Fun things in the works... and 2 book recs

Now that I've submitted Galway book #3 (Andi & Kevin's story, tentatively scheduled for release in spring 2025) to my editor, my first-ever book contract has been fulfilled.

Soooo I've been hard at work with my agent, Sara Megibow, to prepare a proposal for 2 more projects. One will be for a 4th Galway book (remember Sonya, the sweet server at July's restaurant? She'll finally be getting her own story!). I've written about a quarter of the first draft of that one and the two main characters need each other SO MUCH I hurt for them.

The other proposal will be for a whole new series featuring 3 semi-estranged sisters and their dying midwestern hometown. In the past three days I've written 16 pages on that one and I'm really excited about it too! It's fun to write a snarky sibling relationship sometimes. Nobody can rag on you like your siblings.

Despite the fact that I've written and turned in 3 books now, this proposal process is new to me. Before, when I queried the manuscript that became Curves for Days, I was working with a single, finished novel.  It surprised me as much as anyone when I got a 3-book contract without even having to describe any other stories. But this time around Sara and I will be trying to sell books I haven't finished writing yet, much less edited to within an inch of their lives. So it's a different process involving me writing the first 30-50 pages of the first story, plus a synopsis, plus info on the new series as a whole and where I see that going.  Maybe my editor will like it, maybe she won't--I don't know.

New and uncertain stuff is often really uncomfortable to me, but this time around I've got to admit it's also kind of exciting. I'm having fun with it.

Something else I'm excited about: 2 new contemporary romances out this month (today?!): Olivia Dade's At First Spite and Laura Piper Lee's Hannah Tate: Beyond Repair. I had the pleasure of reading an ARC of HTBR and it is touching and hot and funny as hell. I highly recommend it. And I've read enough of Olivia Dade's work to know that that one will be great too. She's described it as the story of her heart, I believe.  If you're looking for great, heart-warming love stories, check those two out! Bonus: Although I've never met these two authors, I have interacted with them online and they are both lovely, lovely people. <3