Snippet Sunday: An Expensive Gift

Another snippet from the midst of our manuscript; this has Chloe looking at a watch in a shop and contemplating buying it as a gift for Gabriel.

It would be perfect for Gabriel, he travels so much, Chloe was thinking. She looked at the man and smiled. “I’ll be back.”

“Let me give you my card,” he said, handing her his business card.

“Thank you.”

As Chloe left the store, she was mentally debating. The watch is perfect for him. But it’s also very expensive. Would he be uncomfortable with such an expensive gift from me?

She started to laugh aloud. I’m having sex with the man, but here I am, trying to decide the appropriateness of an expensive gift. I must be nuts! As she continued to laugh uncontrollably, people on the street started to stare at her….

Snippet Sunday: The Soul Of An Artist

Another passage from our manuscript today, with Gabriel, a photographer, looking through photographs Chloe has done.

He looked at more pictures, studied a photograph from the White Mountains in New Hampshire, on a misty day. The atmosphere was just right, the looming mountain tops having a ghostly effect in the mist. Gabriel realized he knew exactly where she had taken the picture from. It wasn’t just a matter of technical competence or sheer luck. She has an artist’s soul, he thought with a smile.

He saw the movement out of the corner of his eye, and looked up. Chloe came down the stairs, and saw him sitting there, the light above him. There was a long moment of quiet between them as they held each others’ gaze. “Couldn’t sleep either, could you?” Chloe asked softly.

He shook his head. “No.”

Snippet Sunday: The Demise Of Chivalry

We have another passage today from our manuscript, with our leading lady's inner thoughts early on....

She opened her umbrella and set it on the floor to dry. In her mind, she could hear her mother’s voice: “It’s bad luck to open an umbrella indoors, honey.”

I’m not tempting fate, Mom. The bad luck’s already arrived.

She hadn’t had time for breakfast, and now her stomach was reminding her it needed nourishment. She took a large chocolate bar from the top drawer of her desk, unwrapped it and took a big bite. She went to the window. The rain was showing no signs of letting up. She thought of that pig who’d taken her cab. Chivalry’s not only dead, it’s entombed in the bowels of the earth, she thought. Even after ten years of life in the so-called concrete jungle, there was a part of her that longed to be the princess, rescued by the gallant prince and carried off to a beautiful, far away kingdom. Not in the cards, Chloe thought, taking another bite.

Snippet Sunday: Flyover Country

Once more, another passage from early in our manuscript Same Time Tomorrow, with Chloe in an introspective moment.

Mom would have been horrified if she'd seen me do that, Chloe thought. But that wasn't true. Her mother was blissfully unfamiliar with the gesture commonly known as "the finger." if it had been explained to her, Linda Masters would have concluded that her daughter had been living in New York far too long. Everyone knew about New York. It was a fast-paced city populated by rude, self-absorbed barbarians.

That's what people in the Flyover teach their kids so we won't come here, Chloe thought, smiling for the first time. They don't realize it makes us want to come here even more.

The Flyover...the midsection of the country, so nicknamed because anyone who was anyone never actually went there, they just flew over it en route to the East or West Coasts. It was like geographic Purgatory.