by Barbara Dunlop

For a short time, while Hurricane Katrina roared through New Orleans, and we all witnessed the horrible aftermath of the flooding, I wondered if the Harlequin continuity series Hotel Marchand would be cancelled.

We were busy writing, twelve authors each working on a different but connected story centering around the Hotel Marchand located in, you guessed it, New Orleans. The French Quarter, in fact. The timelines in publishing being long, with books written months, even years before they hit the shelves, I wondered how the city would look in 2007 when the books were released, and if we dared go forward.

Looking at the city today, the music clubs reopening, the festivals returning, the tourist resurgence, the parties, the laughter, I am unbelievably thrilled that we had a chance to write our books.

My contribution to the continuity series is A Secret Life. The story is set in the small, fictional town of Indigo, Louisiana. The heroine, Joan Bateman, is secretly a popular mystery writer–a fact she hides from her wealthy, snobbish family in Boston. When her identity is revealed, she discovers her latest mystery plot has come a little too close to the truth. Her life is in danger, and her sexy and capable agent is down from New York running interference.

A Secret Life is my second continuity series with Harlequin. Although it’s always a challenge to sync up a story with eleven other authors, it also makes for a rich foundation for each of the stories and a whole lot of fun for readers.

For those who have read the earlier Hotel Marchand books, the mystery of the opera house continues in mine, and we see some more of that sexy devil, Luc. For those who haven’t yet tried the series, take a trip down south with us. Experience the rich beauty and history of The French Quarter, the Indigo Opera House and the vast, untamed bayous. Despite my fleeting reservations, the Hotel Marchard books turned into a tribute to New Orleans and to the robust, hardworking, optimistic citizens of Louisiana.