Did you guess it?
Cover reveal and a big promo
I’ve never written a long series, because as a travel romance writer, it’s important that each book is a standalone romance with a central couple and that the setting is new and different. As a reader, I love a series with recurring characters, where each book has a new central couple, but with characters from previous books in a secondary role and I was keen to try that kind of series, but what concept could give me the possibility of lots of different destinations?
Then I hit upon the idea of a destination wedding planning agency and 'I Do Destinations’, the agency in the wedding planner series, was born. To be completely honest, weddings aren’t necessarily my best area of expertise (can you tell? I’m genuinely interested to know). Neither is luxury travel. The compromise I reached with my true passions was to create this concept of adventurous weddings that take place off the beaten track - and that’s where Great Heart Adventures comes in, the adventure travel company that’s in financial difficulties and merges with I Do in the first book.
From there, the characters took shape: wedding planner Sophie with her gruff adventure guide Andreas, tomboy Kira with her sweet and sensitive opera singer Mattia, then came Toni with wedding florist Gabri, who she thinks is a woman, but turns out to be a man. And from the very beginning, I’ve been building up to the final book: wedding planner and starry-eyed romantic Ginny’s love story.
Anyone who’s read the rest of the series will no doubt guess her love interest, since he’s been there from the very beginning, lurking in a corner, quite overwhelmed by Ginny and the rest of the I Do crew. Do you know who it is??
And now the pre-order phase for Italy and Forever is starting and I can reveal the cover!!! You only have to wait until 20 August for this one. The official cover reveal will happen tomorrow on social media, so do look out for it and share if you can.
I will warn you that, even though the dynamic between these two lovers has been hinted at for three whole books, they are ‘a lot’ on page. The early chapters of these two is just constant awkwardness. They’re attracted to each other, but they don’t understand why, when every conversation is a self-conscious disaster. And to add to it all, there’s a rather significant age gap of eleven years… And then there’s the time Ginny accidentally sees him naked and things go from bad to worse. Keep scrolling and I’ll tease a little bit of that scene below.
But I’m incredibly proud of finishing this series. The fourth book got especially emotional, because it’s also Sophie and Andreas’s wedding, so I got to revisit them a little more deeply than I usually do. I do love how it all came together. And then there’s a little something special in the epilogue.
Here are all the books now together!
News and deals:
An Italian Island Love Story has been reduced in price to 99p/c! It’s also FREE in certain territories to readers who have Amazon Prime.
As usual, all my travel romance books are in Kindle Unlimited.
The Tour de France starts TODAY! You can get an extra fix of racing with my professional cycling romances (including the Tour de France, which is more of a focus in the second book Don’t Brake My Heart, whereas Head Over Wheels is a whole season across Europe).
Ginny accidentally sees him naked, did you say? Indeed, she does. Enjoy this snippet from the skinny dipping scene:
She peered over the back of the bench and gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth as she did so. He was down to his tight boxer shorts, skin pale over lean muscle – quite a lot of muscle. She’d always assumed a ‘six-pack’ indicated the number of abs that existed on the human body, but he had a whole spreadsheet down there, waffle-maker abs. He wasn’t bulky, like an overinflated bodybuilder, just perfectly… inflated.
Instead of shivering and suffering – as Ginny would be doing if she stripped off when it was nine degrees out – he was calmly folding his shirt, adding it to the little pile of clothing next to his towel.
Her eyes widened at the towel…
What I’m up to at the moment:
Everything and nothing… There will be more travel romances coming your way, but not until spring next year and in the meantime, I’ve been doing some fun secret stuff that might never see the light of publication, but I truly hope so. I’ve been in Paris and the south of France, the Alps and some very special places in London in my writing.
I’m actually in London at the moment, for the Meet Cute Festival, where I’m on a panel and will be signing books. It’s such a fun, chilled day and I loved it last year.
I got to sign books in Berlin, which was wild and amazing, to see Head Over Wheels on the shelves of the English Bookstore in the Mall of Berlin. I had many goofy smile pictures and this is the least embarrassing.
As always, my heartfelt thanks to everyone who’s taken a look at my books and especially to the readers who’ve already picked up a copy of my new releases. It’s so heartening to see the ratings and reviews coming in as soon as the book is out! And a special wave to those of you who’ve contacted me to tell me which books you’re enjoying - you guys are absolute gems.
All the very best to you, lovely readers.
Love Leonie xx
Gorgeous Cover 😍