I'm very excited to be taking part in
The Things We Need to Say Cover and Chapter Reveal by Rachel Burton! It will be released May 11, 2018 by HQ Digital. It sounds like it's going to be a very fun book, filled with romance, travel, and second chances.
Are you ready to see the cover? Are You Ready?
Okay, here it comes.
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Title: The Things We Need to Say
Author: Rachel Burton
Release Date: May 11, 2018
Publisher: HQ Digital
So, what do you think? I really like it. It kind of screams summer vacation. I love the color scheme. It's definitely a cover that would cause me to pick up the book.
Here's the official summary for the book:
Sometimes the things we never say are the most important.
Fran loves Will with all her heart. They had a whirlwind romance, a perfect marriage and a wonderful life. Until everything changed. Now Fran needs to find her way again and teaching a yoga retreat in Spain offers her just that. Leaving behind a broken marriage she has some very important decisions to make.
Will needs his wife, he needs her to open up to him if they're to ever return to the ways things once were. But he may have damaged any possibility he had of mending their relationship and now Fran is in Spain and Will is alone.
As both Fran and Will begin to let go of a life that could have been, fate may just find a way of bringing them back together.
Meet the Author
Rachel
Burton has been making up stories since she first learned to talk.
After many false starts she finally made one up that was worth
writing down.
After graduating with a degree in Classics
and another in English, she didn't really know what to do when she
grew up. She has worked as a waitress, a paralegal and a yoga
teacher.
She has spent most of her life between Cambridge
and London but now lives in Leeds with her boyfriend and three cats.
The main loves of her life are The Beatles and very tall romantic
heroes.
Her debut, The Many Colours of Us, was an Amazon
Kindle bestseller. Her second novel, The Things We Need to to Say, is
released on 11 May 2018. She is currently working on her third novel
in which the heroine follows the love of her life to live in a city
in northern England. It has no autobiographical elements at
all.....maybe.
Find her on Twitter & Instagram as
@bookish_yogi or search Facebook for Rachel Burton Author. She is
always happy to talk books, writing, music, cats and how the weather
in Yorkshire is rubbish. She is mostly dreaming of her next
holiday....
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And Now the Chapter Reveal! Enjoy.
DECEMBER
2004
It
started at the party. His hands on my hips, my forehead against his
shoulder. He asked me to dance but he didn’t know how. We stood
together at the edge of the dance floor shaking with laughter at his
two left feet. I don’t know how long we stood there. I don’t know
if anybody noticed.
He’d
waited for me, sitting with my friends, not sure if I’d turn up or
not. I wasn’t in the habit of going to work Christmas parties; I
only went in the end because he said he would be there, because he
said he would wait for me. I arrived just as the main course was
being served. I slipped into the seat next to him. His hand brushed
against my thigh as I sat down. He held my gaze for longer than he
should have done.
I fell
in love with him that night as we stood on the dance floor laughing,
my hands on his waist, feeling the muscles of his back, the warmth of
his body, through his dress shirt, the press of him against my hip.
That was
where it began. I sometimes wonder if that should have been where it
ended.
But
later that evening, as I got out of his car, and I said those words I
should have kept to myself, we both knew there was no going back.
JULY 2016
Fran
She wakes
up in the same position in which she fell asleep, her husband’s
arms around her, their hands entwined on her stomach. Neither of them
have slept that deeply for months. Fran remembers something: a hotel
room on a Greek island, a feeling of hope, of new beginnings. She
doesn’t allow the memory to linger. This is what they have now.
They can be happy again if they allow themselves to be.
The hot,
humid weather has broken in the night and she listens to the sound of
summer rain on the roof. Will moves gently against her, pulling her
closer. She feels his breath against her neck and the sensation of
hot liquid in her stomach, a combination of desire and need. This is
their second chance – she can’t let it pass her by.
‘I love
you,’ Will says sleepily.
‘I love
you too,’ she replies. It feels good to be saying it to each other
again. She’s never stopped loving him; she just forgot how to tell
him for a while.
‘Do you
want me to go and make coffee?’ Will asks, nuzzling her neck.
‘Not just
yet,’ she replies, turning around to look at him. His brown eyes
are dark, impenetrable pools. His hair is pushed back off his face.
Sometimes she forgets how much all of this has affected him too.
Sometimes she forgets everything except her own pain. She feels his
warmth against her, his strength. She feels as though the gulf that
had been threatening to open up between them for the last year is
slowly closing. She realises they have so much life ahead of them. So
much time to learn to be happy again.
‘I
thought I’d lost you,’ Will says quietly, reaching up to stroke
her face. ‘I thought you’d gone, but recently I feel as though
you’ve come back to me.’
She smiles
softly. ‘I thought I’d lost you too,’ she says. ‘This last
year has been …’ She doesn’t finish. She can’t finish.
She watches
as a shadow of anguish crosses his face, as his brow furrows, as his
jaw tightens. She recognises that look, recognises the pain he is
trying to hide. She hears the shudder of his breath. His eyes flick
away for a moment; he pauses for a fraction too long.
‘No,’
he says. ‘You never lost me. I’ll always be here.’
She kisses
him gently then, and feels his hand drift down the bones of her
spine.
Later,
showered and dressed, they finally appear in the kitchen; Will’s
younger brother, Jamie, is already sitting at the table drinking
coffee. Will and Fran are hardly able to stop touching each other.
Jamie
smiles at them, raising an eyebrow. ‘You’re up late,’ he says.
Fran feels herself blushing, her stomach flipping over, and turns
away towards the toaster.
‘Thanks
for last night,’ Jamie goes on. ‘I needed that.’ Recently
separated from his wife, living apart from his children, Jamie is
lonely. Last night wasn’t the first Saturday night he’d spent
with them. Fran knows Will has been throwing himself into cheering
his brother up. She doesn’t mind. Jamie makes Will smile and it’s
good to see him smile again.
As Will and
Jamie start talking about the cricket, she feels her husband’s hand
on her thigh, the warm, solid sensation of him right there next to
her. They have been given a second chance, and they have grabbed it
with both hands. She isn’t naive enough to think everything is
going to go back to the way it used to be, but she knows that they
can move on; they can talk and heal together. They can take another
chance on living, find a new kind of normal.
Will
stretches, draining his coffee cup. ‘This weather isn’t going to
let up is it?’ he says looking out of the window where the rain is
rattling against the frames like beads in a jar. ‘I’m going to
have to cancel the cricket.’ As captain of the village team it is
up to him to reschedule this afternoon’s match. Fran is quietly
delighted that the weather means she doesn’t have to spend her last
afternoon with her husband before she goes away watching him play
cricket. Will gets up and walks into his study, shutting the door
behind him.
‘How are
you feeling about tomorrow?’ Jamie asks.
‘Nervous,’
Fran replies. ‘It’s the first time I’ve been on a plane on my
own, which is pathetic at my age, I know.’
‘It’s
OK to be nervous.’
‘It’s
the first time Will and I have been apart since …’ She trails
off. Jamie knows what she’s talking about. ‘I’m worried about
him too.’
Jamie
smiles. ‘I’ll look after him,’ he says.
After a
moment Jamie gets up and follows Will into his study. He doesn’t
knock; he just opens the door and walks in. As Fran starts to clear
the breakfast dishes she hears raised voices but can’t quite make
out what they are saying. She rolls her eyes to herself. As an only
child she has long since given up on understanding Will and Jamie’s
relationship: best friends one minute, bickering the next. She just
hopes Jamie doesn’t stay too long – she wants her husband to
herself for the day.
Will
It rains
all day, the sky grey and waterlogged and heavy with cloud. After
Jamie leaves, Will pulls Fran towards him, his hands at the back of
her head where her skull meets her neck, where her hair is cut so
short.
‘No
cricket,’ he says. ‘I’m all yours.’
She smiles,
standing on tiptoe to kiss him.
‘Can we
just watch a film or something?’ she says. ‘I’m tired and I
have to pack for Spain later.’ His stomach drops at the thought of
her going away. He wishes he’d never encouraged her to do it.
‘I’d
forgotten about Spain,’ he says.
‘No you
hadn’t. It’s the only thing we’ve talked about for ages.’
Will had
watched Fran spend the last few weeks flipping back and forth between
excitement and terror at the thought of going to Spain on her own. He
knew she was strong enough to do it; he knew she was stronger than
anyone realised. But he also knew that she wondered if she was ready.
When she first mentioned Spain to him he had seen it as a perfect
opportunity to help her begin to put herself back together again
after what had been the worst year of both their lives. He tried to
believe that everything life threw at him was an opportunity.
Fran had
been teaching at a studio in central Cambridge for six years and had
been asked to teach for a week on a retreat in Spain. Will had always
supported her teaching, always tried to put her career on a level par
with his own and had done everything he could to help her find the
strength to go back to work in January. None of it had felt as though
it was enough. None of it would make up for the last year, the things
he had said, the things he had done. Suddenly he is terrified about
being on his own. Neither of them have been alone for months.
‘What do
you want to watch?’ he asks, squatting down in front of the TV.
‘Can we
watch Some Like it Hot?’
Fran replies.
Will rolls
his eyes. He must have seen it a hundred times, but puts it in the
DVD player anyway and goes to settle himself on the sofa. ‘Come
here,’ he says, and she sits with him, leaning back against his
chest.
‘Are you
OK about Spain?’ he asks quietly.
‘I think
so,’ she says. ‘I’m nervous, but I’m excited as well.’
‘Elizabeth
will be there with you, won’t she?’
‘Yes, and
Constance. In fact, I already know most of the other people who are
going. I’ll be fine.’ She pauses. ‘Are you going to be OK?’
she asks quietly.
‘I’m
going to miss you,’ he says, lying back on the sofa, wrapping his
arms around her. He doesn’t know how to answer the question. He
wants to tell her everything but knows that now is not the right
time.
‘I’m
going to miss you too,’ she replies.
He kisses
the top of her head as she presses ‘play’ on the remote control.
He watches her as she watches her favourite film, her lips moving
along with the characters – she still knows every word by heart.
They used to spend rainy Sundays like this when they were younger,
when life seemed easier.
Halfway
through the film he realises that Fran is crying – fat, salty tears
running down her cheeks.
‘Fran?’
he asks quietly, pressing pause on the remote.
Fran
doesn’t reply, she just turns around and he takes her in his arms.
He feels her body against his. She clings to him as though her life
depends on it and he holds her close as she cries and cries. He can’t
remember the last time he saw her cry like this. They had both done
their grieving in private over the last year but to Will it feels as
though Fran has been holding all this in for months, shutting herself
down. He’s relieved that she finally seems ready to let go.
‘I want
my old life back,’ she sobs. ‘I want to be happy again.’
‘So do
I,’ Will whispers. ‘And we will, in time. I promise.’
‘I wish
we’d never bought this house – we had so much hope.’
‘Shhh …’ Will says softly, stroking her hair
as she weeps against him.
And that's it! The Cover and Chapter Reveal for The Things We Need to Say by Rachel Burton. Thanks for stopping by to check it out!! And thank you to HQ Digital, Rachel's Random Resources, and Rachel Burton for letting me in on the fun!
