Happy Holidays, Inspy Romance Readers! I’ve just spent the weekend at a family wedding in Birmingham, Alabama! It was just so beautiful. The ceremony was outdoors on a ranch with horses, and the rehearsal took place in the beautifully refurbished barn. There were some fun things I hadn’t seen before, like a corn hole game […]
Long Live Chivalry
I know we here at Inspy Romance are contemporary romance readers and writers. We read and write about strong, contemporary women, many of whom own their own businesses or have powerful positions. They’re independent and can do things for themselves, maybe even change a tire (I’m thankful I’ve never had to attempt this myself!). At […]
The Weird Ways of Romance
I was talking to a gal recently about relationships and the different things that men and women want out of them. She was telling me that her husband wants her to fall asleep with him. That’s the height of romance to him. If he’s on the couch playing video games, and she curls up next […]
My (Almost) College Romance
The months of August and September are filled with back to school. My social media feeds are packed with “First day of school” pictures, teacher gifts, and posts about ridiculously long carpool lines. As a homeschool mom, fall makes me want to buy school supplies and I keep hoping someone will send a bouquet of […]
The Heartbeat of Love (& a #giveaway)
It’s crazy to think about it, but next week, my husband and I will be celebrating our 25th anniversary. I’ve been married for more than half my life, and I’ve known that man for thirty-one years. Sometimes I think I know him better than I know myself. (Shh, don’t tell him I said that, though. […]
After Happily-Ever-After
Today is my 10-year wedding anniversary. <3 We’ve been through a lot in ten years. Besides the challenges of blending families with six kids, we’ve survived three Achilles surgeries, one heart surgery, two house floods, three totaled vehicles, cancer, and more. I don’t think this is what anyone dreams of when they promise to stick […]
Hero or Zero?
The title is a bit of a misnomer. I hope you’ll forgive me for that. What is a hero, anyway? Since I write romance novels, you would think this question is easy to answer. I suppose it could be broken down and analyzed by different genres, but, again, I write romance. There are even specific […]
Quiz: Could You be a Heroine in a Romance Novel?
It’s wedding season! I love hearing all the stories of how couples got together. It inspires me to write better because, really, there are a lot of overused tropes out there. I’ve overused them myself. Though I’m happily married, and I feel like my love story would make good fodder, do I really have what […]
Awkward Proposals
Was your proposal PERFECT? You know. Flowers, starlight, candles, down-on-one-knee perfect? Straight-out-of-a-romance-novel perfect? Well, mine wasn’t. Are you confused? I was, too. You see, my then-boyfriend and I had been dating for over two years. He was getting ready to graduate in a month, and everything was up in the air. I was stressed out […]
Where To Next?
I find myself fantasizing about locations lately—specifically getaways. See, this August marks my twentieth wedding anniversary. We haven’t gone anywhere without the kids for longer than a weekend, but this year we decided to plan a *real* vacation, just the two of us. And after being cooped up for over a year with hardly more […]