Conduct Unbecoming of a Gentleman a Regency romance filled with suspense by Wareeze Woodson

Another behind the scenes peek at another of Wareeze Woodson's book. This time the title is Conduct Unbecoming of a Gentleman.

This book raises strong passions either for it or against it. The posting below gives greater insight to the characters and the book that are not included in the text.

First a letter, then an interview.

Dearest Lady Bromsworth,

Because of my deepest concern for the Laningham family, I write to ask you for the truth of the dreadful incident involving Lady Laurel Laningham. The late Lord Laningham served in the Peninsular you understand.  How sad he succumbed to his wounds leaving a young wife and son behind.  His grieving twin sister nearly went into a decline, or so I heard. All due to that little Corsican upstart, Bonaparte, thinking to fight all of England and our brave soldiers dying by his order.   

 I don’t hold with gossip as you know, but I seek the truth to still the old tabbies’ tongues about the matter. Listening to rumors is a vulgar habit, and I try to always gather the facts of a situation instead. The facts, as I understand them, are incredible, scarcely believable, thus my inquiry.

My butler informed me that dear Lady Laurel Laningham survived when a carriage over turned with her and her little son inside.  She was on her way to Sussex to visit her aunt, or so it was supposed. Tis a great shame what with her being so recently bereaved and so lovely. She is not your average silly, pea-goose, either to undertake such a trip without cause. I asked myself if such could be true, and what with the condition of the roads along with the less than trust-worthy coachmen handling the ribbons, I concluded the account could be accurate.

   

Alarmed, I sat down at once with pen and paper to hand. He told a tale of a stranger riding off with the young Lord Laningham leaving the widow stranded in an over-turned coach. The tale becomes even more incredible at that point.  You can imagine my horror and concern.

The abductor is rumored to be Lord Gladrey himself, the boy’s own guardian. That cannot be possible. I know Lord Gladrey. He is such a fine gentleman, gracious and always mindful of his family, such a dear, kind gentleman.  If he did take charge of his ward, I’m certain he had a perfectly sound reason for serving Lady Laningham such a turn. It is quite natural for his cousin to appoint Lord Gladrey as guardian to his son. He and the twins are rumored to have been very close.

Please enlighten me of the facts of the situation so I’ll be able to ward off any unwelcome comments from the Ton. I dare say, you are aware of how vicious some of their tongues can become. I am more than willing to promote the proper happenings for dear Lady Laningham’s sake. I anxiously await word from you, a dear friend and neighbor of the family.

Truly Yours,

Lady Pickering

Character Interviews

The reporter swallowed and began the interview for his newspaper, the Tribute

Reporter:   Lord Adron Gladrey, I work for the Tribute. My editor is interested in the happenings involving an over-turned coach. We understand you rode by and took charge of your ward, Lord Laningham. Why at such at time did you ride away with him before you?

 Lord Adron Gladrey:   I felt it necessary to protect my ward. Due to a misunderstanding, I thought he was being taken to France. The war torn country is hardly a safe environment for my ward. I understood, his mother was careless and wouldn’t understand the danger to my ward.

Reporter:   Were you responsible for the accident?

Lord Adron Gladrey:  No indeed! A deep washout in the lane was responsible.

Reporter:  Why didn’t you speak to her about your concerns for the child?

Lord Adron Gladrey:  She left Landings as I arrived back in England. There was no time. I felt the need to rescue my ward before something dreadful happened to him, as it nearly did. The entire incident was merely a misunderstanding. I would appreciate it if you people would let the subject alone.

A PEEK BEHIND THE SCENES WITH AUTHOR WAREEZE WOODSON

Another glimpse behind the scenes of An Enduring Love

Another letter confiscated by the villain, not in the book.

The Year of Our Lord 1814

My Dearest Husband,

I have not received any word from you since you sailed away from Latvia. I hope you are well. I must write quickly in order to send this to you. There is still a guard at my gate. I feel so desperate and trapped.

With your connection in the government, perhaps you can return and help me travel to England. There will be one added person in need of your assistance, our son. If you cannot come at once, please write. I am most anxious to hear from you.

Never forget my enduring love. Anxiously waiting.

Yours Always,

Rebecca Sudduth

Here is a lovely fact about the author, Wareeze Woodson

First Love

Does it count that I’m still married to my first love? My love came to visit my older sister, drat the luck. He rode up to the house on his horse with graceful competence, one with his mount, tall in the saddle and all the other things written in western romance novels about the hero. Needless to say, I melted with admiration.

I thought he was so cute in his big, cowboy hat. I know he wore clothes, jeans, and boots etc., however, I don’t remember the color of the shirt, but that hat! Wow! To this day, I remember that gray hat set at a slant on his coal black hair. In fact, he still owns that same hat, a bit out of date and hanging in the hallway of our home. Our grandson wears it occasionally. It looks good on him, too.

I’m not positive when he noticed me, but I noticed him, at once. I think my hero thought I was only a child being only thirteen to his mature sixteen. The next time I saw him, he looked a little closer. Finally, he noticed and I noticed back. It didn’t take him long to come around to my way of thinking.

His coal black hair is now peppered with silver, and much to my disgust, he stopped wearing his cowboy hat. He replaced it with a cap.

Four children and eight grandchildren later and we still love each other today. The search for enduring love is true romance, something we discovered together. 

An Enduring Love by Wareeze Woodson (Not the usual excerpt posting)-giveaway

                                                                                                                                                              An Enduring Love by Wareeze Woodson
Something a little different.
Post a comment for a chance to win an ebook of An Enduring Love (A Regency romance with a twist of suspense)

Not the usual postings for a book (An Enduring Love.)

An Added Bonus Feature!

Letters discovered in the belongings of the villain. These letters are not revealed in the book but are held in my heart and give insight to the story. A tidbit solely for you. Enjoy.

Wareeze Woodson

The Year of Our Lord 1813

My Dearest Husband,

I write with my heart filled with sorrow. My beloved mother has passed on to join my father in Heaven. I can only be happy for her although sadness weighs me down. I am now acquainted with deep sadness and how you must mourn for your father. Grief makes it hard to write, but you deserve to know why I am delayed in departing this land.

 At the moment, I am trapped in Latvia due to the up-rising in my country. I do not know how long it may be before I am allowed to travel to England to join you. There is a guard placed outside my gate to prevent my departure at present, but I will travel to Rica at the first opportunity and board a ship to London. Perhaps all will settle quickly. I can only pray it shall be so.

I cannot wait to be in your arms again, to kiss your dear face and gaze into your eyes once more. With words, you painted a lovely picture of your home in England and of your relatives. The thought of meeting your family holds much pleasure for me, especially since I am now alone.

Take care, My Love. I shall write to let you know as the hour of my departure grows closer. Keep safe and know you have my enduring love.

Yours Always,

Rebecca Sudduth

Beneath the glitter of the Regency - The Maid of Milan

By Beverley Eikli

Remember your first love? The one you loved with such passion it bordered on insanity?

Today we can give way to our feelings, and - generally - not carry the damage for the rest of our lives.

For a Regency debutante, however, 'letting go' would be a huge error of judgement. In an age where sex outside marriage was taboo, a debutante who'd 'strayed' would never be readmitted into society, should her sins be discovered. She'd be regarded as impure, and a woman with a 'past'.

For Adelaide, my heroine in The Maid of Milan, the only way to escape such a fate was to invent 'a past'. One that would be acceptable to the respectable, honourable MP who courts Adelaide when she's mourning her lost love.

Here's a scene at the end of the first chapter, when Adelaide gets a nasty shock.

The following scene takes place after Adelaide has decided she cannot be present for the visit of her former lover and the man who was her husband’s childhood friend. Here, she is suddenly caught off-guard.

Mrs Henley knocked and they entered as Tristan rose, his forced smile replaced by one of pleasure when he saw Adelaide. He took a step forward, extending his hand for hers, the flare in his eyes as intense as the day she consented to be his wife, and Adelaide felt an unexpected jolt somewhere in the region of her heart, her determination bolstered to bridge the distance between them, despite the oppressive presence of her mother, always a footfall away,it seemed.

‘Tristan, I—’

She stopped, pulling back as a warm, fragrant breeze stirred the papers on his desk. The French doors from the garden had been thrown open, and the heavy tread of Hessian boots upon the wooden floor pulled their attention towards the muslin curtains which swirled in eddies, silhouetting the shape of a man: a slender man of middle height – the only ordinary thing about him – dressed in a black cutaway coat and buff breeches, who materialised before them like a young demigod, smouldering with an enthusiasm he did nothing to inhibit, for good manners were always in abeyance to the passion that ruled James’s life.

‘Tristan!’ Tossing his low-crowned beaver upon the ottoman, James strode forward, arms outstretched, his voice taut with emotion.

Nearly four years, it had been, and from first impressions it was as if nothing had changed. Inky curls framed his delicately boned face and his eyes were like coals burning the fire within. No, nothing had changed, she could see, for James was still like a coiled spring, eager for love, eager for life, as ready to give as he was to take … without discernment.

Adelaide froze with nowhere to go, tense with premonition while shafts of sensation, painful and familiar, tore through her. Could this really be happening? Unwillingly, her gaze was fixed upon James’s profile, dusted with dark stubble, tapering up to angular cheekbones delineated with the slivers of sideburns sported by the fashionable Corinthians of the day.

In four years he could not be so unchanged whereas she …

She touched her face, her heart. She was a mere husk of what she’d once been. Tristan knew nothing of the passions that burned within her when her heart was engaged – and she didn’t know if he ever would, for suddenly she felt reduced to nothingness by the force of James’s personality.

She’d been his equal once – a woman of fire and vitality – and she’d loved him with a savagery that her mother claimed bordered on insanity. She’d been a child, thrust into adulthood by this charismatic older man. Married older man. But as she looked between the two men before her it was Tristan who made her heart beat faster, as much with

longing as with fear of what he would think of her if he knew the truth.

The Maid of Milan Blurb

After three years of marriage, Adelaide has fallen in love with the handsome, honourable husband who nurtured her through her darkest hours.

Now Adelaide’s former lover, the passionate poet from whose arms she was torn by her family during their illicit liaison in Milan four years previously has returned, a celebrity due to the success of his book The Maid of Milan.

High society is as desperate to discover the identity of his ‘muse’ as Adelaide is to protect her newfound love and her husband’s political career.

Author Bio

Beverley Eikli is the author of eight historical romances.

She has worked as a journalist, magazine editor, a safari lodge manager in the Okavango, and an airborne geophysical survey operator on contracts around the world.

Beverley wrote her first romance at seventeen, but drowning her heroine on the last page was symptomatic of the problems she grappled with during her 23-year journey towards publication. She did however stumble upon lasting romance, herself, when the handsome Norwegian bush pilot she met around a camp fire in Botswana whisked her off into a world of adventure, encompassing 12 countries in twenty years. A romantic adventure that’s lasted to the present day.

Recently Beverley received her third nomination from Australian Romance Readers for Favourite Historical Romance with her suspenseful Napoleonic espionage Romance The Reluctant Bride.

She now teaches in the Department of Professional Writing & Editing at Victoria University, Melbourne.

Beverley writes under the name Beverley Oakley for more sensual stories.

You can read more on her website or blog.

  

And you can buy The Maid of Milan in paperback, ebook and soon audiobook at Amazon US | Amazon UK | iTunes |  Barnes & Noble

Costume Talks Are Fun - & Sell Books

By Beverley Eikli

I can't resist making period costumes from authentic patterns.  Earlier this year I made some 1780s half boned stays and panniers and chemise to go under my 1780s polonaise, together with a Regency gown for my 'History Through Costume Talks'.  A few weeks ago I made my two daughters a couple of pretty 1850s dresses and capes for a 'Christmas in July' event we went to at nearby Sovereign Hill which recreates the gold rush era of the 1850s.

Author talks can be great but they're more fun if I dress in costume, as I'll be doing when I take a workshop tomorrow evening for the Bendigo Writers Council in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia.

In just a few days my Regency espionage romantic suspense The Reluctant Bride will be released in paperback (though it's already out in kindle), and I like to promote it as authentically as I can. It spans the years between the September Massacres during the French Revolution and the Battle of Waterloo, so I chose to make a costume around that period and also have a simple Jane Austen-type gown displayed on a mannequin to underscore the radical change in clothing.

You'll note, above, the long torso of the gown. During the 1780s a barrel-shaped torso with wide hips and full skirts was the fashionable silhouette. The breasts were pushed up and referred to as 'rising moons'. When I found the authentic pattern I realised I couldn't make it until I'd made some half boned stays to create the authentic underpinnings. That then led to making the panniers and chemise.

Tomorrow on my blog I'll be describing the various layers, with accompanying photographs. In the meantime here's the...

Blurb for The Reluctant Bride:-

Can honour and action banish the shadows of old sins?

Emily Micklen has no option after the death of her loving fiancé, Jack, but to marry the scarred, taciturn, soldier who represents her only escape from destitution.

Major Angus McCartney is tormented by the reproachful slate-grey eyes of two strikingly similar women: Jessamine, his dead mistress, and Emily, the unobtainable beauty who is now his reluctant bride.

Emily’s loyalty to Jack’s memory is matched only by Angus’s determination to atone for the past and win his wife with honour and action.  As Napoleon cuts a swathe across Europe, Angus is sent to France on a mission of national security, forcing Emily to confront both her allegiance to Jack and her traitorous half-French family. 

Angus and Emily may find love, but will the secrets they uncover divide them forever?

Buy links:

Buy from: Kindle UK, Kindle US, Apple UK, Apple US, Kobo Books 

Website: http://www.beverleyeikli.com

When Women Had No Legal Rights

By Beverley Eikli

Until 1991 a woman who fled an abusive husband had no legal recourse if he chose to force her return, or deny her her children.

As a writer of historicals and historical romance it's always a balancing act to create a heroine who is on the one hand not too passive for the tastes of the modern reader, nor unrealistic in the actions she takes to exercise her free will. After all, she had no financial or legal independence and was totally dependant on the goodwill of her husband or nearest male relative, unless she were a widow.

Emily, in my Regency espionage historical romance (with mystery, adventure and suspense), has had no choice but to marry Angus, a passionately self-contained war hero, in order to maintain her honour, and that of her family - and keep her child. My Regency espionage romance details Emily's blossoming from downtrodden and ill-used to a woman who deserves the happiness she's fighting for.

Below is the first altercation she has with her new husband which shows something of her feelings for her situation, as well as her self image. 

I hope you enjoy it.

 Here's the set-up:

Angus and Emily, newly married, have just been visited unexpectedly by Angus’s brother and his unsuitable consort. Emily, embarrassed by her highly pregnant state and knowing it will cause gossip amongst Angus’s family, reacts in this scene to her husband’s apologies for the situation Emily has just confronted.

With deliberate care Emily set down the plates once more and turned to look at her husband through narrowed eyes.

‘For contaminating me with a lady of dubious repute? But Angus, how much worse a contaminant would I have been had you not married me?’ She patted her swollen belly. ‘You’d be apologising to your brother. A fallen woman—’

‘Don’t speak like that.’ His wide-set eyes burned with undeserved defence of her. ‘Men’s impulses can be ungovernable, but ladies do not suffer such … urges … You were … taken advantage of.’

Emily stared at him. She sucked in a long, quavering breath as her simmering anger came finally to the boil. Is that what he believed? That she was insensible to passion? And that was a good thing?

‘What would you say if I told you that my impulses were every bit as ungovernable as Jack’s?’ She could barely control her anger sufficiently to speak. For days she had forced her feelings into the background, using the same emotional device against her unwanted husband as she had when her father insulted her, shutting out the hurt by erecting a barrieras impenetrable as steel.

Now, feeling surged through her, blackening her vision and causing her to sway. She put her hand on the back of the sofa to steady herself.

Angus stood awkwardly by the door, as if unsure whether to move closer to support her, or beat a tactful retreat.

Emily glared at him. ‘What if I told you that I was so consumed by passion in Jack’s arms I would not have heeded the Blessed Virgin Mary cautioning me against the temptations of the flesh?’ She tried to regulate her breathing, but the rage was clawing its way further up her body, threatening to make her its puppet. She, who never lost her temper. ‘I loved Jack. I was his slave in passion, every bit as culpable as he. If you are so concerned for virtue, spare your condemnation of innocent Miss Galway. You need only cast your eyes upon your wife to be singed by my sin. There! I have confessed my true nature. Whatever you thought of me before, you cannot but think worse of me now.’ She registered the horror in his eyes and was glad for it. Much better that she banish any pretence between them.

She’d never expressed anger as poisonous as this. At first it frightened her, then it sent exhilaration pulsing through her. Her love for Jack had been cut off at the root. Now hatred filled her veins, making her feel alive again. ‘And so you know, I care nothing for your opinion,’ she added.

She managed to remain upright, though her vision came in waves. She could feel her strength leaving her, but she had to spit out the truth so he’d have no illusions as to the kind of woman he’d married. A woman no good man deserved.

‘You married me because you needed a wife. I married you so I could keep my child. We made a contract. My body is yours to do with as you please, but that is all you will ever have. My thoughts, my feelings, my love will be forever out of bounds to you.

end of excerpt

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Alpha Hero, or Beta?

By Beverley Eikli

I love an historical beta hero. Give me one who has a brooding, taciturn exterior hiding a passionate heart.

That's my Angus in The Reluctant Bride, though having said that, there is a touch of alpha there, too.  As a returning war hero he's proved incredibly courageous but he's also brooding and burdened by events which forced his hand during the retreat to Corunna, in 1809 several years before my story begins.

Angus has unexpectedly found an opportunity to rescue Emily, the woman he's loved from afar, by marrying her, but unfortunately during his first meeting with her to pass on news of the death of her fiancé, he tells her a lie to spare her the pain of knowing how Jack really died.

Now Angus is determined to do whatever it takes to win Emily, his emotionally distant new wife - except tell her the truth. That's not possible. Yet.

Angus is also an alpha hero in that he sets about winning Emily with honour and action when he's sent abroad on a mission of national importance. The beta side of him is revealed in that  he treats Emily with more understanding than she deserves as she’s so stubbornly resistant to his overtures.  One of the challenges I had was showing Emily in a sympathetic light when she's so unkind to Angus to begin with.  But she's just lost her beloved fiancé and the main events in the story span eight months, which isn't terribly long to grieve.

Here's the opening scene in The Reluctant Bride. I hope you enjoy it.

Chapter One

‘It’s not a sin, unless you get caught.’

 

The gentle breeze seemed to whisper Jack’s teasing challenge, its soft, silken fingers tugging at Emily’s ingrained obedience. She put down her basket and stared with longing at the waters below, sweat prickling her scalp beneath her poke bonnet as desire warred with fear of the consequences.

 

‘Where’s your sense of adventure, Em?’

 

Still resisting, Emily closed her eyes, but the wind’s wicked suggestiveness was like the caress of Jack’s breath against her heated cheek; daring Emily to shrug aside a lifetime of dutiful subservience – again – and peel off her clothes, this time to plunge into the inviting stream beneath the willows.

 

She imagined Jack’s warm brown eyes glinting with wickedness. Taunting her like the burr that had worked its way into the heel of her woollen stockings during her walk.

 

Exhaling on a sigh, Emily opened her eyes and admitted defeat as she succumbed to the pull of the reed-fringed waters.

 

Desire had won, justified by practicality. If she had to remove one stocking to dislodge the burr she might as well remove both.

 

Scrambling down the embankment, she lowered herself onto a rock by the water’s edge. Her father would never know. If he glanced from his study in the tower room, where he was doubtless gloating over his balance sheet, he’d assume she was a village lass making her way along the track. Emily had never seen him interest himself in the poor except …

 

Like most unpleasant memories, she tried to cast this one out with a toss of her head, still glad her father had never

discovered what she’d witnessed from her bedroom window one evening five years ago: the curious sight of Bartholomew

Micklen ushering the beggar girl who’d arrived on his doorstep into his carriage.

 

Then climbing in after her before it rumbled down the driveway and out of sight.

 

Now was just another of those moments when Emily was glad her father remained in ignorance. Her insurance, should she need it, was that she knew a few of her father’s secrets the excise men might just want to know.

 

By the time the first stocking had followed Emily’s boots onto the grassy bank she was bursting with anticipation for her swim.

 

What did one more sin matter when she’d be Mrs Jack Noble in less than a week?

End of Excerpt

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Buy the book at Amazon, Amazon UK, or Barnes and Noble.