Reading Addiction Virtual Book Tour for The Gull Motel by Amie Denman

Welcome to my stop on the Virtual Book Tour, hosted by Reading Addiction Virtual Book Tours, for The Gull Motel by Amie Denman.  Please leave a comment or question for Amie to let her know you stopped by.  You can follow the rest of her tour here.

The Gull Motel

by Amie Denman

A Barefoot Book

Publisher: Turquoise Morning Press

Release date: May 29, 2014

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Length: 143 Pages

ISBN: 978-1-62237-271-3

ASIN: BOOKNDYR90

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Buy links:  Amazon * B&N * Smashwords * Turquoise Morning *

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About the book:  

Savvy Thorpe needs a vacation. Finally finished with college, she heads to her favorite shabby motel on Florida’s Gulf Coast where her aunt and uncle always save her room twenty-four. She quickly finds out, though, that The Gull Motel is not just her home away from home. It’s hers to manage while her aunt and uncle take an extended trip.

Skip McComber, The Gull’s former maintenance man, has been working on Savvy’s nuts and bolts for years. Now the new owner of the bar next door, his mission is to renovate a pirate bar while being a walking temptation for the girl he can’t get off his mind.

For Savvy, keeping her cool running a motel in Florida heat is one thing, but navigating the steamy waters of a former fling takes a whole other kind of savvy. In addition to the motel and the man next door, Savvy stumbles on a plot to swindle land from the residents of Barefoot Key. Devalued properties tumble like dominoes until Savvy musters her colorful crew from The Gull Motel to make the pillagers walk the plank.

About the Author:

Amie Denman lives in a small town in her native Ohio with her husband and sons. Her two cats and large yellow labrador are kind enough to share a sunny office where she lets her imagination run wild. Reading books was her favorite escape as a child, and growing up four houses away from the community library encouraged her addiction. When she's not reading or writing, she enjoys walking and running outside. The helpless victim of a lifetime of curiosity, she's been known to chase fire trucks on her bicycle just to see what's going on. Amie believes that everything is fun: especially roller coasters, wedding cake, and falling in love. 

Amie is the author of five contemporary romance novels: 

The Gull Motel

Blue Bottle Beach

Her Lucky Catch

Her Lucky Prize

Will Work for Love

He’s on Her Trail

Please visit her at www.amiedenman.com

On Facebook https://www.facebook.com/amie.denman.1

On Twitter @amiedenman

A perfect summer beach book, The Gull Motel by Amie Denham is a light, sweetly romantic look at two friends who spent their summers growing up together and realize there’s more to their friendship than meets the eye.  Set in Florida around the Eastern coastline, Ms. Denham’s story is filled with interesting characters, light humor, and a real-estate mystery too.  Hopefully we’ll see this setting and characters again.

Recent college graduate Savannah “Savvy” Thorpe heads for the Gull Motel on the Florida coast while waiting to find out if she’ll be accepted for a prestigious training position at the hotel of her dreams.  Owned by her Aunt Carol and Uncle Mike, Savvy has spent most of her summers at the Gull Motel and grew up there along with the hotel’s “repair” man Skip McComber, the son of a local business owner.  Friends, who’ve always been close, Savvy and Skip have crossed the “more than friends” line once and neither knows what to do about it.  Spending her vacation running her aunt and uncle’s hotel wasn’t a part of Savvy’s summer plans.  Neither was falling in love with Skip and discovering a real-estate scam swindling property owners of Barefoot Bay.

Ms. Denham does a great job developing both Savvy and Skip’s characters; it’s clear from the start that they have great emotional and physical chemistry.  While they are both clearly attracted to each other, they had a one night fling during Savvy’s last Spring Break, neither one has reached out to the other since.  Spending the summer in close proximity, they’ll have to decide if they want to take their relationship from friends to something more.  Ms. Denham also does a good job developing the romance between the two characters and it’s sweet to watch their relationship grow. 

Ms. Denham does a good job developing the secondary characters and I really enjoyed getting to know the long time employees of the Gull Motel.  I especially enjoyed getting to know Rita, the receptionist slash assistant manage, and LeeAnn and Maria, the two full times maids.  While they are employees, they are also Savvy’s friends and give her advice, whether she needs it or not.  The mystery takes a back seat until about half way through the story but begins to pick up the pace and it was fun watching Savvy and her “gang” confront the city manager about what was going on.

Will Savvy be able to stop the crooked land scheme that might ruin their businesses and change the Barefoot Bay they know into the next Miami?  Will Savvy and Skip’s relationship turn into something more permanent?  You’ll have to read The Gull Motel to find out.  I enjoyed it and look forward to reading more of Ms. Denham’s work.

My Rating:  4.5 out of 5 Crowns

FTC Discolosure:  I received a complimentary copy of this book as a part of a book tour in exchange for a fair and honest review.