THE SHAKER PROPOSAL
This saucy, sometimes steamy romantic comedy is complete at 86,000 words. The high concept:

Bridget Jones meets Indiana Jones and Young Indiana Jones, gets axed from her job like Star Jones, and winds up lucky in love like Catherine Zeta-Jones.

This book is a modern-day immorality tale about a pleasure-loving woman, Grace Savage, a communications director for a small Pennsylvania university, who is shaken down to her boyshorts while visiting a celibate community in the Granite State and glimpses her future mired in a maiden state.

THE SHAKER PROPOSAL is a fast-paced read with risqué entanglements and loads of one-liners. It has particular appeal to women readers, who might find a story about falling for a very young man and a much older one, with all of their contrasting charms, who are related no less, to be a captivating read -- a great beach read in the most fulfilling sense of the term.

Here's an excerpt from midway through the book when Grace's plan to attract men is working far better than she ever imagined:

"If you’ve ever grown zucchini, you know they all ripen the same day. You wait all of June and July for zucchini. August rolls around, and one day––bam . . . you have more zucchini than you know what to do with. You start handing them out to your neighbors and friends at work because there’s no way any single person can handle all that zucchini. Not even if you’re smart and resourceful and have accumulated dozens of good recipes. Not even a person who likes zucchini as much as I do."

* * *

I also have several new works-in-progress, including one called DIME STORE DEBUTANTE, about twenty-something Nola Spengler, a sturdy, thrifty, responsible woman, a librarian by trade, who wants more from life than doing killer Sudokus and reading Cross-Stitch Today. So she has decided she owes it herself to have her coming out, but it has to be on a librarian's salary.

DIME STORE DEBUTANTE

Chapter One

Twelve minutes to closing. I stared at the rack of new acquistions. Still there. No one had checked it out yet. That meant in a few short minutes, no more whining and runny-nosed toddlers, no more co-dependent borrowers who could no longer count to 800 or remember their alphabet, and best of all, no more waiting to scoop up Oprah's newest book club release. The slim-and-trim trade paperback would be heading home with me along with Hedge Funds for Dummies. Ten minutes to closing. I headed to the back room and clambered over the equivalent of a grassy knoll of boxes, perching atop mounds of books for next week's Bargain Basement Sale, to position myself within inches of the intercom.

"Attention customers," I said, removing all anticipation from my voice, opting for a nasal monotone instead. "The Dread Not Library will be closing in ten minutes. Please bring all your materials to the circulation desk immediately."

The best thing about working at the east branch of the library is that it closed at eight o'clock on weeknights. After tidying up the display racks and the circulation desk, I always got home in time to brew a cup of tea and settle in with two back-to-back episodes of Law and Order. Tonight, however, I planned to step out on Brisco and Green and put on the pedigreed dog, let me tell you, to check out the swanky new bookstore with the built-in coffee shop which stayed open until nine-thirty! I could linger over a decaffeinated café-au-lait, buy the next quarterly edition of Cross-Stitch Today, and still get home in time for one episode of America's favorite police procedural.

"Who's next?" I asked. An elderly man I didn't recognize bumbled up to the desk. I had worked at this branch for eight years; I knew my regulars. He silently slid his books across the counter and wouldn't make eye contact with me. No wonder. He was checking out The Eyes and Lips Have It, What a Girl Really Wants, and Ten Days to a Softer, Smoother You. At that moment, I sincerely hoped he had an unhappy, scaly little woman at home, not wanting to think about the alternative, not with the fuzz growing out of his oversized ears.

I was helping the next person in line when Mrs. Winpenny rushed into the library, creating quite the hubbub with the knocking of her cane and the clacking of her orthopedic shoes beating an oddly syncopated tattoo on our tiled floor, practically knocking the perhaps-perverted old guy onto his keister. She hurried over to the circulation desk, "Miss! Miss!"

"Just a minute, Mrs. Winpenny," I said. "You'll have to wait your turn. There are people ahead of you."

"Nola! This is important," she said, panting heavily, smacking her cane on the floor for emphasis. "Edna called and said you have the new Oprah book. Where is it?"

The new Oprah book? No way was it going home with Florence Winpenny. "Sorry. It's already been checked out."

Mindy Mae, the circulation assistant on the desk, normally a well-mannered, overly quiet little waif piped up. "You're wrong about that, Nola." She stepped around the desk and turned the woman to the new acquisitions rack, pointing to the third shelf. "It's still there, Mrs. Winpenny. See, the third one from the left, with the white Oprah seal?"

"Thank you, miss. You are quite the dear. Quite." Mrs. Winpenny yanked it off the rack faster than a holiday sweater on the seventy-five percent off display after Christmas. Then she demurely stepped in line, waiting her turn.

I sighed from the soles of my feet. No Oprah book for me tonight. Maybe I could buy it at the new bookstore. But then I couldn't purchase my new Killer Sudokus book. On a librarian's salary, I simply had to choose. Wait. I could settle into an overstuffed chair with the new Oprah book in one hand and my decaffeinated café-au-lait in the other every night this week, reading a little bit each time. That's what I decided to do. Read it on the cheap after work.

"Will that be all, Mrs. W?" I asked, thinking you clattering Oprah-book monger, you.

"That's what I came in for." She beamed. "And look at that. Just made it. You close at eight, don't you?"

"That's right." I scanned her book. "Hope you enjoy it," I said utterly lacking in enthusiasm, as I watched my Oprah book hobble out the door in her hot hands. "Oh, and that's only a one-week book, Mrs. Winpenny," I called after her.

* * *

A half hour later, I pulled my Ford Fairlane into the parking lot of Dread Not's brand spanking new Books and Brew, circling around the lot several times, looking for a space. None to be found.

"Hey, nice car!" a teenaged boy yelled out on my third loop around.

Actually, it was a wonderful car, a true cream puff. I inherited "Old Paint" from my Uncle Trig, who babied it until the day he died in the middle of an oil change. Okay, so it didn't look like a Chrysler Sebring convertible, but it got me where I needed to go, and all it cost me was gas, insurance, and upkeep.

Seeing no spaces whatsoever and none pending, I parked in the Pet Parade lot where four cars filled spaces marked "Parking for Pet Parade Customers Only," hoping none of the employees saw me leaving "Old Paint" and traipsing into another store, not theirs anyway. In no time at all I muscled my way through the entrance and passed the glut of non-fiction browsers crowding the front of the store and was safely ensconced among my fellow fictionistas.

As I thumbed through the titles, I noticed a professor from the college where I used to work, who often asked me to put books and journals aside for him. Dr. Tillman, the heart-pounding hunk in the humanities department, who came to Dread Not by way of the University of Michigan, a strangely bifurcated state. Once when I asked him whether he had ever seen any woverines in The Wolverine State, he told me, no, that he was from "The Upper Peninsula," so I wouldn't mistake him for a Lower-Peninsulate troll, I always assumed. His thick, dark hair was rumpled as always, rumpled in a good way, the best way. My fellow librarians and I used to take bets on how much time and gel he spent to get that casual coif looking perfectly casual.

"Dr. Tillman! I haven't seen you in a year. What have you been up to?"

He gave me and my Goodwill castoffs a once-over. He hadn't recognized me.

"It's Nola. Nola Spengler. I used to work in the library."

"Oh, right. Nice to see you," he said then brushed past me.

"How's the tenure track treating you?" I asked, knowing an academic could never resist talking about himself.

"I'm splitting my time with a university in Delaware. I teach two days a week there."

"Hope that works out for you." He had a copy of the new Oprah book tucked under his arm. Maybe that's why he didn't want to stop and talk. "Hey, were there any more--" Before I finished, he was off to another aisle, in pursuit of other literary giants.

Well, forget him. I plucked the very last copy of the new Oprah book off the shelf and headed to the coffee shop for a steaming hot café-au-lait. The line snaked all the way back to the periodicals. I bypassed the latest issue of I-Love-Me magazine filled with silly stories about women who wore tiaras, got spa facials, and went disco-dancing and glo-bowling. I grabbed a copy of Cooking for One from the magazine rack while I waited; their Fuss-Not recipes were the best. Easy, often low-fat, and usually cheap.

Just as I got to the front of the line, from out of nowhere a tall blonde in a designer mini-skirt and a plunging v-neck tank top slipped in front of me and demanded a cappucino.

"Uh umm," I stuttered. "I believe I-I was next, miss."

She ignored my poorly articulated protest. The guy at the counter paid no mind to me either. Clearly he was intoxicated with the lip-lined, long-stemmed, cleavaged creature before him and prepared her cappucino post-haste while I stood there wringing Cooking for One in my clammy hands.

Finally, with café-au-lait in hand, I could settle into my Oprah book. I wandered through the aisles, in search of empty chair, and noticed one at the entrance to the children's section. Before I could remove the the only impediment to sliding my world-weary frame into the seat--the latest issue of Cosmo Girl--a child's shrill voice accosted me.

"You can't sit there!"

I turned to see an angular thing with Tweety-bird legs, about nine-years-old, standing with her arms folded, glaring in my direction.

"That seat is saved."

"You can't save seats in a bookstore."

"Oh, yeah? It's saved for my friend. Go away. Or I'm telling my mom on you."

Since I couldn't find a seat and didn't want to be hauled off for endangering the welfare of a bony child, I decided to just buy the doggone book. After all, I could still donate to the book sale if I finished it this weekend. First I had to put my Cooking for One back-I had already memorized the Fuss-Not fish recipe of the month while standing in line. I slipped it behind another issue and headed for the checkout counter.

"Excuse me!" a woman's voice said, stopping me in my second-hand sling-back shoes.

"What?" I asked, wheeling around to see an aged customer care representative scowling at me. "Are you talking to-"

She had the Cooking for One issue formerly clenched within my sweaty palm resting between her gnarled fingers. "You can't put this back. Look how it's dog-eared and wrinkled. You think you can just come in here, squish-up a perfectly good magazine, and walk out without buying it. You ruined it. You have to purchase it."

"Fine," I said, and took the magazine from her and slunk to the checkout line. Thanks to Mrs. Winpenny, Cosmo Girl, and the Customer Service crone, I'd have to shell out $20.90--more than I made in one hour at the library.

* * *

All during the drive home, I replayed the encounters at Books and Brew in my head. I'd been brushed off by a professor I accommodated so many times my colleagues nicknamed me Tillman's toady. I was gypped in line by a haughty-couture blonde and ignored by the coffee counter guy. Then I was affronted by not only a Books and Brew employee but a pampered pre-teen Cosmo-Girl wannabe.

"What a crummy night, Old Paint," I said, turning down the lane to my cottage.

Old Paint just purred himself into my one-car garage.

I fixed my tea, carrying it into the bedroom, setting it down on the nightstand. I peeled off my corduroy jumper and turtleneck with the apple applique. As I scuffled over to lay my clothing on the rocking chair, I had an "Aha!" moment that left me frozen, mid-stride, riveted to my avocado shag carpet.

My parents had always taught me to be proud of the fact that I was a Spengler. But honestly, Nola Spengler was a stupid name.

"Don't forget, Nola," my dad always said, whenever I was down in the dumps. "You're Spengler stock. Spenglers are good folk--thrifty and resourceful."

I threw on my flannel nightie, crawled into bed, and finished my name-brand tea--a buy-one, get-one special I picked up at FoodCrest.

Being a Spengler hadn't gotten me much of anything, I said to myself, except maybe down comforter, the one that I got for free with the purchase of a new mattress and box spring--a $250 value.

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