After two tours in Vietnam, Major Gib Ramsey, U.S. M.C., knew that war was hell. But how could he convince beautiful, stubborn Dany Villard that her beloved plantation seesawed on a time bomb? The lush land and its gentle people had given Dany the only love she'd ever known—losing them would crush her. Long a warrior, Gib now battled an unfamiliar urge: to blanket a woman in tenderness and promise her more than a fleeting moment of glory…
I've lived six lives in one and it all shows up in the books I write, one way or another.
I was always a risk taker and broke mustangs at thirteen years old in Oregon. I learn to break them with love, not threat or pain.
At 17 years old, I picked night-crawlers (worms) out in our Oregon orchards from 9pm to midnight, every night. I earned enough money to buy my school clothes and book. I also plunked down $600 to a flight company at the Medford, Oregon airport and asked them to teach me...a girl...to fly. I soloed in 12 hours, which is average. From that time until I left for the US Navy at 18, I had accrued 39 hours of flight time in my Cessna 150 single engine airplane.
I was in the US military and was an AG3 (weather forecaster). There was no airplane club, so I couldn't fly when I was in the Navy. But I could look at the clouds in the sky ;-).
Later, I flew in a B-52 bomber for a day and night mission (18 hours total), a T-38 Talon jet, USAF, where I was riding in a "chase plane" on a test flight in a Dragonfly jet.
I was one of the first AFLA (American Fencing League of America) women fencers to fence with epee and sabre. These weapons were closed to women because they were too 'heavy' for a female to handle. I said baloney and fought the males and won half my bouts. I was part of a surge of women fencers on the East Coast in the 1970's to push for equality in the sport. Together, we changed the sport and changed the mind of the men. Today? In the Olympics? Women now fence in foil, epee and sabre, thanks to what we did as a vanguard showing the world it could be done.
I then became a volunteer firefighter when I was a civilian once more, the first woman in an all - male fire department in West Point, Ohio for three years. I became a local expert not only in firefighting, driving the engine and tanker trunks, but also had training in hazardous material (Reynoldsburg Fire Academy, Columbus, OH).
My books always reflect what I experienced. If you like edgy, gritty, deeply and emotionally intense love stories with sympathetic heroes and heroines, check out my newest series that will be available mid-Oct. 2015, and it incorporates much of what I have lived.
I enjoyed this book as it certainly had a unique premise. The heroine is a plantation owner, half-French and half-American who loses her mother in the beginning of the book to a bomb. The heroine had a childhood where she didn't figure into her parents life at all, so the Vietnamese at the plantation became her family and life. The hero is an officer who witnesses her mother's death and comforts her and then later becomes the investigative officer. The heroine thinks all soldiers sweet-talk Vietnamese women and leave them behind without regret. Conflict is arising in Vietnam and the heroine's plantation continues to state their neutral position but for how long? The hero's being a soldier, the heroine not wanting to take sides all are big obstacles between them and I wasn't sure how they would be resolved. These two try to stay away from each other but can't. I enjoyed this and am looking forward to reading the rest of the series.