Whenever people ask me my favorite book I’ve written I always say it’s a tie between two of them: Caressa’s Knees and Fortune.
I can’t say why those two are my favorites. I wouldn’t classify them as the ultimate best, or ultimate sexiest, or the ultimate in literary prowess. They’re just the two that touch me, personally, the most.
There are actually a lot of things in Fortune I thought might annoy people. Kat isn’t your traditional have-it-all-together heroine, and Ryan can be a bit controlling (can we say health nut?) Maybe that’s why I like Fortune so much, because the hero and heroine are regular, flawed, struggling people who happen to bring out the best in each other.
Another thing I like in Fortune is Kat’s close-knit family, especially her Russian fortune teller mom. Kat’s mama is based on some older, slightly crazy great-aunts I had growing up. I always sensed that they had ESP or clairvoyant abilities but now that I’m older I realize they were just really, really, really tuned in to people’s subconscious signals. I love the way Kat’s mom works to keep bringing these two together, and the way we’re never really sure if she has special mental powers or is just the world’s best manipulator.
In this snippet, she’s with Kat at the hospital when Ryan comes in to check on her (as her physician). I love how she knows from the start these two were destined for each other. But you probably knew too…
He stopped outside the door, looking through the window. The mama was sitting in Kat’s room by the bed. Kat was sitting up too, alert and awake. Her eyes flitted to his over her mother’s shoulder, her beautiful eyes that made him forget everything. Elena turned and saw him too.
“Dr. Ryan McCarthy! You come in.” Not would you like to come in? Not why don’t you join us? It was an order as emphatic as any he’d received as a child. He pushed the door open slowly as Kat stared daggers at him.
“I know you’re tired. I won’t stay. I just came by to—”
“Come in and sit,” Elena ordered, getting up. “I have to go to…gift shop. You stay here, you sit with her. You stay, yes? While I am gone?”
He was pretty sure the gift shop was closed, but he sat in the chair Elena shoved him toward and watched her sail out the door.
He studied Kat. Good, she looked better. Some part of him had feared a hidden pocket, a slow bleed. He worried all day about being paged for emergency surgery. He couldn’t have done it, not on her.
“You don’t have to stay,” she said at the same time he asked, “How are you feeling?”
They both paused. “I’m feeling okay,” Kat finally said. “Less groggy. I’m sorry about my mother, she’s a little—”
“Never apologize for your mother,” he said in a chiding tone that doubtlessly annoyed her. She stopped talking and stared at her hands. The awkward silence was stultifying. Just leave, you idiot. “So no pain? No visual disturbances?” Okay, that’s not leaving.
“No bad pain. Just the bruises. And the twenty stitches along the back of my head,” she added ruefully.
“Maybe I should just take a look while I’m here.” Idiot. Not your job! Leave now, before you touch her. If you touch her… She leaned forward and he put one hand on her hair even though he didn’t need to. He felt guilty, like one of those doctors who fondled patients on the sly. Her curls were as thick and soft as he imagined. He ran a thumb across her nape as he lifted the gauze to check the stitches. When she shivered a little he almost came undone. He replaced the bandage quickly and stepped back.
“They look good, Kat. And any scar won’t show unless you pull your hair up. I’d say you’re a very lucky lady to come away with just a scar, considering the fall you took. But you’ll need to take things easy for a while. No late nights and bar hopping. No tabletop dancing.”
She looked at him with that shuttered, slanted glance, and again he thought, Go, just go. Get out of here.
Ah, the trials of new love. If you haven’t read Fortune, you can click the cover below to read a blurb and find buy links. Don’t forget to pick up the first book in the series, Deep in the Woods, to see what Ryan was doing just before he found his true love. (hint: participating in menages!)
It’s been a while since I read Fortune, I loved the origami detail that you added to the storyline. It added so much depth to Ryan’s character.
For some reason the dog staring at the lovers kissing on the cover of Deep in the Woods always cracks me up. For some reason he looks aghast to me. Obviously the cover artist got a member of the canine “Fun Police” by accident when he was looking for models.
Do you have any idea yet as to the release date for your next book? I think you said Disciplining the Duchess is next up, sometime in March? I know it’s deeply unfair that your fans keep nagging you for more books. It takes you months and we might rip through it in less than a day.
At least I can promise you that I have reread everything I have of yours at least once, all the while ignoring a TBR pile of over 400+ books. I still want you to hurry up and write more. They will always skip to the top of the queue, time and time again.
HAHAHA. I know, that dog. He has been the subject of many jokes. Someone pointed out to me that the photochopping is also very bad. Poor Cerby. Somehow I pictured him as much shaggier and feral looking. I think that dog is a Rottweiler? Oh well.
In happier news, I’m doing final edits on Disciplining the Duchess right now, so it should be out by the end of this month. Waking Kiss…I don’t know. I had to do a lot of wrangling with that book that set me back so it might not be out until June-ish. We’ll see. It might surprise me.
Anyway, THANK YOU for bumping me to the top of your TBR pile! You have no idea how wonderful it is to hear stuff like that from readers. 🙂 In return I promise I’ll keep trying to write really good books. No half-assed, just-trying-to-hurry-something-out crapola!! Never for my wonderful readers!!
I am sure I will love Discipling the Duchess but I am really looking forward to Waking Kiss. Why is it the books that seem to cause the greatest struggle for the writer turn out to be the most beloved for their readers?
Oh, I hope that’s true in this case. I hope this book turns out to be worth the pain, lol.
I love this book so much, I can’t really express, Dimitri and Katya relationship is one of the most special things in the book to me, sometimes I wish the book was a little longer so I could enjoy more their time together. And my “health nut” prince Ryan <3. Funny thing is that, as much I love him, he never had a nitid face in my mind like the others.
🙂 Whenever I think of Fortune now, and Ryan, I think of you and your Ryan-crush!! I wish he was a real-life guy so I could deliver him right into your arms! Well, he’s kind of based on a real-life guy but I’m not sure how HE would feel about being delivered right into your arms. And honestly the fictional Ryan is probably a little sweeter, haha!
That’s so cool, you know? One of my favorite authors, that lives in another country, when remembers my favorite character thinks of me. It’s awesome, it’s like if Homer knew that I love Hector, except that you not dead for almost 3000 years. haha
And kinda sux that my dream guy it’s the undeliverable kind. But if you asked any of my sisters they would tell you that right away. I have four older sisters, all mothers and married (at least once), and , sweet Jesus, they try to deliver me guys … a lot. I think they are afraid I don’t like guys or that I’m into vampires, I don’t really know what they think it’s going on, but it no good. hahahahaha
Oh my gosh, you’re like Kat with all her older, married sisters!!!!!
I enjoyed both Fortune and Deep in the Woods for different reasons. I loved the origami image and the thought behind it and I loved the ‘catch and release’ idea in Deep in the Woods but what I like most in both stories is the struggles of the characters, the different ways in which we love or how love claims us. The emotional and life struggles are relatable and that is what grabs me everytime.
thanks Laila! I think when I wrote these two books I was in a really emotional stage. They definitely both have very strong, emotional messages. I try to have those in all my books but in these two I remember feeling like it was a bit deeper. I cried a lot writing both of them…
Well, I got frizzy hair just like Katya too.
Yay! You can totally read Fortune and pretend you’re Kat. I do that with romance books I like all the time. 🙂
Me too! That’s why I always cry reading romances or why I can’t read books with annoying heroines.