Courting Miss Adelaide released at last!

Janet here.

Since childhood I’ve loved September for the Labor Day holiday and the sense of optimism about a new start in school. September is also my birthday month so that makes it special. But this year, September is an extraordinary month of firsts.

My first novel. Courting Miss Adelaide, Steeple Hill Love Inspired Historical, will hit the shelves September 9.That’s tomorrow! Talk about butterflies! I’ve waited over two years for the LIH line to launch and my book to release. It’s hard to believe it’s actually going to happen. I know the book exists. I got my author copies. Still I keep wondering if I’ll find them when I go searching tomorrow, with a camera in hand and my heart in my throat.

My first book signing. I’m praying someone will come on Saturday. Our kids gave me a gorgeous pen engraved with the title that I’ll use to sign. My husband and daughter will be there to help. Our grandkids will stop in with their dad to see their grandmother signing her books. Hopefully! I’ve got a giveaway—a hatbox my milliner heroine would be proud to stash one of her hats in. I’ve filled it with duplicate Seeker books, chocolate, teddy bear, Little Women video and other goodies. I figured it couldn’t hurt to use bribery to lure readers. Along with that enticement and my generous nature , I have another reason for the giveaway. Each buyer will write who they want the book signed to on an index card. After I autograph the book, I’ll toss the card into the pot for the drawing. Voilá! No worries about misspelling, or worse, forgetting friends and acquaintances’ names.

More firsts—I had my first radio interview last week and only babbled a little. The host assured me they’d cut and make me sound smooth. Love a man who can do that.

This isn’t in September, but I’m booked for my first library talk in May 2009. Sounds like forever, but the timing will be great. Right around the release of Courting the Doctor’s Daughter. I’m hearing rumblings of the possibility for more talks. I’m sure speaking will have me quaking in my shoes, but it’s good to be stretched. Thankfully God promises I won’t break.

So what’s Courting Miss Adelaide about?

Lonely milliner Adelaide Crum sees the “Orphan Train” coming to town as her only chance for motherhood. Newspaper Editor Charles Graves sits on the committee that will determine Adelaide’s future. He feels she’d be the kind of mother he’d read about in books and supports her request, but the town fathers disagree and turn her down. William and Emma, orphaned siblings arrive on the train and from that moment on events thrust Adelaide and Charles together….

Sorry, no spoilers here.

Perhaps you’re not familiar with the orphan train phenomenon. I wasn’t until my Social Studies teacher father sent me a newspaper clipping. Are you able to make out the children standing on and around the train in a picture taken during that time? Immigrant orphans and half orphans lived on New York City’s streets in abject poverty and in its overcrowded orphanages. Charles Loring Brace, a Methodist preacher and founder of the Children’s Aid Society, decided relocating these children to farms and small towns would give them a chance for a better life. Between the years of 1853 and 1929, 250,000—some say as many as 350,000—children rode trains to a new life in the Midwest and beyond. Not all those children got a HEA ending. Some lived as indentured servants. A few were sent back, only to ride the train again. Can you imagine the stories those children could tell? I was fascinated and had to put that nugget of history in a book. The result was Courting Miss Adelaide. And later, the sequel, Courting the Doctor’s Daughter.

I love American history, particularly the 1800s. The Courting books are set in 1897 and 1898, a time when women were fighting against the boundaries society placed on them, a perfect fit for Adelaide and Mary, heroine in Courting the Doctor’s Daughter. I love reading and writing historical romances so I’m thrilled to write for Love Inspired Historical, along with the other great authors in the line. If you love historical romances, I hope you’ll check us out on My Space. http://www.myspace.com/lihauthors. And don’t forget to get the Seekers wonderful historical novels—Mary’s Calico Canyon and Julie’s A Passion Redeemed in stores now.

Anyone going to American Christian Fiction Writers in Minneapolis in a couple weeks? If so, please attend the Mall of America book signing and stop at Seeker tables and say hello. Cheryl, Debby, Camy, Julie, Mary, and I would love to see your friendly faces!

Leave a comment here to get into the drawing for a copy of Courting Miss Adelaide. If you want another chance to win a book, note my scheduled blog appearances up on Saturday’s Seekerville post.

Blessings, Janet