Newly released this week Hold On To Me by Victoria Purman.
There’s a signed paperback GIVEAWAY too!

Giveaway open to Australian postral addressees only.
Giveaway open until midnight, AEST, Saturday 19th December 2015

GIVEAWAY NOW ENDED

Can she learn to trust him and love again?

Stella wasn’t looking for love – and especially not from a younger man…

When Stella Ryan’s successful life in Sydney crumbled, she returned flat broke – and broken hearted – to the beachside town she’d once called home. Five years on, she’s opened a boutique and rebuilt her life in the tourist haven of Port Elliot.

Luca Morelli has been working flat out to establish his own building company in the city and doesn’t have time to be driving back and forth to the beach to do a small job in a shop that was almost destroyed in a fire. But he soon changes his mind when he meets the glamorous owner.

Before long, Stella and Luca find that a working relationship isn’t the only thing developing between them. But the closer they get, the ghosts of Stella’s past come to haunt her once more. Can she ever believe a man again? And if she can, is the much younger Luca Morelli the man she can trust with her heart?

A word from Victoria…

Back to the Beach…

Two and a bit years ago, my first book was published.

It was “Nobody But Him” and it became the first in my Boys of Summer series for Harlequin Australia.

It was such a natural fit for me to set these books on the beach and write what one of our US friends would call a “small town romance”. My family and I spend lots of time every summer on South Australia’s south coast. I used those holidays as the inspiration for stories of seachanges, small communities and close friends. It also gave me ample opportunity to describe handsome men in board shorts as well!

After the success of “Nobody But Him”, I continued the series with “Someone Like You” and then “Our Kind of Love”. I really grew to love all the characters from those books, three interlinking couples who all find love and family in my fictitious coastal town of Middle Point.

And when I had the opportunity to write another book for Harlequin? Well, I couldn’t pass up the chance to head back to Middle Point, could I?

“Hold On To Me” is the love story of Stella Ryan (who featured in the first book) and Luca Morelli (who appeared in the third book as Anna Morelli’s brother).

She’s heartbroken and hurt and definitely isn’t looking for love with a younger man. He’s setting up his own business and doesn’t have time to head down to Middle Point and help a boutique owner who’s lost everything in a fire.

But in my world, these two people who are perfect for each other simply have to find love. And luckily for you, my lovely readers, they do! But it’s the getting there that is the fun part – and I hope you enjoy Stella and Luca’s journey.

Victoria

Excerpt from Hold On To Me by Victoria Purman

What was that noise?

Stella Ryan rubbed her sleepy eyes, tossed back the cotton sheets on her bed and sat up. She stifled her yawn and tried to be still to hear what was going on. She cocked her head to the side and swept her ruffed hair behind one ear.

Was that a siren?

Car horns? Listening closer, Stella could make out the distinctive heavy chugging and throaty throbbing of a truck engine. Some- thing was going on: she got out of bed to investigate. She reached for her silk kimono, slipped it on, jogged outside, closed her front door and glanced past her low stone front fence and then up and down her narrow street. The historic sandstone cottages on either side of hers and across the road were quiet. A sea breeze blew up from Horseshoe Bay and rustled the leaves in the street trees. Her neighbour’s teenaged son’s car was parked out the front of her place. Again. Everything looked as it should.

But an unfamiliar cacophony had woken her. It was a Sunday morning in the earliest days of summer in a small beachside town—normally the only sounds were birdsong and the muted rumble of the sea. And now, an acrid smell like burning plastic was battling with the salty breeze, wafting unpleasantly all around her.

Stella walked out of her narrow front garden and let her ears lead her. She turned left towards the main street and then left again into e Strand. She pulled the antique silk tighter around her and tugged a tight knot at her waist as she picked up her pace, her leather thongs slapping on the road.

There was increasing commotion in the distance and, when she crossed the train line, she stopped short for a moment in shock. Country Fire Service trucks, police cars and an ambulance were parked at the northern end of the street. People were milling around everywhere, slowly emerging from their holiday rentals and houses in dressing gowns and bed hair. She barely registered the bare chests and low-slung boardshorts on the young men; the holidaymakers with small children still in their pyjamas, mesmerised by the trucks and the lights.

The northern end of the Strand, away from the beach. Something was going on up there. Something bad.

That’s where her shop was. Style by Stella. Her business. Her labour of love.
Her whole life.

Fear squeezed the air from Stella’s lungs. She kicked up one foot behind her, then the other, yanked her thongs off, and bolted, bare-foot, right up the middle of the bitumen road to the end of the street. Her kimono uttered against her legs like a flag.

Soon her heart was throbbing and her lungs were burning from the sprint. Smoke stung her eyes and tiny bits of ash floated in the street like summertime snow.

This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening.

Fifty metres from her shop, a police car was angled across the road, blocking it, its lights flashing. When Stella tried to get past it, a uniform held her back. A uniform with a tight blonde bun at her neckline. Size twelve. Shoes eight and a half. Favourite colour magenta. Stella reached out to touch the officer’s elbow.

‘Courtney?’ Her voice came out thin. ‘What’s going on?’

‘Oh, Stella.’ The police officer turned. Stella could see her friend was trying to keep things professional, but also that she was shaken. Courtney took her hand and squeezed it. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t let you through just yet. The CFS is still in there making sure the fire is out.’

Stella felt sick, the nausea rising fast in her stomach, and she pressed a hand to her belly to tamp it down.

‘A fire?’ Her voice caught. ‘Oh, god. It’s my shop, isn’t it?’
Hold On To Me is available in eBook and paperback from all good retailers.
BUY NOW
Booktopia
Amazon Australia
iBooks
Kobo

 

Read more about Victoria and her books on
MEET VICTORIA PURMAN

 

 

Leave a comment for Victoria and you’re in the draw to WIN
a signed paperback of Hold On To Me!

Giveaway open to Australian postral addressees only.
Giveaway open until midnight, AEST, Saturday 19th December 2015.

GIVEAWAY NOW ENDED
and the winner is: Wendy Hatton!
Congratulations Wendy, and Victoria says thank you to everyone who left a comment.

Return to HOME page
Return to BLOG