Reading, Reviewing, Guest Authors, Giveaways and more.
….of Televenge by Pamela King Cable
21 Mya Murphy Be a Public Follower of ‘CMASH Loves to Read’
An email has been sent to the winner and has 48 hours to respond with a mailing address or another winner will be chosen. Thank you to author, Pamela King Cable, and all that entered.
Hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?
OCTOBER 24th to OCTOBER 31st, 2012
Hosted by Kathy @ I Am A Reader Not A Writer
*GIVEAWAY ENDS OCTOBER 31st AT MIDNIGHT*
DISCLAIMER / RULES
YOUR JAVA SCRIPT MAY NEED TO BE UPDATED
IF YOU AR EXPERIENCING DIFFICULTY
USING THE RAFFLECOPTER ENTRY FORM
…..of In His Stead by Judith Sanders
16 Anita Yancey Tweet About the Giveaway
43 Tony L Smoaks Be a Public Follower of ‘CMASH Loves to Read’
An email has been sent to the winners and they have 48 hours to respond with their mailing address or another winner will be chosen. Thank you to all that entered!!!
Rebecca Coleman last visited in September of 2011 so when Alissa from The Book Trib contacted me, to be part of Ms. Coleman’s latest tour, it was an automatic yes!! So without further ado, Ms. Rebecca Coleman!!
REBECCA COLEMAN
A New Yorker by birth, Rebecca Coleman grew up in the close suburbs of Washington, D.C., in an academic family. A year spent in Germany, at the age of eight, would later provide the basis for the protagonist’s background in “The Kingdom of Childhood.” She first learned about the Waldorf School movement at age 14 and quickly developed a fascination with its culture and philosophies. After studying elementary education for several years at the University of Maryland, she graduated with a degree in English, awarded with honors. She lives in suburban Maryland with her husband and their four young children.
Visit Rebecca at her website and follow her tour here.
GUEST POST
How can we as a society be more supportive of veterans?
Not long ago I clicked through a Facebook link to read the heartbreaking and deeply moving love story of Taylor Morris, a U.S. soldier rendered quadruple amputee by an IED in Afghanistan, and his girlfriend Danielle. Told in a series of photographs, the story of love and sacrifice and resilience moved me to tears, and I was thrilled to see that readers of the website The Chive had raised over $250,000 to buy Taylor his dream cabin beside a lake. The story is beautiful by any measure, but I am a hopeless softy for any story of a soldier’s homecoming. Turn on a video of a dog bounding out of the house to greet his returned master, and I’m blubbering within seconds.
The trouble with these things, and the sense of triumph and comfort they leave us with– that they’re home, that they’re bouncing back, that everything can go back to normal now– is that it’s false. Rubbing the dog’s belly isn’t the last scene in that soldier’s personal war movie; most likely, it’s somewhere in the middle. The Department of Veterans’ Affairs statistics show that between 25 and 30% of soldiers display symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and many don’t seek treatment in the first place. Of those that do, many receive ineffective or halfhearted treatment. While researching my novel Heaven Should Fall, I was determined to paint an accurate picture both of PTSD and of the VA’s typical handling of it in a soldier reluctant to admit his need for help. The result of that is Elias Olmstead, a young guy full of loves and hopes and pain he can’t articulate, who patrols his own house at night, sleeps in his sneakers, and struggles not to freak out at loud noises and throttle his sister’s kids.
The thing about PTSD is, it affects not only the soldier who suffers from it, but that soldier’s entire family. Husbands or wives welcome home a partner who can seem very unlike the loved one they sent off to war, and the resulting friction impacts the kids. A soldier’s parents, too, can feel helpless and deeply troubled to see an adult son or daughter carrying the invisible scars of battle– all the more if they encouraged or warned against it. The suicide rate among active-duty soldiers and combat veterans is climbing to an alarming level. And as community mental health services become, more and more, the victims of budget cuts, these families are left with fewer and fewer resources from which to seek help. Especially in rural areas, these facilities are often the lifeline for families who live far from a VA hospital or who– in the case of unmarried partners, for example– aren’t eligible for those benefits. To put it bluntly, those who claim to support military families, but favor candidates who want to paint every social service as a frivolous use of tax dollars, are escalating the problem. Never in our nation’s history has there been a more important time to support community-based mental health care than now.
I know that the picture I’m painting is a grim one, but positive change is within our grasp. We can support organizations like the Wounded Warrior Project and the Coming Home Project, and we can stay mindful, this election season, of how our votes will impact the resources that military families depend on to help their soldiers come home in mind as well as body. Because the feel-good stories feel best when we know there’s substance to our actions, and that we’re here for them, as long as it takes.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Alone since her mother’s death, Jill Wagner wants to eat, sleep and breathe Cade Olmstead when he bursts upon her life—golden, handsome and ambitious. Even putting college on hold feels like a minor sacrifice when she discovers she’s pregnant with Cade’s baby. But it won’t be the last sacrifice she’ll have to make.
Retreating to the Olmsteads’ New England farm seems sensible, if not ideal: Jill and Cade will regroup and welcome the baby, surrounded by Cade’s family. But the remote, ramshackle place already feels crowded. Cade’s mother tends to his ailing father, while Cade’s pious sister, her bigoted husband and their rowdy sons overrun the house. Only Cade’s brother, Elias, a combat veteran with a damaged spirit, gives Jill an ally amidst the chaos, along with a glimpse into his disturbing childhood. But his burden is heavy, and she alone cannot kindle his will to live
The tragedy of Elias is like a killing frost, withering Cade in particular, transforming his idealism into bitterness and paranoia. Taking solace in caring for her newborn son, Jill looks up to find her golden boy is gone. In Cade’s place is a desperate man willing to endanger them all in the name of vengeance…unless Jill can find a way out.
EXCERPT
“We both run, too,” I told him. “I ran track in high school, and Cade’s always training for some half marathon or another. So we go running together a lot.”
“I bet Cade tries to outrun you,” Elias said, “competitive son of a bitch that he is.”
“And you wonder why I don’t bring you home to meet my family,” Cade said to me. “You hear the stuff they say about me?”
Elias laughed low. “Just speaking the truth, bro. She’s got to learn it sometime.”
WooHoo!!! Heeeee’s baaack! If you follow me, then you know how much I enjoy Vincent Zandri’s novels. I have read every single book except one and that is waiting for me in my Kindle. And today is super special because not only is he back to talk about one of newly published books, today he kicks off his tour with Partners In Crime Tours. So please help me give a very warm welcome to author and friend, Vincent Zandri!!
VINCENT ZANDRI
Vincent Zandri is the No. 1 International Bestselling Amazon author of THE INNOCENT, GODCHILD, THE REMAINS, MOONLIGHT FALLS, CONCRETE PEARL, MOONLIGHT RISES, SCREAM CATCHER, BLUE MOONLIGHT and MURDER BY MOONLIGHT. He is also the author of the Amazon bestselling digital shorts, PATHOLOGICAL, TRUE STORIES and MOONLIGHT MAFIA. Harlan Coben has described THE INNOCENT (formerly As Catch Can) as “…gritty, fast-paced, lyrical and haunting,” while the New York Post called it “Sensational…Masterful…Brilliant!” Zandri’s list of publishers include Delacorte, Dell, StoneHouse Ink, StoneGate Ink and Thomas & Mercer. An MFA in Writing graduate of Vermont College, Zandri’s work is translated into many languages including the Dutch, Russian, and Japanese. An adventurer, foreign correspondent, and freelance photo-journalist for RT, Globalspec, IBTimes and more, he lives in Albany, New York. For more go to WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Visit Vin at his website, Facebook and Twitter.
Follow Vincent Zandri’s tour here and enter to win a copy of Concrete Pearl, Moonlight Rises and/or Blue Moonlight.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Now you see her. Now you don’t…
Captain Nick Angel has finally made a separate peace with the war in Afghanistan. Since having been ordered to bomb a Tajik village which resulted in the death of a little boy of no more than two, he’s been suffering from temporary bouts of blindness. Knowing the he needs time to rest and recover from his post traumatic stress, the US Army decides to send him to Venice along with his fiancee, the artist, Grace Blunt. Together they try and recapture their former life together. But when Grace suddenly goes missing, Nick not only finds himself suddenly alone and sightless in the ancient city of water, but also the number one suspect in her disappearance.
A novel that projects Hitchcockian suspense onto a backdrop of love and war, The Disappearance of Grace is a rich, literary thriller of fear, loss, love, and revenge. From the war in the Afghan mountains to the canals of romantic Venice, this is a story that proves 20/20 eyesight might not always be so perfect and seeing is not always believing.
See my review here.
Read an excerpt:
“Whoa, slow down, chief,” Grace giggles.
“Eating, smiling, making love to me. What’s next? Writing?”
“Don’t press your luck, Gracie,” I say. “The sea change can occur at any moment. Just don’t start asking me to identify engagement rings.”
She laughs genuinely and I listen to the sounds of her taking a bite out of her sandwich. But then she goes quiet again. Too quiet, as if she’s stopped breathing altogether.
“There’s someone staring at us,” she says under her breath.
“Man or woman?” I say, trying to position my gaze directly across the table at her, but making out nothing more than her black silhouette framed against the brightness of the sun. Later on, when the sun goes down, the image of her will be entirely black. Like the blackness of the Afghan Tajik country when the fires are put out and you lie very still inside your tent without the benefit of electronic night vision, and you feel the beating of your never- still heart and you pray for morning.
“Man,” she whispers.
“What’s he look like?”
“It’s him again. The man in the overcoat who was staring at us yesterday.”
A start in my heart. I put my fork down inside my bowl. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. I think. He’s wearing sunglasses this time. So,. I think it’s him.”
“What’s he look like?”
“He’s a thin man. Not tall. Not short. He’s got a dark complexion.”
“Black?”
“No. More like Asian or Middle Eastern. He’s wearing sunglasses and that same brown overcoat and a scarf. His hair is black and cut close to his scalp. His beard is very trim and cropped close to his face.” She exhales. I hear her take a quick, nervous sip of her wine. “He keeps staring at us. At me. Just like yesterday, Nick.”
“How do you know he’s staring at you? It could be something behind you, Grace. We’re in Venice. Lots going on behind you. Lots to see.”
She’s stirring in her chair. Agitated.
“Because I can feel him. His eyes…I. Feel. His. Eyes.”
I wipe my mouth clean with the cloth napkin. I do something entirely silly. I turn around in my chair to get a look at the man. As if I have the ability to see him right now, which I most definitely do not.
“What are you doing?” Grace poses, the anxiety in her voice growing more intense with each passing second.
“Trying to get a look at him.”
“You’re joking, Nick.”
I turn back, try and focus on her.
“You think?”
We sit silent.
Once more I am helpless and impotent.
“I’m sorry,” she says after a time. “I’m not trying to insult you. This isn’t like yesterday with the ring. But this man is at the same café we’re at two days in a row? This is really starting to creep me out, babe.”
My pulse begins to pump inside my head. Not rapid, but just enough for me to notice. Two steady drum beats against my temples. I find myself wanting to swallow, but my mouth has gone dry. I take a sip of beer thinking it will help.
“He’s coming towards us, Nick. I don’t like it.”
Heart beat picks up. I feel it pounding inside my head and my chest.
“Are you sure he’s coming towards us, Grace?” I’m trying not to raise my voice, but it’s next to impossible.
“He’s looking right at me. His hands are stuffed in the pockets of his overcoat. And he’s coming.”
I feel and hear Grace pulling away from the table. She’s standing. That’s when the smell of incense sweeps over me. A rich, organic, incense-like smell.
There comes the sound of Grace standing. Abruptly standing. I hear her metal chair push out. I hear the sound of her boot heels on the cobbles. I hear the chair legs scraping against the stone slate. I hear the sound of her wine glass spilling.
“Grace, for God’s sakes, be careful.”
But she doesn’t respond to me. Or is it possible her voice is drowned out by what sounds like a tour group passing by the table? A tour group of Japanese speaking people. But once they pass, there is nothing. No sound at all other than the boats on the basin and the constant murmur of the thousands of tourists that fill this ancient square.
“Grace,” I say. “Grace. Stop it. This isn’t funny. Grace.”
But there’s still no response.
The smell of incense is gone now.
I make out the gulls flying over the tables, the birds shooting in from the basin to pick up scraps of food and then, like thieves in the night, shooting back out over the water. I can hear and feel the sound-wave driven music that reverberates against the stone cathedral.
“Grace,” I repeat, voice louder now. “Grace. Grace…Grace!”
I’m getting no response.
It’s like she’s gone. Vanished. But how can she be gone? She was just sitting here with me. She was sitting directly across from me, eating a sandwich and drinking a glass of wine. She was talking with me.
The waiter approaches.
“The signora is not liking her food?” he questions.
I reach out across the table. In the place where she was sitting. She is definitely not there.
“Is there a toilet close by?” I pose. “Did you see my fiancée leave the table and go to the toilet?”
The waiter pauses for a moment.
“I am sorry. But I did not. I was inside the café.”
“Then maybe somebody else saw her. Maybe you can ask them.”
“Signor, there are many tables in this café and they are all filled with people. And there are many people who walk amongst the tables who can block their view. I am looking at them. No one seems to be concerned about anything. Sometimes there are so many people here, it is easy to get lost. Perhaps she just went to the toilet like you just suggested, and she got lost amongst the people. I will come back in moment and make sure all is well.”
I listen to the waiter leaving, his footsteps fading against the slate.
Grace didn’t say anything about going to the toilet or anywhere else. Grace was frightened. She was frightened of a man who was staring at her. A man with sunglasses on and a cropped beard and a long brown overcoat. He was the man from yesterday. The man with black eyes. He was approaching us, this man. He came to our table and he smelled strongly of incense. He came to our table. There was a slight commotion, the spilling of a glass, the knocking over of a chair, and then Grace was gone.
I sit and stare at nothing. My heart is pounding so fast I think it will cease at any moment. What I have in the place of vision is a blank wall of blurry illumination no longer filled with the silhouette of my Grace.
I push out my chair. Stand. My legs knock into the table and my glass spills along with Grace’s.
I cup my hands around my mouth.
“Grace!” I shout. “Grace! Grace!”
The people who surround me all grow quiet as I scream over them.
The waiter comes running back over.
“Please, please,” he says to me, taking me by the arm. “Please come with me.”
He begins leading me through the throng of tables and people. He is what I have now in the place of Grace. He is my sight.
“She’s gone, isn’t she?” I beg. “Did you check the toilets?”
“We checked the toilets. They are empty. I am sorry. I am sure there is an explanation.”
“Grace is gone!” I shout. “A man took her away. How could no one have seen it?”
“You’re frightening the patrons, signor. Please just come with me and we will try and find her.”
“She’s gone,” I repeat. “Don’t you understand me? My. Grace. Is. Gone.”
Purchase links: AMAZON link B&N link
The Disappearance of Grace by Vincent Zandri
Published by: StoneHouse Ink
Publication Date: September 11, 2012
ASIN: B0099C5UFU
Pages: 271
Review Copy from: Author
Edition: Kindle
My Rating: 5
Synopsis:
Now you see her. Now you don’t…
Captain Nick Angel has finally made a separate peace with the war in Afghanistan. Since having been ordered to bomb a Tajik village which resulted in the death of a little boy of no more than two, he’s been suffering from temporary bouts of blindness. Knowing the he needs time to rest and recover from his post traumatic stress, the US Army decides to send him to Venice along with his fiancee, the artist, Grace Blunt. Together they try and recapture their former life together. But when Grace suddenly goes missing, Nick not only finds himself suddenly alone and sightless in the ancient city of water, but also the number one suspect in her disappearance.
A novel that projects Hitchcockian suspense onto a backdrop of love and war, The Disappearance of Grace is a rich, literary thriller of fear, loss, love, and revenge. From the war in the Afghan mountains to the canals of romantic Venice, this is a story that proves 20/20 eyesight might not always be so perfect and seeing is not always believing.
Hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading
Today’s question:
Do you ever get crushes on fictional characters? Name one (or a few), and tell what you liked…
My response:
I’ll admit….I sure do. And with each book I pick up by one particular author, I know I will “swoon” with his male characters. What author am I speaking of? Michael Baron!! I was introduced to this author 3 years ago, and every book he has written since, I have read. His characters are kind, loving, compassionate, romantic, sensitive, endearing and the list goes on. How could a female not be enamored by those qualities? If you have never read a Michael Baron book, then it’s time. I guarantee you will be swept off your feet!!!! Here are just a few of his books that I highly recommend: Leaves, Spinning, A Winter Discovery, When You Went Away, The Journey Home.
October is being hosted by Parchment Girl
Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia of A girl and her books and is now on tour.
According to Marcia, “Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week. Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.”
Click on title for synopsis via IndieBound. (I am an IndieBound Affiliate)
Sunday: Falling In Love by Stephen Bradlee from Author
Monday: Extraordinary Rendition by Paul Batista from BlueDot Literary
Monday: Blackberry Summer by RaeAnne Thayer from The TBR Pile-Won from BlogFest
Monday: Woodrose Mountain by RaeAnne Thayne from The TBR Pile-Won from BlogFest
