Medina

 The first novel I ever wrote and wrote and wrote...you get the idea, will finally be out on Kindle this week, but I need to warn you, it has a staggering 170,000 plus word count (and this was after cutting it in half!) The title of the book is Medina, which is the name of the main character, a young heiress of Irish-American descent.

Back around 2007 or so what I wrote it I knew nothing about writing a novel. I'd written poetry and short stories. I'd tinkered with writing a novel, but never really accomplished anything. I decided to write a romance novel for my best friend for her birthday. She finally got a proof copy of the novel 10 years later, an epic 585-page love story about one young heiress tasked with renovating and restoring the sprawling Graham family estate while recovering from a near fatal accident. Basically, as a teenager she was exiled to the family estate in Galway after she shocks and angers her wealthy, snooty family by having a scorching one-night fling with a rock singer/guitarist pick-up in a bar. Seven years later she's put in charge of restoring Greenhaven. A young man with a lot of piercings and tattoos she meets at the local supermarket deli directs her to his older brother who has his own renovations and restorations construction business. Although she has some misgivings and a volatile relationship with Giancarlo Murphy, she hires him for the work. Giancarlo is jealous and bothered by his kid brother Sebastiano's friendship with Medina. And then there is the suave, polished family retainer, Seth Sheridan, himself from a monied family, trying to change Medina's mind about having hired Murphy. All three men are attracted to the fiery redhead. Giancarlo and Sebastiano have a difficult relationship that is strained by Sebastiano's closeness to Medina and Giancarlo's company rule about not fraternizing with the clients. Then there's Seth who is also interested in Medina. The big problem is that Medina is engaged to a writer in Ireland who wants her to come home.

A lot of things happen as relationships grow, shift, and change throughout the book. Despite all the men surrounding her, Medina cannot find true love and it is a bitter disappointment to her when her friends meet, fall in love with, and marry members of Murphy's crew. There's deceit and treachery shadowing her as the restoration work progresses. Her family contests Cathryn's Graham's will, causing a prolonged court battle. She's attacked by the man she's come to rely on at Greenhaven...or was she? And then, just when she's about ready to give up, the man she has realized she loves the most shows up n the doorstep and the past and the present are reunited.

That's a very brief nutshell version of the novel. I'm working on the print book still, but the Kindle book is going to be in the Kindle store by tomorrow.

Overall, about 11 years in the making, her is my very first novel following close on the heels of my 23rd novel, Minx Marvel.

Minx Marvel

 The print and Kindle ebook versions of my new novel Minx Marvel are now available. Minx started out as a novella, but then bloomed to over 64,000 words so had to be classified as a novel.

This book falls into the same category as The Worth of a Woman. Both books deal with the sexual exploitation of young females. In The Worth of a Woman, 15-year old Jade is sold at auction to the highest bidder and basically becomes that man's sex slave in a dystopian future society. Jade just cannot be untrue to her own self and constantly angers and frustrates her owner. In being her own self she discovers a plot against him at the risk of her own life, which doesn't go unnoticed. Not knowing what else to do with her, Archer sends her away to learn the healing arts. He discovers the worth of a woman in Jade.

In Minx Marvel, Minx is the now twenty-three year old daughter of a controversial but talented artist. She returns home from studying art and painting in England, renting her former family home while she plans the path into her future. Only a man shows up wanting paintings her father had made of her when she was a child. The shocking details of her childhood, when she was sexually abused by her father and other adult men between the ages of three and eleven, rocks the town. Minx never intended any of the past to be exposed, but when the man is killed in an accident on the property the stain of the past begins to spread and threaten her future with the one man she has ever fallen in love with, the one man she trusts, a book shop owner. Child pornography and the sexual abuse of children is not an easy subject to write about. It saddens some, it angers and fills others with outrage. This is Minx's story, a work of fiction. She's been victimized by men in the past, and is again victimized by the public as a victim of that abuse. As she begins to confront the shadows and demons of her past she finds a safe home, a new family who loves her and supports her. As shocking crimes against other young women who were victims of the same child pornography ring further rock the community Minx finds out who her real friends are. In order to move on, she needs to deal with the past. And as a result of staying, not running away and going into hiding, she discovers what her path in life will be.

Minx Marvel will not be for everyone. I tapped into my criminal justice background for this one.