Next weekend Heartbeat Braves is going to be free!

If you or a loved one need a book about sexy urban Indians, your problems are solved.

This is Book One of Four.

When I started, I intended to write four stand-alone romances with a minor background story connecting them. That got away from me. There are unresolved story elements in this book.

Book Four will be out in late spring and wrap up all open storylines.

Here’s the blurb:

There’s never a dull moment at the Crooked Rock Urban Indian Center.

Rayanne Larson knows firsthand the struggles of native people. Working at Crooked Rock gives her the chance to do good work for Indians living in the city. She has high hopes for the Center’s progress until its new leader hands her special project over to his underachieving–and distractingly sexy–nephew.

Henry Grant’s life is going just fine. Though he knows rez life, he’s always been an urban Indian. He has no interest in the Indian Center job his uncle pushes on him. That is until he meets Rayanne. She’s attractive and smart, and like no woman he has ever met.

Rayanne is determined to keep her distance but when the Center faces a crisis, the two of them are forced to work together, and she can no longer ignore the sparks between them.

Here are the purchase links:

Kindle | Nook | Apple | Kobo

I keep a haphazard record of all the romance books I read. This is a separate list from all the other books I read. I don’t have a great system for differentiating what is romance and what isn’t. The lists overlap in places. Why even separate the lists, you ask?

Good question. I understand why I do it in my head but I can’t explain it.

I also keep a list of authors or books I want to try because of good reviews or friend recommendations. That list is down to three authors so I’m either on the ball or falling behind on the job.

I’m not the best resource for discovering new books because I’m always behind and reading books that I bought years ago.

According to my list, I read 32 romances. Of those I DNF 6. I’m not sure how accurate that is because I don’t always keep track of the DNFs. Also my rating system is wishy-washy so unless I’m doing backflips about the book or the book doesn’t work for me at all, they’re mushy in the middle.

After that long introduction, these are a few of my favorite books I read last year. If I had more energy I would link but I’ve got about 30 more things on today’s To Do list. You know how to find them.

Nalini Singh — Angel Blood I finally started the Guild Hunter series and loved the first one. I’m so happy that I have so many Nalini Singh books to look forward to.

Kristan Higgins — The Best Man I loved this one, too. I was upset about one scene that I thought was uncharacteristically mean-spirited, but I’m looking forward to reading more from KH, too.

Lisa Kleypas — Secrets of a Summer Night In my list I leave myself notes to help me remember what the story was about. This one I wrote “scene in the train foundry.” I like contemporary better than historical but I loved these characters.

Tessa Dare — A Night to Surrender Another historical but I fell in love with these characters, too, and I loved the humor.

Sarina Bowen — Understatement of the Year and The Fifteenth Minute I finally finished the Ivy Years series. Those were my most reliable books when I needed something I could disappear into quickly. I’m sorry I’m done with that series. She’s got plenty of new stuff so I expect I will read more in 2017.

I also haven’t managed to get to Courtney Milan — Hold Me yet. That’s high on my list, too.

My favorite non-romance books were The Expanse books by James S.A. Corey. I read the first 5 in 2016. I have #6 sitting here and then I have to wait for new ones with everyone else. I also loved The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold. Why haven’t I read her before? I’m thrilled to have a huge backlist from her to look forward to.

But first, my main job (besides my day job and keeping the house from falling apart) is to get Crooked Rock Books 2 and 3 out before the end of the year. I set some ambitious goals. We’ll see how I do.

I’ve already admitted in the book’s endnotes that the models on the cover are not Indigenous. That’s standard stock art.

For my original plan, I envisioned hiring a photographer and taking photos for the first four planned books all at the same time. I had a Plan A, Plan B, Plan C and an emergency plan and they all fell through. Most of the problem was finding models.

I had some connections but apparently young people hear “romance novel” and don’t come running forward to get involved.

I figured I could make do with stock photos. If you’ve ever search through stock photography (for example: istockphoto) for Indigenous people the selection is not wonderful. Just checking right now, it looks better than the first time I checked. There are great family type photos but after the first screen or two you start getting non-native people dressed up in headdresses and stereo-typical buckskin garb that makes my head hurt to see that even exists.

I had booked the cover artist months in advance so I had to make a decision so we went with the present photo. Holly did a fantastic job. The final project looks great. I was afraid I would be disappointed with it.

I am actively looking pro-quality photos of cute native couples. I’ve you’ve got something, get in touch via the contact form. I’d love to work with you.