Non-Stop Reads: Colleen Connally – A World Filled With Romance!

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Colleen Connally – A World Filled With Romance!

A World Filled With Romance!

by Colleen Connally

I love romance. Of course, I do. I write it. But there are some scenes in books and movies that never leave you. I’m not talking about the typical grand gestures where the hero gives the heroine expensive, elaborate gifts or takes her to the far corner of the world to propose. No…I’m talking of a grand gesture which defines the love between the hero and heroine.

One of my favorite books, Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, has the classic line…in the book it was a tad different…in the movie…Rhett tells Scarlet.

“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”

Every time I watch Gone With the Wind or read it, I get goose bumps. I know what you’re thinking—while Gone With the Wind is a great book…a classic…it isn’t one that you would fantasize about the love story. I mean Rhett and Scarlet don’t end up together, but, I believe, it’s their journey that touches you. Even with the ending, don’t we still hope that eventually they will get back together?

When women fantasize, it is because we dream of the perfect love. So does perfect love exist? Or is it only in the imagination of us romance authors?

I believe in romance…I believe in love at first sight…I believe in the power of love. I couldn’t write it if I didn’t believe in it. I do believe in love. We all want a love to last forever.

My favorite epic fantasy is the Lord of the Rings trilogy! While I would never classify J R R Toilkien as a romance writer in any form of the imagination, I would classify one of his character’s deeds as the ultimate romantic gesture. Arwen gives up immortal life for Aargorn. She decides that the few years she would have with Aargorn would be more precious to her than an eternity without him. That is a love to fantasize about.

Literature is littered with grand romantic gestures. Romeo and Juliet, Lancelot and Guinevere, Cathy and Heathcliffe are examples of true love taking a tragic turn.

But I have a list of my all-time favorite romances gestures.

1) Arwen gives up immortal life.

2) Jane Eyre returns to Thornfield because she hears Rochester calling for her.

3) Love Story. I have never cried harder as I did when Jennifer dies in Oliver arms after he gave up his family’s fortune to be with her.

4) The Notebook. Allie chooses Noah over Lon.

5) Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara. Even without the happy ending…that one gesture defined one of the classic love stories of all time.

What are your favorites? Do you believe in that one special love?

My latest book, Broken Legacy, Book Two of the Secret Lives Series, is a story filled with intrigue, secrets and romance. Thrown into the midst of the Reign of Terror that the French Revolution has become, Lady Eloise has long struggled with the questions arising from her birth. Forced into a marriage she neither wanted or desired, she finds herself drawn to the man who is now her husband. Lord Gerard puts into place a plan to save his children. Marrying Lady Eloise gives him the leverage he needs. Soon, he realizes the woman he married is nothing like the woman she has been portrayed. Never did he consider she would risk her life for him nor did he consider that Eloise would evoke feelings within him he did not know existed. Thrown into a terror few escape, Gerard and Eloise discover a connection that will bind their lives forever—love. That is if they survive.

Hope you enjoy! Have a good one! Keep reading!