RELEASE BLITZ: Life is Right Here by Magdalena Di Sotru & Sophia Soames (Excerpt)
RELEASE BLITZ
Book Title: Life is Right Here
Authors and Publishers: Sophia Soames and Magdalena di Sotru
Cover Artist: Sophia Soames
Release Date: December 1, 2022
Genre: Contemporary M/M Romance
Tropes: Hurt/Comfort
Themes: Co-dependency, Found family
Heat Rating: 4 flames
Length: 65 000 words
It is book two (of two) in the Life is Good series. The books must be read in order.
Buy Links – Available in Kindle Unlimited
“And here you are,” he said softly.
“Like you knew I would be.”
We sounded like a bad pop song from our youth. Or an even worse one from the present.
Blurb
“We’re going to have a brilliant Christmas, Andreas. Just like it was ten years ago, all of us together,” Vati said, placing steaming cups of coffee in front of us. “We’re just pointing out that you and Fredrik always had something special, and you haven’t seen each other for years. It will be lovely for you to reconnect.”
“Reconnecting is fine. We can discuss college life versus German nursing schools, drink Jägerbombs and watch weird Norwegian shit on TV. Christmas will be thrilling.”
“Andreas…” Vati warned as Lottie burst into giggles.
“You adore Fredrik. Still. I can see it in your eyes. You go all panic-stricken and weird when we even mention Freee—”
“Fredrik has a girlfriend in America. Maria hates my guts. Frank and Thomas will whip my butt for not visiting over summer, and anyway, I have to buy them a big present to bribe them to even talk to me.”
Vati smiled. “Frank and Thomas love you like a son, and they will just hug the shit out of you as usual.”
“Alongside Maria’s boyfriend, and Fredrik’s girlfriend. It will be a delightful group hug.” I snarled.
“Fredrik’s girlfriend isn’t coming. I told you that,” Vati said sternly. He was pissed off with me already, and we hadn’t even had breakfast.
“Whatever.” I huffed.
Awkward was the word I was looking for. This whole thing was going to be super awkward. Because they always were. And Fredrik? My world used to spin around the strange, blonde boy who was my best friend for a few years. He lit up my life. Then he fucked off. Well, he fucked off because I told him to. I was stupid and scared. I think he was too.
Awkward. That wasn’t even the start of what this Christmas was going to be like.
Authors’ Note:
Life is Right Here was intended to be a one-chapter Christmas epilogue to Life is Good and Other Lies.
This book is still that, an epilogue, and should be read after Life is Good and Other Lies to make sense. We hope that it will bring everything full circle and that you will enjoy, once again, following this family to their final HEA.
Trigger warnings:
Terminal and life-threatening illness. Bipolar disorder. Talk of suicide and the fear of this. Far too many sugar-laden Christmas foods.
This book has an HEA.
Excerpt
I’d tried. I really had tried. My dads had been together since they were in their twenties, a lifetime. We all knew the story about how they’d met and found love and lost and found and lost and found and then never lost again. It was like a fairy tale, like one of Frank’s favourite movies, even if Thomas kept teasing him that their meet-cute wasn’t actually an epic love story of any sort. He always said it had been fate. Thing was, I’d always wanted that for myself, and I’d thought Andreas had been the one, back when we were teenagers. But then he wasn’t, and I didn’t know what I’d done wrong or why anything had happened in the first place.
My flights home to Oslo this time were chaotic and stressful with too many people going somewhere for Christmas. I’d managed to wrap myself into my own bubble of blankets and cheap pillows and dozed over Canada, then watched the ice over Greenland in wide-eyed, jet-lagged wonder. I’d barely registered landing in Paris before rushing through CDG, a mishmash of then-futuristic architecture from the last century and modern, energy-saving solutions that made me dizzy. I barely caught my flight and dozed off again the second I hit my seat. I felt calmer now; home was getting closer. If it was still home, I thought before my brain shut off.
“Fredrik!” My dad’s arms were long and warm around me outside customs. I dropped my bag and backpack on the floor. My eyes were wet; my god, how much I had missed him. I leant into his chest and sniffed in the familiar smell of his shampoo and aftershave, the detergent we used at home, his stubble scratching my cheek, his hair tickling my lips. I breathed him for who knew how long. Seconds, minutes, I didn’t care.
I was finally home again.
About the Authors
Magdalena Di Sotru is an information security and data protection enthusiast from Norway. She is a mother of two and wife of one as well as a long-established fanfic writer. Her favourite food is (actually) salads (without mayo), her favourite guilty pleasure is fresh bakery goods (and that explains why everyone would think the salad was a lie). She knows her way around knitting, lock picking and skydiving (all at about equal skill levels – go figure). Life is Good and Other lies was her first novel.
Sophia Soames should be old enough to know better but has barely grown up. She has been known to fangirl over TV shows, has fallen in and out of love with more popstars than she dares to remember, and has a ridiculously high-flying (un-)glamourous real-life job.
Her long-suffering husband just laughs at her antics. Their children are feral. The dogs are too.
She lives in a creaky old house in rural London, although her heart is still in her native Scandinavia.
Discovering that the stories in her head make sense when written down has been part of the most hilarious midlife crisis ever, and she hopes it may long continue.
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