Love is in the Air- Everywhere!

 

By: Marcia King-Gamble

www.Lovemarcia.com 

Here we are with Valentine’s Day only days away and the scurrying around is already in full force. Everywhere you look there are signs to Buy! Buy! Buy! The price of roses is already sky high and last year’s unsold merchandise has just made another appearance. Store Windows are filled with every imaginable shade of red and pink, and floating hearts tend to captivate. Love is in the air and Cupid has his bow drawn. Even Hallmark has upped its ante. This February, more and more unlikely lovers find each other, despite extraordinary conflicts and incredible odds. Isn’t love grand?

Still, I scratch my head wondering why the strong push only once a year? And why does love, and adoring appreciation, come with a hefty price tag?

Don’t get me wrong, I love roses and wine as much and maybe more, than the average person. But why wait until February 14^th to show me love when there are 365 days in the year?  

Chocolates get eaten. Flowers die. Memories live on forever.

Give me a hug. Shoot me a smile. Buy me a rose for no particular reason. Take out the trash. Listen to me when I’m blue. Rub my back. Show me you love me in a million small ways. But don’t wait until Valentine’s Day to say you love me. Not when there are 365 days in the year!  

Happy Valentine’s Day All!

Oh, and you just might enjoy this Valentine's Day story from my backlist. If you're in the Jacksonville area, come visit me and author Sandra Madden at the Amelia Island Bookfest, February 18th. Doors open at 10:00 am. 

About Marcia King-Gamble

USA bestselling romance writer, Marcia King-Gamble originally hails from a sunny Caribbean Island where the sky and ocean are the same mesmerizing shade of blue. This former travel industry executive has spent most of life in the United States. A National Bestselling author, Marcia has penned over 34 books and 8 novellas. She has contributed to Michael Fiore’s DigitalRomanceInc and served as a moderator on the now defunct eHarmony advice boards.  Having witnessed the bad, the ugly, and the not so good in relationships, she still prefers to write about happily ever after. Caring for her animal family keeps her grounded and sane.

Visit Marcia at www.lovemarcia.com or “friend” her on Facebook: http://bit.ly/1MlnrIS

Be sure to join her newsletter mailing list.

Instagram * Amazon * Website * Facebook * Twitter

A Calming View and Dreams .... by Delsora Lowe

Visiting my son’s house with the wonderful view of a cove that leads out to the Atlantic Ocean, with sailboat’s white sails bobbing on the water beyond the jut of land and a tiny bridge leading to an island, always calms me.

On a very hot day in Maine, I sit under the ceiling fan in the cool living room that lets in the ocean breeze but not the heat of the sun. And I listen and watch and dream about my bucket list, which includes my own house with such a view. A place that inspires me to write.

But alas, even though I love my little landlocked view from my writing desk, these water views inspire me to write. So, with a day off from computers and writing, and with words and images insisting on churning through my mind, I grabbed my phone and wrote a stream of consciousness…

 

The continuous, high chirps emanating from the leaf cover.

 

West bound wind off the ocean furling leaves bright green to dark, depending on how deep the sun penetrates the canopy of the huge oak standing between me and the ocean.

 

The water a constant movement of ripples headed toward beach.

A white gull’s lazy travel, swooping and landing on the barely submerged sandbar.

 

The water morphing from the color of cement gray to a tailored, summer weight, wool-gray to light turquoise to yellow-green and back to a darker turquoise as the ocean laps against the opposite shore of the cove.

 

The barrier of bright pink and deep red blossoms gracing bushes of dark green-leafed, sea-side roses in the yard across the street.

The hum of the nearby interstate traffic weaving from one end of the city to the other, broken by sirens racing down the highway and a plane roaring into the summer sky from the nearby airport.

 

Then back to the consistent chirp, chew, chew, chirp, chirp buzz of birds.

 

Saturday afternoon, away from computer and household chores and headline news I want to make disappear. The news that makes me regress to my innocence, fifty years ago when I was first old enough to understood policy and politics, hate and love, kindness and cruelty…

Today, I concentrate on the sounds, and the feel of comforting breezes and hot sun and water rippling from the light puffs of wind and nature living its life in the sheltered trees.

Those thoughts, scribbled to clear my brain, allowed creativity to be unlocked.

The tranquil view and the quiet of the house and neighborhood with only sounds of wind and birds and an occasional meow as Luna wandered into the house and plopped down next to me on the couch, her head gently pushing against my leg as she leaned into my caress, helped to settle me.

Views and pets calmed my anger at the world we live in that can’t treat every human being with respect and love.

Thank goodness for serene scenery, nature’s sounds, and dreams of a room with a view where I can get lost in words that will lead to a story with a happy ending. My escape from a harsh world. And…the reason I write romance.

What is on your bucket list?

Amazon: (also in print) https://www.amazon.com/Starlight-Grille-Serenity-Harbor-Collection-ebook/dp/B07CN8JV2Z/  
Books2Read   books2read.com/u/3yDjWe

~ cottages to cabins ~ keep the home fires burning ~

Delsora Lowe writes small town sweet and spicy romances and contemporary westerns from the mountains of Colorado to the shores of Maine.

Author of the Starlight Grille series, Serenity Harbor Maine novellas, and the Cowboys of Mineral Springs series, Lowe has also authored short romances for Woman’s World magazine. Her newest novella is The Love Left Behind. Look for both a Christmas novel (The Inn at Gooseneck Lane) and novella (Holiday Hitchhiker) later this fall.

Social Media Links:
Author website: www.delsoralowe.com
Facebook Author page: https://www.facebook.com/delsoraloweauthor/community/
Amazon Author page: https://www.amazon.com/Delsora-Lowe/e/B01M61OM39/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0
Books2Read Author page: https://www.books2read.com/ap/8GWm98/Delsora-Lowe
BookBub Author Page: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/delsora-lowe-93c6987f-129d-483d-9f5a-abe603876518
Goodreads Author Page: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16045986.Delsora_Lowe
Instagram: #delsoralowe / https://www.instagram.com/delsoralowe/

Photo Credits: Delsora Lowe

MARGARET TANNER'S ROSE GARDEN

Housekeeping and tidying up. Not my favourite topic or occupation, unless we are talking about tidying up my garden. In particular my rose garden, which I tend with loving care, because roses truly deserve special treatment. No chore to tidy up here. I banish any weed the moment it rears its ugly head near one of my “lovelies.”

Roses are my favourite flower. My husband thinks I am obsessed with them.  I always wear rose perfume, Bush Rose, Musk Rose. The Yardley (English company) Rose has a lovely perfume, as sweet and fragrant as its namesake. How many wonderful people have you met who are called Rose, Rosy, Rosemarie, Rosemary?

I have to confess that my garden is full of roses. Hubby hates them with a passion because he thinks they deliberately jump out and stick their prickles into him.

I love the old fashioned roses the best. They may not be quite as colourful as the modern day varieties, but they always have a gorgeous perfume.  Just Joey, a beautiful large bloomed orange rose with a delightful scent is one of my favourites.  Another favourite is a blood red rose named Oklahoma, the perfume is as heady as wine. My garden has recently acquired a rose called. The Chocolate Rose. I have to say that although the bloom is pretty, it isn’t stunning, but it certainly has a chocolate perfume, and you can take that observation from a chocoholic. If there is one thing I know, it is the smell of chocolate.

It amazes me how often I seem to put a flower in the title of my romance novels, or give my characters a floral name. It must have been an instinctive thing because I don’t recall actively trying to do this.

One of my published novels was titled The English Rose. It had rather a tragic publishing history, but I did a re-write, and it has now been released by The Wild Rose Press (TWRP) as Frontier Wife. Holly And The Millionaire is another novel from TWRP. The heroine, Holly has a daughter called Lilly. Daphne is the name of my heroine in The Trouble With Playboys from TWRP. I have also written a short story with the title Call Of The Apple Blossom.  Can you see a pattern here?
                                
Whiskey Creek Press, previously published my novels, Savage Utopia and its sequel Stolen Birthright, singularly, but have recently re-released them in a 2 for 1 e-book, which is available from Whiskey Creek Press and Amazon Kindle.  No flower scenes in these two stories, though.

But my breaking news is that The Wild Rose Press has just contracted a new novel from me. And it has a working title of A Rose In No-Man’s Land.

So, there you have it. I wonder if there is such a thing as a roseaholic?

http://www.margarettanner.com/