I am celebrating! This year marks the tenth anniversary of the publication of my first book, A Desperate Journey. Samhain Publishing originally published the western historical romance after being in the American Title contest.
My western historical romances have been described as “gritty.” The west could be a rough place for a woman, or a man, and I started out writing my first novel as a western. It started with a challenge. I was attending the Ozark Creative Writers weekend, and Dusty Richards, a well-known western author, issued a challenge. “Write your first novel, make it a western, and if it wins my contest, my agent will read the full manuscript.” I’d been writing short stories and poetry up to that point, never a full novel and that challenge was too good to pass up.
I sometimes will take a challenge or a bet, and when I do, it can be life changing. For instance, I asked my husband out on a date on a five-dollar bet, back in high school, but that is a story for another day.
Well, I wrote that western, set it along the old Chisholm Trail in 1867, and along the way, as I wrote, the story turned into a romance. So, it is a true blend of romance and western. If you pulled the romance out, there would still be a lot of story. It’s interesting to me that so many men have enjoyed reading the story and I think that is one reason.
Now you might wonder what happened with that challenge. Well, I finished the book in a year and entered it in the contest. By then, Dusty no longer had an agent, but he sat with me and went over the first chapters, giving me advice. I will always be thankful. I revised it and entered it the next year in a contest Bobbi Smith held at the RT convention in St. Louis where it won third place. Bobbi also sat with me afterward and said, “Debra, start your story in chapter three.” (I was giving too much back story and not getting to the action soon enough.) I rewrote the story and the next year entered it in the American Title contest, where it was a finalist, and during the contest, I signed with an agent, and a year later, he sold my first book to Samhain.
After Samhain published A Desperate Journey, my editor invited me to write a novella. Another western historical romance for a new anthology, and I wrote Dangerous Ties. This one starts out with the heroine strung up over a mineshaft and the rope is breaking. I’d paid attention to my mentors and was going to start my next story right with some action. Jumping right in. I thought this would be the first of many westerns with them. But then my new editor turned it down and wanted me to write erotic romance instead. A third book, a contemporary romance I’d written, was turned down after that. In the seven years I was with Samhain, I had five editors, but subsequent editors were not as enthusiastic as my first two, who I’d enjoyed working with on A Desperate Journey. Dangerous Ties went on to be published by a different publisher, Desert Breeze Publishing.
But now, writing a third was going to be impossible. Because different publishing houses held the rights to the two books. So, you can imagine how thrilled I am to have rights back, to have republished both books through Belo Dia Publishing, and to now be able to publish a third book and pull them all together. My readers deserve that, and it’s exciting to be able to do it in celebration of ten years of publishing.
This month, I am celebrating the tenth anniversary with the release of a box set of three westerns. A new book, Deadly Adversaries, brings together the daughter from A Desperate Journey and a son of the couple from Dangerous Ties. The box set, Desperate, Dangerous and Deadly: A Western Collection releases on April 30th in e-book and the pre-order is available now on Amazon. Get your copy here!
Dangerous Ties is also on sale for 99 cents for the e-book up through June. That’s the breaking rope over the mineshaft one, if you just want a nibble of one of my westerns to see if you like them. It’s a quick novella. It is also available in audiobook and in print.
Do we want a long bio? No, I’ve said enough about me. I’d rather focus on the books. If you want to follow me, I have all kinds of social media links for you below, and if you check out my YouTube channel, you will find my First Chapter Reads playlist where I read from the first chapters of my books, as well as the live giveaways I do after I attend author/reader events. Have fun discovering all the fun linky things!
About my books: I write in many subgenres of romance, so do look around my sites. Books are kind of like ice cream cones. Rocky road or westerns might not be your flavor, but strawberry or my 1920s series about flappers might be, or chocolate or my military romantic suspense stories might be. I am the sort of ice cream lover who would try all the flavors and would like a dip of each, please.
(Are you hungry for ice cream now? I am. Might have to pick up a pint to celebrate!)
Thank you Delilah Devlin for giving me a guest spot to share my anniversary celebration!
Debra’s social media links:
My website is www.debraparmley.com
I’m everywhere on social media.
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/debra.parmley.7
Facebook fan page https://www.facebook.com/authordebraparmley
FB fan group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/debraparmley/
Goodreads Author Page: https://www.goodreads.com/DebraParmley
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/debraparmley/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/debraparmley/
Twitter https://twitter.com/DebraParmley
Cover Model Corner interview blog: https://covermodelcorner.wordpress.com/
Writing Blog: https://threadingtheweb.wordpress.com/
Newsletter sign up link: https://eepurl.com/ZUyC1
Debra Parmley’s Beautiful Day YouTube Channel
https://www.youtube.com/user/DebraParmleyRomance/featured?view_as=subscriber
Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/debra-parmley
Book sales pages:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Debra-Parmley/e/B002BM9H4A/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1509300092&sr=8-1
Barnes and Noble:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/debra+parmley
Audible audiobooks: https://www.audible.com/search/ref=a_pd_Romanc_c2_1_auth?searchAuthor=Debra+Parmley
Itunes for ebooks and audio:
https://itunes.apple.com/ca/author/debra-parmley/id411082477?mt=11
ebooks on Kobo:
https://store.kobobooks.com/en-us/search?query=debra%20parmley
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/debra+parmley
