Cedar Key #2 November 2010 On Sale: October 26, 2010 Featuring: Monica Brooks; Adam 352 pages ISBN: 0758232055 EAN: 9780758232052 Trade Size $15.00 Add to Wish List Women’s Fiction Contemporary Buy at Amazon.com Casting About by Terri DuLong In this beautifully crafted and uplifting novel, the author of the acclaimed Spinning Forward welcomes readers back to the lush Florida island of Cedar Key, where the vibrant shades of hibiscus and azaleas are the perfect backdrop to a colorful, quirky community. . . In the four years since Monica Brooks moved to Cedar Key, she’s found a home, a husband, and now a business to love. Taking over her mother’s bustling knitting shop is a welcome challenge, but Monica’s exciting plans are waylaid by unexpected news. Her husband’s ex-wife has been deemed an unfit mother, and custody of their eight-year-old daughter, Clarissa, is to be transferred to Adam. Going straight from honeymoon to motherhood—especially when she’s unsure she wants children—leaves the normally even-keeled Monica doubting herself at every turn. Yet in a place like Cedar Key, nobody goes it alone. With help from friends and relatives, Monica, Clarissa, and Adam begin to forge a close-knit family of their own—one that will…

The definition of fiction the dictionary gives is, “novels or stories in which the characters and incidents are wholly or partly imaginary.” As an author, I write women’s fiction, so what I’m referring to here doesn’t necessarily involve other genres and what I want to discuss is the “believability” of characters and plot. Where do you get your story ideas, I’m often asked. And your characters, are they real people? My story ideas come from everywhere….snippets of conversation I might overhear, real life stories from the news, anywhere and everywhere. And about my characters being real people…..yes and no. Of course, to me, they’re very real while I’m creating them. Once fully developed, they also come from a multitude of places. That patient I had many years ago when I worked in the Intensive Care Unit, that cashier at a supermarket, a family member no longer here, a stranger I observed in an airport and the list goes on and on. Which brings us to the question, “What makes a plot or character believable?” The longer I’m an author, the more I’m beginning to think that the answer to this is simply, “Whatever the reader might feel.” In other words,…

I’ve always loved the words from Ecclesiastes that begin: To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven. I find the words profound, not only because I strongly believe them, but also because in relation to my writing career, I’ve seen them in action. Although many times I have been disappointed, frustrated and impatient . . . all of the events leading up to my securing a two-book contract with Kensington Books unfolded exactly in their own time. Writing has always been my passion, yet I truly never gave a thought to writingprofessionally until my early forties. Some people express dismay or ask why I never thought to submit even a short story somewhere. Looking back now, I feel certain it all had to do with timing. The timing for me just wasn’t right. Read the rest… Visit FreshFiction.com to learn more about books and authors.