Today, we welcome Susanne Matthews, who is here to share some very good relationship advice from her characters of Wedding Bell Blues. And wow, congratulations to her and her husband of 47 years!
Relationships aren’t easy. They don’t just happen. There’s a lot of work that has to go into them before they become the happily ever afters most of us long for, and once they do, the work is only just beginning. One of the components of a lasting relationship is romance. Person A meets Person B and they both live happily ever after is a simplistic explanation for one of life’s most difficult challenges.
Regardless of who is involved, whether it’s the characters in my stories, or my friends and family, romance is the initial stage in a relationship between individuals. I’ve been fortunate enough to find my happily ever after. Come September, my husband and I will have been married 47 years. To some, that sounds like a life sentence. It isn’t. It’s a wonderful adventure on occasionally stormy seas that makes life worth living.
But for some people, romance doesn’t necessarily lead to a long-term relationship as both MJ and Paul discover before they come together in my novel, Wedding Bell Blues.
As MJ puts it, “I thought Mark was the one. I knew he’d been a bit of a jerk when we were younger, but I really believed he’d changed. Until he cheated on me. Maybe the forever kind of love she and my father had really doesn’t exist anymore.”
Paul’s take on love is a bit different, born in his early years when all he saw was the dark said of love gone wrong. “I don’t believe in love, so when my fiancée dumped me, I wasn’t all that surprised. My mother loved my father, and all she got out of it was a broken nose and a broken heart. Love is for fools.”
How can these people learn to trust in love again? It all goes back to romance.
When Paul and MJ meet for the first time in fifteen years, each one takes something different away from the meeting, but neither can deny the attraction. He sees it as his duty to look out for his best friend’s kid sister, the girl who was the closest thing to a sister he would ever have. She saw her first love as a jerk who not only hadn’t recognized her but had called her fat and an old maid. He would be the last person she would ever turn to for help. But, no matter how hard they try, they can’t deny the attraction between them.
When MJ finds herself stuck on a honeymoon island resort, Paul, the last man she wants to rely on, turns out to be her only hope, and since he would do anything for her, Paul sees it as his duty to help her out going so far as proposing to marry her to save her reputation. But MJ wants what her parents had. Can she accept the idea of a loveless marriage?
The early stage of any relationship is the romance period, what my friend refers to as the chocolate and flowers season, a time when two people get to know one another, warts and all, and while my characters go through this at breakneck speed, they do get to know one another. MJ realizes that Paul is a man broken by time and circumstances and determines to show him that love exists and that he is worthy of it, while Paul realizes MJ is far more than his best friend’s kid sister—she’s an essential component of his ability to be the man he wants to be. But their road to love and a happily ever after isn’t easy, not with mermaids and pirate treasure to find, and Quimbois magic to muddy the waters. Come join them on their journey of discovery. You won’t regret it!
Book Blurb:
Romance, mermaids, cursed treasure, and more.
MJ’s having a bad year. She’s canceled her wedding but refuses to give up the honeymoon. When she arrives on Paradise Island, she discovers her ex has changed the reservation. Stranded, she has to rely on her first love, a man who sees her as his kid sister, for help. When Paul discovers the man behind her plight is the bully who made his own teen years hell, he gets MJ to agree to pretend to be his fiancée. Reluctantly, she agrees. Add in mermaids, treasure hunters, and Quimbois magic, and anything can happen—even falling in love.
Purchase Link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078J5GVJ7
Updated author bio:
Amazon bestselling author Susanne Matthews was born and raised in Cornwall, Ontario, Canada. She’s always been an avid reader of all types of books, but with a penchant for happily ever after romances. A retired educator, Susanne spends her time writing and creating adventures for her readers. She loves the ins and outs of romance, and the complex journey it takes to get from the first word to the last period of a novel. As she writes, her characters take on a life of their own, and she shares their fears and agonies on the road to self-discovery and love.
Not content with one subgenre, Susanne writes romance that ranges from contemporary to sci-fi and everything in between. When she isn’t writing, she’s reading, or traveling to interesting places she can use as settings in her future books. She always spending time with her husband and family whether that involves cuddling by the fire or traveling to various sports activities to cheer the grandkids on.
Follow Susanne on her: Website Blog Facebook page Twitter @jandsmatt
Amazon author page and Goodreads author page