The Story Behind the Story... High Country Bride by Jillian Hart

My work on High Country Bride happened long before I sat down at
my desk to type the opening words to the book.
In a way, it's part of every contemporary McKaslin Clan book I've written
to date. I didn't write a single one of
those stories without wondering about the history of the family. Were their roots in Montana or did they
travel from another part of the country? (They immigrated and settled in
Montana.) When did the first McKaslin
immigrate to America? (Before the Civil
War.) For years I jotted little notes to myself about the family's
history.

It wasn't until I was asked to write for Love Inspired Historicals
that I had the pleasure of pouring through all my notebooks, pulling out those
historical questions and details and wonderings and decide where to start the
historical McKaslin stories. This series
begins with the first generation of McKaslins born on American soil. High Country Bride is the second book in the
series. It is a story about the oldest
McKaslin brother, Aiden, a man with a desperately broken heart who lives on the
family homestead, doing the best for his black sheep younger brother Finn and
working his land.

I first met Aiden in Homespun Bride (the first in the series) as a
secondary character, and I was so taken by this strong, faithful, hurting man
that I fell instantly in love with him.
He's just my kind of guy: good, decent, hard-working, loyal and faithful
with an incredibly big heart. He lost
his beloved wife and baby in childbirth, and it was such a terrible loss that I
did not know exactly how I was going to pull this story off. Would this deep feeling man ever find his way
again? And how? While this kind of loss must devastate a man,
in Montana in the 1880s such losses were not uncommon, sadly. Aiden had loved his wife deeply. How was he going to reach out to another
woman? I knew I needed a heroine who was
sweet and kind enough to understand Aiden's darkness and bring him into the
light. She was the key to his happy
ending.

I wrote the beginning to High Country Bride six times with six
different heroines before I found the right match for Aiden in Joanna
Nelson. I fell in love with her
too. She's a good woman and doesn't see
herself as special, but I think she is.
She's a strong, quiet young widow with two small children. They
are living out of the back of her wagon, and she is providing for her little
ones the best she can. I thought Joanna
had the right voice for the story, and I hope you agree. She has a heart big enough to lead Aiden back
to love and happiness.

As always, any McKaslin story is a labor of love for me, and this
one is doubly so. I hope you enjoy the
book, and thanks for dropping by to read my blog entry.

 

Blessings.

Jillian Hart

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