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Mills & Boon TenderUK & Ireland
January 2005
Harlequin Sweet Australia & NZ
February 2005
Check out the Behind the Scenes story of Her Real-Life Hero... Read What The Reviewers have to Say about Her Real-Life Hero... Covers:
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"Her Real-Life Hero"
"Next door to Mr. Right... Writer Tara Devlin likes her men tall, dark and fictional! Real love is too painful... so she's definitely only interested in her stunningly sexy new neighbor as the model for her new book's hero. But Jack Lewis is nothing like Tara's imaginary hero. He's infuriating, challenging, teasing, too charming for his own good - and determined to open up Tara's guarded heart..."
For more books like this one go to my Harlequin Romance page
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How did that happen? Yes, she wrote about this kind of thing every day. But it wasn’t something that happened every day in real life. Leastways, not to her. A complete scoundrel, whose very name was in doubt, was kissing her. Okay, so he was an all-round, physically damned attractive scoundrel, but he was quite obviously a scoundrel nonetheless. It wasn’t like Tara hadn’t kissed men when she didn’t know their entire life story, but hell, she’d known them more than five minutes before. And she had been kissed by the odd scoundrel before, but she hadn’t been forewarned back then. This time she most definitely was, thanks to all the Fionas and Philomenas. She should have been prepared. His reputation preceded him. This really shouldn’t have been such a big surprise. But the most amazing thing was, if she was going to face up to the truth of the matter, he wasn’t doing too bad a job. Not too shabby at all. In fact, her fantasies started to fall a little short… She stood absolutely still, determined not to participate even as her eyes flickered closed. His mouth moved across hers. Not tentative, but firm - not too firm though. She stopped analyzing the experience for future literary use, and instead sensation took over. Strength. She could feel the overwhelming strength of his body as it enveloped her own. She felt small, vulnerable, and deliciously female. Musk. Whether it was from his skin or something manufactured, it was heady, sweet. Filling her nostrils with the unfamiliar maleness of his scent. Sweet-tasting warmth. His mouth opened slightly, his tongue flicking between her lips, encouraging her participation, sending waves of similar sweet warmth throughout her body. Mmm. The moment he felt her soften, he smiled in satisfaction against her mouth. The moment he smiled she stiffened and struggled until he let her loose. With only a glare she turned, lifted her shopping bag, and swung it at his head. It hit the side of his left eye. Immediately he stumbled sideways, before meeting the ground for the second time when his large feet got tangled. ‘You arrogant -!’ ‘What the hell’s in that bag?’ He lay on his back, both hands held tight against his rapidly swelling eye. ‘How dare you kiss me!’ He squinted up at her. ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time. What’s wrong, didn’t you write that bit out?’ ‘If you ever touch me again I’ll call the police, you hear me?’ She stood over him, shopping bag swinging. ‘I know the local constable and he’ll look out for me.’ ‘I’ve met the local constable and unless he’s managed to get new glasses he’s incapable of looking out for pink elephants, never mind you.’ Jack struggled to his feet. ‘Well, if I didn’t have concussion before, I’ve sure as hell got it now.’ Tara failed to notice his slight swaying. ‘You can’t just go round kissing women who don’t want to be kissed!’ She watched as he removed his hands from his eye. ‘Oh God.’ He looked at her expression with his one good eye. ‘That bad, huh?’ She looked down at the bag and then back at his eye. ‘Oh God.’ ‘Great. I’m disfigured.’ He turned towards the house and tilted dangerously sideways. ‘I forgot.’ She moved to his side, setting his arm across her shoulders to support him. ‘I’m so sorry.’ ‘You forgot you bought an anvil?’ ‘No, tomato soup.’ He glanced down at her. ‘You just hit me with a tin of soup?’ Tara smiled weakly at him. ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time.’ ‘And you’re the one calling the police?’ They made it up the porch steps and through the large entrance hall. ‘Where to?’ Tara glanced from side to side, into large empty rooms with peeling wallpaper and workbenches. ‘Kitchen.’ He pointed ahead. ‘I need an ice pack and possibly a stiff drink.’ He sat down at a worn table while Tara walked to a large fridge. She opened the freezer door, glancing back over her shoulder. ‘Peas or sweetcorn?’ ‘What?’ He already had a headache and she was going nutty on him again? ‘You don’t have any ice so do you want frozen peas or sweetcorn?’ ‘You pick the vegetable. You’re good at that.’ She sat opposite him at the table as he placed the bag against his eye. Her eyes studied him as guilt kicked in. Even a scoundrel didn’t deserve attempted murder. ‘I really am sorry I hit you with the tin. But at least the bread cushioned some of the blow, or I’d probably have knocked you out.’ ‘That’s reassuring.’ She attempted reasoning. ‘But you still shouldn’t have kissed me like that.’ Jack sighed. ‘Okay, then, how should I have kissed you?’ 'You shouldn’t have kissed me at all.’ She frowned at him, her eyes a mixture of regret and annoyance. ‘Not if I didn’t ask you to.’ Drips of water began to appear on the edge of the bag as the heat from Jack’s eye began to defrost the contents. ‘You always ask a man to kiss you? Don’t tell me, you wear the trousers in all your relationships, right? You give them instructions every step of the way, right from “Would you kiss me now?”, through to “Do you mind throwing me down and giving me –”’ The glint of anger in her eyes stopped him. He took a deep breath. ‘How about you and I call a truce?’ ‘What kind of truce?’ Her obvious distrust irritated him but he continued. ‘The kind of truce where we promise not to hit each other with any food, tinned or otherwise, and try to be friends.’ ‘Friends? You and me?’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t think that would work, to be honest.’ He was beginning to wonder about that himself. ‘Why not?’ ‘We don’t get on.’ ‘How do you know we don’t? We haven’t tried.’ ‘I just hit you with a tin of soup!’ ‘Okay, I’ll give you that.’ He smiled weakly. ‘But you got to admit life’s not boring when we’re together.’ One hand reached across to examine the eye below the frozen vegetables. ‘You willing to risk your other eye?’ ‘Promise to use mushroom next time?’ She smiled. ‘You’re crazy.’ ‘I wouldn’t throw stones in that department if I were you.’ ‘You’d have to promise not to flirt with me,’ she leaned back in her chair, ‘and you’d have to be less annoying. Think you can manage that?’ ‘No.’ ‘Well then...’ ‘Flirting is part of my character. It’s apparently something I do without thinking.’ ‘Says who, your ego?’ ‘All of my sisters. They’ve been saying for years it would get me into trouble some day.’ He held the bag away from his face. ‘And today’s that day, it would seem.’ ‘I really don’t see how we can be friends then.’ He smiled gently, his eyes warming. ‘You could try to cure me of it? Or maybe you could just get used to it as you get to know me better?’ She sighed. ‘Why do you want to be friends with me?’ A shrug. ‘I might just like you. For some unknown reason.’ Tara studied him for several long, silent minutes. Jack stayed quiet, for once. She was curious about him - who he really was. What kind of person he might turn out to be below the thick layer of smart-ass. He was right about one thing: life wasn’t boring when they were together. And they lived next door to each other. It would be just too awkward if they didn’t make some attempt to get along. For research purposes maybe? To find out more about what it was like being a scoundrel? She could go with that reasoning. Scoundrels were rife in her writing after all. Research could be a good thing. Especially if she was forearmed. If she already knew he was a scoundrel then she could resist, right? She’d just have to get past the whole ogling thing and limit her fantasizing to her fiction. That all taken into account, there was one thing that sure as hell couldn’t happen. ‘You can’t kiss me again.’ He reached his hand across the table to shake hers. Her smaller hand enclosed in his, he smiled. ‘I won’t kiss you again. Or do anything else from my wide repertoire.’ The smile promoted itself to a grin. ‘Until you ask me to.’
From "Her Real-Life Hero"
by Trish Wylie
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Her Real-Life Hero was the book that would test my resolve about becoming a writer...
They call it
second-book-syndrome, and some people suffer fr
I guess I had proved to myself that I could do it...
The story stemmed from my love
of the movie Romancing
Enter Jack. And here I
was a teeny bit ahead of my time... 'c
Locations for this book:
Tara's Hero, as I knew the
story, was set in a fictional coastal village, with both Jack and Tara's houses
on the cliff's over-looking the
A
Soundtrack playing:
Nope - still didn't have a specific music *thing* at this stage... I think that started with The Wedding Surprise to be honest...
*All Photographs are used to give a visible representation of the Authors 'view' and are in no way representative of the people or places in real life beyond the realms of the Authors imagination.
"Sparky interaction, sexual tension, hilarious one-liners and heart-warming romance all combine to make Her Real Life Hero a spellbinding story which you will find very hard to resist." Julie Bonello - Cataromance
"I love Trish Wylie, her writing style is light, a little humorous, so just up my street and this book had everything I expected after reading her first book. All the emotion with a smile and characters that are as imperfect, yet lovable, right from the start." Amazon Reviewer - South Africa
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home | books | bio | ireland | tips | blog | links | Press Info | contact
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om
it worse than others. It's when you really believe that your first was a fluke
and that they'll discover with a second that you can't actually write after
all... And remember, I originally came from a working background where the
phrase 'one-hit-wonder' was rife!!! So when I first sent this book in and
it was suggested I 'set it to one side' - I had a crisis of confidence and ran
off to tour Ireland for eight months instead... When I came back, this was the
book I went back to - and I tore it apart and put it back together again -
several times!!! Until eventually, thanks to a very patient editor... It sold!
The
Stone - I loved the idea of a romance author being swept up in an adventure
that mirrored her stories!!! I mean - I wish! So I wondered what that
would be like in the *real* world...made my heroine a writer similar to the
heroine in Romancing The Stone, as in she wrote swashbuckling
adventures... and then added a modern day slant on it. Where did my heroine draw
her inspiration from? As it turned out - right outside her window... Where her
new neighbor was working on his run down house (I will confess to thinking about
the Coke adverts at this point - you know the ones I mean...) So I had my
Tara...
os
I chose an architect hero before they became popular in movies like The
Lakehouse - so go me! Maybe it was the Coke advert inspiration - but for me,
Jack was gorgeous!!! Mind you - that could also have been the part of me that
was wishing for that kind of inspiration right outside my own window! What I
hadn't for-seen was how Jack's family of sisters and his business partner Adam
would influence my imagination for my next book - because out of Her
Real-Life Hero came Adam and Dana's story in
sea... And this imaginary place was based on two real-life locations, both of
which I love! The cliffs inspiration coming from a popular beach called
Rossnowlagh in Co. Donegal... where I spent many's a rainy and sunshine-y day...
And I guess the first little seeds of an idea for this story came when sitting
in The Smuggler's Cove restaurant overlooking the Bay. Pretty darn inspirational
that place! And if it was inspirational for me then surely it would be equally
as inspirational for the author of a swashbuckling pirate story romance? So the
story that Tara is writing filters though the book too, mirroring some of the
emotions she's experiencing in real life... I guess that's a case of life
influencing art influencing life influencing...erm...art... Confused yet???
s
for Percival, the cat that stomps all over Tara's keyboard in the very first
chapter... well he also comes from real life. Though my version of Percival only
arrived a year after the book was written - nowadays I regularly have the
keyboard stomped all over by either or both of my cats...Daisy and Max just
don't get the theory of waiting to be fed... That'll be some of that life
and art thing again...