The Story of Freelan — How a Simple Romance Grew

A story that developed a life far beyond my initial intentions

Lest anyone think that my fiction writing steers toward the gory, as shown in my latest Thorny Thursday story, this section is devoted to my serious writing as opposed to the shorter items. It all grew out of what was supposed to be a romance novel.

Once upon a time, Hubby and I lived on a ten-acre ranchette in a valley. We endured a couple years (long story) and then moved on. But that valley became the setting for the Freelan novel series.

And it all began with, “Sweetie, why not write a romance novel set in that valley?”

Hubby had asked it one day as we were on a long drive to our new home.

“A romance?” I had asked back, wriggling up my nose as if I smelled skunk spray. “You mean those ‘Oh, her heaving bosom’ and ‘His well-muscled torso’ things?”

“No, just a nice love story,” he had replied.

And the conversation had gone back and forth from there. In the end, I had said I would give it a go, making no promises since my background was in shorter fiction and in non-fiction (articles, website content, user guides, white papers, system documentation—things like that). Once settled into our new home, I had carried through with that sorta commitment and sat down at the laptop, drafting Hammil Valley Rose (the original title) in about a month. It was about 150K words, well past the word limit most romance publishers wanted, and that was fine since the story had grown far past the Hallmark movie stage.

Things began simply enough. A widow, now the sole owner of a 100-acre ranch in the valley is preparing to hold a memorial service for her deceased husband in a nearby town. And during that, she does her best to avoid her rancher neighbor, the man who owns most of the land in the valley and who wants her ranch, willing to do anything to get it, or so her husband had told her during their brief six months of marriage.

Sounds like a good setting for ye olde traditional romance.

The story then took a life of its own even though still headed toward the ultimate romantic ending. And the reason for that was clear. A lot of ideas built up inside me over decades of existence had found a home. Rose, the widow, and Jim, the rancher neighbor, were in a way symbols—she of those who believe that capitalism is terrible, and he of those who practiced laissez-faire capitalism in a very self-respecting manner. But then another element popped up—Sid, the man who hates Jim and uses Rose, seeing Jim’s growing admiration for her, against Jim.

And then my husband had started asking me how the novel was going. I would explain things as best I could, and then he would suggest things, such as, “Have the people in Sacramento send someone to the valley to spy on them and cause trouble.” Thus, the character of Peter Thorn was introduced. I had Sid, a typical crony businessman, encourage a buddy in the State government to send Peter to the valley. But Peter didn’t want to be an antagonist, so he morphed quickly into a protagonist. Sid fumed and took another tack to seek revenge on his enemy.

Things have definitely steamrolled from there, and I will be presenting bits of what developed along with the process behind the series here in future. Hope you enjoy them! A peek inside a writer’s brain.