GCC presents Jennifer Echols

Ah yes, and any hopes I had of being a regular blogger this year appear to be well and truly out the window. We are slowly getting settled into our new life though there are still a lot of things waiting to be crossed off the To-do list (you know like 'find lots of money', 'get fabulously slim and gorgeous') but overall the kids are settling in and no one has laughed at me for having such a weird hybrid accent from my years away.

Anyway, today it's not about me, it's all about Jennifer Echols and her latest release, Love Story. But before we just start can I please just mention that Jennifer is also our fearless leader who organizes the Girlfriend's Cyber Circuit tours and without her we would be lost, so she needs an extra big cheer for being so awesome!!!!!
Love Story

For Erin Blackwell, majoring in creative writing at the New York City college of her dreams is more than a chance to fulfill her ambitions – it’s her ticket away from the tragic memories that shadow her family’s racehorse farm in Kentucky. But when she refuses to major in business and take over the farm herself someday, her grandmother gives Erin’s college tuition and promised inheritance to their maddeningly handsome stable boy, Hunter Allen. Now Erin has to win an internship and work late nights at a local coffee shop to make her own dreams a reality. She should despise Hunter… so why does he sneak into her thoughts as the hero of her latest writing assignment?

Then, on the day she’s sharing that assignment with her class, Hunter walks in. He’s joining her class. And after he reads about himself in her story, her private fantasies about him must be painfully clear. She only hopes to persuade him not to reveal her secret to everyone else. But Hunter devises his own creative revenge, writing sexy stories that drive the whole class wild with curiosity and fill Erin’s heart with longing. Now she’s not just imagining what might have been. She’s writing a whole new ending for her romance with Hunter… except this story could come true.

“A tremendously talented writer with a real gift for developing relationships.”
– Romantic Times Magazine

1 How did you come up with the idea for this book?
When I was in school, I took every creative writing class I could. The experience was always so intense, and the writers in these classes got so touchy and emotional about sharing their stories, that I thought this would be an explosive place to set a romance.

2 What’s been your favorite author moment so far in your career?
My critique partner Victoria Dahl and I were both finalists last year in the RITA, an award judged by fellow romance authors. That was very special for both of us.

3 It’s Oscar speech time! Who are the three people that you would most like to thank for helping you write this book?
Vicki and my other critique partner, Catherine Chant, make all my books so much better. But my best friend from high school, Catherine Burns, was also a huge help on this book particularly. She lives in New York City, and when the copyeditor questioned my traffic patterns, my subway stops, and my horses in the middle of the city, she came to my rescue.

4 Describe a typical writing day
I wake up at 4:30 a.m. and try to get in two hours of writing before my son wakes up and I have to make breakfast. After that I try to fit another six hours of writing into my day, but the summer schedule is crazy! Things will be easier when my son goes back to school in August.

5 Tell me one strange random fact about this book.
Hunter writes a story about the sizes of the planets in our Solar System in relation to the distances between them. When I was in eighth grade, I wanted to be an astronomer, and I had an idea for a project like this. It wasn’t feasible because, as Hunter discovers, the distances between the planets are too vast. This is my favorite part of the novel. Retweet this button on every post blogger

GCC presents Melissa Walker

Yay, today I'm touring Melissa Walker and her new book, Small Town Sinners. I'm such a fan of Melissa's writing and her last book Lovestruck Summer is one of my favorite YA romances because it is so light and delicious and while Small Town Sinners is a very different kind of book, I'm totally intrigued by it!

Small Town Sinners is the story of Lacey Anne, daughter of the pastor and perennial good girl, who is eligible for a lead role in the season’s Hell House production—a role she’s been coveting for years. But when Ty moves to town as casting begins, a new perspective is added to Lacey Anne’s world and she starts to see her tight-knit, Evangelical community in a different light. With the help of her two best friends Starla Joy and Dean, and her potential first love Ty, Lacey Anne begins exploring her own thoughts and feelings about her religion, her community, and her place within both. While this novel deals with provocative issues like religion, teen pregnancy and underage drinking, it is not an “issue” book; the topics are masterfully interwoven into this story of friendship and family.

“Both tender and provocative… Walker creates an astutely balanced portrait of a conservative congregation’s in-your-face response to perennial issues of domestic abuse, teen pregnancy, and suicide, as well as of those who struggle to fit the prescribed Christian mold.” –Publishers Weekly

“This secular story about religious people could easily devolve into camp mockery, but because Walker takes her character’s crisis of faith seriously and sensitively, readers will, too.” –Kirkus Reviews



1 How did you come up with the idea for this book?

My friend Joy's mother, Betty, started telling me about her church's "Judgment House" and my jaw dropped. I researched more about Hell Houses and Judgment Houses, and then I pitched my ELLEgirl editor on a magazine story. She bit, I got to write the story. And the small town I visited, plus the teenagers in it, never left me. Here's that original non-fiction story:
http://www.melissacwalker.com/media/ellegirl-hellhouse.jpg

2 What’s been your favorite author moment so far in your career?

It has to be sharing the cover of my hometown magazine with the amazing Sarah Dessen.
http://www.melissacwalker.com/sarah-dessen-and-melissa-walker/

3 It’s Oscar speech time! Who are the three people that you would most like to thank for helping you write this book?

I'd like to thank Betty Elliott for sharing her own church's Judgment House story and exposing me to this ritual for the first time. And finally, I'll thank my editor Caroline Abbey who brought out Lacey Anne's story in such insightful ways!
4 Describe a typical writing day.

Wake up, facebook, twitter, blogs. Then write for 10 minutes. Then check twitter. Then write for 10 more minutes. Then check facebook. Then write again. Hopefully reach 1000 words in fits and starts by 2pm, and then work on magazine stories, which are still a big part of my day too. Actually, Stephanie Kuehnert has been doing a #90minwrite challenge on twitter, and that has helped me a lot, when I participate. I feel like I need to spend a solid block writing, and it makes me way more productive.
5 Tell me one strange random fact about this book.
I never say specifically where the book is set... but I can picture the town perfectly. Retweet this button on every post blogger

Winner of the Fairy Bad Day Scavenger Hunt

Okay, first of all major apologies for taking so long to draw this. I've been ridiculously distracted with the move from NZ to Australia but things are slowly falling into place--though between you, me and the wall, there is a LOT of red tape involved in trying to move back to the country of my birth!!!!

Anyway, I would like to thank everyone who entered. You are all very clever and figured out that the answer was indeed Skittles!! And the winner of the Scavenger Hunt is:

Alyssa Durrstein.

Alyssa, if you could email me your postal address then I can send you out the prize (and of course I haven't had to replace the packet of Skittles three times because I keep eating them. I mean that would just be crazy!) Retweet this button on every post blogger

GCC presents Suzanne Young

Phew! I'm here in sunny Australia and the move went really well. There is sooooooooo much to tell but first I must right a terrible wrong! I was meant to post this tour last week before I lost Internet access but I totally didn't get a chance to do so.

Even worse is that Suzanne is one of the most lovely people ever so I hate that I'm late on this. So, without further ado, let's talk about Suzanne Young and her new book A Need So Beautiful, which I'm pretty sure is setting the net on FIRE since everywhere I look people are raving about how wonderful it is!!!!

We all want to be remembered. Charlotte's destiny is to be Forgotten...

Charlotte's best friend thinks that Charlotte might be psychic. Her boyfriend thinks that she is cheating on him. But Charlotte knows what is really wrong. She's one of the Forgotten, a kind of angel on earth who feels the Need--a powerful, uncontrollable draw to help someone, usually a stranger.

But Charlotte never wanted this responsibility. What she wants is to help her best friend, whose life is spiralling out of control. She wants to lie in her boyfriend's arms forever. But as the Need grows stronger, it begins to take a dangerous toll on Charlotte. And who she was, is and will be--her mark on this earth, her very existence--is in jeopardy of disappearing completely.

Charlotte will be forced to choose: Should she embrace her fate as a Forgotten, a fate that promises to rip her from the lives of those she loves forever? Or is she willing to fight against her destiny--no matter how dark the consequences.

See? How amazing does this book sound? I want to read it immediately!!!!!!!

Q How did you come up with the idea for this book?

Someone close to me was very ill and a stranger who I met for an hour gave me some great advice. I never saw her again, but the idea that a brief conversation could change your life stuck with me. And then I thought that maybe she was like an angel, only meant to guide me through a rough time. That's where the idea for a Need So Beautiful began.

Q What's been your favorite author moment so far?

Meeting fans at a signing. It was the first time that it hit me that ACTUAL people read my books.

Q It's Oscar speech time. Who would you like to thank?

My husband, my grandmother and my agent Jim McCarthy.

Q Describe a typical writing day.

Coffee, write, repeat.

Q Tell me one strange, random fact about this book?

The original idea involved golden scales under my main character's skin!

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