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Nora Goes Off Script by Annabel Monaghan

If you like Lifetime movies, holiday Hallmark movies and happy endings, Nora Goes Off Script is for you! What a treat to settle in on the couch and dive in to Nora’s life. She is a single mom who writes movie scripts for The Romance Channel and is enjoying a bit of success. Her latest work, based on the real breakup of her marriage, is being produced at The Tea House, the shed where she does all her writing, set in her backyard. The actors and crew are settling in on her property for a few days to shoot the film, transforming her home to a movie set. When Nora finds Leo Vance, The Sexiest Man Alive and the leading man playing the part of her deadbeat ex-husband sitting on her porch with a bottle of liquor the day the film wrapped, offering her rent to allow him to stay an extra week, she couldn’t resist.

Author Annabel Monaghan’s main character, Nora, makes light of the cheesy, formulaic stories she herself writes for tv, but it is clear that authentic, quality writing makes all the difference and may even win awards. I happen to be a fan of the heartfelt stories that make you feel all the feels, and this fun read qualifies!

And Coming Out in June…

Same Time Next Summer

Same Time Next Summer

The ultimate summer nostalgia read, about an engaged woman who comes face to face with her first love who she hasn’t seen in fourteen years, but who she spent every summer with from age five to seventeen when he broke her heart, calling into question everything she thought she knew about their love story, and herself. 

“An unforgettable love story…Bursting with the magic of first love, it’s everything I want in a summer romance.”–Carley Fortune, author of Every Summer After

Beach Rules: 
Do take long walks on the sand.
Do put an umbrella in every cocktail.
Do NOT run into your first love.

Sam’s life is on track. She has the perfect doctor fiancé, Jack (his strict routines are a good thing, really), a great job in Manhattan (unless they fire her), and is about to tour a wedding venue near her family’s Long Island beach house. Everything should go to plan, yet the minute she arrives, Sam senses something is off. Wyatt is here. Her Wyatt. But there’s no reason for a thirty-year-old engaged woman to feel panicked around the guy who broke her heart when she was seventeen. Right?

Yet being back at this beach, hearing notes from Wyatt’s guitar float across the night air from next door as if no time has passed–Sam’s memories come flooding back: the feel of Wyatt’s skin on hers, their nights in the treehouse, and the truth behind their split. Sam remembers who she used to be, and as Wyatt reenters her life their connection is as undeniable as it always was. She will have to make a choice.


About the Author:

Annabel Monaghan writes for TheWeek.com, The Huffington Post and The Rye Record. Her first book for adults, Does This Volvo Make My Butt Look Big? is a collection of humorous essays for moms (Fischer Press 2016). She is the author of two novels for young adults, A Girl Named Digit and Double Digit (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 2010 and 2012), and she is the co-author of Click! The Girls Guide to Knowing What You Want and Making it Happen (Simon and Schuster 2007). Annabel teaches novel writing at The Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence College and lives in Rye, New York with her husband and three sons.


This story appears through BookTrib’s partnership with BookNationByJen. It first appeared here.

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Nora Goes Off Script by Annabel Monaghan
Publish Date: 2/28/2023
Genre: Romance
Author: Annabel Monaghan
Page Count: 304 pages
Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons
ISBN: 9780593420058
Jennifer Blankfein

Jennifer Gans Blankfein is a freelance marketing consultant and book reviewer. She graduated from Lehigh University with a Psychology degree and has a background in advertising. Her experience includes event coordination and fundraising along with editing a weekly, local, small business newsletter. Jennifer loves to talk about books, is an avid reader, and currently writes a book blog, Book Nation by Jen. She lives in Connecticut with her husband, two sons and black lab.