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THE RALLY
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October Reads Worth Falling For

Danger, desire, second chances, and unexpected romanceβ€”discover this month’s Fresh Fiction Featured Books.

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A poisoned cousin, a five-year-old's life, and a family with too many secrets.


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Supernatural sparks fly
between a bookseller
& her hard-boiled ghost.


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If Her Highness thinks I’ll let another man claim her and my child, she’s lost her royal mind. Sophaya’s mine.


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She found a body. Then she started asking the wrong questions.


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He ghosted her ten years ago. Now she’s stuck with him for Christmas.


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She’s the lady everyone overlooks. He’s the prince who can’t look away.

WELCOME TO FAT CHANCE, TEXAS

Welcome to Fat Chance, Texas, August 2015
by Celia Bonaduce

Lyrical Press
Featuring: Dymphna Pearl
ISBN: 1601834292
EAN: 9781601834294
Kindle: B00OWWFE0I
Paperback / e-Book
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"Seven strangers brought together to succeed in a ghost town with money at the end of the rainbow."

Fresh Fiction Review

WELCOME TO FAT CHANCE, TEXAS
Celia Bonaduce

Reviewed by Kay Quintin
Posted July 27, 2015

Women's Fiction

Dymphna Pearl raises angora rabbits and uses the fur for yarn to use in her professional knitting. Life in sunny California is about to change when she receives a financial bequest that could set her up nicely. To do this, Dymphna will have to help rebuild the Texas ghost town along with seven other recipients. Six months doesn't seem so long for the host of a video podcast--does it?

Cleo Johnson Primb's billionaire father died, leaving a puzzling request in his will. Trying to make amends to certain people for various reasons, he has included these six unlikely strangers along with his daughter, to carry out his request before receiving their inheritance. Along with Dymphna there is Bertha Belmont, an eighty-year-old woman once involved with the deceased; Wallace Watanabe, a Japanese American; Cleo's nephew Elwood (a professor); goth Polly Orchid; and a classic bodybuilder black man, Ray Darling "Titan." They have absolutely nothing in common. Each receives a credit card with $1,000 line and no way to use it in Fat Chance. Using their own resources after each being assigned a different type of property with supplies to suit the establishment, they eventually manage to make it somewhat of a home and a family with no interference of Internet reception, phones, etc. These mismatched strangers are sharing the town with an opinionated buzzard, an old donkey, goats, chickens, and an aggressive rattlesnake. Is there a chance that love can be found among the strangers? This just might be what it takes for each of them to make it their own "second chance".

This unusual story grabbed me at once with the mystery of how this was going to work. People from different walks of life sequestered together with the bare minimum and only their own resources to draw from. There's something new at each turn to make them grow and change. The journey through this read is profound and captivating, as well as extremely imaginative. This is a wonderful clean and fulfilling tale of renewal and re-evaluated priorities. The author has made this a very interesting and exciting read that I totally enjoyed.

Learn more about WELCOME TO FAT CHANCE, TEXAS

SUMMARY

For champion professional knitter Dymphna Pearl, inheriting part of a sun-blasted ghost town in the Texas hill country isn’t just unexpected, it’s a little daunting. To earn a cash bequest that could change her life, she’ll have to leave California to live in tiny, run-down Fat Chance for six monthsβ€”with seven strangers. Impossible! Or is it? Trading her sandals for cowboy boots, Dymphna dives into her new life with equal parts anxiety and excitement. After all, she’s never felt quite at home in Santa Monica anyway. Maybe Fat Chance will be her second chance. But making it habitable is going take more than a lasso and Wild West spirit. With an opinionated buzzard overlooking the proceedings and mismatched strangers learning to become friends, Dymphna wonders if unlocking the secrets of her own heart is the way to strike real gold.

EXCERPT

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