You may have noticed that since January, I’ve been going on about something called “Pomegranate Café.” (If you haven’t, don’t worry–the start of my 2023 has been hectic too!) So what’s up with that? Well . . .
The Pomegranate Café is Belville’s newest business, serving tea, coffee, and delicious baked goods–with a complimentary side of match-making. 😉
And on February 10, just in time for Valentine’s Day, I’m releasing a clean* romance** novella***. (Definitions below, haha.) It’s not a mystery, but it involves familiar faces from my mystery series–Red and William, of course, and also the mysterious Ryuko and his sister, Sakura, who first appeared in Cry Big Bad Wolf. However, you don’t have to have read any of The Alchemical Tales to follow along. We get to see Belville through fresh eyes as the newly-arrived, big-city-girl-gone-small-town Mel gets roped into helping Sakura and Ryuko plan the Pomegranate’s big opening event.
Basically, picture a rom-com set in a fantasy café. On Valentine’s Day.
Voila– Worthy in Love. 😉
I had so much fun writing Worthy in Love that I plan to write a few more romance novellas centered around Belville’s new café–hence all this talk about a new series, Pomegranate Café Romance. 🙂 I’ll release them interspersed with The Alchemical Tales mysteries. With the Pomegranate’s cozy influence and some helpful pushes from its meddlesome owner, Sakura, we’ll see romance bloom for several of Belville’s more notorious characters!
Definitions
*clean = no violence or sex; this isn’t erotica. 😉
**romance = just what you’d expect: like a rom-com movie, the plot centers around two characters falling (or resisting falling!) in love.
***novella = shorter than a novel! 😀 In general, novellas are longer than short stories but about half the length of many mystery/fantasy books. (If you want to be very technical, using my own books as examples: Beauty and the Alchemist is about 75,000 words, while Worthy in Love clocks in at just under 40,000.)
