Welcome to the virtual book tour for Aftereffects by L.J. Greene. Today's stop is one of my favorite kinds of stops, where the characters take over to talk to us. Keir and Selene are sharing their thoughts about the dual POV that takes place in their book. Please enjoy this and then enjoy an excerpt before you download the book. Leave the author (and characters) questions and comments. Be sure to enter the giveaway as you follow the tour for more fun!
Keir: So the question here is what . . . why we didn’t want some third person telling our story for us?
Selene: Yeah, that’s the question.
Keir: Why would we want that?
Selene: I don’t know—because a third person is unbiased, I guess. And they can speak to what other people are thinking, too.
Keir: What other people? The story is pretty much just us.
Selene: Like Justin, for example.
Keir: No one cares what Justin thinks. I don’t even care what Justin thinks.
Selene: (laughs) Nah, I really don’t care, either.
Keir: Besides, Aftereffects isn’t about some bank heist. It’s a love story.
Selene: A friends-to-lovers love story.
Keir: Exactly. It’s kind of personal. To have had some third person telling it would’ve been weird. Don’t you think?
Selene: I agree. Another option, though, is that I could’ve told it.
Keir: By yourself?
Selene: Yes.
Keir: Not happening.
Selene: Why?
Keir: That’s boring.
Selene: What?
Keir: You’d have spent the whole book going ooohhh Keir, he’s so hot, he’s so perfect, he has such a big—
Selene: Keir!
Keir: (laughs) You know you would.
Selene: You’re the most annoying.
Keir: And you, Ms. Georgiou, are my aching, forever love. But you have to admit, Aftereffects is much better because I’m in it. Also, not to bring up a sore subject here, but you didn’t always read the tealeaves correctly when it came to us.
Selene: Ouch.
Keir: It’s true, though.
Selene: It’s kind of true. Much as I hate to admit it to your arrogant, smug face.
Keir: Handsome, did you say?
Selene: I didn’t say that, no.
Keir: (smiles) And don’t forget that I told some great stories in Aftereffects.
Selene: Like what stories?
Keir: Like the Jiffy Pop story in Chapter 21. I gave some valuable insight into my upbringing.
Selene: You mean how ten-year-old you ran around pretending to be a superhero?
Keir: Human Torch, baby. Flame on! (reaches out for a fist bump)
Selene: Flame on!
Keir: You know, one of the reviewers said they loved the way I told the part about when you made me go with you to Bloomingdales.
Selene: I didn’t make you. You were holding up your side of a bargain.
Keir: Yeah, whatever.
Selene: I’m still a little mad at you for that chapter, by the way. Did you really have to tell everyone about . . . you know . . .
Keir: (grins big) I don’t think I do. What are you referring to?
Selene: Hush, you.
Keir: (laughs) You’re blushing! That part was awesome . . . Any guy would agree. And that’s why we needed my POV. We needed a man’s perspective.
Selene: And what would’ve been your perspective on the part where you told me you wanted every side of me in every light of day for as long as we have.
Keir: I don’t remember it like that.
Selene: Which is why we needed my perspective. (smiles big) It’s all right there in Chapter 12.
Keir: I knew I should’ve narrated that chapter. And speaking of which, I need to talk to L.J. about the number of chapters I got. I don’t think it was 50/50.
Selene: She probably didn’t think you could keep a secret.
Keir: What do you mean?
Selene: I think she wanted me to tell the earlier chapters because good storytelling means you let a story out slowly. And you’re kind of . . .
Keir: I’m kind of what?
Selene: Awesome. (smiles)
Keir: No. (laughs) Nice try, Georgiou. What were you going to say? I’m kind of what?
Selene: You’re just very . . . introspective. You analyze everything. Which is a good thing. It’s one of your best qualities, Keir.
Keir: But?
Selene: No but.
Keir: (raises a brow)
Selene: I just think once you got rolling, you would have told the whole thing in one long chapter and not left anything for me.
Keir: So you’re saying I’m too awesome of a storyteller.
Selene: I don’t think that’s what I said at all.
Keir: And a bit of a demigod.
Selene: It’s a good thing I love you.
Keir: It’s a damn good thing you love me.
Aftereffects
What could be more terrifying than falling in love with the person who is your good place? Maybe realizing just a smidge too late that there can be dire consequences to becoming your best friend’s lover.The lives of Keir Stevens and Selene Georgiou serendipitously collide midspan on San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, one jarring step ahead of fate. He’s a temporary transplant from Seattle; she’s facing the biggest career opportunity of her life. They have no notion of the common thread that connects them.
As they come to discover they share a similar adversity, their relationship evolves from a fun and frivolous infatuation with nowhere to go into a true friendship with sincerity, humor, and respect at its heart.
It’s awfully hard not to fall in love with that—even if you’re pretty darn certain you shouldn’t.
But when love and friendship suffer their own devastating collision—their interests brutally conflicting—the consequences of blurring the lines between the two suddenly become real. In the end, which one will be the stronger? And more importantly, can either survive?
AFTEREFFECTS is a standalone dual POV adult contemporary romance about the things we choose in life out of all the things that are beyond our choosing—a tale of love and friendship, of time and how we spend it, and of the inner wars that ultimately show us what really matters.
Read an excerpt:
It was always that first look of his that killed me. Unfiltered, it was like intensity and appetite combined in a way I’d never seen before on anyone. I couldn’t say it was aimed at me specifically, but it definitely affected me. It felt like fire racing through my veins whenever he looked at me that way. Luckily, it only ever lasted a second before he blinked and something more benign replaced it.
Tonight that something was a broad, boyish grin that grew on his face as he rose from his stool, rocking that five-o’clock shadow and a pair of Levis like nobody’s business. A forest-green sweater stretched across his chest.
It had been more than two weeks since he came to my house for dinner, and seeing him again caused a complicated ache to push through me. He had so quickly and unexpectedly become a friend in the most genuine sense. We talked on the phone often, and had forged a connection that I didn’t have with anyone else.
But he was also like a warm chocolate brownie being waved under my nose.
I wanted to say that I didn’t notice how tempting he was. But the truth is, I did really, really love brownies . . .
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LJ Greene is a self-professed obsessive multi-tasker who writes really boring stuff by day and lets her inner romantic fly by night. This California native is married to the most amazing man and has two beautiful children, not old enough to read her books. (They probably wouldn’t want to anyway on account of the “Ew, gross” factor.) She’s an avid reader of all genres with an embarrassingly large ebook collection, and a weird penchant for reading the acknowledgements at the end of a novel. She's also a music lover with no apparent musical talent, a travel enthusiast, and a cheese connoisseur.
Author Website and Info:
www.ljgreenebooks.com
Twitter: @authorljgreene
Facebook: LJ Greene
LJ Greene will be awarding a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.
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