GetToKnowTheBook: 'Hitting The High Notes' by Nan D. Arnold

Mini-Interview with character: Maggie, the protagonist.

Maggie, tell us a little about you and what you did to surprise Nan.

Answer: Me? I’m hanging on to the tail end of my fourth decade, resisting the big five-oh, dealing with weight gain everywhere but where it’s wanted, and hot flashes, as happens during “the change of life”, while looking for love in the wrong places. I’m the gal who made wrong choices along the way.

As to the surprise angle, Nan wanted to write something quirky. Given her sense of humor, that was easy, but I decided to add dark undercurrents, like my having a history of homicide. Justifiable homicide. The guilt bugs me; so, I hook up with wrong guys to punish myself, like Lorenzo--aka Stavros. He’s the opera star nursing a bruised ego who gets us both in dutch with a wacky environmental group and a special color-blind cop. There’s allusion to other secrets as well, fully fleshed out in PESTO PACKIN’ MAMA.

Maggie, how much of Nan is incorporated into your personality?

Answer: Um, I’d say we’re split fifty/fifty. The fast on the feet quips are all mine, of course. Ditto the flirty part. And the part that gets me out of trouble and between peach and white 450 thread count sheets with…. Read the book. Other things like cooking is all Nan. She loves to cook so she hangs that trait on me. That right there tells you Nan’s leaving quirkyville, heading straight to crazyville. Who cooks when there’s take out, right? But characters can only push an author so much. Pity.

EXCERPT

Maggie Duncan’s fourth decade on earth sped along at warp speed as she clung to its coattails, widowed, childless, and unattached.

Currently seated in the eat-in kitchen of an attractive townhouse, she considered the wine glass her host, a man called Stavros, set before her. The balloon-shaped bowl on a long fragile stem looked half as wide and nearly as deep as that big zero in Florida’s abdomen known as Lake Okeechobee.

“So, your name is Stavros.” Maggie’s blunt tipped finger rimmed the glass.

She’d met him by chance at a convenience store only an hour before. “Just Stavros?”

He nodded.

“Mysterious.” She took a tentative sip. The wine coated her tongue and slid down her throat. The merlot’s warmth wrapped second thoughts about her reckless acceptance of his invitation into a snug blanket and Maggie surrendered to the moment’s spell.

For more excerpts check out http://www.champagnebooks.com/books/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=19_12&products_id=360

HITTING THE HIGH NOTES Reviewd by Romance Alley.
Reviewer Betty Ann Harris: Hitting The High Notes is a witty and clever book that was a total delight to read. The author, Nan Arnold, has a wonderful sense of humor that breezes through each page and carries through the entire story...read the full review at www.romancealley.suzannahsafi.com/reviews2.html