She calls herself a Hard-Wired Carolina Girl. In her own words, she says:
I spent
about 25 of my [fill in the blank] years in North Carolina. I always tell
people I wasn’t born there, but I belonged there. Actually, the maternal side
of my family tree is deeply rooted in Eastern NC, and has been since, oh, The
Lord Proprietors were handing out tracts of land.
My
grandpa Frank was a Halifax County boy, and his wife Mary—one of the
grandmothers whose lineage is celebrated in my penname—was born and raised in
Chowan County. Chowan County is where I grew up, too, in a tiny, unincorporated
community called Welch or Tyner, depending on who’s asking.
I
believe there’s a such thing as genetic memory—where you know down to your
cells where your people are from. That way you always know where to fly home
to, if you listen in well enough. In the past couple of years, I’ve been even
more convinced of the phenomenon because my husband and I uprooted our little
family back in 2011 for a move to Colorado. We made a “Yeah, we should live
while we’re young!” decision. Decided to be adventurous and stuff.
Well.
Colorado sure is pretty. Lots of mountains and clear skies and fluffy white
snow (I hate snow). But, I’ve never been more keenly aware of my place on this big spinning rock than
when we moved to the wrong part of it.
Some
people call this off-center feeling “homesickness,” but I think that’s an
entirely different dysfunction. Homesickness can be cured with care packages
and the occasional plane ticket, and over time, the feeling may abate
altogether. This thing I feel, and that I feel everywhere I go that’s not
haunted by familiar ghosts, is more like I’ve been uprooted and replanted into
soil I’m not meant to thrive in.
I’m
making the most of my time in this not-so-wild West. Of all the romances I’ve
written since the move, all but one was set at least in part in North Carolina.
If I can’t be there, at least I can tell people about it. I can go home
whenever I’m in front of my keyboard. Unfortunately, my imagination doesn’t
provide me with barbecue sandwiches and Lance honey buns.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Grant Fennell
seems to lack the luck of the Irish. He’s had his nose broken three times, his
dissertation advisor was a useless lump, he’s thirty-one and finishing his PhD,
and he can’t find a teaching position in the US. Then he accepts a job in his
native Ireland on the same day the stunning former student he’s been intrigued
by for nearly eight years shows a shred of interest. Finally, he catches a
break: Carla Gill needs his expertise.
Carla is at a dead end on her late Irish-American
father’s family tree project. Who better to assist than an expert on Irish history?
But when Carla accompanies Grant to Ireland to conduct her research, he makes
it clear he wants to put her on the fast track to matrimony. The professor
wants to teach her something about “happily ever after.” Does she really want
her happy ending to start right now?
AN EXCERPT
“Hey,
give me your phone.”
“Huh?”
He held
out his hand. “Your phone. I’m supposed to already know your phone number since
you’re my girlfriend.”
She
arched one eyebrow up into a question mark. “I’m sorry?”
“It’s a
long story. Suffice it to say it has to do with those loudmouths at the bar and
the chick who’s squawking at them.” He held out his hand.
She
studied his face and upon finding he looked absolutely mortified, gave him the
device.
He punched some information into
her contacts list while occasionally glancing back over his shoulder to watch
the mounting fracas. “Here. That’s my stuff. Come over in the morning and I’ll
help you with your project. I live at Hillside.”
“Um…okay.”
She studied the screen. Grant Fennell.
“And one
other thing.” He bent down and put his lips next to her ear. “Listen, I hate to
drag you into this craziness, but I have to do this.”
“Do
what?”
When his
gaze darted over to the bar yet again, she followed it with her own. The tall
woman had stopped yelling at the bouncer and Grant’s friends. Now she was
glowering at Grant.
She
suddenly understood. “You want me to pretend we’re…together?” Hardly an
inconvenience.
“It’ll
either make things worse or better. I’d certainly feel better.”
How could she refuse? She laced
her fingers through his hair so the tips met at the crown, and pulled his face
down toward hers. His green eyes closed as their noses touched, then there was
the press of lips. It wouldn’t have taken much to make it look like a good show
from a distance, but she wanted to put everything she had into that kiss. She
needed to redeem herself with it. She needed redemption for being so
damned clumsy and awkward, for not remembering his last name and for the fact
that once he walked away, she would probably be too cowardly to call him.
She
wound her tongue around his, searching his mouth, emboldened by his moan and
the tightening of his fingers around her thighs.
The
noise at the bar escalated. When she drew back, she wasn’t finished; she
could’ve sucked on his lips all evening.
He drew back panting. “That was
like a going-off-to-war kiss.
I’m not going to die, love. Might go to jail tonight is all.”
Love. A careless use of a pet name
and she was smitten. And when he dragged pad of his thumb over her cheek,
spontaneous human combustion suddenly seemed like a feasible phenomenon.
With one
last smoldering smile, he straightened up and moved with graceful ease through
the tables to his friends.
She felt a tinge of arousal watching his agile form
skirt away, thinking of how strong and forceful his tongue was, but quickly
drowned it with the remnants of Sharon’s Long Island Iced Tea.
LINKS
Saint and Scholar, a contemporary romance
published by Lyrical Press, is available for purchase as an e-book at Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Saint-and-Scholar-ebook/dp/B00DJVH31G/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1372403594&sr=8-3&keywords=saint+and+scholar),
Barnes and Noble (http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/saint-and-scholar-holley-trent/1115799417?ean=2940016567655),
and other major vendors, including Overdrive for libraries.
Learn more about
Holley Trent’s books and upcoming projects at http://www.holleytrent.com. Like her
Facebook fan page at https://www.facebook.com/writerholleytrent?ref=hl
or follow @holleytrent on Twitter for random bon mots and book-related news.
