Friday, October 4, 2013

"What's In A Name" Contest

     My next novel, Not Alone, is just as suspenseful as The Beloved Daughter, but it also has a romantic component. That's where you come in! Tell me about a real-life romance you know (could be yours!). Do you have grandparents who have been married for 72 years and still slow dance in the living room with bare feet every evening? Did your spouse pull off some amazing wedding or proposal surprise that still makes you smile? Did your next-door neighbor marry his junior high sweetheart? I want to hear those stories!

Rules: 
  1. This is an exclusive contest for newsletter subscribers. Not a subscriber? Just add your email to the upper-right sidebar, or go to alanaterry.com/newsletter.
  2. Tell your story in the comments section below.
  3. Choose your names for the two characters in Not Alone. (Don't use real names without permission!) If you'd like to honor a couple that's truly in love but they want to keep their privacy, you can come up with names that start with the same letter of their real names. Of course you can use your name if you'd like (as long as you have your partner's ok as well.) Include your choice of names in the comments section.
  4. If your story is selected as the winner, the names you chose will be used in Not Alone, and I'll send you either a free paperback copy when the book is released (USA only - ebook for international winners) or an advanced PFD pre-publication!
For more about Not Alone, check out the book trailer!  *** Just released ***



3 comments:

  1. It was the fall of 1993 and my church’s youth group was at the annual Edmonton Eskimos vs. Calgary Stampeders Labor Day Classic football game. I was sitting beside my girlfriend and we were two rows behind a group of teenage boys. I leaned over and told my friend, “one day I’m going to date that boy” as I pointed to a guy with a permed mullet. She laughed at me and said “no way”.

    In the spring of 1994, another girlfriend who was my bestie entered a singing competition in a city which was an hour and a half away. We asked this long haired boy who had his driver’s license if he’d be able to drive us down. Always happy to be behind the wheel of a vehicle, he happily agreed. It was that trip that Doug fell in love with a young blue eyed and blonde haired girl. Since that was the year that I was graduating and I needed someone to take me, I asked Doug to be my date and again, he obliged. On April 29, he made it official by asking me to “go out” with him as he handed me a single red rose.

    Three years, three months and three days of dating later, we were married. Him, not quite 20 years old, myself just past 21.

    This summer we celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary. We have four amazing children and are looking forward to what the future holds for us.

    ~Stephanie

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    1. Love the story Stephanie! So glad you shared. How sweet you had such an right-on intuition about things from so early on!

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  2. Allow me to introduce you to my parents, Mike and Bonnie. They have been married for 51 years, it will be 52 in May. My father's father died when he was a teen, so the only real father he has known was my mother's dad. He treated him like a father and likewise my grandfather treated my dad as a son. My grandfather was 92 when he passed away 2 years ago. Up until that time, my folks were constantly with him taking care of his every need. Upon his passing, my mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease. This has been a big drain on my father, but he knows that this is the part of the marriage vows where it says "For Better or Worse, in Sickness and in Health". They are both retired, so they spend each day remembering "the good old days" as they work together to make my mother's last years here on Earth the best ones yet to come. I would love to honor them and their life in your book. We could either give them code names like "Brenda and Mark" or we could use the names of Catherine and Jennings, these were my grandfather and his wife, my mother's step mother. She herself was more of a mother to my mother than her own mother ever was.

    Thanks for the chance for this contest, this is a neat idea.

    Rick

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