A Dream Within A Dream: The Counting Downers Blog Tour: Excerpt + Giveaway

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for The Counting Downers by A.J. Compton! Today I have a great excerpt from the book to share with you - and don't forget to enter the giveaway! To follow the rest of the tour, check out the schedule at the bottom of the post.

The Counting Downers

Author: A.J. Compton

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Release Date: July 24, 2015

Description:

The stunningly poignant and life-affirming debut novel by A.J. Compton

Imagine if we could see how long everyone around us had left to live. But we weren’t allowed to know our own numbers…

Trying to make sense of life after the death of her beloved father, free spirit Matilda Evans meets Tristan Isaacs and discovers a marrow-deep connection with him.

No stranger to grief himself, lonely artist Tristan is in awe of Matilda’s fun and philosophical approach to life. With every second spent in her presence, he finds his views on life and loss changing, and begins to embrace the beauty of being alive.

As their friendship turns into something deeper, lessons are learned, memories are made, and legacies are created.

But with both of them knowing how long their soulmate has left in this lifetime, important questions have to be asked and tough decisions have to be made before time runs out.

The Counting-Downers is an inspiring story about life, loss, love, and making the most of every moment.

The length of time you know someone doesn’t make your grief more valid than somebody else’s. You can meet someone once and leave such a life-changing impact on them that they will never forget you. Or you can work side-by-side with someone every day for years and they’ll struggle to remember your name.

My father was the sort of person you only needed to meet once to be changed for good.

I think, in a way, each of us leave pieces of ourselves with the people we know and love, like we’re all composed of a million-piece jigsaw puzzle and we give one bit or more to everyone we meet.

Some of these people have pieces of my father that I never will. They knew him as the guy who had a dirty sense of humor, the heart-breaking womanizer in his college days, or the naughty little boy next door who smashed their windows with a football.

But I have pieces they don’t. I knew the guy who gave amazing cuddles and made even better pancakes. The one who taught me with patience to read, and ride, and swim, and love, and live. I will always hold pieces of the man who comforted me after my first heartbreak, and taught me to go with the flow.

If we all came together, you’d see the whole picture. But maybe that’s not the point.

All of us are, and mean, different things to different people. We’re one person, but a million people. Fractured, but whole. All giving out puzzle pieces and carrying around a bag full of the ones given to us by everyone we’ve ever met.

I read once that the Japanese believe you have three faces: The first, you show to the world. The second, to your close friends and family. The third, you never show anyone and it’s the truest reflection of yourself.

I think a lot of truth lies in that. For as many puzzle pieces as everyone here today holds of my father, there will always be some missing. Secrets of his self, he’s taken to the grave.

We knew a lot about him, but we never knew all.

A.J. Compton is a 23-year-old Londoner, professional dreamer, and full-time over-thinker. She is the author of The Counting-Downers and a dozen other unfinished manuscripts which will hopefully see the light of day soon.

A University of Cambridge graduate, A.J. is currently in a polygamous relationship with an embarrassing number of fictional book boyfriends.

Those two facts are not related. Honestly.

She loves people-watching and exploring her observations in her writing.

She really hates writing about herself in the third person.

Author Links:
Twitter: www.twitter.com/AuthorAJCompton
Facebook: www.facebook.com/AuthorAJCompton
Instagram: www.instagram.com/AuthorAJCompton
Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/AuthorAJCompton
Spotify: open.spotify.com/user/authorajcompton
Goodreads: www.goodreads.com/AuthorAJCompton
Website: www.ajcompton.com

Buy Links:
Amazon US: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ZABXJVQ
Amazon UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00ZABXJVQ
Amazon AU: http://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B00ZABXJVQ