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Silhouette Romance USA & Canada
October 2006
Mills & Boon Tender UK & Ireland
March 2006
Harlequin Sweet Australia & NZ
April 2006
Check out the Behind the Scenes story of O'Reilly's Bride... Read What The Reviewers have to Say about O'Reilly's Bride... NOMINATED:
Covers:
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"O'Reilly's Bride"
"Sean O’Reilly had become so close to his colleague and friend Maggie Sullivan that he was beginning to imagine their friendship could lead to more. Only now, bizarrely, she’s backed off – and, even more strangely, she’s started looking for love on the internet! Well, if he can’t beat them, he’ll have to join them… Maggie can’t let herself get close to Sean. Not now. Not when she’s discovered something that will break all his dreams of happily-ever-after. But she has no idea of how much she has hurt Sean – nor how much she has just fuelled his determination to make her his… by any means necessary!" For more books like this one go to my Harlequin Romance page
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“Another hot date?”
Maggie
wasn’t the least bit surprised to find Sean in the reception hall when she
came back from a late dinner. He looked like he’d been caught longer in the
summer rain than she had. His dark hair was curling in damp locks against the
nape of his neck, his coat several shades darker than its usual navy.
Shaking
her umbrella she glanced at him from beneath lashes spiked with water, “Are
you spying on me?”
“Oh,
yeah, right, cos I have nothing better to do with my time.” He started to walk
past her to the wide staircase that led to their part of the house.
Maggie
followed him, “Well you have to admit that every time I come back from a date
you’re hovering about somewhere.” Shrugging his wet shoulders he kept on walking, “That has more to do with insomnia than it has to do with any interest in your dates.”
Which
wasn’t entirely true.
“Since
when do you have insomnia?” Giving him a look of disbelief to his back was
probably pointless so she sighed and glanced away from his shoulders. This
unfortunately brought her observant gaze to his rear as he walked ahead of her.
And for the life of her she couldn’t seem to look away.
His
deep voice echoed off the cavernous ceilings, “I haven’t slept for more than
five or six hours in years.”
“Really?”
She continued watching his rear as he walked up the last step and onto the
corridor, “How come?”
Sean
laughed, “Is this friendly curiosity or are you going to charge by the hour
for your analysis?”
Choosing
to ignore his question she instead focused on how well he filled out a pair of
jeans. She’d always thought she was an ‘eyes’ girl, but wow, she could
change her mind. Maybe it was just because, wet as his jeans were, they just
molded in all the right places.
At
the doors to their apartments he swung round to look at her and grinned when her
eyes shot upwards and she blushed. He studied her face for the briefest of
seconds and then asked, “Were you just checking me out?”
“No!”
She blushed an even fierier red at the lie.
“Yes
you were,” He continued grinning as he leaned a shoulder against the wall and
folded his arms across his chest, “So what’s the verdict?”
With
a scowl she went searching for her door key, her eyes avoiding his, “I have
better things to do that look at your rear.”
“You
were looking though.”
“I
was not!” And as if she was about to admit she had been. Hell would be a cold
place first. Locating the key she produced it from her bag with a flourish and
scowled up at him, “And even if I was
I wouldn’t be looking at much.”
“Well
that would be a matter of opinion I guess. You wouldn’t be the first person to
compliment me on it.”
Why
the smug-!
She tilted her chin and quirked an eyebrow, “I don’t think your ego’s
opinion counts.”
He
laughed. And the deep sound echoed along the hallway again. Unfolding his arms
he stepped forwards and took the key from her cold fingers, his face moving
dangerously close to hers, “So, you going to invite me and my superior rear in
for hot chocolate to help me sleep?”
Maggie
felt his warm breath tickle her skin and her nostrils were invaded with the
feint lingering scent of his way too familiar aftershave. She felt the tiniest
bit dizzy for a second, “Maybe you and your superior rear should just try
counting some sheep.”
She
reached for her key only to find her hand enclosed with it in his grasp. She
swallowed hard.
“Don’t
you want to tell me about your date? Friends do that kind of thing you know.” Scowling again she tried to tug her hand free, “You’re not interested in my date, remember?"
“True,”
He held his fingers tightly closed around hers, “But if it’s anything like
your date with Bryan I might be bored enough to get sleepy.”
Her
eyes narrowed. She searched her mind for a suitable retort but, while searching
his eyes at the same time, she saw a small flicker. Something she’d seen
before. She stopped struggling to free her hand and asked him in a soft voice,
“Why don’t you sleep?”
Looking
down at their joined hands he smiled, “What can I say, when you have as large
a brain as mine it’s tough to switch it off.”
“You
have nightmares?” The memory of him looking haggard on several mornings when
he’d overslept invaded her memory.
He
shrugged his broad shoulders, his fingers absentmindedly moving over hers,
“It’s been known.”
Maggie
instinctively stepped closer and bobbed down a little to look up into his eyes,
“How often?”
His
dark lashes raised an inch to meet her curious emerald gaze with a dark one of
his own, “Some.”
“Some
like, every time you close your eyes?”
The
long fingers eased their hold, but he continued moving skin against skin, his
eyes fixed on hers, “Not if I get good and tired. I sleep pretty well the
third or fourth night when it catches up on me. A little past my alarm
sometimes.”
Without
thinking Maggie freed her thumb and mirrored the movement of his fingers on the
back of his knuckles, “And the rest of the time?”
His
gaze dropped to their hands as he shrugged again. He thought seriously about
making another of his usual wise cracks to worm out of an honest conversation.
But how could he expect Maggie to ever confide in him if he couldn’t still
open up to her? It was a two way street, so he was reliably informed by all the
women who had attempted to get him to open up in the past. But it was quite a
hurdle to get over. He’d just gotten so used to dealing with things on his
own. Maybe not coping, but dealing.
She
squeezed her fingers against his, “Sean?”
His
mouth quirked at the edges, “Okay, the rest of the time I might possibly have
a bit of an issue with trying not to remember a few things.”
Maggie
felt her heart tear a little. Her feet voluntarily made up the last inch of
distance between them and she twisted her neck to keep looking into his eyes.
She waited until he glanced up at her, his mouth still quirking upwards but his
eyes dull. When she spoke again her voice was soft, as soothing as she could
make it, “What do you see?” He saw Maggie. Right in front of him, close to him. All he would have to do was move his head forward and he could touch his mouth to hers, could lose himself in her and block out the visions that normally tortured him at night. It would be so easy
From "O'Reilly's Bride" by Trish Wylie
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O'Reilly's Bride, the book now famous universally as The Pineapple...
And why you may ask? Well the answer is simple - writing it felt like giving birth to a pineapple, complete with spikey top... What I didn't know when I christened it this, was that the phrase would branch into the Romance Writing community like a disease... To all of those writer's now afflicted - my sincerest apologies!!!!!
What made it so tough to write? Well, there's the emotional conflicts within it, yes - there's the wounded hero, yes - there's the difficult subject of infertility. Yes, all of those things. Then add a severe shoulder injury that caused hours of agony at the keyboard and a change of Editor mid book. Et Voila! A Pineapple of a book!!!
This story was once again grounded in real life. I have friends who battled with this very subject for a long time to have the family they wanted. And they are such a strong family unit now that I couldn't help but be inspired by it!!!
The Pineapple was also the first book where I actively sought to 'cast' a hero and heroine with pictures that would carry me all the way through. Yes I had used pictures before, but I really do think this was the first book where I saw it as a casting... Because it was the first time I had to re-cast as I got into the story. The hero image I had chosen just wasn't helping me through all the other difficulties I was coping with!!!
Sean O'Reilly, my
hero, was an award winning Cameraman in places like Somalia, Ethiopia and Iraq -
he
Still stings a bit though...We should get
little stickers like you get in the dentist when you're good for books like this
you know...
T
Also we had a lot of the story centred around a fishing village where Sean and Maggie are sent to do a story. And again I've been in and around a lot of places like this when I was growing up - so I had a fair idea of what I wanted... Especially as this is the one and only book I have ever set in the North Of Ireland...
So,
Yep, all very familiar places to me - even The Empire, where Sean and Maggie go for the Comedy Night. I've been to loads of those nights with friends, and have ended up laughing so hard that the tears ran down my face long after I left. We're back to the Write What You Know theory again with this one. In case I haven't mentioned it already - I'm a convert of that one!
Soundtrack playing:
O'Reilly's Bride was the first time I discovered Josh Groban... And he has kept me company for nearly every book since with one track or another...
Everyone who writes romance should have this young man's albums for inspiration I tell ya!!!
Such a stunning, multi-layered voice... such soulfully romantic words and music... It's a romance writer's dream come true! Thank you Josh!!!
For this book I had You're Still You playing.. lots... and then some more... Realistically, at the time I needed all the help I could get!
You can buy the album here and you can scroll down and listen to You're Still You here. Sigh...
*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.
"Trish Wylie's O'Reilly's Bride (4.5) is lighthearted and witty, with a wealth of emotion beneath. Sean may be the perfect man -- and, best of all, there's no magical solution to Maggie's infertility" Catherine Witmer - Romantic Times
"O'Reilly's Bride is another fantastic novel by Trish Wylie which you will devour in a single sitting! Brimming with passion, emotion, romance and humour and featuring a fantastic heroine and a gorgeous hero, O'Reilly's Bride is sheer perfection!" (5 star review!!!) Julie Bonello - Cataromance
"In a short amount of time, Wylie packs a great deal of punch and feeling into this relationship. The book opens with sparks already beginning to fly, and the author skillfully expresses the frustration of both characters - the hurt that Maggie carries because of her secret and the pain that Sean feels because Maggie won’t consider him. It never gets too depressing, however, because in between Sean provides a lot of entertainment as he stalks Maggie. Through it all, the author builds on their strong attraction to each other, and I was satisfied with just about every moment." Joan Lee - All About Romance
"O’REILLY’S BRIDE by Trish Wylie is a
heart-warming romance that left me feeling completely satisfied at the end. Sean
is a sexy hero who I could not help but admire for his determination and loyalty
to Maggie. While Maggie was a sensitive, caring heroine that you can’t help but
feel for. Trish Wylie has done an awesome job in creating a story that I think
all romance fans will enjoy." Dina Smith -
Romance
Junkies "For a short category romance, there is much
packed into the pages. The relationship between Maggie and Sean shines, full of
teasing, love and sharing. Even when they are being evasive, they are clearly
connecting on a romantic level. It is a fun book to read. While both are a
little skewed in their thinking, they both love and want what is best for the
other. This makes their mistakes endearing rather than annoying. Wylie’s style
shines through too, with a tad bit of tongue in cheek and a sparkle in the
writing that keeps the reader engaged and encouraged that all will work out in
the end." Shirley Lyons -
The Romance Reader
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home | books | bio | ireland | tips | blog | links | Press Info | contact
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his
book also had a large Country House feature in it - this time as the place where
Maggie and Sean both had apartments - across the hall from each other... I'd
blame researching Country Houses for
the
fishing village was one on the Co. Down coast, and the majestic building they
walk past the night Sean crashes in and ruins one of Maggie's dates is the
magnificent building that serves as the City Hall in Belfast... Isn't it
stunning lit up at night???
