Book Feature with Margaret Lake, author of My Lonely Heart

Indie Book Promo is happy to welcome Margaret Lake to the blog. She is the author of My Lonely Heart and is here to share some information about her book. If this sounds like something that you would be interested in reading, please find buy links at the bottom of the post and pick up a copy or two.

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Blurb:

It’s Valentine’s Day and Holly is alone again. Darren is away on business as usual and Holly doesn’t know how she’s going to get through the day. But with some sage advice from the rehab center’s favorite patient, 85 year-old Mary, Holly just might find a way to save her marriage.

Excerpt:

February 14^th and Holly was alone on Valentine’s Day … again. Oh, Darren had called this morning, and there would be flowers sent to her workplace. And when he got back from his business trip, he would take her out to a fancy restaurant and give her a fancy gift.

To be honest, he had no choice. He had to go where his company sent him when they sent him. And he always made it up to her. He always brought her back a gift from wherever he had been. Sometimes just a tacky souvenir like a carved coconut head or a flamingo made out of shells. Sometimes a pair of earrings would catch his eye in a store window, or a knick-knack he knew she’d like. She really did love everything he gave her.

The only problem was that the one thing she wanted was her husband home on the holidays, not to mention nights and weekends. The reality was that he was gone three weeks out of four. He installed computer systems all over the world and was responsible for training as well. Sometimes he’d be on his way home when he would get a call that a system had crashed somewhere else, and he’d be on his way there.

Holly had a great job that she loved; working in the rehab as a physical therapist. It was wonderful to get someone back on their feet after a debilitating accident or stroke. Equally rewarding were the small triumphs such as Jack being able to hold a spoon, or Edith learning to steer her electric wheel chair.

If it weren’t for that, she’d be following Darren all over the world. That and one other not so little thing: she desperately wanted to start a family. But what was the use? When Darren was gone so often, she might as well be a single parent.

Holly dashed away a tear and picked up the file for her next patient. She couldn’t help but smile when she saw it was Mary, everyone’s favorite. There was no holding down this feisty little woman. Not even five feet tall and a bare 80 pounds, this 85-year-old’s determination carried her through the most difficult of exercises. The hardest thing was to get her to slow down so she wouldn’t undo all of the orthopedist’s good work. Mary was early, as usual, and raring to get down to business.

“Hello, Mary,” chorused everyone in the therapy room.

Holly couldn’t hide her smile when the men in the room started working harder. They didn’t want this little old lady to make them look bad.

“How are we today, Mary?” Holly asked.

“Well, I don’t know how ‘we’ are but I’m just fine,” Mary replied with a twinkle in her eye.

“Ready to get to work?”

“Ready to go home,” Mary countered.

“When are you going to learn not to rush things?” Holly sighed.

“Little girl, at my age, if I want to finish something, I’d better finish it darned quick.”

My Lonely Heart can be purchased on Amazon.

Bio:

I was born on the Jersey Shore and lived there until my teens when my family moved to Florida. I raised two children in the Sunshine State, and that have, in turn, given me two beautiful grandchildren.

The urge to write was a vague itch for a long time. Unlike a lot of authors, I didn’t start scribbling stories about bunny rabbits in my early years. It was more of an “I read so much I don’t know why I can’t write” kind of thing.

Then my son-in-law bought me a new computer on which I spent many happy hours playing golf. One day, he said if he’d known I was just going to use it to play games, he’d have bought me an Atari. Kind of embarrassing, really.

I went to sleep that night with his words ringing in my ears. They rang so loudly, they woke me up at 3 am with an idea for a novel fully formed in my head. I fired up my computer, started writing, and Ariana’s Pridewas born… or at least conceived.

Four months of intense writing day and night, when I wasn’t at the day job, and the first draft was finished. Two months later, the second draft was finished and I sent it out for proofing. Then came rounds of rejections followed by the decision to be content with the fact that I’d done it. I’d written a novel I was proud of.

Ariana sat on a floppy disk for a long time, until I discovered the Kindle. Then the idea came to publish it myself. With the help of Jeff Hepple of Elisco Publishing, my dream became a reality. Within the first month, Ariana’s Pride rose as high as #444 in the Kindle store.

I’m currently writing the third in the medieval series as well as a novel set just after WWI. My love of historical fiction/romance began with the Angelique series by Sergeanne Golon. Then I read Catherine by Anya Seton and I was hoked on the Lancasters.

My favorite author is Susan Howatch, both her historical fiction and series on the Church of England. My favorite series is Harry Potter, and my favorite book is Outlander, by Diana Gabaldon.

Margaret can be found on:

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