Guest Post, Excerpt, and Giveaway: Sunset at Pencarrow by Lou Sylvre and Anne Barwell

We’re so pleased to welcome author Lou Sylvre today on the Sunset at Pencarrow blog tour, a novel she penned with fellow author Anne Barwell. They’ve got some great things to share, including a giveaway, so be sure to check out the Rafflecopter widget for entry details.

Welcome, Lou!

Hi! I’m Lou Sylvre and I’m stoked to be a guest once again on The Novel Approach, this time stopping by on the Sunset at Pencarrow blog tour. I co-authored this book with Anne Barwell, and we’re excited it’s to be released in just five days, on June 7, 2017. It’s the New Zealand story in Dreamspinner’s World of Love collection, available to preorder now. Good news: for a limited time you can get 30% off at the Dreamspinner store by using code PENCARROW at checkout. More good news: we’ve got a Rafflecopter giveaway going on, so be sure to enter (several times) for a chance to win!

Now that all that business is out of the way, here is today’s post. A little farther on, a brief excerpt, but first a letter from one of the protagonists, an American man named Rusty Beaumont, to Geoff, the man he would have married if fate had not intervened. I could tell you more, but his words are better than mine.

Dearest Geoff,

I’m in flight, on the way back home from New Zealand. You wanted to go there so bad after LOTR! I’d like to say I saw all those neat places in the movies, but I didn’t. Other places, other stuff. Good stuff, but not there.

I know you can’t hear me, and you can’t answer, and you can’t grab me by the front of my shirt and pull me close like you always used to when you thought I was making things tougher than they needed to be. Hah! Makes me smile thinking about that, just like every time back when you were with me. Even when I got deployed again, had to go to Afghanistan instead of home like we’d planned. God knows I didn’t feel like smiling then, but there you were, all that love in your eyes, all of you just so perfect for me. “Just wait, Rusty,” you said, “when you get back we’ll get married—we’ll do it all.”

I should have gone with you, to your folks’ place in Shasta, after the marines cut us both loose and we were putting our dreams together. But it was only for a couple days, and I had my classes and all the wedding stuff. Besides the idea of meeting your family before you had a chance to smooth things over after you told them about us—that scared me. I didn’t tell you that, but you knew. These last couple years since you’ve been gone—God Geoff! I can’t help but think if I’d been there, if I’d been walking next to you, I’d have caught you when you slipped, and you’d be alive still, and all our dreams would be real by now.

And hell! I know you’d put me straight for thinking like that if you could. I can practically hear you rolling your eyes. I’m working on letting that guilt go, Geoff. And something else. I need to let go of my dream with you. Because it can’t ever be, right?

You always let me cry if I needed to. You always listened when I was angry or scared or sad, and no matter how hard I tried to just breathe and be in the moment, I couldn’t shake it. You let me feel and stood with me like a buffer in whatever storm was kicking my ass. But you always wanted me to smile. To smile and mean it from my heart. You wanted me to be happy.

I know that’s true. And I need it to be true now, because I can’t really say for sure, but maybe I met someone, Geoff. What if that could be true? What if I can have a new dream?

This guy—his name is Nate. Nathaniel Dunn. You’d like him. He makes me smile.

I love you Geoff, and that’s why I think maybe I can love again. Thank you.

Always,
Rusty

About the Book

Kiwi Nathaniel Dunn is in a fighting mood, but how does a man fight Wellington’s famous fog? In the last year, Nate’s lost his longtime lover to boredom and his ten-year job to the economy. Now he’s found a golden opportunity for employment where he can even use his artistic talent, but to get the job, he has to get to Christchurch today. Heavy fog means no flight, and the ticket agent is ignoring him to fawn over a beautiful but annoying, overly polite American man.

Rusty Beaumont can deal with a canceled flight, but the pushy Kiwi at the ticket counter is making it difficult for him to stay cool. The guy rubs him all the wrong ways despite his sexy working-man look, which Rusty notices even though he’s not looking for a man to replace the fiancé who died two years ago. Yet when they’re forced to share a table at the crowded airport café, Nate reveals the kind heart behind his grumpy façade. An earthquake, sex in the bush, and visits from Nate’s belligerent ex turn a day of sightseeing into a slippery slope that just might land them in love.

World of Love: Stories of romance that span every corner of the globe.

Buy the Book: Dreamspinner Press (Discount code PENCARROW from 5/31-6/30, 30% off, DSP store only.) || Amazon || Barnes and Noble || Google Books || iTunes || Kobo

The Excerpt

He had to pay attention to his footing now. The trail was truly steep—muddy and slippery in places.

Immediately on thinking those words, slippery in places, he felt like it was about something besides the muddy ground of the Orongorongo forest. He associated the phrase with his own intentions, coming out here with a man who—okay, I’ll admit he pulls at me like sex on toast. If he wasn’t so sure he didn’t want anybody, he’d think he wanted Nate. And yes, he knew he was skirting the truth. 

Is that a rock in my shoe? Hard to think about anything else, really, with that irritant. He needed to do something about it. “Nate, hold up. I have a—”

A rolling blast of thunder cut his words short. In his mind’s eye, he saw explosions all around him in a cornfield around a sleepy, dusty town in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. But he’d come a long way since leaving that year of his life behind, and he knew almost instantly that he wasn’t there; the sound he heard wasn’t war.

“Fuck! Earthquake,” Nate said.

That made perfect sense—especially as the ground suddenly lurched beneath Rusty’s feet, knocking him off-balance. He fell forward, and gravity carried him downslope against Nate, who went down under him. Instinctively, he tried to shield Nate’s head from hitting the hard ground, cradling it against his chest with his hands. The packs on their backs weren’t bulky, but were enough of a lump to keep them from rolling far. Instead they slid, and by the time they came to a stop, they’d nearly reached the river.

Rusty lay still, concentrating on steadying his breath, but when he realized his body lay spread over Nate’s like butter on bread, his heart took off racing all over again. Trying to rein in his senses—ignore the feel of the man, the scent of him, the rush of his own blood heating his veins—he pushed up onto his elbows.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“Yeah. Dandy.”

The breathy sound of Nate’s voice seemed to belie his words, and Rusty turned sharply to meet Nate’s gaze. He looked pissed again, and Rusty couldn’t blame him. He pushed up farther, intending to rise and then help Nate to his feet. But from that slightly higher perspective, Rusty suddenly saw he’d been reading Nate all wrong.

Yeah, maybe there was anger in that smoldering gaze, but it wasn’t anger at Rusty. The man’s as hungry for me as I am for him! Rusty knew that without a doubt. Of all the incongruous things, he could even smell Nate’s arousal mingling with his own. It smelled damn good. 

And fucking dangerous.

Thank you, TNA, for hosting our tour, and thank you all for reading. I hope to see you around on the other stops. For the complete tour schedule and links to the blogs, just click here.

About the Authors

Anne Barwell lives in Wellington, New Zealand. She works in a library, is an avid reader and watcher across genres, and is constantly on the lookout for more hours in her day. Music often plays a part in her stories, and although she denies being a romantic at heart, the men in her books definitely are.  Anne has written in several genres—contemporary, fantasy, historical, and SF— and believes in making her characters work for their happy endings.

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Lou Sylvre loves romance with all its ups and downs, and likes to conjure it into books. The romantics on her pages are men who fall hard for each other, end up deeply in love, and often save each other from unspeakable danger. It’s all pretty crazy and very sexy. Among other things, Lou is the creator of the popular Vasquez and James series​, which can be found at Dreamspinner Press, Amazon, and many other online vendors.

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Lou and Anne’s shared Facebook page

The Giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway
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