This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Jenna Jaxon will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

I think this is such an interesting post topic because we all want to know more of the nitty gritty details about our favorite authors’ lives, right? Well, here are some of the little known facts about Jenna Jaxon. (Some of these things you may know if you’ve read my blog over the years, but several of them are things I don’t think I’ve EVER told my readers.)

1. When I was a senior in high school, I was on the fencing team (even then I loved the romance of swordplay). The coach was technically not an associate of the school (he taught fencing at the local YMCA and all of us took lessons from him there) and so rather innocently I flirted with him and right after my 18th birthday, started dating him. He was ten years older than me (not a problem in my book as historical heroes are often much older than the heroine) and was very intelligent and good looking. We dated for about three or four months before he broke it off to date a woman closer to his age. I wasn’t really crushed, but it did sting a little.

2. This is related to number one above: after taking lessons from my fencing coach for almost a year, I qualified for and actually competed in the USA Fencing National Championship.

3. Also related to number one above: Because I was the only girl on our high school fencing team, I ended up as a contestant for Homecoming Queen that year! I’m still amazed when I look at that yearbook and I’m in the pictures with all the other contestants. (I was SO not that girl.)

4. The very first live theater production I ever saw was my high school’s production of Oklahoma! when I was about thirteen years old. A friend of mine was playing Will and I still remember the scene where Will was trying to get his $50 back so he could marry Ado Annie. Fast forward 10 years and I saw my first Broadway musical, Sweeney Todd with the original cast. It’s still my favorite musical.

5. The first time I went to Ireland, I kissed the Blarney Stone (which may have given me mono!).

6. The first story I ever wrote was a six-page masterpiece called Miss Priss Finds a Kitten. They say write what you know and I’d grown up with cats all my life. So, in the third grade, I wrote and illustrated my very own story about cats.

7. I cannot stand beer. Cannot drink it. It tastes like what I imagine swamp water tastes like. Even when I was going to England (a college class for 3 weeks in May my senior year) for the first time and the tour director made all of us try lager and lime (mine ended up half lager, half lime) I still couldn’t drink it.

8. I met my husband when I was hired to do a show with him for the Army. We fell in love working on the production and playing Space Invaders together.

9. In 2015 the university I work for did a production of Little Shop of Horrors, one of my favorite musicals. I wanted to be in the chorus, just so I could sing the song “Skid Row” but my boss, who was the director, told me I could be on Skid Row as a bag lady ONLY if I also played the role of the first customer at the flower shop—a character who had lines. I am not an actor, I don’t like being on stage at all usually, but I wanted to be in the show so badly I said yes. I had fun with it—but I was terrified every night when I went on and had to say lines.

10. This is one that actually a lot of people know: I began writing romance because I became gluten-intolerant. And when I went on a gluten-free diet, it gave me so much creative energy I had to put it somewhere. I read Kathleen Woodiwiss’s Everlasting about that time and when I finished the book I said to myself, “I could write something like this,” and sat down and started writing my first book. And the rest, as they say, is history.

A scandalous mistake…or a wicked way to happiness?

Hoping to compromise herself, Lady Amantha Easton sneaks into the bedroom of her would-be suitor only to find a total stranger there—a totally handsome, charming stranger to be sure—but not at all the man she plans to marry. She leaves his room with her reputation intact—barely—only to fall victim to the gentleman’s charms in a public place. Now Amantha must face the fate she’s tried to avoid—marriage to a man who will never love her.

All Rafael Beauregard wanted was a warm bed and a good night’s sleep…but what he got was an unexpected romp with a beautiful vixen and a fiery kiss that left him wanting more. An excellent trade, except now he’s got to marry Lady Amantha, one of the most willful women he’s ever met. So Rafe’s challenge is to persuade her that marriage to him might be the best thing for them both…once he convinces himself.

Enjoy an Excerpt

“What is it, love? What’s wrong?”

“Father,” was all she could get out at first.

“You went to see him? He didn’t agree to grant your request?”

Amantha nodded and sniffed. Rafe reached into his breast pocket and produced a handkerchief. “He g…gave me a choice. Marry you or…or be put in p…prison.”

“Prison!” What kind of monster would threaten his own daughter with prison? And what kind of power did such a man wield? “He’s going to send you to Newgate? On whose authority?”

“His own authority.” She wiped her eyes and nose then clenched the square of linen in her fist. “And not Newgate. Not a real prison. But he will turn his northernmost property, Woolston Lodge in Northumberland, into a prison. He will send me there tomorrow, with no clothes and no friends, just a jailor and armed guards for the rest of my life.” Tears threatened again and Rafe pulled her head back to his shoulder.

“Shh, love. Don’t think about it. We won’t let that happen, will we?” She shook her head and nestled deeper. The small movement of acquiescence shot straight to his heart. He could fix this. “I am afraid, though, that I’m going to have to change my mind about our marriage.”

She sat bolt upright, terror widening her eyes as she stared at him.

Damn. He hadn’t meant to frighten her even more. His own fault for drinking that second brandy.

“Shhh.” He ran a gentle thumb down her delicate jaw line, cupping her chin and pulling her face close enough that she had to look into his eyes. “Amantha, I just meant I now want to marry you more than anything in the world.”

About the Author: Jenna Jaxon is a best-selling author of historical romance, writing in a variety of time periods because she believes that passion is timeless. She has been reading and writing historical romance since she was a teenager. A romantic herself, Jenna has always loved a dark side to the genre, a twist, suspense, a surprise. She tries to incorporate all these elements into her own stories.

She lives in Virginia with her family and a small menagerie of pets–including Olive, an almost silent cat, Earl Grey, a very curious bunny, and a Shar-pei mix dog named Frenchie.

Buy the book at Amazon.