Even as I was typing up the news about the Isles of Secrets Series, I knew I’d be getting to announce some other exciting news soon too. 😁 I’ll also be having a book come out from Bethany House between the end of the Codebreakers and the beginning of the next series! This one is a stand-alone, set in Savannah during the Civil War.

Dreams of Savannah (tentative title–it could very well change, LOL) is pretty fun. I actually wrote it years ago upon the request of an editor, but the contract fell through for various reasons. It’s just been sitting there in my digital drawer since 2011, so when my editor at Bethany House asked if I wanted them to take a look at some of my finished-but-unpublished books, I all but shoved it at them. 😉 And I was so incredibly pleased when they said they liked it and wanted to release it in just over a year! That’s right, this one will be coming out sometime around December 2020/January 2021 (exact date TBD)!!

Cordelia Owens can weave a dream around
anything, and is well used to winning the hearts of everyone in Savannah with
her whimsy. Even when she receives word that her sweetheart has been lost
during a raid on a Yankee vessel, she clings to hope and comes up with many a
romantic tale of his eventual homecoming to reassure his mother and sister. 

But
Phineas Dunn finds nothing redemptive in the first horrors of war. Struggling
for months to make it home alive, he returns to Savannah injured and cynical,
and all too sure that he is not the hero Cordelia seems determined to make him.
Matters of black and white don’t seem so simple anymore to Phin, and despite
her best efforts, Delia’s smiles can’t erase all the complications in his life. 

War, however, doesn’t wait for the clarity of anyone’s heart. When the fort falls and the future wavers before her, Delia has to decide
whether a disillusioned hero is worth the sacrifice of all the dreams she so
long cherished.

For those of you who read my Culper Ring Series, you know I’ve already written one Civil War-era book. The funny thing is that Savannah was already finished when I was working on Circle of Spies, so in my mind, I kept thinking, “Well I already did this, so I…oh wait! No one else knows I’ve already done that!” (“”That” being things like certain treatments of issues like slavery from a Southern perspective–it was mostly the Union perspective represented in Circle of Spies.)

I’m so excited to finally be bringing this story into the world! I’m sure there will be many edits and changes from that 2011 version, but I love these characters so much–I actually reread it a couple years ago as I wrote A Lady Unrivaled, to make sure that Ella, who has some similarities to Delia, isn’t too close to my romantic-adventure-writing Southern belle. And leading Phin through some huge challenges and mental changes was an adventure in itself! One that involves the help of the most unlikely of friends–an Englishman of African descent, who has a very different view of the world than anyone Phin has ever known. I used him–Luther–to bring in some of England’s abolition history, which was fun. =)

Hilariously, the same story of mine from college from which I stole Phillip Camden (who is introduced in The Number of Love and is the hero in On Wings of Devotion) also gave me Luther. Originally he and Camden were first mate and captain on their pirate vessel. 😉 Luther was stolen first for Dreams of Savannah, and I’m glad I didn’t re-steal him for On Wings of Devotion, LOL. But just so you know that if ever the two met, despite now being of different generations, they would have been the best of friends. 😉

I’m looking forward to digging back into this one and polishing it up for you guys!

I can’t believe we’re less than 3 months from the release of On Wings of Devotion! I’ll soon be diving into edits for the third book in The Codebreakers, and also into writing the first book in my new series, Isles of Secrets. Plus I’ll have another announcement in the next week or two, after things are signed-sealed-and-delivered. 😉

But in the meantime, I wanted to let everyone know that pre-orders are open in my store for signed copies of On Wings of Devotion! And you can get 20% until December 31 if you use this coupon code: wingspreorder

If you’ve never ordered from my store before, it’s super-simple. Just add whatever items you want to your cart, and during checkout, type or paste that code into the grey box that asks for the coupon code. After you’ve proceeded to checkout, there’s a Notes section where you can put in your personalization request. 😁

As a reminder, Wings releases on January 7. I’ll pack up pre-orders as soon as I get my copies, which is usually about two weeks early, though I can’t make guarantees on that.

Pre-Order Now from RoseannaMWhite.com!

Though there are still two books yet to come out in the Codebreakers Series, they’re both already written and turned in…which means it was time for me to begin thinking of what’s coming next. =) After conferring with my editors (i.e. sending in a list of a dozen ideas and seeing which one they liked best), we decided it would be fun to leave behind the world of the Great War and go back to the earlier 1900s. Return to the world of aristocracy and the upstairs/downstairs feel. But of course, deliver some super fun romance and mystery.

I absolutely love that the team went for this idea. And I’ll tell you why.

When The Number of Love came out, my first order of business was packing up the pre-orders that had come in through my store. I had a ton of them, and as I signed books and affixed labels, I was entertaining myself by counting the number of people who had the same name. I had no fewer than four variations on Emily and something like six Elizabeths. At one point as I tackled one of those, I said to myself, “Oh, look. Another Elizabeth.”

Another Elizabeth.

The words stuck in my head all day. I knew there was a story there, but I wasn’t sure what it was. It would make a fun title, I thought. But I didn’t know what the concept would be…at first. A day or two later, however, I was out on our giant swing set, and the story began to trickle into my head. 

A girl shows up at a new apartment. When she signs the lease, the landlady greets her with, “Oh, another Elizabeth, is it? Hope you’re more dependable than the last one. She left me high and dry…” Our Elizabeth thinks nothing of it, at first. But then she begins to find things in her new home, left there by the previous owner. Mysterious things. Made all the more mysterious when people keep knocking on her door, saying, “Elizabeth?” and then foisting more mysterious articles into her hands when she confirms that she is indeed Elizabeth. Baffling…until the first Elizabeth’s brother shows up, concerned for his sister and shocked when she doesn’t open the door. This would be our hero, of course.

That was the basic concept that I pitched to Bethany House. They were very enthusiastic–though they did instruct me to come up with a title that conveyed the nobility angle more. For about a week I cast around, looking for good locations, different titles, and specific plots and characters, before sending them an official proposal. I decided on the Isles of Scilly off the coast of Cornwall as a setting, and as I dug into the history of this island chain, other plot elements just fell right into place–you know, legends, pirates’ treasure, and an abundance of unique flora and fauna. So I’m now thrilled to announce the first book:

The Nature of a Lady

1908 – Lady Elizabeth “Libby” Sinclair, with her
love of microscopes and nature, isn’t exactly a hit in society. She flees to
the beautiful Isles of Scilly for the summer…and stumbles into the dangerous
secrets left behind by her holiday cottage’s former occupant, also called
Elizabeth, who mysteriously vanished.

Oliver Tremayne—gentleman and clergyman—is determined to
discover what happened to his sister, and he’s happy to accept the help of the
girl now living in what should have been Beth’s summer cottage…especially when
he realizes it’s the curious young lady he met briefly two years ago, who
shares his love of botany and biology. But the hunt for his sister involves far
more than nature walks, and he can’t quite believe all the secrets Beth had
been keeping from him.

As the two work together, along with Libby’s maid, they find ancient legends, pirate wrecks, betrayal, and the most
mysterious phenomenon of all: love.

I’m currently armed with these two fun research books, and I can’t wait to dive in and bring Libby and Oliver’s story to life! I have some time to really get to know them before I start writing, so I’ve been daydreaming about who they are and what will make them special. I’m going to be including some fun local legends from the islands, there’s going to be an antiquities smuggling scandal in the series, and undergirding it all will be the true history of one of England’s most terrible pirates, who made the Isles of Scilly his base of operations…and whose treasure still hasn’t been found.