July 5

I'm always so glad to see July 5! I don't care if it's Monday, Tuesday or--you get the idea. It doesn't matter what day July 5 is. If Mr. B is alive, unhurt and well, then it is a good day.

Explanation: He arrived home on June 28 and on July 4 his aunt invited us down to her place near Harrisburg, PA. She had tickets for us to go to Hershey that day to a big park where we would go to a Kitty Wells concert.

July 4 started out well. She made a lovely breakfast and Mr. B and I spent the day wandering around the park. We were so much in love that everything was beautiful. Except the roller coaster! It was not beautiful and no, thank you, I did not need a second ride on that demon thing. And to this day, I still do not do rides at amusement parks. I wanted Mr. B to think I was a tough, sassy Texas Rebel with a big hair do. That roller coaster came close to turning me into a whiny, whimpering bag of bones and it messed up my hair. If I'd known a roller coaster was on the agenda that day I would have used a heck of a lot more of the hair lacquer that morning.

Then the day ended and his cousins asked us to go swimming with them and their wives/girlfriends. Now I'd spent my whole life swimming in Pennington Creek in Tishomingo, Oklahoma, so that was no problem for this country girl. So I donned my bathing suit, took along a towel so I could sit on the shore and got ready for an evening of watching my hot fiancé those tight fittin' trunks.

He climbed the tree at the edge of the water right behind his cousins. I remember him asking, "Is it deep enough to dive?"

And they answered, "Sure, it is. We do it all the time."

Now the difference is that they were about five and a half feet tall and he was well over six feet. And they were skimming the water not diving straight in. His feet were still sticking out of the water when his head made contact with a nice big flat rock on the bottom of the creek.

We went straight to the emergency room where they put thirteen stitches in the top of his head and told him to report to the hospital near his home town the next morning. After a long, painful night we followed orders and he was admitted for traction for the next ten days.

Now move ahead one year. We made the decision to move back to Oklahoma for him to go to college and we arrived on July 4. That meant that Mr. B met his mother-in-law for the first time on July 4.

He survived both but since then we celebrate the holiday very quietly. I'm glad all stores are closed and that the children are very busy with their own hoop-las! That means we can stay home all day and wait for the holiday to pass.

So far; so good!!

Happy Fourth of July

This is the scene out of my office window this morning! A brand new flag with the creases still on it flying in our front yard. Wishing all y'all a wonderful holiday with family and friends. And thanking all our servicemen and women who can't be with their families today, for their sacrifice so we can enjoy this day with our families!

God Bless America!

COVER REVEAL...

Heroes and Heartbreakers

unveils the cover of

A Heap of Texas Trouble

A Heap of Texas Trouble

Available for preorder now at Amazon, B&N

and your favorite book stores.

(Pub Date: Dec. 6, 2017)

Carlene Lovelle, co-owner of Bless My Bloomers lingerie shop, found a pair of fancy red-silk panties in her husband's briefcase, and all hell is breaking loose. She custom-made those fancy bloomers herself—and she remembers the bimbo who bought them. If her husband had a lick of sense, he'd known there are no secrets in a town like Cadillac.

Carlene's cohorts—and their mamas—plan to exact revenge on Lenny Joe where it'll hurt the most: break his ten-year winning streak at the prestigious Red-Hot Chili Cook-Off. Never before has a woman dared to compete. But the ladies of Bless My Bloomers are cooking up a storm...and it seems the whole town is taking sides in the showdown. 

(NOTE: This is a reissue of The Red Hot Chili Cook Off. Different cover, different title, same story)

  

100,000 COPIES!

Hold the Presses!

Exciting news!

Today I got this gorgeous shadow box from my awesome publisher at Montlake to commemorate the sale of more than 100,000 copies sold of Hidden Secrets. (The little plaque at the bottom says: Presented to Carolyn Brown to commemorate sales exceeding 100,000 copies: Hidden Secrets: April, 2016)

COVER REVEAL!!

ARRIVING SEPTEMBER 13!

USA Today HEA revealed the cover today!

After seven years of misery and abuse, it’s all over—Hannah O’Malley is officially divorced. Hallelujah. It’s like every Christmas in her life all rolled up into one glorious day. Not only does Hannah get to keep her grandmother’s spacious old house, but she has full custody of her sparky five-year-old daughter. All Hannah has to do now is put the past behind her.
And now that she’s free, she wants to make a difference. With the help of her warm, close-knit circle of friends—including her high school crush, Travis Wilson—Hannah begins turning her home into a safe house for other women who’ve endured the pain she’s known. But even as life and laughter return to Hannah’s home, she’s haunted by the memory of her dangerously unstable ex. With a second chance at love on the horizon, Hannah must face down her past in order to let the sunshine back into her life.

New Cover, New Title...same characters!!

RE-ISSUE Tomorrow!!

What Happens in Texas!

On Sale Tomorrow!

It's got a new cover and a new title but the characters are the same.

A little excerpt from the beginning of the book...

If Prissy Parnell hadn’t married Buster Jones and left Cadillac, Texas for Pasadena, California, Marty wouldn’t have gotten the speeding ticket. It was all Prissy’s damn fault that Marty was in such a hurry to get to the Blue-Ribbon Jalapeno Society monthly meeting that night, so Prissy ought to have to shell out the almost two hundred dollars for that ticket.

They were already passing around the crystal bowl to take up the voting ballots when Marty slung open the door to Violet Prescott’s sunroom and yelled, “Don’t count ‘em without my vote.”

Twenty faces turned to look at her and not a one of them, not even her twin sister, Cathy, was smiling. Hells bells, who had done pissed on their cucumber sandwiches before she got there, anyway? A person didn’t drop dead from lack of punctuality, did they?

One wall of the sunroom was glass and looked out over lush green lawns and flower gardens. The other three were covered with shadow boxes housing the blue ribbons that the members had won at the Texas State Fair for their jalapeno pepper entries. More than forty shadow boxes all reminding the members of their history and their responsibility for the upcoming year. Bless Cathy’s heart for doing her part. She had a little garden of jalapenos on the east side of the lawn and nurtured them like children. The newest shadow box held ribbons that she’d earned for the club with her pepper jelly and picante. It was the soil or maybe she told them bedtime stories but she, like her momma and grandma, grew the hottest jalapenos in the state.

“It appears that Martha has decided to grace us with her presence once again when it is time to vote for someone to take our dear Prissy’s place in the Blue-Ribbon Jalapeno Society. We really should amend our charter to state that a member has to attend more meetings than one every two years. It looks like you could appreciate the fact that we did amend it once to include you in the membership with your sister, who by the way has a spotless attendance record,” Violet said.

Violet, the queen of the Club as most of the members called it, was up near eighty-years-old, built like Sponge Bob Square Pants and had stove pipe jet black hair right out of the bottle. Few people had the balls or the nerve to cross her and those that did were put on her shit list right under Martha, aka Marty, Andrews’ name which was always on the top.

Back in the beginning of the Club days, before Marty was even born, the Mayor’s wife held the top position on the shit list. When they’d formed The Blue-Ribbon Jalapeno Society, Loretta Massey and Violet almost went to war over the name of the brand new club. Loretta insisted that it be called a society and Violet wanted to be called a club. Belonging to Club just sounded so much fancier than saying that one belonged to Society. Loretta won when the vote came in but Violet called it Club anyway and that’s what stuck. Rumor had it that Violet was instrumental in getting the Mayor ousted just so they’d have to leave Grayson County and Loretta would have to quit Club.

Marty hated it when people called her Martha. It sounded like an old woman’s name. What was her mother thinking anyway when she looked down at two little identical twin baby daughters and named them after her mother and aunt: Martha and Catherine? Thank God, she’d at least shortened their names to Marty and Cathy.

Marty shrugged and Violet snorted. Granted it was a lady-like snort but it still went right along with her round face and a three layered neck. Hell, if they wanted to write forty amendments to the charter, Marty would still do only the bare necessities to keep her in voting standing. She hadn’t even wanted to be in the damned club and had only done it because if she didn’t, then Cathy couldn’t.

Christmas...

So those of you who read last Saturday's post are already aware of the story behind these little notes: My sister, Patti, passed away almost three years ago and my brother-in-law brought over these notes he found when he was going through some things. After a tough year, I gave her a little present each day for the whole month of December and wrote a note each day. She kept them all for almost thirty years...

On the Third Day of Christmas, my sister gave to me--a teddy bear in a stocking since that sounds better than a dumb partridge or two turtle doves.

How does that song go? "I wish I was a teddy bear...not going nowhere..." Let's just forget about work today, get our teddy bears and go the park.
Love you,
C

(NOTE: That teddy bear in a stocking was about three inches tall and was a Christmas tree ornament that she used every single year.)

On the Fourth Day of Christmas, my sister gave to me--one golden ring: Well, now that golden ring would've made my bank book groan in pain, mater of fact they would've thrown me in that little room with bars for writin' hot checks if I'd gotten you a real golden ring. However, we must not give up the tradition so a ring it is, a ring with a star in the middle. "Would you like to swing on a star..."

Let's got to the park, sit on a bench and celebrate Christmas by chasing moonbeams after work this evening.

Love you,
C

(NOTE: And that, too was a Christmas ornament!)

Now I can hear her singing those two songs in my head. Not a bad memory because we used to sing while we washed dishes every night and she didn't even make fun of me because I'm tone deaf and couldn't carry a tune in a galvanized milk bucket!