Margo's Choice is free on Amazon for Oct 8 & 9!

 http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008M0U8CU.

 

Margo’s Choice is a Southern Women’s Fiction story.

Margo Lake isn’t looking forward to seeing her ex husband Jay again. After 16 years of separation the marine still knows how to push her buttons. She has never stopped loving him, at least in some ways, though she really doesn't like him.

When she learns he isn’t coming for a visit but is retiring, she fears what he can do to her heart if she lets him inside for even a second. Even more, she fears for the heart of her youngest daughter, the child who adores him, the child he doesn’t believe is his.

Jay has finally had his fill of war and danger. He is ready to retire and get to know his daughter better, be with his family. He wishes Margo would come clean and tell her youngest daughter he isn’t her father. Then he could forgive her lies and maybe they could all have honest relationships.

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Excerpt
Jay had seen his daughter and her scuzzy boyfriend. The alpha ex Marine has to do something.

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Once he was sure Electra was gone, Jay strode up the cracked sidewalk to the dump his daughter had just left. He glanced up and down the road and saw no neighbors walking. He leaned on the doorbell button, but he didn’t hear any ringing. Was it a silent ring or just dead?

When he heard no footsteps, either, he banged on the door. He counted to one hundred before he heard heavy footfall and loud cursing.

A voice rusty with sleep or drugs yelled. “Hold onto your balls, asshole!”

Jay stepped back when a mountain of a man appeared inside the screen door, scratching his crotch.

“Yeah? We don’t want any.” The huge man slammed the door closed.

Jay banged again. “I’m looking for the creep who was with Electra,” he yelled.

The door opened a crack. Someone inside yelled, “Shark, get down here. Someone wants you. Screwing jail-bait again?”

Jay hoped that was a joke, but he wiped sweaty palms on his jeans, fighting the urge to open a can of Marine whup-ass on the oaf standing in the doorway.

The door finally opened to reveal a tattooed critter. The shirtless chest looked almost concave. Pants hung on hipbones of a man who surely was a druggie.

“Looking for me?”

The man at the door was Jay’s opposite. How could Electra or any self-respecting young woman want anything to do with him?

“Yep, I saw you with Electra.” Though Jay’s hands hung at his sides, they were fisted.

“One fine piece of ass! Who wants to know?”

Jay saw red. He tore the screen door off its hinges. Anger filled him, making him swell with adrenaline. “Her father, you piece of shit!” Jay growled.

“Hey, she’s legal,” Shark sniveled.

“But you were buying her alcohol before she was legal, weren’t you? Feeding alcohol to a minor?”

“I ain’t done nothin’ she didn’t want.” The scuzzy man dug his own grave with his words.

“I can’t believe you’re stupid enough to say that to her father. Stay away from her if you want to keep your dick. I will tear it off and make you eat it!”

“I’ll call the cops.” His brave words came out in a squeak as he took stumbling steps backward.

“Good, my brother is a cop, call him.” Jay took a step forward, clenching and unclenching his hands

The jerk slammed the door.

Jay rammed his fist through the flimsy door before he realized he intended to hit it.

“Shit, man!” Shark growled from behind the door. “You crazy MF-in’ bastard!”

“Crazy Marine to you, asshole! Stay away from Electra!”

Jay strode back down the sidewalk, relieved there were no neighbors walking in sight. He had lost his cool for the first time in more than seventeen years. That time he’d heard that Margo was pregnant with a child that couldn’t be his. He sat in his car, trying to calm down before driving away.

 Are you put off by the way he handles this situation? Would you want to do what he did? 

 Comment, though EVERYONE can download this book FREE!

We have a variety of writers and readers here. I always considered myself a writer of romance. Strangely enough, my last two stories have been women's fiction. Since my books aren't published yet, I feel odd calling my "books" books. Well, I'll call them books, anyway.

Women's Fiction books are about issues women face and journeys they experience. They may contain a love story or a mystery or suspense. They may be about younger women or those of us way over forty. Some include characters who span three or more generations. some include more than one subplot, but the main story is about a woman or women at a point of change.

Clear as mud? Let's hope we'll hear from folks with their own interpretations.

The next four books were in my huge to-be-read stacks. I found some real treasures.

Haywood Smith is one of my favorite women's fiction writers. She deals with infidelity, aging parents, problems with a woman and her adult children. Her Red Had Club books are about a Georgia woman and her friends. If you enjoy southern fiction, give her books a try. The latest is Wedding Belles (St Martin's Press, 2008).

Beverly Brandt also has a wonderful book called The Tiara Club, (St Martin's Press, 2005). Again there are friends, most of whom are local beauty queens. Corny? Nah. Shallow. Nope. This story deals with the complicated relationship Georgia has with her mama and her friends. There is a hunky guy, by the way. The story contains suspense and tons of fun.

Barking Goats and the Redneck Mafia by Dolores J. Wilson (Medallion Press, 2006) kept me in stitches. The protagonist, Bertie Byrd owns Bertie's Garage and Towing. This book, part of a mystery series, has wonderfully emotional moments and characters so bizarre you'll laugh out loud.

Jill Marie Landis grabbed my heart with Lover's Lane (Ballantine Books, 2003) Carley Nolan has worked hard to build a life for herself and her young son, Christopher. Her life changes when a detective is determined to find her.

What are you reading and loving?

Ladies, please help me welcome Karen White, a southern writer who makes me feel at home in her southern novels. (I'm Georgia bred and Georgia raised.) Karen is a past president of Georgia Romance Writers. Ask her about her tiara.

Karen, when did the writing bug bite you?

After playing hooky one day in the seventh grade to read Gone With the Wind, I knew I wanted to be a writer—or become Scarlett O'Hara.

From her bio:
In spite of these aspirations, Karen pursued a degree in business and graduated cum laude with a BS in Management from Tulane University. Ten years later, after leaving the business world, she fulfilled her dream of becoming a writer and wrote her first book. In the Shadow of the Moon was published in August, 2000. This book was nominated for the prestigious RITA award in 2001 in two separate categories. Her books have since been nominated for numerous national contests including another RITA, the Georgia Author of the Year Award and in 2008 won the National Readers’ Choice Award for Learning to Breathe.

Karen currently writes what she refers to as ‘grit lit’—southern women’s fiction—and has recently expanded her horizons into writing a mystery series set in Charleston. Her tenth novel, The Lost Hours, was released in trade paperback by New American Library, a division of Penguin Publishing Group, in April 2009.

Karen hails from a long line of Southerners but spent most of her growing up years in London, England and is a graduate of the American School in London. She currently lives near Atlanta, Georgia with her husband and two teenaged children, and a spoiled Havanese dog (who appears in several of her books), Quincy. When not writing, she spends her time reading, singing, playing piano, chauffeuring children and avoiding cooking.

In mid-December, 2003 I finally received the call from my agent that I’d pretty much given up hope ever getting. She left a message on my answering machine saying that she had a two-book offer on the table from my dream publisher, Penguin Publishing Group.

I stood listening to the message about a dozen times, holding heavy bags of groceries, wanting to believe in her sincerity while the whole time picturing my long-suffering husband standing behind her while she made the phone call with a weapon pointed at her head.

Let’s back up three years to explain how I got to that point. Granted, it wasn’t technically my ‘first sale’—but for me, it was the first sale that counted. Most people who know me know my story—how I entered the first book I ever wrote into a contest and it ended up not only winning, but also garnering the attention of a literary agent who offered to represent me. My first sales were to two small publishers. At the time, I would have worked for free (and I just about did!) for the privilege of being published. My advances were small, my print runs and distribution even smaller. Still I was grateful, and pumped out four award-winning books of which I’m still very proud.

I was at least climbing the ladder of success, although my paltry print-runs and publisher non-support kept me firmly planted on the bottom rung. I felt as if I were going to the prom. Sure, my date was the dorky boy with pimples, but at least I was going!

And then even my foothold on that bottom rung was shaken loose and I crashed to the floor. My publisher dropped me, stripping me of confidence and pride. I couldn't sell a book for 2 ½ years. Even the dorky boy didn't want to take me to the prom anymore. I was humiliated, devastated and heartbroken. It no longer mattered to me that I’d published four really great books (as friends and family kept reminding me). At the time, all I could do was point out Tom Petty's song, Even the Losers (Get Lucky Sometimes).

I was inconsolable. St. Jude, the patron saint of hopeless cases, became my close companion and we'd talk every day. I even thought seriously about making voodoo dolls of certain New York publishing personnel and holding them over hot flames. I gave myself until December 31st of 2003. If I hadn’t sold another book by then, I was hanging up my word processor. I simply couldn’t bang my head against the wall any longer. On the day I received the call from my agent, my husband was on a business trip in New York. Before he’d left, he asked, “Is there anything I can get you while I’m there?” My despondent answer, “A contract.”

I supposed it was only natural, then, that when the call came from my agent later that day, I couldn’t help but picture my husband ‘influencing’ my agent into making an offer. We authors are a pessimistic bunch, after all. It was only after I’d calmed down enough to call her back that I learned the truth: my manuscript had earned the contract on its own merits and the publisher liked it enough to give me a contract for another book that wasn’t yet even a twinkle in my eye.

So, my advice for all of you writers who are waiting for ‘the call’ or have hit a bump? Have faith. Have faith in a higher authority that things are working out the way they should. Have faith in your abilities as a writer. Then go do. Keep writing. You can't sell that next book if it's not written. Read books out of your genre. Take a writing class to hone your skills. Help others. It takes the focus off of yourself for a while and makes you feel better. Hang out with your friends and people who love you. They are a marvelous buffer against the mean people out there.
I know that it's inevitable that I'll hit a rough spot in my career again. But I've found the survival basics I'll need to get through it the next time. Remember: have faith. And voodoo dolls couldn't hurt, either.

For more info check out

http://www.karen-white.com

Karen will give away a copy of The Lost Hours to a lucky commenter. Comment and ask questions! The Comment button is at the top of this entry.