The Book Corner: Coco Pinchard,The Consequences of Love and Sex

Monday, 4 August 2014

Coco Pinchard,The Consequences of Love and Sex - Robert Bryndza Blog Tour

Blurb:
Since Coco Pinchard found first husband Daniel in bed with another woman, she hasn’t just picked up the pieces: she’s now a best-selling author married to her hunky soul-mate Adam. She feels stronger and wiser and surely the second time round she’ll have learnt from her mistakes?

But things aren’t going quite according to plan... Adam has lost his job, Coco’s grown-up son Rosencrantz seems to have derailed his life in spectacular fashion, and ex-mother-in-law Ethel keeps letting herself into the house thanks to an endless supply of spare keys. When literary agent Angie takes on Coco’s arch rival, the indomitable Regina Battenberg, it looks as though things can’t get any worse. And then Coco discovers she’s pregnant; at 44.

Can she really go through it all again? Sleepless nights, stretch marks on top of stretch marks, and poo as a normal topic of conversation?

The third and final book in Robert Bryndza’s bestselling series is a hilarious diary with Coco’s trademark wit and honesty, tracing the raging hormones and extraordinary twists that take her to motherhood for the second time.

*Coco Pinchard, The Consequences of Love and Sex can be read as a stand-alone*

Extract:

Hi and thanks for welcoming me to your blog as part of the Coco Pinchard, The Consequences of Love and Sex blog tour!

For today’s stop I’d like to share with you an extract from the book, where Coco Pinchard tells her literary agent Angie Langford that she is pregnant… at 44…

Monday 6th February

I left Adam this morning uploading his CV to job search sites, and took the tube over to see my literary agent Angie. She has finally finished re-modelling her house, a beautiful four-storey home in a quiet, elegant terrace in Chiswick. She opened the door wearing pyjamas, holding a cup of coffee, with a cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth.

‘Hi Angie… We have got a meeting today?’

‘Course Cokes,’ she said using the free side of her mouth. ‘This is the joy of working from home: you only need to get dressed up when it’s something important.’

I wiped my feet and gave her a look.

‘Of course love, you’re important. But you’re a mate too,’ she said.

She gave me a tour of the finished house. The basement has been excavated, and she now has a home cinema, underground parking, and her own spa with a jacuzzi. We finished the tour at the swimming pool. The huge expanse of water rippled softy under a vaulted sandstone ceiling. The bottom of the pool was tiled with a mosaic of her family.

‘I didn’t bank on the rippling water making me look so fat,’ she said, as we peered down at the bizarre Disney-esque cartoon mosaic of Angie, her fifth husband Mark, and her kids.

‘Course the kids all wanted to include their fathers in the mosaic, but why would I want to go for a swim with those bastards every morning?’ Angie is a proud four-by-four-er. Four kids by four different

fathers. I often wonder if it’s her skill as a literary agent that has landed her this luxurious lifestyle, or her skill at negotiating a divorce settlement.

We came up to Angie’s office via a sweeping staircase. The walls were adorned with photos of her kids, every Madonna concert she’s been to and, I was flattered to see, a big poster of my proudest triumph, ‘Chasing Diana Spencer: The Musical’, which was adapted from my novel of the same name.

Angie’s new office was lined with bookshelves containing the work of all her authors. I spied Recherche Lady Di, the best-selling French edition of Chasing Diana Spencer. It gave me a thrill to be getting back to work again after a few months away from it all. I took a squashy chair in front of her desk. Angie lit a cigarette and sat opposite. Behind her was a beautiful view of rooftops and the Thames in the distance.

‘What happened to your old assistant?’ I asked.

‘Brenda took me to a tribunal,’ said Angie.

‘That’s a shame, what happened?’

‘You know when they dug out my basement, they found that Roman settlement and the plague pit?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Brenda started taking tea down to the builders, but the daft cow didn’t wear a facemask. She caught the bubonic plague.’

‘That’s terrible.’

‘Oh, it’s nothing these days, Cokes. She had to take a course of antibiotics, and she was fine. But the cow got greedy and wanted more than statutory sick pay. I said to her, ‘Did they get statutory sick pay in 1665? No they bloody didn’t. They all died.’’

‘And what did she say?’

‘Well she repeated that at the tribunal, and it cost me a bloody fortune. So for now Chloe is working for me.’ Angie’s daughter Chloe came in with two coffees.

‘Right,’ she said composing herself. ‘I’ve got a release date for

Agent Fergie. Your publisher, The House of Randoms, is looking at April 16th, so we really need to start things moving.’

‘There’s just one other thing,’ I said. ‘I’m pregnant. I’m going to have a baby in August.’

‘Bloody hell!’ said Angie. She sat back and puffed on her cigarette, then as an afterthought waved the smoke away from me. ‘You know, that could be a brilliant promotion angle. Old mum.’

‘Old mum?’

‘Have you got an ultrasound?’ I started to get it out of my coat.

‘No give it to Chloe to scan. It would be good to have on record if the press need it. This is such good news Coco! We could get Heat magazine to do a folic acid themed, ‘What’s in your fridge?’ You could recommend stretch mark cream in Boots Magazine. We could pitch something to Grazia or Cosmo about female incontinence – Ulrika Johnson has paved the way with that one. It’s perfect! Your readership is women over thirty five – and of course poofters. Could we do a mum and son thing in Gaytimes? Rosencrantz topless, and you in maternity gear?’

‘Hey! Angie!’

‘What?’

‘I’ve just told you I’m pregnant.’

‘I heard you love.’

‘And what do normal people say in response?’

Angie looked confused. ‘Um. Whose is it?’

I shook my head.

‘Are you gonna to keep it?’ Then it dawned on her. ‘Shit, congratulations Cokes.’

‘Thank you.’

I showed her my scan and she became human again. She even asked if I wanted to be put in touch with her Harley Street gynaecologist.

‘He’s great,’ she said. ‘Got me into a private hospital that lets you smoke. I could choose when I had my Caesarean, and they did a bit

of liposuction at the same time.’

I lied and said I’d think about it.

‘Well when you get the next bit of your advance through you can afford it love.’

You can read more about Coco Pinchard’s adventures in pregnancy in Robert’s book Coco Pinchard, The Consequences Of Love and Sex which is available now.

About the Author:

Robert Bryndza was born in the UK and lived in America and Canada before settling in Slovakia with his Slovak husband Ján. His debut novel The Not So Secret Emails of Coco Pinchard became an Amazon bestseller and two sequels have followed, Coco Pinchard’s Big Fat Tipsy Wedding and Coco Pinchard, The Consequences of Love and Sex. A Very Coco Christmas, is a delightful introductory novella to the Coco Pinchard series. When he’s not writing Rob is learning Slovak, trying to train two crazy dogs, or watching Grand Designs – all in the hope that he’ll be able to understand his mother-in-law, build his dream house, and get the dogs to listen.