What Made You Write This Book?

By Lynn Cahoon

I am so excited to be at The Stiletto Gang. Big thanks to my BFF Laura for inviting me.

Ever since I found out that The Bull Rider’s Brother was going to be published, I’ve been asked the ‘author’ questions from friends, family and relatives. Like, when are you going to write a real book, like (insert popular book title here – from Twilight to Sarah’s Keys). Or, where do you get your ideas? Did this story happen to you? And my favorite, How can I get published?

So today, I’m answering one of those questions. Where do you get your ideas?

The Bull Rider’s Brother is a small town, cowboy, secret baby, homecoming story. Say that five times fast.

The background for the book started the day after I met the man I would marry.

Dating again after divorce, I’ll admit, I was in pretty rough shape, emotionally and financially. All I was looking for was someone to have fun with. And the current man in my life fit that description (we’ll call him Date Boy #1.) I wasn’t in love. Wasn’t looking for love.

One night, Date Boy #1 and I were in a bar. He played darts, I drank beer. As I sat and talked to the other players, I realized, I was again settling. Getting myself involved with someone who I didn’t love, but who was convenient.

The next day Date Boy #1 and I went to the Riggins Rodeo. For those of you who have lived in a small town, you know how an event can take on a life of its own. That’s what happens each year when the rodeo comes to this little canyon town. Rodeo weekend is one big party running from the corrals and stands south of town, to the park on the north side. I enjoyed the weekend, but knew I would have to end the relationship because I wasn’t being honest. With Date Boy #1 or myself.

That weekend became a turning point in my life. Where I started to really trust that I could have the man of my dreams and the life I’d always wanted. That my choices mattered. I didn’t know it at the time, but one of those dart players I had been talking to that night, would become my best friend and my husband.

When I started writing this book, I knew my setting. I wanted Lizzie and James, my star crossed lovers in The Bull Rider’s Brother, to be from a small town like Riggins. I knew that as teenagers, their only plan was how to escape the small town. And, I knew that only one of them was successful.

And that was all I knew when I started writing. That and one of them would be running a tilapia farm. (That part got changed during revision.)

Is The Bull Rider’s Brother a story from my own experience? Yes and no. The setting, the gentle sounds of the river running through the town, the ice cream at the end of the parade? All from memories of my weekend.

The rest is and should be a work of fiction.

What questions do you want to ask your favorite author?

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Growing up in the middle of cowboy country, Lynn Cahoon was destined to fall in love with a tall, cool glass of water. Now, she enjoys writing about small town America, the cowboys who ride the range, and the women who love them. Contact her at her website – http://www.lynncahoon.wordpress.com/

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The Bull Rider’s Brother 

Rodeo weekend is the start of the summer the entire town of Shawnee, Idaho. On a girl's night out, Lizzie Hudson finds herself comparing her life as a single mom with her best friend's successful career when James Sullivan, the cowboy who got away, walks his Justin Ropers back into her life. Seeing him shakes Lizzie's world but James is in for an even more eventful weekend, learning he has a son. James has enough on his plate trying to manage his brother's bull riding career. Can he learn to redefine family and become part of Lizzie's life before she gives up on him and marries another?

The Bull Rider’s Brother is a series contemporary romance about Lizzie Hudson, a single mom who wants to keep her life just the way it is, thank you. The problems you know are less scary than the problems you don’t.

When James Sullivan comes back for the town’s rodeo weekend and finds out that his high school sweetheart had his child, six years ago, Lizzie’s world is thrown into turmoil and she must decide if safety and certainty are worth giving up on a chance for love. A love that an emotionally damaged James may never be able to return, breaking her and her son’s heart in the process.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Bull-Riders-Brother-ebook/dp/B008195C2I/ref=la_B0082PWOAO_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1336860703&sr=1-1