Belinda Williams gives us the perfect "pitch"

We're pleased to introduce you to Belinda Williams today, as her second novel in her "City Love" series, The Pitch, has recently been published (May 28th by Momentum).

Belinda is a marketing communications specialist and copywriter who allowed an addiction to romance and chick-lit to get the better of her. She was named a top ten finalist in the Romance Writers of Australia Emerald Award in both 2013 and 2014.

Her other addictions include music and cars. Belinda’s eclectic music taste forms the foundation of many of her writing ideas and her healthy appreciation for fast cars means she would not so secretly love a Lamborghini. For now she’ll have to settle with her son’s Hot Wheels collection and writing hot male leads with sports cars.

Belinda lives in Sydney and blogs regularly about writing and reading over at her website. You can also find her at Facebook and Twitter. 

Belinda's first book in the "City Love" series, The Boyfriend Sessions, is currently FREE for Kindle. (Also free at Amazon UK.) This special deal is good through June 4th, so don't miss out!

Why chick lit has got this woman’s heart

In the world of chick lit fiction, our leading ladies have a lot going on in their lives. They might be juggling romantic relationships, friendships, family relationships, work commitments, all the while aiming to meet personal goals, which could be anything from saving for a big holiday or changing careers.

I believe this is the reason chick lit resonates so much with readers. It’s because of this insight into an everyday woman’s life in its glorious entirety. It’s messy and complicated, funny and sad, inspiring and frustrating. It’s satisfying to have a woman’s life—even a fictional one—put on the page where we can tag along for the journey with the lead character.

Reading these journeys can help our own journey

In my latest release, The Pitch, my leading lady Madeleine Spencer is a driven businesswoman. She’s focused on landing the biggest client ever for her marketing agency, Grounded Marketing.

When media mogul, Paul Neilsen, makes a ‘too good to be true’ offer to mentor Maddy through the pitch, she knows she’d be silly to refuse. They start working together and that’s when things get messy.

Maddy is attracted to Paul, but she’s incredibly career-driven (it’s been four years since her last serious relationship) and she wants to win this pitch. Paul has a history of his own which he’s not particularly forthcoming about. Both Maddy and Paul secretly know it would be a bad idea to get involved with each other.

Yet…

The challenges of juggling work and relationships

In The Pitch, I wanted to write about the issues around juggling work or career aspirations with relationships because it’s a challenge a lot of women face. It’s also a world I’m personally familiar with. In my other life I work in marketing and have done for fifteen years. This profession, and indeed many professions that women work in today, demand a lot from us mentally, physically and emotionally.

Relationships also make demands on us. As much as we love someone, we need to make time in our lives for them. Which leads me to the next question:

Can women have it all?

Don’t groan when you read the sentence above. I know you’ve read it before, possibly even contemplated the sentiment in depth. Whatever your feelings on the subject it is worth recognizing that since women started taking a more active role in the workplace, their lives, as well as the lives of their families, have become more complex. More fragmented. And yes, complicated.

This constant juggle is a reality for many women in the modern world. It’s this reality that led me to examine the impact this fragmentation and complexity can have on women in The Pitch.

I wanted to explore—with humour—how a woman might navigate the competing demands on her time, resources, and her heart. And that’s where I ended up: her heart.

It’s a woman’s heart that might drive her to be the next company CEO, to accept a proposal from the man she loves, or to decide to take a break from her career so she can spend time with her young family.

And that’s why I love chick lit. Because it gets to the heart of women everywhere.

About The Pitch
She’s in a long-term, committed relationship. With her business.
In three years Madeline Spencer has single-handedly grown her marketing agency, Grounded Marketing, into one of the country’s fastest growing companies. But her success has been at the expense of her social life, and her girlfriends have had enough. They’ll do whatever it takes, from speed dating to blind dates, to show her there’s more to life than work.

Only Maddy is having a hard time forgetting about her business. She’s about to pitch for her biggest client ever and the mysterious media mogul, Paul Neilsen, has volunteered to mentor her. Maddy might just be in with a shot of landing the account—if she can keep her mind on the job.

Working with Paul is not at all what she’d imagined, and Maddy finds herself torn between her ever increasing workload and her feelings for Paul. She’s discovering playing in the big league means making sacrifices…and Maddy must decide what she can’t live without.


Thanks to Belinda for visiting today. Hope you'll check out her books soon!