Spotlight: The Do-Over by Jennifer Honeybourn

Publication date: July 14th 2020
Genres: Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult

In The Do-Over, a teenage girl gets the chance to redo her past in this smart and charming YA novel by the author of When Life Gives You Demons, Jennifer Honeybourn.

Emelia has always wanted to fit in with the A crowd. So, when Ben, the hottest guy in school, asks her out, she chooses him over Alistair, her best friend—even after he confesses his feelings to her.

Six months later, Emilia wonders how her life would have been different if she’d chosen Alistair instead. Haunted by her mistake, she finds a magical solution that promises to rectify the past. As a result, everything in her life is different.

Different, but not better.

What happens if her second chance is her only chance to make things right?

Excerpt

Alistair doesn’t say anything for a long moment. It’s so quiet that I can hear the snow falling. 

He clears his throat. “I wanted to know if you want to go to winter formal,” he says. “With me.” 

I gape at him. A school dance is the last place that Alistair would ever voluntarily be seen, but he’s asking me to go with him anyway. As his date. It’s so un-Alistair-like that I’m momentarily thrown. 

My throat feels thick as I tuck my hands inside my jacket pockets. “Ben already asked me.” 

Alistair winces. He glances away from me. “So, what? He’s your boyfriend now?” 

I shrug. I have nothing to feel bad about. I should be happy—I was happy, until he showed up outside my window—but instead I feel hollow. I’m shaking, but I don’t think it has anything to do with the cold. 

He gives me one of his lopsided smiles and my heart aches. This is the worst. “Okay, well. No big deal,” he says. “Just thought I’d ask. Uh, I should probably get going. Before we both freeze to death.” 

I nod. “Okay. Talk to you tomorrow?” 

“Yeah, sounds good.” My chest tightens as I head back toward my house. I just want to get inside and crawl back into my bed, and hopefully the next time I see Alistair, we can pretend this conversation 

never happened. We can go back to ignoring these feelings we have for each other, and just stay friends. 

I’m almost at my door when I hear him hurrying to catch up with me, his high-top Converse crunching through the snow. 

“Actually, Em,” he says as I turn back around. “There’s something I need to tell you.” He’s standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at me, his eyes bright. “And I need to do it now before I completely lose my nerve. So just listen, okay?” 

I’m not sure that I want know what he’s about to say. In fact, I’m pretty sure that I don’t want to know—he’s going to ruin everything—but he’s already walking up the steps. He stops in front of me. 

“If you’re a bird, I’m a bird,” he says. 

I blink. Huh? 

“I could be fun, if you want,” Alistair continues. The tips of his ears are red. “Pensive . . . smart . . . superstitious, brave. I can be light on my feet. I could be whatever you want. You just tell me what you want and I’ll be that for you.” 

Wait. Is he quoting from The Notebook? 

My stomach flips. I think he is. Marisol and I have made him watch that movie a million times. He always pretends to hate it. 

Alistair sighs and rubs the back of his neck. “Look, what I’m trying to say is that I—” 

“I know what you’re trying to say,” I interrupt. I just can’t believe he’s saying it. I can’t believe that he’s doing this now. The depth of feeling in his eyes scares me and I don’t know how to handle it. I’m not ready for this. I’m not ready for him. He reaches for my arm but I step away. 

We’ve been friends forever. I don’t want to ruin what we have. Besides, I can’t just turn off my feelings for Ben. And, more importantly, I don’t want to. 

Alistair exhales and tips his head back to look at the sky. The silence between us stretches into awkwardness. “I don’t get it,” he says finally. “Why him?” 

I shake my head. I don’t know what to say. The truth is kind of embarrassing to admit, and it won’t make anything between us easier: Ben is good-looking, the most popular guy in school, and he likes me. Out of all the girls in our school, he noticed me. Is it so wrong to want to be popular, to spend weekends doing something other than playing board games? To want a different life from the one I have? 

But Alistair wouldn’t understand—being popular isn’t something he aspires to—so I just say, “Why not him?” 

He scowls. “I can think of a few million reasons.” 

“Come on. You don’t even know him.” 

“And I don’t want to,” he says. “Em, seriously, he’s a jerk. How do you not see that?” 

“People can change.” 

He shakes his head sadly. “Yeah, I guess they can.” Then he turns and walks away, leaving me alone on the porch, my eyes burning with tears as I watch him disappear down the street.

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About the Author

Jennifer Honeybourn works in corporate communications in Vancouver, British Columbia. She’s a fan of British accents, Broadway musicals, and epic, happily-ever-after love stories. If she could have dinner with anyone, dead or alive, she’d have high tea with Walt Disney, JK Rowling, and her nana. She lives with her husband, daughter and cat in a house filled with books. Wesley James Ruined My Life is her first novel.

Connect:

https://www.jenniferhoneybourn.com/

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15215579.Jennifer_Honeybourn

https://www.facebook.com/jenniferhoneybourn/

https://twitter.com/Honeybourn

https://www.instagram.com/jennifer_honeybourn/

Spotlight: The Bridesmaid by Vic P. Victory

Genre: Adult Romance/Comedy

Release Date: April 2020

Summary:

May I introduce Emma to you? Emma, early thirties, dependable magnet for mishaps, “screw ups”, and small to medium catastrophes, trusting victim of womanizers, and a newly minted frustrated single. Nachos with cheese sauce, frozen chocolate tarts, family packs of vanilla ice cream, a little too much red wine, and a gigantic serving of self-pity are helping her drown her misery.When her friend Olga choses Emma to be her bridesmaid amidst her own personal crisis, she would rather burst into flames. After an initial period of stagnation, she begins to accept the task thrust upon her, and fully dedicates herself to project “Wedding”.If only it wasn't for the bride, who slowly mutates into a self-righteous, megalomaniac, obsessed with perfection and allergic to any well-meant criticism. In other words, a bridezilla. Despite Olga’s unrealistic expectations and unabashed fits of rage, Emma resists the thought of a jumbo-sized Kentucky fried chicken bucket, straightens her 3-buttons-blouse, pulls herself up, has another sip of red wine, and charges into the fight to save a wedding and a friendship.

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Connect:

Instagram: vic_p_victory 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Vic-P-Victory-879559825573822/?modal=admin_todo_tour 

Website: www.vicpvictory.com

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJTLSo5iJm6_dU5esPt9AJQ (Vic P. Victory)

Spotlight: How the Deer Moon Hungers by Susan Wingate

For those who enjoy reading books like Where the Crawdads Sing and My Sister's Keeper

MACKENZIE FRASER witnesses a drunk driver mow down her seven-year-old sister and her mother blames her. Then she ends up in juvie on a trumped-up drug charge. Now she’s in the fight of her life…on the inside! And she’s losing. 

HOW THE DEER MOON HUNGERS is a coming of age story about loss, grief, and the power of love.

Excerpt

PART ONE 

the beginning 

“a flower knows, when its butterfly will return, and if the moon walks out, the sky will 

understand; but now it hurts, to watch you 

leave so soon, when I don't know, if you will ever come back.” ―Sanober Khan

1 

The Day Before 

I, one Miss MacKenzie Becca Fraser, was never one for saying fuck much. But as with life, things change. 

The year before, Dad removed Tessa’s training wheels. The bike had grown up, was halfway between a tricycle and a teenager’s bike. Her eyes glowed when the trainers came off. Her smile? Buoyant. My bike was what Tessa called a big girl bike—a beach cruiser in Tiffany box blue. Mine didn’t have ribbons shooting out of the handles. Can you imagine me going to school with ribbons out of the handles? My peeps would never let me live it down. 

The evening before what people called the worst thing that’s happened on the island since Becca Winthrop went and flopped over dead of heart failure at the liquor store, we set off on a night ride—Tessa and me. We left Mom at home stirring up dust with her favorite electric broom. Tuesday was a lazy fall night, one with the sun and moon in competition for the evening sky; with the sun being selfish for time, trying to hang on to day even though it knew it should just stop shining, give up, and go away. We’d stuck playing cards in the spokes of our tires to add to clicking crickets, tree frogs chirping, a not-so-distant fox hacking out a cough to alert its scattered pack of food found—a doomed rabbit or kitty kibbles left out on someone’s porch. Up the hill, deep in the woods, an owl’s Psalm echoed back from its mate as if they were holding invisible hands across the horizon, not wanting to let go. Their song played while we rode.  

We’d split the deck of cards, each one clipping twenty-six onto our tire spokes to deter animals from darting out into the lane ahead. Because that was all we needed—to crash into a raccoon crossing the street. Not much good for the coon either. But the road was deserted, and I kept Tessa in front, keeping my eye out for her. 

Tessa rode her bike fast like she was angling to lasso the moon, which sat high at the end of the road over Old Man Johnson’s cattle farm. The big, yellow ball lolled around atop a silhouette of gossamer evergreens framing a large swatch of grazing land. 

Wind fluttered that silky sable ponytail of hers as we came off the downhill side of False Bay Drive where the road at the end of summer stripes a path of thirsty grass along the strait, where cows graze in a pasture trimmed by a stand of golden poplars, crooked and bending toward the north sky away from steady winds coming off the water. Most people think that on our island in the Pacific Northwest, we live in slickers and galoshes year-round. But that’s the secret we have. Seattle gives our island a bad reputation, makes us soggy when we’re not. We live in what meteorologists call a banana belt or a rain shadow, so our island lacks the lush, drippy rainforests often found in other parts of the Pacific Northwest.  

Each downstroke of my pedals matched rhythm with the plastic ribbons whipping off Tessa’s handlebars, whizzing like a thousand bees around her hands. When she skidded to a halt in front of me, I yanked left, my wheels slipping as I swerved to miss her, no doubt balding a spot on the tire’s rubber. 

“What’s wrong with you?” I demanded, anger flashing hot in my cheeks and pooling into my chest. 

Tessa didn’t seem to hear me. She was gaping up at the sky with that moon gaping back at her.  

“What?” I repeated, but this time we were both fixed on the dang moon. 

“Do you see it, Mac? The deer?” Tess was in the habit of starting, finishing, and rereading Thurber’s The White Deer for, like, the millionth time—a read way above her grade. In fact, she often fell asleep with the stupid book open-faced on her chest. Then the next morning she’d stick a crow feather in the book to mark her place and set it on her nightstand, ready for her evening read.  

“There’s no deer in the moon, dork, but there might be a man if you look hard enough. You need to read real stuff. You’re getting weird.” 

“See its horns?” 

“Antlers.” I told her. “A hungry moon like that likes to eat seven-year-olds for dinner.” “Nuh-uh,” Tessa answered. 

I rolled my bike backward, parallel to hers, close enough to sneak my hand around the back of her head and yank her ponytail. 

 “Don’t,” Tessa yelped. 

I enjoyed hearing her whiny kid voice. Mom called it plaintive. But Mom liked to make things sound more sophisticated. Her beaten-up chest of drawers was a chiffonier. The mossy stone patio, a pergola. Mom wanted more out of life, and I suspected she harbored a few regrets. “Our island didn’t hold a candle to New York City,” she’d complained one night. “Not even to Seattle. At least Seattle has an international flair,” she’d said.  

Mom could have been a model if she’d pursued it, but she’d fallen in love, had kids. The what-happenedto-my-life syndrome seemed to have snagged her in a net she couldn’t get out of. She often talked about things she would do after Tess and I were out of school, when the house and her life were her own again. A longing filling her words, just enough for me to sense an underpinning of resentment. Her gaze would shift to the window, outside, away and away, but not for long; and she would chuckle. Then, she’d sit upright and say, “Oh, we wish on stars and mushroom caps for moon dust and fairies.” I don’t know where she got that phrase, but Mom always trotted it out when she got wistful. Maybe it came from Gramma Kiki. Who knows? It really doesn’t matter, but the oddity of a phrase like that will stick with you.  

And although our island boasted an international school—Spring Street School—our town was mostly country, with nothing international about it. We didn’t even have a stoplight. Just stop signs and, of late, one abused turnabout.  

When I glanced sideways at Tessa, she was straddling her bike as she stared up at the moon. I noted a certain otherness in her expression, as if we weren’t alone, as if the ghost of that deer she’d spotted in the moon had plopped onto her shoulders and was weighing her down. Her eyes seemed dark with worry and as deep as a pair of bottomless wells, shimmering with unshed tears. I think about that worry sometimes. It haunts me still. 

“Come on,” I said. “We’d better get home. Mom’s already in a snit.” 

“I wonder what the deer eats, Mac. Do you think it’s hungry?” 

“One thing it doesn’t eat, Tess, is cheese!” I said, laughing, but Tessa didn’t get it. She didn’t know then, or ever, about the man in the moon or about the cheese the moon was allegedly made of.  

I used to like the word allegedly. I’d learned it as a vocabulary word at the start of my junior year, and I got it right on a pop quiz in homeroom spelling. The teacher even had me write my sentence on the board: Gemma allegedly hid the pencil from me, but there was no evidence to prove that for sure. The sentences I would write with this word now could not be more different: I was allegedly taking care of Tessa when we went to the park the day after looking at the deer moon. And I was allegedly not watching when the car hit her.  Allegedly became an important word for me after Tessa died. It’s weird to recall how much I liked the word in my junior year but hated it afterward when I heard the cop use it. 

“Allegedly,” he’d said, “the younger one was in the older sister’s care.” And then, as though no one understood, “The older one was supposed to be watching the younger one.” He said one as if we were buttons on a conveyor belt at some stupid button factory. The jerk. 

After Tess died, I started counting the days of the moon as it sketched out a path in the sky from crescent to half to gibbous to crescent again. I called it moon spying, and every month when the moon was ripe, I used to rush outside to search that big ol’ cheese wheel. Maybe I’d spy Tessa riding on the back of the deer ghost, but mostly I just hoped she might see me searching the moon for a glimpse of her.

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About the Author

Susan Wingate is a #1 Amazon bestselling award-winning author of over fifteen novels. Susan writes across fiction and nonfiction genres and often sets her stories in the Pacific Northwest where she is the president of a local authors association. She writes full-time and lives in Washington State with her husband, Bob.

Connect:

Website: www.susanwingate.com 

Blog: www.susanwingate.com/blog 

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/susanwingate

Facebook: www.facebook.com/authorsusanwingate

Spotlight: Not Another Love Song by Olivia Wildenstein

Publication date: July 7th 2020
Genres: Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult

Synopsis:

An aspiring teenage singer finds herself playing a different tune when she falls for a boy who could jeopardize her future dreams in Olivia Wildenstein’s romantic YA novel, Not Another Love Song.

Angie has studied music her entire life, nurturing her talent as a singer. Now a high school senior, she has an opportunity to break into Nashville’s music scene via a songwriting competition launched by her idol, Mona Stone. Discouraged by her mother, who wishes Angie would set more realistic life goals, she nonetheless pours her heart and soul into creating a song worthy of Mona.

But Angie’s mother is the least of her concerns after she meets Reedwood High’s newest transfer student, Ten. With his endless collection of graphic tees, his infuriating attitude, smoldering good looks, and endearing little sister, Ten toys with the rhythm of Angie’s heart.

She’s never desired anything but success until Ten entered her life. Now she wants to be with him and to be a songwriter for Mona Stone, but she can’t have both.

And picking one means losing the other.

Excerpt

“You’re going to be drawing your partner, costume and all. It can be as abstract as you want. And you are welcome to use whichever medium you’d like.”

“I have to warn you,” I tell Ten, once I’ve recovered from the realization that we’re partners, “I’m real bad at drawing people.”

“Good thing Miss Bank said it could be abstract.”

“Yeah. I even botch abstract art.”

He drags an easel toward a chair, and I do the same. “I won’t take offense if I end up with a Picasso face.”

“You’ll be lucky if you end up with a Picasso face.” We walk to the supply closet and grab paintbrushes and tubes of acrylic paint. As we return to our chairs, I ask, “You are aware Walt Disney didn’t come up with Harry Potter, right?”

His mouth rounds in surprise. “No way!”

I’m about to say yeah, when his golden eyes spark with . . . amusement? “You’re not a Harry Potter character, are you?”

“Nope.”

I study his red graduation gown and the yellow silk scarf knotted around his neck while he starts painting me. “Are you a wizard?”

“No.”

My gaze drops to the inflatable sword hooked into a rope tied around his waist. “The prince in Cinderella?”

“You think I look like a prince?” he asks without glancing away from his paper.

My cheeks smolder. “I said the prince—never mind.” I direct my attention to my still-blank paper. I dab red paint on the paper and swirl it around until it sort of takes on the shape of a poufy gown.

“Are you giving up? I didn’t peg you for the type of girl who gave up,” Ten says.

Our gazes collide. Although several conversations buzz around us, all I can hear is what Ten just said. “About your costume?”

He returns his attention to his canvas and lifts his paintbrush. “Isn’t that we were talking about?”

My heart skitters to a halt inside my rib cage. Is he kidding? Did I just totally misread him? He wants me to guess his alter ego’s identity, but not his actual one? “I didn’t think you wanted me to keep guessing.”

He looks back at me. The gold flecks in his irises seem to have dimmed. “So you’re giving up?”

“Honestly, I think it’s better if I do.”

I jab my paintbrush against the canvas and red paint splatters over my cleavage, which is wedged too tightly into my costume’s sweetheart neckline. I should probably have bought a new dress instead of recycling the one I wore two Halloweens ago.

I try to wipe the paint away with the heel of my hand but end up smudging it and making it look like I walked off a horror movie set. I head to the sink, where I ball up scratchy paper towel and wet it to clean myself up before I give Miss Bank a heart attack.

“Arthur from The Sword in the Stone,” Ten says after I return to my easel.

“I would never have guessed that.”

For a moment, we look at each other. A long moment. And then I avert my gaze because there’s too much to see in Ten’s face. What’s the point in seeing anything if there’s no way of understanding what I’m looking at?

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About the Author

USA TODAY bestselling author Olivia Wildenstein grew up in New York City and earned her bachelor’s in comparative literature from Brown University. After designing jewelry for a few years, Wildenstein traded in her tools for the writing life, which made more sense considering her college degree.

When she’s not sitting at her computer, she’s psychoanalyzing everyone she meets (Yes. Everyone), eavesdropping on conversations to gather material for her next book, and attempting not to forget one of her kids in school.

She has a slight obsession with romance, which might be the reason why she writes it. She’s a hybrid author of over a dozen mature Young Adult love stories.

Connect:

http://oliviawildenstein.com/

https://www.instagram.com/olives21/

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/13734301.Olivia_Wildenstein

https://www.facebook.com/owauthor

https://twitter.com/OWildWrites

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Spotlight: Kitty's War by Barbara Whitaker

Seeking adventure, shy Kitty Greenlee joins the Women's Army Corps. In 1944 England, as secretarial support to the 8th Air Force, she encounters her dream man, a handsome lieutenant who only has eyes for her blonde friend. Uncomfortable around men, Kitty doesn't think the handsome officer could want someone like her.

Recovering from wounds, Ted Kruger wants to forget about losing his closest friends and have fun before returning to danger as a bomber navigator. When Ted recognizes Kitty as the girl who rescued him two years before, he must choose between dating the sexy blonde or pursuing quiet, serious-minded Kitty even though he knows he's not nearly good enough for her.

As the war gears up with the D-Day invasion, will Kitty and Ted risk their hearts as well as their lives?

Excerpt

She reached out and touched his cheek. He shivered slightly. His skin felt cold, clammy. 

He was freezing. 

Desperation seized her. 

She needed to get him warm. His wet clothes, the chilling wind. He could die from exposure if she didn’t get help. 

She released his hand and shrugged out of her sweater as she looked up and down the beach. It was deserted except for the few birds scurrying along the shore. She didn’t want to leave him, but common sense told her he needed more than she could give him.

“I’ll go get help.”

She draped her damp sweater over his chest. His eyes flew open. He reached for her. She caught his hand and squeezed it. 

His eyes pleaded for her to stay. 

Her insides melted. “I won’t be long, I promise.” She looked into those questioning, blue eyes. “It’s not far. I’ll bring someone to help.” 

A soft smile creased the corners of his eyes and he nodded, ever so slightly.

Her throat constricted. Her breath caught and held as if she could hold onto that moment forever simply by refusing to breathe. 

Impulsively, she kissed his cold hand. The odor of burnt oil and rubber lingered on his skin. “You’re safe now,” she whispered. “I must go, but I’ll be back. I promise.”

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About the Author

Barbara grew up in a small town in Tennessee where the repeated stories of  local and family history became embedded in her psyche. Fascinating tales of wartime, from her parents and her in-laws, instilled an insatiable curiosity about World War II. After retiring from her sensible career in accounting, she began full time pursuit of her lifelong love of  historical romantic fiction. Enjoying every minute of research, Barbara spends hours reading, watching old, black-and-white movies and listening to big band music.  

Although Barbara and her husband have been longtime residents of Florida, they both still think of Tennessee as "home." Visit Barbara's website at http://barbarawhitaker.com/.  Or find her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/BarbaraWhitakerAuthor/. 

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Spotlight: What Did You Do in the War Sister? by Dennis J. Turner

Throughout the occupied territories, Catholic Sisters were active members of The Nazi Resistance. Based on letters and documents written by Catholic Sisters during WWII, this book tells the remarkable story of these brave and faithful women. From running contraband to hiding Jews, from spying for the allies to small acts of sabotage, these courageous women risked their lives to help defeat the Reich. This is a story that needs to be told.

Excerpt

CHAPTER ONE: A BRUSH WITH DEATH – SAINT-HUBERT, BELGIUM, DECEMBER 1944

December 22, 1944
Saint-Hubert, Belgium

The German army is here – again.

American soldiers marched into Saint-Hubert in September and we believed the war was over. The departing Germans soldiers told us “We will be back,” but no one believed them. American troops came in such numbers, with hundreds of tanks trucks and jeeps.  The soldiers were so fit and robust, busting with confidence. What army in the world could resist such a force? Certainly not the dirty, exhausted German soldiers we saw slipping out of town in the dead of the night.

And yet, German shells are now raining down on our town and many of the jaunty American soldiers we saw streaming to the front in September are straggling back into Saint-Hubert with weary, vacant faces, suffering from wounds and frostbite. There is another bad sign. Americans are pouring out on the ground all the gasoline they had stored in their fuel depots. They want to keep it from falling into the hands of the advancing Germans. Engineers are dynamiting large trees to the block the roads. Apparently, the Americans are going to abandon Saint-Hubert and they are hoping to slow down the German tanks. Once again the citizens of Saint-Hubert will be living in a Nazi occupied town. Again they will be dying from American bombs and shells when they try to retake Saint-Hubert. We cannot flee. There is no transportation. The roads are snow covered, and temperatures are hovering around zero. We cannot abandon our sick Sisters or the homeless children we have sheltered in our school.

I am ashamed to admit that I fear death.  All my training as a Sister of Our Lady was meant to prepare me for death.

A hypothetical acceptance of one’s death, however, provides only some comfort when faced with the prospect of imminent death. My near-death experience at the start of the German shelling yesterday shattered my philosophical beliefs.

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About the Author

Dennis Turner graduated from Georgetown University in 1967 with a degree in History. He received his Juris Doctorate degree from Georgetown University Law School in 1970. He has served as an Assistant County Prosecutor and as a Magistrate-Judge. Since 1974, he has been a Professor of Law at the University Of Dayton School Of Law. During his tenure at the University of Dayton he has served as Assistant Dean, Acting Dean, Director of the Law Clinic and Director of the Legal Profession Program. The University of Dayton has awarded him its highest award for teaching, The Faculty Teaching Award. He has also received numerous Teacher of the Year Awards from the students at the University Of Dayton School Of Law and was chosen to be one of the Master Teaching Fellows for the University of Dayton. He has been a visiting professor for the University of Notre Dame London Law Program. He also has extensive experience with the British criminal justice system through his association with the barrister firm, Pump Court Chambers, in Winchester, England.

Dennis Turner is the author of many law review articles and a law text book, Steele v. Kitchener Case File. For two years, he also wrote a bi-weekly column for the Dayton Daily News entitled, On the River.

What Did you Do in the War Sister