Deserted Island with author Tracie Banister

Weekly Feature here at Snowdrop Dreams  of Books where authors and bloggers share what five books and what five  other items they would want with them if they were ever stuck on a  deserted island and why they chose them. Some posts are serious, some  are extremely silly and some are mixture. Check back every week to see  what your favourite authors and bloggers would pick. Click here if you would like to participate.

Tracie Banister is author of In Need Of Therapy and Blame It On The Fame. This chick lit author has stopped by my deserted island with some seriously great book choices and some quite witty humour. It was a pleasure working with Tracie and I hope you enjoy her post as much as I do.

 

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Thanks so much for having me on your site today, Chrystal! I feel like I am well-prepared to answer your deserted island questions because I just finished reading On the Island by Tracey Garvis-Graves (A great book that I highly recommend! P.S. I have vowed never to fly over a body of water again!)

Okay, which 5 books would I want with me if I were stranded on a tropical isle? First of all, thank heavens I'll have reading material with me during this unplanned vacation. I think I'd go mad if I went without a book for an extended period of time. It wasn't easy for me to narrow this list down to just 5 books as I'm not the type to reread something over and over and I'm a big fan of variety, but here's what I came up with: 

1) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - Austen is my favorite writer, and the story of Darcy and Elizabeth is one that never gets old for me, factor in the witty dialogue and entertaining supporting characters and this book is one I could see myself enjoying repeatedly.

2) Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell - I fell in love with this book when I first read it at age 9, and it remains a favorite of mine. Plus, it's almost 1000 pages long, so reading it would be a great time-killer!

3) Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding - One of the funniest books I've ever read, and I think that I'd need a good laugh if I were stuck on an island. I could probably keep myself entertained for hours by reading the book aloud with a faux British accent.

4) Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë - A classic so complex and multi-layered that one can discover something new about the characters and the story every time it's read. The setting of the novel on the cold, windy moors of Yorkshire would be a nice place to visit via my imagination while I'm sweltering in the sun on some forsaken beach.

5) One for the Money by Janet Evanovich - Another book with copious amounts of humor. Hopefully, the sassy heroine, Stephanie Plum, who's always getting herself out of jams in ingenious ways, would be an inspiration to me. And there are many scenes in the book where Steph is gorging herself on one of her mom's delicious, home-cooked suppers, which I'm sure I would appreciate in my food-deprived state.

As for the 5 items I'd want with me:

1) Sunscreen - Tons of it, with the highest SPF possible (I'm not even sure what that is, maybe 100?) I am extremely fair (Casper the Friendly Ghost has more melanin than I do!) and would have a third-degree burn in just one day on a tropical island without any protection for my pale skin.

2) First Aid Kit - Never underestimate the importance of Neosporin and Tylenol! The characters in Onthe Island would have been dead by the halfway point of the book if they hadn't had the medical supplies in their trusty First Aid Kit.

*photo supplied by author

3) Notepads and a pen that never runs out of ink - I can't remember a time in my life when I wasn't writing, so these tools of the trade would be necessary. Then, when I got rescued, I could publish all of my island musings and become the toast of the literary world!

4) Battery-operated bread machine with a large assortment of bread mixes - Seafood and fruit are perfectly nice, but I'll need a steady influx of carbs if I'm going to survive on this island. Carbs are as essential as air and water to me. I think I'd go into a homicidal rage without them.

5) A man, preferably one who's brave, strong, and looks like Joe Manganiello - I'm going to need him to build me some kind of shelter, hunt and gather food, and protect me from all the creepy crawlies on the island (i.e. bats, tarantulas, jellyfish, and monsters made of smoke.)

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Author Bio:  An avid reader and writer, Tracie Banister has been scribbling stories since she was a child, most of them featuring feisty heroines with complicated love lives like her favorite fictional protagonist Scarlett O'Hara.  Her work was first seen on the stage of her elementary school, where her 4th grade class performed an original holiday play that she penned (Like all good divas-in-the-making, she, also, starred in and tried to direct the production.)  Her dreams of authorial success were put on the back burner when she reached adulthood and discovered that she needed a "real" job in order to pay her bills.  Her career as personal assistant to a local entrepreneur lasted for 12 years.  When it ended, Tracie decided to follow her bliss and dedicate herself to writing full-time.  Her debut novel, the Hollywood-themed Blame It on the Fame, was released in January, 2012.  And she's following that up with the Miami-set Romantic Comedy, In Need of Therapy. 

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Book blurb (In Need of Therapy): Lending a sympathetic ear and dispensing sage words of advice is all part of the job for psychologist Pilar Alvarez, and she’s everything a good therapist should be: warm, compassionate, supportive. She listens, she cares, and she has all the answers, but how’s the woman everyone turns to in their hour of need supposed to cope when her own life starts to fall apart?

While working hard to make a success of her recently-opened practice in trendy South Beach, Pilar must also find time to cater to the demands of her boisterous Cuban family, which includes younger sister Izzy, an unemployed, navel-pierced wild child who can't stay out of trouble, and their mother, a beauty queen turned drama queen who’s equally obsessed with her fading looks and getting Pilar married before it’s “too late.” Although she’d like to oblige her mother and make a permanent love connection, Pilar’s romantic prospects look grim. Her cheating ex, who swears that he’s reformed, is stalking her. A hunky, but strictly off-limits, patient with bad-boy appeal and intimacy issues is making passes. And the sexy shrink in the suite across the hall has a gold band on his left ring finger.

When a series of personal and professional disasters lead Pilar into the arms of one of her unsuitable suitors, she's left shaken, confused, and full of self-doubt. With time running out, she must make sense of her feelings and learn to trust herself again so that she can save her business, her family, and most importantly, her heart.

Excerpt:
"Hello, Victor," I acknowledged the dark-haired man in the cream-colored designer suit who was conspicuously perched on the corner stool at the bar.

He swiveled around to face me. "Buenas noches, mi amada." Victor was not bilingual, but he liked to pepper his conversation with Spanish words and phrases as though he was. It enhanced his Latin lover image, or at least he thought it did. "This is a surprise."

"I doubt that. You followed me here, and now you're spying on me and my date. Remember that discussion we had about boundaries? You're not respecting mine."

"But I am!" he insisted with a hurt expression. "I didn't come to your table. I was just admiring your beauty from afar."

"I don't want you admiring me period. We broke up, remember?" I kept using that word as if he suffered from amnesia. Selective memory was more like it. Most of what I said to Victor seemed to go in one ear and out the other.

"I don't accept that." Before I could stop him, he dropped down on one knee and took my free hand in his, clutching it to his heart. "I love you, Pilar. No other man will ever love you like I do. I eat, breathe, and sleep you. You are in my thoughts every minute of every day!" It was quite an impassioned speech, but then Victor had always been one for the big romantic gesture.

"You are developing an unhealthy fixation on me, Victor. Please, get up." I tugged on his arm, and with a plaintive sigh, he rose to his feet.

"You have no romance in your soul, mi querida," he chastised. "Most women would be thrilled to have a man fall at their feet and pledge his eternal devotion."

"So, why don't you go find one of them and leave me in peace?" I suggested.

"Pilar, Pilar . . ." He gazed at me with rueful brown eyes. "It doesn't work like that. You are the only one for me. Another woman will never do."

"As I recall, plenty of other women did just fine when we were dating. Let's see, there was that jailbait cashier at Pollo Tropical, your brother's girlfriend, the one who liked to sunbathe by your parents' pool topless - I think her name was Stacey, the lingerie model who was built like Pamela Anderson . . . shall I go on?"

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