True Love In A Dream?

Welocme Haley Whitehall, who released her debut book "Living Half Free" February 29th 2012!

Thank you, Shannon for hosting me on your blog. I know that you write urban fantasy and paranormal romance. I thought long and hard to come up with a topic that connected historical fiction to paranormal/fantasy. My conclusion? True love.

True Love

True love is a constant theme in every genre. Some people think it is cliché. Some people do not actually believe true love can happen. I believe it can. Call me a hopeless romantic, but I believe that we all have a soul mate out there. We might not find him or her though, but they exist.

I also believe that, if written right and written fresh, that true love can capture your reader’s interest and perhaps their heart. True love is not necessarily love at first sight. True love is a deep love that grows and evolves over time. True love is what a couple married for sixty years has discovered.

What is true love? True love is hard to define and such any definition is up for debate. Shakespeare couldn’t even find the words. I believe that true love is the unconditional feeling that you feel for another person. You do not have reasons for loving them, you just do. True love inspires, revives, and sometimes even hurts. True love is when you would give up your whole world, just to make sure that the person you love is safe.

Can two hearts be unconsciously connected? Does a higher power control who we fall in love with? Can a person be drawn to another without knowing the reason? Can our ancestors direct our destiny, including our life partner?

In my debut novel LIVING HALF FREE my protagonist, Zachariah, a mulatto slave, thinks that he has found true love -- at least he is asleep. A mysterious and beautiful Native American woman keeps coming to him in a dream. When they finally meet will it truly be lasting love?

Here is a Short Excerpt:

Michael and Ellen carried on a conversation in low voices. The walls always had ears, Ma often said, reminding Zachariah and Rachel to watch their tongues. Slaves rarely had privacy and a stray word overheard by a customer or a passerby could cause a heap of trouble.

Zachariah hated to eat in silence. He wanted to add to the conversation. Should he tell them the dream he had had the night before—the very strange dream? A giant eagle had picked him up by his arms and carried him to a strange land where most of the people were a reddish color.
The most beautiful woman he had ever seen, with piercing green eyes, welcomed him. She dressed like the rich ladies who came to the restaurant in a long gown with a sloping neckline that showed off her shoulders. With one finger, she beckoned him to come nearer. He took a step forward. Instant attraction pulled him closer. Soon he was in her arms kissing her lips and cheeks and neck.
Zachariah touched his tongue to his bottom lip. He’d better keep the pleasant thought to himself. They’d probably scoff at his secret desires.


Contest:


Comments with a Twitter length entry - 140 characters - about true love and you could win a free copy of LIVING HALF FREE. (It is available it all ebook formats)

Bio:

HALEY WHITEHALL has a B.A in history and has been studying the Civil War era since the 5th grade. Her writing style is Mark Twain with a little more faith. She likes to write out of the box stories that feature an underdog. LIVING HALF FREE is her debut novel. Released February 29, the ebook can be found at Amazon, B&N, and Smashwords. Find out more about Haley through her website or connect with her on Twitter @HaleyWhitehall or Facebook.

Resonating Love Stories: The Ones That Hurt

I’ve had a number of people ask me why, in my debut novel Sundered did I write the romance to revolve around a married couple rather than a newly met, fall in love, fall into each other’s arms couple.

Well, because as far as I’m concerned, happily ever after doesn’t happen once you’re married.

Nope, nada, ain’t realistic.

Happily ever after comes in the quiet moments between the disagreements about who ate the last cookie, the Dutch Ovens, PMS, and the make-me-want-to-pull-my-hair-out-misunderstandings.

I wanted to show that the best love stories, the ones that you can feel deep in your soul, the ones we can all relate to, are those which we see in our own lives. The stories that make us cry and cheer for the characters in love are the ones who resonate with us.

In Sundered, Mara and Sebastian face a crisis as a married couple, they face the possibility that they might not make it, that the secret he’s kept from her could tear them apart. This secret is one that he SHOULD have shared with her, he lied, thinking to keep her from being hurt. He forgot that as his wife, she is there to help him share the burdens he faces, as he should share hers. But, that isn’t the case; it takes what was a good marriage and threatens to destroy it.

Who can’t relate to that? We have all been in, or are in, relationships that have stood on the brink of being over. Looking into the abyss of heartbreak, we have all had that choice to make when it comes to our mate at some point in our lives together.

The question is, do you stand by the one you love, in spite of the things they have done to hurt you? Or, do you walk away, pretend that the pain isn’t real, doesn’t stab at you from the inside, that it doesn’t make you want to curl up into your mother’s arms, and let her wash it all away? Which decision do you make?
With Sundered, even though it’s “just” a book, I wanted people to see that, in my opinion, real love encompasses more than the sexual flush of desire, more than the honeymoon stage that many romance books show case. That in order to have a happily ever after, we have to face the abyss over and over again, each time making a decision. Whether to move forward, to forgive and to work together as a team to face the challenges ahead, or to say goodbye and walk away from the one you once loved.


What you, and I, and Mara have to ask ourselves is, do I go on, do I love him enough to make this worth the pain I know will come with choosing to stay, the hardship of fighting each day for our bond?

The secrets Sebastian keeps from Mara, damages their marriage, as any secret between a couple will. It stretches them both to the breaking point, holding them over the abyss while they fight with everything they have to hang on to one another, choosing to believe that they can make it through.

For those of you who’ve been there, staring into the abyss as the world moves on around you, you know this hurt, and for those of you who haven’t, for you I hope you have the strength when the time comes to make the best decision for yourself.

And for Mara and Sebastian? Though they are only characters in a book, they are the type of couple that I hope one day I, and my husband can be like, when our turn comes. The ones who find the strength to fight for our love, fight for everything we have that is good, and true and real when we have to face the abyss.

*Art work by Patricia Schmitt, used with permission*

Letter to a Difficult Husband

Twelfth day of the eleventh month of the tenth year. Cool date and worthy of a blog post for more than that reason. Today also marks the ten year anniversary of me and my husband’s life together. I’ve seen a few blogs where husbands are thanked for their unending support, their love, understanding of a writers quirks and even their willingness to chip in and help with conferences and housework. I don’t know where those men are found, I think they may in fact be from Mars.

I would however like to thank my husband, who does not always fit into those catergories, for a few things. Not what you’d expect, but the kind of things, I, as a person have needed.

To the one who has stretched me further than any other person in my life:

There are times when I’ve cursed you, for your bluntness, your ability to see through my defences and for calling me on my bluffs. There are times when I’ve lain in bed, crying myself to sleep for a misplaced word, tone in your voice or what I perceive as a lack of attention. You have forced me to look at myself, my life and my decisions with a logical eye (not something I have) as well as an eye to the future. I hated it at times.

Do I regret having you in my life? No. In pushing me out of my comfort zones and forcing me to stand up for what I believe in and who I am you’ve made me a better person. Was the ride always comfortable? No, but it taught me things that I otherwise never would have learned, or if I had, the lessons would have been at the hands of those who cared nothing for me and did what they did only to hurt me.

Do you regret having taught me these things? I think maybe there are days that you do. You didn’t want a doormat for a wife and you saw in me the possibility of a woman of strength. Now you have her, I think perhaps there are days you wonder why you did what you did. I see it in your eyes, a glimmer of what the hell did I teach her that for. But more than that, I see respect for me as a person, not just as your wife.

You’ve pushed me to lengths that no one else in my life has ever even thought of and I thank you for that. You are the one who believed in me when no one else did, you are the one who forced me to see the person I could be, you are the one who drove me to fight for want I want in my life. These are not things that many women would be thankful for, and I certainly wasn’t in the moments that they happened. But ten years and all that lays within them has given me a little perspective. And a lot of gratitude for the stubborn, complicated man that I love more than anyone else in this world.

So for all of you who struggle with a man like mine, hang on to him. He will teach you things you never knew about yourself and when you look back, you will see how just far you’ve come.