Today, author PJ Colando visits with her new release, Winner's Circle, third novel in the Faith, Family, Frenzy! Series.
Here's PJ to tell us about her book, which releases today.
Life in rural small town can
dull the senses. A trio of gal pals—mired in middle age,
Middle America, and other people’s problems—long to escape.
When Bonnie wins the Boffo Lotto, her
circle of friends urge her to lawyer up, invest, and sequester herself.
But secrets are inconceivable in small
towns, so Bonnie and Carl invite close friends to witness their Vegas wedding
and honeymoon in Hawaii with endless vagabond beyond. The sky’s the limit!
The allure of travel is fun for a
while—hilarious, in fact. But when the husbands are jailed, wanderlust is no
longer a romp and things get complicated when you’re halfway round the world,
untethered from all you know and love.
Life has its consequences… and there’s no
place like home.
Blurb
A trio of gal
pals—mired in middle age, Middle America, and other people’s problems—long to
escape. The Boffo Lotto funds wanderlust, but husbands misbehave, lawsuits
proliferate, and conundrums get amplified when you’re halfway ‘round the world,
untethered to all you know and love. There’s no place like home.
Excerpt
One: Fran
Unlike Jackie, Fran was irked by “Amazing
Grace”. Especially when Bonnie’s ringtone interrupted steamy Tom Selleck
dreams. She groped the nightstand for her cell, clicked it on, and croaked,
“How—“.
Fran
swallowed to regain her voice and attempt cordial.
She needed to reply, “How sweet the sound, “ the obligatory
response among friends, but just now the ritual undermined behavior management
principles. One shouldn’t reinforce disruptions like nighttime phone calls.
Though she was a late-in-life newlywed, who didn’t require beauty sleep, she
did need peace. How did Jackie Breeden sleep with grandfather clock chimes
every quarter hour through the night?
Fran
opened one eye to sneak a clock peak: 10:33 p.m. In the jostling, her phone dropped
to the floor, but their carpet prevented clatter. Gratefully she rolled over,
mindful not to bump her snoring mate. His guzzle-snort camouflaged a phone call
that would awaken him and ignite his potential to pray.
Joan
Baez’s famed anthem resumed. Fran suppressed a groan. Her clumsiness had
disconnected the call of a persistent friend. Rolling to a crouch on the floor,
she scooped up the phone and clicked on.
“The
new sweet sound will be cha-ching,” Bonnie said. “Write these numbers down!”
“Hold
your horses if you want to remain friends. I didn’t hear please. Also, speak softly. Paul’s asleep and I need to locate
paper and pen, plus my bookmark. I’m reading the new Jan Karon book.”
This
was a half-truth, a misdirect to cover her irritation. Somewhere Safe with Somebody Good lay spread-eagled on the
nightstand. A moment ago, it covered her phone.
“Trying
to learn how to be a pastor’s wife?” Bonnie joked.
“Bad
move, Bonnie. Thank your stars you’re long distance. Do you want me to write
the number or not?”
Fran
bustled into the robe draped across the foot of the bed. A double bed shared
with a pastor who performed unpuritanically under the sheets, then cozied her
onto the mattress edge where she tried to read herself to sleep. Marriage was
unexpectedly exciting. Apparently abstinence did make a body grow fonder. Fran
was considering an additional wedding gift: purchase of a king size bed to
ensure her own space.
She
grabbed her phone and held it low, amidst the rustle and swish of the silken
fabric, hoping the noise would infuse sense into Bonnie’s head. Fran padded to her office down the hall and
Brailled the desktop. A tablet and pen aligned in their always-place. The
silver patina of her recent wedding photo’s frame twinkled in the moon glow.
Fran
startled. She’d never noticed Paul’s tie skewed to spoon the folds of her
wedding suit sleeves. Significant lust hidden in plain sight.
She
smiled as she recalled squeezing her nosegay during the ceremony and the
subsequent photo shoot. Moments later, she lofted the roses over her head
backwards for a perfect landing into the hands of Bonnie, Paul’s secretary. The
same, still unmarried woman who’d quit her job and left town a few days ago
with Carl, Steve Breeden’s half-brother. California bound, they said. What an
upended apple cart to accept, to explain, and, eventually, to embrace.
Bonnie
Voss. The same woman who’d lost her
morals and her mind. The same still unmarried woman who called her for a favor
in the middle of the night. Please.
Fran’s
chair rewarded her careful sit with silence. Her knees complied, noiseless too.
She poised the pen and drew her cell to her ear. “I’m ready. Shoot me the
numbers.” Fran cleared her throat to underscore her great effort.
“Please?
10. 11. 31. 41. 44. 14. 24.”
“Okay.
Let me repeat them to make sure I got them right.” Fran adjusted her robe. “10.
11. 31. 41. 44. 14. 24.” After Bonnie’s confirming purr, she continued, “What
are these? Sounds like high school locker combinations.”
“Good
guess, girl! It’s Carl’s combination from his junior and senior years of high
school. He was excited to have a locker in the jock block twice.”
“Is
that the hell why he remembers the numbers?” Fran snapped so harshly, she
almost bit her tongue. She nursed a grudge
about entitled high school athletes, a remnant of fending off Coach’s
over-protection when his star players missed grades. She smiled at a memory of
hoisting her paddle in the general vicinity of his over-stuffed ass. Hell,
she’d have whacked him, if her office door had been closed.
Emboldened
by the memory, she pressed on. “What the hell am I supposed to do with these
numbers? Memorize them and then eat the note? Global nuclear war didn’t start
after the nightly news, did it? You giving me the combination to Carl’s
underground bomb shelter or his safe deposit box?”
“Watch
the Boffo Lotto drawing tonight at 11:00. We can’t, because we’re deadheading
to Rock Island, Illinois. I knew you stayed up late and would do a favor for a
friend.” Bonnie didn’t pause to allow Fran to object. “I have a question for
you, Fran? What the hell are you saying hell
for? You’re a pastor’s wife now!”
“I’m
off-duty.” Fran slammed down the phone.
Fran
stood, hoisted her robe so she wouldn’t trip over its hem—and to shake off
Bonnie’s rebuke—and swished into the family room. She turned on the TV, already
set on FOX, and heard the same news pronounced by another bubble head, part of
the daily parade, all interchangeable, most often blondes with hair sprayed
into helmets. Cement-smiled with chunky gold jewelry coiled at the crest of
vibrant high-necked, sleeveless dresses. Clothing to frame the toothy truths
spread by big mouths on pedestal necks. Lipstick like dual blood streaks
cheek-to-cheek. Yip-yap-yip. It was exhilarating to watch.
Fran
settled in. She’d never monitored the lottery picks before, never even bought a
ticket, considering the act beneath her station in the small, close-knit
community. Maybe she’d made a mistake. A buy was frivolous for certain, but
watching the drawing promised the simplest high on the planet. Its pep
counterbalanced the bite of the recycled news’ spew.
The
numbered ping-pong balls bubbled, perked, and popped into round channels, the
Plexiglas contraption reminding her of the junior high science teacher’s
elaborate gerbil cage.
Glad
to perch on her chintz-covered chair, swimming solo in a household of beige
leather and brown corduroy, Fran felt secure. She’d moved into the parsonage
under extreme protest, put her Craftsman cottage up for sale. Paul didn’t know
it, but she’d slipped back several times for respite from his parishioner
problems, of which she now owned fifty percent. For better or worse.
The
sixth ball rolled down the chute, almost smiling as it scooted into place. Fran
looked at the paper in her lap, looked at the screen, looked at her lap, took a
deep breath, and squinted.
Then,
she looked again. Shock sucked her breath. I’ll
be go to hell and back! Did that just happen? Is this a dream, a fairytale, or
a nightmare come to life?
Bonnie’s,
er Carl’s, numbers were winners! Fran’s heart felt as skittish as the numbered
balls had looked inside the tumbler that assured their mix. Her sleeves
fluttered like monarch wings while she flapped her arms in a wild chicken
dance. She’d never pranced with abandon at wedding receptions, not even her
own. She grabbed a table lamp before it
toppled, then twirled it for good measure.
She
longed to scream. She was a former school administrator, used to being in
control, and a newlywed mindful of her husband’s rest, not a frivolous teen.
Yet unbridled joy surged her arms to the ceiling to accompany a silent “Hip!
Hip! Hooray!” No high kick, her knees still aggravated by the beside-the-bed
crouch to answer the cell call.
When
she realized the size of the lottery win, she gasped and slid to the floor. Her
mind flip-flopped like the ponytails of the cheerleaders whose moves she’d
emulated. The ones whose skirts grew shorter every year—as did Fran’s fuse,
fueling her retirement at the end of the last school year.
Should
she call Bonnie back? She’d said something about being on Illinois time, an
hour earlier than Michigan, but not whether she and Carl would be driving or
sleeping at this hour. Perhaps Bonnie and Carl were as involved as Fran and her new husband, Pastor Paul, had been an hour
ago.
She
couldn’t tell Paul. She heard her snoring giant, sawing logs as if cutting away
the sins of the world, perhaps beseeching God on His heavenly throne to fix all
of the church problems overnight.
She
couldn’t call Jackie Breeden. It wouldn’t be copacetic, as her husband, Steve,
would say. Fran knew the farm couple awakened earlier than early for chores.
“Bonnie, how are you? Are you sitting down?”
“I’m
fine. Doing 80 mph on I-80, so of course, I’m sitting. I’m seat belted and
squeezing the handle above the truck cab door, gluing my tongue to the roof of
my mouth to improve my balance, like you told me from yoga class. I’ve only
driven small town roads, never been accelerated as a passenger to this speed.
Carl said the sky’s the limit on the Interstates, so I’m hoping to not go
airborne.”
“You
won.”
“Of
course, I won. I won the man, took that church secretary job and shoved it. Did
I tell you we’re headed to Vegas to marry in the Little White Wedding Chapel
near the Strip? Elvis will officiate.”
“You
won the Boffo Lotto.” Fran kept her voice flat. Mention of a strip flustered her all the more. Was the former church secretary wayward
already? She held her tongue, willing Bonnie to comprehend soon. Fran
longed to end the call and return to bed.
“I
did, er, Carl, my intended, did? What’s the total?
“$536
million.”
Fran
clicked off the TV. The lottery win was the only news needed, and her tolerance
for noise not what it used to be. Perhaps that’s why she disliked football, that roar of the crowd bullshit.
Along
with the silly frilly cheers.
Then
Fran realized that the phone echoed the silence of her home. Bonnie said
nothing. No sounds. Not even road noise broke the silence. Eerie.
Fran
shook her phone, pulled it back from her ear to see if it had gone dead. “Are
you there?” Still silent. Fran wondered about tunnels on I-80 that might block
cell reception. She’d never been west of Chicago.
Fran
clicked off the call and sent a text, which took longer than it should because
her fingers kept hitting the wrong keys. That many zeros after a dollar sign
seemed inconceivable. The spacing back to erase and then re-enter the correct
numbers took several seconds. Her phone rang, startling her into additional
errors. Bonnie’s name appeared at the top of her screen, but she ignored the
call until she completed the text.
She
didn’t bother with the voice mail she received in the interim. She suspected it
would be a resounding yelp. Instead she hit the callback feature.
“Yes…
Yes… Yes… Bonnie, calm down. You won. Yes, you won. Or did Carl? Where did you
buy the ticket?”
“I
bought the ticket in Tinley Park, Illinois. At a Speedway station while Carl
gassed up. It was a whim. I was bored riding shotgun in a truck. Carl didn’t
even need me to read maps! I had to pee and the kiosk in the station enticed me
as much as the snacks, so I bought one of each!”
“A
ticket and a Twinkie! You’re a two-fisted wonder woman!” Fran doubled over with
laughter, almost peeing her pajama bottoms. Fran thought, but didn’t say
anything about Bonnie not peeing the leather seats in Carl’s new truck.
Bonnie’s giggling seemed out of control.
Bonnie
calmed to talk, her voice stronger now. “The station and neighborhood looked
safe, not likely harboring Chicago’s high crime, so I won’t mind going back to
claim the money. $536 million, really?! Wow-oh-wow-oh-wow!”
“Well,
as I recall, you don’t get the cash at the ticket seller’s. It’s not like an
ATM. Think about it, woman. Give your brain a spin.”
“You
shouldn’t insult me now that I’m a millionaire, Fran.”
“I’d
say sorry, but it’s near midnight, Bonnie. I’m trying to help. Anyway, come
home. You have to lawyer up, hire an accountant, and a financial planner. Maybe
a publicist. I’ll call my brother—remember he’s a judge— tomorrow to see who he
recommends.”
“Well,
I hadn’t thought of coming back to Michigan—” Bonnie said.
“Where
else would you go?” Fran interjected.
“I
guess you’re right. There’s no place like home, among people we trust. Thanks.
Thanks a multi-million!” said Bonnie, her excitement building to a shriek.
Despite
the distance, Fran heard a loud “Woot! Woot! Whoopee!” The news must be sinking
in. Fran could almost hear the phone tossed over Bonnie’s shoulder into the
back of the truck cab. How sweet the sound, indeed!
Buy
links
All are live for order now. Books are also available on B&N,
KOBO, etc.
Official release date is today, February 1.
BIO
PJ
Colando was born and raised in the Midwest, yet unabashedly aspired for
adventure elsewhere, following her parents’ model. She lives in southern
California with her family, hobbies, and pets.
PJ writes
comedy and satire with a literary bent. She is the author of three previous novels,
with short stories, personal essays, and articles published in journals,
magazines, and anthologies. Follow her boomer humor blog
on pjcolando.com.
Best regards and Muchas
Gratias, Diane – PJ Colando, grateful author of The Winner’s Circle