Читать книгу This Good Man - Janice Kay Johnson - Страница 4

Dear Reader,

I’ve created many troubled heroes—heck, they’re my specialty!—but Reid Sawyer is one of my all-time favorites. He was more of a challenge than some to write, too, because he’s not an angry man, he doesn’t lash out and he rarely if ever raises his voice. Most people see him as cool, strong, unemotional. He feels driven by duty and, yes, vicarious revenge on a brutal father. In fact, he sees himself as damaged, incapable of real emotion, especially the softer kinds. This is a man who is utterly self-contained, capable of suppressing any powerful emotion almost before it appears.

Maybe that’s what made it so satisfying to challenge his beliefs. First he discovers he has a younger brother who needs him, and then he falls in love with a woman despite himself—and the poor man doesn’t recognize what’s happening to him! Hmm. Come to think of it, he may be the perfect man: calm, competent, protective, quiet and tidy. Well, okay, a guy who says “I love you” once in a while is nice, too!

I never plan my books by thinking, “this one is about the hero,” or “this one is about the heroine.” But most often they come out that way, with the focus most intensely on one character or the other. Sometimes I’m really taken by surprise. I’ve got to admit, though, with only a couple of exceptions, my favorites among my books are hero-centric ones. So maybe I should plan better….

Here’s hoping you, too, fall in love with Reid while you’re saying goodbye to Angel Butte, Oregon, the setting for what was originally intended to be a trilogy but grew to five books. And you never know—I may decide to revisit Angel Butte one of these days!

Janice Kay Johnson