Sherry Ewing

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First Kiss Friday with Jude Knight

30 Friday Jul 2021

Posted by SherryEwing in First Kiss Friday

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#FirstKiss Friday, Be My Guest, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, Regency Romance

Welcome to my First Kiss Friday Blog. Today’s guest is one of my favorite authors and a dear friend. Please enjoy this excerpt from To Claim the Long-Lost Lover which releases today! Happy reading, my lovelies!

In this excerpt from the novel To Claim the Long-Lost Lover, the hero and heroine have met after seven years apart. He wants a second chance. She is reluctant to trust him again. You’ll have to read the book to find out more.

Excerpt:

“Until tomorrow.” Sarah gave in to the impulse to offer him her hands again, and this time he pulled her close and lowered his head, stopping when his lips were no more than an inch from hers. She waited a moment. He stayed where he was, the terrible man. Sarah raised herself that inch, her mouth tentative on his.

Odd. She thought she remembered his kisses. But she had forgotten the sweetness of it, the way his lips softened, the touch of his tongue asking her to open, the way he stroked into her mouth. With each moment, as the kiss deepened and his gentle persuasion became more insistent, more urgent, the memories flooded back.

That summer, they had discovered a hundred ways to kiss, a thousand. Different touches, different pressures, different positions. This, hand in hand, nothing but their mouths connected, was tame compared to some of their explorations, but there was nothing tame about the impact.

Cold? She could do with some cold. A dip in ice would not put out the conflagration.

When he pulled away, she whimpered.

His voice was strained as he stepped back, using his grasp on her hands to hold her at arm’s-length. “Dearest heart, have mercy. I am on fire, and if you are not going to invite me to stay…”

Oh. Her face heated. She dropped her gaze to his fall and blinked.

“Indeed,” he confirmed, with a short laugh. “I thought I had acquired considerable control over these past seven years, but you are fast demolishing it, my lady. Let me wish you a good night while I am still sane enough to be a gentleman.”

He was correct again, though for a wild moment she had not been able to think of any reason not to invite him to continue what they’d started. “Tomorrow, then,” she managed.

Nate gave her hands a final squeeze and released them. “Tomorrow,” he confirmed, with a bow.

Sarah followed him to the door and watched him cross the entrance hall where a footman waited to let him out. Four, she said to herself as the door closed behind him. One more point for that kiss, and another for stopping.

To Claim the Long-Lost Lover
by Jude Knight

The beauty known as the Winderfield Diamond hides a ruinous secret. Society’s newest viscount holds the key.

Sarah’s beloved abandoned her seven years ago, leaving her to face the anger of her family and worse. And now he is back, more compelling than ever. Sarah is even lovelier than when she was a girl, but what did she know about her father’s revenge on Nate: forcible enlistment into the navy and years of servitude?

Released 30 July

Buy Links

Jude Knight’s book page https://judeknightauthor.com/books/to-claim-the-long-lost-lover/

Amazon US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B096RLJJBZ

Other links on Books2Read: https://books2read.com/CMK-Claim

About Jude Knight

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

But life kept getting in the way. A seriously ill child who required years of therapy; a rising mortgage that led to a full-time job; six children, her own chronic illness… the writing took a back seat.

As the years passed, the fear grew. If she didn’t put her stories out there in the market, she wouldn’t risk making a fool of herself. She could keep the dream alive if she never put it to the test.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Her first book came out to excellent reviews in December 2014, and the rest is history. Many books, lots of positive reviews, and a few awards later, she plans to keep publishing until she runs out of years.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

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First Kiss Friday with Matilda and Charles

07 Friday May 2021

Posted by SherryEwing in First Kiss Friday

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#FirstKiss Friday, #ReadARegency, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, New Release, Regency Romance

Welcome, dearest readers, to my First Kiss Friday blog. Today’s guest is my dear friend Jude Knight who will be sharing an excerpt from Melting Matilda. In this excerpt, the kiss is the first one in this book. They had another kiss a year before, and it haunts them. You’ll have to read the book to find out more.

Excerpt:

He had dressed with enormous care, driving his valet demented by changing his mind three times about his waistcoat, rejecting six cravats before settling on the seventh, and hesitating for twenty minutes on his choice of fobs. The valet would probably slit his wrists in despair if he could see how Charles had set his hair in disarray by running his fingers through it, and ruined the hard-won perfection of the cravat by tugging it further open because he felt it choking him.

Then the door opened. Matilda entered the room and he lost his breath again. She was magnificent in a violet gown that hugged her curves before sweeping out into a deceptively simple skirt that avoided fashionable ruffles in favor of more subtle stitching that added detail without fuss. The neckline was low enough to rivet his attention while still high enough to be demure by the current standards. She wore pearls at her neck, her wrists, dangling from her ears and glowing in her dark hair, and the blue eyes he met when he wrenched his attention from the snowy skin displayed by her décolletage had taken on a violet cast from the gown.

He gazed, losing track of time and space, until she said his name. “Charles?”

“I had a speech.” His voice croaked, and he swallowed. “I do not remember a word.”

With one hand, index finger outstretched, he traced an inch or so away from her face. “Why did I try so hard to resist you, you beautiful woman?”

It was the wrong thing to say. Her nostrils flared. “Because I am the base-born daughter of a harlot.”

“I cannot remember why I thought that important,” he confessed. “You are the beloved sister of the next Duke of Haverford, the ward of the current duchess, and a lady of impeccable education, training and manners. That is not why I love you, though.”

Her eyes softened. “You love me?”

“That was part of the speech. It is the only bit I remember. I look into your eyes, and I forget my own name.”

“Why?” Matilda asked.

“Why do I forget? No? Why now?” She colored, and he realized what she was asking. “Why do I love you? How can I explain something that has grown in my heart without my knowledge, even against my will?” He took both of her hands, and suddenly the words began to flow.

“I have been attracted to you since the first time we danced, but that is desire, and desire is a part of love but not the whole. I do desire you, my love, more and more each day, but I also admire you, I like being with you, I enjoy talking to you, I respect you. I want to see you every morning when I wake, to spend my days with you, to have the right to dance the first waltz with you at every ball, and to go home with you every night. I want to see your belly rounded with our child, and watch you as you gently teach them the way I’ve seen you teach your little sister. I want you and only you as my countess and the mother of my children. I want to grow old with you, Matilda Grenford.”

He dropped to one knee. “Miss Grenford, I esteem you with all my heart. Will you do me the very great honor of becoming my wife?”

He waited, his anxiety rising as she said nothing, despair taking over as tears rose and began to leak from her pansy eyes. Then she began to nod as she slipped to her own knees and reached out for him. “Yes. Oh, yes. Charles, I love you, too.”

For more than a year, Charles had kept to himself the fact that the Haverford Ice Princess kissed like a flame. As he abandoned his own granite facade for once and for all, he rejoiced in her heat. This time was even better than the last, and the best was yet to come. Though perhaps not here in a family parlor where her brother or sisters could walk in at any time.

“I hope you do not want a long betrothal,” he whispered, between kisses.

She broke off her attempt to completely unravel his cravat. “Not long,” she agreed.

Her fervent answer demanded that he kiss her again, losing himself so deep he didn’t know they were no longer alone until a voice behind him said, “I trust you are betrothed to my sister, Hamner, for it would be most inconvenient to start the evening’s celebrations by killing you.”

Melting Matilda
By Jude Knight
Release Date: March 23rd

Can the Ice Maiden soften the Granite Earl?

Her scandalous birth prevents Matilda Grenford from being fully acceptable to Society, even though she has been a ward of the Duchess of Haverford since she was a few weeks old. Matilda does not expect to be wooed by a worthy gentleman. The only man who has ever interested her gave her an outrageous kiss a year ago and has avoided her ever since.

Can the Granite Earl melt the Ice Maiden?

Charles, the Earl of Hamner is honour bound to ignore his attraction to Matilda Grenford. She is an innocent and a lady, and in every way worthy of his respect—but she is base-born. His ancestors would rise screaming from their graves if he made her his countess. But he cannot forget the kiss they once shared.

Melting Matilda is a novella in the series The Return of the Mountain King. Chronologically and by publication order, it comes after To Mend the Broken-Hearted, published in March, and before To Claim the Long-Lost Lover, available in July.

To preorder Melting Matilda before the publication date, 23^rd March, go to https://books2read.com/MeltingMatilda

Note. Melting Matilda was first published in Fire & Frost, a Bluestocking Belles collection.

About Jude Knight

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jude-knight

First Kiss Friday with Jude Knight

12 Friday Mar 2021

Posted by SherryEwing in 2021, First Kiss Friday

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

#FirstKiss Friday, #ReadARegency, Be My Guest, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, Regency Romance

It’s always a pleasure to have my friend Jude Knight back on my First Kiss Friday blog. Today Jude is sharing an excerpt from her novel To Mend The Broken Hearted. Enjoy and happy reading, my lovelies!

Excerpt:

Had she not been equally frustrated, Ruth might have been amused at Val’s valiant attempts to hide his dissatisfaction with the additions to their company. She had planned to allow him the kiss she hoped he wished to steal.

Her spirits soared, however, when they came through the gate into the enclosed space. It was larger than she expected, larger even than her mother’s garden. It was also very overgrown, so that one path could not be seen from another. And Jeyhun and Zyba had been courting in decorous fashion for some time.

She bided her time, allowing Val to conduct the tour of the main features of the garden. Despite his constant refrain of, “Of course, it used to be much more beautiful,” enough remained to charm and delight. The former Lady Ashbury had selected for scent and form, as well as for plants whose blooms were open at night, and all the blooms were white, glowing luminescent in the light of the moon, as did much of the foliage.

At last Ruth suggested sitting for a while on a bench near the central fountain. As she expected, her captain and her companion quickly became restless. They had been comparing eastern gardens with the ones they had seen since their arrival in England, and Zyba was certain that a tree they had passed near the entrance to the enclosure was similar to one that bloomed in a garden they had visited in Istanbul. Jeyhun was equally sure she was mistaken.

“Why do you not go and take another look?” Ruth asked.

Jeyhun opened his mouth to argue about leaving her alone with their host, but Zyba took his arm and led him away. Val looked at Ruth with what she was certain, even in her innocence, was desire, but he stayed sitting on the rim of the fountain.

“There is plenty of room beside me,” she said, her cheeks heating at her own boldness.

He leapt up and closed the space between them in two long strides, then sat just far enough away that he touched no part of her, except for the heated gaze that swept from her brow to her shoulders, bared by the fashionable gown, and lower.

She returned the gaze, tracing his face, his shoulders, his torso, with her eyes, and when he leaned towards her, she met him partway. Only their lips touched, brushing once, twice, a third time. He straightened, so that his face drew away a few inches. “Ruth?”

She answered what she hoped he was asking. “Yes.” She leaned towards him again, and he shifted so that they were thigh to thigh. He slid his hands—flesh on one side and carved wood on the other—across her arms and around her back, pulling her chest to chest. This time, when their mouths connected, they clung.

She was vaguely aware of the texture of his jacket under her palms, but most of her attention was on the touch of his lips on hers, of his teeth nipping her lower lip, of his tongue surging inside her mouth when she gasped at that gentle nibble.

She turned her face to give him better access. She had always wondered whether noses interfered with kissing, but apparently her body knew how to prevent that from happening. Someone moaned, and she rather thought it was her. Without her willing it, her body moulded itself to his, but she could not get close enough. She edged up onto his thigh, and it was his turn to moan as her leg slipped down between his and pressed up against something rigid and unyielding.

“Ruth…” he said her name on a groan, then again, this time more sharply, turning his head as her mouth followed his and tried to reconnect. “Ruth. Sweetness. We have to stop.”

Yes. Yes, they did. Heavens! Jeyhun and Zyba were somewhere nearby, perhaps just around the corner, and she was draped over the Earl of Ashbury like a tavern slattern. She jerked away from him, the heat rising in her face. Whatever did he think?

“I beg your pardon,” she murmured.

“I am the one that should apologise, but I find it hard to be sorry. That kiss…!” Val’s voice still sounded strained, as if he were in pain. Her doctor’s mind registered a point from her reading: extreme tumescence could be painful, and when she had been on his lap, she had felt his… If her face got any hotter, it would melt.

She opened her mouth to make some sort of an excuse for her behaviour, or to change the subject to something innocuous. But what came out just added to her embarrassment. “I have never been kissed before. Was it…?” She wasn’t sure what she was asking. Was it exceptional? Was it meaningful to you? Was it something we could do again?Perhaps all of them.

Val, who had dropped his arms when she shifted away, lifted his good hand to cup her cheek and move her face so he could gaze into her eyes. “I have never had a kiss like that in my life. Ruth, you are an exceptional woman, and make me wish with all my heart I was a better man.”

She leaned into his hand. “You are a good man, Valentine Monforte.”

A burst of dialogue came from just beyond the hedge that shielded them. Jeyhun and Zyba were returning.

Val caressed her lips with his thumb before standing, allowing his fingers to trail over her cheek as he dropped his hand and stepped away. He was just in time. Jeyhun and Zyba rounded the turn in the path, and their stolen moment together was over.

To Mend the Broken Hearted

Ruth is a healer, not a social gadfly. She’s glad to leave the foreign world of the ton to run an errand for her sister-in-law. She doesn’t expect to be caught up in a smallpox epidemic, nor to meet the man of her dreams.

Ruth Winderfield is miserable in London’s ballrooms, where her family’s wealth and questions over her birth make her a target for the unscrupulous and a pariah to the high-sticklers. Trained as a healer, she is happiest in a sickroom. When a smallpox epidemic traps her at the remote manor of a reclusive lord, the last thing she expects is to find her heart’s desire.

War and betrayal have wounded Val beyond bearing. The woman who arrives at his retreat with patients who need shelter says she’s a healer. But he is beyond healing. Isn’t he?

Valentine, Earl of Ashbury, was carried home from war three years ago, unconscious, a broken man. He woke to find his family in ruins, his faithless wife and treacherous brother dead, his family’s two girl children exiled to school. He becomes a near recluse while he spends his days trying to restore the estate, or at least prevent further crumbling.

When an impertinent, bossy female turns up with several sick children, including the two girls, he reluctantly gives them shelter. Unable to stand by and watch the suffering, he begins to help with the nursing, while he falls irrevocably for both girls and the lovely Ruth.

The path to happiness passes through danger and scandal

The epidemic over, Ruth and Val part ways, each reluctant to share how they feel without a sign from the other. Ruth returns to her family and the ton. Val begins to build a new life centred on his girls. But danger to Ruth is a clarion call Val cannot ignore. If they can stop the villains determined to destroy them, perhaps the hermit and the healer can mend one another’s hearts.

Buy link: https://books2read.com/b/3GANrd

About Jude Knight

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jude-knight

First Kiss Friday with Jude Knight

06 Friday Nov 2020

Posted by SherryEwing in 2020, First Kiss Friday

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#FirstKiss Friday, #ReadARegency, Be My Guest, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, Regency Romance, Storm & Shelter

Welcome to another First Kiss Friday! It’s always a pleasure when I can welcome back my dear friend Jude Knight. Today Jude has an excerpt from her novella A Dream Come True that will be found in Storm & Shelter. Enjoy this excerpt and take it away, Jude!

In this excerpt from A Dream Come True, a novella in the Bluestocking Belles’ box set Storm & Shelter, Barney finally does what he has been yearning to do for weeks. You’ll have to read the book to find out more. Storm & Shelter is our first collection ‘With Friends’ — four of the Belles have been joined in this book by Grace Burrowes, Mary Lancaster, Cerise DeLand and Alina K. Field. Eight wonderful novellas, all set in the village of Fenwick on Sea during a stormy February.

Excerpt:

Behave, Barney told himself, as Theo landed so close that her thigh brushed his. Her delectable mouth, open in surprise, was within kissing distance, if he just leaned a little sideways and bent his head.

He could see her collect herself. She closed her mouth, swallowed, and looked down at her hand, still trapped in his. “I have overstepped,” she admitted. “I should have sent Daniel to ask you.”

“No!” He reached for her other hand and captured it. “You did exactly right. Theo, darling Theo, don’t you know how we feel about you? Daniel has adopted you as his aunt. Annie prefers you even to Daniel when she has a bruise or is tired. And I love you.”

Theo looked up at that. “You love me?”

His heart sank at the note of surprise, but he carried on. She needed to know how little he had to offer. “I am not much of a bargain. I am only my father’s curate, with a very poor income, and, once my father finds out that I have taken in my sister’s children, I am likely to lose even that. I will have to find another position, perhaps tutoring, or secretarial work, or assisting a physician. Will you wait for me until I have an income to support a wife? Will you be the children’s aunt in truth?”

Theo was silent, tears welling in her eyes and trickling disregarded down her cheeks.

Barney’s heart landed in his boots and kept falling. “My turn to overstep.” He let go of her hands and shifted a few inches away from her along the sofa. “I am sorry I upset you. I thought you… Never mind. We shall pretend all of that unsaid, shall we?”

A smile was spreading across Theo’s beloved face, and she retrieved Barney’s hands. “Foolish man,” she scolded, fondly. “Don’t you know that I love you, too? I am just surprised because I never believed that dreams could come true.” With that, she moved closer and tilted her head for a kiss, and brought into reality one of his most cherished dreams of the weeks since he’d met her.

How long the kiss, or perhaps the kisses, lasted, Barney could not have said. The bang of the front door followed by thudding of feet in the hall gave them a second’s warning to spring apart, though anyone with eyes would have known exactly what they were doing. They had only to look at Theo’s swollen lips, mussed hair and disarranged clothing. Barney assumed he looked no more reputable.

Daniel flung open the door and burst into the room. He was breathing hard. “Auntie Theo; Uncle Barney, we’ve got trouble.”

A Dream Come True

The tempest that batters Barnaby Somerville’s village is the latest but not the least of his challenges.

Vicar to a remote parish, he stretches his tiny stipend to adopt his orphaned niece and nephew and his time to offer medical care as well as spiritual. A wife is a dream he cannot afford.

But the storm sweeps into his life a surprising temptation—a charming young woman who lavishes her gentle care upon his wards—and him.

God knows, he will forever be richer for having known her, even if he must let her go.

For more about Storm & Shelter, including preorder links, see: https://bluestockingbelles.net/belles-joint-projects/storm-shelter/

About Jude Knight

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/

Pinterest: https://nz.pinterest.com/jknight1033/Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jude-knight

First Kiss Friday with Bob & Judy

05 Friday Jun 2020

Posted by SherryEwing in 2020, First Kiss Friday

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

Be My Guest, Bluestocking Belles, Jude Knight, Love At First Sight, True Love

Welcome to a special First Kiss Friday with my dear friend, Jude Knight. With everything going on in the world right now, it’s nice to read a story that is so uplifting that it can only bring a smile to your face and tears in your eyes (in a very good way). Love at first sight really can happen and with that intro, I’ll let Jude take it away! Enjoy, my lovelies.

I haven’t been writing, what with packing up the house we’ve sold, Covid-19 lockdown, moving cities, buying a new house, and having a newly retired husband home the whole time.

So I thought I’d give you something different. A couple who met long ago at a prayer meeting, met again several times at youth outreach (she was secretary of her Young Anglicans group and he was president of the local Young Catholic workers), and finally went out together for a night dancing. Just dancing and talking. Two well-behaved young people in the late nineteen-sixties, and after all, they barely knew one another.

***

It was a dismal Monday morning, but the usual trip to training college had to be endured regardless. Across the harbour bridge into the city, and then a second bus out to an old made-over colonial mansion in Arney Road, where would-be kindergarten teachers learned educational theory, human development, and how to make music and movement fun and interesting for a herd of rambunctious toddlers.

Judy’s mind was on her book rather than the weather or her studies, but the greeting from further down the bus riveted her attention. Bob. She had hoped to see him again, but not so soon; not on the bus.

“I often catch this bus,” he said. “I’m surprised we haven’t seen one another before.”

They talked all the way into town, and he walked her to her next stop. He was smart, and funny, and attentive, and courteous. She didn’t miss her book at all; didn’t even pull it out of her bag until the bus turned a corner and he was out of sight.

He was there waiting to walk her to her bus that night, and on the first bus again the next morning. “Do you like the ballroom type of dancing?” he asked. “Only, I’ve got tickets for a ball this coming Friday. I could pick you up if you’d like.” As casual as him, she said she’d enjoy that.

She had university that night – she was doing two papers, and stayed late on Tuesdays and Thursdays to attend lectures. No Bob on the bus. She scolded herself over her disappointment. If he knew, he’d think she was chasing him! They were just friends, after all.

Just in case that doubt was in his mind, she deliberately caught a later bus on Wednesday. To her surprise, he was on it. She fretted all day about what he might think, and wasn’t surprised when he didn’t appear at the stop in the city to walk her home.

Thursday, she caught the earlier bus in the morning, and stayed for lectures in the evening. When she saw him on Friday morning, she wasn’t sure he’d noticed her absence the previous day. Not that they were courting, or even boyfriend and girlfriend. They were just two people who happened to like one another, and who happened to be going dancing together, because dancing was fun.

She took some money out of her bank account so she could afford to have her hair done for the ball.

It was a wonderful night. The harbourside venue was stunning, the music was glorious, Bob was a splendid dancer, his friends (it was a ball for Outward Bound Old Boys) welcomed her as if she belonged… then it got better.

They were slow waltzing, and Judy was looking up into Bob’s eyes when she saw them change. Ever after, she struggled to express what she saw: the eyes softened and grew more intent, all in one. As the warmth in his gaze wrapped her around, she fell in love, and ever after swore that he beat her to it, if only by seconds.

What happened in the remainder of the evening? Neither of them took much notice. The roof could have blown off the building, and they would still have been in one another’s arms, dancing. They couldn’t believe that five hours had passed when they were herded outside with the rest of the stragglers so the venue could be closed.

They walked back to his father’s car hand in hand, not needing words. He drove one-handed so he could continue holding hers in his clasp. And when they parked in her mother’s driveway, he cupped her chin the heel of his hand, leaned in for a kiss, and the magical night got better still.

Reader, I married him. I’m slightly stunned that that night counts as history, since on the 3rd of August this year it will have been fifty-one years since the night we talked until dawn, chose a name for our first son, and shared far too many kisses to count.

About Jude Knight

Jude Knight’s writing goal is to transport readers to another time, another place, where they can enjoy adventure and romance, thrill to trials and challenges, uncover secrets and solve mysteries, delight in a happy ending, and return from their virtual holiday refreshed and ready for anything.

Jude writes everything from Hallmark to Regency Noir, in different eras and diverse places, short, medium and extra long. Expect decent men with wounded hearts, women who are stronger than they think, and villains you’ll want to smack or worse.and all with a leavening of humour.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

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Books + Main Bites: https://bookandmainbites.com/JudeKnightAuthor

Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/Jude-Knight/e/B00RG3SG7I

First Kiss Friday with Jude Knight

27 Friday Mar 2020

Posted by SherryEwing in 2020, First Kiss Friday

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

#FIrstKissFriday, Be My Guest, First Kiss Friday, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, Regency Romance

Any day I can welcome my friend Jude Knight to my First Kiss Friday blog is a good day. She certainly has a way of pulling at your heartstrings. Read on to find out what she has in store for you!

This first kiss appears in Paradise Lost, the little collection of vignettes that Jude Knight is currently writing, and that she’ll give away to newsletter subscribers when she publishes the story of James’s son next month, on 15 April. Paradise Lost is a companion piece to Paradise Regained, which is about James. To Wed a Proper Lady is the story of his son, and novel one of six in The Children of the Mountain King.

Excerpt:

Eleanor traced the words in the water that puddled on the stone rim of the fountain. “Lady James Winderfield.” Her lips curved in a tremulous smile. The man she loved was asking her father for her hand, and would soon come to ask her.

“I have made an appointment to meet your father tomorrow,” he had whispered in her ear last night as they promenaded down the centre of the double line of dances. Then, as they passed one another, a few moments later, “You know what I want to ask him, my darling.”

She circled the girl at the head of the ladies’ line, barely aware of the other people in the room, conscious only of James and the words that set her heart thumping. Only years of practice kept her moving gracefully back around to meet James again, her arm stretched high, her hand ready for his brief clasp and her ears for another burst of whispered words.

“This is what you want?”

Looking up, she nodded, and the anxiety cleared from his eyes as they met hers. How could he be unsure of her? She had no further opportunity to reassure him. They had to part and dance down the outside of their respective lines, and the music drew to a close before they could speak again.

Her mother was waiting, and hurried her away. The Earl of Farnmouth, her father, had decided it was time to leave.

He was with her father now, shut in the earl’s study. Soon, surely, the earl would send him out into the garden. The answer would be yes, of course. As the daughter of an earl, she knew her worth, but James was third son of a duke; a duke, furthermore who was a friend of her father.

Eleanor cast a glance at the house and frowned slightly. Lord Farnmouth would say yes. Of course, he would. Only last week, he had interrupted her dinner with her mother to announce that he expected a very eligible offer for Eleanor’s hand. “I am pleased with your daughter, countess,” he had told her mother. “Betrothed after only two months after her debut. You are to be congratulated, madam.”

He had not spoken to Eleanor, but he seldom did. Nor had he given a name, but who could it be but James? James was her most ardent suitor. Indeed, since the rapscallion son of the Duke of Winshire had made her the object of his devotion, the rest of her court had fallen away. They had been callow boys, in any case, standing up with her because of childhood friendship or because she had become fashionable.

James was a man, not a boy — twenty-four years to her seventeen. He was unbelievably handsome, charming, clever, funny, and dearer to her than anyone she had ever known, even her older sister. And he had chosen her! She clapped her hands and spun in a circle, unable to contain her delight.

Soon he would come. She composed herself on the stone bench opposite the path by which he would enter the garden. How would he propose? On one knee? Sitting beside her? The thought had her up on her feet again, too excited to stay still, peering down the path.

“Eleanor!” It was a hiss just a hairsbreadth above a whisper.

She spun around. James had come from the other direction. Well, no matter. She hurried towards him, her hands outstretched. What was the matter? The tragic expression on his face frightened her. “James? What is the matter?”

He clasped her hands and pulled her after him into the shadows of the yew walk, where he wrapped his arms around her and rested his chin on her hair. “Eleanor, I love you. I love you more than life itself. You believe me, do you not?”

Eleanor pulled away, but only enough to peer into his eyes. “James? What did my father say?”

James groaned.

“James, you are frightening me. Did he say we must wait?”

“Eleanor, he says that he has given your hand to the Duke of Haverford,” James blurted.

Eleanor’s breath stopped and she could hear her blood surging in her ears as her heart pounded. Her sight grew dark at the edges, and the enormous yew hedges swayed towards her as if to batter her into the ground. By force of will, she fought off her faintness. “But… but he is old,” she stammered, “and a wicked libertine, and cold as ice.” She stamped her foot. “I don’t want him, James. I love you. I love you, James.”

“Shush, my love,” James begged. “We must be quiet. Farnmouth told me I could not see you again, but I had to, Eleanor. I’ll find a way. I promise. You love me and I love you. I will ask my father to help. He is friends with yours. Surely Winshire can persuade the earl.”

“Yes!” Eleanor’s heart gave another enormous thump, this time with relief. “We will be together?” she asked.

“We will marry,” James promised. He bent his head and his lips touched hers. It was a gentle, reverent salute, but Eleanor pressed closer and the kiss changed, James’s lips still soft, but questing, moving, devouring. His tongue pressed the seam of her mouth and swept inside when she gasped. Again, the darkness hovered, but this time it was a welcoming warmth, a giving and taking of sensation, a merging of selves so that Eleanor no longer knew who sighed and who moaned, or how long they stayed intertwined.

The whistling of a gardener brought them back to themselves. “I must go,” James told her. “Stay strong, my love. We are meant to be together, and I will find a way.”

“We are meant to be together,” she agreed.

***

The Duchess of Haverford put the rose back into her memory box. It was from a small bouquet he had sent her. She had worn it for that last dance. Now it was fragile, dried and faded, adorned with yet another tear to join all the others she had wept on it in the past ten years. Once, she had loved and been loved. That, at least, would never change.

***

For more about Paradise Regained, see https://judeknightauthor.com/books/paradise-regained/

For more about The Children of the Mountain King series, see https://judeknightauthor.com/the-children-of-the-mountain-king/

For more about To Wed a Proper Lady, including preorder, see https://judeknightauthor.com/books/to-wed-a-proper-lady/

For your copy of Paradise Lost, subscribe to Jude’s newsletter: https://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

About Jude Knight:

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jude-knight

Happy Valentine’s Day!

14 Friday Feb 2020

Posted by SherryEwing in 2020

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Tags

#BellesInBlue, #ReadARegency, Amy Quinton, Bluestocking Belles, Caroline Warfield, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, Regency Romance, Rue Allyn, Sherry Ewing

Happy Valentine’s Day to all our wonderful readers!

I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank all of you for making Fire & Frost a bestselling box set. The Bluestocking Belles and I are thrilled with all the marvelous reviews we’ve been receiving and also for the set hitting several bestseller lists including, Amazon, Goodreads, and Smashwords.

You are the ones to make this happen. Thank you for supporting the Bluestocking Belles by purchasing a copy of Fire & Frost. Your purchase also supports our mutual charity, the Malala Fund. Our readers are the best!

♥ ¸.•*(¸.•*´♥`*•.¸)`*•.♥

Fire & Frost – Only $0.99

Curl up with the gift of a great book this Valentine’s Day. Fire & Frost will warm your heart!

In a winter so cold the Thames freezes over, five couples venture onto the ice in pursuit of love to warm their hearts.

Love unexpected, rekindled, brand new or rediscovered—even one that’s a whack on the side of the head—heats up the winter. After weeks of fog and cold all five stories converge on the ice at the 1814 Frost Fair when the ladies’ campaign to help the wounded and unemployed veterans of the Napoleonic wars culminates in a charity auction that shocks the high sticklers of the ton.

In their 2020 collection, join the Bluestocking Belles and their heroes and heroines as The Ladies’ Society For The Care of the Widows and Orphans of Fallen Heroes and the Children of Wounded Veterans pursues justice, charity, and soul searing romance.

Celebrate Valentine’s Day 2020 with five interconnected Regency romances.

Buy links:
Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2LGvSbK
Apple Books: https://apple.co/355nXMG
Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/2sdPVYd
Kobo: http://bit.ly/36nYwX
Smashwords: http://bit.ly/2LF74AK

International:
Amazon AU: https://amzn.to/2t7vMDH BR: https://amzn.to/2rybx1o CA: https://amzn.to/2Pcnenz DE: https://amzn.to/2E2sIL6 ES: https://amzn.to/2E77hZr FR: https://amzn.to/2RKJc2J IN: https://amzn.to/35bdCPd IT: https://amzn.to/2qIOSz2 JP: https://amzn.to/35c8mLw MX: https://amzn.to/2YATO5r NL: https://amzn.to/2YGzhfR UK: https://amzn.to/2YArBf2

First Kiss Friday with Jude Knight

17 Friday Jan 2020

Posted by SherryEwing in 2020, First Kiss Friday

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

#BellesInBlue, #FIrstKissFriday, #ReadARegency, Be My Guest, Bluestocking Belles, Fire & Frost, First Kiss Friday, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, New Release, Regency Romance

Welcome to another First Kiss Friday. Today’s guest is my dear friend Jude Knight who will be sharing the first kiss scene from her upcoming novella Melting Matilda. Happy reading, my lovelies, and enjoy!

First Kiss Friday with Matilda and Charles

In this excerpt from Melting Matilda, a novella in the Bluestocking Belles’ box set Fire and Frost, the kiss is the first one in this book. They had another kiss a year before, and it haunts them. You’ll have to read the book to find out more.

Excerpt:

He gazed, losing track of time and space, until she said his name. “Charles?”

“I had a speech.” His voice croaked, and he swallowed. “I do not remember a word.”

With one hand, index finger outstretched, he traced an inch or so away from her face. “Why did I try so hard to resist you, you beautiful woman?”

It was the wrong thing to say. Her nostrils flared. “Because I am the base-born daughter of a harlot.”

Her eyes softened. “You love me?”

“That was part of the speech. It is the only bit I remember. I look into your eyes, and I forget my own name.”

“Why?” Matilda asked.

He dropped to one knee. “Miss Grenford, I esteem you with all my heart. Will you do me the very great honor of becoming my wife?”

“I hope you do not want a long betrothal,” he whispered, between kisses.

She broke off her attempt to completely unravel his cravat. “Not long,” she agreed.

Melting Matilda

For more about Fire & Frost, including preorder links, see: https://bluestockingbelles.net/belles-joint-projects/fire-frost/

About Jude Knight

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jude-knight

First Kiss Friday with Jules and Mia

20 Friday Sep 2019

Posted by SherryEwing in 2019, First Kiss Friday

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

#FIrstKissFriday, #ReadARegency, Be My Guest, Bluestocking Belles, First Kiss Friday, Historical Romance, Jude Knight, Regency Romance

It’s First Kiss Friday and it’s always a pleasure when I can bring back my dear friend, Jude Knight. When we get to celebrate a new release, well… that’s even better. We hope you enjoy this excerpt from Unkept Promises. You’re going to just love this book! Happy reading and enjoy.

Seven years after he wed her and left, they meet again

The child bride Jules left in England has changed. She is all grown up and here, uninvited, in his Cape Town house. As they work together to nurse his dying mistress and look after his children, he begins to see that he needs to change as well. In the following excerpt from Unkept Promises, they finally have their first kiss.

Excerpt:

Another piercing look, remembered anguish blazing from his eyes. “It could have been so different.” He put the brandy down to rise and take the two steps needed to drop to his knees at her feet, his hands reaching to frame her face. “I have nightmares, thinking about what I might have come home to, if you had not arrived. I can’t imagine how I would feel now, leaving port knowing that I had to depend on hired servants for the safety of my family. I can never thank you enough.”

He leaned forward to press a gentle kiss to her forehead, and she put her arms around him, hugging him close. “Ah, Jules. I have only done what I thought right. Besides, I love them. I do not need thanks for looking after the people I love.”

He lifted her chin and began kissing the tears from her cheeks. She shifted so that a kiss fell on the corner of her mouth, and he pulled back a little, but only to say, “It was the luckiest night of my life when I was captured by smugglers and locked up with you.”

Disappointed that he had stopped, she grumbled, “You didn’t think so at the time.” This seduction would never happen if she left it all to him. She summoned her courage and put her hands on his face to keep it still before pressing her mouth on his. He’d better take the hint, because she had no idea what she was doing.

His lips froze, and she almost pulled away, and then, thank goodness, they softened on hers and began to move. Was that his tongue, sweeping across the seam of her mouth? Those were certainly his teeth, nibbling at her lower lip until she gasped at the wonderful sensations that reverberated through her whole body, and would have gasped again when his tongue invaded her mouth, except her mouth was full and she could manage nothing more than a strangled moan.

He clearly took that as approval, for he deepened the kiss, pressing her back against her chair, his body firm against hers, his face angled to allow him to invade even deeper. No. Not an invasion, for she had invited him in. His tongue retreated and then returned, retreated and returned, until she took the hint and allowed her own tongue to follow his. Ah. This invasion could be reciprocal, and she could make him moan, too.

She applied herself enthusiastically to mimicking his actions, learning what he taught, sinking deeper and deeper into the sensations he created.

A timeless period later, Jules ended the kiss; not releasing her but drawing back enough to meet her eyes, his own hot. “Sweet Mia, even then I could tell you’d make a rare woman. Brave, clever, caring. I saw all of that. I knew you’d be pretty, too.”

She wanted to trust he meant it, but it was a little much to swallow. “How can you say that? I look like a boy!”

Jules’s laugh was disbelieving. “Never! A boy?” His hands rounded her body to run over her breasts, paused briefly to cup them, brushed over her nipples which had somehow become so hard that they ached, then skimmed down to her waist. He spread his thumb and fingers to span her waist on both sides. “I can almost touch my fingers together. You are perfect.”

Did he really think so? “I barely have any curves at all,” Mia protested.

Jules pressed a quick kiss to her mouth, as if to stop her words. “I beg to differ.” He moved his hands, one scooping under her buttocks and half lifting her from the chair, the other coming up to once again cup a breast, the thumb rubbing back and forth across the nipple. “Look. Beautifully curved.”

She could barely think as his movement both relieved and intensified the near pain in her nipple. “So small!” she pointed out. “Gerta–”

Another firm quick kiss. “Does not belong between us. Mia, do you not know I have been lusting after you since I arrived home?” Kiss. “Feeling bad about it, too, when at the beginning I thought you had moved Kirana out of her room and dismissed Maureen. I felt the lowest of dogs to desire such a woman.” Kiss. “But as I learned the truth and got to know you, admiring you more and more each day, my desire grew.” His hand kept moving, and the other pulled her closer, until she was plastered to his body, groin to groin, the hardness behind his falls rubbing close to the place of sudden, desperate need. Beguiled, she shifted against him.

“Ah, Mia,” he groaned, “can’t you tell what you do to me? Sleeping in the room next to me while I lie awake, night after night, imagining you are in the bed with me and I can, at last, worship you with my body as I promised so long ago?”

His mouth was on hers again, and his lips, his tongue, his teeth, his hands, his hard body, all drove her to a place where she no longer knew where she was and barely who she was. She only knew that she yearned, hungered, ached—and that Jules could answer that need.

Then he pulled away, and she reached after him before her mind registered what he’d already heard—a burst of conversation as the kitchen door opened and shut again, and then footsteps approaching.

Jules was already back in his seat, his brandy glass in his hand. His hair was ruffled, his neckcloth half untied, but he had shrugged his coat back on as he crossed the room. She caught a glimpse of red swollen lips before he raised the glass to cover them.

She pulled her shawl over a bare breast she didn’t remember Jules exposing, and grabbed her own glass, just as Fortune came through the room on his way to check on the door.

Unkept Promises

She wants to negotiate a comfortable marriage; he wants her in his bed

Naval captain Jules Redepenning has spent his adult life away from England, and at war. He rarely thinks of the bride he married for her own protection, and if he does, he remembers the child he left after their wedding seven years ago. He doesn’t expect to find her in his Cape Town home, a woman grown and a lovely one, too.

Mia Redepenning sails to Cape Town to nurse her husband’s dying mistress and adopt his children. She hopes to negotiate a comfortable married life with the man while she’s there. Falling in love is not on her to-do list.

Before they can do more than glimpse a possible future together, their duties force them apart. At home in England, Mia must fight for the safety of Jules’s children. Imprisoned in France, Jules must battle for his self-respect and his life.

Only by vanquishing their foes can they start to make their dreams come true.

Not your usual Regency: Jude Knight writes historical fiction with a large helping of romance, a splash of Regency, and a side order of suspense.

Buy links:

Books2Read: books2read.com/UnkeptPromises

Jude’s Bookshop: https://judeknight.selz.com/item/unkept-promises

About Jude Knight:

Have you ever wanted something so much you were afraid to even try? That was Jude ten years ago.

For as long as she can remember, she’s wanted to be a novelist. She even started dozens of stories, over the years.

Then her mother died. That great lady had waited her whole life to read a novel of Jude’s, and now it would never happen.

So Jude faced her fear and changed it–told everyone she knew she was writing a novel. Now she’d make a fool of herself for certain if she didn’t finish.

Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/