25 Years and Counting

This year, Harlequin Intrigue is celebrating it’s 25th anniversary. I’ve been writing for the line nearly that long. I sold my first Intrigue in 1985–DOUBLE IMAGES, published in February 1986.

Since I was invited to write one of the August anniversary books—STEALING THUNDER—I thought I would take a look back at some of the Intrigues I’ve written over the years.

When I wrote DOUBLE IMAGES—a story about a music video producer—I was Supervisor of Television Production at a community college. I also had a background in film. For my 25th birthday, my then boyfriend wrote a song for me called “Our Favorite Game.” So I used my film background to create a music video before music videos existed. I did it for fun, for artistic challenge. And when I decided to try writing an Intrigue, I went with something I knew. My heroine was a director of music videos hired to film a top band.

Even though I’d already sold two romances on my own and a couple with a writing partner, I wrote the entire novel. The senior editor at Intrigue really liked the story, but asked for some revisions. For example, I dressed my hero in a Superman costume for the big finish (I mean, he was supposed to be a hero, right?), and the editor suggested it was a bit too much. So I revised. And sold my first Intrigue.

Look for more of my “stories behind the stories” in August—I’ll be blogging several times. Is there a particular Intrigue you’d like to know more about?