Gina Rae Mitchell

What’s Not Lost by Valerie Taylor | Guest Post ~ Spotlight ~  6 Winners

A book blog tour from iRead Book Tours.

Thank you to the author, publisher, & Lauren at iRead for providing me with the information for this tour.

Today I’m bring you a guest post from bestselling author, Valerie Taylor, as part of the book blog tour for book 3 of the What’s Not series. You can read my post on the first two books here:

What’s Not Said by Valerie Taylor | Spotlight Tour | Also featuring What’s Not True

Book Details

What's Not Lost by Valerie Taylor
Series: What's Not #3
Published by Aspetuck Publishing on 02/07/2023
Genres: Fiction, Contempoary Romance, Romantic Comedy
Format: eBook, Paperback
Pages: 324

What would you do if you discovered your fiancé’s ex-girlfriend is pregnant?

Through the eyes of an overachiever, the schemes of a homewrecker, the magic of a bottle of wine, and a cat, award-winning author Valerie Taylor propels this heart-warming and humorous series to an unexpected and delightful conclusion.

Kassie O’Callaghan is searching … for herself and for answers. With her husband six feet under and an engagement ring on her finger, Kassie is convinced managing a company merger in Paris will complete her. When she learns her fiancé’s ex-girlfriend is pregnant, Kassie’s dreams come tumbling down. At least for the moment.

Despite pleas from her younger fiancé to stay in Boston and a warning from her best friend of what’s at stake should she leave, Kassie heads to Paris. There, she stumbles into a world of wine and roses as she puts her strengths and beliefs to the ultimate test. When a Greek businessman tries to rescue her, Kassie discovers—in life—it’s not whether you win or lose, it’s the way you love that counts.

Content Rating:  PG-13 + M. There is some bad language and references to sex scenes, but no explicit sex scenes.

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Purchase Links for What’s Not Lost

Amazon-OneLink for all countries    BookShop/IndieBound

BN

What's Not LostShop on Amazon

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I love to read books through my  Amazon Kindle Unlimited subscription. 

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Guest Post

Light Bulb Moments

By Valerie Taylor

Multi-award-winning author of the What’s Not trilogy — What’s Not Said, What’s Not True, and What’s Not Lost

 

I had this idea for a blog post. But then I didn’t. Either it was a bad idea, or it slipped my aging brain. It’s like what happens when you walk into a room and can’t figure out what you went in there for in the first place.

In all honesty, I’m kidding. I didn’t lose my thought, my idea, because I’d written a couple of words down with my handy red Flair marker on a light green Post-it note.

“Stories are everywhere.” That’s what I’d scribbled.

That’s my response when I’m asked where I get my ideas from. I don’t mean to be glib. In fact, I carried around the idea for What’s Not Said for a decade in a messenger bag filled with stray notes and pages of meaningless chapters I’d started during a writer’s conference in Boston and failed to finish during my ten years living in Seattle.

Quite an embarrassment, to be sure, to retire and be asked, “So, whatever happened to that novel?” I could’ve said, “Stories go everywhere” and left it at that.

But I didn’t because I had an idea for the ending of a story that kept nagging at me, like the sound of thewoodpecker who chose to feed off my house. Everything I wrote read like a boring corporate policy statement or some convoluted marketing campaign. After settling back in CT, I decided to hang onto theidea but to eighty-six the hundred or so pages I’d been lugging around.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Through some online novel writing courses and by reading the experts on mastering all the elements of plot, character, setting, dialogue, etc., I crafted a beginning and a middle and attached my ending to the manuscript like a caboose.

I wiped my hands. I was done. What’s Not Said published in September 2020, right smack dab in the middle of the lockdown.

Not so fast. Readers asked for more. “Are you kidding me?” I chortled. They weren’t. Back to the drawing board; actually the keyboard.

Since I hadn’t planned a series, I hadn’t purposely dropped breadcrumbs along the way that would easily sprout into a sequel. Similar to my predicament for the first book, I had only one idea percolating. And it was the middle of the story. Luckily I had a cast of characters I could call on to help me. I asked them, “what if you did that?” or “what if he said this?” Not only did they carry me to the middle, but they catapulted me to an ending for What’s Not True I hadn’t predicted when I started.

By the time I arrived at what became the last book in the trilogy, What’s Not Lost, I was one lucky writer. Finally, I had the beginning. And then, soon enough, I hit not a dead end, but an empty middle. I floundered with testing ideas, drafting different scenarios. None worked. Until they did.

I woke up one morning and rushed to my dining room table where index cards were strewn in some illogical order and moved a middle chapter to the front of the book. Then I rewrote it and introduced it as the prologue.

At around the same time, I was leading a book club group that was discussing the first two novels in the series. One club member ecstatically offered what she thought was a brilliant concept for the last book, which was, of course, already in progress. Her idea was not entirely new to me, but up until then, I had chosen another path for my characters. But I have to admit, she was right.

It meant I had to rework the second half of the story. Minimize the role of one character and enlarge that of another. And it was so much fun doing it!

Clearly, responding to my own creative juices and listening to the idea of the most important person in the process — my reader — made What’s Not Lost a truly unpredictable, yet extremely satisfying ending to the entire trilogy.

In my house, Alexa turns on some of my lights these days. I count myself lucky to recognize the truly great light bulb moments when they arrive, no matter their energy source.

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Purchase What’s Not Lost online from a local bookstore.

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Easy Amazon Links

Amazon-OneLink for all countries

If the above link does not take you to your country, here are a few more:

Amazon – Canada

Amazon – France

Amazon – Germany

Amazon – United Kingdom

Please send me a note if your country isn’t listed and you would like to purchase using my links. Using my link does not change the price you pay. Amazon pays me a minimal amount out of their share. 

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Giveaway!

Enter to win $50 AMAZON GIFT CARD (grand prize) or signed copy of WHAT’S NOT LOST (5 winners/USA only) (ends Mar 31)

Please visit more stops on the tour for extra chances to win!

Official Tour Page for What’s Not Lost

WHAT’S NOT LOST Book Tour Giveaway

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