Fergie Welcomes Son!
He’s here! Fergie and husband Josh Duhamel welcomed their first child together, a boy named Axl Jack Duhamel. Their rep confirmed the news with People.com,…
Author Interview: Kate Hewitt
Thanks to Kate Hewitt for letting us interview her! Be sure to check out her novel This Fragile Life as well! When did you know…
In My Mailbox: Week of August 25
Title: Hijack in Abstract
Author: Larissa Reinhart
Received: CLP Blog Tours
Synopsis: With a classical series sold and a portrait commissioned, Cherry Tucker’s art career is in Georgia overdrive. But when the sheriff asks Cherry to draw a composite sketch of a hijacker, her life takes a hairpin as the composite leads to a related murder, her local card-sharking buddy Max Avtaikin becomes bear bait and her nemesis labels the classical series “pervert art.”
Cherry’s jamming gears between trailer parks, Atlanta mansions, and trucker bars searching for the hijacker who left a widow and orphan destitute. While she seeks to help the misfortunate and save her local reputation, Cherry’s hammer down attitude has her facing the headlights of an oncoming killer.
The Husband’s Secret by Liane MoriartyTitle: The Husband’s Secret
Author: Liane Moriarty
Received: She Reads
Synopsis: At the heart of The Husband’s Secret is a letter that’s not meant to be read
My darling Cecilia, if you’re reading this, then I’ve died. . .
Imagine that your husband wrote you a letter, to be opened after his death. Imagine, too, that the letter contains his deepest, darkest secret—something with the potential to destroy not just the life you built together, but the lives of others as well. Imagine, then, that you stumble across that letter while your husband is still very much alive. . . .
Cecilia Fitzpatrick has achieved it all—she’s an incredibly successful businesswoman, a pillar of her small community, and a devoted wife and mother. Her life is as orderly and spotless as her home. But that letter is about to change everything, and not just for her: Rachel and Tess barely know Cecilia—or each other—but they too are about to feel the earth-shattering repercussions of her husband’s secret.
Acclaimed author Liane Moriarty has written a gripping, thought-provoking novel about how well it is really possible to know our spouses—and, ultimately, ourselves.
Title: The Theory of Opposites
Author: Allison Winn Scotch
Received: Get Red PR
Synopsis: In her anticipated fifth novel THE THEORY OF OPPOSITES (Publication date: November 12, 2013), New York Times bestselling author Allison Winn Scotch takes readers on one woman’s trek to cast aside her doubts and start owning her choices.
Willa Chandler-Golden and Shawn Golden, aka “Shilla,” are perfectly comfortable. As a couple they do EVERTHING together. They never argue. There aren’t any over-arching marital issues. They’re even trying for a baby. But when Willa spots a credit card receipt to a trendy Manhattan club in Shawn’s wallet, she senses that something is awry with her handsome but nerdy better half.
Soon after her discovery, her neat house of cards collapses at rapid speed. Willa is fired from her job. She learns that her tween nephew is moving in. Her Yogi-to-the-Stars brother is indicted for a Ponzi scheme. Her best friend Vanessa gets the best writing gig on the hottest new reality show Dare You! And a former boyfriend has requested to be friended on Facebook . . . but that’s just the tip of the iceberg: Shawn announces—with a list of rules— that he wants a two month “break” from the marriage.
Is this her destiny or can Willa change the topsy-turvy direction of her life? According to her father—the author of the bestselling Is It Really Your Choice? Why Your Entire Life May Be Out of Your Control—you can’t escape the inevitable. It’s a thesis that Willa doubts, but one that’s controlled her life and has kept her in the safe cocoon of inertia.
Prodded by Vanessa, Willa signs on to help write The Theory of Opposites, a book that contradicts her father’s premise. Willa becomes a guinea pig for the book’s concept when she is dared by Vanessa to step out from behind her father’s shadow to live her life and take chances.
Will Willa be brave enough to get out of her own way and write her own map to a rewarding life?
THE THEORY OF OPPOSITES is Allison Winn Scotch’s heartfelt and funny tale about life’s curveballs and how to catch them … or not.
For the Love of Cupcakes by ANita KushwahaTitle: For the Love of Cupcakes
Author: Anita Kushwaha
Received: Anita Kushwaha
Synopsis: Priya Patel has wanted to become a baker since the first time she saw the light of her Easy Bake Oven. However, working as an assistant baker at Sugarplum Fairy Cakes isn’t the glamorous life she dreamed about. Priya tries to impress her boss, Helen Bouffant, with creative twists on traditional recipes but her culinary skills are completely ignored as she is forced to scrub toilets and clean up everyone else’s mess. After Priya is blamed for a major screw up at Sugarplum Fairy Cakes, she decides to throw in her apron. With the support of her husband, Arj, and a kick in the pants from her best friend, Mae, she decides to start her own cupcakery.
Just when Priya thinks she’s washed her hands of Helen once and for all, they both enter a charity bake off with a grand prize of $10,000. Priya will have to cook the most creative, delicious cupcakes of her life and defend herself against Helen, who will stop at nothing to see Priya and her cupcakery fail. The competition gets heated but there is one thing that will keep Priya going- the love of cupcakes. Does she have what it takes to win the bake-off? Whose talent will prevail?
For the Love of Cupcakes will leave your mouth watering for cupcakes and your cheeks sore from smiling.
The Reluctant Bride by Beverley EikliTitle: The Reluctant Bride
Author: Beverley Eikli
Received: Choc Lit
Synopsis: Can honour and action banish the shadows of old sins?
Emily Micklen has no option after the death of her loving fiancé, Jack, but to marry the scarred, taciturn, soldier who represents her only escape from destitution.
Major Angus McCartney is tormented by the reproachful slate-grey eyes of two strikingly similar women: Jessamine, his dead mistress, and Emily, the unobtainable beauty who is now his reluctant bride.
Emily’s loyalty to Jack’s memory is matched only by Angus’s determination to atone for the past and win his wife with honour and action. As Napoleon cuts a swathe across Europe, Angus is sent to France on a mission of national security, forcing Emily to confront both her allegiance to Jack and her traitorous half-French family.
Angus and Emily may find love, but will the secrets they uncover divide them forever?
You Knew Me When by Emily LiebertTitle: You Knew Me When
Author: Emily Liebert
Received: Sarah Hall Productions
Synopsis: Best friends forever…until life got in the way.
Katherine Hill left her small New England hometown in pursuit of a dream. Now, twelve years later, she’s a high-powered cosmetics executive in Manhattan and a much glossier version of her former self, unrecognizable to her family and old friends. Not that she would know—she hasn’t been home in over a decade.
Laney Marten always swore she’d never get “stuck” in Manchester, Vermont. No, she was destined to live out her glamorous big-city dreams. Instead, she wound up a young wife and mother. That was when her best friend ran out.
When Katherine receives word of an inheritance from former neighbor Luella Hancock, she reluctantly returns home to the people and places she left behind. Hoping for a second chance, she’s met by an unforgiving Laney, her former best friend. And there’s someone else who’s moved on without her—someone she once loved.
Tethered to their shared inheritance of Luella’s sprawling Victorian mansion, Katherine and Laney are forced to address their long-standing grudges. Through this, they come to understand that while life has taken them in different directions, ultimately the bonds of friendship and sisterhood still bind them together. But are some wounds too old and deep to mend?
Kiss Me In Paris by Kimberly KinradeTitle: Kiss Me in Paris
Author: Kimberly Kinrade & Dmytry Karpov
Received: Badass Marketing
Synopsis: When the city of love brings two lost souls together, only their darkest secrets can tear them apart.
Winter Deveaux tried love once. It didn’t end well. Unable to open herself up to another heartbreak, she hides in her romance novels as she struggles to break out as a real author. She thinks Paris holds the answer to a new start, but when her nightmare follows her across the world, she’s forced to face the darkness living like cancer inside her soul. If she doesn’t, she might miss her chance to become the kind of writer she’s always wanted to be. But more than that, she’ll miss out on the greatest love she’s ever known.
Cade Savage is heir to the largest ranching family in Texas. Part cowboy, part architect, Cade has his feet forever in two worlds. When he receives an acceptance letter from the school of his dreams, he must decide between family and destiny. But ghosts from his past still haunt him, and circumstances beyond his control may decide his fate.
When Winter and Cade meet, everything they believe about life, love and what it means to be happy is put to the test.
Will the magic of Paris pull these two lost souls together? Or will their darkest secrets tear them apart?
Wedding Countdown: Two Weeks!
Two weeks. TWO WEEKS. OMG, the two week countdown is here! I thought it was so bizarre once one month rolled around and I was saying to people, “I’m getting married in a month.” But now two weeks?! Okay, I’ll try to stop saying that. Puzzle pieces are falling into place. Final numbers are being tallied. Balances are being paid. Week of and day of schedules are being written. My days are getting filled with appointments – for wedding dress fittings, hair highlights, a meeting with the photographer and cake lady. The gifts we bought for our wedding party are being delivered and packaged. Our marriage license has been applied for. Family is going to start coming in just one week – so excited to see my mom! These last two weeks are going to be fairly maniacal, but the end result will be so worth. Husband and wife. This year of engagement has absolutely flown by, and I’m sure these two weeks will as well. My Twitter statuses might get a little out of control but if you want to follow my excitement, I’m @chicklitplus. Two weeks…until I’m a bride. Pinching myself.
Cover Reveal: Bird of Prey by Danielle Claude Ngontang
This was supposed to be an easy case… Sémya Slotin had spent the last three years living in London with her best friend Polliannah Koch…
In My Mailbox: Week of August 18
Title: Everybody’s Got a Story
Author: Heather Wardell
Received: CLP Blog Tours
Synopsis: Both personally and professionally, Alexa knows all too well the power of words. Two years after her boyfriend Christophe’s vicious attack, she’s still trying to see herself as more than simply ‘his victim’, still trying to figure out her own story.
After his trial, she moves from New York City to Toronto in an attempt to start over, but his words cling to her and even in a new country she can’t see how to move into relationships with the new people in her life while hiding the secret of Christophe’s worst offense.
She can’t hide that secret from her coworker Jake, though, because the news buff has recognized her from the coverage of the assault and trial and knows every word she can’t bring herself to say about her ordeal.
With Jake’s help, can Alexa reclaim her story and her life?
Title: The Girl You Left Behind
Author: Jojo Moyes
Received: Penguin/SheReads
Synopsis: From the New York Times–bestselling author of Me Before You, a spellbinding love story of two women separated by a century but united in their determination to fight for what they love most
Jojo Moyes’s bestseller, Me Before You, catapulted her to wide critical acclaim and has struck a chord with readers everywhere. “Hopelessly and hopefully romantic” (Chicago Tribune), Moyes returns with another irresistible heartbreaker that asks, “Whatever happened to the girl you left behind?”
France, 1916: Artist Edouard Lefevre leaves his young wife, Sophie, to fight at the front. When their small town falls to the Germans in the midst of World War I, Edouard’s portrait of Sophie draws the eye of the new Kommandant. As the officer’s dangerous obsession deepens, Sophie will risk everything—her family, her reputation, and her life—to see her husband again.
Almost a century later, Sophie’s portrait is given to Liv Halston by her young husband shortly before his sudden death. A chance encounter reveals the painting’s true worth, and a battle begins for who its legitimate owner is—putting Liv’s belief in what is right to the ultimate test.
Like Sarah Blake’s The Postmistress and Tatiana de Rosnay’s Sarah’s Key, The Girl You Left Behind is a breathtaking story of love, loss, and sacrifice told with Moyes’s signature ability to capture our hearts with every turn of the page.
Title: Chase
Author: Jill Knapp Zitron
Received: Media Connect
Synopsis: When Amalia Hastings first came to New York to get her master’s degree at NYU, she didn’t think life could get much better – a perfect boyfriend, a great apartment, solid friends, and the pursuit of a successful career in medicine. One by one, she starts to lose the people and things she cherished most. Having never imagined life without them, it becomes a struggle for her to get back on track. But when a break-up, a new love interest, and several unexpected events test her strength, she comes to realize she’s a lot stronger than she would’ve ever imagined.
Title: Love and Happiness
Author: Galt Niederhoffer
Received: St. Martins Press
Synopsis: Jean Banks’ life is middling to poor. Her job as a film producer largely involves cold calling investors. Her sex drive for director husband Sam has all but vanished. Her children are a delight, but also a constant reminder that she’s not an unattached, twenty-something artist anymore. Put simply, Jean is in a midlife rut.
…until she clicks a button. Until the cache of unsent emails she’s written to Doug, her college flame, blasts across the World Wide Web. Until she meets handsome stranger Benjamin Kraft on a business trip and falls truly, madly, deeply for him. Now the cornerstone of a love quadrangle, Jean must choose—either the safe, day-to-day equilibrium she’s come to inhabit, or a liberation that will split her life open at its seams.
This is Forty for the Park Slope set, LOVE AND HAPPINESS perfects the balance between the Victorian and the modern that Niederhoffer first achieved in A Taxonomy of Barnacles. Her third novel artfully examines relationships, family, and the film world, with a style that winks at both Madame Bovary and Miranda July.
Title: Maybe I Will
Author: Laurie Gray
Received: Novel Publicity
Synopsis: It’s not about sex.
It’s about how one secret act of violence changes everything–how best friends can desert you when you need them most, how nobody understands. It’s about the drinking and stealing and lying and wondering who you can trust. It’s about parents and teachers, police officers and counselors–all the people who are supposed to help you, but who may not even believe you.
It’s about how suddenly all of your hopes and dreams can vanish, and you can find yourself all alone, with nothing and no one. Your only choice is to end it all or to start over… and all you can think is Maybe I Will.
Author Laurie Gray presents a compelling picture of the realities of sexual assault in Maybe I Will, drawing on her years of experience as a Deputy Prosecuting Attorney, dealing with crimes against children. The twist in the story is that we never know for sure if the victim is a boy or a girl, and we realize that it doesn’t matter, because it’s not about sex.
Title: Bargain Struck
Author: Liz Harris
Received: Choc Lit
Synopsis: Does a good deal make a marriage?
Widower Connor Maguire advertises for a wife to raise his young daughter, Bridget, work the homestead and bear him a son.
Ellen O’Sullivan longs for a home, a husband and a family. On paper, she is everything Connor needs in a wife. However, it soon becomes clear that Ellen has not been entirely truthful.
Will Connor be able to overlook Ellen’s dishonesty and keep to his side of the bargain? Or will Bridget’s resentment, the attentions of the beautiful Miss Quinn, and the arrival of an unwelcome visitor, combine to prevent the couple from starting anew.
As their personal feelings blur the boundaries of their deal, they begin to wonder if a bargain struck makes a marriage worth keeping.
Wedding Update: Less Than One Month!
In twenty-four days, I become a wife. Holy buckets, where has the time gone? This year has flown by, and now my days are filled with last minute details – confirming with my vendors, making a play list for the DJ, planning the rehearsal dinner. We just applied for our marriage license last week and now have that bad boy in our possession. My mom will get to Iowa in just two weeks and I will be so glad to finally have her here and going through this with me. The week before the wedding is started to get filled with appointments – hair, nails, soldering the rings, final dress fitting and pick up. Our ceremony outline and songs have been confirmed, our decorations are being delivered, and the RSVP’s are still trickling in. We have a spare room in our house that was dubbed “The Wedding Room” once we moved in, and now you can barely cross the threshold because it’s jam packed with boxes. I have my second dress fitting tonight and my maids will be learning how to bustle my dress. I’m so excited for this one because I’m curious to see how it will look. My train is quite large and there are seventeen hook and eye boppers for the bustle, so it’s going to take some time to get done! But I’m looking forward to seeing the finished product 🙂 I have to make this post short because well…I’m getting married in twenty-four days and up to my eyes in stress and my to-do list 😉
Novel Spotlight: Winter at Death’s Hotel by Kenneth Cameron
Blurb: New York, January 1896. Arthur Conan Doyle, the renowned created of Sherlock Holmes, arrives with his wife Louisa at the Britannic Hotel in New…
Interview with Laura Barnard
When did you know writing was for you?
From a very young age. My mum says even as a small toddler I was obsessed with books and the minute I could put pen to paper I was coming up with all sorts of stories. I used to bore my mum senseless making her listen to them. As I got older I started to pester teachers with marking extra stories, but then hit my teens and got a bit shy.
How would you describe your books?
I would say they are a portal for you to enter into another woman’s hilarious life. There are laugh out loud moments, but also serious, tender moments. There’s a romance (the amount of people that refer to Ryan as a real person is hysterical!), but really my book is centered around friendship. It shows with the right love and support you can get through and laugh about anything.
Why was The Debt and the Doormat a book you wanted to write?
A lot of my friends started struggling with debt and they’d always come to me embarrassed, as I’m normally so careful and organised with money. I would try to help them, but realize that unless you totally take control over someone there is no way you can change them. That’s where the idea came from. I still get phone calls from friends, frantically asking me ‘Am I Jazz???’ However, without these friends I would be a total bore! I’m such a Poppy! They’re the ones persuading me to get another bottle of wine in or treat myself to a new outfit. I think opposites suit each other as they can both bring out the best in the other.
What is the hardest part of the writing process for you?
The beginning! I have so many ideas, its sometimes hard to focus on just one. I like to have a rough idea of the story and then work on characters. I go so ridiculously in depth – I write interview questions for them, find similar looking celebrities, even find what sort of clothes they would wear and what kind of vocabulary they would use. Once I have a set of solid characters they seem to guide me on where the book goes and sometimes its in a totally different direction!
What are your favorite genres to read?
I love reading chic-lit and my favorite authors are Madeleine Wickham (writing as both herself and Sophie Kinsella) and Lindsay Kelk. However, while writing this I tried to broaden my tastes and wondered around my local library selecting books I wouldn’t normally bother with – crime thrillers, erotic and heavily romantic Mills and Boon books. It was strange going outside of my usual comfort zone but I loved them and feel each one taught me something different. I learnt how to write tense, edge of your seat scenes and I learnt how to write a love story the reader completely goes head over heels for.
What do you want readers to take away from your story?
Mainly I just want them to have a good laugh and when they finish the book feel like they’ve lost a friend. A great book is one you keep thinking about and wish was a bit longer. If you can remember a scene from it a few weeks later and have a giggle its a good one.
How important do you think social media is for authors these days?
I think its hugely important, especially for self-publishing. Before social media there was really no other way of mass-promoting your work on such a huge scale. You can also hear up to date information from reviewers and receive comments from the public. It’s like skipping the messenger and having everything to hand.
What would be your advice to aspiring writers
Keep writing! Sometimes it can feel like you are getting nowhere but if you carry on you’ll be surprised at how you can pull something together. The best advice given to me was by my college Tutor, Ian St Peters, who said ‘Writing is a craft. You have to perfect it over time, but if you don’t enjoy it don’t bother.’ I genuinely love writing and if only a handful of people also enjoy my story that really is enough satisfaction for me. If it isn’t maybe you’re in the wrong game.
