A LITTLE SUGAR, A LOT OF LOVE by Linn B Halton #excerpt #giveaway

#giveaway

A Little Sugar, A Lot of Love

by

Linn B Halton

 
#giveaway

Genre: Chick Lit

Release Date: Kindle: 15 January 2016 / Paperback 14 October 2016

Publisher:  Choc Lit

Celebrating the Paperback release of Linn B Halton’s wonderful book

A Little Sugar, A Lot of Love

Life isn’t all love and cupcakes …

Katie has had her fair share of bad luck, but when she finally realises her dream of opening a bakery it seems things can only get better.

But the reality of running a business hits Katie hard and whilst her partner, Steve, tries to help she begins to sense that the situation is driving them further apart. Could Katie be set to lose her relationship and her dream job?

Then, one winter’s day, a man walks into her shop – and, in the space of that moment, the course of Katie’s life is changed.

But nobody finds happiness in the blink of an eye. Sometimes it takes two Christmases, three birthdays and a whole lot of cake to get there …

Previously released as Sweet Occasions by the author. Revised and edited by Choc Lit December 2015.

EXTRACT

Grandma Grace peers at me with interest over the top of her glasses, taking the box from my hands and placing it on the side. She wraps her arms around as much of me as she can reach, being at least a foot shorter, and gives me a fierce hug.

‘Thank you, my dear, but the only present I wanted was to see you standing here in one piece. It’s such a long journey and the weather! That rain is relentless, so many places are flooded. To think of you at the side of the road worried me to death and I will admit to saying a few little prayers as one hour turned into two, then three …’

She raises her eyebrow sternly, but it’s a brief moment before those twinkly blue eyes are full of love and laughter again.

‘My boy is here and that’s all that counts.’

‘Grandma, I haven’t been a boy for many years,’ I retort, softly, as she releases me with a tender pat on my back. She might be in her twilight years but her spirit is strong and her mind as sharp as ever. We all thought she’d fade away when Pop died, but the truth is he’s the one who would have faded if she had gone first.

‘You will always be a boy to me. Now, tell me more about this guardian angel of yours.’

While the tea is brewing and the cake is sliced, I hang around the kitchen as I did when I was growing up. Grandma Grace was always easy to talk to; she seemed to understand even when the words wouldn’t come. Her instincts filled in the gaps at times when even I couldn’t make sense of what was going on inside my head. After this failed relationship I began to despair of ever finding someone special.

‘You can’t hurry love,’ she’d told me. ‘It takes time to find your soulmate and in the process you change and grow. That’s why young love often withers, as Pop would have said. Two people either change and grow together, or they grow apart. Love is about sustaining what comes after that first hormonal rush.’

‘But that wasn’t the case for the two of you,’ I remember pointing out.

‘There has to be an exception to every rule,’ she’d replied, with a wicked smile. ‘We were lucky. Fate was kind to us. But with hindsight, we were too young and naive to understand that until much later in life. Don’t fret, Adam, there’s a wonderful young woman out there for you when the time is right.’

Sadly, when I reached that point it too turned out to be yet another huge failure. This time the consequences had been more painful than I could ever have imagined. Kelly was everything I thought I wanted in a woman and, after adjusting to the shock of an unplanned pregnancy, she was a fantastic mother. With hindsight I can see now that parenthood came too early in our relationship, we hardly knew each other. Suddenly I was a family man and yet, surprisingly, the role seemed to come naturally to me. I loved Sunday mornings the best. When a little head would appear on the pillow next to me at some unearthly hour and a warm little hand would wind its way around my neck.

Lily Grace is my sanity, my raison d’être.

#giveaway

BUY LINKS

AMAZON UK EBOOK

AMAZON UK PAPERBACK

AMAZON US EBOOK

AMAZON US PAPERBACK

ABOUT LINN B. HALTON

#giveaway

“I’m a hopeless romantic, self-confessed chocaholic, and lover of coffee. For me, life is about family, friends, and writing. Oh, and the occasional glass of White Grenache…”
An Amazon UK Top 100 best-selling author with A Cottage in the Country in November 2015, Linn’s novels have been short-listed in the UK’s Festival of Romance and the eFestival of Words Book Awards. Linn won the 2013 UK Festival of Romance: Innovation in Romantic Fiction award. Linn writes chick lit, women’s contemporary fiction and psychic romance for Choc Lit, Harper Impulse and Endeavour Press.
Website/blog: http://linnbhalton.co.uk/
Twitter: @LinnBHalton FB: Linn B Halton Author
Amazon: http://smarturl.it/LittleSugarLotOfLove

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#SEWES2016 ~ Sept 21 – Temple Sowerby to Kelso

#SEWES2016

Sept 21 – Temple Sowerby to Kelso

We decided that when we left Temple Sowerby this morning, we would attempt to visit  The Devils Porridge Museum in Eastriggs one more time. We weren’t far away and had plenty of time before we needed to arrive at Duncan House in Kelso.

My computer scared me bad. I mean scared me real BAD. When I shut down my laptop this morning, Windows 10 decided it needed to download and install updates. You can prevent it from happening, but I didn’t know how at the time. I chose install and restart. Except it didn’t restart. It went through the motions and it looked like the days of DOS or a Linux system starting up. We’re talking command line code happening… until it froze.

I froze in panic! The computer had to be turned off at some point for travelling, so pressed the power button until it shut down. I turned it back on and the same thing happened all over again. Visions of taking it in to the store I bought it from when I got home flashed through my mind. No computer until then? Whatever would I do? Sure I had my iPad and hubby had his laptop but still, you develop a relationship with your own computer. You know its quirks and idiosyncrasies (at least I thought I did).

After checking out of The Kings Arms Hotel and leaving some of my books’ postcards at the hotel – gal checking me out of the hotel asked if I knew the author – I said yes, it’s me. Well, that prolonged the process because we had to talk about writing and reading and what not. She told me there’s a book club in Temple Sowerby. So maybe one of these days, they’ll read one (and maybe all) of mine.

On to Eastriggs and the museum. We arrived there about 10:15 to a reasonably empty car park. Yay!

Robbie Brodie (I think that’s his name), gave us an overview of the original munitions plant that occupied the land between Eastriggs and Gretna.

Sept 21
map of the HM Factory Gretna
Setpt 21
#s 1-5 from the above map
Sept 21
#s 6-10 from the above map
Sept 21
uniform worn by the munitions girls
Sept 21
one of the nitrating pans

Another event depicted here at the museum is the Quintinshill Rail Disaster.

Sept 21
petition to the King asking for the signalmen charged in the disaster to be pardoned

On the upper level of the museum, they have an area set aside for research, and another for “selfies”. Here, clothing from the era is available to try on and take your picture in – including an army helmet!

Sept 21
Don modelling a helmet
Sept 21
Me wearing a hat

I rather like my chapeau even if I don’t look best pleased in the photo. Note to self… try to find something similar when I get home.

Before leaving the museum, I did namedrop. As in my crime writer friend’s name – Chris Longmuir and her historical novel, Devil’s Porridge, set at the actual munitions factory here.

I wanted to visit Hermitage Castle, one of the many properties under the care of Historic Scotland. It happened to be on our route to Kelso (more or less).

Sept 21
Hermitage Castle
Sept 21
Hermitage Castle
Sept 21
within the walls of Hermitage Castle
Sept 21
The chapel grounds at Hermitage Castle

After leaving the castle, I got my fill once again of narrow roads with passing places – and cattle grids. I really don’t mind these roads although they’re much better when the visibility is better. You don’t want to end up having to back up to a passing place if you don’t have to. I drove and put hubby to work taking pictures out the windscreen.

Sept 21
driving on one of the single track roads…
Sept 21
in a passing place on a single track road
Sept 21
Hope nothing is coming from the other direction…
Sept 21
Waiting in a passing place for the oncoming vehicle

The Waverly Route Heritage Association has preserved a section of track and we spotted this passenger carriage on our right. Despite passing place etiquette not allowing for such things as photo ops, the traffic was so light, I couldn’t resist.

Passenger carriage
Passenger carriage on the Waverly Route
Sept 21
Viaduct on the Waverly Route
Sept 21
Approaching a cattle grid
Sept 21
Tree canopy created by the lorries
Sept 21
Civilization! A road with centre markings
Sept 21
At the intersection of the B6357 and the A68
Sept 21
Approaching Jedburgh Abbey

Once through Jedburgh, it didn’t take long before we found ourselves at Duncan House in Kelso. This is the third time we’ve stayed there and since the first time, have said ‘next time we’ll stay for more than one night’. So far it hasn’t happened.

Call it premonition, but the night before I looked up an email from our host (from the previous year) to check the combination for the lock box.  If I hadn’t, we might not have been able to get in, although I carried printed confirmations of all of our accommodations and other pre-booked events with me.

The first thing I did when I got up to our room (same room we’ve had each time, too) was pull out the laptop and its power supply. Plugged in, I powered up. A huge wave of relief washed over me when the lock screen came up. Not sure what crawled up the computer’s butt in the morning but at least now I could say ,”It’s alive!”

Sept 21
River Tweed and Floors Castle from our room at Duncan House

Knowing the computer survived, we walked down to Kelso Abbey. On the way, a woman outside one of the shops approached us with bags to collect gently used clothes. I had something else in mind for them. After accepting them, we continued on to the abbey, poked around the ruins there and through the cemetery on the other side of the street.

Sept 21
Kelso Abbey

This cute gallery in the shape of a boat stands on Abbey Row across the street from the graveyard.

Sept 21
Huggins Haig Gallery

After a wander around the town, we made our way to The Waggon Inn where we had a delicious meal.

Sept 21
The Waggon Inn

Paused for a selfie on the way back to Duncan House after our meal.

Sept 21
After a delicious meal at the Waggon Inn

Tomorrow we head north to Broughty Ferry and back to the same hotel we stayed in last year.