FREE FALLING AGAIN

My very first Blog post, in April of 2009, was about my contemporary romance novel FREE FALL, which had just been published by a small publisher. Here’s what I wrote:

“I was a single working gal and it was April in Illinois, (Not exactly Paris, but you can’t have everything.) A girlfriend and I decided to go to Iowa to visit a friend and her husband. Our hosts took us to a club for dinner and dancing and I wore my new dress. It was sleeveless, with a square neckline and bouffant skirt, and, as the silk fabric was imprinted with colorful flowers, I put an orange belt around my (then) tiny waist. My hostess owned a pair of orange silk pumps so I wore those too, although they were two sizes too small.

“We finished dinner and were drinking coffee, when a handsome man came to our table and asked our host for permission to ask me to dance. Even in those days, men didn’t ask permission to marry a girl, much less ask her to dance. Was this amazing, or what?

“So I danced with him, during which I discovered he was a skydiver. A forty-one day whirlwind courtship later we were married and about seven hundred days after that, we were divorced. My mother quoted the old proverb, “Marry in haste; repent at leisure,” regularly thereafter, bless her heart.

“FREE FALL, my latest contemporary romance novel, is based on what I learned about skydiving and parachutes in those two years. In my book, the skydiver is the hero, but in real life he left a lot to be desired. So, although some of the novel is true, most is made up, which is what novelists do. Not to brag too much about my own work, I’ll just say it has some romantic scenes--which is what you buy a romance for--some exciting scenes--this is an awesome sport--and a bit of humor. Without humor, I’d never have survived that matrimonial adventure.”

Now, four years later, I got my rights back. The publisher I used never got reviews on Amazon or did any other promotion, was sloppy about reporting sales to me, and charged way too much -$6.50 - for a 200-page e-book. I’m republishing it with the same title and text, but a new cover picture (after all, it’s a romance so it needed lovers), and the new e-book price is $2.99. In fact, it’s going free for five days, Nov. 7-11, on KDP Select.

And here’s the other good news. If you receive a free copy And post a review on Amazon, I will send you a free copy of one of my other novels. (Your choice of NORTH BY NORTHEAST, STRANGER IN PARADISE, THE ITALIAN JOB or ONCE MORE WITH FEELING.)

The bad news? I’m going to take a hiatus from my weekly blog to get a complete knee replacement. But I’ll keep in touch after I’m home again and will resume posting as soon as I can.