WELCOME TESSA STOKES TO AWESOME AUTHOR BOOK SPOTLIGHT
Tessa, I am happy to have you here today!
Let's tell everyone about your book, STONE KISSES.
Let's tell everyone about your book, STONE KISSES.
The book I brought along to
share today, STONE KISSES, was inspired by a visit to an old manor house garden. I saw
something in a spooky overgrown part of the garden which inspired the start of
the book and then when I began to write it the characters as usual took over.
It’s not a spooky story it’s
full on romance and humor. I have woven lots of hidden Greek and Roman gods
into the story through other characters names, which was great fun. It’s a
genre blend of romance, and fantasy. Lots of real life meets fantasy.
There’s this ordinary girl,
Stella. She has her own graphic design business but she has to work hard to pay
her mortgage. She has no family and it’s been a long time since she had a man
in her life. It’s summer and she seems to be surrounded by couples. The sun and
her loneliness makes her long for love or at least kisses. She looks at her
house from her garden and knows it needs painting but she can’t afford that so
she decides to visit the nearby garden store to buy flowers for her garden.
There she meets Justin who is
gorgeous (naturally), and enigmatic. He finds her attractive and decides to
pursue her.
The other thread of the story
is the fantasy aspect because down the road live two gods left over from
ancient times, and Stella our heroine gets caught up in a game they play, love
relationships develop, and the whole game is upended.
I’ve tried to show humanity
and our frailties within the story.
The sex scenes were great to
write because I wanted to create the atmosphere of absolute tenderness and love
between Stella and her men.
I think they are successful,
as most of the reviewers so far have loved them.
Stella is ‘every girl’. She
finds herself left behind with not many outings because her friends all have
men in their lives. She works hard. She wants to be love and give love. She’s
brave. I know a few women like that.
Excerpts from different chapters in the book:
“Mercury”, he said.
“Everybody loves him, even I love him. We’ve only got one of him and there are
three or four of each of the other statues”.
The young man’s name badge
read Justin. Stella smiled at him.
“I don’t think he will sell
too soon because he is so expensive, but I wish he wasn’t”, she said, and she
sighed.
Justin gave her a glance of
approval. He liked her friendly open manner and big light blue eyes. She had a
good figure too, he decided as she walked ahead of him, even though her jeans
looked a size too big, and her cotton sweater was loose, and came down to her
thighs, as if she hid behind the clothes. He pulled the trolley along with the
birdbath on it, and he wished she could have afforded Mercury. He watched the
way tendrils of her dark hair fell from her ponytail and whispered around the
back of her slender neck. She should have Mercury, he thought.
By the time they were at the
checkouts Justin, whose dad owned the center, had decided Stella would have
Mercury. He made sure that he was the one to ring up her purchases and to take
her address for the delivery of the birdbath. He smiled at her as she thanked
him for his help and watched her take the flat box with her bedding flowers
balanced on there to her car, saying she would manage them, and that he had
helped enough.
Justin left the checkout to
the two people who were scheduled to work there that day and went straight down
to the statues. He talked to them as he walked through to Mercury telling them
that Mercury was going home to someone who loved him. He grinned at one of the
smaller frogs, and picked it up to put in in a birdbath that had collected a
little water as the nearby plants received their nightly watering from the
overhead sprays.
Justin took the tag from
Mercury’s winged sandal and slapped him on the shoulder. “You are one lucky guy
Mercury, and this time maybe so shall I be”, he said, and took the tag with the
bar code down to the checkout where he rang it up as paid on his own account,
and included it for delivery with the birdbath to Stella.
Mercury silently walked to
the door of the conservatory. He had watched Stella lock the door on some
nights and forget it on others. Tonight she had forgotten probably because she
was so in love with him, and had about driven him crazy with her fondling and
kisses.
He pushed his hands through
his dark chestnut hair and licked his lips he would very much like a drink of
water he decided, and as he turned the handle of the door he made sure that all
of him had shed the stone. Then holding up his drapery that served to cover his
lower body he went into Stella’s house. He silently found a glass filled it
full of cold water to have a long drink and then he placed it carefully on the
table.
Mercury needed to make sure
not to frighten Stella, he had to make sure she believed this was a dream, and
so very softly, almost silently he chanted a spell to keep her semi sleeping as
he climbed the stairs to her room.
He pushed her bedroom door
open carefully and looked at her sleeping. His green eyes filled with tears.
She had a T-shirt on, and some little cotton shorts that came to her hips, and
left her thighs, and legs bare. He glided to her bed and sat beside her. The
way she looked was touchingly peaceful, and he stroked her hair away from her
face as he bent to kiss her cheeks, then nose, her eyelids and then her lips.
Stella stirred and moved towards his lips. In her dream she was with Mercury.
She wanted him so badly and he was real in her bed with her.
He was too, and he lay down
next to her and began to ease the T-shirt up her body kissing her along her
ribs until he reached her breasts when he was overtaken by a wave of desire and
took a nipple into his mouth. He sucked gently, and licked all the way to her
other breast where he swirled his tongue around that nipple. His hand caressing
down her body to stop and push the little cotton pants down until he could feel
her soft dampness.
He found her mouth with his
as he pressed his fingers into her carefully, gently, lovingly. Stella was
dreaming of him, had her hands in his hair, and was kissing him passionately.
She moved her lips from his and whispered his name, “Mercury”.
Mercury moved quickly to have
her kiss back on his lips and eased over her with care. Stella moved her hands
over his body until she found him hard and needy, and in her dream she moved
down his body kissing him until she took the velvet end of him into her mouth
and sucked a little. Mercury softly moaned with pleasure his hands in her hair,
but he wanted her kiss, and he moved her until he held her close, his lips on
hers, and then he opened her legs trailing his fingertips against her to make
sure she really wanted him. He was very gentle about pushing into her, and
nearly groaned aloud when she held him to her, and thrust her hips to meet him.
She whispered his name again against his lips, and as they made love to each
other he told her he loved her, over and over. Stella told him she loved him
too.
When the first rays of the
morning sun wove between the last streaks of darkness, Mercury raised himself
from Stella’s arms and kissed her lovingly.
Copyright Tessa Stokes 2012
ISBN 978-1-908210-48-7
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