Review: Stealing Harper By Molly McAdams

This is Chase's POV from Taking Chances.

Chase Grayson has never been interested in having a relationship that lasts longer than it takes for him and his date to get dressed again. But then he stumbles into a gray-eyed girl whose innocence pours off her, and everything changes. From the minute Harper opens her mouth to let him know just how much he disgusts her, he's hooked.

But a princess deserves a Prince Charming who can make her dreams come true. Not a guy who can turn her life into a nightmare.

All good intentions go out the window when Harper starts to fall for the guy Chase has come to view as a brother. He wanted to protect her by keeping her away, but he can't stand to see her with anyone else, and he'll do anything to make her his. But when it comes down to Harper choosing between the two, will Chase have the strength to step back from the girl who has become his whole world if it means she's happy?

Lines will be crossed. Friendships will be put to the test. And hearts will be shattered.

CAUTION: DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT READ TAKING CHANCES

If you read my review of Taking Chances or hell even if you had any contact with me for about a week after reading it you know, you know how much that book DESTROYED me.  I cried for days, I cried while writing my review, I cried so much my eyes stayed red.  I cursed my book bestie Gabrielle for having me read the book while at the same time loving her for bullying me into reading it.   I wanted to send Molly McAdams a bill for therapy and tissues.  I wanted to have Chase for myself.

So I am sure you are all asking yourselves why in the hell did you read Stealing Harper Janna when you knew what would happen and how upset you were before.  I will tell you why.  I needed Chase’s POV, I needed to see inside his mind and heart to see if all the love I had for him in Taking Chances would be the same in Stealing Harper. I can safely say that no my love for Chase isn’t the same, it is more intense.  I love him even more after reading his POV.

Chase knew he had screwed up when he pushed Harper into Brandon’s life, but he never expected for it to destroy him as much as it did just seeing her with his best friend.  He fought the attraction, he tried to just be friends, but when you are so deeply in love with someone staying away isn’t always easy.  He broke my heart more than once because he just wanted Harper to take a chance on him so he could prove that she was his one and only once and for all.  When we read the events leading up to the end of the book, you feel the anxiety forming because you know what is about to happen and you can’t stop it no matter how hard you wish the words you are about to read weren’t true.  Awe hell I have tears in my eyes again just thinking about it.

Now I am taking a text that I had with my book bestie and this should kind of hint at what I feel for Harper, I wasn’t a huge fan of her in Taking Chances but in Stealing Harper she made me hate her for how much pain she put Chase through.  Okay so here is what I said “I want to do a combo vag kick throat punch bitch slap to Harper”.  Yep that basically sums up how I feel.

I have cried before with books, I am an emotional person so I feel harder than some people might.  Taking Chances and Stealing Harper are books I will never forget.  They will hold a special place in my heart because they made me feel so many emotions so deeply that they imprinted into my heart and soul.  I am looking forward to reading Trusting Liam because I just know that it will be just as amazing as the first two books.  Molly McAdams you have shredded my heart, caused me to go through boxes, yes boxes of tissues, and you have a way to make something that is so painful still be beautiful and moving to your readers.

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Blog Tour: The Summer Remains By Seth King

Twenty-four-year-old Summer Johnson knows two things. The first is that due to a quickly worsening medical condition, she faces a risky surgery in three months’ time that may very well end in her death. The second is that she would like to fall in love before then.
As spring sinks into her namesake season on the Florida coastline, Summer plays the odds and downloads a new dating app - and after one intriguing message from a beautiful surfer named Cooper Nichols, it becomes clear that the story of what may be her last few months under the sun is about to be completely revised. All she has to do now is write something worth reading.

Tender, honest, devastating and triumphant, The Summer Remains explores a very human battle being waged in a very digital age: the search for a love that will outlast this temporary borrowing of bones. In an era when many feel compelled to share and re-share anything about everything, prepare to feel a love so special, you will want to hug it close and make it yours forever.

Ugly Cry alert! Have your tissues handy and don’t plan to read this in public because this will have you crying ugly tears.

Rarely there is a book that has moved me as much as The Summer Remains has.  I am sitting here trying to find the words to express what I felt while reading this and I am having one of the hardest times I have ever had writing a review because nothing seems to perfectly describe it.  This is the first book by Seth King that I have ever read and I can say without a shadow of a doubt that it will not be my last.

Normally when I don’t want to give anything away in my reviews I say that it will be short and sweet.  I am not going to give anything away but I don’t know if I could even do short and sweet for this book because I want to try to convince our readers the beauty that is The Summer Remains.  This book will move you emotionally; will change all your preconceived notions of what you believe a romance should be, it will change you.   Summer and Cooper will hold a special place in your heart.  Yes it is an ugly cry type of book, but the beauty that it contains will make each and every one of your tears worth it.  If you don’t feel some sort of emotion while reading The Summer Remains then, please check your pulse and make sure you are alive because there is no possible way that you won’t feel anything but I can almost guarantee you will feel something that stays with you even after you finish. I could go on and on about how much I loved this book, and about how emotionally moving it was for me, but I won’t because I want you to experience the feelings for yourself, so please just go get it and experience it for yourself.

Find on Goodreads

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Chapter 1
On a sunny Tuesday morning towards the end of March, a white-haired man walked into a cold room and told me I might die soon.
I fidgeted on the hospital bed as Dr. Steinberg entered, the late-spring sunlight mocking me as smiled onto the industrial tile floors. I’d known Steinberg since I was four. He’d handled almost all of my throat problems, and I trusted him. He was like a second father to me, and I knew he would always tell me the truth.
That’s why the look on his face scared the living shit out of me.
I listened for the next ten minutes as he gave me the gist of the story. It was all so surreal that my mind could only catch certain phrases before the sentence would run away from me again:
Your esophagus has ruptured again, for good this time…
Your stomach is leaking more and more…
Toxicity levels are through the roof…
Your body just isn’t getting the nutrients it needs from your feeding tube any longer…
And finally, terminal.
“Terminal?” I heard myself squeak, my throat filling up with that weird, shivery feeling you get when you know your life has just changed. Steinberg suddenly became very interested in a fraying string on the sleeve of his jacket.
“T-terminal,” he stuttered. “Summer, the thing is…I’m afraid this is a…well, nobody has ever…”
He finally cleared his throat and met my gaze, tears pooling in the corners of his cerulean eyes. “Sweetheart, I am so sorry to tell you this, but this mountain may be unclimbable for you.”
My mother let out a small, sharp sob in the corner and then clapped her hands over her mouth.
“Okay, unclimbable,” I swallowed, staring down at the floor as I tried to grasp just what that word now meant to me and my family and this weird little life I had created for myself.  “Okay. Unclimbable. Okay.”
But Steinberg wasn’t done yet.
“Hold on. I said it may be unclimbable, not that it definitely will be. I want to prepare you, and I don’t want to give you any false hope, but there may be something we can do, Summer. It’s a small chance, but still, it’s a chance. A Hail Mary, if you will.”
I reached up to rub my temples. “Okay, well, survival sounds good. Better than death, I suppose. What is this Hail Mary?”
Steinberg crossed his arms, studied me for a moment, and then took out a chart and launched into a spiel about something called the Porter-Collins Procedure, an extremely major surgery that would perhaps be saving my life in three months’ time.
“Nobody has ever survived this particular operation,” he concluded a few minutes later, skipping all the medical jargon to keep from boring you to death, pardon my pun. “Nobody. It’s been attempted three times, but none of those were ultimately successful. One person survived for three months in intensive care, but she was fifty-one, and in frail health in general. We think you’re a much more viable candidate, but then again, there is no way to be sure. We can do it in two, maybe three months, after I assemble the specialists and create a game plan – considering your health doesn’t take another nosedive before then, that is. If we’re going to try this, we need you in tip-top shape – or as close to that as we can get you, anyway.”
“Okay,” I said again, sitting a little taller. “And what are the chances that this Hail Mary will even work, and that I won’t just die a few days later, anyway?”
He peered down at me from over his glasses. “I’m afraid to say that it would be stretching things to even tell you eighty/twenty.”
I steeled myself and took a breath. “Okay, well, that’s better than a hundred to zero. Let’s go out with a bang, then, Steinberg. Let’s do this.”
He threw up a fist, triumphant, but I could see the fear in his eyes. “It’s settled, then. Hail Mary it is.”
My mom rushed over to sit beside me and kind of hang onto my shoulder as some counselor woman came in who helped families handle these types of situations – “transitions,” she called them, and just hearing that word threatened to pull me under. Dr. Steinberg watched, an apology on his face, as she said things like “preparations” and “options” and “arrangements.” I tried to be polite and pay attention, but truthfully I didn’t give a damn about what she was saying. It was go time, and things were looking grim. I already knew that. The wet, metallic panic erupting in my stomach was due to an entirely different subject.
“And finally,” the counselor, Angie, said in a hushed, clipped, polite voice that spoke of years of having impossible conversations with worried families huddled in chilly waiting rooms, “I work very closely with Last Great Hope, a wonderful organization that specializes in situations like this, and if there is anything you want before the surgery, Summer – a trip to Tahiti, a cabin in the mountains, whatever – we can do it. Or if-”
“Thanks, but no thanks,” I said, making her stop short.
“Wh – excuse me?”
“Save the Disney trips for the twelve-year-olds,” I told her. “Spend all that money on a cancer kid or something; I know the truth about those fairy tales now. Make someone else happy – I’ve got everything I need. Or almost everything.” I paused as everyone leaned in. “I do have one request, actually. First of all, all of you are forgetting something vital.”
“Oh no, did we forget your milk?” my mom asked as she reached for her purse. “I thought I put some-”
“No, Shelly, we did not forget the baby milk I pump into my stomach tube every day to keep myself alive because my throat doesn’t work, but that does have something to do with it.”
As she pouted in my general direction I realized what a complete bitch I was being, and then I realized just as quickly that I probably wouldn’t be able to stop myself anyway.
“What is it, then?” my mom asked, stung, and I took a breath and then pushed it back out.
“Frankly, I need all of you to chill the fuck out.”
My mom dropped her purse onto her lap. Dr. Steinberg looked at me like I’d just tried to jump out of the third story window. Angie held her pen in midair and stared at me, the sun turning her brownish eyes ocher.
“Excuse me, young lady?” my mother asked. “We need to what?”
“Chill the eff out,” I said, editing my language the second time around. “Sorry, but all this emotion and drama and doom and gloom crap is already making me freak out. You’re all forgetting I’ve had a broken throat and a tube in my abdomen since I was in diapers, and that I can handle this. I’ve dealt with health scares before, and I will do it again, no matter how much scarier this Scare is than all the other Scares. Like, I know you’re trying to help and stuff, and I love you, but having meltdowns in front of me is not going to help me deal with all this, so please, I beg you, everyone take a deep breath, close your eyes, and get your panties out of a bunch.”
“We’re sorry,” my mom said after an impossibly long and awkward moment. “It’s just that we need to prepare you for…for what will happen, and-”
“Prepare me to die?” I asked. “Guess what, Shelly, I’m going to die one day, be it in three months or sixty years, and wasting all my time crying over it isn’t going to help. Here’s what I want, my one last wish – or my maybe-not-last wish, or whatever the hell this is.” A tear appeared in my mom’s eye, and I softened my voice as I reached up to wipe her cheek. “Okay. Before the surgery, I want to have a normal summer by the beach,” I began as I cleared her eye and shook the water from my finger. “I want to go to the sea and go to work and read my books and go about my business like usual without everyone breathing down my neck and treating me like A Broken Person, because if I am treated like A Broken Person for one more month of my life I will break some faces, no offense. Shelly, if you so much as make one special meal – I mean, not that I can eat or anything, because I can’t – anyway, I’m burning down the house. There will literally be a pile of smoldering ashes where your kitchen used to be, I promise.” Shelly pouted again, but I trudged through. “I’m serious, no special treatment. No Christmases in July, no excessive hugging, not even a midnight run to Target for some trinkets from the dollar section. And most of all…”
I looked around and, seeing sympathy in everyone’s eyes and knowing this request would be completely futile, said – “No sympathy. Please. The sympathy is what breaks me and makes me feel broken. If this is gonna be my last chance to live and have fun and be normal, then I’m going to need to feel as normal as possible, and that means absolutely no pity, because that separates me from everyone else and makes me Different with a capital D. And if I don’t stay in a good headspace I’m gonna spend the next three months in a fetal position in my closet having an endless anxiety attack about the surgery, so please work with me here and keep the pity locked up.”
A sigh and a smile. Shelly put her hand on mine. “I would never pity you, Summer. You’re the strongest person I know, and you always have been. You know that. We all know that. That’s not what this is about.”
I tried to smile back. “Thanks, Shelly.”
“Anytime. And can you please call me Mom, like a normal twenty-four-year-old?”
“Not a chance, Shelly.”
“Okay, fine. So, then…a Jax Beach summer? Is that really all you want?”
I paused as her words hung in the overly sanitized air. It wasn’t all, and I knew it. As I sat there I thought of the one thing I didn’t have, the one thing I’d never had, the one thing that screamed at me from the silence and jumped out at me from the shadows – and now that this upcoming summer had perhaps just become Summer’s Last Stand, my desire was suddenly more urgent than ever. I knew I wouldn’t be able to stop the longing from rising to my face, and as I felt the blood burn my cheeks I caught Steinberg’s eyes again, which just embarrassed me even more.
“Well, I mean, since you’re asking, there is one thing…”
“Anything!” Shelly and Dr. Steinberg said at exactly the same time, and I stared out of the window as my eyes got all weird and watery.
“Okay, well, I know something so sentimental is going to sound crazy coming from someone so…well, you know how I am…”
“Honest?” Steinberg offered, trying to be polite.
“Opinionated?” Shelly said.
“Brash?” Angie asked, even though she’d just met me ten minutes ago and it was literally beyond embarrassing that she already held that opinion of me.
“Headstrong and stubborn and annoying,” I finally said, shoving it out of the way, and they all nodded. “Anyway, here goes. Since you’re asking, the thing is…well, I’d like to fall in love.”
I looked down at the ground again as everyone in the room broke my most important rule already: I could feel their pity descending on me, smothering me just like it had my entire life, snuffing out any chance I had at being treated like a normal, living, breathing human, who deserved to love and be loved just like anyone else, as they say in the Hallmark cards.
“Oh, honey…” Steinberg sighed.
“It just wouldn’t be fair to someone…” my mother chimed in, just as Angie the counselor lady threw in her two cents, too.
“Sweetie, you have to understand, your situation is very serious. People get irrational during times like these, and if you get involved with someone and the worst happened, well-”
I crossed my fingers behind my back and shook my head. I’d known they’d react like this – why had I even tried in the first place? Some things, I knew, were just better left unshared.
“Yeah,” I said. “Okay, yeah, you guys are right. I’ll try to…put that off, I guess. For now. God knows I have tons of time to think about it – it’s not like I’m dying or anything.”
Everyone forced quick, fake laughs and then got back to business. Unbeknownst to them, however, my mind was quickly leaving the room, flying past the barren oak branches outside the window and soaring above the clouds to someplace only I knew. My desires could not be contained by the circumstances in this room, or by sickness, or even by reality in general, really. I wanted love more than anything – this was true, as much as it humiliated me to admit it. I’d wanted love ever since I was a cookie-cutter little girl being brainwashed by cookie-cutter Disney movies about cookie-cutter princes and princesses falling into cookie-cutter love and then prancing off to their cookie-cutter castles to live out their cookie-cutter lives. And strangely enough, this desire had only deepened after the fairy tale fantasies faded away and melted into a more grown up, real-world entity known as relationship FOMO, when my condition had rendered me an observer from the social media sidelines as everyone my age paired up and got engaged and married and pregnant and then shouted about it from the Facebook treetops as loud as their keyboards would let them while I sat there single as a nun with the flu. But I didn’t want that cookie cutter love from the Disney movies and my social media feeds. I didn’t want some run of the mill summer romance that would fizzle out as soon as the sunrays slanted in the fall and the Facebook Official status went to shit.
Because I, Summer Johnson, Purveyor of Pragmatism, Lover of Logic, Ultimate Believer in the Rational, and Person Who Was Maybe Going To Die Soon, wanted to drown in someone.

Seth King is a twenty-five-year-old author and artist.

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Release Blitz: Unsound By Chantal Fernando & M.N. Forgy

 

Two authors with novellas that you don't want to miss!

TIME AND TIME AGAIN by Chantal Fernando I always thought I had luck on my side. Things seemed to go in my favour, whether by will or by nature. But that luck just ran out. Jobless and on the verge of being homeless, I find a strength in me that I didn’t even know existed and discover an unlikely savior --- Tag. He avoids commitment like the plague, and starting anything with him will only lead to heartbreak. I know this. He knows this. So why am I still here? Oh, right. Because I want him more than I want my next breath. THE BROKEN PIECES OF US by M.N. Forgy Babs is no stranger to the MC world. As an ol’ lady, she takes the hell that comes with it and dishes it out times two. When things take a turn for the worst, it leaves her questioning just how equipped she is for the hell she lives. She thought her marriage with Locks was it; that she had it all. But the past has a way of sneaking up and tearing life apart. Finding herself trapped as Locks’ ol’ lady, with the threat she will be his till the grave, her world spirals out of control. The only person risking it all to save her is the last person she thought would care: Bull. President of the Devil’s Dust MC, Bull, is good at running women off and is even better at pissing off his brothers. When he sees the way his vice-president is treating his ol’ lady, he tries to keep his thoughts to himself. The one thing Bull insists on in his club is respect and loyalty: respect for the patch, respect for your brother, and loyalty to the club. However, after finding Babs in a harsh predicament after a run in with Locks, he can’t help but step in. Crossing lines and hurdling around life’s unpredictability, will they find refuge in each other or will they have to endure what life gives them? ***WARNING - This is not your typical happily ever after.

Unsound is a great anthology and fans of Chantal Fernando and M.N. Forgy need to make sure that they pick this one up.  I will note that for M.N. Forgy’s book The Broken Pieces Of Us, should be read after reading the other books in the Devil’s Dust series or there will be spoilers for the first two books.  Personally I loved seeing Bull and Babs’ story and even though I knew what would happen from the previous books it still broke me in two.  I know for me, I wished I could go back and rewrite what happens so that we get that HEA for them.  In Chantal Fernando’s book, Time And Time Again, you watch how one accidental meeting can set the course to so much more.  How finding that right person can fix all the things that are broken inside of you and as long as you open your eyes happiness could be standing right in front of you. 

I love both of these authors and can’t wait to see what else they have in store for their readers in the future.  Unsound is available now so go grab it today!

Purchase the book today!

Amazon US | iBooks | Amazon UK | Barnes & Noble

 

About the Authors

New York Times, Amazon & USA Today Bestselling Author Chantal Fernando is twenty seven years old and lives in Western Australia.

Lover of all things romance, Chantal is the author of the best selling books Dragon's Lair, Maybe This Time and many more. When not reading, writing or daydreaming she can be found enjoying life with her three sons and family.

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M.N. Forgy was raised in Missouri where she still lives with her family. She's a soccer mom by day and a saucy writer by night. M.N. Forgy started writing at a young age but never took it seriously until years later, as a stay-at-home mom, she opened her laptop and started writing again. As a role model for her children, she felt she couldn't live with the "what if" anymore and finally took a chance on her character's story. So, with her glass of wine in hand and a stray Barbie sharing her seat, she continues to create and please her fans.

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Blog Tour: Presently Perfect By: Alison G. Bailey

Perfection is an illusion fueled by the perception of others.

****

Tweet was my heart, my soul, and my purpose.

She was my everything.

Neither of us were perfect. We both made mistakes. Looking back, that was okay, because every choice brought us to where we needed to be at the time we needed to be there. The one constant, our love and friendship.

There are two sides to every story and I wouldn’t trade our sides for anything in the world.

First let me start off by saying please read Present Perfect before reading Presently Perfect.  You will have a much better understanding even though this is in Noah’s POV, having Amanda/Tweet’s POV first makes this so much more meaningful.  Secondly make sure you have boxes of tissues close by, I am still contemplating sending Ms. Bailey my bill for Puffs after reading this book.

This has to be one of top reads for 2014.  I fell in love with Tweet and Noah in Present Perfect, but have given my undying affection and love for these two after Presently Perfect.  As I stated above this is in Noah’s POV and while we do reread some scenes we have read before they are still different because being able to finally see and feel what Noah was during everything that goes on makes it all that much more emotional.  Now were there times when I wanted to slap the ever loving shit out of Noah, yes there was.  Can I just ask this: What the hell was up with the B squad, aka Beth, Brittani, and Brooke I was beginning to wonder if he had some sort of fetish with sluts whose names start with the letter B.

Anyways, I shall move on.  Noah while he may have been with someone he never lost what he felt for his Tweet, and he suffered just as much emotionally as she did when she would push him away.  His reaction to when he finds out about Tweet being sick had me crying massive ugly tears because I could feel his pain.  I cried a lot during this book, just like I did in Present Perfect, but I think I cried more this time around. 

I could go on and on about how angsty, heart wrenching, emotional and gut twisting Presently Perfect was, but what I want you to know is that it was a beautifully written story about two best friends whose lives are far from perfect but when you have something as special as Noah and Tweet have, then your life is perfect in its own way.  Alison G. Bailey has shredded me not once but twice with the story of Tweet and Noah’s journey to happiness, hell I have tears in my eyes while I am typing this review (more tissues needed again).   I will always remember both of these books for a very long time to come and they will hold a special place in my heart.

If you would like to read my review for Present Perfect here is the link:

http://www.mysecretromancebookreviews.com/2013/08/blog-tour-giveaway-present-perfect-by.html

Here's the GR link for Presently Perfect

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21588076-presently-perfect

AMAZON ** B&N

EXCERPT:

              I was standing one step below Tweet when she broke free from Brad, twisting her body in my direction. I let go of her other wrist and caught her as she fell toward me. Her arms wrapped around my neck as I grabbed hold of her hips, trying to keep her steady.

Tweet’s head tilted back as she clung to me. “Look, Brad! It’s Noah! My Noah!” Her voice was ear-splittingly high. “He’s so sweet and sexy. He’s swexy. He licked my thigh under my parents’ dinner table.” She straightened her head, bringing her forehead to rest on mine. The look in her eyes had turned smoldering, her voice husky when she asked, “You remember licking me, Noah?”

We had a huge fight just a little over an hour ago and now she was completely wasted; her clothes were rumpled, she had pieces of sand stuck to her face, her hair was a tangled windblown mess, and she reeked of tequila and the ocean. But she was still the most beautiful thing I had ever laid my eyes on. My expression teetered from snarling at the Smurffucker to wanting to smile at Tweet.

God, even drunk she’s adorable.

I was either the biggest idiot known to mankind or so beyond in love with this girl that all my common sense and self-preservation got obliterated when I was around her. My heart was pounding against my chest while the temperature in the room soared. The tension in my muscles was beginning to disappear and I was getting lost in teal eyes. I needed some distance.

My hands moved to Tweet’s shoulders and I helped her stand upright. “I’m taking you home.”

“But Brad was going to do some things to me on purpose. I don’t know what, but I’m having fun. Hey! You want to come with us?” she asked, hooking her arm around mine.

My gaze zeroed in on Brad glaring down at me, his jaw clenched tight. My priority was to get Tweet home safe. I’d deal with this asshole later.

I snaked my arm around Tweet’s waist and led her down the steps. She was abruptly yanked away from me. I whipped around and saw Brad clutching Tweet’s arm.

“Haven’t you done enough to her tonight? She’s having a great time with me, so get your fucking hands off of her,” he growled.

Tweet smiled up at him, then turned to me, and said, “I really am having fun. He’s not a Smurffucker at all.”

Glaring at Brad, I grabbed Tweet’s hand, and led her toward the front door. We had taken two steps when I felt her being tugged away from me again. I let go of her hand, walked over to Brad, and punched him in the stomach. His hand fell from Tweet as he doubled over and dropped to the floor. I picked up Tweet, tossed her over my shoulder, and finally headed out uninterrupted.

Just before reaching the front door Tweet grabbed the waistband of my pants, lifting herself up slightly, and yelled, “Bye-bye, Brad! Thanks! Maybe you can lick my thigh next time! Bye-bye!”

Once we were at my truck, I lowered Tweet off my shoulder until her feet touched the ground. Her eyes struggled to stay opened, losing the battle, right before she passed out. I wrapped my arm around her waist, holding her body against mine while I unlocked my truck. I placed her in the seat and leaned over to fasten her in. The click of the seatbelt caused her to stir. Reaching my hand up to her face, my thumb brushed away the dusting of sand that clung to her cheek.

Her eyes stayed closed as a lazy grin slowly appeared across her pink lips. “Mmmm…,” she moaned. “Noah.” She sounded breathy.

“Yeah, Tweet?”

“You’re my knight in plastic armor.”

A slight chuckle escaped me as I remembered our Halloween costumes from when we were six years old.

“You always take care of me and make sure I have candy,” she said, her voice trailing off.

I stared at her for several seconds, simply enjoying the view. As I inched away from her, she shifted in the seat.

Another slight moan flowed over her lips, and she whispered, “I love you Noah.”

I knew she wouldn’t remember saying those words to me tomorrow, but that didn’t matter. The only thing that counted was that for the first time she let go of her heart, her head, and allowed herself to love me. There was nothing better than when the girl of your dreams made all of yours come true. 

AUTHOR BIO:

Alison was born and raised in Charleston, SC.  She attended Winthrop University and graduated with a major in Theater.  While at school she began writing one-act plays, which she later produced. Her debut novel, Present Perfect, landed on Amazon's Best Seller List and appeared on many "Best Reads of 2013" Book Blogs. The novel won Best Book at the 2014 Indie Romance Convention Awards. The second book from The Perfect series, Past Imperfect, was published in February of 2014 and hit many Top 100 category lists on Amazon

AUTHOR LINKS:

Website - http://alisongbailey.com/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/AlisonGBaileyAuthor

Goodreads - http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7032185.Alison_G_Bailey

 Twitter - https://twitter.com/AlisonGBailey1

Instagram - http://instagram.com/alisongbailey

Pinterest - http://pinterest.com/alisongbailey/present-perfect-by-alison-g-bailey/

PURCHASE LINKS:

Present Perfect (Book #1)

Amazon - http://tinyurl.com/km2b3bn

B&N - http://tinyurl.com/ktg8fy3

Smashwords - http://tinyurl.com/lttkba4

Past Imperfect (Book #2)

Amazon - http://tinyurl.com/pumtvb8

B&N - http://tinyurl.com/oyvh4pm

Smashwords - http://tinyurl.com/ppptykv

Presently Perfect (Book #3)

​http://www.amazon.com/Presently-Perfect-Book-3-ebook/dp/B00QJ0RK6M/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1417628155&sr=1-1&keywords=presently+perfect

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/presently-perfect-alison-g-bailey/1120852648?ean=2940149901920​

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Houston Author Event Interview & Giveaways: Day 1 Spotlight on Tara Sivec

I was given the incredible opportunity to sit down and have some one-on-one face time with the attending authors at the recent Houston event. It was a blast! I got to pick their brains for five minutes each. Thanks to all of you who submitted questions, I was armed and prepared. ~Nadine 

We’ll be featuring a different author and their interview here for the next several days. Make sure you scroll to the bottom and enter the AMAZING Rafflecopter for your chance to win a SIGNED paperback from each attending author and keep scrolling for another chance to win various swag from the event.

Today’s spotlight is TARA SIVEC! You asked the questions, she answered them. Enjoy!

Were you funny as a child?

I think I was. Like in my mind I was hilarious, but I was probably just annoying. Yeah, I think I was pretty hilarious.

Is Gavin a REAL kid?

Yes, he’s my son. He’s seven now. He was four when I started writing Seduction and Snacks. So he was the basis at 100% for Gavin. And my daughter a little bit because she has her own little sneak attack humor of things that come into play. That one whole scene where Gavin has the KY Jelly and he’s like ooooh it tingles, it’s warm, that was actually my daughter that did that.

 

How do you come up with such hilarious characters in your Chocolate Lovers series?

A lot of it is based on real life. Things that have happened in real life. Mostly my brain is a real scary place to live. Like the stuff that is not true, you don’t ever want to be in my brain, weird things are happening in there.

How do you get any work done when you write these hilarious books?

*laughs* See, I don’t think I’m funny. My editor gets so mad at me because I’ll send her a chapter note saying this is the stupidest thing, it’s not funny at all, I hate it, she’s like you are a moron. I don’t think anything I write is funny. I always second guess what I’m doing.

What inspired you to start writing?

Boredom with my job that I was doing at the time. I just wasn’t happy with it. Things were changing and I was miserable day in and day out. In my mind I’m figuring if I’m going to work this many hours away from my family, I want to be doing something that I love. And so at my full-time job I just started writing at my cubicle in a corner where no one could see me. I wrote Seduction and Snacks and Futures and Frosting 100% when I had a full-time job. All day during work, that’s what I did, all day. Come back later, I’m busy. No, I can’t go to that meeting I have a lot of work to do. I have a lot of editing, err I mean work.

From start to finish, how long did it take you to complete your first book?

It didn’t take me long to complete it, probably a couple of months. But, the tweaking and the editing and adding things and changing things probably at least a few years.

That's all I had time for folks before the chimes dinged signaling my time with Tara was up. Yes, I said chimes! :) Make sure you pick up Tara Sivec's new release, Passion and Ponies, it's out now and will have you in fits of laughter.

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