historical romance set in the late 19th -century will enjoy stories combining, History, Humor, and Romance, emphasizing Faith, Friends, and Good, Clean Fun.











Thursday, October 3, 2024

My Recent Trip to Columbia State Park

 

Ah, Columbia, California. It's one of my favorite places to go! Located in the California Gold Country, Columbia State Park is actually a town that has been preserved and has restaurants, two hotels, a number of shops and even a theater with live performances! It also has a grocery store that is like a Trader Joe's in the guise of an old fashioned mercantile.

You can mine for gold in the park, watch candle makers, blacksmiths, and other artisans of the mid 1850s. Store employees dress in 1850s attire, and are as friendly as can be. Enjoy some lunch and tea at Columbia Kate's Tea House. You can even take a stage coach ride!


I've set books in Columbia and of course had to do the research of the town. Most of the town burned down twice! So if you go, you'll notice all the brick buildings. There are also a few Victorian homes in town and miner's cabins. After going through the park, you can toddle up the road to Sonora. A much bigger town that also retains many historic buildings and is full of fun shops and restaurants. Unlike the tiny town of Columbia, Sonora is a town with a population of almost five thousand people with many amenities. 

Columbia hosts a variety of events throughout the year like their Harvest Festival, Boo Boulevard, a Spooky Street Dance Party, Victorian Christmas Feast, a Christmas Equestrian Parade, Easter Parade and Egg Hunt, a Fourth of July celebration and more! 

Columbia was once known as the "Gem of the Southern Mines" and by 1853 was one of the largest cities in California. Many a gold rush settlement was destroyed due to fire or over time, but the heart of Columbia still stands. 

So the next time you're in Northern California, take a gander at the quaint little town of Columbia, you'll be glad you did!



Wednesday, October 2, 2024

Look what our authors published in September!


 

 

 

 


 


 

 

 

 Our authors have been busy writing your next favorite story.

Look what we published in September!

 

A Sleigh Ride For Claire (Sleigh Ride)

By Jo-Ann Roberts

       He was the most stubborn and prideful man she’d ever met!
       She was a busybody who stuck her nose in his business at every turn!
      With Christmas on the horizon, Claire McAllister has far too much to do to entertain dreams of a husband and family. Even if she feels inclined to help Lincoln Wyse outwit his three mischievous young daughters, it's impossible to imagine the handsome widower seeing her as anything but a scolding schoolteacher.
      Even though the pretty schoolteacher never turned a favorable eye to him, Linc Wyse’s heart skipped a beat whenever she pinned him with her mesmerizing green eyes. Beautiful or not, Claire McAllister was a meddling spinster who placed judgments on him and his family.
      Yet, neither one can imagine how a magical Christmas Eve sleigh ride will open their eyes to love…or how the Lord will awaken their faith and hope.

Release Date: September 2, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/Sleigh-Ride-Claire-ebook/dp/B0CXHXVQQF

 

Miss Verity: Sweet Historical Western Romance (The Brides of Fiddler's Gap Book 9)

By Kit Morgan

A betrayed young woman
A chivalrous storekeep
And... spies?!

      Verity Hinkle has never felt like she belonged. Partly because she was adopted, and there was the fact she was made to work like a slave in her own home. But then the unspeakable happens, and her father tries to marry her off to a beast of a man. Thank goodness his plan was thwarted by James Ruggles and his friends. Now, ensconced in the Ruggles' household, would her life ever be normal again? Worse, who could she trust? Certainly not her family!
     After rescuing Verity Hinkle from a lecherous man, James Ruggles is determined to protect her from danger, even if he has to marry her to do it! And so he does. But Verity is under the impression that the marriage is a farce, a means to an end. And once the danger has passed, the marriage will be dissolved. James must convince her otherwise, but how can he when she's been so viciously betrayed by her own family and trusts no one? Find out in this sweet, tender romance!

Release date: September 6, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D2KS1GZ3

 

Hotfooting from Hawthorne: Pioneer Brides of Rattlesnake Ridge Book 15

By Marisa Masterson

A woman with trouble hot on her trail and a child at her side. A man who handles his Colt revolver like a shootist.
      Ginny Maxwell has one child left as she waits at a train depot in Hawthorne, Nevada. The others left one by one as the orphan train traveled farther west. She wanted to believe each had found homes where they would be clothed and fed. She could not hope for them to be loved. Growing up as a foundling, she knew adults rarely wasted affection on orphans.
      While she and the unclaimed orphan wait for the eastern bound train that would take them back to Chicago, their lives change with one slash of a shiny knife. A man stabs a lone woman waiting on the platform. At Ginny's gasp, he realizes she and the little boy have seen him.
      A frantic race to escape begins, and desperation sends them into the back of a tarp-covered wagon. Hiding there, she hears the whistle. They missed their train and are stuck with a killer on their trail.

Release date: September 9, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D49LQR1F

 

A Sleigh Ride For Grace (Sleigh Ride)

By Linda Carroll-Bradd

      Grace Darton believes family is more important than anything…even an attentive beau. Three years ago, she broke off a courtship to tend her ailing aunt and assume management of her boardinghouse. Although her life might lack romance, she and her younger sister, Kerrie, strive to provide a family atmosphere for their boarders. But is it really enough?
      Darach MacLean thought he had his future planned—he and his love, Grace, were to marry and move to Golden City for him to attend the Colorado School of Mines. But she stayed behind. As a new graduate, he returns to Spur Springs to either win her back or purge her from his life forever. His sweet Grace has become a successful businesswoman and is being wooed by the mayor. Can Darach find the way back into her heart or has he returned too late?

Release date: September 16, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D34RFGGM

 

A Sleigh Ride For Holly (Sleigh Ride)

By P. Creeden

     A nanny whose children have grown finds herself without prospects for another job. At twenty-five years old, spinster is the best description for her now. But will a letter and an invitation for a sleigh ride change her life?
    *More description coming soon*

Release Date: September 23, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D344YDTG

 

Wyatt's New Bride: Mountain Men & Mail-Order Brides

By Zina Abbott

     Wyatt Holt gave up searching for gold. Instead, he found work as a lumberjack to satisfy the demand for timber supports in the new Tuolumne County quartz mines and lumber for the nearby towns.  He is tired of sharing barracks-style quarters with other men. With more men bringing families to the logging camps and living in company-provided cabins, he begins his search for a wife. Guided by the most unlikely of matchmakers, he corresponds with, and then sends for, a bride.

     Following the murder of her husband, to provide for herself and her young daughter, Rosalie Barker turns her home into a boardinghouse for the local gold miners. As the two-year anniversary of her late husband’s death approaches, on the night of a miner’s meeting, three of her boarders and two strangers—one seriously wounded—enter her home just as she prepares to bar the door. They beg her to care for the unconscious man. She had not been able to help her late husband. Can she keep this man alive long enough for the doctor in Sonora ten miles away to brave winter weather, swollen creeks, and bad roads to arrive and take over?

     Between being shot during a meeting gone bad, no longer able to support the bride he sent for, and uncertain if he will heal well enough to work again as a lumberjack, is there is any hope for a loving wife and family in Wyatt’s future?

Release date: September 26, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CW19ZPG9


A Sleigh Ride For Georgia (Sleigh Ride)

By Kimberly Grist

      Abandoned as a child, Georgia knows first-hand the results of chasing rainbows, searching for the proverbial pot of gold. That same lure called her father to California, leaving her to grow up in a children’s home. Even though she knows that there is little value in depending on anyone but herself, buried in her heart is the dream of her own happily ever after – a husband and family. Desperate, she accepts the advice of her pastor and applies to a matchmaking agency. If only someone would look past her inadequacies and see her potential, she would devote herself to ensuring his happiness and love him with her whole heart. Unfortunately, she is out of time.
       “Who was it that said desperate times demand desperate measures? The Lord forgive me if I’m wrong, but the next letter I write, I’m omitting the fact that I limp.”

Release Date: September 30, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D32LX394

 



 Not all of our authors make their books available on pre-order. However, for those who do, those advance sales go a long way toward boosting their sales rankings. 

Here are future releases:

 

October Pre-orders:

 

Mail-Order Blacksmith: Honorable Husbands

P. Creeden

Honorable Husband Series.
Even independent women can need a helping hand now and then. More than muscles and rugged good looks, this bride needs a blacksmith and only the honorable need apply...but is that what they'll get?

Mail-Order Blacksmith
With the passing of her father in the war, Sadie Cahill finds herself running the town’s livery on her own. A falling out with her blacksmith leaves her in desperate need. But is she desperate enough to marry one?

Release date: October 10, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CQ2K4DC4

 

Lily Lassoes the Lawman (Uncertain Sweethearts Book 3)

By Marisa Masterson

Return to Fox Creek with this latest addition to the Uncertain Sweethearts series!

     He followed a hunch and found a woman worth loving. Too bad she had walked on the wrong side of the law one time too many.
      Lily Calhoun loved two things in this world—her son and her café. She had a chance at a fresh start, a clean slate with a new name. Lillian Perkins was gone.
       She had loved poorly and lost. She would not risk her heart again. Or so she thought. Then he came to town.
       Travis Strickland had a tough time believing what his eyes told him. The beautiful café owner was Dirk Perkins’ widow. He could not credit this innocent-appearing woman as being someone who had traveled with a murderous gang of thieves.
      No matter what his mind argued, Travis knew the truth. Lily was the woman who had disappeared with a trunk filled with stolen gold. All too soon, he expected Perkins’ brother would find her and reclaim the gold.
      When Perkins appeared, he would be in Fox Creek to arrest him. He was a duly sworn United States marshal. Somehow, he would clear Lilly of any charges and pin the blame on the gang’s leader.
      What begins as a job for Travis quickly heats up into attraction and love. Can he save Lily and her son from the monster who is hot on her trail? Will her mistake as a fifteen-year-old shatter Lily’s chance at lasting love?

Release date: October 15, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D6RSTPD3

 

Lemon Cookies by Lisbeth: Old Timey Holiday Kitchen Book 32

By Zina Abbott

     Much to Elizabeth Jewell’s disappointment, she failed to capture Arnie’s affections. All along, his heart had belonged to her sister. The lemon cookies she prepared for Christmas dessert had been a flop. At least his cousin, Roy, had appreciated the trick she played. In spite of everyone else angry at her for trying to make her sister look bad in an attempt to get her way, thanks to Roy, she survived the Christmas debacle.
     Following Roy’s suggestion, she starts a business making and selling hand pies. First, though, she chooses to shed her reputation of “Little Betsy,” the immature younger Jewell daughter. She informs all that from now on, she is to be addressed as Lisbeth. Determined to become a businesswoman instead of a flighty female focused only on fashion and gossip, she soon finds herself enjoying greater respect and self-esteem. However, she often wonders—will she ever find a man who will love her?
     As the holidays approach, Lisbeth wonders if Roy, still working on a railroad crew, will be able to get off work long enough to join his family and hers for Christmas dinner. Hoping she will see him again, she plans to once more make her lemon cookies. After all, in exchange for him helping her out of the trouble she brought on herself the previous year, she promised that this year she would make a whole batch just for him.

Release date: October 15, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DF6446S6

 

An Outlaw for Christmas: Confederate Widows, Spinsters, and Proxy Brides

By P. Creeden

Southern grace meets Western grit, and love becomes the greatest gift of all.
Join these Southern Belles on a Christmas journey to bridge the North and the South. Pasts fade and futures ignite amidst prairie snowflakes under western skies. Before each love story can unfold, the bride and groom are wed by proxy—having never met. Wounded souls find redemption in the bitter winter winds, and love’s embrace is the gift that warms their hearts. Find tales of hope, healing, and holiday joy as these Southern Belles, left alone by the war’s harsh realities, navigate cultural differences to forge new lives wed to their western, Yankee grooms. Will every heart discover the true spirit of Christmas and defy expectations? Fall in love right along with every star-crossed couple when you immerse yourself in each of these sweet holiday romances today!
Release Date: October 16, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CZ1MSXF2

 

Gunnar's New Bride: Mountain Men and Mail-Order Brides

By Linda Carroll-Bradd

      Logging camp owner Gunnar Hallbjorn has spent the last two years focused on ensuring the business he inherited from his uncle continues succeeding. A recent visit from a newlywed cousin demonstrates how much a wife would add to his bachelor life. He imagines how coming home to a hot meal and pleasant conversation will be better than eating in the camp’s dining hall with two dozen bachelors. As he writes his ad for the matrimonial newspaper, he envisions a demure Scandinavian girl like he remembers from back home.
      Baker Blasa Eberhard struggles to keep a roof over her and her younger brother’s head due to their father’s gambling habit. Faced with an ultimatum from her father to either marry his business associate or someone else because he can only afford to support his son and himself, she enters into a correspondence to become a mail-order bride. Bank agents arrive to take possession of the house, because mortgage is in default. Blasa has no choice but to pawn her mother’s jewelry to buy train tickets to Colorado. How will Mister Hallbjorn react when she shows up on his doorstep? Will he still want to marry when she has her brother in tow?

Release Date: October 31, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D34TW77L

 

November Pre-orders:

 

Custard Pumpkin by Claire: Old Timey Holiday Kitchen Book 34

By Marisa Masterson

      Their joint cause allows them to drift apart. Can a mystery create a bond of love between them?
     For Claire's small German village, it is a black summer. Typhoid hits the townspeople and surrounding farms with a vengeance. With Claire's parents dead, she struggles to know how she will survive.
      When a call for volunteers goes through her part of Germany—a chance to settle in Michigan and Christianize the local tribe—she seizes the opportunity. She hopes to forge a new future--one filled with possibility rather than starvation.
     As a single woman, she must travel as the unpaid servant to the only other couple going from her village, the young preacher Hans Mueller and his wife. Unfortunately, Claire's prospects change radically when the man's wife perishes in the epidemic. The reverend offers marriage as a way for Claire to travel with him. Reluctant but determined, she agrees.
      She and her husband arrive in a new land carrying their old grief. Hans has not left behind his grief for the wife he so recently lost. He throws himself into the work of building the settlement for their community. Claire is at a loss on how to be a wife to a man who does not want one. Instead, she spends her time with women from the Chippewa tribe.
      Mischief and then outright vandalism threatens the settlement. Are the Chippewa—the people Claire views as friends—responsible? What can stop the sudden surge of hate that springs up in the missionary community founded to spread the love of Christ?
      Finally, Claire and Hans are united in a way not even marriage had brought about. They are determined to discover who wants to drive away the German immigrants, but at what cost? Perhaps one or both of their lives.
     Discover how custard pumpkin plays a role in not only bringing peace and forging a bond between the Chippewa and the settlement but also winning the heart of Claire’s groom. Sink into a comfy spot and enjoy this sweet historical romance today.

Release date: November 5, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCT43RHY

 

Ivy: Christmas Quilt Brides Book 18

By Jo-Ann Roberts

     Years ago, Lily Sutton was drawn to the new orphan boy in town. Unfortunately, she soon became the unfortunate victim of Grady Walsh’s mischievous deeds in school.
    Lily is back home in Harmony, Kansas for good but is she willing and able to forgive the boy who made her childhood unbearable?
     Grady Walsh lost his heart to the sweet girl the day she gave him a quilt. Can this boy-turned-man make up for the reckless actions of his youth?
     Or will another steal her away before they have a chance to discover a kind of love that might just heal the pain from the past?

Release date: November 8, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DG4LTGGC

 

Phoebe : Christmas Quilt Brides Book 19

By Zina Abbott

     After Phoebe Wilton’s days as a student at the Calloway Girls’ Academy in New Ponca, Oklahoma Territory, ended, she knew she would not be welcomed home to live with her parents. In recent years, they kept their social and travel calendar busy to the point that they only managed to bring her home one month of the year. Undecided about whether or not she wishes to attend a co-educational college or a normal school to train as a teacher, she accepts the position of teaching assistant at the academy. At least for the present, she continues to live and work with people who appreciate her contributions and with whom she has developed deep friendships.
     Increasingly, Phoebe wonders about her future. One thing she refuses to allow is for her parents to foist her off on a son of one of families in their social set in order advance her father’s business interests and her mother’s social standing. Is she destined to live out her life as a spinster schoolteacher? Or, can she someday hope for love and marriage with a man of her choosing?

Release date: November 15, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DG31SDXD

 

A Rancher for Christmas: Confederate Widows, Spinsters, and Proxy Brides

By Linda Carroll-Bradd

Dunn MacDoughall faces a dilemma more ornery than a stubborn bull. To meet the stipulations of his granddad’s will and receive the deed to his three-thousand-acre Montana ranch, he has to marry by his twenty-eighth birthday. With only four months until the deadline, he resorts to using the services of a matchmaker. He’s desperate enough to put no restrictions on the woman’s background and agrees to a proxy marriage—as long as she arrives before fall roundup.

Ex-cotton heiress, Angelina Beauregard can barely rub two nickels together as a seamstress in post-war Bossier Parish, Louisiana. The war stole her father, brothers, and fiancé, but Angelina is determined its aftermath won’t steal her future. She seeks a proxy marriage with a man far away from her Southern homeland so she can finally get rid of memories that haunt her. But when she arrives and discovers her groom is a Yankee, is Angelina’s heart big enough to accept their fundamental differences?

Release Date: November 20, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0D1DYHV3B

 

 A Surprise for Christmas: Confederate Widows, Spinsters, and Proxy Brides

By Zina Abbott

     Analia Cantrill and what remained of her family fled the South as the Yankees approached South Carolina. They took refuge with her aunt’s family in Baltimore. Following her mother’s death, circumstances all but force Analia out. With nothing left to draw her back to the South, she decides to seek a husband in the West—hopefully one who will leave the difficulties of the War Between the States in the past and accept her situation.

     Jeffrey Holden struggles to overcome his hatred for the Southern rebels responsible for the death of his older brother. After corresponding with several women, some stopped writing after he admitted a war injury now required him to walk with a cane. Others he rejected because they were from the South. He decided upon Miss Cantrill from Baltimore. Even though Maryland still allowed slavery during the war years, it stayed with the Union. The woman’s uncle rose to the rank of captain in the Union Army. Surely, she was an acceptable choice.

   Analia feels a sense of unease when, in the same letter with her fare to join him, Jeffrey expresses his happiness over finding a nice Northern bride. She suspects, once he hears her speak and discovers who she brings with her, he will be in for a big surprise.

Release Date: November 27, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0D1LVNY3L

 

December Pre-orders:

 

A Pony for Christmas: Western Christmas Magic

by P. Creeden

Will hope, love, and peace make its way to the western frontier this year and help someone in desperate need of the spirit of Christmas?

Little Susan Price has never spoken a word. Her father, Wayne Price, has never quite understood how to bring his child out of her shell, but has fully accepted her as she is. But at five years old, he’s worried how other children will respond to little Susie’s silence. Christmas is coming, and he really doesn’t even know what he might get her for a gift. Through it all, his stalwart mother has plans to help both his son and granddaughter. Perhaps finding a wife and mother might be the cure to all their ills.

Eleanor Hunter’s father runs the livery in Golden, Colorado and she’s always been one of his hardest workers. When a black pony comes to town with a man who is ready to shoot it, she stops him and buys the pony for a dollar. Now her father wants to know what she’s going to do with the feral thing. But the more time she spends with the pony, the more she realizes that he just needs confidence, love, and trust. And she’s happy to give him both. If only it were so easy to get the man who she’s been in love with for five years to trust her as well. But then his mother steps in.

Release date: December 1, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DFVP33DN


Minda: Christmas Quilt Brides Book 22

By Linda Carroll-Bradd

     Philadelphia socialite Minda Gayle Harleigh is still in hiding. Wishing to avoid the social shame of being jilted at the altar like her cousin, she embraces a leap year tradition so she can be the one asking. At the summer gala for the Penn Sailing Club Regatta, surrounded by family and friends, she proposes marriage to her beau. Ernst Heinrich III refuses, telling her she has stripped him of his dignity. Now she’s scouring matrimonial newspapers to find someone out West who knows nothing of her background and her inappropriate boldness.
     Montana farmer Kunz Lambrecht has barely won back his standing in the Butte City German community after rejecting a mail-order bride almost three years earlier. No one accepted his rationale that someone with hearing loss could be in danger on a farm. Again, he places an ad in Brides by Mail and is amazed to connect with an Eastern woman who is visiting his town the following month.
     But when the two meet, will they hide behind their past mistakes, or will they see their correspondence connection for the real possibility it presents?

Release date: December 13, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0DG6H5486


Trifle by Tilde: Old Timey Holiday Kitchen: Book 36

By P. Creeden

     Tilde Visser has only one dream for Christmas, to live in a house again and bake a Trifle for her mother. Until now, her family has been living with other Dutch in tent communities. But when there’s a robbery in their small town and one of the Dutch are blamed, the whole community lands in an uproar. Then Samuel, the kind baker who has been helping the Dutch, gets involved in the trouble as well.
     Tilde must find a way to clear Samuel’s name before there’s a territory dispute, and help everyone find peace before Christmas. But she might just find love as well…

Release date: December 17, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DHV6YL9K


A Recluse for Christmas : Confederate Widows, Spinsters, and Proxy Brides

By Kimberly Grist

Join these Southern Belles on a Christmas journey to bridge the North and the South. Pasts fade and futures ignite amidst prairie snowflakes under western skies. Before each love story can unfold, the bride and groom are wed by proxy—having never met. Wounded souls find redemption in the bitter winter winds, and love’s embrace is the gift that warms their hearts. Find tales of hope, healing, and holiday joy as these Southern Belles, left alone by the war’s harsh realities, navigate cultural differences to forge new lives wed to their western, Yankee grooms. Will every heart discover the true spirit of Christmas and defy expectations? Fall in love right along with every star-crossed couple when you immerse yourself in each of these sweet holiday romances today!

Release date: December 23, 2024

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CZK49D8B