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Author Interview of Alissa Baxter featuring The Blog Affair! $20 GC giveaway!

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The Blog Affair

 

 

Alissa Baxter

 

Chick Lit/Contemporary

Ubuntu line from Decadent Publishing

Escape to Africa

246 pages

 

 

 

 

BLURB:

 

Twenty-something, white, South African Emma Bradshaw has a pattern of falling for unsuitable men and starts a blog about these so-called “serial datists”. Her search for new beginnings takes her to Cape Town, where she gets a job working for sexy author, Nick Reynolds. Romance with her boss is a no-no, but slowly, Nick works his way around her defenses. Trust him, or not, especially with her awful track record with men?

When an anonymous male reader of the blog challenges her on her ideas about the male species, Emma realises she must confront her past and find her true self before she can move forward…and love can blossom again in her future.

 

 

Buy links:    Amazon US     Amazon UK     B&N    Decadent Publishing

 

Excerpt:

Damn him. Damn him. Damn him. Like a bad apple, he just had to pop up in her new home. She’d left Durban to escape him, and here he was, back again, tormenting her as ever. Awful enough that memories of him were with her all the time, without him turning up in the flesh. And what flesh it was….

“You had a good time in Italy?” she inquired.

Phil nodded.

“Great. Well, I have things to do. Bye.”

“Running away, Em?”

Emma, who had starting walking toward the door, stopped in her tracks and turned around. “I’ve moved on, Phil.”

“You mean you’ve moved away. You haven’t moved on.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Phil gazed into her eyes before looking down at her mouth, and Emma swallowed hard. He always made her insides twist into knots, and the fact she couldn’t bear to be in the same room with him for even five minutes clearly showed she hadn’t moved on.

She had to put him behind her, though, and stop allowing him to upset her equilibrium to the degree he did.

But as she studied his once-loved face, she let out a tiny sigh. How did you just move on and forget someone? Especially when you’d once believed that someone was the love of your life?

She stood immobile for a long moment. Then, without a word, she turned around again and walked out of the room.

 The-Blog-Affair cover

authorinterview

Welcome Alissa Baxter! Please start off by telling us a little about yourself.

I’m married and have two sons – a two-year-old and a four month old, so I’m the only female in a household of males, which is fun! I’ve written two Regency romances, and two modern day chick lit stories, set in South Africa, and I love the challenge of writing creatively. I also work in Corporate Communications in a freelance capacity, so I have a lot of different things to juggle on a daily basis. It’s great to be busy, though.

Is The Blog Affair a single title, or part of a series?

The Blog Affair is technically a stand-alone book, however my first chick lit novel Send and Receive is actually the first book in the series. A number of characters in Send and Receive feature in The Blog Affair.

 

What were your inspirations for the story?  Please share your setting for The Blog Affair. Have you ever lived or visited there? If so, what did you like most?  

When I was single and dating, I moved to Cape Town, and it was this time in my life, when I experienced the highs and lows of being on the dating scene in a new city, that inspired The Blog Affair. My novel is about twenty-something Emma Bradshaw who moves to Cape Town and tries to make sense of her dating blunders by starting a blog where she analyses her past relationships. Cape Town is a beautiful coastal city with an amazing outdoor lifestyle – a wonderful place to live!

 

When did the writing bug first bite?

I first decided that I wanted to be a writer when I learned to read properly at the age of seven.  It was very clear cut in my mind – I knew specifically that I wanted to write novels. I started writing my first novel, a Regency romance called The Dashing Debutante, when I was 19 and in my second year at university.

 

Who are you favorite authors, book/series?

I like to read across a range of genres. I’ve read all of Cathy Kelly’s novels and most of Marian Keyes’ novels, and I recently completed Debbie Macomber’s Cedar Cove series.  I enjoy crime novels, particularly Peter Robinson’s Inspector Banks series and I also enjoy inspirational novels.

 

If you could have an author roundtable discussion with any authors, who would you invite?

Cathy Kelly, Marian Keyes, Francine Rivers, Karen Kingsbury, Debbie Macomber, Jill Mansell, Helen Fielding… the list goes on!

 

Do you have any hobbies or special things you like to do in your spare time? 

I don’t have much spare time at the moment, what with two babies and all. But when I do have some free time, I enjoy running, reading and attending language classes (I majored in French at university).

 

What’s the strangest thing you’ve heard or seen?

Well in the context of dating… I once dated a guy who told me that after his divorce he’d started putting all his bad dating experiences into a closely guarded notebook. I decided not to stick around when he consistently referred to women as being “crazy” and whipped out his notebook on a date!

 

 

 

 

AUTHOR BIO:Alissa Baxter author pic

Alissa Baxter was born in South Africa, and grew up with her nose in a book on a poultry and cattle farm. After school and university, where she majored in Political Science and French, she published her first novel, The Dashing Debutante. Alissa travelled to London, England, and did an odd assortment of jobs while researching her second novel, Lord Fenmore’s Wager, which she wrote after she moved back to South Africa and settled in Durban. Alissa then relocated to Cape Town where she wrote her third novel, Send and Receive, before moving to Johannesburg, where she currently lives with her husband and two sons.

 

 

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS:

 

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/alissa.baxter.writer

Twitter: https://twitter.com/alissa_baxter

Blog: http://alissabaxter.blogspot.com

Good Reads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1146980.Alissa_Baxter

Website: www.alissabaxter.com

 

 

Giveaway:   Alissa is giving away a $20 Amazon gift card to 1 lucky winner!
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