Today, we’re celebrating one of the authors who helped us make the Frasier Contest possible! Vickie McDonough‘s recent release is Rancher Under Fire, and is Romantic Suspense.

Q: Vickie, can you tell us a little bit about your next book?

Jackson Durant would go to any lengths to protect his young daughter and his ranch. He knows the puzzling incidents on his homestead are no accidents. Someone is after him…but who? And why? Reporter Mariah Reyes is determined to find out. She never expected her pursuit of a story on the once high profile pro-football-quarterback-turned-reclusive-rancher would endanger her life—nor that she’d fall for the cowboy. But when Jackson’s daughter is kidnapped, she’ll do anything to help save the little girl—even if it means becoming a target herself.

Q: What was the most emotional scene for you to write in your novel?

I can remember early on in my writing that I was working on a pivotal dark moment scene that made me cry. I felt so stupid sitting there typing and swiping my eyes. I worked in my bedroom on a tiny desk and kept peering over my shoulder to see if my husband or boys were there, watching me, which of course they weren’t. The lesson learned is that if a scene moves me, the author, so much, it surely will move readers. Don’t be afraid to be mean to your characters and let them face difficult obstacles and bad things. Let them struggle. Readers love reading those hard scenes—they love the emotion of the scene—even if it makes them cry.

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Bestselling author Vickie McDonough grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams in her fictional stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen, and others living in the Old West. Vickie is the award-winning author of thirty-four published books and novellas. Her books include the fun and feisty Texas Boardinghouse Brides series, and End of the Trail, which was the OWFI 2013 Best Fiction Novel winner. Whispers on the Prairie was a Romantic Times Recommended Inspirational Book for July 2013. Her latest book, Rancher Under Fire, is a contemporary suspense.