Smardy Pants Book Blog: Tour Stop for Drive Me To Distraction by Caitlyn Nicholas

Sometimes life or death decisions are easy. Alex Radford has a choice – borrow the money to treat her mother’s rare and aggressive cancer from sleazy moneylender Hamish MacCameron. Or do nothing and watch her die.

MacCameron has an agenda. He wants Alex in his bed, and he wants her to help him exact revenge on his sworn enemy, Robert Dryden. He is only too happy to lend her what she needs, but the strings attached form a tangled web from which Alex has little hope of escape.

It’s not all bad. Since she was a girl Alex has had one dream: to become a Formula 1 driver and show the boys how to drive a race car. MacCameron’s money gives her a shot at fame, and in a move that scandalizes the F1 racing fraternity she becomes the new driver for Rob Dryden’s struggling F1 team, Prometheus.

Alex tries to keep her distance from Rob, knowing that one day she will need to betray one of the few people who ever had faith in her. But things begin to unravel when Hamish MacCameron is murdered and she and Rob are the top suspects on the list .

Meet the Author:
I've always loved to read. I began pinching my Mum's Mills & Boons (from the teetering pile by her bed) at the age of fourteen, and cannot remember a time in my life when I was without a romance novel. From the classics (Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen is my alltime favourite - because it makes me laugh) to the contemporary (Crossstich by Diana Gabaldon, or anything by Janet Evanovich, or... okay let's not go there!) I love them all.

I began writing in 2005. Exhausted, pregnant (sure I was going to expire from morning-sickness) and coping with a demanding toddler, I decided the time was right to embark on a writing career. (In hindsight I may have been suffering from a scorching case of sleep-deprivation).

Still, it kinda worked out. My debut novel - and the first manuscript I'd ever written - Running Scared, was published by Samhain Publishing in January 2007. My next book, Secret Intentions by also published by Samhain in 2009.
Then I had a short story published in the Mammoth Book of Special Ops Romance (MBSOR) in 2010 - my story is called The Grey Man.In 2012 my novel Drive Me To Distraction was published with Momentum Books (Digital first imprint of Pan Macmillan Australia), and my novella The Danger Game came out with Escape Publishing.

You can find information and excerpts from these books by clicking on the BOOKS menu above.

Fun Facts:

When I first took myself backpacking in Europe (at the tender age of 17) I was such a young innocent thing that I assumed the scantily clad young ladies hanging about in doorways near her hostel were waiting for a lift home. (They were hookers)

I'm ambidexterous. I can do almost everything left and right handed, except for write - which I do left handed. (It comes in handy)

I was born in England and moved to Australia in 1983. (I love them both - but I'm sorry UK, the Aussie rugby team owns my heart)

I hate shopping, and am bored by shoes. My husband loves shopping and shoes. (We are a perfect match).

Televisions unexpectedly turn themselves on in my presence. (Seriously, its freaky)

I love to travel by train. (I often don't feel that way about my travelling companions though)

I love to garden and have a huge vegetable patch - I grow awesome tomatoes - even though I loathe them and never eat them.

I can speak, read and write Chinese (very rustily). Many years ago (1998) I spent three months on a language exchange in Kunming, Yunnan. I was once locked out of my apartment complex, and was caught scaling the fence by the local police. (It ended well - and there are a lot of photos of me looking slightly stressed adorning a police station somewhere)

I once wanted to be a chef. I studied cooking for a summer at the Cordon Bleu cookery school in London. One of the other students was from Montana, he fell madly in love with me and begged me to go back to the States and live on his ranch. (I said no - but I've always wondered what if??)

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