Outlaw Pleasures

Although over the last 50 some odd years, settings for my books have always gone between historic and contemporary periods, the books on Kindle up until now have all been contemporary. It seemed a good idea to submit books that fit a category. Now it's time to open a new category with ePublishing my historical romances.

When I wrote it, Outlaw's Lady had a different title, Outlaw Pleasures, which I still like very much but given the popularity of erotica these days and the fact that this book is not, I felt compelled to change the title to something a little more western. I didn't want to disappoint readers seeking erotica nor did I want to lose potential readers who might avoid erotica but are open to healthy sex.

As a title, outlaw pleasures suited what this story was really about which is that a culture can turn simple joys into forbidden fruits. My heroine was born into a time where women's options, even to how they dressed, were limited by the expectations of their social strata. If women enjoyed sex or even their own bodies, they were of the 'other' sort. Men were often as much stifled by the rules as the women. The story is about jumping over those boundaries and finding one's own way.

Given the realities of the publishing eBooks, what readers expect, it not only needed a different title but also a different cover. Below is the original digital painting for it and still my favorite. Alas, I am not trying to please me but the readers who might buy the book.

I also had to give up the mustache as if you aren't painting something digitally, putting a mustache on a stock photo is difficult. Models with mustaches on the sites where I look are rare to say the least.  (I personally LOVE mustaches on men-- on boys it's a bit more iffy).

So here is the only place the original cover will ever be seen. I like the new one too. This was, however, my first love, and you know how you feel about first loves...

Outlaw's Lady is the story of Abigail Spenser, trapped in her comfortable, but limited world until an opportunity comes along to escape. Once she leaves behind the rules, she begins to learn about life and that nothing is without cost. She learns of simple life pleasures she'd never experienced and tastes of the forbidden fruit.

It's also the story of Sam Ryker who had never found life easy and then along came a chance to change it all, to have what he'd thought was beyond him-- a 'good' woman. He'd had the reckless freedom but now what about living with the expectations of another person, of finding a life inside the rules? There's more to it than just getting 'the' woman, you have to then keep her.

What these two learn is there will always be expectations, can they put theirs together and make a relationship work?

I put together a video with images that inspired the book both from my time in Arizona and my imagination. The link to it will only be available to those who have read the book because it gives away too much of the plot which means best appreciated afterward as a way to savor it in a different way. In it, I wrote a prologue about how I see outlaw pleasures-- even today.

Outlaw Pleasures 
Take responsibility for your life
Dress as you want
Follow your own strong life code
Live in tune with the land
Love hard and honestly
Live your life to the hilt.
Step out and make your own way
even if others don't much like it.
Don't break laws--
unless those laws go against nature
and true wisdom.

If all goes well, Outlaw's Lady will be available on Kindle October 7th. It will have a marketing trailer on YouTube, but I'll be writing more about all of that in the days leading up to its availability. This is actually the first time I'll have done much in the way of 'promotions' leading to a new book, but I feel it's more essential since this is the first of something new-- my historical romances.

Incidentally, I now have my books on Good Reads. I am still not sure how to put an app here that leads readers to my site there. Navigating GoodReads hasn't proven easy for me, but it would be rewarding if I ever figure it out as it has many readers-- or so it says. It is a place to list the books we have read, are reading and our ratings for them; so it's fun even when it's not involving my own books.