Jenn Windrow's Blog, page 4

Booklore’s First Book Club Meeting

It’s here! Our first official meeting as a book club! Christina and I are excited to be talking about the book  A Court of Thorn and Roses by Sarah J. Maas, which I totally loved!

Okay…let’s get this discussion rolling. Leave your comments and discussion items in the comments on the blog. If you have an area of the book that you would like to talk about, feel free to post about that too. We’ll be around all day ready to have a good old cup of tea, not a coffee drinker, and a fun talk about a good book.

Question 1 – The obvious theme of the book was Beauty and the Beast, but what other themes did you find as you were reading? Were there symbols throughout the book that led to the other themes?

Question 2 – Characters. Who was your favorite? Hunky Tamlin? Or our Heroine Feyre? Or one of the other Fay that we meet throughout?

Question 3 – How did Feyre’s past shape her future? Did the  way she was treated by her family or the way she took on too much as a kid effect how she reacted as she entered the other side of the wall?

Question 4 – Were you engaged from start to finish, or did you find yourself playing on your phone when ever it buzzed that you had a new FB message?

Question 5 – Did the ending make you want to pick it up and read the next one or did you just close it and forget about it?

 

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Writing Knock-em-Dead Smiles

Margie Lawson, the amazing Margie Lawson, guest blogged on the Eight Ladies Writing Blog today and she featured several smiles from my book Struck By Eros. If you’re interested in reading some knock-em-dead smiles go on over and check out some of the over 50 smiles she highlighted.

Guest Blogger Margie Lawson: Writing Stellar Smiles

Wacky Word Wednesday

I love words. Fun words, made up words, words that I can use for double meaning in my novels.  When I write, I look for words that will surprise people as they are reading, something out of the ordinary. Words that will make the reader laugh.

Like word of the day toilet paper. You can do your business and learn a thing or two while doing it.  Well, consider Wednesdays your new word of the day toilet paper, but the words will be way more fun and far filthier.

Why? How?

Because I’ll be pulling words from my new favorite book…The Big Book Of Being Rude.

So, each Wednesday I’m going to pick a word at random and post it. Consider this education with a side of belly busting laughter.

This weeks word comes from the category Stupid, Irritating, and Contemptible and is a general expression for loathing.

Tripe-Hound

Let’s use it in a sentence.

That dirty tripe-hound better not be stepping out on me again.

That concludes this weeks edition of Wacky Word Wednesday. If you have any Wacky Words that you would like to share, please, please, please post them in the comments. I live for finding new and fun words to play with!!

Isn’t writing supposed to be fun?

When I first decided that I was going to be a “serious” writer, I had dreams of book deals and signings and adoring fans. Being a writer was going to be a blast and a half.

Then *poof*

Those dreams turned into reality and I realized fairly quickly that writing isn’t always fun. Mostly it’s work. Hard work. More work than I want to do some days. But, if I want book deals and singing and adoring fans I need to get off my lazy lump of a butt and write and edit and write again and edit yet again.

Some days my writing path is skewed and crooked and seems never ending.

Some days my creative monkey says screw you and goes and hides in a corner of my mind I don’t have access to, (seriously when are they going to create that Limitless drug already?) and I find myself staring at my current novel unable to make the magic happen. Hell, I’m lucky I’m doing more than drooling on the keyboard.

Some days it’s easier to knock around ideas with my writer friends. Help them shape their own stories, instead of forcing words on a page I’ll have to spend days changing.

Some days my imaginary friends take their ball and go home.

On the days when writing  isn’t fun, I have found it is best to let my creative mind wander down a different path. Do something different like, work on my blog, make swag for author events, read someone else’s words, color in my adult coloring book, heck, last week I rearranged furniture. Anything that sparks a creative fire.

And it works.

The ideas come. The story reinvents itself. The monkeys start turning the wheels.

I have to remind myself that when it seems like I’ve gone off course, it’s the little things that will help redirect me. It’s the little things that make writing fun again.

Race the Darkness: Cover Reveal and Excerpt

My dear friend Abbie Roads is showing off her new pretty today and I am lucky enough to get to help her show the world. So, welcome to the cover reveal for Race The Darkness.

It’s precisely 7:22 pm ET, the sun has just set in the Eastern Time zone, and it’s starting to get dark.

We are excited to reveal the cover of Race the Darkness, a dark, gritty, emotional and sexy romantic suspense novel by debut author Abbie Roads!

First in a gripping paranormal romantic suspense duo by a Golden Heart finalist debut author whose clinical work gives her chilling insights…

Cursed with a terrible gift

Criminal investigator Xander Stone doesn’t have to question you—he can hear your thoughts. Scarred by lightning, burdened with a power that gives him no peace, Xander struggles to maintain his sanity against the voice that haunts him day and night—the voice of a woman begging him to save her.

That threatens to engulf them…

Isleen Walker has long since given up hope of escape from the nightmare of captivity and torture that is draining her life, her mind, and her soul. Except…there is the man in her feverish dreams, the strangely beautiful man who beckons her to freedom and wholeness. And when he comes, if he comes, it will take all their combined fury and faith to overcome a madman bent on fulfilling a deadly prophecy.

About Abbie Roads:

Abbie Roads is a mental health counselor known for her blunt, honest style of therapy. By night she writes dark, emotional novels, always giving her characters the happy ending she wishes for all her clients. Her novels have finaled in RWA contests including the Golden Heart. Race the Darkness is the first book in the Fatal Dreams series of dark, gritty romantic suspense with a psychological twist.

Race the Darkness will be available on October 4th. 

Amazon: http://amzn.to/22nGnVk

B&N: http://bit.ly/1pwghOK

BAM: http://bit.ly/1RmOgoN

My favorite reads of 2015

Every year I do the Goodreads reading challenge, one of my favorite things!! Then at the end of the year I like to reflect on what books I read. What ones did I love? Hate? What books would I recommend to family and friends?

Here’s my list to answer the last question. My top 5 books from my reading list last year.

1. The Dirt on Ninth Grave – Darynda Jones. – .In a small village in New York lives Jane Doe, a girl with no memory of who she is or where she came from. So when she is working at a diner and slowly begins to realize she can see dead people, she’s more than a little taken aback. Stranger still are the people entering her life. They seem to know things about her. Things they hide with lies and half-truths. Soon, she senses something far darker. A force that wants to c

ause her harm, she is sure of it. Her saving grace comes in the form of a new friend she feels she can confide in and the fry cook, a devastatingly handsome man whose smile is breathtaking and touch is scalding. He stays close, and she almost feels safe with him around.

But no one can outrun their past, and the more lies that swirl around her—even from her new and trusted friends—the more disoriented she becomes, until she is confronted by a man who claims to have been sent to kill her. Sent by the darkest force in the universe. A force that absolutely will not stop until she is dead. Thankfully, she has a Rottweiler. But that doesn’t help in her quest to find her identity and recover what she’s lost. That will take all her courage and a touch of the power she feels flowing like electricity through her veins. She almost feels sorry for him. The devil in blue jeans. The disarming fry cook who lies with every breath he takes. She will get to the bottom of what he knows if it kills her. Or him. Either way.

2. You – Caroline Kepnes – When a beautiful, aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he does what anyone would do: he Googles the name on her credit card.

There is only one Guinevere Beck in New York City. She has a public Facebook account and Tweets incessantly, telling Joe everything he needs to know: she is simply Beck to her friends, she went to Brown University, she lives on Bank Street, and she’ll be at a bar in Brooklyn tonight—the perfect place for a “chance” meeting.

As Joe invisibly and obsessively takes control of Beck’s life, he orchestrates a series of events to ensure Beck finds herself in his waiting arms. Moving from stalker to boyfriend, Joe transforms himself into Beck’s perfect man, all while quietly removing the obstacles that stand in their way—even if it means murder.

3. The Last Breath – Kimberly Belle – Chasing disasters around the globe keeps humanitarian aid worker Gia Andrews away from her own ground zero. Now, after sixteen years in jail for the murder of her stepmother in small-town Tennessee, Gia’s father has come home to die of cancer. And she’s responsible for his care. 

Resuming the role of daughter to the town’s most infamous murderer means confronting the past she’s spent over a decade avoiding. But in the end, the truth about what really happened may have deadlier consequences than she could have ever anticipated…

4. Splintered – A.G Howard – Alyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers—precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.

When her mother’s mental health takes a turn for the worse, Alyssa learns that what she thought was fiction is based in terrifying reality. The real Wonderland is a place far darker and more twisted than Lewis Carroll ever let on. There, Alyssa must pass a series of tests, including draining an ocean of Alice’s tears, waking the slumbering tea party, and subduing a vicious bandersnatch, to fix Alice’s mistakes and save her family. She must also decide whom to trust: Jeb, her gorgeous best friend and secret crush, or the sexy but suspicious Morpheus, her guide through Wonderland, who may have dark motives of his own.

5. Cinder – Marrisa Meyer – Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl.

  Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

Those are mine. Let’s hear what your favorite reads of 2015 were?

Happy New Year

I tried to think of a catchier title than Happy New Year, but honestly what else is there to say?

So, Happy New Year to all my friends and followers.  I hope that 2016 brings good things, happy times, and time spent with those you love.

Personally I am looking forward to this coming year and all that it will bring.

Muse Fall Blog Hop Winner!

Thank you to everyone who joined me on the Desert Muse Fall Blog hop. I had a great time hosting everyone!!

Now it’s time to announce the winner!

To see if you won the $70.00 Amazon gift card from the Muse Blog visit the Desert Muse Blog.

The winner of the signed copy of Wicked Temptation by Zoe Archer, the signed copy of House of the Rising Sun by Kristen Painter, and the $10.00 Amazon Gift Card is……

jeanna_massman@hotmail.com

Congrats and I will be touch for mailing information.

Muses Fall Carnival Blog Hop

Welcome to my entry into the Muses Fall Carnival Blog Hop! In addition to having a greater chance of winning the $70 Amazon Gift card, I’m giving away a signed copy of Wicked Temptation by Zoe Archer, a signed copy of House of the Rising Sun by Kristen Painter, and a $10.00 Amazon Gift Card, just scroll down the site and click the follow button and a winner will be chosen at random. The winner will be announced November 6 so stop back by and check out the Muses blog to see the list of winners of the grand prize (Amazon gift card) and each individual giveaways.

Let’s talk Spooky books. It’s Halloween after all. I know a lot of people will name anything by Stephen King. And why not, he’s the maestro of scary. But other than Stephen King, what other author has made the pee run down your leg? The book you had to hide in the freezer to keep the monsters from being released? (Any Friends fans out there?)

Mine is a book called Smoke and Mirrors by the amazing Tanya Huff. Scared the bejeezus out of me. Husband was out of town, I was all alone with an eighth month old baby, and the ghosts she wrote were so terrifying, so freaky, so nightmarish that I had to sleep on the floor of the babies room so I wouldn’t be alone. I still own that book, but I have never had the nerve to read it a second time.

How about you? What’s that beyond scary book? Leave me a note in the comments, I’d love to hear.

Don’t step off the Carousel yet! Hop on over to Camelia Miron Skiba site here.