Regrets and Responsibilities #MarchMadnessSale

Regrets and Responsibilities
#MarchMadnessSale
$2.99 thru March 31

After nearly forty years in the Army, Henry Wade, the Marquess of Dunbury, finally returns to London to officially claim his father’s title, hopefully to reunite with his long lost love, and to exact revenge on the man who ruined his life. Add six orphaned nieces into the mix, and suddenly, Henry’s life is upside down. Marrying them off seems like a fine plan, but finding suitable husbands for them is an impossible task. 

They all wish to marry for love.

Regrets and Responsibilities is the first book in the Ladies of Dunbury series. I found Henry Wade when I was beginning to write LADY OLIVIA'S UNDOING. I needed another love interest and lo and behold, Henry Wade popped into my head.

Lt. Col. Henry Wade,
Marquess of Dunbury

I knew Olivia needed someone like him to shake up her life. (Little did she know how badly the earthquake would hit.)

When Henry returns home from the wars, he is saddled with the responisibility of marrying off six nieces and has no idea what to do. 

Lady Catherine Gantry

Upon his arrival to his old home, he is greeted by a shrew of a woman who just so happens to be the girls' governess. He's thrown completely off guard because the woman looks exactly like the woman he left behind thirty-five years ago. That Catherine Gantry happens to be Olivia's cousin is another blow. Henry doesn't know what to do about his feelings for any of them, and to top it all off, he suffers from PTSD. (Only they didn't call it that then, but they did call it Soldier's Nerves.)

Lady Mercy Wade

I knew when I started writing the Ladies of Dunbury series, it was going to be a long road. Research, research, research. Thankfully, I had a slew of folders on my dashboard. And when I decided to add in characters from The Reluctant Grooms series, and give more backstory to questions about such things as Davingdale's past and Stephen Carlton's death, I had to dig back into my own stories, which has been a delightful surprise. They say write what you want to read. And well, I'm liking what I'm reading.

Lady Faith Curtiss

I also knew that "wrapping in" other characters from a previous series would be somewhat difficult. I had to get timelines right, and characters' names, not to mention horses (sometimes--yes, I named all the animals too.) But I wanted to write another layer, another dimension of family stories that made all these people who they were when I wrote them. Does that make sense? I figured I had to create a world, past-present-future, to give both of the series dimensionality. Especially if the readers had already read The Reluctant Grooms. They would be able to click with characters they already knew, and discover the new ones as well. 

Lady Charity Curtiss

Anyway, Henry is a complex man. He's been a soldier for all of his adult life, used to giving orders, bossing people around. Catherine is appalled at his manner and sets about softening him up. Unfortunately, she falls head over heels in love with a man, who is only looking at her because she looks like his lost love. Catherine is stoic, Catherine is serene, Catherine is screaming inside. She wants to love Henry, and he won't accept it. Not until the girls are married. It's killing her.

Lady Hope Curtiss

Henry, on the other hand, is fighting within himself as he falls in love with Catherine. She nurses him, gives him comfort, puts up with his fits and moods. The woman is perfect in almost every way--save the fact she looks exactly like the Olivia he thought he remembered. His mind understands Catherine is not Olivia. However, his heart cannot undo the memories of the past. 

They both have to learn a hard lesson before they can move forward.

Lady Patience Shaffer

Henry and Catherine are fun characters. They're easy to write because they bicker a lot. Writing this series has also given me the idea to write side-stories with only Catherine and Henry as characters, vignettes perhaps, of how they feel, what they're doing in their relationship as each of the girls find beaus, as their lives move forward. And how Henry must deal with his feelings about Olivia. (However, as much as I would love to tackle that project, I can't do it  now. Time is not on my side as I'm struggling with other writing-publishing goals, as well as spring projects in the house. But someday. And don't worry, I've been taking notes.)

Lady Prudence Shaffer

Confession: As I continued writing the girls' stories, when I came to Prudence, I became stuck. Life had thrown three fastballs I didn't see coming, and I had to put down the computer and step away. For a long time. Eighteen months. I'm back to it now, finally, but I had to make some tough decisions about my writing. One of them was that I couldn't write a full-lenth novel about a character I hated. Uranus entered Taurus on March 6 this year and believe it or not, I came up with a great idea of how to write the story without losing my mind. Took awhile, but I'm back on track.

Anyway, Regrets and Responsibilities is the first book in the Ladies of Dunbury series. 

On Sale Now 

thru March 31 

$2.99

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Anne Gallagher (c) 2019