Lola Carlyle's 12-Step Romance
Release Date: 05/05/15
Entangled Teen
Summary from Goodreads:
Lola Carlyle is lonely, out of sorts, and in for a boring summer. So when
her best friend, Sydney, calls to rave about her stay at a posh Malibu rehab
and reveals that the love of Lola’s life, Wade Miller, is being admitted, she
knows what she has to do. Never mind that her worst addiction is decaf
cappuccino; Lola is going to rehab.
Lola arrives at Sunrise Rehab intent solely on finding Wade, saving him
from himself, and—naturally—making him fall in love with her…only to discover
she’s actually expected to be an addict. And get treatment. And talk about her
issues with her parents, and with herself. Plus she has insane roommates, and
an irritatingly attractive mentor, Adam, who’s determined to thwart her at
every turn.
Oh, and Sydney? She’s gone.
Turns out, once her pride, her defenses, and her best friend are stripped
away, Lola realizes she’s actually got a lot to overcome…if she can open her
heart long enough to let it happen.
Buy Links:
Stupid/Crazy/Foolish/Wild
Let’s get this out in the open. Some of the adults who’ve
read LOLA CARLYLE’S 12 STEP ROMANCE do not approve of Lola. Because, well, she
fakes her way into rehab because of a boy. Sure, she has good intentions—wants
to rescue him, help set him back on the right path—but she also hopes he’ll
fall in love with her. Yeah.
It’s a CRAZY thing to do. Irresponsible. Disrespectful to
the “real” addicts. Completely the actions of a crackpot. And Lola herself
starts out spoiled and bratty and a total potty-mouthed smart-ass.
So I get it. And it’s fine—some people are just not going to
like or approve of her.
Those readers maybe don’t remember being younger and doing
crazy things. Or maybe they don’t want to think about the crazy things they
did. Or maybe they didn’t do many crazy things. Maybe they never even
considered doing anything crazy.
Maybe they didn’t hand-deliver a perfume-doused love letter
to the house of a boy in third grade. Maybe they didn’t play Truth, Dare,
Double-Dare in a darkened math lab during recess. Maybe they didn’t show up all
dressed-up, everywhere they thought a certain boy would be and then feel too
shy to talk to him, and ending up feeling like a freakshow stalker type. They
probably didn’t take the screen off their window and sneak out of their house
at night and run wild with a pack of kids who’d done the same, diving into
bushes every time they heard a car coming. Perhaps they were never in love with
somebody they couldn’t have, never kissed someone “inappropriate”, their
parents never ruined any of their romantic opportunities, they never signed on
to a summer program just so they could be near a boy who’d already dumped them,
but they couldn’t get over. Maybe they didn’t dance on any tables and never
fooled themselves, lied to themselves, did crazy, stupid things for “fun”, or
out of loneliness and desperation.
Lucky them.
I did, though. I was an unstoppable, wild, foolish mess. And
I remember. And although I have a few regrets, a few memories that make me
cringe and blush even now, I’m glad I did/tried to do most of those things. I
was a disaster most of the time, yes. But I was intensely alive, and growing,
and taking action and sorting things out in my own way. Usually the wrong way,
sure. But I wasn’t sitting on my butt waiting for anybody to fix things for me.
And neither is Lola. Yes, faking her way into rehab is an
officially Bad Idea. A ridiculous idea. I don’t approve, either.
But I survived a lot of bad ideas and a ton of
self-inflicted ridiculousness, and I’m still here—a mostly well-adjusted and
functioning adult, with a very full, happy life, and a sense of humor forged in
the fires of wild/stupid/foolish/crazy. And I suspect there are a few readers
out there who are, or were, just like me. Lola is for them.
Thanks for hosting me today, and happy reading!
Danielle Younge-Ullman is a novelist, playwright and freelance writer.
She studied English and Theater at McGill University, then returned to
her hometown of Toronto to work as professional actor for ten years.
Danielle’s short story, Reconciliation, was published in MODERN MORSELS—a
McGraw-Hill Anthology for young adults—in 2012, her one-act play, 7 Acts
of Intercourse, debuted at Toronto's SummerWorks Festival in 2005, and her
adult novel, FALLING UNDER, was published by Penguin in 2008. Danielle
lives in Toronto with her husband and two daughters.
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