The Rose I Never Gave My Wife

Dateline: May 1981 As I looked out the window, I noticed that the sky was cloudy. It looked as though it might rain. But it was Mother’s Day and I had promised my mother I’d be over with the kids. I had sent over a dozen red roses that I had bought for my mother—just as I had done every years since I got my first job.

A Widow’s Summer Romance

Dateline: August 2006 She assumed it would be a summer fling. But when Daryl gets serious about their future, Deena fears she’ll lose her independence.               
A widow for just a year, Deena’s finally rebuilding her life. She married Justin, a Navy sailor, and had Ian, when she was still a teenager, accustomed to being the “good girl,” who acquiesced to everyone. She’s grown up and no longer willing to compromise her own desires. Would Daryl accept this new empowered Deena? When a girl is ready to embrace her own power, she becomes a woman. She answers to herself first. Daryl and Deena are in love. They’d make the perfect family, but since she is unwilling to move to his hometown, it doesn’t seem possible to make it work. Love is never easy when two people live in different cities, and Skyping only goes so far! I drove across the bridge and onto St. Simons Island on July first, exactly one year after Justin’s death.

Bloodlust: A Killer Love Story

Dateline: October 2001

“Celene, you’re too sweet, too naïve,” my best friend told me as I dropped a five-dollar bill into the lap of a man who was panhandling on the sidewalk. “One of these days, I won’t be around to protect you from yourself.” “Why? Where are you going? Seems to me you’ve been around half my life, protecting me from myself.”
“I mean it, Celene! There are two halves in this world: the good and the evil. And it seems that the evil is always looking to harm the good.”

A Madman Tried To Replace My Husband!

Dateline: May 1970 After three weeks and four days of no word from my husband, Val, in Vietnam—right on top of the mail in my box was an overseas letter. I unlocked the foyer door and ran headlong up the flight of stairs to my apartment, ecstatic with relief. I dumped my grocery sacks and the rest of the mail every-which-way on the daybed and started to tear open that letter.

The Road To Madness

Her dreadful secret was out! Even the man she loved knew – and knowing, despised her. What could she possibly do?

Dateline:May 1933 She had a terrible, dark secret -- she was a prescription drug addict. It was a long time ago and she has completely turned her life around, but her past threatens to ruin her future. In love and engaged to be married to a wonderful man, Margerie struggles with her conscience. Should she tell her fiance the truth? What if he rejects her as all the others did? How can she risk losing everything? This story from the 1930’s is remarkably current and universal in so many ways. Problems with addiction, secrets that can’t be buried. Who doesn’t have a secret or two? And, who doesn’t yearn to be loved for who they truly are -- flaws and all.   The suddenness of the question threw me off my guard. I began to lie shamelessly Her dreadful secret was out! Even the man she loved knew— and knowing, despised her. What could she possibly do?

That Crazy Girl

Love is so beautiful—so terrible—so awesome a thing. It came to her like a tropical dawn—in a matchless sweep of breathless beauty and wonder, yet. . .

Dateline: April 1937 

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They were falling deeply in love, but she held a secret: Myra was the cause of all his bitterness. She caused his plane to crash during the town air-derby, forever destroying his ability to fly. He knew the name, but had never seen the face of the woman responsible. Destiny (with a little help from Myra) brings them together again, and they are immediately love-struck. Myra never reveals her true identity. Who could blame her?When Dick proposes, she fears it’s the end. Is it a tragic love story, or, a triumph of the human spirit? Would love be enough to forgive the guilty -- who managed to deliver two blows to the heart by not only causingthe accident, but also lying about who she was? 

My Heart Is A Living Tomb

War had robbed her of her lover—another war gave him back to her. But now she was the wife of another. Her lover had been faithful all these years. Should she now go back to her first love?

Dateline: April 1925 Her life seemed perfect, but no one knew the heartache she suffered. She had experienced an extraordinary love, but it was stolen from her when her lover died in battle.

Why He Married Her

She longed for her husband's love, but lived always in the knowledge that one had been there before her.

Dateline: February 1929 I never saw Lila Lane. I first heard of her when I came to Lanesville to teach school. She had passed away the spring before, leaving a disconsolate husband and four babies. The sad event had been the occasion of much discussion, and expressions of sympathy in the community.

Forbidden Dreams

From the January 1949 issue of True Romance Magazine:

Laurie agreed with Bill -- they were meant for each other. But would he still think so when he knew the secret she kept locked in her heart?

Dateline: January 1949 She had a secret that made her different from other girls. Rightly or wrongly, she believed it made her unlovable. 
Laurie was never a “party girl.” She was quiet, sensitive, unassuming. Was there a man who would find her attractive? He was vivid in her dreams, but did he really exist? When she meets Bill, she recognizes her soul mate, but fears he’s too good to be true. Why do we focus on what we’re not and let our insecurities run us ragged? Laurie was a gentle soul who required an equally gentle man. It was all about finding the right fit (isn’t it always?) and believing we are perfect just as we are. Are Laurie and Bill truly matched for each other? Are they destined to live happily ever after? 

My Mother's Lover is My Husband

From the pages of True Love Magazine: Dateline: May 1970

Beth’s father (who is separated from her mother) likes to think of Mom as “overflowing with love.” Beth feels a mixture of anger, pity and, occasionally, love – she is her mother after all.