Author Spotlight - Excerpt from Accidental Hearts

Michelle and I hope you've enjoyed her week in the spotlight. Here's an excerpt from Accidental Hearts. Leave a comment here on this post today, Saturday and Sunday along with your email and I'll pick a winner from the post to receive a PDF copy of Michelle's story.

Smiles
Moderator Steph

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(The set-up: Abby and Tyler have taken their respective monsters ... err, nieces and nephews ... out to a recreation center with mini-golf, games, ice cream, laser tag)

"Uncle -- "
Tyler jerked around when Pam shrieked and barely closed his eyes in time as the golf club slammed into his face. He threw himself backward and flung up his hands, deflecting the worst of the blow.

And ended up sitting in three inches of slightly scummy water.

It occurred to him that if Pam hadn't yelled, he wouldn't have turned and put his face directly in the path of Danny's golf club.

Then again, he should have checked before he bent to take his violet ball out of the hole. He knew it was a mistake to put himself and Abby ahead of the children, even though he knew the game would go much faster that way. That was what he got for hoping to leave the children several holes behind so he could have some private time with Abby. Trying to get away from them seemed to encourage the children to play fast, which brought Danny up on his heels playing without looking ahead. How hard was it for the boy to see an adult male standing two feet away on the putting green?

"Tyler?" Abby knelt on the edge of the shallow water hazard and reached for him. "Are you all right?"

"Am I bleeding?"

"No."

"Then I'm all right. I think." He tried to smile and regretted it. The tiny movement sent a spike of pain crashing through his head. Now he knew how Frankenstein's monster felt, with that seam around the top of his skull.

Twenty minutes later, he and Abby sat in a corner of the snack bar, all by themselves, while he pressed a paper towel full of crushed ice to his forehead. According to the tiny mirror in Pam's pocket, most of the damage consisted of a half-inch wide mark down his forehead, dark red and turning into a bruise. Nothing on his nose, though it felt like the bone was ready to crumble. No blood, thank goodness. He had felt sick enough when Abby had hurt her knee. Seeing her blood had made him feel helpless and angry and slightly twisty in his stomach. Tyler didn't want to know how he would react to his own blood on his hands.

"Feeling better?"

"It's quiet, there's no one arguing within a mile of here, and I have ice cream.
Which, I might add, I don't have to share with those two monsters of mine. What more could a man want?" He tried to smile and was relieved when his head didn't threaten to split open again.

"I like a guy who's easy to please." Abby spooned up some of her sundae. There was an odd flicker in her eyes that made him wonder if she was about to say something and then changed her mind.

"Honestly, I am feeling better. Would you stop trying to feel guilty?"

"Me?"

"Yes, you. It was Pam who shrieked and Danny who hit me. I don't see any way you could have foreseen or stopped them, and Chad and Candy weren't involved at all."

"Well, if you put it that way ..." She fought a grin. "How's your sundae?"

"Fine."

"I'd believe that if you were actually eating it."

"Oh." His face warmed, which felt rather odd against the chill of the paper towel.
The truth was that between trying to drive the ache in his face away, wondering what kind of an idiot he looked like, and gloating over Abby's concern for him, he hadn't had any attention to spare for eating.

He liked staring into her eyes as she sat across the table from him. Tyler wished he could ensure she would be there every morning and evening -- but how could he say that? Most of their time together had been either full of interruptions, embarrassment, or accidents. The last thing he wanted to do was drive Abby away. He wanted to do everything in his power to make sure she wanted to be there, with him.
Short of brainwashing at this point in their relationship -- did they even have a relationship? -- what could he do?

*****

Web site: www.Mlevigne.com
Trailer: www.Mlevigne.com/tabor-main.html
OR www.MLevigne.com/trailers.html
Buy link: http://stores.desertbreezepublishing.com/-strse-326/Tabor-Heights%2C-Ohio-cln--Accidental/Detail.bok

Author Spotlight - Michelle Levigne wants to hear your story!

Tell me YOUR story.

Abby and Tyler have a lot on their individual plates, and it takes some determination, some whining, some prayer, some interference on the part of nieces and nephews, before they can finally get together and speak their hearts. Have you experienced something like this in your life? Not just in the area of romance, but in things you need to do, want to do? Getting an education? Taking a vacation? Obtaining a life-changing experience? Overcoming obstacles, especially the ones thrown at you by people who think they're being helpful but they're actually working against you? What part did your faith play in it? Can you point to something that clearly wouldn't have happened if God hadn't stepped in? Or maybe you wish God HAD stepped in? Maybe even slapped you backwards and said, "Nuh uh. This ain't the way, babe." (Okay, maybe God doesn't talk like that, but how can you be sure?)

Speak up -- either when the blog here is open for comments, or post comments to the Tabor Heights Today blog: www.Tabor-Heights-Today.blogspot.com. I will publish the top 5 on the blog, the most inspirational stories of overcoming, and everyone who gets published with receive a mousepad with the cover art for all the books of Year One.
We wanna hear from you -- and who knows? Maybe I'll like your story so much, it might just slip into a subplot in Year Two ... (Not making any promises, I'm just saying it might happen ............)

***
Part of this week's giveaway: Post your stories! Michelle will pick 2 commenters in a random drawing to win a mousepad of the story.

Web site: www.Mlevigne.com
Trailer: www.Mlevigne.com/tabor-main.html
OR www.MLevigne.com/trailers.html
Buy link: http://stores.desertbreezepublishing.com/-strse-326/Tabor-Heights%2C-Ohio-cln--Accidental/Detail.bok

Author Spolight - Michelle Levigne talks about Tabor Heights Year Two

Happy New Year!

ACCIDENTAL HEARTS is the 12th book in Tabor Heights, and the final book in Year One, which coincides with the 12th month of the year. So in essence, this is New Year's Eve, and the book that comes out in December, INVITATION TO A WEDDING, is New Year's Day.

And just like on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day you have traditions, and you look forward to the new year and make plans and resolutions, INVITATION will give you just a tiny taste of what is going to happen in Year Two of the Tabor Heights books. People you've met and cheered for in the previous year/12 books will show up, and you'll hear about their weddings, changes in their lives, and resolutions of their stories. Some, like Officer Mike Nicholls, will be mentors to the heroes and heroines of the stories of Year Two.

We're going to have 2 collections of short stories in Year Two, both of them dealing with Butler-Williams University students. Some of them, as in the dorm sisters in A BOX OF PROMISES, aren't even looking for love, but somehow love -- or the potential for it, anyway -- finds them!

Just like Abby and Tyler in ACCIDENTAL HEARTS. They are so busy taking care of their families, helping their siblings and nieces and nephews, they aren't looking for something for themselves. But when God drops someone nearly on your head and says, "Hey, look what I've got for you!" well ... you gotta listen. And fight for that true love. Even if the entire world seems to be conspiring to keep you apart.
Just like Abby and Tyler.

Web site: www.Mlevigne.com
Trailer: www.Mlevigne.com/tabor-main.html
OR www.MLevigne.com/trailers.html
Buy link: http://stores.desertbreezepublishing.com/-strse-326/Tabor-Heights%2C-Ohio-cln--Accidental/Detail.bok

Author Spotlight - Michelle Levigne talks about Redemption

Redemption -- I'm not talking about taking a story that you wrote a long time ago, dusting it off, and performing a little plastic surgery to make it workable. With ACCIDENTAL, I had to do some major redemption. I wrote this story I don't know how many years ago, before I started pulling the Tabor Heights stories together. Before I realized it was a Tabor Heights story. I had to change the hero's last name, his sister's marital problems, and bring the heroine's parents back from the dead. Along with minor details like street names, city names, and current events. But that's not what I mean by redemption.

Big confession time: There was a period in my writing when I succumbed to the allure of writing "sexy" -- and the requests of some of my editors, and the pressure of the people around me in RWA. When Tyler plans the "get to know you better" getaway for him and Abby, in the original version of the story, he was planning on proposing, convincing her to fly to Vegas to elope, and even packed a lacy negligee to surprise her with. Ummm, NOT the Tyler and Abby we know now! And in the original version, they were seriously considering having the honeymoon first, before they were interrupted by their rescuers. (Hope that doesn't give away too much of the story...)

I have other stories I've put back into storage that I hope to redeem someday, take away the sex and concentrate more on the relationship and the action, the conflict, the challenge in the story. It's going to be hard, but I've been learning -- and maybe God has been teaching me -- that you don't need the hormones going at 300MPH to have a good story!

Web site: www.Mlevigne.com
Trailer: www.Mlevigne.com/tabor-main.html
OR www.MLevigne.com/trailers.html
Buy link: http://stores.desertbreezepublishing.com/-strse-326/Tabor-Heights%2C-Ohio-cln--Accidental/Detail.bok

Author Spotlight - Q&A with Michelle Levigne

STEPH: I don't know much about "Accidental Hearts." What's it about?

MICHELLE: Tyler Sloane, who we first met in COMMON GROUNDS as Xander's college friend and new roommate, has come to the rescue of his sister Tanya, whose marriage just imploded. He has her and her two children, Danny and Pam, come live with him.

Abby Morgan, who we first met in THE SECOND TIME AROUND, is the cousin of Dr. Daniel Morgan of Bulter-Williams University's theater department. She is helping her widowed brother, Al, raise his children, Chad and Candy.

They meet at summer camp, when, after dropping off their nieces and nephews, Tyler's Corvette breaks down and blocks traffic. Abby, who happens to be a pilot and has some mechanical skill, steps up to help. They're both interested, but with jobs to do and kids to help raise, who has time? Somehow, accidents keep throwing them together -- and when the accidents start pushing them apart, they realize they want to be together.

STEPH: How long did it take you to write?

MICHELLE: I can't remember how long the first draft took, because it was so long ago, but I spent about 2 months, on and off, doing the revising. Boring answer, huh?

STEPH: How much research did you have to do?

MICHELLE: Not that much. I had to look up some things like if there was an airport in Davenport, Iowa, and a little terminology for small aircraft, but the rest was taken from experience and all the things I had already established for the Tabor Heights books. For instance, where Tyler gets his hand smashed by the knucklebuster on the theater curtain ... *sigh* ... that was ME!

STEPH: How does the cover reflect the story within?

MICHELLE: I love Corvettes. What else can I say? I always give Jenifer such a challenge for my cover art, because I'm not a very visual person, but she always comes through. It's a great cover. I think the hood being propped up on a Corvette, signalling something is wrong ... that says it all.

STEPH: Abby is the heroine. What are her strengths? Weakness?

MICHELLE: She's responsible, reliable, dedicated, has a slow fuse -- but she's so used to putting herself last for the sake of her family that she feels guilty when there's something she wants and she feels resentment and frustration because it seems eternally out of her reach. Meaning a relationship with Tyler.

STEPH: What does Tyler find appealing about her?

MICHELLE: Maybe unconsciously, he likes that she doesn't seem to need rescuing, like his sister. Even though Tanya is strong -- she has to be -- she let her jerk-face husband scam her and then steal from her and her children. Tyler likes that Abby is independent and takes care of others. It helps that she's pretty, but she's not a glamour chick. And it helps a LOT that she understands the world of theater, because Morgan is her cousin. You can't believe the conflict and stress that can form in a relationship where one person doesn't understand the world that the other one lives in. (Well, maybe writers with spouses can understand -- especially the spouses/kids/parents who don't understand that when the fingers are moving across the keyboard, or you're staring into the distance, yes, you ARE working and interruptions about anything less important than blood or fire will destroy that scene you're building in your head.)

STEPH: What is the theme of the novel?

MICHELLE: Life gets in the way -- but you gotta decide what's really important to you and go for it. No matter what. No matter who.

STEPH: As a writer, where do you draw inspiration from?

MICHELLE: I HATE this question. Because honestly, ideas come from everywhere. Some stories come from dreams that stay in your head long after you wake up. Other stories come from watching a TV show or movie or reading a book that you hate because you KNOW it should have gone a different direction. Or the old standby: "I can write better than THAT!" You get images in your head, or someone asks a question, or you have a favorite story you'd like to see from a different angle. A friend dares you to retell an old story. Or, in the case of some of my SF, I made a world so "real" and secondary characters so solid that they developed lives and histories of their own, and I knew I had to tell those stories, too.

STEPH: Do you have an ebook reader? If so, which one?

MICHELLE: I started with a Palm Tungsten, then ordered one of the first Nooks. When my Palm died (temporarily!), I needed another MP3 player, so I got an iPod Touch, which lets me load e-reader software, so I have Nook, Kindle and iBooks on my iPod and my iPad. I have too many gizmos and too much luggage! But I would be lost without my iPad -- I can read in the line at stores or riding in a car (NOT driving), check my email without having to go through the fuss of logging in online, keep notes and lists and iTunes University is proving to be incredible for research purposes.

STEPH: Fun question: Are you a candle fan? What's your favorite candle to burn? Any autumn scents you'd like to gush about?

MICHELLE: I like scented candles, but don't really take the time to burn them. I have a Bath & Body Works 3-wick candle sitting on my desk, half-burned, that I got last Christmas. It's called Winter Night. I really like it, but as you can guess, I haven't burned it in a long time. And I keep it sealed to preserve the scent. Maybe when the cold weather comes back and I don't have my windows open for fresh air anymore, I'll start burning the candle.

But you know, I'm hoping to get my own place soon, so maybe I'll start getting candles and burn them regularly ... READERS? Any suggestions from you?


Web site: www.Mlevigne.com
Trailer: www.Mlevigne.com/tabor-main.html
OR www.MLevigne.com/trailers.html
Buy link: http://stores.desertbreezepublishing.com/-strse-326/Tabor-Heights%2C-Ohio-cln--Accidental/Detail.bok