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Saturday 5 November 2016

Guest Post: In the Darkest Hour, Can Time and Love Truly Heal All Wounds? by Leslie Bowes

In the darkest hour, can time and love truly heal all wounds? That is the question that Catherine, the main character of my novella, Heart Healer, has to ask herself a few times.

I grow up watching Gone with the Wind, which gave me a love for all things Civil War. But as I watched Scarlett go through everything she went through and still not get her happy ending, it made me so angry that I felt I just had to give her happy ending, which started me on the path to becoming a writer.

I started out writing in a story journal every day. Then came fanfiction for all of my favourite TV shows. But then I started high school, and writing become less important. When I was in college I was set on a different path and was going to become a movie editor, but then I took a writing class and that passion for writing was relit.

But that wasn’t the ending of Heart Healer just yet. Heart Healer started out as Rose Hill, which was about Isabelle, an eighteen-year-old girl whose father sold her to a woman named Mrs. King to pay off the money he owed to her. In the end, Isabelle falls in love in Mrs. King’s son Christopher, but Mrs. King wants to kill Christopher so he can’t be the successor of the plantation. Rose Hill was never published.

So then I started working on another story called A Second Chance at Love, which was about a girl called Alyssa whose husband, Ethan, acts like he doesn't want children and leaves when Alyssa tells him they are going to have a baby. But that turns out to be a lie, as he wants the baby to give to his mistress who can’t have children.

I knew something was missing from A Second Chance at Love, so I went back and revisited Rose Hill. I started playing about and putting Rose Hill and A Second Chance at Love together and in the end, the two combined became what is now Heart Healer.

As for the main character who started out as Isabelle then became Alyssa, she finally became Catherine. She is a wonderful, sweet lady who gives so much of herself to everyone and everything that she does. However, life has not treated her well since her mother’s death, with her father leaving her to raise her brother. On his return, after a few years have passed, he brings home a man called Blake and tells Catherine that she will be the man's slave until she works off his debt. Blake turns the tables and says, 'no, she will marry me'. Understandably, Catherine isn’t happy about this, but there is little she can do as a young woman in 1800s Britain. On getting to her new husband's home, Blake becomes abusive and something happens to make her run away. Something strange and magical happens, resulting in Catherine turning up in 2014, where a man called Christopher finds her and their journey begins.

About Leslie Bowes


Leslie lives in South Carolina with her family. She grew up watching Gone with the Wind, which quickly made the Civil War become one of her favourite time periods. She hopes that you enjoy reading Heart Healer as much as she has enjoyed writing it.


Catherine Andrews is an English woman living in the 1800s. Her father has sold her to Blake Von-Clyer to be his wife to pay off the taxes he owed Mr. Von-Clyer. Catherine soon finds out Blake is a cruel and horrible man. On their wedding night, to escape his cruelty, she throws herself into the river. 

Christopher King is living in 2014, doing his best to raise his young son Ryan as a single parent. One night, Christopher finds a woman unconscious in the river, dressed in old-fashioned clothes and barely breathing. Christopher does everything in his power to help the young woman. 

When Catherine regains consciousness, she finds herself in a strange and unbelievable situation. Terrified, she does her best to keep her guard up against Christopher. But as she gets to know him, she can't help but fall for the man who saved her life. When Catherine's dangerous past comes back to haunt her, it has Catherine and Christopher fighting for each other and their love. In the darkest hour, can time and love truly heal all wounds.

Heart Healer is available to buy now.

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Thanks so much for sharing how Heart Healer came to be, Leslie!

Do you think that time and love can heal all wounds? Let me know in the comments below!

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