Spring is here! A season where everything that has lain dormant throughout the cold dark winter springs to life again. Trees start budding, grass turns green again…A fresh start.

Fresh and green. Reminds me of tossed salads. For some reason, I don’t like to eat lettuce during the winter, but this time of year salads start looking good to me.

Spring Mix

In the supermarket’s produce section, they sell a packaged salad called Spring Mix. Are you familiar with the term? It’s a mix of several kinds of greens including spinach, leaf lettuce, arugula, radicchio and chard.

Spring Mix: A little bit of everything. That’s what April is going to be like here on my blog. Here are some of the things you can look forward to:

New Release

The Reluctant Billionaire will be released from Anaiah Press on April 13. I’m so excited to share this contemporary Christian romance with you.

Christmas Novella Sequel

I’ve also signed a contract with Anaiah Press to publish Serena’s New Year’s Wish, a sequel to my Christmas novella.

You can order my first novella from Amazon while you’re waiting for the sequel to be released later this year.

Buy Link for Angelica’s Christmas Wish: https://www.anaiahpress.com/product/angelicas-christmas-wish/56?cp=true&sa=false&sbp=false&q=false&category_id=7

Friday Features

On Fridays, I introduce you to books by other authors. I have a terrific lineup this month. You’ll have a chance to read the inspiration behind and excerpts from a great mix of books, including a romantic comedy with a mysterious element, a YA dystopian, and two romantic suspense novels.

Giveaway

I have a giveaway going on right now through Sunday April 4 at noon. What is your favorite Easter or April Fool’s memory? You can answer in the comments below, then follow this link to enter your name into a random drawing for a free signed copy of my Christmas novella.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Media Links

You can follow me here on this blog or on one of my other social media links so you don’t miss any news as my writing journey progresses.

https://facebook.com/authorcarolunderhill

https://twitter.com/@carolunderhill7

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57493857-the-reluctant-billionaire

https://amazon.com/carol-underhill

I’m so excited. This is the day that I’ve been waiting for, revealing the cover for my new Christian contemporary romance, The Reluctant Billionaire.

The Reluctant Billionaire

With her husband’s ultimate betrayal, and the finalization of her divorce, Jessica Palmer’s dreams for her life go up in flames, leaving her devastated and lost. Now, she’s leaving Chicago and moving back into her parents’ house in an effort to rebuild her life. Longtime neighbor and friend, Liam Engstrom, is the only reason she hasn’t completely fallen apart, but the closer they get, the more she realizes the depth of his feelings.

Liam has loved Jessica since they were teens, but she never noticed him as more than a friend. Now that she’s single, he’s determined to show her how much he cares and that not all men are like her ex-husband–if she’ll let him.

Jessica is reluctant to trust again after what her husband did to her, and Liam refuses to be the rebound guy, but their attraction is hard to deny. So, together, with a little help from God, they decide to give love a chance. But between Liam’s recent inheritance and an unwanted public billionaire status that has people lining up with their hands out, and Jessica’s ex-husband monitoring her every move, their relationship is off to a rocky start. And when tragedy strikes, Liam pushes everyone away—including Jessica. Can they both learn to forgive and grow, or are they doomed to be alone?

The Reluctant Billionaire will be released on April 13 and…

Here is the full cover:

About the author:

Carol Underhill lives in rural Michigan a few miles from the farm where she grew up. She is mom to three adult children and a spoiled Lab. Her household also includes several rescued cats. She likes finding new authors on Kindle and binge-reading all their books. Carol rewards herself for meeting deadlines with a cup of fudge-flavored coffee. She enjoys quiet mornings and spending time with her family.

Facebook: https://facebook.com/carolunderhill

Twitter: https://@carolunderhill7

Website: https://authorcarolunderhill.com

Goodreads

Last week I shared how waiting for the release of my new book, The Reluctant Billionaire, is similar to the process of expecting a new baby. And like any new baby, my book needed a name. It was a challenge to come up with the title.

There is more to a book than the title, though. There are also character names to come up with. Not just the hero and heroine, but all of the characters, from those that get mentioned once to the names of their close friends and family.

There are around 300 descendants of my paternal grandparents. My dad was one of 12 brothers and sisters who had more than 40 children among them. Their children (my generation) had children, and so forth. The family continues to grow each year as more marriages and babies are added.

My husband is from a large family, also. When we were naming our babies, we had to take all of our relatives’ names into consideration. We didn’t want to use a name that belonged to another family member. There weren’t as many in my dad’s family back then, but it was still difficult.

Also, a lot of my friends were having babies at the same time I was and I didn’t want to use any of their favorites.

It’s no wonder, then, that the task of naming our children was a challenge.

The same is true of every story I write.

When naming characters, I take into consideration all 300 of my dad’s family, along with my relatives on my mom’s side, my husband’s family members, plus friends and even acquaintances. I don’t mind using a name that I’m familiar with, but I want to make sure that the characteristics don’t emulate anyone I know by that name.

A lot of thought went into naming the characters in The Reluctant Billionaire. In the original manuscript, the hero and heroine had different names. Then a couple of people appeared in my life with those very names and it didn’t feel right to use them anymore. So I started listing all the possibilities and by process of elimination, I came up with the names Liam and Jessica.

Now that I have written Liam and Jessica’s story, the names fit them exactly right.

Anna

Anna was one of two kittens who showed up with their feral mother cat one afternoon in May or June 2016. The first time we saw them, they crawled into a bucket that was tipped on its side. My daughter took a picture of them. I said, “Let’s bring them into the house and litter-train them and find them good homes.”

Well, you can picture how the story went. We brought them in and fell in love with them. We kept them in a carrier for a few days and let them out to slowly adapt to their new environment. We treated them with kid gloves: literally, we put on gloves to draw them out of the carrier so we didn’t get scratched.

Of the two, Anna was the feisty one. That’s why, a year and a half later, we knew something was wrong when she just lay around, lethargic. We took her to the vet and found out she had a condition that caused her blood to be low. She was nearly gone and the vet recommended a blood tranfusion. She was going to bring her healthy, chubby cat to the clinic as a blood donor.

Anna had been on medication, a steroid, earlier in the year for the same condition, and we decided to try the medicine again. In a short time, she started to perk up again and got out of the danger zone. She still takes the meds three days a week. I crush up the pill and add it to canned food.

Anna is the reigning queen of our house. She presides over her kingdom from beneath the dining room chair, where there is usually a coat that has fallen from where it was placed (ahem–I’m too lazy to take it to the coat rack.)

Her favorite spot used to be the chest freezer in the entry. She was friendlier there. Once we moved the chest freezer to my son’s house, she lost her throne and became a little less friendly. Just ask my brother. He used to be able to pet her when he came in, and since then has tried to bite him. She “talks” to him, though, so she still likes the attention.

She also likes to get up on the furniture and specifically, my desk. Right in between my keyboard and screen, so I can’t see what I’m typing.

Yes, Anna knows how to get our attention, but she’s a treasured part of our household.