A lovely email from a reader this morning prompted me to write this post. She had just finished reading Midnight Ride, featuring Tyler Jenkins as the hero and Rohn Lerner as his boss and future hero of Book 2 in the Midnight Cowboys series titled MIDNIGHT WRANGLER.
She was curious to know how to pronounce Rohn’s name, because of the odd spelling with the ‘h’. I totally get that!! I hate when I’m reading a book and I don’t know how the name is pronounced so I decided to clear up the doubt for readers of the series right now.
ROHN IS PROUNOUNCED LIKE “JOHN”
Why the added ‘h’? There’s a good reason.
Picture it… I’m in Vegas for the PBR Finals a couple of years ago (that’s Professional Bull Riders, for you city folk) and my friends and I are sitting in the bar at Mandalay Bay, if memory serves. There are bull riders and fans alike swarming around like bees on a summer day, and good bar real estate was hard to procure but we managed to grab a table and four stools, and the drinks were flowing.
Next to us in that crowded bar sat a sexy older cowboy, his wife, his daughter and her boyfriend. We were tight pack so of course we started talking since we were pretty much shoulder-to-shoulder. Lo and behold, they were all from Alaska, and they were bonafide cowboys, not just men wearing cowboy hats for the Finals. And their names were–wait for it–Rohn and Colton.
Now, being an author, I always warn people up front that anything they say or do will likely end up in a future book, and I warned them right then that I was stealing those names for my next cowboy series–Midnight Cowboys.
That’s how Tyler’s boss became Rohn and his coworker on the ranch became Colton.
Oh, and why the ‘h’ in Rohn’s name? It turns out the real life Rohn is a twin, and his brother’s name is John so his mother put an ‘h’ in the name Ron, I assume so they’d match. Rohn and his lovely wife did the same, adding an ‘h’ when naming their daughter, Tahra.
So there you go, the truth behind the fiction. Oh, and for those who didn’t see my post on Facebook, I finally have all three covers for the Midnight Cowboy series! Here is the mockup for my new bookmarks.
The Midnight Cowboys Series
“Johnson is a master at pushing boundaries, and the opening of her Midnight Cowboys series is no exception.”RT Book Reviews
Midnight Ride (Tyler)
Midnight Wrangler (Rohn)
Midnight Heat (Justin)
2 thoughts on “The Story Behind the Story – Midnight Cowboys’ Rohn”
Ahhhh…I have fond (yet fuzzy) memories of that night in the bar.
Ah, now see, to me it makes total sense to have a name like Rohn. I have a nieces named Tawnya and Teena. Extra letters are normal. 😀 However, I did enjoy you sharing the story behind the story. Lovely! Thank you.
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