"Starlight" Explores What it Means to Be Beautiful

Hi GLIAS friends!

I’m excited to be here talking about my newest release, The Bride Wore Starlight, the third book in my “Seven Brides for Seven Cowboys” series.  I couldn’t wait to bring to this particular story to the world, because I’ve loved this heroine from the moment I started the series.

Joely Crockett was first introduced in The Bride Wore Denim along with her five sisters. When the Crockett girls’ father died, leaving the family’s Wyoming home—Paradise Ranch—to his daughters, they learned the ranch’s finances were in dire condition. Since all the women had jobs outside of Wyoming, it was difficult to decide who, if anyone, could take over running Paradise.

Joely, newly separated from her husband and looking for a change, volunteered. Unfortunately, she was involved in a serious car accident that left her unable to take on something as big as managing the biggest cattle ranch in Wyoming.  She turned over the reins to her older sister and fell into depression while she tried to heal from devastating injuries.

 I’ve been waiting through two books to tell what happens to her!

In addition to the fact that there are THREE weddings in The Bride Wore Starlight!!! the more serious thing that excited me about the story was the chance to explore our society’s obsession with beauty and perfection.  Joely has always been the “beautiful” sister. She was rodeo princess, rodeo queen, homecoming queen, and Miss Wyoming. Whenever she suggested she might set her sights on something else she was met with soothing admonitions not to “worry her pretty little head” over difficult decisions. She even married a man who promised to help her pursue her goals, only to find she was not much more than a trophy wife.

So, all Joely’s ever known is how to get ahead using her beauty, and she’s learned to believe that people only love her for her one and only “talent”:  being pretty.

That world crashed around her after the accident.

What happens when you lose your biggest asset? Joely had to find out, since she was left with permanent lameness, and a visible scar on her face. As a woman who once made her livelihood on stage in front of thousands, she now can’t bear to be seen in public at all.

I thought Joely’s struggle with beauty held a mirror up to the daily struggle women—and men, too—face every day. We’re obsessed with needing to be beautiful, forever young, healthy, strong, active—perfect. And we’re bombarded constantly with commercials, TV shows and movies, billboards, and magazines showing us just what we should strive to be. I know I bought into that culture long ago.

In The Bride Wore Starlight Joely fights getting on with her life pretty strongly at first—even when Alec Morrissey enters her world and turns out to be someone with all the moral authority in the world to help her learn to live with her injuries. Alec is a former rodeo super star who gave up his dreams due to injury. He, however, has made peace with his life (at least on the surface) and it was a joy for me to watch him convince Joely little by little to take some chances on things she thought she could never do. It takes time, but she grows in confidence and in strength and, as she and Alec fall in love, trust. Every day she has to believe a little more that it was never her beauty that made her strong, but her brains, her toughness, and her love.

I think most of us struggle every day to love who we are the way we are. Some of us have already figured it out, but I think we can all use reminders that we don’t need to look like beauty queens to be gorgeous.  I hope that’s what Joely’s story will be:  a reminder!

Join me here tomorrow when I'll tell you more about our hero, Alec. I was so excited when Joely met him--but he has some secret issues of his own -- oh, and very very BIG dog!  Plus I'll have an exclusive excerpt for you.

I’m giving away a $10.00 Amazon gift card and several books including one of our own Angi Morgan's latest romantic suspenses. Enter the rafflecopter to be eligible, but then tell me your best “beauty” tip—and I don’t mean cosmetics, but what you do to make yourself feel fantastic inside as well as out. 

Here's where you can find The Bride Wore Starlight and pre-order it for delivery on

RELEASE DAY - FEBRUARY 9th!!

  Amazon 

B&N

iTunes

Kobo

And be sure to check out the first two books of the Seven Brides For Seven Cowboys series:

 a Rafflecopter giveaway