Spotlight & Giveaway: Chasing Tail by Roxanne St. Claire

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Roxanne St. Claire to HJ!

Hi Rocki and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Chasing Tail!

 
Hello, again! Feels like it’s been a while since I’ve been here so it’s good to be back!
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Hot firefighter. Stray dog. Small town romance….do I really need to say more? Okay, I will! The Dogmothers are up to their matchmaking tricks again when they pair grandson Connor Mahoney with DC transplant Sadie Hartman. They want Sadie to help with Connor’s mayoral campaign, which is really to elect Frank, a stray dog, as the “ceremonial” mayor. But when Sadie learns who the other candidate is (a man who ruined her happy family), she decides she’d better run herself to make sure of a win. Then someone discovers an ancient town bylaw that upends everything in the most unexpected way. That’s when Connor and Sadie discover the best part of running against each other is, well, being *against each other.*
 

Please share the opening lines of this book:

Wait…what? Bitter Bark Bar?
Sadie Hartman slowed her step and frowned at the frosted glass etched with three words and two frothy beer mugs. She glanced up and down Ambrose Avenue to make certain she knew where she was. Bitter Bark hadn’t changed that much in seventeen years, had it?
But…Bitter Bark Bar? Wasn’t this…Bushrod’s?
“You look lost.”
Sadie turned toward the male voice, coming face-to-face—no, face-to-chest, and a solid, broad one at that—with a worn leather jacket barely covering the fire department logo on the T-shirt underneath.

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• Like all the books in the Dogmothers and Dogfather series, the cover was photographed at Alaqua Animal Refuge in Florida. Every dog, including this one, is a rescue from Alaqua and the men who model are just “local guys” who like to support the shelter. I donate a portion of pre-orders and first month sales to the shelter and we hope to reach $20,000 donated this year!
• This one has a little more suspense than other titles in the series, with a bit of a heart-stopping ending that I so loved writing!
• My FIRST CAT CHARACTER EVER is on the pages…and is the love interest for the dog, which surprised me more than anyone when it happened!
• Frank is NOT the first dog mayor — there are several all over America and they are very popular with tourists and townsfolk.

Please tell us a little about the characters in your book. As you wrote your protagonist was there anything about them that surprised you?

Neither one is what they seem at first blush. Connor is a man who hates to lose and loves to joke around. But Sadie helped him real understand the root of those traits, and how they can help him…and hold him back in life. His journey to love forces him to take a deep look at himself, and become the man he really wants to be. Sadie seems like she should be a hardened political type, having lived in DC and worked on Capitol Hill. But really, she’s a small town girl and her love for the simple life and sweet town where she grew up deepens along with her love for Connor, a man who embodies everything about that town,.

If your book was optioned for a movie, what scene would you use for the audition of the main characters and why?

When they find out the only way either one of them can run for mayor is if they are betrothed, widowed, or married. That leaves one option…did someone say fake fiancee? I love the scene in the stairwell when Connor presents this solution to Sadie and her process for finally agreeing to it.

What do you want people to take away from reading this book?

This one is full of laughs. Like all my books, there is a huge family working in the background to support the romance, and a colorful town, and an extraordinary dog who has his own character arc. (And falls for a kitty named Demi-cat.) And, of course, there’s lots of emotion and maybe a few happy tears. But every once in a while, one of my books comes out lighter and funnier, and I think this is one of those. The previous book in the series was a six-Kleenex weep fest (HAPPY tears, I promise) so I needed this one to make readers chuckle a little more.

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have planned?

Next book in The Dogmothers series, out in May/June! Title and release date and cover reveal will all be on my active and FUN reader page on Facebook! Join us:https://www.facebook.com/groups/roxannestclairereaders/
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: A signed copy of CHASING TAIL and a Dogfather coffee mug!

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: The dog in this book is named Frank…yes, for “Frankendog.” The hero finds Frank in the woods while doing a search and rescue mission for a missing child. The dog has saved the little boy’s life, pulling him from the water, and Connor describes the canine hero as…”the face of a Staffy, the body of a Lab, retriever paws, and a tail that had to come from a…Husky?”What might you name a dog who looks like that?

 
a Rafflecopter giveaway

 
 

Excerpt from Chasing Tail:

Connor shifted in his seat, thinking, then looked at Sadie to say, “I feel like that whole…serious relationship and marriage and family thing…is a game that I’m not sure I want to play.”
“Getting married is a game?”
“A gamble?” he suggested instead. “A risk I’m not sure I want to take? However you package it, I’m fine with things that last a few weeks or a month. But then…”
“You get bored.”
He held her gaze for a few heartbeats, intensifying the quiet intimacy of the moment. “That’s not it.”
“What is it, then?”
His lips curled up. “Pretty deep for five in the morning after a twenty-four-hour shift, Ear Girl.”
She leaned in a little. “How else can I find out your deepest secrets?”
His blue eyes flickered with surprise. “You want to know them? Why?”
“My old boss used to say, ‘Information is power.’” She smiled. “Maybe I want a little power.”
He inched closer, too, reaching over the little table to put his hand over hers. “You already have a lot of power. I spent twenty-two hours on a shift thinking about you.”
Her heart flipped. “What about the other two?”
“Out on calls, when I don’t think about anything but my job.”
She couldn’t look away. The pull of his attention was too strong, and the heat curling through her was absolutely delicious. “And what exactly did you think about for twenty-two hours? How to debate me?”
“If by ‘debate’ you mean ‘kiss you until you can’t breathe,’ yeah.”
She had to fight not to shiver in front of him. “God, you’re good.”
“I can be.” He took a slow breath and stood up, his broad shoulders rising and falling, his gaze unwavering. He stepped around the little table and reached for her, drawing her to her feet. “You know what would be a horrible waste?”
She shook her head, vaguely aware of need rolling over her, powerful, dizzying, and real.
“All that toothpaste you used so I would kiss you.”
“You think that’s why I brushed my teeth.”
“I know it.” He lowered his head and let his tongue graze her lower lip. “Mmm. Minty fresh.”
She wanted to smile, but she wanted to kiss more. “No one’s watching us, Connor.”
“I hope not.”
“I mean…we don’t have to.”
“Yeah. We do.” He pressed his lips against hers, pulling her in so she could feel every hard muscle and angle of his body. She tasted black coffee and tangy peppermint. And Connor. Hot tongue and sweet lips and warm, wet kisses.
Arching into the kiss, she wrapped her hands around his neck, drawing him closer as he splayed his fingers over her back and cradled her in his arms.
“C’mere,” he said gruffly, guiding her toward the open sofa bed. “Just let me kiss you.”
She didn’t argue. How could she with her mouth attached to his, her fingers digging into his back, her body melting against him?
He eased her onto the bed, half sitting, then falling back, kissing her throat and jaw as his big hands stroked her back and dipped over the curve of her rear end.
“This is it,” he murmured into the kisses.
“This is…” She felt her eyes widen as heat curled through her. “What?”
“My fantasy. All freaking day.” He trailed his tongue along the line of her jaw and headed back to her mouth. “Twenty-four hours.”
“Twenty-two,” she corrected into the kiss.
“I lied. Even on calls.” He slid both his hands into her hair, finger-combing the messy, morning strands and moaning with pleasure. “I just wanted…this.”
“Yeah.” She couldn’t lie. She’d been thinking an awful lot about it, too. “Yeah, nothing like…oh.” She gasped as he pulled her on top of him, the ridge of a massive erection shocking her. And all she wanted to do was…press against him.
But Frank barked so loud it made them both freeze for a moment.
“Pay attention to your own girl, Franko.” He coasted his hand from her hair to her shoulder, hovering over her breast as he held her gaze. “’Cause I’m really into mine.”

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

When firefighter Connor Mahoney decides to run for mayor, he’s confident of victory because of his brilliant idea to put Frank, a local canine hero who saved a drowning child, on the ticket with him. Then Connor gets some unwanted help from the Dogmothers, who think a pretty new arrival from Washington DC would make the perfect campaign manager for their highly-eligible bachelor grandson. But no matter how much Connor likes the idea of working with the gorgeous Sadie Hartman, she’s doing her best to keep him at arm’s length.
Disillusioned by politics after working in DC, Sadie doesn’t want the job, no matter how smoking hot the sexy firefighter is or how much his sweet grannies push. But then she learns that the race has another candidate – a man who was instrumental in wrecking Sadie’s family. Uncertain the “dog and firefighter” can win, she launches her own campaign to be mayor of Bitter Bark.
But Connor and Sadie are both in for a big surprise when a two-hundred year old law is unearthed to upend the entire election. Then, the only way for Sadie or Connor to save the town from a terrible mayor is to join forces in a way no one is expecting. As Sadie and Connor discover that the best part of running against each other is literally being against each other, it doesn’t take long to figure out that sometimes winning the race means losing your heart.

Book Links: Amazon | B&N | iTunes | Kobo | Google |
 
 

Meet the Author:

Published since 2003, Roxanne St. Claire is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than fifty romance and suspense novels. She has written several popular series, including The Dogfather, The Dogmothers, Barefoot Bay, the Guardian Angelinos, and the Bullet Catchers.

In addition to being an ten-time nominee and one-time winner of the prestigious RITA™ Award for the best in romance writing, Roxanne has won the National Reader’s Choice Award for best romantic suspense four times, as well as the Maggie, the Daphne du Maurier Award, the HOLT Medallion, Booksellers Best, Book Buyers Best, the Award of Excellence, and many others.

A mother of two but recent empty-nester, Roxanne lives in Florida with her husband and two dogs.
Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | GoodReads |