The Reason Is You Blog Tour

There are some books you can tell by the cover and blurb are going to be your kind of book. I felt that way about The Reason Is You by Sharla Lovelace. Isn't that a great cover? Today, I am happy to be a part of the The Reason Is You Book Tour. Author Sharla Lovelace has written a guest post and provided us with an excerpt. She is also holding a giveaway. We hope you enjoy the reading and follow her tour. Welcome. I will be sharing my review soon.

The Reason Is You 
by Sharla Lovelace 
Genre: Contemporary romance, paranormal
Format: paperback, 320pages, and ebook
Publisher: Berkley Trade (April 3, 2012)
BLURB: In the small river town of Bethany, Dani Shane never fit in. Being different pushed her to the fringes of society, and even leaving town for two decades didn't stop the talk. Now, with her sixteen year-old daughter Riley in tow, Dani is back in Bethany looking for a fresh start. Too bad her plans for staying under the radar are about to be thrown out the window. 

Mischievous and sexy, Dani's old friend Alex still has the power to rock her world, but there's a big obstacle standing in their way—Alex has been dead for forty years. With a ghost popping up at inopportune moments and sparking conversations with her teenage daughter, Dani scrambles to find solid ground and get a grip—both on her sanity and her heart.

Guest Post by Sharla Lovelace
Hello and so glad to be here! I’m enjoying all these stops and love meeting new readers, so this has been a whirlwind.

I’m talking a little bit about what brought about the ghostly storyline in THE REASON IS YOU. I’ve touched on this before, but basically I can’t seem to help myself when it comes to adding a touch of mystical or supernatural to my stories. It may not start out that way, but it always manages to seep into the cracks. Something a little weird or off kilter.

I started this story with just the worn out single mom returning to her hometown with her teenage daughter. I knew the dynamics of that, I knew what the problems might be, but it fell flat for me. It needed the weird.

Enter Alex.

Alex was a ghost that came to me ready to go, full of cockiness and snark and yet loving and loyal to the end.

And hot. :)

He was just what my main character needed—a reason to be nervous about going home. A reason to be nervous that her daughter would question things. A reason to worry again about other people catching her talking to a ghost. A past history of talking to spirits and hiding it was an exciting storyline to me. It gave her flaws and depth and interest. And it allowed me to play around in a medium I’d never been in before. I got to create some of my own rules and boundaries, and that was soooo much fun.

Playing Dani, the main character, between two men living and dead, was also a blast and sometimes crazy to write. Obviously that kind of love triangle—and physical aspects of it—have limitations, so I had to get creative. Hopefully you’ll enjoy where I went with that…lol.

In using ghosts, I got to bring in some other fun characters as well, which you’ll see. I hope you enjoy the book, and thanks again for letting me come chat with you! Feel free to ask me any questions!

~Sharla

An excerpt from The Reason Is You: 

Preface: Dani and her teenage daughter, Riley have arrived back in Dani’s hometown, and one of the first things Dani has to deal with is catching her daughter talking to her old best friend Alex in the front yard. Alex is a ghost… 

My head said to walk forward, but my feet went numb. Then he looked my direction, and suddenly I was head-to-toe buzz with blood rushing in my ears. I took a deep breath and attempted normal as I made it down the steps without tripping. 

Riley saw Alex. Riley wasn’t supposed to see people like Alex. 

She had her usual folded-arms-with-one-hip-jutted stance, looking annoyed as hell, while Bojangles circled the yard in a frenzy with his nose to the ground. Alex slowly took off his glasses and locked his blue eyes in on mine with that arrogant little smile of his. I felt heat radiate from every pore. 

“Dani,” he said, low and smooth, and all the breath left me. “My God, look at you.” 

I opened my mouth to say the same thing, that after twenty-plus years he still looked exactly the same, hot enough to melt my shoes. But then the mommy gene stood up and waved and I remembered Riley was there. 

He laughed, a deep throaty sound, as he pointed at Riley. 

“I knew it had to be.” 

A nervous noise squawked from my mouth. Nothing profound like I always imagined it would be. 

“The eyes were the first clue,” he said with a wink. 

Riley frowned, her expression a mix of disgust and wariness. 

“God, you know this perv? He was here on the car watching me and won’t tell me who the hell he is.” 

He smirked. “The sweet, gentle nature was the clincher.”

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About the author: 
Sharla once hunted for crab in a Honduran jungle, and explored an unknown cave on her belly through a rabbit hole. Not in the same night.

Now, she lives in Southeast Texas by the Neches River with her family, an old lady dog, and 19 cockatiels. If you wonder how she writes with all that noise--the birds actually have their own house outside. THE REASON IS YOU is her debut novel.

When she's not writing, doing the day job, or doing the family thing, she's stalking her Twitter feed. 

Giveaway: 

Sharla will be giving away a $20 Amazon or BN gift certificate to one randomly drawn commenter during the tour and a $15 Amazon or BN gift certificate to the host with the most comments (excluding Sharla's or the host's). The tour dates can be found here.