Good morning and Welcome to Day 3 as I introduce the wonderful authors who’ve agreed to join my team of Takeover Authors for THE FINAL COUNTDOWN AUTHOR TAKEOVER PARTY, happening on JANUARY 18th ON FACEBOOK FROM Noon UNTIL 6:00 PM (Central Time).
I’m super excited to introduce you to Amanda Linsmeier, author of Ditch Flowers,. Amanda will host from 1:30 to 2:00 PM , and I can’t wait for you to meet her, as she’s one of several authors from Penner Publishing whom I’ve come to know really well. In fact, she’s one of my “Inner Circle of Besties” at Penner. If you’d’ve asked me whether she and I would’ve been friends eight months ago, I would certainly have negated the idea. You see — and Amanda doesn’t know this — she intimidated me! Yup, that’s right. She scared me to death! I could tell from the description of her book that it was going to be an awesome read, and that much talent made me nervous. I kept wondering, How am I with the same publishing house as her? Surely they’ve made a mistake! I wish they’d hurry and publish my book before they realize the mistake!
Then one day I got invited to a group chat through Twitter. I entered the room, and there was Amanda! Oh wow! What in the world am I gonna say to her? I mean…it’s AMANDA! She’s crazy talented!
Turns out I was right. Amanda is crazy talented, but she’s also one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met! She’s always there to pick you up when you’re feeling low, and she’s great at talking me away from the ledge when I’m about to jump. And those of you who know me well know that I’m a control freak and tend to get a teensy-weensy bit excited when things don’t go absolutely the way I imagined they should. Amanda is always that calming presence that soothes, and I really appreciate her for that. And the fact that she’s my friend? Squeeee! I’m friends with Amanda Linsmeier! How cool is that? Okay…so enough fangirling. Let me tell you a little bit about Amanda, the author.
From Her Author Bio:
Amanda Linsmeier’s work has appeared on Brain, Child Magazine, WOW! Women on Writing, and Portage Magazine. She works part-time at her local library and brings home more books than she has time to read. Amanda lives in the countryside with her husband and children, two dogs, and half-wild cat. Ditch Flowers is her first novel.
What Amanda’s bio leaves out is that, only a few days after the release of Ditch Flowers, she delivered a beautiful baby girl! Amanda is the proud mama of three beautiful children. She’s also…um…eccentric? Is that the word I’m looking for? You see, Amanda is obsessed with new notebooks and journals, but she doesn’t approach them in the same way as most of us. She explains her unique approach to a new pad of paper: “When I get a new one, I always flip to the middle to start writing. Never the first page.” I seriously love this about Amanda!
Amanda is a sucker for a happy movie, has an addiction to coffee (I’m seriously thinking about just giving her an IV filled with coffee!), and loves peanut butter cups. Okay — so I’m not gonna lie, I’m totally down with the coffee and peanut butter cups. Somebody get an IV for me, too!
Amanda’s first novel, Ditch Flowers, was one of those books I’ve not been able to get out of my head. It tells the story of a young couple struggling with infertility. After a series of heartbreaking miscarriages, they move to the husband’s childhood hometown where the wife begins a new job in a daycare center. While there, she meets a child who is the absolute image of her husband. As she mentally calculates the dates, she realizes that her husband just happened to be “home” for his father’s funeral during the timeframe when this beautiful child was conceived. Could her husband have betrayed her so cruelly? You’ll have to read Ditch Flowers to find out, but I’ll tell you that you’ll want to read it when you have nothing else on your agenda because you won’t want to put it down!
I read and reviewed Ditch Flowers several months ago. To read my review, you can follow this link.
For THE FINAL COUNTDOWN AUTHOR TAKEOVER PARTY on Facebook, Amanda will be giving away one e-book copy of her novel Ditch Flowers. In order to win, though, you’ll need to pop in and say hi to Amanda between 1:30 and 2:00 PM on JANUARY 18th so you can find out how to win. Trust me when I tell you that it’s an awesome read!
In the meantime, take a few minutes to check out Amanda on her website and the other social media. Say hello — she’s truly a sweetheart!
Today is the 3rd day of our TAKEOVER AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT! Did you miss yesterday’s spotlight? If so, follow this link to catch up!
C.H. Armstrong Books 
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