Maxine Moss arrived in Pacific City to start a brand new life complete with her first real job as a marketing assistant at Hedenby Holdings. Life was supposed to be simple until the unexpected happens. After a disastrous first meeting with her infuriatingly sexy boss, an unlikely friendship starts with the man she just can't quite figure out. The waters become turbulent and unpredictable as old flames and new sparks add fuel to an already slow-burning fire that Maxine fears might burn her if she lets herself get too close. As Maxine's world expands into unchartered territories for a small-town, big-dreams kind of girl, she finds herself caught in the spotlight and worse, in a love story with a man who was never looking for one. Will she run in the opposite direction or will she free-fall? *** Copyright © 2013 by Nina Tippett. All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of Nina Tippett. This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

Pictures... one of the few things that brought her happiness. Oh, how she loves taking pictures, mostly of the skies and the birds who fly. Meet Hayley. Lonely girl in her Junior year of high school. She has a dad, one friend, a cat and a favourite teacher who somewhat replaces her lost mother who left when Hayley was young. Meet Ryan. New kid, with a love for Basketball. He catches the eyes of many girls, though he could care less. When Lonely Hayley Williams and Pretty Boy Ryan Smith are assigned partners in Photography class, they both get more out of it than they expected, they become close friends. And when the project is all said and done... what will happen then? "A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words," that's what they all say. Being the photographer she is, Hayley knows this is true, but really, Ryan makes them something... more. General Fiction ~ #121 (best) Teen Fiction ~ #449 (best)

***Jan 2016 - The Budding Roses has been selected as one of the TOP 10 ONE DIRECTION FANFICTIONS worth reading by Sugarscape! http://www.sugarscape.com/bookclub/news/a1085541/10-one-direction-fanfics-worth-reading-january/ *** Currently appearing on the Wattpad Fan fiction Featured List and selected for Wattpad's 'Back to school YA' Reading List. Set amidst a chaos of hilarity in 1990's Brighouse, West Yorkshire, The Budding Roses is a classic Young Adult coming of age novel which follows the anxious voice of teenager, Simone Rose, and her descent in to panic, as she struggles to cope with the all-consuming occupation of lusting after boys and the emotional exhaustion of never being able to find the right one. As Baywatch plays on the television Simone has just vomited for the twelfth time, which as she has established has to be God's secret punishment for her recent transgression with the loathsome Harry Styles. At least she has Baywatch to maintain her spirits during illness, and it is from her sick bed that she falls in love for the first time with tanned, floppy haired Adonis, life guard Eddie Kramer. Powered back to health by her emerging amour, Simone soon realises that the coal blackened streets of Brighouse offer just as many hotties as the far flung beaches of Southern California. If only best friend, precocious know it all, Natasha could share her romantic sensibilities instead of chasing after Harry and his stupid football or worse still High School's newest hero, Liam Payne. Why can't such losers bog off and stop embarrassing her with their immaturities? Unfortunately for Simone, such luck is not to be hers.

Kelsey Mays knows everything there is to know when it comes to loving a bad boy. They're uncaring jerks who will leave you brokenhearted and alone without a second thought. So when Julio enters her life, she pretty much has him all figured out. But when they become lab partners in a project she would rather not do, she becomes dependent on him. And he knows it. Whatever it takes, Julio plans on breaking her out of her closed, cold chains and showing her a life worth living. A life that doesn't have plans. Through love, bets, loss, lies, and tears, Kelsey must learn what it means to put your trust and love in one person. Even if that person just so happens to be a bad boy.

[NOTE: This book was written in 2010, a time of long-distance phone cards, weight-loss obsessions, and searching for a man as a solution to life's problems-what a messy time to be alive! In other words, I hope you enjoy this throwback, and while this book does end on a cliffhanger of sorts, the sequel addresses any unanswered questions (which is hopefully fair, given that book 1 is free, ya know?] An awkward family homecoming at Christmas. A humiliating public weigh-in, with two judging parents as the audience. The announcement of a deadline for arranged marriage doom. And that's just the first two chapters. In "Year of the Chick," Romi Narindra must find love before her parents find her a husband. Easy to say, less easy to live through, as this book takes you deep inside "awkward Indian living in the West." To escape her fate, Romi wades through the waters of secret-dating, where self-consciousness is at an all-time high, and experience at an all-time low. It's the sort of thing that would turn almost anyone into a man-crazy freak with romance tunnel-vision, and that's exactly what ends up happening. All the while, a lack of inspiration in her corporate job leads Romi to her love of writing, in what quickly becomes a man-quest play-by-play. From whiskey-breath scum bags to uni-brow creeps and everything in between, Romi and her wingmen come up empty time after time. And that's when she meets a fellow writer. On the Internet. So will it be arranged marriage doom, or an Internet affair that's not as creepy as "To Catch a Predator"? Time will tell in the "year of the chick," a twelve-month quest to find love. Tick-tock. --------------------------------------------- "Year of the Chick" is book one of a series, and book two is available at Amazon! LENGTH: 75,000 words or 285 pages DISCLAIMER: this book contains profanities, blunt accounts of the dating scene, and many awkward family moments. Enjoy!