Book Excerpts
DAYS OF ETERNITY...
Louise Lenahan Wallace's Latest Novel
Monday morning after the Fort Sumter news broke, instead of eating breakfast and heading to the cornfield as on the thousand other spring days of his life, Zane dressed to go to town and sign up for going to war. He planned to walk with Mac and Rose on their way to school. He could ensure trouble hadn’t erupted in town, and that the youngsters wouldn’t come to harm.
He tried to make light of it all and of his ultimate reason for going. As he viewed his neatly combed hair, he joked, “I can’t remember dressing this carefully since the evening we got married, Rissa.” Glimpsing her stricken eyes in the mirror, his voice trailed off. Turning slowly, he faced her. Ignoring the fact Mac and Rose were watching, he reached to touch her soft chestnut hair.
She caught his hand in both of hers and held it to her lips. “You were a sight to make my heart race that night, Zane Edwards. And never once since then has it slowed down.” A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “Just in case the fact slipped your notice these fourteen years.”
He brushed her lips with his thumb. “It didn’t, Rissa-love. Be sure, it didn’t.” He looked deep into her eyes and saw love and glowing pride replace the stricken look. Pride in him, he realized with the same awe he always experienced, even after all the years.
He turned to the silent children and Rose slipped her hand into his. “Ready, pupils? We don’t want Miss Sullivan to mark you late. I wonder if she’s wearing the same whalebone corset she wore during my student days? Talk about an unbending personality.” As he intended, Rose giggled and Mac hid a coughing chuckle at such wicked talk.
At the door, under cover of their amusement, he bent to Larissa’s ear. “I’ll be home soon as I can.”
She lifted her hand, and in spite of the heart heaviness he knew she concealed, she gave him a glowing smile that made his toes curl. “I’ll be waiting.”
"Days of Eternity" by Louise Lenahan Wallace, is published by Treble Heart Books under the MountainView Publishing and Sundowners label. Treble Heart Books Sierra Vista, AZ., 2007. Trade paperback.
An excerpt from DAY STAR RISING...
the long awaited sequel to Longing of the Day
In the gray light of pre-dawn, Hannah Clayton stirred restlessly, her work-wearied body, even on the fringe of wakefulness, instinctively seeking the edge of the bed farthest away from Luke sprawled behind her. The sound that had penetrated her sleep came again. In the next room, 17-month-old Micah had started his baby murmurings -- soft 
enough for the moment, but a firebell in full voice for his three brothers who shared the room with him.
A sigh started to escape her, but broke off before it had a chance to become reality. She had long ago learned that even such a small indulgence could attract Luke's attention. Slowly, carefully, soundlessly -- all achieved from much practice -- she slid out of bed. If she could get to Micah before he woke the others...In the act of reaching for her shawl to pull around her nightdress, her hand froze. Luke's side of the bed was empty.
More puzzled than alarmed — Luke was not an "up before the sun" riser by any stretch of the imagination — Hannah drew the wrap around her tall, slender figure and pulled free the hair caught between her nightdress and the shawl. She hesitated at the bedroom door, but Micah's murmurings were becoming insistent. She'd best get him before Luke became annoyed.
Flinching at the scraping sound, she pulled open the door. The light from the lamp on the kitchen worktable struck her squarely in the eyes, causing her to blink before she saw the room was empty, and that the note propped against the base of the lamp had her name scrawled across it in Luke's bold, unmistakable handwriting.
Slowly she reached for the paper and unfolded it. The contents were brief. They were also brutally direct.
Dear Hannah, I've left to find the men responsible for the raid on the ranch. I admit I talked in town that day, but I hadn't meant no harm. I know you never really thought I was much of a man, but when I return with the guilty men, maybe you'll see how unfair you've been all this time and think a little more kindly of me. -- Luke
"Day Star Rising" by Louise Lenahan Wallace, is published by Ogden Publications Inc., Topeka, Kansas. 2001. Trade paperback.
An excerpt from LONGING OF THE DAY...
Louise Lenahan Wallace's popular first novel
The night was sultry that early summer evening. It was also still. Too still. No breeze rustled the cottonwood 
leaves. No bellow of frog nor chirp of cricket nor beat of insect wing disturbed the hush. The moon had not yet risen as though it, too, had been caught up in the silence. The deafening silence. The waiting silence.
Alone in the darkness, Matt peered about fearfully. In all his three years he had never been outside at night by himself. He could hear his own loud breathing and feel his heart thumping fiercely and noisily against his shirt. His arms were cramping, hanging on to his baby sister Catty, but he dared not put her down. Papa said to hold her, and he'd be furious if he came back and found Matt had disobeyed. So he sat and clutched his sister and watched the night shadows flicker, never leaving the fragile shelter of the bush.
Not even when calls and cries and hideous screams shattered the silence or when living shadows leaped, withdrew and leaped again. He huddled, too terrified to cry, head bowed over the baby. He didn't know why the black night glowed so red around him; he was only aware that, suddenly, it had become very quiet again, and he wondered why Papa didn't come.
"Longing of the Day" by Louise Lenahan Wallace, is published by Ogden Publications Inc., Topeka, Kansas. 2001. Trade paperback.