Melissa’s third novel, Growing Up Wilder, introduces readers to Dancy Wilder and her sister Marla who are navigating

childhood successfully in spite of their father’s crazy romantic encounters ~ a spiritualistic grass-smoking hippie, a double-D cup kleptomaniac known over the CB airwaves as Hot Ginger, and an olive-skinned Greek goddess, just to name a few. Dancy and Marla’s father, Everett is raising his two girls alone.

A perpetual bachelor and successful lady’s man, Everett can have just about any woman he wants. Problem is he wants them all ~ and likes them all a little crazy.

Follow Dancy and Marla as they grow into strong, capable, common sense women who have taken something of benefit from each of their father’s many love interests, including their Momma Lou, a biker chick, who they learn has a secret profession that keeps the Wilder financials in the black. Read an interview with Melissa about Growing Up Wilder.

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Growing Up Wilder includes a character inspired by the winner of the Wilder Woman contest!

Thank you to Susan Weaver, winner of the Wilder Woman Contest, for introducing Isabella Catelyn Bleufield Maymore Jacobson Claxton Perryworth to the Wilders. I don’t know how Everett, Dancy, and Marla ever got along without her. As the winner, Susan will receive ten complimentary copies of Growing Up Wilder and an opportunity to attend book signings and events with the author. Susan is also mentioned in the acknowledgments section in the front pages of Growing Up Wilder. Melissa gives Susan all the credit for Chapter 12 called “The Fairest of them All.”

Susan’s character, which Melissa calls Cee for short, is sassy, shrill, showy and an unapologetic gold-digging debutante who is just a little past her prime but always on the prowl.

Sister Blackberry and House of Cleaving