“Grace Unexpected”, a Romantic Comedy by Gale Martin

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Today we meet Gale Martin, the author of Grace Unexpected, the dating life of a 30-something: Grace has slogged through crummy jobs and dead-end relationships with men who would rather go bald than say “I do” …    

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How would you describe your book to someone who has not yet read it?
Grace Unexpected is a romantic comedy about a smart, fun-loving professional woman who blunders into an unexpected romantic triangle.

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Grace Unexpected by Gale Martin

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Grace Unexpected has a promotion on Sunday, March 24, and is available at all retailers for only $0.99.  So, readers can take advantage of this amazing offer and download chick-lit at its finest. Wit, drama and surprise fill every page. A 5- star read. 273 pages of fun!

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Is there a message in your book that you want your readers to grasp?

Love will find you, if you let it.

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How did you get the idea for the novel?
I don’t travel to the extent that a lot of people do, I suppose, so any trip I take makes a profound impression on me. When I visited Shaker Village in Canterbury, New Hampshire in 2005, I couldn’t stop thinking about the place. Everyone’s lives were so neat and ordered and prescribed. The idea of a place for everything (and everyone) and everything in its place is attractive, to a degree, until it becomes stifling.
So, when I learned men and women were expected to live in celibate community in Shaker Village during the 19th and most of the 20th centuries, it profoundly affected me. I am a better person for having found a wonderful, loving man for a life partner. The more I thought about it, the more severe it seemed to restrict an entire culture of women intimacy with the opposite sex while LIVING alongside men. I wrote a short story about Grace visiting Shaker Village that eventually evolved into a novel.

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Give us an excerpted quote from your favorite review of this book:
“I absolutely LOVED Gale Martin’s, Grace Unexpected and recommend it to anyone who loves chick lit. Grace Unexpected has it all: sexual frustration, great friendships, witty dialogue, hilarious scenes, and even a shocking twist thrown in that will shock you!  Do yourself a favor and read this great book, you won’t be disappointed!” — Candace Lybarger, Endless Days of Literary Ecstacy

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Are your characters based on real people?
My characters are inspired by real people because real people are hilarious and infuriating and endearing, alternately. In this novel Lacy is is several wretched annual fund directors rolled into one treacherous young woman. True was inspired by a very charismatic 60-something I met when I was 30-something, whose charm and physical appeal left an indelible impression on me.

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What inspired you to start writing?

After being a lifelong reader, I woke up one day in midlife and started writing a novel. It helped me deal with a lot of heart hurts I’d accumulated but hadn’t surfaced since my teenage years, and I found the writing to be actually pretty cathartic. So, I began writing at age 46 and haven’t stopped writing since.

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What would/could a reader or reviewer say about this book that shows they “get” you as an author?

Here’s an excerpt of a review from Barbara Bamberger Scott that shows she gets me as a storyteller: “Martin has taken a likable smart young woman and dropped her into what seems like an overwhelming series of landslides (relationship woes, job stress, sprained shoulder, car on the blink, enemy of the powerful) and then it seems, she watches with us as her character comes alive and digs herself out. We are all amazed at Grace.”
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If Oprah invited you onto her show to talk about your book, what would the theme of the show be? Today on Oprah we’re talking to women who fell in love with much younger men and women who fell for much older men. Can relationships with either (or both) can really work? In Gale Martin’s newest novel, her protagonist Grace Savage becomes involved with one of each–a young stud and a silver fox.

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Gale Martin

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What scene or bit of dialogue in the book are you most proud of, and why?

Beginning on p. 171 — “If you’ve ever grown zucchini, you know they all ripen the same day. You wait all of June and July for zucchini. August rolls around, and one day—bam! You have more zucchini than you know what to do with. You start handing them out to your neighbors and friends at work because there’s no way any single person can handle all that zucchini. Not even if you’re smart and resourceful and have accumulated dozens of good recipes, not even a person who likes zucchini as much as I do.”

I love that passage because it shows how funny and literary Grace is, relying on an extended metaphor to carry the humor.
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Grace Unexpected can be found at Amazon

Barnes&Noble  and Local Booksellers / Kobo

Grace Unexpected has a promotion on Sunday, March 24, and is available at all retailers for only $0.99.  So, readers can take advantage of this amazing offer and download chick-lit at its finest. Wit, drama and surprise fill every page. A 5-star read. 273 pages of fun!

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“Grace Unexpected”, a novel by Gale Martin

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‘Boy, are YOU in for a surprise…’
“I thoroughly enjoyed reading Grace Unexpected  and those around me thoroughly enjoyed watching me jump out of my seat and scream “ARE YOU SERIOUS?” while reading the second to last chapter of the book. Want to find out more? You’ll just have to pick this one up!”
Reviewer N. Whiffen, Amazon.com
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What others say:

“Martin delivers an engaging plot, with witty banter, comedic elements that border on farce and cleverly titled chapters . . . its ending contains a welcome twist. An entertaining light read.”
— Kirkus Reviews

“This is Gale Martin’s second novel and I can’t wait to see what she does next. Not many authors can be intelligent, witty and funny with such ease. Five and of five huge stars.”
— Book Evolution

“I absolutely LOVED Gale Martin’s ‘Grace Unexpected’ and recommend it to anyone who
loves chick lit.”
— Endless Days of Literary Ecstacy

“GRACE UNEXPECTED is chick-lit at its finest. Wit, drama and surprise fill every page. A 5-
star read. 273 pages of fun!”
— Literary R&R

“A simple gift of comic genius”

“Calling all single ladies! In this charming and witty story, Gale Martin reminds us how humorous and daunting the dating life can be. GRACE UNEXPECTED is a delightful mix of love and loss. Snark kept me laughing on each page, but it was Grace Savage’s voice that kept me wanting more.”
— Marni Mann

Read more Book-Blurbs 
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About the book:

Thirty-something Grace Savage has slogged through crummy jobs and dead-end relationships with men who would rather go bald than say “I do”. In search of a respite from her current job, she visits a Shaker Village in New Hampshire. Instead of renewal, she’s unnerved to learn that Shaker men and women lived and worked side by side in complete celibacy.

When her longtime boyfriend dumps her instead of proposing, Grace avows the sexless Shaker ways. Resolved to stick to her new plan – dubbed the Shaker Plan – and despite the fact that her ovaries are ticking, she returns to her life in Pennsylvania.  Almost immediately, she’s juggling two eligible bachelors: Addison, a young beat reporter; and True, a venerable anthropology professor. Both men have ample charms and real soul mate potential to test her new-found Shaker-style self-control. Grace appears to be on the fast track to a marriage proposal… until secrets revealed deliver a death rattle to the Shaker Plan.
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Grace Unexpected, e-book ($3.99) and print ( $13.35), 273 pages,
Amazon:
Barnes&Noble
Independent Bookstores in North America with store locator

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Gale Martin

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About the Author

Gale Martin  is an award-winning writer of contemporary fiction who plied her childhood penchant for lying into a legitimate literary pursuit during midlife. She began writing her first novel at age eleven, finishing her first book three decades later.

Her debut novel, DON JUAN IN HANKEY, PA, published in 2011, is a humorous backstage novel inspired by Don Giovanni, Mozart’s famous tragicomic opera about the last two days of Don Juan’s life. It was named a Finalist in the 2012 National Indie Excellence Awards for New Fiction.

Her second novel GRACE UNEXPECTED, published in 2012, is wryly witty women’s fiction that features a protagonist who can hear her ovaries ticking, who has a heart of pure gold, wrapped in lead. But a string of crummy boyfriends would do that to any lovable woman while waiting for Mr. Right.

She has a master of arts in creative writing from Wilkes University. Her work has been published in: The Christian Science Monitor, Duck & Herring Company’s Pocket Field Guide, Sirens Magazine, Giggle Water Review, and in several anthologies.  Gale hosts a blog about opera called “Operatoonity.com” and an opera-themed Twitter account @operatoonity.
Visit her Goodreads presence
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Gale is a also a very popular guest speaker, her next appearances are:

• AAUW Book and Author Luncheon, Willingboro, NJ, April 26, 2013
• Author Event, Alvernia University Literary Festival, Reading, PA, October 24, 2013
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Don’t miss to read Gale Martin’s blog when visiting her appealing website http://galemartin.me.  Every time I log on, I enjoy her amazing posts, and spend way too much time reading it all. Her website is a real show case, a role model for other authors.
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