Thank you for the invitation to stop by This Book For Free today for a visit. I’m settled into the corner of the sofa over here and I’ve got a cup of coffee in one hand and a double fudge cupcake in the other. Hell, Yeah, the second book in the Honky Tonk Trilogy just hit the bookstores last week. Life is good so let the questions begin!

Shoshana

1. If you can have Christmas in August, what (or whom!) would you like to have in
your stocking, and why?
I want one of those RITA statues for any one of the Honky Tonk Series. I’ve been a good little writer, Santa, darlin’, and I won’t be greedy and ask for two of those lovely ladies. I’ll let you decide which book wins it and could you please give me the grace to walk up the steps to receive it without falling. I’m more than a bit clumsy. There will be a cold longneck bottle of beer and pretzels on the bar for you … my lips are sealed … Mrs. Claus or all those millions of children will never know about the beer or that you stopped long enough to rest your aching feet at my kitchen table.

2. If you’re going to be stuck in an island for some time, what are the three items you must have? (This is assuming that you have food and shelter and don’t have to worry about dying.)
My lap top with internet. One of those big umbrellas that stick in the sand so I don’t burn to a crisp. And a box of romance books to read when I’m not writing.

Virginia C

3. What’s the very first book that made a lasting impression on you from your
childhood?
I lived with a blind grandmother when I was a little girl and at night we listened to her “talking books” which were these big records that had someone reading books to us. Or else I read my library books if she wanted to talk to her friends on the telephone. I’m not sure I could ever choose one book in amongst all those. Everything makes an impression on me.

4. What’s the last book you read that made you cry?
I love LaVryle Spencer and she made me cry in every book she wrote. Can I have a coupon for a lunch with her in my Christmas stocking, too? Did I hear big a hell, yeah?

Estella

5. How do you decide on the names for your characters?
If I’m writing historical fiction I go to the top 100 names during that time frame. If I’m writing contemporary it’s pretty much the same only in the year that my character was born. But sometimes a name pops into my head and that’s it no matter if was popular or not. Like Jezzy Belle in Hell, Yeah … or Travis … and of course, Cathy! The names fit their personalities. Jezzy couldn’t have been a Sue, or a Darlene. It just wouldn’t have worked like Jezzy.

6. What do you enjoy doing in your spare time?
I love to cook and sit out in my fabulous back yard and listen to the birds sing in the late evening. Both cooking and sitting on my patio with a cup of coffee or a can of Diet Coke clears my mind and gets me ready to write the next scene or chapter or even book.

Chey

7. Do you get to choose your own titles?
Titles are something my editor, the Sourcebooks staff and I all work on together. I absolutely loved the titles for the Honky Tonk Series. That Hell, Yeah cover just pops off the book shelf at the readers, doesn’t it?

8 . How much input do you have in your covers?
I’ve been very fortunate that the folks at Sourcebooks read about my characters before they design the book covers. They take the information I supply and come up with those gorgeous covers which are BYOB … that means Bring Your Own Bib to the book store because there will be drooling!

Caffey

9. If you could meet any author from the past that inspired you to become an author, who would you like to meet and what would you like to ask them? That would have to be Margaret Mitchell and I’d like to ask her why in the devil did she stop at one book?
There were many more stories that could have spun off of Gone With The Wind and I’m
just sure I would have loved every one of them!

Pam S

10. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream?
When I’m buying a cone I like that soft vanilla with a curl on the top. When I’m treating myself for finishing a difficult scene, it’s pecans pralines and cream right out of the half gallon with a spoon and standing at the kitchen bar. When I’m brave enough to step on the bathroom scales, it’s orange sherbet because it has less calories.

11. What is your most memorable vacation?
Well, I just came home yesterday from the RWA Convention in Orlando, Florida and that was pretty awesome. But in all my travels my favorite … remember now, I’m a romantic at heart … had to be on my 30th anniversary when my husband took me to Panama City Beach, Florida to celebrate and instead of a card he drew this big, enormous heart in the sand and put Happy 30th right in the middle of it.

Meredith Miller

12. Have you had any “real life” adventures that have influenced your characters or plots?
Oh, my yes. Those are the spice of a story and breathe life into it.

13. What is the strangest question someone has ever asked you in an interview?
That would be whether I’d written anything I wouldn’t want my mother to read. My mother read everything I wrote as long as her eyesight was good and until she took her last breath, anyone who came into her nursing home room got a full report on how many
books I’d sold, where they could buy them or check them out of a library and what month the next one came out. And if they didn’t want to be scolded the next time they entered her room, they’d have danged sure better come prepared to tell her that they’d read my books. She would have loved the cover for Hell, Yeah!

Terri C

14. When did you know you wanted to make a career of writing?
I do believe it was when I was four. All those beautiful words in those books had to be exciting. When I was five I learned to read and from that moment I was going to grow up and write.

CherylS22

15. What is your favorite writing environment?
When the nest was finally empty of kids and grandkids, I converted a small bedroom into an office. That’s my favorite place to write, surrounded by all my book covers, matted and framed around me, my notes thrown haphazardly around and a window where I can see the squirrels playing in the pecan tree right outside.

KarenK

16. Who are your most favorite authors?
If we’re going to get into that we’d better refill our iced tea glasses and put out another platter of cookies because the list is long. I love LaVyrle Spencer, Sue Grafton, Randy Wayne White, Nora Roberts (of course), Leon Uris … as you can see, I’m an eclectic reader.

CrystalGB

17. Who are the biggest supporters of your writing?
My husband, bless his heart! It takes a special man to be married to a writer. When we married, I tailor made his clothes; put three hot meals on the table plus cakes, cookies and pies for in between meal snacks; and kept a clean house. Now he wears clothes off the rack, eats fast food and dust bunnies tell him bedtime stories while I finish one more scene. He also monitors the phone and lets only important calls through to me … like when the youngest granddaughter said her first words!

LilMissMolly

18. What do you enjoy reading?
I will read anything from the back of the Special K box to Faulkner and love all of it. I love a good romance that makes me sigh, puts a wee tear in my eye, and gives me the giggles until I get the hiccups. I love a good mystery that makes me hold my breath and try to figure out whodunnit. Or a good old fashioned shoot-’em-up western. Any day with a book in my hands is a good day.

Aurora M

19. What book was your earliest memory?
Well, there was See Jane Run in the first grade when I was five. But I suppose you mean romance book? I remember the summer I found Victoria Holt and then Janet Dailey. I think I’m dating myself here.

20. If you could have any other job what would it be?
I can not think of another job that I would want other than being a writer. I can work in my pajamas on my own hours in my own house. It don’t get no better than that.

HELL, YEAH BY CAROLYN BROWN – IN STORES AUGUST 2010
She’s finally found a place that feels like home…
When Cathy O’Dell buys the Honky Tonk, the nights of cowboys and country tunes come together to create the home she’s always wanted. Then in walks a ruggedly handsome oil man who tempts her to trade in the happiness she’s found at the Honky Tonk for a life on the road with him…

He lives the good life…
Gorgeous and rich, Travis Henry travels the country unearthing oil wells and then moving on. Then the beautiful blue-eyed new owner of the Honky Tonk beer joint becomes his best friend and so much more. When his job is done in Texas, how is he ever going to hit the road without her?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Carolyn Brown, an award-winning author who has published 36 romance novels for the library market, credits her eclectic family for her humor and writing ideas. She was born in Texas but grew up in southern Oklahoma where she and her husband, Charles, a retired English teacher, now make their home in the town of Davis, Oklahoma. They have three grown children and enough grandchildren to keep them young. Visit Carolyn Brown’s at http://carolynlbrown.com/.

Giveaway:
Thanks to Danielle and Sourcebooks. There’s two winners for Carolyn Brown’s brand new novel, Hell Yeah.
US and Canada addresses.
Contest ends August 30.
Fill in this form and leave a comment below to win.

For your comments, you can ask Ms Carolyn some more questions. It’s quite an honor to have Carolyn visit and mingle with us.

Tags: Carolyn Brown

Hell, Yeah
by Carolyn Brown
Mass Market Paperback
List Price: $7.99
Published in 2010
ISBN-10: 1-4022-3927-0

This title is the second installment of the Honky Tonk series. It started out with I Love This Bar. You don’t need to read the first book to enjoy this one. Cathy O’Dell is an accountant who bought the Honky Tonk bar from her cousin, Daisy, who was the star of the first book.

On New Years eve, Travis Henry kissed her. He’s geologist in town for a new oil well. He just also happen to have his new trailer located right next to Cathy’s bar. Sparks fly, and this story is off to a rollicking start.

While I enjoy reading this story, it didn’t hold my attention like Carolyn Brown’s other book. She’s an awesome writer guaranteed to make you enjoy her story, but I just can’t seem to care about Cathy or Henry for some reason. I think maybe it’s because Cathy and Henry are simply happy and well-adjusted. One of the reason I grow from reading stories is when a character has a personal struggle. I can learn from the choices that they make. I can learn from when they do it wrong, or when they do it right. I can decide for myself if there’s no clear answer. In this story, it’s a beautiful sunset. Period.

Other books in the series
I Love This Bar (June, 2010)
Hell, Yeah (Aug., 2010)
My Give-A-Damn’s Busted (Oct., 2010)
Honky Tonk Christmas (Nov., 2010)

Tags: Carolyn Brown

I Love This Bar (Book 1, Honky Tonk Series)
by Carolyn Brown
Mass Market Paperback, 384 Pages
List Price: $7.99
Published in 2010
ISBN-10: 1-4022-3926-2

I was 9 years old when I started reading about cowboys. I particularly like Diana Palmer’s Long, Tall Texan series and Joan Johnston’s Hawks Way series. I just love cowboys. When I was offered a chance to immersed myself in Honky Tonk set almost right at my backyard, I cannot resist.

This time, there’s Daisy O’Dell who’s perfectly happy to manage a bar she inherited from her friend, Ruby. She has her regulars, and her juke box. She takes care of animals in her time off. She’s sort of the anointed local vet.

One night, she literally run into Jarod McElroy, a guy from Oklahoma who only went to Texas to help his old and sick uncle, and changed the course of her life. Jarod’s uncle Emmett is an adorable curmudgeon of a man. He’s practically a teddy bear with a bark and bite. He deserves special mention because I really like him.

This is a fun book to read. I highly recommend it. Carolyn Brown excels at giving you a close look at the locales,  you can almost taste the dust on your tongue.

If you also reviewed this book, feel free to leave your link. The link must land to that specific post. All others will be deleted.

Tags: Carolyn Brown, Danielle Jackson, Sourcebooks

Guest Post:

Hello everyone. Thank you for having me on your blog site again to let everyone know that Getting Lucky, the final installment of the Lucky trilogy, has been put on the book store shelves. I’m sure a copy is waiting for the readers who want to know what happened to Griffin, the only Luckadeau cousin with black hair instead of blond. Well, Julie Donavan came into his life like a tornado headed for a tar paper shanty and set his little perfect world on its hind end one bright sunny Texas morning.

She didn’t mean to cause trouble in St. Jo, Texas. She was looking for a place to raise her own dark haired daughter with a white forelock in a town where no one knew them. It didn’t take long before she realized she’d moved to the worst possible place in the whole state of Texas, maybe in the universe.

Folks tell me that they like to read a little excerpt of a book so I’ve decided to give you all a taste of Getting Lucky. It’s like getting a little bite of a good chocolate candy bar. I’m hoping you like the taste so much that you want the whole candy bar.

Excerpt from Getting Lucky:

Julie Donavan, the new kindergarten teacher, was on her knees consoling a little boy named Chuck on the first day of school when she noticed movement coming in the door. She gasped when she looked up. Her eyes widened and high color filled her cheeks. The most striking cowboy she’d ever laid eyes on just walked through the door. Well, she had laid eyes upon him one time before but that time they’d been two point five sheets to the wind. One less drink that night and they’d have stopped before they got to the motel. Two more and neither would have remembered a damn thing. But the combination had been just right and he was there in her kindergarten classroom in Saint Jo, Texas.
Her first thought was “Damn, he even looks better with hair.”
Her second was “What in the hell is he doing in Saint Jo, Texas?”
Her third was, “Oh, shit, what do I do now?”
The man stopped in front of her and looked down. “Hello, we are the Luckadeaus. This is my daughter, Lizzy, who will be in your class this year.”
And I’m the woman you met in Dallas six years ago? She wanted to shout at him. Remember me? I’m Red.
Griffin waited for her to finish with the little boy, his pulse racing and his heart thumping. God Almighty, he’d never been attracted to a red head before. That was his brother’s choice of women. No one told him the new kindergarten teacher was knock-down-gorgeous or that she had eyes that could see straight into his soul. Desire shot through his body or was it plain old lust? Either one was something he hadn’t allowed in a very long time and he determined he would get control of it before he spoke again.
Julie’s daughter, Annie, came running from across the room, her jet black dog ears bouncing on her shoulders, the white poliosis streak in her hair parted so that the majority of it was on the left side. She stopped dead in front of the little girl.
They eyed each other for several minutes, mirror images of each other, doubles in almost every sense of the word. Jet black hair with a white streak from the forehead back several inches, crystal clear blue eyes, a slight dent in their chins.
Finally Annie grabbed Lizzy’s hand and said, “Come sit by me. My momma is the teacher, she won’t care.”
Lizzy let go of her father’s hand and ran off with Annie, her jet black pony tail waving from one side to the other, the white streak in her hair slicked straight back.
Both parents couldn’t peel their eyes away from the two little girls giggling together. Julie felt the world tilt backwards on its axis and the concrete floor St. Jo, Texas elementary school tremor as if Texas was having a rare earthquake.
“Who are you?” Griffin whispered. Desire took a back seat to shock. That little girl had to be a Luckadeau. His blue eyes narrowed into slits. Who was the red head and where had that child come from?
“I’m going to be your child’s teacher but we knew each other a long time ago. You don’t remember?”
He shook his head. “I’ve never met you before in my life but I’d know that little girl anywhere. She could be my Lizzy’s sister with that white forelock.”

© Carolyn Brown, Sourcebooks Casablanca, 2010

Tell me, after reading that, would you like to read more? What’s happened six years before to make her thinks she’d met him before. He swears he hasn’t ever laid eyes on her and yet those two little girls are carbon copies of each other. Find the answers in Getting Lucky!

Happy Reading,
Carolyn Brown

GETTING LUCKY BY CAROLYN BROWN—IN STORES JANUARY 2010
Book 3 in The Lucky Trilogy
Single mom Julie Donavan is looking for a place to start over. What she finds after buying a small house on five acres is nothing short of a nightmare.

Single dad “Lucky Griffin” Luckadeau has been crossing horns with his elderly neighbor for years. But when his daughter, Annie, decides she wants the new little girl who lives on the feuding property to be her friend, or better yet her sister, the sparks fly.

These two stubborn hotheads, who irritate each other beyond endurance, refuse to admit that it’s fate that brought them together. And running from the inevitable is only going to bring a double dose of misery…

About the Author
Carolyn Brown, an award-winning author who has published 36 romance novels for the library market, credits her eclectic family for her humor and writing ideas. She was born in Texas but grew up in southern Oklahoma where she and her husband, Charles, a retired English teacher, now make their home in the town of Davis, Oklahoma. They have three grown children and enough grandchildren to keep them young. For more information, please visit http://carolynlbrown.com/. Be on the lookout for Carolyn’s new series, The Honky Tonk Series, in 2010!

The Giveaway:

Thanks to Danielle of Sourcebooks, Inc for this giveaway.
1 full set of the Lucky Trilogy (Lucky in Love, One Lucky Cowboy, Getting Lucky) to 1 winner on January 22.
US and Canada only, no PO Box address, please.

How to win?
Leave a comment, at least 4 sentences long.
Start with: I read because….
If you listen to audio book, answer this: In what ways can a reader make or break a book?

The Winner is….

Added January 25 (drawn Jan 23 at random.org)
Winner: Leean Wilson

Tags: Carolyn Brown, Danielle Jackson, The Lucky Trilogy

Getting Lucky
by Carolyn Brown
Mass Market Paperback, 416 Pages,
Published 2010 by Sourcebooks Casablanca

While I was reading One Lucky Cowboy, ”Lucky Griffin” Luckadeau made an appearance at a party in Nellie’s place (Slade ”Lucky Slade” Luckadeau grandmother). That scene was so vivid in my mind that I can hardly wait for Griffin’s story. I like the short glimpse I have of him. His streak of white hair and the way he came out of the pages just grabs me.

If it was a movie, I’d have gone out and rent or buy all other movies made by this person. But he’s a book character, and I can only wait til his story comes out. This is one satisfying read. I like Julie. She’s sexy, kind, down-to-earth, fierce, and fair. Her daughter looks just like Griffin’s daughter. What was she supposed to think?

This book is going into my re-read collection. I like to re-read certain books. Here’s a few of my re-read list (not a complete list at all):   Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin, The Bronze Horseman by Paullina Simons, Coltrain’s Proposal by Diana Palmer, Heaven, Texas by Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Paradise by Judith McNaught. This book is going to that collection, too. Carolyn Brown takes me away from the present and takes me on a journey where I can vicariously enjoy other people’s love story. It’s like watching a movie in print.

In a few hours, Carolyn Brown will guest post here and there will also be a giveaway for a whole set of Lucky Trilogy, courtesy of Sourcebooks.

What are your re-read titles?

Tags: Carolyn Brown, Sourcebooks