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Pink Ice Creams by Jo Woolaston - Book Tour

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Pink Ice Creams


Intent on fixing her broken marriage and the alcohol-fuelled catastrophe that is her life, Kay Harris arrives at her grim and grey holiday let, ready to lay to rest the tragedy that has governed her entire adulthood – the disappearance of her little brother, Adam.

But the road to recovery is pitted with the pot-holes of her own poor choices, and it isn’t long before Kay is forced to accept that maybe she doesn’t deserve the retribution she seeks. Will the intervention of strangers help her find the answers she needs to move on from her past, or will she always be stuck on the hard shoulder with no clear view ahead and a glove box full of empties?

Pink Ice Creams is a tale of loss, self-destruction, and clinging on to the scraps of the long-lost when everyone else has given up hope.

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Excerpt
Kay’s ‘holiday’ and hopes to re-build her life are not going exactly to plan. Having discovered that she may be responsible for putting a man in hospital, she retreats into hiding, the only straws left for her to clutch at being the standard ‘bottle of something’ and the tin pot advice from her well-meaning but naive best friend ringing in her ears...

What should I do, Jen?

Take mental snapshots of moments at rock bottom and every step on the way up. Make a scrapbook, a visual aid, each picture a step higher to chart all progress, however small. Keep the images stored ready to bring out like a slide-show, no matter how painful, no matter how hard. In difficult times it will show just how far you’ve progressed and spur you on not to give in. It will help you to keep going, knowing you are taking a baby step higher each time.

Mental Snapshot No. 5
Click. Rock bottom. This must be how a fish feels on ice; wide-eyed, open-mouthed, motionless, helpless, waiting for the mallet to fall. My ice is an acrid puke-stained carpet a foot above the cold concrete of a hard-standing plot. I have been here before, only a few days ago, transfixed by a bloody plaster under the cabinet, my cheek stuck to the floor with vomit, my arms losing their ability to feel, my throat stretched and sore after purging the contents of my stomach through it. I am equally sickened and relieved to get back to familiar territory. I am rock bottom. I am a scumbag, a skank. I am the lowest of the low.

I hit the kerb. Didn’t I? I hit the kerb on the other side of the junction before I knew a junction had approached. It can’t be a hit and run. Run implies I was aware of a hit, running away, fleeing the scene. But I didn’t see him. I didn’t know I had hit him, I didn’t know I had hit anyone. I had no idea I had knocked someone over and left them to die in a ditch. And I didn’t know this because I was blind drunk and have no clear recollection of the incident whatsoever. I remember taking the car out, I remember hitting the kerb. If it was a kerb.
Should I leave? Or stay here? Hit and hide. I am a hit and hide driver, a coward, a waste of space, a low-life. There is still an hour to go before day-break, but the site is already starting to wake up. There are some people outside, I can hear them, so if I decide to go then I really have to go right now. But of course I can’t go, then I really am what they will call me. Why is there so much noise outside, I can’t think straight. Sshh! Breathe. What should I do Jen? Tell me. Begin the slide-show.

1.      This is me in the kitchen. I have only just arrived. I am drinking a donated cup of tea from a mug with a kingfisher motif.

2.      I have stubbed my toe, all my fillings are on view and I look beautiful.

3.      Suited and booted face down on the bed, with a vinegar soaked chip wrapper up my jumper. The curtains are open and the car lights are on.

The car lights are on. I left the car lights on, all night. The battery is dead and I still haven’t found the car keys. I am going nowhere.

4.      I have a new friend, he has a bandana.

5.      Rock bottom. A fish on ice.

This is not progress, Jen. This is not bloody progress! It is the opposite, a cup of tea from a stranger to the lowest of the low in only five steps.

 


Author Bio
Jo Woolaston lives in Leicestershire, England with her extreme noise-making husband and two lovely sons. She tries to avoid housework and getting a ‘proper job’ by just writing stuff instead - silly verse, screenplays, shopping lists...
This sometimes works in her favour (she did well in her MA in TV Scriptwriting, gaining a Best Student award in Media and Journalism – and has had a few plays produced - that kind of thing) but mostly it just results in chronic insomnia and desperate tears of frustration. Pink Ice Creams is her first novel, she hopes you liked it.


Social Media Links –
Twitter: @JoWoolaston




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