A bit about Back to Tomorrow

Hello, Gwynn here today. I wanted to share some background about my time travel tale, Back to Tomorrow. I suppose it came about because I watched a Hallmark movie titled, as I recall, The Letter. Anyway it was a story about a young man in present time who communicates with a young woman during the Civil War through an old desk and letters until he finally ends up living part of the past. It did not have a real romance style happy ending but there was a ray of hope that the 1860s woman was reborn in a present day descendant. As a total die-hard romance fan, I was not quite satisfied but the idea of reaching across time via the written word held an irresistible appeal.  Pretty soon I began to play with some what ifs

The picture here is the original cover which I had done by a talented friend with the Poser software--although the Amber Quill version's cover is much more artistic and commercial, I have a soft spot for this one which I basically planned myself. It is on a mug and mouse pad I got when it first came out under the original publisher. Sadly that was short lived and I am thankful again that Amber Quill took in  my orphan!

When I wrote this book, most of it in a burst of activity in about six-eight weeks in the summer of 2000, I was living "twenty miles west of Tombstone" as I explained when I talked about The Man in Black. I really did want to do a Tombstone tale but not one on the notorious Earps, Holiday and Clantons et. al. That had been, IMHO, done to death and then some. Probably dug up and done to death again! I was like "Yech, no way." So I definitely did my own thing here. The only historical character that appears is Nellie Cashman and I took some liberties with the time she was there according to what I could find out on her--she didn't rate two percent of the verbiage the gunfighters and such have garnered but she was a remarkable lady and I was glad to honor her..

Last week I attended for the first time a meeting of a local writers group--some published and more aspiring. I had carried along a couple of books to 'prove' my boast that I had published ten novels and since reading something to the group is a rule apparently, I read the prologue of this tale. Everyone wanted more so I guess it went over okay!

As always, I tried to make the setting totally vivid and real, and since I am familiar with the whole area in which the book is set, that wasn't hard to do. I know the scent of rain-wet creosote and mesquite, the ferocity of the frequent thunder storms, the heat baking down on the white hills, and the red canyon going up from the San Pedro valley side to reach Bisbee. I especially loved both Emily and Zach and the fact I made Zach not a miner or gambler or gunslick but an eastern man who loved to write! I also tried to be authentic in the way people talked, acted and thought in 1889! I am fussy about historical accuracy and although I know I make an error now and then, I do try to be authentic.  I may throw a book across the room when I find a character speaking or acting in a manner totally inappropriate to the era of the tale! I hope no one will find anything like that in this book!

New cover, buy info and excerpt in the next post!