Between the Devil and Ian Eversea
Pennyroyal Green Series #9
By: Julie Ann Long
One of the questions I’m frequently asked is: “what is your writing process like?”
Now, the word “process” is a useful, flexible word. For instance, deciding the refrigerator is long overdue for cleaning or that the cat could use a good brushing when I’m on deadline is definitely part of my “process.” (Note: some misguided people might call that “procrastination.” Silly people.) Lying on the couch, staring at the ceiling, chewing my bottom lip and drumming my heels while I mull sticky plot points is part of my process. Switching on my bedside lamp at 3 o’clock in the morning to scrawl a “Eureka!” plot point on the notebook is also part of my process. As is too much tea, too much dark chocolate, working until my contac lenses have all but permanently adhered themselves to my eyes and my legs may never straighten from a sitting position again and my my eyebrows attempt to unite and my hair can’t remember the last time it wasn’t in a ponytail on top of my head. ( As you can tell, grooming goes straight to Hell during deadlines. It’s part of my process.) You might suggest it would be practical to finish writing my book done well ahead of my deadline. And I might nod, agree, and politely suggest somewhere for you to stuff it.
Every book is different, truthfully. Some stories flow easily, almost as if I’m watching the movie of it unfold in my head, and some only reveal themselves to me a torturous little bit at a time. You know what it’s like to thread the drawstring back into a pair of sweatpants, one painstaking inch at a time? Kind of like that. More often, however, my process sort of toggles between those two poles. I’ve learned that readers, thankfully, can never seem to tell the difference between those two kinds of books, and when it’s all over, I tend to forgive the book for trying to kill me, and I love them all the same.
In real life I love things like graphs and spreadsheets, but my own writing process resists being wrangled into an orderly form: I usually flash on an idea, a scene, a line of dialogue, something that seems vivid to me. I know it’s important to the story, so I’ll write it. That little piece leads to the discovery of other little pieces. It’s a little bit like an archeological dig, where I discover things out of order, and you don’t know how the pieces fit together, you just know that they do. Once I have enough vivid pieces, pieces I’m pleased with, I usually begin to plot more rigorously.
For example, as you might have guessed from the cover of BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND IAN EVERSEA, windows play a role in both Miss Titania “Tansy” Danforth’s and Ian Eversea’s destinies. began with two vivid scenes, both involving windows and our heroine. A man shouting up at a window, and her first glimpse of our hero, which is what I’ll leave you with:
For example, as you might have guessed from the cover of BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND IAN EVERSEA, windows play a role in both Miss Titania “Tansy” Danforth’s and Ian Eversea’s destinies. began with two vivid scenes, both involving windows and our heroine. A man shouting up at a window, and her first glimpse of our hero, which is what I’ll leave you with:
It was a man.
A bare man.
Bare from the waist up, anyway.
He was standing on the little balcony next to hers, just feet away.
She ducked back into her room and dragged the curtain over her face, leaving just her eyes exposed, like a harem girl, and leaned forward for a better look. She could only see his back: A glorious burnished expanse of shoulders, a lovely trench of sorts along his spine, dividing two ridges of hard muscle, all of that narrowing into a taut waist.
Suddenly he thrust his arms up into the air, arched backward as though he’d been struck my lightning, and made a sort of roaring sound, like a pagan god calling down the morning. Though she doubted whether a god would sport fluffy black hair in his armpits.
He promptly disappeared back into his room, just as though he’d been a cuckoo popping out of a clock to announce the time.
How about you—what’s your “process?” Do you procrastinate? Do you read the instructions? Do you dive right in and hope you figure it out as you go?
She might look like an angel…
The moment orphaned American heiress Titania “Tansy” Danforth arrives on English shores she cuts a swath through Sussex, enslaving hearts and stealing beaux. She knows she’s destined for a spectacular titled marriage—but the only man who fascinates her couldn’t be more infamous…or less interested.
…but it takes a devil to know one…
A hardened veteran of war, inveterate rogue Ian Eversea keeps women enthralled, his heart guarded and his options open: why should he succumb to the shackles of marriage when devastating good looks and Eversea charm make seduction so easy?
…and Heaven has never been hotter.
When Ian is forced to call her on her game, he never dreams the unmasked Tansy—vulnerable, brave, achingly sensual—will tempt him beyond endurance. And fight as he will, this notorious bachelor who stood down enemies on a battlefield might finally surrender his heart…and be brought to his knees by love.
EXCERPT
“Come now, Captain Eversea, surely you of all people know that a little risk makes life less dull, altogether.”
He gave a short laugh. She suspected she’d surprised it from him.
“My risks are calculated, Miss Danforth. And informed by experience.”
“And you can’t possibly know that I know nothing about, as you say, ‘such matters.’ ”
He inhaled deeply, exhaled at length, sounding oh-so-long-suffering.
“Oh, you know how to make them yearn, I grant you. You know how to get attention. There’s a look experienced women have, that’s all. A demeanor. And you haven’t the look.”
This was news. How on earth would an experienced woman look? Shocked? Tired? Wicked? Reflexively, she tried an expression that she thought might incorporate all three.
He laughed again, genuinely. “I’ve seen that expression on one of Colin’s cows, after she’d eaten something she ought not.”
Torn between laughing and scowling, she frowned.
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Author Info
The author of five popular novels from Warner and eight from Avon, Julie Anne Long lives in California with a fat orange cat (little known fact: they issue you a cat the moment you become a romance novelist).
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