Trade in your wine today for a little bubbly and welcome Christi Barth to talk about her wedding planner love story. Welcome Christi!
Christi: Hi – I’m so happy to be here. Your blog followers are so much fun….not to mention how much I adore both reading and wine!
Lexi: So you did work as a wedding planner? Did any of the inspiration for Planning For Love come from your previous job?
Christi: 9 out of 10 people who learned I was a wedding planner would say you should write a book! Then they’d launch into elaborate eye winks about bridezillas, and mother of the bride horror stories.
Except, in my experience, 90% of weddings are wonderful. They are a celebration of friends and family and enduring love. Most people do pull it together and behave like grown-ups. So I didn’t want to write a scathing tell-all. But a series that focuses on the wedding industry, showcasing people who spend every day creating the perfect happily ever after? That felt like a good place to start. And maybe a few crazy hijinks did slip into my manuscript. It is a comedy, after all! You’ll have to guess which ones are real and which ones are just figments of my imagination…..
Lexi: As a fellow sucker for romance I love weddings. Maybe that means I look at the world with rose colored glasses, or maybe it just makes me a romantic. Do you find yourself seeing the good side of things (much like your character Ivy)?
Christi: I absolutely wear rose-colored glasses when it comes to love. I truly, 100% believe that there is a happily ever after match for everyone out there. But I’m a rampant worrier in all other aspects of life.
Lexi: Ben and Ivy are the main characters in your new release. They are so much fun to read, the strong emotions they feel pull you in. Were they easy to write?
Christi: Ben was just as much fun to write as he is to read. I’m naturally a smart aleck, so he was easy. Ivy was more of a challenge, figuring out how to balance her Type A professionalism and general sappiness, while still keeping her both believable and likeable.
Lexi: I find your books are perfect to read in the summer. Do you write them in the summer, or do they just happen to have good summer vibe feel to them?
Christi: Such a difficult question, because I do like to describe my books as beach reads. However, (and I can’t stress this enough) they are a fun, light read that will lift your mood all 365 days of the year! Book 2 comes out in March, and book 3 comes out in July—and it is set in the deep, icy darkness of a Chicago winter. I hope people are willing to read about cocoa and snuggling in July! But I do write all 12 months of the year. (I did just finish writing a book about the beach…at the beach – that was fun!)
(by July I will so be ready for a winter read, bring it on Christi!)
Lexi: And last do you have any embarrassing wedding stories that involve you that you would be willing to share?
Christi: Ah, see the catch here is that I really don’t want any former clients to sue me! I did help a friend with her destination wedding in Miami. The one thing she’d specified about the tropical flowers was that they not be pink. Sure enough, when the florist dropped them off (an hour late), her bouquet was entirely pink. So my husband RAN down the hot, humid street to a random florist and purchased a bunch of orange and red blooms. We held the ceremony for ten minutes until he arrived and stuffed them in her hands. They were the only flower she liked in any of her pictures!
Lexi: Thanks for stopping by Christi! Planning For Love was so much fun to read, I can't wait for your next one!
Christi: Aww, that makes me so happy! Look for Book #2, A Fine Romance, in March. It is the story of Sam the baker/aspiring chocolatier and Mira, the manager of Ivy’s new romance store who doesn’t like chocolate. Spoiler alert: there is a VERY hot sex scene that just might involve melted chocolate…… Book #3, Friends to Lovers, follows Daphne the florist and Gib the British lothario as they journey from—well, friends to lovers! Just finished writing their aphrodisiac dinner that works far better than either of them expected. Also, please keep an eye out in December for my novella Ask Her At Christmas, in the anthology Romancing the Holiday, also featuring stories by Jaci Burton and Helen Kay Dimon. It, too, is set in Chicago, with a cameo appearance from the hotel where Ivy & Ben have their one torrid night.
Planning for LoveAisle Bound Trilogy #1
by Christi Barth
Kindle Edition
Published August 1st 2012 by Carina Press
ASIN B0088NH1K8
Hopeless romantic Ivy Rhodes and anti-Cupid Bennett Westcottrequest the pleasure of your company for their disaster of a courtshipGoodreads
Wedding planner Ivy Rhodes is the best in the business, and she's not about to let a personal problem stop her from getting ahead. So when she's asked to star in the reality TV show Planning for Love, it doesn't matter that the show's videographer happens to be a recent—and heartbreaking—one-night stand.
Bennett Westcott admits he didn't handle his encounter with Ivy very well. But looking at her beautiful smile—and great body—through a camera lens every day? He can't be faulted for suggesting they have some no-strings fun.
The more time they spend together, the more Ben realizes Ivy isn't the wedding-crazed bridezilla he'd imagined. But if he doesn't trust himself to make a relationship last, how can he convince Ivy to give him another chance?
Purchase at Amazon, and Barnes & Noble
About the AuthorChristi Barth earned a Masters degree in vocal performance and embarked upon a career on the stage.
A love of romance then drew her to wedding planning. Ultimately she succumbed to her lifelong love of books and now writes contemporary romance. Christi lives in Maryland with her husband.
~*GIVEAWAY*~
Since Christi can't share any embarassing wedding stories, how about you? Have a funny, embarassing, or sweet wedding story of your own or a friend's? Share in the comments below to enter in the drawing for an ebook of Planning For Love, courtesy of Christi. Then enter the Rafflecopter. Good luck!
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We went to a wedding and the bride bent to light the unity candle and caught her veil on fire. They were able to put it out quickly.
ReplyDeleteThe gal that made my flowers said that something always goes wrong so she stuck a small orange flower in my bouquet so nothing else would go wrong on my wedding day.
Oh my goodness, thank you so much for that tip! I am writing book #3, about the florist, right now, and I will work it into the story!
ReplyDeleteWhen my husband's sister got married there were some guys that showed up at the wedding reception and nobody knew who they were at all.
ReplyDeleteThanks for a fun post and giveaway! The one and only time I ever agreed to be a bridesmaid, literally everything went wrong. The most notable was the centerpieces. They had goldfish bowls w/ pretty marbles and real fish surrounded by votive candles. Well... the none of the fish survived the night as the candles boiled 'em! And then the couple got divorced less than a year later...
ReplyDeleteI had a destination wedding in Hawaii and since we don't like champagne, we decided on fruity rum drinks instead. My better half came up with a drink called a crusher. To this day, I'm not exactly sure what was in that thing, but our 40 guests managed to polish off 12 full bottles of rum during our celebration.
ReplyDeleteI got married at the preacher's house. My sister and family and husband's sister and family was all that was there. My niece was three at the time, I had lived with her ever since her birth. She did not understand what marriage was. She had her arms wrapped around my leg crying, looking at my husband to be, begging, please don't take her. My sister tried to get her off me, but she clung for dear life. The preacher said it was okay and proceeded with her wailing the entire time. It was not funny at the time but it made me feel so loved that she desperately wanted me to stay with her and not marry.
ReplyDeleteWe were married in my parent's back yard under a big tent. Of course it had to rain but there there was enough alcohol that no one cared.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! Never had have any embarrassing moment in wedding, I hope for NEVER.
ReplyDeleteI really dont have any wedding stories but I would love to read this book. It sounds very good. Tore923@aol.com
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, no stories to tell, loved the excerpt. The book
ReplyDeletelooks really good.
divavixenqueen(at)gmail(dot)com
sorry..i don't have embarrasing story for share...but i do love my best friend wedding...i cry and cry and cry....that;s a aweet moment :)
ReplyDeleteNothing during the wedding but during the reception of my brother and lay. My hubby and his other friends all stripped his truck right down to his truck bed liner then wrapped it in so many layers of commercial grade packing wrap that it took them about an hour and a half to cut their way into and put their truck back together to leave for the honeymoon.
ReplyDeleteNeedless to say they weren't to happy so when we got married we hid our cars well and took a limo!