Hi Everyone!

I’m so excited to welcome the beautiful and talented author and actress Courtney Giardina as my guest blogger today. Read on and I know you’ll be as exited as I am to read her novel, Tear Stained Beaches. She beautifully captures why we love to read and her excerpt below gave me chills when I first read it!

Enjoy!

Patricia

Channeling Your Inner Haylie Julian By Courtney Giardina

The best books are ones we can relate to. Ones where we can see a little bit of ourselves in the characters. Readers of Tear Stained Beaches feel exactly that way about the main character Haylie Julian, a young woman struggling with love and life. Her fear of letting go and walking into the unknown consumes her thoughts throughout the story. Her inner challenge to find herself in the midst of heartbreak and sadness, finding happiness in accepting herself for who she is and where she is in life are just a few of the battles you will find when reading this emotional story. Sounds familiar right? We may not all have experienced the same situation as Haylie, but we can all pull a time from our memories that has made us feel the way Haylie feels at each point within the novel.

While writing Tear Stained Beaches, I wanted it to have a moral. I wanted readers to get something out of it. For me it was that we all are much stronger than we give ourselves credit for. That we are all capable of picking ourselves up each time we fall and that we need to learn to accept ourselves for who we are, not who others may want us to be. The moral may be different for each reader, but nonetheless everyone will find a message that speaks to them. And my hope once they are done reading it is that they are empowered to fight through any tough situation that may come at them.

Haylie Julian is a little bit of me, a little bit of you and a little bit of every woman who has ever experienced love, loss and heartache. She’s the girl we all have inside ourselves and I hope by reading this she’s able to bring it out of all of you.

Tear Stained Beaches is available for download for just $2.99 on Amazon, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble

Find out more about Courtney Giardina and where to purchase Tear Stained Beaches at www.courtneygiardina.com

Tear Stained Beaches Excerpt

I’m not sure what it was that night. Lying in bed tossing and turning, I wasn’t able to sleep. My head was spinning with all sorts of thoughts, and my heart raced at the very fact any one of them could be true. He had been texting often lately; much more than ever before. His phone never seemed to leave his side and you could see the panic on his face every time it was within my grasp. His business trips became more frequent. Yes, work was busy, but how often does a lawyer need to travel when they’re only licensed to practice in one state?

I kept telling myself that I was being paranoid, that he wasn’t like my exes. After all, he wasn’t the high school boyfriend who shattered my heart into pieces; he was my husband of five years. The most trusting man I had ever met. There’s no way the man who proposed in a quaint little bed and breakfast, after drawing me a bath and ordering in room service, would do anything to intentionally hurt me. I must have been crazy to think that.

 I tried my best to smile and drew the covers up to my chin, telling myself to relax. He was just a dedicated working-man. A man who worked hard for the house we had, the life we lived and the luxury cars that sat in the driveway.

I closed my eyes, and our Jamaican honeymoon came to life. What an amazing time we had that week. It rained for most of it, but those were the best parts. No one was hogging the Jacuzzi when it was pouring, so we saw our chance and took it. Hell, we were wet anyway, so the rain didn’t bother us. I actually found it romantic. Every evening, at sunset, we headed down to the deserted end of the beach and took pictures of the starfish that hung close to shore. The last memory before falling asleep was of myself: bright orange starfish in hand, turning my head toward the camera, smiling and in love.

It was almost two in the morning when I woke to the door squeaking open. I kept my eyes closed, listening to him move around in the darkness. After a few moments, he lifted the covers to crawl in. He nudged closer to me and wrapped his arm around my waist. I took a deep breath and paused. My eyes shot open as a tear slowly rolled down my cheek. I stared straight ahead, careful not to move and betray that I was awake. A shiver ran up my arm where his hand rested. I lay there, staring into space, my gaze lingering, almost as intense as the smell of her perfume.