Finding Love in All the Wrong Places Guest Blog and Giveaway with Terry Spear

But what if the place is all right, but the time is really out of sync?

Have you ever been somewhere that it's the right place, wrong time?

I had nightmares about missing classes in college because I'd be in the right place, but wrong time and miss a test. Or show up at the right time, wrong place.

But what if you went to your favorite spot and woke up in another century? Two centuries earlier?

How would you cope with it?

How about: DISBELIEF?

Time travel is NOT possible. So I'm not here in the past. Everything is set up to be this way for a reason.

Or: I'm dreaming. And I can't wake from the dream.

Next: ACCEPTANCE?

Okay, somehow I'm here and I've got to get back to where I belong. Pronto. Or I'll mess up the timeline continuum and really screw things up. What if I did something that ended up wiping out my existence in the future?

Next: THE WHAT IFS?

What do I do if I CAN'T get back? How can I cope? Live in a world so foreign to me?

Next: THE DECISION?

Go back, stay.

THAT is the question.

Every time I visited Salado, Texas, I was drawn to the question of what would a woman do who was from the present who ended up in the past? How would she react? What would it be like for her back then?

Of course, we'll never know exactly what it would be like living in the past—the hardships, the constant toil, the missing conveniences we take for granted today. I know, because when my Internet is out and then the electricity is on the blink due to a storm, I'm unable to do anything! And I realize just how much not having these conveniences is…inconvenient. But compound that 100-fold with no running water and no car, and no stores to shop at for all kinds of anything-we-want-readymade items, no cell phones, and well…it's unimaginable. Really.

Why would ANYONE in their right mind want to give up all of that for all the hardships?

We have to suspend disbelief and believe in romance and fantasy and the fantastical.

Oh, sure, you're saying no way, Jose! But really. Love transcends all time. We could fall in love with someone in the past just as we could fall in love with someone today.

What if that someone we found in the past is THE ONE? What if we never could find someone who makes us feel as he does? Would we give him up to have all the conveniences in the world?

I just watched The Company Men and how one of the men has lost his job and he believes everything he is, is tied up into his job persona and his paycheck. He's forgotten the roots of his existence. The love of his wife and children. His connection to the downhome world. Everything is money and stuff. The fancy cars, the golf club membership, you name it…all stuff.

When times get really tough, can you give it all up? You'd have to. What if you had someone to love who loved you back with all his heart? Would you give it all up to find your roots and live a simpler life?

That's what Lisa must decide in A GHOST OF A CHANCE AT LOVE!

Excerpt from A GHOST OF A CHANCE AT LOVE

When she entered the hotel lobby, she felt like she'd stepped into a nineteenth century movie set. A woman wearing a blue dress reaching her ankles pushed a woven wicker buggy toward Lisa. A bustle attached in the back of the woman's dress accentuated her figure from behind, and Lisa wondered how she could sit down in that contraption. A chenille hairnet confined her mousy brown hair beneath an ivory hat dripping with dyed ostrich feathers. She returned Lisa's stare. Her brows lifted slightly.

Lisa smiled, figuring the woman must have been part of the hotel staff, although she hadn't recalled anyone dressing that way the night before. "I love your dress."

"Why, thank you, Miss."

Unable to resist a closer look, Lisa leaned over the buggy, wishing things had worked out with Tom, and she could have had their very own baby to care for in a year or so like they'd so often discussed. A white lacy bonnet covered the baby's brown fuzzy head, her face cloaked in sleep.

"She's adorable."

"He's my son," the woman said softly.

Lisa stared at the lace-trimmed gown the baby wore. "Oh, sure." Her skin warmed with embarrassment, but heck, the baby looked like a girl in a gown. "He's really sweet."

Another thought occurred to her. Why would a lady on the hotel staff drag a baby around with her?

Maybe an old time arts and crafts fair was scheduled and the woman served as one of the vendors? The Highlander fair was scheduled for next weekend. Maybe this was a Victorian fair.

Lisa glanced around the lobby. High back chairs with wide-winged arms and curved loveseats covered in rich burgundy and green brocades, fit the nineteenth-century décor that looked similar to the antique furniture her grandmother had willed to her.

The cowboy she'd collided with in the hall outside her room entered the lobby. She thought he tried to appear inconspicuous about looking for her, but was doing an awful job of it because as soon as he saw her, his haunted eyes caught her gaze, and he turned away.

***

Jack's already been in her bed once…by accident. What would it take to keep him there?

What would YOU do to keep him there?

Thanks so much for Roxanne for having me on her blog!

One lucky commenter will win a free ebook copy of A GHOST OF A CHANCE AT LOVE!

~Terry Spear

"Giving new meaning to the term alpha male."

www.terryspear.com