I grew up reading Signet Regency romances. All that wit and the building tension, culminating in a marriage proposal and a single kiss. Oh, swoon! The best thing about those traditional romances was the way the heroine struggled against society’s rules and the hot guy saw something in her that no one else did. That was the fantasy of my adolescence and I loved every word.
But as I grew up, as I married and had children of my own, my imagination expanded to stories about relationships between equals, about a woman with a career in her own right, and the man who fit into her life, not the other way around. I pulled those themes into my historical romances, but over time, they too grew stale. I needed to explore other markets and all my fantastic paranormal ideas.
But then, guess what happened?
- I wrote a ton of shifter romances, and really, just how many grizzly bear stories are there? (answer: a lot!)
- I started ballroom dancing and fell in love with it!
- A few of my Jade Lee fans kidnapped me and demanded that I write more historicals.
- Dragonsblade Publishing asked me to launch a shared world series set in Regency London.
Answer: 4 – Kathryn Le Veque of Dragonsblade Publishing met up with me at Book Lovers Con and asked me to launch her Lyon’s Den series. The idea was exciting, and I’d been itching to get back into historicals. So…I said yes. Along with another 3-book series after that called Lords of the Masquerade.
Honestly, I wasn’t sure I could do it. I’ve been a long time out of historicals, but once I started writing, it was like greeting an old friend. I remembered all my favorite scenes and looked at them with new eyes. That first waltz scene was so fun, and the ride in Hyde Park? Well, I enjoyed the heck out of that. Why? Because I didn’t write it the same old way. It’s different, it’s better, and it was so much fun.
But if you answered any of the other three options, never fear. More shifters will be coming from Kathy Lyons. I wasn’t kidnapped, but I have been strongly encouraged by fans to return to historicals, and I’d love to try ballroom dancing sometime. But it’s not on my list just yet. I’ve got three more historicals to write!
Kathy
Coming February 27, 2020
From USA Today Bestselling author JADE LEE, a lush tale from the greatest, most notorious gambling den in London. Welcome to the world of THE LYON’S DEN: The Black Widow of Whitehall Connected World!
Intrigue makes for strange bedfellows…
Elliott, Lord Byrn, often found himself in strange places, but none is more bizarre than the infamous Lyon’s Den gaming house in a tony part of London. The gambling doesn’t surprise him, nor the salacious things rumored to happen in the upstairs rooms. What shocks him is a slip of a girl jeweler/fence who bargains with him over a missing brooch. He needs her to refashion the thing before anyone else realizes it is missing and she drives a hard bargain.
Harder than he can imagine…
Amber Gohar lives her days in the gray world of a gambling hell, but she dreams of escaping into the vibrant world of the ton. When the opportunity arises for her to spend just one night at a society ball, she grabs it with both hands, never expecting that she would also be taking hold of a man who set her heart on fire. But once she realizes what she’s done, she won’t let go. She can’t. Happily ever after doesn’t come easily, or for free, in the world of The Lyon’s Den.
How these two unlikely bedfellows discover their best bargain will set both the ton, and The Lyon’s Den, on fire.
