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Left
by T.R. Graves
Your own two feet are all you have when you've been left.
A naive Baylee loves Colt, her boyfriend of four years, more than she ever thought possible. After a little snooping, she's convinced she's well on her way toward hearing an once-in-a-lifetime proposal and starring in the wedding-of-the-year event. Instead, she's blindsided by a very public breakup and the crushing news that Colt is marrying someone else… someone more befitting him and the role his father expects him to take in his law firm.
Baylee may have spent years resenting Ariana, her mother, and her suicide, an intolerable show of weakness in Baylee's opinion, but after Colt leaves her just short of the altar, Baylee sees the world through her mother's eyes. She sympathizes with Ariana's actions and realizes that some things—soul-deep aches—can irreparably damage you and make moving on nearly impossible.
At least that's how she feels until she meets Ryker. With his help, Baylee discovers there is life after Colt, and she prepares to move on by pulling herself up by the bootstraps, holding her head high, and standing on her own two feet. Unfortunately, a new jealous and hateful Colt has his own plans for her, and they are plans no one—especially Baylee—ever saw coming.
A naive Baylee loves Colt, her boyfriend of four years, more than she ever thought possible. After a little snooping, she's convinced she's well on her way toward hearing an once-in-a-lifetime proposal and starring in the wedding-of-the-year event. Instead, she's blindsided by a very public breakup and the crushing news that Colt is marrying someone else… someone more befitting him and the role his father expects him to take in his law firm.
Baylee may have spent years resenting Ariana, her mother, and her suicide, an intolerable show of weakness in Baylee's opinion, but after Colt leaves her just short of the altar, Baylee sees the world through her mother's eyes. She sympathizes with Ariana's actions and realizes that some things—soul-deep aches—can irreparably damage you and make moving on nearly impossible.
At least that's how she feels until she meets Ryker. With his help, Baylee discovers there is life after Colt, and she prepares to move on by pulling herself up by the bootstraps, holding her head high, and standing on her own two feet. Unfortunately, a new jealous and hateful Colt has his own plans for her, and they are plans no one—especially Baylee—ever saw coming.
Age Group/Genre: New Adult, Contemporary Romance
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I'd like to thank
Sarah Hollis @ Literary Meanderings for the opportunity
to guest post and for hosting my book tour and me. It goes without saying that
authors - like myself - would be nowhere if it weren't for the kindness
showered upon us by bloggers like Sarah Hollis and blogs like Literary Meanderings. ❤
An
Indie Author's Reasons For Writing
There
are those who believe that the 'eyes are
the window to the soul'. As an author, I'm convinced that people's writings
are truly 'the window to their souls'. I
say this because creating characters and developing storylines is personal.
Every word written within a book is told from the author's perspective and is based
on their life experiences, opinions, and assumptions. From it, you can usually
catch a glimpse of the author's personality and/or their opinions of other
people's characteristics. I know this to be true because I see it in my
characters' mannerisms and the stories' progressions.
In fact,
my writing is so personal that anyone who knows me - including myself - has a hard time believing that I write such
intimate details... that I allow those intimate scenes to be released for the
world to see. We all freely admit they happen. We all freely admit they are normal,
natural, and necessary. Still, there's something about them being written out
and written about that makes some uncomfortable.
Rather
than being disconcerted with the scenes I write in order to progress the story,
I take a page from my father's book and embrace anything and everything that
will make the story better. He was a man who could tell a story that was so
vivid and dramatic that people hung on his every word, flocking to our house
morning, noon, and night just to hear them. A few months after he died, story
plots and their characters began haunting me. They were so demanding that I had
no choice but to write them down... to share them. Before his death, writing a
book was not anything I'd ever imagined doing. Since his death, writing books
is all I imagine doing.
I might
use every tool necessary to tell the best story possible, but that doesn't mean
there is not a purpose to my story. As a nurse and mother (and my father's
daughter), I'm as committed to writing socially responsible stories as I am committed
to writing stories that are suspenseful page-turners. I'll be the first to
remind everyone that a socially responsible story does not lack
exciting/passionate/heart-stopping moments. Instead, the morals are embedded so
deep that they are inferred and not preached, a very, very difficult goal to
achieve.
Left
(Still Standing, #1) is the perfect example of a book that is filled
with hot and sexy scenes between amazing characters, defeats that will have the
readers mouths dropping open and asking 'What
the heck?', AND suspense that will have people flipping the page and
praying for an outcome that they can tolerate. By the end of the story, readers
will understand 1) how fast a woman can get herself into an abusive
relationship and 2) the ramifications when she doesn't begin her fight to get out
right away. They will have water cooler talking points as determined by their
personal (family's/friend's) experience, but they will not have me preaching to
or judging of them. There are too many people that I respect who have found
themselves in these positions for me to think that it happens because of their
actions or that they deserve what they get. In fact, those types of assumptions
are the very ones that led me to write Left.
No one
will ever say Baylee deserves what she gets, and everyone will be disheartened
by her situation.
Grave
Bound (Secrets, #1) was written as a wake-up call to people who
think that forced sex and/or women who are dominated is romantic (please note: I'm not referring to
consensual situations as evidenced by my review of Fifty Shades). In
this series, we have a woman who lives a life where women have no rights. Grave
Bound is dark, sexy, frightening, and heartbreaking. I cry every
time I read this book because I know there are women who live like this - with a lot more violence/fear than I could
ever envision or write into a story. Anyone who pretends sex trafficking
(any anything like it) is not a very real epidemic in this country is in
denial.
Readers
will root for Emily and demand that Lorenzo's head be served on platter.
Finally,
Warriors
(Warrior, #1) - the first book I ever wrote - was begun as a
way for me to open the lines of communication with my teen-aged daughter. As
she read the book, she and I debated the personal dilemmas of the characters in
a way that felt safe because everything - characters and story lines - was
fiction. My daughter was fifteen when I began writing that series and creating
those characters. With it and our discussions, she quickly realized that she
and I are more alike than we are different. After she read Warriors, she
sent me a text that told me she loved the story and had no idea I was so
creative. Today, she's one of my biggest fans and even narrated the Hidden
Object - Enemies game for me.
Fans of
this series will pull for Allison's and Brody's love while living through their
every disappointment as their exciting paranormal/fantasy story plays out.
If I
never sell another book, I'll consider this indie writing adventure successful.
It brought my daughter and me together at a time when some mothers and teen-aged
daughters go their separate ways for good. I've also had several people contact
me and tell me they've used (themselves or sent to others) the information
included at the end of Left detailing
where to go and what to do if you are in a domestic violence situation. I should
also mention that I've pledged to donate $0.50 (for every regular priced book
sold for the first three months of the release) to a Houston area women's
center that is focused on helping women who are living with domestic violence. 
T. R. Graves, the author of The Warrior Series and The Secrets Series, is a 2012 & 2013 NaNoWriMo Winner.
She lives along the Texas coast with her husband. Together, they raise her beta-reading daughter and their football-loving son. Besides being blessed with a supportive family, she counts her career as a registered nurse in not-for-profit hospitals high on her list of fulfilling accomplishments.
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Continue on for giveaway details! ~
Good luck & thanks for stopping by!
♥ Happy Reading!
♥ Happy Reading!
