Story Inspiration and Excerpt from Hot Western Nights - western romance anthology - by Kaye Spencer #prairierosepubs #westernromance

Songs often provide inspiration for my stories. Marty Robbins’ song Meet Me Tonight in Laredo gave me the basic idea for my book 'The Comanchero’s Bride', and Ghostriders in the Sky is at the heart of my book 'The Gunfighter’s Woman'.

Once again, a song provided the starting point for my novelette that is included in the new western romance anthology from Prairie Rose Publications—HOT WESTERN NIGHTS. My story is Give My Love to Rose.

 Johnny Cash fans will recognize that same title as one of his early hits. The song provided the [quite loose] plot fodder for my story. I changed things around and Rose became the main character. The man who came across the dying man is a deputy U. S. marshal.

Here is Johnny Cash’s singing 'Give My Love to Rose'.

EXCERPT

Gray sunrise at her back, milk bucket in one hand and a basket of eggs in the other, Rose Griffin gazed south beyond the river where the railroad tracks cut across the prairie. The tracks were too far away to see but, in her mind’s eye, she saw the abandoned water tower where Lon flagged down the train. She imagined him turning Molly out into the small fenced pasture with a natural spring and stowing his saddle and bridle under the lean-to.

Lon had allowed himself a week to take care of his business in Amarillo, including the travel there and back, which meant he should have returned by now. He was a man who allowed himself few celebrations in life. He wouldn’t miss being away from home at Christmastime unless he was dead. Truth be told, when they’d said goodbye, she’d known he wouldn’t make it home alive. Stoop-shouldered, eyes sunken, he’d wasted away these last many months and was in no shape to make the trip to his attorney. They all knew it, but there was no other way.

Lon’s plate was still at the head of the table. His mother, Bess, couldn’t bring herself to remove it. The sight of it represented the hope of his return, but too many days had passed to continue ignoring what had to be said. Rose didn’t relish the conversation they had to have, but Ma was a woman who found something good in everything and everyone. Her spirits seldom fell for long. She hadn’t said the words, but Ma knew as well as Rose they’d seen the last of Lon when he left home for Amarillo.

Bess Griffin was the mother Rose didn’t remember, and she loved Bess with all her heart, and those feelings were reciprocated. Since the day Lon had opened his door and invited her inside his house, Rose had whispered thanks for this blessing every night before she went to bed. Despite her upbringing, she wasn’t a religious woman, but she reasoned it couldn’t hurt to speak her gratitude aloud just in case there was someone out there listening.

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Until next time,

Kaye Spencer

Writing through history one romance upon a time

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THOUGHTS, QUOTES and SONGS

2017 was a year of challenges, successes and so much more. Taking a look back is part of what I do as I prepare for the next phase or year. Many of you know, I love quotes. I find them a concise way of seeing things in few words. Many times the quotes are more applicable than others, but are always a way to focus on the present as it moves from the past to the future. As the year is coming to an end, some thoughts, written and sung, I find useful.

Little Wonders

The gift of books and reading:

Reading is a basic tool in the living of a good life. 
Joseph Addison

Reading is a means of thinking with another person's mind; it forces you to stretch your own. 
Charles Scribner, Jr.

The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page. 
Saint Augustine

You cannot open a book without learning something.
Confucius

Hallelujah

The joys of research and learning:

Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and to think what nobody else has thought. 
Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose.
Zora Neale Hurston

Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do. 
Pele

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever. 
Mahatma Gandhi

Try Everything

The Past and the Future:

For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: 'If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?' And whenever the answer has been 'No' for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Steve Jobs

The past, like the future, is indefinite and exists only as a spectrum of possibilities. 
Stephen Hawking

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. 
Eleanor Roosevelt

Let us make our future now, and let us make our dreams tomorrow's reality. 
Malala Yousafzai

We'll Sing in the Sunshine

I will leave you with two quotes from a writer from my neck of the woods:

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. 
Mark Twain

Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. 
Mark Twain

Time in a Bottle

Wishing everyone a beautiful, fruitful and peaceful December.

Children Go Where I Send Thee

Doris Gardner-McCraw -

Author, Speaker, Historian-specializing in
Colorado and Women's History

Angela Raines - author: Where Love & History Meet

For a list of Angela Raines Books: Here 

Photo and Poem: Click Here 

Angela Raines FaceBook: Click Here

Every step you take should be a prayer.
And if every step you take is a prayer then you will always be walking in a sacred manner. 
Oglala Lakota Holyman.

What's your favorite song? by Kaye Spencer

We all have songs that mean something extra special to us whether by our associating them with a special event, a loved one, a precious moment, a situation, etc. In fact, if you’re like me, I could go on for hours singing the words to all the songs that are near and dear to me.

But there is one song for me—the one song that tops all the others, the one that gives me chills and brings a tear to my eye every time I hear it—and it’s an American rendition of an old English folk song of complicated and not entirely identifiable origins. But, what is known about the original folk song is it was familiar in Shakespeare’s day, because he referenced it in his play, The Merry Wives of Windsor. There is a legend that the original song was written by Henry VIII for his future wife, Anne Boleyn, but that is apparently a myth as there is evidence the song was around before Henry’s time.

By 1690 or so, the original song was becoming associated with Christmas and New Year’s. Then by the 19th century, any Christmas songbook worth its salt included some version of the original folk song (lyrics and tune) as a carol. Elvis Presley sang the song in one of his movies, and there are a host of others that I won’t include here.

The original song I’m talking about is Greensleeves. As a Christmas song, we know it as What Child is This? And as my favorite song, it’s from the 1962 western movie (and book by same title written by Louis L’Amour) How the West Was Won: A Home in the Meadow performed by Debbie Reynolds.

So for your listening enjoyment, here is the YouTube clip from How the West Was Won with the lyrics below.

A Home in the Meadow
Away, away
Come away with me
Where the grass grows wild, where the winds blow free
Away, away
Come away with me
And I'll build you a home in the meadow
*
Come, come
There's a wondrous land
For the hopeful heart, for the willing hand
Come, come
There's a wondrous land
Where I'll build you a home in the meadow
*
The stars, the stars
Oh how bright they'll shine
On a world that the Lord must have helped design
The stars, the stars
Oh how bright they'll shine
On that home we will build in the meadow
*
Come, come
There's a wondrous land
For the hopeful heart, for the willing hand
Come, come
There's a wondrous land
Where I'll build you a home in the meadow
*
(Lyrics by Sammy Cahn)

Until next time,

Kaye

Fall in love…faster, harder, deeper with Kaye Spencer romances
www.kayespencer.com
(clip art courtesy openclipart.org)