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Author bio:
Heidi Joy lives in Happy Valley off Sunnyside Road. She swears she did not make that up.
Heidi’s obsessed with storytelling. Her career includes marketing, journalism, and a delicious few years as a food columnist. Media passes took her backstage with several rock bands, where she learned that sometimes a wardrobe malfunction is exactly what the rock star intends.
You’ll most often find Heidi Joy with her husband and two small kids cooking, fishing, exploring the Northwest, and building epic forts in their living room.
She loves to hear from readers via messages at facebook.com/author.heidi.
Heidi’s obsessed with storytelling. Her career includes marketing, journalism, and a delicious few years as a food columnist. Media passes took her backstage with several rock bands, where she learned that sometimes a wardrobe malfunction is exactly what the rock star intends.
You’ll most often find Heidi Joy with her husband and two small kids cooking, fishing, exploring the Northwest, and building epic forts in their living room.
She loves to hear from readers via messages at facebook.com/author.heidi.
· Website: heidijoytretheway.com
Hi and thanks for featuring Won’t Last Long, a chick lit/contemporary romance book set in Seattle. My book asks whether two people who are totally wrong for each other can ever be right.
I thought you’d want to hear a little more about some of the real places that inspired me (and a few things I wish were real).
The book is set largely in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood, which is known for its tangled streets and classic Craftsman-style houses. In Won’t Last Long, Melina, the main character, rents an apartment in a Craftsman home’s carriage house. Over the course of the story, Melina invests herself in cleaning up the property that’s fallen into disrepair.
This element of the story was a vivid part of my life in my mid-twenties, when I purchased a 100-year-old house and spent every spare minute (and dollar) fixing it up. But home improvement is gratifying, humbling work, and if there’s one thing my main character needed, it was humbling! Melina kicks off the book as a driven, calculating ice queen, but events in the book force her to tear down these walls.
The view from my office during eight years of working in Seattle’s second-tallest building inspired another key setting: Joshua’s apartment in downtown Seattle. The city lights and view of the Puget Sound are stunning, but the most arresting perspective for me was the wonder of being above the fog.
One of my favorite scenes in the book is Joshua and Melina’s walk on the beach. When Melina bends down to pet Joshua’s huge, shaggy mutt, the dog instantly takes advantage of the situation and licks her in the mouth. Melina sputters in disgust—exactly as I did when a chocolate lab licked me in the mouth on my second date with a guy. Lucky for me, my husband’s chocolate lab has settled down in the past nine years (but I never let him forget that Mia kissed me first!).
Other settings in the book, including the Sea Shack, Next restaurant and Frank’s Family Fun Center, are inspired by real Seattle places. I wish I could say the same for a pepper-themed restaurant that celebrates spiciness in a host of world cuisines (it even has a wall of hot sauces). That restaurant is pulled entirely from my imagination, although if you’ve heard of a restaurant like this, please let me know—I’m dying to try it!
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Can two people who are totally wrong for each other ever be right?
She's a feisty, sly marketing exec intent on hiding her small-town roots. He’s a laid-back engineer with a shaggy mutt and a pushy ex.
When Joshua asks Melina out, she asks what kind of car he drives. She’ll do drinks, not dinner. She’s always in control. But with Joshua’s easy confidence and sharp wit, Melina is soon breaking the dating rules she made for herself.
Opposites attract—but friends think Melina and Joshua can’t possibly last. When crisis throws their world off its axis, Melina must confront her childhood family, the people she’s come to care about, and the destruction of her pristine image.
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Setup: After a rough breakup, Joshua has just moved into a new Seattle apartment with his dog Aussie. He’s invited his friends Mark and Stephanie over for dinner. They have plenty of opinions about who Joshua should date next, but one girl has his attention—the woman he met at the party thrown by his neighbors Juan and Eric a few weeks ago.
“That’s it, don’t feed me another bite. I’m stuffed.” Mark pushed back from Joshua’s cramped dining table and held his stomach, grinning widely. “The best thing about when you were sleeping on our couch was when you were awake in our kitchen.”
Joshua swallowed another gulp of wine, poured from the third bottle they’d opened that night, and surveyed the wreckage on the table.
Every morsel was gone, his friends were well-fed and happy, and Joshua’s home felt alive and cozy, nothing like a sterile catalog page. Aussie snored in front of Joshua’s fireplace, virtually the only open space since the dining table had been extended into the living room to accommodate Mark, Stephanie, Juan, Eric and Joshua.
Juan jumped up from the table. “I know you said to just bring booze, but I also brought some dessert.” He opened Joshua’s freezer and pulled out plastic-wrapped disks shaped like hockey pucks.
“Ice cream sandwiches.” He tossed each person the homemade chocolate chip cookies filled with vanilla ice cream. “They’re better than the kind from the store.”
“He’s more Martha than Martha,” Eric said, giving his roommate a gentle shove. “My ex would have hoped Juan would rub off on me, but I am just not meant to be domestic. I’m an artist.” Eric made a goofy face to show he was not taking himself too seriously.
“So are you single?” Stephanie pried. “Are you dating?”
“I’m, uh, between boyfriends at the moment,” Eric admitted. “My ex moved to Boston about a year ago. I’ve been going out more lately, but I haven’t found anyone worth seeing regularly.” He picked up the last wine bottle and poured a trickle into each of the five glasses to finish it off.
“I keep trying to find him a boyfriend so he’ll leave me and Tina in peace,” Juan said. “She’s in Vancouver getting her master’s, so weekends are our only quality time, if you know what I mean.”
“What about you, Joshua?” Eric asked. “With this place, you’ll be getting plenty of dates.”
“I’m looking,” Joshua answered slowly. “I’m just starting to get what it feels like to be single again, so I’m not trying to rush into anything.” He explained briefly about his split from Crystal, whom he’d met in high school and dated on and off through college.
“Joshua can afford to be picky,” Stephanie said protectively. “The last thing he needs is another pushy girl trying to fit him into her life, rather than appreciating him for who he is.”
“Let’s not get carried away,” Mark cut in. “Maybe what Joshua needs is a fun date—someone who isn’t all serious. Someone hot,” he wiggled his eyebrows at his wife, “and who cares if she’s not the type to bring home to mother? It doesn’t matter if it won’t last long; he’s not trying to get married right now.”
“You want hot? You should go out with that girl Melina,” Juan said. “She’s smokin’.”
“Who’s that?” Mark asked.
“Josh talked to her at the party. Those legs. She works with Eric.” Joshua and Mark exchanged looks over the legs comment.
Eric volunteered a few details. The youngest senior account executive in the company, Melina was known for her killer instinct. Eric liked working with her—usually—because although she was often critical, she never criticized his work unless she could suggest how to improve it.
“You could call her. I’ll give you her number,” Eric offered.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Stephanie frowned. “She seemed really pushy. She strolled into your party like she owned the place, like you threw it in her honor, Eric.”
Eric smiled. “That’s just part of Melina’s shtick. She does it everywhere. I’ve never seen anyone who could so thoroughly own a room. That’s why she’s so successful—she’s totally cultivated the ice queen persona and it works for her. But she’s smart and she’s hot and I think she’s single, so why not go out and have some fun?”
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Thanks for featuring Heidi and Won't Last Long!
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