The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – The Wedding Engagement by Zoe Allison

Episode Date: October 8, 2024

The Wedding Engagement by Zoe Allison Amazon.com Planning a wedding is so romantic . . . except when it’s not yours, and you’re planning it with the guy you’re secretly crushing on. Scottish schoolteacher Liv Holland has a secret. She’s been carrying a torch for Arran Adebayo, her brother’s best friend, for years. A blind date gone wrong cements in Liv’s mind that Arran has no romantic interest in her whatsoever. But then, with her brother set to marry her own best friend, she and Arran are enlisted to help plan the festivities… After being left at the altar by his ex, single father Arran is having trouble managing his growing feelings towards the woman who is both his best friend’s sister and his son’s teacher: Liv. Then his mind is blown when fate thrusts them together for an unexpected blind date, but he messes up his chance to tell her how he feels. As the big day approaches and Liv and Arran’s connection intensifies, their chemistry chafes against their checkered romantic histories. Risking everything for love could mean losing each other forever . . . or being the next ones to find their happy ever after.About the author Zoe lives in Scotland with her husband, two children, and massive notebook collection—having been brought up in a mixed-race family in Yorkshire. Her favourite past times include reading, movies, music and pop culture, and walking into rooms and then forgetting what she went in there for. Growing up, she always enjoyed stories about falling in love. But rather than daydreaming of being rescued by a knight in shining armour, she would imagine fighting dragons alongside him. As an adult, she went to medical school and became a doctor. However as time passed, she began to crave a creative outlet to counter the burnout that her career inflicted upon her, and also to achieve the happy endings that were so often lacking in the real world. A Zoe Allison novel promises a heroine who is not only her hero’s equal in ability and intellect, but whose hero equals her in emotional intelligence. Her characters overcome conflict infused with spine tingling sexual tension to forge a deep connection as soul mates as well as lovers, and ultimately, they both rescue each other emotionally. Even if they might begin their journey as enemies…

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Chris Voss is one of the TikTok, and God knows where i make this stuff up off the cuff i really make it up off the cuff people anyway and people are going it's still stupid so we have an amazing author on the show she's a multi-book author it's called the wedding engagement out october 8th 2024 zoe allison is joining us on the show we're going to be talking about her newest book and some of her books she's written so far. And she's probably one of the most exciting new authors. Newer, newish, newer.

We don't want to call her new. She's got a lot of books out. But her new book is out. That's what I'm trying to say. Zoe lives in Scotland with her husband, two children, and a massive notebook collection. She's brought up in a mixed race family in Yorkshire. Her favorite pastimes include reading movies, music, and pop culture and walking to rooms and then forgetting what she went in for.

Wait, that's my favorite pastime. At 56. She grew up always enjoying stories about falling in love, but rather than daydreaming or being rescued by a knight in shining armor, she would imagine fighting dragons alongside him. As an adult, she went to medical school, became a doctor. However, as time passed, she began to crave a creative outlet to counter the burnout that her career inflicted upon her and also to achieve happy endings that were often lacking in real world.

Welcome to the show, Zoe. How are you? I'm good, thank you. How are you, Chris? I am excellent, just still fighting off COVID muck 17 days in. You know, I think I might be the same, because I'm just recovering from, as we call it in Yorkshire, a bit of a lurgy. A lurgy. A lurgy, so that means kind of a nasty illness, so I'm still a little bit husky and a little bit bunged up as well. I'm always definitely husky, I have two of them, so two husky and a little bit bunged up as well so we're always definitely husky i have two of them so two husky dogs but yeah the the it's it just sticks with you man i slept for 11 hours last

night and i'm like oh my body must need to get it out of my system yeah it needs it yeah yeah all that healing so give us any dot coms where can people find you on the interweb to get you know better? So I've got a website, which I do my best to keep updated. So it's zoeallison.co.uk. And then I'm active on social media, probably mostly active on talk and Instagram. On TikTok, pretty sure I'm Zoe Allison author on there and Insta as well. TikTok, I like to make kind of funny book-related content. And Insta, kind of keep everything updated with what's happening with the books so they're the main two but i'm on facebook as well and on x as well so people can find me there so give us a 30 000

overview what's inside the new book so yeah this is the bit where us writers go oh what is what is my own book about i've spent ages writing it and it's about a person the wedding engagement is a contemporary romance set in the Scottish Highlands I live in Scotland and it's about Lib Holland who is a nursery school teacher and she has carried a torch for her brother's best friend Aaron Adebayo for years and years but he's always been in a long-term relationship and he has a young son with his partner but then the previous year Aaron's fiancee left him a few weeks before their wedding. Since then Liv and Aaron have become close friends in their own right and Liv has helped Aaron with child care for his four-year-old son who is about to start in her nursery school class and Aaron was traumatized by this breakup because he was

really blindsided by it and it came at a time of financial by this breakup because he was really blindsided by it, and it came at a time of financial and career instability because he'd just lost his painting and decorating job around the same time, so he's been keen to avoid romantic relationships since the breakup to concentrate on his son and also to get a new creative business off the ground because he's an artist, and he's taken a financial gamble with his redundancy money to open an art studio so the two are now closest friends live helps him care for his son and then just when she thought that keeping her feelings under wraps couldn't be any more difficult live's brother who's aaron's best friend announces his engagement to live's best friend which is

delightful news best friending going on around here. Yeah. It's set in a fictional town called Glen Avie. And the first book, The Xmas Holidays, that was out last year is about another couple from the same friendship group. So they see each other about this friendship group. They announce this engagement, delightful news, but they ask Liv and Aaron to help plan the wedding.

So now Liv has to plan a wedding with the guy that she's been crushing on for years but could never have. Yeah. Know each other better. Yes. Indeed. Yes. There's a little bit of kind of that... Do you remember the movie The Wedding Singer? There's some of those behinds in there. Yeah.

Yeah, that was a great movie. Yes, I love that one. Yeah, that was a great movie. People love this sort of stuff. They love entertainment. They love love. They love weddings. It sounds like it's packed with all the good stuff and, you know, crushes and people you like.

Yeah, yeah. And there's a couple of kind of classic romance tropes in there. We've got the brother's best friend trope. We've got the friends to lovers trope. Single dad. You know, all the good stuff that creates all the serotonin. All the romantic tropages. Yeah. tropages i don't know but so now you you had a prior book with the same publisher that kind of has a similar sort of artwork that kind of has a branded theme for you is yeah is is this a standalone from that other book you i think you mentioned there's the same

city in both books is the same characters play through at all I think you mentioned there's the same city in both books. Is the same characters play through at all? Yeah. Yeah, you're right about the artwork. So this is the one that's coming out on the 8th of October, the wedding engagement. You can see Liv and Aaron. You can see my little friend Hamish the Highland Cow there. He features in the book.

Is that a real cow? Side character. So he's based on my Highland cow footstool, which I will try to show you in a minute if I can get him on camera. That's the one that came out last year, The Excellence Holidays. So lovely artwork. They've done a beautiful job there at Berkeley. Yeah, brilliant.

And yeah, so I wanted to set it in the Scottish Highlands, which is obviously a lovely location. I live in Scotland, but a bit further south. I decided to make the town up so I wouldn't be constrained by reality. And yeah, so the first book is about another couple from the same friendship group in Glen Ave, and the hero from the first book and the heroine from the second book that's coming out soon,

they are twin siblings and they're all friends together. So, yes. There's a lot of friendship going on here. But that's the foundation for being friends first, right? Yes. And in this case, it is. In the first book, they were kind of

enemies to lovers, really, but yes. Those are the best loves, the ones that are enemies and then yeah yes yeah they turn it around i'll just see if i can get hamish the highland cow footstool on camera to show you i'm still trying to hate me to turn around and love me so there's i don't think it's gonna happen there you got you go, that's a bull, the cow. Yeah, so he's kind of based on him, yeah. All right, so tell us a little bit about yourself.

How did you grow up? When did you start writing? When did you find you had a passion for it or a knack for it? And, you know, you kind of took some side roads before you became a full, I imagine you're a full-time writer now? No, I'm still a full-time doctor and then try and fit the writing in on the side so yes that's infected to you no i'm just kidding that's the joke i pull on every doctor at a party i go hey can i show you something that looks

infected i just need a second opinion can i show you my rash can i show you my rash and they're just like i'm at a party damn it but it. For real. They're always like that. But it's always a funny joke. It's like when I go to bars and there's a band, and I always yell, play Freebird. I'm that asshole. Tell us about yourself, your upbringing and stuff. So I'm not from Scotland originally, but I'm married to a lovely Scottish man, and I have two Scottish children.

So I'm from Yorkshire in Northern England originally, but I moved to Scotland when I was 19 to go to medical school and then stayed from there. I never thought of myself as a creative person. I had, I think this kind of unrealistic expectation that, you know, you could either be a science geek or you could be, you know, a book nerd and you couldn't be both. You couldn't be a creative if you be a science geek or you could be you know a book nerd and you couldn't be both you couldn't be a creative if you were a science bod I never thought of myself as a creative person and then went to study medicine only ever read medical textbooks I had previously really been into fiction but kind of lost didn't lose the love for reading but just never had the time for it really and then had a young family and the only books I was reading were children's picture books which I still really enjoyed and then I

can't remember why but it just kind of took my fancy to do a creative writing course specifically to write children's picture books probably because that was all I was reading at the time in terms of fiction. I did that and then I won a e-book for my Kindle. I was able to choose one of three books and I chose a Sarah Morgan one who's a fantastic romance and women's fiction author. I hadn't read any of her stuff before. Read it, absolutely loved it. It just was optimistic and effervescent and created all the good feelings and I remembered actually I did used to really like reading particularly you know these sorts of stories when I was younger and I read her back catalogue and then there was just kind of something that clicked and made me think oh I wouldn't mind having a go at this putting my own spin on it

and you know kind of remembering that back when I was at high school, I was also good at English, English language, English literature. They were passions as well. But I think science just kind of overtook a little bit. And then when I went on to do medicine, that took over. So I just thought, I'll give it a go, started writing, and it went on from there. So it was a bit unexpected, really. It wasn't something i thought would happen but i'm very glad that it did and when the rest of we are and your fan base that really loves your prior book and i'm sure they're gonna love this but when it comes out on october 8th so what do you what do you hope people come away with when they read your books what do you hope that they when they

get done they're like wow that was something yeah i think the the biggest compliments i've had someone said to me that when they read the first one they were sad when it ended because they felt like the characters were their friends and they were going to miss their new friends so that was really lovely and i think when someone says because i try and infuse humor into them so that they are kind of you know more rom-coms, I suppose. When people say, oh, you really made me laugh, you know, when this happened or it really made me smile. That brings me so much joy to think that I made a person smile. I made a person laugh, you know, especially when there's so much horrible things going on in the world.

If I've managed to create a bit of positivity and make someone feel happy, make someone laugh, make someone smile. And it's the same with the content, mainly that I post on TikTok. If people say, oh, I love your TikToks, I do kind of romance parody TikToks. And when people say to me, oh, it really made me laugh, it made me smile, that just brings me so much joy. Yeah, most definitely. It's great that joy can be brought in the world and people love entertainment they love you know they love these books i know women really enjoy them for beach reads and stuff like that they fly off the shelves i'm fast myself well you know i get good at writing novels but i don't know i think i think women are better writing those romantic stories they're good at you know portraying them in the head and they and when

they kind of know what women we just had a guy on recently who wrote kind of a variation of 50 shades of gray who's now writing romance novels and the women are eating it up but interesting aspects so i'm like maybe there is hope for a guy that can write novels but i don't know so we'll just keep reading yours yeah i have heard kind of the romance authors say, you know, we write the manuals, the men just need to read them and then they'll get all the women. I mean, my novel would be like, guy meets girl, they fall in love, the end. Go right to the end part. Get to the point.

So I think you mentioned there's a future book you're working on or that's in the works? I'm kind of working on a few different things altogether at the moment. I'm kind of waiting to hear what might be next for Berkeley who have published these ones. There is a third in this series about another

couple from it. It's kind of a six strong friendship group. So their one is planned but there are also some other ideas for another christmas themed romance kind of the holiday romances are really really big things people love those and then i also have some ideas that i'm working on for i suppose what you call more speculative romance where fantastical things happen you know the kind of witchy romances and time slips and all these sorts of things where kind of more fantastical things happen, you know, the kind of witchy romances and time slips and all these sorts of things where kind of more fantastical things occur.

Yeah, people like that sort of stuff, time traveling through romance. Yes, it's all good escapism, isn't it? Mm-hmm, yeah, yeah. It's pretty wild, escapism. We don't need entertainment, we need escapism. And sometimes you learn stuff, maybe you learn how to love better, be better, and all that good stuff.

So as we go out, Zoe, pitch people on where to pick up the book and final thoughts and your dot com so that people can find you on the interwebs. Yeah. If people pop on my website, zoeallison.co.uk, there's links to all my books on there. You can get them on Amazon and in the States. It's kind of pretty broadly available in stores as well. And then I'm Zoe Allison, author on Instagram and TikTok on Facebook and X as well. Probably most active if people like romance and reading and like a laugh, come and have a look at some of the TikToks I do on there.

And hopefully I could make you laugh and smile by watching those as well as by reading the books thank you very much zoe for coming on the show we really appreciate it please come back for your future books we'd love to have you oh i would absolutely love that thank you so much for having me it's been lovely to be on definitely and and there's five or six books people can find on amazon to scoop up yeah this is my second one out with Berkeley. It's my sixth book altogether. I've got four other ones that were out with a smaller publisher. The first two were paranormal romances about vampires and vampire espionage.

So impervious and revealed, they're called. And then I've got another couple of contemporary romances, a summer romance and a spring one that came out with them. So a couple of other ones if people want to go back and read those too. Buy them all, folks. Just scoop them all up. It's a bulk thing. I think there's a big sale coming up or something.

I don't know what's going on. Maybe it's a little more sale than I'm thinking of. Just buy them all, folks. Read them all and entertain yourselves. You'll have something to do through the holidays. So thanks for coming on the show, Zoe. We really appreciate it. Thank you very much for having me a delight to be here thank you all the way from scotland order per book wherever fine books are sold folks out august or i'm sorry

october 8th 2024 called the wedding engagement and check out our other books as well go to goodreads.com for says chris voss, LinkedIn.com, 4SaysChristmas, Christmas1, the TikTokity, ChristmasFacebook.com, and all those crazy places on the internet. Be good to each other. Stay safe. We'll see you next time. And there we go.