Virtual Book Tour w/Giveaway: Fearless Destiny by Annette Bower

Fearless Destiny

by Annette Bower

GENRE: Women's fiction with romantic elements

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Annette Bower will be awarding a $20 Amazon or Barnes and Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.  Please visit GoddessFish.com to follow the tour, remember the more you comment better your chances on winning.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

BLURB:

From the Romance Review Readers Choice nominee, Annette Bower, comes a new small town romance, Fearless Destiny. Tiffany George, riding high on her commission as a fresco artist, returns home for some deserved rest and relaxation. The drive is uneventful until she rescues Will Cleaver on the side of a highway. While savoring memories of a kiss and a well formed butt, her future goals do not include a romance. Once in town, she discovers the hopes and dreams of her community hinge on the development of a new resource mine and Will Cleaver’s designed neighborhood. Her parents demand she give up art and resume her working partner role in the family business. Tiffany George is pulled by her community roots and stretched by her newly discovered independence. Will Cleaver knows about taking charge of destiny. He models the courage she uses to become the woman she needs to be.

Buy Links:

Amazon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Excerpt:

The words “hello there” ploughed down the silent hallway as Tiffany’s roadside linebacker advanced with a synchronized arm and leg crutch-walk.

Tiffany bit her cheek while she watched her father grab the railing on the wall. She stepped forward. “Tiffany George of George’s Family Plumbing. There’s a water break.”

His gaze traveled up from her chest to the collar of her pink coveralls and then to the top of her head, where she was sure her spikes had tumbled like dominoes. Then down to the tips of her lime-green boots. “Nice boots, real nice boots.”

Tiffany tugged at the weight of the tool bag across her body.

“A sprite of many talents, I see.” He gripped his walking aids.

“We can’t all be just a pretty face.” She could have bitten off her tongue.

He raised his eyebrows and his eyes sparkled. They weren’t black after all, but a deep brown.

“You think I’m pretty?” He sounded amused.

She took a wide stance and began an assessment of him from the tip of his dusty loafers, gray trousers, a rumpled white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows exposing firm, and tanned arms. His whiskers shadowed across his firm jaw, his full lips held neutral, his straight nose and those dark watchful eyes had deep etched laugh lines around them. “You have a certain road weariness that I’d like to capture on paper.” Reaching with her callused fingers, she touched his beard.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Q & A with Annette Bower

Thank you for hosting me today as part of the Goddess Fish Virtual Book Tour for Fearless Destiny.

What books/authors have influenced your writing?

Canadian author, Lucy Maud Montgomery. She wrote the Anne of Green Gables series, by using her experiences as a young girl. She often commented on the significance of place, but studies indicate that readers don’t often recall specifics of setting, it is the story they recall. Montgomery married but was committed to being a writer. She commented that her first book was “something, which but for me, would never have existed.” I explore the theme about the fine line between selfishness and selflessness for artists in Fearless Destiny.

Also Frances Hodgson Burnett, author of The Secret Garden. She used Mary’s growth and the bringing back to life of the garden as the central symbol. She showed the magic healing brought about by caring for one another and the living things around us.

Tell us something you hate doing. Why?

I procrastinate downsizing my book collection because they are touchstones for me. I may not have opened their covers for awhile but just knowing they are there is comforting. However, they do take over my office and others would surely benefit from having them.

Share a funny incident in your life. 

I'm directionally challenged so getting lost is easy for me and finding my way back to where I started is sometimes difficult. I had been away on a boat cruise and I couldn’t seem to find my way across Liberty Bridge that connects Buda and Pest across the river Danube, to get back to the docking area. After many false starts, I decided to follow this man who appeared to know where he was going. He did walk off the bridge and when he stopped to relieve himself in a bush, I carried on. I’ve often said, “I wish someone would invent shoes with a GPS in them.” But then I wouldn’t have stories to tell.

When you are in writer mode, music or no music?

When I’m working, no music but I get many story ideas and emotions from country music. I like the stories the songs tell. One of my favorites is: You Can’t Make a Heart Love Somebody by George Strait. … “You can lead a heart to love but you can’t make it fall.”

Who was your favorite hero/heroine?

Gracie Hart played by Sandra Bullock in Miss Congeniality. Gracie abhors everything the US Beauty Pageant stands for but she goes undercover and shows what women do to their bodies to be beautiful. She is independent but also wants love. I usually smile when she says to her partner Eric Mathews, after she is beautiful, “You want to kiss me. You want to hug me. You want to marry me.” To give Eric credit he does recognize her qualities before her transformation.

Have you ever had one character you wanted to one way with but after the book was done the character was totally different?

In Fearless Destiny I wanted to write Tiffany’s mother as a kind woman but she had her issues with Tiffany and she wanted to air them. In many ways she was jealous of the special relationship Tiffany had with her father when the mother really wanted a daughter who dressed in frilly dresses and would get married and continue the family with grandchildren. Rather than the Tiffany who qualified for a plumber and was the partner qualified to take over the family plumbing business.

Thank you for the opportunity to share a little about myself with your followers today. 

Yours truly,
Annette

Lucy Maud Montgomery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucy_Maud_Montgomery

Francis Hodgson Burnett: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Hodgson_Burnett
Miss Congeniality: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0212346/
Bridge picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_Bridge_(Budapest)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Annette Bower sets her romance novels in Saskatchewan because she believes home can be as exotic as anywhere else in the World. Annette travels extensively, but always returns home to Regina, Saskatchewan. Born in Regina, her experiences as a nurse, administrator, town councillor, teachers’ assistant and student inform her stories and reflect the experiences of many readers. Annette’s stories are read around the world and have been shortlisted on many national and international stages.
Annette Bower writes about women’s roles in families, in communities and women’s emotions at the beginning and end of love in her home office in Regina, SK. Her short stories are published in magazines and anthologies in Canada, United States, and United Kingdom.
Her women’s fiction novels with romantic elements, Woman of Substance and Moving On are published by Soul Mate Publishing.
Annette Bower’s day-to-day experiences as a nurse, administrator, town councillor, teacher’s assistant and student means that her stories are the real thing because they are about you and your neighbours. Her short stories and novels are read around the world. Her romance novels are set in Saskatchewan because she believes home is as exotic as anywhere else in the wide world she has visited.

Social Links:

Website Blog Facebook Twitter

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

a Rafflecopter giveaway