BooksChatter: ☀ The Evans Trilogy [1-3]

Thank you for joining us on the Virtual Book Tour for the Evans Trilogy, a Chick Lit series by Jennifer Collin.

PREVIEW: Check out below details of each book in the trilogy, as well as our Q&A with author Jennifer Collin. The Evans Trilogy is FREE on Kindle Unlimited and Kindle Owner's Lending Library.

Author Jennifer Collin will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour. Please do take part: comment on our post and follow the tour where you will be able to read other excerpts (☀), interviews (ℚ), reviews (✍) and guest blog posts (✉).

The Series | Author Q&A | About the Author | Giveaway & Tour Stops

The Series: Evans Trilogy

Set me free | Open My Eyes | Bring Me Back |

Click on the book cover to Look Inside the book on Amazon and read an excerpt.

Set me free [1]

Disastrous love life aside, Charlotte Evans is rather content with her life. Her quaint little art gallery is plodding along nicely, and her sister Emily’s artistic career is about to take off, thanks to her tireless promotion. She even gets to see her best friend every day and drink his delicious coffee in the café next door.

But when dastardly property developer Craig Carmichael comes along, threatening to demolish her gallery and take everything away, Charlotte has an unexpected fight on her hands. Not only is she battling to stop Craig’s development, she’s also struggling against the mysterious magnetic pull that has her on a collision course with Craig himself.

Craig Carmichael is fighting the Battle for Boundary Street on more than one front. The tenants of the building he wants to knock down are mounting a strong case against him and in a hot-headed moment he put his career on the line for a project that is threatening to fail. If the project doesn’t succeed he will lose everything, but for some reason he’s having trouble maintaining his focus.

As their worlds begin to unravel around them, anyone could win. It’s what they might lose that has Charlotte and Craig wondering what it is they really want.

[28 April 2013, Jennifer Collin, 298 pages]

Excerpt

     ‘You know I’m going to fight you in this development, don’t you?’
     ‘I do.’
     They walked in silence until they rounded the corner into her street and crossed the road in front of her building.
     Charlotte stopped. ‘You lied to me,’ she accused, finally seeking out his eyes.
     ‘No I didn’t. Not technically. I failed to tell you something, but I didn’t lie.’ Was he teasing her?
     ‘Same thing,’ she snapped. ‘I don’t like liars. And I’m not very fond of people who are out to ruin my life,’ she added.
     ‘I’m not going to ruin your life,’ he said, not looking away, holding her with his dark brown gaze.
     ‘Well that means that you are because you’re a liar.’
     He chuckled softly and gently. ‘Your argument is not sound.’
     Charlotte withheld a grin. He was right. She sounded like a petulant child. She decided not to bite back.
     ‘I’m going in now,’ she said. ‘Thanks for seeing me home, I guess.’
     He shrugged. She paused, and her gaze fell on his lips. When the corners of his mouth started to turn, so did she, on her heel, to stomp up the stairs to her apartment.
     ‘Goodnight, Charlotte,’ he called.
     Throwing him one final glare, she closed her door on him and made a beeline for the shower to wash away the sinful desire threatening her good judgment.

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Open My Eyes [2]

Everything happens for a reason, they say. And sometimes the reason is you're stupid and make bad decisions. Sleeping with her sister's best friend is one of the dumbest things soon-to-be divorcee Emily Evans has ever done. But she's determined to put it behind her and move on. She's walked away from her cheating husband, managed to make a new friend, and found herself a real job and somewhere to live so she doesn't have to couch-surf any more. Everything should be falling into place but for one problem – there are some mistakes from which you can't move on.

Meanwhile, Ben Cameron is getting on with his life. After all, it's the only thing to do once your heart has been stomped on by the woman of your dreams. Expanding his business and getting cosy with the girl next door are proving welcome distractions. He's even happy to babysit his nephew, as long as he can to hand him back when he's done! And thankfully, Emily Evans, the woman with the heavy boots, is avoiding him like the plague.

But Emily can't avoid him forever, and when she drops a bombshell that turns Ben's world upside-down, suddenly, getting on with his life takes on a whole new meaning.

[7 April 2014, Jennifer Collin, 293 pages]

Excerpt

     They walked back to the car, side by side, a little closer this time. It felt normal, like it used to be between them. Comfortable and safe. She reached for his arm and wrapped her fingers around his bicep, feeling his muscles twitch beneath her touch. She rested her head against his shoulder. He reached around her and pulled her closer, kissing the top of her head, sending a shower of tingles down her spine and all the way to her toes. Keeping her eyes on those toes, she soaked up his warmth.
     When he pulled up outside her new home, he asked, ‘So, do you want to book in that shopping trip then?’
     Emily didn’t want to get out of the car. She wanted to stay there with him. It was so quiet and peaceful and toasty. It felt like home.
     Emily closed her eyes. She could hear the hum of the car engine, the faint sounds of the radio not quite turned all the way down. Another car drove past. And there was Ben’s breathing. The slow intake of air and the whisper of his exhalation.
     There had been other days, other times like this, late last year after she split from Geoff, when Ben was the centre of her universe. Back then he was always there, when she didn’t even realise she needed him. Even before she split from Geoff he’d been there, always there to make her laugh, keep her company when she was lonely, amuse her when she was bored. Ben had always been there, but she hadn’t seen him until it was too late.
     She could see him now.

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Bring Me Back [3]

Andy Evans is on the move. For six long, lonely years, he’s been running from his past, leaving his family and his life as a drug-addicted rock star far behind. His latest move takes him to the sleepy seaside town of Oamaru, New Zealand, to sell cigar-box guitars to tourists. The only running he’ll need to do will be training for half-marathon in nearby Dunedin. But when Andy sets eyes on Steampunk HQ, Oamaru's main tourist attraction, he realises his days of running might not be over, especially if a certain Steampunk fan from his past catches up with him.

Annie Martin is on the cusp of great success. Her career as a Steampunk academic is about to take off, as long as she can convince one disagreeable, New Zealand-based Professor to sign up to the anthology she’s putting together. Thankfully, Annie is a master at maintaining her poise and few people, no matter how nasty, can rattle her. Not any more. In fact, it’d been a good six years since anyone had gotten under her skin, after her best friend’s brother had vanished into thin air.

When Annie finds her future career on a collision course with her secret past, Andy Evans is the last person she expects to find tangled up in the mess. With a vengeful drug-dealer or two hot on his heels, and a vindictive academic determined to ruin her credibility, can Annie bring Andy back to his family before it’s too late? Annie and Andy are used to being alone, but if they don’t work together, there’ll be much more at stake than her livelihood and his sobriety.

[30 January 2015, Jennifer Collin, 246 pages]

Excerpt

     She didn’t have much time. Even in regular clothes she would’ve been conspicuous, but in her Victorian skirts and corset, she stood out like, well, like someone from Victorian England had been dropped at the finish line of a twenty-first-century marathon. Most of the runners were walking in circles, shaking their legs, breathing heavily. Some were lying on their backs, chests rising and falling, eyes closed. One was bent over, hands on his knees, head down. The only runner with a beard.
     Annie looked around to make sure she was still unseen by the officials. In the clear, she inched closer, careful to stay behind him so he couldn’t see her.
     When she was close enough to reach out and touch him, she clasped her skirts with her shaking hands. ‘Andy?’ she said.
     ‘Yeah?’ He looked up and saw her.
     Andy Evans watched Annie’s eyes widen and her face whiten. Then he straightened, cursed, and bolted.
     Behind him, Annie cursed as well and started chasing him.
     He dodged through the crowd, leading her to the end of the park and down the beach. He was running on pure adrenalin – there was no strength left in his legs. He glanced over his shoulder to see he was getting away as Annie stumbled in the sand in her boots.
     ‘You’re such a jerk, Andy Evans!’ she called after him. ‘Don’t you run away from me!’
     Andy was doing his best, but it was looking more and more like he’d have to obey her command. His legs weren’t promising to carry his weight any further, and at any moment they would give out beneath him. Still, he pushed on and somehow managed to increase the distance between them.
     Something slammed into his back and he broke stride to see what had hit him. A leather ankle boot fell to the sand behind him. She must’ve taken off her boots and decided to throw them at him. He spared her a glance and tried to recover his pace. A knock to the back of the head told him she’d thrown the second boot. He stumbled and crashed face first into the sand. Annie reached him in seconds, jumping onto his back and pinning him with her knees.
     Andy couldn’t breathe. She was crushing his already spent lungs. He tried to tell her as much.
     ‘I don’t care,’ she said, and ground her knees into his back.
     Desperate, Andy mustered his remaining strength and lifted himself, with Annie on top. He flipped over onto his back and she landed on his chest for a split second, before rocketing to her feet and stepping away.
     She searched around for her boot, picked it up and threw it at him again. It hit him in the chest.

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About the Author

Jennifer Collin writes quirky, and sometimes gritty, love stories about ordinary people dealing with what life throws at them.

She lives in Brisbane, Australia, with her husband, two noisy children and a cantankerous cat.

She used to party, but now her idea of a good time is an uninterrupted sleep. These days, her characters do her partying for her, and she doesn't necessarily let them sleep.

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