Instead of trying to find your perfect match in a dating app, we bring you the “Author-Reader Match” where we introduce you to authors as a reader you may fall in love with. It’s our great pleasure to present BROOKE BURROUGHS! Writes: I write rom-coms starring women who have a heart for adventure, even if they don’t know it yet! THE MARRIAGE CODE, which takes place in Seattle and Bangalore, India, is my debut novel which comes out on January 1st, 2021. About: THE MARRIAGE CODE is inspired by my experience working in the tech industry, and moving to India, where I met my husband. When I’m not writing, I conduct experiments in vegetarian cooking, perform with a Bollywood dance troupe, travel whenever I can, and am frequently seen at the dog park with my Great Dane which is often mistaken for a horse. I now live in Austin, Texas with my husband and our two dogs, and often miss my mother-in-law’s delicious South Indian cooking. What I’m looking for in my ideal reader match: You’re always rooting for the romance in any TV show, movie, or book—even if it’s not actually a romance. I mean, Godzilla and Mothra—couldn’t you see…
I have a love-hate relationship with the New Year. On the one hand, it’s a brand-new time—full of possibility, a fresh start, and a time to plan and think about all the things that could happen in the coming months. On the other, we live in a society where the New Year signifies a time of intense diet culture (which is really just body shaming and misogyny), insecurity, and whatever else deemed wrong and in need of change. And let’s not forget we’re still in the middle of a world-wide pandemic and political turmoil. Thanks, 2021! In spite of all of that, however, good things have been happening (more on that later), and by good things, I do very much mean GOOD BOOKS. Here are a few of my favorite opening lines from some of my fave books of 2020, as well as a few from the 2021 books I’m looking forward to coming out! The Worst Best Man by Mia Sosa (2020) My phone’s text tone chirps like a robin—which fails to prepare me for the clusterfuck on the screen. ANDREW: Everything you said last night made sense, M. Thanks to you, I can see the truth now. I…
I love to read novels set in interesting places. Currently, I’m reading a historical romance that takes place in Nazi-occupied Paris during WWII. I’ve always loved Paris, which makes the book even more fun to read. Being able to recognize the settings where the action takes place, as well as the names of restaurants and streets I have visited. As a writer, going to the place your book is set, or choosing a place you have actually been, is the best way to make your book seem real. In THE ULTIMATE BETRAYAL, the novel takes place in Colorado, a state I love to visit. After I’d concluded my second Maximum Security novel, THE DECEPTION, which was set in Texas, I was looking for someplace different for book number three. Colorado, with its wide variety of landscapes and extreme climate conditions, seemed perfect. Having been to Denver a number of times, street names were familiar, parks and airports, locations of smaller towns, and rural mountain communities. Since this was a Maximum Security novel, a romantic thriller, I began by researching crime in the state. I had digging and digging and finally stumbled onto an article about the U.S. Army chemical weapons…