Fun Friday Giveaway: SONOMA ROSE: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel‏

Last year, Jennifer Chiaverini’s The Wedding Quilt was published and quickly was placed on the New York Times bestseller.  This year, her newest novel in the Elm Creek Quilts series, SONOMA ROSE has just been released.  Here is the press announcement:

Sonoma Rose

An Elm Creek Quilts Novel

 

The 1920s evokes indelible cultural motifs—the Jazz Age, Modernism, Prohibition—and

inspired heralded literature—from the interwar disillusionment explored in The Great Gatsby

 or The Sun Also Rises to the strong women portrayed in Alice Adams or Main Street.

But in recently published fiction, this time period has rarely been explored.

  

Jennifer Chiaverini, author of the bestselling Elm Creek Quilts series, is one of few writers

working today to demonstrate equal mastery of contemporary and historical fiction. In 2011,

she published two New York Times bestselling novels—The Union Quilters, a Civil-War-era

chronicle of life behind Northern lines, and The Wedding Quilt, a twenty-first-century

celebration of one of America’s most enduring and romantic traditions. In SONOMA ROSE

(On sale: February 21, 2012), Chiaverini turns her imaginative powers to the story of how

one woman’s courage and vision wrought true change, for her family and for herself. 

Rosa Diaz Barclay is touched by the criminality surrounding Prohibition when she

unwittingly discovers that her husband, John, has given over the duties of their

Southern California rye farm in favor of armed bootlegging. Fearing the safety of her four

beloved children, Rosa flees, with little more than a suitcase filled with John’s ill-gotten gains

and her heirloom quilts. Accompanying Rosa is her true love, Lars Jorgensen, a good but

flawed man who is the father of two of her children.

Together, the six travel north to San Francisco, seeking not only refuge from danger, but a cure

for two of the children, who suffer from a mysterious wasting disease. A beneficent doctor orders

 a special diet and a rural convalescence for which Rosa and Lars, under assumed names, hire on

at a Sonoma County vineyard. There, the devotion of the Italian-American community to the

craft of viticulture—which through no fault of their own, has become illegal—inspires Rosa

to acquire a vineyard of her own, even as she discovers firsthand its inherent hardships

and dangers winemakers face in such turbulent times.

As Rose, she creates a personal and professional identity that she would never have dared

imagine at the opening of her tale, one that brings great honor—and beauty—to all who

surround her. As the New York Journal of Books has written, “Jennifer Chiaverini’s strength is

not only writing strong female characters, but also placing them in interesting life and

times.” SONOMA ROSE is a triumph on both fronts.

About the Author:

Jennifer Chiaverini is the author of the New York Times bestselling Elm Creek Quilts series, as well as

five collections of quilt projects inspired by the novels. A graduate of the University of Notre Dame and

 the University of Chicago, she lives with her husband and sons in Madison, Wisconsin. For

more information, please visit www.elmcreek.net.

Jennifer is also currently on a booktour that takes her to many bookstores and libraries across the country.
•  Friday, February 24 — Hudson, OH
• Saturday, February 25 — Collegeville, PA
• Sunday, February 26 — Gurnee, IL
• Monday, February 27 — Libertyville, IL and Mequon, WI
• Thursday, March 1 — Petaluma, CA
• Friday, March 2 — Corte Madera, CA
• Saturday, March 3 — Thousand Oaks, CA
• Saturday, March 10 — Oconomowoc, WI

For book tour locations, dates, and times, please see the Events page on Jennifer's website: http://elmcreek.net/events.
If you are able to attend one of her book signings, she is also giving away limited edition sonoma Rose pins for each copy of Sonoma Rose that you have her sign, while supplies last. This pin features two original quilt blocks, Sanoma Rose and Arboles Valley Star.

Did I mention a giveaway?  Yes, Jennifer's publisher has generously offered to ship a free copy of Sonoma Rose to a follower of SewCalGal who is a resident in the US or Canada.  To enter to win, simply leave a comment on this post and I'll randomly select and announce the lucky winner next Friday.

Want to increase your chances of winning, by extra entries?  If so, please leave an additional comment for any/all of the following that you want to claim:
For Twitter users:
1) Follow @jchiaverini on Twitter.
2) Follow @duttonbooks on Twitter
2) Tweet a comment about this giveaway and include @duttonbooks, @chiaverini and @SewCalGal
Here is a sample tweet:  "Win a copy of Sonoma Rose, newest novel in the Elm Creek Quilts by @jchiverini, published by @duttonbooks at http://tinyurl.com/8666azc "





The winner of the giveaway from last week is  Connie (Quilting by the River)  And they will receive a copy of "Nature's Beauty in Applique': Pretty and Practical Projects", by Susan Taylor Probst, published by Martingale & Company, home of That Patchwork Place.