Thanks to author Leah Brunner for joining me to talk about her latest release in the DC Eagles series, Betrothal or Breakaway.
For links to the books discussed in this episode, click the link here to take you to the Google Doc to view the list.
For episode feedback, future reading and author recommendations, you can text the podcast by clicking the "Send us a message button" above.
For more, follow along on Instagram @whereileftoffpod.
Thanks to author Leah Brunner for joining me to talk about her latest release in the DC Eagles series, Betrothal or Breakaway.
For links to the books discussed in this episode, click the link here to take you to the Google Doc to view the list.
For episode feedback, future reading and author recommendations, you can text the podcast by clicking the "Send us a message button" above.
For more, follow along on Instagram @whereileftoffpod.
Welcome back. I'm Kristen Bahls and you're listening to Where I Left Off a Bookish Podcast, and today I'm joined by the author of the DC Eagle series, Leah Brunner, and we are talking about her latest release, betrothal or breakaway. Thank you so much for joining me, Leah.
Leah Brunner:Thank you for having me. I'm excited.
Kristen Bahls:Me too. I don't know what you put in your books, but I have just been reading them nonstop. I got through all of the DC Eagle series and I'm on Checkmate in the Under the Kansas Sky series in like two weeks. That's awesome. I just kept flying through them every time.
Leah Brunner:I love it.
Kristen Bahls:They're amazing. Oh my gosh.
Leah Brunner:Thank you, I'm glad you're enjoying them.
Kristen Bahls:Yes, I love them all. And before we get into a little bit about your latest book, I always have to ask what are you currently reading right now?
Leah Brunner:I've been binging all of Elle Kennedy's Briar U and Off Campus series. I've just I don't know, I can't get enough of it.
Kristen Bahls:Those are on my TBR. I need to start them for sure.
Leah Brunner:They're so good.
Kristen Bahls:Oh, yay. And what can you tell us about your current work in progress, if you can let us know any details?
Leah Brunner:I can't talk much about my current work in progress, but I can tell you it is not part of the DC Eagles world.
Kristen Bahls:Oh wow, Do you think you will eventually go back to the DC Eagles again?
Leah Brunner:Yes, when I'm done with this one, I will write Bruce's book and that will be. That will wrap up the series, unless I mean a series is always, you know, can be added on to if, if, I get the urge to write somebody else. But for now I'm planning on Bruce being the nice little bookend.
Kristen Bahls:And I mean I'm pretty sure his name is Thomas. You could always like go with some of the rookies and like, yeah, on off from there and have a whole other like part two.
Leah Brunner:Yeah, it would. It would be easy to find a character that you know that if I thought of a story for them. You know I'll never say never, so maybe that would be amazing.
Kristen Bahls:How has your love of hockey, kind of overall, shaped the DC Eagles series?
Leah Brunner:So I would actually turn it around and I would say the DC Eagles have shaped my love of hockey. I think that they go kind of hand in hand for me, like I can't have one without the other. So I wasn't a hockey fan until I was researching for the prequel Passion or Penalty. That I wrote back in 2021, like the very end of 2021. So I started watching hockey, you know, during that and got super into it and I was like, wow, this is awesome. I should have been watching this way sooner.
Kristen Bahls:Cool. I don't know why. I just assumed that you were a hockey fan before, so that's really cool that your research ended up kind of leading you to that.
Leah Brunner:Yeah, it gave me a whole new hobby.
Kristen Bahls:So then, what made you decide to start with hockey in the first place?
Leah Brunner:I had read a lot of Helena Hunting books some of her older stuff and her all in series, which I love, her All In series and I realized that the kind of sweet lower spice genre really didn't have a lot of sports romance at that time and so I wanted to kind of bring that over to that side and I felt like hockey was the only thing that was really interesting to me and it seemed fascinating and I like winter sports, so basketball is a little too squeaky for me. That's kind of what I grew up seeing in Kansas. That's like the big thing is basketball, but hockey just caught my interest.
Kristen Bahls:Wow, well, that's really cool, Starting to talk a little bit about Betrothal or Break Away. Can you describe the plot in a few sentences for readers?
Leah Brunner:Childhood best friends to lovers enter into a mutual marriage of convenience. That's supposed to be platonic, but the forced proximity causes them to not feel so platonic as they thought they would be feeling.
Kristen Bahls:That's perfect, and Amber is a single mom.
Leah Brunner:Yes, yep, she needs a heart procedure. So he's like. You know what, marry me, I can give you insurance, I can give you help with the baby and what you know. What have we got to lose? What could possibly go wrong?
Kristen Bahls:It just sounded like the perfect arrangement in the book, of course, yeah. Yeah, it just sounded like the perfect arrangement in the book, of course, yeah. So what's the hardest trope that you've written? I feel like marriage of convenience would be really difficult, and you did it in Running Mate as well as this book.
Leah Brunner:Yeah, I would definitely say that Running Mate and Betrayal or Breakaway were my hardest ones to write. And I think it is the marriage of convenience, because we all know that. You know, this is fiction. Probably no one really has marriages of convenience, but you have to make it. Fiction doesn't have to be realistic, but it has to be believable. So making that trope believable and making it make sense, but also putting like a fun spin on it, it's a little challenging, for sure.
Kristen Bahls:Well, I feel like in Betrothal or Breakaway and in Running Mate, both are very believable and they're really unique. I haven't heard like the circumstances kind of like stacking up in that way really on either and other books that have marriage of convenience. So it's a really unique take that you kind of took with both. Yeah.
Leah Brunner:Thank you. I always try to put a fresh spin on things so that it feels different than like something you may have already read. And I, I was thinking, you know, I don't think I've ever read a book that had a marriage of convenience for insurance purposes, but I feel like that might be the most realistic one. I mean, it's still like fraud, just like marrying for, you know, citizenship or anything like that. But I, I was like, you know, this actually kind of makes sense, that she doesn't have insurance, then he does so I know I feel like lately I've read marriage of convenience.
Kristen Bahls:It's more like publicity themed or like they kind of got themselves into some situation and it's all related around publicity, which is not really very believable at all. But, like you said, it's fiction, so I mean either way it's fun, right? So you said that this novel was difficult to write. Did Ford's autism representation and some of the heart problems with Amber and trying to research and the accuracy with those? Did that also make this book a little bit more difficult to write?
Leah Brunner:Yes, I don't know, probably everyone has noticed this, but this book took me longer to write than any of my other books and it was, you know, marriage of convenience, making it believable it was the heart defect and, you know, researching that, making sure I knew what I was talking about, and then the autism and making sure that I got his character just right. So I actually I had to kind of pause for a while and I read a lot of books that featured a character who has autism and kind of studied in my own way and took notes on, you know, what made them, what made them endearing and what made them realistic and what made them feel like a real person with real struggles. So it definitely took more time than some of my other books.
Kristen Bahls:As a former teacher, I can definitely say that you got the autism down can definitely say that you got the autism down.
Leah Brunner:Thank you. My oldest son is on the spectrum and so I drew a lot of inspo from him to without like, like giving him privacy, but, you know, being inspired by kind of our stories, that was kind of fun to write what you know, just a character who would be kind of like him.
Kristen Bahls:Especially in a leadership role and how his friends had no idea the entire time and he was able to completely keep the secret until her decided to tell them in this book. Do your characters normally come first, or is it the plot, or because it's such an interconnected series, do you kind of like pick a character and pull out a plot from there?
Leah Brunner:I feel like I never started out with, oh, this person on Colby and Noelle coming next. But of course Mitch's story came to me and I was like I feel like you know he was such the villain in Passion or Penalty, but he just his story came to me and spoke to me and I was like he needs to be next and I feel like people are not going to like him but they'll end up loving him by the end of the book hopefully. So I think it all worked out.
Kristen Bahls:Yes, I started with Mitch's story first, and then I ended up going back to Passion or Penalty, and so I already loved Mitch by the time.
Leah Brunner:I saw the first part. Yeah, I almost feel like Passion or Penalty is more enjoyed after you've read the rest of the series, like, and that's. You know, obviously I didn't have that experience because I wrote that one first, but yeah, so, but I think it's it's more. It seems more fun to me to go back and revisit all the characters before they found the loves of their life and settled down and everything.
Kristen Bahls:Yeah, and I agree with that. And after listening to Mitch's story, like he, you do reference the first book, of course, a little bit, and so you're talking about some of the strife between Mitch and the other characters in the locker room. Um, and I did get to get a little bit of that in Passion or Penalty, but I liked kind of, like you said, I liked being able to get to know Mitch, get to know their chemistry, and then going back and going, oh okay, that's what happened in in the locker room and on the ice whenever they kind of had a couple of problems at first, when they were making their team.
Leah Brunner:Yeah, it comes full circle.
Kristen Bahls:What has been your favorite scene to write in this book?
Leah Brunner:In Betrothal or Breakaway. I think my favorite scene to write was the lingerie shopping. That one I always write in order, like I start at the beginning and I write all the way to the end. And but this one, that scene came to me and I was like I just have to write this out. And so I wrote it and I just like put a page break and just when it came, you know in sequence, finally I scooted it up where it needed to be. But I just that was my favorite by far.
Kristen Bahls:That was a really funny scene, the whole section. Oh my gosh, poor Ford I know shy little Ford.
Leah Brunner:He just didn't know what he was getting himself into, at least all the other guys were there to kind of help push him a little bit. Colby's like here, I'll help you out, dude. And he's like no, please don't.
Kristen Bahls:It's going to happen anyway, especially with Colby. You're going to get the help, whether you really want it or not. Yes, exactly, be, you're gonna get the help, whether you really want it or not. Yes, exactly. So how do you create really such a camaraderie between I'll first start with, between the teammates? It's kind of like there's. So there are a lot of things that happen kind of in the locker room and on the ice, so you would think, okay, they're two of the same places. It might start to get repetitive, but it never seems repetitive and it always really builds on each other and you kind of keep that like side story going to create their camaraderie. How do you do that?
Leah Brunner:I don't know. I feel like it's almost like a universal fantasy for me to have like such a close friend group, and you all live in the same town, in the same cul-de-sac um, that's like my dream. And so I feel like I write my own dream like into this book. That like found family um, it's kind of how I picture me and my friends would be if we all lived in the same spot.
Leah Brunner:And I think that being a real life hockey fan does come into play there, because I know, you know, that there's a lot of things that happen besides just the games. Like there's a ton of marketing campaigning, you know, like they have to do a lot of photo shoots and different things, and so that gives me some fun ideas of like you know they're going to be on the ice right now, but it's for a photo shoot for their like calendar and not a game. Like I try to mix it up so that, because there's a lot of, there's a broad range of readers and some of them love all the sports. Like I want to feel like I'm there at the game. So I think it's fun to add in those tidbits for the people who maybe aren't so much needing all the sports.
Kristen Bahls:There's a few things in there outside of just playing the sport I appreciate that, like you said, there is a decent amount of the sport, which of course there are some sports romances that you know you could take them and kind of almost like plop them into any sport because it's just so not about that. You get kind of the best, the best of both worlds and whenever I was reading really all of the DC Eagles series, I kind of felt like it was very similar to the vibe, I guess, in Sarah Adams, the Rule Book or the Cheat Sheet where you know the locker room conversations and conversations on and off the ice were just as important to the story. So I really appreciated that. And in addition to their talk you also get a lot between the wives and the girlfriends and I'm sure with them it helps because most of them have been roommates or they kind of already knew each other and then the guys happened to see them when they were all together.
Leah Brunner:It's always fun to write a villain, um, and I feel like when there is a villain in a book, especially like a catty woman or someone who's not a girl's girl, you know, it's like entertaining. But I think that for this series I really wanted to show the positive, you know, light of female friendships and that women aren't, you know, toxic and catty, like we can all be friends, and that I just really wanted that for this group of gals.
Kristen Bahls:Yes, you definitely did that well. It's so fun to read about them and how accepting they are to anyone.
Leah Brunner:Yeah, I love the girls. I want to be their friend.
Kristen Bahls:Which one do you think is the most like you?
Leah Brunner:Probably Andy, because she's like always like she's she's not trying to be mean, but she, she kind of blurts what she's thinking and then later she's like oh, I probably should have said that. So that's totally me and I feel like the sarcasm and just bluntness of Andy is. I also love bubble baths and audio books.
Kristen Bahls:So definitely, I think everyone can agree. And she even got Mitch on her train a little bit yeah. I know she did he tried that one audiobook that did not work out in his favor. I'm glad that he found it.
Leah Brunner:I know poor guy. He didn't know what was going to happen there he thought it was just about hockey. Yeah, I know.
Kristen Bahls:Oh my gosh. Yes, so I saw on Instagram that one of your books was actually used in a promposal. Did you get to talk to the couple or find out a little bit more about that?
Leah Brunner:No, I didn't. I I should have asked some questions because I thought that was so fun. I did not talk to the couple, but now I'm like why didn't I like reach out and ask some questions? I should have done that. Kudos to that guy. That's every girl's dream.
Kristen Bahls:Promposal and a book and then you could even possibly in the future have, um, andy's little brother do that for a girlfriend or something. Yeah, that's true that was a a really, really cute, cute idea. What is the coolest thing that fans have done up until this point for your books?
Leah Brunner:There's been so many fun things. I feel like there's been this one I can't remember the name of the account, but she does. She cross stitches all of the guys from the hockey romances that she reads and I love when she cross-stitches another character and I get to see all my guys cross-stitched there's. Also I had Ashley Funk, sent me friendship bracelets and they have all the guys' last names and numbers on them, which I thought was super cute. There's been some really cool TikToks that people have made with like collages and it's fun to see like who they would picture as each character stuff like that it's pretty fun.
Kristen Bahls:That is so cool. If there was ever going to be a movie made from Betrothal or Breakaway, who would you cast as Ford slash, Remy and Amber and you can take a second to think about that, because that's a hard question Just kind of spring.
Leah Brunner:I don't even have to think about it. Actually, my fan cast for Ford. He was inspired by Henry Cavill, and I'm actually not even the person who always cast Henry Cavill as everything, but when I was thinking of Ford in my mind, I just always cast Henry Cavill as everything. But when I was thinking of Ford in my mind, I just always pictured Henry the strong jaw, the glasses, the dark hair, just perfection. And then the female for Amber would be Isla Fisher. Wouldn't they make a cute couple? Oh yeah, I would love to see that they would make an adorable couple.
Kristen Bahls:I could see them together. Yeah, oh my gosh, so cute. So if you get approached for film rights, you've already done the job of the casting director.
Leah Brunner:Exactly. I'm already like I can just put it in the contract I won't sign unless you get me. Henry Cavill, that's the dream.
Kristen Bahls:So you're on the Amazon top 50 list. How did that kind of come about? Did readers just find you on social media, or was there kind of something that helped get your book out there?
Leah Brunner:TikTok helped me out a lot with Desire or Defense was the one that went to number 41 in the whole Kindle store. It was pretty crazy. Like up till that point I think I'd gotten to like 850 in the whole store, so I'd never been even close to the 100s. I had had a couple TikToks like before the book came out. That did pretty, you know, got a lot of views and that got me pre-orders. But it uh, none of the videos that I was posting after the book released really did anything. But thankfully some people who had pre-ordered it posted TikTok videos and a few of those went really viral and that kind of bumped me up there and thankfully enough, people pre-ordered the next book and the next book. That they've all done, you know, pretty well and gotten up to those higher numbers that I've never dreamt of seeing. So that's been pretty cool.
Kristen Bahls:Hey, I personally found you on Instagram and then, whenever you, you post a lot there and kind of took some of the like, tropes and quotes from your other books and that's that's what sold me. And then, of course, once I found this series.
Leah Brunner:My marketing is working. I'm glad.
Kristen Bahls:Yes, yes it is. And and recommendations there were several, several recommendations, of course, for sure. So, yeah, all that kind of played a role. But cabin mate and uh checkmate are actually coming out on audiobook too. How long does it take to try to work, you know, cast the audiobook and get all that figured out after you already have the books released?
Leah Brunner:it's kind of like a second release a little bit it is, and actually the reason that it'll take me a while to release Bruce's book is because I'll do a simultaneous release that time, so where the audio book, paperback and e-book will all release on the same day and so. But I have to give them time, you know, to narrate it. So typically it depends on the company, but with the DC Eagles book they usually give me some ideas for narrators and then once I approve, you know, narrators for the book, it takes an entire book, but I do really like listening to the audio.
Kristen Bahls:I've kind of done combination audio and ebook. Good, so you have plans coming up for a work in progress and that is not connected to the DC Eagles series, and then you also have DC Eagles coming up. After that, do you think you'll start a new series, completely different? Okay.
Leah Brunner:Yes, I will start a new series. I have lots of ideas and I'm kind of right now, like because I have two more books to write, you know, before I even think about my next series. But yeah, it's fun to think of something like totally different and totally fresh and new that I haven't worked on yet. It's got all this potential and all these new characters that I haven't met yet. So it's pretty exciting to think about it. And will they all be closed door? That's such a tricky question to answer, because I feel like I always want to.
Leah Brunner:It's always my desire to bring, you know, something new to the market, and I think that there are already a lot of spicy books, and you know I love spicy books as much as the next person, um, but I like bringing something new. Uh, that there's, I think, less of, for, you know, a group of people that might not like as much spice or maybe just don't feel comfortable with as much spice, but I I also don't like feeling, I guess, like stuck in a box of. I feel like it kind of limits my creativity and sometimes with certain characters I'm like oh, I feel like this. I feel like this couple needs things spiced up a little bit, which I kind of did, spice it up a little with Ford and Amber, which is hard not to do when they're like sleeping in the same bed and they're literally married.
Kristen Bahls:And they've been friends since childhood and already had that relationship. Yeah.
Leah Brunner:Yes, they've got all this built up tension and friendship, and so, yeah, I I don't like to say for sure one way or the other, but I think that I could say for sure that I will always keep it like lower spice and not like super like. It's never my intention to make something super spicy.
Kristen Bahls:I see and I'm sure, like, as you write the characters, like you said, you kind of tell their story, so you never know what's really going to come out until you're in it. Yeah, but what I've heard in general from readers that do like closed door is, as long as you know, you have modifications in the beginning, they also appreciate that. So, yeah, you know, if you ever did go open door, just having the modification still hits, hits both parties.
Leah Brunner:Right, yeah, I think I would definitely do that. And, um, another thing that I think is important to me is staying consistent through a series. Like you know, if a series started closed door, I think I would keep it that way because you don't want people to feel uncomfortable reading like the rest of the series that they've already fallen in love with. So I think, from series to series, it would always stay consistently the same spice level, no matter what I ended up true, doing or not doing yeah, yeah, that's a good point.
Kristen Bahls:That's a good point to keep it the same throughout the series. That makes sense because you know you get, you get attached to that one grouping and you want to finish it out and you kind of think you know what to expect whenever you know, you're picking up. Is there anything else that you would like to say about Betrothal or Breakaway?
Leah Brunner:Like. I announced the dates for Checkmate and Cabin Mate for audio, but Betrothal or Breakaway is also coming out on audio this summer and I didn't have the date when I posted that, but now I do, and it is July 9th that Betrothal or Breakaway will be here in audio. So just like another month and a half and we'll have it. So I'm excited about that. And Alex Picard is doing the narration for Amber and she has done all of my other female characters except for Passion or Penalty, so that'll stay the same, and then Remy will get his own voice and David Bendina is the narrator for Ford, so I'm'm excited about that.
Kristen Bahls:And do you get to ever kind of like meet or talk to the narrators, or is it just all done?
Leah Brunner:I've chatted with Alex because she's narrated, you know, desire defense, rotation or face off, and now Betrothal or Breakaway. So I have gotten to chat with her and she's tons of fun and super nice. I also chatted with Dane a little bit when he was narrating um Desire Defense. He's the voice of Mitch and he'll also be the voice of David Wendell in uh Checkmate. So I'm excited to to hear him again bring a new character to life.
Kristen Bahls:Well, now I need to go. I need to go finish Checkmate and Cabinmates. I'll be ready to go back and listen to them again on audio. Yes, there you go. Which series was your favorite to write? DC Eagles or Under the Kansas Sky, or they're just so totally different that you like them for different reasons.
Leah Brunner:I do like them for different reasons. I I think that I have enjoyed the DC Eagles a little bit more because I feel like, um, I learned so much while writing that first series. So I feel now that I have a little more confidence in what I'm doing and I know a little bit more what to do to, I guess, make the book bingeable. And I think knowing what I'm doing makes me enjoy the process a little bit more because it's not just like, ah well, okay, I definitely still have those days where I'm like this is trash, throwing it all away, but those days, I think, get a little fewer and further between the more books you write. So but I really enjoyed being in the DC Eagles world.
Kristen Bahls:I love reading the DC Eagles world. I'm so glad and I'm sure that you know with each book of course you always have your own like struggles and challenges with those characters or that plot, but hopefully it gets a little bit easier to kind of crank it out or the mindset you know that it takes to be able to go from idea to full novel and I can't wait to read what you keep writing. Thank you so much for joining me, leah, and that's it for today. Thanks for listening to Where I Left Off A Bookish Podcast. You can visit Leah's site, follow her on social media and purchase her novels through the links in the show notes, or you can also find all of her books on Kindle Unlimited.