It’s Begining to Look a Lot Like Chick Lit
an Anthology by:
S.E. Babin, Geralyn Corcillo, Amy Gettinger, Holly Tierney-Bedord, Jax Abbey, Susan Murphy, Tracy Krimmer, Kate O’Keefe, Monique McDonell, Laurie Baxter
Genre: Chick Lit
Tour Dates: December 18th – 24th, 2016
=============================
Blurb:
Eleven short and funny holiday stories of women going home for Christmas, stirring up old flames (& finding new ones), baking grandma’s cookies, planning revenge pranks on high school duds, opening Pandora’s Box, racing across the country for love, & kissing cute hunks under the mistletoe. Grab your copy while this limited time collection is still available!
Buy the Book:
=============================
Excerpt
Ming
was trying to calculate their good-byes. Should she say it had been
nice seeing him? Probably. Common courtesy, at least, was called for.
What if he tried to do that kissing on the cheek thing that guys do?
What if she got flustered and turned, brushed her lips against his?
What if—and then, entirely against her will, her mind filled with
images of them kissing up against the brick building, her back to the
wall, arms wrapped around Charlie’s neck, Charlie and his
ridiculous scarf and his ridiculous jacket wrapped around her,
keeping her warm even without a coat, right there between the
spot-lit posters for The
Shop Around the Corner and
Some
Like It Hot.
“You
have a good night, now,” Marcy said as she held the door for them,
snapping Ming back to reality.
Ming
smiled and said a shaky “Merry Christmas” as she followed Charlie
through the exit into the night.
And
then she stopped.
“Wow,”
he breathed next to her.
Endless
enormous snowflakes floated down, a good three inches already piled
up on the ground, even though it had been bare when she’d gone into
the theater. It was dark, quiet, the lot almost empty at this hour on
the holiday. Everyone else was home or watching Aftershock
5: Megatsunami
or whatever the hell was playing over at the multiplex. There was a
click behind them. Marcy walked around to her car, parked beside the
building. She climbed in and pulled slowly away, wipers swishing. A
breeze swirled, spinning the flakes through the air around them.
“I
do miss this,” she said, stepping out from under the overhang in
front of the theater and turning her face to the sky.
“Me,
too. I haven’t seen it snow like this in years.”
Oh,
crap. Why had she said anything? She was practically asking him to
bring it up.
“I’m
in California now,” he added.
And
there it was.
“Yeah.
I’m, uh…” In California, too, and actively avoiding you.
“Yeah,
it’s okay. Congrats on the getting into the doctoral program, by
the way.”
She
gave him a quizzical look.
He
looked down, shuffled some snow with his foot. “I might have
cyber-stalked you a little. I mean, I don’t think it really counts
as stalking. I found your Twitter profile. And sometimes I see you
comment on Facebook. We have like eighteen mutual friends.”
Nineteen,
actually. Not, again, that she was keeping track on purpose. Just.
You know, you notice these things.
“Anyway,”
he said, looking up, “Good for you. USC’s a great school.”
“Yeah,
well so is—” Crap she wasn’t supposed to know he was at
Caltech.
He
gave her a lopsided grin. “You knew.”
Dammit.
“I’ve
been busy.”
“It’s
okay, Ming. I didn’t really expect…”
“You
could’ve looked me up.”
“Would
you have wanted that?”
She
said nothing. She wrapped her arms around herself. Suddenly, she was
cold.
“Where’d
you park? I’ll walk you to your car.”
Was
he kidding?
“I
can walk myself to my car, Charlie. I’m a grown woman.” In the
interest of being able to say she’d at least been polite, she
thrust out her hand. “It was nice seeing you.”
He
shook it. She gave him a curt nod, then turned and walked toward the
lot on the other side of the building. Unfortunately, Charlie Brown
followed. Good grief.
“I
told you,” she said, looking back at him, “I’m fine.”
He
nodded behind her. There was one other car in the lot. His mom’s
old Corolla, parked at the opposite end.
“Oh.”
“So
I guess… I guess good-bye, then,” he said, almost sadly. Which
was rich, coming from the guy who had rejected her.
No, Charlie, we’re not going to be pals back in SoCal. So sorry.
Seriously, she wanted to ask him what his deal was. But not as much
as she wanted to get into her car and turn the heat on. She hadn’t
dressed for lingering out in the cold.
The
imagined scene between the movie posters came back unbidden.
“Yeah,
bye,” she snapped, squelching it.
She
stalked to her dad’s Accord, which she had borrowed for the
occasion, pulling her sweater sleeves down over her hands for warmth.
She
never could figure out what had possessed Charlie to handle the whole
prom thing the way he had. If anything, she had been extra nice to
him in school. She had, for instance, never once mentioned the time
freshman year when he
had asked her
to a dance only because his parents made
him ask someone. They were concerned he wasn’t being “social”
enough. So he’d gone and asked the biggest nerd he could find with
an XX genotype. And she’d never even brought it up. Fortunately,
she had turned him down with some excuse about visiting cousins that
weekend (really, what did he expect, coming up to a girl he’d never
spoken to outside of class and asking her on a date?), but she’d
felt bad when she learned his folks put him up to it (Brian tipped
her off). And, actually, in a weird way, it was what made her notice
him. What made him stand out from the rest of their dorky peers as
someone bordering on relatable.
After
that, she sat with him at lunch sometimes, called him if she missed
class to get the assignment, passed him the occasional caricature
she’d doodled of their teacher in Advanced Bio because she knew
it’d make him laugh. It had been the start of what became a real
friendship. What she had
thought
was a real friendship.
Her
car was so covered, if there had been others there, she would have
had trouble picking hers out. Fortunately, the snow was wet and
lightly packed, so it only took a quick sweep of the brush to clear
the windows. She willed herself not to look back at Charlie as she
worked, though she heard his engine start up and saw the glow of his
headlights lighting up in the corner of her eye.
She
took a deep breath and let it out. She knew she was fooling herself
if she thought it hadn’t affected her to run into him. But there
would be lots of time to process her resurfacing adolescent angst and
whatever else bobbed up with it. Right now, she just wanted to get
the hell out of there.
She
dropped into the seat, slipped the belt into the buckle, slid the key
into the ignition, and turned it. All one smooth motion. Only one
problem. The car didn’t start.
=============================
About the Authors:
S.E. Babin is an award-winning author with a passion for writing books with a paranormal twist. Whether it’s romance or mystery, she loves taking the norm and turning it into the extraordinary. Her love of reading turned into a curious exploration to see whether or not she could write her own novel. Beginning with discarded pages of angsty novels and a slightly popular reimagining of Beowulf’s Grendel in her high school English class, Sheryl spent way too much time in the library, killing any chance of her becoming a cheerleader or anything even remotely cool.
First and foremost, Geralyn Corcillo loves reader reviews! In other news…When she was a kid growing up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Geralyn Vivian Ruane Corcillo dreamed of one day becoming the superhero Dyna Girl. So, she did her best and grew up to constantly pick up litter and rescue animals. At home, she loves watching old movies, British mysteries, and the NY Giants. Corcillo lives in a drafty old house in Hollywood with her husband Ron, a guy who’s even cooler than Kip Dynamite.
Amy Gettinger lives in Orange County, California with her husband and her two piteous poodles under the shade of a very noisy old eucalyptus windrow full of crows and wild parrots. When she’s not writing novels, she’s creating Reader’s Theater plays and coaching a local senior group to perform them, complete with big bad wolves, feather boas and tiaras.
Holly Tierney-Bedord lives in Madison, Wisconsin. She is the author of several novels including Coached, Bellamy’s Redemption, and Surviving Valencia. Visit her website at www.hollytierneybedord.com where you can connect to her blogs and subscribe to her newsletter.
A Durham, North Carolina native and graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Jax Abbey bleeds Carolina blue. By day she molds the young, bright minds of the future, but at night you can find her furiously pounding the keyboard as she funnels the zany ideas and quirky characters from her brain to the computer. When Jax isn’t telling preschoolers to keep their hands to themselves or telling her characters to simmer down, she loves to spend time with her significant other, Tyler, and her TinyDog.
Tracy’s love of writing began at nine years old. She wrote stories about aliens at school, machines that did homework for you, and penguins. Now she pens books and short stories about romance. She loves to read a great book, whether it be romance or science fiction, or any genre in between, or pop popcorn and catch up on her favorite TV shows or movies. She’s been known to crush a candy or two as well. Her first romance novel, Pieces of it All, released in May 2014 followed in December with Caching In, a romance mixed with the hobby of geocaching. She also has written several short stories.
Kate O’Keefe – I write funny, sexy, feel-good romantic comedies.
I’ve loved rom coms, romance, and chick lit since I first encountered Bridget Jones as a young, impressionable writer. It really was a match made in chick lit heaven.
I’ve been a teacher and a sales executive, but am now content as a mother and writer, madly scribbling all the ideas I’ve accumulated during my time on this planet we call home.
I live and love in beautiful New Zealand–where my novels are all set–with my wonderful family and my two very scruffy, naughty dogs.
Monique McDonell – I am an Australian author who writes fun, flirty contemporary women’s fiction including chick lit and romance. After many attempts writing books that made me miserable I decided to write books with happy endings and have been loving the journey ever since.
I live on Sydney’s Northern Beaches with my husband and daughter which probably explains why the beach features in so many of my novels and why people describe them as excellent beach reads.
Laurie Baxter has degrees in both puppetry and screenwriting because let’s face it, majoring in English would have been no more useful and way less fun. She loves chocolate, ice cream, chocolate ice cream, dogs, New York City, old movies, modern architecture, all kinds of theater, and music from before she was born. Her eighth grade English teacher told her to become a writer, so she did.
=============================
Why not
visit all the Stops on the Tour:
December 18th
Hea Romances With A Little Kick - Book Excerpt/Promo
Romantic Reads and Such - Book Excerpt
He Said Books Or Me - Book Promo/Author Guest Post
December 19th
Kristin's Novel Cafe - Book Excerpt/Promo
Hello...Chick Lit - Book Excerpt/Promo
December 20th
ItaPixie's Book Corner - Book Review/Excerpt
Reads and Treats - Book Review
Rae Reads - Book Excerpt/Promo
December 21st
Appletree Books - Book Review
Chick Lit Central - Promo Post
December 22nd
Jena Books - Book Review
Wonderfully Bookish - Book Review
December 23rd
Pretty Little Book Reviews - Book Review
Steamy Book Momma - Book Review
Blog on the run - Book Promo Post
December 24th
Novelgossip - Book Review
Book Lover in Florida - Book Review/Promo
=============================
Thank you for having us!
ReplyDeleteYou're very welcome! 😀
Delete