Happy Valentine's!

Family.

I've built a life and my writing career around family.

This Hometown Hearts Wedding trilogy deals with families. Friends who become families. Families who are made through adoption. Families who are born...Family. Watching people come together, fall apart, adapt... It's a fascinating process. Every story comes at it from a new direction.

We've talked before about how my real life impacts my writing. In March's book,  Something Blue, I deal with dementia in an older loved one. It's a reality I know about. My grandmother slowly lost her battle with dementia over years. Then we adopted a neighbor who also battled that kind of loss. It's an awful process. And you might be thinking, Holly, that's too grim to read about.  But that's not all there is. My grandmother always knew me and my kids. We visited every day. Even after she couldn't remember our names, she knew she was ours and we were hers. The connection was still there. She knew she was loved and she wasn't alone.

We saw the same thing with our neighbor. The Minions owned her entire nursing home. We walked over regularly. The two littles would dress up in their superhero capes and ride their scooters (you can't ride a bike in a cape). Not only did she know we were hers and she was ours, the entire nursing home knew the Minions. They high-fived their way through the halls. Some days they were Batman and Robin, sometimes they were Superman and the Green Lantern... What I loved the most is how gentle they were with everyone. They didn't worry if our neighbor didn't know their names. They filled her in on their day and chatted away and she loved it. 

We missed those visits last year.

Someone once questioned why we visited if a patient didn't know us. I think that even when memories have gone, when someone is lost in their own mind, they recognize love. They feel it. It's a bright light in a dark place. So we visited. My kids and the Minions learned lessons on patience, empathy and love. And our loved ones learned no matter what they were never alone.

Those are the things I tried to put in Something Blue. Connection. Empathy. Love. I know I write romances and writing about love is obviously a part of that, but I really try to write about broader loves. About family. About all the ways they come together and all the ways they stand together.

I've built a life around family and I've built a career around it.

I am so lucky in both! And Valentine's Day seems like the perfect day to talk about that kind of love.

I hope you'll check out the entire Hometown Hearts series and Something Blue!

Holly

 Hometown Hearts:

Crib Notes: Hometown Hearts #1

Kindle, Nook, Kobo, iBook

A Special Kind of Different: Hometown Hearts #2

Kindle, iBook, Kobo, Nook

Homecoming: Hometown Hearts #3

Kindle, Kobo, IBooks, Nook

 

Suddenly a Father: Hometown Hearts #4

Kindle, Kobo, Nook, iBooks

Preorder: Something Borrowed: Hometown Hearts #5

Available 1/5/21

Kindle, Kobo, Nook, iBooks

PREORDER: Something Blue Available 3/21

Kindle, 

Kobo, 

Nook, 

Apple Books

Preorder Something Perfect Available 5/21

Kindle
Kobo
iBooks
Nook

HollysWoodsStudio

Happy Valentine's!! I've got a gift for you...

Happy Valentine's!  I hope tomorrow is a wonderful day for you.  I've got a houseful here, so it's bound to be chaos...but a good chaos!

 Once Upon a Valentine's is the perfect book to talk about on the day before Valentine's!  This is the third and final book in my PTA Mom series.  If you missed they other two, you can find them here!   This is Carly's story.  She's my accidental arsonist.  Yes, that's a thing.  And when she's partnered with an Erie cop for her community service, Sparks Fly. (I know, I know, that was bad, but I just couldn't help myself!)  

What are people saying?   

"An overcommitted and lovable but prickly heroine and a no-nonsense hero spar brilliantly in this sassy, tender, sometimes hilarious romance set in Jacobs's hometown of Erie, PA. Another winner from the author of Once Upon a Christmas." ~Library Journal  

"After Carly burns a couch -- and the neighbor's shed -- she's court-sentenced to help steamy lawman Chuck teach fire safety classes in the schools. As things heat up with Chuck, Carly struggles to balance her responsibilities: her kids, her last semester of nursing classes and her PTA seat. And when Chuck isn't satisfied with keeping things casual, Carly gets in way over her head! Jacobs reminds readers that not having time to fall in love won't keep it from happening." ~Romantic Times BookClub    

In other news,  I've started my second Ceramics class. Keep an eye out for more My Novel Freshman Experience posts and pictures!  And keep an eye on future newsletters...I have some fun giveaways and plans for the year!  I was in the studio working a few weeks back, carving some clay spoons and had an idea for a short story.  As my Valentine's gift to you all...it's free this week.  (Those are my spoons on the cover.)  You can grab a copy here...SPOONS.

I posted my 'gift' on FB yesterday and a friend said that giving spoons on Valentine's was a tradition.  I found it on Huffington Post...
"One traditional romantic Welsh gift is a love spoon. As early as the 17th century, Welsh men carved intricate wooden spoons as a token of affection for the women they loved. Patterns and symbols were carved into these love spoons, each signifying a different meaning. A few examples include horseshoes, which stand for good luck; wheels, which symbolize support; and keys, which symbolize the keys to a man’s heart." You guessed it...I had geek glee all over the place!  

That's it!  Wishing you a wonderful Valentine's filled with spoons, good romance stories and lots and lots of love!

Holly

PS. Briar Hill Road is out in March.  I'm so in love with this cover!

Valentine's Day...The Words that Matter

Happy Valentine's...well, almost Valentine's!

Do you have any plans for tomorrow?

My husband and I are going to an RV show.  

Now, I know, you're thinking, wow, Holly your romance authorship is showing!  But I'm going to argue an RV show with my husband is sort of romantic.  

Why?  Because it's with my husband.  After all these years, he's still my favorite person to hang out with.  Whether we're at an RV show, or washing dinner dishes, or reading the paper together.  

The together part is what matters to me.

We're probably not going to exchange cards (we're not card people) and neither of us would fight the crowds to go out for dinner out tomorrow, but we do say the words...the words that matter.  What words are those?  I think they change regularly.  Yes, of course, there's I love you.  And I've always been fond of here I am.  But words like, let's go for a walk.  You are handy. You make me happy.  Oh, and thank you.  Thank you is a very important phrase!

The idea of words having power is a concept that has been woven into so many of my stories.  Sometimes blatantly, sometimes subtly.  

But since tomorrow is Valentine's, I thought the idea of words was something we should talk about.  I hope you have a great day tomorrow...and I hope you remember to say the words that matter the most to you!

Holly

www.HollyJacobs.com

Valentine's Giveaways!

Happy Valentine's!!!  I hope tomorrow's a lovely day for you.  And in case your SO (significant other) didn't get you anything…I have a gift and a chance at a free book.

You can enter a drawing for a three free Kindle copies of my Maid in LA Mystery series' first book, Steamed, by going to https://www.facebook.com/RMSwriters and liking the page, then liking my post about the contest.  I'm giving away the copies to celebrate not only Valentine's, but the release of the 4th book in the series, Swept Up.  

And free for the taking:

You can pick up a copy of my Valentine's short story, Nothing But Heart, for free for Kindle today!  The Nothing But… short story trilogy is part of my award winning, Everything But… world.  The books and the shorts all feature my Hungarian grandmother, Nana Vancy.  In the first three books, she tries to break a curse she accidentally put on her own family.  In the next three books, she's broken the curse and she's bored, so she tries her hand at matchmaking.  It the three short stories, she's given up matchmaking people and is matchmaking dogs to their forever homes…and accidentally helping a three couples find love while she's at it!

Nana Vancy has become a reader favorite.  The books were originally hardbacks, but last year, they were released as Kindle eBooks, and it's been so much fun to see a whole new set of readers join in Nana Vancy's adventures.  I'm thrilled she's got a cameo in a whole new series this fall, starting with the October release of Christmas in Cupid Falls.

I know it's not flowers or candy, but I hope my 'gifts' give you a bit of enjoyment on Valentine's!

It's been a busy couple weeks here for me.  I always say that Valentine's is a romance writer's Christmas!  Even if the holiday is 'made up' as I've heard some complain, there's something nice about a day that's designed to celebrate love!

Wishing you the best!  ~Holly

A Valentine's Present...free short story

Book 1

Book 3

  I didn't plan on writing for Avalon Books, but I met their editor at a conference and she asked if I had any unsold books stuffed under my bed.  Well, it just so happened that I had a story about a couple who got involved with a radio station's contest and were living in a truck.  Whoever managed to stay in it the longest, won it.  I know, you're shocked that a book that's set almost entirely in the front seat of a truck was a hard sell.  LOL  Well, she bought it, and three others afterwards.

Book 2

Book 4

It was fun writing about the radio station whose motto was, Where Love is More than Just a Song.  A friend is a local DJ and Craig Warvel (Star 104 Erie, PA) let me come out and hang out with him in the studio one morning.  I went on to write the second book in the series about two disc jockeys.  Then another disc jockey with an Old English Mastiff (we had one at the time, and other than a slime problem, he was a marvelous dog).  The only edits my editor asked me to do on that book was to deslime it.  I told her that I'd already toned down the slime...my dog slimed a lot more than I'd portrayed in the book.  She told me slime wasn't romantic.  Who knew?  So, I deslimed it and went on to do one last book.  A book that featured a bit of stand up comedy.  And I said goodbye to WLVH.

Book 1

Book 2

  I'd started writing more serious books for Harlequin.  I loved pushing my writing to something other than humor, but I didn't want to stray too far from my comedy roots.  So when I finished the WLVH Radio series, I pitched another series that had been languishing under the bed.  This one had a Hungarian grandmother who accidentally cursed her family to bad weddings.  I'd planned it as a trilogy.

Book 3

When I finished the trilogy (she'd broken the curse), readers told me they missed Nana Vancy, my Hungarian grandmother.  And frankly, so did I.  So, I called and pitched another book.  After breaking the curse, Nana Vancy was bored and wanted to try her hand at matchmaking....to the tune of The 12 Days of Christmas.  It sold.  So did the fifth book, and once you had two, it was easy to come up with one more story and make it a trilogy.

Book 4

Book 5 

This last book, Everything But a Dog, was especially fun because I put my two dogs, Ethel Merman and Ella Fitzgerald, in it. Of course, I renamed them because...wait for it...wait for it...they didn't want the puparazzi to hound them! Yeah, go ahead and roll your eyes.  My kids do every time I say it!

I'd finished writing the book when I heard that Avalon was sold to Montlake Book.  They told me they'd not only be releasing Everything But a Dog, but they'd be rereleasing the backlist of both series as eBooks and paperbacks.

Book 6 

Short story, Book 1

Well, I wanted to do something special for my readers. I also wanted introduce new readers to the two series that had originally been available mainly in libraries (Avalon's market).  And I thought I'd give away...a short story.  A story that merged the two series.  So, for Christmas, I put up Nothing But Love on Amazon.  I started my career writing shorts and it was fun to go back to it.

That's the story of ten books that came out from under my bed, went to a bunch of libraries, and then got a second life as eBooks and paperbacks.

And so for Valentine's, I'm offering the second short story, Everything But Heart. It's free for Valentine's on 2/13, 2/14 and 2/15.  The first book, Nothing But Love is still available as well.

Nothing But Heart...free at Amazon 2/13, 2/14 and 2/15

So, happy Valentine's!!  I hope you enjoy my 'gift' and the story of how it comes to be.  And keep an eye out on St. Patrick's Day.  This Irish girl might have a bit of a gift for you then, too!

Holly