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Here's a summary and extracts from the books Name & Address Withheld, Lost and Found , Technical Hitch , Like Mother, Like Daughter , Confessions of a Agony Aunt & an exclusive extract from the next novel The Romancipation of Maggie Hunter which will be published this summer. |
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Technical Hitch Published
by Red Dress Ink
Wedding planner Jessica James has pulled off the wedding of her career just a week before her own, but when it comes to her big day, she doesn’t even make it to the church on time…. Her sister Sarah, meanwhile, has never been interested in the pomp and circumstance of weddings, but she does believe in marriage. When she discovers nearly three years after eloping with her soul mate that, legally, she isn’t married at all, should it really matter? Jack Carlisle, society wild child, has finally been tamed by Emma Hunter – or at least that’s what the papers say. But was it really the perfect white wedding, or has Emma simply met her checkmate? Fiona’s ready to settle down, but when, on the day her brother is left standing at the altar, she falls for a nice guy – and he falls right back – she panics. Happy endings? What if marriage is exactly that – the ending, not the beginning? Extract Jess inhaled deeply in an attempt to calm her galloping heart rate but adrenaline had seized the moment and the more she tried to rationalize with her nervous system, the more it chose to ignore her. It was now or never. Not that Elvis was asking. And never was far too risky. Maybe it would sound better out loud than it did in the confines of her mind. ‘I can’t do this.’ Petulantly Jess flung her necklace back on to the table in a flourish of general frustration just as a cloud passed across the sun casting a momentary shadow across the bedroom and proceedings in general. She couldn’t have choreographed it better herself. Pure Hollywood in West London. A sign. Disappointingly though, no Hammer House of Horror of thunderclap. ‘Here, let me. It’s just a tricky clasp…’ Standing behind Jess, Fi grinned at their joint reflection in the mirror. While Fiona was resplendent in full dusty pink bridesmaid regalia, Jess only resembled a bride from the neck up, her favourite black cotton cardigan, faded jeans and flip flops diluting the overall effect. Never the girliest girl on the block, there had been a time when Jess had joked about getting married in white jeans…but that had been in the 1980s when they were still socially acceptable in countries other than the Caribbean. ‘…And then madam, I think it’s about time you got changed…’ Jess’s bridal gown was currently hanging in a room of its own lest a splash of coffee, kamikaze biro or eyeshadowy finger accidentally stray. Careful not to dislodge the veil that the hairdresser had attached to Jess’s now perfectly tamed hair only moments earlier, Fiona rotated the necklace into its optimal position before standing back to admire her handiwork and to coo her approval. Jess looked on silently. Apparently today was for everyone else’s entertainment. She felt like an extra in a film but unknown to the rest of the cast there was a major plot twist just around the corner. ‘…It’s just perfect.’ Fiona swallowed a sigh. One day someone would design a piece of jewellery for her and have it delivered on a breakfast tray. Hopefully a couple of years before she had stopped ovulating. ‘I mean I can’t marry him.’ Jess shuddered. Nope, out loud it sounded just as bad and Fiona was definitely the wrong person to be telling first. But time was running out and at least, at last, the sentence that had plagued her all night, all week, was now in the public domain. Not that she felt any better. Fiona paled. Her blue eyes had never been any wider, her pupils dilating and contracting in turn as her brain did its best to digest this breaking news. Jess was her best friend. And Nick was her brother. In the Battle of Allegiances this was the third world war waiting to happen and she was a natural born pacifist. ‘Of course you can.’ To Fiona’s relief, Sarah’s voice wafted out of the bathroom in a tone usually reserved for soothing a child on the verge of a shoelace tying tantrum. ‘This is no time for runaway bride talk. You and Nick are practically married already.’ ‘I’m not joking.’ Jess wished that her veil would double as an invisibility cloak. If only she’d gone to Hogwarts for her education instead of her ordinary day school. She could hardly algebra her way out of this situation. She was still waiting for the moment in her life that all that x=y stuff was going to come in useful. Fiona and Sarah exchanged a look. The one that suggested neither of them knew what to say next. But Sarah refused to be thrown by her older sister’s attempt to alter the course of events. Six years as a kindergarten teacher and she could handle anything. Under fives were rarely predictable. As, she was learning, were the over-thirties – although at least they could go to the toilet by themselves. ‘What on earth are you talking about? Why not?’ Sarah’s question was as direct as the eye contact she was forcing Jess to make. Maybe Montessori teachers and the Gestapo received the same training. Jess paused to gather her thoughts which, at the moment of truth, had suddenly started to blur around the edges. Along, apparently, with her ability to construct sentences. ‘170 guests at
£80 per head says you can.’ Financial blackmail, emotional
blackmail, Fiona had her brief. Get bride to aisle. And nothing
was going to stop her now. She was on the verge of having a sister
for the first time in her life. Her brother was about to become
the happiest man in the world. And bridesmaids always pulled at
weddings. ‘We don’t even know.’ ‘What’s it got to do with you Fi?’ ‘No, “we” as in you and Nick. Mr & Mrs.’ Fiona sighed. ‘And right now, it’s got everything to do with me. Wedding phobic wedding planners can’t exist. It’s inconceivable.’ Enviously, Jess stared out of the window at a pigeon sitting contentedly in the window box of the flat opposite. She could feel colour rising in her cheeks. She wished she could be anywhere else, be anyone else, just for today. ‘We’re a rare breed.’ The blushing bride knew this was all her fault. She’d been perfectly happy living with him, yet from the minute she’d said yes to marriage she’d been panicking inwardly. And silently. Then the Carlisle wedding came along and for six months she’d been living and breathing their plans, just going through the motions with her own, but now if she didn’t follow her gut, in a couple of hours she’d be Mrs Seaton. She listened to the muffled chorus of normality outside. Strains of just another Saturday morning in the rest of the world. People collecting dry cleaning, braving supermarkets, watching cartoons, administering failsafe hangover cures…Maybe if she tied her veil to a radiator she could leap out of the window and abseil down to freedom. ‘And what about the honeymoon?’ Fiona was covering all angles. ‘What, so now I’m supposed to marry him because we’ve got a holiday booked? It’s only money. Love and marriage might once have gone together like a horse and carriage but they don’t necessarily go hand in hand like a house and a mortgage.’ Pausing for a moment to ensure she had the full attention of her ladies in waiting and in denial, Jess needn’t have worried. Four eyes studied her intently. Four ears pricked to attention. ‘It’s just, well…’ she cast her gaze floorwards and addressed her big toe. ‘I’ve been having my doubts for a while now. And, I mean, well what if Nick isn’t in love with me…’ Fiona jumped in to defend her family name. ‘Now you are being ridiculous….’ Jess held her hand out to silence her bridesmaid. This was a sentence she definitely needed to finish. ‘…I mean not really in love with me. But more, well I guess more with the idea of being married and having children.’ ‘Is there someone else?’ Sarah had to ask. Fiona meanwhile was still taking in the last couple of points. Apparently she was having trouble understanding the English language this morning. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. I haven’t got time to get my legs waxed these days, let alone have a bloody affair. I barely even see Nick that often. Sleeping next to each other doesn’t count as quality time. I mean this is the first weekend I haven’t been working, in…in months.’ ‘Well,’ Fiona searched for something positive to say. ‘Life’s like that sometimes.’ Surely people didn’t really call off weddings. Not to her brother. And not on her shift. Sarah leapt in before Jess could. ‘Fiona’s right. Ups and downs. Give and take. Getting married is a stressful business. They say that along with moving house and…’ ‘You don’t need to tell me.’ Jess shook her head as she interrupted. It probably hadn’t helped that The Carlisle wedding had demanded so much time and energy. But going on column inches and magazine covers alone, Emma and Jack were the hottest newlyweds of the moment and she had played a high profile part in that. Indeed the extent of the media buzz around the taming of heart throb actor Jack Carlisle was trademark Patrick Robson. PR by name, PR by nature, he was the master of the invention of tradition. What he touched, people aspired to be part of. The head shake had been taken at face value. ‘I don’t know what you think you’re disagreeing with?’ ‘I wasn’t. And I know I’ve been hiding from myself for the last few weeks. The trouble is, I see too many couples throwing themselves at the their big white day only to find that when the confetti settles, the cracks they were trying to paper over with their marriage certificate start to re-appear.’ ‘What are you trying to say?’ The million dollar question. ‘I don’t know…That I was merely in the right place at the right time, that Nick’s hung up on being married….and I’m not. Fi rolled her eyes in an attempt to discredit her best friend. However it was sounding more and more like Jess had really thought about it. Not good at all. ‘Have you discussed any of this with him?’ ‘I don’t want the happy ending…’ ‘Of course you bloody do.’ ‘I want the happy beginning…and not the beginning of the end’ Fiona couldn’t believe she was hearing this. It was like listening to an echo. She was the one who’d spent years worrying about letting a man into her life and heavily mortgaged flat to pee on her Habitat toilet seat and to connect his PlayStation to her hard earned widescreen plasma television. But then she hadn’t met a man she’d take on holiday, let alone contemplate spending a lifetime with, in ages – make that ever. ‘…and then there was the map thing.’ With every confession Jess felt her horizons widen. As Sarah listened to her sister, a pain gripped her chest. Probably heartburn. She didn’t normally have a bacon sandwich for breakfast. Should have stuck to the usual muesli. Unless of course she was having a heart attack…passing out was probably not a bad idea. She checked her watch. Just over an hour until they were due at the church. And to think she’d actually been excited about today. ‘The map thing?’ Fiona’s impatience wasn’t even thinly disguised as she searched the dressing table. ‘Sarah, have you seen the Rescue Remedy?’ Jess ignored their attempts to belittle her crisis. A few drops of flower juice steeped in brandy were hardly going to provide a solution. ‘Well it was probably just a catalyst but…’ ‘What bloody map?’ Fiona started opening drawers increasingly urgently. ‘And you of all people should know that marriage is for life not just for Christmas, or autumn, or Septfuckingtember.’ She resisted the urge to stamp her foot or burst into tears – this might have been her first call-up as a bridesmaid but she wasn’t eight years old. A pity, because for the first time in over twenty-five years she felt like throwing a tantrum. She did her best to regain at least a smidgen of composure before continuing. No mean feat, bearing in mind it appeared Jess had taken the lot. ‘You think the need for direction is the problem here?’ Finally she spotted the little bottle in her handbag and unscrewing the lid, by-passed the dropper and took a swig before proffering it to Jess who waved it away dismissively, carefully teased tendrils of her dark hair itching her neck. ‘You should have seen the look in his eyes, for that moment he hated me.’ Jess’s voice was steady. ‘He was probably just stressed, worrying that you might be having second thoughts, you know something ridiculous like that…’ Fi stopped herself. No one could muster a smile let alone a laugh. ‘I missed a turning not a period. In fact the latter would probably have been less of a big deal.’ Jess turned to face her sister. ‘Since you and Simon had Millie, he is obsessed with having children.’ ‘For God’s sake Jess, don’t try and blame your hang-ups on me. And you know he’ll be a great dad.’ Jess nodded, that much she knew. It would just be so much easier if she could buy him a baby. To buy
a copy of Technical Hitch: Read an extract from Name And Address Withheld |
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