Day 4~ AP Valentine Day Stories

Author Bio

Therese Gilardi is a paranormal romance writer, essayist and poet living in the hills above Los Angeles with her husband, children and numerous pets. Therese's work appears online in such journals as "Literary Mama," "The 13th Warrior Review," and "The Dirty Napkin," in various print magazines, and in the books "Knowing Pains" and "So Far And Yet So Near: Stories of Americans Abroad." Therese is currently working on a memoir of her years as a mother, writer and ratatouille fan in Paris, France, as well as a poetry chapbook and a contemporary romance. My work appears online in "Punchnel's". My poetry will appear in upcoming issues of "The Mom Egg" and "Onthebus".
Therese would love to hear from you.

Blurb:

For centuries, Cupid has longed to be more than Venus’s arrow boy. When he’s sent to eliminate “Happily Ever After by Amelia”, the matchmaking business threatening Venus’s status as the goddess of love, Cupid decides to steal Amelia’s methods and make his own matches. While spying on Amelia, Cupid accidentally shoots himself with his magical arrow and falls in love with her. But bereaved Amelia doesn’t believe in the existence of Roman gods, and she’s certainly not looking for romance. She’s too busy perfecting the patented personality profile that’s made her Hollywood’s favorite matchmaker.

Disguising himself as a mortal financial advisor, Cupid manages to break through Amelia’s guarded exterior. As their passion deepens so does Cupid’s guilt about deceiving Amelia. Cupid’s interference with Amelia’s life causes her business to falter, leads to a sterile spring that threatens the animal kingdom and shatters the longstanding peace between the Roman and Greek gods. With the fate of the natural and under worlds at stake, Cupid must decide whether to reveal his true identity and risk losing the chance to live happily ever after with Amelia.

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Matching Wits with Venus ~ An excerpt from the first chapter

“Matching Wits With Venus”.

Chapter One

In the valley below the thirty foot white block letters that spelled out HOLLYWOOD, between Ripley’s “Believe It or Not” museum and a string of psychic reading rooms, sat a glass-front shop with a rose-colored door. Above the storefront’s small bay window a pink and purple sign proclaimed “Happily Ever After by Amelia”. Inside, Amelia Coillard stretched out her hands to receive a large almond vanilla pie.
"It took me all night to make this,” a tall woman wearing an enormous pear shaped diamond on her left hand said, “But I wanted you to know how grateful I am. Really, Amelia, you’re the best. David and I want to invite you to our wedding. On June twenty-first.”
Amelia bowed slightly and smiled.
“Glad we could help Susanna. Don’t forget to tell your friends about us.”
The woman nodded, then strode past the wrought iron café table where Amelia interviewed clients, out onto the empty sidewalk.
“We’ve got another wedding, “ Amelia called out to her assistant Jennie as she stepped into the back room and placed the pie on a distressed pine sideboard, next to the boxes of chocolates, baskets of figs, bottles of champagne, potpourri sachets and bundles of beeswax candles she’d received from satisfied clients.
“Let me guess,” Jennie replied, rubbing her hands together. “The summer solstice.”
Amelia nodded.
“Flowers in bloom, longer days, baby animals at the zoo. It all means only one thing: June brides. I don’t know how people can be so hopeful.”
“Hmm, well you’d better get ready. Your first client will be in to fill out her patented personality profile in ten minutes. You know, she actually asked me if I’d mail her the profile and let her fill it out at home! As if we’d release your proprietary secrets!”
"I don’t know what I’d do without you to look after me,” Amelia chuckled.
She reached inside the little cupboard in the corner and withdrew the fitted white croceted sweater she’d gotten two years ago at the Rose Bowl Flea Market. The seller had told her the cardigan had been part of the trousseau of one of the old stars who’d lived up in the Hollywood Hills. Amelia wasn’t sure she believed the woman’s story, but the sweater’s delicate pattern reminded her of wedding lace, so she wore it every time she met with a client. And, though she never told Jennie, Amelia was convinced that the sweater from another woman’s trousseau was as close as she’d ever come to clothing herself in bridal wear.
While Amelia was pulling the sweater over her black mini-dress and adjusting her wavy auburn hair over its pearl trimmed collar she saw a photo smiling out at her from the back of the cupboard. Inside the silver frame stood an extremely thin young man, his eyes protruding below penciled on eyebrows, a blue bandana wrapped around his head. As Amelia reached out to caress the photo she heard someone rapping on the back window.
“Justin,”She called out to the young man in the red and black leather jacket, torn jeans and scruffy tennis shoes.
Justin’s long hair needed a trim and he could use a shave, as well as a bottle of sunblock. Like many of the others who bedded down on the streets around Hollywood and Vine, his face was testimony to the hard realities of living rough under the merciless California sun.
“I’ve got something for you,” she said as she opened the door.
Amelia scooped up a napkin, fork and bottle of water from the table that held her teakettle. She handed them to Justin, along with a plate bearing half of the almond vanilla pie.
“Thanks Amelia.”
“Have a good day.”
Amelia watched as Justin disappeared into the alley. She gazed up into the hills in the distance, at the faded ocher stucco mansion that stood atop the highest point. Long verandas seemed to wrap around the house, though it was impossible to know for certain if they ran across the back of the home, since the far side of the walled property was not accessible by road or foot. It sat atop a fault line; no one dared venture onto the rocky terrain for fear of disrupting the crusty earth beneath the bougainvillea bushes.
“Lia! Lia!” Jennie called out from the front room.
When she got no response, Jennie headed to the back room. She threw her shoulders back and sighed as she watched Amelia, hunched forward, her eyebrows creased.
“Don’t,” Jennie said softly as she sidled up next to Amelia.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t go down that path, Lia. It’s not going to take you anywhere you want to be.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Come on, let it go.”
Amelia sighed.
“Do you have any idea how many cakes, cookies, tarts, baskets and bouquets I left on those stone steps? Do you know, I used to cimb up to that gate every year on Christmas Eve and what should’ve been my parents’ anniversary and leave her these hand-written letters I’d actually sealed with a kiss. I taped those little Hershey’s candies to the envelope when I was little and then, in high school, I slathered red lipstick on my lips and ran my mouth across the back of the envelope. I can’t believe I was so stupid!”
“We all do dumb things.”
“Yeah but come on! Believing in the existence of an ancient Roman goddess AND that she lived right in my own neighborhood? Talk about desperate.”
Jennie laughed.
“It does sound absurd when you put it that way. Plus everybody knows that house has been abandoned for decades. Why they don’t add it to the Haunted Hollywood tour is beyond me.”
Amelia nodded. As she took a final look at the mansion she thought she saw a flash of light shoot out from its left flank.

***
Inside the ocher palazzo Venus flicked her cream colored scarf over her slender shoulders as she peered through the ultra-powerful telescope she had trained on “Happily Ever After by Amelia”.
“You have to do something about that woman or before you know it they’ll be tearing down all those statues of me and calling HER the goddess of love.”
Venus turned away from the window and looked at her son. Cupid was sitting on the edge of a pink silk sofa, a thick clutch of papers between his muscular hands.
"If you’d just take a look at these spreadsheets, I think you’ll see I’ve discovered a way to streamline everything. I’ll be able to shoot twice the arrows in half the time if I don’t have to keep backtracking. All you have to do is make your matches in a more geo-centric manner.”
Venus held up her manicured hand.
“When I want your advice I’ll ask for it.”
“Mother, please. I’ve given a lot of though as to how we can modernize, maybe even….”
“Modernize?”
Venus stared at her son, who was looking back at her with eyes the color of Lake Cuomo. He opened his mouth again, and she saw the slight chip on his front tooth. It was the only flaw on his perfectly proportioned face.
“I don’t want to hear any more of this nonsense. Where are your arrows?”
Cupid shook his head in disgust. No doubt it would take another hundred years before his mother even admitted that there was a need to change the way they did business. He tapped his foot impatiently against the floor, whose wooden planks had been imported from Italy, and wondered whether his mother would ever see him as more than her arrow boy.
“Cupid! Where’s your quiver?”
Cupid pointed at the monogrammed leather case lying against the wall, beneath the portrait of Venus that Remus had commissioned after she’d matched up the first inhabitants of Rome. Light glistened off the tips of the golden arrows poking out of the top of the quiver.
“Now listen to me. I want you to shoot this Amelia with the most powerful arrow you’ve got.”
“Mother, I’ve got a better idea.”
Cupid began to leaf through the stack of papers.
“I said, shoot her! Do you hear me?”

You can find Therese here:
http://www.theresegilardi.com/index.html
http://theresegilardi.wordpress.com/
Matching Wits with Venus is available here:
http://astraeapress.com
http://amazon.com
http://barnesandnoble.com
http://allromancebooks.com
http://omnilit.com
http://efictionbookstore.com

Thank you, Therese, for joining us every day this week, it's been a pleasure having you here.

La La Land ~ what is it?

La La Land

The Oxford English Dictionary recently defined “La La Land” as: “n. can refer either to Los Angeles (in which case its etymology is influenced by the common initials for that city), or to a state of being out of touch with reality—and sometimes to both simultaneously ».

In light of the fact that « Matching Wits With Venus », my paranormal romance about a Hollywood matchmaker and the Roman god Cupid takes place in La La Land (and I must admit, I call the hills above the city home), I have decided to offer up an Angeleno play list and menu that will surely put you in the mood for love L.A. style.

So pull out the record player/fire up the i-tunes/grab the boom box and let’s go.

Nothing captures the sense that anything – even the presence of a Roman god and his family living in the Hollywood Hills – is possible in the City of Angels like Randy Newman’s « I Love L.A. ». If you don’t already know this anthem, I’m sure a quick listen will have you longing to ride around with the top down and the car windows open no matter where you live.

When you’re ready to groove some more, you can count on the L.A. radio. No So Cal (Southern California) station is without a copy of a Beach Boys tune. Any Beach Boys tune will do, although of course the anthem « Wish They All Could Be California Girls » pretty much sums it all up. And let’s not forget California native Katy Perry’s « California Girls » for a fresh take on life on the left coast. And of course anything by the Red Hot Chili Peppers will carry you straight to La La Land. Finally, since you’re getting in the mood to visit the Los Angeles of Cupid and Amelia in « Matching Wits With Venus », you need to listen to « Vivaldi’s Four Seasons ». Although Cupid never shares this fact with Amelia, he was the inspiration for the spring movement.

Now that you’ve got your play list going it’s time to dine So Cal style (best on a beach, terrace or balconey, but in front of the fire will do as well as virtually all residents of La La Land love to start up their gas fireplaces when the temperatures are cold enough to require a light sweater). What’s on the menu ? Everything! As one of the most diverse places on the planet, Los Angeles is home to every kind of cuisine. Even haggis. However, if you want to dine like Cupid and Angeleno Amelia, then go for a burrito, hand-made guacomole and chips, tostada, taco, or perhaps some soup at a noodle bar in Little Tokyo ….

The possibilities are endless because, as the Oxford English Dictionary rightly points out, La La Land is as much a state of mind as it is a specific location. So if you believe that magic isn’t just reserved for the movies, then come on. It’s time for a visit to La La Land.

http://astraeapress.com

http://amazon.com

http://barnesandnoble.com

http://allromancebooks.com

http://omnilit.com

http://efictionbookstore.com

Tomorrow you can read part of Chapter one of

Matching Wits with Venus



Read Therese's interview with her heroine today

Amelia Coillard runs “Happily Ever After By Amelia”, a successful matchmaking business in Hollywood, California. I caught up with Amelia recently for a quick interview.
“Amelia, what made you decide to enter the matchmaking business?”
“I’ve wondered why relationships between men and women don’t work out ever since my mother deserted our family when I was seven, only to take up with a string of unsuitable boyfriends. For years I blamed Venus, the goddess of love, since my father always said he married my mother after he’d been struck by Cupid’s arrow. As I got older, I looked around at my friends’ fractured relationships and thought to myself, ‘there has to be a better way’.”

“How did you train to become a matchmaker? What makes ‘Happily Ever After By Amelia’ different from all of the other matchmaking services?”
“Well, we use my patented personality profile, which is based on my years of studying psychology combined with computer science. I employ my patented technology to elicit responses from my clients that allow me to gain insights into their personalities that other matchmakers miss. I suppose you could say I trained by fixing up my friends and the friends of friends for years.”

“What can a client expect from you?”
“I begin with a detailed meeting during which my client completes the personality profile. Then we have a series of discussions and I get to work on making matches. If my first choice doesn’t work, I continue to match the client with other potential partners.”

“What’s it like to work in Hollywood?”

"My storefront is in West Hollywood, which many people would be surprised to learn has an almost village like quality to it. Los Angeles County is a place of tremendous diversity and natural beauty, which gives me a lot of inspiration.”

“Do you have any words of wisdom for those discouraged about their romantic prospects?”
“Absolutely. Never give up! Your perfect partner is out there. It just may take a little while longer than you would like before you meet your match.”

http://astraeapress.com
http://amazon.com
http://barnesandnoble.com
http://allromancebooks.com
http://omnilit.com
http://efictionbookstore.com

Tomorrow Therese talks about 'You are what you read'