The Stolen Bride
Brenda Joyce

originally featured September 2006

1. As everyone is not familiar with your The de Warenne Dynasty can you give a brief history on this powerful family you have created.

In 1989 The Conqueror was published. I had no idea I was starting a dynasty when I wrote about a hard-ass Alpha hero who was William the Conqueror’s top general after the Norman invasion. But as so often happens with my characters, Rolfe and Ceidre lived a long and happy life (after The Conqueror) and I had to tell the story of their first born, Stephen de Warenne, in another medieval, Promise of the Rose. When I wrote an Elizabethan novel, The Game, introducing the first of the O’Neil heroes, I didn’t know I would blend the two great families in current de Warenne Dynasty novels. But that is exactly what happened when I decided the Regency de Warenne men and women would belong to an earldom in Ireland.

2. The Stolen Bride is part of The de Warenne Dynasty and continues with the story of Sean and Elle. What is their story?

Eleanor and Sean grew up together and Eleanor has loved him her entire life. But he has the urge to wander as a young man, and it is heartbreaking for her when he decides to leave. But he promises to come back. And then four years go by without a word, and the family assumes he’s dead. Eleanor finally lets go of her love and agrees to marry a suitable Englishman. And just days before her wedding, Sean reappears. But he is a gaunt, dangerous stranger she can barely recognize, for he has been in prison and is now on the run from the authorities. And Eleanor will do anything, and give up everything, to help Sean—and to find the man buried inside that he once was.

3. What is your favourite scene in this novel?

Towards the end of the book, they are finally captured by the British and Sean is being taken away. Eleanor tries to follow the troops on foot and Sean won’t look at her because he wants her to go on with her life. It is heartbreaking.

4. Sean is a very emotional man, and suffered some emotional tragedies in this novel. Yet the reader cannot help but feel for the man. Where do you draw inspiration for such tortured characters and if you could would change anything about Sean?

I wanted to do a deeply wounded hero, the kind I have never done before, a man wounded not just physically, but in his soul. Also, before Sean left their home, he was too nice and balanced to be an exciting hero. He needed tragedy to flesh his character out. He needed to become darker or I couldn’t write their love story. Ireland’s history is ripe with suffering and injustice, so it was easy to find historical instances that would do the job and turn him into a truly deep, dark, tormented hero.

5. With the release of The Stolen Bride, you’re having a great contest with a trip to Ireland. Can you give the details of the contest please and where they may register.

As it turns out, the seat of my fictional earldom, Adare, really was an earldom and currently, a luxurious Georgian five star manor and resort exists there. So we are sending one lucky winner and a guest to the Adare Manor Hotel for five nights. Airfare, the lodging, a supper and two spa treatments are included. The contest runs for three months, and each month a runner up will receive a pair of Waterford crystal wine glasses. Enter at the dewarennedynasty.com/contest.

6. Who has Lady Elizabeth's father betrothed her to that she is desperate not to marry?

Her betrothed is Baron Sedgewick of Avenley, a man twice her age whose previous wives died—and not, as it turns out, from natural causes. He is definitely a bad, bad man, as readers will find out! <g>.

7. So what is next for you and The de Warenne Dynasty?

A Lady At Last is Cliff de Warenne’s story. He is the greatest gentleman privateer of his era—and a notorious ladies man. But he winds up rescuing a pirate’s daughter in the West Indies at her father’s hanging—and suddenly finds himself not just escorting her back to England to meet the mother she has never known, but encouraging her transformation into a lady. Cliff, however, is too obtuse to realize he is falling in love, and instead, trying to behave with honor, he decides to find her a proper husband! Of course, every suitor falls far short of his impossible standards…. A Lady At Last is on sale December 2006.