Description, Excerpt, Author Bio, Order
eBook ISBN: 1-58749-543-0, Print ISBN: 1-58749-567-8
GENRE: Ciontemporary Western romance
AUTHOR: Gwynn Morgan
Regular price is $4.99
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DESCRIPTION: Marisa McCabe's life centers around remote Red Canyon, Arizona and her horse training. Her secondary goal is earning her high school diploma. When a controversial construction project starts nearby, her ordered life is shaken by changes. Horse training may be dangerous work, but danger is relative. She learns some relatives can be dangerous indeed and loyalties may be severely tested. |
| As superintendent on his first big construction job, Dusty Layne has to prove his capabilities. A chance meeting with a young woman leads to an unlikely friendship. When that converges with environmental protests he confronts a major challenge. How can he reconcile these issues while he saves Mari from the danger created by her loyalty to him? Can he even save her from himself? | |
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REVIEWS: “Relative
Dangers is a heart-warming romance that details the best and worse
of people in a fashion that will leave you breathless. Marisa
is a strong woman who has dealt with the worst life threw at her
and remained true to herself. Dustin is a good man that admits
his past mistakes and wants more in his life than work and a distant
family.”
Reviewed by Tammy for Fallen Angel Reviews,
4 ANGELS |
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Excerpt: Mari felt Paisley tense as they entered the arena. His ears flickered nervously, but he trotted obediently in a circle, about six feet from the fence. She slacked the reins slightly and nudged him into a slow canter. He surged ahead, taking the proper lead at once. She reined him in a figure eight, which he executed perfectly, although she noticed he was breaking into a sweat much too quickly for the light exercise. True, the afternoon sun was warm, but not enough to account for his building lather. She sensed the horse was anxious, almost fearful, as if he expected at any moment to be hurt. Just then, seemingly out of nowhere, a dust devil appeared. The whirling wind picked up a couple of tumble weeds and spiraled them skyward, right in front of the horse. He gave a shrill squeal and reared straight up, pawing at the attack he perceived. Mari slacked the reins at once, grabbing a handful of mane and gripping hard with her knees to keep her seat. She slapped the horse across the ears with her right hand. As she hoped, he ducked away from the blow and dropped down, but only for a moment. An instant later he reared again, teetering precariously on his hind legs. Dusty looked up at the sound of the horse's cry. His heart stopped somewhere high in his throat. Mari clung like a burr to the horse, but what if the animal fell? Could she shake herself free quickly enough to get out of the way? He stood, transfixed and helpless. Moments before he had watched her trot the horse into the arena, admired the easy way they moved in unison She's good, way too good for this dump. But no matter how good she was, if that damn horse fell.... "Mari, get clear! Let go and jump free!" He wasn't sure if he yelled or only thought that desperate plea. Time skidded to a stop, the whole world in balance with the frightened horse. Again, Mari slapped across the horse's ears, kicked him hard in the ribs, and attempted to rein him away from the dust devil, which hung persistently right in front of them. Apparently the habit of obedience took over. He turned, coming down again on all four feet as he did so. Now he might buck, but that would be far preferable to falling. But he didn't, he trotted a few paces before she checked him with the reins. Then he stood, shaking as with a bone-deep chill although sweat streamed off his body in rivulets. Dusty gulped in a great breath of air, almost giddy with relief but also illogically angry. What right did she have to put him through such a fright? What right had she to be so important to him so soon? He tried to rationalize that he simply did not want to witness a horrible accident and have to render the first aid or get help, but his fears went far beyond that, and deep inside, he knew it. |
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CLICK for Gwynn Morgan's thoughts on how she came to write this book. Author BIO: Gwynn Morgan, lifelong Arizona resident, finds endless inspiration in the natural beauty, ethnic diversity, colorful history and marvelous variety of the American southwest. She brings a strong flavor of this exciting region into every one of her novels which she calls “romantic adventures.” On the drawing board at present are some historical tales set in the environs of Tombstone, Fort Huachuca and Bisbee as well as more Arizona-set contemporary stories. “So many ideas, so little time,” she frequently laments. Bitten hard and early by the writing bug, she wrote her first verse at age eight and soon afterwards began to try her hand at fiction. Serious pursuit of a writing career was put on hold while she went to college, found employment with the U.S. Government, married and raised a family. Finally after ending a twenty-five year civil service career, she found her niche in writing romance—but romance with a unique Arizona Ambience. Gwynn now lives in a rural area of Cochise County, Arizona’s southeastern corner, an area rich in history and natural wonders. She shares her rustic little home with two canine companions, Sadie and Rico, for whom she serves as chauffeur and household staff. Although she has been an active and volunteering member of a number of writing-focused organizations including Romance Writers and America and several of its chapters, she has now drawn away from most of her volunteer efforts. This was necessary to allow her concentrate on writing and rebuilding her life following the sudden death of her partner and husband of thirty two years late in 2003. She plans to complete some joint efforts they had worked on together as well as to continue with her own projects. In between hours at the keyboard, she enjoys a wide range of creative and outdoor activities such as reading, Celtic/ethnic music, rock-hounding and lapidary, astronomy, nature photography, sewing and crafts, hiking, back-road driving in her fiery red Mazda pickup, the Red Hot Mama, and spending time with her children and grandchildren. Gwynn presently has eight novels available from four different small press publishers (see her web site for details) and several others in the queue for release in the next couple of years. Gwynn loves to hear from friends, fans and fellow writers. Contact her by email at Gwynn@gwynnmorgan.com or azwriter427@yahoo.com. You can also write to her at PO Box 6046, Huachuca City, AZ 85616. |
~How author Gwynn Morgan came to write Relative Dangers~
Essentially Relative Dangers is a stand-alone book. Those who read my earlier book Powerful Medicine will recognize the InDinay as the hypothetical tribe I created for that novel but that is the only connection. I do plan to visit the InDinay Rez again in some future stories but both Relative Dangers and Powerful Medicine are complete tales with no sequels or series planned.
As I wrote Relative Dangers I pulled together bits and pieces from a number of sources. The InDinay already existed--at least in my mind—and environmental issues are very sensitive in the west, so a protest over the building of a dam was a realistic scenario. For Mari’s work, I drew heavily on my own experiences back in the 1960s when I worked as a horse trainer. Some of Mari’s riding and horsy misadventures closely parallel my own experiences. In fact, her character is based to some extent on my younger self; I’d have to say this is the closest to autobiographical of my novels but I took a lot of liberties with real life for the sake of the story. I was not abandoned by my mother or raised as a step or foster child nor was my situation as harsh as Mari’s by any means. Dustin is very superficially based on a friend of mine at that time but again, many details were changed.
I wrote the first draft of this book some time ago, like about twelve or fifteen years. It was one of those “books of the heart” that didn't seem to quite fit anywhere, so it went in the proverbial "box under the bed." However, this past year I reached a point where I decided I wanted to give it to the world, so out came the box and I went to work. The re-writing was mostly subtle, because the core of the story was sound. I just needed to fine tune some aspects and smooth the rough spots since my writing skills have improved a bit--at least I hope they have!
Relative Dangers is what I call an April-September romance in which there is a considerable age gap between the hero and heroine. That is one source of their internal conflict. Both of them have a lot of other issues in their lives, some of which get intertwined as the story advances. There is plenty of violence and danger. Although I try not to dwell on the "blood and guts" aspects, real life can be violent and sometimes a person must fight back in self defense and support of what they believe. Mari is not shy about doing this although I hope she comes across as a very sensitive and caring person. In desperation, people will do many things they might not normally even consider.
As usual, I tried to make the setting and the whole cast of secondary characters as realistic and vivid as possible. To me there is nothing worse than cardboard people standing around the painted backdrops filling some kind of role while the hero and heroine do their thing! It ruins a book completely for me. I want to be there and feel like I know everyone before I put the book down, so I try to write what I like to read. If this appeals to you too, maybe you’ll enjoy Relative Dangers.