HAVEN STRONG
by Jessica Rakus
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GENRE: Women’s Fiction
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BLURB:
Josephine Grant lives a charmed life - a husband, three perfect children, strong bonds with family and friends in the small town where she's lived her entire life. She's the helper, the hostess, the one who always shows up. The person who can do it all.
Then the bus carrying her son's basketball team crashes, and Jo's husband and son are among the lives lost. Now she has a new identity. Widow. Single mother. Woman who lost everything. Grief begins to tear apart the place that's always been her home. Infighting among friends. Gossip and rumors. Wounds that may never heal and bonds that just might.
Now Jo has to rebuild her life, but as the person who thinks of herself as the helper, asking others to help hold her together is impossible. Jo must learn to lean on others as she learns to stand on her own.
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EXCERPT
The game got more physical, Reston between me and the basket. I couldn’t push past him and still dribble, so I turned my back to him, trying to get an angle on him. My back was against his chest, heat radiating from his body. I closed my eyes, inhaling the scent of his sweat, feeling the pounding of his heart, the rise and fall of his breathing. My mouth went dry, and I did my best to swallow. I wanted to turn around, but I knew if I did, I would kiss him.
We were in my driveway. All of Haven could have seen us, and then what?
“Everything okay?” Reston murmured against my ear.
I’d stopped dribbling, holding the ball in my hands. This was no longer friends goofing off, having fun together. This was me realizing that I wanted—badly—to take Reston inside and make love to him on my unmade bed. The lust had bubbled inside of me unexpectedly, but my husband, I couldn’t do that to him, even if he wasn’t...
“I have to get back to my chores,” I replied, taking half a step away from Reston.
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Guest Post
Topic: Pros and cons of writing in your genre. I love writing book club fiction! It’s always been my genre, since I first started writing (well, in my teens, I was writing YA, but it had a lot of the same themes that I work with now, just with younger characters). For me, the biggest pro is being able to explore topics that feel grounded in real life. Grief specifically is a central theme in most of my projects (probably all of them, if I’m being honest), and grief is universal. Not all my characters handle their grief the same way (just look at the community in Haven Strong), so each time I get to see how different life experiences and support systems and societies change the grief process for these characters. The biggest con to me is the market - these days, people don’t run out to get their hands on a book where realistic bad things happen to people. One could argue that no one wakes up in the morning and thinks, “I’m going to spend my relaxation time making myself cry.” That’s not an escape! Maybe I could make this easier on myself and write whatever the publishing industry is going nuts over, but that’s not why I write. I love making people cry, sorry, readers!
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Jessica Rakus is a debut novelist, after many, many years of writing practice. She currently lives in Louisiana, after living briefly in seven other states.
More information available at JessicaRakusBooks.com
Purchase on Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F9QNWVDF/ref=sr_1_1
Purchase at Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/haven-strong-jessica-rakus/1148809286
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GIVEAWAY
Jessica Rakus will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner.
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