Where you do you get your ideas? That is one of the most common questions I’ve been asked over my long career as a published author. Usually, I say everywhere and it’s true.
However, when it comes to my latest release, Ruthless Enforcer, I got the idea for the setting from someplace I know very well. Portland and it’s surrounding areas is near and dear to my heart because I live in one of those suburbs and consider Portland’s city center my Downtown.
By the way, that’s Portland, Oregon, not Portland, Maine.
From the annual Naked Bike Ride protesting the overuse of fossil fuels to the vibrant theater and music scene, Portland is a city with its own distinctive personality and culture. The perfect place (to me) to set a book.
Several years ago, we were driving by an abandoned shipping yard, and I couldn’t help wondering what kind of business would take over the space. When I started planning for my book, Ruthless Enforcer, I decided that business would be run by the Greek mafia.
So many other things about Portland worked for the story. The large but close knit Balkan community, the lack of a distinctive mafia presence in the city, the way Portland goes from totally urban to unpopulated industrial areas and even farmland within an hour’s drive in several directions.
When the heroine in Ruthless Enforcer, Lucia, runs from her life in the Italian mafia in Detroit, she chooses Portland for some of those same reasons. They play a role in Atlas and his brothers deciding to establish territory for the Ádis Adelfótita (Hades Brotherhood – their Greek mafia) in Portland as well.
Out Today
RUTHLESS ENFORCER
by Lucy Monroe
USA Today bestselling author Lucy Monroe introduces a new Greek syndicate in her spicy mafia romance series, Syndicate Rules.
LUCIA
I ran from the Cosa Nostra after a rival syndicate killed my husband. I live like a normal person now. Atlas shows up in my club when everything in my life is finally coming together and I think it’s fate. I’ve never trusted anyone with my darkest desires…until him.
Then I learn the man I love is everything I am running from and now he’s my enemy.
ATLAS
I never wanted any woman this bad, this fast. From her luscious curves to her eagerness for bedroom games, Lucia is perfect for me. But when she finds out what I’m there for, she hates me. I’m head enforcer for a reason though. I don’t let anything stop me from getting what I want. That includes her.
Because she needs my protection as much as I need her light and if I have to get her pregnant to keep her, we’ll both enjoy every minute of it.
