Personal

• Can you tell us a little about yourself? I live in San Diego, CA with my husband and our two heathens—I mean, adorable daughters.  When I’m not writing, reading, or chasing my girls, I try to have as much fun as I can with family and friends.
• Do you have a day job? Yes, what can I say, my kids like to eat and won’t stop growing! ; )  Writing doesn’t pay the bills fully – yet!
• What was the greatest thing you learned at school? I think the greatest things I learned were outside the classroom.  The social aspects of school – learning to interact with others, finding your way and how you fit in the scheme of things, figuring out who you are, etc. – I feel were more important than what I memorized out of books.
• Do you laugh at your own jokes?  Sometimes, depends on the joke.
• Why do you think what you do matters? My daughters.  I’m not perfect, but I know they look to me as an example of how to be and I’m doing my best to try and make them proud.
• Have you ever found true love?  Yes!  I met him 11 years ago and haven’t let go, nor do I plan to.
• Do you have a saying or motto for your life and/or as a writer? Not so much as a writer, but just for life in general, “Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans” – John Lennon.  So simple, yet so meaningful.
• What is something you never leave home without (apart from keys, phone, money, and ID)? There’s not really much other than my iPhone – I have an app for almost everything in my life.  My husband teases me that he knows I’ll be just fine if I ever get stranded in the woods because he’s sure I’ll have a survival app I can use.
• Where can people find you on the web? Where can they read more about your books? The best place is my website is www.kristenbeairsto.com.  I’m also on Facebook (www.facebook.com/authorkristenbeairsto) and Twitter (www.twitter.com/authorkbeairsto).

Your Novel

• What is your book about? Jules is the heroine and she’s responsible for her five younger brothers and sisters after the death of their parents.  But to help make ends meet, she works as a consultant to a black market antiques dealer.  Her old high school crush, Roman, reenters her life and she struggles with the possibility of a relationship and trying to keep her secret.
• What about your book might pique the reader’s interest? I think readers will find they can relate to Jules and Roman.  Although she’s intelligent enough to have skipped multiple grades at a time, Jules is a woman who feels awkward with herself and is struggling to give her siblings the best life she can at the risk of her own safety and happiness.  There are so many of us out there that feel and do the same thing.  Roman is a Navy vet who is trying to figure out his place in the world after being wounded and experiencing life in a war zone.  I think a lot of people can relate to just wanting to figure out where they belong.
• Are the names of the characters in your novel important? Although, it’s not an incredibly deep meaning, there is some.  Jules and her siblings are named after Shakespeare characters (Jules is short for Juliet).  Roman’s nick name from high school is Romeo as a nod to their opposites attract theme since he was the high school heartthrob and she was the school geek.
• How did you choose your title? Because Jules has an affinity for books I wanted the title to have something to do with books.  I’m horrible at figuring out titles for stories!  But during the editing process, I was struck by one of the lines Roman has about Jules making an assumption about him and “judging a book by its cover”.  I realized that phrase covered so many facets of the book that I had to use it for the title.
• Who is your most unusual/most likeable character? Other than Roman and Jules, I think the most likeable character in the story is Roman’s brother, Richard.  He’s the town sheriff and a stickler for the rules, understandably.  But there’s just something about him that I think people will like despite the fact that he makes mistakes.
• You got the call – your novel is being made into a TV series or movie – who’s in your dream cast? Hmmm, not sure about the female lead, but without a doubt, my dream male lead is Channing Tatum.  Mmmmm, sorry I need a minute . . . ; )

Writing

• How many people (i.e. characters) have you done away with in the course of your career? Too many to count. Oh, that sounds bad!
• Have you ever regretted killing one of them off? No. J  I even once killed off one of my best friends in an unpublished story, but without her death there wouldn’t have been a story.  Sorry, Heather! J
• How much impact does your childhood have on your writing? I don’t think I’d be where I was if I’d had a different childhood.  I received nothing but encouragement as a kid and it’s because of it that I’ve been able to pursue my writing career.
• What’s your writing schedule like? Do you strive for a certain amount of words each day? Basically, I write whenever I can.  Between a full time job, two kids, and a husband, I get in as much as I can whenever I can without losing too much sleep.
• What is the most difficult part of the writing process? The easiest? The hardest part is getting the rough draft completed.  Because I don’t have a regular writing schedule and I sometimes only have time to write 500 words a day, there are times when it feels like it takes FOREVER to finish a first draft of a story.  The easiest for me is the editing process.  I love working on a story and taking the time to make it better.
• How many stories are swirling around in your head? Do you keep a mental list, a computer file, or a spiral notebook filled with the ideas?  Right now, there’s 8 stories floating around in my head, 5 are outlined but I haven’t started them yet and 2 others are still working themselves out.  I try to write them down, but it doesn’t always happen, so I’m more of a mental list gal.
• Who gave you the best writing advice you ever received and what was it?  The best writing advice I’ve ever seen was something I read in an interview with Isaac Asimov when I was really young.  He said the best way to become a better writer is to read and write.  Since then, I’ve seen that same advice given time and time again.  So basic, but so true.
• Have you written any other books?  Yes, I have three other novels — Love Like Krazy, Sugar & Spice, and Going After the Heart.

Fun (Crazy, odd questions just for fun)

• Have you ever gone out in public in mis-matched shoes, or with your shirt on backward, and when you realized it just said ‘eh, screw it’?  No, but I’d probably say screw it if it did happen.
• Are you a neat freak? Or clutter-bound?  I’m a weirdo and a combo of the two, don’t like things crazy neat, but don’t care for a lot of clutter either.  Of course, with kids, it gets hard to keep things even reasonably neat on a regular basis.
• You were just given a yacht. What would you name it? Girls Just Want to Have Fun
• Someday I want to _____ (fill in the blank) Spend an entire day sitting at an Italian villa, sipping some really good wine and watching the clouds roll across the sky.
• If you could have a super power, what would it be? Hmmm, tough!  Probably the ability to not have to sleep – I’d get so much more done!!
• How many licks does it take to get to the middle of a Tootsie Pop? 5, because I start chewing on it after that. J

Quick Questions

• Sing in the rain or dance in the streets?  Sing
• Pen or pencil? Pen – I like to live dangerously
• Summer or Winter? Winter
• Movies or TV? TV
• Theater or DVD? DVD
• Rural or Urban? Rural
• Facial hair or clean shaven?  Facial hair – I’m a 5 o’clock shadow kind of girl
• Cowboy or Bad Boy? Cowboy
• Sunrise or Sunset? Sunrise
• Fall leaves or Spring flowers? Spring Flowers
• Peanut butter or jelly? Peanut Butter – best food ever!
• Spender or Saver?  My inner saver is easily silenced by the spender showing her a cute pair of shoes

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Blurb

Books have always been Juliet Marlowe’s sanctuary; the one place she would never be judged or made to feel like an outcast.  But when tragedy strikes, she has to get her nose out of the antique tomes she prefers and become the guardian of her five younger brothers and sisters.

Jules struggles to make ends meet.  And with the constant threat of losing custody of her siblings if she doesn’t maintain the standard of living previously set by her parents, she finds herself forced to make tough decisions and take risks.

One thing she knows for certain is she definitely does not have room in her life for a relationship.  Especially with a man who’s trying to readjust to civilian life and who once held a starring role in her secret fantasies.  No, absolutely not, she does not have any room in her life for Roman Price and his smoldering gaze that triggers her irritating blushes with only a thought.

But when everything Jules has built threatens to collapse on her, she finds herself not only accepting Roman’s offer of help, but starts to question whether or not she misjudged the situation from the beginning.

Excerpt

Roman fought desperately to keep his shock in check.

This long-legged beauty was Juliet Marlowe?  The same timid girl who roamed the high school halls watching everyone as though a monster might pop out and eat her?

Man, she filled out nice, he decided as he moved towards her with an outstretched hand to help her up.  He carefully kept his gaze on her face.

When he walked in, his Navy training took over and he swiftly took in the situation, cataloging the various details of the scene.

Including the black bra easily seen through the soaked white blouse.

He felt a pull in his groin.  A welcome feeling, considering his lack of physical response to anything but pain over the last several months.

Struggling to recall her face back in high school, he could only remember how she used to duck and hide behind a book.  He wondered if there had been a hint of the smooth expressive features then.  Features, he couldn’t help noting, were bright red.

Embarrassment rated better than pain or tears, he figured, still worried she might have hurt something.  Reaching her, he bent down and offered his hand, “You think you can stand?  Anything hurt badly?”

She gaped at him, making him wonder if he had something on his face.  He didn’t think so.

As though coming out of her stupor, she lifted a hand to cover her eyes, “Please someone tell me he’s a mirage and I really just hit my head and am laying on the floor bleeding from a serious head wound.”

Frowning, Roman slowly stood and glanced for a second at the young boy she walked into the kitchen with.

The boy shook his head as he looked down at Jules, “She’s finally lost her mind,” he regarded her sagely.

Arching a brow, Roman returned his gaze back to Jules.

Hand falling away, she moved the brightest pair of blue eyes he ever saw to the boy.  He again wondered if he knew she possessed that vibrant gaze when they were teens.

“Finally?  You’re just now noticing,” she replied before turning her eyes back to him.

Bio 

In between her to-be-read pile and trying to bring the characters in her head alive, Kristen spends as much time as she can with family and friends.  Much to her husband’s dismay, she enjoys collecting purses, shoes, and jewelry.  During those rare times she’s not working at her day job, rushing her daughters somewhere, watching movies with her husband, and trying to meet a deadline, she can usually be found energetically cheering for one of her favorite New York sports teams.

As with just about every other writer on the planet, Kristen grew up an avid reader.  She started with young adult before she technically hit the age range and moved on to sci-fi classics by Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury.  At fifteen, her best friend gave her a book she just had to read!  The book was Honest Illusions by Nora Roberts.  Always a sucker for a happy ending, she was a goner and fell in love with the romance genre.  Having started writing novel length stories at the age of eleven, Kristen’s stories all took a romantic turn from that point on.

You can connect with Kristen through her website www.KristenBeairsto.com, Facebook www.facebook.com/AuthorKristenBeairsto, or Twitter www.twitter.com/AuthorKBeairsto.