by Jennie LucasWhat was your worst job ever?
Mine was working at a gas station when I was 21. Working my way through college, I took the swing shift making $4.50 an hour, working 10 hour shifts without breaks. I worked alone and felt vulnerable late at night.
It was a bad time in my life. As if my financial situation weren’t difficult enough, I was also forty pounds overweight and engaged to a man who was all wrong for me.
But the dark time turned out to be the classic darkest-before-the-dawn cliche. Things started improving when my fiancé cheated on me and dumped me. I found a better job at twice the pay
My new book Italian Prince, Wedlocked Wife was inspired by that gas station job. Except Lucy Abbott’s situation is far more dire than mine ever was, because at twenty-one, she is not trying to work herself through college—instead, she is the sole support of her baby daughter.
She'd come home from the grocery store at Christmas when she was nine months pregnant to find her fiancé had deserted them to poverty. A year later, she is struggling to support her baby with minimum-wage jobs.
Then a dark Italian prince comes into the gas station one snowy New Year's Eve. Punching out her lecherous boss, Prince Maximo d'Aquilla kisses Lucy senseless, blackmails her into a forced marriage, then whisks her and the baby away into a life of luxury in
I wanted Lucy to meet the man of her dreams who would ultimately love her as his princess bride and love her baby as his own child. I wanted all her money problems and fears to disappear forever. I wanted her to finally find her prince, like I did.
Italian Prince, Wedlocked Wife comes out in few days--just in time for New Year's wishes. Please visit my website to read an excerpt, or enter to win a signed copy of Sharon Kendrick's book The Greek Tycoon's Baby Bargain.
13 comments:
I'm just back from your website
where I enjoyed reading your excerpt.
You can be sure that I will be in
the store looking for your book. I
think I'll make a run to Wal-Mart,
they always seem to have books out
before the release date!
Pat Cochran
I enjoyed reading the excerpt. It sounds like a sweet HEA story, just the kind I like! I wish you and your family a wonderful Christmas season!
What a dream come true this book sounds wonderful I will be looking out for its release here in Australia
Have Fun
Helen
Pat, thanks so much for your nice words! I'm kind of excited myself to see it on shelves. I checked my local Wal-Mart on Wednesday and it wasn't there yet, but it should be coming within the next day or two. (As if I needed another reason to be visiting Wal-Mart this week...ha!)
Cheri, I'm so glad you liked the excerpt, thanks for saying so! Wishing you and your family a wonderful Christmas and very happy New Year, with lots of warmth and laughter and lovely treats.
Helen,
Italian Prince, Wedlocked Wife was actually already released in Australia in November, but I do have another book coming out there soon. A woman is six hours away from getting married when she realizes she's pregnant by another man--the sexy Brazilian boss who seduced her then dropped her! Virgin Mistress, Scandalous Love-Child will be out Down Under in April.
Hope you have a fun holiday season, with much nicer and warmer weather than the icy white Christmas we're having here! Ah, how lovely it would be to be lying out on a warm beach with crystal blue water...
Ooh, I've had some hideous jobs, Jennie!
When I was working my way through university, I flipped burgers at the local fish and chip shop - where the owner's 4 good(?) Greek sons took turns at trying to corner me in the stockroom. I did learn some pretty handy evasive techniques, though :-)
I'm so pleased you found your prince! And I'm so looking forward to reading your book.
Merry Christmas!
Oooh l love the description, cinderella type stories are my favorites.
Michelle, it sounds like we have very similar backgrounds. All those jobs were painful at the time, weren't they? But now good fodder for stories, so it's all worked out well. ;)
Getting cornered by 4 Greek boys in the back of a chip shop--eek! It sure doesn't sound nice how you've described it. (Although maybe if the Greek boy were an arrogant billionaire, and it was the back of his yacht...?) That certainly puts my "lonely" gas station job in perspective!
Thanks for your kind words. I hope you have a great Christmas, too! I'm hoping to bring my family Down Under for the RWAust conference in 2010--hope to meet you then! :)
Jennie
Gina, Cinderella-type stories are definitely my favorites, too. I love it when hardworking, good-hearted girls finally get everything they've ever wanted. ;)
Ok, my hideous job was at the amusement park where I live. I ran the duck pond where you pay 25 cents for a duck and you pick it up. Whatever number is on the bottom that is the prize you win. Well, I was giving away to many prizes so they moved me to the kitchen.
I was mopping floors, cleaning tables, and emptying the garbage. I quit after 2 months.
Ooo...your book sounds fantastic! Congratulations on your book by the way!
Merry Christmas!
Michele, your amusement park job doesn't sound fun at all. And it seems very rude that they moved you to the kitchen just because you were giving away too many prizes. I only stayed with my own job for a month--I'm impressed you managed to stay at yours twice that long!
Thanks for your nice words about my book. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas week and New Year! :)
Hi Jennie,
Excerpt is fabulous, can't wait to read the whole thing now. Nothing reads quite so well as a young deserving woman finally getting her wishes granted.
Worst job? That's easy, I packed Waterford Crystal for four whole days before calling quits. I was supposed to do the bubble wrap thing first, then a layer of tissue (or maybe it was the other way around) and then choose the appropriate size box and bundle it all up nice and presentable looking. Yeah, right. Do you know how awkward it is to wrap vases, glass balloons of all shapes & sizes without actually breaking the stuff??? Very awkward I can tell you. Needless to say I was crap and decided it was in the best interest of everyone else to take my 'skills' elsewhere. I broke two pieces and the money was taken out of my wages, which sadly left me with nothing because I didn't even hold that job down for a week!!! Luckily I was young and had nobody else depending on my income.
Warm wishes from Eire to you and yours this Christmas Jennie,
"Nollaig Shona agus Athbhliain faoi Mhaise Dhuit".
See you in 2009,
Aideen.
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