Bell Bridge Books

Summertime, and the reading is easy!

I vacation every summer in a beautiful beach town on the New Jersey shore, not too far from where my husband grew up. I start each day with a leisurely jog up and down the town’s boardwalk bordering the beach, which offers the best views of the sun rising up out of the Atlantic Ocean. The beach is always empty then—except for an occasional gathering of sea gulls—and the breezes lift off the water and keep me and the few other early joggers from getting too hot. It is the most peaceful time of day. While my sneakered feet stay on the boardwalk, my mind wanders in all directions. I get some of my best writing ideas during these tranquil morning jogs.

After I return to the inn where my husband and I stay, I wash up, change into a swimsuit and coverup, and grab some breakfast, after which we head back down to the beach, armed with chairs, an umbrella, and books, books, books! My husband loves biographies, narrative history, and thrillers, many of which he buys in hardcover (which makes our beach tote bag weigh a ton.) I prefer women’s fiction, romances, and mysteries—the same genres I write—and I read them on my Kindle. Of course, this means I can bring hundreds of books down to the beach with me, all stored on my lightweight reading device.

Much as I love my morning jogs (and my evening ice-cream pig-outs; our inn is a short walk from a fabulous ice-cream parlor), my favorite part of vacation is sitting on the beach and reading. I slide my chair into the umbrella’s shade, dig my toes into the sand, and gorge on books. My definition of bliss!

If you’re like me, and looking for some delicious new books to read while you’re on vacation, I hope you’ll give The April Tree a try, especially while it’s specially priced at only $1.99. Much as I love all the books I’ve written (one hundred so far!), The April Tree is the book closest to my heart. It contains drama, romance, sorrow, and laughter. It’s about life and loss, fate and faith. And it’s about the enduring bonds of friendship.

Some of you may be beach readers like me. Some may be hammock readers. Some of you may be hopping on planes and traveling long distances this summer—but hey, you’ll need a good book or two to keep you company on the flight. So stock up on your summertime reading—and take advantage of any discounts you can find. I hope you’ll include The April Tree on your summer reading list.

Judith Arnold

THE APRIL TREE is on sale for just 1.99! Grab it today!

Goodbye to 2015

by Judith Arnold

Last year—2015—began for me, rather unpleasantly, with major surgery. I remember talking to my surgeon about whether scheduling the surgery for January 2^nd was such a hot idea. “Will you be hung over?” I asked. He assured me he wouldn’t be. I certainly wouldn’t be. My husband and I weren’t exactly in a celebratory mood that New Year’s Eve.

But as I look back on the year just ended, I realize that despite its start, 2015 wasn’t a bad year at all. The surgery went well. My husband and some potent drugs got me through the first few post-op days, and then I started to reclaim my life.

I’m an exercise freak. I jog. I work out with weights. I do crunches and stretches. One year ago, I suddenly found myself unable to do any of those things. And yet, step by step, crunch by crunch, I got stronger. A week after the surgery, I could walk all the way to the corner and back. Another few weeks and I was able to walk a mile. I was able to carry the groceries from the trunk of my car to the kitchen without assistance, and lug the laundry baskets up and down the stairs. My clothing once again fit. My scars faded.

Now, one year later, I’m me again!

So in fact, 2015 was a terrific year. I got knocked down, and I picked myself back up again. That’s my definition of wonderful.

Still, when it comes to last year, I’m ready to say “goodbye to all that.” A new year means a new beginning. New walks and jogs, new adventures, new books to write, new readers to entertain. I hope this new year will be wonderful for all of us.

Say GOODBYE TO ALL THAT with Judith Arnold – only $1.99 through January 15th! 

What Women Really Want

by Judith Arnold

A few years ago, a woman in my circle announced that she and her husband of many years were separating. Nothing permanent, she assured us. They were going to sell their house, rent two apartments, and reevaluate in a year. They still loved each other; they just wanted to live apart for a while.

The predominant reaction among my friends was…envy.

Mind you, we’re all in solid, long-term marriages. We love our husbands. Yet every woman I spoke to expressed the wish that she could do what my friend was doing.

I remembered my mother’s envy when my sister graduated from college and took an apartment in Manhattan. To call this apartment small would be charitable. I’ve seen bigger closets. But it was hers and hers alone, and my mother—who at that time lived in a comfortable seven-room house and had been married to my father for about twenty-five years—said, “This is my dream! An apartment like this, all to myself!” My father died some months after their sixtieth anniversary, and though she misses him, my mother now has—and loves—a cozy little apartment all to herself.

When you’re a novelist, you can make your dreams come true on paper, if not in real life. The dream my friend was living with her husband in their his-and-hers apartments seemed like a great premise for a novel. Thus was born Goodbye to All That. When female acquaintances of a certain age asked me what I was working on, I’d describe the book to them and they’d sigh and say, “Oh, I wish I could do that!”

The romance novels I’ve written explore the joys and emotional risks of falling in love. But for many women, after we’ve done the falling-in-love thing, the ’til-death-do-us-part thing, the happily-ever-after thing, routine sets in. We spend our days doing whatever needs doing that no one else wants to do. We make sure the kids have their school lunches with them. We remember the doctor appointments and the music lessons. We run the laundry, stock the refrigerator, and get the car to the shop for servicing, because if we don’t do it, it won’t get done. We do, do, do for everyone else.

We take care of our families because we love them. But the notion of living only for ourselves, tending to our own needs before we tend to anyone else’s, is as exciting a fantasy as being swept off our feet by a sexy hero.

My husband and I will be celebrating our thirty-fifth anniversary this fall. I adore him. He still makes me laugh. He still makes me think. He’s still cute. But every now and then, I find myself thinking about Ruth Bendel, the family matriarch who one day says “goodbye to all that” in my novel and moves into her own apartment, just to see what it feels like to be in charge of the remote control, to sleep in the center of the bed, to answer to no one but herself. A woman can dream, can’t she?

Find what YOU really want in GOODBYE TO ALL THAT – an April Monthly Deal for only $1.99!!

Tip o’ the Hat to Murph

 by Judith Arnold

My ninth-grade English teacher was a tall, broad-faced, red-haired, vehemently Irish man named Eugene Murphy. Murph was brilliant, motivational, stern, and funny—the best teacher I had in high school. All these years later, I still remember the cadence of his coordinating-conjunctions chant, his purple-prose parodies, his explication of The Iliad and his flummoxed reaction when we all handwrote our Iliad essays in spirals so he’d have to rotate our papers to read them. I remember the day he confiscated our water pistols and then turned them on us and mowed down the entire class with spritzes of water. I remember the day he read us a short story he had written, a lovely, lyrical tale heavily influenced by James Joyce. I remember him serenading us with “Danny Boy,” his voice a sweet, high tenor.

One reason I wound up writing for and then editing the high school newspaper was that Murph was the faculty advisor. I didn’t want to lose the chance to work with him once I’d finished ninth grade.

Not surprisingly, Murph took St. Patrick’s Day very seriously. My senior year, the St. Patrick’s Day parade in New York City coincided with an awards luncheon for high school newspapers at the Waldorf-Astoria. Our school newspaper had won some sort of recognition from the Columbia University School of Journalism, and Murph piled the newspaper’s senior editors into his car and drove us into Manhattan so we could receive our award.

I don’t remember much about the award or the luncheon. What I do remember was that we arrived in the city hours before the luncheon so we could view the St. Patrick’s Day parade first. I recall little about the parade itself—a parade is a parade—but everything about Murph that day. He wore a necktie festooned with shamrocks, and balanced a kelly-green derby precariously atop his red hair. He waved at the marchers. He sang. He cheered. He made me wish I was Irish.

I am not Irish. I come from Eastern European Jewish stock, and I’m as proud of my heritage as Murph was of his. And so, the following Monday, I brought Murph a St. Patrick’s Day present: a square of matzo painted green.

Tears glistened in Murph’s eyes when he opened the box and saw that bright green matzo. Whether they were tears of joy or horror, I can’t say. I did warn him not to eat the matzo, because I’d used real paint, not food coloring. Perhaps his tears arose from disappointment over not being able to snack on my gift.

I kept in touch with Murph for years after I graduated from high school. He was my mentor, my inspiration. He definitely deserves some of the credit for my career as a novelist. Never does a St. Patrick’s Day go by when I don’t summon a memory of him standing on that crowded sidewalk on Fifth Avenue in midtown Manhattan, wearing a tacky green derby and singing “McNamara’s Band” as the parade passed by.

CELEBRATE EVERYTHING GREEN (PAINTED OR NOT) THIS ST. PATRICK’S DAY!

AND DON’T FORGET TO GRAB DEAD BALL BY JUDITH ARNOLD FROM AMAZON TODAY! 

JUST CLICK THE LINK!