Welcome! Today I get to share a guest post from the author. Read below...
Sea Glass Castle
(The Carolina Coast Series #3)
By T.I. Lowe
Christian Contemporary Romance
Paperback & ebook, 320 Pages
August 1st 2020 by Tyndale Fiction
Summary
Sophia Prescott is still mending from the embarrassment of a highly publicized divorce from a pro football player, and the now-single mother is back in Sunset Cove, surrounded by the supporting love of her family and the Sand Queens. Sophia doesn’t think there’s any hope for starting over until an unexpected trip to the pediatrician’s office gives her a second chance after all.
Dr. Weston Sawyer knows all about lives shattering into millions of pieces. His own all but ended when a truck driver fell asleep at the wheel and barreled head-on into his pregnant wife’s sedan, killing her instantly and leaving Wes with a soul so wounded that it has refused to heal. He packed up and left swampy southern Alabama for South Carolina with the hope of fading into the sleepy coastal town of Sunset Cove. Instead, feisty brunette Sophia Prescott will have him braving something different and entirely unexpected. If Sophia and Wes can take the leap to give love another try, they just might find that hope has a way of coming back around and weaving into one’s heart.
Guest Post:
10 Things to Know About the Carolina Coast Series
1. The book titles are also the names of the characters’ beach houses. Naming them is a fun thing beach house owners do, so I took this opportunity to use the names to clue readers in on the books’ themes.
2. There are two friend groups throughout the series. The main group is the Sand Queens, who are also the main characters of the three books: Opal Gilbert, Josie Slater, and Sophia Prescott. The other group is the older busybodies called the Knitting Club. That’s a club I’d like to join when I turn seventy or eighty. They were so fun to write about, and this group also includes my favorite character of the series. See number 3.
3. My favorite character of the series is Dalma Jean Burgess, a ninety-year-old who is a hoot! I know, I know. We aren’t supposed to name favorites, but this woman... At first glance she’s a spacy elderly lady, but she shares such rich nuggets of wisdom out of the blue that I dare the reader not to favor her too.
4. Dalma Jean was not in the original draft of the series. This lady didn’t even introduce herself to me until I was doing rewrites. It could have saved me a lot of time if she’d said hello before that point, but I enjoyed her so much that I welcomed her into the series anyway.
5. Driftwood Dreams was originally supposed to be the first book of the series, and Beach Haven was supposed to be the second. Ain’t gonna lie, when my editor suggested switching the order, it freaked me out! But I have to admit, she was so right about it. The rewrites were scary but so very worth it, and I’m beyond proud of what we ended up with. Readers seem to agree, so there’s that!
6. August Bradford is the charming artist/hero in Driftwood Dreams. He was inspired by one of my characters from A Discovery of Hope, Duke Harris. The timing has never been right to write Duke’s story, but Driftwood Dreams gave me a chance to share it through August. I think fans of Duke will appreciate me finally doing this.
7. Each book includes a recipe at the end that ties into the series. Beach Haven features “Not Opal’s Crab Biscuits,” because girlfriend cannot cook worth a lick. Driftwood Dreams includes my simpler version of the “Driftwood Diner Biscuits & Gravy” that appears in the story. It has shrimp and bacon in it. No going wrong with those two ingredients! Sea Glass Castle includes the famous “Sand Queens’ Summer Punch” recipe that readers will notice the Sand Queens enjoying throughout the series. Warning: the punch is addictive!
8. Each book is dedicated to my daughter, Lydia, and presents her with a dare. Dare to be different. Dare to dream. Dare to declare your own destiny. The main characters face these dares, and my hope is that my daughter—as well as my readers—will take me up on them. The author’s note at the end of Sea Glass Castle explains this in more detail, so be sure to check it out.
9. Sea Glass Castle is the first book I’ve written about a widower. Weston Sawyer was a challenge, but sharing his male perspective on something so devastating was very rewarding. By the time I completed the book, he had become my hero too.
10. A charming troublemaker is introduced in Sea Glass Castle, and I enjoyed writing that scoundrel so much that he has inspired a spin-off series. Fingers crossed, I’ll have more to share about that soon. Stay tuned!
Other Books in the Series
(Linked to a Q&A with the author and an excerpt.)
About the Author
Tonya “T. I.” Lowe is a native of coastal South Carolina. She attended Coastal Carolina University and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, where she majored in psychology but excelled in creative writing. In 2014, Tonya independently published her first novel, Lulu’s Café, which quickly became a bestseller. Now the author of twelve published novels with hundreds of thousands of copies sold, she knows she’s just getting started and has many more stories to tell. She resides near Myrtle Beach with her family.
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