Spotlight & Giveaway: When She Dreams by Amanda Quick

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Amanda Quick to HJ!

Hi Amanda and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, When She Dreams!

 
Waving from Seattle
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

WHEN SHE DREAMS is my newest Amanda Quick novel set in the glamorous and dangerous 1930s world of California: Maggie, an assistant to an advice columnist who is being blackmailed, hires Sam Sage, a down-but-not-quite-out private eye. The two take off for an undercover operation at a psychic dreaming conference. Maggie is not an ideal client as far as Sam is concerned. She’s reckless and she insists on interfering. Maggie is convinced Sam needs advice on how to do his job. Were these two made for each other or what?
 

Please share your favorite line(s) or quote from this book:

Sam put the convertible in gear, pulled out onto the highway, and drove toward Burning Cove at a sedate pace.
“I guess you aren’t accustomed to fast cars,” Maggie ventured.
“Guess not,” Sam said.
“Don’t worry, you’ll get used to this one,” Maggie said. “Now about your evening jacket.”
“I’ve arrested a few mobsters in my time,” Sam said. I know how to dress for a town like Burning Cove.”

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

I was amazed to discover that conferences on lucid dreaming and astral traveling were very popular during the 1930s. Such a conference made the perfect setting for my heroine, Maggie, who just happens to be a lucid dreamer.

What first attracts your Hero to the Heroine and vice versa?

Sam knows Maggie is going to be a problem client but he is intrigued by her spirit and determination. She’s a force of nature. Maggie hires Sam primarily because he is the only P.I. in town who isn’t drunk at 10 o’clock in the morning. He puts on a cynical, world-weary facade but she senses that deep down he’s got a sense of right and wrong that matches her own. It’s their shared core values that draws them together and sparks the physical attraction between them.

Did any scene have you blushing, crying or laughing while writing it? And Why?

I love this little scene because it reflects the relationship:

“The very thought of you cooking up a cover story for us strikes fear in my heart,” Sam said.
Maggie either didn’t hear him or wasn’t paying attention. “We’ll take my car. I’ll pick you up at nine tomorrow. What’s your address?”
He wondered if he should panic. “Uh, eleven Beachfront Drive,” he heard himself say.
“Got it,” Maggie said. “Do you have an evening jacket? Don’t worry, if you don’t have one we can rent a jacket in Burning Cove. See you in the morning.”
There was a click. The phone went dead. Sam took the receiver away from his ear and stared at it for a moment. No question about it. He had lost control of the conversation, the case and the client.
Definitely time to panic.

Readers should read this book….

…If they love sparkling romantic suspense infused with a touch of the paranormal.

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have in the works?

Next up for me is SWEETWATER AND THE WITCH, under my Jayne Castle pen name. Yes, this is another book in my futuristic/dust bunny/ghost-hunters series set on Harmony.
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: (1) Print copy of WHEN SHE DREAMS by Amanda Quick

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: Lucid dreaming is what they call the experience of knowing you are dreaming when you are in a dream. Ever had a lucid dream?

 
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Excerpt from When She Dreams:

The car was beautiful and under other circumstances—if he had been at the wheel, for example—he would have been enjoying himself. The day was perfect for a drive up the coast–crystal clear blue skies and a diamond-bright ocean. But the lady at the wheel was transforming what should have been a pleasant road trip into a roller-coaster ride.

Maggie’s shoulder-length hair was once again secured with a scarf that had been folded into a triangle and knotted under her chin. She wore a white silk shirt and a pair of high-waisted, dark green trousers. Sunglasses and leather driving gloves added a dashing touch. She was the kind of woman a man’s mother was supposed to warn him about—smart, independent, bold, reckless, unpredictable–downright scary. Interesting.

“I’m working on a novel of suspense,” Maggie said, “but so far I’ve only been able to sell short stories to the confession magazines. Not much money in that kind of publishing and to be honest, I’m not very good at it. That’s why I’m assisting Lillian Dewhurst. I need the extra cash.”

He closed his eyes for the next curve. “Why aren’t you any good at writing confessions?”
“The stories all have the same theme—sin, suffer, repent.” Maggie downshifted. “It’s the female protagonist who gets to do the sinning, of course, and it almost always involves sex. Illicit affairs, that sort of thing. I’m good with that part. It’s fun to write. But it’s incredibly boring to do the suffer-and-repent bits.”

He gripped the edge of the window frame in preparation for another curve. “Let me guess—you’re not writing from personal experience.”

“Of course not,” Maggie said. “No one could rack up that many interesting experiences no matter how hard she tried. What success I’ve had in the magazine market is a tribute to my creativity, if you ask me. You’d be surprised how difficult it is to come up with a lot of fake confessions.”

“I am, of course, shocked to hear that those magazines are printing fiction,” Sam said.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Return to 1930s Burning Cove, California, the glamorous seaside playground for Hollywood stars, mobsters, spies, and a host of others who find more than they bargain for in this mysterious town.

Maggie Lodge, assistant to the reclusive advice columnist known only as Dear Aunt Cornelia to her readers, hires down-but-not-quite-out private eye Sam Sage to help track down the person who is blackmailing her employer. Maggie and Sam are a mismatched pair. As far as Sam is concerned, Maggie is reckless and in over her head. She is not what he had in mind for a client, but he can’t afford to be choosy. Maggie, on the other hand, is convinced that Sam is badly in need of guidance and good advice. She does not hesitate to give him both.

In spite of the verbal fireworks between them, they are fiercely attracted to each other, but each is convinced it would be a mistake to let passion take over. They are, after all, keeping secrets from each other. Sam is haunted by his past, which includes a marriage shattered by betrayal and violence. Maggie is troubled by intense and vivid dreams—dreams that she can sometimes control. There are those who want to run experiments on her and use her for their own purposes, while others think she should be committed to an asylum.

When the pair discovers someone is impersonating Aunt Cornelia at a conference on psychic dreaming and a woman dies at the conference, the door is opened to a dangerous web of blackmail and murder. Secrets from the past are revealed, leaving Maggie and Sam in the path of a ruthless killer who will stop at nothing to exact vengeance.
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Meet the Author:

Jayne Ann Krentz writes romantic suspense with a psychic edge under her own name for contemporary settings, Amanda Quick for historicals and Jayne Castle for futuristics. She has had over fifty New York Times bestsellers.
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