THE EDUCATION OF MADELINE by Beth Williamson

The Right Man Comes Along

Madeline Brewster practically owns Plum City, Colorado. But at thirty-two, she knows she has missed any chance for happiness. Until she finds a tall, strong, handsome Irishman on the wrong end of the hangman’s noose. Suddenly this unconventional woman comes up with an outrageous idea . . .

Teague O’Neal has rugged cheekbones, tousled black curls, and eyes as blue as the sky, even if he is caked in Colorado mud. The men insist they caught him horse-thieving, and there’s something desperate about him that says he’d do anything for a buck.

Maybe it was pure chance, or maybe it was something more that brought Madeline and Teague together. But one thing’s clear, between a woman who has just about everything she could ever want, and a man who’s lost that and more, they might find something in between worth living for.

The Characters Told Me What to Write

There are some who might hear the premise of the story and wonder if I lost my mind. After all, a woman paying a man to be hers in the 1870s? Was there such a thing? I think, of course, the answer lies in the idea of how it all began.

Madeline is of course a fictional woman, but she’s made up of many women I have known in my life. She’s tall, curvy and what I would call a real-sized woman. She’s also intelligent, educated and not well liked because of it. Why is that, you might ask? Because this is 1870s Colorado, a small town who viewed women with brains as an anamoly to be feared and pitied.

She’s passionate and opinionated, yet still a vulnerable person who needs to find her own path in life. She wants to be happy, to finally live outside the shadow of her father’s ghost. She takes a chance, an enormous chance, which leads her to Teague, a man who haunted by the sins of his past he’s given up on life. He’s also a big man, taller than Madeline and willing to do anything for money.

Life was not easy for a woman like Madeline in the west during the 1800s. She had to fight for everything, even against her own common sense. Yet she made the right choice when she found Teague, and he didn’t realize the course of his life had changed forever.

The combination is explosive, emotional and hot, I cried, squirmed and laughed as I wrote Madeline and Teague’s story. They literally took over my fingers and told me what to write.

*holds up hand*

Honestly. The very best stories I write are not actually written by me, they’re written by the characters through me. The Education of Madeline was no exception. Sometimes I read what I’ve written and think, “Wow, I wrote that?”

I hope you take the journey with Madeline and Teague, with hope, laughter and tears. They’re waiting for you.

–Beth

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