Release day for The Turnaround Treasure Shop - A house is a home when...

A house is a home when…

What does a house or a home mean to characters in a book? With the upcoming release of my fourth book in the Swallow’s Fall series, The Turnaround Treasure Shop, I decided to go outside my four walls and ask my neighbours - authors of contemporary and historical fiction. 
Over 12 days special guest authors talk us through A house is a home when…

But...

It's Friday 22nd May and it's release day for The Turnaround Treasure Shop, by me.
So I thought I'd let you know what a house or a home means 
to Lily Johnson, my heroine.
(And there’s a giveaway too.)

The Book: The Turnaround Treasure Shop, book #4 in Jennie’s small-town rural romance Swallow’s Fall series. Releasing TODAY.

Character: Lily Johnson (an ordinary, everyday heroine). 

I'm offering one reader from anywhere in the world who leaves a comment an eBook copy of this shorter length novel in my series. It's longer than a novella but not quite a full-length novel. 

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Character bio: long divorced, working two jobs, and struggling to bring up two teenage children Lily is also attempting to fulfil her own dream.

The House: the old house Lily grew up in, a twenty-minute walk from town. Weatherboard, tin roof. The property was once a successful piggery but is now rather dilapidated. A well-worn track leads up a hillside and serves as the driveway. The house is surrounded by fields which Lily thinks of as her never-ending garden.

What makes a house a home for Lily?

To Lily, a house is home when it holds her children, her treasures, her yoga mat, music, and her workshop in the living room where she turns unwanted country wares into shabby chic curios. She doesn’t mind the bad plumbing or the creaky floorboards. This is the house that holds her history, and it’s the house where she makes her plans for the future. One day, she’ll open the empty corner shop on Main Street and run it as Turnaround Treasures: second-chance love. One day.

An excerpt from The Turnaround Treasure Shop by Jennie Jones:

Lily stood back and admired her perfectly distressed work then checked her watch. Five thirty. Time to get dinner on the go. Sunday night; pizza night. Lily made the dough and the kids chopped up the toppings, according to wants, needs and what was available in the pantry.

She opened the bi-fold shutters from her workshop — the back lounge room — and walked into the open plan kitchen-dining room. ‘Open plan’ was a term suggesting Lily lived in a modern brick and tile house but it was the old weatherboard and metal-roofed house she’d grown up in. The open plan area came about when Lily, her mother and the children had decided they needed more space and had taken an axe to the dividing wall. The house was lavish all the same, to Lily’s mind. Especially with the re-decorating she and the children had done over the last few years, gathering junk and buying second-hand paint from neighbours who’d over-ordered or were throwing out, and giving their house a brand-new lease of life.

That’s how her hobby had started, along with her boundless enthusiasm for everything out-dated and considered useless. She’d managed to pick up lots of interesting tools for her lounge room workshop from what had been her father’s shed, now old and rickety. It also held numerous pieces of furniture her parents had discarded, stacked and stored over the last 30 years. In case they might be needed again.

Nothing went to waste in the Johnson household.

The back cover blurb for The Turnaround Treasure Shop by Jennie Jones

"Revisit Swallow’s Fall in this beautiful short novel from Jennie Jones about an ex-military man, a single mother, and the impossibility of dreams coming true."

Fatalistic, long divorced and doing her best to give her children a good life, Lily Johnson works two jobs in her hometown of Swallow’s Fall, saving every spare cent for the day she can lease the empty corner shop on Main Street. She longs to open it as Turnaround Treasures, a second-hand shop bursting with rescued country curios—but there aren’t enough spare cents and Lily’s dream is slipping away.

Ex-Navy diver Nick Barton arrived in Swallow’s Fall a year ago to quietly reunite himself with civvy life. Recognising an instant attraction to Lily, Nick backed away fast. Given his track record of an unhappy ex-wife and the baggage that comes with a Special Forces career, Nick doesn’t think he stands a chance with shy, reserved Lily. He can’t be with her – but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t see her.

Lily has spent her whole life cheerfully giving to others. When Nick offers her the ultimate chance for a turnaround, will Lily’s fear of being ‘second hand’ ruin the opportunity of forever love for both of them? 

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Leave a comment to go into the draw to WIN an eBook copy of The Turnaround Treasure Shop.
Open internationally to all.
Good Luck!

And pop back tomorrow to see the next of my special guest authors (a multi-award winning author, and a fan-girl moment for me) and discover what a house or home means to a man who’s restoring his grandmother’s homestead and who has little idea that he's about to uncover big family secrets. 

Jennie x

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The Turnaround Treasure Shop by Jennie jones

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After you’ve left a comment, why not scroll down or click the links and visit previous days and maybe win a book:

Monday 18th: USA & Australia bestselling author Anne Gracie with The Spring Bride
Tuesday 19th: Award winning author Fiona Lowe with Truly Madly Montana
Wednesday 20th: Historical fiction author Eliza Redgold with Naked: A Novel of Lady Godiva
Thursday 21st Much love international bestseller Rachael Johns and The Road to Hope

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