Hello, friends.
Are you as excited as I am for a new year and new books?
I know I’m throwing a lot at you here in a short amount of time, but I feel like that balances out the veritable drought of content from me in 2020.
Now, Goldilocks may seem familiar. This book was written month-by-month for my newsletter subscribers. So, you may have followed along or caught a chapter here or there when the file was available.
I’ve written three books this way, and all have been super valuable learning experiences. It’s always fun to share a rough draft with my readers, and I find the instant feedback enlightening. The other two books that I did this way are Recovered and Downfall. Both actually ended up being a couple of my bestselling titles, both here and overseas. Fingers crossed Goldilocks follows in their footsteps!
If this book does well, I’ll wrack my brain for a new idea that can be the next newsletter book. Though, I may have to put that off until 2022 in order to stay on top of all the content I have planned for this year. If you read the sneak peek at the end of A Righteous Man, I’m sure you are anxiously awaiting my next big project. If you didn’t… oh boy… you are gonna be BIG sad that you missed it.
This version of Goldilocks has been edited, copyedited, and proofread. Along with having an actual ending now, it is all polished up to be a more cohesive and professional story. You will notice some changes if you read the first draft, and hopefully, you’ll find that they made the book better.
Regardless, if you read along while I was writing, thank you for powering through my terrible, often incomprehensible rough draft. And if you just picked up this title the minute it was published or somewhere down the road once it became a real book, thank you for honoring me and my words with your time and dollars.
These days both are so precious, and I appreciate you sharing any little bit you have.
Happy reading!
Love & Ink,
Jay
I’m not usually one who offers up trigger warnings in my books, because I don’t ever consider the content I write taboo or that far outside expected events in real life. However, I’m sensitive enough to know this story does touch on emotional abuse, mild physical abuse, and a touch of suicidal ideation, and that’s a lot of heavy material for one book. If you are a reader who struggles with any of those topics, you might wanna sit this one out. I’m a big believer in self-care in all forms. Do what you gotta do for you!
I was a girl born to be caught forever between two extremes. And between two brothers.
I grew up in a home that was opulent and over-the-top massive. Everything was accented in gold, and the artwork on the walls were originals from the masters. There were rugs and silverware that cost more than my mother made in a year as the head housekeeper of the sprawling estate. Before I could even talk, I was juxtaposed between outrageous wealth and abject poverty. I was never sure on which side of the coin I fell, because while I was privileged enough to attend the fancy private school where the homeowners sent their two sons, I was by far the poorest kid attending the academy. I received the best education money could buy, but it was no secret I was a kid bound for community college or trade school, not the Ivy League like the rest of my classmates.
I was also trapped in a bitter back and forth between good and evil throughout my entire existence. I grew up in the shadow of two boys who were as different as night and day. My mom cared for both of them like they were her own…and treated all three of us the same. That couldn’t be said for the rest of the adults who haunted the halls of the ostentatious mansion. Both boys were the same age, born mere weeks apart. One was the rightful heir to the family fortune, his mother the reigning society queen of the small, ritzy New England town where we lived. She called all the shots and was scary powerful in the right circles. Her child was the favored son. He could do no wrong in the eyes of the elite.
I knew better.
He might look like the prince of the castle, and the hero of every