The Story Behind LADY OF THE STARS

Lady of the Stars was the first story I had published.

In 2007, a new ebook publisher, The Wild Rose Press, ran a contest for time travel stories. They promised a free critique by an editor to everyone who entered. So, I wrote a time travel about a 21st century astronomer heroine who goes back to the Regency to meet the hero. The story is a science fiction romance (I like astronomy) although, at the time, I didn't know the genre existed. I also came up with a twist that I've never seen elsewhere. The twist includes the book's title, which does not refer to the heroine's profession, but explaining the title's meaning will give the story away.

I didn't win the contest, but they said they would accept the story if I made some changes. I made the changes, and after two more tries, they took the story. If you want all the gory details, you can read them here.

The Wild Rose Press published Lady of the Stars in 2009. The story was an EPIC E-Book Competition finalist in Science Fiction Romance in 2010, received 4 stars from RT Book Reviews, and was The Romance Reviews Finalist for Best in Historical Fantasy/Paranormal in 2011.

As the years went on, I thought of things I wanted to add to the story. When I pulled the book from the publisher last year, I added everything that had simmered in the back of my mind for so long. And, although the original book still read well, I rewrote the entire story--I write better now than I did then. :)

The writing took some four months. The latest version is 50% longer than the original, (now 34,000 words to the original 21,000) with some holes plugged, some Point of View (POV) errors fixed, the telling, especially at the end which was mostly telling, converted to showing and the removal of a lot of "he thought, he heard, he saw".

Lady of the Stars, Regency time travel mainstream romance

Available at

Amazon: http://getbook.at/Lady1

Barnes and Noble: http://bit.ly/1RQXiKl

iBooks: http://bit.ly/1VCZvHo

Kobo: http://bit.ly/1Pl3FVG

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/607960
All formats are available on Smashwords.

Thank you, all,
Linda