About
the Book
Title:
Spiral (The Salzburg Saga Book One)
Author:
D.U. Okonkwo
Left
to raise her three younger siblings at the tender age of seventeen,
Nina Bishop is accustomed to solving problems. Now that she and two
friends run their own law firm, she gets paid for solving other
people’s problems. And as a businesswoman, she can always smell a
great opportunity. So when her biggest client, Parker Drayton,
organizes a networking ski trip to Salzburg, Austria, she is the
first to board the plane. There's only one drawback: Parker is
bringing along his two notoriously difficult, grown-up sons, Justin
and Hugh.
Even
before take-off the tension between Parker and his sons is palpable.
But when Hugh causes their small jet to crash, plunging them all into
unforgiving back country, the networking trip goes from
tension-filled journey to living nightmare.
Author
Bio
D.
U. (Davina Uchenna) Okonkwo is the author of the novel, RISE, and the
Salzburg Saga. She was born and raised in London, United Kingdom. An
avid reader from a young age, she cites her favourite childhood books
as Tiger Eyes by Judy Blume, Hacker by Marjorie Blackman, The
Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis, and The Twits by
Roald Dahl.
Davina
began to write her own stories at age ten and would give them to her
schoolteachers to read. Not limiting herself to any one genre, she
wrote stories about children’s fiction, romances, and mysteries.
She fondly remembers enjoying her mock GCSE English exam at age 15
because she was required to write a story: “I wrote about a
teenage girl who finds out that her boyfriend is cheating on her,”
she recalls. “I remember my teacher giving me an A grade and
writing at the end of the paper, 'What a creep!'
She
didn’t think about writing again for several years and instead
pursued higher education and graduated with honours in European
Business with Spanish from the University of Salford. The course had
included an ERASMUS placement in La Universidad de Salamanca, Spain.
It
was when, upon graduating and working full time, that the idea of
writing once again occurred to her. While in a bookstore she suddenly
had the thought, ‘I wonder what it would be like to write a book
one day.” She says that as soon as she had the thought, a
powerful jolt seemed to go through her, actually pushing her back a
step. Dismissing the strange sensation she left the bookstore but it
was later that very same day that the idea for RISE surfaced.
She
wrote and revised RISE around her full time day job. While she did
so, digital changes began shaking up the publishing industry. It was
seeing how these digital changes were empowering authors that made
Davina decide to publish RISE independently. In the summer of
2014 she launched her own publishing company, A Few Words Press
Limited. RISE was the first book published under AFWP in January
2015.
In
her spare time she enjoys salsa dancing, spa breaks, swimming
and watching tennis.
Links
Author
Website: http://www.duokonkwo.com
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the book for FREE on:
Book
Excerpts
Nina
slipped her passport into her tan leather cross-body bag and zipped
up her roller bag. The sharp slide of the bag’s zip punctuated the
tense silence of the living room. After a moment’s hesitation, she
flicked a glance at the man sprawled on the long cream sofa three
feet from her.
In ripped blue jeans
and a too-tight white polo shirt, his gray-socked feet hanging over
the arm of the sofa, Alex Riley raised his light brown eyes from his
latest issue of Classic
Cars,
his eyes clashing with her blue ones.
They eyed each other
for several seconds. Alex eventually broke the stare, his eyes
dropping resentfully to her luggage. “All ready then?”
Though her lips thinned at his tone, Nina nodded and buttoned her sky
blue ski jacket over her red wool jumper. “Yes, but, Alex–” She
broke off. No,
she would not succumb to another argument about this trip.
“It
doesn't bother you at all, does it?”
She
tightened her dark brown ponytail. “I can't let it bother me, Alex.
Like I’ve said, this is a business networking trip. How could I ask
to bring my boyfriend along?”
“You
could have asked Neil." Bitterness laced his words.
Her
teeth ground together. “This isn’t Neil’s trip; it’s Parker
Drayton’s. You know he’s our biggest client. Besides, you don't
even like him or his two sons that he’s bringing along.” In all
honesty, she wasn't crazy about Justin and Hugh Drayton either, but
Parker himself was fine. At ages twenty-nine and twenty-seven
respectively, Justin and Hugh Drayton held senior positions within
their father’s chain of hotels. As a solicitor and partner with the
law practice she had set up with her two friends Angela Akura and
Neil Vaska, Nina was proud that their firm gave legal expertise to
well-known clients in the leisure industry such as Drayton Hotels.
They had a good working relationship with Parker Drayton himself, but
his sons Justin ad Hugh? Not so much. For some reason both Justin and
Hugh communicated poorly with their father. Whether there was a power
struggle going on or a private family conflict she didn’t know, but
Justin ad Hugh often failed to return her messages, failed to get
contracts and affidavits signed by Parker on time, and Hugh, whose
struggle with alcohol was well known, was the worst. It often made
for uncomfortable conversations with their father.
“Why
must I like them?” Alex asked as he flipped a magazine page with a
flick of his wrist. “While you network, I could be on the slopes.
You said Parker’s rented a ten-bedroom chalet. Good enough for me.
I don’t have to talk to him or his idiot sons.”
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