The Way She Reads: The North Star Trilogy - Blog Tour, Guest Post & Giveaway

Nearly three years ago, North Star was released book by book. Now you can get the entire series as a bundle!

I’m delighted to welcome Posy Roberts to my blog and honoured that she wrote a guest post all about the inspiration behind the story line in the North Star Trilogy.

Enjoy the guest post, read the blurb and don’t forget to enter the Rafflecopter giveaway!

Long before I added "Writer" to my CV, I worked as a family therapist, a home visitor, and parent educator. My passion is families, helping couples get along better so they can create nurturing environments where children can thrive. And for those people who grew up in non-supportive homes, I want to help them find healing so they can move past their hurts and live up to their potential. Knowing that, it probably wouldn't come to any surprise that I write stories about families; families in the broad definition. I write about families of origin, chosen families, biological and adoptive families, and more.

The North Star trilogy is the work that manifests my passion the most, I believe. I wanted to tell a story about how family of origin shapes and forms people, both good and bad, and how they then take those lessons learned into future relationships with partners, children, and even life outside of the family. That meant I needed to show readers how Hugo and Kevin live with their family of origin, so Spark includes some of their life as teens, where they fell in love, but then drift apart before meeting again as adults. Fusion and Flare cover what happens after Hugo and Kevin decide they want to pursue their relationships as adults and all the complications of blending their lives.

Kevin's father was a control freak, cold and callous, vs. Hugo's family, who loved him for who he was. As adults, that's obvious. Kevin has become exactly what his father expected him to be: successful, married with children, and living the perfect-on-the-outside life, even if he's miserable. Only after his father dies, does Kevin give up the pretense, ask for a divorce, and attempt to figure out who he is. In contrast, Hugo lives as an openly gay man, a drag queen, and an actor, even if he can barely manage to scrape enough money together to pay the bills. He's happy with who he is, but he's also lonely and craves something more.

North Star is about second chances, not only at love, when Kevin and Hugo meet by chance on a weekend getaway. It's also about getting a do-over for Kevin. Now in his mid-thirties, he gets to figure out who he is. And yes, he's still that bisexual man who fell in love with Hugo back in high school. Now he has to figure out how to tell his ex that he's been bisexual all this time. He has to find a way to tell his kids that his old friend, Hugo, is more than just his friend. Not to mention telling the extended family and his social circle. And just when they think everything is going to fall into place, more complications come to a head.

What I tried to do with North Star is create a realistic family, headed by Hugo and Kevin, that fights to stick together through thick and thin. Their love for each other is the glue that keeps their uniquely defined family (and you'll see what that means when you read) together through horrendous news, Kevin's coming out, Hugo's career changes, and the complications their love brings to the two kids they are trying to raise together. Two decades of working with families went into this book.

In high school, Hugo and Kevin discover they are perfect for each other. Sadly they fell in love years too early to make a solid commitment, and college and other relationships got in the way. Fifteen years later they meet again, and all those old feelings are rekindled. Second chances at such perfect love don’t happen every day. Hugo and Kevin immediately know they’re meant to be, but figuring out a way to combine their divergent lives without rocking their well-established boats is the challenge. If that’s even possible. Perhaps their love is worth upending the worlds they know.

The blurb:

Falling in love again is easy. Fitting into each other’s complicated lives isn’t.

Hugo and Kevin were best friends and secret lovers in high school, but a chance meeting years later proves that the spark that drew them together before is still there. In Spark, Hugo and Kevin must try to put together a relationship while overcoming the obstacles of coming out, divorce, and children. In Fusion, an unexpected illness may tear apart all they’ve been building. And in Flare, though they’ve finally settled together happily, outside forces are working hard to upset their family.

Bio:

Posy Roberts writes about the realistic struggles of men looking for love. Whether her characters are family men, drag queens, or lonely men searching for connections, they all find a home in her stories.

Posy is a Jill of all trades and master of the drill and paintbrush. She’s married to a partner who makes sure she doesn’t forget to eat or sleep during her writing frenzies. Her daughter, a budding author and cinematographer, helps her come up with character names. For fun, Posy enjoys crafting, geocaching, and singing spontaneously about the mundane, just to make regular life more interesting.

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