Today I am so pleased to welcome Becca Jackson to Joyfully Jay. Becca has come to talk to us about a new release, The Half Baked Plan. Becca has also brought along a great giveaway. Please join me in giving a big welcome!
Exclusive Excerpt
I pull down the zip, shutting out the team dancing and singing, and flop back against my air mattress. I really need to lay off the margaritas.
A buzzing draws my attention, and I grab my phone out of my pocket and check the screen. The second the yellow duck flashes on the display, I swipe to answer.
“Duckie, man, how are you?” I ask my younger brother.
“Could be better.”
A pit forms in my stomach. “What’s wrong?” I’m sitting up in the middle of my tent, phone pressed tight against my ear.
“You are. Mom said you’re not coming to the reunion. What the fuck, man?”
I groan and lie back against my mattress. It’s not as good as an inflatable but it will do to keep me from waking up with a stiff back.
“I’m working.”
“You don’t even know when it is.”
“All right, when is it?”
“January fo—”
“I’m working,” I say before he’s even finished the date. It’s not that I don’t want to see them. I love my family. They mean the world to me. I just don’t want to hear the million and one questions about why I’m still single and when I plan to settle down and start a family.
“Pops is coming. You love Pops,” Duckie says, and I laugh.
“I love you all, dickhead.”
“But you love Pops more.”
I don’t. Not really. But it’s different with Pops. When I was placed with the Grants at sixteen, I thought it would be like the other foster homes; a brief stay until they needed the bed for a younger kid. I understood. After I hit puberty, still bouncing between foster homes, I realized adoption was off the table for me, so I was happy to move on and give the young ones a shot at a permanent placement.
Duckie has been with the Grants since he was six. They adopted him at nine and had three older children already out of the home when they brought me in.
Sixteen years old, with fourteen foster families behind me, most of them decent, none of them home. Not until the Grants.
The day after I came to stay, Pops arrived on their doorstep, suitcase in hand, kicked out of the nursing home he was staying in. To this day, he won’t tell me what he did.
When I was seventeen and Pops caught me looking at share houses for when I aged out, he ripped up the paper and said, “No Grant is going to move out of home before they’re working and ready.”
Mom and Dad asked me that night the question I never thought I’d hear. Three months later, I had my name changed from Carter Smith to Carter Grant.
I should go to the reunion. I haven’t seen the family since last Christmas. But the bakery is going to take long enough, and if I take any time off it’s just going to delay things even more.
“Are you taking Ash?” I ask him, hoping he and his girlfriend can help distract Mom from my forever single existence.
He sighs. “No, she left. I’m single again.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. It was months ago now.”
“When is the reunion again?”
“Oh, so now I’m single you want to come?”
“Now you’re single, Mom can focus on how her little Duckie is all alone, and leave my sad love life out of it.”
“So, you’ll come?”
“Maybe.”
“I’ll take that as a yes. I’m messaging Pops.”
“Don’t you dare!”
“Too late. Sent. Now the whole family will know you’re coming by morning.
Blurb
Love in No Man’s Land Series, Book 2
Lucas
Fire took out my business, my apartment and almost my life a few weeks back, and now I’m living in my best friend’s house while I rebuild, and he travels the world. He found his perfect match and now It’s time I found mine.
After years on my own, I want a family, but I have zero hope in finding my match while I’m still completely crushing on the hottest builder in the world, and to make matters worse, he’s now my roommate.
I thought sharing a house with Carter would help me get over him. I’d see why he’s never had a boyfriend, or anyone worth bringing around town. I’d discover all of his faults up close and squash the perfect god-like image I’ve cemented in my mind all these years.
Problem is, no matter what annoying habits I jot down on my list, the more time I spend with him the more I’m convinced Carter is everything I will ever need. Now I just have to figure out a way to tell him.
Carter
With Michael traveling the world, it’s just Lucas and me in his house while we rebuild the café, bakery, and apartment. I’m happy for Michael. I really am, but seeing another friend get their happy beginning shines a light again on the fact that I might never get mine.
I’m sick of being everyone’s best friend, yet no one’s boyfriend. I want my happy beginning too. I want someone to pick me. To want me. To love me.
So I do what any single guy would do, I sign up for speed dating. Blind dates suck but I’m never going to find the one if I don’t start putting myself out there.
The problem is, the more time I spend living with Lucas the more I realize, I don’t want any of these random hookups. I want the sweetest guy I’ve ever met. The one who bakes me cookies to make me smile. So now I have to figure out a way to show him I can be an awesome boyfriend. I can be his happy beginning if he will just give me a chance out of the friend zone.
Bio
Becca Jackson is the author of mm romance stories that deliver heart, heat, and happily ever afters for some totally adorkable and fabulous guys.
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- Facebook Reader Group: https://geni.us/BeccaJacksonFBGroup
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- Website: https://geni.us/BeccaJacksonWeb
- TikTok: https://geni.us/BeccaJacksonTiktok
- Instagram: https://geni.us/BeccaJacksonInsta
- Facebook: https://geni.us/BeccaJacksonFacebook
Giveaway
To celebrate the release of The Half Baked Plan, Becca is giving away a $5 Amazon Gift card and an e-copy of Book 1 Textual Connections! Enter the Rafflecopter giveaway for your chance to win!
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Welcome, Becca, and thanks for the excerpt and the giveaway chance. Best wishes for the success of The Half Baked Plan!