Improvisation

After a lifetime of moving and change, Jan Carroll wants nothing more than to settle down and build a home. Then her father gets sick, and the stable?if solitary?life she’s made as a high school geometry teacher in Spokane, Washington, threatens to crumble around her. She wants little to do with newcomer Tina Nelson, a shallow and unreliable playgirl. Especially since their mutual friend Brooke Stanton has been not-so-subtly matchmaking?

Tina, a graphic artist and musician, has vowed to spend her life free from the obligations that characterized her youth. No ties, no long-term commitments. But she agrees to travel to Spokane to help her cousin promote his business and, in a second moment of weakness, promises to contact Jan. Tina is certain her acquaintance with the too-logical and inflexible woman will be a short one.

Sometimes, though, love makes you throw away life’s careful script. Can these women learn to improvise?

Karis is a Pacific Northwest native with a BA in English from Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, and a few years of postgraduate work in Classics at UW in Seattle. Naturally, this education led to a career as a horseback riding instructor. She has been teaching for over twenty years and has been published in a national equestrian magazine. She lives on a small farm in Washington with a black cat, goats, and a foster horse from a local equine rescue group. She spends most of her free time reading, playing the violin and viola, and riding with friends.