Blog Tour: SUMMER PEOPLE by Corinne LaBalme

 

Summer People

by Corinne LaBalme

 

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GENRE: Cape Cod Romance

 

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BLURB:

 

Jessica Stratton's long-cherished dream of opening her own Folk Art gallery in an idyllic Cape Cod setting finally comes true. However, her start-up is anything but smooth sailing. Her ten-year marriage hits the rocks and, when the hunk next door to her shop - a brooding ecologist on a mission to save the planet - proves too irresistible to ignore, she's got to relearn the rules of the dating game while working overtime to lure clients to her boutique. Unfortunately, someone's already far too interested in a 19th century example of advertising art in her collection and will go to any means - legal or illegal - to acquire it. Maybe the planet isn't all that needs to be saved...

 

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Excerpt One:

 

Why on earth did that woman get under his skin so much? This was the second time he'd stomped off her property. Well, it had a whole lot to do with that chunk of jewelry on her left hand, didn't it? He didn't need anything to do with married women. Never again.

           

Had he said anything to her that would make them both cringe if they ran into each other in the mini-mart?

           

Oh yeah. Smallpox. Well, that was a low blow, considering that she personally hadn't poisoned any of his ancestors. All the fashion stuff was OK.  But he'd added something about French can-can boots, hadn't he? Boots which had absolutely nothing to do with his sister's thesis. No, those kinky, lace-up boots were part of Martine's Halloween costume last year.

           

She hadn't taken those boots off either. Not even when they went to bed.

 

 Just thinking about the sex that ensued made him feel like he needed another shower. But then he'd have to dry all that damn hair again. How did women stand all this stuff hanging around their shoulders? He'd read about hermits who refused to cut their hair until they'd atoned for their sins.

           

Well, Rick Starfire Martell had a helluva lot to atone for.      

 

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GUEST POST

What are the key elements that you include in your stories?

 

MYSTERY. MYSTERY. and MYSTERY.

When I was a kid, a next door neighbor who was cleaning out her attic came over with six or seven Nancy Drew books. I was hooked in roughly… three chapters. Carolyn Keene became my first and most enduring author crush.

And – in a way that still feels like magic – my best friend in high school turned out to be Carolyn Keene’s grand-daughter. Carolyn Keene, of course, was a nom de plume. (Her real name was Harriet Stratemeyer Adams.) Her father, who laid the groundwork for a mighty YA fiction empire with the Bobbsey Twins books, thwarted his daughter’s desire for higher education. Harriet, however, won the long game and took over the whole syndicate on his death. She wrote the Nancy Drew and Cherry Ames books and quite a few of the Tom Swift and Hardy Boys adventures. The Adams farmhouse in rural New Jersey, with bookshelves crammed with mysteries, was like Ali Baba’s cavern to me. There was a secret to be unwrapped in every single book.

I studied comparative literature in college and while I love Dante Alighieri, Alexandre Dumas and Fyodor Dostoievski, I don’t think there’s been a greater influence on my own writing than Carolyn Keene. I write cozy mysteries most of the time – French Ghost was released last January – but even in a classic romance like Summer People, the plot doesn’t feel like a plot to me without a light sprinkling of mystery.

That’s why – betwixt the soup spoons, samplers and chess sets – Jessica’s Cape Cod gallery simply had to showcase one very problematic example of American Folk Art…  

 

 

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

Corinne LaBalme lives in France and loves everything about it… except eating snails. Her articles about European fashion, food and fun destinations have appeared in The New York Times Travel section, Diversion, La Belle France and France Revisited. Her favorite place to write? Any Parisian café with a good croissant connection… 

 

The setting for SUMMER PEOPLE is founded on childhood memories of vacations on Cape Cod and based on my mother’s (very real) house in Brewster.

 

The romantic hero of SUMMER PEOPLE -- Rick Martell -- is the kind of guy who exists only in our sweetest & beachiest dreams…. sigh!

 

Twitter: @corinnelabalme

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/corinnelabalme/

Website:  https//corinnelabalme.com/

 

https://www.amazon.com/Summer-People-Corinne-Labalme/dp/1509243275/r

 

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61449367-summer-people

 

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GIVEAWAY

 

Corinne LaBalme will be awarding $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway