Sunday, August 12, 2012

'Touched by Death' Book Feature and Giveaway


Touched by Death

Author: Dale Mayer
Publisher: Valley Publishing
Length: 90,000 words
Genre: Romance
Sub-Genre Romantic Suspense
Sub-Categories: Mystery/Thriller
Heat Level: Steamy (Hot sex scenes/language, but not explicit.)

Available at Amazon: Kindle | Paperback

Blurb:

Death had touched anthropologist Jade Hansen in Haiti once before, costing her an unborn child and perhaps her very sanity. A year later, determined to face her own issues, she returns to Haiti with a mortuary team to recover the bodies of an American family from a mass grave.

Visiting his brother after the quake, independent contractor Dane Carter puts his life on hold to help the  sleepy town of Jacmel rebuild. But he finds it hard to like his brother's pregnant wife or her family. He wants to go home, until he meets Jade - and realizes what's missing in his own life.

When the mortuary team begins work, it's as if malevolence has been released from the earth. Instead of laying her ghosts to rest, Jade finds herself confronting death and terror again. And the man who  unexpectedly awakens her heart - is right in the middle of it all.
Excerpt:
The women headed to the Iron Market and the few shops open along the way. The elegant mansions and townhomes spoke of days gone by. Once glorious in their regal bearing and bright colors, these buildings had taken a major knock from Mother Nature. Still, even with the damage from the earthquake, Jacmel was a tourist destination like no other. At least here, there were obvious revitalization attempts happening to get the city back on its feet.

The afternoon zipped by at a rapid pace – full of shopping, laughter and fun as the women ran from shop to shop and stall to stall buying a few items to make their job a little brighter and more comfortable. Jade was delighted to find several brightly colored t-shirts and cotton pants in a beige-khaki color. They would withstand a lot of wear and tear. At one brightly festooned stall, she found several hair clips big enough to hold her heavy blond hair off her neck.

If she'd had a little longer to prepare and pack, she'd have gotten a haircut. As it was, the clips would do for now. She could always get it cut here if she couldn't stand the heat. Meg's short curls looked perfect. And Susan's fine black bob that stopped at her chin also looked comfortable.

"Now that has to feel better." Meg patted Jade's hair clip. "Nice. Now I almost wish I had long hair myself. Almost." She grinned and picked up several clips. "I bet my sister would love a couple."

"Later, when it's time to go home. Too much to pack this early."

"You're right." Meg put it back with a sigh. "Too bad though."

As they headed back to the SUV Susan stopped at another brightly colored stall, one festooned with  odd-looking handmade dolls. An old short and squat women – wearing so many necklaces, they almost obliterated the sight of her red blouse underneath – worked at the booth. The woman's black gaze latched onto Jade and never let go.

Jade moved to the other side of Susan in an effort to get away from that piercing stare. And came too close to the weird-looking straw and cloth dolls. She noticed the papier-mâché looking ones painted in black with weird markings…and many other items she couldn't begin to recognize. "What are these things?"

"Vodou paraphernalia."

Jade shuddered and took several steps back. "Not for me, thanks."

Susan shook her head vigorously. "No. You don't get it. This stuff is for good luck. Used to ward off bad spirits."

With a second shudder, Jade moved several steps back, shaking her hands in front of her. "I still don't want one."

Susan grinned and reached to pluck her choice off the top of the stall. "Well I do. Just what we need for the grave work."

The transaction was done in silence. The old woman accepting the money never took her eyes off Jade. Unsettled, Jade did everything to avoid her. She wished Susan would hurry.

Finally they were done. Jade turned to leave when the old women moved off her stool so quickly, Jade never would have believed it possible if she hadn't seen it herself. Before Jade could back away the old woman grabbed her by the arm.

"Danger stalks you. You see it but you don't understand it. Careful. Or you will join those that have gone before." She dropped Jade's arm and returned to her stool beside her cart.

Jade froze. So shocked and horrified by the crone's touch, she hardly understood what the old woman said.

Meg grabbed her arm. "Come on," she hissed. "Forget about her. Let's get back to the SUV."

Susan snagged her other arm so the three walked back linked together.

"That was too weird," Meg said. "I'm glad you got a doll, Susan. Good luck is just what we need."
Reviews from other readers:

This book had so many twists and turns and I can honestly say that the ending truly surprised me! I was not expecting it to end the way it did so kudos to Ms. Mayer for keeping the suspense up until the ending. There are mentions of voodoo in the story but because this is Haiti, how can there not be? However, these do not take over the story and the evil in this story is purely human. This was a great mystery entwined with a good love story and just enjoyable all the way around. (Kmoaton)

Another well written, suspenseful book that's come to be expected, by Dale Mayer. Her characters come alive and the story literally jumps off the pages. A mix of devastation from the earthquake in Haiti to painting a picture of the beauty that was untouched by it with a smattering of Haitian spiritual beliefs thrown in. Highly recommend. (Janet Fedor)

Dale Mayer has done it again. She's written an amazing, page-turning book that's unlike any other book I've read. I can't imagine any other author setting a book in Haiti after a devastating earthquake - and pulling it off so brilliantly. I cared about Jade and Dane. They felt like real people in trouble. I admired them and wanted them to be safe and happy.

I'm good at guessing endings, but this book kept me in suspense up to the end. I already want to read Mayer's next book! (E.S. Rose)

About the Author:

Dale Mayer is a prolific multi-published writer. She's best known for Tuesday's Child, her romantic suspense novel that was one of the final four in the Seek, Kensington Brava/Romantic Times contest this last year. Besides her romantic suspense/thrillers, Dale also writes paranormal romance and crossover young
adult books in several different genres. To go with her fiction, she also writes nonfiction in many different fields with books available on resume writing, companion gardening and the US mortgage system. She has recently published her Career Essentials Series . All her books are available in print format as well.

To find out more about Dale and her books, visit her at http://www.dalemayer.com. Or connect with her online with Twitter at www.twitter.com/dalemayer and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/dalemayer.author.

BOOKS BY DALE MAYER:

Psychic Vision Series
Tuesday's Child
Hide'n Go Seek
Maddy's Floor

Single Title Romantic Suspense/Thrillers
Touched by Death – out now!

Novellas
It's a Dog's Life- romantic comedy

Young Adult Books
Dangerous Designs – Book I
Deadly Designs – Book 2 – out soon!
Vampire in Denial – Book I of Blood Ties
Vampire in Distress – Book 2 out soon!
Gem Stone Mystery Series- out soon!
In Cassie's Corner- soon

Non-Fiction Books
Career Essentials: The Resume
Career Essentials: The Cover Letter
Career Essentials: The Interview
Career Essentials: 3 in 1
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Saturday, August 11, 2012

'Curtain Call: A Death Metal Novel' by Nathan Squiers Promo and Playlist

Curtain Call: A Death Metal Novel by Nathan Squiers

Book Blurb:
A promising career in the music industry was on the horizon for up-and-coming heavy metal band, Bloodtones. Even for their non-human members, this is the opportunity of a lifetime!

Yes, life was good… until it took a hellish turn.

Literally!

After a bizarre encounter, Bloodtones' lead-singer Bekka finds herself sharing her body with a slew of terrified beings and in mortal danger from wraithlike forces capable of superhuman feats.

When fans can be otherworldly assassins and every mood-swing can end in an exploding amp, Bloodtones' rock-solid future is rapidly crumbling before their very eyes. What hope do the five have against a force that neither their magic or paranormal members can begin to explain? With no choice but to fight, Bekka and her band-mates soon find themselves struggling for not only their music…

… but their very lives.




ULTIMATE DEATH METAL PLAYLIST:

~HIM "Wings of a Butterfly"
~Jay Gordon "Slept So Long"
~Mushroomhead "Sun Doesn't Rise"
~Disturbed "The Night"
~Sixx AM "This is Gonna Hurt"
~Nightwish "Bye Bye Beautiful"
~Disturbed "The Animal"
~Drowning Pool "37 Stitches"
~Black Veil Bride "Fallen Angels"
~Lukas Rossi "Headspin"
~Metallica "Until it Sleeps"
~Sick Puppies "You're Going Down"
~Tomandandy "AxeMan"
~Fireflight "Desperate"
~Entombed "Left Hand Path"
~Nightwish "Amaranth"

Biography


Born in Massachusetts in 1986, Nathan Squiers (The Literary Dark Prince) grew up in Andover, where his affinity for story-telling flourished due to a love of books and movies as well as an overactive imagination. At the age of 13, Nathan and his mother moved to Upstate New York to be closer to their family.

After surviving public school, where he spent most of his days locked away in the AV room watching old 80s movies on Laserdisc and planning out his next video project, Nathan began a shaky college career. A love of weaving tales and telling stories was motivation enough to pursue an education in English, and, as luck would have it, a series of phenomenal professors were available to get him pointed in the right direction. It was in his first years of college that Nathan began to actively pursue a writing career, starting his first literary journey with a piece that would later become "Noir", the first book of the Crimson Shadow series.

Like any good story, a chaotic turn of events brought Nathan from the very brink of insanity and loneliness to the warm, comforting embrace of Megan, his best friend, lover, kindred spirit, and--more often than not--personal handler. It was with Megan at his side that Nathan was able to continue his writing (sometimes solely motivated by the young lady's threats of dismemberment if he tried to stop). With Megan's help, Nathan was able to see Death Metal, his fourth manuscript, through the publication process.

Nearly ten years later, The Literary Dark Prince continues to invent stories and put them into a literary sequence that he hopes will be somehow decipherable by other readers. As a lover of all things creative, he works in both novels, novellas, short stories, as well as comic book scripts (just don't ask him to draw something if you don't like stick figures and poorly-executed shapes).

If he's not submerged in the realm of fiction or burning out his retinas with horror movie marathons, Nathan is planning/getting a new piercing/tattoo or enjoying life with his lovely fiancé.
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Friday, August 10, 2012

'The Lust Garden' Book Tour - Excerpt


The Lust Garden

With her perfectly tousled blonde hair and pink, pouty lips, Gianna Salvani is the girl everyone loves to hate. She has it all – fame, fortuneand unrivaled beauty. But behind the seductive smile is an insecure girl who still grieves for the father she lost years ago. With a controversial new film in the can, and the release of her debut album looming, Gianna ispoised to take center stage. But when a shocking secret leaves her exposed, her fame will bring her face-to-face with a nightmare she never saw coming. Because lurking in the shadow of her spotlight is an obsessed killer with plans of his own for Gianna.

Ignited by his first conquest, Gianna’s greatest admirer begins a brutal hunt to claim her as the ultimate trophy in a string of look-alike murders. Motivated by envy, he forces himself into her seemingly untainted world and threatens to ruin everything she’s built by revealing a hidden tie that binds them. And if you knew his secret, you’d want to kill her too.

Read an excerpt:
Rachyl Salinger, a beautiful model with an affinity for nose candy, makes her debut on the catwalk…

Rachyl staggered off to the side of the velvet curtain that cloaked the runway. She peered out to the eager crowd. The house was packed. Not an empty seat. She felt her adrenaline begin to surge through her veins. She wanted this crowd as much as they wanted her. And she was hungry.

“It’s time,” Jason announced to the metropolis of people backstage.

“Rachyl, you’re a go in 5-4-3…”

Seconds after he uttered the last number, the red curtain lifted and exposed Rachyl Salinger to the starving crowd. Her applauding minions instantly jumped to their feet and screamed for her to walk. She stood at the beginning of the runway for a moment basking in their adoration. The beat of the music began to thump behind her. Her signature song was playing over the crowd. Lords of Acid’s “The Most Wonderful Girl.”

With a single step forward, she stalked the runway setting off an explosion of light bulbs. Rachyl was on fire and blazing bright for all to see. Giving them what they wanted, she shook her hair wildly and opened her mouth to scream for them. The crowd chanted her name over and over again in unison.

Rachyl was laughing, eating it up.

These extras worship me.
Kindle / Paperback


Billy Jolie graduated from the University of South Florida with a degree in Mass Communications. He lives in the Tampa Bay area.
Follow him on Facebook / Twitter / Blog / Goodreads

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Thursday, August 9, 2012

'Dark Genesis' Book Tour - Extended Excerpt


Dark Genesis

Author: A. D. Koboah

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Format: eBook

Life for a female slave is one of hardship and unspeakable sorrow, something Luna knows only too well. But not even she could have foreseen the terror that would befall her one sultry Mississippi evening in the summer of 1807.

On her way back from a visit to see the African woman, a witch who has the herbs Luna needs to rid her of her abusive master’s child, she attracts the attention of a deadly being that lusts for blood. Forcibly removed from everything she knows by this tormented otherworldly creature, she is sure she will be dead by sunrise.

Dark Genesis is a love story set against the savage world of slavery in which a young woman who has been dehumanised by its horrors finds the courage to love, and in doing so, reclaims her humanity.

Read the first chapter:
My name is Luna and my tale begins on a dry summer evening in 1807.

I was walking quickly along a dusty country road, my shoes stirring up a small cloud of dust that turned the hem of my faded violet dress a muddy brown. The trail of dust I left in my wake soon settled. But the pressing need that had me make this two-hour journey in beaten shoes and a broken spirit, in the midst of a particularly merciless Mississippi summer, would not be settled as easily. Wiping the sweat from my brow and waving away the flying insects that droned lazily near my face, I wished for some respite from the relentless heat but found none. Although the sun hung low in the topaz blue sky, it felt as if I were walking through warm soup and it was likely to stay like this long after the sun went down.

I would have found some relief from the pitiless sun if I had chosen to walk through the woods that rose up on either side of the road like a green and brown wall. But green woody spaces such as those have been a deep source of fear for me since I was a child and I imagined that they would continue to be so long past what I guessed was my twenty-second or twenty-third year on this earth. So I clutched my lantern and small cloth bundle and walked on in the heat, listening to the birdcalls punctuate the otherwise still air.

I was lucky to be able to make this journey during the summer months as the previous two trips had been made in the dead of winter when night gathered up the day long before I could finish serving the family’s supper and slip away, leaving the other house slaves to do my share of work and conceal my absence. That small mercy meant that I didn’t have to walk alone in the dark, afraid to light my lamp in case the solitary glow brought unwanted attention my way, or have to dive into the trees every time the sound of a horse’s hooves disturbed the sweet melody of the crickets. It also meant that when I turned the corner and saw the woodland give way to cotton fields, marking the beginning of the Marshall plantation, there was still roughly two hours of daylight left, which meant I would be able to finish my business and be back before dark, hopefully before I was missed by my hawk-eyed mistress.

I stopped for a second to gaze at the rows of cotton up ahead. I have always thought that there was something heavenly about cotton fields, which looked like row upon row of fleecy white clouds caught up in brown nets. But I’m sure that the brown-skinned figures bent double between those rows would have disagreed. For them, there was nothing even remotely celestial about the cotton fields in which they had been toiling since sunrise. And they were likely to still be working in them when the sun set. Even from this distance I could see that most of them were wretchedly thin, their few flimsy items of clothing in tatters. And although I wasn’t close enough to see their faces, I was sure that they all wore uniform expressions of misery and fatigue.

I left that unhappy sight and ducked into the trees on my left, a necessary shortcut to the slave quarters. Although many slaves have used this shortcut on their way to see the African woman, I’m sure I’m the only one who ran all the way through the trees looking back over my shoulder even though I knew I wasn’t being followed. Only when I saw a flash of white through the trees did I slow down so my breathing could return to normal by the time I exited the screen of trees.

The slave quarters were little white cabins made of wood, which lay in two long rows some distance from the Master’s mansion. Only a few children were around at this hour, some of whom recognised me and stopped what they were doing to stare with a quiet reverence that made me uncomfortable. It was the same reverence I had received from the grownups the last two times I had come here under the cover of darkness and they had not only stopped what they were doing to watch me pass by, but nodded or offered some sort of greeting, which I returned before hurrying on by. I didn’t have to endure that kind of scrutiny today, but I still hurried down to the lone cabin at the back of the clearing, which was nestled under the shadow of the trees some distance away from the rest of the slave quarters.

Many slaves came to visit Mama Akosua for her medicines, and her skills were known far and wide. It was also rumoured that she dealt in more than just herbs and was actually a witch. Whether that was true or not, she was feared by many, even some of the whites, and few dared incur her wrath.

As I got nearer to the cabin, I saw that the door had been left open and a light was burning inside even though the sun had yet to go down. I approached gingerly. Already feeling the unease that always possessed me in the presence of the African woman, I walked up to the door, and stopped.

“Mama Akosua.”

There was a short spell of silence and then her voice floated out to me.

“I have been expecting you.” The voice was low and dry like the sound of rustling leaves.

She probably said that every time someone came to her door, no doubt to help foster the belief that she was a powerful all-seeing, all-knowing witch. But the words still sent icy fingers trailing down my spine and I swallowed before taking her words as permission to enter.

The cabin, which consisted of only one room, was rich with the slightly bitter, but not unpleasant, smell of dried herbs. Most of the room was taken up by a long wooden table, which held bottles, bowls and an assortment of other instruments that were used to prepare her concoctions. Every wall in the room was lined with shelves holding bottles, jars and baskets of fresh and dried herbs. The only evidence that someone lived in the cabin was the pallet in the corner. This was the most furniture I had seen in any slave cabin, but as her Master profited from the sale of her herbs, it was in his interest to make sure she had everything she needed. There was another smaller table in the centre of the room and that is where she sat, peering at me by the light of an oil lamp.

She was a small lithe woman with delicate features like mine. Her head was cleanly shaven and she would have been considered beautiful were it not for the scars, rows of lines about an inch long, marking her forehead and cheeks. It was rumoured that those scars had been self-inflicted when she was first brought to America as a slave. Some people whispered that she had done it to honour the customs of her people, others, that the journey, the horrors of the middle passage, had driven her to scar her face in madness and despair. Although I would never dare to ask her, I didn’t believe she had been driven insane. The shrewd dark eyes that met mine belonged to a strong, sharp mind and I doubted that anything could, or ever would, be able to break it.

“Evening, Mama Akosua,” I said as I walked into the circle of light.

There was still daylight outside but it didn’t seem to reach the small window in Mama Akosua’s cabin and so it was always dark in here no matter what the time of day.

She gestured to the chair opposite hers, her eyes never leaving my face. I moved to the chair and when I sat down, she pushed a small cup toward me.

“Drink,” she said.

I picked up the cup and sipped the cool concoction, which tasted vaguely of mint leaves. Whatever it was, it seemed to have an immediate effect because I no longer felt as hot and the fatigue, which had been pulling on me like lead weights, seemed to evaporate.

Feeling slightly better, I was able to meet the force of her gaze fully. She seemed to have aged a great deal since I last saw her, nearly four years ago. The lines around her eyes and the ones running from her nose to the corners of her mouth had deepened and although she was not yet forty years old, she looked much older.

She studied me for a few moments and a soft sigh escaped her when she finally shifted her gaze away from my face.

“It is as I feared,” she said and stood up, wincing from the small movement.

“You hurt?”

“It is a small price to pay,” she mumbled, more to herself it seemed.

She reached into a basket on one of the shelves and pulled out a small black cloth bundle. Moving back to the table she placed the bundle before her and when she sat down again she closed her eyes for a few seconds. She was clearly in a lot of pain.

“I have prepared what you need,” she said pulling open the cloth bundle to reveal six paper sachets of herbs.

There was no need for her to ask me why I was here. I would only risk making this dangerous journey for one reason.

“Take this tonight.” She pointed to the larger of the bundles. “The rest is to be taken for five nights after, to stop the bleeding.”

She tied up the bundle and pushed it across the table toward me.

“Thank you, Mama Akosua.”

“Is it the son this time?”

I looked up and met her intimidating gaze, but on this occasion, I couldn’t hold it. She knew how much these things shamed me yet it didn’t stop her from asking about them. When I answered, my voice was barely a whisper.

“Yes.”

“How long?”

“He... he be at my cabin near about three times a week now since Easter.”

“He is worse than his father, no?” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement.

“Yes.”

I fought back tears as an image came to me from a few weeks before. I was standing in my tiny cabin and Master John was behind me gazing at our reflections in a small handheld mirror. I don’t know if making me look at myself was one of the many ways he had of tormenting me or if he really was oblivious to the fact that I despised my face. Either way, he would make me stare at my piercing dark brown eyes framed by long sooty eyelashes, deep mahogany skin, small delicate features and large sensuous lips. My springy, unruly hair was pulled away from my face, something he insisted on, as my hair was the one thing a man like him could find no beauty in. It was always the same ordeal with the mirror whenever he came to my cabin. And I honestly don’t know which face I hated more, that of the blond-haired, blue-eyed man I had come to despise even more than his old, decrepit father, or my own. The face he was enamoured with. He eventually pulled the mirror out of my hand, and placing it on the bed, held his arms out.

“Dance with me,” he had said in a soft, silky voice.

I remained where I was, my face a blank mask but rage no doubt burning behind my eyes. I may not have had a say over his nocturnal visits, but I would not play these little games or pretend that I wanted him in my wretched little cabin.

Fast, so fast that I didn’t have time to protect myself, he raised his hand and slapped me, sending me crashing to the floor. Pain bloomed along my temple and the left side of my face. I had also bitten my lip when I hit my head. His foot came down on my neck and I felt the dirt on the sole of his boot rubbing into my skin as he pressed down, cutting off my air supply. I struggled in vain to breathe and was close to losing consciousness when he slowly removed his foot and hauled me back onto my feet as if he were picking up a sack of potatoes. Then he held out his arms again, that smile, which never seemed to leave his face, swimming before my eyes as I struggled to clear my vision.

I was bristling with anger and yet fear won out because he could do anything he wanted to me and there was nothing I would be able to do to stop him. No one I could go to for protection. I had been born and bred purely for men like him, not only to do with as they pleased, but to increase their riches by breeding more slaves for them to own.

“Dance with me,” he said again.

Tasting blood in my mouth, I did as I was ordered to do.

“Massa Henry used to please hisself and leave,” I told Mama Akosua. “But Massa John... he like to play.”

I sensed rather than saw her rage.

I had led a relatively painless existence, for a slave, up until around the age of eight or nine when Master Henry had sent me on an errand to one of the neighbouring farms, an errand which would take me through the woods. I had run eagerly out of the house, hardly believing the good fortune that meant I could spend most of the morning walking through the woods instead of working. And it was the perfect day for a long walk, a beautiful spring day. The air was crisp and cool and the sun filtering through the fresh green leaves created patches of golden haze for me to walk through. I skipped along carefree and untouched at that time by the burdens of a female slave, deviating from my path only once to chase a squirrel, losing it moments later when it darted up a tree and out of sight.

It wasn’t long before I came to a stream winding its way through the trees directly in my path and saw Master Henry on his horse. I froze straight away but wasn’t immediately frightened as it seemed his face lit up with the kind of excitement you would expect to see on the face of a man on a long quest for buried treasure at the moment he finally finds it.

“Massa Henry!” I cried, dropping the parcel he had given me to deliver. I stooped to pick it up and when I straightened, he had already dismounted and was walking quickly toward me.

Master Henry, who was in his fifties, was tall and thin, had brown hair that was peppered with grey, a beak of a nose and thin, pink lips. I felt immediately uneasy about being on my own with him so far from the house, especially since it seemed as if he had gone to the trouble of saddling up his horse and riding out of the plantation with the sole intention of overtaking me.

But I tried to allay my fears by telling myself that he had never actually given me reason to fear him. The only unnerving thing about him was that he had a habit of turning up wherever I was working and would watch me intently for far too long as if he were looking to find fault with my work. He had never actually reprimanded me for anything, but something about his manner, his long wrinkled neck, bony elbows and knees, reminded me of a vulture waiting patiently. Mary, the cook, seemed uneasy about his apparent interest in my work. Perhaps she was worried that if he found fault with anything I did it would be blamed on her. So whenever Master Henry was at home she was always beside me, helping me with my chores even though I was more than capable of doing them on my own, a light sheen of anger marking her every action, the quick furtive glances she cast in Master Henry’s direction always fearful. Sometimes she would find an excuse to call me away if Master Henry made his way into whatever room I was in. I noticed that the other house slaves did the same.

I was too young at that time to know why his greedy eyes had become my shadow or why he showed such an overt interest in everything I did. I was also too young to understand the acid rage I saw in his young wife Mistress Emily’s eyes whenever she saw him watching me, or why she had tried on more than one occasion to send me to work in the fields. And the other slaves obviously thought it was kinder not to explain it to me.

So when I saw him waiting for me that day, I knew I was in a lot of trouble but I didn’t know what I had done.

When he got to me I saw a feverish light in his eyes as they moved over my tiny body. It was as if he couldn’t see or hear anything but me. Then his hand shot out abruptly and he pushed me to the ground. When he began to wrestle with his belt I tried to crawl away, knowing now that something awful was about to happen. But he was already on top of me, ripping my dress off whilst he moaned and reached for my chest to paw at what had not yet begun to form there. The pain had been horrific and my screams seemed to heighten his pleasure as he rode me as if I were the stallion he had obviously ridden furiously in order to catch me here alone in the woods. I lost consciousness at some point, and when I came to it was to the sight of him pulling up his trousers. He had mounted his horse and then turned to look at me with what I now know to be lust and it was clear that he was considering getting off his horse to repeat what he had done. Thankfully he gently urged his horse on through the trees to make his way back to the road.

Once he was gone I rolled onto my side and sobbed. I didn’t fully understand what had happened, but I knew it was something to be ashamed of and that I couldn’t go back to the house and face Mary. There was a faintly metallic smell mingling with that of the cold dry earth and I realised that it was the smell of my own blood, which was seeping through my legs. I tried to cover myself but my dress was torn in two so I wrapped my arms around what was left of the garment and lay there crying.

After a while, when the sun had reached the highest point in the sky, the sound of a twig snapping under the weight of a person’s foot told me I was no longer alone. I sat up with a start to see one of the slaves, Jupiter, standing about three metres away from me. He was a tall, handsome African of around eighteen years old and had coal black skin and big beautiful brown eyes.  

Author Bio

A.D. Koboah was born in London and completed an English Literature degree in 2000. Her first novel, Dark Genesis, was inspired by the concept of dehumanisation and the impact it can have on the psyche. She is currently working on a screenplay and will begin the sequel to Dark Genesis shortly.

Links

Website: http://www.adkoboah.co.uk/

Amazon: http://amzn.to/QH1Y4i

Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dark-Genesis-Darkling-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B007NI8GUS/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1332433043&sr=1-7

Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/141566

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5807160.A_D_Koboah
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'The Boss and Her Billionaire' Book Barrage and Giveaway



Title: The Boss and Her Billionaire

Author: Michele de Winton

Publisher: Entangled Publishing

Length: 60,000 words

Genre: Romance

Sub-Genre: Contemporary

Sub-Categories: Adventure, Comedy, Holiday romance

Heat Level: Sizzling (Highly explicit sex scenes/language)

AVAILABLE AT:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

BLURB:

Cruise director Michaela Western has everything she wants—everything except a sex life. But there are no secrets on cruise ships. She risked her job once for a dalliance with the Captain, and won’t do it again for a few minutes of toe-curling pleasure. Until a devilishly handsome new staffer with a body made for sin tempts her to walk on the wild side...

Investment billionaire Dylan Johns always gets what he wants. He is used to giving orders—not taking them—until he’s forced to go on hiatus from his investment company. To bide his time and carry out an old dream, he takes a job on a cruise ship—and ends up taking orders from his gorgeous, but uptight, new boss. He is determined to loosen her up with a fun onboard romance, but their no-strings fling turns serious and Dylan is forced to confess his lies.

When the affair threatens to shatter Michaela’s own career dreams, she finds herself caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.

EXCERPT #1:

“Okay then, bandmaster. Take us away,” George called and sat back in his seat.

The band started up, a soaring number with orchestral strings and a fabulous cello part played on the bandmaster’s keyboard. Her heart was swept up with the incredible music to a point somewhere close to the center of the high-arched theater ceiling. Her head swayed, and she wanted nothing more than to be pulled up into someone’s arms and swung around the stage. Someone with a broad chest at the perfect height for her to rest her head on. Someone just like Dylan Johns.

Stop it. You’re working.

The stage began to brighten, and in among the props Michaela discerned the smallest amount of movement. “Oh,” she gasped. Two statues were actually people, painted white and now moving through the set.

“You like?” George’s grin flashed brightly even in the dimmed light of the audience. “That Dylan makes a better statue than anything made of stone,” he whispered.

EXCERPT #2:

“The bastard,” Felicity hissed. “Saying that a woman couldn’t do your job. As if he would do any better—he needs a staff of ten to make sure he doesn’t forget anything.”

Michaela smiled. Oh, it was good to smile.

“And the captain said it’s Dylan who’s been telling tall tales? The bloody cheek! I’ll have that man on toast.”

“We did sort of...” Michaela hesitated, but there was nothing to lose now. “Dylan and I... We...”

“You fox!” Felicity’s delight was immediate. “Was he scrumptious?”

“Oh, God!” Michaela’s heart dropped again at the thought of the gossip that was even now whirling around the ship. “Everyone’s been saying I seduced him. That I used my position to take advantage.”

“And I bet it was him that snared you, wasn’t it? The toad, trying to look squeaky clean.” Felicity switched from triumphant sex-gossip to compassionate friend in a heartbeat. “What’s he trying to prove, that he’s hot enough to score cruise director for starters and then have dessert of those dancing twins? Just wait until I get hold of him.”

EXCERPT #3:

“Like I said, I don’t do holidays. If I’d had to sit around and read a book for this long, I already would have gone crazy.”

Dylan smiled at her, a coronary-inducing, thigh-quivering smile. She wanted to throw herself at him, but he stood up. “So, ready for some fun?”

He’d said it again. Fun. Of course. For a moment, she thought he was going to say something different. That there might be something more between them than a bit of fun. But no, fun was just what she needed. At least for now.

“Can we start again?” she asked.

Dylan’s smile was delicious—the green of both ocean and forest in his eyes, and the heat in their depths sparkled. “To fun?” he asked and held out his hand.

“Fun,” she said, taking it, her heart racing.

“Now, about that snorkeling,” he said. “Race you to change?”

Michaela wondered at what his definition of fun might be. As she changed into her pale blue bikini in the luxurious bathroom, her skin tingled, and when she emerged she felt Dylan’s gaze as if his eyes had physically stroked her.

REVIEWS:

“I ate this book up, just could not turn my kindle off! The story cleverly eschews the romance novel formula by having the female lead in the position of power as the cruise director...and the hunky male lead is a dancer. I particularly enjoyed the dance scenes - the rehearsals, description of performances and interplay between dancers. Often i find the support characters are barely sketched in other romance novels but in this story they are fully fleshed, interesting and often hilarious. And the chemistry between the leads bursts off the page - they're hot! Move over Love Boat...this has made me want to go on a cruise!”- Megan Beard, Amazon review

"Better than the love boat. Yep, it's a big call but I think Michaela Western makes a better Cruise Director than Lauren Tewes. More smarts, more sass, and more self respect. Eventually anyway. I really liked it. I wasn't sure I was going to, because I didn't know how having the hero go from Investment banker to dancer was going to play out, but it works. Really works. I loved Dylan, and the sex scenes were hot. If this is a debut I'm looking forward to the next one." – Jess, Amazon review

“I loved this book! It has a great premise, being set on a cruise ship in the middle of the pacific, and it breaks some of the usual boring 'rules' of romance by having a sexy dancer as the male lead, and his boss as the heroine. The chemistry sizzled, and I really got into the characters. It kept me up reading into the small hours, and I had work the next day, but it was worth it! Even the side characters worked for me. The banter between Michaela and her friend Felicity cracked me up - which is something I'm always looking for. For a debut, this is an especially good one. Looking forward for more from this writer.” - Trudi Jaye, Amazon review

My thoughts:
This is the kind of a sizzling story that makes for the perfect beach read. A sexy Australian man who is willing to satisfy every desire of the woman he desires? Yes, please!

Finding your own billionaire is completely a fantasy for most women, yet the way this is written, it seems almost plausible. Michaela is down-to-earth and independent. She knows what she wants and what is right. Dylan may be rich and gorgeous, but doesn't play that up in an obnoxious way. Money is just a part of his life. He is beautifully torn between dedication to his family and a desire to fulfill his dreams. He only thinks he knows what all of those dreams are. It's up to Michaela to help him discover the rest of them, and vice versa.

This steamy read will keep you up late and the pages will keep flying. I managed to polish it off in one evening. I look forward to more work by this new author!

About the author:
Michele was born in the mid 1970’s amid a burgeoning sprawl of vineyards and new retirement homes. Despite training in law (or perhaps because of it) she has been a dancer, producer, writer, and all round arty type in  various countries for most of her life. Now back home in New Zealand after travelling a plenty, she is a mom to one and writes full time in an office surrounded by whispering trees.

You can find Michele on:
Post a comment on her blog http://micheledewinton.blogspot.co.nz/
Drop her a line through http://www.micheledewinton.com
She also blogs at The Naked Hero as The Luna goddess: http://www.thenakedhero.com
And on the Indulgence blog: http://entangledindulgence.wordpress.com/


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Wednesday, August 8, 2012

'Forever Man' Blog Tour and Review


Forever Man

Author: January Bain

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Publisher: Champagne Books

What if you had been given the gift of healing and could save those you loved? And furthermore, discovered you could save the one you love from a vampire’s kiss. There is a catch; of course, the cost of such a healing could mean your own death…

Ellie Hightower is discovering such gifts in the novel, Forever Man by January Bain. She is telepathic, young and bright and has been running from these new found gifts all the way to Nome, Alaska where she encounters the man of her dreams, Mike Stone and an ancient evil force out to take him away from her. Will having goodness and light on her side be enough to save them from Katrianna, a newly resurrected vampire that looks to enslave Mike in her nefarious web?

To find out the truth you will need to read, Forever Man, the first in the FOREVER SERIES by January Bain.
 
Read an Excerpt:
While I waited for her to return I looked out the window, admiring the view of snow-peaked mountains when I heard the screeching of brakes and a thud, then realized someone had hit a dog with a half ton truck right in front of the restaurant. The driver, a young woman in obvious distress, jumped out and cradled the animal’s head in her lap. In an instant I turned and rushed for the stairs, taking them two at a time.

As I reached the woman she looked up at me with stark pleading in her eyes. “I didn’t see him! Please, I need help!”

Crouching down beside them, I carefully laid my hands on the whimpering dog. It looked like a husky, probably a sled dog. He or she was still breathing, but it was labored and loud. I could also see blood on its soft white fur. My heart instantly melted and reached out to the poor creature with its pain-filled, whiskey-brown eyes that seemed to beg me to do something. Despite the gut-wrenching plea, I felt helpless, sheer happenstance had brought this poor animal to this end and I had no power to save it from its fate.

Hesitantly, I reached my hands out and laid them on the poor dog’s head and its eyes seemed to tell me that it knew its fate. Tears flowed and the image of the dog blurred. I felt its pain as my own as I closed my eyes in sheer anguish.

Please God, let this beautiful creature be okay. Suddenly, something came alive inside me like a dam bursting its banks, and a great tidal wave of energy flowed through me from my very core. It was so strong it made me shake and my legs, cramping in the crouch, almost gave way.

A surge of pure power seemed to drive through my hands into the dog as I concentrated my thoughts on it and then all I could see and feel was hot, white light surrounding me for a few brief incredibly thrilling seconds. The light blinded me, its power as strong as the noonday sun. A sense of pure aliveness electrified me, as if I was at the pinnacle of my strength and could rise up and fill the world with goodness and healing. Then, just as suddenly, the floodgates in my mind closed and the white hot  energy retreated back into my hands that began to shake violently with the excess energy.

The sensation left as abruptly as it had come and I fell back exhausted from the effort. The dog whimpered, shook itself and sat up. It looked at the two of us as if nothing had happened, its brown eyes shining and its tail wagging as if it didn’t even remember the last few minutes of its life.

The woman, her eyes huge in her round face, looked at me with complete wonder. “How could this be? One minute I thought it was dying, then you came along and now it’s up and fine? It doesn’t make any sense.” The woman shook her head, unwilling to believe her own eyes.

I knew exactly what she meant. Under the sense of complete exhaustion I was now aware of lurked the feeling that the world had slid sideways and then realigned itself in a new configuration.

Standing up, I felt immediately light-headed and woozy and stumbled forward from severe vertigo, catching myself from falling just in time.

“I don’t know—I guess it wasn’t—as hurt as you thought—it must have just been stunned.” I tried to put a sensible spin on recent events, my tongue feeling wooden and clumsy in my mouth. My slurred words made me sound drunk or slow I realized from a muddled distance, my voice echoing in my head.

“But didn’t you see the bright light just before the dog got up?” The woman was not to be deterred from her new sense of wonder.

I knew I had to get away, but an overwhelming sense of fatigue was slowing down my reaction time and was it was like being forced to move in deep, heavy water.

“Who are you?” The woman asked, her tone blunted by suspicion now.
My Thoughts:

Forever Man has a good premise to it. Ellie is desperately seeking a new life, which she finds in Nome, Alaska. She is fortunate enough to land a new job, new place to stay, and fast friends. It doesn't hurt that her new boss, Mike, is a hottie and that there is instant chemistry between the two of them. Could he be her Forever Man?

What Ellie doesn't know is that she is endowed with a special gift for healing. She has an inkling of her powers, but has never been educated on them, nor really experimented with them. She ends up with several opportunities to try them out in her new surroundings. She is put to the ultimate test when the evil Katrianna  shows up, with nothing but Mike on her mind.

Katrianna's true identity is more alluded to via descriptions as opposed to being stated outright. The reader knows full well who she really is and can deduce her plan, almost as soon as she shows up in Alaska. The mystery lies in precisely how she is going to carry out her evil deeds. A slight twist at the end may catch you a little off-guard. I would have loved a bit more of an explanation as to how it was possible.

This is the first book in the new Forever series. I would love to see more character development and have the story flesh out a bit more. Experiment some more with plot and the characters and this could turn into a really interesting series.

Buy links: Paperback | Kindle

About the author:
January Bain hails from Ashern, Manitoba,
Canada. Married to the love of her life, her
husband Don, she has combined her love of
romance with her interest in the paranormal
and vampires to produce the FOREVER SERIES
of books. She teaches English and Computer
courses during the day, and writes at night and
in very spare moment she has. She hopes to
touch your heart with this first book in the
series, Forever Man and would very much
enjoy hearing from her readers.


Twitter: @januarybain
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