Midnight in Ruby Bayou (52 page)

The grand part of it all is when Southerners write and tell me they didn't know I lived there, and they know just which plantation house I used in my book. That tells me I caught the flavor of a very special place.

Your recent books have given readers such wonderful glimpses into the world of fine gemstones.
Pearl Cove
was especially fascinating with its lore and allure of pearls. Have you always been a lover of fine gems? What is your favorite gemstone?

Ever since I was a child, I've been fascinated by rocks and minerals. Crystals were my favorite. I could look into a cluster of them and see a whole new universe. They did such fascinating things with light, transforming it from ordinary to extraordinary. My personal bias has always been toward clear crystals, such as natural quartz or cut and polished diamonds. For me, a diamond contains all the beauty of every color of gem. And because I love hiking, gardening, fishing, boating, and other things that are hard on jewelry, I prefer to wear diamonds. You don't have to pamper them.

Objects of value — gems, art, artifacts — have always interested me. There is so much human history/hope/myth/fear wrapped up in them. When I decided to switch from historical romance to contemporary romantic suspense (Evan and I weren't writing mysteries any more and I missed them), I quickly chose to use some kind of gem as the fulcrum on which the plots would pivot. First was the imperial Russian Amber Room in
Amber Beach
, then the fabulous jade burial suit from ancient China (
Jade Island
), then South Seas pearls in
Pearl Cove
. Rubies seemed a natural gem to represent the brooding, often tragic, always beautiful South.

Elizabeth Lowell's
many remarkable historical and contemporary novels include
New York Times
bestsellers,
Forget Me Not, Only Love, A Woman Without Lies, Autumn Lover
and
Winter Fire
. Her latest major accomplishments,
Amber Beach, Jade Island,
and
Pearl Cove
were instant
New York Times
bestsellers. Ms. Lowell has more than fifteen million books in print. She lives in Palm Springs, California, with her husband with whom she writes mystery novels under a pseudonym.

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BOOKS BY ELIZABETH LOWELL

Amber Beach*
Autumn Lover
Beautiful Dreamer*
Desert Rain*
Eden Burning*
Enchanted
Forbidden
Forget Me Not*
Jade Island*
Lover in the Rough*
Midnight in Ruby Bayou
Moving Target*
Only His
Only Love
Only Mine
Only You
Pearl Cove*
Remember Summer*
To the Ends of the Earth*
Where the Heart Is*
Winter Fire
A Woman Without Lies*

*Available as a HarperCollins e-book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

MIDNIGHT IN RUBY BAYOU
. Copyright © 2000 by Two of a Kind, Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

The excerpt from an interview with Elizabeth Lowell by Claire E. White originally appeared in The Internet Writing Journal®, http://www.writerswrite.com.
Copyright © 1997-2001 by Writers Write, Inc. Reprinted by permission.
All rights reserved.

EPub © Edition DECEMBER 2001 ISBN: 9780061747779

First Avon Books paperback printing: May 2001

First William Morrow hardcover printing: July 2000

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