Making It Last review & Visit with Ruthie Knox

Making it Last (Camelot Series #4) is the newest release from Ruthie Knox. The publisher is Loveswept and the release date is July 15, 2013. From the author’s website.~

In a brand-new eBook original novella, RITA finalist and USA Today bestselling author Ruthie Knox takes her spectacular Camelot series to new heights with a tale of desire reinvented.
 
A hotel bar. A sexy stranger. A night of passion. There’s a part of Amber Mazzara that wants those things, wants to have a moment—just one—when life isn’t a complicated tangle of house and husband and kids and careers. Then, after a long, exhausting “vacation” with her family, her husband surprises her with a gift: a few days on the beach . . . alone. 
 
Only she won’t be alone for long, because a handsome man just bought her a drink. He’s cool, he’s confident, and he wants to take Amber to bed and keep her there for days. Lucky for them both, he’s her husband. He’s got only a few days in Jamaica to make her wildest desires come true, but if he can pull it off, there’s reason to believe that this fantasy can last a lifetime.

Ruthie was kind enough to stop by today on her whistle stop tour and answer one question and giveaway 1 copy of Making It Last to one lucky winner.

A Quick Visit with Ruthie

As part of her "whistle-stop tour" for Making It Last, Ruthie agreed to stop by and answer one question about the story. She's also giving away a copy of the book, today only! Imagine her standing in the caboose car of her blog tour train, shouting out her answer over the crowd and flinging an e-book and some Tootsie Rolls at the assembled audience. Or not. Either way — here's the question:

This book made me cry. Damn you.

Ha! Yes. Sorry. But not really.

I recently interviewed Mary Ann Rivers for my newsletter, and she had this to say about crying moments in books: "Often, I don't think it is the sad thing that makes my readers cry or feel sad. It is what the sad moments are giving my characters that does." What I took from her comment is the idea that in a story, when we as authors take time to really focus in on truth and meaning for our characters — and, in a broader sense, truth and meaning for women more broadly, as we try to write about the shape of love and relationships and marriage in women's lives — we create characters whose realizations, loves, and losses are bigger than the book. They are our own realizations, our own loves, our own losses, and that's why they make us cry.

I wanted very much, in writing Tony and Amber's story, for there not to be an epic mistake, or a "bad" character to balance against the "good" one. I wanted, instead, to focus in on life as so many of us live it — on a stuck place in this marriage between Tony and Amber. It's a sad stuck place, and I think one that many of us can empathize with, which sometimes produces tears — but this marriage is one that contains so much love and yearning, as well, that I think we can see great potential for joy once Tony and Amber are unstuck.

I think — I hope — that the crying parts in this book are the moments where Tony and Amber (and Janet, Amber's mother, who gets a moment of significance near the end) are getting something — a gift of understanding, of truth — that will help them move to a better place in their lives. For me, this is where the tears always happen.

Giveaway

Ruthie is giving away one e-book copy of Making It Last to a randomly selected commenter. This giveaway is for today only! Just answer this question to enter:

I confess, I'm a weeper. I like crying books, and crying movies, and even crying TV commercials. What about you — do you cry easily when you're reading? Do you like it, or do you try to avoid it?

The giveaway is open in North America only. (Sorry -- due to geographical restrictions, Ruthie can't buy her own e-book outside North America!)

About the Book

Making It Last by Ruthie Knox

Camelot series, book 4

Releases July 15, 2013

In a brand-new eBook original novella, RITA finalist and USA Today bestselling author Ruthie Knox takes her spectacular Camelot series to new heights with a tale of desire reinvented.

A hotel bar. A sexy stranger. A night of passion. There’s a part of Amber Mazzara that wants those things, wants to have a moment — just one — where life isn’t a complicated tangle of house and husband and kids and careers. Then, after a long, exhausting “vacation” with her family, her husband surprises her with a gift: a few days on the beach . . . alone.

Only she won’t be alone long, because a handsome man just bought her a drink. He’s cool, he’s confident, and he wants to take Amber to bed and keep her there for days. Lucky for them both, he’s her husband. He’s only got a few days in Jamaica to make her wildest desires come true, but if he can pull it off, there’s reason to believe that this fantasy can last a lifetime.

E-book. 136 pp. ISBN: 978-0-345-54929-7.

Read more about Making It Last on Ruthie’s website

View the Random House page for Making It Last

Shelve or find out more on Goodreads

Buy the book from Amazon (US) | Barnes & Noble | iTunes Bookstore | Amazon (UK) | Amazon (Canada) | Other buy links via Random House

About Ruthie

USA Today bestselling author Ruthie Knox writes contemporary romance that’s sexy, witty, and angsty—sometimes all three at once. After training to be a British historian, she became an academic editor instead. Then she got really deeply into knitting, as one does, followed by motherhood and romance novel writing. Her debut novel, Ride with Me, is probably the only existing cross-country bicycling love story. She followed it up with About Last Night, a London-set romance whose hero has the unlikely name of Neville, and then Room at the Inn, a Christmas novella—both of which were finalists for the Romance Writers of America’s RITA Award. Her four-book series about the Clark family of Camelot, Ohio, has won accolades for its fresh, funny portrayal of small-town Midwestern life. Ruthie moonlights as a mother, Tweets incessantly, and bakes a mean focaccia. She’d love to hear from you, so visit her website at www.ruthieknox.com and drop her a line.

My review of Making It Last:

I love Ruthie Knox books with a passion. As soon as I see she has a new book coming out, I start a countdown to release date. I've been exceptionally lucky to get so many new books from her this year. Her newest release is Making it Last, which is a novella length book and the 4th book in her Camelot series. We get to revisit Tony and Amber in this book.

First of all, this book takes place 14 years after How to Misbehave and Tony and Amber have 3 sons now. I loved Tony and Amber in How to Misbehave, and was excited to get to see where they are now as a couple. I'll be honest and say I'm single and haven't been in a relationship in a while. However, I have friends who have been married for years, and I totally got where both Tony and Amber came from in this story.

You will need tissues to read this story, it pulls that many emotions from you. I loved the role-playing Tony and Amber did in the bar and how honest they each were about who they really were as they talked as "strangers in a bar". The passion between Tony and Amber was just as hot as ever, yet the demands of daily living have gotten in the way of their relationship. I loved this book for so many reasons, but mostly because it seemed so real to me. I know the demands of daily living get in the way of so many things, and know couples have it twice as hard as a single person. When Amber shares her dreams with Tony for where they would be a year later, I absolutely could picture their new life that way.

Since we have now read about all the Clark siblings, I'm sure the Camelot series is finished. I will miss my visits with the Clark family, but am so glad I can revisit them anytime on my kindle. Ruthie Knox totally blew me away with this book, and I’m already on the countdown for her next book.