Beth Trissel's "Into the Lion's Heart"

Title: Into the Lion’s Heart


Publisher: The Wild Rose Press, is debuting a new historical series this summer called Love Letters. Authors were invited to participate and my story will launch the line, so I’m doubly honored. The premise behind Love Letters is that a letter must be the cause of bringing–or throwing–the hero and heroine together.

Cover blurb: As the French Revolution rages, the English nobility offer sanctuary to many a refugee. Captain Dalton Evans arrives in Dover to meet a distant cousin, expecting to see a spoiled aristocrat. Instead, he's conquered by the simplicity of his new charge. And his best friend Thomas Archer isn't immune to her artless charm, either.

Cecile Beaumont didn't choose to travel across the Channel. And she certainly didn't expect that impersonating her own mistress would introduce her to a most mesmerizing man. Now she must play out the masquerade, or risk life, freedom – and her heart.

1) How did this story come to you?
The connection I feel to the past and those who’ve gone before me is the ongoing inspiration behind my work. I come from a lot of well documented English/Scots-Irish ancestors, with a smidgen of French in the meld, a Norman knight who sailed with William the Conqueror. One line of the family goes back to Geoffrey Chaucer, all fascinating and compelling to me. With Into the Lion’s Heart, my first English historical, I more deeply explored my British ancestry. I’ve also always had an interest in the French Revolution. I’m a big Scarlet Pimpernel fan.

2) Tell us about the journey to getting this book published.
After my editor, Nicole Darienzo, the senior historical editor for The Wild Rose Press, asked me to contribute a story for Love Letters, I spent a lot of time at work on it. At 24,000 words, Into the Lion’s Heart is an easy but satisfying read and the required length for the line. However, I did as much research for it as I would a full novel.

2) Tell me three things about yourself that would surprise your readers.
If they follow my blog, little may surprise them. I’m an armchair adventurer, fascinated with authentic colonial muskets, tomahawks, and other weapons of that era, including swords. I want to write a pirate adventure, but don’t know when.

3) What are you working on now and what's next for you?
Right now, I’m writing the sequel to my Native American historical romance novel Through the Fire. This novel will be the third in my colonial frontier trilogy, assuming my editor likes it. The second is my Native American historical romance novel Red Bird’s Song. After that, I intend to finish the sequel to my light paranormal time/travel romance, Somewhere My Lass. My paranormal editor would appreciate my getting that done.  I write for two lines at The Wild Rose Press and have two editors.

4) Parting comments?
“Courage dear heart.” ~A quote by Aslan from C. S. Lewis’s The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, a favorite book. Looking for Narnia is what inspired my time travel ‘Somewhere’ series.

5) Where can fans find you on the internet?
My blog is the happening place and links you to my website: One Writer’s Way at: http://bethtrissel.wordpress.com/

Available August 17