Mar 16, 2017

Blog Tour -- A Boy Like You by Ginger Scott





We're celebrating the release of A BOY LIKE YOU by Ginger Scott!






A BOY LIKE YOU
YA Contemporary Romance
Scheduled to release: March 3, 2017




BLURB:

They say everyone’s a superhero to someone. I’m not sure who I’m supposed
to save, but I know who saved me.

We were kids. His name was Christopher. And up until the day he pulled me
from death’s grip, he was nothing more than a boy I felt sorry for. In a
blink of an eye, he became the only person who made me feel safe.

And then he disappeared.

Now I’m seventeen. I’m not a kid anymore. I haven’t been for years. While
death didn’t take me that day, the things that happened left me with
scars—the kind that robbed me of everything I once loved and drove me into
darkness. But more than anything else, that day—and every day since—has
taken away my desire to dream.

I wasn’t going to have hope. I wouldn’t let myself wish. Those things—they
weren’t for girls like me. That’s what I believed…until the new boy.

He’s nothing like the old boy. He’s taller and older. His hair is longer,
and his body is lean—strong and ready for anything. I don’t feel sorry for
him. And sometimes, I hate him. He challenges me. From the moment I first
saw him standing there on the baseball field, he pushed me—his eyes
constantly questioning, doubting…daring. Still, something about him—it
feels…familiar.

He says his name is Wes. But I can’t help but feel like he’s someone else.
Someone from my past. Someone who’s come back to save me.

This time, though, he’s too late. Josselyn Winters, the girl he once knew,
is gone. I am the threat; I am my worst enemy. And he can’t save me from
myself.









Top 5 Reasons Why Baseball Is The Most Romantic Sport:


Here’s the thing about baseball. I bet I could walk the streets, especially in places like Boston and Chicago, and ask any random hundred people, men and women, what the most romantic sport is, and I can almost guarantee you baseball comes out on top. I have a lot of theories on this, but I’m going to boil it down to my favorite five. For me…these are the reasons why my heart melts every spring and I beg for winter to be over.


1.      Robert Redford. 

Let me expand on this. Robert Redford is one of those icons that just makes people flat-out fall. I was a kid when I first saw The Natural. I wasn’t all about the boys yet—they still had cooties—but when I watched Roy Hobbs knock the cover off the ball all because he saw the woman in white in the stands with a glow of sunshine behind her, my heart picked up a step. There was something about the way he wore the hat, the way he fought to come back, his love of the game. It was infectious, even though fictional. That story, and because I read the book I can say this—Robert Redford more so—hits right at the oooey gooey center of what makes that sport the epitome of romance. Man or woman—you watch that red-headed swoony gent swing a bat with that music blaring behind him and you’re going to get goosebumps. If you don’t, I’m insisting you get checked out.


2.      We all love a good Western.

Huh? Hear me out. There’s something sexy about a duel. While baseball is ultimately a team sport, it is also filled with individual moments—rivalries between teams, between players, between a man and his demons. The best example is the battle between pitcher and batter. There’s the slow build of tension while the pitcher thinks, his hand working the ball behind his back, deciding the precise weapon that will strike his opponent down. The batter digs in, his muscles poised and anxious like a bull ready to charge at fresh meat. Only one can win. And when it’s down to the wire, it can either break your heart or set you free. A walk-off. A perfect game. A stolen homerun for the win. Extra innings. A comeback. All duels fought between men, and it comes down to who wants it more.


3.      Fenway. 

Now I know we all have our allegiances. Me, I’m a Dbacks and Cubbies girl (I married a Chicago boy; it’s in the vows) but whether you’re a Yankee’s fan or not, whether you believe in curses, love or hate the Red Sox, there is something undeniable that happens the moment you step inside Fenway. I’ve been to a lot of stadiums, and I can find romance in most of them. But Fenway…it should come with a warning: “May cause permanent goosebumps and break your heart, ruining it for all other fields forever.” This park is set in a storybook, with sunsets in the backdrop that rival Hollywood created ones and stars that sparkle beyond skylines and a Hancock sign. And then there’s that little thing that happens there in the middle of the 8th inning. Go on – you know you want to know what it is – watch it here: https://youtu.be/KxAk1aL-BNo


4.      The uniform. 

It really is the best uniform in all of sports. There are no pads to hide behind, and it’s not bare-chests and abs…it’s the seduction of knowing that something is underneath it all filling out that poly-blend in a way only fine-tuned muscles, a thousand pitches, 420-foot home runs and a month of spring training can. Now shade the eyes with a hat, and I’m sunk.


5.      Bryce Harper. 

All I’m going to say is google the ESPN body issue if you haven’t seen it.









Excerpt

I let my eyes drift back to the field, where Wes is throwing balls to nobody, letting them hit the backstop. I push from the wall and throw my bag over my back, my cleats untied and loose around my feet as I trudge through the outfield toward him.

“I can catch for you…if you want,” I say. He turns quickly at the sound of my voice, startled.

“Oh…uh, thanks, but it’s okay, I was almost done, ” he says, jiggling his arm against his side as if it’s sore and tired. He hasn’t thrown many pitches at all today, though. I know, because I’ve been watching.

“You know, eventually you’re going to have to give in to the fact that I can handle you,” I say, my eyes leveling him with a challenge. He laughs lightly to himself, his lip held between his teeth as he tugs down on the bill of his hat, shadowing his face, until he finally nods at me.

“A’right,” he relents, shrugging to home plate.

I step over to the backstop and throw the dozen or so balls he pitched on his own back to him, and he drops them in his bag near his feet one at a time. I brush the dirt from home plate with my glove, then crouch down. I hold the pose for a few seconds while Wes stares at me, and eventually he shakes his head with a quiet laugh.

“What?” I yell, dropping my arms to my knees. I hate catching; it’s miserable. I only did it because it was him—he needed help. No…I wanted to help. And now he’s laughing at me?

He jogs toward me in long, slow strides, and I stand, leaning with my glove against my hip. He’s wearing dark blue shorts over black compression pants, and unlike the other boys on my dad’s team, he actually looks good in them—like a real ballplayer. I look away and take a step or two back when he gets closer, but he reaches for my arm, catching my elbow with his fingers. My eyes go right to his hold and then to his face where he’s waiting for me with the same expression I have.

“Sorry,” he says, letting go of me quickly. I feel the loss of his touch.

Kneeling down, he urges me to do the same next to him, shirking his glove from his hand and holding his palms on the insides of his thighs. 
“You are sitting like this. It’s unsteady, and you’re going to get tired…fast,” he says, his eyes gliding over to my legs. He licks his lips, and sucks in a slow but heavy breath, before putting one knee down and bringing his hand to my leg, glancing at me quickly for permission before resting his fingertips on my kneecap. His touch is cautious and purposeful. It’s also powerful, and I feel it. 

“If you just turn…like this, and then shift your weight,” he says, tugging my knee out gently before clearing his throat slightly as his eyes run up my thigh. He stands abruptly, and I let down one knee to rest my legs. “Anyhow, I just figured maybe you never caught before, and I could show you something. You probably already knew that though, so—”

“Thanks,” I interrupt him before he steps away. I’m not warm and fuzzy. I make him nervous. And I regret that. “Really,” I add, as he tilts his head sideways over his shoulder, glancing back at me. “My dad use to show me stuff like that, but…it’s been a while.”

His lip pulls up with sympathy, and he looks down before glancing back at me with a sideways tilt of the head, raising the ball in his hand. “Let’s try a few,” he says, walking back to the mound.

I kneel just as he taught me, and my legs shake a little at first, so I adjust my knees more, giving myself a base. “I’m good,” I say, pounding the center of my glove and holding it out for his target.

Wes nods, then winds up for a pitch. He throws a changeup, and I know he did it because he doesn’t want me to get hurt catching anything faster. The fighter in me wants to spit and tell him to give me the real stuff, but the girl I am—the one that likes the way he looks at me—is okay with the fact that he wants to protect me.

“That looked good,” I say, throwing the ball back to him. His lips twist into a crooked grin, and he tugs his hat low again before winding up for another pitch. I praised him, and he liked it.

I liked that.












GIVEAWAY:



About the Author:


Ginger Scott is an Amazon-bestselling and Goodreads Choice Award-nominated author of several young and new adult romances, including Waiting on the Sidelines, Going Long, Blindness, How We Deal With Gravity, This Is Falling, You and Everything After, The Girl I Was Before, Wild Reckless, Wicked Restless, In Your Dreams, The Hard Count, and Hold My Breath.

A sucker for a good romance, Ginger’s other passion is sports, and she often blends the two in her stories. (She’s also a sucker for a hot quarterback, catcher, pitcher, point guard…the list goes on.) Ginger has been writing and editing for newspapers, magazines and blogs for more than 15 years. She has told the stories of Olympians, politicians, actors, scientists, cowboys, criminals and towns. For more on her and her work, visit her website at http://www.littlemisswrite.com.

When she's not writing, the odds are high that she's somewhere near a baseball diamond, either watching her son field pop flies like Bryce Harper or cheering on her favorite baseball team, the Arizona Diamondbacks. Ginger lives in Arizona and is married to her college sweetheart whom she met at ASU (fork 'em, Devils).

Social Media Links:
Twitter: @TheGingerScott












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