Sweet Treats & Yummy Reads Hop!

Valentine’s Day 2018 Event – Sweet Treats & Yummy Reads

Are you excited about Valentine’s Day? The authors at Chick Lit Chat HQ are, and we know quite a bit about romance, not to mention gorgeous guys and swoon-worthy storylines, which is why we’ve put together a fun-filled event that celebrates all these wonderful things.

That’s right, book lovers, it’s time for the Sweet Treats & Yummy Reads Hop! Starting February 12th, 40+ Chick Lit and RomCom authors will be throwing a fabulous, Valentine-themed bash on Facebook and each of them will be offering a GIVEAWAY–books, gift cards, author swag, and lots of other wonderful prizes will be up for grabs!

But wait, there’s more! You know we have the “yummy reads” covered (this group is nothing if not crazy talented), but what about the “sweet treats?” Hold on to your hats, peeps, because CLC HQ has outdone itself this time. We’ll be giving away not one, not two, but THREE Grand Prizes for this hop and each of those lucky winners will receive a 6-pack of Wicked Good Cupcakes!* And the best news of all? You get to choose your own sinfully delicious flavors. (Commence happy dance now.)

So, what are you waiting for? Head on over to the Sweet Treats & Yummy Reads Hop on Facebook and join the group page where you can meet and chat with fellow readers, as well as some of the most popular authors in your favorite genres, plus find the lists of participating authors and enter to win one of the Grand Prizes. We look forward to seeing you there!

Tree Love new release celebration prize!

My giveaway** prize for this event includes the following:

One ebook copy of my new release short story, Tree Love
Lightweight cotton scarf in charcoal colour with little gold hearts printed on it
A gold-tone triple strand necklace with a heart pendant
Black metallic heart-shaped jewel box

I might also throw in some delicious heart-shaped, Italian-made Girl on a Plane chocolates wrapped in red foil. Because yum!

Tree Love is releasing widely on major ebook retail sites on 13 February for only 99c or 99p. The universal link to all retailers is here – books2read.com/TreeLove

This story is a tale of first loves reunited, email to trees (no joke — based on a true story too, of email addresses assigned to trees in public parks and people writing them love letters), an artist heroine and urban lumberjack hero. It’s set in and around the beautiful botanic gardens in my home city of Melbourne, Australia. All the fun and swooniness ensue!

My question for anyone wanting to enter my giveaway is:

If your first love fell out of a tree, would you catch him (or her)?

I ended up marrying my first love, so I guess I’d catch him and not let him drop on his head or fall to his death! Hehe, what was I saying? Oh yes, my lovely husband is an absolute sweetheart. We’ve been together for many years and he’s a keeper. 🙂

Comment on the giveaway post on my Facebook author page for your chance to win. I’ll choose a winner on 16 February (Aussie time). This may be 15 February where you live).

P.S. You can also sign-up to my email newsletter to keep up-to-date with my writing, giveaways and to receive a free copy of my sexy romcom novelette, Chocolate Truffle Kiss. Just complete the form on my Contact page.

*Wicked Good Cupcakes only ships to destinations in the United States, so the Grand Prize portion of this hop will not be open to international entrants. However, the 40+ individual author giveaways will be open internationally.

**My giveaway is open internationally but is not sponsored by or endorsed by Facebook.

Tree Love Is In The Air. . .

Last week I made an executive decision as captain of my own writing ship. I decided to indie publish a romantic short story of mine, Tree Love. This story was previously published a year ago in the Taste of Romance anthology along with other stories from authors in my writing group, the Melbourne Romance Writers Guild.

Tree Love is a short and sweet story about first loves reunited, emails to trees, art, nature and taking chances. It’s now up for pre-order, ready for release on 13 February, just in time for Valentine’s Day.

Tree Love: A Romantic Short Story by Cassandra O'Leary, cover design

Here’s the cover for Tree Love. I designed it myself with a gorgeous stock illustration (copyright warawiri) sourced from 123rf.com. Isn’t it pretty? Well, I think so.

Tree Love story inspiration

I was actually inspired to write this story after reading a wacky newspaper article about something that happened in my home city of Melbourne, Australia.

Under a new environmental plan, the city assigned email addresses to trees. And people started emailing, not just to report on the condition of the trees as had been expected, but they wrote to the trees. Letters, poems, confessions. This was pretty hilarious to me, but also sweet. So a story idea was born!

The original article is on the News.com.au website — People around the world have been emailing trees in Melbourne to confess their love.

In Tree Love, I imagined my heroine, Natalia, was the admin person working for the Parks and Gardens department tasked with answering the Tree-mails. It’s entertaining but also baffling at times.

Blurb

If your first love fell out of a tree. . . would you catch him?

Natalia Bianchi is a botanical artist, who finds herself accidentally working for the city’s Parks Department in admin and also accidentally engaged to her boss. It’s not what she had planned.

One day she checks on ‘her’ tree in the botanical gardens, and her first love, Dan “The Man” Mancini falls at her feet. Literally. Almost like it was meant to be. But that’s what she thought ten years ago when they were friends at university.

Should Natalia shake up her entire safe, convenient life to climb Dan like a tree? Could this be her second chance at love that could last forever?

Buy links

You can pre-order Tree Love now from Amazon, iBooks, Kobo, Barnes & Noble and Google Play Books. It’s only 99 cents or 99p.

Universal link:

books2read.com/TreeLove

Inspiration pics

Stock photo of tree from Pixabay

Check out my Tree Love Pinterest board for some great pics of the Royal Botanical Gardens in Melbourne, and some character inspiration too.

P.S. join my newsletter list if you’d like to know more about my writing and receive a free novelette, Chocolate Truffle Kiss!

Yes, I’m Tempted to Write

Today is deadline day. For the last two weeks I’ve been writing like some sort of romance-ninja hepped up on caffeine as part of the #TemptedToWrite short story competition run by Mills & Boon (Harlequin Books). This competition presented a challenge and I’d already decided to try to challenge myself with my writing this year. So I jumped in and got started. 10 questions, 10 days, 10,000 words. The competition ran from January to early February, in the lead up to Valentine’s Day. I could do that, sure I could. Hmmm.

It had been many years since I’d written a short story and once I got started, of course I found the experience quite different than writing my two unpublished novels. I’m very much a novice at the plotting and scheming side of fiction writing. I’ve discovered that I’m a ‘pantser’ i.e. I like to write by the seat of my pants. Usually, a bright and shiny new idea will come to me while I’m doing something mundane like brushing my teeth and then I try to work out if the story has legs.

Anyway, I soon discovered that the short story form presents some challenges, especially in the romance genre. Could my two characters really fall in love in only 10,000 words? I hoped I could convey some meaningful interaction between them and of course some heat (otherwise known as sexy times) in the course of a short story. I hope I’ve succeeded. In any case, it was a really great exercise for me as a writer, to answer so many questions about the characters, their motivations and what they would do in various situations, before I actually started to write the first scene. I don’t know that I will ever be a hardcore ‘plotter’ but this competition has helped me to find a happy medium and to think about key scenes and story length.

I also loved the social media aspect of this competition, forming an online community of like-minded (aspiring) romance authors. Much of the competition was run via Facebook and Twitter.

The #TemptedToWrite competition run by Mills & Boon.

It’s been a real pleasure to virtually chat to the other participants, have a laugh and share each other’s pain in editing. I hope everyone else in the competition enjoyed it as much as I did.

I’m thinking of posting a snippet of my story on this blog soon. In the meantime though, I just wanted to rant a little and also say thanks to Mills & Boon for running such a great competition for aspiring authors. Bravo!

Sweet and Spicy and all things nicey…

Cover reveal

I’m very excited to be able to share a cover design! This is the gorgeous cover for the upcoming Sweet and Spicy anthology being published by the Melbourne Romance Writers Guild to celebrate its 25th anniversary. And my short story, Chocolate Truffle Kiss, will be included. Yay!

Without further ado, here’s the cover:

Sweet and Spicy romance anthology cover image.

Sweet and Spicy romance anthology cover design. To be released by the Melbourne Romance Writers Guild in November 2015

To read more about this anthology, go to the Melbourne Romance Writers Guild blog. More details will be coming soon.

Sweet success — delicious book news!

I’m calling it – as of 10 November 2015, I’m officially a published author. It’s just over two years since I got serious about fiction writing and now one of my story babies is out in the world. Hopefully, this will be the first of many book-aversaries.

Sweet and Spicy romance anthology. Cover design by Jay Aheer.

I’m so excited that the Sweet and Spicy anthology from my fabulous writing group, the Melbourne Romance Writers Guild, is now live and available to purchase from a variety of e-book retailers. This collection of romance and love stories is a celebration of the MRWG’s 25^th anniversary, and includes my first published long-ish 9,000 word short story, Chocolate Truffle Kiss.

The MRWG took on this project a few months ago, creating short stories from scratch, critiquing and editing, undertaking a cover design process and developing a promotional plan. All in all, it’s been a fantastic learning opportunity for the whole group, getting the chance to be indie published to professional standard.

Chocolate and coffee fuelled inspiration

My story, Chocolate Truffle Kiss, is a romantic comedy, inspired by my home city of Melbourne and the art of people watching, which I enjoy when out and about in cafés, restaurants and around town. As fellow Melbournites know, food and drink is a serious business to us.

Coffee and chocolate are a couple of the hot button topics for Melbourne foodies, and someone’s favourite café can be a definitive make-or-break in the friendship stakes. Overheard snippets of conversation in the city might go something like this:

She likes Gloria Jeans and Starbucks…whaaat?? I’m more a Degraves Street and Market Lane kind of girl.

So, when a story idea on this theme popped into my head when I was jotting down notes in a café one day, I knew I had to write it. Here’s the full blurb:

A writer, Beth, comes into her favourite café every day for her coffee and a chocolate truffle fix, a decadent treat that fuels her creativity. But what really keeps her coming back, day after day, is the delicious looking man behind the counter. The barista, Samuel. Could he be watching and wanting her too?

There may be some postmodern self-reflexive references going on here, but just so you know, I’ve never fallen in love with a hot barista. Aww. Never mind, I have a spunky hubby at home who just happens to be a whiz with our espresso machine and is an excellent cook. As I love to drink coffee and eat delicious treats, it’s true love!

If you need more mood-setting, have a look at my Pinterest board for the story or read an excerpt on my Writing page. There’s lots of Melbourne-ish goodness, plus my inspiration pics for the hero, Samuel, are kind of nice eye candy. Ahem.

I hope I’ve encouraged you to try a taste of romance, and not just made you hungry.

Read more about the Sweet and Spicy anthology and the other great authors in our group, and find the ‘buy now’ links on the Melbourne Romance Writers Guild website or see my Home page.