Looking Forward: Launch of A Fine Mind and a Givewaway!

This month, we have been taking a look back at the last year and taking a moment to collect our breath as we plunge into 2021.  My 2020 was… unique.

My kids aren’t getting any younger, so we did what we could to enjoy them this year.  In the time B.C. (Before Covid) my daughter was on a high school equestrian team and starting to nail that reining pattern. This is her spinning her horse Marty. They qualified for the State tournament, but alas, it was not to be.

My older son was on a middle school VEX robotics team and taking (with his partner) second in the state! The boys’ robot is the one on the left. There was talk of Nationals (as an alternate) but…

My younger son’s passion for cooking (especially sweets) got us through our depressed funk in March and April when all the fun things went away. He’s the one I blame for the extra padding I have today. This monstrosity is not hollow—it’s an actual gingerbread CAKE. And I ate more than my share. Tonight, as I’m typing this, he made me toast… with homemade Nutella! No joke. I’ll never be thin, but I’ll be happy, and that’s good enough.

We did get out some. We are a road-tripping family, so we found a way to take a couple of socially distanced car trips to the beach and Glacier National Park.

We also had a few weird things. I was sicker than I’ve ever been last January, with a high fever (105) for several days and non-standard pneumonia (sound familiar?), and ended up in the ER. I couldn’t even get out of my chair. Ironically, it was while I was writing Indisposed!

We had a horse-related injury or three, and a wildfire season unlike any we had seen before.  For several days, we were marauding around the area with a livestock trailer (I was on dispatch in the copilot seat) and looking for animals to evacuate. I have pictures of me carrying a pig! You have to carry them upside down… ask me how I know this. Once, my husband was putting out little hotspot fires around the trailer (eek!) while I tried to help a nervous owner catch and load her unhandled Arabian colt. That was… interesting.

This picture was taken at about 2 in the afternoon. The sky really was that red!

On the whole, however, my family came through 2020 relatively unscathed. We are thankful for that. Now, we are laying as low as we can, like everyone else, and waiting to see what this new year brings.

Last year, I embarked on a fun experiment with novellas, partly because I have a house full of teenagers now, and my attention span is not what it was before! Plus, with as wild as 2020 was, it was nice for me as a writer to enjoy a sweet, lighthearted tale instead of my usual angsty beast. It seems I got a bit carried away!  Behold: I was busy last year.

Today, I have a new darling to introduce to you. She has been on pre-order, and any minute now, she will be going live on Amazon. Confession: I am painfully nervous about this one! It is very special to me because of Georgiana’s character, but rather than tell you all about it, I’ll let you read a bit for yourself.

Make sure to stick around and leave a comment! I’ll be giving away three copies, and announcing the winners on February 2.

He’d give anything to keep his sister safe.
Even his own future.

Georgiana Darcy sees the world differently. Gifted with a sensitive soul and a mind that feels what others miss, she is the misfit in an aristocratic family. She’s also the reason her brother, Fitzwilliam Darcy, lets few people into his heart.

Teaching her, guiding her, and pushing away those who would not understand her, Darcy has done all in his power to protect his sister. Is it enough? If he cannot convince his uncle, the earl, that Georgiana’s place is with him, he is in danger of losing her forever.

Darcy’s worst nightmare comes true when Georgiana stumbles—quite literally—into a guest at Pemberley. But, when that guest turns out to be Elizabeth Bennet, the only woman in the world he ever dreamed of having by his side, Darcy learns to hope that there may still be a way to have everything.

Can he persuade Elizabeth to give him another chance? Will they find a family and a love that endures all, hopes all, and never fails?

A Fine Mind is a sweet, novella-length, Regency variation of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.

Chapter One

Darcy covered his eyes and drew another deep sigh. “Please, Georgiana, you must—“

His sister hurled herself into the corner of the carriage, whimpering piteously with her hand shielding her head.

“Come, sweetling, we are nearly there. A few moments more, that is all.”

She made no response, but the weeping continued.

Darcy leaned closer to the shade so he could peer out the crack afforded as it fluttered in the summer breeze. Oh, to have a little fresh air in that stuffy coach! But Georgiana could not bear the flickering light through the trees as they drove, so he kept the window covered. “Georgiana, would you like to hold my pocket watch?”

She quieted somewhat but did not move.

“I can see where we are,” he continued. “From here, we will be home in a quarter of an hour.”

She raised herself slowly. Great, limpid blue eyes searched his hands, but her expression remained broken and distressed.

Darcy extended his pocket watch. “Here, take it. At half-past, we will be at the door.”

She blinked, then accepted the watch. She clasped it greedily to her chest and rocked, her knuckles white and her jaw clenched. “Half-past,” she repeated. “Home at half-past.” She jerked up the watch to examine the position of the minute hand. “It is not moving.”

“It will move more quickly if you look at it less often,” he chided gently. “It is a beautiful day today. Would you like to look out for a moment?”

He knew better than to expect an answer to that. She was rocking again, staring at the squab behind him, and chanting, “Home at half-past.”

Darcy let his head drop back against the wall and released a long breath. He had hoped they could have got home before the misery struck. Traveling always troubled his sister. The movement, the change, the lack of certainty in her surroundings, and especially the random shocks of light from the window as they passed wooded areas. Even the different food from the coaching inns would unsettle her, so he had learned to keep a few familiar provisions from Cook in a basket.

The first day was usually tolerable, and sometimes the second. She had been getting more comfortable in recent years, and a year ago, they had managed an entire journey from London to Pemberley without suffering. That was before George Wickham scared the life out of her.

Now…

Darcy closed his eyes and permitted himself a guilty moment of peace. If they arrived home without further mishap, and he left her to rest until her nerves could be eased, she should be calm again. And he would be deviled if he took her anywhere else the rest of the summer.

Besides… there was nothing south of Derbyshire for him, anyway.

The wheel struck a bump in the road, and Georgiana emitted a cry. “The watch! Half-past, is it half-past?” She scrambled down to search the floor for the lost watch, trembling as if the dropping of it meant that time would spin backward.

Darcy bent to pick it up, and he dangled it before her. “Not yet. Five more minutes, and you will see the house.”

She was panting, her eyes franticly darting around the carriage. “I want to get out, William. I need to get out, please!”

“But I told you, darling, we are not yet to the house. Very nearly. Wait just another moment.”

She shook her head, and her entire body followed with a great wave of denial. “No, no, no,” she muttered. “Out now! I need to get out!”

Darcy swallowed and glared at his boots for a split second. “Out now,” he grumbled. If he refused, she was likely to have a bad spell that would last all night. Discouraging, to say the least, particularly since she had held together so very well until the last ten miles. “Very well. John? Let us out to walk, please.”

It was a vast improvement over the inside of the carriage, he had to confess it. The fresh air, the sun warming his shoulders, and the look of relief washing over Georgiana’s face. Her frame sagged, and she closed her eyes, then dropped to the grass and lay flat out.

He permitted her to remain. What were a few grass stains when it was the most relaxed she had looked all day? He could grant her a few moments to collect herself before he made her get back into the carriage, and he could do with a moment of quiet in his own head as well.

Pemberley. A small ache ripped in his breast as he looked out over the rolling lands, the ancestral grandeur of his home. It was more than a house; it was family and honor and tradition. It was twelve generations of dignity and heritage, of duty and expectation, and a light passed on from father to son.

A pity it would all end with him.

Georgiana was stirring now—well, not precisely. She was luxuriating in the feel of the grass, stroking her cheek along the velvety blades and smiling to the heavens with closed eyes. At peace, for once. Darcy gazed down at her with a swelled heart. Dearest girl!

She was the world to him. It would be impossible to love anyone quite the way he adored her—although one had eclipsed her in sheer power of feeling, with a different kind of love altogether. But Elizabeth Bennet was not here, and never would be here.

His life was to be bound up in the needs of the present, in caring for what was his. None other could inspire such a swirl of devotion and terror in him as the sister he had raised. No one had ever touched that deep well of protectiveness.

Nor had anyone ever tried his patience so much.

“Come, Georgiana,” he announced at last. “Time to go. But a few moments more, and we will be home.”

She opened her eyes and glared.

“Georgiana,” he warned, “I will not have it today. Please get up and let us go.”

She scrambled to her feet, but she was shaking her head and backing away. “No. No more carriage, William.”

“Georgiana,” he commanded more sharply. “Give me your hand.”

That was his fatal error. She hated taking his hand and could not bear to be sped along until she was ready. Georgiana was staring at the ground now, her feet stumbling backward as she clutched his watch. “No!”

Darcy dropped his hand and bit back his frustration. He knew, he knew not to let his impatience get the better of him, but there, he had gone and done it again. Been short with her when a little moderation, a little negotiation, would have served him better. “Very well, we will wait a few moments. Come, dearest, will you sit down a bit, and take a breath?”

She spun about and ran.

I hope you found that first chapter interesting! A Fine Mind will be available through Kindle Unlimited, paperback, and an audio edition is on the way from Megan Green.