Desires of the Heart

Coming March 4, 2009 from The Wild Rose Press.

When life today is filled with pain, look to the future – or past.

Loren Fairchild longs for children, but is barren. At a cottage in Carlisle, UK, she puts her divorce behind her and begins a new life. She’s interested in the former owners of the small house and about the woman who disappeared into thin air. The same week, according to local gossip, her husband took up with a dark-headed harlot. One morning, a simple minded woman wearing a white nightgown appears at the cottage and triggers events that change Loren’s life forever.

Miles Chapeau misses the wife, the mother of his two children, he’d known before the war. When he returned home in 1945, he learned she’d been hurt in an air raid and now had the mind of a child. He loves her like another child and would never forsake his duty, but misses the intimate side of marriage and having someone to share his interests and goals with. One day she disappears and his existence is turned upside down.

Forever Faithful in now out in print!

I'm pleased to announce that Forever Faithful is now out in print. This is a contemporary western love story set in the Hill Country of Texas. Intertwined with the ups and downs of Lucas and Gail's marriage is a twenty-year-old murder mystery.

You can watch the book trailer on Utube.

Please check it out at Champagne Books. Ebook format is also available at Fictionwise. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Thanks for reading!

Linda

Tag, you're it!

This morning I was tagged by Lauri Robinson, fellow Wild Rose Press historical author. If you check out Lauri's blog, you'll see her in sitting in her favorite toy--a red Mustang convertable.

By the way, Lauri, I loved Mail Order Husband.

So, I'm to list six things that make me happy. Only six? I could name loads more, but these will have to do.

1. My family and spending quality time with them making memories.

2. Writing stories and seeing the finished product in ebook and/or print.

3. My friends who make me laugh and boost my spirits when I'm down.

4. Our dog Molly, a mixed breed who loves us unconditionally.

5. My ebookwise reader that allows me to carry a boat load of books in one small package.

6. The many blessings the Lord bestows on my family.

I need to tag six people. Since Lauri got so many of the Cactus Rose authors, I'll try a couple other genres.

Judith Leger
P. L. Parker
Cindy K. Green
Chiron O'Keefe
Debbie Wallace
Alisha Paige

Let the tagging begin!

Linda
http://www.lindalaroque.com/

Champagne Books New Years Eve Sale

Mama's Date Roll Cookie Recipe

A Christmas tradition in the home where I grew up was date roll cookies. They are my brother and husband's favorites, so now that my mother is no longer with us, I feel compelled to try to keep up the tradition.

These are refrigerator cookies, which means you put the rolls in the icebox or freezer, take them out when you need more, slice, bake, and eat. Though I make a double recipe, we rarely have any left in the freezer for later.

The thinner the slices, the browner and chewier they get. This is the way I like them. My brother and husband like them thicker and softer. I try to vary the thickness so we'll all be happy.

Date Roll Cookies

1 lb. pitted dates

1/2 C. sugar

1/2 C. water

Cut the dates, comgine sugar and water, and cook over low heat til mushy. Add a pinch of salt.

3 eggs beaten 1 C. sugar

4 C. flour 1 C. brown sugar

1 t. soda 1 C. oleo

1 t. salt 1 T. vanilla

1 T. cold water

Cream oleo, sugars, and beaten eggs. Sift flour, salt, and soda THREE TIMES, then add to oleo mixture. Add vanilla and cold water. Knead. Divide dough into parts and roll out on floured surface. Spread with date paste, roll up, pinch ends. Roll up into waxed paper, twist ends. Refrigerate until firm. Best if refrigerated overnight. Slice think, place on cookie sheet and bake in 375 degree oven until brown.

I hope you enjoy this recipe. Merry Christmas!

Linda

Texas Fruitcake

We've all received one of those terrible canned fruitcakes as a gift,
but here is one you'll be proud to bring out and share with friends or give as a gift. I'm not crazy about fruitcake, especially the dark ones with more fruit than cake, but I love the the ones made from this recipe. It came from a cookbook of Favorite Recipes of Home Economics Teachers. I taught Home Economics for 30 years in Texas and we sold these cookbooks back in the 60s and 70s. I've used this recipe since 1970. The first time I made it my daughter was a baby and I've been hooked ever since.

1/2 lb. candied pineapple
1/2 lb. candied cherries
1/2 lb. raisins1/2 lb. chopped dates
4 to 5 oz. candied orange peel or sliced candied orange slices
2 lbs. shelled pecans
1/2 lb. shelled walnuts
5 C. flour
1 & 1/4 lb. oleo
2 C. white sugar
1 C. brown sugar
6 eggs
3/4 t. soda
1/2 C. molasses
3/4 C. apricot preserves
3/4 t. cloves
3/4 t. allspice
3/4 t. nutmeg
3/4 t. cinnamon


Cut fruit; dredge fruit and nuts in 1/2 C. flour. Cream oleo & sugars; add eggs, and beat. Mix soda and molasses; stir into sugar mixture with preserves. Add flour and spices (sifted together); add nuts and fruit. Grease two tube pans; line with waxed paper. Grease paper. Turn batter into pans; put pan of water on bottom shelf of oven. Bake 4 hours at 250 degrees.

I use my turkey roaster to mix this all together as it's the largest thing I have. Nothing else seems big enough.

I hope you'll give it a try and your family enjoys it as much as mine does.

Merry Christmas to you and your!

Linda

A Review for Forever Faithful

Check out my wonderful review for Forever Faithful available now at Champagne Books. View the book trailer at my website at www.lindalaroque.com or on utube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsljzzwswM4

http://blog.lyndacoker.net/2008/11/08/wrdf-review-of-forever-faithful-by-linda-laroque.aspx#comment-1534703

Fantastic, Stays on Shelf.

Title: Forever Faithful
Author: Linda LaRoque
Genre: Contemporary Western Romance
Page extent: 224 pages
Publisher: Champagne Books
ISBN 978-1-897445-32-7
Heat rating: Sensual

Blurb:
Love is like a flame, some days it burns bright and others it dwindles. Faith is the forge upon which love is strengthened to steel.

Lucas and Gail Johnson live the idyllic life on their ranch near the small town of Stony Creek, Texas. The one thing they want but don’t have is a child created from their love. Will an unidentified body pulled from nearby Possum Creek and a single night of indiscretion shatter their dreams of happily ever after?

Review:
Perfect, just about sums up my feelings for this book. As the title indicates this book deals with the very delicate and deeply significant issue of marital fidelity, but it was so much more. Linda LaRoque has given the perfect snapshot of married life, “for better and for worse” and Lucas and Gail learn to appreciate the vow “to forsake all others...till death do [them] part” in small-town Texas. Ms. LaRoque manages to interweave the subplot of a murder mystery beautifully into the main love story.

What I loved best about this book is its portrayal of all facets of love, love of courtship, young love, married love, unconditional love, obsessive love, and above all the love between a parent and child. Ms. LaRoque beautifully brings out how sometimes the flame of love dwindles but how faith can forge it into steel. The dash of the supernatural and the mystery both add to the enjoyment of the plot.

If I have one quibble, it’s that even in fiction it is the woman who is portrayed as being more flexible and willing to forgive, despite the warped circumstances but considering the fact that fiction reflects reality I must accept that aspect of the plot. But overall Lucas is quite a hero and Gail’s dad Sam Steele is also a great supporting character. But I guess there needs to be give and take to get to happily ever after. And FOREVER FAITHFUL sure ends that way. I whole-heartedly recommend this book. It has all the aspects of a great love story and is great entertainment.

Reviewed by Raakhee Suryaprakash
WRDF Review

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Reading and Writing!

Linda