About Me

•Hometown: Texas

About Me and My Books:

I write mainstream fiction for both Penguin Putnam and Bethany House. My first book, Tending Roses came out in 2001, followed by Good Hope Road, The Language of Sycamores, Drenched in Light, A Thousand Voices, Texas Cooking, Lone Star Cafe, and Over the Moon at the Big Lizard Diner, A Month of Summer, Talk of the Town, and Word Gets Around, the Summer Kitchen, Never Say Never.

My newest book is Never Say Never, a Feb 2010 Bethany House release.

"Never Say Never " excerpts from chapter 1

Donetta Bradford

You'd imagine, livin' high and dry in the middle of Texas, with the jackrabbits and the prickly pears, you wouldn't close your eyes at night and feel the water. In this country, people think of water like the narrow string that runs over the rocks in Caney Creek, or drifts long, and slow, and lazy down the Brazos or the Guadalupe. But when I close my eyes, I feel the kind of water that surrounds you and seeps into your mind and soul, until you breathe in and out with the tides.

Where, in heaven's name, would a person get a dream like that in Daily, Texas, where the caliche-rock ground's so hard the county's got no need to pave roads-they just clear a trail and let folks drive on it. It'll harden up quick enough and stay that way three quarters of the year while the farmers and the ranchers watch the sky and hope for rain. Life here hasn't got much to do with water, except in the waiting for it. But every night when I close my eyes, I feel a tide, rockin' back and forth under my body. I been feeling it for sixty-nine and a half years now, long as I can remember. I never did anything about it, nor told anybody. They'd think I was nutty as a bullbat, and when you're a businesswoman in a small town, well, you got to protect your reputation. That goes double, if you're the hairdresser, and a redhead. We all know what kind of reputation hairdressers and redheads got.

All that's even more important for someone whose people, historically speaking, ain't from Daily. In a little town, even if you been there all your life, you're not native unless you can trace your roots back generations. There's still folks that'll point out (in a backhanded way mostly, because they're all gonna need a haircut sooner or later) that I'm only a Daily girl by half, on my father's side. On the other side, there's a bit of scandal the biddies still cluck about.

My daddy was what you'd call a prodigal. After leaving behind his fine, upstandin' family and a half-dozen broken-hearted girls of marriageable age in Daily, he wandered the world for so long everyone thought he'd either landed in jail or got hisself killed in a barroom fight. Then one day, he showed up at my grandparents' hotel building on Main Street, as mysterious as he left. He wasn't alone, either. He was driving a 1937 Chevy folks thought he must of got in a bank robbery, and he had a girl in the passenger seat. When she stepped out, my Grandma Eldridge fainted right there on the spot. The girl was pregnant, and she was Cajun, and a Catholic. She was thumbin' a rosary ninety-to-nothin'.

Word Gets Around, a February 2009 release from Bethany House.

When Romance is in the Air, Word Gets Around

Lauren Eldridge thought she'd wiped the dust of Daily, Texas, off her boots forever. Screenwriter Nate Heath thought he was out of second chances.

Life's never that predictable, though Cajoled by her father, Lauren is back in town helping train a skittish race horse set to star in a Hollywood film. But the handsome screenwriter gives her more trouble than the horse. And Nate is realizing there's a spark of magic in the project-and in the eyes of the girl who is so good with horses.

Daily Texas, has a way of offering hope, healing, and a little romance just when folks need it most.

Talk of the Town

Talk of the Town is a zany little tale about big dreams, small town life, fried food, and the making Hollywood superstars-not necessarily in that order. While the book has a serious side that looks at grief, recovery, the temptations of fame, and the value of community, it also has a lot of laughs thanks to the quirky, crazy folks of Daily, Texas.

Daily is a place not unlike many small towns, and if you've ever lived in one or spent time in one, you'll probably recognize some people you know in Daily, Texas. While you're there, don't forget to stop in at the café for a cup of coffee and a slice of pie. Say hi to Imagene, Donetta, and girls for me. Don't be surprised if they're cooking up more than just red beans and rice. There's never any telling, on any given day, what will happen in Daily, and that goes double now that local Daily Darling, Amber Anderson has made it to the top on the American Superstar show. Ever since the big news about Amber hit town, it's been dig-in-your-spurs-and-hang-on-Sally, we're going for a ride.