With almost 50 years between when I learnt to ride and the next time I got on a horse, it gives me great pleasure to welcome Roxana Valea to the blog today to tell me about her latest horse riding inspired book. My enormous thanks to Rachel at Rachel’s Random Resources for inviting me to participate in this blog tour.

Staying in with Roxana Valea

Welcome to Linda’s Book Bag Roxana. Thank you for agreeing to stay in with me.

Thank you for inviting me, it’s a pleasure to be here!

Tell me, which of your books have you brought along to share this evening and why have you chosen it?

I brought along my latest book, Seven and a half Minutes because it is a fun and easy summer read and not just for polo fans.

What can we expect from an evening in with Seven and a Half Minutes?

Fun, adrenaline and insights into a fascinating sport: polo. Seven and a Half Minutes is the third novel of The Polo Diaries Series but the first one in the timeline. It tells the story of a girl who is looking for love but unexpectedly stumbles upon polo and falls in love with the sport. She does not give up on love, although it becomes more and more difficult to find the right guy to date as polo starts consuming all of her time and resources.

Seven and a Half Minutes sounds just right for a summer read Roxana. Tell me a bit about the series.

The Polo Diaries Series are romantic comedies but all three books are slightly different.

While the first one, Single in Buenos Aires is a classical romantic comedy – think Bridget Jones goes to Argentina, the second book – A Horse Called Bicycle – is more of an introspection and coming of age novel. This one, the third and last book of the series is light hearted and very sports oriented.

I’m sure I’d enjoy them all. What else have you brought along and why?

I’ve brought two pictures, both from my polo times. The Polo Diaries are all inspired by true stories from my past as a female polo player.

How much is truth and how much is fiction in these novels? Well, I’ll let each of the readers take a guess!

Oo. Now that is intriguing Roxana. I’ll tell blog readers a bit more about Seven and a Half Minutes and then maybe you can tell me a few of your secrets! Thanks so much for staying in with me.

Seven and a Half Minutes

Before Roxy found herself “Single in Buenos Aires,” she was a single girl in London in search of true love. The third installment of The Polo Diaries series takes us back to that time, and we follow Roxy as she hires a love coach to help her navigate the dating scene. But the love coach comes up with an unexpected assignment: reconnect to a long-forgotten passion. For Roxy this means horses. Within weeks, she finds herself playing polo, thanks to a series of unforeseen events.

Torn between her desire to become the best polo player she can be and the dream of falling in love, Roxy steps fully into the exciting and demanding world of polo, where injury and recovery mix with hard training, and where celebrating the victory of a tournament comes at a high price. Will Roxy eventually become the polo player she dreams to be? And with polo being such a demanding sport, can there be any space left for love?

Seven and a Half Minutes is available for purchase on Amazon UK and Amazon US.

About Roxana Valea

Roxana Valea was born in Romania and lived in Italy, Switzerland, England and Argentina before settling in Spain. She has a BA in journalism and an MBA degree. She spent more than twenty years in the business world as an entrepreneur, manager and management consultant working for top companies like Apple, eBay, and Sony. She is also a Reiki Master and shamanic energy medicine practitioner.

As an author, Roxana writes books inspired by real events. Her memoir Through Dust and Dreams is a faithful account of a trip she took at the age of twenty-eight across Africa by car in the company of two strangers she met over the internet. Her following book, Personal Power: Mindfulness Techniques for the Corporate Word is a nonfiction book filled with personal anecdotes from her consulting years. The Polo Diaries series is inspired by her experiences as a female polo player–traveling to Argentina, falling in love, and surviving the highs and lows of this dangerous sport.

Roxana lives with her husband between England and Spain, and splits her time between writing, coaching and therapy work, but her first passion remains writing.

For more information you can follow Roxana on Twitter @roxana_valea, or find her on Facebook and Instagram.

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