An Accidental Odyssey by kc dyer
Contemporary Romance
12/12/2021 by Berkley
Summary:
In what Kirkus Reviews has called, “A mouth-watering journey,” AN ACCIDENTAL ODYSSEY (Berkley Trade Paperback Original; on sale December 14, 2021) follows a bride-to-be and her estranged father as they embark on a life-altering adventure to retrace Odysseus’ famous voyage.
Recent college graduate and aspiring journalist Gianna Kostas is on her way to building the perfect life. She is set to marry one of New York’s most eligible bachelors—and one of the richest—and is sure to have a fairy tale wedding. But all of Gia’s plans are derailed when she receives an alarming phone call from the hospital, letting her know that her father, a man she barely knows, has suffered a heart attack. Even worse, he is determined to run off to Greece despite his condition and retrace the journey Odysseus made in The Odyssey.
When her father leaves the hospital without his medication, Gia is forced to follow him to Athens. She knows her father is in no condition to take this journey alone, and this may just be the opportunity she needs to get to know him and potentially secure her career as a journalist. But as Gia adventures—and eats—her way around the Mediterranean, she discovers that confronting epic storms, sea monsters, and gorgeous archaeologists might be the easy part.
Excerpt:
When I arrive at the university offices, the door to the Classics floor is open, which is a good sign. The place is usually deserted and locked up tight on a Saturday, so the fact the door is not only ajar but propped open with a copy of Ovid bodes well. Unfortunately, when I poke my head into his office, there’s no sign of my father.
Instead, I find his grad student, Evan, seated behind a pile of papers at my dad’s old desk. He jumps to his feet as I come charging into the room. A bit of a pipsqueak at the best of times, Evan takes one look at my face and caves almost immediately.
“He’s gone,” he says, his tone somewhat defensive. “He told me he has doctor’s permission.”
“Gone? Gone where? He signed himself out of the hospital, Evan. And the last time I checked, the Classics department was not issuing medical degrees.”
Evan steps sideways, effectively putting the desk between us. “I’ve got a tutorial session in five minutes,” he mutters.
I yank my dad’s abandoned pill bottle out of my bag and rattle it in his face. “He left his meds, Evan.”
Pointing up at the clock on the wall, I add, “He’s already overdue for one dose, which is putting him at risk of another stroke. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to be party to that — would you?”
He swallows hard, and visibly blanches when I rattle the pill bottle again.
“I — I didn’t know,” he whispers, his voice catching in his throat. “He didn’t say anything about medication. Only that he was feeling better, and that he had a flight to catch.”
“A — a flight?” I sink onto a chair at the magnitude of this. As I do, my phone pings in my pocket, but I ignore it. “Dude,” I say, ratcheting my tone down from demanding to merely pleading. “I’m supposed to be somewhere else, too. But I’m really worried about my dad.”
Evan glances at his watch, takes a deep breath, and then yanks out a file folder from the top drawer of the desk. “If he finds out I told you, he’ll kill me,” he says, faintly.
I glance into the folder, and then meet his eyes one last time. “You’d better get to your session,” I say firmly. “I can take it from here.”
Evan doesn’t wait to be told twice. He’s out the door in an instant, a trail of papers literally swirling in his wake.
As for me? I glance back down at the folder.
And this is how, less than a day after waving my magazine internship goodbye, and without tasting even a single morsel of wedding cake, I find myself on a plane bound for Athens, Greece.
From AN ACCIDENTAL ODYSSEY published by arrangement with Berkley, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright © 2021 by kc dyer.
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About the Author:
kc dyer resides in the wilds of British Columbia where she likes to walk in the woods and write books for teens and adults. Before An Accidental Odyssey, her most recent novels for adults were Eighty Days to Elsewhere and Finding Fraser, both romantic comedies published by Berkley. For teens, kc’s most recent work is Facing Fire, a sequel to the acclaimed novel, A Walk Through a Window, published by Doubleday. Learn more online at kcdyer.com.
Author photo by: Martin Chung
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