VBT Interview & Giveaway - Maybe Too Good To Be True by Christy McKee

Welcome to my stop on Christy McKee's Virtual Book Tour for Maybe Too Good To Be True.  Please make sure to leave a comment or question below as Christy will be awarding a digital copy of Maybe Too Good To Be True to a randomly drawn commenter at every stop and a $30 Amazon GC to one randomly drawn commenter during the tour.  You can follow her tour here.   

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 Interview

Me:  Maybe Too Good To Be True is your first published fictional work.  Can you tell us what the inspiration was behind this book?

Christy:  Actually, the inspiration for “Maybe” was a result of attending my first writer’s conference.  One of the publishers was launching a new line called Lucky in Love. The premise: the heroine receives a windfall that completely changes her life. My idea was not a rags to riches Cinderella tale but a story about a talented woman in the enviable position of suddenly having the means to make her biggest dream come true and being too filled with self-doubt and guilt to embrace it.

Me:  Your bio lists a career in journalism, commercial production and freelance writing, but you state your love was always fiction writing.  What finally pushed you into writing fiction full time?

Christy:  Without sounding  morbid, my mother’s death after a long bout with cancer made me want to grab on to life with both hands and do something I really enjoyed—writing fiction. After looking through dozens—no exaggeration, we’ve moved nine times— of moving boxes, I found Maybe Too Good to Be True. It had been gathering dust for three years. The characters still excited me and I saw a way to make the story stronger. My husband understood and accepted that my “someday I’ll be a full time writer” was going to happen now.  

Me:  You list travel as one of your favorite pastimes, with Alaska, Mackinaw Island and Bermuda as some of your favorite places.  Do you have a dream vacation or destination you haven't had a chance to visit as of yet?  If you could spend an entire summer somewhere in the world, with a home that is already furnished, where would it be?

Christy:  Dream vacation- If money was no object, I would like to take a cruise around the world in 104 days. My ship would be the Crystal Serenity and of course we would have a deluxe suite. The idea of not having to haul luggage around, packing and unpacking every few days, and worrying about all the little travel details, would be wonderful. There are so many fascinating cultures and beautiful things to see and I wouldn’t want to miss any of them. Making friends with our fellow travelers would be an amazing benefit.   

I’ve been to Scotland twice but didn’t do much travelling beyond Edinburgh. My family (Boleyn & Cromwell) have English roots, but I prefer Scotland for its beauty, magical mists and the friendliness of its people. 

Me:  Is there an author you would go all "fangirl" over?  Who were your favorite authors while growing up? Can you tell us what you're currently reading?

Christy:  I am a huge fan of Christina Dodd. Meeting her and learning about her writing process and where she gets her ideas would be an amazing experience. Growing up, Trixie Belden saw me through the measles and Nancy Drew helped pass the time when I had chicken pox. I moved on to my brother’s Hardy Boys books and then to Regencies and historical romance which I love to read but could never write.

I’m a fairly eclectic reader. Right now I’m bouncing back and forth between Dodd’s novella, Stone Angel –The Chosen series and Susan Mallery’s All Summer Long.  

Me:  Can you tell us what a typical "working" day is like for you?

Christy:  At 9am, with my breakfast on a tray, my two Labs follow me down to my office. While they nap, I get a good three and a half hours of writing in. I might glance at my email but only answer something if it needs an immediate response. It’s too easy to get sucked in to wasting time on the internet.

At 1:30pm, it’s kibble for Gracie and Lambeau and something healthy for me. After lunch we spend about twenty minutes outside playing ball, then return to my office. The dogs nap and I work until about 5:30pm. Usually after everyone is tucked in for the night, I will spend two hours catching up on emails and blog posts. For the weekends, if we go somewhere for the day, I give myself the day off. If we stay at home, I’ll write for three to four hours each day. It’s not that I am so driven to rack up a certain number of pages on the weekend, but because I like to “stay close and connected” to my story and my characters.

My office is well lit, cozy, and lined with several bookshelves. The walls are decorated with bright water colors and favorite photographs.

  

Me:  Can you tell us what you're currently working on and would you be willing to share a small excerpt?

Christy:  I have two works in progress, a ghost tale and another contemporary love story.  Both are very rough at this point but I can share a blurb for my contemporary.

Too Close for Comfort

Lilly Talbot ventures north to Vermont to lay claim to an old lake house, “Pointe Cottage.” On arrival, she’s blindsided  by two immediate problems: Her roof is about to slide into Lake Champlain  and the man who can fix it will only agree if she trades him room and board for his labor. Practically broke, Lilly has no choice but to give in. It wouldn’t be so bad if the man was normal, average looking, but this contractor was a pro football knock off, one hundred percent hard core male and he made her uncomfortable.

After serving time for insider trading, Mac McQueen turned his life around and is now a respected builder of eco-friendly homes in Haley, but he has no illusions that he’ll ever build one for his own family, since the word “felon” seems to strike fear in the hearts of most women. He’d coveted Pointe Cottage for four years…now he wants Lilly to become part of the deal.

Favorite Color? Periwinkle blue

Favorite Pizza?  Deep dish style with mushrooms, lots of mozzarella and pepperoni from the Windy City’s Malnati’s.

Favorite Movie?  The Holiday with Kate Wins let, Jude Law, Cameron Diaz, and Jack Black. I love the scene with the precious little girls inside their tent. We watch this one every Christmas.

If your friends had to describe you in one word, what would it be?  Busy

Earth has been overrun by zombies - what one book would you take with you as you make your escape?  The Destruction of Zombies for Dummies. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Heels or flats?  If I was fleeing from a horde of crazed zombies it would be my running shoes. Otherwise, I’m strictly a flats woman—I’m tall enough as it is.

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Maybe Too Good To Be True

by Christy McKee

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BLURB:

Gabrielle March is summoned to an oceanfront estate in Massachusetts by the matriarch of Atlantic-Hastings International where she is presented with a hefty block of shares as amends for a crime committed against her family. The stock—worth several million dollars—can give her the means to make her dream come true if only she can muster the courage to break free from her past and believe in her unique creative talent.    

Pierce Hastings, son of Gabrielle’s benefactress, grudgingly agrees to take her under his wing and acclimate her to Atlantic-Hastings.  Never one to mix business with pleasure, Pierce stuns himself when he ignores his own self imposed rule. Gabrielle’s complete lack of artifice, unvarnished honesty and quirky sense of humor are intoxicating to him―and he’s rapidly becoming addicted. He’s blindsided when Gabrielle confesses that, in spite of her growing feelings for him, she will never fit into his world of power and privilege and has no desire to try.

Excerpt: 

Pierce answered him with a glare. What the hell was wrong with him? What difference did it make what she thought of him? Until a few weeks ago, he had never heard of Gabrielle March. So why had she suddenly become so important to him?

          "I think our Gabrielle has gotten to you little brother. What a pleasant change it is for you to be the one cooling your heels."

          The crunch of gravel drew their attention to the driveway. When Elizabeth’s blue Mercedes came around the curve, Pierce abruptly turned his back to the driveway and leaned against the porch railing.

          James snorted with laughter. "Wouldn't want the lady to know she'd been missed would we." He sauntered down the steps to greet Gabrielle.

          "Did you have a nice afternoon?" James opened her car door.

          Pierce swiveled to face them but remained on the porch, propped against a sturdy post, his strong arms folded across his chest. "You missed some excellent water skiing this afternoon, Peaches."

          Gabrielle came even with him on the porch. "Really? Why I'm surprised you need skis at all," she sniped. "I assumed someone like you walked on water."

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

My addiction to reading emerged  when I was ten and down with measles. My mother, trying to keep me entertained,  brought home a stack of Trixie Belden and Nancy Drew books. Within days, I’d consumed them all and asked for more. That’s when it truly began−the pleasure of reading which would eventually lead to my writing.

I can’t pin point precisely when I knew I was different from everyone else−at least from my tight group of  hometown friends. Didn’t everyone have movies playing in their heads starring beautiful  characters leading adventurous lives in exotic places?  NO—they did not. Did that mean  they  were normal and I was the odd, slightly wacky duck?  My answer to that conundrum came when I attended my first writer’s conference in Savannah. Nervous about being on my own at the crowded event, a kindly writer from Texas took me under her wing and introduced me to at least a dozen writers.  Surrounded by so many writers who were so like me, I  fit  right in. I wasn’t an “odd” duck after all; I’d simply been in the wrong pond!

As a result of that conference, my desire and conviction to write blossomed. Still working a full time job at  a Louisiana cancer center,  I carved out time to write every night and on weekends. My first manuscript went through four incarnations, and a year under the bed,  before success came knocking.

Today my family and our two Labs—Lambeau, the Green Bay Packers unofficial mascot  and Gracie, who is just plain, sweet Amazing Grace—live  in a picturesque little town in Ohio wrapped around a lovely town square with an intricately carved gazebo where weekly band concerts take place all summer long.   

http://www.christymckee.com

http://christymckeewriter.blogspot

http://twitter.com/ChristyMcKee

Don't forget to leave a comment or question below for Christy to be entered in her giveaway.  You can follow her tour here.