Monday, December 4, 2017

Riding with James Dean


Riding with James Dean         
David-Matthew Barnes

Genre: Young Adult

Publisher: Blue Dasher Press

Date of Publication: November 7, 2017

ASIN:

Number of pages:
Word Count: 12,500

Cover Artist: http://www.GoOnWrite.com

Book Description:

When seventeen-year-old Johnny moves to a sleepy new town and meets the enigmatic Marco, the glamorous Mary, and the punk princess Jemma, his summer nights are soon filled with friendship and love.


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Excerpt:

From a distance, I could’ve sworn I saw the ghost of Marilyn Monroe.
            There was a beautiful woman standing next to Marco in the parking lot of the 50’s hamburger palace. They were leaning up against the side of his vintage car, waiting and doused in the shadows of slow pulsing neon lights. His arm was draped around her shoulders. It appeared she was propping him up. She laughed when she steadied him and the sound was sweet and melodic. She was a platinum blonde, dressed in a black pencil skirt and a low-cut white angora sweater. There was a red chiffon scarf tied around her neck. She exuded power in her black stiletto heels. She was a movie star in the making, a glamorous goddess just waiting for someone to discover her and catapult her to fame. If anyone had been born for a life on the silver screen, it was her.
            She pried herself away from Marco and stepped in my direction. “You must be Johnny,” she said. I nodded in reply, mesmerized by the seductive green color of her eyes and the tenderness of her voice. She leaned in, kissed my cheek, and then spent the next few seconds trying to wipe her lipstick off my skin. Her touch was soft and comforting. 
 “Are you Marilyn Monroe?” I asked. My words fell into her cleavage.
            “You’re close,” she said. “I’m Mary.”
            “Yes,” I said. “Marco mentioned you.”
            “He’s like a brother to me,” she whispered. “Be gentle with his heart.”
            Marco moved to us, wrapping an arm around us, connecting and cementing us as a trio. “I’m a lucky guy,” he said. “I get to spend the night with my two favorite people.”
            “Marco doesn’t have many favorites,” Mary explained. She was clearly his interpreter. “So, I guess that makes us the lucky ones.”
            Marco gently guided us in the direction of his parked car. “I wish we could go to Vegas,” he announced.
            “Why don’t we?” I challenged.
            He shook his head. “We wouldn’t make it there until dawn.”
            “Dawn’s a lovely time to arrive in Vegas,” Mary said. “You can sleep all day and then be ready for the night.”
            “Are we vampires?” I asked, with a small laugh.
            “In another life, yes,” explained Mary. “In this one…”
            Marco glanced up to the dark, starlit sky and said, “We’re the ones everybody else wants to be.”
            Mary shook a finger at him, reprimanding. “Careful, Marco,” she said. “You almost sound smug.”
            “Do you think they know?” he asked. “About how much we’ve been through?”
            They looked into each other’s eyes when Mary spoke. “If they did,” she said, “they wouldn’t care. But our sorrow would ruin the façade.”
            “Façade,” he repeated. “I like that word.”
            Mary insisted on sitting in the backseat, but not before pulling me aside. “You belong up front now,” she explained, in a hushed tone. “Next to Marco. He needs you by his side.”
            “But you were here first,” I reminded her.
            “I appreciate your chivalry,” she said. “But you’re new.”

            I slid across the bucket seat and into the shelter of Marco’s arms. He pulled me closer to him.  “There,” he said. “That’s better.”


About the Author:

David-Matthew Barnes is the award-winning author of several novels and collections of stage plays and poetry. His acclaimed screenplays have earned many accolades including a 2017 Los Angeles Film Award. David-Matthew has written over fifty stage plays that have been performed in three languages in ten countries. His literary work has appeared in over one hundred publications. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America, International Thriller Writers, and the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. He earned an MFA in Creative Writing at Queens University of Charlotte in North Carolina. He has been an educator for more than a decade.

For more information, please visit:






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Winter Holiday Extravaganza Guest Blog - Happy Place by L.P. Maxa


Even Brighter

I have always loved the holiday season. From October 1st until January 2nd is my jam. I'm one of those "to every season there is a purpose" people. I don't start thinking about Thanksgiving until Halloween is over. And I don't put up any Christmas decorations until after the Thanksgiving leftovers are almost gone. I like to celebrate each holiday, milk every occasion for all it's worth.

But now, it’s officially time for Christmas. I'm doing a little happy dance in my chair as I type this. I've always loved everything about Christmas. I love the glitter and the food and the good will and cheer. I love the twinkle lights and the magical feel in the air. I love that people strive toward kindness and compassion. December gives me all the feels.

Obviously, I love holiday traditions. I live for them and I am constantly trying to rope my family into new ones. Not all of them stick...my family doesn't blindly follow my lead.

My absolute favorite tradition? Christmas books. We started it when my daughter was a baby, and we do it every year. We buy my daughter a new Christmas book and then read it during bedtime all of December. Every night in December we crawl in bed and read through all her Christmas books. It's so cozy and fun. And I can now recite “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” which is a great life skill.

I know that my daughter won't always let me read to her. I know that before long, she'll be reading to me. But just as I refuse to celebrate holidays early, I refuse to rush my kiddo out of her childhood. I'll help her believe in the magic of Christmas (and Halloween and Thanksgiving) for as long as I possibly can.

Happy Holidays everyone. Joy and Good Cheer you and your loved ones.




Happy Place
L.P. Maxa

Genre: Romance

Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group

Date of Publication:  December 20th 2016

ISBN: 978-1541227-91-0 – print
ISBN: 978-1-944262-56-3 - ebook
ASIN:  B01MT15T5J

Number of pages:  162
Word Count: 50,260

Cover Artist: Boroughs Publishing Group

Tagline:    Secrets, lies, Christmas, and a fake wedding. What could go wrong?

Book Description:

Two years after spending one blissful night with her lifelong crush, Cassie Huntington meets Declan Preston again during the Christmas season, and secrets and lies turn into a fake wedding that just might save their love.

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About the Author:

L.P. lives in Austin, Texas with her husband, daughter, three rescue dogs, and one adopted cat. The fish died. She is a full-time writer, and part time business owner. L.P. says she loves to read as much as she loves to write, and reading a good book is her reward after writing one. In her spare time, she fosters puppies for a rescue organization based in Austin.

Website: http://www.lpmaxa.com





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Deadly Eleven: A Collection of Post-Apocalyptic, Dystopian, and Horror Thrillers




Deadly Eleven: A Collection of Post-Apocalyptic, Dystopian, and Horror Thrillers

Mark Tufo, Michelle Bryan,
David Moody, Bobby Adair,‎
Shawn Chesser,‎ Leigh M Lane,‎
John O'Brien,‎ Jaime Johnesee,‎
Heath Stallcup

Genre: Post-Apocalyptic, Horror, Dystopian

Publisher: Devil Dog Press

Publication Date: June 1, 2017

ASIN: B072M6WX9T

What happens when everything comes crumbling down?

Some of today's best -selling authors take you to the dark side in this collection of eleven deadly tales.

What happens when everything comes crumbling down? Some of today's best-selling authors take you to the dark side in this collection of eleven deadly tales.

Zombie Fallout - Mark Tufo 

This is the story of Michael Talbot, his family, and his friends: a band of ordinary people trying to get by in extraordinary times. When disaster strikes, Mike, a self-proclaimed survivalist, does his best to ensure the safety and security of those he cares for. Book one of the Zombie Fallout Trilogy follows our lead character at his self-deprecating, sarcastic best. What he encounters along the way leads him down a long dark road, always skirting the edge of insanity.

Strain of Resistance - Michelle Bryan 

I was 12 years old when the world ended. For eight years I've survived in this shithole once known as earth. Fighting the alien parasite that mutated most of the population into blood-thirsty freaks, while the rest of us became the lunch special on their alien menu.

Now things are changing, and not for the better. The parasite is evolving. Becoming smarter, stronger and deadlier.

Strangers - David Moody

A spate of brutal murders occur in and around the small town of Thussock. The bodies of the dead – savagely mutilated, unspeakably defiled – are piling up with terrifying speed. There are no apparent motives and no obvious connections between the victims, but the killings only began when Scott Griffiths and his family arrived in Thussock...

“In his evocation of fear and unease and the speed with which he grips you, he brings to mind old Brit horror writer James Herbert. And that is some recommendation.” —London Lite

“Moody has the power to make the most mundane and ordinary characters interesting and believable, and is reminiscent of Stephen King at his finest.” —Shadowlocked

World-Mart By Leigh M. Lane  

World-Mart takes place in a not-too-distant future, one in which the collective and all-powerful entity known as "Corporate" owns and controls every aspect of society. One held in place by complacency and mediocrity.

One that could very easily come to pass . . . very soon.

What does your future look like?

A New World: Chaos - John O'Brien

This hard-hitting, action-packed series begins with Jack Walker being suddenly thrust into a world where the infrastructure which cherished Armani suits, night clubs, fast and expensive cars and watching the daily stock market are gone. Left in its place is the material world mankind built but a majority of the population has vanished; replaced by a new, savage, unrelenting, cunning, animalistic species which hunts and operates at night.

Trudge: Surviving The Apocalypse - Shawn Chesser 

Unable to get ahold of Brook and Raven and unwilling to leave them at the mercy of some distant politician’s inability to hold the nation together, he begins an impossible 3,000 mile journey across a reeling United States with presumably millions of infected in his path and only one acceptable outcome: find Brook and Raven alive—or die trying.

Black Virus- Bobby Adair 

Alienated in a world where he doesn’t fit in, Christian Black survives because he’s different. Then the virus came, and made the world turn different, too.
Now people are dying by the million. Food supplies are short. Riots are blazing through the streets, and Christian’s only goal is to keep his family alive. But safety lies far from the city, and just getting out will be tougher than anyone knows.

Next: Aftermath - Scott Nicholson

But as a half-mutant, Rachel’s choice isn’t as simple as mere survival—the mutant way of life might be more promising than anything humans could hope to restore. And Rachel’s next decision could tear apart her family and the entire world.

The Death of Kaylis - Jaime Johnesee

In a post apocalyptic future, Kayliss and her vultures rule the wastelands with an iron fist. Nobody'd ever had the guts to stand up to her until her sister came home. Sasha doesn't like the person Kayliss has become and vows to stop her by any means necessary. In a world where the lawless make the rules can anyone truly make a change?

Dead Hunger - Eric A. Shelman 

Something happened to the earth. Inexplicable. Not a product of man, but of nature.

Now Flex Sheridan and Gem Cardoza must do all they can to protect Flex's six-year-old neice Trina and find ways to survive a massive outbreak that has caused most of humankind to metamorphose into the walking dead.

Return of The Phoenix - Heath Stallcup

Humanity has spent its time enjoying the peace that can only be had through blissful ignorance. For centuries, stories of things that go 'bump' in the night have been shared. When creatures of the night proved to be real, the best of America’s military came together to form an elite band of rapid response teams. Their mission: to keep the civilian populace safe from the monsters that go bump in the night and hide all evidence of their existence.

Amazon     Amazon UK     BN     Smashwords


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Bad Blood by Laurencia Hoffman and Sophie Smith


Bad Blood
Wages of Sin
Book One
Laurencia Hoffman
and Sophie Smith

Genre: Horror/Paranormal

Publisher: Vamptasy Publishing

Date of Publication: 4/3/2016

ISBN: 1532872887
ASIN: B01DTIIGVY

Number of pages: 250
Word Count: 70,000

Cover Artist: Rue Volley

Tagline: Not all monsters live in dreams...some are real and they walk among us.

Book Description:

Vampire, Blake Auckley develops a wild and rebellious nature that puts him and all humans who are unlucky enough to make his acquaintance in danger. Abandoned by his maker, Melina, the night he was created, Blake is used to being on his own, but when she suddenly reappears in his life, it changes his world yet again.

Though forgiving and forgetting the past is hard, Blake and Melina attempt to put their differences aside and repair their relationship. However, with dark secrets and old wounds marking their souls, Blake's enemies not far behind, and so many obstacles still ahead they must fight to survive the danger, as well as each other.


Amazon      Amazon Print     BN

Excerpt:
“Why did you turn me, Melina? Why did you take my life?”
“What are you going to do? Kill me? And here I thought we were getting along so well,” she said with a chuckle.
Blake considered the idea of destroying her there and then; how satisfying it would have been, even if that feeling would only last a moment. But, realistically, he knew that he would still be left with unanswered questions, and the prospect of Silas hunting him down. It would just prove to be more of a hindrance than anything else.
His grip relaxed and then fell from around her throat. “I don’t know why I waste so much energy despising you. Think of what I could accomplish if you didn’t burden my mind.”
Clearly angry that he had been aggressive, her slender fingers clutched his neck and threw him to the floor.
“You’re stronger than I thought you would be, but do not forget your place. It would not matter if I were merely a year older than you; every year counts. Your elders are stronger than you, even if it’s only by a sliver. If you forget that, you may become vulnerable. And in a fight between you and them, you would lose.”
 “You’re attractive when you’re angry,” he said with a smirk.
With a roll of her eyes, Melina released him, got back to her feet, and then composed herself.
However disrespectful he was toward her, he had asked her a question, and it was only polite for Melina to respond.
“I was desperate, lonely, and hungry when I turned you. There was something about your eyes...something that indicated that immortality would suit you.” Her answer was simple. Blake could tell by her answer that she hadn’t put much thought into turning him. “Any other questions?”
“Have I become just what you imagined, your perfect progeny?” That, most of all, was what irked him. She had been so thoughtless, so careless with his life.
“I’m not sure. I don’t really know you, so I can’t make any assumptions. You could use a lesson in manners, though.”



About the Authors:

Laurencia Hoffman is the author of Casting Stones, Bittersweet, A Wish for Remembrance, Life and Death, No Love Lost, and co-author of The Wages of Sin series.

When she's not writing, she also enjoys making her own line of natural products, satisfying her sweet tooth, and watching films.






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Sophie Smith is the co-author of the Wages of Sin series. When she's not writing, she enjoys gaming, blogging, and watching her favorite shows.










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Three winners will be chosen to receive all three ebooks in PDF format.

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Friday, December 1, 2017

Winter Holiday Extravaganza A Tradition of Making Music with Emily Mims


A Tradition of Making Music
Emily Mims


Music is an important part of everyone’s Christmas, whether it’s Christmas carols at the church Christmas program, watching a rerun of White Christmas, or the incessant Muzak playing at the malls. 

As a singer and musician, Christmas music is an especially important part of my Christmas. I have been making music for the holidays since I was a teenager playing the organ in a little Baptist church, and music continues to be an important part of my Christmas celebration every year.

I’ve made Christmas music everywhere I’ve been invited. In that small church; at the school where I taught for many years; in the televised choir of a large suburban congregation; in the back of a truck on a Christmas caroling hayride; on a barge floating down the San Antonio River with the Boy Scouts; for church senior groups; and in the dining rooms and halls of nursing homes. 

My opportunities to make Christmas music grew exponentially when I learned to play the dulcimer and ukulele and joined The San Antonio Riverpickers, a mountain music band that features dulcimers and old-time Appalachian tunes. Also, I’m a member of Ukulele Ladies and Gents, which plays all kinds of music, including lots of island songs. With these two groups, I have expanded my holiday repertoire beyond the usual Christmas carols and radio and movie songs. Also, I’ve found myself playing in venues that are an adventure in and of themselves.

Riverpickers does a lot of street festivals around the holidays, most notably Christmas in Comfort and Dickens on Main in Boerne. We mix in a few Christmas numbers, but play mostly mountain tunes, as few carols sound all that good on a dulcimer. Our audience seems to enjoy the old mountain tunes as much as they do the carols. 

Playing for a street festival can get interesting in terms of weather. We’ve played on a stage facing a setting sun (yes blinding), and under chilly cloud cover with rain threatening. We’ve played in the heat; this is Texas after all, and it can still be hot in December. We’ve played in the cold. Really cold. Our record cold-weather performance was an hour-long set in Boerne a few years back. The sun had gone down, it was twenty-nine degrees and the wind was blowing. It was so cold the instruments all had to be retuned, not a problem unless you play a hammered dulcimer with forty-plus strings. (My fingers burned for a solid hour afterward.) Afterward, we promised ourselves we’d never play below forty degrees, but honestly, I don’t think it would stop us. Street festivals are too much fun to pass up.

The ukulele group is the complete opposite. We stay inside where it’s nice and warm (or cool depending on the temps), and play Hawaiian Christmas music, complete with hula dancers and red and green Aloha shirts. And, we sing in Hawaiian. Of course, we do the traditional Christmas songs too. The ukulele group plays at many different places, including churches and libraries, and a lot of nursing homes. Although we play somewhere every month, the holidays tend to be our busy season. So far, we have one performance scheduled right before Thanksgiving and four during December. So far. 

Making all the performances can get hectic in an already jam-packed holiday season. Occasionally my husband and I must skip a party or another event to play and sing, but making music, especially Christmas music, deeply enriches our holidays.  


♪ ♫ ♬ I cannot imagine Christmas without music. ♪ ♫ ♬

P.S. The guitar strap in the photo lights up. How fun is that?


Mistletoe
The Smokey Blues
Book 6
Emily Mims

Genre:  Romance

Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group

Date of Publication:  November 20th 2017

ISBN:  978-1-979474-24-5 – print book  
ISBN: 978-1-944262-99-0 - eBook

Number of pages:  227
Word Count: 65,450

Cover Artist: Boroughs Publishing Group

Tagline: Can the holiday season turn make-believe into real passion, love and romance?

Book Description: 

Aspiring songwriter Caitlyn Murphy is tired of sister’s hand-me-downs. From toys and bicycles to men, it seemed like everything in Caitlyn’s life first belonged to her late sister. Roped into doing Christmas for motherless nieces, and entering into a pretend romance with their dangerously attractive father, Caitlyn soon finds herself falling in love with the girls, and the enigmatic Tanner Dyson. She resists the temptation and Tanner’s insistence that they make their pretend relationship real. She wants her own family, not the one her sister had first.



About the Author:

Author of thirty-four romance novels, Emily Mims combined her writing career with a career in public education until leaving the classroom to write full time. The mother of two sons and six grandsons, she and her husband live in central Texas but frequently visit their grandchildren in Tennessee and Georgia. For relaxation, she plays four musical instruments: the piano, the ukulele, the organ and the dulcimer.




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Red Sleeper by Brian Downes



Red Sleeper
The Berlin Fraternity Universe
Book Two
Brian Downes

Genre: Historical horror

Date of Publication: December 1st, 2017

ISBN-13: 978-1978447349
ISBN-10: 1978447345
ASIN:

Number of pages: 450
Word Count: 118,766

Cover Artist: Miriam Medina

Tagline: A cold war after dark.

Book Description:

In the horsepower town of 1950s Detroit, FBI agent Christopher Haigwood is raising his Catholic family and hunting Soviet spies. Then a communist fanatic who was arrested with a lot of guns, dynamite, and heroin breaks out of jail right before his eyes, and Haigwood is plunged into a terrifying labyrinth of plots, informants, liars, and the horrifying revelation that vampires are real, and that some of his KGB quarry are undead.

Red Sleeper is set in the world of The Berlin Fraternity.



Excerpt:

          Haigwood had read Walter Swale’s file several times. He’d written sections of it. White. Brown eyes, brown hair, approximately 5’6”, 175 pounds estimated weight. Father born in Poland, 1893, changed the family name to Swale from Szwarc on arrival in the USA. Haigwood had studied photographs of Swale to memorize the high chin, the bulging lips, the distance between the eyes, the widow’s peak that pointed out of the receding hairline. He had once sat at Swale’s kitchen table with the curtains drawn and copied names out of his address book while Swale was out at the movies. Now Swale was sitting in jail, having been brought in the night before for resisting arrest, along with possession of: four ounces Mexican heroin, ten sticks dynamite, one M1 rifle with two hundred rounds of ammunition, one police revolver with ammunition, and twenty-three copies of a Communist Party pamphlet urging workers to revolt against their bosses and their elected leaders in Washington, D.C.
          Haigwood had been at home with his wife, Annie, over the Thanksgiving weekend. He’d gotten the call last night at dinner. Now he was walking into the jail at eight on Monday morning to get his first eyeball-to-eyeball with this Red they had been watching for more than six months.
          There was a jail guard stationed at the front desk. Haigwood smiled at the man as he unwrapped his scarf from around his neck. “Good morning! How’s everything with you fellas?”
          “Good morning,” the guard answered, looking him up and down warily. “Is it snowing already?”
          Haigwood took his fedora off, tapped the snow dust off its brim, and ran his hand through his hair. “Yes, it’s brisk out there!” He pulled out his credentials. “I’m Christopher Haigwood, Federal Bureau of Investigation. I’m here to see Swale, Walter, a prisoner brought in about 2100 hours last night.”
          The guard, whom Haigwood saw was about ten years younger than he was, focused on Haigwood’s ID. He reached his hand out tentatively to touch the wallet. “I heard about that. So you really work for J. Edgar Hoover, huh?”
          “And the American people,” Haigwood answered with a smile. “Now do you think you could get someone to show me to Swale?”
          The guard picked up a telephone receiver from a handset at his station and dialed a number. Haigwood toyed with his hat, smothered his impatient sigh, and looked around at the signs in the jail’s foyer. The signs told him to be on the alert for any men dressed in black and gray stripes, because they might be escaping inmates. And that he was going to have to surrender his revolver if he wanted to go any further. He looked out the window and saw the snowflakes floating gently downward, their numbers growing. From further inside the jail he could smell the morning coffee, but he’d just finished off a Coca-Cola in the car.
          He was really angry at Swale for getting himself arrested like this. But he was very much looking forward to speaking to him personally.
          A second guard appeared and took Haigwood inside the jail. This one older than him, and not shy at all about staring at the G-man with frank curiosity. He had a nametag that read, “G. Cantor”. Nobody asked Haigwood for his service weapon, so he kept his overcoat on and didn’t mention it.
          “So I read this guy’s sheet,” Haigwood’s guide said indifferently as they walked.
          “Yeah, you did?”
          “Yeah,” Cantor nodded, looking like he didn’t care, but watching Haigwood’s face carefully. “You know we don’t get a lot of dynamiters in here.”
          “Oh, you don’t?” Haigwood put a chime of surprise in his voice.
          “No,” the guard said, warming up to explaining his job to someone he had expected to be smarter than him. “We don’t get too many commies, either.”
          “I guess you’ve got one today, though?”
          “Yeah, yeah, we’ve sure got one today. It’s an unusual day. Here he is, on the end.”
          They had been walking down a chilly, second-level row of cells as Haigwood parried Cantor’s efforts to pump him for information. It was cold enough that Haigwood was quite comfortable with his overcoat on. Morning light, turned a cottony gray by the snow coming down outside, slanted in through the high, narrow, barred windows.
          Swale was up early, and had heard them coming. Haigwood could see him pressing his face up against the bars of his cell, craning his neck to see them approach. But Haigwood stopped first at the cell adjacent to Swale’s, and looked down at a little man wrapped in a blanket on one of the cell’s two bunks. “Who’s this?” He asked Cantor.
          “Who, him? That’s Hobson. He stays with us sometimes, three or four times a year.”
          “What brings him in?”
          “Tuning up his wife.”
          Haigwood gestured at Hobson’s sleeping cellmate. “And what about that one?”
          “That’s, uh, Gomez. Got drunk and stabbed a fellow over a game of cards.”
          “OK,” Haigwood said, reassured that the two men who might overhear his conversation didn’t much matter. He told the guard, “Thank you very much, Mr. Cantor, I’ll be fine here,” as he took the final few steps that brought him face to face with Walter Swale through the bars of his cell.



About the Author:

Brian Downes learned to read at a young age. He is now a novelist who lives in Orlando, Florida. His other novels are The Berlin Fraternity and The Carrefour Crisis. He also writes for the website Florida Geek Scene.



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