FYI, the ebook of Bold Moves is on sale for the first time in North America. Until the end of August, you can get it for $2.49 at Amazon. It’s also available in KU, in paperback, and on audio, where it’s read wonderfully by Savannah Peachwood and Jeremy York. There’s a full list of buy links at Books2Read.
Additionally, the ebooks for Chick Magnet and Bad Reputation are both $1.99 this month, so it’s a great time to stock up on Emma Barry titles for cheap.
I suspect that every author has a list of hopes and dreams for their books. For example, I would love to see my one of mine in an airport bookstore. I mean, I’d love to see them in any bookstore at all, but for reasons that I can’t really explain, the airport bookstore feels like an especially high bar. Probably because the titles you see there tend to be super mega ultra bestsellers, and, well, who wouldn’t want that?
But another goal for me was translations; I desperately wanted to sell foreign language rights to one of my books. And two years ago, the lovely folks at Queen Edizioni bought the rights to Chick Magnet and Funny Guy, and Chick Magnet is going to release on April 22, 2025: the same day that Bold Moves will appear in English.
Isn’t the cover for the Italian translation gorgeous? It’s so bucolic, and I adore that they kept the pink and yellow cover scheme from the English-language version.
Anyhow, if you read in Italian, you can preorder Chick Magnet for Kindle here.
As you probably know, Hurricane Helene barreled into Appalachia in late September, causing widespread devastation. I live in coastal Virginia, and we’ve traveled in the affected area many times. It’s a beautiful region of the country, and the images of bridges and towns being swept away in an instant was horrifying.
Wanting to do something to help, I donated to the Western North Carolina Indie Authors auction. The auction goes live TODAY and ends on October 20, so get browsing!
Up for grabs is a set of books from me. I’ll send the winner signed paperback copies of Chick Magnet, Funny Guy, and Bad Reputation immediately and then, as soon as I have them in hand, I’ll add an ARC of Bold Moves. Chick Magnet and Bold Moves are both set in small (fictional) towns in southwest Virginia, so it’s especially poignant for me to be able to offer those to the highest bidder in this auction.
Continue reading “A Charity Auction and a Zillion Guest Posts”
It’s been an age, and I’m so sorry about that! I have fun and exciting book news (!!!) that I cannot talk about yet. But as a result, I’ve been stuck in my writing cave since late May. I’m approaching the finish line on a draft though, and I hope to emerge–phoenix-like–from the ashes soon.
But on Thursday, July 13th, I’m going to stick my head out to be on Romance Happy Hour, and I would absolutely LOVE to see you there. You can join Shana Gray, Dawn Luedecke, Dylann Crush, and me on Facebook or YouTube at 8 p.m. CT. I’m going to read from Chick Magnet, and I’ll be giving away a print copy. I’m certain it’ll be a great time.
We have a number of iconic pairings in romance. Grumpy-sunshine, innocent-experienced, and morally good-morally evil, to name a few. A decade ago, the legal scholar Dahlia Lithwick added another one to the mix: Chaos Muppet-Order Muppet. Essentially the idea is that all Muppets are either forces for entropy or forces for organization and structure. Animal and the Swedish Chef? They’re Chaos Muppets. Sam the Eagle and Bert? Order Muppets. And these opposites tend to attract. Think about Miss Piggy and Kermit.
Up until now, my characters have mostly been Order Muppets. When I have written the occasional Chaos Muppets (Vivy in Free Fall comes to mind), they’ve been minimally chaotic. But Sam in Funny Guy is not minimal chaos. Sam is the full tornado.
Continue reading “It’s This Stand Up Guy’s Time to Fall”
Chick Magnet–my grumpy-sunshine, small town, veterinarian and backyard chicken influencer romance–is on sale for the first time EVER. For the entire month of May, Chick Magnet can be yours for just $1.99. You can add the audio (read by the incredible CJ Bloom and Aaron Shedlock) for only $1.99, which I highly recommend doing. And the paperback is less than $10 at the moment. So pop over to the ‘zon and grab it!
This is the kind of news that I share with my mailing list. In today’s missive, I also discuss the backstory for Funny Guy, which will be out in two weeks. You can sign up for my mailing list here if you’re so inclined.
Just a heads up that I’m planning to send a newsletter on Monday with a Valentine’s Day extra: an alternate chapter for Chick Magnet in which things gets considerably more steamy on Will’s porch. I’ll talk more about this in the newsletter itself, but writing the scene with extra heat helped me to get over my mid-book slump and finish the book. So while I fully love the final (lower-heat) version of the chapter, it’s fun to look back and ponder, “what if?”
Anyhow, if this sounds like something you want to read, make sure you sign up for my newsletter here.
Friends, release week for Chick Magnet was BONKERS in the best way. I have done more promo for this book than for anything else I’ve written before. As a result, I wanted to put together a roundup post so that readers could find all those articles, podcasts, etc. in the future.
I’ll update this with more stuff as it drops–because not all of it is out in the world yet!–but here’s what I have so far. I am omitting reviews because I’ve been doing my best not to read those. ; )
And Funny Guy is now available on Netgalley if you’re a reviewer.
It is almost inconceivable that I’m sitting my office where, two and a half years ago, I started writing this book, and now I’m writing the release day post. That’s right, Chick Magnet can now be yours! You can grab a paperback at Amazon, get it for your Kindle, and pick up the audiobook at Audible (read by the wonderful CJ Bloom and Aaron Shedlock).
This is a grumpy-sunshine romance about a small town veterinarian and the backyard chicken influencer who moves across the street from him, the one he doesn’t want to like, but whom he can’t stop watching. It’s about two people who are bruised underneath the masks they put on for the world. But as a result, they can’t help but see through the other’s disguise. It’s also about the joys of kittens, of coaching kid’s soccer, of prying neighbors. It’s about whispering secrets in the dark and kissing on your porch. And chickens. There are a lot of chickens.
So many people helped me write this book, it’s almost embarrassing. Without Genevieve Turner, Olivia Dade, Sarah Younger, Lauren Plude, everyone at Montlake, and everyone at Kaye Publicity, this book wouldn’t exist…or you wouldn’t have heard about it. I’m just so grateful to all my friends, family, and readers for their support.
I’ll have a big roundup soon of all the coverage for Chick Magnet, but if you’re a fan of Liz Donatelli’s Reader Seeks Romance, I had the chance to talk with her, which you can watch here.
Isn’t the cover for Funny Guy amazing? Well, the blurb is even better:
From the author of Chick Magnet comes a heartfelt friends-to-lovers story about what can happen when a funny guy and his childhood best friend are stuck together in a small New York City apartment.
Sam can’t escape the smash hit “Lost Boy” because, well, he is the lost boy. His pop-singer ex immortalized him in a song about his childish ways, and now his comedy career is on the line.
At least he still has Bree, his best friend and confidante. Bree has always been there for Sam, but she’s never revealed her biggest secret: she’s in love with him. To help herself move on, Bree applies for her dream job across the country―and doesn’t say a thing to Sam.
But as Sam tries to resuscitate his career, he turns to Bree for support―and maybe more. In the confines of her tiny apartment, they share a different dynamic. A charged dynamic. But she’s his friend. He can’t be falling for her.
Except he is.
Are his feelings for Bree just funny business? Or is their smoldering attraction the real deal?
It’ll release on May 16, 2023, but you can preorder it on Amazon and add it to your Goodreads shelves now.
And while I have your attention, I had a wonderful chat with Meg and Liz at the Make Out Already podcast about Chick Magnet. You can listen here, and you should because they’re charming.
Emma Barry 