![\"Izzy:](\"http:\/\/martinaboone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Izzy_The_End2.gif\")
<\/p>\nI’m excited to wish my latest project a happy book birthday today! Love for Two Lifetimes<\/i> in my first YA book in a while since I’ve been writing adult fiction, but I love this story so much. It’s what I call my “gift book,” because it’s the only thing I’ve ever written where it just wrote itself. Izzy’s voice popped in my head while I was working on something else, and I sat down and wrote over 10,000 words in one sitting. And most of those words haven’t changed at all since I put them down. <\/p>\n
The story is loosely based on the idea of Princess Diana, Prince Charles, and Camilla Parker Bowles, except that Izzy’s mom is Princess Diana as the glamorous “other woman” in the marriage. I wondered how that would affect the children of the man and the woman he loves but didn’t marry, and that’s how this story was born. Izzy follows twenty years of unsent love letters to England and walks into a world of glamour and royalty where she falls in love with a young aristocrats–only to discover that insurmountable obstacles may lie between them.<\/p>\n
Here’s an excerpt. I hope you’ll enjoy it! And be sure to scroll down to the bottom for a chance to win a mystery box of young adult hardcover books!<\/p>\n
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This isn\u2019t a story about death or grief. It\u2019s about grabbing love while you can.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Malcolm and I are in the hospital corridor in front of the cardiac care unit, and the too-familiar alarms, hurrying feet, and acrid scents of disease melt away around us. There are only the answers we don\u2019t have. And the possibility that loving him may, with the speaking of a single word, turn out to be biblically, terrifyingly wrong<\/i>.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0His hands shake on my arms. His knees bend so we can look straight at each other. I love the sea-ice green of his eyes beneath the dark swoops of brow, the dimple in his chin, the way he concentrates.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We\u2019re pulled together, our bodies tipping closer, millimeter by millimeter, my skin alive beneath his fingers, our heartbeats echoes of one another.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In German, there\u2019s a word for a kiss that makes up for kisses that never happened. In case there can never be more between us, that\u2019s exactly what I need: one last kiss to hold all the kisses that might have been, not only mine and Malcolm\u2019s, but all those that were missing from my mother\u2019s life.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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![\"Izzy:](\"http:\/\/martinaboone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Izzy_Brittle_Leaves2.gif\")
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The music wakes me. Mom\u2019s piano is a constant in our house. She listens to her compositions while she sleeps, and she plays\u2014even louder\u2014when she\u2019s awake. I love the magic of it, but sometimes I feel as if her music has taken over my heartbeat, my breathing, my life<\/i> as well as hers. Today, she\u2019s awake too early, which means she hasn\u2019t yet gone to bed.<\/p>\n Text to Elli: <\/p>\n Me: Higher Grounds? <\/p>\n Elli: Twenty minutes!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I dress in a scowl and the pink Oscar Wilde T-shirt my mother hates. To be fair, Mom hates all my Oscar Wilde T-shirts. She claims there\u2019s no point wearing quotes that advocate independent thought when I insist on going to a public school that seems to discourage thinking altogether. I tell her that just makes the message even more important.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In the shadow of the moon that still clings to the sky outside my window, I make my bed and gather my books together. The envelope that murdered my future lurks on the corner of the desk, and I grab that, too, before I trudge downstairs.<\/p>\n My mother is in the morning room, coffee cups strewn everywhere, sheet music sprawled on the grand piano and the bench beside her. Rough drafts pour from her fingers to the keyboard in ultra-fast arpeggios\u2014wild, tumbling notes like leaves chased by wind. Four dry leaves flutter to rest with a pile of others against the wall, their sienna and burnt umber stark against the sapphire of the Turkish rug.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I don\u2019t bother checking the closed window where the sheer white curtains hang unmoving. Beyond it, the trees are still and bare, their leaves only now beginning to bud. In the darkness, daffodils glow like yellow stars uncurling among the black mulch in our flower beds. It wasn\u2019t the season that called the leaves into being; it was the magic of my mother\u2019s music.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I pad across the carpet and stand beside her. She stops playing to scratch something onto a manuscript page, then repeats a passage she has played already. She\u2019s recording the session, too, but she likes the process of setting the notes on paper. That\u2019s the one artistic thing I\u2019ve inherited from her. The words I type on my computer always trickle one at a time from inside my head, while those I write longhand seem to flow through me instead of from me.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Mom looks up and smiles, her eyes still a little music-drunk. “\u2019Morning, querida<\/i>.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Good night,” I say, “considering it\u2019s still dark outside. Waking me up this early is practically child abuse.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“So report me,” my mother counters in her faint Argentinian accent, and her gaze shifts down to take in what I\u2019m wearing. “That T-shirt, Isabelle! Must you?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Definitely. Also, shouldn\u2019t you go to bed?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Soon.” Her brows furrow and form a spiderweb of creases on her normally smooth, warm skin. “Are you going to go tell Elli this morning?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“I wish I didn\u2019t have to.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“In that case, I forgive the T-shirt. Temporarily. But in future, write your own subversions instead of relying on someone else\u2019s.” She studies me, sharp dark eyes registering all the things I haven\u2019t said. Her features soften. “What do you say we celebrate this weekend, you, me, and Elli? I\u2019m sure you two will work things out, and my Concerto in E-flat Major is nearly finished. We could fly to Paris.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I smile, because the concerto that Mom\u2019s composing has been “nearly finished” these past two years. By this afternoon, she\u2019ll either be in despair once more or so far down the rabbit hole of creation she won\u2019t remember mentioning Paris.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Sure,” I tell her, and I\u2019m typing as I turn away.<\/p>\n Text to Elli:<\/p>\n Me: Leaving now. <\/p>\n Elli: Caffeeeeeine!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Hey!” Mom calls after me and taps her cheek. “You forgot something.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I bend down to kiss her. “Make good art, Mom.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Make good stories, mija<\/i>.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I cross to the door and glance back from the threshold. My mother\u2019s playing again already, immersed so deep in her music that the rest of the world has faded. Another speed-of-light arpeggio rustles through the room, and another brittle leaf shimmers into being above the piano\u2019s gleaming, swooping curves. One more small piece of my mother\u2019s magic.<\/p>\n Elli\u2019s waist-length hair is lavender, which I not-so-secretly envy. She doesn\u2019t have much of it, which I also envy. I have enough hair for three people, which is like wearing a space-heater when it\u2019s hot, and when it\u2019s humid I look like a Q-tip dipped in walnut furniture stain. This means that, thanks to climate change, I\u2019m doomed to a lifetime of hair-suck. Here in Arlington, Virginia, it\u2019s either humid or raining or snowing about 350 days a year. Today being worse than usual, I slink into Higher Grounds wearing a hot-pink beanie to go with my T-shirt, red coat, and purple sneakers, and Elli gives me a bug-eyed grin. Her grins are happy<\/i>. They stretch from ear to ear.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“I knew it was going to be a good day. See? We couldn\u2019t have planned this better.” She gestures at her own pink and red outfit, delighted at our color-coordination. Backing up to stand beside me in front of the bakery display that\u2019s lit up to make every crumb of sugar glisten, she aims her phone, angling it down while she draws her cheeks in and pouts her mouth out and does something sparkling with her eyes.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The hand I raise in front of my face is a half-hearted gesture. My puffy-eyed morning-look doesn\u2019t matter much in the grand scheme of things, and though she be but little, Elli is unstoppably fierce. She wins\u2014as usual\u2014and the photo is up on social media before I\u2019ve even plucked my Caramelized Honey Latte from the counter.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Carrying the cup to an empty table, I inhale the perfection that is the smell of coffee and absorb the way the music of the grinder and the steam and the water trickling punctuate the indie pop music playing on the sound system. Coffee smells like heaven, but it tastes bitter as heck unless you fill it with de-heckifying additives. Coffee that costs more than the per capita daily income of India is theoretically against my principles. Still. Caramelized. Honey. Latte.<\/i><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0My principles are a work-in-progress.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Elli throws herself into a booth, pries the lid off her Macchiato, and blows down into the steam. She picks at her chocolate chunk muffin. About a million calories float toward me across the table and settle onto each of my thighs. Elli eats. I absorb. That\u2019s how our relationship works.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Between bites, she peers across the table. “You didn\u2019t call me back or text last night, so what\u2019s up with you? Did your mom finish the concerto? Were you celebrating?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Nearly almost.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I refrain from mentioning Paris and focus on trying to pluck the right explanation out of the useless swirl of thoughts inside my head. For once, words completely fail me. Then again, I don\u2019t need words. Rummaging in my bag, I retrieve the acceptance packet from Princeton that just broke my online waitlist impasse. We\u2019re both silent as I hand it over. Elli\u2019s officially a Princeton reject. One yes<\/i> and a no<\/i> should be an automatic pass. That\u2019s what we agreed. But this is Princeton.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Princeton.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Elli unfolds the letter, runs her thumb over the logo at the top of the page, and reads the first sentence. “Izzy!” Her eyes go moist. “This is fantastic. You have to go.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I shake my head. “We pinky swore.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Pinkies have an unwritten Princeton exception. Also there\u2019s less humidity in New Jersey.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“I\u2019m not picking a school based on hair-suck. Columbia is great. Or Chicago. And we\u2019re both still waiting at Yale. Anyway, since they rejected you, I have to question Princeton\u2019s judgment. Which makes me question the quality of their education. So, who wants them?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“You<\/i> do.<\/i> Princeton was your first word out of the womb, just about. And your mom already took the teaching job up there on the presumption that we\u2019d all be together.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“I\u2019m resilient, and Mom doesn\u2019t have the patience for teaching anyway\u2014and since she\u2019s a literal diva, no one will think less of her for quitting. Really, I\u2019m doing all her would-be students a public service. Think of the fragile young egos I\u2019ll be saving.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“It\u2019s my parents I blame for this.” Elli plops her elbows down on the table and buries her chin in her hands and heaves a dramatic sigh. “If only they did something useful for a living! The Ivies are already drowning in doctor\u2019s kids, which makes me the last thing they need. But you? You have the whole Marcella-Cavalera-as-a-mother thing going for you. You\u2019re a trophy kid. Everyone has to take you.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Hey! Watch it!”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Oh, fine.” Elli\u2019s hands surrender for her. “You know I don\u2019t mean that. You earned Princeton, and I got that stupid C in Freshman English. But seriously, what kind of a fascist teacher hates Toni Morrison? Or trees. Toni Morrison\u2019s trees. It was a darn good essay.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“It wasn\u2019t a D essay,” I concede.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Right? A solid B. B- tops.” Elli pauses. Leans forward. Looks all serious. “But you know you have to go, don\u2019t you? No arguing, because I\u2019ll never forgive you if you don\u2019t go.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I\u2019m not sure I will either, but college without Elli was never in the plan. Apart from Mom, Elli\u2019s all the family I\u2019ve ever had. How can I possibly leave her?<\/p>\n Elli and I met in the hospital nursery eighteen years ago.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The way the story goes, her dad and my mom were both standing in the hall, staring at us through the glass like we were little aliens they didn\u2019t know what to do with. Dr. Andrew thought baby Elli was impossibly fragile compared to her brothers, who\u2019d both been born looking like future football players. Mom had never held an actual infant and she\u2019d never played with dolls. Even then it was probably obvious a baby was never supposed to be written into her concert program. Dr. A, being no dummy, took inventory of Mom\u2019s hospital gown and robe and asked if one of the babies belonged to her. Mom pointed to me in my pink beanie\u2014baby pink back then, not the hot pink one I wear now\u2014and asked which one was Dr. A\u2019s. He pointed to the bassinet next to mine.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The way the story goes, Elli and I were already looking at each other, and until the day we went home, we screamed whenever we were separated. I guess we got over that eventually. By then, though, Dr. Andrew and Dr. Eleanor had adopted both me and Mom, and Mom no longer held me like she was afraid to break me.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Elli and I never needed to adopt each other. We\u2019ve always belonged, <\/i>the same way Mom and I belong.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Other friends have come and gone, drifting around our periphery, shuffling with us through the usual series of linoleum-floored, locker-lined school halls and activity-overloaded summer camps. Elli and I are constant. She loves her family, but her messy, turbulent, sports-loving brothers are like alien beings, and she prefers the lack of stinky football cleats and the quiet of my house. I sometimes envy her the messy completeness of having both a mom and dad, not to mention siblings, so I like to borrow them all now and then. I live there, anyway, whenever school schedules don\u2019t let me tag along on Mom\u2019s foreign tours. But it\u2019s Mom and Elli and I who get along the best. Elli can cook carbonado <\/i>and empanadas<\/i> better than I can, and we both cook better than Mom, who burns a third of everything she tries to make and is more likely to give us dulce de leche<\/i> on bread than something involving meat, veg, or actual nutrition.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The way our story was supposed<\/i> to go, Elli and I would go off to Princeton in the fall. I would follow in the footsteps of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Eugene O\u2019Neill, and Jonathan Safran Foer, and Elli would try to figure out why any reasonable human being\u2014much less someone who calls themselves a scientist\u2014could still fail to understand the dangers of climate change. Mom was going to drive up once a week to teach a class, and the three of us were all going to live together happily ever after. Or at least for four more years.<\/p>\n “The best laid schemes o\u2019 mice an\u2019 men<\/i><\/p>\n Gang aft a-gley.”<\/i><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Robert Burns<\/i><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0So. What am I supposed to choose? Mom and Princeton? Or Elli?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Man, I hate decisions.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The thing is, I know how lucky I am to even get to worry about all this. In the grand scheme of things, I have the best kind of problems. I have a mom I love more than Nutella chocolate tarts, a best friend who knows me better than I know myself, and some of the greatest schools in the world who are willing to teach me things. But no matter what I decide, someone I love gets hurt. Someone is going to lose. Something will change, and our three futures will diverge like that Robert Frost poem about the road not taken, which isn\u2019t about asserting individuality so much as it\u2019s about looking back and finding ways to justify the hardest choices. People always get that wrong.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I don\u2019t want to look back and have to justify.<\/p>\n Final semester of senior year, not even the teachers care very much. Which explains why we\u2019re watching the travesty that is The Scarlet Letter <\/i>with Demi Moore in AP English.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The door opens from the hall, admitting the sound of basketballs bouncing from the nearby gym and the hollow slam of a locker down the hall. I don\u2019t bother looking up from the pro\/con lists I\u2019m scribbling in my pocket notebook. Not until the rustle of heads turning and bodies unslumping penetrates my Princeton-induced depression.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0For once, Principal Gupta isn\u2019t obnoxiously using the PA system or calling on the phone. Her long braid swings wildly as she duck-walks under the projection screen to Mrs. Murphy\u2019s desk in person. Both she and Mrs. Murphy are dressed in aggressively passive beige, and until this moment, I\u2019ve never considered how similar they are in personality. I wonder if they are friends. Do they sit in the teacher\u2019s lounge together, sipping sludgy coffee and sharing complaints about over-involved or under-involved parents and bemoaning bygone days?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0An imaginary conversation between them writes itself out in my head, but it\u2019s first draft, not even notebook-worthy. Frowning, I dig deeper, try to imagine the secrets they\u2019d be desperate to keep the other from finding out, the secrets they\u2019ve never told to anyone. Secrets are the key to every fictional character. Every interesting one, at least.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Elli pokes me in the shoulder.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“What?” I ask.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0She nods toward the front of the room. Reaching over and taking my hand, she squeezes. Hard.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The whole class has lapsed into a nervous silence, and Mrs. Murphy and Principal Gupta have turned to look at me wearing those horrified, avid expressions that nice people get when something awful happens. I try to think of something I might have done to earn that look, but T-shirts and asking occasionally “challenging” questions are pretty much my main subversions. Neither one rates very high on the scale of offenses that would draw the principal\u2019s attention.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Still, Mom\u2019s going to say I told you so.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This is what I\u2019m thinking.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Then Principal Gupta\u2019s hand is suddenly on my shoulder, and her voice is full of pity, and Elli\u2019s standing up to try to follow me, but Mrs. Murphy\u2019s shaking her head and bending to whisper in Elli\u2019s ear. I\u2019m stumbling out into the hall where there are two police officers waiting, their shirts lumpy over Kevlar vests and their faces serious and sympathetic.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0No-no-no-no-no-no-no.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This is what I\u2019m thinking.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Because there\u2019s no possible yes<\/i> in this situation.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0There\u2019s only something horribly awful. There\u2019s only someone hurt.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And apart from Elli who was sitting beside me a second ago, I really only have one person in the entire world.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Just one.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And the police tell me there\u2019s been an accident.<\/p>\n The police turn on the sirens as we drive to the hospital. That\u2019s how bad it is.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The patrol car stinks of sweat and vomit inadequately masked over with upholstery cleaner and pine-scented air freshener. We pass cars in blurred strands of brake lights.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Officer Tillman keeps turning to look at me, and I try not to hyperventilate, try not to picture my mother cut out of her car by firemen, hooked up to machines, lying in a hospital bed all alone despite a million doctors and nurses bustling around her.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Can she hear anything if she\u2019s brain dead?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0She shouldn\u2019t die to the sound of hospital machines.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I start making a playlist of her favorite pieces on my phone\u2014 Liszt\u2019s “La Campanella,” Prokofiev\u2019s “Concerto No. 3 in C Major,” Beethoven\u2019s “Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat Major”\u2014because it\u2019s something I can do.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I will never listen to these pieces again. How could I ever listen to them again? But Mom deserves to go out with what she loves.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Pausing to dry my phone against my jeans, I ignore the ding<\/i> of Elli\u2019s zillionth text:<\/p>\n Elli: ???? Izzy! Answer me! Please answer!<\/p>\n Elli: Are you ok? Mom and Dad are coming. We\u2019re all coming.<\/p>\n Elli: What do you need? How\u2019s your mom?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I can\u2019t answer.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I can\u2019t type the words.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I won\u2019t think them.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I won\u2019t believe them. The universe doesn\u2019t need that out there.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Mom swears by yoga and meditation. In Sanskrit, intention is called Samkalpa, which literally means what you create in your mind with will or imagination. Karma begins with intention.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I intend<\/i> for Mom to be fine.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I imagine<\/i> this is all a mistake.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I will<\/i> the doctors to be wrong.<\/p>\n My mother is a deflated balloon, lying in the hospital bed. Small and diminishing. Floating away.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Not awake.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The doctors insist she won\u2019t wake up, can\u2019t wake up, and they tell me I have to be the one to choose. That\u2019s the downside of being eighteen. As if anyone is ever adult enough to deal with this.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I don\u2019t want to be adult. I only want my mother.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0She doesn\u2019t look…she doesn\u2019t need<\/i> this. Her face isn\u2019t damaged. Around the breathing tube, it\u2019s still lovely and almost peaceful.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I can\u2019t decide. I can\u2019t.<\/i><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I place my phone beside her ear on the rough, sterile sheets and start the music playing. Sitting beside her with my knees drawn up on the chair, I rock myself back and forth.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The music knifes through the air in dazzling notes. I imagine her playing, her fingers skipping and sizzling and gliding and tip-toeing across the keyboard, the music pouring from her heart.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0If I do what the doctors recommend, Mom will never finish her concerto. She\u2019ll never achieve what she\u2019s always worked for. Not the perfect piece. Not any future music. Not any future anything.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0But they tell me that\u2019s over no matter what I choose.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Please come back,” I whisper, picking up her hand. It\u2019s warm and limp, her and not her. I wait, and wait, and wait. It doesn\u2019t move. It doesn\u2019t change.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0My beautiful, mercurial, passionate mother has played for royalty and performed in the greatest concert halls around the world. She brings audiences to their feet and conductors to their knees. She has never met a batch of cookies she can\u2019t burn or a bill she can\u2019t forget to pay.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Just last Tuesday, she emerged from her music and threw herself onto my bed, making me bounce where I was studying. “I need a sweet-tooth-ritual,” she said. “Pack an overnight bag. Hurry up.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I gave the usual, token argument. “I can\u2019t go anywhere. I have school tomorrow…”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“I\u2019ll write the note,” she said. “I\u2019ll fawn. I\u2019ll be nice<\/i>. Please, querida<\/i>. I need this.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In the pre-spring lull, Cape Cod was still bitterly cold and quiet. We walked on the empty beach and played Scrabble (which I always win) and chess (which she always wins), and we watched Casablanca<\/i> for the thousandth time on the hotel cable while eating dessert for appetizers and dessert for dinner and dessert for dessert.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0All that sugar made my stomach hurt, and I groaned and said, “We\u2019re getting too old for sweet-tooth-rituals.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Mom stole the last of my cr\u00e8me br\u00fbl\u00e9e<\/i>. “What do I always tell you? You only get one life. You may as well choose to live it brilliantly.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0People who don\u2019t know my mother talk about the blinding speed of her hands, her dexterity, the absolute lack of a dominant side in her playing. She laughs at that. She says it isn\u2019t her hands she\u2019s training with all the practice.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Studies prove the mind of a pianist is wired differently, that it communicates in syntax instead of words. Pianists multitask. They make decisions at the speed of light. My mother\u2019s mind is what allows\u2014allowed<\/i>\u2014her to make choices that communicate pure emotion. Choices that make people feel<\/i>.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Brain dead. That\u2019s what the doctors call it. Mind death.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The other driver was texting.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A scream builds in my chest, squeezing out the air. A scream that has no sound. A scream that has no relief.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This can\u2019t be real.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0What kind of a text was worth my mother\u2019s life?<\/p>\n I sit on the floor with my hands wrapped around my knees and Elli\u2019s arm wrapped around my shoulders. I\u2019m sobbing so hard I can\u2019t hear what Elli\u2019s parents are saying, shaking so hard my teeth chatter. I understand there are people Mom can help, that she wanted to be an organ donor. I understand I have to decide, even if the thought of life without my mother is impossible.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I\u2019m supposed to trust what the machines and the doctors and Elli\u2019s parents tell me, that Mom will never breathe or move on her own again. Never think on her own again. I\u2019m supposed to believe she will never be Mom again. She will never see me graduate from high school, or walk me down the aisle at my wedding like she promised.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Why did I run out this morning to meet Elli at Higher Grounds? That\u2019s an extra hour I could have had, listening to Mom, watching her. Being with her. It never occurred to me that the time I gave up might have been all the time I would ever have.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I don\u2019t want to let go. I don\u2019t want to, but I can\u2019t be selfish. Mom wouldn\u2019t want life without her mind, without her music. She\u2019d want me to fight for what she<\/i> wanted, the way she has always fought for me.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This isn\u2019t about what I<\/i> want.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I have to choose for my mother because she can\u2019t choose for herself.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \n The Duchess of Northumberland created an entire poison garden at Alnwick Castle, and the only ideas I\u2019ve come up with for Halford Hall are a murder tour and paper butterflies. Butterflies. It\u2019s bloody emasculating, that\u2019s what it is. I try to tell myself I\u2019m evolved enough not to mind that I\u2019m spending Friday night hiding insects for the amusement of sugar-sozzled children. Still, I can\u2019t help a Neanderthal knee-jerk reaction that makes me long for a pint and a nice, bruising game of rugby. Not necessarily in that order.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Percy, my best mate, does little to hide his amusement as I get down on all fours to tack a Large Blue butterfly\u2014only recently brought back from extinction locally\u2014to a life-sized portrait of the eighth Countess of Mortimer. “I should snap a few photos of you doing that,” he says, “and hold them in reserve for appropriate blackmail opportunities.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Only if you have a death wish.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“You used to be more fun, you know, once upon a time. Right, so how many Maculinea arion<\/i> are we up to now? Ninety-five?” He marks this latest butterfly on the tourist map of Halford\u2019s public rooms.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I knock the eighth countess\u2019s portrait as I scramble to my feet, and she chides me from her gilded frame. She\u2019s the one who introduced dark, arched eyebrows into the Halford gene pool sometime in the fifteenth century, and the way they draw together even when her lips are smiling makes her appear perpetually worried. But she<\/i> lived here long before having a stately pile in the British countryside required tours, destination wedding weekends, community hearts and minds campaigns, and treasure hunts for children featuring paper insects, maps, and prizes. I doubt my own expression looks any happier.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“It\u2019s ninety-eight butterflies, not ninety-five,” I say. “Don\u2019t tell me you\u2019ve lost track?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Are you quite sure?” Percy\u2019s own blond eyebrows bristle like a pair of caterpillars.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Of course I\u2019m sure. But you\u2019re the one meant to be reading Maths at Oxford. I assumed you could count.” With a sigh, I amble over, and we both frown at the map.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Percy\u2019s windblown complexion grows even redder as I take the pencil and mark the missing butterflies for him. His attention shifts strategically to the ceiling. “I\u2019m thinking of changing over to Politics instead, actually,” he says. “Which you\u2019d know if you ever showed up for meals or anything remotely social.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0That\u2019s about as close to admitting hurt as Percy\u2019d ever get, and he covers it with a grin and a shake of his head. “The good news is,” he continues, “starting out in Maths and Philosophy, I\u2019ve done most of the core for Philosophy, Politics & Economics. I\u2019ll only need to make up a handful of courses.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I take in his pinched smile, his unaccustomedly rumpled shirt, the mop of hair that\u2019s untidier than usual, and the pallor beneath the ruddy cheeks he gets from rowing. Clearly, I\u2019ve been a rubbish mate. I never twigged that offering to help me set up the butterfly hunt was a pretext for needing a sounding board. And when am I ever around for him to talk to? I\u2019m down here every weekend now that Dad\u2019s seemingly chucked in half his responsibilities.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Which is no excuse. Friendship doesn\u2019t deserve excuses. I should have noticed Percy struggling.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Look, I\u2019m the last person to tell you to stick it out in Maths,” I manage to say quite evenly, “but I wonder if it\u2019s escaped your notice that Economics isn\u2019t any better. And also, the PPE-ists are all first-rate dickheads. I can\u2019t see you swanning around college in a suit and planning clandestine coup d\u2019\u00e9tats<\/i> of the Doctor Who society en route to ultimately taking over Parliament. It\u2019s not your style.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Percy\u2019s shoulders curl, and his finger twitches on the pencil. “I haven\u2019t got many other options, have I? I revise until my eyes bleed and my grades are still disastrous. Face it, I\u2019m useless at anything to do with science or technology or management. History is soporific\u2014no offense\u2014and I\u2019ve never had your dedication to keeping the family pile afloat. I can\u2019t see myself spending the next six decades of my life supervising meaningful community employment at Malming Abbey and researching the hidden history of long-dead blacksmiths. In which case, I might as well embrace the family tradition and wade into the swamps of government. Honestly, the thought of it wouldn\u2019t be half so bad if I didn\u2019t know it would put a smile on the old man\u2019s face.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The half-hearted grins we exchange at that are a show of solidarity. Our friendship, Percy\u2019s and mine, was forged in the crucible of admiration for the Leicester City Football Club and a mutual hatred of our paternal members. The reasons may be different\u2014Percy blames his father for destroying the country and mine was only responsible for destroying my mother\u2014but the intensity of feeling brought us together and bonds us still.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We duck into the state dining room, and I affix another paper butterfly to a sign about Grinling Gibbons, the man who carved the seventeenth-century wall paneling. The last of the hundred >Maculinea<\/i> goes in a corner of the corridor outside. Then, thank God, we\u2019re done. Technically, I suppose, setting up the new endangered butterfly hunt is one of the things the tour staff could have handled. They\u2019re already overworked, though, since Dad\u2019s too depressed to care about what goes on these days. In the grand scheme of things, my butterfly hunt may not do much to increase the number of mums and dads willing to plonk down hard-earned cash to force march their offspring through Halford\u2019s gardens and twenty-six public rooms. But it\u2019s almost free to implement, and it can\u2019t do any harm.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“That\u2019s it? Obligation discharged?” Percy marks the final butterfly on the map and checks his watch. “Because it occurs to me I could be convinced to forgo Mrs. Danvers\u2019 roast beef and Yorkshire pud in favor of LiveFriday at the Asmolean followed by an irresponsible night of drinking. We could still make it back to Oxford with time to spare. And in case you need more incentive, that red-haired Catherine was asking if you were coming.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I\u2019ve no interest in any girl who\u2019s more enamored with an aristocratic title than the person it belongs to, but I refrain from mentioning that. “You swore you\u2019d see me through the weekly dinner,” I remind him instead, “and please don\u2019t call Anna \u2018Mrs. Danvers.\u2019 First, she\u2019s nothing like that, and second, her hearing is supernatural and her umbrages are legendary.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“All the more reason to get out whilst we can. You may love her, but your housekeeper very nearly gives me fond feelings about my own family dinners. At least until I remember I\u2019d rather have my teeth drilled out than attend another one. You\u2019ve no idea how good you actually have it with your father.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“You only say that because you haven\u2019t had to live with him. And don\u2019t think I haven\u2019t noticed you\u2019re trying to change the subject.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“I changed that five minutes ago. Do keep up, Mal. The point is, I\u2019m bound to be sucked into government sooner or later. I might as well embrace my fate as not.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“The whole purpose of fate is to give us something to rebel against.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“Nietzsche would argue that one.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“True, but embracing life isn\u2019t the same thing as embracing fate, is it?”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0“All the more reason we should take time out to embrace LiveFriday and red-haired Catherine.”<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Though Percy\u2019s tone is light, his eyes tell a different story. I can\u2019t help giving in. Anna\u2019ll be disappointed, but I doubt Dad will even notice so long as I\u2019m back in the morning before the tourists.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Percy and I cut through the book hall and the library, then stop in the office to drop off the annotated butterfly map. Tours are finished for the day and the guests for Sunday\u2019s wedding won\u2019t start trickling in until tomorrow. For the moment, the house is still: ninety-eight cavernous rooms that have witnessed rebellions, treachery, treason, war, wealth, poverty, and everything in between. For me, it\u2019s a comfortable stillness, though, like the pensive quiet of an old married couple who know all each other\u2019s secrets.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The fight to save Halford is the one and only thing my father and I still have in common. He singlehandedly kept it from being turned into a hotel when he was little more than my age, and if he was able to do that, I can\u2019t see it gutted and sold off piece by piece on my watch.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Whatever daft schemes and ridiculous stunts I need to concoct, however many children\u2019s tours and community events I\u2019ll have to devise, I won\u2019t let Halford slip away.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n \n Two generations, two great loves, one impossible choice . . .<\/b><\/p>\n When Izzy unexpectedly loses her mother in a car accident, her world shatters. Their relationship has always been so close that Izzy can’t imagine life without her. Nor can she begin to understand when she finds a secret box of love letters that her mother wrote but never sent. The idea of her mother hiding such intense feelings for more than twenty years without so much as a hint makes Izzy question everything she thought she knew–including the identity of her father. <\/p>\n Following a trail of clues overseas, Izzy steps into a world of glamour and English royalty, one which years ago forced her mother to choose between her obligation to her musical gift and her lover’s obligations to his family, title, and estate. It’s a world of secrets and masquerades, of heartache and betrayal. And in the midst of this world, Izzy finds a young man who feels as broken as she does herself. The two are drawn to each other–only to find that their parents’ lies may present an insurmountable obstacle between them.<\/p>\n Thrown together on a coming of age journey of discovery that spans two lifetimes and takes them from a grand estate in the Cotswolds to a hospital bedside in India and ultimately to the Taj Mahal, Izzy and Malcolm try desperately not to fall in love. But some things are impossible… <\/p>\n And some loves are worth any sacrifice… <\/p>\n Uplifting, funny, tragic, and unforgettably romantic, Love for Two Lifetimes<\/i> is a tale of two generations of romance, a lifetime of friendship, a history of good intentions, and one last, heartbreaking and hopeful choice revealed in prose, texts, and love letters. If you enjoy the fairy tale royal weddings or the intense emotion of any story by John Green or Nicholas Sparks, Love for Two Lifetimes<\/i> will have you turning pages late into the night. <\/p>\n “Heartwarming, lyrical, soulful, and with just the right amount of humor: this book sparkles with authentic, layered characters and beautiful, thoughtful prose.” — Jodi Meadows, NYT bestselling co-author of My Lady Jane<\/i> and My Plain Jane<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n \nLove for Two Lifetimes<\/i> is available now in hardcover, paperback, and digital. There’s a special early order campaign with exclusive goodies for anyone who orders the book before November 1st. Additional incentives are available if you order from\u00a0One More Page Books, Martina’s local indie.<\/p>\n See here for additional details<\/a>.<\/p>\n \nOr order directly from your favorite retailer:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \nSelf-explanatory! Some lucky winner will get ten hardcover YA books in a mix of contemporary, fantasy, and all things in between, along with a set of Love For Two Lifetimes<\/i> special swag that’s in addition to the early order incentives! (Think velvet bookmarks with charms. :))<\/p>\n\n
![\"Oscar](\"http:\/\/martinaboone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/oscar_wilde_t-shirt.gif\")
<\/p>\n![\"Scene](\"http:\/\/martinaboone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/scene_break.gif\")
<\/p>\nArpeggios<\/h3>\n
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<\/p>\nChoices<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\nIzzy & Elli\u2019s Origin Story Version 3.5<\/h3>\n
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<\/p>\nWhispers<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\nPlaylist<\/h3>\n
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<\/p>\nMind Death<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\nLetting Go<\/h3>\n
![\"Malcolm:](\"http:\/\/martinaboone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Malcolm_Paper_Butterflies2.gif\")
<\/p>\n\nABOUT THE BOOK<\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/images.gr-assets.com\/books\/1536108286l\/41714592.jpg\")
<\/a>Love for Two Lifetimes<\/b>
\nby Martina Boone<\/b>
\nHardcover<\/i>
\nMayfair Publishing<\/i>
\nReleased 9\/25\/2018<\/i><\/p>\nOrder\u00a0Love for Two Lifetimes Now<\/h2>\n
Purchase with Swag at One More Page<\/a>
\nPurchase at Amazon<\/a>
\nPurchase at Barnes & Noble<\/a>
\nPurchase at iBooks<\/a>
\nPurchase at Kobo<\/a><\/h3>\nMystery Box Giveaway<\/h2>\n