ONE PERFECT ROSE

July 1997 and June 1998

Historical Romance

Ballantine 1997

Fawcett Gold Medal 1998

ISBN 0-449-0018-4

Devastating news sends Stephen Kenyon fleeing incognito across England on a journey where he finds not only his own soul, but the love he has always desired.

Last of the Fallen Angels series (seven books are enough for a trilogy!), the story features Stephen Kenyon, Duke of Ashburton and older brother of Lord Michael Kenyon, hero of Shattered Rainbows. Stephen was supposed to be a wallpaper character, but he made himself interesting by reaching out across years of hostility to build a vital friendship with his estranged younger brother.

Typically, I came up with his story by deciding what was the worst, the very worst, thing I could do to the poor guy. A sober sort, Stephen had always subordinated his own desires to the heavy responsibilities he carried. Now on the brink of a new life, he comes face to face with his own mortality and bolts from the gilded, aristocratic cage in which he has spent his life. In the course of his anonymous journey across England, he falls in with lovely, compassionate Rosalind Jordan and her family of exuberant traveling players. Needless to say, happiness doesn't come easily, but in the end Stephen and Rosalind find what they so richly deserve.

The response to the hardcover of One Perfect Rose was marvelous, and very gratifying. The book was a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, and was named one of the year's five top romances by both the Library Journal and the Washington Post. In addition, it was nominated as one of ten finalists for the Romance Writers of America Favorite Book of the Year award. But while recognition is nice, the best part of all is the wonderful comments people have made about how Stephen and Rosalind's story touched their souls.

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