As I’m reissuing all my titles, and writing more, I’ve realized that several of my stories interconnect in ways I hadn’t really thought about before. The interconnections don’t make them a series per se, but they are connected simply by their (fictional) geographical location.
Texas Tangle, which was my first story for Carina Press, takes place in the fictional small town and surroundings of Barnett Springs. It features Nikki, who raises/rescues horses; Dillon, who owns his own landscaping firm; and Brett, who is a police office with the Barnett Springs police, along with multiple other members of the Barnett family and the community. (It’ll be re-released early 2023 both as an ebook and as a paperback.)
Feeding the Flames also takes place in Barnett Springs. It follows Tabatha, who runs Twisted Tabby’s Diner; and Zac, who is a firefighter with the Barnett Springs Fire Department. As I was updating this book the other day for the big sale I participated in this week, I discovered that Brett appears in it, as well as his friend and fellow police officer, Tiny.
Okay, you’re asking, how can I “discover” something in a story that I wrote? Yes, well, I wrote it back in 2014-2015ish and I have so many characters to keep track of, especially when I’m working on a different book (I was working on two more at the time) that I forget my own stories and sometimes the minor characters get forgotten completely. It’s just my weird writers’ brain.
Tangled Past also takes place in Barnett Springs, but that’s in 1873, and so you won’t see any cross-over characters there, though the characters from Tangled Past are referred to in Texas Tangle, since they are the contemporary characters’ ancestors, and they live on the same ranch Dillon’s family has inherited and occupies.
Another part of why I realized this connection is because I have another brand new story coming out in January 2023 ( 🤫 ) that also takes place in Barnett Springs. I can’t really talk about it yet but it features Quinn, who is Zac’s best friend in Feeding the Flames, and you will get a couple glimpses of both Zac and Tabby in it as well.
I also often refer to Barnett Springs in my Grady Legacy novels as a nearby town/county/whatever. So there may be some cross-over there too, but not in the same way as in the Barnett Springs stories, plus the Grady Legacy has created its own separate world.
Anyway starting today, you will see some changes. First off in the menus here on the website. I’ve created a new grouping called The Barnett Springs Romances, and it will list all the stories that take place in the Barnett Springs realm. They may (or may not) have characters from other stories flitting in and out occasionally, none of them need to be read in any sort of order, though I would suggest you start with Texas Tangle as that is the first book I wrote in that world.
My plan is to add a caption or a graphic of “a Barnett Springs Romance” to the covers too, to make them all consistent, but that takes money so they’ll be a little slower to be changed out. In the meantime, if you see me or anyone referring to my “Barnett Springs Romances” or some may even call them a series, that’s what they (and I) mean.
Figured you might want to know.