Bachelor Bay Background

Last summer I started toying with an idea for a ménage series based on a bit of Seattle history. First of all, to date I’ve been exclusively a contemporary author with 3 books published with Siren and 4 m/f books published under another pen name. I’d never tackled a historical, though I loved to read them, especially set in regency England.
The basic plot revolved around a group of 23 women who answered an ad in a Boston newspaper for brides wanted in 1860s Washington Territory. Washington didn’t become a state until 1889, so this was back when the area was first settled. My fictional town of Port Steele would be set on a beautiful bay on the east side of Puget Sound, literally across the water from Seattle. I pictured Bachelor Bay to be in the area of what is now Bremerton/Port Orchard/Silverdale. Since this series takes place during the Civil War era, men were scarce back east. The women who answered my hero’s ad were willing to leave civilization behind and journey to an unknown land in the hope of finding a new life and a new love. The Gallagher brothers, who owned a logging company and sawmill, placed the ad in order to pacify their lumberjacks who were threatening to leave because of the lack of women in the area.

Figuring there was safety in numbers, I talked to my good friends, Bella Grace and Eve Adams, to see if they’d be interested in joining me. The more we talked about the idea, the more excited we became. The three of us collaborated on characters, plots, conflicts, and threads that’d run through all the stories. I poured over old UW archives on historical logging and pioneer life in the Pacific Northwest.

Since Eve and I are currently published with Siren, we approached Siren/Bookstrand publisher’s with our idea. She loved it. I mean really loved it. Our publisher accepted the series into the Ménage Everlasting line, and Les Byerley did our gorgeous covers.

And The Brides of Bachelor Bay was born.
What started out as a three-book series blossomed into a six-book series. Depending on the sales, we might try for a nine-book series. The first three in the series were released on Memorial weekend. We’re working on the next three books now.
I’m extremely excited about this series. Each book will average about 35,000 words and will feature one of the brides as the heroine. The heroes have various professions, such as lumbermen, lumberjacks, the town mayor, a Sioux Indian, a mercantile owner, and others. Of course, we have several villains, some who redeem themselves and some who don’t.

All in all, this series has been immensely satisfying to write. I hope you’ll pick up a copy and escape to Bachelor Bay for an evening or two.