Book: Pieces of April: A Sweet, Quirky, Romantic Puzzle
Author: Jennifer Lynn Cary
Genre: Sweet, Clean Romantic Comedy
Release Date: January 20, 2026
She’s trying to move beyond her past…
…He wants to know who he was.
Will combining their pieces risk erasing their future together?
April Mathers wants to move forward. She can’t undo her impulsive high school blunder, so she keeps her head down, works hard, and prays for that long-awaited promotion. She’s cautious—even about the friends she chooses.
Then her next-door neighbor sublets her apartment to the one person capable of blowing up April’s world by repeating words that once shattered her.
Except he doesn’t remember saying them.
In fact, he doesn’t remember her.
Viet Nam vet Paul Romer has returned home hoping a support group can help him make peace with his permanent amnesia. All he has from before are flashes of a girl.
Then he finds her.
She lives next door.
And she definitely knows something—something not good.
Their chemistry is real, the tension tangled, and the secret between them is as stable as six-inch platform shoes. When the truth comes out, will it destroy their fragile beginning, or give them a future worth remembering?
Return to 1974 Kokomo, Indiana, where faith, love, and a legendary cardinal in a sycamore tree might fit the pieces into place.
You’ll swoon for this sweet, quirky, romantic tale of second chances, because sometimes sharing all those pieces of your heart is the only way to put it back together.
Click here to get your copy!
Historical
Christian Romance author and three-time Selah Award nominee,
Jennifer Lynn Cary, likes to say you can take the
girl out of Indiana, but you can’t take the Hoosier out of the
girl. Now transplanted to the Arizona desert, this direct
descendant of Davy Crockett and her husband of forty-plus years
enjoy time with family where she shares tales of her small-town
heritage and family legacies with their grandchildren. She is the
author of The Crockett Chronicles series, The
Relentless series, and The Weather Girls trilogy, as
well as the stand-alone novel, Cheryl’s Going Home, her
novella Tales of the Hob Nob Annex Café, and her
split-time novels The Traveling Prayer Shawl and The
Forgotten Gratitude Journal. Her current spin-off series,
The Weather Girls Wedding Shoppe and Venue, contains
standalones with a common thread.
Ever have one of those songs that you’ve loved for a long time and then you discover someone else covered the song? As a general rule, I tend to like the first version better. It’s familiar and often brings up good memories.
However, (you knew there was a however coming, right?) I discovered a different version of “Pieces of April” solely by accident. And it was done by the guy who wrote the song, Dave Loggins. Three Dog Night’s version is great. Chuck Negron did some of his best work on that track. But Dave Loggins’s version touched me in a new way.
So, I did some investigating. For one thing, I wanted to know what the song was about. Was there really an April? Or was it just a play on words?
Turns out, there was an April. And that Dave Loggins enjoyed interacting with fans online. So he’d written that he and April (the girlfriend) had a relationship for three Aprils (meaning the month) before they broke up. He missed her and wrote the song for her and it was one of his favorites that he’d written.
However, (you should’ve known this one was coming :) Dave passed away in 2024 so I didn’t get to ask him any more questions.
As I was putting this series together, I listed all the rock and roll songs I could think of from 1960 to the early 1970s that had girls’ names in the titles. Then I grouped them for similarity in beat and title words. When I came to “Pieces of April”, I immediately knew it would have to be an amnesia story. I started it out as a young married couple who ends up going through this but it wasn’t working. I struggled a lot trying to rework what I’d been musing on for months and the funny thing is, once I got past chapter five, things started happening. I’m not a plotter but I’m not a pure pansters/discovery writer either. But this book was a lot of discovery for me and how the threads all got tied up, that’s a God thing.
Book Reviews From an Avid Reader, April 14
Debbie’s Dusty Deliberations, April 15
Inspired by Fiction, April 16
Leslie’s Library Escape, April 17
Jodie Wolfe – Stories Where Hope and Quirky Meet, April 18 (Author Interview)
Pause for Tales, April 18
Texas Book-aholic, April 19
Truth and Grace Homeschool Academy, April 20
She Lives To Read, April 21
Books, Books, and More Books, April 22 (Author Interview)
For Him and My Family, April 23
A Modern Day Fairy Tale, April 24 (Author Interview)
Mrs. Ryan Moser’s Book and Movie Reviews, April 24
Paula’s Pad of Inspiration, April 25
Life on Chickadee Lane, April 26
Books Less Travelled, April 27 (Author Interview)
To celebrate her tour, Jennifer is giving away the grand prize of a $50 Amazon Gift Card and an eBook copy of the book!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.
https://gleam.io/8J97u/pieces-of-april-celebration-tour-giveaway
Interview
What things molded your desire to write a novel?
I daydreamed of writing a book from the time I was a kid and fell in love with reading. Then, as an adult, I read a couple paragraphs in a history book that gave me an idea. But I didn’t start anything. Fast forward a few more years and I’d gone back to college to get my teaching certificate. In one class, a professor I wasn’t all that impressed with asked us to imagine what we’d be doing in five years. When he got to me, I said I’d be relaxing next to the pool at a high-end resort after a wildly successful book signing for my New York Times bestseller. (I mentioned I wasn’t fond of him, right?) Anyway, I got my certificate and a job and eventually I felt like God tapped me on the shoulder and asked when I was going to get around to writing that book. So I started writing. Hadn’t a clue what I was doing, but a lady at church who had been writing for several years offered to help me. She thought I had talent. So I got that book finished with her encouragement (and from others too). Then it was a crazy maze of what not to do, but God always seem to make a connection for me. Bodie Thoene helped me by suggesting I check out ACFW (only back then it was American Christian Romance Writers), I met others who lent a hand. One of the best things to come of it was the friends I made. I’m still very close to several of them after more than twenty years.
If you had a free day, what would you do?
Oh, my. I think I’d start with paper crafting. Maybe make one of those big interactive albums I never have time to make. Inbetween I’d plan a lunch date with a friend to catch up, maybe grab a new book—definitely a romcom—and then do more paper crafting or crochet something while I watch a good movie. That sounds like fun to me.
Do you use humor at all in your writing?
Believe it or not, I do try. Even with my early historicals, I had to have moments of laughter because some of the drama was heavy. I remember texting a writing friend after a particularly gruesome scene (not graphic, just saying) and asked her to talk me down because I’d just killed off seven characters. People have to have a moment to breathe with that so I do insert humor. But I much prefer that the book is intended to be humorous.
Is your book part of a series?
Yes, it is. 😊Actually, it is part of a spin-off series. I started with The Weather Girls trilogy and just didn’t want to leave, so I came up with (that sounds egotistical) er, so the Holy Spirit downloaded an idea that got me excited. Which has turned into this twelve-part series (working on book ten as I write this) that could be read in any order or as standalones. The Weather Girls Wedding Shoppe and Venue series. Pieces of April is book 9.
Share something funny that’s happened to you.
Went to the doctor’s office with my hubs a while back. Hubs likes to get me t-shirts and the one I was wearing announced “I am a Writer. Anything you say can end up in a book.” So when the nurse called us back, she saw the words and asked if I wrote. I said yes. She asked what genre. I told her currently sweet romances with romcom feel. She asked how to find my books so I pulled out some bookmarks—one for Weather Girls, one for Wedding Shoppe and Venue, and one for my best seller The Traveling Prayer Shawl. She saw it and gasped. “I’ve read your book! My friend in CA told me to read it. I started on KU but had to buy it. You’re a good writer.” So I did what any self-respecting author would do while sitting with her husband in a doctor’s office. I told her thank you. Then I smacked my hubs on his arm and said, “See? I told you.” We all laughed.