What Could’ve Been (The Loose End Book 4) by Tesa Erven

In What Could’ve Been (The Loose End Book 4), the fourth installment of The Loose End series, readers revisit Renee and Bradsen’s complex relationship. Will Bradsen be left holding the short end of the stick as Renee struggles with the idea of surrendering to love?  Desperation drives Renee to seek a professional ear, but has she waited too late to reclaim Bradsen’s heart? Will she be able to overcome her feelings of doubt before a mystery woman helps Bradsen reconnect with his past, or will she become one of the loose ends?

 

Excerpt: What Could’ve Been (The Loose End Book 4)

 

Renee hadn’t been on Bradsen’s luxury yacht since he’d broken the news to her about Kayron still being alive. An uneasy feeling came over her as they stood on the sun deck of the yacht. This was all so déjà vu for her.

“Bradsen, what are we doing here?”

“I brought you here so we could talk. Plus, I also have something for you,” Bradsen said, handing her an envelope.

Renee’s mind flashed back to the last time Bradsen said he had something for her on this deck. It wasn’t good news. She took a deep breath, not wanting to relive the old memories. What could it be this time? she thought. She hesitated to take the envelope from him, but Bradsen urged her on. She pulled out the contents and read them silently.

Renee raised her hand to her mouth and her eyes widened in surprise. “Are you serious? Really? You really want to do this?”

“Yes.” He pulled her hand down and held it. “I love you, Renee. I think it’s about time for us to take the next step in our relationship.”

She continued to stare at the papers in disbelief until Bradsen got down on bended knee and asked, “Renee Lawson, will you go away with me?”

“Bradsen Myers, you are too funny. Of course, I’ll go to Italy with you.”

He stood to kiss her, leaving little doubt of his serious intent. “One day I’ll be back down on my knee. But only when you’re really ready.”

“Okay, when do we leave?” Renee asked, trying hard to be still and contain her excitement. She had never been to Italy before.

“How about now? We’ll dock at the nearest port and leave from there.”

“Now?” Looking confused by his response, she began to ramble. “But what about our clothes…our families…my business…your clients…?”

“Relax, baby. Everything has been taken care of,” he said as they set sail, leaving Renee to her thoughts.

( Continued… )

© 2017 All rights reserved. Book excerpt reprinted by permission of the author, Tesa Erven. Do not reproduce, copy or use without the author’s written permission. This excerpt is used for promotional purposes only.

 

Purchase What Could’ve Been (The Loose End Book 4)
African American > Women’s Fiction. The Loose End Series
https://www.amazon.com/What-Couldve-Been-Loose-Book-ebook/dp/B074NZGJST

 

About the Author
Tesa Erven rocks the pen when it comes to writing contemporary romance fiction. Bursting onto the publishing scene in 2015, she has already captured a large reading audience with her four-book “The Loose End” series. Tesa’s hectic life as a wife and mother of two children, while holding down a full-time job, is the steam that pushes her to create a private world of her own. This realm of unique, real and dramatic love stories is filled with suspense and riddled with plot twists. Escape into the world of this New Jersey romantic that will keep you intrigued and pondering what the next page will bring. You can visit her website at http://www.tesaerven.com or connect with her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/authortesaerven

 

 

Red September by Marita Berry

Red September, is a contemporary, fiction, romance novel. It’s a coming-of-age narrative that tells the story of Constance (Connie) Brown. Set amidst the poverty of the 1950’s on an island in the Caribbean. After their father dies, Connie and her siblings live in fear of their alcoholic and abusive mother. Connie life changes when Nathaniel (Nathan) Hart, a charismatic twenty-one-year-old man arrives from New York City on family business. When they meet it is love at first sight for both.

However, Connie is forced to marry Mr. Henry, a wealthy landowner, for financial gain. He moves her into his home on the hill overlooking the town. Though this may seem like a fairy tale ending, events begin to unfold and secrets are revealed that subsequently fractured the center of angst that all of Connie’s conflict revolve around. Her life is riddled with lies, masquerades, and broken dreams.

Connie is left with the task of coming to terms with strong, ambivalent feelings towards her mother, staying in a loveless marriage, or risk everything for her independence and ultimately find her place in the world with Nathan.

Customer Reviews on Amazon.com

 

5.0 out of 5 stars.
I really enjoyed the book. It was a page turner from the beginning to the end. I would definitely recommend this book for the young and the old. I brought five books for my friends and family.

4.0 out of 5 stars. By Rico
One of the best books I have read lately
I have always felt that the most compelling gift that a writer possesses is the ability to describe places and characters in such authentic detail that the reader sees himself/herself there in the flesh watching the story unfold. This was my experience as I read Marita Berry’s “Red September” and being transported to a small fictional Caribbean island,Taino, that featured the same people, culture, beauty and poverty familiar to my own upbringing. On one hand it is the story of a mother who was dealt a cruel hand, losing her father at an early age, living with an abusive alcoholic mother and having the responsibilities of adulthood thrust upon her at much too early an age. Among those responsibilities was having to care for her siblings. Thirty years later with a family of her own she tries to understand the mother who had caused her so much pain and discomfort in her early years and she finds solace retroactively in telling the stories of her upbringing to her daughter, Brenda and at the same time finding room to forgive her abusive mother. “Red September” is much more than a story of struggle and survival. It is also a love story with it’s own twists and turns of the heart. This is one of the best books I have read lately. My advice to you, the reader, is to get a copy and lose yourself in a great story of love, forgiveness and a mother’s triumphant survival in the end.

5.0 out of 5 stars.
This book is a wonderful love story, chapter after chapter is gets more endearing that make you want to keep reading. A great buy!!

4.0 out of 5 stars.
A great story of an innocent woman coming into adulthood through unexpected trials and tribulations and how things work out.

4.0 out of 5 stars. By S. Stone
This was a Giveaway on Goodreads. Thanks so much!
I really enjoyed this heartwarming debut novel by Marita Berry. The story travels from the West Indies in the 1940’s to New York City in the 70’s. It’s the story of a young girl has to endure the harshness that her mother’s drinking evokes. Forced to marry their landlord in exchange for a place for her mother and younger siblings to live, raped, and becoming a mother herself at the young age of 16, it is a story of survival, of hopelessness, and of a love seemingly destined not to survive. Recounting her past to her daughter, Connie relives that love and what it has meant through the years. I will definitely look for more works by this author.

 

The Supremes Sing the Happy Heartache Blues: A Novel by Edward Kelsey Moore

When a late life love affair blooms between Mr. Forrest Payne, the owner of the Pink Slipper Gentleman’s Club, and Miss Beatrice Jordan, famous for stationing herself at the edge of the club’s parking lot and yelling warnings of eternal damnation at the departing patrons, their wedding summons a legend to town. Mr. El Walker, the great guitar bluesman, comes home to give a command performance in Plainview, Indiana, a place he’d sworn—and for good reason—he’d never set foot in again.

But El is not the only Plainview native with a hurdle to overcome. A wildly philandering husband struggles at last to prove his faithfulness to the wife he’s always loved. And among those in this tightly knit community who show up every Sunday after church for lunch at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, are the lifelong friends, known locally as “The Supremes” —Clarice, facing down her longing for, chance at and fear of a great career; Barbara Jean, grappling at last with the loss of a mother whose life humiliated both of them, and Odette, reaching toward her husband through an anger of his that she does not understand.

Edward Kelsey Moore’s lively cast of characters, each of whom have surmounted serious trouble and come into love, need not learn how to survive but how, fully, to live. And they do, every one of them, serenaded by the bittersweet and unforgettable blues song El Walker plays, born of his own great loss and love.

 

Edward Kelsey Moore Book Reviews

“This lusty novel sings with life, saluting friendships through dreams, marriage and long-held secrets.”
—Minneapolis Star Tribune, “Summer Books”

“Moore’s bluesy, breezy novel takes readers through life’s highs and lows and in-between times when no one knows what is coming next; its air of folksy optimism should appeal to fans of Alexander McCall Smith and Fredrik Backman.”
—Library Journal (starred review)

“Edward Kelsey Moore, besides being laugh out loud hilarious, has a profound understanding of human nature. This gift, combined with his clear love and affection for his characters, makes him a truly remarkable writer. This book is a joy to read.”
—Fannie Flagg, author of The Whole Town’s Talking and Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

“Spending time with the Supremes is like slipping into a warm embrace of love and laughter, soul-searching and sass. There’s nothing these three strong women can’t handle, and that includes the legacy of the pain inflicted by fathers to sons, mothers to daughters. Edward Kelsey Moore has crafted a novel that beautifully illustrates the healing power of forgiveness.”
—Melanie Benjamin, author of The Swans of Fifth Avenue and The Aviator’s Wife

“The arrival of Edward Kelsey Moore’s new novel had me singing anything but the blues. Even better cause for celebration? Odette, Clarice, and Barbara Jean are back . . . and what a supreme encore it is!”
—Julia Glass, author of A House Among the Trees and Three Junes

 

Chapter 1 (Excerpt)

It was a love song. At least it started out that way. The lyrics told the tale of a romance between a man and the woman who made his life worth living. Being a blues song, it was also about how that woman repeatedly broke the man’s heart and then repaid his forgiving ways by bringing a world of suffering down on him. The beautiful melody soared and plunged, each verse proclaiming rapturous happiness and gut-wrenching pain. Here, in a church, this piece of music couldn’t have been further outside its natural habitat. But the tune’s lovely mournfulness echoed from the back wall to the baptismal pool and from the marble floor to the vaulted ceiling and settled in as if the forlorn cry had always lived here.

As the song continued and grew sadder with every line, I thought of my parents, Dora and Wilbur Jackson. The blues was Mama and Daddy’s music. Nearly every weekend of my childhood, they spent their evenings in our living room, listening to scratchy recordings of old-timey blues songs on the hi-fi. One of those might have been as sorrowful as the dirge ringing through the church, but I couldn’t recall hearing anything that touched this song for sheer misery.

Mama preferred her blues on the cheerier and dirtier side—nasty tunes loaded with crude jokes about hot dogs, jelly rolls, and pink Cadillacs. The gloomy ballads, like this one, were Daddy’s favorites. I never saw him happier than when he was huddled up with Mama on the sofa, humming along with an ode to agony. He would bob his head to the pulse of the music, like he was offering encouragement to a down-in-the-mouth singer who was sitting right next to him, croaking out his hard luck.

Sometimes, before sending me to bed, my parents would allow me to squeeze in between them. They’ve both been dead for years now, but their bad singing lingers in my memory. And, because I inherited their tuneless voices, I remind myself of my parents every time I rip into some unfortunate melody. Whenever I hear a melancholy blues, I feel the roughness of Daddy’s fingertips, callused by years of carpentry work, sliding over my arm like he was playing a soulful riff on imaginary strings that ran from my elbow to my wrist.

I’d be ordered off to bed when Mama’d had enough of the dreariness and wanted to listen to a record about rocking and rolling and loving that was too grown-up for my young ears.

Even though the song rumbling through the sanctuary would have been a bit dark for Mama’s taste, she’d have loved the singer’s wailing voice and the roller-coaster ride of the melody. And she wouldn’t have let this song go unnoted. If she had been in the church with me, she’d have turned to me and declared, “Odette, your daddy would’ve loved this song. Every single word of it makes you wanna die. I’ve gotta write this in my book.”

My mother’s “book” was a calendar from Stewart’s Funeral Home that she kept in her pocketbook. The cover of the calendar showed a gray-and-white spotted colt and a small boy in blue overalls. They were in a meadow, both of them jumping off the ground in an expression of unrestrained bliss. Above the picture were the words “Jump for Joy,” and below, “Happy thoughts to you and yours from Stewart’s Funeral Home.” Whenever Mama ran into something that she felt was remarkable enough to merit celebration, she wrote a note on that day’s date so she’d never forget it.