⭐ Release Day Book Spotlight ⭐
A Western Heart
by Liz Harris
Publication Date: December 10th, 2024
Publisher: Heywood Press
Pages: 127
Genre: American Historical Romance
Wyoming, 1880
Childhood sweethearts Rose McKinley and Will Hyde have always been destined to marry, and with their parents just as keen on the match, there would seem to be nothing to stop them.
Except that Will has yet to propose to Rose.
And except that Cora, Rose’s younger sister, can see a better alternative match.
When the handsome Nate Galloway comes to town and turns Rose’s head, Cora, lovesick and fed up with the focus on Will and Rose, sees an opportunity to get what she wants, which is Will.
“Liz Harris’s vivid portrayal of 1880s mid-west America as a place ruled by the elements where neighbourly trust is essential to survival, is another sure hit.” (~ Daily Mail)
HELLO, THE HOUSE!
by Liz Harris
Approaching a homestead in Wyoming in the 1880s, you’d most likely holler “Hello, the House!” if you valued your life. With many west-bound pioneers causing strife by settling on land that was once the home of native peoples, and with dissension between large ranches and small homesteads, a quaint desire to avoid being shot on sight would encourage you to identify yourself thus.
How did I find this out? Not from books or the internet, but from a wrangler on a ranch in Wyoming during the wonderful three weeks I spent there when researching A Bargain Struck. The wrangler was a rugged, good-looking man, tanned from days on the range, not that I noticed any of that: I was there for a greater purpose – to learn more about the life of second generation settlers in Wyoming Territory, 1880.
Why was I in Wyoming? Well, it’s because back in England, I’d found out a great deal about the dangers and hardships facing the pioneers who’d crossed Wyoming in covered wagons, following one of several overland trails, but I’d found little about the nitty gritty of rural life for their successors, and that’s what I needed to know.
In A Western Heart, Rose and Cora McKinley, Will Hyde and Nate Galloway are second generation settlers. Unlike the early pioneers, they were able do more than merely struggle to survive from morning to night in harsh conditions – their lives were richer than that. So I needed to know how they lived, and what sort of features their homes would have.
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| Old Trail Town, Cody, Wyoming – a reconstructed town wherein every building dates from the 1880s |
When I went to Wyoming, I started my visit by staying on a ranch that dated from before 1890. By staying there, I fleshed out the lives of the second generation of settlers. I discovered, for example, that small homesteads might have a rudimentary form of running water in the kitchen. On the ranch where I was staying, in addition to the main well, a 28 foot deep, stone-lined well had been sunk next to the kitchen wall. A pipe attached to a pump next to the kitchen sink ran down to the well. Bingo! Running water.
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| Pump beside the sink |
Call me trivial, but I was curious about the sanitary arrangements. I knew there’d be an outhouse, but did it have a can inside – a sort of porta potty de luxe? Or was it just a hole in the ground? No book answered this, but the wrangler did. A hole in the ground, possibly covered by a structure with a seat, was covered with soil when full and the outhouse was lifted up and moved to a different place.
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| The Outhouse |
While on the ranch, I travelled about the place in the same way as the ranchers had done in the 1880s, and still do – I got on a horse and rode.
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| Liz Harris on a ranch at the foot of The Rockies |
You’ll note that I’m not sitting side-saddle with my skirts and petticoats tucked under me, as was the custom of women in the 1800s. Rather, I’m wearing trousers and sitting astride my bucking bronco.
Learning that women rode side-saddle in the 1800s was a great surprise. Having seen Doris Day films, I’d assumed that all women sat astride their horse. Not so, I learnt. Riding astride didn’t become customary till the late 1880s, a museum curator told me.
It came about as a result of the deliberate relaxation in the restrictive nature of women’s clothing. The reason why this happened is interesting. Basically, Esther Morris, the first female justice of the peace in the country (1870), wanted Wyoming Territory – today the second least densely populated State in the US – to become a State. For this could happen, a certain number of votes were required.
Wyoming’s population was very small so women’s votes were needed, and Esther Morris effectively bribed women, who’d had the vote since 1869, into voting for statehood. She did this by making it clear that corsets could be discarded and more comfortable clothing adopted.
It worked! Wyoming become the 44th State of the Union in 1890.
My research done, I came home, wrote A Bargain Struck, and then Golden Tiger and a novella, A Western Heart.
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| The Heart of the West Series |
Thank you very much, Coffee Pot Book Club members, for allowing me to talk to you today and to re-live some very happy memories of my time in Wyoming.
This title is available to read on #KindleUnlimited.
Liz Harris
Born in London, Liz Harris graduated from university with a Law degree, and then moved to California, where she led a varied life, from waitressing on Sunset Strip to working as secretary to the CEO of a large Japanese trading company.
Six years later, she returned to London and completed a degree in English, after which she taught secondary school pupils, first in Berkshire, then in Cheshire, and finally in Oxfordshire.
In addition to the twenty novels she’s had published since her debut novel The Road Back, Liz has had several short stories in anthologies and magazines.
Liz lives in Windsor, Berkshire. An active member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association and the Historical Novel Society, her interests are travel, the theatre, reading and cryptic crosswords.
To find out more about Liz, visit her website at http://www.lizharrisauthor.com
Thank you for allowing me to talk to you today. I loved every minute of the research that I did for my three novels set in Wyoming in the 1880s, and I hope very much that when you read them you are transported to that most romantic of times and locations, just as I was when living in my head with my characters.
ReplyDeleteWe're always thrilled to host you, Liz, and to learn about your impressive research. I'm sure readers will love A Western Heart too. Take care. x
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