Aftereffects by L.J. Greene - Book Tour - Guest Post - Playlist - Book Review - Giveaway - Enter Daily!

Hey lovelies!  It gives me great pleasure today to host L.J. Greene and her new book, “Aftereffects”!  For other stops on her Goddess Fish Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the images in this post.

Be sure to make it to the end of this post to enter to win a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble Gift Card!!  Also, come back daily to interact with L.J. and to increase your chances of winning!

Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you lots of luck in this fabulous giveaway!

Aftereffects

by L.J. Greene

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GENRE: Contemporary Romance

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BLURB:

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.

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EXCERPT TWO:

She rose from the table without looking at my face, which was a lucky thing, because the multitude of images that one sentence conjured was astounding and dangerous. I was unprepared. I opened my mouth to say something casual like Yeah, go for it, but if anything at all came out, it was most likely every thought-producing brain cell I had.

I blinked down at my hands and pretended to study the grouting tool intensely—like it was suddenly the most fascinating thing I’d ever seen. But I’m pretty sure that every nonplatonic feeling I had was now flashing neon across my face.

That had to stop immediately.

This just friends thing would work fine so long as everyone was in agreement. But if one person started having thoughts, the whole mess would come down like the house of cards that it was.

When Selene and I’d first met, I had the same reaction to her that any other warm-blooded male might have: she was fucking beautiful. And a badass with a jack. And yes, I flirted a little; she flirted too. And if I were back home under normal circumstances, there is no question I would ask her out, and I’d take things as far as she’d let me. A night? Longer if she wanted?

But we didn’t meet under normal circumstances, and I wasn’t in any position to be starting something with her. A little flirting was fine, but I definitely couldn’t let it go any further than that.

The problem was that finding out about her father changed something for me. It was a reflexive thing, an impulse that couldn’t have felt more natural. My protectiveness cut through the very separation I was trying to maintain. I knew there were plenty of good reasons to be cautious, but I couldn’t help but to want to be there for her. To hold her when she’d needed it, and to just listen, if that’s the only thing I could do.

Still, sitting there at her table as I watched her turn and walk down the hallway to her bedroom, a familiar sense of wariness took hold in my gut. The more time we spent together, the more aware I became of how risky that impulse was, given the chemistry we shared. Our friendship sat like a lush oasis on the threshold of an abyss—a beautiful place for my mind to go when I needed it, when she needed it.

But pass beyond friendship, and there be dragons.

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GUEST POST:

Aftereffects’ Keir Stevens on Cooking With Fire

Keir Stevens is a 31-year-old chef; owner of Blaze, a high-end catering business in Seattle renown for its open-fire grilling; also a fabulous brunette (of the male kind)

Fire.

I’ve been fascinated with it for so long I can’t remember ever becoming fascinated with it. There’s just something about its sheer, awesome power that captivated me from a very young age. You have to respect fire, and its most basic ability to preserve life and to take it. It’s always exciting, always unpredictable. Both terrifying and beautiful.

So if you had asked me at ten years old what superpower I most wanted? Fire hands, of course. Favorite comic hero? No question: Human Torch. Flame on!

And I shared every kids’ impulse to play with it whenever possible—in fact, my father’s worst nightmare was probably me sitting in front of a campfire with a stick in my hand and nothing to do. That would yield about a 97 percent chance of melted sneakers, assorted burns, or someone—likely him—taking an accidental stick to the face.

I distinctly remember one summer when we were camping up in Henley Woods near San Francisco, and I want to say I was maybe twelve years old. Rather than quizzing me on state capitals or American presidents like he usually did to pass the time when we camped, he handed me my own Jiffy Pop, the kind with the long wire handle.

What he wisely understood about me and the whole process of making Jiffy Pop over a campfire was that if I got too close to the open flame, the foil would burn, and the popcorn inside would be ruined. And if I was impatient and tried to rush it, I’d end up with almost nothing popped that was edible. But if I took my time, was careful, and focused on the end reward—all things that went directly against my nature, by the way—I could make something I wanted, and keep myself out of trouble in the process.

He saw it as leveraging my innate competitiveness to teach me to overcome a tendency toward hyperactivity. At twelve, I saw it as me battling a great force of nature, and bending its power to my will.

I saw it as my own kick-ass superpower.

Over the years, Jiffy Pop became our tradition, and he and I would have contests to see which of us could yield the most perfectly shaped dome, which of us could produce no burned pieces, which of us could end up with the fewest unpopped kernels. I held the record at six. He was neck and neck at seven.

It’s no wonder that those quiet nights with him remain some of the best memories of my life.

In time, that fascination with fire evolved into my multimillion-dollar partnership with it, a catering business inspired by Francis Mallmann–style cooking. Preparing a meal over an open flame has never lost its thrill for me.

It has never stopped feeling like my superpower.

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PLAYLIST:

Aftereffects Playlist

1.) Pieces by Rob Thomas

2.) Water Under the Bridge by Adele

3.) Unsteady by X Ambassadors

4.) Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen

5.) Where You Go by The Young Romans

6.) I Get to Love You by Ruelle

7.) Anyway by Martina McBride

8.) Make You Feel My Love by Adele

9.) Keep It Precious by Melissa Etheridge

10.) Not Easy by Alex Da Kid (featuring X Ambassadors)

11.) Same As You by The Fray

12.) Love Me Now by John Legend

13.) Shameless by Garth Brooks

14.) We'll Pick Up Where We Left Off by O.A.R.

15.) Please Forgive Me by David Gray

16.) The Wind by The Fray

17.) Sky Blue and Black by Jackson Browne

18.) Something by Marc Scibilia

19.) Two of Me, Two of You by Jackson Browne

20.) When You Love Someone by Bryan Adams

21.) So Close to Magic by Aquilo

22.) The Dance by Garth Brooks

23.) Changing Tides by The Fray

24.) You're Missing by Bruce Springsteen

​25.) Fair Fight by The Fray

26.) All I Ask by Adele

27.) Boulder to Birmingham by The Fray

28.) Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) by Green Day

29.) I'm Alive by Jackson Browne

30.) Let's Hurt Tonight by OneRepublic

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BOOK REVIEW:

Last year, I had the pleasure of reviewing L.J.’s book, “Sound Effects,” which is Book Two in the Ripple Effects Book Series, and it comes just before today’s featured book, “Aftereffects,” Book Three in the series.  I really enjoyed reading, “Sound Effects,” and gave it a strong FIVE-STAR rating!!  It was such a fun, hot, sexy read filled with excitement, love, romance, adventure, and passion!!  It was well written and thoroughly researched.  L.J.'s latest book sounds just as incredible and I can't wait to check it out!!  Check out my book review and last year’s book tour post at the links below.  I'm sure you'll definitely be wanting to add the WHOLE book series to your TBR List as this is one series you don't want to miss out on!!!

Check out my book review on the blog here:

https://fabulousandbrunette.blogspot.com/2017/01/sound-effects-by-lj-greene-book-tour.html

Did you find this review helpful?

If so, please, please, please mark it as helpful on Amazon here:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/review/R3W2CBBIHQHEE0

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AUTHOR BIO:

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.

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CONNECT WITH L.J.:

Website:

www.ljgreenebooks.com

Blog:

https://www.ljgreenebooks.com/blog.html

Email:

https://www.ljgreenebooks.com/contact-me.html

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100009405693070

Twitter:

https://twitter.com/authorljgreene

BookBub Author Page:

https://www.bookbub.com/authors/l-j-greene

Goodreads Author Page:

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14165132.L_J_Greene

Goodreads Book Page:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41634021-aftereffects

Amazon Author Page:

https://amzn.to/2UthmH8

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BOOK BUY LINKS:

Amazon Kindle:

https://amzn.to/2SAZSH3

Barnes and Noble:

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/aftereffects-lj-greene/1129490736

Kobo:

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/aftereffects

Apple iBooks:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/aftereffects/id1435706918

The Book Depository:

https://www.bookdepository.com/Aftereffects-Lj-Greene/9780998271613

BAM! Books-A-Million:

https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Aftereffects/Lj-Greene/9780998271613

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GIVEAWAY INFO:

L.J. will be awarding a $25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a purchase made I may receive a small commission to help support this blog.  This does not cost you anything, it just helps pay for all those awesome giveaways on here.**

This contest is sponsored by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish Promotions.  Prizes are given away by the sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.