TITLE: THE TROUBLE WITH CHRISTMAS
AUTHOR: KAIRA ROUDA
ADULT CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE
Release: November 10, 2014
Blurb:
At 35-years-old, Cole Stanton is burned out. His high-paced, uber-successful career has left him yearning to start over. He finds Indigo Island, buys a restaurant and settles into an uncomplicated life. But Christmas is a mess. He has over-committed the small restaurant’s resources again, and is over his head. He finds himself longing for everything he has left behind, until a chance encounter with gorgeous Lily offers a spark of salvation to his business and, perhaps his life.Beautiful pastry chef Lily Edmonds is thirty years old and heartbroken. It’s just before Christmas and she’s just been dumped by via telephone by her fiancee. Her best friend Avery Putnam invites her to Indigo Island, hoping to add joy back into Lily’s life. A chance encounter with the sexy owner of a local restaurant makes Lily feel an attraction she thought she’d never feel again, and offers her a business challenge to keep her mind focused on something other than her broken heart.
Cole Stanton and Lily Edmonds are both starting over. Will the joy of the holiday season bring them together or will the troubles with Christmas push them apart?
EXCERPT
What a difference a bridge would make
for the restaurant. He stopped at a tangled pile of driftwood that blocked the
rest of the beach. A bridge would bring in more diners, which the restaurant
desperately needed, but it would also ruin the seclusion and peace of the
island, a place his grandmother introduced him to when he was a child. He
needed to find an answer to the dwindling profits. As he jogged back home, his
mood dark, not improved by the quick five-mile run. For the first time in his life, Cole had failed. His embarrassment still rankled. As the
new owner of Marshside Mama’s restaurant, he’d overpromised and under delivered
on his first major holiday, Thanksgiving. What had he been thinking? He didn’t know the restaurant industry,
nor did he know the island that well, but he had jumped in anyway, investing in
Sally Ann’s Marshside Mama’s with a lot of ideas fueled by arrogance and
enthusiasm and not a lot of knowledge or foresight.
What
the hell had happened to his brain?
He’d been determined to improve people’s lives, not destroy them. His jaw hurt because he’s been
clenching it so often, but as he ran past the Putnam Plantation, he had a whole
different hurt. Christmas had
arrived. The porch glowed with white lights, wrapped in garland and cheery red
ribbon bows. Christmas. The trouble with Christmas? It was a
family holiday, but his family was far away. His parents had begged him to come home to New England for the
holidays but he couldn’t leave Sally Ann with the mess he had created. So he’d
promised his mom he’d make it next year.
She hadn’t been happy, and he felt even worse.
Cole imagined his family’s home in
Lincoln, elaborately decorated for Christmas with colorful lights, a tree
filled with the handmade ornaments Cole and his brother had made through
elementary school. His mom’s spiced apple cider always simmered on the stove,
filling the house with the scents of family and the holidays. He imagined the snow was already
blanketing the ground, and his mom would have a roaring fire in the
fireplace. And he was here. Alone.
He shook his head and pushed the
sadness away. He’d chosen to change, to move far away and start over. He decided that after the lunch rush,
he’d head to the General Store to find a few Christmas decorations. That would get him in the spirit.
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Kaira Rouda is an Amazon #1 bestselling, multiple award-winning author of three women's fiction novels including HERE, HOME, HOPE, ALL THE DIFFERENCE and IN THE MIRROR.
Tule Publishing Group's Southern Born imprint is publishing her new contemporary romance series set on INDIGO ISLAND: WEEKEND WITH THE TYCOON, Book 1; LINES IN THE SAND, Book 2; and THE TROUBLE WITH CHRISTMAS, Book 3. Four more books in the series will be out in 2015.
Her nonfiction title, REAL YOU INCORPORATED: 8 Essentials for Women Entrepreneurs, continues to inspire women internationally.
She lives in Southern California with her husband and four almost-grown kids, and is at work on her next novel. Connect with her on Twitter, @KairaRouda, and on Facebook at Kaira Rouda Books. For more about Kaira and her books, please visit wwww.KairaRouda.com.
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