I ran into Caroline Maplethorpe from MJ Compton’s novel, SUMMER FLING, the other day at a fundraising event and she agreed to do an interview with me on my blog today! SUMMER FLING is MJ Compton’s latest contemporary romance (check out that sexy cover!) and Caroline has quite the story. Read on to find out more about this fascinating lady and her dedication to breast cancer awareness.

Hey Caroline, welcome! Can you tell us a little about yourself?

I am the second of three sisters, and as such, I’m always caught in the middle, acting as a buffer between their very different personalities. I was close to both of my parents; their divorce and my mother’s subsequent death devastated me. I needed a long time to forgive my father for what he did. I think I’ve done a good job of re-entry into my family. I even tolerate my father’s current wife and am fond of my younger half-brother. I live a careful life. I went a little crazy after my mother died and have spent the years since returning to the fold being dutiful. My family expects me to fulfill their definitions of who they think I should be, and for the most part, I go along. Except when it comes to the man my father wants me to marry. There’s a difference between being dutiful and being a push-over.

Wow, sounds like your family is quite the handful! If my father was trying to force me to marry someone, I wouldn’t be too thrilled either. What do you do for work?

I work for the Kathryn Maplethorpe Foundation, a not-for-profit focused on educating about breast cancer as well as raising funds for breast cancer research. My father started the foundation to assuage his guilt over divorcing my mother right before she was diagnosed with terminal breast cancer, but that doesn’t change the good work we do. We don’t need to lose any more mothers, sisters, daughters, wives to this insidious disease.

As someone who frequently diagnoses breast cancer (and sees the havoc it wreaks upon women), I am totally with you on that! If you had a day to do anything you wanted, what would you do?

I would watch the man I love pitch the winning game of the World Series.

And that sounds awesome! Favorite alcoholic beverage?

Moonsinger Beer in a bottle.

Hmm, I’ll have to try that one! Favorite music?

Chin music. Ha-ha. (That’s a high, inside fastball aimed at a batter’s head.) Seriously, it depends on my mood. Show tunes are nice. Bob Dylan when things aren’t going well. I have a custom mix of Dylan songs I call “Dylan Says It Best.”

Chin music, HA! I’ve never heard that term, but it’s clever. 😉 Bob Dylan definitely has some great songs! Now let’s move on to the man you love…what do you adore most about Win?

Win fell in love with me as a person before he ever knew my real name, and he never gave up looking for the woman he believed me to be…who turned out to be the woman I truly am. He gave me permission to be me.

He sounds like a great guy. 😀 Before the story began, what were your hopes for the future?

I was content to live my life pretty much on my father’s terms. It was easier to be a balloon drifting in my father’s wake than resist. I was aimless, working for the foundation and going to baseball games.

So what changed?

Win Winston walked back into my life and reminded me of the woman I could be. He wouldn’t take no for an answer.

I need to meet this Win fella! But I’m glad you’ve found happiness and someone who loves you for YOU. Thanks so much for stopping by, Caroline, and to you dear reader, for joining us! Read on to find out more about Caroline and Win’s story, SUMMER FLING.

BLURB:

Caroline Maplethorpe spent a summer as plaything for a minor league baseball team…and oh, how Win Winston played. Seven years later, she’s respectable, and he’s in the big leagues. Now that he’s found her again, he still wants her in a major way. But their second-chance relationship attracts too much publicity, and the third member of their long-ago fling threatens to destroy the respectable life Caroline so carefully reconstructed after that crazy summer.

BUY LINKS:

LOOSE ID http://www.loose-id.com/summer-fling.html

ALL ROMANCE EBOOKS http://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-summerfling-1797313-149.html

AMAZON http://tinyurl.com/z7exmh7

BARNES & NOBLE http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/summer-fling-m-j-compton/1121879015?ean=9781623009151

GOOGLE PLAY HtTps://play.google.com/store/books/details/MJ_Compton_Summer_Fling?id=MaH1CAAAQBAJ/

Ibooks https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/summer-fling/id992251460?mt=114

KOBO https://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/summer-fling-8

SNIPPET:

I never thought the indiscretions of my youth would return to bite me in the butt by walking through the door of the Susie Buddha Café in Syracuse’s trendy Armory Square district, but they did. Or rather, one did. Winslow Winthrop Winston the Whatever, commonly known as Win.

I don’t know if I lost my ability to breathe because I was terrified he’d recognize and expose me or because he was just so darned good-looking. Probably the result of both. Win had always had a paralyzing effect on me.

Chuck somebody or other, one of the Syracuse Saltboilers baseball team board members, accompanied Win. They headed straight for our table.

There was no escape. Life as I knew it was about to end.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

MJ Compton grew up near Cardiff, New York, a place best known for its giant, which inspired her to create her own fiction.

Although her 30-year career in local television included such highlights as being bitten by a lion, preempting a US President for a college basketball game, giving a three-time world champion boxer a few black eyes, a mention in the Drudge Report, and meeting her husband, MJ never lost her dream of writing her own stories.

MJ still lives in upstate New York with her husband. She’s a member of Romance Writers of America and Central New York Romance Writers. Music and cooking are two of her passions, and she enjoys baseball and college basketball, but she’s primarily focused on wine . . . and writing.

Where to find MJ:

Website & Blog www.comptonplations.com

Twitter https://twitter.com/Comptonplations

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/AuthorMJCompton

Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/compton4555/

Tsu http://www.tsu.co/mj_compton

Tumblr http://comptonplations.tumblr.com/

Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8075221.M_J_Compton

Amazon Author Page: http://www.amazon.com/MJ-Compton/e/B00J9DFFIG/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1