A BRIDE FOR GIDEON WINS!

In case you are one of the few people who has escaped my announcement, please let me share my news with you. Recently, I learned that A BRIDE FOR GIDEON received the honor of being named the #1 Proxy book of all time by BookAuthority! OF ALL TIME! Can you believe it? I am—to say the least—amazed and pleased!

Do I believe A BRIDE FOR GIDEON is the best Proxy Bride book of all time? Of course, I'd like to because it's my baby and I love it. I think you'll have to read it and decide for yourself.

The hero and heroine in A BRIDE FOR GIDEON are among my favorites and the book is one of my favorite stories. The cover by V. McKevitt of Black Widow Designs is one of my favorite covers. Obviously, I enjoyed writing and promoting this book. To have someone else recommend it is icing on my cake—with cherries on top.

Here’s a bit about the story:

Keira desperately wants to belong somewhere...

Gideon is haunted by a secret too horrible to share...

Fate conspires against them.

Keira Cameron came to Boston from Scotland after the death of her parents. She wanted a job, a husband, and eventually a family. She feels rejected because she's too tall, too foreign, and too pretty for a wife to want her working near her husband. Were her expectations unreasonable? Her cousin convinces her to enter a proxy marriage to his friend, Gideon Ross, who lives in Montana Territory. Out of options, she agrees and hopes her goals will be realized.

Gideon Ross is a large man at five inches over six feet. His business is a smithy and gun repair shop. The war left him with a terrible scar on his face. He wears a beard to try to conceal the scar but still hears people whisper he's a monster and a giant. Do they think he has no feelings? He's haunted by the war and has terrible nightmares. Reluctantly, he agrees to wed Keira by proxy.

Outside forces work against the couple. Keira and Gideon must find the key to the attack on their lives. Can they defeat the enemy before they're too late?

Growing up, one of my favorite fairy tales was Beauty and the Beast. Not the Disney version (which I predate), but the plain story of an unhappy, lonely man and the girl who comes to love him. Have you considered that perhaps the "beast" didn't change? Perhaps the girl learned to see him with her heart instead of her eyes and to fall in love with what she found.

Gideon is like the "beast" in that he appears almost frightening. Physically, he dwarfs most men. His bushy beard, scar, and long, shaggy hair give him an ominous appearance in spite of his personality. The reader is also reminded that no matter how people look on the outside, their feelings can be hurt. They are affected by the attitude of those around them.

Finding new ways to vary a story is a constant quest for authors. I'd never before used a blacksmith as a hero. I had a general impression of a blacksmith's duties, but had to research specifics. What I learned confirmed that a blacksmith was a very important person in pioneer America. He still performs a major role, even though some of his duties have fallen to other fields with the advance of automobiles and so forth. I also found that a blacksmith was often also a gunsmith and a farrier.

I sympathized with Keira because she was even taller than I am. As a girl I was usually the youngest and tallest person in my school class. I dreaded one part of the several family reunions we attended each summer. Seeing extended family was fun and the food was great. Unless you were tall, you have no idea how many times I heard a man tell my father that he should tie a brick to my head to slow my growth. Ugh. This was supposed to be a joke but I did not find the comment funny.  

Moving on, A BRIDE FOR GIDEON is a mystery which has Keira and Gideon racing to solve before the villain succeeds. 

Universal buy link at Amazon is https://mybook.to/Keira and the book is in e-book, print and is also in KU.

Although this is a part of the multi-author series Proxy Brides, the book is a stand-alone work.  If you haven't read this story, please do. And, please leave a review.