Monthly Archives: September 2016

If I Had You by Heather Hiestand #newrelease #historicalfiction #newseries

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if-i-had-you-1Welcome to 1924, a time when youth was fast and fleeting, and the young people of the time pushed the memories of terrible war into the deep recesses of their minds in order to PAR-TAY! England didn’t have Prohibition like the United States, just a law that required food to be served along with liquor. Youth flocked to nightclubs, movie theaters, and daytime dances in order to have fun. The madcap elite of the day were called the Bright Young Things.

If I Had You is set around a Grand Hotel with an attached nightclub,  the decadent Russian design bringing aristocrats, film and theater people, and travelers of all sorts to its doors. Not only that, it’s attracted the attention of Russia itself, and the new Soviet government is using the hotel to house trade delegates…or are they saboteurs, intent on bringing down the British government?

Into this glittering party arrives Alecia Loudon, a young woman ready to work as a secretary to theater people by day and live as a flapper by night. She wanders the hotel in the wee hours, listening to jazz and watching out for the handsome Russian night watchman who also prowls the corridors…

If I Had You is the first novel in the Grand Russe series. Book 2, I Wanna Be Loved By You is out next Valentine’s Day, and Book 3 will be out next September. Fall in love…in the 1920s.

The Russians are Coming! If I Had You drops in one week #GrandRusseseries

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If I Had You, the first book in my Jazz Age London series, goes on sale in one week! I’ve been eagerly awaiting the response to my move to 1924. When you were last reading my historical fiction, it was 1892 in London! How times change…

When I decided to write a Grand Hotel series, I needed to make it opulent. I found information about the Ballet Russes and was very inspired by the costuming of this French-based ballet company. I designed my hotel based on the art in the marketing materials for The Sleeping Princess ballet back in the early 1920s. It’s on the Internet if you want to take a look.firebirdThis gorgeous creature is the Firebird. In my series, this painting hangs on a wall in the hotel and it figures into the series as it goes along. With all this Russian art in the decor, I had to bring in Russian characters, too.

Move over Scottish heroes, here come the Russians!

The hero of my first book is Ivan Salter. He was an upper middle class Russian who was able to leave during the Revolution because he and his sister were visiting friends close to Finland and were able to escape. Some people left that way, others left by way of China…or even British warship, like the hotel’s chambermaid, Princess Olga Novikova, another key character in the series.

In this time period the Bolshevik threat was very real, and a fair amount of the plot in this series highlights love in the time of bombs, deceit, and spycraft, 1920s style. In books 2 and 3 of the Grand Russe, you’ll start to see the spies come into play. It’s hard to fall in love when you’re pretending to be someone you are not!

But in If I Had You, the heroine is a British girl, reared by a vicar, who just wants to be a flapper, one of those girls who danced the night away in fabulous clothes. When she goes to London to work for a theatrical couple, she has no idea their command performance at the hotel is going to stir up a hotbed of Russian anger, centered on the hotel. Falling in love with refugee who is starting over isn’t so simple either. But when you meet the love of your life you just have to roll with it!

Happy September and Happy Release Month for Heather Hiestand

IfIHadYou200x300Happy September! Here in the Pacific Northwest it feels like autumn already. Admittedly, so did July this year, but most of August was hot and summery. It’s time to put away the kiddie pool, though, brew some tea, and curl up with a bunch of new books! My publisher is promoting If I Had You with some other new historical romances that are coming out this month, and I can’t wait to read them all. My Kindle is recovered from its epic crash and I have them all loaded up to enjoy!

If I Had You is out September 27th, though you can preorder it, as well as the sequel, “I Wanna Be Loved By You” which is out on Valentine’s Day. I’m negotiating the title of book three in the Grand Russe Hotel series with my editor.  Book #3 will be out in September 2017. I hope the series is a success so I can keep writing stories set in my exotic, sexy hotel in 1925. I have two more stories already planned, including the happy ending for the mysterious and elegant hotel manager, Peter Eyre, who is featured in all the stories, along with his doomed romance with a tragic flapper.

I can’t wait to see who the favorite secondary characters are in my new series! I always have my own favorites, and how readers respond gives my editor and I feedback as to who readers want to learn more about. That’s how Lewis Noble got his own story in the Redcakes series. Yes, Christmas Delights was written just for Lewis fans (of course, I’m one too!)

Thank you to my readers, who allow me to pursue my favorite career outside of motherhood. I hope we can enjoy the Grand Russe hotel together.

#HistoricalRomance