Tumbleweeds and Valentines
a short story in
Nine days—nine stories from nine veteran western historical romance authors
Just in time for Valentine’s Day!
Romancing The West welcomes Phyliss Miranda, who, when I asked her to introduce herself, gave us this insight: I’m a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author and native Texan, who lives in the Texas Panhandle with my husband of forty-five years, Bob. With plans to write a cookbook, I took my first creative writing class in 2001. One of my favorite parts of being an author is teaching the craft and mentoring beginner writers. I enjoy sharing my love for the new frontier, the Civil War, quilting, and antiques; and still believe in the Code of the Old West.
I blog the first Tuesday of every month, and sometimes in between, at Petticoats and Pistols, dedicated to the love of western historical romances. I also do a separate blog at Prairie Rose Publications, a publishing company devoted to publishing westerns and western romances written women, the first Tuesday of the month and sometimes in between.
RTW: What intrigued you to write Tumbleweeds and Valentines?
PM: I was intrigued to write this story for one simple reason... I love chocolate covered marshmallow anythings: the little Santas at Christmas to Hearts for Valentine’s Day. When I’m at the checkout counter they tempt us by putting them right in our faces, so we have to buy some. I did some research on when marshmallow came into existence, confirmed what I needed and off I went. In my very first anthology for Kensington, Give Me a Texan, my hero was a blacksmith, so I thought how much fun it’d be if he made molds for my heroine who owned the candy store. I didn’t even know he had a twin brother at the time. So, what intrigued me to write Tumbleweeds and Valentines was my love for marshmallow chocolates.
About Tumbleweeds and Valentines
The wildness of a tumbleweed and the sweetness of chocolate bring Amanda Love the love of her life.
Chocolate hearts and a tumbleweed with an invitation attached only confuses Amanda Love ... the last person in town who anticipated getting invited to the town’s Valentine’s Dance. If so by whom?
RTW: Who doesn't love chocolate? And a yummy hero to go right along with it. What else do you have for our readers to enjoy?
I blog the first Tuesday of every month, and sometimes in between, at Petticoats and Pistols, dedicated to the love of western historical romances. I also do a separate blog at Prairie Rose Publications, a publishing company devoted to publishing westerns and western romances written women, the first Tuesday of the month and sometimes in between.
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| Phyliss Miranda |
PM: I was intrigued to write this story for one simple reason... I love chocolate covered marshmallow anythings: the little Santas at Christmas to Hearts for Valentine’s Day. When I’m at the checkout counter they tempt us by putting them right in our faces, so we have to buy some. I did some research on when marshmallow came into existence, confirmed what I needed and off I went. In my very first anthology for Kensington, Give Me a Texan, my hero was a blacksmith, so I thought how much fun it’d be if he made molds for my heroine who owned the candy store. I didn’t even know he had a twin brother at the time. So, what intrigued me to write Tumbleweeds and Valentines was my love for marshmallow chocolates.
About Tumbleweeds and Valentines
The wildness of a tumbleweed and the sweetness of chocolate bring Amanda Love the love of her life.
Chocolate hearts and a tumbleweed with an invitation attached only confuses Amanda Love ... the last person in town who anticipated getting invited to the town’s Valentine’s Dance. If so by whom?
RTW: Who doesn't love chocolate? And a yummy hero to go right along with it. What else do you have for our readers to enjoy?
Soon to Release
The Troubled Texan
by Phyliss Miranda
March 14, 2014
from Kensington
An LA Assistant DA didn’t resign, she disappears.
My story The Troubled Texan came to me after I followed a horrific mass murder in California. It took two and a half years to prepare for the three month trial. In my previous life, I worked in the legal field, so I know first hand how a case gets into the head of the lawyer... particularly prosecuting such a horrifying one where psychiatrists were on the scene to assist the investigators. I asked myself what the prosecuting attorney would do if she was threatened in the courtroom as the defendant heard his conviction. My answer--get as far away from LA as possible.
I knew I definitely wanted my heroine to come back to a small Texas town, but I needed a name. Suddenly, Kasota Springs and its fifth generation residents came to life. Many of you will remember the town and the names from two of my anthologies Give me a Cowboy and A Texas Christmas.
I’d been saving my hero for a special book. A retired professional football player turned Sheriff. He fit perfectly into the first of the Kasota Springs Romance series because it’s full of suspense, romance, and secrets. As a special treat, at the end, I included my grandmother’s chocolate cake recipe and the family story behind it.
♥ ♥ ♥
How do you capture a cowboy's heart? Hearts and Spurs is a collection of nine stories by some of western romance’s best—just in time for Valentine's Day! Following up their Christmas collection Wishing for a Cowboy, these ladies have done it again with new stories of handsome cowboys and the women who captivate them in Hearts and Spurs.
The Widow's Heart by Linda Broday
Skye O’Rourke thinks her imagination is playing tricks on her when she sees a man emerge from the shimmering desert heat. No one would willingly take a stroll under the scorching sun with a saddle slung on his back. She’s shocked to discover it’s Cade Coltrain, a man she once gave her heart to only to have him give it back.
Can she trust him not to abandon her this time? Yet, trusting each other is the only way they can survive. And love might just save them if they believe…
Guarding Her Heart by Livia J. Washburn
Julia Courtland was on her way west to marry a man she had never met. Henry Everett, the marshal of Flat Rock, Texas, was the grandson of her uncle's best friend. It seemed like a good match for both of them, and the wedding was scheduled to take place on Valentine's Day.
Grant Stafford thought the young woman who got on the stagecoach at Buffalo Springs was the prettiest thing he had seen in a long time. She wasn't too friendly, mind you, but she was sure easy on the eyes. Not that Grant had time to worry much about such things. He was the shotgun guard on this run, but more than that, he was an undercover Texas Ranger on the trail of the vicious outlaw gang responsible for a string of stagecoach robberies.
Fate threw Julia Courtland and Grant Stafford together on a cold February day in West Texas, but it also threw deadly obstacles in their path. A runaway team, a terrible crash, and bullets flying through the air threaten to steal not only their lives but also any chance they have for happiness. If they're going to survive, they will have to learn to trust each other...and maybe steal their hearts back from fate.
Found Hearts by Cheryl Pierson
Southern belle Evie Fremont has lost everything — except hope. When she answers an advertisement for marriage to Alex Cameron who lives in the wilds of Indian Territory, she has few illusions that he could be a man she might fall in love with — especially as his secrets begin to unfold.
Ex-Confederate soldier Alex Cameron needs a mother for his two young half-Cherokee sons more than he needs a wife — or so he tells himself. But when his past threatens his future on his wedding day, he and Evie are both forced to acknowledge their new love has come to stay — along with their Found Hearts.
Open Hearts by Tanya Hanson
To honor her brother’s last request, Barbara Audiss takes on his identity. Letting loose her secret will land get her arrested. But keeping it prevents her from giving her heart to handsome sheriff Keith Rakestraw.
Furious at “Judge Audiss’s” latest verdict, Keith discovers she’s a fake and consequences seem easy: toss her in jail. Instead, he finds himself eager to give her his heart.
Madeline Andrews is a grown up orphan. Sam Wilding made her feel part of his life, his family and swore he’d come home to her when the war ended, but he didn’t return. With the Valentine’s Ball just days away, the Wildings encourage Madeline to move forward with her life and open her heart to the possibilities. But Madeline is lost in old love letters and can’t seem to let go.
A Flare of the Heart by Jacquie Rogers
Celia Valentine Yancey has no illusions she’ll ever enjoy wedded bliss, so chooses marriage over spinsterhood even if she has to marry a man her father picked. On the way to meet her groom, she endures armed robbery, a stagecoach wreck, a dozen hungry baby pigs — and an incorrigible farmer.
Ross Flaherty retired from bounty hunting to become a farmer but now Celia has brought his worst fear to his door — in more ways than one. A ferocious wolf-dog and a dozen piglets are no match for this determined lady.
Which is more dangerous — the Sully Gang or Miss Celia Yancey?
Coming Home by Tracy Garrett
Sometimes it takes two to make dreams come true.
When a man who believes he’ll never have a home and family…
Former U.S. Marshal Jericho Hawken should have been shepherding a wagon train to new territory, but he unwillingly left them vulnerable to a vicious raider. The murder of the settlers he was supposed to be guarding is the hardest thing he’s ever had to face…until he meets the sister of one of the settlers.
…finds a woman who has lost everything…
Instead of a joyous reunion with her brother, Maryland Henry has come to River’s Bend to take responsibility for her three orphaned nieces. Fired from her teaching position and with no other family on whom to rely, Mary believes Jericho Hawken is responsible for all her woes. Or is he what she’s been searching for all along?
It takes a lot of forgiveness and a few fireworks to realize that together their dreams can come true.
Tumbleweeds and Valentines by Phyliss Miranda
When Amanda Love finds a tumbleweed lodged against her fence with an invitation to a Valentine Day dance stuck to it she thinks someone must be playing a joke. No one would invite her. No one ever had. Besides, she has no time for such things. She has a candy store to run. Curiosity gets the best of her though. Finding her name scrawled on it as bold as can be sends ripples of surprise through her. As she embarks on a quest to find the sender’s identity, she examines herself and the secret dream she harbors of having a husband and children.
Maybe, just maybe, someone had seen the yearning in her heart. But who?
The Second-Best Ranger in Texas by Kathleen Rice Adams
His partner’s grisly death destroyed Texas Ranger Quinn Barclay. Cashiered for drunkenness and refusal to follow orders, he sets out to fulfill his partner’s dying request, armed only with a saloon girl’s name.
Sister María Tomás thought she wanted to become a nun, but five years as a postulant have convinced her childhood dreams aren’t always meant to be. At last ready to relinquish the temporary vows she never should have made, she begs the only man she trusts to collect her from a mission in the middle of nowhere.
When the ex-Ranger’s quest collides with the ex-nun’s plea in a burned-out border town, unexpected love blooms among shared memories of the dead man who was a brother to them both.
Too bad he was also the only man who could have warned them about the carnage to come.
♥ Hearts and Spurs ♥
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