Regan Walker's Best of the Regency with Author Caroline Warfield

Regan here… today on The Best of the Regency my guest is Caroline Warfield, author of the Dangerous Series of Regency romances, stories of men and women raised with all the privilege of the English aristocracy, who seek their own destiny and make their mark on history, overcoming challenges even after their happy ending.

Be sure to leave a comment with your email as Caroline is giving two winners their choice of an ebook from her Dangerous series.

On Amazon

Caroline’s latest release from her new Children of the Empire series:

Betrayed by his cousin and the woman he loved, Rand Wheatly fled England, his dreams of a loving family shattered. He clings to his solitude in an isolated cabin in Upper Canada. Returning from a business trip to find a widow and two children squatting in his house, he flies into a rage. He wants her gone, but her children are sick and injured, and his heart is not as hard as he likes to pretend.

Meggy Blair harbors a secret, and she’ll do whatever it takes to keep her children safe. She’d hopes to hide with her Ojibwa grandmother, if she can find the woman and her people. She doesn't expect to find shelter with a quiet, solitary man, a man who lowers his defensive walls enough to let Meggy and her children in.

Their idyllic interlude is shattered when Meggy’s brutal husband appears to claim his children. She isn’t a widow, but a wife, a woman who betrayed the man she was supposed to love, just as Rand’s sweetheart betrayed him. He soon discovers why Meggy is on the run, but time is running out. To save them all, Rand must return and face his demons.

Read a short excerpt:

 

She pushed away from the door. “If you’re finished, I’ll clear up your dishes.

“Damn it woman, I fend for myself here.” He looked her up and down. He noticed her deep blue eyes, midnight black hair, and dusky skin. “What are you? Gypsy? Is that where you learned how to diddle a man out of his belongings?”

She drew her back up straight and squared her shoulders. The gesture pulled her dress tight across obviously ample breasts.

There’s a practiced enticement. She’s in for a surprise if she thinks that trick will work on me.

Chin high, she met his eyes without flinching. “My grandmother is Ojibwa, my father was French, and my husband was a Scot. You can despise whichever one of those your English heart chooses, or all of them, but I am not a thief.”

She grabbed her skirt and took a step toward the door. “Do fend for yourself. We’ll leave as soon as we can.”

Meet Caroline:

 

Traveler, poet, librarian, technology manager—award-winning author Caroline Warfield has been many things (even a nun), but above all she is a romantic. Having retired to the urban wilds of eastern Pennsylvania, she reckons she is on at least her third act, happily working in an office surrounded by windows while she lets her characters lead her to adventures in England and the far-flung corners of the British Empire. She nudges them to explore the riskiest territory of all, the human heart. 

And now to the interview:

Why did you decide to write Regencies?

Like many people, I began to write what I like to read. For many years I devoured Regency romances, and lost myself many an evening in the Regency world. It seemed natural to write one. The beauty of the subgenre is that it spares a new writer world-building as part of her work. While a friend of mine spent considerable energy creating an entire village for one of her books, in general the Regency world with its tropes, customs, rules, language, and costume can be picked up ready made waiting for the author to create conflict, characters and romance. My current release, set post-Regency in 1832, falls under William IV, either very late Georgian or pre-Victorian. I found that a challenge after several years of writing to the Regency period, challenging but invigorating. It grows from Regency roots.

 

How often to you get lost in a story?

Caroline: I disappear into a book as often as I can, I do it for at least a while every evening before sleep. I'm thrilled when I find one that tries to keep me awake. Even if I put it down, I know it will be there in the morning for me to enter whenever I want.

Is writing or story telling easier for you?

Caroline:  I'm primarily a storyteller. I write my first drafts in spoken English, my native tongue. It takes beta readers and a good editor to massage it into written English, which sometimes feels foreign to me. Of course, I say, "spoken," but I do it on a laptop. I'm a true extrovert who doesn't always know what she thinks before she speaks or types the thought. I work it out on the keyboard, but my words come out as they might be spoken, and have to be wrestled into good prose.

Be honest, when reading...do you put yourself in the heroine’s role?

Caroline: Sometimes I do, but I confess that I sometimes put myself in the hero's role as well. I relate strongly to smart, independent women and caring protective men. My heroes tend to struggle with various emotional issues. The hero of The Renegade Wife clings to solitude at the beginning. I strongly related in his need to protect himself and the courage it took to break out for the heroine's sake.

What does it mean to love someone?

Caroline: Relationships begin with attraction: the looks, the touches, and the scents. Attraction is never enough, even when a couple acts on it. Relationships deepen with trust and knowledge, as a man and woman allow reveal themselves to one another even at the risk of vulnerability. What makes a relationship loving, however, is putting the good of the other ahead of one's own good. Someone who loves must be willing to sacrifice himself, or herself for the other, even to the point of letting go of the relationship if it is in the best interest of the other. In romance novels it is often the hero who most clearly comes to the point of sacrifice. Those are the stories I get lost in.

What three things are, at this moment, in your heroine’s satchel/purse?

Caroline: Good question! Meggy is a practical soul. She probably has a shopping list, a needle and thread for quick repairs, and a handkerchief—one for her children of course.

Can you tell us about a real-life hero you’ve met?

Caroline:  Oh my yes—my father. That is a good question for Veteran's Day. Dad was one of those individuals who could compare landing in Normandy with landing at Inchon in the Korean War. A recent episode of American Experience on PBS about the Battle of Chosin Reservoir reminded me about it. What happened at Chosin haunted Dad the rest of his life. Outnumbered ten or twelve to one by an estimated 120,000 Chinese, the first Marine division and elements of the 7th Army Infantry Division withdrew 78 miles along a 15 foot wide road with a sheer wall on one side and a 100 foot drop on the other in temperatures that dropped as low as 37 below zero. It took thirteen days. My dad led an artillery battery that helped cover the withdrawal and protect the Hungnam parameter until that last troops (and 100,000 North Korean civilians) had boarded boats. The nightmares lasted his whole life.

Tea or Coffee? And how do you take it?

Caroline: Coffee and make it black please, at least before noon. I might have herbal tea after that. My current favorite mug has a definition for coffee: n., a necessary morning beverage that inhibits anti-social behavior; to be consumed until it is socially acceptable to drink wine.

Keep up with Caroline on her Website, Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads.