Friday, December 8, 2017

The Happiness Pact by Liz Flaherty Interview & Giveaway

On Tour with Prism Book Tours

The Happiness Pact
by Liz Flaherty
Contemporary Romance
Paperback & ebook, 384 pages
December 1st 2017 by Harlequin Heartwarming

The fine line between BFF and happily-ever-after…

Tucker Llewellyn and Libby Worth—strictly platonic!—realize they’re each at a crossroads. Tucker is successful, but he wants a wife and kids: the whole package. Libby knows that small-town life has her set in her ways; the tearoom owner needs to get out more.

So they form a pact: Libby will play matchmaker and Tucker will lead her on the adventure she desperately needs. But the electricity Libby feels when they shake on it should be a warning sign. Soon the matchmaking mishaps pile up, and a personal crisis tests Libby’s limits. Will Tucker be there for her as a best friend…or something more?


About the Author


 Liz Flaherty was a little nervous about retiring from her day job, but making quilts, more family time, traveling at the mere mention of “why don’t we go...” and becoming a Harlequin Heartwarming author have made the past years more fun and exciting than she could ever have imagined.

Interview:

1.   What literary pilgrimages have you gone on?
I’m not sure if they qualify as pilgrimages, but every trip I’m on that involves staying overnight becomes literary for the simple reason that there is something about working in a hotel dining room that makes me productive. I’ve done hours’ worth of edits, become unblocked (yay!), and written countless blog posts while under the influence of a bottomless coffeepot and the friendly conversation of strangers.

On a more planned note, my friend Nan Reinhardt and I go on at least one writing retreat a year. We write, go to restaurants our husbands would hate, wear comfortable clothes, drink wine, write...

2.   Does writing energize or exhaust you?
Well...yes. Today, for instance, I was writing a scene that had absolutely everything in it I love. Humor, angst, the turn of a corner—everything! I wrote until the words were blurring in front of my eyes and after dinner I went out to my office and tried to write some more. (Didn’t work, but I tried.) It was the most energizing writing day I’ve had in a while, and I am totally exhausted by it. I’m sitting here whining about taking a shower because I’m so tired. And happy. So happy.

3.   Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book.
Although The Happiness Pact is the third book from LakeMiniagua, and I insert the occasional name from previous books into every new one, I’m not interested in creating a long series. I think they’re wonderful, but I don’t have the focus required to keep all the continuity ducks in a row. All too soon I’d be giving someone the wrong eye color or middle name.

My “body of work” is as eclectic as my taste in music, and I like it that way. I might have had a more successful career if I’d stayed in Taft or Peacock or any the other settings I wrote about, but I don’t think I’d have had as much fun.

4.   If you didn’t write, what would you do for work?
Actually, I retired from the post office after 30 years in 2011 and I loved that job. Then, a year and a half or so ago, a friend at the local library said the director was looking for part-time help. I filled out an application, stating in a separate note that I didn’t want to work very much and I didn’t know how long I’d want to work. She hired me either because of or despite my limitations and I love this job, too.

The serious answer to that question, though, is that I’ve always written, since years and years before I was published. Quitting that has never been an option. Still isn’t. I’m just one of the lucky ones who liked her other jobs, too.

5.   What is the first book that made you cry? When Beth died in Little Women, I lay in bed and cried for...well, I don’t know how many nights. Looking back, it seems like a lot, but I was nine, so it’s hard to be sure. Although Jo March was the one I wanted to be, I loved Beth. I grieved for her as much as I would have for a close friend or even a family member...

     ...which segues neatly into Question 6. What is your favorite childhood book? I read voraciously as a kid (even more so than now) and had a new favorite every week. Since I didn’t go to college and specialized writing courses weren’t offered in my high school, the books of my childhood and adolescence were my training manuals. I think I learned something from each of them, but Little Womenwas my syllabus. If I could only take one book to a desert island, it would be the one.





1 winner will receive a signed copy of EVERY TIME WE SAY GOODBYE and a Christmas stocking
US only
Ends December 13th
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