GUEST POST and EXCERPT
In Her Eyes
by Wesley Banks
In Her Eyes by Wesley Banks is currently on tour with Bewitching Book Tours. The tour stops here today for a guest post by the author and an excerpt. Please be sure to visit the other tour stops as well.
Description
When Ben Wilder is given a second chance he focuses on the one thing he's always been good at: running. After walking on to the University of Florida he begins to quickly move up the national rankings, paving a path towards the NCAA Track and Field Championships. Everything is going the way he planned, until the day he bumps into Casey Taylor.
New to Gainesville, and focused on her first year out of medical school, Casey is initially hesitant to let Ben into her life. But the truth is she's worried about letting a guy near the one thing she loves most: her daughter, Emma. After one fun and fateful night Casey can no long bury her feelings behind these excuses, and takes a chance on a guy she is slowly falling for.
Casey's relationship with Ben starts to gradually build into a love that she has never felt. But more importantly Emma has taken a particular liking to Ben. As they all spend more time together Ben is forced to confront painful memories when he starts to notice something hauntingly familiar in Emma's eyes.
After a local journalist uncovers the secret of Ben's past their lives begin to converge on a single promise that Ben Wilder has long since made: to never give up ... no matter what.
Excerpt
Ben was tired, but he was excited when he woke up on Monday morning. It was Casey’s day off and Coach had given the team the week off, minus a team meeting this afternoon, since they had another month until the NCAA Championships.
Emma’s school started at seven forty-five which meant if he got to Casey’s around eight, they could spend the whole day just relaxing.
When he arrived the garage was shut, so he walked up to the front door. Before he could knock, though, the door swung open and Casey jumped on him, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist.
“My hero,” she said in a terrible southern accent. Then she started giving him little pecks all over his head and face.
He walked inside with her still wrapped around him and kicked the door shut. Laughing, he said, “Who is this strange girl, and what did you do with Casey?”She continued on in the southern accent. “You won the race for your beloved and claimed victory.”
Ben sat her on the backside of the couch and looked down at her. “What on earth has gotten into you?”
“You, Sir Runner. Now, take me, take me now.” Casey puckered up her lips playfully and Ben laughed.
Ben leaned in to give her a quick kiss, thinking she might taste or smell like alcohol, because right now that was the only explanation he could come up with. She tasted like…cookies.
He looked around the room and to his right, sitting on the kitchen counter, he found his answer. He let go of Casey and she fell backwards onto the couch.
“Hey!” she said as she hit the couch cushion.
Ben walked over to the kitchen and picked up a small tub of Cookies ’n Cream ice cream and a bag of Fudge Filled Chewy Chips Ahoy. He held up both and looked over at Casey who was half-hiding, half-peering over the top of the couch. “Please tell me you are not eating cookies and ice cream at eight o’clock in the morning.”
Casey jumped over the couch and came running at Ben, a ball of sugar filled energy. She wrapped her arms around his waist, her legs around the back of his calves, and inched her way up his body. When she reached the top she bombarded his neck with kisses. “My hero,” she said. She stopped for a moment and looked at him with the most devious, sensual grin. She leaned in closer until there was almost no space between her lips and his. Then like a cheetah springing on a gazelle, she grabbed the ice cream with her left hand and the cookies with her right, hit the ground and took cover on the couch.
“You have serious problems,” Ben said.
Casey pulled out a cookie and dipped it in the ice cream and held it up for him to see. Then she started humming and dancing the cookie around like she was taunting him.
Ben took two steps, dove across the couch, snatched the cookie from her hand and shoved it in his mouth before she could barely move. She looked at him wide eyed and in complete silence and then jumped on him. They wrestled and tickled each other like five-year-olds, stopping every now and then for a quick cookie break.
This went on for about thirty more minutes and then she crashed on the floor next to him. Her head lay across his chest as he played with her hair until eventually he crashed too.
[Want more? Click below to read a longer excerpt.]
Praise for the Book
"Wesley did an amazing job illustrating each scene of the story. He painted such a clear picture that kept me turning the pages. The love, emotion and fate is what makes this story a perfectly written fairytale." ~ Amazon Customer
"A thoroughly enjoyable read with a sweet romance and exciting plot twist." ~ Trosado
"The author did it again. He keeps you interested to see how the story evolves throughout the book. It was a great touch to put a name to each chapter and have that be the focus." ~ pat cairns
"I loved this book! Another great read from Wesley Banks. Wesley's vivid descriptions put you right there in the story. People familiar with Gainesville and the University of Florida will love the local references. The story with its twists kept me hooked right up to the amazing end, and I'm eagerly awaiting the next book from this gifted writer." ~ Terry Picard
"Wesley Banks scores high again! His newest book is another beautifully written story of love, dedication, and perseverance. Without spoiling any parts of this amazing book, all I can say is that In Her Eyes is a definite must read! I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and again, I am so looking forward to his next book!" ~ Teresa Thompson
Guest Post by the Author
From Engineer to Fiction Author
There’s several stereotypes about engineers. We aren’t good communicators, we’re introverted, we aren’t creative … this list goes on.
I worked in the world of civil engineering for nearly eight years. And to be perfectly honest, for the most part, I’ve found those stereotypes to be true.
Engineers work in a very constrained world. The physical properties of steel, concrete, and timber don’t change. Newton’s laws of physics always hold true. Ultimately there is no point in time where the engineer puts his or her pencil down, and thinks, “What if the elastic modulus of steel were actually 765 x 200 GPa?” Why don’t we do this? Because the elastic modulus of steel will always and forever be 207 x 109 GPa.
We deal in the world of physical facts, not fiction. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be creative.
I’ve designed multi-barge systems to float bridges down a river. I’ve designed hydraulic winches with pulleys to replace mechanical trunnions in order to open and close a bascule leaf (what most people call a “draw bridge”). This takes a lot of creativity, but it’s not free flowing, it’s structured.
Fundamentally there are more hurdles for an engineer, or any left-brained thinker to overcome in order to break into a world of fiction.
I wasn’t always an engineer
I was lucky enough to have been exposed to the right-brained world in college, because I wasn’t always an engineering major. At first I was an English major.
A lot of my influence comes from my father. For as long as I can remember he was always reading. Just as any little boy wants to grow up like their dad, I started reading too.
I loved the school book fairs in elementary and middle school. Unlike others I loved the SRA reading system, which most people don’t remember or have never heard of.
In high school I read books during class while others tried to stay wake. After reading Emerson I began to write essays for fun.
Then in college I got hooked on the poetry of Richard Brautigan, Jack Kerouac, and Pablo Neruda.
I was going to be an English major …
Money makes the world go round
It’s terrible to think that money changed my mind, but it kind of did.
At eighteen years old, I didn’t really know you could choose “fiction writer” as a profession, and there wasn’t any other field of literature or writing that I wanted to be a part of.
So, I resorted to the only other thing I was good at: math.
I enjoyed my engineering classes, except for thermodynamics – everyone hates thermodynamics – but I never really garnered a passion for the discipline.
And so in my free time, I wrote. Until one day, about eight years down the road, I decided that I didn’t ever want to look back on life and think, “Man, I wish I would have tried to publish a book.” Instead, my wife and I came up with a twelve month plan to quit my job and pursue a career in writing.
About the Author
Wesley Banks was born in 1983 and grew up on the west coast of Florida. He graduated from the University of Florida with a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Civil Engineering. After spending over 7 years building movable bridges from Florida to Washington he decided to focus on his true passion: writing.
Wesley recently moved from Florida to Oregon to get back to the great outdoors that he loves so much. He lives with his wife Lindsey, and his two dogs Linkin and Story. Most of his time these days is spent writing, with as much rock climbing, hiking, or skiing as they can fit in.
Wesley’s debut novel, Hope In Every Raindrop, was released May of 2015.
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