Welcome to CentreStage!

CentreStage showcases fabulous authors from around the world. These authors might tell you about themselves or their books, their writing habits or their authorly inventions. Today, it is my great pleasure to welcome fellow loveahappyending.com featured author and great virtual friend, the lovely Jessica Strassner. Jessica has just finished writing her latest book, a sequel of sorts… a semi-sequel, so to speak, to her fantastic novel, The One Who Got Away. I adored The One Who Got Away so I can’t wait to read on! But hold on, a Semi-Sequel? What’s that all about?

Take it away, Jess!

Introducing… Jessica Strassner!

A little bit about me… I recently packed up my flip-flops and moved from sunny Florida to Washington, DC. I live with my wonderful boyfriend who makes my coffee every morning and bakes me cookies.  I love anything that sparkles. I could eat cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  I like just about any kind of music and love going to concerts, even though I have no musical ability whatsoever.  If I’m writing, my headphones are on and the music is turned up loud!

My three novels (Here We Go, The One Who Got Away, One of the Guys) are all available on Amazon.com.

Jessica talks about her latest book ~ a Semi-Sequel!

One of the Guys is a “semi-sequel” to my last book, The One Who Got Away.  I’m calling it a “semi-sequel” (Is there such a thing?  If not, I just made it a thing.) because it continues the story of Lucy and Jackson, but is told more from the viewpoint of their best friend, Kate.

When I finished The One Who Got Away, I kind of left things hanging, because I wasn’t sure how I wanted Lucy and Jackson’s story to continue.  Plus, Kate was one of those secondary characters that I liked writing, and I thought she needed a story of her own!  Readers can find out more about what happens with Lucy and Jackson, and now they get to learn about Kate, too!

In the book, Kate is helping Lucy and Jackson plan their wedding while attempting to juggle a few romances of her own.  Everyone questions when it will finally be Kate’s turn to walk down the aisle, but she can’t even manage to hang on to a boyfriend! She does have several options, though. There’s Chris, the smooth, sexy photographer. And then there’s Max, the boy next door “friend with benefits…”  Kate can’t help but wonder – is it possible to date one of your guy friends? How about two? At the same time? Which one of the guys will she choose?

Visit, follow or watch!

You can find Jess all over the place. She has a website as well as a blog. She has author pages at amazon and lovehappyending.com. You can follow her on Twitter or find her on Facebook. And there’s also a fabulous video called New covers!

Huge congratulations, Jess! I adore the cover and can’t wait to get reading to find out how the story goes on.

Semi-Sequel… I’m intrigued! How do you address the challenge of continuing a previous book without writing an outright sequel?

Readers, what do YOU think of sequels, semi or otherwise?