Spotlight & Giveaway: Slow Dancing at Sunrise by Jo McNally

Posted June 26th, 2019 by in Blog, Spotlight / 58 comments

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Jo McNally to HJ!
Spotlight&Giveaway

Hi Jo and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Slow Dancing at Sunrise!

 
Hi, everyone! I’m Jo McNally. My husband and I live in North Carolina now, but I grew up in Upstate New York, where both my books series are set. When I’m not writing, I’m usually hanging out on our porch with a nice glass of wine and my girlfriends–who helped inspire the book club in Slow Dancing at Sunrise.
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Whitney comes to the town of Rendezvous Falls to visit her widowed Aunt Helen and to regroup after losing her accounting job in Chicago. She’s shocked to find Helen’s winery in disrepair and struggling to survive. She’s even more shocked to find Luke Rutledge living above the winery and supposedly running the place. Their first meeting ends up in a literal tug-of-war, and it sets the pace for their relationship–two strong-willed people trying to overcome their trust issues. Aunt Helen knows she neglected the winery after her husband’s death. She’s just coming out of her fog of grief, with the help of her bawdy book club friends. The book club decides Whitney might stay if they can find her a suitable man. Sadly, their matchmaking skills are…not great. In the meantime, Luke and Whitney are forced to work together to save Falls Legend Winery in time for the annual Blessing of the Grapes festival. Their tug-of-war brings them closer and closer, until falling in love seems inevitable. But Luke has a hard time believing anyone could love or trust him, being one of the infamous “Rutledge boys” and the son of a felon.

Please share the opening lines of this book:

Whitney Foster was stuck in a traffic jam.
On a Thursday afternoon.
In the middle of nowhere.

 

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

  • Slow Dancing at Sunrise is the first book of my Rendezvous Falls series, where a feisty senior book club dabbles in matchmaking, usually with disastrous (and funny) results. The series combines a couple of things I care about: the wine country of New York’s Finger Lakes district, and senior citizens that are far more likely to flip each other the bird as they are to call each other “dearie.” I have a close group of friends (ages 58 – 78) who are such funny, vibrant, active women, and I wanted to write characters who reflected that energy.
  • One thing that makes this series unique is that each book will feature the point of view of one of the book club members, along with the two main characters. In Slow Dancing at Sunrise, it’s Aunt Helen’s POV we see, as she deals with her friends and watches the surprising romance bloom between her niece and her winery manager.
  • Fun Fact: People don’t always associate New York with wineries, but New York is the third-largest wine producing state in the U.S., and much of it comes from the Finger Lakes.

 

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

Whitney and Luke are two snarky alphas, full of suspicion and insecurity. I really enjoyed digging into their pasts, and seeing what made them tick. Both had been forced to grow up fast due to unstable, financially-vulnerable home situations. Whitney became driven and skeptical. Luke became defensive, always figuring people thought the worst of him because of his family. In fact, it was Luke’s internal conflict that pulled me in the most. He was a damaged man, whose lack of self-worth was nearly insurmountable. At the same time, he was a deeply loyal, strong and honorable man–qualities everyone could see except for Luke himself.

 

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

Luke and Whitney spend a lot of their time entangled in a power struggle with each other, while being equally determined to help her Aunt Helen. A good audition scene would have to show their suspicion of each other, along with the undercurrent of chemistry. Here’s a quick snippet from an early scene that might work:

She was staking her claim as Helen’s family. Fine. He was staking his claim as the guy in charge. Not her. Whitney hurried behind him, watching every move he made.
“I’m serious!” She was a little out of breath from trying to keep up. “Helen is my…”
He spun before she could talk herself into some really dangerous territory.
“I know who Helen Russo is.” He gestured in the direction of the main house. “The last I knew, hers was the only name on the deed to this place. Hers is the only name on my paychecks.” When he got a paycheck. “And everything I do here is for her. So before you start throwing the word family around…I’ve been more family to that woman since Tony died than anyone, especially you. Don’t try to set yourself up as some heir apparent. It ain’t happening.”
He could see it in her eyes—his words had hit home, and he couldn’t decide if she was feeling offended or guilty. Maybe a bit of both. She stepped up so close he could see the individual flecks of gold in her eyes. Her finger waggled threateningly under his nose. Her woodsy, mossy perfume curled around his nostrils.
“I’m not ‘setting myself up’ as the heir apparent…” Each word came at him like a bullet. “I am the heir apparent. I’m the closest blood relative Helen has.” He liked to think it didn’t matter, but blood was blood. He was like family to Helen, but he wasn’t actual family. If Whitney wanted to, she could make things uncomfortable for him here. “But I’m not here to steal the winery from her. I’m here to help her save it, you idiot. And if this Blessing of the Grapes thing can do that, then you and I will be seeing a lot more of each other. And you’re going to teach me the wine business.”
She stalked off, and Luke wondered what the hell just happened. She had a way of making down seem up and in seem out. Being around her was like riding the world’s scariest amusement park ride.

 

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

I hope readers get some laughs and all the feels from Whitney’s doubts about love, Luke’s desperate need to be loved, and Helen dealing with the loss of love. A message I try to share in every book is that love has the power to transform people. Not that “love cures all”, because it doesn’t work like that. But love can make people want to be better, to be healthy, to be whole. And that’s what makes it magical.

 

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

I’m actually beginning two new series this year. Slow Dancing at Sunrise is book one of Rendezvous Falls. Book 2 will be Stealing Kisses in the Snow, a holiday romance coming in November. In September, my new Gallant Lake Stories series will begin with A Man You Can Trust from Harlequin Special Edition. Book 2 of that series, It Started at Christmas… (another holiday romance!), is coming in December. The Gallant Lake Stories revolve around a resort town in the Catskills that’s struggling to make a comeback–one romance at a time.
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

 

Giveaway: 1 print copy of SLOW DANCING AT SUNRISE by Jo McNally (entrants limited to North American mailing addresses).

 

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: This book takes place on a winery, so the research was loads of fun for me! If you drink wine, what’s your preference? For me, it’s a hearty Malbec. If you don’t drink wine, what’s your favorite beverage to relax with on a Friday night?

 
a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Excerpt from Slow Dancing at Sunrise:

“It’ll warm up. Close your eyes.” She surprised him by complying right before he sprayed her in the face. Having her eyes closed didn’t do anything to improve her temper. The curses she hurled his way were impressive. He slapped a bar of soap in her hand and released her.
“Lather up.” She stared at the soap blankly, blinking away the water. He’d turned the hose to the side, leaving it running to warm it up. “Tick tock, Whit. You only have a small window of time to get that oil off your skin.”
That got her moving. She started scrubbing every inch. She skipped over her wet shirt, and he shook his head. “Soap it all up. The oil could be on your clothes, too. I should probably make you strip…”
She sudsed up her shirt and shorts furiously, kicking her work boots toward the door as her eyes slammed into his. She let out a sharp, angry snort.
“Yeah, I bet you’d love that, wouldn’t you?” She glared at him through strands of dark, wet hair.
He didn’t trust himself to answer that question. “You ready for a rinse? The water should be warm by now.”
Whitney straightened, stoic and silent, closing her eyes and holding her arms straight out. He started at her head and worked down, hoping for her sake the oils from the poison ivy were washing away with the soapy water that swirled around the drain. She turned without being asked, and he continued with the hose until he’d drenched every shapely inch of her. Nope. Not gonna think about her gentle curves and all that glistening wet skin. Not gonna do it. This was strictly a humanitarian mission. He turned off the water and grabbed a roll of paper towels from the shelf. After yanking four or five feet of it for himself, he handed the roll to Whitney.
“It’s the closest thing to towels I have out here. Don’t rub—just pat yourself dry.” He started drying her upper arms while she tore off a length of paper towels and patted her chest. Really not helping. “You should go to the house and take a real shower. Throw those clothes in the wash.” He inspected her forearm. “Looks like you have some scratches there that could turn into a rash. Helen probably has some calamine lotion to control the itch. Don’t you know what poison ivy looks like?
“Uh, no. My tenth-floor apartment didn’t have ivy issues of any kind, so excuse me if my horticulture skills are lacking.”
The comment was an unwelcome, but healthy, reminder that any attraction to Whitney was wasted. She was way out of his league, with her fancy former job and tenth-floor apartment. She stopped patting her stomach and looked to where her arm rested in his hand. Her gaze rose to meet his, and he realized how close they were standing. So close he could see the gold flecks in her brown eyes. So close he could see those eyes go dark and wide. Her lips parted, the tip of her tongue tracing her top lip.
His voice was raspy in his own ears. “You should…um…dry off…and…”
Too close. They were much too close. But he was caught up in her gravity field now, and couldn’t step away. He took the wadded-up towels in his hand and touched them to her waist, allowing his fingers to trace across her skin.
Stupid move. Really stupid move.
He did it again.
He wasn’t sure how, but now they were standing even closer than before. Her eyes dilated to pure black, and her pulse fluttered at the base of her neck, where her skin was soft and white. Her voice turned soft and breathy.
“I thought you were supposed to pat it dry.”
He blinked, his fingers moving on her skin again, as if he had no control of them.
“What?”
Her mouth slanted into a grin. “Aren’t you supposed to be patting me dry?”
“Oh…yeah…” And damn if his hand didn’t trace another circle on her waist. Her lips parted.
His hand slid around her back and flattened against her warm, wet skin. He tugged her against him, and she didn’t resist. Her eyes fell to his lips, telling him they were both on the same page. It was a very bad page, filled with very bad ideas. But he had no more control over what happened next than he did over the spinning of the planets. His head dropped, her face turned up to meet him and their lips touched. She made a soft, contented sound from deep in her throat, like she was purring. And Luke lost his mind and kissed her.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Corporate auditor Whitney Foster returns to her onetime childhood haven, Rendezvous Falls, to regroup after finding herself suddenly unemployed. She discovers her widowed Aunt Helen’s winery is falling into disrepair and flirting with financial ruin. Whitney blames the most likely culprit: Falls Legend Winery’s manager. But her suspicions can’t erase the fact that Luke Rutledge’s disheveled yet determined vibe intrigues her, even if he is whispered about in town as “one of those Rutledge Boys.” When Aunt Helen’s book club decides to set Whitney up on a few blind dates to distract her from going crazy while she attempts to unravel the books, Luke realizes that he cares about the nosy “bean counter” far more than he thought.

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

Meet the Author:

Jo McNally lives in coastal North Carolina with 100 pounds of dog and 200 pounds of husband – her slice of the bed is very small. When she’s not writing or reading romance novels (or clinging to the edge of the bed…), she can often be found on the back porch sipping wine with friends, listening to great music. If the weather is absolutely perfect, she’ll occasionally join her husband on the golf course, where she always feels far more competitive than her actual skill-level would suggest.
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58 Responses to “Spotlight & Giveaway: Slow Dancing at Sunrise by Jo McNally”

  2. Pamela Conway

    I don’t drink wine or any alcohol really. I drink water or cranberry juice.

  3. janinecatmom

    I like to drink wine of vodka. My wine taste changes with the seasons. Right now, I like rose or moscato, merlot is good for winter.

  5. Courtney Kinder

    My favorite beverage is a strawberry daiquiri. Thanks for sharing!

  8. Karina Angeles

    Not a big drinker. I love to relax with a glass of sweet tea when out with the family.

  13. Lisa B.

    On the rare occasion that I drink, I like sweeter whites, especially Muscato or Riesling. I also enjoy an occasional hard cider.

  20. Ellen C.

    Hard to pick my favorite, but right now Riesling. Love the Finger Lakes and Finger Lakes wines.

  22. Glenda M

    My choice in wine depends a lot on my mood. However, I can’t drink most wines on the market because of the added sulfites

  31. Linda May

    I love to drink Asti Spumante, it’s so yummy. Thanks for this amazing chance.

  35. joab4424

    I’m not a drinker but I like tea. My favourite is Mixed Berry herbal tea.

  36. Jo-Anne Boyko

    I’m not a drinker but I do like tea. My favourite is Mixed Wildberry herbal tea.