Spotlight & Giveaway: You, with a View by Jessica Joyce

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Jessica Joyce to HJ!

Hi Jessica and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, You, with a View!

 
So happy to be here!
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

You, with a View follows Noelle Shepard, a struggling millennial woman who’s recently lost her beloved grandma. She finds a stack of old photos of her gram and a mystery man, alongside a letter that mentions a botched elopement, and takes to TikTok to see if she can find said mystery man to learn the story behind it. The video ends up going viral and she finds the man in the photos—along with his grandson, who happens to be her old high school nemesis, who’s now ultra-successful (and still as hot and annoying as ever). When she discovers that her gram and Paul, said mystery man, had planned a honeymoon road trip across the Western United States, she decides to take the trip herself. Only, Paul wants to join, too, so he can tell her the love story between him and Noelle’s gram—and he wants to bring Theo, too.

Once they’re on the road, Noelle discovers the adversarial sparks that flew between them are still there, and they’re fanning into hotter flames. But if they want to keep the fire burning once the road trip is over, it means revealing secrets about themselves, and those secrets might instead end up putting them on different paths forever.
 

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

Simply because it ties so perfectly back to the title of the book:

“Look at the view,” I say against his mouth when we pull back for a breath.

His thumb grazes over the plane of my cheek. “I am.”

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• The storyline between Noelle’s grandma, Kathleen, and Theo’s granddad, Paul, was inspired by pictures I found of my own grandma and a handsome mystery man. I got the story of their love-story-that-never-was from my family, but loved the idea of someone taking to social media to try and find the long-lost love of their grandparent.
• The first scene I ever thought of happens about 50% into the book, when Noelle and Theo are taking a dip at a swimming hole in Zion National Park. They’re both dealing with their own disappointments and secrets, and Theo encourages Noelle to scream underwater with him to get some of the stress out of their bodies. I still remember how that piece of the scene played out in my mind like a movie!
• I originally didn’t plan on Paul coming along with Noelle and Theo on the road trip. As I was writing the scene where Noelle tells him she’s planning the trip, he kind of just…invited himself! And now, of course, I can’t imagine him not being part of the trip!
• The original title of this book was Tell Me a Secret, which is the name of the game Noelle used to play with her gram (the game being that they reveal one or two secrets to each other every time they’re together). It’s a game that Noelle and Theo end up playing on the road, too. Ultimately, we ended up with You, with a View because it sounded much more romance-y, but I still slip every once in a while and call it Tell Me a Secret (or TMAS, as me and my friends say!).

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

Noelle and Theo knew each other all through high school, so when they see each other as adults, they still have that alchemic spark they completely ignored as teenagers.

Beyond both of them (obviously) being very hot, Theo is attracted to Noelle’s curious mind, her refusal to give up, her thirst for knowledge and the way that she isn’t intimidated by him. He loves that he can roast her and she’ll gleefully roast him right back. He loves that she thinks he’s enough exactly as he is; he never has to prove his worth to her. She thinks he’s worthy without parameters put on him. Theo sees an equal partner in Noelle.

Noelle is attracted to Theo’s dedication to his granddad and the close relationship they have, to his passion for Where To Next, the travel app he co-founded, and how he champions making travel more accessible to people. She loves that he doesn’t coddle her, that he tells her the unvarnished truth because he knows she can take it, and that he clearly views her as being strong and having fortitude, even when she doesn’t see it herself. And she loves his single but very powerful dimple.

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

I loved writing the scene where Noelle shows up to Paul’s house to go through some of the pictures and letters he’s kept of his time with Kathleen. She thinks it’s just going to be her and Paul, but gets a very shirtless surprise in the form of Theo, who’s hard at work gardening for his granddad in Paul’s backyard. Of course, Paul acts like it’s a big old mixup, but we all can see that he’s playing matchmaker.

Writing Noelle’s response to seeing Theo shirtless was SO much fun for me. It just felt like one of those pure romance genre moments when you’re cackling and kicking your feet because you know the main characters are going to fall like TREES.

This is the moment I love most:

When he turns, I inhale so sharply I choke on air.

Paul pats my back. “Are you all right?”

“Bug,” I choke out.

More like *body*. I want to know what kind of devil deal Theo made when he was born. Besides his questionable personality, he was built lovingly and with extreme care by whomever is in charge of those things.

His chest is broad, his skin honey-hued underneath the midday sun. He’s sculpted in an elemental way that broadcasts he knows how to use his body, that the muscles and tendons underneath that smooth skin work for him however he wants them to. It’s so intensely hot I want to run away from it until I find a cold body of water to submerge myself in.

It’s fucking rude that he’s so good-looking. It offends me.

Readers should read this book….

If they’re looking for a book that feels like summer: spectacular destinations, adventure, falling in love. You, with a View is full of banter and tension of the emotional AND sexual variety, with epistolary elements that shine a light on the interrupted love story of Paul and Kathleen, which led to the inevitable love story of Theo and Noelle. It’s a story that handles the themes of grief and healing with equal parts heart and humor (because I can’t let things get TOO heavy for too long).

It’s also just a big old love letter to a genre I adore—it has tropes like just one bed, forced proximity, roasting as a love language, and plenty of steam. It’s a great book to throw into your beach bag or hiking backpack or suitcase when you’re on your way to the other side of the world! Truly the best travel companion you could imagine.

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

I’m in the middle of revisions for my second book with Berkley, which comes out summer 2024. More information forthcoming soon, but for now I think I can share that it’s a second chance romance and I’m in LOVE with these two. So much pining and tension and history, all coming to a boil thanks to forced proximity. 🙂
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: A print copy of YOU, WITH A VIEW by Jessica Joyce.

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Excerpt from You, with a View:

The bar is in an open-concept area not far from the check-in desk, curving sleekly around a towering display of liquor bottles. It’s quiet, even for a Monday.

Theo’s seated at the bar with his hand curled around a glass. He’s watching a baseball game, eyes glazed with boredom. He looks down at his phone, illuminating the screen with his knuckle. Whatever he finds there—or doesn’t—makes his mouth pinch with displeasure. His attention drifts back to the television.

Until it snags on my approach.

Surprise flashes across his face, his eyebrows pulling up. But he recovers quickly, and watching the awareness sink into his gaze sends white-hot power surging through my veins.

There’s a confidence in the way his eyes drop down my body, a confession that he’d know exactly what to do with me. That I’d like it; he’d make sure of it. He traces the shape of my hips from twenty feet away. My breasts and neck from ten. By the time I’m standing next to him, his gaze is bouncing up from my mouth.

It pulls up under his attention. “Hello.”

“Hello,” he echoes in a smoky voice. “Couldn’t manage a text back?”

“Figured it’d be redundant, since I made it down here so quickly.” I slide into a seat, tilting my head to appraise him. The sweep of my hair over my bare shoulder pulls goosebumps onto my skin. “Unless you were checking your phone waiting for my response or something.”

He grins, caught. “Such a little stalker, Shep.”

I give him a cheeky wink. “What’re you having?”

“Bourbon.” His dimple pops as his mouth pouts into a smirk. “Two fingers.”

I lift my hand to get the bartender’s attention. “I don’t respect a man who can’t handle three.”
Theo chokes on a laugh as the bartender approaches. If this were a tennis match, the point would go to me.

I nod toward Theo’s glass. “I’ll have what he’s having.”

He leans in as the bartender moves away, his shoulder grazing mine, breath brushing my ear. “Two fingers are enough to satisfy you tonight, huh?”

A quiet chuckle follows the shiver I fail to stave off. I dip my chin, leveling him with a look. “We’re supposed to behave, Spencer. Don’t get all riled up.”

He grins. “Who’s riled?”

Our noses are practically touching. He has the faintest scar just above the severe stroke of his right eyebrow.

A glass slides into my periphery—my drink. I pull it toward me.

Theo mirrors me, pressing his glass to mine with a soft clink. “Cheers, Shepard.”

“What are we cheersing to?”

“Looking, I guess.”

I can’t help my laugh. “To looking.”

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Two high school enemies must reunite for a road trip inspired by their grandparents’ broken engagement in this electric debut romance.

Noelle Shepherd is unemployed, living with her parents, and grieving the loss of her beloved grandmother when she discovers decades-old photos of Gram and a smitten man, tucked alongside a love letter. She creates a TikTok to search for the mystery man, which goes viral, and she’s shocked when his grandson responds—a man who happens to be her high school nemesis, Theo Spencer.

Noelle refuses to let Theo’s annoying accomplishments in adulthood—or his sexy smirk—stand in the way of meeting his grandfather and unlocking the secrets he knew about her gram as a young woman. When she learns that their plans to elope were thwarted, Noelle decides to take the honeymoon road trip they planned but never got to carry out. There’s a catch, though: Paul, Theo’s grandfather, asks to come with her, and he insists that Theo join them.

It’ll be a miracle if they make it through the trip without Noelle throwing Theo out of the moving car—or the bed they end up sharing. As the miles tick by, the tension simmers hotter between them…until she discovers that Theo’s hiding a secret that could cause their tenuous relationship to end before it can restart.
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Meet the Author:

Jessica Joyce lives happily-ever-ongoing with her husband and son in the Bay Area. When she’s not writing character-driven, realistic and relatable tales of millennials who are just Doing Their Best while falling in love, you can find her listening to one of her dozens of chaotically curated Spotify playlists, trying out a new skincare face mask, crying over cute animal TikToks, or watching the 2005 version of Pride & Prejudice.
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