My Inspiration for "A Wife for the Orange Farmer" Short Story by Dora Bramden

Mum and I had just entered the gates at the Melbourne International Flower and Garden show when the threatening sky started to rumble. A few fat drops of rain turned into a downpour. Booming thunder and flashes of lightning sent us scuttling for the nearest cover under one of the trees in the avenue on the grounds of the Royal Exhibition Building. Unnerved and scared It was too far to the nearest building so we ruled out making a run for it. 

We were still getting dripped on a lot and were wondering if we should leave and go home when a tall youngish man with a golf umbrella came to our aid. He stood close to us so we were under his umbrella with him, and so in these close quarters, Mum and I realized we had a rather handsome and impressive hero come to our aid. We were instantly impressed by his country chivalry and charming looks.

We forgot about the thunder and lightning as he explained he was part of an agricultural group that had come down for a conference. He was an orange farmer. Wow. A handsome farmer, who would have thought this was going to happen. He pointed to the group he came with who were huddled under a tree not far from us. A few of the women grouped under another golf umbrella were watching us intently. They looked as if they would rather be under our orange farmer’s umbrella than where they were. I couldn’t blame them. I was being swept off my feet and already thinking this guy deserves a short story with him as the inspiration at the very least.

 Mum grew up on a mixed farm in Tasmania and immediately told him that she only ever bought Australian grown oranges in support of our local farmers. He laughed and said, "Actually, America has a different season to Australia and so each country takes the others oranges". I was relieved because I 'd been feeling guilty about buying California navel oranges in the summer. But oranges aside, Mum and I were smitten. You know you can tell a lot about a man in a short time. His easy-going nature, his protectiveness of Mum and I. He was so friendly without wanting a single thing in return. Being of service was all he wanted.

The sky started to lighten and the rain reduced to a sprinkle and we had no excuse to hold him up any longer. After we’d thanked him enthusiastically, he rejoined his group and we went on to have a lovely day. I think we both walked on air for most of the time, and our conversation kept returning to what a lovely man he was.

Mum’s and my orange grower inspired the hero of my short story ”A Wife for the Orange Farmer” A gentleman with a big heart and sturdy family values, who lives with and takes care of his grandmother and her orange grove. The dear lady is old and tired and needs to go into care for a respite while he’s doing the harvest. It’s in the nursing home that she meets a young woman carer who would be a perfect match for her grandson, so she hatches a plan to bring them together.

Dora Bramden writes heart-melting, passionate contemporary romance. 

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How I Make A Castle Setting Be Like A Character. by Dora Bramden

When creating a mood for a scene in my story, I like a setting with energy that the characters can connect to. It affects their choices and happiness making them want to stay or go. Where a character lives is of particular use too, in revealing who they are. Like a family member, the setting of their home will impact on the main characters in the story.

When thinking about this month’s topic, it occurred to me that so far all my books contain scenes in a palace of some kind. A Palazzo is the family home of Alessandro in ‘The Italian Billionaire’s Secret Baby’ and  a castle-like family estate is the setting for Angus McLaren’s home in ‘The Scottish Billionaire’s Secret Lover’.  What all castles have in common are their history and weightiness. For good or bad they are symbolic of great responsibility.  The palace character is dominating and demanding, like the Netflix series ‘The Crown.’ Buckingham Palace is a looming presence that the royals must live in, against their inclination as captives of the system.

The settings in my books are inspired by actual places.  I visited Sir Walter Scotts home, Abbotsford during a bus tour around England, Wales and Scotland. At the time, it impressed me as having a distinct character. It was traditional, very old with a rich history, luxurious and charming. There I found, Sir Walter Scott had a two-story library with first editions of Jane Austen’s books. The grand house and estate influence Angus in ‘The Scottish Billionaire’s Secret Lover’ as a character might because it’s history and solidness are a weight on his shoulders. The house is a constant reminder of what his aristocratic responsibilities are.

 It also has a significant impact on Natalie, who is staying there to create a successful charity ball. The setting puts her in a fish out of water predicament. Wanting to be a part of Angus’s life but believing she can’t win in a competition with his responsibilities to the estate.

View of the shoreline, Lake Como.

Summer Palazzo in Ferrara. The ornate ceiling in the palace coffee shop.

In ‘The Italian Billionaire’s Secret Baby,’ Alessandro’s estranged wife and son arrive at his ancestral palazzo on Lake Como. (I was inspired to create this palazzo when on a cruise on Lake Como). Katrina is impacted from the moment she drives through the grand gates. The formality of the garden and the view of the palazzo are impressive and beautiful but they represent a significant a part of Alessandro’s like that she’s been excluded from.

While their son bonds with his grandmother Katrina attempts to feel at home, baking on the cooks day off and practicing for her next ballet in the unused ballroom. The ornate the palazzo suits her, a prima ballerina she’s at home in lavish settings and we can see that she would fit into this life so well. But the power of the palace is subliminally threatening to a woman who values her independence above everything. shores.

Even in my next to be published novel there is a maharaja’s palace that is an exclusive hotel in Jaipur, India. The grand energy of this place emboldens the hero and heroine to make a last stand in their fight to be together. 

And in the book I’m currently editing, there is a massive night club that has a façade like a castle, which used to be a ballroom. For the heroine who was a child when she lived there, it was her fairytale castle. She's grown up but has never stopped longing to return to the place where all her happiest memories reside. The heiress to a music empire returns home to claim her castle but finds it already has an occupant who wants to call it home as badly as she does. Each has a love of this place and that gives it life, like  a character in the story

Dora Bramden writes heart-melting, passionate romance.

The Scottish Billionaire’s Secret Lover

The Italian Billionaire’s Secret Baby

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If I could live for a week in any time period which one would that be? by Dora Bramden

I'm wearing a homemade Regency inspired dress.

Which time period would I live in if I could choose any? My first thoughts are that I’d like to live in one that has gorgeous clothes and chivalrous men, like in a Regency period novel.

But even though I’m a passionately committed romantic, I couldn’t suffer any period in time where women weren’t masters of their own lives. As much as I love the clothes of the Regency period it's not a time want to actually live in for a week. I enjoy the fantasy of a historical novel but I couldn’t bear sitting around with no TV to watch, waiting for the men to make life interesting, not for a moment let alone a week.

Give me the current day. Women are taking leadership roles in running their country. In Australia, we have had a female Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister. Male dominated sports like Australian rules football,  now have a women’s competition.  The Australian Women’s Football League games are aired on commercial TV.

The Romance genre is fantastic right now. I love to barrack for those career women heroes, balancing their goals and a budding relationship with a strong man. I love reading about a man who gets behind her and lends a hand and doesn’t expect her to be the handmaiden at his table of life. I like that the male heroes aren’t just wanting her because she’s beautiful but because he sees her qualities as a human being. These male heroes want a woman who is their equal in all things. 

As for going forward in time, I'm optimistic that things are going to get even better and I really would like to own a hover car, however, I don't want to know my future. What if I run into myself and corrupt the space/time continuum. Who knows what that might do? Said with a grin, believe me. 

I’m pretty happy to be waking up tomorrow and being alive right now. If I want to visit another time period I'll pick up a book.

Dora Bramden writes Heart Melting, Passionate Romance

Romance Authors are Writers of Influence by Dora Bramden

This months topic of writers of influence got me thinking about how many writers have influenced me. One thing they have in common is that they wrote romance, relationship stories with a happy ending.

The romance genre was once overlooked as having cultural influence. Probably due to it being written mainly by women but also because it appealed most to women. But that is precisely the reason it should be given credit. Male historians weren’t so interested in social change outside of war and politics. But now women historians are asking questions that pertain to the lives of the female role models and people of note. Also, romance writers have an impact, on the women who read them, their family life, roles in the workplace and their roles of responsibility in general.

While the male gender had for so many years dominated what women read about themselves,  the rise of female romance authors changed that. They started telling stories with female main characters that shaped their world and made life better for themselves and the community around them.

Women reading these stories saw heroines proactively participating. Powerful and making things happen. Female characters modeled empowering behavior in the books women read.

Change is slow, and I know there isn’t really a direct link that I can point to, but the rise in women’s power came when they started to take their place among the ranks of working men. Jane Austen was a Vicar’s daughter and never expected to earn money. But in publishing her stories, she gained some independence and a voice through her novels.

Because her letters to her sister were published, we have been given an insight into her attitudes toward society, and it’s inequities. In her life she chose to reject marriage as an institution, refusing to wed without love. She wouldn’t give up her independence because society told her that was her only way of having success.

This has enabled us to see that those views paralleled in her works of fiction. Elizabeth Bennet refused Mr. Darcy’s first marriage proposal because she wouldn’t give in to societies pressure to marry for security alone. It had to be a marriage that gave her something more substantial. It had to be about love.

Romance as a genre has traditionally been a male and a female who look to form a loving relationship. This has been the same since  Charlotte Brontë, published Jane Eyre under the pen name "Currer Bell," in 1847. Jane was dependent on her circumstances, however, was never subservient. She used every bit of power available to her to be self-determining. The pay off was a  happy ending with the man she loved. This was a time when women were expected to be little more than a helpmate for a man and to provide him with children. She saves Mr. Rothschild from a lonely existence.

Since those early days, when women often chose to publish under a male name so that they’d be taken seriously, we have come a long way in the quest for rights for women. We are now sitting in the houses of parliament and running countries. It’s not hard to imagine Jane Eyre stepping up should the occasion arise for her to use her power of intellect for the good of all.

Over the last couple of centuries, romance novels have continued to keep pace with women’s empowerment. Romance novels now contain women in roles that give men a challenge intellectually.

A favorite novel, ‘The Accidental Tourist’ by Anne Tyler is a masterpiece.  Muriel is a dog trainer who takes Macon’s dog in hand and teaches him to respect her. Although she is poor, she’s extremely resourceful. When Muriel and Macon fall in love, he thinks they’re too different. Muriel finds a way to show Macon that she’s the right person for him. She follows him on a trip to Paris. He’s amazed and can’t work out how Muriel has managed it. She goes over her elaborate arrangements with him, including calling in favors and doing trades. This teaches him to respect her and her talent for making things happen.

A recently published romance called ‘In At The Deep End’ by Penelope Janu has a heroine,  Harry, who has been strong enough to keep alive the foundation set up by her environmentalist parents, even though she was orphaned when a teenager. Her love interest arrives in the shape of a Per, navy man who wants to conduct important scientific research in the Antarctic. He wants to bark orders and have Harry fall into line, but she’s never going to do that. She wants to back his research and works to make his expedition a reality, but she does it her way. She earns his respect and grows through knowing him. It’s the way relationships should work. It models men and women as equals, working together. Each has to adjust their attitudes so that they can become a united couple.

I could cite many more romance writers that use the critical ingredient women having an equal footing with men, pursuing their dream job and being proactive and capable but I don’t have space to do them justice in this blog. Safe to say, regarding women in literature being depicted as intelligent, active human beings, romance writers are continuing to inspire and model feminine strength to readers. 

Dora Bramden writes contemporary romance.
Find out more about Dora Bramden and her books on her Amazon Author Page
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SHE'S GONE COUNTRY!

There’s an old saying: “Hindsight is 20-20.” Looking back on my family’s move to a fairytale-beautiful acreage in the country, I must agree that the view from four years on is not at all what we expected.

Four years ago, Chuck and I and Son 2 and his family moved onto four acres of woods and pasture thirty miles outside of Portland, Oregon. The property sits on a hillside overlooking a small valley in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains. This is one of the most beautiful spots you could ever find!

The original plan was that Son 2 and his wife would finish college (both were returning students) and build a house on the property. Meanwhile they and their four kids would live with us in the big four-bedroom house. Son 2 worked for his dad in his home-based consulting business and attended classes at a nearby technical college. Our daughter-in-law commuted to PSU in downtown Portland.

Chuck was the only one of us with any livestock experience. Although he grew up in the city, as a teenager he had a horse and worked off  boarding fees cleaning stalls and doing odd jobs at the stables. He also worked in a nursery and was in Future Farmers of America in high school. Thank God for that!

I’d always wanted alpacas. Chuck bought me three for Mother’s Day. He and Son 2 built them a shed in the pasture during a week of pouring rain. (I’m sure it was an omen.) We rented a horse trailer and went to get them.

My first inkling that alpacas weren’t exactly the animals I thought they were came when the lady we bought them from put on a raincoat “because they won’t be happy about getting in the trailer, and when they’re not happy, they spit—a lot!” She wasn’t kidding! Suffice it to say it took four adults to get them into the trailer.

Alpacas look like friendly, cuddly animals. They are more like aloof cats. Sometimes crabby, seventy-pound cats that may kick or body-slam you when you least expect it!

FRONT OF OUR HOUSE

Soon we added free-range chickens and three baby goats to the livestock. The chickens were fun to watch and the eggs were wonderful, but they dug up the flowers and pooped all over the porch.

In fact, dealing with poop—alpaca, chicken and goat—occupied a lot of our time. It’s the hardest part of having livestock, in my opinion. The only thing harder for me was worrying about the livestock because to me, they were pets.

I worried about coyotes attacking the alpacas down in the pasture all the time. The only defense alpacas have is running away and bleating an alarm call. Put them in a pasture, and they can’t even run away. Luckily, the coyotes stayed away. But false “alarms” had me running down to the pasture every other day. They bleated at the neighbor using her walker to go down to her mailbox. They bleated at people walking and cycling on the main road. They bleated at the garbage truck. Never once did they bleat at anything dangerous!

I worried about the goats eating something poisonous, because the people who lived on the property before us had landscaped with trees, bushes and flowers that are poisonous to goats. At night, we kept the little goats in the barn in the woods above the house. The alpacas wouldn’t let them into their shed in the pasture. So every morning we had to walk the goats down to the pasture past all the tempting poisonous plants, and every evening we had to take them back up to the barn.

Galen’s family helped with chores, but he and his wife were gone most of the time and the kids soon tired of farm life. Before long they realized they are city folk at heart. They moved back to Portland.

VIEW DOWN TO PASTURE BY ROAD

Business took a downturn and we learned Chuck needed knee replacement surgery. Most of the livestock chores fell to me. I didn’t think we could hold onto the property financially, or that we could handle the work load. We sold the livestock and consulted a realtor. Our dream of life in the country was in tatters.

Luckily, we made it through the winter and Chuck recovered from surgery.

Then my disabled daughter and her husband and grown daughters moved out from Iowa. After a while, my daughter and her husband moved onto our property in their fifth-wheel trailer. They pay a little rent and our son-in-law helps a lot with chores. One of our granddaughters and her husband rented the basement from us for a year. We were able to refinance the house. We made it through!

Business is good again and we are even considering getting two goats to help clear out the brush in the woods. This time we will know what we are getting into! They will live and ‘work’ on the same area of the property. I true country fashion, we’ll re-purpose a playhouse to be their goat shed.

VIEW OF BARN AND TREE HOUSE 

Since “going country”, so much has happened that we never expected! We were city slickers for sure. But we have wonderful helpful neighbors, friends and family to support us as we learn to “live country.”

Have you ever moved from the city to the country, or visa-versa? What did you find most surprising?

I'm Sarah Raplee, Paranormal Romantic Suspense Author of Blindsight,Psychic Agents Book 1.

Stories I Become Immersed in by Dora Bramden

With pen in hand, I could be scribbling in my notebook while laying on my cozy bed or on a windy beach with waves crashing around me. In my head, I’m in an Italian palazzo overlooking Lake Como or slipping and sliding on Hadrian’s Wall in the UK because I’m living vicariously through the characters in the book I’m writing. The wonderful thing is, it’s a complete break from my everyday life, and the possibilities are endless for my characters but for me, not so much. What I can’t do in real life I can do in my imagination as I write or as I’m reading someone else's novel. I’ve always loved reading and getting lost between the pages of a great story is marvelous.

Romance stories are my preference as they lift me out of the everyday and into a magical realm. I love to write stories that could be about fairies and goblins and knights in shining armor, but instead of them being from a magical kingdom I make them human and send them on a journey, a quest of some kind. To make amends for past mistakes or to find a wife so that the future of an orphanage is secure. I find a way to make the people come to life as they pursue a dream or salvation. It’s never easy, and there’s a struggle, and I think that’s the kind of story that really gets me immersed. As a reader or writer, I want to have high hopes that the characters win, in the end, achieve what they needed to and I want to feel sorry for them when things don’t go as planned.

When adversity strikes, it flows from the actions of the hero and heroine. They must heal a past hurt and learn from their mistakes through the love they have for each other. Mistakes made due to previous heartbreak and an endeavor to protect themselves can create a sticky web that binds them in pain. When even the reader can’t imagine a way out because they seem so stuck, the story is intense and keeps the reader so engrossed they barely notice turning the pages. My favorite Jane Austen character is Captain Wentworth from Persuasion. He has created an expectation that he prefers Louisa, too late he discovers his love for Anne (his one time fiancé) is still strong. Although it’s Anne he really wants, he can’t have her because honor demands that he follow through on the previous attention he's given to Louisa and marries her. Poor Captain Wentworth! Poor Anne! I’ve read this book so many times, but I always feel their anguish.

In most books I read, the setting and the characters create an alternative world for me to inhabit and that is so addictive. In writing, I enjoy the same effects. The cheapest holiday ever. My two novels ‘The Scottish Billionaire’s Secret Lover and The Italian Billionaire’s Secret Baby’ are wholly and partially set in countries overseas from Australia where I live. I visited the UK and wrote the places I went to into my novel. I did the same for another later trip to Italy. I got to relieve these wonderful places again as I wrote the novels. The next novel to be published this year is set in Australia and India. I’ll admit I haven’t been in person, but I did a lot of research and read travel brochures on holidaying in the Rajasthan area. I also met a fashion designer who’d actually lived and worked in this area, and I was able to ask her heaps of questions. So in writing my last book, I didn’t have the expense of a trip to India, but I became immersed in the romance of a fashion designers life, working in that country, through my writing.

Learn more about Dora Bramden on her website

‘Healing Love, Passionate Romance.’