Reading, Reviewing, Guest Authors, Giveaways and more.
Debra Webb, born in Alabama, wrote her first story at age nine and her first romance at thirteen. It wasn’t until she spent three years working for the military behind the Iron Curtain—and a five-year stint with NASA—that she realized her true calling. A collision course between suspense and romance was set. Since then she has penned nearly 100 novels, including her internationally bestselling Colby Agency series. Debra’s debut romantic thriller series, Faces of Evil, propelled her to the top of the bestselling charts for an unparalleled twenty-four weeks.
Connect with Debra at these sites:
On Writing and Reading:
-Do you draw from personal experiences and/or current events?
A little of both. Since my husband was in the military we spent a lot of years living in different locations and meeting different folks. I spend a lot of time reading newspapers, magazines and online news feeds.
-Do you start with the conclusion and plot in reverse or start from the beginning and see where the story line brings you?
With the Faces of Evil the motive is key since the series explores the levels of evil. Once I have the motive in place I decide who the killer will be and then the victims. Once those elements are fleshed out the story begins!
-Your routine when writing? Any idiosyncrasies?
I have my coffee and wander to my office. First thing I do is turn on the music and get comfortable.
-Is writing your full time job? If not, may I ask what you do by day?
Writing has been my full time job for 15 years. Before that I worked on the Shuttle Project with NASA.
-Who are some of your favorite authors?
Too many to name! But I never miss anything by Regan Black,Allison Brennan, Robert Gregory Browne, Brett Battles, Kathy Carmichael, Cindy Gerard, Rita Herron, Vicki Hinze, CJ Lyons, VR Marks, Karen Rose, and Peggy Webb!
-What are you reading now?
I am really lucky! I’m reading an advance copy of a Lucy Guardino novella by CJ Lyons.
-Are you working on your next novel? Can you tell us a little about it?
I am! I’m working on Book 7, VICIOUS, of the Faces of Evil series and a Christmas novella that’s a prequel for the series.
Fun questions:
-Your novel will be a movie. Who would you cast?
I think I’d have to leave that up to the experts!
-Would you rather read or watch TV/movie?
Most of the time the answer would be read but I do love a great movie!
-Favorite food? Good bread.
-Favorite beverage? Coca Cola
Thank you for stopping by CMash Reads and spending time with us.
When her beloved high school teacher appears on her doorstep, Deputy Chief Jess Harris is flooded with fond memories—until the woman says she’s about to be charged with murder.
The victim was a member of Birmingham’s famed “Five.” Twelve years ago, the Five were rich, popular seniors who threw one last wild party. Two social outcasts were invited, and the next morning one of them was dead. Now Jess fears the invitation to an upcoming class reunion may have forced the Five to play a deadly new game. A vicious cycle of vengeance has begun, and the killer is far from finished…
Publisher: Forever Mass Market
Publication Date: July 30, 2013
ISBN-13: 978-1-4555-2758-8
Three photos of three unknown women. Sent to Deputy Chief Jess Harris by the 
Player, one of the world’s most sadistic killers. The Player is taunting her, and Jess is more than ready to take on his challenge.
Only one thing could distract her from the Player’s deadly game: the appearance of a clue to long-unsolved cases. For years Birmingham’s children were vanishing—one per year, always on a full moon—until the disappearances stopped and the Man in the Moon case went cold. No leads on the children were ever found—until now.
Jess has no choice but to pursue the case. Someone is reaching out to her, sending her mementos of the missing children, and the citizens of Birmingham deserve justice. But after years of silence, has the Man in the Moon really resurfaced? Or is he just another pawn in the Player’s game?
Publisher: Forever Mass Market
Publication Date: August 27, 2013
ISBN-13: 978-1-4555-2760-1
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Eric Trant is a fantasy-thriller author who lives in North Dallas with his wife and family. His work blends believable stories into a mixture of realism and supernatural elements, while always keeping the reader engaged with deeply-drawn characters, stunning visuals and constant motion. His goal is to create stories which linger with the reader long after the book is read. Wink is Eric’s second novel.
Connect with Eric at these sites:
Why You Should Be Yourself in Writing and Marketing
I used to have this story in my head, and I guess it’s still there, called A Day in the Life of Someone More Interesting. I have no idea what the story is about, other than it is not about me. I don’t find that I’m all that interesting or impressive or conversational or mysterious or brilliant or any of those things you want your characters to be. I want to be someone different, and that can get you into trouble.
First of all, everyone is interesting if you dig deep enough. We all have backstories and a neat history and worthwhile beliefs and opinions. Just because someone is popular does not mean they are more important or smarter, it just means they are more obvious to a greater number of people.
I now bring the topic to the art of writing and to the business of marketing your writing. There is a (or an? help!) ubiquitous belief among non-megalomaniacs and non-Narcissists that we are uninteresting to ourselves. There is also a pervasive fact of human nature that we are interesting to everyone else. There is the nosy neighbor peeking through the blinds, here the gossip whispering, down in the basement the Facebook addict posting up juicy tidbits, and all around you the flitter-flatter of chitter-chatter about other peoples’ (or people’s? peoples? oh man where is my editor!) business.
Be true to yourself when you write and your readers will be true to you. This means creating stories that you find interesting, and that draw on your experiences. If you want a different experience, get one! Go on a cruise before you write the boat-book, on a hike before you write the mountain-book, on a date before you write the date-book, and so on. You do not have to fake interesting to find great pieces of yourself to inject into your stories.
Even more of this is true for the marketing. As a society of consumers, raised in the Golden Age of Advertising, subject to tweets and posts and sidebar ads and billboards and commercials and little signs above the urinal, we are adept at picking out the BS from these ads. While some ads are tricky, we can usually spot the stinky-stuff and avoid it with a fair degree of success.
So avoid the stinky-stuff in your marketing. Do what you are comfortable doing, and become good at those things. Find a marketing path that marries your personality with your skillset, and that caters to the crowd who is going to read the stories you wrote. Public signings and speeches come first to mind, since that is a big deal to authors, especially new ones. If you are uncomfortable and insecure and untrained in public speaking, it is best to be silent and thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. Isn’t that how the saying goes?
Me, I prefer to keep my blog and FB and one-on-one marketing very personal and personable with a smidge of commerciality. In other words, I want to be known first as Eric, and then as Eric Trant the Author. Still, going full-on commercial works for many authors and entertainers, but not for me. I prefer to wait on the book signings and speaking until I have a few books to sign and speak about. Wink is my second novel, and I have several short stories under my belt. I am just now comfortable doing things like blog tours and open promotions, and speaking in personal circles about my writing, and hope on future pieces to be comfortable doing public signings and speaking. Many authors tour their first book, or even their first short story, but that’s not for me.
Do you see where I’m going with this? While I do step out of my comfort zone — you must do that — I stay close enough to home that I don’t become someone unrecognizable as Eric. I am true to myself, and I believe that will make all the difference.
How about you? Have you done or been asked to do anything you did not believe in? What are your comfort zones for marketing and writing?
Genre: Thriller
Publisher: WiDo Publishing
Publication date: 3/27/2013
Pages: 282
ISBN-13: 9781937178345
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Bella Andre is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, and has sold more than 1.5 million books. Her books have appeared on Top 5 lists at Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble and Kobo. After signing a groundbreaking seven-figure print only deal with Harlequin MIRA, Bella’s Sullivan series will be released in paperback in a major global English language launch in the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia in continuous back-to-back releases from June 2013 through April 2014.
Known for “sensual empowered stories enveloped in heady romance” (Publishers Weekly), her books have been Cosmopolitan Magazine “Red Hot Reads” twice and have been translated into nine languages, and her Sullivan books are already Top 20 sellers in Brazil. Winner of the Award of Excellence, The Washington Post called her “One of the top digital writers in America” and she has been featured by NPR, USA Today, Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, and most recently in TIME magazine. She has given keynote speeches at publishing conferences from Copenhagen to Berlin to San Francisco.
If not behind her computer, you can find her reading her favorite authors, hiking, swimming or laughing. Married with two children, Bella splits her time between the Northern California wine country and a 100-year-old log cabin in the Adirondacks.
Connect with Bella at these sites:
Gabe Sullivan risks his life every day as a firefighter in San Francisco, but he knows better than to risk giving his heart again. Especially not to the woman he saved from a deadly apartment fire…and can’t stop thinking about.
Megan Harris owes everything to the heroic firefighter who saved her and her daughter. Everything except her heart. Because after losing her pilot husband, she has vowed to never suffer through loving –and losing—another man with a dangerous job.
But when Gabe and Megan meet again, how can he possibly ignore her courage, determination and beauty? And how can she deny not only his strong bond with her daughter…but also his sensual kisses, challenging her to jeopardize everything she’s been guarding for so long?
If one –or both – of them aren’t careful, they just might end up falling in love.
Genre: Romance Contemporoary
Publisher: Harlequin
Publication date: 7/30/2013
Number of Pages: 336
ISBN-13: 9780778315582
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Jodi Ellen Malpas was born and raised in the Midlands town of Northampton, UK, where she lives with her family. Working for the family construction business fulltime and with the prospect of taking it over once her father retired, she tried to ignore the lingering idea of writing a novel until it became impossible. She finally found the time and courage to release her creative streak and in October 2012 self-published This Man as an e-book. She took a chance on a story with some intense characters, notably Mr. Jesse Ward, the Lord of the Manor, and sparked incredible reactions from women all over the world. Two months later, Jodi made the decision to give up her day job to concentrate on her new and very unexpected career in writing.
Connect with Jodi at these sites:
THE STUNNING CONCLUSION TO THE THIS MAN TRILOGY IS A #1 NEW YORK TIMESBESTSELLER! The Manor, the very place where their passionate love affair began, fills with guests on what should be the happiest day of Ava and Jesse’s lives. She has accepted that she’ll never tame the fierceness in Jesse-and she doesn’t want to. Their love is profound, their connection powerful, but just when she thinks that she’s finally gotten beneath his guarded exterior, more questions arise, leading Ava to believe that Jesse Ward may not be the man she thinks he is. He knows too well how to take her to a place beyond ecstasy . . . but will he also drive her to the brink of despair? It’s time for this man to confess.
I’m relishing in the calmness and quiet as I swim length after length, no one joining me, no one venturing in to use the Jacuzzis, and no one coming to relax on a sun lounger. But then I hear movement, and I stop mid-length to see who has arrived. My eyes flick to the entrance of the changing area, and then Jesse emerges, wearing a loose pair of black swimming shorts. I sigh in appreciation, and he blasts me with his smile, before diving straight in, his body stretching out, making minimal noise or splash as he slips below the surface. I float in the middle of the pool and watch the shadow of his tall body approaching me under water until he’s right in front of me, but he remains submerged.
Then I feel his palm wrap around my ankle, and I squeal as I’m yanked under the water, just catching a lungful of air before I disappear, my eyes naturally clenching shut. His lips meet mine, his arms surrounding me, and he rolls us around under the water, our skin slipping all over each other, our tongues dancing wildly.
This is nice, but I’m rubbish at holding my breath, and he must be gasping for air, having been down here a lot longer than me. I pinch him to indicate my depleting breath, and my lungs scream a thank you when we surface, my legs clenching around his waist and my arms around his shoulders. I try to grab a hold of my bearings and attempt to open my eyes, and when I do, I’m greeted by a dirty great big grin. I know he can’t touch the bottom himself, so he must me treading water frantically with my dead weight clinging to him. You would never know it, though. He looks like he’s just floating effortlessly in front of me.
I push his wet hair from his face and match his grin. ‘You closed the pool, didn’t you?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ He shifts me around to his back and starts swimming to the side. ‘It’s never busy at this time of day.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ I rest my chin on his shoulder. ‘You couldn’t stand the thought of me in a bikini and others seeing it. Admit I’m right.’ I’ve got my Lord worked out.
He reaches the edge of the pool and pulls me from his back, pushing me up against the side. ‘I love the thought of you in a bikini.’
‘But for your eyes only?’
‘I’ve told you before, Ava. I don’t share you with anyone or anything, not even their eyes,’ He slides his hands down my sides and onto my thighs. ‘Just for my touch,’ he whispers. It makes me immediately clench my thighs as he leans in and kisses me gently before scanning my face. ‘Just for my eyes.’ His finger slips into the side of my bikini bottoms, and I hold my breath as he strokes me softly. ‘Just for my pleasure, baby. I know you understand me, don’t you?’
‘I do,’ I shift in front of him and drape my arms over his shoulders.
‘Good. Kiss me.’
I dive right in and show my appreciation with a long, hot, passionate kiss that draws a low moan from each of us. His hands shift to my waist, his big palms circling me completely as he holds me tight, and we kiss for the longest time – there in the middle of the pool, just me and him, drowning in each other, consuming each other, loving each other.
Genre: Fiction, Romance
Print Length: 501 pages
Publisher: Forever
Publication date: July 2, 2013
ASIN: B00C102T2Y
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