Chasing Pavements Christmas Offer

I do this every summer and every Christmas. Let readers download my debut novel Chasing Pavements for free.  Every summer to celebrate the anniversary of its launch, and every Christmas because… because it’s Christmas, and because it was Christmas time when I completed the first rough draft of the manuscript, and because the story starts once upon a Christmas...

So it’s almost Christmas, so join me in celebrating what will be the book’s third festive season in market and download your free copy now via:

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/177590 

And also at these retailers:

Apple iBooks US: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/chasing-pavements/id541808113?mt=11  

Apple iBooks UK: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/book/chasing-pavements/id541808113?mt=11 

Barnes & Noble Nook Store: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/chasing-pavements-neha-yazmin/1112040592?ean=2940044682344

Kobo: https://store.kobobooks.com/en-us/ebook/chasing-pavements-the-soulmates-saga-book-1

Chasing Pavements

To introverted and socially withdrawn singer and songwriter Jamie, life has no meaning unless childhood love Sarah returns to him. Roaming through life without living it, shutting the world out, he has long since given up on a potential career in music.

It is only when he meets the unexpectedly inspirational Mukti, who instantly falls in love with him, that Jamie is lured out of the black hole he has banished himself to for years. Suddenly, his creativity knows no bounds and he feels torn - he has to see her, but what will she make of his tortured soul? Little does he know that Mukti has her own secrets and is just as troubled a soul as he is. Her name translates as ‘freedom’ in her native tongue Bengali, but she is anything but free.

Torn between his unconditional love for Sarah, and his undeniable need for Mukti, Jamie’s life is in far more chaos than ever before. And when his estranged mother Tanya becomes intent on sabotaging his relationship with Mukti, Jamie stands to lose the two women he cannot live without. 

Set in contemporary London, Chasing Pavements is a unique love story between two unique characters who will stay with you after you have turned the last page.

~ What Others Have Said About Chasing Pavements ~

"Neha Yazmin's novel grips you from start to finish.  There are so many things I love about this novel.  Jamie's creativity.  Mukti's determination.  Twists and turns with every chapter.  But most of all, I love that you see the characters grow and develop.  When you reach the last page, it feels like you've been on a long journey with them - yet it's a journey that you want to do all over again!" *****

~~~

"This is not your typical chic lit book.  There is no sloppy romance and no mushy words.  This is truly a one of a kind book.  Little by little the story was told to me and it was told perfectly.  I cannot believe this is Neha’s first book.  It is perfect.  This is definitely a must read." *****

~~~

"Chasing Pavements is like one of a kind.  I loved the book.  It touched me in such a way that I felt lost for a while without having Jamie and Mukti in my life.   I can't believe that this is the author's first book; the way it's written is excellent.  I was captured from the beginning of the story.  A must read." *****

~~~

"Unputdownable.  I loved the London setting. The story is well told.  Neha has a way with descriptions that make the scenes really vivid.  The songs were a great mechanism to add to the story telling.  I look forward to reading Neha's other work but I hope I don't have to wait too long!" *****

The Soulmates Saga by Neha Yazmin

The Soulmates Saga (Chasing Pavements, Make You Feel My Love & Someone Like You)

Meet the soulmates....


Jamie.  

Musician....  Introverted....  Loner....  Elusive....

Mukti.

Young professional....  Inspirational....  Intriguing....  Damaged....

Both are huanted by the past....

Trapped in the present.....

Afraid of the future....

Two fading stars....   

What happens when they collide? 
  

Would you recognize true love if you saw it, or would you just keep Chasing Pavements? 

To introverted and socially withdrawn singer and songwriter Jamie York, life has no meaning unless childhood love Sarah returns to him. Roaming through life without living it, shutting the world out, he has long since given up on a potential career in music.

It is only when he meets the unexpectedly inspirational Mukti that Jamie is lured out of the black hole he has banished himself to for years.  Suddenly, his creativity knows no bounds and he feels torn - he has to see her, but what will she make of his tortured soul?

Little does he know that Mukti has her own secrets and is just as troubled a soul as he is.  Her name translates as ‘freedom’ in her native tongue Bengali, but she is anything but free.

Torn between his unconditional love for Sarah, and his undeniable need for Mukti, Jamie’s life is in far more chaos than ever before.  And when his estranged mother Tanya becomes intent on sabotaging his relationship with Mukti, Jamie stands to lose the two women he cannot live without...

Set in contemporary London, Chasing Pavements is a unique love story between two unique characters who will stay with you long after you have turned the last page.

Barnes & Noble Nook  |  Apple iBooks US  |  Apple iBooks UK  |  Amazon US  |  Amazon UK  |  Smashwords

Read an excerpt at the Amazon Kindle Store here, or download the first 25% of Chasing Pavements for free from Smashwords here.

If you thought finding your soulmate was the hard part, think again. Chasing Pavements continues....

After a tumultuous year, star-crossed lovers Mukti and Jamie have finally resolved their personal issues and are starting a new life together in New York City. Mukti has found her calling in life and Jamie’s music career is taking off.

But as all this brings new obligations and responsibilities, their love is once again put to the test.  The sequel to Chasing Pavements unravels even more secrets and lies which threaten to split them apart forever.

Barnes & Noble Nook  |  Apple iBooks US  |  Apple iBooks UK  |  Amazon US  |  Amazon UK  |  Smashwords

Read an excerpt at the Amazon Kindle Store here, or download the first 20% of Make You Feel My Love for free from Smashwords here.

The story continues in Someone Like You....

What if you had to choose between your soulmate and saviour?

 

Someone Like You is releasing July 27, 2016.

Available to pre-order from iBooks and B&N Nook at a low introductory price of $0.99, so pre-order your copy now as the cost will return to its normal price after release!

Amazon will let you pre-order it from May 2016.

Download Chasing Pavements for Free this July

I do this every summer and every Christmas.  Let readers download my debut novel Chasing Pavements for free.  Every summer to celebrate the anniversary of its launch, and every Christmas because… because it’s Christmas, and because it was Christmas time when I completed the first rough draft of the manuscript, and because the story starts once upon a Christmas...

But it’s not Christmas now, it’s summer, so join me in celebrating the book’s second year in market and download your free copy now via:

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/177590 

And also at these retailers:

Apple iBooks US: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/chasing-pavements/id541808113?mt=11  
Apple iBooks UK: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/book/chasing-pavements/id541808113?mt=11 
Barnes & Noble Nook Store: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/chasing-pavements-neha-yazmin/1112040592?ean=2940044682344

Chasing Pavements

“It was very stupid but it was also very true. Mukti was in love with him and she didn’t even know his name.”

To introverted and socially withdrawn singer and songwriter Jamie, life has no meaning unless childhood love Sarah returns to him.  Roaming through life without living it, shutting the world out, he has long since given up on a potential career in music.

It is only when he meets the unexpectedly inspirational Mukti, who instantly falls in love with him, that Jamie is lured out of the black hole he has banished himself to for years.  Suddenly, his creativity knows no bounds and he feels torn - he has to see her, but what will she make of his tortured soul? Little does he know that Mukti has her own secrets and is just as troubled a soul as he is.  Her name translates as ‘freedom’ in her native tongue Bengali, but she is anything but free.

Torn between his unconditional love for Sarah, and his undeniable need for Mukti, Jamie’s life is in far more chaos than ever before.  And when his estranged mother Tanya becomes intent on sabotaging his relationship with Mukti, Jamie stands to lose the two women he cannot live without.

Set in contemporary London, Chasing Pavements is a unique love story between two unique characters who will stay with you after you have turned the last page.

~ What Others Have Said About Chasing Pavements ~

"Neha Yazmin's novel grips you from start to finish.  There are so many things I love about this novel.  Jamie's creativity.  Mukti's determination.  Twists and turns with every chapter.  But most of all, I love that you see the characters grow and develop.  When you reach the last page, it feels like you've been on a long journey with them - yet it's a journey that you want to do all over again!" *****

~~~

"This is not your typical chic lit book.  There is no sloppy romance and no mushy words.  This is truly a one of a kind book.  Little by little the story was told to me and it was told perfectly.  I cannot believe this is Neha’s first book.  It is perfect.  This is definitely a must read." *****

~~~

"Chasing Pavements is like one of a kind.  I loved the book.  It touched me in such a way that I felt lost for a while without having Jamie and Mukti in my life.   I can't believe that this is the author's first book; the way it's written is excellent.  I was captured from the beginning of the story.  A must read." *****

~~~

"Unputdownable.  I loved the London setting. The story is well told.  Neha has a way with descriptions that make the scenes really vivid.  The songs were a great mechanism to add to the story telling.  I look forward to reading Neha's other work but I hope I don't have to wait too long!" *****

Soulmates Saga Cover Reveal

So, here they are, the results of the book cover makeover.  Hope you like them as much as I do....

First up, Chasing Pavements (Soulmates Saga, Book 1):

And now, Make You Feel My Love (Soulmates Saga, Book 2):

And finally, farewell to the old covers, I will miss you, but not too much because the new covers are AMAZING!

Soulmates Saga Makeover

The Soulmates Saga is getting a makeover!  Well, the book covers are. 

I always knew what I wanted on the covers of the books in the Soulmates Saga.   I also knew that the movie poster-style covers I constantly daydreamed about was not something that I could achieve.  Not without forking out a lot of money.  And that wasn’t something I wanted to do when I had no idea whether I would be able to sell my books in the first place.

So I had to limit my design ideas to concepts I could actually put together on my personal laptop.  I didn’t know much about royalty-free stock images back when I was readying my debut romance novel Chasing Pavements for self-publishing, let alone aware of the fact that had I hired a book cover designer instead of doing it myself, they would have used stock imagery to create a cover for me.

I only learned about some of the processes involved in professional book cover design in the beginning of this year, when I was forced to acknowledge the fact that, though I loved the existing covers (why wouldn’t I, I created them?), they didn’t reflect the books’ themes, plot twists and turns, and quite frankly weren’t as eye-catching as e-book covers must be in order to attract readers.

So the search began for a designer to update the cover of Chasing Pavements.  The majority of the designers in the search results were US-based, understandably due to the bigger e-book market in the US.  I decided it made better sense to work with someone in the UK and not have to deal with the time difference, and apart from two, all the UK-based designers I contacted were fully-booked for the next few months.  Ultimately, it was Peter from BespokeBookCovers.com that I went with.  It was double the budget I had in mind, but I decided it would be worth it if we accomplished the perfect cover.

From just a few e-mail exchanges, Peter was able to gauge the look and feel I wanted.  I was pleasantly surprised by how he used the colours and tones in which I always pictured the scenes in my book, without me communicating this.  Unfortunately, it was impossible to find the right stock images to create the cover I had fantasized about since the moment I decided to self-publish the book, but Peter made several changes until he created a design I was happy with.  What was most helpful was that towards the end of the process, Peter would show me how the next draft was coming along, so that I could see the direction the design was heading and give my thoughts.  This is something that really speeds up the process and helps achieve a design that both designer and author will be pleased with.

Then I was left with a problem.  Though my new cover for Chasing Pavements was a 100 times better than the old one, it also couldn’t have been more dissimilar to the cover of the book’s sequel Make You Feel My Love, and they just didn’t look right together.  This meant that I needed to update the cover for the sequel and upload both new versions together.  Peter offered to create a cover for Make You Feel My Love, but unfortunately he was going away on holiday during the period that I needed the new cover (I didn’t want to wait too long before showing off the new cover of my debut novel).

So the search was on again.  This time I contacted a mix of UK and US-based designers, and I knew to ask first whether they would be able to create the design I had in mind.  I liaised with a couple of talented designers (Brandi from ebook-coverdesigns.com and GX of graphiczxdesigns.zenfolio.com), but together we struggled to find the right stock images to compose my ideal cover for Make You Feel My Love.  I was prepared for this disappointment however, so prepared that I had a plan B, one which I knew I would be able to create myself by spending only a fraction of what I paid for the first cover.  Provided I found the right stock images.

Thankfully, I did.  And they were perfect, exactly what I needed for plan B.  Very lucky indeed.  It took me just one evening after work to download those images from Shutterstock.com, another evening to play around with them to see how best to put them together, and then one last evening to pull it all together and put the final touches.  So, while I spent a couple of months and 100s of pounds on the first cover, I spent less than a week creating the second one myself and shelled out only £35 for it (well, I didn’t use all 12 images I can download via the On Deman subscription I purchased from Shutterstock.com, so it works out much cheaper actually!).

Just goes to show, there is a learning curve with everything, and that if you have a little patience and know-how, you don’t have to spend a lot to produce something special.  The new covers will be revealed on Saturday 15^th March, 2014.  Exciting times!

Book Review - Chasing Pavements

This review was posted on the book's Smashwords page.

Book: Chasing Pavements

Author: Neha Yazmin

Reviewer: Smashwords customer

Rating: 5 stars
Available via: Smashwords, Apple iBookStore, Diesel eBook Store, Barnes & Noble Nook Store, Sony Reader Store 

"It was very stupid but it was also very true. Mukti was in love with him and she didn't even know his name." 


To introverted and socially withdrawn singer and songwriter Jamie, life has no meaning unless childhood love Sarah returns to him. Roaming through life without living it, shutting the world out, he has long since given up on a potential career in music.

It is only when he meets the unexpectedly inspirational Mukti, who instantly falls in love with him, that Jamie is lured out of the black hole he has banished himself to for years. Suddenly, his creativity knows no bounds and he feels torn - he has to see her, but what will she make of his tortured soul? Little does he know that Mukti has her own secrets and is just as troubled as he is. Her name translates as 'freedom' in her native tongue Bengali, but she is anything but free.

Torn between his unconditional love for Sarah, and his undeniable need for Mukti, Jamie's life is in more chaos than ever before. And when his estranged mother Tanya becomes intent on sabotaging his relationship with Mukti, Jamie stands to lose the two women he cannot live without.

Set in contemporary London, 'Chasing Pavements' is a unique love story between two unique characters.

~~~ 

Opening with the lines “It was awfully quiet in his head”, Neha Yazmin’s novel grips you from start to finish. Who is he, you ask? Jamie York, an aspiring singer-songwriter from East London. Suffering with a severe case of writer’s block, he has become introverted and cuts himself off from the world. That is, until one day he sees Mukti by the needle sculpture. He senses her watching him and is surprised to discover that song lyrics flood his mind. The silence is broken and he just has to find out why.

But this isn’t your typical love story. His writer’s block might be gone, but Jamie is still haunted by the shadows of his past. And Mukti Khan, a research analyst starting a new job in the city, has a troubled past of her own. Together will they find the strength to come to terms with the past and make a fresh start in life? Or are some problems just too big to overcome?

There are so many things I love about this novel. Jamie’s creativity. Mukti’s determination. Twists and turns with every chapter. But most of all, I love that you get to see the characters grow and develop. When you reach the last page, it feels like you’ve been a long journey with them- but yet it’s a journey that you want to do all over again!

Another thing that I should mention is that there is a playlist! It’s something that many authors are now doing - including Stephanie Meyer, author of the Twilight series - where they share the playlist of songs that inspired the chapters in the book. I think it’s a really cool idea and it adds another dimension to the novel. You get an insight into how Adele’s ‘Chasing Pavements’ and other songs from other artists inspired Neha Yazmin in her writing.

I can’t wait to see what other novels (and playlists!) are to come from Neha Yazmin. I recently found out that her second novel is out - ‘Poision Blood’ – so looking forward to reading that next!