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You’re Invited

February 10, 2020 by in category Writing tagged as , , , ,

I love romance novels, Hallmark movies, candlelight dinners and flowers from my husband, and this is of course the week to pull out all of the stops, so that’s exactly what I’m doing.

              My 2nd book #SilverBracelets, a romantic comedy that starts the day after Valentine’s and ends on St. Patrick’s Day, releases on Valentine’s Day. I’m so excited for the release that I’ll be having a two day party in my facebook reader group, Tari Lynn & Friends.

              The story is set in my version of Hermosa Beach, and is about a school teacher who finds herself in a social media nightmare when a picture of her crashing a bicycle into a trash can goes viral. Benny Lopez, a cute police officer, seems to be behind the posts that are making her life miserable, and she wants nothing to do with him.

              All Benny wants is a date with the cute school teacher, but she won’t talk to him. Until, he gets some great advice from his grandmother, and snaps on the handcuffs.

              Between the bicycle accident and the handcuffs are a series of mishaps, false starts and incidents that bring friends… and maybe a guy and a girl together.

              I’m having so much fun writing this series, I hope you’ll check it out. And stop by the party in Tari Lynn & Friends , Thursday, February 13th and Friday February 14th. I’ll have games, prizes and books. Did I mention chocolate?

              The Amazon preorder price for #SilverBracelets is 99 cents. Get it at this special price for a limited time. Hope to see you at the party!

              Then for the after party, Hunky Hubby and I are planning an evening just for two. We may even end up in Hermosa Beach. I’ll tell you all about it later…well, maybe not ALL about it…

              Happy Valentine’s Day!

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Romantic Connections

January 10, 2020 by in category Charmed Writer by Tari Lynn Jewett

I know that New Year’s is barely over, but I’m already looking forward to Valentine’s. I walk through craft stores, department stores…even the grocery store, and love the red and pink lined aisles. I love the paper doilies, heart shaped boxes of chocolates (especially See’s Chocolates), and sentimental cards. I love planning a romantic evening, what I’ll wear, where we’ll go. Even after thirty years of marriage, Valentine’s is an important holiday to both me and Hunky Hubby. Yes, my gearhead, construction worker, sports loving husband, is a romantic.

So, this year in The Charmed Connection, our Charmed Writers Facebook reader group, we’re having a special celebration. We’re celebrating from February 1st through 16th with romance interviews from some of our very owned Charmed Writers.

Would you like to find out what authors find to be romantic? What would an author consider a romantic Valentine’s date? What would be on the menu? Who would be sitting on the other side of the table? How would the evening end? (This is on facebook, so it’ll have to be PG, LOL)

We have some wonderful authors participating in this event, and we hope you’ll join us!

And on Valentine’s Day I have a new book releasing, #SilverBracelets is Book 2 in my #HermosafortheHoliday series. Book 1, #PleaseSayYes is a Valentine’s story. If you haven’t read it, I hope you’ll check it out (in fact, if you email me at tarilynnjewett@gmail.com, I have 10 free ecopies to give away this month).

Book 2 begins the day after Valentine’s, and ends on St. Patrick’s Day. #SilverBracelets is available for preorder right now on Amazon for 99 cents. This price will go up after the book releases next month.

I hope you’ll join us in The Charmed Connection. Charmed Writers is made up of over 130  authors from NY Times and USAToday best-selling authors to new authors just beginning their journey. We work together, learn from each other, support each other…and share the results with you.


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Surprise!

November 10, 2019 by in category Charmed Writer by Tari Lynn Jewett tagged as , , , ,

I’ve wandered down the rows of bookshelves in libraries and bookstores so many times in my life, fantasizing about what it would feel like to see my book on one of those shelves, hold a book with my name on it in my hands, sign books for readers, and maybe, just maybe get fan letters.

Last year my first book was published, and this year it was released in print. I’m still excited to see my name on the front of the book…and inside. And, I’ve signed books. Yes, it’s true! I’ve signed dozens of books this year. But a couple of weeks ago, I got my first fan letter…from an unexpected reader.

#PleaseSayYes is book 1 in the 6 book #HermosaForTheHolidays series. It’s a sweet romcom. I wrote it for adults of all ages…think Hallmark movie. Sweet, light, hopefully a heartwarming read that might even make you laugh. And adults of all ages have read it, young single women, young mothers, a few men, and grandmothers into their 80’s have read this story, but what I didn’t expect was  kids reading the book after all it is a romance. I’ve had a review from a 12 year old, and my first fan letter was from a 9 year old girl. She wanted to share the book with her class.

So, of course, I’m sending her 6 books, so she can keep her copy. And what she doesn’t know, is that in the upcoming release of book 2 #SilverBracelets, she is a character in the story. I had so much fun including her, and I hope she enjoys it as much as I enjoyed receiving her letter.

One more fantasy to fulfill, to see my books in bookstores. I’m feeling pretty good about the dreams I’ve checked off, but I think the one I’ll treasure most is this letter from my young reader.

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Sometimes You Can Go Back

October 10, 2019 by in category Charmed Writer by Tari Lynn Jewett tagged as , ,

If you love Christmas and romance, you’ll want to add author, Jina Bacarr’s latest book, Christmas Once Again, to your holiday reading list, it’s available TODAY!!

Jina has taken all that is Christmas, and woven it through this tale of love, heartbreak and breathtaking magic to take us back in time. Kate Arden, an accomplished career woman in the 1950’s has never gotten over the loss of her first love in World War II.

Defying the conventions of the 1940’s, Kate, a beautiful young typist from a warm, caring, blue collar family, and Jeffrey Rushbrooke, heir to the Rushbrooke paper mill that supports the economy in the small town of Posey Creek, fall in love, pledging to be together forever.

On the night that they plan to elope, Jeff is called to Washington on a special mission, and Kate never sees him again

By 1955, Kate is an accomplished single, career woman, living in New York. When her younger sister calls and begs her to come home for Christmas, Kate reluctantly gives in dreading the memories of her lost love. She would give anything to be able to go back in time to change history, or at least see Jeff just one more time.

But once on the train, the magic of Christmas and true love take over. Kate finds herself getting off of the train in 1943, one week before Jeff is called to Washington. Going back isn’t as easy as it seems. While she looks like the 19-year-old girl that all of the people in her life knew, inside she’s a more mature and independent young woman, and she knows what the future holds for those around her.

Can two young lovers reach across time to be together again? Is the magic of Christmas strong enough to change history?

Christmas Once Again is the perfect mix of romance and Christmas past, and a great start to the current holiday season. If you’re looking for that Norman Rockwell Christmas with a little bit of Miracle on 34th Street. Look no further. You’ll find it here!

And to watch the book trailer:


Available Today: Christmas Once Again

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Five Things I Learned Teaching Writing to Children

September 10, 2019 by in category Writing tagged as

Not that I’m a brilliant writer, or have anything that anyone else doesn’t have within them, but on occasion I’ve been asked if I could teach someone to make magic with words.

One of those people was a friend with a journalism degree, who was applying to grad school, and not getting great results from his application essay. He asked me if I might be able to tweak it, I did my best, he loved it, and asked me what I’d done.

“You wrote everything I wrote, didn’t add or delete anything, and yet it’s magic. Can you teach me to do that?” I didn’t really know what I had done, so I wasn’t very helpful at the time. This happened many times over the years, and I wondered if ‘making magic’ was something inherent rather than something that could be taught.

Years later an opportunity arose to teach a class on writing for magazine publication to children in the GATE class at our sons’ elementary school. The students ranged from grades 3-5 with IQ’s that put them in the gifted range. As a child, I’d dreamed of becoming a teacher, and this opportunity both excited and terrified me…and ultimately, I’m sure that I learned more than the kids that I taught that year.

  1. Some of us are rule followers and others rule breakers. This is true for both kids and adults. But, it’s important to know the rules so that when you break them you know what you’re trying to accomplish. I learned that although I tend to be a rule follower, sometimes it’s a good thing to break the rules!
  2. You can  create energy, power or ‘magic’ just by changing a few key words. Drop unnecessary words that slow a sentence down, use active verbs, and power words to give your sentences more strength. This may seem like a no brainer to most of you, but twenty years ago, when I taught this class, the only writing instruction I’d had had been in high school, and until I analyzed what I did, to teach the students, I had never broken it down.
  3. Write the way you speak. Let the reader ‘hear’ your voice. Kids tend to do this naturally. They write exactly what they would say, but eventually, school, society, the universe somehow makes us believe that in order to write ‘Great Literature’ we have to write more formally. Save the formalities for business letters and legal documents, and write the way you’d speak to your audience.
  4. No one thinks they like to do revisions, until they start to see the magic! Then very often you can change their minds. I sometimes do more than a dozen rewrites, I definitely need a deadline, or I’ll rewrite forever. For me the real ‘writing’ or crafting is done during the revisions. The first draft is to organize my ideas and get them on paper. The kids in my class wrote at least three drafts of the articles they were writing before they submitted them to real publications. Each revision we added another layer to their writing, and they began to see exactly what they were capable of if they went that extra mile (or draft). When teachers, and parents asked how I’d gotten the kids excited about writing three drafts, I just smiled and told them it was magic!
  5. Not only can rejections be positive, but they can be fun!! At the end of the school year we submitted their work to publications, and spent our final sessions reading rejection letters that had been received by famous authors. The kids loved  hearing how L. Frank Baum had been told that The Wizard of Oz was ‘too radical a departure from the traditional juvenile literature’ and yet, nearly 100 years later we’re still reading this book, that A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle received twenty-six rejections, and that JKRowling’s, Harry Potter was rejected twelve times, and she was told ‘not to quit her day job’.

I also reminded the kids that if they happened to receive a rejection letter, it was a badge of honor, not very many people, even grown ups have actually had their work considered by a real publication. All of the students work was published in a school collection, and by the last day of class, they had promised to let me know when they heard from the publication they’d submitted to.

All summer I received excited phone calls from students who had received rejection letters. A few parents even told me that they’d framed them. And, two of my students were published in magazines.

The kids excitement to receive even a rejection reminded me how lucky I am to do what I love, and that rejection should be a learning tool, not the doorway to depression.

So there you go, just a few things that I learned teaching writing to children, and by the way my friend got into graduate school! I’m sure that with his GPA and the hard work he’d done as an undergraduate, he’d have been accepted anyway, but I’d like to think that there was a little bit of magic involved!

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