Padme's Library: Alert the Media by Mia Fox

Monday, December 7, 2015

Alert the Media by Mia Fox

Title: Alert the Media

Series: Hollywood Hotties #1

Author: Mia Fox

Genre: Chick Lit/social satire

Release Date: June 13, 2013

Publisher: Evatopia Press

Cover Design: Eden Crane Design

Summary:
When you’re an entertainment publicist, there’s no better cure for a broken heart than to Alert the Media...

April and Ryan Monahan are the perfect Hollywood couple. He’s a handsome actor on the rise; she’s a high-powered entertainment publicist. Her job becomes more demanding, however, when Ryan announces he is gay and wants a divorce.

Believing that her persuasive power over the press will give Ryan the publicity he craves, April launches a swift media campaign to make him realize that he can’t live without her. But Ryan has decided that he likes the dating scene and April’s boss insists that she keep him happy as his account is important to the firm.

To her dismay, April is forced to protect her firm’s bottom line by maintaining Ryan’s status as a Hollywood heartthrob while enduring her own heartbreak. As she picks up the pieces of her destroyed marriage, April is determined to compete with Ryan for power, publicity, and true love -- even when her imagination takes her from the board room to the bedroom.

To save her sanity, her corner office, and her two dogs from becoming caught up in an ugly custody battle, April constructs a plan to use her media savvy skills to her advantage.

I entered the office conference room to find my assistant, Bebe, busily applying a green tea, mud mask to our Creative Director’s neck. Thus far, my assistants have either needed extensive training, or have just reached the point where they are well-trained and realize they are too advanced to be an assistant. Bebe was thankfully at the in-between stage, good for at least another six months before the threat of quitting would arise unless given a raise. She had also recently relocated to Los Angeles from Atlanta so hopefully she didn’t have enough connections for me to worry about her being poached by another firm. The only obvious health benefit I could discern from Bebe bathing Josh Cohen in this green goo was he couldn’t request anything from me for fear of cracking its cakey exterior.
The firm’s president, Bruce Lindsay, was the only person senior to Josh. My three years at Cohen & Lindsay Creative revealed that Bruce brought forth the money, while Josh supplied an element of peculiar that the media and our clients interpreted as “genius.”
I stepped over Josh’s supine figure and leaned down to where Bebe was kneeling amidst bowls of slime. “I don’t suppose you could give me a hand?” I asked.
“Of course. Just as soon as Josh has been thoroughly cleansed.”
“Send him to church,” I whispered. “I need you more.”
Another ten minutes passed before Bebe appeared. “What took you? I’m on the verge of a life seizure.”
Within the hour I had Bebe retrieve that day’s edition of Hollywood Reporter and Daily Variety before Josh retreated into the bathroom with them. I never liked reading the mags after someone else had folded and fiddled with the different sections, disrupting their natural order and creasing the pages. The thought of going through a paper that had been exposed to Josh’s bathroom air was even worse.
“Are they fresh?” I asked.
“Of course, they’re pre-prune,” she said knowingly.
I grabbed for the papers and began feverishly turning the pages until I found what I wanted.
“Ooh, news about Ryan? Hurry, I wanna see, too,” she said leaning over my shoulder.
I fumbled with the papers a minute, turning to the “First Look” and “Talent Watch” sections, trying in vein to find any news about Ryan that might give me a sign as to who or what had brought on this epiphany. “Bebe, I don’t think we’re in luck this morning.”
“Okie dokie, I’ll just check on Josh if you don’t need me.”
I waited until Bebe skipped across the hall to Josh’s office before returning to the section that would really give me an answer...my horoscope.
Aries: Love relationship on tender hooks while moon is in Jupiter; give partner space for personal growth. Focus on quiet solitude to promote healing.
I understand the theory of planetary pull, but in my experience, the planets never pull for me. The realization has forced me to discover my own astrological solution. If I find anything remotely negative with my horoscope, Aries (March 21-April 20 to be exact), I search for another sign more suitable. I figure with rising signs, birth signs, moon signs, and sun signs we’re all somehow related to nearly every sign. When the planets are completely ignorant of my needs, I form a sort of horoscope soufflé, gently folding in portions of one reading to add to another.
My mother, a devout horoscope follower and Hints from Heloise reader, is convinced my practice can only lead to heartache and poor investments. My sister, Melissa, fears horoscopes reduce spontaneity by causing unnecessary consideration of one’s actions. In the continuum of my family, I fall somewhere in between.
“Give partner space for personal growth.” Right. As if I could sit idle and allow Ryan to nab more boyfriends than my life’s total. I had to do something to correct this injustice. Ryan was obviously insane, and I was meant to be with him!

Author Bio:
Mia Fox is a Los Angeles-based novelist who writes across varied genres including Young Adult/New Adult Paranormal Romance, Steampunk, and Chick Lit. She received her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Communications from U.S.C.

Before writing full time, she worked as an entertainment publicist, a career she chronicles in her novel, “Alert the Media.” However, she is happy to leave that world behind her, preferring that any drama in her life is only that which she creates for her characters.

She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, three children, Casey, the Wonder Westie, and Bean, his brother.