MADAME REBELLE
Amber Leigh Williams
GENRE: Historical Romance
Blurb:
Rebel. Smuggler. Spy.
Champagne, France 1943
Meet Madame Rebelle. Edmee Guillon is a smuggler. She hides people from the German troops surrounding her ancestral home. When a dying man in a German uniform seeks refuge at Maison Boutet, Edmee struggles to believe his claims that he is French. Her life, the maison and the people she loves are already at stake. Can she take the chance that this mysterious spy is who he says he is? And which side of this war is he really on?
Christian Vovk has been betrayed by someone inside his resistance organization. He knows asking the striking young war widow to hide him will put her in certain danger. However, Christian can help Edmee save as many refugees as she can. Falling in love with her will hinder his duty to the operation that brought him to her doorstep in the first place. When love and duty become inevitably tangled, will Christian sacrifice one for the other?
Purchase Madame Rebelle on Amazon Ebook, Amazon Paperback, Author's Website
Excerpt:
“Go home, Edmée. Do not come back to this part of the woods.”
As the soldier moved away, Edmée couldn’t believe it. They were letting her go?
Just like that?
Her feet tripped over one another as she moved into the trees. That was far easier than it should have been. They hadn’t asked to search her bags. They hadn’t asked what she was doing in the woods in the dark after curfew.
They’d only asked her name.
It made no sense.
She fled, her hands locked around the handles of the suitcases.
She didn’t risk taking her usual path back to Maison Boutet. She weaved and wandered for a while through brambles that caught her clothes and mud that sucked at the bottoms of her boots.
It felt like minutes…or maybe hours before she was back at her uncle’s vineyard.
The cases dangled weightily at the ends of her arms. Her knuckles had been white around them for so long, she could no longer feel them.
The maison was so dark, she failed to distinguish it from the landscape.
She looked at her muddy shoes, her trousers soaked past the ankles. The suitcases would have to be hidden, half of the contents destroyed…
She rushed into the heart of the rows. Her beacon was now the limestone mound with its rough-hewn back to the sky, the entrance to the hidden network of caves underneath the estate.
She wedged past the rocky entrance and stumbled down the steps toward the light.
At the bottom, the barrel of a pistol greeted her.
Her heart slammed into her ribs. Her knees threatened to fold.
She gaped at the man behind the gun.
Christian’s face was red and sweat-sheened. In the lantern’s low throbbing light, his features looked harsh. Moisture cloaked his bare chest like a second skin.
She’d searched him—his clothes, his personal effects… How did he get a gun?
Her lips trembled. She lifted her chin, regardless. The words were rough against her throat. “Are you going to shoot me?”
Interview with Amber Leigh Williams
What is your favorite part of the book?
My favorite part of Madame Rebelle is the scene where the morally gray MMC, Christian, is trying to teach the conscientious FMC, Edmee, spycraft. We see a deeply honest character coming to grips with the emotional dilemma of struggling to live with the implications of a double life. She’s saving lives and she knows what she is doing is right, but in the balance she questions the deception and lies she must engage in to do so. I find that very human.
Does your book have a lesson? Moral?
I was inspired to tell Edmee’s story after reading firsthand accounts of the women of the French Resistance. What they risked and sacrificed to take their country back from the German Army is extraordinary. Everyday people can make a difference. There's also hope even in the darkest of times and everyone has the power to impact someone else's life for the better. That's what Edmee stands for.
Are your characters based off real people or did they all come entirely from your imagination?
Edmee and Christian are fictional, but their story is set against the historic backdrop of World War II France. The danger they face is the same danger real people of that time had to confront in order to survive or resist. I based a few minor characters off of real life people. For instance, the character Evelyn who plays a small part in the second part of the book is based on SOE intelligence officer Vera Atkins.
Of all the characters you have created, which is your favorite and why?
Long before I wrote Madame Rebelle, Edmee’s voice was with me. Maybe that's because she represents the incredible women who inspired her story. She insisted on her story being told. I hesitated for a long time because I feared I wouldn't get her story right. Now that the book has been published, I don't hear her quite so much as I once did so I feel that both she and I have made peace with each other.
What character in your book are you least likely to get along with?
That would be a spoiler so I can't name names. (I want to keep the plot twist extra twisty.) However, I will say that there is someone in Edmee's life whose motives are not what they seem to be and he/she's true intentions are pretty devastating.
What would the main character in your book have to say about you?
I hope Edmee's satisfied with how it all turned out. *fingers crossed* I also hope I’ve done justice to the people who lived through the real events of the time. While writing Madame Rebelle, I was conscious of the gravity of 1940s France and what people went through in order to do what was right for their country and themselves.
Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?
This is my first stand-alone novel. I’ve published a seven-book contemporary romance series and two romantic suspense trilogies with Harlequin. I approached writing Madame Rebelle like I wrote my suspense titles, keeping that ticking clock and the danger and suspense always in the background to keep the plot moving. Similar themes, too, exist across all my books—hope being the prevailing message at the end of the day. Characters are forced to go through their worst fears in order to overcome. As readers, there's nothing more uplifting than watching characters do so and that's one of the reasons I love reading and writing so much.
Author Bio and Links
Amber Leigh Williams writes pulse-pounding romantic suspense, historical fiction, and contemporary romance. When she’s not writing, she enjoys traveling and being outdoors with her family and dogs. She is fluent in sarcasm and is known to hoard books like the book dragon she is. An advocate for literacy, she is an ardent supporter of libraries and the constitutional right to read.
Connect with Amber Leigh Williams
Giveaway:
1 comments:
Thank you for featuring MADAME REBELLE today.
Post a Comment