Today, I have author Jaye Frances here with us sharing an excerpt from her novel The Cruise – All That Glitters.

Welcome back Jaye!

Thank you, Brianna, for having me back on The Book Vixen. I really appreciate the opportunity to give your readers a sneak peek at my new romantic comedy, The Cruise – All That Glitters.

Vacation—the very word brings back childhood memories of carefree summers, when beach picnics and fishing trips to the lake were better than a week of birthdays. As we grew older, vacations became synonymous with a time of blissful abandonment, occasionally granting us the opportunity to pursue a daydream or two. But what happens when our idealistic expectations are sabotaged by the hard truth of reality?

In this excerpt from The Cruise-All That Glitters, the main character Dean, a thirty-something bachelor, has flown to Florida, ready to take his first cruise vacation. Hoping to find a boatload of hard-bodies to fulfill his fantasies, he arrives at the cruise ship terminal and gets his first glimpse at his fellow passengers—not exactly the collection of beautiful babes he was hoping to find. Although disappointed, he shakes it off and boards the ship with optimism, only to be confronted with his first look inside a cruise ship cabin.

EXCERPT

Nearly a thousand people stood waiting in separate lines—cued by the initial of their last name—to present travel documents and complete the rituals of check-in. It was a swaying, shifting sea of Hawaiian sundresses and bright Caribbean prints capped with a bobbing field of silver-gray beehives coated with enough hair spray to make them as enduring as the pyramids. At first glance, I figured radiocarbon dating would put the average passenger at about seventy plus. This worried me. Hopefully, they were a contingent from AARP, with the rest of my shipmates—the younger ones—already on board.

I began to wonder: Where were all the hard-bodies? The ones with perfect boob jobs? The ones wearing skintight shorts exposing that smooth, tight transition between thigh and butt, making it impossible to tell where leg stops and ass begins? Dear God, where were they?

Forty-five minutes later, I walked through terminal security and entered the enclosed gangway. Suddenly, I was standing in the ship’s main reception area.

I had expected more of a transition. Perhaps if I had known when I stepped over those few inches of space between dock and boat, I would have experienced a sense of leaving the land. I decided I would recommend a little sign over the doorway that read Ship Begins Here.

I found my cabin, inserted the key and pushed the door open. In panicky disbelief I began to slowly turn full circle, looking for another doorway, another passage that would take me from this little “entry” into the real cabin. But the only interior door opened to a minuscule bath just large enough to accommodate a single sink, a potty, and a half-sized shower.

In disbelief over the cruise line’s assumption that I could actually stay in this tiny cubicle for four days, I paced off the dimensions. The room was about ten feet square, not including the mini-bath. Gray, flat weave carpeting covered the floor. The furnishings consisted of two single beds, a nightstand, a three-drawer dresser, and a television mounted high in one corner of the room. On the outside wall (the port side, I would later learn), pale yellow curtains flanked a small non-opening window that offered a dismal dose of claustrophobia, courtesy of the four inches of empty space between the ship and wharf.

Realizing my only choice was to make the best of the Lilliputian accommodations, I tugged at one of the bed frames, curious if I could move them together. But the bunks—like the rest of the furnishings—were bolted to the floor. I made a mental note that my search for companionship would have to focus on petites. There was no way I’d be able to bed anything larger than a size four.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jaye Frances is the author of the new romance novella, The Possibilities of Amy, and the paranormal-occult romance book The Kure, the first novel in The Kure series. She is also a featured columnist for the NUSA SUN magazine. Born in the Midwest, Jaye readily admits that her life’s destination has been the result of an open mind and a curiosity about all things irreverent. When she’s not consumed by her writing, Jaye enjoys cooking, traveling to all places tropical and “beachy” and taking pictures—lots of pictures—many of which find their way to her website. Her upcoming books include The Cruise - All That Glitters, a humorous take on a shipboard romance, scheduled for a May 2012 release, and Journeys From Above and Below the Belt, a collection of adult fiction novellas and short stories, scheduled for a Summer 2012 release. Jaye lives on the central gulf coast of Florida, sharing her home with one husband, six computers, four cameras, and several hundred pairs of shoes.

Find the author online: website | blog | facebook

ABOUT THE BOOK

It’s love on the high seas for Dean, a thirty-something bachelor taking his first cruise, hoping for a shipboard romance. On the prowl for the elusive hard-body, he quickly becomes disillusioned, wondering if his expectation of a boatload of beautiful sea nymphs is something found only in travel brochures.

Until he meets Angel.

She is the girl of his dreams, brought to life as a bewitching goddess, ready to engage in every sensual delight. Quickly lured into submission by Angel’s seductive charms, Dean is ready to surrender his heart and soul to this provocative beauty.

Until he meets Marcie . . .

Buy the book: Amazon