Sunday 21 September 2014

Circle Star re-released


I've finally completed the revised edition of Circle Star, a full length western historical romance. I wrote Circle Star in 2006, immediately after finishing Klondike Dreams, a long historical novel set in the Klondike gold rush. I did a huge amount of research for Klondike Dreams, my first historical novel, and I wanted to put some of that knowledge to use in another work set around the same period.

I also wanted to write a historical romance that fitted as closely as possible to the popular category romance formula—alpha hero, spunky but feminine heroine, and a nasty villain.

While I was writing the story, the heroine’s best friend gained a more prominent role than I had intended, which resulted in a book with two intertwined stories about two different couples fighting the same villains.

I submitted the book to Harlequin, but by the time they got back to me almost a year later with some potentially good news, I had become tired of waiting and had offered the book elsewhere. It was published in 2008—my first published novel—by Resplendence Publishing.

Although the book received mainly positive reviews, some readers disliked the way the focus shifted to a different couple halfway through the story. A few years later, I withdrew the novel from publication, with the view of revising the story to separate it into two parts.

This turned out more difficult than I had expected. I broke up the story but it didn’t work. I put it back together but made the two stories intertwined from the beginning. That didn’t work either. I separated the stories once more and mulled over them for months. The only way to solve the dilemma was to add several chapters of new material to Susanna’s story, and edit Claire’s story to delink some of the overlapping events.

Better? Or just different? Every writer wrestles with those doubts during the rewriting and editing process. I hope that the days and weeks I spent on the revisions have made the story more enjoyable.

CIRCLE STAR will be available on Kindle, $ 3.99.  It will be available to borrow in Kindle Owners' Lending Library and Kindle Unlimited.

If anyone who bought the Resplendence Publishing edition would like a copy of the revised edition, please email me on tatiana.march@yahoo.com and I'll send you a PDF file.


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