Spotlight & Giveaway: Playing for Keeps by Julie Hammerle

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Julie Hammerle to HJ!

Hi Julie and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Playing for Keeps!

 
Hi! Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here.
 

Please summarize the book a la Twitter style for the readers here:

A former attorney decides to quit the rat race and ends up in a small town where she falls for a cute security guard, who’s trying to save up enough money to escape said small town.
 

Please share the opening lines of this book:

If pressed, Jake Warner would choose listening over talking every time, but today his new trainee, Kat…something, kept insisting on asking him personal questions. She should probably forget about resort security and jump right to being a police detective.’

“Where’s this?” she asked, holding up a picture he’d printed out of Lofoten, an archipelago in Norway.

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• Fake romance/romance of convenience
• Small town, family dramatics
• Very pregnant sister, who tells it like it is
• An adorable niece
• Jake has been running away from his past for ten years. Can Bryce get him to stay in one place?

What first attracts your main characters to each other?

They meet outside an ice cream shop where Jake, a security guard, has been called to check out a “vagrant” who is disturbing the peace. The “vagrant” is Bryce. He’s attracted to her obvious intelligence and “forget it all” attitude. She’s attracted to his kindness and compassion for her…even though she’s wearing ratty clothes and beaver slippers out of the house.
 

Using just 5 words, how would you describe your main characters”love affair?

They are each other’s person.
 

The First Kiss…

He looked her in the eye as he pressed his mouth to hers, waiting for her to push him away or slap him or something, but she only parted her lips, which tasted like berries and cream.

Without revealing too much, what is your favorite scene in the book?

The conversation between Jake and Bryce in the ice cream shop, immediately after she drags him–without his consent–into her mess of a personal life.

“What the hell, Bryce?” Jake hissed as he followed her into the ice cream shop.

He had to get out of this town…somehow. His family was putting pressure on him about the coaching job, and now apparently the woman he’d caught double fisting ice cream yesterday was his new girlfriend.

If your book was optioned for a movie, what scene would be absolutely crucial to include?

The scene on Ted’s boat. I love the interpersonal stuff going on there. The ex-husband, the new girlfriend; the ex-wife, the new (fake) boyfriend. All the little stuff that bubbles up among them.

Her body crashed into the water and sank. Bryce was going to die here, now, broke and pathetic. But a few seconds later, strong arms enveloped her and pulled her to safety.

Readers should read this book …

If they love a small-town romcom with a hint of real, deep-seated drama underneath. Lots of family dynamics and complicated relationships.

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

I’m working on a new series that is a little more women’s fiction than straight up romance.

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: An ebook copy of IT’S RAINING MEN. US ONLY.

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: In the book, Jake and Bryce bond over ice cream. What’s your favorite flavor?

 
a Rafflecopter giveaway

 
 

Excerpt from Playing for Keeps:

Jake made a sharp turn onto Territory Drive, the main road in the resort. He’d driven Jeeps across the dunes in Arizona. Driving on this perfectly smooth asphalt was kid’s stuff.

He spun into the ice cream parlor parking lot and screeched into the nearest parking spot.
All he saw there was a family of four huddled together at one of tables on the patio and a lone woman standing outside the door, happily taking alternating licks on a double-decker ice cream cone and a chocolate-covered ice cream bar.

“Is that the vagrant?” Kat squinted at the woman.

“We’ll see.” Jake needed more info before he’d saddle her with the scarlet V. “Wait here. I’ll handle this.”

As he exited the car, Jake assessed the woman as objectively as he could.

She was probably about his age—early thirties or so. She wore dingy, ill-fitting clothes, and her blond hair, which was in desperate need of a touchup at the roots had been pulled into a messy, grimy bun. She had eyes only for her two-fisted ice cream treat.

The parents at the nearby table watched her warily.

A pang of sadness and compassion hit Jake hard.

Yeah, maybe her attire was a bit out there, but she wasn’t bothering anyone, and she seemed happy enough, slurping away at her sweets, enjoying the simple pleasures of life.

Jake could relate to that. He knew all about following one’s own bliss. They weren’t so different, this woman and Jake.

Still, he approached her with caution. “Excuse me, ma’am?”

Her eyes snapped up, full of blue fire and anger. “‘Ma’am?’” she repeated, one eyebrow arching with contempt.

The mother at the table pulled one of her kids closer.

Though Jake was technically the lawman here, he instinctively raised his arms in surrender, desperate to prove that he came in peace, that he, probably more than any other resort security guard on staff, understood what she was about. “Just making sure you’re okay.”

“Are you here to arrest me”—she looked him up and down, unimpressed—“Officer?”

“No—”

“Is it illegal to eat ice cream outside a store that expressly sells ice cream?” She paused a second as if waiting for an answer, but then barreled on before Jake could give her one. “Loitering isn’t illegal in Illinois, and even if it were, I have a purpose for being here. I have to eat my ice cream before it melts. Also”—she raised both hands—“I can’t very well drive like this with my hands full, can I?”

Jake backed up instinctively. He was a resort security guard. He’d barely been trained to deal with a rabid raccoon, let alone an angry woman wielding two fistfuls of ice cream. He’d spent almost two decades avoiding interpersonal conflict like this. It wasn’t in his wheelhouse.
Jake liked to go along to get along. “No,” he said. “Again, I’m here to make sure everything’s okay.”

“Which means someone called the fuzz on me.” Her eyes shot daggers at the family nearby. “I’m a paying customer. Why were you brought in to harass a paying customer?”
“Um…” How to tell a woman she looked like the main character in every child’s recurring nightmare?

She glared at Jake. “‘Um?’” she said. “Was that ‘um’ a comment on my general appearance? I’ve heard it all from the mail carrier and my next-door neighbor and”—she pointed to the ice cream parlor—“from Sharon at the register in there. I don’t need to hear it from you, too. I’m fully clothed. I’m wearing shoes.” She gestured toward her fuzzy beaver slippers. “Neither my hoo-ha nor my hooters are hanging out. Is it a crime to wear dirty sweatpants to a store?”

“It’s not,” he said, glancing around. The two children were staring at them, terrified. She’d be making a recurring appearance in their nightmares for sure. “Maybe we should take this conversation elsewhere.”

“No. I have every right to be here, and I want you to admit it.” She asked again, “Officer of the ‘law,’ is it a crime for me to be enjoying my dessert while wearing beaver slippers?” She put the word “law” in awkward quotes, since her hands were full of dessert. But she wasn’t wrong. Jake was no more an officer of the law than the small child at the table with chocolate ice cream all over her face. He was a thirty-year-old vagrant, larping as a security guard. “Is it a crime?” she repeated.

Jake shook his head. “No…no, ma’am.” He winced. Bad answer, Jake.

Excerpts. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

USA Today bestselling author Julie Hammerle’s quirky romantic comedy about two strangers, a fake relationship, and a teeny mid-lie crisis…

Bryce Barrett has disappeared off the face of the earth. Well, technically she’s just temporarily hiding out in a teeny Midwest town, away from her ruined marriage and professional demise…at least until she can figure out her next steps. But when she bumps into her ex—dressed in what could be only described as “dumpster chic”—she does the only reasonable thing a woman can do: panics and pretends the cute security guard on the scene is her new boyfriend.

Free-spirited nomad Jake Warner knew returning to his hometown was a bad idea. It’s bad enough that his family’s pressuring him to step into his dad’s hypercompetitive shoes and settle down, but when a complete stranger (cute, though possibly unbalanced) enlists him as her fake boyfriend, Jake knows he’s making some questionable choices…especially when he inexplicably goes along with it.

Now these two mismatched misfits are temporary allies against a town filled with happy, normal, and annoyingly stable people. Fake dating keeps everyone off their back while they plot their respective escapes. But nothing botches a plan more than unexpected chemistry…
Book Links: Amazon | B&N| Goodreads |
 
 

Meet the Author:

USA Today bestselling, RITA nominated author Julie Hammerle writes witty, absorbing, romantic comedies about characters who are still trying to get their lives together, no matter their ages. She is the author of Knocked-Up Cinderella, Write Before Christmas, and It’s Raining Men, as well as four novels for teens. Before becoming a writer, she studied opera, taught Latin, and blogged about TV shows like American Idol and The Walking Dead. She lives in Chicago with her husband, two kids, and their dog, Bucky.
Website | Instagram |