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Southern Exposures by Ann Jeffries
Law school student Vivian Lynn Alexander could no longer fight the undeniable truth that she had to end her three-year love affair with her college sweetheart, Carlton Andrews, to have the career she dreamed about in law. Nor could she deny a growing interracial passion that she felt for former basketball icon Chuck Montgomery—that is, until she met his best friend, Derrick “Dunk and Jam” Jackson, who was an even bigger star than Chuck. Both medical doctors now, Chuck and Derrick find that they have no medical skills to keep them both from falling hard for the attractive, young Georgetown Law student.
Kenneth and Benjamin Alexander are brother and best friends, but as different as night and day. Kenneth, the older, the cool, calm and collected President of his San Francisco-based electronics and security telecommunications company, and Benjamin, the dashing young US Air Force jet fighter pilot, stationed in San Diego. Yet they came to the same conclusion: They were both falling in love with the same woman—the beautiful and alluring JeNelle Towson, owner of INSIGHTS, a Santa Barbara landmark emporium of style and grace.
Despite their individual and desperate problems, the three of five Alexander siblings rally at perilous risk to themselves and others they care about when everything is on the line and the weight on all of them is the greatest. Two is company, but three is a family.
Book Reviews for Southern Exposures
“Ann Jeffries definitely has a skill for storytelling. There is vitality and high drama in Southern Exposures. The author did an excellent job with honing in and focusing on the three main, important characters of which the drama surrounds. I fell in love with the Alexanders. Job well done!” -- Jessica Tillis, Author/Editor
“Loved the way Ann Jeffries described the activities . . . I felt as though I was there witnessing everything that she was describing. She immediately got my attention with the colorful . . . attention to details. The book is very warm. The characters have to face challenges and each does it in a different way. Loved the focus on loving family—members of the family loving each other and believing in each other.” -- Brenda Irons LeCesne, Esq.
“There are a lot of promising plots within the story. I thoroughly enjoyed . . . this novel. I think Ann Jeffries’ ability to create emotion is a true talent. She did a great job creating suspense. The characters’ stories seemed most authentic and entertaining. Language and dialogue over all . . . is a strong area for Ann.
-- Karen R. Thomas, President, Creative Minds Book Group
Southern Exposures: Family Reunion (Volume 3)
Purchase: http://amzn.com/099150030X
Touch Me In The Morning by Ann Jeffries
In Summer County, South Carolina, Satarah Whitfield, head Emergency Room nurse battles to save the lives of countless accident victims of the record-breaking blizzard. She did not have time to think about her husband’s and sister’s betrayal when they absconded with every dime she had leaving their twin boys behind for her to raise. For one patient, a young boy whose name she did not even know, she risks her career to save his life by performing an unauthorized surgery that, if it goes wrong, could land her in prison. She only hopes that, if her own missing son needed extreme measures to save his life, someone would step up to save him.
In Richmond, Virginia, firefighter, Deputy Battalion Chief, Douglas Johnson, is battling to save his career after giving testimony in court against his fire department for malfeasants. That would be enough pressure to contend with, but his young, defiant adopted son is driving him to distraction with his preteen angst. If Doug’s wife hadn’t committed suicide, perhaps he would not feel like throwing in the towel.
When the chips were down neither Satarah nor Douglas have been quitters. So when Douglas learns that his boy was in a near fatal school bus accident on his way to Disney World, a trip that Douglas knew nothing about, his fear for his son’s life chases him to a South Carolina community he has never heard of and to a woman the likes of which he has never met. When these two bruised, but not broken people unite, they battle together to save their future.
Book Reviews for Touch Me In The Morning
“I could not put my iPad down once I started reading. Loved the characters and story line which kept me guessing what was going to happen next.” -- Pauline, an avid reader.
“Ms. Jeffries has given us a love story about two adults who, having experienced some of life's darker moments, fall deeply and passionately in love. Her characters are real life and enable the reader to eagerly ride along with them on their adventure.” -- Abraham Leib, Critic.
“I loved this novel; many times finding myself lost in their lives. The author did a fantastic job with character and plot development, and an unpredictable storyline.” -- Jessica Tillis, Author
Touch Me In The Morning (Volume 2)
Purchase: http://amzn.com/0991500377
An Unguarded Moment by Ann Jeffries
Otis Redding probably said it best in his rendition of “If Loving You Is Wrong, I Don’t Want To Be Right.” An affair between two married people can sometimes be more, mean more than just sex and infidelity. It can mean everything to two love-starved people.
Former Texas beauty queen, JaiHonnah Reise Chapman of African and Native American ancestry is finally moving back to the United States after studying abroad for the last four years and completing her doctorates in architecture and structural engineering at Arcadia Laboratories, Politecnico di Milano, Italy. A new career opportunity awaits her in Washington, DC, away from her wealthy, powerful, and manipulative father, Jake Hawkins, and the brutal man she married, international financier, Calvin Chapman. The last thing she needs or wants at the beginning of her professional life is to have An Unguarded Moment with another woman’s husband, her new boss.
J. Roderick Baylor, known as the sports icon JRock, has shed the highlights of his illustrious, professional basketball career, and the lowlights of his disastrous marriage to Monique, a would-be starlet. Now he has his twin, five-year-old daughters, Shelly and Shelby, a highly successful construction and development business and loving supportive family and friends around with which to build a new life. Little did he know that an illicit affair with another man’s wife, his new employee, had the power to refurbish the torn parts of his life and erect a monument to the power of love.
Book Reviews for An Unguarded Moment
“Ann Jeffries does an excellent job of weaving her characters' stories together and keeping the reader captivated.” -- Nancy Engle, Author “Murder at Mount Joy”
“An engrossing and sensuous love story that immediately grabs your attention and keeps you involved till the last page.” -- Abraham Leib, Critic
“My overall view is that this is a good, intelligent read! It's the kind of story you never want to end.”
-- Janice Sims, Author “This Winter Night”
“I really admire Ann’s smooth writing style and the appealing premise of this project.”
-- Mavis Allen, Associate Senior Editor, Silhouette Books
An Unguarded Moment (Volume 1)
Purchase: http://amzn.com/0991500334
Excerpt from Southern Exposure
A piercing scream followed by shrilled laughter tore Vivian Alexander's attention away from reading Fahey: Treatise on Ethics. She shifted Black's Law Dictionary to her side, and lifted her eyes to the little children playing raucous games with complete strangers, sending torrents of infectious giggles and laughter up to the high, cavernous ceiling. The vision brought a smile to her gamine face, bright brown eyes, and curved Cupie Doll mouth. She thought of her younger siblings—Gregory and Aretha—when they were at that age. She watched the children for a moment or two longer, hoping the little unguided missiles didn't fall flat on their faces or tumble over a piece of Samsonite luggage. The children were, however, under the watchful eyes of their parents who scolded them for making too much noise and, nodding toward her, smiled apologetically. Vivian acknowledged the parents with a smile and a shrug and turned her attention to the wintery scene unfolding outside the tall, wide window. Snow was still falling, blurring her panoramic view of the airport tarmac.
It was a very cold, grey, blustery day in Chicago. Muck-blotched snow was heaped high in places on the airport landscape at O'Hare International. Ground crews dodged arriving and departing international and domestic aircraft, as they scurried to load provisions, luggage, and/or fuel into waiting airplanes. In the background, deicing trucks spewed clear, slushy fluid on the aircraft fuselage and wings.
It was the Christmas holiday season, just before New Years’ Eve. At any airport in the country, literally thousands of people were traveling. O'Hare Airport, still one of the largest and busiest in the world, was no exception despite the horrendous weather conditions. Controlled chaos would aptly describe the scene along the wide corridors of the airport's many concourses with passengers of many nationalities in a hurry to catch a flight to some distant destination. Little shops and food concession stands were bustling with activity. Airline flight crews briskly walked, pulling their rolling essentials behind them in black leather luggage not much larger than a breadbox. Passenger loading-bay areas were jammed with people sitting or standing guard over more carry on luggage than they probably needed. Ground-crew flight attendants scurried to their appointed posts, and were immediately mobbed by travelers looking for seat assignments, checking on connecting flight schedules, or asking questions about in-flight food service. Announcement after announcement chronicled the arrival and departure of many flights.
Some babies cried while others slept, nestled peacefully in their parents' arms. Little children continued their play, as if the melee were an extension of the just past Christmas morning enthusiasm. Occasionally, aircraft engines roared into action, as a ground crew released the front wheel of the aircraft and energetic hand signals sent it on its way.
Vivian quietly sat before one of the wide, ceiling-high windows in the airport on a padded bench with her long legs curled up under her. She was nearly oblivious to the chaos that surrounded her. She leaned back against a tall column, reading and occasionally observing ground flight crews, as they loaded baggage in steel cases into the belly of the airplane parked at the end of the long, slanted ramp. She, her parents, Bernard and Sylvia Alexander, her younger brother, Gregory Clayton, and her eleven-year-old sister, Aretha Grace, were waiting at Gate 6 for the United Airlines’ attendant to announce that the flight was ready for boarding. They would continue their trip home to Goodwill, South Carolina, a small town located in Summer County, more than forty miles from South Carolina's state capitol of Columbia. Her return flight to Washington, DC, and Georgetown University Law Center, would not be leaving until 6:15 P.M. from Gate 23.
The Alexander family was
returning from San Francisco, California, where they spent the week of
Christmas holidays visiting with Kenneth James, the eldest offspring of
the Alexanders. Benjamin Staton Alexander, her twenty-eight-year-old
brother, an Air Force jet pilot, managed to get some time off and fly
himself to San Francisco from San Diego for a few days. It wasn't like
being at home in Goodwill for the holidays, Vivian mused, but at least
the family was able to spend another special time together.
They stayed at Kenneth’s home in Marin County, outside of San Francisco. Vivian was enormously proud of her oldest brother, holding him and his accomplishments in awe. Before starting his own company, he worked as the lead electronics engineering specialist for Sandoval Anniston Corporation, a huge American aircraft and electronics manufacturing operation with corporate offices based in New York and other worldwide locations. Being the thorough researcher that she was, in undergrad she used Sandoval as an example in one of many business classes she took. The company had many military contracts for sophisticated and top secret surveillance and guidance systems, as well as doing some work for the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security, and the super-secret National Security Agency (NSA). She had done very well on that paper. Now Kenneth was the Executive Director of his own company, CompuCorrect, Incorporated (CCI).
For a few moments, Vivian allowed herself a respite from her intense focus on her reading of Fehey's Treatise, as she noticed her parents talking quietly together a short distance away from where she sat. She couldn't hear the conversation, but they always seemed to have so much to say to each other. She smiled, thinking that she couldn't have designed two more perfect parents. Her parents would have never permitted the raucous public display that she witnessed with the young parents seated nearby and their rambunctious offspring. Her parents could do more with one look than most parents did with a good scolding. She smiled again and turned her attention away from her parents and back to her reading.
( Continued... )
© 2014 All rights reserved. Book excerpt reprinted by permission of the author, Ann Jeffries. Do not reproduce, copy or use without the author's written permission. This excerpt is used for promotional purposes only.
Southern Exposures: Family Reunion (Volume 3)
Purchase: http://amzn.com/099150030X
They stayed at Kenneth’s home in Marin County, outside of San Francisco. Vivian was enormously proud of her oldest brother, holding him and his accomplishments in awe. Before starting his own company, he worked as the lead electronics engineering specialist for Sandoval Anniston Corporation, a huge American aircraft and electronics manufacturing operation with corporate offices based in New York and other worldwide locations. Being the thorough researcher that she was, in undergrad she used Sandoval as an example in one of many business classes she took. The company had many military contracts for sophisticated and top secret surveillance and guidance systems, as well as doing some work for the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security, and the super-secret National Security Agency (NSA). She had done very well on that paper. Now Kenneth was the Executive Director of his own company, CompuCorrect, Incorporated (CCI).
For a few moments, Vivian allowed herself a respite from her intense focus on her reading of Fehey's Treatise, as she noticed her parents talking quietly together a short distance away from where she sat. She couldn't hear the conversation, but they always seemed to have so much to say to each other. She smiled, thinking that she couldn't have designed two more perfect parents. Her parents would have never permitted the raucous public display that she witnessed with the young parents seated nearby and their rambunctious offspring. Her parents could do more with one look than most parents did with a good scolding. She smiled again and turned her attention away from her parents and back to her reading.
( Continued... )
© 2014 All rights reserved. Book excerpt reprinted by permission of the author, Ann Jeffries. Do not reproduce, copy or use without the author's written permission. This excerpt is used for promotional purposes only.
Southern Exposures: Family Reunion (Volume 3)
Purchase: http://amzn.com/099150030X
Meet the Author
Ann Jeffries is a native of Washington, D. C. She is an only child who enjoyed the benefits of a private school education at Allen in Asheville, NC, and a public education at the University of Maryland. She began writing fiction for her own amusement. She is currently writing novels in her Family Reunion: The Wisdom of the Ancestors series.
Ann is the recipient of many awards for leadership and public service. A speaker at colleges, universities, conferences and conventions, she has extensively traveled the North American continent, Asia and Europe. Among other things, she is an entrepreneur, an avid viewer of public television and a voracious reader of fiction.
Ms. Jeffries’ pride and joy are her family, particularly her Fabulous Four grands. She lives in Maryland and South Carolina. Website address: www.newviewliterature.com; Facebook @Ann Jeffries; Twitter @newviewlit; e-mail at annjeffries@newviewliterature.com
