For a solid 24 hours, my novel THE COLOR OF HEAVEN outsold THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATOO on Kindle, and for the next two weeks sold at a record rate of a book a minute. It rose to #4 on the general fiction Kindle list at Amazon and hit #1 on the contemporary romance list. I was flooded with letters from readers who believed my fictional story was true, and I had to write back and explain it was not.  Some went hunting on the internet, looking for actual news items about the story.  Other readers wrote to share personal stories of connection with lost loved ones, who they believed were watching over them from some other dimension. THE COLOR OF HEAVEN isn’t a religious book.  In fact, it’s more of a love story than anything else, but it touched a nerve with so many different kinds of people – men and women, young and old. Some key parts of THE COLOR OF HEAVEN are based on my own life experiences (the character’s car accident and her daughter’s illness) but the essence of the story comes from my imagination and my research into the fascinating subject of actual, documented…

I have a story to tell you about having a dream and not giving up, no matter how many times you get knocked down. Most of you know me as a historical romance writer.  Over the past 11 years, I’ve written 15 historicals for three different publishers, so I think it’s safe to say I’ve been branded as a certain kind of writer. Occasionally, however, a writer needs to step out of the box, and it can be both exciting and nerve-wracking to venture into risky, untried territory.  I know this for a fact, because I have just released my first women’s fiction mainstream contemporary novel, THE COLOR OF HEAVEN – and let me tell you, it was a good lesson about perseverance, because I had a very hard time selling it. I first came up with the concept for the book six years ago, because I’ve always been fascinated by near-death experiences and the question about what lies on the other side of this life. My interest in the subject grew after a serious car accident at the age of twenty-five.  Somehow, miraculously, I survived a horrendous wreck and walked away without a scratch. I’m still not sure why…