Amazon 99 Romances Sale!

US Marketplace only . . .  An Agreeable Arrangement and . . .

. . . all 5 books of the Gentlemen of Worth series are on sale for 99 cents each!

Gentlemen of Worth series US Kindle Monthly Deal!

$1.99 US Marketplace from October 1 to October 31!

Author Copies!

May 2015: It  never  gets old.

Montlake Celebrates An Elaborate Hoax

Gentlemen of Worth series . . . Kindle books 1-4

$1.99 US Marketplace  until July 10, 2015

An Elaborate Hoax

February 2015: 

Gentlemen of Worth - Book 5  

Penny’s Story: An Elaborate Hoax will be released June 2^nd 2015!

Montlake Romance has sponsored a US GoodReads Giveaway

. . . and I added an Australia, Canada, Germany, and UK Giveaway!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

An Elaborate Hoax

by Shirley Marks

Giveaway ends June 15, 2015.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to Win

Back to London, Back to the US

January 2015 :  A picture of a side trip we took to visit some family friends in Hampshire.

The New Year is here and it’s time to go home. We need to get over our jet-lag, get the bills paid, and get back to work. I know the edits for Penny’s book are waiting for me.

 There’s good news . . . the release date for An Elaborate Hoax is June 2, 2015!

Too Much of a Good Thing

October 2013:  Before I return to writing Penny’s book, I need to make plans to revisit London for Christmas. 

I'm really feeling more like a travel agent than an author.

Help!

End of February 2013: Back to Penny’s book. If I can find it in the pile of papers on my desk.

Back on Track

February 2013:  I remember that I’m working on Penny’s book. I find, and dust off, the binder where I keep my story. 

I reemerge myself into her world and continue.

Looking Ahead to Book 5

Mid May 2012 – I begin planning a loose outline for Penny’s story. It is coming together very well.

Familiarizing Myself with the New Year

Mid-January 2011: I use the internet to find more about the year 1816, especially what’s happening in the UK.  

OH—something big!  It’s the “Year Without a Summer.”  Not sure that will play a big part in the book but it shall certainly influence the characters, and how they dress, somewhat. 

Book 4, Page 1

Early-January 2011: I opened the file for Book 4 and instead of finding notes and partially written scenes, I’ve found  . . . nothing.  

::gulp::  I hadn’t been prepared for this.

The Hubby says, “At least you have that paragraph.” Was he trying to be helpful? 

I know what happens in the book, I just don’t know how it happens. This is going to be a bit more work than I first thought.  There’s no jumping to the fun writing part.

Back to the Keyboard

End of July 2009 - After I return from the conference I figured if my editor liked Book 1, I best go forward with Book 2. I pulled out the notes and chapters I'd written.

I reread the chapters, browsed through the notes to reacquaint myself with the characters and the story. Charlotte, Muriel, Aunt Penny, and Edward the duke. Some of the suitors from Book 1 return, and then there are Charlotte's suitors . . . they make themselves known to me at once.

My editor calls me two weeks later and she’s going to buy the series.

What does she mean by the series?

"How many books?" I asked her.

"The whole thing," she says.

"What?"

The W-H-O-L-E thing!

I am completely speechless.

My Ambitious Plan Continues

December 2008 - It took a little over a week to work out what would happen in the first three books. I still had the “how” to work out. The struggle with titles continued. I tried using the sister’s names: Augusta’s Anguish, Charlotte’s Charade, and Muriel’s Muddles.

No. No. No.

I kept the Gentlemen’s titles which kept me on track because it gave me some sense of those men. While I worked on Augusta’s book, learning about the people, the family members, the neighbors, the townspeople, it occurred to me that the premise of my idea, about limiting Augusta’s London Season exposure, came from Aunt Penny. She had grown up in a family of legendary beauties.

They were the Darling sisters: Mary, Sarah, and Penelope. Mary, the eldest, had married a baron , Sarah, the most beautiful sister, a duke, and Penny, the dutiful daughter had an arranged marriage. Her husband, who was much older than she, passed away a year or so after they wed—about the time her sister Sarah died. Penny then removed to Faraday Hall and helped raise her nieces.

I wonder . . . now that I’m marrying off the three sisters. What happens to Penny? Then it occurs to me . . . I have a duke whose daughters have gone off to marry, what happens to him?

I’m thinking this might be a FIVE book series?

What's in a Name

Still November 2008 - I realized the Duke could not have raised his daughters on his own. Yes, they had nannies and governesses, a houseful of servants but they needed more . . . another family member, female perhaps, to guide them to young adulthood. The middle daughter Charlotte called out to her . . . Aunt Penny.

Penny . . . Penelope Parker. Mrs. Penelope Parker, their mother’s sister. Younger sister, just as Whatshername was the younger sister of Augusta and Charlotte. And I knew that Mrs. Parker, Aunt Penny, was a young widow.

Then I wondered if the Duchess and Aunt Penny, two sisters, might have been three, mimicking my three young heroines.

I still needed a family name for them . . . something meaningful. I would have three stories set during three different time periods with all three sisters looking for a worthy gentleman.

Playing around with that idea I decided upon the idea that each daughter searches for a Gentleman of Worth.