âMarion Lennoxâs RESCUE AT CRADLE LAKE is simply magical, eliciting laughter and tears in equal measure. A keeper.â
âRT Book Reviews
âBest of 2010: A very rewarding read. The characters are believable, the setting is real, and the writing is terrific.â
âDear Author on CHRISTMAS WITH HER BOSS
Dear Reader
Itâs autumn as I write this, and the weatherâs closing in on Southern Australia where I live, so right now Iâm packing my togs and thongs (thatâs Aussie-speak for bathing costume and flip-flops) and heading for an extension to my summer. Iâm flying up to the Australian Gold Coast. Why not? In Southern Queensland itâs almost perennially summer, the beaches are superb, the surfâs excellentâand there are lots of places that sell drinks with little umbrellas!
Iâm sure the characters in Gold Coast City Hospital didnât have drinks with umbrellas in mind when they applied to work in the hospital weâve set our stories in. Surely not! Our Gold Coast Angels are a dedicated team of young medics, whose every thought must be tuned to the medicine they live and breathe. But weâve nobly allowed them some down time. Weâve thrown in a little surf, plus a touch of intrigue and drama, and weâve definitely included romance. A lot of romance.
Your four dedicated Aussie authors have thus had a wonderful time playing on the Gold Coast, researching everything we needed to bring you four fantastic romances. But Iâve been away for too long, writing and not sun-soaking. Now thereâs a sun lounger with my name on it waiting up north. I can hear it calling. I can hear the surf calling. The Gold Coastâs a wonderful place for lying on the sand and reading romance. Maybe Iâll meet you there. Iâll be the one with the umbrella.
Happy reading!
Marion Lennox
MARION LENNOX is a country girl, born on an Australian dairy farm. She moved onâmostly because the cows just werenât interested in her stories! Married to a âvery special doctorâ, Marion writes Medical Romances>â¢, as well as Mills & Boon>® Romances. (She used a different name for each category for a whileâif youâre looking for her past Romances search for author Trisha David as well.) Sheâs now had well over 90 novels accepted for publication.
In her non-writing life Marion cares for kids, cats, dogs, chooks and goldfish. She travels, she fights her rampant garden (sheâs losing) and her house dust (sheâs lost). Having spun in circles for the first part of her life, sheâs now stepped back from her âotherâ career, which was teaching statistics at her local university. Finally sheâs reprioritised her life, figured out whatâs important, and discovered the joys of deep baths, romance and chocolate. Preferably all at the same time!
WHY DID ACCIDENTS seem to happen in slow motion?
There seemed all the time in the world to yell a warning, to run down the beach and haul the dog out of harmâs way, to get the fool driving the beach buggy to change direction, but in reality Zoe Payne had time for nothing.
Sheâd been sitting admiring the sunset at the spectacular surf beach five minutesâ drive from Gold Coast City Hospital. A tangerine hue tinged the white crests of the breaking waves, the warm sea air filled her senses and the scene was breathtakingly lovely.
Sheâd also been admiring a lone surfer, far out in the waves.
He was good. Very good. The surfable waves were few and far apart, but he had all the patience in the world. He waited for just the right wave, positioned himself before the rising swell with casual ease, then rode seamlessly in before the breaking line of white water.
The scene was poetry in motion, sheâd decided, and the surfer wasnât bad either. When the wave brought him close to the shore she saw him up close. He was tall, sun-bleached, ripped, and the way he surfed said he was almost a part of the sea.
But sheâd also been watching a dog. The dog was lying partly concealed among the dunes, closer to the shore than the place she sat. She wouldnât have known he was there, but every time the surfer neared the shore the big brown Labrador leaped from its hiding place and surged into the shallows. The surfer came in the extra distance to greet the dog, they exchanged exuberant man-dog hugs, and then the surfer returned to the sea and the dog to its hiding place.
Sheâd been thinking sheâd kind of like to go and talk to the dog. This was her first week at Gold Coast City and she was feeling a bit homesick, but there was something about man and dog that said these two were a team that walked alone.
Only now they werenât alone. Now a beach buggy was screaming down from the road above.
There was no way a beach buggy should be on this beach. There were signs everywhereâprotected beach, no bikes, no horses, no cars.