#NewRelease A FLARE OF THE HEART by @JacquieRogers #romance #western #99cents

A Flare of the Heart
A Hearts of Owyhee Single-Read
by Jacquie Rogers

What would you do if you had a dozen weaner pigs and a woman to rescue from a wrecked stagecoach on a mountain road?

Miss Celia Yancey is on her way to Silver City to marry the pastor of the church.  The marriage was arranged by her father, who was a lot more interested in the fact that the church was built over a silver mine than on the character of his future son-in-law.

Celia isn't too fond of the notion, far preferring to choose her own husband, but that's exactly the problem--no men from which to choose that she'd have.  And she does want children.  Moving 1,500 miles away from her father doesn't sound all that bad, either.

So how does that all pan out with historical facts and the real Silver City?

Other than the timing, pretty well.  The church was, in fact, built over a silver mine.  You can see the mine entrance even now.  But it wasn't built until the 1890s, so too late for Celia and Ross Flaherty.  It was built as an Episcopalian church and is now Our Lady of Tears Catholic Church.  Here's a photo of the inside:

And here's an aerial video of Silver City that shows the church.  Yes, the video is too wide for the page but I hope it works okay.  (Thanks to Marilyn Burke, who posted it at the Pickle Barrel.)  You can't really tell but the church is built on a hill, and it's a trial getting up to it.  They've put in posts and strung rope so you can pull yourself up there.  Can you imagine doing that in a corset and long skirts?



About A Flare of the Heart

Celia Valentine Yancey has no illusions she’ll ever enjoy wedded bliss, so chooses marriage over spinsterhood even if she has to marry a man her father picked. On the way to meet her groom, she endures armed robbery, a stagecoach wreck, a dozen hungry baby pigs—and an incorrigible farmer. Ross Flaherty retired from bounty hunting to become a farmer but now Celia has brought his worst fear to his door—in more ways than one. A ferocious wolf-dog and a dozen piglets are no match for this determined lady. Which is more dangerous—the Sully Gang or Miss Celia Yancey?

You could win a free book!

A Flare of the Heart

(Hearts of Owyhee single read)

by Jacquie Rogers

Buy at these online stores:

Amazon, Smashwords, Nook

Print books and ebooks make great gifts.  Have you started your shopping yet?  When do you start?  (My sister shops year around!  I start about Dec. 20.)  Don't forget to include your email address with your comment.  The winner will receive a free copy of A Flare of the Heart.  And yes, I do deeply appreciate reviews.  I'll draw the winner on Nov. 30, 2016, at 10pm Pacific Time.

Hearts of Owyhee series

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Romancing The West | Pickle Barrel Bar and Books

Stagecoaches: Forging the Way West

A stagecoach outside the Twin Falls News
office in Twin Falls, Idaho.

Celia Valentine Yancey, the heroine in Jacquie Rogers’s short story “A Flare of the Heart,” is no half-starved, delicate flower of womanhood. A spinster blessed with a built-in bustle, she heads to Idaho to marry a preacher she’s never met. The journey, by stagecoach, isn't exactly a pleasant introduction to life in the west:

She finally had the stagecoach to herself on the last leg, which was a vast improvement over the fourteen passengers crowded inside and on top of the stage that left from the train station in Winnemucca, Nevada. Unfortunately, this coach also carried luggage and several bags of mail, one of which she had to hold on her lap, along with her own valise. Her trunks had been loaded onto a freight wagon and wouldn’t arrive in Silver City for a week.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The coach lurched, hurtling down the rutted road, and Celia could barely keep herself upright. Gunshots! She dropped in a heap onto the floorboards, praying the driver and messenger fared well.

The coach clattered and rumbled as it lurched about. Bags of mail thudded on her back and mashed her face into the buckle on her valise. She grasped the leg of the center bench, the only thing that was stable, and hung on for dear life. The coach veered side to side, bouncing violently over ruts and washouts.

More gunshots, the horses’ neighs sounding like screams. She gripped the bench leg even tighter as the coach veered around, and heard the loud crack of wood splintering as it tipped, flinging her onto the window, which was now scraping the ground. With another crash just beside her head, boards poked through the coach wall. Piglets squealed and as their box broke, they scrambled into the coach on top of her.

Celia heard more shots, this time much louder and closer. Her heart raced and she felt hot, like she wanted to run, but she was trapped under mail pouches and squealing pigs. They stepped on her head and one of them caught its leg in her bonnet.

Reverend Cheasbro’s mine better be rich. If she lived to see it.

The piglets belong to an incorrigible farmer named Ross Flaherty, who puts an even bigger crimp in Celia’s plans.

A stagecoach in front of the Idaho Hotel in Silver City, Idaho.

Imagine being trapped in an overturned stagecoach with a dozen hungry piglets. As odd as it seems, a shipment of piglets very well might have traveled by stagecoach. Stagecoaches carried not only passengers, but also mail, money, and cargo of all kinds. Drivers often delivered packages much as a modern mail carrier might. They also transacted business for important clients of the stagecoach line.

A few stagecoach facts:

• The first Concord stagecoach was built in 1827 by the Abbot Downing Company, which improved earlier coach designs by using leather strap braces instead of a spring suspension. The coaches were so sturdy, they usually wore out before they broke down. The company built more than 700 Concord coaches in the twenty years of its existence, selling its products not only to lines in the U.S., but also in Australia, South America, and Africa.


• In 1827, Boston served as a hub for 77 stagecoach lines. By 1832, the number had grown to 106.


• The U.S. government authorized the first transcontinental overland mail route in 1857. By federal law, the stagecoaches that ran the route were required to transport supplies, mail, and passengers from the Mississippi River to San Francisco, safely, in twenty-five or fewer days.


• The Butterfield Overland Express won the first federal contract for transcontinental stagecoach delivery: a six-year, $600,000 job. In 1858, John Butterfield established two starting points: Tipton, Missouri (near St. Louis) and Memphis, Tennessee. The trails converged at Fort Smith, Arkansas, and then proceeded through Arkansas, Texas, and the New Mexico Territory to California. Covering approximately 2,812 miles, the Butterfield Trail was the longest stagecoach line in history. The service ran only until the Civil War began in 1861.


• Charley Parkhurst may have been the most famous stagecoach driver in history. So tough that bandits would not attack his stages, he became a legend in his own lifetime. But Charley had a secret: He was born a woman. After living as a man for 55 years (from the age of 12), he died of cancer in December 1879. Only when friends laid out his body after his death was his genetic identity discovered.

Concord stage with military guard riding on top, ca. 1869.
(U.S. National Archives and Records Administration)

 Piglets, outlaws, and a farmer who’s much more than he seems beset poor Celia all the way through “A Flare of the Heart.” She gives as good as she gets. Read her story and eight other western historical romances in Hearts and Spurs, available in print and ebook at your favorite online bookstore.