A standalone romantic saga full of angsty emotion that spans the years. If you remember the 1970s or just wish you’d been there, you won’t want to miss this story!
Published: October 14th, 2019
A standalone romantic saga full of angsty emotion that spans the years. If you remember the 1970s or just wish you’d been there, you won’t want to miss this story!
Everyone wants of a piece of Robin Stewart. As he blazes a path across the pop culture landscape of the 1970s, from television sex symbol to rock superstar, he’s the ultimate picture of cool and the romantic fantasy of women everywhere, carrying the hopes and burdens of his show business family on his sexy shoulders. But nobody knows how much alcohol it’s taking to keep up that image, or how terrifying groupies can be. All Robin wants is to claim his own identity. To be loved for himself.
Quietly at his side, Robin’s co-star Christine Keithley is his groupie kryptonite, shielding him from rabid fans. She’s the one person who’s always honest and direct with him. But a dark secret from her past keeps her from giving her heart and soul to him. When Robin walks away from stardom, it means leaving Christine in the past as well.
Years later, they are reunited when an old foe comes to claim all Robin holds dear. Is life giving them another chance? The television season of ’72 is part of their past. After a lifetime apart, do they have the courage to rediscover their love?
EXCERPT
Chapter Two
1972
Robin Stewart had never seen the
inside of Christine Keithley’s trailer before. Throughout most of the first
season of Golden Gates Mysteries, his costar had barricaded herself
inside, drinking gallons of orange juice and pleading a headache. If someone
had asked Robin for his diagnosis, he would have said that Christine Keithley
was the headache.
A small electric fan ran to
dispel the midday heat. The whir provided a backdrop of sound, like a chorus, a
running commentary on the undercurrent of awkwardness.
He was pretty sure he’d lost his
pursuers somewhere around the three-tiered fountain in the old town square. But
to be safe, he would stay with Christine until he was needed on camera or until
the commotion died down. At the rate things were going in his life, that
probably wouldn’t be until he turned thirty, another eight years—if he made it
that long.
Christine looked him over. She
had big blue eyes, the watery kind of blue, like an aquamarine. They were so
vast and expressive, they seemed capable of holding a sea of pain, not to
mention sympathy.
“Girls again?” she asked.
“These weren’t girls.” They
definitely weren’t girls in the sense of twelve-year-olds. Teeny-boppers were
Jay’s department. Robin’s little brother had a fan club full of them.
“Oh?”
“These were women.” From
the looks of their flower-power boutique dresses and teased, sprayed hairdos,
they were Beverly Hills types, wives or mistresses of important executives. And
they most likely found the prospect of chasing after Robin Stewart more
exciting than a sale at Bonwit Teller. They sought out the same thing every
other member of the fairer sex did who camped on the streets outside his house
or lurked beyond the barricades of Monument Studios: Robin Stewart’s—ahem—corduroys.
“Naked again?” Christine asked.
It wasn’t like Robin had anything
against women, naked or otherwise, though of course he preferred the former.
He shook his head. “Not this
time.” Robin gave a slight shudder. He’d finally gotten that little
intrusion from last week out of his head, and Christine had to go and bring it
up.
He’d had a lot of explaining to
do that day to Judy, the girl he’d been seeing and had high hopes for. He had
just so happened to be giving Judy a tour of the set, along with that week’s
guest star, a Tricia Nixon lookalike fresh from Ohio. When Robin had opened his
dressing room door and found two strange – and unclothed—women there, he heard
a loud scream—he was pretty sure it had come from him.
Robin was jolted out of the
memory by Christine holding out her pack of cigarettes. “Here.”
He glanced at the pack with its
painted design of a woman in a field of flowers. “Eves? You smoke Eves?” They
were one of those brands “for women,” full of long, graceful one-hundreds that had
pretty flower-painted filter tips. As if he didn’t feel silly enough, now he
would have to smoke those.
Even so, Robin lit up, took a
long, refreshing drag, and exhaled. “That was close.”
It wasn’t that Robin had no
interest in sowing wild oats. It was just that he wanted to have some say in
the matter. And he preferred to be the one doing the pursuing.
As much as he didn’t want to be
out there, mobbed by strangers, he also didn’t want to be in a trailer with
Christine, who clearly was repulsed by him. No, all he wanted was to play the
field with his choice of typical, usual fast girls, like Judy.
“Can you imagine if they found
me?” he asked.
“Yes,” Christine said, pressing
two fingers to her lips, which he assumed, was a gesture meant to hold back laughter at his expense. “They
might have tousled you to death.”
Robin winced. Very funny.
“For your information, I happen to have sensitive skin.”
Magnetism or no, he hated being
manhandled, or in his case, woman-handled. He was sensitive to the touch,
ticklish even, especially to the touch of strangers.
He wriggled in his corduroys at
the thought.
“Let me guess.” She gave him a
sidelong glance. “The heartbreak of psoriasis?” She put one of the Eves to her
mouth and lit up. Her lower lip—full, plump, and practically bee-stung—jutted
out in a pout. The effect was quite sensuous. He’d never noticed it before.
Christine tilted her head back
and blew. A long plume of smoke shot upward toward the ceiling. The movement
gave her an air of self-assurance and maybe projected some French-style ennui
and a certain sophisticated pissed-offishness. But if she was aiming for sexy,
she had a long way to go.
About the author:
Karen Tomsovic writes contemporary love stories that aim for the funny bone as well as the heart. She lives in the Pacific Northwest, where she likes to look out the window from her kitchen table and find new ways to describe clouds. Her two pet parrots, Teddy and Daisy, interrupt her as often as possible.
Like her owner, Daisy loves to devour books. However, she does so in a more literal sense. Teddy makes a great muse. He thinks Karen should include a bird in every book. Karen says she'll try.
Author's Giveaway:
12 comments:
A lovely cover, synopsis and excerpt. This sounds like a wonderful read! Thank you for sharing your book details and for offering a giveaway.
Sounds very interesting.
WOW this looks amazing, love the cover and the title.
This book looks great
Sounds great.
I love the cover it is soooo 70's. Love that time frame as I was born mid 60's.
Wow sounds interesting.
Sounds like my kind of book :)
Such a lovely cover! The book sounds wonderful!
Hi! Thanks for sharing "Season of '72" with your readers.
And thanks, everyone for the kind words. I love the cover, too. It really captures the emotions of the story.
Like katieoscarlet, I was also born in the mid-60s, so the '70s were my growing-up years. What a blast I had going down Memory Lane while researching this novel. But as fun as nostalgia is, the book is really a romance at heart.
Good luck to everyone who entered the giveaway!
--Karen Tomsovic
The cover is pretty and story sounds interesting. I do remember the 70's; not sure I want to relive them! Best wishes on the new release.
Sounds interesting
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