Blog Tour & Giveaway: The Second Man by Emelle Gamble

The Second Man

by Emelle Gamble

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GENRE: romantic suspense

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BLURB:

 Jill Farrell’s college reunion is coming up, but she wants no part of it. The man she once loved, Swedish exchange student Max Kallstrom, is rumored to be attending, but that doesn’t tempt her as Max disappeared from her life the night before the graduation, and has never been heard from since.

When her ex-husband, Andrew Denton, knocks on her door and announces he wants to make nice, and, “oh, by the way, one of their class alumni might be a murderer”, Jill’s resolve to avoid the event hardens.

Jill shuts Andrew’s efforts to reconnect down, and tries to put Max out of her mind.
And that’s that, until a second man knocks on her door, and the emotions of a time long ago overtakes her. Max Kallstrom tells Jill she’s the reason he has come to California. He asks her to please let him explain why she hasn’t heard from him for fifteen long years.

She’s willing to listen to what he has to say, but immediately realizes that her memories must guide her through a wrenching and dangerous few days. While her heart remembers a handsome young lover, she and her classmates are all different people now, and the reality of a murdered friend proves she can’t trust everyone.

What’s not so clear is if she should trust anyone . . . especially Max Kallstrom.

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 Excerpt One:

Jill stared at her ex.

Andrew was much the same, auburn hair and icy blue eyes, but somehow completely changed from the man she last saw over a decade ago. He wore an expensive, dark suit, like an attorney, and any appearance of youth was now gone. He was lean and intense, the man behind the eyes more complicated than she remembered.

When they were together, he had worn his hair short around his neck and ears. It was longer now, combed straight back and gelled. There was a scar at his right temple, small and flat, and perfectly round.

“Because I can’t think of a single thing we have to talk about,” she finally replied.

“Grudge holding doesn’t become you.” He set the vase on the ground at his feet. “We should talk some things out.”

“No, we shouldn’t. I’m leaving the past where it belongs. Dead and buried.”

“Okay, so we won’t talk about the past. We’ll focus on going forward and celebrating all we have in common.”

“Which is nothing.” Jill swallowed, her mouth dry.

“Not true. We’re alumni from the same college. The same class. And our reunion is in two weeks.”

The reunion.

Twice in one day she was being forced to travel back and time and think about a man and a broken relationship. Although her short marriage to Andrew, four years after they graduated, was not the same thing as her college romance with Max Kallstrom, two reminders in one day that she wasn’t a very good judge of men’s characters was distressing.

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Emelle Gamble became a writer at an early age. At six years old, she was bursting with the requisite childhood stories of introspection, and this itch to tell tales evolved into bad teen poetry and tortured short works that, thankfully, never saw the light of day, or an editor’s red pen.

She took her first stab at writing a novel in an adult education class in Mobile, Alabama when her kids were in bed for the night. As ‘M.L. Gamble,’ she published several romantic suspense novels with Harlequin Intrigue. She now publishes novels of Ordinary Women in Extraordinary Situations with SoulMate Publishing and Posh Publishing …works ranging from women’s fiction to thrillers and romantic suspense.

Always intrigued by the words ‘what if’, Gamble’s books feature an ordinary woman confronted with an extraordinary situation. Emelle celebrates the adventurous spirit of readers, and hopes each will enjoy the exciting and surprising journeys her characters take.

Emelle lives in suburban Washington D.C. with her hero of thirty years, Philip, and two orange cats, Lucy and Bella. Like all good villains, the cats claim to have their reasons for misbehaving. Her children are happily launched on their own and are both contributing great things to society, their mother’s fondest wish.

Emelle welcomes any reader interested in emailing her at emellegamble@aol.com and hopes they will visit her website, www.EmelleGamble.com or her Author Emelle Gamble FaceBook page.

Emelle Gamble social media links and buy links:

Facebook  https://www.facebook.com/Emelle.Gamble  Twitter @EmelleGamble

Amazon Author Page http://www.amazon.com/Emelle-Gamble/e/B00DXZ2SJA

Website http://www.emellegamble.com

Molly & Cruz

http://www.amazon.com/Molly-Cruz-Collection-December-Wedding-ebook/dp/B011SFK5N2

http://www.audible.com/pd/Romance/Molly-Harper-Audiobook/B011ADVXB0

Secret Sister 

http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Sister-Emelle-Gamble-ebook/dp/B00DUL4LQA

http://www.audible.com/pd/Romance/Secret-Sister-Audiobook/B00K35QVIM

Dating Cary Grant

http://www.amazon.com/Dating-Cary-Grant-Emelle-Gamble-ebook/dp/B00JEY7RKY

The Second Man

https://www.amazon.com/Second-Man-Emelle-Gamble-ebook/dp/B01K7WK3LG

Interview

Where are you from? Tell us a little about yourself!

I am a Los Angeles, California girl, born and bred. Left there many years ago to follow my hero and raise our two children – primarily in the Washington DC area, with a decade worth of stops in New York and Mobile, Alabama. The best part of our nomadic travels is I feel my children were fortunate to have lived in different parts of the United States, and I like that I have too. One gets to understand our country when you interact with people from different backgrounds and traditions. It helped me with my writing, I think, to meet many people raised with different values and opinions than mine in laid-back, sunny California. I gained perspective, both about my pre-conceived notions about them, and theirs about me. My gynecologist in Mobile greeted me, after a glance at my new patient chart, with “I see you’re from the Land of Fruits and Nuts!”. Ha. Ha. But all learning is good, and I enjoyed almost everything about my five years in the South.

Tell us about your book. How did it get started?

This story has been on my mind for a long time because I loved the concept of meeting back up with someone you haven’t seen for a long time. I thought it would be exciting, and kind of sexy, to encounter an old lover, and wondered if the old sparks would be rekindled. That led to thinking of a plot where my heroine had to decide if the man she once loved was the same guy she meets up with 15 years later, and if she was remembering things about him accurately, or if she had changed reality inside her own head. I think we all do that, adjust our memory to fit our story of our pasts. I realized when I was writing it that, of course, none of us are the same person we once were, because with experience many things about ourselves changed over the years. This line of thinking lent itself to a suspenseful plot line when I threw in the fact that a murderer just might be taking advantage of fading memories and posing as someone else…

How do you create your characters?

I never get tired of this question because I have never really been able to answer it fully. Most writers will tell you that characters come to you, sometimes fully formed and brand new, different than anyone you’ve ever known. Sometimes they are a bit like someone you know and love, sometimes like someone you don’t like much. Often times you build them around a role they play in our plot, for example, a villain, or a secondary character might start of as a cliché, but then you have to find motivation, build a back story, etc. So I ‘create’ a character for plot purposes, but very often, almost always, my subconscious adds in elements that makes a character multi-faceted and much more interesting than a ‘role’. I hope.

Where do you write? Is there something you need in order to write (music, drinks?)

Almost every page I’ve ever written has been in my office. I can’t write on the fly, in the doctor’s waiting room, or on vacation. I can’t grab a few minutes between the roast chicken cooking and setting the table. I need to sit, think, stare at the computer screen, and bring my story to me. I envy other writers who can write wherever and whenever! As for what do I need? The cats are usually sleeping some place in my space, and that’s a lovely feeling of camaraderie. And I need quiet. I have threatened (silently) to drop flower pots on the heads of my neighbors who love to stand on my sidewalk with their barking dogs or leaf-blowers when I’m trying to coax a character along.

What do you like to read?

On the couch. With hubby gone golfing and the house quiet. With a drink; coffee with cream and sugar is my favorite. And hours to spend. Which happens about twice a year. HA! Luckily for me, I can read during all those times, and in all those places, where I can’t write. Once I let the ice cream melt in the store because I was sitting and having a coffee and reading a book in the grocery store and just let the time get away from me.

Anything else you’d like to share?

I would love to hear from readers about where their favorite place to read is, and what their favorite romantic suspense novel of all time is. I have a short list of 5. I wonder if yours is on it?

GIVEAWAY INFORMATION

Emelle Gamble will be awarding a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.