WE HOPE YOU ENJOYED reading Dearest Millie, because Millie and Dermot are coming back in two future stories. As many of you know, we can’t let our characters go. They live and breathe for us. These two will return in very prominent roles in our novella How to Ditch a Duke (Spring 2019) and in Highland Jewel, the second book in our Royal Highlander Series, which begins with (March 2019). So, for those of you who’d like to visit and keep up with them in the future, stay tuned.

Also, for our Pennington Family fans, you remember Dermot from and Millie from .  

As with all of our novels, we have tried to combine the real and the imagined in this story. The idea for this novel came to us during the years we went through a life-changing event of our own. During that time, laughter and support from family and loved ones and friends became an integral part of the healing.

In writing Dearest Millie, we were reminded that when a person is afflicted with a serious medical condition like cancer, sharing that news is a difficult and deeply personal decision. The same goes for melancholia—or as we know it today, depression.

In 1812, the popular English novelist Frances Burney wrote a number of letters to her sister about her mastectomy. She survived the surgery and lived to the advanced age of eighty-eight.

The history of depression is that of an innately human experience. As a mood or emotion, the experience of being melancholy or depressed is at the very heart of being human. Robert Burton wrote in 1621, “Melancholy in this sense is the character of mortality.”

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DEAREST MILLIE is part of the series of stories about the Pennington family.

— Millicent Wentworth (introduced in The Promise) , driven to undo the evil wrought by her dead husband, must find a way to save her estate and free the innocent people he enslaves. Her only hope is a marriage—in name only—to Lyon Pennington, the Earl of Aytoun, a man devastated by a tragic accident that killed his wife and left him gravely wounded. These two are the parents of Millie in Dearest Millie.

— Pierce Pennington (the younger brother of Lyon, Borrowed Dreams) and Portia Edwards search for family in Boston and in Scotland.

— David Pennington, the youngest Pennington brother, and Gwyneth Douglas solve the mystery of Emma’s murder.

The Pennington Family series moves into the Regency Era and follows the romantic adventures of the next generation

— Hugh Pennington, the eldest son of Lyon and Millicent (Borrowed Dreams), a scarred war-hero, opens a crate delivered to his estate and finds a beautiful, half-dead woman with a priceless jewel sown into her dress.

— Jo Pennington, the adopted daughter of Lyon and Millicent (Borrowed Dreams, Romancing the Scot), and Captain Wynne Melfort search for her birth-parents at an ancient abbey-turned-asylum in the Highlands. Dermot McKendry is introduced in this novel. And his charm and character wins many hearts.

(RITA© Award Finalist)— Gregory Pennington meets his match when he is tasked with conveying Freya Sutherland and her five-year-old niece from the Highlands to Baronsford for the annual Christmas Ball.

— Phoebe Pennington, the fourth sibling in the Pennington family, and Captain Ian Bell fall in love even as they are haunted by the murder of his sister. Millie plays an important part in this novel as her sister’s companion and confidante.

In addition, we mention Dr. Isabella Murray Drummond in this novella. She is the heroine of , the first novel in the new Royal Highlander series, in which three extraordinary women in the Highlands of Scotland find courage to defy the world at a tumultuous moment when a new Scottish identity will be forged or a political assassination will divide a nation forever.

As authors, we love feedback. We write our stories for you. We’d love to hear what you liked, what you loved, and even what you didn’t like. We are constantly learning, so please help us write stories that you will cherish and recommend to your friends. Please and follow us on BookBub.

Finally, if you like Dearest Millie, please leave a review.

Peace and Health!

Nikoo and Jim (writing as May McGoldrick)

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