THE BEAUTIFUL AMERICAN #Excerpt by @M_Holdsworth #WomensFic #HistFic

THE MONROES SET SAIL FOR FRANCE
from THE BEAUTIFUL AMERICAN by Marilyn Holdsworth

A stiff breeze was blowing across the Chesapeake Bay the next morning when the Cincinnatus pulled away from Cheapside Wharf, leaving Baltimore Harbor to make her way toward the open seas. Although it was early, all the ship’s passengers gathered on deck for the sailing. I stood at the railing, holding Eliza’s hand. The wind blew through our hair, as we watched the quay grow smaller and smaller.

“Do you think we’ll ever come back, Jasmine?” Eliza suddenly whispered, clutching my hand tightly.

“Course we be comin’ back,” I told her stoutly, hoping I sounded more sure than I was feeling. The roll and pitch of the ship plowing through the waves gave me little assurance. I felt like I was leaving everything the least bit familiar and comforting behind forever. I had heard Master Monroe talking to Mistress Elizabeth about gaining her sea legs, and I wondered about my own now as I watched the shoreline being replaced with the heaving, rolling seascape before us.

We had been sailing for about four hours when the sky suddenly darkened and the waves grew higher and heavier. Captain Joshua Barney walked the deck advising all of us to go to our cabins. “Ladies,” he warned, “you must prepare yourselves for a bit of roughness. I fear a slight squall is building.”

Rain pelted, the wind howled, and great waves crashed over the ship’s side,sending torrents of water rushing along the deck. The Cincinnatus pitched and rolled unmercifully for the rest of the afternoon and through the night. I lay on my floor pallet next to Eliza’s bunk, listening to her tossing and crying. Too wretchedly sick to comfort her, I clutched my charm bag and rabbit’s foot, praying that the good lord would take me. “Dear, lawd,” I prayed, “I be ready if youse would only take me now.”

You can read more about The Beautiful American, by Marilyn Holdsworth at: http://marilynholdsworth.com/the-beautiful-american/

As a novelist, I draw on many real life experiences to provide background for my books. After completing studies in Literature and History at Occidental College, I became a staff writer on a travel magazine, and throughout my career I have traveled extensively all over the world. Because I love horses, I owned and trained them. I support horse rescue and wild mustang preservation. Based on my experience with horses and my research on abuse issues, I wrote Pegasus.

As a descendant of James Monroe, I did extensive research at the James Monroe Museum in Virginia about him and his wife Elizabeth Kortright Monroe. I also visited their home, Ashlawn/Highland in Albemarle County. This resulted in my novel, The Beautiful American. Making Wishes, was based partly on my experiences as creator, owner and operator of a greeting card company.

Elloree Prince is an attractive, creative young woman who marries a wealthy businessman, Tom Randall. After courting his bride with unrelenting determination, Tom moves her into old-moneyed Oak View, where generations of Randalls have lived for years. Outwardly, Elloree appears to settle into raising their two sons within Oak View's stifling social structure, but inwardly, she yearns for her artistic work. 

An unexpected phone call from Mark Williams, her former employer, offers her the career opportunity of a lifetime, and she must make a choice. She is torn between her devotion to her sons and her love for her work. Her decision to return to Wishes, Inc. brings dramatic life changes to her and the people she loves.

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Genre - Women's fiction

Rating – PG-13

"Abby Long is thrilled when she offers the winning bid for an antique desk at an auction. With its intricately inlaid woods and elegant style, the desk is perfect for Abby; it is the gift she promised herself to finally celebrate her thriving antique business. She has no idea that the antique desk holds a secret that will lead her on a fascinating, life-changing journey back in time.

When Abby discovers a hidden diary stuffed inside a secret compartment in the desk, she can hardly wait to read the spidery, faded script. As she carefully turns the tattered pages, she reads the captivating story of two remarkable women from opposite backgrounds who somehow manage to form an unforgettable bond against the backdrop of a fledgling America struggling to find its place in the world. Elizabeth Kortright Monroe, the wife of James Monroe, and Jasmine, a young slave girl, develop an extraordinary relationship as they are united by pivotal historic events, political intrigues, and personal tragedies.

 From a bucolic Virginia plantation to the bloodied, starving streets of post-revolutionary Paris, this powerful tale follows the lives of two courageous women from the past as they quietly influence—and inspire—a woman of today’s world."

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Genre - Historical fiction

Rating – G

Widowed at thirty, Hannah Bradley is a successful journalist focusing on animal abuse issues. An accidental meeting introduces her to lawyer, Winston Caughfield III. Drawn to Hannah’s gentle beauty and fierce commitment to her work, Win joins her in a fight to save wild mustangs from slaughter. Together they rescue a badly injured horse with a mysterious background. Hannah’s search to discover the animal’s true identity leads them into a web of black marketeering and international intrigue. 

Action packed with crisp colorful dialogue the story propels the reader to a race against time conclusion. Marilyn Holdsworth delivers a gripping tale of mystery, adventure and romance guaranteed to hold the interest and capture the heart. She brings true-life characters together with real-life issues to create a fast-paced irresistible story.

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Genre - Contemporary fiction

Rating – PG

More details about the author

 Connect with Marilyn Holdsworth on Facebook & Twitter

Website  http://marilynholdsworth.com/

Blog http://marilynholdsworth.com/blog/

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Inside the Mind of #Author Olga Soaje (Twelve Houses) #Contemporary #Women #Fiction

Now this is a tricky part, since every person is unique as their handprints and ideas to which they excel . But I would dare say the mind of an writer works all day round, very much like a painter sees the world in shades of colors and forms. Writers see the world around them in stories, characters, ideas and emotions.

I would dare say that we can we occasionally eavesdrop at restaurants and several places, just because human interactions are information, material and the kind of things that make our journeys in novels worthwhile.

When I’m personally working on something I always carry a notebook with me, because when least expected and this has happened even in the supermarket I get an idea or a paragraph would just come to be unwilling to wait until I’m at the keyboard.

The mind of an Author is ever churning in order to make the reader feel and be transported to places of amusement, emotion and inspiration.

Can anything good follow the best thing that ever happened to you?

Amelia Weiss loved her husband of thirty-five years very much, but now he’s left her a widow. Without him, she is unable to work in her sculpture studio without crying. She no longer has a bridge to her estranged daughter. And she can’t seem to keep her mind in the present.

But when her daughter reaches out asking for her help and her agent threatens a lawsuit if Amelia doesn’t deliver for an upcoming exhibit, she’s forced to make a choice. Will she reengage with her life and the people in it—allowing room for things to be different than they were before? Or, will she remain stuck in the past, choosing her memories over real-life relationships?

Thrust fully into the present, Amelia stumbles into a surprising journey of self-discovery.

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Genre – Contemporary Fiction, Literary Fiction, Women’s Fiction

Rating – PG-13

More details about the author

Connect with Olga Soaje on Facebook

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Your Novel Has Its Own Fate, Says Eva Fejos @FejosEva #AmWriting #Women #Contemporary

My answer is simple: maybe you shouldn’t try to sell your first book. It also might not be the one to bring your breakthrough to success. I think the first book you write is your guinea pig. Let me tell you my own example; clearly there are people who write amazing novels the first time around (those people can skip reading this part): I started writing novels when I was in my teens, but naturally I got stuck several times. I didn’t have much practice yet and if I couldn’t find a solution, I just started a new novel. I had all these unfinished manuscripts before I was able to actually finish my first book at age eighteen. Like all authors, I immediately ran happily to a Hungarian publisher.

I was lucky, because an editor read it and called me up to say that it was full of mistakes due to my lack of practice, but that a novel competition had been announced not long ago, and that I had one more month before they closed the applications. He suggested that I write a new novel during that time. Since it was summer and I had time, I got right down to it. I managed to finish by hardly sleeping at all, sitting up and writing all the time. In the end, I placed second in the competition and went home with a contract in my pocket. I was very happy. Then, a few weeks later, the publishing house went bankrupt and they didn’t publish my novel. I’m glad now that they didn’t. If I re-read today – which I won’t – what I had written then, I’d be stunned. I’m sure I would discover plenty of mistakes. I’d see that it wasn’t a mature text, and that the story was obviously undeveloped. But it was a great lesson.

Then what happened? I wrote a novel that I felt was mature enough, that the story was well written, and that it was time to send it to a publisher. This book was Till Death Do Us Part, which I really did send to a publisher in Budapest in 1999. They immediately accepted it and published it! True, they only printed limited numbers, and they also suggested that I publish under a pseudonym. While writing this book, I already felt that this novel was destined to reach many people, but this didn’t happen back in 1999. They only printed 3,000 copies, though they did sell all of them. But the story isn’t over. When I founded my own publishing company in 2013, I thought, now is the time when my long lost first book can finally reach a much wider audience. So this was the first book my own publishing house printed last summer. I gave the book a new name, a symbolic name, Starting Now, asked a new editor to work with it, had a new cover designed, and sent it out into the world, this time, under my own name.

Now, at the start of 2014, I can safely say that this book, which barely reached readers under the name of Till Death Do Us Part, is finally starting to ‘fulfill its destiny.’ I always felt that the book had this potential, but it needed 14 years (and 11 books to follow it) in order to reach so many people. So I think that patience and timing are important. Also, make sure that you write only for yourself about things you yourself would like to read about. Don’t try and please your ‘imagined audience’ or try and live up to real or imagined expectations.

The most important thing is to enjoy writing and believe that each of your novels has its own fate. This way, writing will always stay entertaining and you won’t give up hope.

Bangkok: a sizzling, all-embracing, exotic city where the past and the present intertwine. It’s a place where anything can happen… and anything really does happen. The paths of seven people cross in this metropolis. Seven seekers, for whom this city might be a final destination. Or perhaps it is only the start of a new journey? A successful businessman; a celebrated supermodel; a man who is forever the outsider; a young mother who suddenly loses everything; a talented surgeon, who could not give the woman he loved all that she desired; a brothel’s madam; and a charming young woman adopted at birth. Why these seven? Why did they come to Bangkok now, at the same time? Do chance encounters truly exist?

Bangkok Transit is a Central European best-seller. The author, Eva Fejos, a Hungarian writer and journalist, is a regular contributor to women’s magazines and is often herself a featured personality. Bangkok Transit was her first best-seller, which sold more than 100,000 copies and is still selling. Following the initial publication of this novel in 2008, she went on to write twelve other best-sellers, thus becoming a publishing phenomena in Hungary According to accounts given by her readers, the author’s books are “therapeutic journeys,” full of flesh and blood characters who never give up on their dreams. Many readers have been inspired to change the course of their own lives after reading her books. “Take your life into your own hands,” is one of the important messages the author wishes to convey.

Try it for yourself, and let Eva Fejos whisk you off on one of her whirlwind journeys… that might lead deep into your own heart.

About Eva Fejos, the author of Bangkok Transit

- Eva Fejos is a Hungarian writer and journalist.

She:

- has had 13 best-selling novels published in Hungary so far.

- Bangkok Transit is her first best-seller, published in 2008.

- has won several awards as a journalist, and thanks to one of her articles, the legislation pertaining to human egg donation was modified, allowing couples in need to acquire donor eggs more easily.  

- spends her winters in Bangkok.

- likes novels that have several storylines running parallel.

- visited all the places she’s written about. 

- spent a few days at an elephant orphanage in Thailand; and has investigated the process of how Thai children are put up for adoption while visiting several orphanages. 

- founded her own publishing company in Hungary last year, where she not only publishes her own books, but foreign books too, hand-picked by her. 

- Her books published in Hungary thus far are:

Till Death Do Us Part (Holtodiglan) | Bangkok Transit | Hotel Bali | Chicks (Csajok) | Strawberries for Breakfast (Eper reggelire) | The Mexican (A mexikói) | Cuba Libre | Dalma | Hello, London | Christmas in New York (Karácsony New Yorkban) | Caribbean Summer (Karibi nyár) | Bangkok, I Love You (Szeretlek, Bangkok) | Starting Now – the new edition ofTill Death Do Us Part (Most kezdődik) | Vacation in Naples – the English version will be published in summer, 2014 (Nápolyi vakáció)

To be published in spring of 2014: I Waited One Hundred Nights (Száz éjjel vártam)

Bangkok Transit (English version): http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HDIT4UY

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Genre – Women’s Fiction, Contemporary

Rating – PG-13

More details about the author

Connect with Eva Fejos on Facebook & Twitter

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