Hello Readers! 

If you’re in the US, you know October is a sort of turning point, where summer is officially fall (in our minds if not according to the the actual temperature) and we begin to prepare for the end of the year and the various celebrations that brings. 

I’m prepping halloween costumes for the kiddos as well as completing book 2 my Debutante Dares series and a standalone Christmas novella. I’m also sending Teach a Rogue New Tricks (book 2 of the Cavendish Family series) to my brilliant critique partner and writing draft 1 of book 3 for Debutante Dares. 

So much to do! 

How are you keeping busy in the final months of the year?

Book Recs

Check out this gorgeous and mysterious cover from new-to-me author Lisette Marshall. The Spinster and the Thief sounds like the perfect October book, no?

Introducing my new favorite book--The Brazen Bluestocking. Seriously grab it. Tracy Sumner is a goddess of words and swoon.

Look at that dude looking at his. He's saying, "buy this book." And how could I not!?!?

Aw. I love a good book about hope and love. Sometimes that's just what we need! And Anderson's sweet and clean romance delivers.

Need more heat? Give Torrid Affairs of the Heart a try! It's an anthology so lots of new authors and quick reads.

History Break

Daring the Duke comes out this month! October 28th, and it’s a bit different from my other books. I must have been in a contemplative, easy-going mood because that’s how it turned out. There’s definitely some steam and spice and moments of hilarity, but the focus is on two people who are too aware of their own flaws, and how the pursuit of perfection leads not to happiness but to pain. 

Can they ignore the voices telling them how to act and what to do and instead just be themselves? And can they fall in love with the perfectly flawed versions of each other?

You’ll have to read to find out of course. :) But I’ll tell you I had a blast writing the Duke of Collingford’s transformation from proper prig to passionate hero. 

Anyway, one of the things I researched for this book was Sermons to Young Women by Reverend James Fordyce. You might recognize the name from Jane Austen. In Pride and Prejudice, Mr. Collins reads from Fordyce’s Sermons to the Bennett sisters. The book, quite well-known in its time, preached, among other things, that a woman’s most important role in life was to make men happy. Whatever dude wanted, that’s who she should be. 

But that can be a lot of things depending on the dude, yes? So our heroine, Lady Tabitha, and her friends have to figure out how to practically use Fordyce’s advice when it’s simultaneously so narrowing and so vague. If Lady Tabitha is to be the perfect woman, she’s got to get Fordyce right. 

Until she realizes Fordyce’s Sermons should be, you know, buried in a deep hole in the back of a garden somewhere. 

If you’d like to know more about Fordyce’s lessons for young women, here’s a great video!

Happy reading, dear bookworms!

Charlie Lane