When I started writing the story which became The Mistress’ House, I was coming out of a bad case of burnout (writing 80 books in 20 years will do that to you), and I thought this was going to be a short story.

In fact, I remember telling my critique partner it was a short story. “…Except it won’t end,” I wailed. “It just keeps on going!”

Perhaps, she suggested gently, there’s a book trying to get out of your head.

And darned if she wasn’t right – but rather than a single set of characters and one story, I discovered there were three heroes, three heroines, and a house that insisted on becoming a character too. And so I accepted that this project was bigger than I’d thought, and I settled down happily to explore my new world and get to know all my people.

However, just as I had committed to writing a triple story, I ran into the biggest roadblock of my new career as an author of sexy Regency historicals.

The hero and heroine of the second part of the story not only wouldn’t go to bed together, they wouldn’t even talk.

It does not bode well for a sexy story when the hero and heroine have no desire to get to know each other – and I’m not just talking about knowing in the Biblical sense. These two wouldn’t even go into the same room.

I was writing scene after scene about a lovely, wounded Regency woman … and scene after scene about an exhausted soldier just home from the war… but both of them were going out of their way to avoid spending time together. And as any romance reader or writer knows, it’s tough to make a story romantic when the two main characters haven’t met.

Then one day as I was whining (again) to my long-suffering critique partner about my two great people who would simply not cooperate, I heard myself say, “What if they don’t belong in the same story?”

There was a long silence from the other end of the phone line – I think my critique partner was looking up the number of the men in white coats, to send them after me – but I knew I’d struck gold. My exhausted soldier home just from the war was far too drained to help my lovely, wounded Regency woman heal; she truly was a great heroine, but she needed a stable, solid, wonderful man she could push against. Meanwhile, that wounded woman couldn’t possibly help a tired soldier regain his zest for life; he needed a peppy, lively, inquisitive, joyful woman who would challenge his every belief.

So I created a stable, solid wonderful man for her, and a peppy, lively, inquisitive, joyful woman for him, and both stories flew off the page. That’s why Felicity is matched up with Richard, and Julian is matched with Georgiana… I hope you’ll enjoy meeting them as much as I did!

[Ed. Two lucky commenters will win a copy of Leigh’s The Mistress’ House, so be sure to chat with Leigh today! U.S. and Canada only, please.]