The book Cause & Effect was always meant to be a stand-alone story, which means you don’t need to read anything else and the story is complete. It was based off two movies: “28 Days” with Sandra Bullock and “Girl Interrupted” with Angelina Jolie.
The original title of the book was Girl Interruptous when it was written in 2009. Again with my Hannah Montana fan fiction. It’s about a high school senior who gets sentenced to thirty days in rehab for drinking and driving instead of going to jail. Throughout the course of the story, we learn why all of this happened as well as her coming into her sexuality when her mother is homophobic. While this book is a “romance” per se, it wasn’t written as such. My goal was to find the emotional drama these characters had and how they deal with the trauma and complexed emotions that some teenagers have. Like I said, it was more drama than romance.
When I moved this from my fan fiction days into a rewrite for publishing, I fell in love with the secondary character, which became an integral part of the main cast. CJ, who was originally named, Jess was based Ruby Rose in Orange is The New Black. I also hinted to this being in the same universe as the “girl/Mistress” series with Trixi (then known as Traci). CJ’s story line evolved as did her part in the story becoming one of my favorite characters I have written.
Here is what I dislike about the book… as a whole, there story is solid but… I was very immature as a writer and the book head-hopped all over the place. Instead of fixing it so that it read from all from Luisa’s point of view, I just made short chapters for the POV change. It makes sense, but yet… it doesn’t. I wanted everyone’s views and thoughts on the events transpiring but it gets confusing at times. Mixing in between the scenes is also bits and pieces of Luisa’s private journal that she gives to Natalia to read after she gets out of rehab. Putting all of that together makes for a messy storyline.
When I released it in 2022, I listed it as a prequel to book one of the “girl/Mistress” series because I did decide to bring the characters from Cause & Effect into the series at various times. So… same universe, but you do not have to read anything past this. The book ends with the HEA.
The book is available on Amazon to purchase in eBook and paperback.