by Liza Palmer
Lincoln pulls me into him, his mouth fast on mine, his arms wrapped around me. The warmth of him envelops me. That oaky, outdoorsy smell is everywhere. He pulls me in close, hugging me tight.
And in my ear he whispers, “You Marpled me too, love.”
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About the author
Meet Liza Palmer
Anna and Lincoln’s Guide to Phoenix
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About the author
Meet Liza Palmer
Author photograph by Edwin Santiago
LIZA PALMER is the internationally bestselling author of Conversations with the Fat Girl. Conversations with the Fat Girl became an international bestseller its first week in publication and hit number one on the Fiction Heatseekers List in the United Kingdom the week before the book debuted. Conversations with the Fat Girl has been optioned for a series by the producers of Rome, Band of Brothers, and Generation Kill.
Palmer’s second novel is Seeing Me Naked, of which Publishers Weekly says, “Consider it haute chick lit; Palmer’s prose is sharp, her characters are solid and her narrative is laced with moments of graceful sentiment.”
Her third novel, A Field Guide to Burying Your Parents, which Entertainment Weekly calls a “splendid novel” and Real Simple says “has heart and humor,” was released in January 2010.
Palmer’s fourth novel, More Like Her, received a starred review from Library Journal, in which they said, “The blend of humor and sadness is realistic and gripping, and watching Frannie figure out who she is and what matters is gratifying.”
Kirkus Reviews called her fifth novel, Nowhere but Home, “a heart-wrenching tale told with true wisdom and brilliant wit. . . . An uplifting reading experience.”
After earning two Emmy nominations writing for the first season of VH1’s Pop Up Video, Palmer now knows far too much about Fergie.
Girl Before a Mirror is Palmer’s sixth novel.
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Anna and Lincoln’s Guide to Phoenix
I HAD NEVER BEEN TO PHOENIX. I haven’t been to a lot of places, so this isn’t really news in the Palmer household. But I wasn’t setting Girl Before a Mirror a lot of places—I was setting it in Phoenix. I thought I could hide behind good research, but it remained plainly obvious: as Tina Fey says (ish), “I had to go to there.”
So, if you’re ever in Phoenix . . .
STAY
ARIZONA BILTMORE
2400 East Missouri Avenue
Phoenix, AZ 85016
I needed a solid location to set Anna and Lincoln. It had to be a character in and of itself. And that’s exactly what I got in the 1929 Frank Lloyd Wright–inspired Biltmore. So I set my GPS from L.A. and drove. And drove. And drove. New Edition’s “If It Isn’t Love” can only energize you so many times. It was hot. That last loop into Phoenix rivals Cannonball Run. I needed food and a bed. I pulled into the Biltmore and I remember just sighing. It was nighttime, so it was all lit up—fountains, Italian café lights—people milling around. It was exactly the type of place two broken people would let their guard down long enough to fall in love.
EAT
ASADERO NORTE DE SONORA
122 North 16th Street
Phoenix, AZ 85034
Real Cokes. Spanish wafting all around. It reminded me immediately of when I used to visit my aunt Concha—the smell of pinto beans lilting from the kitchen. Tiled tables with a roll of paper towels atop. Vending machines with cheap toys and framed pictures of old Sonora. I was in heaven. I spoke in broken Spanish and the waitress, bless her heart, acted like it wasn’t terrible. And then I ate. And ate. I can still smell the barbecue even now.
MRS. WHITE’S GOLDEN RULE CAFE
808 East Jefferson Street
Phoenix, AZ 85034
Whenever I did research on Phoenix, someone would always mention Mrs. White’s. The cobbler, they’d drool. The cobbler though. After having more than a bit of trouble with an ornery one-way street (it was the street’s fault, okay?), I parked and headed in. The thing about locals-only places? They know you’re not from there. The good ones, though? Can’t wait to find out more about you. That’s Mrs. White’s. All the way from L.A.? For our cobbler? They hated to tell me: they were out. BUT. BUT. Have you tried our sweet potato pie? No, I whimpered. We’ll get you some, honey. AND OH MY GOD. It was warm. And I may have cried a little. But I’m still going back for that damn cobbler one day.
GO
IRISH CULTURAL CENTER
1106 North Central Avenue
Phoenix, AZ 85004
I needed a location to set an event for RomanceCon. Something . . . epic. Maybe an Irish castle in the middle of Phoenix will do? I parked—oh my God was it hot—and walked through the gates, and it was . . . how does this place exist? Gray stone castles and little cottages and barns with raftered ceilings and libraries and kids learning Gaelic (programs you can find under the heading of “Wee Folk”). A wonderful red-haired woman with a smoky voice proudly showed me around, explaining murals and giant black fireplaces and flags, and I was transported. They have a little shop there. Sells tea and chocolate. Just sayin’.
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NOWHERE BUT HOME
The strategy on the gridiron of Friday Night Lights is nothing compared to the savagery of coming home...
Queenie Wake has just been fired from her job as a chef for not allowing a customer to use ketchup . . . again. Now the only place she has to go is North Star, Texas, the hometown she left in disgrace. Maybe things will be different this time around. After all, her mother—notorious for stealing your man, your car, and your rent money—has been dead for years. And Queenie’s sister, once the local teenage harlot who fooled around with the town golden boy, is now the mother of the high school football captain.
Queenie’s new job, cooking last meals at the nearby prison, is going well . . . at least the inmates don’t complain! But apparently small-town Texas has a long memory for bad reputations. And when Queenie bumps into Everett Coburn, the high school sweetheart who broke her heart, she wishes her own memory was a little spottier. But before Queenie takes another chance on love, she’ll have to take an even bigger risk: finding a place to call home once and for all.
MORE LIKE HER
What really goes on behind those perfect white picket fences?
In Frances’s mind, beautiful, successful, ecstatically married Emma Dunham is the height of female perfection. Frances, recently dumped with spectacular drama by her boyfriend, aspires to be just like Emma. So do her close friends and fellow teachers, Lisa and Jill. But Lisa’s too career-focused to find time for a family. And Jill’s recent unexpected pregnancy could have devastating consequences for her less-than-perfect marriage.
Yet sometimes the golden dream you fervently wish for turns out to be not at all what it seems—like Emma’s enviable suburban postcard life, which is about to be brutally cut short by a perfect husband turned killer. And in the shocking aftermath, three devastated friends are going to have to come to terms with their own secrets . . . and somehow learn to move forward after their dream is exposed as a lie.
Also by Liza Palmer
Nowhere but Home
More Like Her
Conversations with the Fat Girl
Seeing Me Naked
A Field Guide to Burying Your Parents
Credits
Cover design by Amanda Kain
Cover photograph © by Julia Davila-Lampe/Getty Images
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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arperCollins Publishers.
GIRL BEFORE A MIRROR. Copyright © 2015 by Liza Palmer. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-229724-2
EPub Edition January 2015 ISBN 9780062297259
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