Amber Rules: the ideas & inspiration behind the story
I've often worked with others who love gossip web sites, who read People every week as if it's required reading, who watched Paris Hilton get released from jail, are riveted by Lindsey Lohan in court and read everything they could get their hands on about Tiger Woods' mistresses. I admit to a little idle curiosity myself, but you won't catch me having gossip updates sent to my phone!
For decades (dating myself here), I've been married to an athlete. He played basketball in college, competed in the Final Four, "retired" from college sports after four years and started playing competitive beach volleyball (2-man teams). Trust me, you don't want to go bowling with this man unless you're serious about competing. But once I got used to his ways, he's provided me with a lot of eye-rolling fodder (but I will not even play him a game of ping pong).
Around 2005, I was listening to a lot of self-help gurus, The Secret, books on cd and attending success coach worksessions. And as usually happens when my mind wanders (yes! my mind wandered during a self-help, motivational lecture! Can you believe it?), I started to put some of these amusing - to me - things together and added in a little Richard Simmons, who my mother adores.
What if...a self-help guru, kind of like Richard Simmons (well meaning, successful, but not exactly someone a teenager wants as a dad - apologies to Richard, he really does help people like my mom, he's just not my cup)...where was I? Oh, yeah, a self-help guru who wasn't James Bond cool to his kids dies and leaves his now grown children his practice - only he's never told anyone how he actually coaches people into success. Of course, he'd leave clues, but not where just anyone could pick up on his secrets.
And then there's a cast of characters only Hollywood can provide: a sex kitten reality star, a heartless heart-throb actor, an NBA star with something to prove, a wounded gossip columnist, a driven self-made sports franchise owner, a sister who needs to grow up and a brother who thinks he can ride the heroine's coat tails.
It wasn't a story Harlequin was interested in, so it percolated in my brain until 2008-2009, when I decided I just had to write it, if only to get these characters out of my head.
Cover buzz: I wanted something that would capture the light-hearted tone of the book, the fashion, basketball! I think it turned out wonderful!
Hope you enjoy Amber's story! Look for the sequel in December 2011 - Blue Rules! That man is going to get what's coming to him!
Amber Rules
For years, Amber Rule was the main attraction in her father's self-help infomercials, his personal before-to-after example of how to transform your life: overweight to svelt adolescent, dependent teen to independent adult, social dork to paparazzi princess. Dooley Rule pointed out all of Amber's failings - on camera no less - and then made it appear he'd fixed them. He used Amber to hawk his personal life coaching services and peddle his motivvational books. She had no interest in the Dooley Foundation and the Rules of Attraction it hawked: Choose, Voice, Trust, Welcome.
