Sandra C. Lopez's Blog, page 121

Blog Tour: BABE IN THE WOODS by Jude Hopkins

Babe in the Woods

by Jude Hopkins

 

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GENRE:   Women's Fiction

 

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BLURB:

 

It’s September 1995, the first year of therest of Hadley Todd's life. After living in Los Angeles, Hadley returns to herhometown in rural New York to write and be near her father. In addition tolooking after him and teaching high school malcontents, Hadley hopes to channelher recent L.A. heartbreak into a play about the last moment of a woman’sinnocence. But she seeks inspiration.

Enter Trey Harding, a young, handsome reporterwho covers sports at the high school. Trey reminds Hadley of her L.A. ex and isthe perfect spark to fire up her imagination. The fact that Trey is an aspiringrock star and she has L.A. record biz connections makes the alliance perfect.She dangles promises of music biz glory while watching his moves. But thesurprising twist that transpires when the two of them go to Hollywood is notsomething Hadley prepared for.

 

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Excerpt One:

 

“Have you ever fallen in love?”

 

He winked at her. “All the time.”

 

She’d have the last word, something she realized wasimportant to her. “I think it’s wrong, all these women you lead on. Don’t you?I mean, they may get attached, fall for you. But you seem to use them, to seewhat you can get out of them for your own purposes. I think that’s wrong,They’re human beings, after all. With feelings.”

 

He turned around, his eyes drained of any light. “They useme, too. It’s not like they’re not getting anything out of it.”

 

“What am I getting out of this?” she asked him, if notrhetorically.

 

He stood on one hip, a move that made him appear more rakishthan usual. “I really don’t know, Miss Todd. I wondered that myself. I thoughtperhaps you were bored or intrigued. Or maybe you’re a control freak.” He tooka step toward her so he was within half an inch of her face. “Or maybe you’rejust like the rest and can’t resist me.”

 

Hadley stood her ground. “How do you know when it’s over?The moment when love, or lust, turns into something else. Something not aspassionate?”

 

“I don’t think about it,” he said, returning her gaze. “It’ssomething that happens. Maybe it’s not one moment. It just is.”

 

He turned around and walked out of the room.

 

 

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

JudeHopkins has published essays in The Los Angeles Times, Medium, thebelladonna—and poetry in various journals including Gyroscope Review,Timber Creek Review and California Quarterly.

Ithas always been her desire to write. She was featured in Dickinson College’sliterary magazine when she was an undergraduate. One poem in particular, “MixedMetaphors,” contrasted two viewpoints in a lakeside scene: one of aromantic young woman who thought the wind was blowing through her hair like anAeolian harp; the other, that of her suitor who believed the water looked ascold as hell. Ah, love’s different sensibilities! What she lost in thatrelationship, she gained from her sojourn at Dickinson, earning her Phi BetaKappa key while there, as well as a desire to continue her education.

 

Thenit was on to graduate school at Arizona State University where studying for hermaster’s degree in English and grading essays as a teaching assistant took mostof her time (and partying — it was ASU, for Pete’s sake). However, she did havea germ of an idea for a self-help book that she began outlining, fueled by manya Thermos bottle of Dunkin’ coffee.

 

Itwasn’t until she moved to L.A. that she thought about writing a proposal forthat self-help book. She got some bites from agents. Top agents. But workingthree jobs took precedence. (One of those jobs was at a Hollywood recordcompany where she met a Beatle, among other artists.)

 

Whenshe finally moved back to Pennsylvania, she began seriously writing again,squeezing in time to pen some poems between endless essay grading at one of theUniversity of Pittsburgh’s branch campuses. As an adjunct English instructor,Jude was uncompromising on what she expected from her students, knowing theywere capable of achieving great things when challenged, but she tried to balancethe hard work with humor. Nevertheless, she knew that discipline and knowledgecould turn even the most reluctant student into a pretty good writer. Toachieve that end, the cellphones had to be put away, and attention had to bepaid. The result? Some model research papers and essays from memorable students(she taught English in Pennsylvania, New York state, California and Arizona).

 

Theneed to write something besides comments on student essays gnawed at her. Oneday, she took out her old self-help book manuscript from a cobwebby drawer andbegan the process of turning it into a novel. That novel became “Babe in theWoods” and will be traditionally published by Wild Rose Press sometime in 2023.She blogs about that novel, so, readers, please follow her blogs as she updateseveryone on the book's progress. Please also check out her essays and poems,also featured herein.

 

Website: https://www.judehopkinswriting.net/

https://www.twitter.com/HeyJudeNotJudy

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1509248439/

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/babe-in-the-woods-jude-hopkins/1143104918

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GIVEAWAY :

 

Jude Hopkins will be awarding a $15 Amazon or Barnesand Noble GC, to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Review: EVERYTHING IS OK by Debbie Tung

Depression. It’s something we allfall into sometimes. Sometimes the thoughts in our heads can just get toooverwhelming. In this book, Debbie chronicles her struggles as a freelanceartist and the overwhelming burden of all her incessant thoughts and emotions.

Am I enough? Yes, you are!

I loved the caricature-likesketches. The whole journey was captivating and relatable. As an artist myself,I know all too well about not feeling good enough, feeling pathetic, andfeeling worthless. I just can’t seem to get it right. We all have that little devilon our shoulder telling us we suck all the time.

Debbie captured it all perfectlyin this graphic memoir.

“Even if the world around me issilent, it’s always loud inside my head.”

 

“Life is pointless. Everything Ido is pointless.”

 

We’re all hardest on ourourselves, that’s for sure.

“I don’t have it all together, butthat’s ok.” Just take each day as it comes. Good advice! Be thankful for thelittle things in life. Through Debbie’s therapy sessions, we pick up someuseful tips on coping with depression and anxiety.

Honest and thought-provoking. Areal winner!

 

Rating: 5 stars

Review: SORRY I RUINED YOUR CHILDHOOD by Ben Zaehringer

Funny, short, little skits. Likethe one where Princess Toadstool finds a hunky Super Mario on Nintender andgets a BIG disappointment. There were no monsters under the bed, except themonster was the bed. He, he, he.

The scarecrow and Tin Man goingafter Dorothy for her brain and heart.

Cute, little cartoon graphics. Agood read for a good laugh!

 

Rating:4 stars

Review: DOLL by Guy Colwell

“Make me a woman” was the requestof this man with the grotesque face. After all, what real woman would want him?In his 47 years, the man with the face has never had sex, which was why he wantedthe artist to make him a doll—for sex. Was that even possible?

 

The quest to build a perfectwoman. Boy, they get really detailed and technical on the…specs. The B/Wsketches were cool.

 

Soon, a fight for the doll sendsher in the possession of other sx-starved guys. Evidently, this doll had ahypnotic power over everyone. Everybody just had to have her. Yowza! Was shethat real? Did it feel that real? The images were quite sexually explicit, butsome were kind of hot.

 

It was funny how ever man wantedher—this plastic doll to mess with. For the ugly guy, this becomes a mission to gethis doll back. Poor guy. All he wanted was a doll to have sex with.

 

I didn’t really get the secondhalf of the book. She was just passed around to every crazy pervert? By thatpoint, it becomes nothing but sex, sex, sex. What kind of way was that to endthe story? It turns into nothing but p0-rn. It gets kind of disgusting and VERYgraphic. I’m talking about close-ups on EVERY part.

 

Like I said, the graphics werecool. Quite honestly, the story was sweet up until the second half of the book.Perhaps the author wasn’t going for sweet. In any sense, I didn’t like how itdeveloped with everyone literally fighting over the doll.

 

An okay read.

 

Rating:3 stars

Review: LUNARBABOON: THE DAILY LIFE OF PARENTHOOD by Christopher Grady

This book is a charming andhumorous illustration of parenthood. Parents that didn’t want to fight in frontof the kids would still do it via text. Ha, ha! A dad that would much ratherspend some time alone than be with the wife and kid. Too funny and true! Kidsliterally recording everything you say. It’s a very Bizarro world. Ha, ha!

The B/W sketches were simple witha Ziggy-like quality. I like stuff that you don’t have to think too much on. Ofcourse, I didn’t always get them, but they were still fun to look at.

Some good comics here.

 

Rating:4 stars

Blog Tour: HOW TO BURY YOUR DOG by Eva Silverfine

How to Bury Your Dog

by Eva Silverfine

 

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GENRE:   Literary/Upmarket fiction

 

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BLURB:

 

Lizzyhas largely retreated from the world: she tends her adopted strays and goes towork, but she has forsaken lifelong pastimes and declines invitations from oldfriends. On the day she buries Happy, the abandoned basset hound she adoptedyears before, she learns a real estate developer is threatening the heart ofher rural community—a tranquil pond and a relict stand of hemlocks. For Lizzythis is a magical place, hidden from the modern world.

Coaxed by an old friend to join a group fighting the development, Lizzy isreluctant—she wants to avoid both hope and him. But she realizes she can nolonger keep the outside world at bay. As the battle over the developmentunfolds, Lizzy opens herself to two young neighbors who share her love of thenatural environment—an awkward sixteen-year-old and an inquisitiveten-year-old. And as Happy’s elements return to the earth, buried memories findtheir way to the surface in increasingly curious ways.

 

 

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Excerpt One:

 

Lizzy had wandered toward the pond herself that morningafter a restless night. Her mind had been full of the day’s trip, which overallhad been predictable and therefore frustrating. She took her usual routethrough the woods to the bluff. A bird called relentlessly—she recognized itssong, but she couldn’t remember its name, even though Wes had told her so manytimes. She had never tried very hard to remember because its name was notimportant to her. She didn’t need to name the bird to be reassured by its call,to be reassured by knowing it was there and living the life it was supposed tolive, to be reassured there was a world much bigger than herself. It was inknowing there was a world bigger than her own life that she typically foundcomfort, but this morning she was experiencing the other side: that she was toosmall to affect the course of events unfolding in her own backyard.

 

As Lizzy approached the bluff, she saw the sourwoods were inflower—racemes of dainty white urns were calling in the honeybees. She walkedto the edge of the bluff and looked over the hemlocks standing firm on theirperilous slope.

 

Even if she hadn’t known the hemlocks were relicts ofanother era, the bluff had always seemed an ancient place, a magical place,hidden from the modern world. An earthy scent emanated from the ground— humusand moss overlain with the sweet aromatic sheath of shed hemlock needles andbranchlets. She loved the hemlocks—their form, their scent, their flat, darkgreen leaves.

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

Fromliving above her parents’ hardware store in Brooklyn, New York, to living amile down a gravel road in semi-rural Texas with her husband, sons, and thelocal wildlife, Eva Silverfine has explored a variety of urban to rurallandscapes. On that journey, she earned two degrees in the environmentalsciences, worked in an entomological research lab, and eventually retooled as acopyeditor. She freelances for several academic presses and writes personalnarrative and fiction in the in-between spaces. Her short fiction has appearedin a variety of online journals; she has published a collection of essays, ElasticWalls: From Brooklyn to Texas and Points in Between; and her novels, Howto Bury Your Dog and Ephemeral Wings, have been published by BlackRose Writing. Find her at www.evasilverfine.com and on Facebook, Instagram,and Twitter.

 

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100034819616151

https://www.instagram.com/evasilverfine/

https://twitter.com/EvaSilverfine

https://www.amazon.com/How-Bury-Your-Dog-Silverfine/dp/1684338212/

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GIVEAWAY :

Eva Silverfine will be awarding a $15 Amazon or Barnesand Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Blog Tour : SERVANT by Patrick R. Field

 

Servant

by Patrick R. Field

 

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GENRE: Paranormal Fantasy

 

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BLURB:

 

Not long after their move into Blackstone, married couple Mitchand Buck begin to witness strange sightings of shadowy figures, physicalmanifestations and inexplicable events taking place in the former Sheppardfamily estate nestled in the Northern Poconos of Pennsylvania. Through séances,they learn from the spirit of Jedidiah Sheppard that he has not been able tocross over into the afterlife because the truth behind his sudden disappearancein 1965 has never been solved. During this journey, Mitch and Buck and aneccentric psychic, Gladys Munch aka Madame Fortunesta, encounter interferencefrom the spirit of a Lenape medicine man, Mesingwe Medeu, who protectsJedidiah’s spirit. Mitch and Buck eventually realize that they must findJedidiah’s remains and let the authorities discover through modern detectivework the evidence needed to try and convict the murderer. But is it too latefor Jedidiah’s spirit to find eternal peace?

 

 

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Excerpt One:

 

“The spirit led us to this area of the cellar by blinkingthe lights, making them dimmer and then brighter. When we asked if he wouldlike to be called a spirit, the intensity of the blinking increased, brighterand faster. We thought it was because he liked it, but then the blinkingstopped and the intensity of the light grew until the bulbs started to burst,and as you can see, there is shattered glass on the floor,” I explain as wewalk across the broken glass, the crinkling sounds underfoot. “Sorry about theglass. I have been a little freaked out to sweep up.”

 

“Where did you find the album?”

 

“Over here. It fell off this shelf of the bookcase, whereyou can see the imprint in the dust.”

 

Gladys places her hand on the spot where the album once layand closes her eyes. Suddenly, she opens them, and a surprised, distressedexpression comes over her face, the first time I haven’t seen a hint of a smileall morning.

 

“I would like to leave here now,” she states in a fearfultone.

 

“Sure, is something—”

 

“Now, Mitch! We need to leave now!”

 

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

Aftertwenty-five years in higher education, Patrick Field traded in teaching andtextbooks to pursue his passion of writing spine-chilling fiction. Holding aPh.D. in Anatomical Sciences and Neuroscience, his experience informs hiswriting, a unique blend of scientific knowledge with supernatural storytelling.

 

Hisnon-scientific writing career began with Prince Patrick, a memoir of his precociouschildhood that he wrote for his mother as she battled pancreatic cancer. Thisprocess was not only healing but helpful in stirring his creativity and markedthe moment he was bitten by the writing bug.

 

An avid fan ofAnne Rice, Edgar Allen Poe, and Joe Hill, Patrick’s subsequent novels wereinspired by his favorite authors. His first fiction novel, The Malevolent, andhis two latest novels, The Bedfordshire Warlock (release date in early 2024)and Servant were written throughout the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

His latestnovel Servant was inspired by the supernatural events that happened to theauthor, his husband, and friends that have stayed in their home in northeasternPennsylvania. Taking a page from his teaching philosophy that those who teachmust never cease to learn, Patrick found himself hungry to discover all hecould about the area's diverse cultures, including the Anthracite coal miningcommunity and the indigenous tribe of the Lenape.

 

Patrick’swriting process is a mix between walking meditation and meticulous research.His novels form while he walks alone with his dogs, imagining plot lines andcharacters. Once he’s home, he quickly types notes on his computer beforefleshing them out later. Research is a considerable part of his process- thescientist in him abhors “alternative facts.” When he encounters an idea or ahistorical thread unfamiliar to him, he researches all he can about it. Whilehe writes about a world where the supernatural realm is prominent, the realworld is always based on facts.

 

When developingcharacters, he usually has an idea of the destination he wants for eachcharacter but the journey to get there is often written by the character andthe environment. Of all the characters he’s written, Gladys Munch in Servant ishis favorite, as she’s an amalgam of delightful, humorous “mature” ladies inhis life and physically inspired by British actresses Margaret Rutherford andAngela Lansbury.

 

In addition towriting, Patrick appears on the stage of his community theater and sings in thechorus of a local opera company each summer. He enjoys spending time with hishusband, Matthew, and their dogs and exploring new destinations around theworld, especially those that have a supernatural history. Haunted buildings andstructures associated with the occult fascinate Patrick. His idea of a perfectday: drinking pints of Guinness draught with friends and family overscintillating and humorous conversation.

 

 

 

Website: www.patrickfieldauthor.com

 

Instagram:patrickfieldauthor

 

Facebook:actoranatomist

 

Links forpurchasing Servant

 

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Servant-Patrick-R-Field/dp/1509248765/ref=sr_1_1 

 

Barnes andNoble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/servant-patrick-r-field/1143071600

 

Walmart:

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Servant-Paperback-9781509248766/2686843043

 

 

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GIVEAWAY 

Patrick R. Field will be awarding a $10Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Blog Tour: HOLD ON TIGHT by Jerry Harwood

HOLD ON TIGHT

by Jerry Harwood

 

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GENRE:  Sweet Romance

 

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BLURB:

 

Whenevent planner Megan Rouche's boyfriend lands a job in Atlanta, he proposes. Butshe chooses to stay in her small Tennessee town to care for her grandmother.There she kindles a new relationship. However, all is in jeopardy when Frankreturns on behalf of his Atlanta company with big plans to develop a newfactory in Bakewell and marry Megan.

 

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Excerpt One:

 

As Meganslammed the driver-side door, she realized only too late the end of her long,flowing scarf remained inside. She felt her shoulders and neck revolt againstthe rest of her body. The color-coded, highlighted, and well-organized weddingbinder did not have the same attachment to the car door as her scarf. It wentforward, scattering over the parking lot. The wedding schedule, names of familymembers and important friends, the order for the toasts, and the marriagecertificate took flight.

 

Megan reachedout in an attempt to pull the folder and the last ten seconds of her life backin. As she did, gravity won out. She hit her back against the car door andslumped to the ground. Frantically, she unwrapped the knitted noose from herneck. As she stood, the wind caught the loose papers. At first, they wereaflutter near her feet. Then the wind, perhaps realizing how it might continueto torment her, sent a stronger gust.

 

Megan eyed theenvelope with the marriage certificate. It was tenuously holding its flightpattern over a puddle. She lurched forward, far from gracefully, toward theenvelope. Her fingers touched the edge before the wind chose to take it a bitfarther down the pea gravel parking lot. The marriage certificate danced overthe neighboring spaces before landing against the sidewalk’s curb. From there,it caught an upward draft straight into the holly bushes with the receptionsong list.

 

Megan removedthe scarf and moved toward the holly bush. She heard the snap of her leftshoe’s heel. Her reward was a skinned knee and another trip to the gravel lot.Her new circular-frame eyeglasses decided they would abandon ship and bounced afew feet away. Megan sat on her bottom, feeling the ground’s moisture creep upher skirt. She raised her hands before patting the ground around her. A delugeof tears threatened to explode from her eyes as she strained to keep them atbay.

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

Jerry Harwood was born in Ooltewah, TN. His mother was anelementary school teacher and he spent his afternoons reading books in herclassroom or the nearby public library. He currently is a writer, which makessense based on the fact you are reading this here. He has experimented withother occupations: camp director, program director at a counseling center,college professor and middle school teacher. Jerry has backpacked Europe,taught in a Ukrainian University, worked in Rwanda after the genocide, is afirst responder, sort-of remodeled a VW Thing, and has a love for Cherry CokeZero that is only surpassed by his love for his wife, six children, and grandson.He is chairs the Writer’s Track at ConNooga, and actively participates in theChattanooga Writer's Guild where he previously served as a board member.

 

Feel free to share your thoughts on the book with Jerry atJerryHarwoodBooks@gmail.com or visit his website at www.jerryharwood.com. Hecan also be found on The Zon at https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0863YPCD7

 

Buy the book at: https://www.amazon.com/Hold-Tight-Jerry-Harwood-ebook/dp/B0BM7ZMSLF?ref_=ast_author_dp

 

 

 

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GIVEAWAY 

The author will be giving away a $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Blog Tour: GILLESPIE FIELD GROOVE by Corey Lynn Fayman

Mystery

Date Published: March 15, 2023

 

 

An obscure rock'n'roll roadie dies under mysterious circumstances. His prized Jimi Hendrix guitar has gone missing. Can Rolly Waters save his new client from the ruthless collectors looking for it?

When nurse and fledgling pilot Lucinda Rhodes hires guitar-playing private detective Rolly Waters to track down a Stratocaster guitar owned by her deceased father, Rolly is thrilled to take on her case, especially when he learns the guitar’s original owner may have been Jimi Hendrix. But Gerry Rhodes’s reckless personal history leads to more questions than Rolly and Lucinda have bargained for, as an aging rock’n’roll impresario, his trophy wife, a Russian gangster and the FBI get involved. When a forty-year-old shooting accident reveals a surprising connection to a pop star’s hit record, Rolly sees darker forces at work. And his and Lucinda’s lives hang in the balance.

 

Gillespie Field Groove is the fifth book in the Rolly Waters mystery series

Review: In chapter 1, it seemed that wewere transporting back to the past in memories of the old Woodstock days. Theold was taking one last stroll down memory lane before taking his final breath.  

Days later, his daughter, Lucy,requests the assistance of P.I. Rolly to help find an old guitar that mighthave belonged to Jimi Hendrix. Was it true that anything he might’ve touchedwould’ve been worth a lot of money? But that wasn’t the most interesting part.The interesting part was that the police thought the old man might’ve beenmurdered. Now, it had my attention. You’d think that, at this point, Rollywould dig right into the murder. Instead, he goes trolling around old musicshops looking for that missing guitar. The character was clearly familiar withthe music industry, which was rather fascinating, but, to me, it wasn’t themain focus. I wanted to get into the murder right away.

The narrative was nice and simplewith some witty commentary. To be honest, the mystery of the missing guitar wasrather appealing but not overly enticing to me. I’m not really a fan of Hendrixor really any of the old music from the time. This would definitely be a goodread for those music buffs.

Fairly nice read.

Rating:3 stars

About the Author

Corey Lynn Fayman has made a career of avoiding the sunlight in his hometown of San Diego, California, where he’s done hard time as a keyboard player for local bands, a sound designer for the world-famous Old Globe Theatre, and an interactive designer for organizations both corporate and sundry. Armed with a B.A. in Creative Writing from UCLA and an M.A. in Educational Technology from SDSU, he’s also taught technology and design courses at various colleges and universities in Southern California.

Fayman's adventures working for the infamous Internet startup MP3.com led him to conceive the character of Rolly Waters, the guitar-playing detective first featured in the San Diego Book Awards nominated mystery, Black’s Beach Shuffle. Unduly encouraged by this early success, he set about writing a second Rolly Waters Mystery, Border Field Blues, winner of the Genre Award at the 2013 Hollywood Book Festival. Desert City Diva, the third novel in the series, was a bronze award winner in Foreword Reviews 2015 Indiefab Book of the Year Awards. The latest in the series, Ballast Point Breakdown, was awarded the best-in-show Geisel Award at the 2021 San Diego Book Awards.

Contact Links

Website

Facebook

 

Purchase Links

Amazon

Blog Tour: IMAGINARY FRIENDS by Chad Musick

Imaginary Friends

by Chad Musick

 

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GENRE:   YA Magical Realism

 

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BLURB:

 

If the delivery had been a demonic bowlingalley or a mermaid’s grotto, Ivy would have sent it away. She has standards,after all. But she can’t refuse a magical Library, especially when they’ve goneto the trouble of including a wheelchair ramp. They say that on the Internetnobody knows you’re a dog, but somebody knows fourteen-year-old Ivy is anorphan, that she sells her paper-writing services to lazy college students, andthat her imaginary friends are unhappy being stuck in the mural on the wall ofher Alaskan home.

Himitsu refuses the Library, becoming angry enoughto attack the delivery people with his bamboo sword. They won’t tempt him withbooks, any more than his mother has been able to tempt him into leaving theirapartment during the past two years. He has all he needs: video games, onlineforums, and his virtual girlfriend Moe. Well, almost all. His dad’s death hasleft a hole in him, which is why when he receives text messages saying theLibrary can bring back the dead, he changes his mind. Moe tries to warn himabout the danger, but what does she know, anyway?

Now, having been lured into the Library and havingfoolishly brought their imaginary friends with them, Ivy and Himitsu find thosefriends are trapped. The teens have a choice: fulfill the Librarian’s odd andpainful demands in hopes of rescuing their friends or go back alone to theirsmall, boring lives, knowing they’ve failed the only ones who really believe inthem.

 

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Excerpt One:

All giraffes are named Janice, excepting a few heretics. Theold guard, being traditionalists, are the most militant in asserting that thisis the necessary state of affairs.

 

The Janice of our story, however, is not one of the oldguard. He’s too young to be a veteran of the Nehming War, and to him theconsequent Sophie massacre is something that happened to distant Frenchrelatives. Because of this, he is sometimes known to intimate that his namemight, in fact, be Chanda.

Despite this obvious breach in social graces, hedoesn’t consider himself to be a deviant. In fact, he thinks of himself asquite normal. Janice is anything but normal. For one thing, he’s a giraffe. Wemustn’t neglect this observation. Giraffes are not normal. But let us leavethat aside for a moment and pretend they are.

Humans, not being monstrositiesexcept in aggregate, naturally regard involuntary baldness among the males asan unsightly defect. Bald men are likely to be regarded as degenerates. Some ofthem even become history teachers. Among boy giraffes, however, baldness of theossicles—those little sticky-uppy bits on their heads—is a mark of honor gainedby battering at other giraffes.

 

To his enduring shame, the tops of Janice’s ossicles arecovered in thick, feathery hair. Not because he is cowardly (though he is) butbecause Janice has never met another giraffe. In fact, he’s never encountered athird dimension at all, being stuck in perpetual twilight in the paper junglepasted to the wall of Ivy’s otherwise crappy little house.

 

 

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What drivesthe characters in your story and why?

The twomain characters in Imaginary Friends are Ivy and Himitsu. They are verydifferent. Ivy is living on her own in Alaska and selling term papers tocollege students while trying to stay off the radar of social services. Whenshe receives the delivery of the magical library, and they include a wheelchairramp, she is immediately intrigued. Ivy’s world is very small, and her onlyfriends are animals in a mural painted on her living room wall. She enters thelibrary out of curiosity and at the urging of her imaginary friends who want toescape the mural. Ivy never imagined that they would be trapped inside thelibrary. Once Ivy’s friends are trapped, she is motivated to free them. Ivylost her parents in a car accident and cannot bear to lose anyone else.

When wemeet Himitsu, it is several years after the suicide of his father, and he isliving with his grandmother. Himitsu is a shut-in whose only friend is an AIcalled Moe. The first time they try to deliver the library doors, Himitsurefuses them thinking that they are a ploy of his grandmother to get him to dosomething other than hang out with Moe. Later that day, he receives a messagethat the doors leading to the magical library can bring back the dead. Moe is skeptical and warns Himitsu not to go, but he enters the library anyway.He is desperate to see his father again. Once inside the library, he discoversthat they cannot bring his father back and that Moe is trapped inside. Himitsu,like Ivy, wants to save his only friend. 

 

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

ChadMusick grew up in Utah, California, Washington, Texas, and (most of all)Alaska. He fell in love in California and then moved with his family to Japan,where he’s found happiness. He earned a PhD in Mathematical Science but lovesart and science equally.

Despitea tendency for electronic devices to burst into flame after Chad handles them,he persists in working in various technical and technology-related roles.

Chadmakes no secret of being epileptic, autistic, and arthritic, facts that informhow he approaches both science and the arts.

 

Amazon buy link: https://www.amazon.com/Imaginary-Friends-Chad-Musick/dp/1953971733/

 

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GIVEAWAY :

Chad Musick will be awarding a $10 Amazon or Barnesand Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway