Roxanne Rhoads's Blog, page 505

Mrs. B’s Guide to Household Witchery: Everyday Magic, Spells, and Recipes By Kris Bradley

Excerpt from SIMPLE SABBATS FOR THE BUSY WITCH: simple ways to celebrate the passing of the seasons
Samhain—October 31
Though many look to October 31 as Halloween, Pagans from around the world call it Samhain (Sow-en), a time to remember their ancestors and to celebrate the start of a new year. This period is well suited to practicing divination, working on transitions of all sorts, candle magic, protection magic, and working with or contacting those who have passed on.
October is often one of the busiest months of the year in a Pagan household.The fun of Halloween, creating costumes for the family, school events, and getting the household and property ready for the coming cooler weather keep us hopping. Sometimes there are not enough hours in the day to breathe, much less to plan a way to honor the season. Here are a few simple ways to celebrate.
Ritual: 5 Minutes Alone
This simple Samhain ritual lets you honor those who came before. If you have a few extra moments, add your favorite form of divination and see what the coming year will bring!
Items Needed:
• Your ancestor altar• Lighter or matches• A glass of apple cider• A small snack, such as gingersnaps or a sliced apple
1. Sit before your ancestor altar and take a few deep breaths. Think about those who have passed on—their struggles and how they’ve affected your life. Think about how blessed you were to have them in your life.
2. When you feel centered and ready, light the candle on your altar and say,I light this candle in honor of Samhain and to recognize the changing season. Ihonor the Lord and Lady and my ancestors and give them thanks. On this night,when their spirits walk among us and magic is in the air, I ask my ancestors fortheir blessings and ask them to watch over my family and home. So mote it be.
3. Sit for a moment or two. Drink your cider and eat your snack, being sure to leave some on your offering plate. Let the candle burn for as long as you safely can.
Small Group Ritual
This ritual is just the right length to do with a friend or two, your partner, or the whole family. Just gather round and share the time together.
Items Needed:
• A candle• A lighter or matches• Scraps of paper• A pen or pencil for each participant• Your cauldron or other heat-safe container• Cider and cups• A plate of cookies
1. Gather everyone, and sit down somewhere comfortable with all of your ritual items. Begin with a simple deep breathing exercise to get everyone centered.
2. When everyone’s ready, light the candle and say,
On this fall night of Samhain, we celebrate the turning wheel. As the seasons change, so goes the cycle of death and rebirth. Tonight we mark the death of the old year and the birth of the new. We make these pledges to ourselves and to the Lord and Lady.
3. At this time, each person should write down any resolutions that they’d like to make for the new year or any plans for new beginnings that they’d like to put into motion.
4. Go around the circle, and one at a time each participant can choose whether to share what they’ve written out loud. The paper is then lit on the flame of the candle (younger participants should be assisted by an adult) and placed in the cauldron to burn.
5. When everyone has finished, pass around the cider and cookies and enjoy each other’s company. Everyone should save a sip of the cider and a bit of his or her cookie. When it’s time to finish up, take the cooled ashes outside and bury them in the ground. Leave your food offerings nearby.
For the Kids
There are usually more than enough Halloween activities going on in October for the kids. But how do you get them to understand what Samhain is really about? Create something fun to draw their attention while you count down the days!
Grab some orange construction paper and cut out thirty-one pumpkin shapes; number them 1 to 31 on one side. On the other side, write a short fact about Samhain, or paste on a picture of a loved one who’s passed or share a fun fact about that person. If you like, staple or tape a small treat to each pumpkin, such as a piece of candy, a coin, a small Halloween eraser, or something like that. Starting on October 1, find a place to stash the pumpkin where you know your child will find it. Pack it in their school lunch, stick it in their sock drawer, or prop it up by their toothbrush. On Halloween morning, tape the last paper pumpkin to a real pumpkin and help them carve a face in it so that it can guard your home that night.
October 19 Interview, Paranormal Romantic Suspense, http://sjclarke.com/blog-2/
October 20 PromoFang-tastic Bookswww.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
October 22 Guest Blog and ReviewThe Insane Ramblings of a Crazed Writerwww.jessekimmelfreeman.com/blog.html
October 22 PromoFreda's Voice http://fredasvoice.blogspot.ca
October 23 Guest BlogA Writer's Mind- www.skypurington.com
October 24 Guest blog and reviewthefaeryromanticlibrarian.blogspot.com
October 25 Guest blog and reviewhttp://simplegoddessmagic.blogspot.com/

October 25 PromoCover2CoverBlogwww.cover2coverblog.blogspot.com
October 26 Promo and reviewMelissa @ Melissa's Eclectic Bookshelfhttp://melissaseclecticbookshelf.blogspot.com/ 
October 27 promo and reviewReadaholic's Reviews/ www.readaholicsreviews.com
October 27 ReviewKrystal's Enchanting Reads http://enchantingreads7.blogspot.com/
October 28 Guest post and reviewOn the Broomstickhttp://onthebroomstick.blogspot.com/
October 28 Promo and reviewhttp://moonstarsfantasyworld.blogspot.no/
October 30 Interview and reviewWolf Majick Reviewswww.wolfmajick.blogspot.com
October 30 Guest blogBookin' It Reviewshttp://www.bookinitreviews.com/
October 31 Guest Post and review Mama Knows Books http://mamaknowsbooks.blogspot.com
November 1 Interview Nov 2 ReviewBlooding Book Reviewshttp://frankieblooding.wordpress.com/




Mrs. B’s Guide to Household Witchery: Everyday Magic, Spells, and Recipes
By Kris Bradley
Genre: New Age/ Wicca
Publisher: Weiser Books, an imprint of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLCISBN: 978-1-57863-515-3
Number of pages: 224Word Count: 49,000
Cover Artist: Jim Warner
Amazon   B&N
Book Description:For domestic goddesses everywhere—add some magic and fun to those mundane household chores with Mrs. B.'s Guide to Household Witchery. Whether you're sweeping the floor, making a meal, or cleaning out that junk drawer, domestic witch Kris Bradley, creator of the popular blog, Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom, will show you how to create spells and magic to bring happiness and balance into your home.Bradley offers ideas and solutions to make the most out of everyday items, activities, and obligations. From Anchovies to Broccoli, and Wine to Yeast, from sweeping the floor to blow-drying your hair, you can change your outlook on life with a pinch of knowledge and a dash of magic! The book includes simple rituals, spells, and ways to connect with the spirits that watch over your home and family. Includes an appendix of herbs and a complete materia magica from the kitchen pantry.Mrs. B's Guide to Household Witchery features:      Room by Room: How to create magic while you cook, set up a family altar in the living room, or do a junk drawer divination      The Elements for the Domestic Witch: a primer on the 4 elements and how to balance them in your home      The Domestic Witch's Herbal: Magical uses for every herb and food in your pantry, as well as instant magic with prepackaged spice mixes      Simple Sabbats for the Busy Witch: simple ways to celebrate the passing of the seasonsMagical Recipes: More than 100 recipes and spells


About the Author:
Kris Bradley is the magic behind the popular blog Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom (2500 readers). She helped establish The Sisterhood of the Triple Goddess coven in Keyport, NJ and is a legally ordained minister, in addition to being a witchy wife and mother. Her work on domestic witchery has been featured in PaganParenting.org and as a national column for Examiner.com. She lives in Keyport, NJ.
Website: http://www.krisbradley.com/
Blog: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/confessionsofapagansoccermom/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ConfessionsofaPaganSoccerMom
Twitter: https://twitter.com/KrisMrsBBradley
GoodReads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6008206.Kris_Bradley
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Impossible Realities: The Science Behind Energy Healing, Telepathy, Reincarnation, Precognition, and Other Black Swan Phenomena By Maureen Caudill Chapter One Excerpt

Chapter 1The First Black Swan: Psychokinesis
I have a bowl in my house that is filled with the remains of various pieces of cutlery that are not exactly usable. These are forks and spoons and an occasional knife that used to be good-quality stainless steel cutlery, but which now are just . . . strange. Every so often I give a workshop for people who want to learn how to access their psychic selves. The format varies some, depending on the time available. Yet, no matter how long the workshop—a day, a weekend, or a week—the one skill people always want me to teach them is spoon-bending.To be honest, I’m not quite sure why spoon-bending is so popular. It’s really a bit of a party trick rather than anything profound. But maybe it’s just that a warped fork is tangible evidence that they have done something unusual. When you go home with a fork that is bent and twisted into strange shapes, you have absolute proof that you did something extraordinary.Spoon-bending is definitely a skill that has fallen on hard times. It had been extremely popular in the 1970s as celebrated psychic Uri Geller rose to fame as a spoon-bender extraordinaire, until in 1973, he was caught cheating on national television, on the Tonight Show. He was declared a fraud. He was pilloried by all and virtually drummed out of the United States.Now to be fair, Geller did cheat. Everyone agrees on that, even him. What is often not heard is why he cheated. According to his side of the story, he was blindsided by that request, not expecting to be forced into demonstrating his skills in that particular venue. Furthermore (again from his perspective) he was exhausted, stressed, and simply not in the right frame of mind to be doing anything psychic, yet he felt hounded to perform on television. Still young and desperate not to look bad by refusing, he resorted to cheating.Do I believe this story? Well . . . perhaps. Knowing what I know about doing any psychic function, Geller’s story is credible, at least in the basics. Psychic functions, like all other human talents, are not perfect all the time. No one—no one—can perform at their peak at any hour, day or night, or continuously, or on demand under stressful circumstances. That applies just as much to a top athlete, an exceptional musician, or a terrific student. Human beings simply aren’t perfect. And the public pressure to be perfect—particularly in any psychic field where people are simply waiting for you to fail—is overwhelming. A young man (he was only twenty-seven at the time of that infamous Tonight Show debacle) who had grown accustomed to acclaim might easily be tempted to mix stage magic with psychic skills. So . . . I think the verdict is “unproven” in this case, no matter whether you’re trying to prove Geller’s abilities or his lack of them.It is also true that after that episode, a number of scientific studies conducted in Europe under extremely rigorous conditions validated his innate ability to manipulate matter with his mind. Here in the United States, however, his reputation seems forever tainted by that Unfortunate Incident.A decade ago, however, I would have laughed to scorn anyone who defended the “fraud” Geller. Why my change of heart? Because I can spoon-bend. And I’ve taught close to a thousand other people to do it, too. I now understand that not only is spoon-bending possible, but also most anyone can learn to do it—and pretty easily, too. I’ve taught people to do it in small workshops, and in huge ones with hundreds of people. And in one memorable interview on Coast to Coast AM with George Noory, he asked if I was willing to try to teach people to spoonbend over the radio. I said I’d never tried that before, but I’d give it a shot. As it turned out, it was hugely successful, with one listener even calling in to say he had no cutlery handy, so he’d bent a large screwdriver instead!
A few years ago I was attending a workshop given by my good friend Robert Bruce. He is a renowned Australian mystic, whose work in energy and out-of-body experiences is some of the most effective in the world—and he’s an incredibly charming and funny man in person. At any event, on the second or third day of this five-day program, I asked him if he ever used his energy exercises to teach people to spoon-bend. He told me he’d never done it himself, so he didn’t teach it. Was I willing to show the group how to do that?That night I went to the local KMart and bought enough good-quality cutlery for the smallish group to learn spoonbending. When the time came the next day, I handed out forks (I strongly prefer to teach people using forks rather than spoons for reasons I’ll explain later), and proceeded to use Robert’s energy exercises to get people to bend their forks. As I have come to expect, everyone in the class succeeded brilliantly, and within fifteen or twenty minutes, we had a whole menagerie of twisted cutlery sculptures.The next morning, one of the women in the workshop came in and said she had to tell us what happened the night before. It turns out that this lady was dining with friends at quite a nice local restaurant. During the dinner, the talk turned to politics, a subject she was passionate about. She got a little, um, enthusiastic while talking with one of her friends. She was making her point rather forcefully and wagging her fork at the person she was speaking to, as you might wag your finger at someone. And. . . the fork drooped and melted in her hands.She was so embarrassed!She hurriedly pulled the fork out of sight onto her lap and, hiding her actions with the tablecloth, tried to put it back into its original form. She never did get it quite right, of course . . . the specific curves and angles of cutlery are difficult to replicate by hand, particularly under cover of a tablecloth when you’re upset!So the lesson from this is: If you must spoon-bend when you’re dining out, spoon-bend responsibly.5The bottom-line conclusion I have drawn about spoon-bending is that it is one of the absolute easiest psychic skills to learn, at least at the elementary level I teach it. (Far from television worthy,I might add!) And why do I prefer to teach people to bend forks rather than spoons? Because forks are a little bit harder. With a spoon, about the only thing a beginner can do is to twist the spoon at the neck, where the bowl meets the handle.6 That’s far too easy to do, even in fairly sturdy cutlery. But if you’ve ever taken a good-quality stainless steel fork and tried to bend just one tine with your fingertips, you know that it’s all but impossible to do. I ask people to try to bend their forks with their fingers before we start the spoon-bending process, just to make sure they’re convinced they can’t do it. Only then do I start guiding them in how to spoon-bend.The basic process is one of running energy through the fork to soften it. I teach people some simple exercises on manipulating chi energy; then I get them to run that energy through the fork for a few minutes, concentrating on setting their intentions that the fork soften and bend.7 As they do that for a while—as little as a minute or two, or as much as five or six minutes, depending on how good they are at running energy and holding their concentration on what they’re doing—the fork really does soften. At that point, they can bend, twist, warp, and distort it however they like—including twisting individual tines. When they have it twisted it into the configuration they like, they put the fork down and don’t touch it for three or four minutes. When they pick it up after that break, the fork has “set” in that new shape and is as hard and stiff as it was before. If they want to change the shape again, they have to start the process from scratch.It’s true that my success rate is not quite 100 percent. I find  that two kinds of people have trouble learning to spoon-bend. One set is people who are themselves quite low in chi, or life energy. This is usually people who are elderly or who have a serious illness. They barely have enough chi to keep themselves going, let alone some left over for softening stainless steel.The other type is someone who is convinced that it cannot work. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’ve taught a lot of skeptics to spoon-bend, to their astonishment. The very first time I tried to teach spoon-bending, the group included a PhD physicist and a PhD anthropologist, each of whom individually assured me that spoon-bending was a total fake, all because of the flap over Uri Geller’s Tonight Show debacle. Yet, they were willing to humor me and give it a try. They took less than five minutes to become amazing successes. The physicist in particular had ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), so he had very poor strength in his hands, yet he succeeded at bending his fork.I also remember one workshop in which there was a participant who was a professional magician. At the break before we started the spoon-bending exercise, he came up to me and assured me that it was all a fake8 and that he knew at least a dozen different ways to fake spoon-bending. I listened to him as he listed them all; then I assured him he wouldn’t have to use any of those fakes in the workshop—he could do it for real. He was skeptical but had an open mind and was willing to give it a try. Twenty minutes later, he came up to me, showing a wildly twisted fork and jubilantly said, “I did it! I don’t have to fake it anymore! I can really do it!”The type of skeptical person who fails is the one who is so convinced that it can’t be done that she refuses to actually try— or subconsciously refuses to allow herself to try. I ran into one of those in a workshop with a number of scientists. While claiming to have an open mind, when it came to the spoon-bending part, one in particular simply could not get her fork to bend. I tried everything I could think of to help her, short of bending it myself: running extra energy through it with her, helping her focus and concentrate, and so on. Nothing worked. I could see she appeared to be trying to bend it but . . . nothing. Finally, I actually touched her fork . . . and it was so soft it was practically like squishy butter! Clearly, she’d made it so soft and malleable that a small child should have been able to bend it—yet when I again encouraged her to try to bend it, she still claimed she couldn’t, that it was too stiff. It seemed to me that her fingers were working against each other, something like doing an isometric exercise, where a lot of effort is expended yet nothing actually moves. My guess is that she has never been able to bend a spoon and likely never will.As with any psychic (or physical) skill, you can convince yourself you are incapable of doing it. Yet, the truth is, as best I can tell from my totally unscientific observations of hundreds and hundreds of people, most people, possibly almost all people, can do spoon-bending. It’s easy to learn, easy to do, and when you do it yourself—as opposed to watching someone do it on the stage— you know for a fact that it’s not a fake.And that’s exactly why I teach this particular little party trick so often in workshops. When I teach people about chi energy, it all sounds airy-fairy and nonsensical to anyone with a scientific mindset—it certainly did to me when I first heard about it. Even when I show people that they can literally feel the energy moving around their bodies, they often have the same reaction I initially had, that it’s all imagination and none of it is anything more than self-delusion. Yet, when I teach people to take that same “imaginary” energy, run it through a fork for a few minutes, and then feel solid stainless steel soften enough to become soft and malleable in their hands, suddenly what was nonsensical and imaginary becomes very, very real.So perhaps that’s the real reason for the popularity of spoonbending. If you learn to do even one thing that conventional science deems wildly impossible, you begin to believe that other things are possible, too.
Spoon-bending is of course only one of many manifestations of psychokinesis. People have been known to have a wide variety of psychokinetic skills, including• lighting light bulbs in their hands,• sprouting seeds by holding them in the palm of the hand,• moving objects without touching them,• changing how dice roll or roulette wheels spin to force a specific result,9 and• influencing random events (such as with a random number generator) to force a specific trend in results over many, many trials.
Again, these are only examples of skills that have been studied. While my experience has been primarily spoon-bending, I did once try sprouting seeds in the palm of my hand. It was, well, not exactly either a success or a failure. Here’s what happened.I was preparing for a new workshop I planned, and I wondered if I could manage to teach people how to sprout seeds in their palms—in spite of the fact I’d never done it myself, nor even seen anyone else attempt to do it. Someone had mentioned to me that it was possible to do it, so I figured I’d give it a try. If I could manage the trick, I’d think about adding it to the workshop.I got some vegetable seeds from my local nursery and gave them a little soak in water for about an hour. This particular type of seed was supposed to have a seven- to ten-day sprouting time once planted. After that brief soak, I sat down in my favorite meditation chair, put about three seeds in the palm of my hand, and started doing the same energy process that I use for spoonbending. (I have no idea if this is how people who know how to sprout seeds do this—it’s simply the process that I tried.) I was very careful to hold my hand steady by propping it on a pillow so I wouldn’t accidentally tip it. I cupped my other hand over the one holding the seeds and started running energy between my palms. After a few moments, I felt something very odd—a flash of heat and light combined with a shock, a bit like an electric shock. Startled, I uncovered my palm holding the seeds to see if they had sprouted. They hadn’t.Instead, they’d disappeared.So much for my seed-sprouting abilities. I never did add seedsprouting to my workshops. Probably that’s just as well, don’t you think?A couple of points about this aborted seed-sprouting effort are important. One thing is that when you’re working with these energies, you sometimes get results that are not what you intend. Was I trying to make the seeds disappear? Not at all. It never occurred to me to even try to do that. Nonetheless, that’s what I accomplished. Particularly in a case like this where I didn’t have any idea what I was doing, never even having seen someone else do it, it was likely a little foolhardy on my part to attempt seedsprouting. Maybe someday I’ll get someone to show me how to do it correctly.Another key point to remember is that the energies you work with when doing psychic work are significant. These are not toys or games. I cannot emphasize that enough. Working with life energy and altered states of consciousness is serious business. These energies are powerful and they can do things to you and to other people that are not so pleasant. Fooling around with psychic skills is highly risky unless you learn how to do it under the guidance of a competent, caring, and highly ethical instructor. It is especially risky when you lack the discipline and maturity to use these skills wisely instead of arrogantly. While not quite as dangerous as handing a four-year-old a loaded pistol to play with, the impact of careless, irresponsible “play” in these arenas can have serious consequences.On second thought, maybe playing around irresponsibly with psychic skills is more dangerous than handing a four-year old a loaded pistol.10
If psychokinesis is impossible, what are we to make of other reports by researchers in which some amazing effects are noted? For example, Dong Shen reports on a Chinese experiment in which solid matter (a piece of paper) apparently passed through other solid matter (a capped plastic canister)—and did so instantaneously— or at least so quickly that no one observing the scene saw it happen.Shen described a program in which Chinese volunteers are trained to see a “third eye” screen behind their foreheads by entering a trained state of “second consciousness.” When in this state, they can visualize an object being other than where it is— and the object relocates to a new location. Here’s how it works.A capped black plastic canister, such as that holding 35mm film, is used to hold a piece of paper. The paper, prepared in secret, has something written on it, unknown to everyone except the preparer. The preparer also folds it in a personally unique way and places it in the plastic canister where the cap seals the paper inside. An independent observer monitors the preparation of the paper and the canister but cannot see what is written on the paper.In the experiment Shen witnessed, the main participant was a seventeen-year-old with only a middle-school education but who had received approximately six months of training in accessing this second consciousness state. Once the canister was ready, the participant sat in a chair one meter (a little over three feet) away from a table. The canister was placed on the table. The two researchers plus five observing guests sat also between one and three meters (between three and ten feet) away from the table. No words were spoken during the experiment.For about forty minutes, the participant focused his attention on the plastic canister. Neither he nor anyone else moved from their chairs. No one was close enough to the container to reach it. Other than staring at the container and occasionally looking up at the ceiling, the participant did not move.After forty minutes, the participant announced that the paper was no longer in the container. It instead had moved about six meters away (nearly twenty feet) to the far wall of the room. The participant also announced that what was written on it was “830,” in blue ink.An observer checked that location and retrieved the paper. The person who prepared the paper verified his own handwriting, the content of the message, and that the paper was still folded in the idiosyncratic way he had folded it at the beginning of the experiment.There it was, just as the participant had announced: 8-3-0, in blue ink.There are many curious features about this experiment. First, the participant had no demonstrable psychic skills until undergoing the Chinese training program. Thus, whatever skills he possessed at the time of the experiment were learned skills. Second, although there were at least seven witnesses, all watching attentively, no one saw the paper move out of the cylinder and across the room. Furthermore, the paper, even folded as it was, was far too small and light to be able to be thrown for that distance (nearly twenty feet).Shen describes the subject’s efforts:
During the experiment he concentrated on the black cartridge container and got it deep in his consciousness while entering into the SCS [second consciousness state]. Then an image of the container appeared on the third-eye screen located in front of his forehead. He saw the image of the paper in the same way. At the very beginning, the paper image was not stable and not clear. After he focused on the image for a while, it became stable and clear on the screen. The number on the paper could then be easily read, that is 830 written in blue, even though the paper was folded inside the capped container. When the image of the paper was clear on the screen, he started to use his mind to move the paper out of the container. At a certain point he “saw” in his mind that the container was empty and saw in the room that the paper was on the floor near the wall.12
It’s easy to dismiss reports like this. They’re clearly idiosyncratic to this subject. The researchers make no claims that everyone can achieve effects like this. And yet, cultural biases should not lead us to ignore reputable reports, even if they’re not conducted in western European or American institutions. The Shen report discusses the prime candidates for training in psychic skills as being children between the ages of eight and twelve (prepubescent) or young adults between fifteen and twenty-two years who have limited education—in other words, people who don’t know that they’re doing something that isn’t supposed to be possible.Is it the case that we educate our children out of a whole range of abilities by informing them that they can’t do them? Does the Western mindset force psychic phenomena underground?
What Is a Meta-Analysis?Often, a single study doesn’t generate convincing results, particularlywhen the size of the study is small. Generally, the most trusted form ofevidence for or against an effect is not a single study but an analysis ofall studies that have been done on that effect. Doing a meta-analysisis tricky, however, because studies are typically done by differentresearchers, using different protocols, with different degrees of carein study design.The primary reasons researchers do meta-analyses are becausethey are more general than any one specific study. In addition, metastudiescan determine if any type of publication bias is occurring.They also tend to demonstrate if an effect is specific to one particularresearcher or one specific study protocol or if it extends tomultiple researchers and protocols. This process also increases thetotal number of participants or trials—and in statistics, more datameans more significant data. If you flip a coin five times, it’s not allthat unusual to get five heads in a row—it happens about 3 percentof the time. But if you flip a coin fifty times, the odds of gettingfifty consecutive heads (or fifty consecutive tails) are about 1 in 1quadrillion (specifically, 1 chance out of 1,125,899,906,842,620). Inother words, if you flipped fifty coins every second, it would take youwell over thirty-five million years before you flipped fifty consecutiveheads or fifty consecutive tails.There are many ways that meta-analyses can go wrong. First, theanalysis is only valid if it includes all studies published on a particularsubject (or at least all studies in which necessary analysis informationis included in the study report). How individual studies are encodedand selected for inclusion in a meta-analysis is a subjective process. Ameta-analysis can be considered trustworthy only if it explicitly definesthe criteria for selection and the methodology of encoding the studies inadvance and explicates those criteria and methodologies in its report.
All this is well and good, but what is the scientific evidence that these are not just amusing and interesting anecdotes? Does science in any way support the reality of these experiences?As it happens, it does.Several types of psychokinetic effects have been put under rigorous scientific scrutiny. These typically are experiments in rolling dice to see if it is possible to influence the outcome or in attempting to influence random-number generators to output nonrandom-number sequences.The short answer to this type of experiment is that across about fifty years of studies, the effect is small but highly statistically significant. For example, a 1989 meta-analysis of a half century of controlled dice-rolling experiments showed highly significant influence of participants on selecting the roll of a standard die. The results were so significant that the chance that they’re merely statistical flukes is more than a billion to one.13In 2006, a controversial meta-analysis of psychokinetic effects was published by Dr. Holger Bosch, Dr. Fiona Steinkamp, and Dr. Emil Boller, from various European organizations. This study, which for convenience I’ll refer to as the BSB study, performed a meta-analysis of human interaction with random number generators. It is one of the more frequently cited studies by skeptics as disproving psychokinesis.Basically the BSB study searched hard to find a reason to discount the possibility of psychokinesis. While noting that there are strong statistical data supporting psychokinesis, and that this evidence is generally of quite high quality in terms of the methodology used to collect the data, the authors came down firmly on the negative side of the question of whether psychokinesis is real. They concluded,
the statistical significance of the overall database [of studies of human interaction with random-number generators] provides no directive as to whether the phenomenon is genuine . . . Publication bias appears to be the easiest and most encompassing explanation for the primary findings of the meta-analysis.14
In part, their claim that publication bias was responsible for the supposed psychokinetic effects was as a result of their use of a funnel plot to identify such bias. (See “What Is a Funnel Plot?”) The resulting chart clearly showed an asymmetric funnel, which is commonly interpreted as meaning that larger effects come from smaller-scale studies. When this happens, these smallscale studies are possibly statistical flukes, like tossing only five heads in a row instead of fifty heads in a row.
What Does Publication Bias Mean?Not all research studies ever see the light of day in peer-reviewed journals.The reasons studies may never be published include two criticalones—and these reasons undermine how science should be conducted.The first such problem is that a study in which the results areinconclusive, or oppose the researcher’s expected results or (worstof all) pet theory of the world, very often are stuck into a file drawersomewhere and never written up. This is horrific for science since itgenerates a tremendous bias in favor of currently popular theorieswhile suppressing data that tend to undermine those theories.The second problem is that a study may be written up and submittedto appropriate journals, but those journals may decide that thestudy outcomes are either results they choose not to present (oftenbecause they undermine existing accepted theories or belief structures)or are simply “uninteresting” because they merely confirmexisting theories. The problem with that is that having more data thatsupports a theory means that confidence in that theory is more secure.
What Is a Funnel Plot?A funnel plot is used in meta-analyses to determine if publicationbias exists in the reported studies. Basically, it plots the magnitudeof the effect against the sample size in each study. Ideally, it mightlook something like the plot shown for a meta-analysis with each datapoint representing an individual study included in the meta-analysis.If the funnel plot is not symmetric, it implies that there is some type ofpublication bias, either for or against the effect as a result of the sizesof the studies. In other words, small-scale studies might show favorableresults, while large-scale studies do not (or even might shownegative results).The dark lines on the chart reflect the 95 percent confidence levelfor the studies, that is, that there is 95 percent confidence that thestudies’ correct results are between those lines based on a statisticalanalysis of the studies and the data..Usually, the study size is represented by the statistical standarderror of the measured effect. Most commonly, the study size is on thevertical axis, and the effect size is on the horizontal axis. This type ofplot is convenient because a quick glance at the distribution of thestudies can demonstrate whether they’re approximately symmetricallylocated within that 95 percent triangle, as are the dots in theexample diagram. If they are approximately symmetrical around thecenter line of the triangle—the vertical that runs through the peak ofthe triangle—there is no obvious publication bias; if they’re not evenlydistributed, if they lean more to one side or the other of the center ofthe triangle, it means there is a possibility of publication bias. Or theremight be some other reason for such a distribution.Problems can arise with using funnel charts, including the possibilitythat there really is a difference between large-scale and smallscalestudies. Also, depending on how study size and effect size aredefined, the shape of the chart can change quite dramatically.
The BSB study, as noted in the concluding statement quoted earlier, also ascribes the positive results shown by psychokinetic studies to the “file drawer” effect in which negative or inconclusive studies are simply buried in file drawers and never written up for publication. (See “What Does Publication Bias Mean?”)Doesn’t look too good for psychokinesis being a genuine effect, does it? Well, not so fast. As it turns out, there are some serious issues with this highly publicized meta-analysis that show up only when the actual process used in the BSB study are examined in detail.Dean Radin, Roger Nelson, York Dobyns, and Joop Houtkooper responded to this meta-analysis with an assessment of the quality of the BSB study itself.15 They note a number of serious problems with how that study was done. One problem is that the BSB study was itself quite selective in how it chose to include or exclude previous research reports in its meta-analysis. One specific research report sort of included in the BSB study reported results from a total of seven individual experiments, yet only one of these was included in the BSB study analysis. Furthermore, the four largest studies included in the BSB report all had their data seriously underreported—and those four studies contained more than three hundred times as much data as all the other small-scale studies included in the BSB report combined. These four studies by themselves are so large that Radin et al. claim that “the overwhelming preponderance of data in these large experiments should be taken as definitive . . . [because] the remainder of the meta-analytic database [in the BSB study] comprises less than half a percent of the total available data.”16In other words, the BSB report threw out the vast majority of the data available for its meta-analysis, giving excessive weight to the small-scale studies while ignoring the statistically more important large-scale studies. That’s definitely not how a metaanalysis of anything should be conducted.Radin et al. also noted that in addition to throwing away nearly all the relevant data, the BSB study also literally threw away two-thirds of the potential studies that could have been used in the meta-analysis. As noted in “What Is a Meta-Analysis,” one of the huge mistakes made in a meta-analysis of anything is arbitrarily ignoring previous research papers and including only a selection of them—the selection that matches the bias of those doing the meta-analysis. All data and all previous research needs to be included to construct a competent meta-analysis, not just data or research that supports the biases of those doing the meta-analysis. This is not the case in the BSB study.Radin et al. reported yet another key problem with the BSB study that is far too common in modern-day science. This error is called “experimenter’s regress.” Specifically, the BSB report concludes,this unique experimental approach will gain scientific recognitiononly when researchers know with certainty whatan unbiased funnel plot (i.e., a funnel plot that includesall studies that have been undertaken) look like. If thetime comes when the funnel indicates a systematic effect,a model to explain the effect will be more than crucial.Until that time, Girden’s (1962b) verdict of “not proven” .. . with respect to dice experiments also holds for humanintentionality on RNGs [random number generators].17
As Radin et al. note, specifying this kind of criteria is setting up a Catch-22 requirement for psychokinesis. Here’s why. When an accepted theory predicts outcomes of an experiment, the theory is tested merely by comparing experimental results with those theoretical predictions. If they match within the limits of experimental error, everyone rejoices and says the experimental protocol and measurement methodology was “obviously” correct. Unfortunately, if experimental data and accepted theory don’t match, the presumption is that it must be the experimenter’s fault. The design of the experiment or the protocol or the methodology must be wrong. Or the experimenter must have been perpetrating a fraud. Or the participants in the experiment must be hoaxing the experimenter. Or something. It can’t possibly be that the theory is wrong because, well, simply everyone believes the theory, right?Right.Certainly it’s true that not all studies of psychic effects are well designed. Yet, at the same time, as the BSB study demonstrates equally clearly, many of the studies that “disprove” psychic effects are very poorly done and display a shocking amount of researcher bias, poor protocols, and other mistakes that invalidate the conclusions drawn by the skeptical authors. In other words, if it’s important to demand scientific care in paranormal scientific reports—and it is—it is equally important to demand the same type of scientific care on those reports that attempt to debunk those studies.Because no coherent theory exists for psychokinesis (or any other psychic phenomenon), and because mainstream thought— the “accepted theory” in today’s science—is is that psychic phenomena simply don’t exist, any experiment that demonstrates a statistically significant psychic effect must be wrong. In other words, rather than letting actual, measured, real-world data control the theory, theory overtakes observation. We’re not allowed to measure the effect until we have a theory of how psychokinesis (or any other psychic phenomenon) works, but without data, it is impossible to construct a coherent theory of how it works.Catch-22.
Before leaving this topic, I need to point out one other little detail that virtually proves our ability to impact physical matter solely with the mind. In the 1980s, Jack Houck became seriously interested in spoon-bending. As it happens, he had access to metallurgical analysis equipment. As reported by Paul Smith, Houck investigated the crystalline structure of metal that had been psychically deformed (which Houck referred to as “warm forming” the metal to avoid sensationalizing his reports), compared to metal that had been mechanically deformed (as happens in all magician’s tricks, such as when the spoon is surreptitiously pressed against the edge of a table, or previously deformed with a vise and a pair of pliers). He also compared those with theThe First Black Swan: Psychokinesis 21 structure of metal that had been subjected to extreme heat (such as a torch). Houck took cross-sections of the three types of deformed metal and compared their microstructures to determine what types of cracks, if any, each type of deformed metal had at that microscopic level. Here’s what he found:Metal deformed mechanically, as a stage magician does it, showed cracks in the structure. Metal deformed by extreme heat showed a set of crystals that had been fused and melted. But metal deformed using “warm forming” (that is, the psychically bent spoons bent at ordinary room temperature, or at least skin temperature), however, showed neither the fused and melted crystals of being subject to high heat nor the cracks of mechanical deformation. Instead, at a microscopic level, they had an intact crystal structure, as if they had been manufactured in that physical shape. In other words, the psychically bent spoons had the same microscopic structure as if they were melted and cast in the deformed shape. As can be seen in the photos of some of the psychically bent cutlery from my workshops, such a set of silverware would be very interesting, if not too functional.The melting point of stainless steel is approximately 2750°F (1510° C). I don’t know about you, but my hands simply don’t get that hot. (Ow!) While skeptics may claim that it’s possible to fake spoon-bending (and it is, in lots of different ways), I know of no way to fake it that preserves the microscopic structure of the bent spoon or fork as found by this research.What’s even more interesting is that science has known for more than thirty years that psychokinesis works. Isn’t it interesting that it is still dismissed as a party trick? All I can say to that is:Some party trick, huh?


Impossible Realities: The Science Behind Energy Healing, Telepathy, Reincarnation, Precognition, and Other Black Swan Phenomena

By Maureen Caudill
Genre: Non-Fiction/New Age/Paranormal
Publisher: Hampton Roads Publishing, an imprint of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLCISBN: 978-1-57174-663-4
Number of pages: 256Word Count: 66,377
Cover Artist: Jim Warner
Amazon   Barnes and Noble
Book Description:
Impossible Realities is the first book to examine the science behind psychic and paranormal activity. A former Defense Department expert on artificial intelligence, Maureen Caudhill provides evidence for a wide range of paranormal phenomena.

Impossible Realities presents a wealth of anecdotal and empirical evidence to prove the existence (and power) of:
psychokinesis (most famously spoon bendingremote viewingenergy healingtelepathy, animal telepathyprecognitionsurvival after deathreincarnation
Caudill presents the strongest case yet for bringing paranormal phenomena from the margins into the realm of the normal and credible. This is a book both for true believers and skeptics alike.
About the Author:
Maureen Caudill spent more than twenty years as a computer scientist, fifteen of those as a researcher in artificial intelligence and neural networks. She was a program manager and Artificial Intelligence researcher working on such advanced projects as DARPA (“High Performance Knowledge Base” program) and ARDA (“Advanced Question Answering for Intelligence” program).


Website:  http://www.maureencaudill.com/index.htm
Blog:  http://scienceofpsychicphenomena.com
Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/MaureenCaudillAuthor
GoodReads:  http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/63686.Maureen_Caudill

Tour Guest Blog SEE ME by Natalie-Nicole Bates

From Book Lover To Book AuthorBy Natalie-Nicole Bates
I have always been a voracious reader ever since I was a child. I was the twelve year old kid in the corner reading Harold Robbins and Sidney Sheldon. I remember being swept away in Sheldon’s Master of the Game and Robbins’ Goodbye, Janette. Influenced by these masters, I knew I wanted to write someday.
A few years ago, I spent a week in the hospital after an ill-fated skateboard stunt. I sent my partner to the bookstore to get as many Harlequin and Silhouette books he could find. That week I reached my all time record for the number of books read—24 books in one week!
More than a year ago, I decided to try making the big leap from reader to writer. I knew it couldn’t be accomplished by simply sitting down at the computer and pounding out a 350-page story. There were building blocks to creating a novel—idea, setting, plot, scene, point of view—to name a few.
I enrolled in an intensive six-month course in the art of novel writing. I was paired with a mentor, and was ready to writing this sweeping mainstream saga involving two people who had wills that left them a piece of property. My mentor said, you belong in the romance genre. This was best advice I could get.
This past summer, I finished my first novel, a contemporary romance called Change of Address. To my delight, I sold it to Secret Cravings Publishing in just a week.
After I signed the contract, I was hit by an idea for a paranormal story. I knew that I wanted it to be short, just a small bite for a reader to enjoy, and hopefully if I could sell it, it would be my introduction to all of the readers in this world. During a particularly frenzied episode of writing, I finished the story in a day. After editing, I sold the story to Books To Go Now. Back To You, soon followed and is now available at Bradley Publishing. I’m now looking forward this October to the release of SEE ME from Leap of Faith Publishing.
This is my introduction to the world of publishing. I hope you will enjoy my stories as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them

October 15 promoSapphyria's Steamy Book Reviews: http://saphssteamybooks.blogspot.com/
October 16 Guest blogKacey's Konnections - Supporting Author Book Tourshttp://kaceyskonnections.blogspot.com/
October 18 Guest blogCarly Fall - Where Fantasy Meets Romancewww.carlyfall.com
October 19 Guest blogwww.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
October 20 InterviewRoxanne’s Realmwww.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com
October 21 Guest blogMila Ramos, Paranormal & Contemporary Romance http://jademystique.blogspot.com 
October 22 Guest blogwww.creativelygreen.blogspot.com

SEE MEby Natalie-Nicole Bates
Description:
Carly Anders  is hearing voices in her head. Another one of her kind is trying to contact her. She knows of the malevolent freaks—others who are eternal like her and seek out the weak to inflict pain upon. For years, Carly has held up huge protective walls to keep herself and her secrets safe. Now, physically and mentally exhausted, Carly needs protection and rest.
She accepts the invitation to visit an internet friend who needs help appraising a collection of antique photographs.  The situation is not ideal, but Carly hopes a male presence in her life will deter the determined suitor who haunts her thoughts and dreams.
Daniel Tremont is not what Carly is expecting.
The former funeral director has a secret of his own. Not only is he eternal like Carly, he is her creation from all those years before—her abomination she thought she killed.
Daniel has been searching for Carly for years. He knows she is the piece of his life that he has been missing for so long. Now that he has found her, he has no intentions of letting her go.
Leap of Faith Publishing

About the Author:
Natalie-Nicole Bates is a book reviewer and author.
Her passions in life include books and hockey along with Victorian and Edwardian era photography and antique poison bottles. Natalie contributes her uncharacteristic love of hockey to being born in Russia.
She currently resides in the UK where she is working on her next book and adding to her collection of 19th century post-mortem photos.
Visit Natalie online at www.natalienicolebates.com
Twitter: BatesNatalie
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/natalienicole.bates

Interview with the Authors of Specter Spectacular

What draws you to reading and writing ghost stories?:
Shannon: I find I write best when I push myself to explore the uncertain, the uncomfortable, and the unacceptable. Often, this takes my writing in the direction of the fantastical: many of my stories have elements of fairy tales, folk tales, and the supernatural. As a narrative form, ghost stories specifically interest me because of their potential for psychological ambiguity, their metaphoric ability to communicate fear and pain. I like to venture down into the unlit basement. Allegorically speaking, as a writer and a reader. In real life, I’m afraid of the dark! I’m only half-joking. A few years ago, past midnight, as I was stumbling through my pitch-black kitchen, I had a sort of silly revelation: everything at night – in this moment, my kitchen – is exactly the same as it is in the daytime except there’s an absence of light. I couldn’t hang onto that sensible thought: the nighttime darkness just feels like a different world – familiar, and yet strange. Freud calls this creepiness Das Unheimliche (which translates as “the uncanny,” but it sounds so much more elegantly menacing in German).
Jamie: A good story – the best of stories, in my opinion – grabs and engages the reader on a deeply emotional level. Some make us bite our lips to stifle late-night laughter; some make us glance up in embarrassment in the coffee shop, hoping that no one notices that our eyes are red and watery – hoping, too, that even if they do notice, we can pawn it off as allergies. A good ghost story – a good horror story, although the two aren’t always mutually exclusive – can grab two of our most atavistic emotions at once and wring them for all they’re worth: wonder and fear. In short: I enjoy reading them because they remind me of what it means to be afraid of the dark.
Terrence: The idea that there is something left over after death – is not pleasant. People who live on, in some wan fashion, after they die, are in a real pickle. What did they do to deserve being one of the not-quite-dead? What do they do now? Are they so pissed about their involuntary condition that they take it out on the living (e.g., by going “whooo…whooo” and scaring the s*** out of them?). There is a curse of not being able, finally, to let go. The stories of these, the most unfortunate of the unfortunate, call out to us. We may be next.
Where did the idea for your Specter Spectacular story come from?
Shannon: “Wendigo” is, in part, a story about addiction – one that it draws on personal experience, although at a remove. Someone I care for has had problems with alcohol. He was a habitual, late-night drunk-dialer, and I always took his calls. He’d be morose, but aggressive; talkative, yet unreachable. One night he called me, drunk to the point of distortion. Only his misery came through clearly. As he spoke, I had a sudden image of him talking to me from hell, and I couldn’t shake it. I began writing this story soon after. In its own way, I think addiction is a curse, a possession. Not only is the addict haunted, but the addict haunts family and friends; everyone involved is haunted by notions of who the addict used to be or could be, sober.
Jamie: When I was a child – eight or nine, I guess? – and living in southern Ohio, tornado watches and warnings were a pretty common experience. While staying at a relative’s, we had a tornado warning, and we went down to the basement. I can’t remember why I did it, I do remember that the sound that came from the other end of the phone – some error signal I’d never heard before – scared me very badly. This piece of technology, which had been there the way my parents had been there (that is, as something before I was, something that proved there was a world before me), had gone bad. And, as absurd as it sounds, the idea of that not just terrified but horrified me: that something that seemed as evil as the tornado could break something so fundamental. Although the situation and setting isn’t the same, I wanted to try and write about that fear, and it became the climax of the story. (And I should add that the story wouldn’t have been written were it not for a prompt in Matthew Vollmer’s fiction workshop).
Terrence: In Don Giovanni, the statue of the murdered Commendatore appears, and drags the Don down to Hell. There must have been a time when the statue first realized that it was – had been – someone whom the Don had killed. Perhaps it was being carved – by a second-rate sculptor who worked on the cheap – who resented having to do hack jobs for a few ducati. The statue remembered – that there had been a life before; and how it had ended – and how there could be revenge.
What is your favorite ghost story of all time?
Shannon: I deeply admire (and drew inspiration from) Don Chaon’s “The Bees”, which is also a ghost story that deals with alcoholism. “The Bees” features a man who has ditched his drinking and his destructive ways – but his happy ending with his wife and young son is beginning to blur at the edges. The past, the awful past, begins to leak into the present. Chaon’s former addict is, I think, a dark double, and his former life, an underworld of the self. This story is relentless, start to finish; it’s bookended by two horrific, fascinating images and moves swiftly between these two points. “The Bees” can bJamie: The Shining, by Stephen King. It was the book that taught me that good characters are the key to good horror. When you feel things for the characters (despite – or maybe because of – their flaws) before the horror even starts, it magnifies your fear as the reader. The Overlook is scary, no matter how you look at it, but thinking of Jack and Wendy and Danny as real people trapped inside makes the fear metastasize into terror.
Terrence: In the O.T., King Saul calls up the ghost of the prophet Samuel. Samuel has a terrible prophecy for Saul. Saul should have never tried to raise the dead, because the prophecy may never have come true had Samuel not been so incensed at having been raised to a kind of re-lived life.



World Weaver Press presents Specter Spectacular: 13 Ghostly Tales anthology of short fiction edited by Eileen Wiedbrauk. New!Spirits, poltergeists, hauntings, creatures of the dark —Specter Spectacular: 13 Ghostly Tales delivers all these and more in thirteen spooky twists on the classic ghost story.  From the heartwarming and humorous to the eerie and chilling, this anthology holds a story for everyone who has ever been thrilled by the unknown or wondered what might lie beyond the grave. Step inside and witness ghosts of the past, tales of revenge, the inhuman, the innocent, the damned, and more. But be warned — once you cross the grave into this world of fantasy and fright, you may find there’s no way back out.Featuring work by Amanda C. Davis, A. E. Decker, Larry Hodges, Sue Houghton, Andrea Janes, Terence Kuch, Robbie MacNiven, Kou K. Nelson, Jamie Rand, Shannon Robinson, Calie Voorhis, Jay Wilburn, and Kristina Wojtaszek. Read digital edition for $4.99 from these ebook retailers and others:
Amazon |  Barnes & Noble | Kobo Read print edition for $8.99 from these retailers and others:
Amazon | Print-on-Demand___Release date: September 25, 2012Genre: Contemporary and historical ghost storiesAnthology length: 155 pagesPraise for Specter SpectacularExcerpts from Specter SpectacularAbout the authors of Specter Spectacular
Add Specter Spectacular: 13 Ghostly Tales to your Goodreads shelf.___Praise for  Specter Spectacular “I loved this anthology. Creepy stories to haunt you, funny stories to charm you, and ghosts that made me shiver and smile. Like a ghost tour through a hundred towns, this was one ride I wanted to last forever.”
— Alex Hughes, author of Clean“Poignant and spooky”
— K.C. Ball, Publisher and Editor of 10Flash Quarterly“A nice little collection to read this Halloween … a fun, quick read.”
—  Tangent Tangent on individual tales in the collection:On “Cinder”: “A tale that tries to be different. And it succeeds. The prose is strong and action is paced perfectly.”On “Wendigo”: “Absolutely chilling … made my blood race. And that doesn’t happen often at all.”On “The Secret of Echo Cottage”: “Perfect for a cool Halloween afternoon with a cup of cocoa.”On “Cooter, Ass-munch, and Me”: “The collection’s finale is a quirky entry with a lot of style … told with some flare and a nice little ending, bringing the collection to a satisfying end. “___

Excerpts from  Specter Spectacular From “My Rest a Stone” by Amanda C. Davis: We are all in the lifeboat and our noses are full of the salt sea and I am hugging my dolly, like always, when her head wobbles once and falls off. The stringy hair slides through my fingers and right over the side. It rolls away with her curls all waving around in the water and her glass eye winks at me to say ha ha, she is leaving. She is leaving and I am not.So I scream. I am not as good at screaming as I used to be so sometimes I do it for practice, for When We Are Rescued. I scream for a long time.Mr Bauman says Will Someone Shut That Child Up.Mrs Adde says Let Her Scream Perhaps Someone Will Hear.Be A Brave Girl says Miss Mary who I think has forgotten how to say anything else.I Do Hope My Husband Found A Lifeboat says Mrs Baron because she says it all the time, just like Miss Mary says Be A Brave Girl until I want to hide my face in her skirt and cry, to be cowardly just for spite.But I don’t. I keep screaming. For practice.[Read the rest of this story in the anthology.] From “Alabaster” by Jamie Rand: By Ben’s watch—which he always kept ten minutes fast, because that was what his father did—it was almost five o’clock when they turned from the pavement and followed the rutted tracks deeper into the forest. His uncle Dave, up in the passenger seat, turned the radio down. Grass hissed against the underside of the Jeep and thin branches skittered against the canvas top. It reminded Ben of the sound his nails made when he’d scratch his leg through his jeans.When the trail climbed a steep hill his father dropped into second and gunned the engine. Ben felt his stomach lurch as the Jeep pitched backwards. Pennies and dimes tumbled from the ashtray and rolled under the seats. A quarter bumped against Ben’s shoe and he wiggled down to pick it up.Dave turned around to look at him. “Almost there, Benny. Excited?”“Hell yes!” he said, slipping the quarter into his pocket. And then, almost immediately: “Sorry for cussing, Dad.”His father either didn’t hear him or elected not to; his eyes were on the road, such as it was. It took a hairpin turn—Ben saw the ground drop away outside his window—and climbed at an even steeper angle. His father downshifted into first. The engine roared like a bear ready to charge. Ben could smell exhaust and burning oil.“I think we were just about your age when your grandpa first took us here,” Dave said. He had to almost shout to be heard over the motor. “That right, Mark?”“Yeah,” his father answered. “I was twelve, I think. Maybe thirteen. You were ten.”Ben could imagine his uncle that young—his mom often called him a thirty-year-old boy, so that wasn’t a huge leap—but his dad? No sir. Trying to imagine his father without his beard, without the premature gray in his hair, trying to picture him without the pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket or with fingers that weren’t dirty under the nails? That was like dividing by zero. Mrs. Jankowski had taught him that in class last year. It was impossible.Dave smiled. But it was strange. Benny had never seen him smile like that before. Tight-lipped, eyebrows up, eyes narrowed. He opened his mouth like he meant to talk but shut it and glanced at Ben’s father. Then, like he was making a joke, he blurted, “Your watch working, Benny?”Before Ben could answer his dad did it for him. “Shut the fuck up about that, Dave.”“It’s working fine, Dad,” Benny said, confused and a little hurt at the way he’d sworn. It was an Armitron, a digital with two different time settings, a stopwatch, and a display at the top that told him the day, month, and year. Press a button and the face glowed a radioactive green. It even had a little flashlight, small but bright, like they sometimes sold as key rings. It had been a present for his birthday last week. Brand new. Why wouldn’t it work?[Read the rest of this story in the anthology.] From “Cinder” by Kristina Wojtaszek: Beyond the rhythmic rasp of his own breath, Edan could hear the house cry out in death. Rafters buckled and snapped behind him, piercing through the hiss of water from the live line his buddies had dragged in. They were battling the beast at ground level while he searched the second floor. He struggled down the hall where he’d heard whimpering a moment ago, then ripped off his mask in a last effort to see the door more clearly. Soot-blackened tears fell and his lungs heaved, rejecting the toxic air; his whole body was racked with pain as he coughed out smoke. Embers, like tiny fairies, burst into wild flight as he threw his body into the door. His daughter would see things like that—find beauty in the midst of hell. He choked on the thought and took a draw of oxygen from his mask once more. Why, when the roof was disintegrating and the rooms he’d traveled through to get here were nothing more than a gaping inferno, was this damn door so stubborn? Parting his thoughts like a curtain was his little girl. If she only knew what lay beyond the door … Finally, his boot buckled its center, shards snapping, releasing a cool draft from the broken window inside. Glass littered the floor, a thousand stars reflecting heat. There she was. He’d expected her to be bigger, but then, everyone who crumpled and slept from smoke inhalation looked small and deflated. He couldn’t see her sides heave. He strained, ran his gloved hand along her charred fur, feeling for life. He lifted her gently, her head hanging limp over his shoulder, and started carefully back down the hall. From another room he yelled down, and a ladder was shifted over to him. Heading down through the starless night, he could hear his comrades shouting and clapping above the wails of an ambulance.[Read the rest of this story in the anthology.] From “The Haunts of Albert Einstein” by Larry Hodges: For every living human being in the world today, there are about thirty from the past who, by virtue of no longer being alive, are now dead. So while there are about 6.6 billion living humans on the planet, there are about 200 billion dead humans.Ghosts.Now ghosts don’t want to be dead just anywhere. Would you want to be dead for eternity in some desolate ocean covered with plankton? Or freezing your ectoplasm off on some desolate glacier with a bunch of dancing penguins? Or, God help you, in New Jersey? So there are only about 22 million square miles of land that are deadable for ghosts.That’s 9000 ghosts per square mile. Nine Thousand! If you think Earth is crowded with humans with their paltry 300 per square mile, imagine what it’s like for the 9000 ghosts. Sardines!That’s why the ghost of Albert Einstein, no longer constrained by the artificial ethical concerns created by the prefrontal cortex of a living human brain, decided to solve the problem of ghost proliferation.[Read the rest of this story in the anthology.][Top of page] Read digital edition for $4.99 from these ebook retailers and others:
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AmazonAbout the Authors Amanda C. Davis  is a combustion engineer who loves baking, gardening, and low-budget horror films. Her short fiction has appeared in Shock Totem, Orson Scott Card’s InterGalactic Medicine Show, and others. You can follow her on Twitter @davisac1 or read more of her work at www.amandacdavis.com.A. E. Decker is a former ESL tutor, doll-maker, and historian determined to build a career as a full-time writer. She holds degrees in English and History and is a graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop. At present she is editing an anthology for the Bethlehem Writers’ Group, writing the occasional short story, and working on a novel about a tomato-obsessed hit man of the supernatural. Larry Hodges , of Germantown, MD, is an active member of SFWA with over 60 short story sales, over 40 since 2008. His story was the unanimous grand prize winner at the 2010 GSHW Story Competition. He’s a 2006 Odyssey Writing Workshop graduate, a full-time writer with six books and over 1300 published articles in over 130 different publications, and a member of the USA Table Tennis Hall of Fame. Visit him at www.larryhodges.org.British author,  Sue Houghton , had her first short story published in 2001 and has since become a regular contributor to most of the women’s magazines in the UK and around the world. She has written for ezines and given quotes for several publications on the art of creative writing. Her work has won competitions and her stories have appeared in seven anthologies. Sue’s dream is to have her novel published. Andrea Janes  lives in Brooklyn, New York. From her front window she can see Upper New York Bay, a Victorian cemetery, and a high-voltage ConEd substation. She loves ghost stories, all things nautical, and tremendously big breakfasts. Terence Kuch  is a consultant, novelist, and avid hiker. His writing has appeared inCommonweal, Diagram, Dissent, New York magazine, North American Review, Slow Trains, Washington Post Book World, Washington Post Magazine, etc., and has been anthologized by Random House and McGraw-Hill. A world traveler, his literary and speculative fiction has been published in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, India, and Thailand. Robbie MacNiven  is a small-time author and freelance journalist living in the Highlands of Scotland and currently enrolled as a full-time student at the University of Edinburgh, studying History and English Language. In between exams (only a passing discomfort) and writing Robbie follows politics, football, backstabs people on Team Fortress 2 and stalks small presses online to see if they have a “submit” button. He generally prefers cats to dogs, and is 20 years old. Kou K. Nelson  lives with her husband and dogs in the way East Bay of Northern California. She enhances her history degree by visiting cities that treasure their past, St. John’s, Newfoundland, among them. She shared her love of history by teaching high school social studies for 15 years. She now owns her own dog training business, but continues to immerse herself in days of yore by attending period costume balls and various folk festivals.Jamie Rand is currently working toward his MFA at Virginia Tech. He has stories published inAbsinthe Revival, Blood Lotus, carte blanche, and Annalemma Magazine. He also has a short story in the anthology Best New Writing 2011.Shannon Robinson’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Nimrod, Sycamore Review, Crab Creek Review, Sou’wester, New Ohio Review, Prick of the Spindle, and New Stories for the Midwest. Recent honors include the Katherine Anne Porter Prize, an Elizabeth George Foundation grant, and a Hedgebrook Fellowship. She holds an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis, and this past fall was the Writer-in-Residence at Interlochen Center for the Arts. Calie Voorhis  is a life-long fanatic of the fantastic, with stories in Ray Gun Revival, Beyond Centauri, Fusion Fragment, and The Online Anathema Anthology, and stories in the print anthologies Dead Set: A Zombie Anthology, Space Sirens, Farspace 2, DOA – Tales of Extreme Terror, Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine – Issue 51, and Anywhere but Earth, among others. She holds a BS in Biology from UNC-Chapel Hill, an MFA in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill University, and is an Odyssey Writing Workshop alumna. Jay Wilburn  is a public school teacher in beautiful Conway, South Carolina, where he lives with his wife and two sons. He has published many horror and speculative fiction stories. His first novel, Loose Ends: A Zombie Novel, is available now. He is a columnist for Dark Eclipse and for Perpetual Motion Machine Press. Follow his many dark thoughts at JayWilburn.com and @AmongTheZombies on Twitter. Kristina Wojtaszek  grew up as a woodland sprite and mermaid, playing around the shores of Lake Michigan. She earned a BA in Wildlife Management as an excuse to spend her days lost in the woods with a book in hand. She currently resides in the high desert country of Wyoming with her husband and two small children. She is fascinated by fairy tales and fantasy and her favorite haunts are libraries and cemeteries. Her novella Opal a unique twist on the tale of Snow White, comes out this November.About the Editor Eileen Wiedbrauk , Editor-in-Chief of World Weaver Press, is an editor, writer, collegiate English instructor, blogger, coffee addict, cat herder, MFA graduate, fantasist-turned-fabalist-turned-urban-fantasy-junkie, Odyssey Writing Workshop alumna, photographer, designer, tech geek, entrepreneur, avid reader, and a somewhat decent cook. She wears many hats, as the saying goes. Which is an odd saying in this case, as she rarely looks good in hats. Her creative work has appeared in North American Review, Swink, Enchanted Conversation, and others. Her website, Speak Coffee to Me, can be found at eileenwiedbrauk.com.

Guest Blog: Haven 6 by Aubrie Dionne

Designing Book Covers
Although I’m primarily an author, I do design book covers for fun. The process is actually very easy. The hardest part is buying a nice program to create the font and manipulate the images. I use Adobe Photoshop.
Then, I get my images from Dreamstime.com. Sometimes it takes me hours to look for the perfect image. My eyes feel like they are going to bleed! You have to be creative in your search words. If you want an illustration or digital graphic, then you click the top box for photographs out. If you want a real life picture, then you sort the images by clicking off the box for illustrations. You can search through both real photographs and illustrations if you’re not sure what you are looking for.
You can get free fonts all over the web and install them very easily. But, Photoshop does have a number of great fonts. I play around with the picture, the title and the author’s name to see which placement is better around the image. Sometimes the words look great right in the middle, and sometime they look better on the top and bottom. A tagline is a great to put on a cover, or a quote from an author who liked the book. I usually put the tagline or author quote in a different font than the title and author’s name.
After I find the right font and placement, I use “blending options” to manipulate the quality of the words. You can add a “drop shadow” and “inner shadow,” make the words look like satin, or look “crunchy”. You can change the color of the font to match the cover, bringing the exact color from your cover to the words. It’s pretty cool.
I’m most concerned with making the cover look professional. Too many covers nowadays are just words slapped on top of an image. I try to match the words with the image and make it look smooth. I’m not a professional, but I do enjoy doing it. Now, since I’m with bigger publishers, they design the covers for me. Haven 6 was designed by Heather Howland at Entangled Publishing. It does take some of the pressure off me and allows me time to write. But, sometimes I do miss designing!



October 15 Guest blogDoctor's Noteshttp://doctorsnotes-shy.blogspot.com/
October 16 Guest blogFang-tastic Bookswww.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
October 17 Interviewwww.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com
October 18 Guest blog and reviewWords of Wisdom from The Scarf Princesshttp://wowfromthescarfprincess.blogspot.com/
October 22 Guest blogEx Libris – www.stella-exlibris.com
October 23 Guest blogGraveTellswww.gravetells.com
October 30 InterviewThe Creatively Green Write at Home Momwww.creativelygreen.blogspot.com
November 1 Guest blogButterfly-o-Meter Bookshttp://butterflyometerbooks.blogspot.com/
November 4 Guest blogSMARTMOUTHTEXANwww.smartmouthtexan.wordpress.com
November 6 Guest blog and reviewQueen of All She Reads blog  http://queenofallshereads.blogspot.com/
November 7 Interview and reviewReading Realityhttp://www.readingreality.net
November 8 ReviewNot Now...Mommy's Reading  http://www.mommysreading.com
November 9 Interview and reviewAlways a Booklover – http://alwaysabooklover.blogspot.com
Nov 10 Guest blog and reviewMichelle's Paranormal Vault of Bookshttp://concisebookreviewsbymichelle.blogspot.com/
November 11 Guest blogJeanzBookReadNReview                      http://jeanzbookreadnreview.blogspot.co.uk/
November 11 Guest blogBooked & Loaded – http://bookedandloaded.com




Haven 6
New Dawn Series Book #4Aubrie Dionne
Genre: Science Fiction RomancePublisher: Entangled Publishing
ISBN-10: 1937044858  ISBN-13: 978-1937044855
Number of pages: 326Word Count: 85KCover Artist: Heather Howland
Goodreads   Amazon  
Book Description:
A product of an illegal pairing, Eridani is the only woman without a lifemate aboard the colonization ship, the Heritage, and she is determined her less than perfect DNA will not get in the way of finding love. As the ship nears it's final destination of Haven 6 after five hundred years of travel, images of the surface show evidence of intelligent life on a planet that's supposed to be uninhabited. Commander Grier assigns Eri to the exploratory team to spy on the alien society and return with information on how to defeat them.

When Eri's team lands, tribes of humans attack and Eri is saved by Striver, the descendant of a colonist and a pirate from Old Earth's colonization efforts in other parts of the galaxy. Striver helps Eri rescue her team and they are drawn to each other despite their different allegiances. While Striver battles with trusting Eri, Eri must decide whether to warn him and his people about the commander's intentions, or follow orders and complete her mission.

About the Author:
Aubrie grew up watching the original Star Wars movies over and over again until she could recite and reenact every single scene in her backyard. She also loved The Goonies, Star Trek the Next Generation-favorite character was Data by far-, and Indiana Jones. But, her all time favorite movie was The Last Unicorn. She still wonders why the unicorn decided to change back to a unicorn in the end.

Aubrie wrote in her junior high yearbook that she wanted to be "A concert flutist" when she grew up. When she made that happen, she decided one career was not enough and embarked as a fantasy, sci fi author. Two careers seem to keep her busy. For now.

Her writings have appeared in Mindflights, Niteblade, Silver Blade, Emerald Tales, Hazard Cat, Moon Drenched Fables, A Fly in Amber, and Aurora Wolf. Her books are published by Entangled Publishing, Lyrical Press, and Gypsy Shadow Publishing. She recently signed her YA sci fi novel with Inkspell Publishing titled: Colonization: Paradise Reclaimed, which will release in October 2012.
Twitter: @authoraubrie
www.authoraubrie.blogspot.com     
Website: www.authoraubrie.com
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2964057.Aubrie_Dionne


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Now on Tour Dante's Awakening by Devon Marshall

Hi, my name’s Devon Marshall, author of ‘Dante’s Awakening ( Vampires of Hollywood #1 )’, a paranormal LGBT romantic adventure and modern-day Hollywood-glamorous take on vampires. Welcome to my blog tour with Bewitching Blog Tours where I’ll be doing some promos, interviews, and a guest blog talking about what inspires me to write my fiction!

October 15 Tour Intro Fang-tastic Bookswww.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
October 16 guest blogSMARTMOUTHTEXAN www.smartmouthtexan.wordpress.com
October 16 PromoBook Dream Land   http://booktimeforlife.blogspot.com/
October 17 InterviewCreatively Green Write at Home Momwww.creativelygreen.blogspot.com
October 18 Guest blogNomi’s Paranormal Palacehttp://nomisparanormalpalace.blogspot.com.au
October 19 InterviewRoxanne’s Realmwww.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com
October 20 InterviewBooks & Other Spells nightskydarkstar.blogspot.com
October 21 Guest blog and review Butterfly-o-Meter Bookshttp://butterflyometerbooks.blogspot.com/
October 22 Promo and reviewThe Book Mavenbookmaven623.wordpress.com
October 22 Reviewthe solitary bookworm www.thesolitarybookworm.com



Dante's AwakeningVampires of Hollywood #1Devon Marshall
Genre: LGBT Paranormal/ Lesbian VampirePublisher: Untreed ReadsASIN: B00824CMFW
Number of pages: 194Word Count: 65,898
Cover Artist: Ginny Glass & Untreed Reads
Amazon UK   Amazon US  BN  
Untreed Reads Webstore
Book Description:
Dante Sonnier is a successful Hollywood agent. She is also a friend to the secret community of vampires living in Los Angeles, and occasionally she assists them when they have a problem that requires a human to handle it. The vampires are led by Voshki Kevorkian, a gorgeous, sexy female vampire, who has made it clear that she would like Dante to be her human. Dante, although attracted to Voshki, is wary of the possessiveness and jealousy involved in being a vampire’s chosen human lover and resists.
When the Children of Judas, a two-thousand-year-old sect of murderous, rebel vampires shunned by the main community, rise up under a new leader and threaten to topple Voshki’s leadership and expose the whole community, the vampires turn to Dante for help. Dante travels to a small town in upstate California where the Children seem to be active, in the company of Ellis Kovacs, another vampire sired by Voshki, and Voshki’s "right-hand woman."
There, whilst investigating the Children and their leader Robin Shepherd, Dante succumbs to being seduced by the alluring Ellis. When Dante is kidnapped by the Children, Voshki decides it's time to take matters into her own hands.
Hell hath no fury like a vampire scorned.

About the Author:
Devon discovered at an early age that she had a fertile imagination and a profound love for words which together led to her writing stories. She has published numerous short stories and articles in the LGBT and mainstream small presses.
Dante's Awakening is her first published full-length novel and spent a week in the Amazon Top 100 in Lesbian Fiction #58  
Her second novel, 'Voodoo Woman' is available in PB and on Kindle, and the novella 'The Lives and Loves of The Modern Goddess' is also available on Kindle.
Devon lives on a windswept and remote Scottish island where the 'rat race' is an event at the annual County Fair and the daily view includes boats, birds, and the occasional bottlenose dolphin.  When she isn't writing, Devon enjoys reading, watching TV, and spending as much time as possible with her dog. She is currently working on the next book in the Vampires of Hollywood saga and a stand-alone horror novel.
http://devonmarshallwrites.weebly.com
http://wwwdevonmarshallwrites.blogspot.com  
@DevonWrites
www.facebook.com/devon.marshall.71  


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Interview and Giveaway with PM Richter

As an author, do you use an outline to write and what is your work schedule like?We authors have to put our characters through a lot of trauma.  If they led calm uneventful lives there wouldn’t be a story.  When writing a paranormal like The Necromancer I didn’t use an outline, but I did have a big list of questions about where the story was going.  I also had copious notes of research.  There were times when I put my main character in such a disastrous situation I couldn’t figure out how to rescue her.On the second part of the question, the work schedule, I wrote whenever I had the time.  Sometimes, when not sprouting exciting ideas I’ll just edit.  I enjoy editing; adding descriptive words or deleting the unnecessary ones.
What sparked the idea for The Necromancer?Paranormal books are so much fun.  I love the ones by Koontz, King, Rice, Straub, Konrath.  The Necromancer was my second novel and I wanted to do a big paranormal in the tradition of my favorite writers.  It’s funny, but you feel like you’ll be writing the darn book for the rest your life.  It’s a major revelation, a super rush when it’s done, because you never thought it would happen.
The book cover gives a feeling for the novel.  Where did you get it?
I found the cover at a stock photo site on the internet.  I searched for a long time.  Then I couldn’t believe my eyes, and was transfixed by a picture.  There was a tall black haired woman, like my main character, Michelle, holding a magic crystal.  The magic crystal is featured in the first and last chapters of The Necromancer.  On top of that there’s a full moon, great for Wiccan ceremonies, and she’s going through a doorway, showing the changes she goes through in the novel.  The picture was square and I went through all kinds of angst trying to get the picture to a book rectangle without it going fuzzy on me.  Then I added the graphics and did an overlay of smoke around the border.  I love making covers!
Are you writing another book at this time?
Yes, I have four published novels, and my new one is almost entirely on a cruise ship.  This one is a romantic suspense.  I hope to have it done in a few months.  Of course, I’ve already picked out the cover and started tinkering with it, which is very motivating.
Now tell us a little about the plot of The Necromancer.
There are several themes going on.  One of the main one is that Michelle had a very horrible experience that has psychological consequences.  This is an adult book for mature audiences.  She experiences a rape, and subsequently, fears being alone with any man.  She has panic attacks which restrict her social activities.  She longs to get over it and become the woman she once was.
Another part of the novel concerns Omar, The Necromancer, himself.  We know he’s been stalking Michelle, but he has ulterior motives that are revealed at the end of the book.  I can’t give a spoiler.The novel takes place in Hawaii, where I lived for a while and I tried to give a little background on the culture.  And the novel has witchcraft so I learned a lot about that to put into the book.  I hope my readers enjoy the novel.



The NecromancerP.M. Richter
Genre:  Paranormal
ISBN-13: 978-1478349501 ISBN-10: 1478349506ASIN: B004AYDGVM
Number of pages:  346Word Count:   121,705
Amazon Kindle       Amazon Print       Barnes and Noble
Book Description:
She picked the worst guy to have an affair with! -  Evil stalks in Hawaii
Michelle was brutally attacked in her locked hotel room in Las Vegas. The police didn't believe her and thought she must have lured a man up to her hotel room for a little sexual adventure, which went dangerously out of control.
Michelle sustained visible scars from the terrifying and almost lethal attack, but pure fear motivated the move from her home in California to Hawaii. She's scared her attacker will come back. She's sure the next time he'll kill her. Now she has a successful career and she figures abstinence is an acceptable, if lonely, way to live.
Michelle decides that an affair with a wickedly handsome man who moves into her building might cure her of the humiliating, embarrassing, and uncontrollable anxiety attacks which plague her whenever she finds herself alone with a man.
How could she know she made the worst possible choice?
Omar Satinov, the man Michelle has chosen, is a secret, whispered legend across several continents. His lure is a mystical religion based upon Witchcraft; his hook, the addictive herbal products he sells his followers. But does he really have supernatural powers, as many of his disciples believe?
About the Author
PM Richter is an author living in West Hollywood California. She has a degree in Psychology, from Northridge State University. She has worked as a property manager for Nansay, Corp. a multi-national corporation, been a dance teacher for Arthur Murray and Fred Astaire Dance Studios. She has five novels available on Amazon Kindle.
The Living ImageThe NecromancerMidnight ReflectionsTrifectaDeadly Memories
Website:  http://anauthorsplace.weebly.com/index.html
Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/pam.richter.391
Twitter: @pmraven



Would you like to win 1 set of  4 of Pam's books in pdf or Kindle gift format (winner's choice)
Then Leave a comment on this post with your email address
The NecromancerMidnight ReflectionsThe Living ImageDeadly Memories

Guest blog with Mandy Harbin

First, I’d like to thank Roxanne for having me here today. :)
I’m gearing up for my wild and crazy month of blog stops, and with Halloween right around the corner, I can’t help but wonder about those things that go bump in the night… and in the bed… or both. I mean, c’mon, we all love paranormal romance! Since my latest release, Surrounded by Temptation, is part of a paranormal shifter series where men turn into mountain lions—and if they are unattached, they cannot be around single women or they will force a mating—creatures have been heavily on the mind. But what makes us love these animals, monsters, zombies, to the point where we root for them to get the girl at the end… and I don’t mean so he can eat her for dinner (maybe eat her in other ways…).
Truth is I don’t know. I find virile men just as sexy as the next woman (or smart man). Is it because beasts represent the quintessential character whose passion, anger, control are all barely leashed, if at all? I think that could be it. I know I find myself drawn to the heroes that are so mean, evil and/or heartless because they are the ones who have the greatest hurdles to overcome to win my love… er, I mean the heroine’s love. Having heroes who need to drink blood to survive or become more animalistic than humanly possible only amps up the heat and makes us squirm. You never know if the sexy vampire will rip out her throat or just drink from it. You never know if that buff werewolf will attack the woman he loves because he’s not human in that shifted state to know any better. The rules don’t apply when it comes to paranormal romance and the monsters that we love.
And sometimes breaking the rules is just too much fun.
So let’s hear it. What kind of monster really gets your engine running? I haven’t found a monster type that I don’t like… I just want the tortured soul, the hard-as-nails cold-blooded bastard who finds that one woman who’ll bring him to his knees. Or paws. Because sometimes you just need a man on all fours.
If you love shifters, then check out my Woods Family series. My latest release is Surrounded by Temptation and has alpha males galore. Hot. Hot. Hot.

October 11 InterviewLaurie's Paranormal Thoughts and Reviewshttp://lauriethoughts-reviews.blogspot.com
October 13 Guest blogFang-tastic Bookswww.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
October 14 InterviewRoxanne’s Realmwww.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com
October 16 Guest blogThe Creatively Green Write at Home Momwww.creativelygreen.blogspot.com
October 17 review (all 3)The Steamy Sidesteamyside.blogspot.com
October 18 Guest blog and review (all 3)Crazy Four Bookshttp://www.crazyfourbooks.blogspot.com
October 20 PromoLisa’s World of Bookswww.lisasworldofbooks.net
October 22 Promo and reviewwww.VampireRomanceBooks.com
October 23 Interviewhttp://janieraeldridge.blogspot.com/
October 23 review (all 3)Smitten with Readinghttp://www.smittenwithreading.blogspot.com/
October 24 Interview and reviewConfessions from Romaholicshttp://confessionsfromromaholics.com/
October 25 PromoSapphyria's Steamy Book Reviews: http://saphssteamybooks.blogspot.com/
October 26 Promo and reviewPublishing the Paranormalhttp://jbridgerwriting.blogspot.com
October 27 review Books & Other Spells. nightskydarkstar.blogspot.com
November 1 Guest blogA Bibliophiles Thoughts on Bookshttp://bibliophilesthoughtsonbooks.blogspot.com/
November 2 Guest blogRamblings From A Chaotic Mind -  http://nikkibrandyberry.wordpress.com/
November 3 Promo/Excerpt and reviewBook Dream land  http://booktimeforlife.blogspot.com/
November 3 PromoSapphyria's Steamy Book Reviews: http://saphssteamybooks.blogspot.com/
November 5 Interview and reviewBitten By Love Reviews www.bittenbylovereviews.com
November 6 PromoMila Ramos, Paranormal & Contemporary Romance http://jademystique.blogspot.com 
November 7 Character InterviewFangs, Wands & Fairydust http://fangswandsandfairydust.com/
November 8 Character interview and review Erzabet's Enchantmentshttp://erzabetsenchantments.blogspot.com/
November 8 promoSMARTMOUTHTEXANwww.smartmouthtexan.wordpress.com



Surrounded by TemptationWoods Family Series Book 3By Mandy Harbin
When Krista needs Ariel’s biochemical expertise because her new boyfriend can turn into a mountain lion, Ariel thinks her sister has lost her mind. But the possibility of a major discovery like this is too much of a temptation to ignore. Create a drug to stop a shifter from forcing a mating? Only if she got to test his sexual limits herself.
Rob thinks Ariel is an angel in disguise, and he immediately knows she’s the one for him. But is he strong enough to resist his animal’s need to claim her once the temptation begins?
WARNING:  This book contains a shifter who must resist his feral need to mate and a biochemist who is hell-bent on testing his sexual limits. You’ll never look at science the same way again.
Reader advisory: This book contains graphic language and explicit sex.
Amira Press   Amazon    Nook   ARe

About the Author:
Mandy Harbin is the author of several books across multiple genres that range from young adult to erotic romance.
Her novels include Season’s Change: Summer, a young adult romance, and Darkest Sin, an erotic romantic suspense, both being the first in new series. Mandy also continues to work on her Possession series, which explores BDSM elements with Digital Possession being the series starter, and the ever popular Woods Family series, which began with Surrounded by Woods. She lives in a small Arkansas town with her family and can be reached via her website at www.mandyharbin.com
http://www.facebook.com/Author.MandyHarbin
http://mandyharbinblog.wordpress.com/
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5048225.Mandy_Harbin
https://twitter.com/Mandy_Harbin

Schuler's Multi Author Paranormal Book Signing

October 24 7pm
Schuler Books & Music2820 Towne Centre Blvd, Lansing, Michigan 48912-5

http://www.facebook.com/events/209297172535040/
Authors attending the event:
Sidney Ayershttp://www.sidneyayers.com/books.html
Sidney Ayers loves infusing her stories with humor.  What would the world be without a little bit of laughter? She writes a plethora of genres, ranging from historical, to paranormal, to contemporary. As Arianna Skye, she blends her snarky brand of humor with steamy fantasy erotic romance.

A native of Michigan, Sidney still lives in the same town she grew up in. No matter how hard she tries, she just can’t seem to get away. Michigan is in her blood, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.


Sydney will be signing
Demons Prefer Blondes Demons Like It Hot Wings of Desire (As Arianna Skye)


Demons Like It Hot

A RECIPE FOR DISASTER...

Matthias Ambrose is a demon mercenary who never took sides, until his attraction to the spunky caterer he was hired to kidnap leads him to almost botch a job for the first time in eight hundred years. Now he must protect her from his former clients, but even an ice-cold demon like Matthias struggles to resist her fiery charms.

OR THE PERFECT RECIPE FOR PASSION...

Completely engrossed with planning menus and prepping recipes for her shot at cooking show fame, star caterer Serah SanGermano refuses to believe she's on a fast track to Hades. But how's she supposed to stick to the kitchen if she can't stand the heat of her gorgeous demonic bodyguard?

As a diabolical plot to destroy humanity unfolds and all hell breaks loose in Serah's kitchen, she and Matthias find themselves knee-deep in demons and up to their eyeballs in love...


Cindy Spencer-Pape  http://www.cindyspencerpape.com/books.html
Cindy will be signing
Holiday Hearts  Immortal Cravings  Stone Heroes
And be sure to check out her newest release:
Moonlight & MechanicalsBook 4 in the Gaslight Chronicles    Cindy Spencer Pape
Genre: Steampunk Romance
Publisher: Carina PressDate of Publication:  Oct. 22. 2012ISBN: 978-14268-9452-7
Number of pages: 276Word Count: 74,000
Cover Artist: Kix by Design
Amazon      Barnes & Noble
Book Description:
London, 1859
Engineer Winifred "Wink" Hadrian has been in love with Inspector Liam McCullough for years, but is beginning to lose hope when he swears to be a lifelong bachelor. Faced with a proposal from a Knight of the Round Table and one of her closest friends, Wink reluctantly agrees to consider him instead.
Because of his dark werewolf past, Liam tries to keep his distance, but can't say no when Wink asks him to help find her friend's missing son. They soon discover that London's poorest are disappearing at an alarming rate, after encounters with mysterious "mechanical" men. Even more alarming is the connection the missing people may have with a conspiracy against the Queen.
Fighting against time—and their escalating feelings for each other—Wink and Liam must work together to find the missing people and save the monarchy before it's too late...
About the Author:
Award-winning author of over forty popular books and novellas in paranormal, historical, and erotic romance, Cindy Spencer Pape is an avid reader. According to The Romance Studio, her plots are “full of twist and turns that keep the reader poised at the edge of their seat.” Joyfully Reviewed said, her “colorful characters and plot building surprises kept me spellbound,” and Romantic Times Magazine says her “characters are appealing, and passionate sex leads to a satisfying romance.”
Cindy firmly believes in happily-ever-after. Married for more than twenty-five years to her own, sometimes-kilted hero, she lives in southern Michigan with him and two college-age sons, along with an ever-changing menagerie of pets.  Cindy has been, among other things, a banker, a teacher, and an elected politician, but mostly an environmental educator, though now she is lucky enough to write full-time. Her degrees in zoology and animal behavior almost help her comprehend the three male humans who share her household.
http://www.cindyspencerpape.com  
Blog: http://cindyspencerpape.blogspot.com/
Newsletter group: http://yhoo.it/ni7PHo
Twitter: http://twitter.com/CindySPape
Facebook: http://on.fb.me/gjbLLC
Gary W. Olson http://www.garywolson.com
Gary W. Olson grew up in Michigan and, despite the weather, stuck around.
He loves to read and write stories that transgress the boundaries of science fiction, fantasy, and horror, while examining ideas of identity and its loss in the many forms it can have. Away from working and writing, Gary enjoys spending time with his wife, their cats, and their mostlyreputable family and friends.
"Gary's first dark fantasy novel, BRUTAL LIGHT, was published in December 2011. He's also a contributor to the dark fiction anthology FADING LIGHT: AN ANTHOLOGY OF THE MONSTROUS. He is currently working on THE MORPHEIST, a science fiction biopunk novella."
Gary will be signing
Brutal Light 
Fading Light 
Brutal Light
When the light comes...pray for darkness.
All Kagami Takeda wants is to be left alone, so that no one else can be destroyed by the madness she keeps at bay. Her connection to the Radiance--a merciless and godlike sea of light--has driven her family insane and given her lover strange abilities and terrible visions.
However, the occult forces who covet her access to the Radiance are relentless in their pursuit. Worse, the Radiance itself has created an enemy who can kill her--a fate which would unleash its brutal light on a defenseless city.

Roxanne Rhoads www.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/RoxanneRhoadsAuthor
Roxanne will be signing:
Hex and the Single Witch: Vehicle City Vampires Book One

Paranormal Pleasures: Ten Tales of Supernatural Seduction
Hex and the Single Witch Vehicle City Vampires Book OneBy Roxanne Rhoads
Anwyn Rose is descended from a long line of powerful witches yet she can barely cast spells young witchlings have mastered. She has one functioning witch gift, the power of knowing, which she puts to good use as a Detective on Flint’s Preternatural Investigation Team (aka the P.I.T. Crew)
It’s a new era in Vehicle City, supernaturals are running the town. 

The P.I.T has their hands full with paranormal crimes. Top priority is a serial killer, who appears to be a vampire, draining young women in the city.

Anwyn is on the case with her sexy partner Detective Mike Malone. 

Complicating things is her relationship Galen, a vampire who looks more guilty than innocent, although Anwyn trusts her instincts even if her power is on the fritz.
Mysterious spells, compromising situations, and a possible demon on the loose make it hard to focus on the case, but Anwyn has to make things right before the human police execute the wrong vampire.

Hex and the Single Witch contains magick, a little bit of mystery, a lot of supernatural mayhem, and a sexy love triangle that will leave you wanting more.

Amazon Kindle     Smashwords   Barnes and Noble    Print

About the Author:
Story strumpet, tome loving tart, eccentric night owl...these words describe book publicist and erotic romance author Roxanne Rhoads.
When not fulfilling one the many roles being a wife and mother of three require, Roxanne's world revolves around words...reading them, writing them, editing them, and talking about them. In addition to writing her own stories she loves to read, promote and review what others write.
Roxanne is the owner of Bewitching Book Tours and operates Fang-tastic Books, a book blog dedicated to paranormal and urban fantasy books.
When not reading, writing, or promoting Roxanne loves to hang out with her family, craft, garden and search for unique vintage finds.


Visit her online


Author blog www.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com
Book Blog www.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
Bewitching Book Tours www.bewitchingbooktours.blogspot.com
Facebook
www.facebook.com/RoxanneRhoads
http://www.facebook.com/BewitchingBooktours
http://www.facebook.com/RoxanneRhoadsAuthor
http://www.facebook.com/FangtasticBooks
http://www.facebook.com/FlintFangFest
Twitter @RoxanneRhoads
Roxanne can also be found on Linked In, Goodreads and Google+

Megan J Parker
http://www.emjayart.com/writing.html http://www.facebook.com/Color.Me.Blood.Red/info
Megan J. Parker lives in a small town in Upstate NY with her fiancee and two devil kitties. She loves all things art and is usually writing, designing or editing videos.She started with writing poetry before slowly developing into writing short stories and finally, her work developed into novels.

Scarlet Night
Zane Murdoch just got a tattoo.
The problem is, the tattoos are a magically infused curse that turns him into a raging beast and the only hope he has of curing it is absolving his rage. Seems simple enough until he and his clan are nearly demolished in a powerful attack. Now Zane finds himself involved in a paranormal battle of mystical proportions and breaking the curse may be a bit more challenging than he thought.
Serena Vailean is alone in the world and quite frankly that's how she likes it…
At least until she finds a way to bring back her dead lover, Devon Thomas. 
Unfortunately for her, plans have a nasty way of changing and she finds herself thrust back into the world she's been trying so desperately to escape. Her only hope is to seek help from the very people she has gone to great lengths to avoid.
As an epic battle approaches, Serena and Zane must rely on each other and overcome their personal demons if they plan to survive. Unfortunately, caging a demon makes them all the harder to control.

Nathan Squiers http://www.nathansquiers.com/ http://www.facebook.com/Nathan.Squiers

Nathan Squiers (The Literary Dark Prince) is a resident of upstate New York where he lives with his loving fiancé and two demonic beings that have, for the time being, chosen to disguise themselves as cats (incredibly demanding and out-of-control cats). Living day-by-day on a steady diet of body modification and potentially lethal doses of caffeine, he often escapes reality through novels, comics & manga, movies & anime, and (of course) his own writing. When he's not immersed in the realm of fiction (be it his own or someone else's), he can be found in the chair of a piercing studio/tattoo parlor or reacquainting himself with the real world (more often-than-not against his will). Visit Nathan and find out more about him and his work at www.nathansquiers.com

“Crimson Shadow: Noir” (book #1 of the CS series)“Curtain Call: A Death Metal Novel” (book #1 of the DM series)

Xander Stryker wants to die.
Ever since witnessing his mother's murder at the hands of his abusive stepfather when he was a boy, he has spent every day trying to reach that goal. But every night he's denied the death he craves.
When his eighteenth birthday approaches, an unforeseen chance for change is offered when his life is plunged into chaos and he's dragged into a supernatural world of vampires and other creatures of darkness. Caught in the depths of this new reality, mysteries of his supernatural lineage begin to unravel and Xander is given the ultimate choice:
Continue on with his wretched life or begin a new one as the vampire he was always meant to be.
Unfortunately, the supernatural world can be just as unforgiving and brutal as any other and Xander's choice is met with disastrous consequences. Now, with the chaos of the new world pressing down on him, his past reemerges and once again threatens to crush him. Will Xander be able to use his new strength to conquer his fears, or will he succumb to his own bloody darkness...
... and allow it to finally destroy him.

Davison Library Multi-Author Book Signing

 The GDL Multi-Author Paranormal and Urban Fantasy Book Signing will be Thursday October 25 

Davison Branch Genesee District Library203 E 4th StDavison, MI 484236:30 PM
http://www.facebook.com/events/346059575470419/ 


Authors attending the event:
Cindy Spencer-Pape  http://www.cindyspencerpape.com/books.html
Cindy will be signing
Holiday Hearts  Immortal Cravings  Stone Heroes
And be sure to check out her newest release:
Moonlight & MechanicalsBook 4 in the Gaslight Chronicles    Cindy Spencer Pape
Genre: Steampunk Romance
Publisher: Carina PressDate of Publication:  Oct. 22. 2012ISBN: 978-14268-9452-7
Number of pages: 276Word Count: 74,000
Cover Artist: Kix by Design
Amazon      Barnes & Noble
Book Description:
London, 1859
Engineer Winifred "Wink" Hadrian has been in love with Inspector Liam McCullough for years, but is beginning to lose hope when he swears to be a lifelong bachelor. Faced with a proposal from a Knight of the Round Table and one of her closest friends, Wink reluctantly agrees to consider him instead.
Because of his dark werewolf past, Liam tries to keep his distance, but can't say no when Wink asks him to help find her friend's missing son. They soon discover that London's poorest are disappearing at an alarming rate, after encounters with mysterious "mechanical" men. Even more alarming is the connection the missing people may have with a conspiracy against the Queen.
Fighting against time—and their escalating feelings for each other—Wink and Liam must work together to find the missing people and save the monarchy before it's too late...
About the Author:
Award-winning author of over forty popular books and novellas in paranormal, historical, and erotic romance, Cindy Spencer Pape is an avid reader. According to The Romance Studio, her plots are “full of twist and turns that keep the reader poised at the edge of their seat.” Joyfully Reviewed said, her “colorful characters and plot building surprises kept me spellbound,” and Romantic Times Magazine says her “characters are appealing, and passionate sex leads to a satisfying romance.”
Cindy firmly believes in happily-ever-after. Married for more than twenty-five years to her own, sometimes-kilted hero, she lives in southern Michigan with him and two college-age sons, along with an ever-changing menagerie of pets.  Cindy has been, among other things, a banker, a teacher, and an elected politician, but mostly an environmental educator, though now she is lucky enough to write full-time. Her degrees in zoology and animal behavior almost help her comprehend the three male humans who share her household.
http://www.cindyspencerpape.com  
Blog: http://cindyspencerpape.blogspot.com/
Newsletter group: http://yhoo.it/ni7PHo
Twitter: http://twitter.com/CindySPape
Facebook: http://on.fb.me/gjbLLC


Bruce JenveyAngela's Coven www.covenbooks.com

Bruce Jenvey was raised in rural Michigan with a great interest in history, popular culture and the paranormal. After earning a B.A. in Psychology from Michigan State University, he migrated to the Detroit area and began a career in advertising. For twenty years he worked in agency creative departments on such national accounts as Pontiac, Cadillac, Mr. Goodwrench, FTD, Budweiser and more. And then one day… he was downsized.

Taking inventory of his skills as well as his love of sailing and history, Bruce founded “Great Lakes Cruiser Magazine.” He and his wife, Christine, spent the next ten years traveling the region as he and his staff recorded the local history and told their readers about some of the most wonderful places to visit along the shores of America’s Inland Seas.
Along the way, Bruce had unique access to untold incidents and documentation of the unexplained. He collected and chronicled these experiences in every place he found them, from the shores of Lake Michigan to Upstate New York. As he did so, he was struck by how consistent and similar these accounts were from region to region leading him to the conclusion that all we see may not be all there is to know...
 Today, Bruce is pleased to share with you so very many of these real-world experiences and accounts, all pulled together and retold here, in the fictionalized saga of his Cabbottown Witches.
Bruce will be signing
Angela’s Coven
In Angela’s Coven, Reggie Sinclair is an aging British rock star living in New York City who has just found out he is terminally ill.  He also has a very dark secret: When he was still an undiscovered teenager, he sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for his great fame and success.  Now, as his life draws to an end, he prepares to face the inevitable until he stumbles upon a very enchanting, modern-day witch named Angela, and her extremely untraditional coven.
Angela gradually introduces Reggie to her world of old school Witchcraft with its roots in alchemy and ‘natural chemistry’ dating to the Dark Ages. As their relationship grows, they devise a plan to break Reggie’s contract and save his soul.
This is a story of the struggle between good and evil with a cast of characters that ranges widely from guardian angels to young witches-in-training. Together, they have to come to terms with love, loss, life decisions and uncertainty to save Reggie from an unbearable eternity.  It will also cast an entirely different light on anything you may have ever considered as faith.  Here is a plot filled with unexpected twists and surprises to the very last page!

Gary W. Olson http://www.garywolson.com
Gary W. Olson grew up in Michigan and, despite the weather, stuck around.
He loves to read and write stories that transgress the boundaries of science fiction, fantasy, and horror, while examining ideas of identity and its loss in the many forms it can have. Away from working and writing, Gary enjoys spending time with his wife, their cats, and their mostlyreputable family and friends.
"Gary's first dark fantasy novel, BRUTAL LIGHT, was published in December 2011. He's also a contributor to the dark fiction anthology FADING LIGHT: AN ANTHOLOGY OF THE MONSTROUS. He is currently working on THE MORPHEIST, a science fiction biopunk novella."
Gary will be signing
Brutal Light 
Fading Light 
Brutal Light
When the light comes...pray for darkness.
All Kagami Takeda wants is to be left alone, so that no one else can be destroyed by the madness she keeps at bay. Her connection to the Radiance--a merciless and godlike sea of light--has driven her family insane and given her lover strange abilities and terrible visions.
However, the occult forces who covet her access to the Radiance are relentless in their pursuit. Worse, the Radiance itself has created an enemy who can kill her--a fate which would unleash its brutal light on a defenseless city.

Roxanne Rhoads www.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/RoxanneRhoadsAuthor
Roxanne will be signing:
Hex and the Single Witch: Vehicle City Vampires Book One

Paranormal Pleasures: Ten Tales of Supernatural Seduction
Hex and the Single Witch Vehicle City Vampires Book OneBy Roxanne Rhoads
Anwyn Rose is descended from a long line of powerful witches yet she can barely cast spells young witchlings have mastered. She has one functioning witch gift, the power of knowing, which she puts to good use as a Detective on Flint’s Preternatural Investigation Team (aka the P.I.T. Crew)
It’s a new era in Vehicle City, supernaturals are running the town. 

The P.I.T has their hands full with paranormal crimes. Top priority is a serial killer, who appears to be a vampire, draining young women in the city.

Anwyn is on the case with her sexy partner Detective Mike Malone. 

Complicating things is her relationship Galen, a vampire who looks more guilty than innocent, although Anwyn trusts her instincts even if her power is on the fritz.
Mysterious spells, compromising situations, and a possible demon on the loose make it hard to focus on the case, but Anwyn has to make things right before the human police execute the wrong vampire.

Hex and the Single Witch contains magick, a little bit of mystery, a lot of supernatural mayhem, and a sexy love triangle that will leave you wanting more.

Amazon Kindle     Smashwords   Barnes and Noble    Print

About the Author:
Story strumpet, tome loving tart, eccentric night owl...these words describe book publicist and erotic romance author Roxanne Rhoads.
When not fulfilling one the many roles being a wife and mother of three require, Roxanne's world revolves around words...reading them, writing them, editing them, and talking about them. In addition to writing her own stories she loves to read, promote and review what others write.
Roxanne is the owner of Bewitching Book Tours and operates Fang-tastic Books, a book blog dedicated to paranormal and urban fantasy books.
When not reading, writing, or promoting Roxanne loves to hang out with her family, craft, garden and search for unique vintage finds.


Visit her online


Author blog www.roxannesrealm.blogspot.com
Book Blog www.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com
Bewitching Book Tours www.bewitchingbooktours.blogspot.com
Facebook
www.facebook.com/RoxanneRhoads
http://www.facebook.com/BewitchingBooktours
http://www.facebook.com/RoxanneRhoadsAuthor
http://www.facebook.com/FangtasticBooks
http://www.facebook.com/FlintFangFest
Twitter @RoxanneRhoads
Roxanne can also be found on Linked In, Goodreads and Google+

Nathan Squiers http://www.nathansquiers.com/ http://www.facebook.com/Nathan.Squiers

Nathan Squiers (The Literary Dark Prince) is a resident of upstate New York where he lives with his loving fiancé and two demonic beings that have, for the time being, chosen to disguise themselves as cats (incredibly demanding and out-of-control cats). Living day-by-day on a steady diet of body modification and potentially lethal doses of caffeine, he often escapes reality through novels, comics & manga, movies & anime, and (of course) his own writing. When he's not immersed in the realm of fiction (be it his own or someone else's), he can be found in the chair of a piercing studio/tattoo parlor or reacquainting himself with the real world (more often-than-not against his will). Visit Nathan and find out more about him and his work at www.nathansquiers.com

“Crimson Shadow: Noir” (book #1 of the CS series)“Curtain Call: A Death Metal Novel” (book #1 of the DM series)

Xander Stryker wants to die.
Ever since witnessing his mother's murder at the hands of his abusive stepfather when he was a boy, he has spent every day trying to reach that goal. But every night he's denied the death he craves.
When his eighteenth birthday approaches, an unforeseen chance for change is offered when his life is plunged into chaos and he's dragged into a supernatural world of vampires and other creatures of darkness. Caught in the depths of this new reality, mysteries of his supernatural lineage begin to unravel and Xander is given the ultimate choice:
Continue on with his wretched life or begin a new one as the vampire he was always meant to be.
Unfortunately, the supernatural world can be just as unforgiving and brutal as any other and Xander's choice is met with disastrous consequences. Now, with the chaos of the new world pressing down on him, his past reemerges and once again threatens to crush him. Will Xander be able to use his new strength to conquer his fears, or will he succumb to his own bloody darkness...
... and allow it to finally destroy him.

Megan J Parker
http://www.emjayart.com/writing.html http://www.facebook.com/Color.Me.Blood.Red/info
Megan J. Parker lives in a small town in Upstate NY with her fiancee and two devil kitties. She loves all things art and is usually writing, designing or editing videos.She started with writing poetry before slowly developing into writing short stories and finally, her work developed into novels.

Scarlet Night
Zane Murdoch just got a tattoo.
The problem is, the tattoos are a magically infused curse that turns him into a raging beast and the only hope he has of curing it is absolving his rage. Seems simple enough until he and his clan are nearly demolished in a powerful attack. Now Zane finds himself involved in a paranormal battle of mystical proportions and breaking the curse may be a bit more challenging than he thought.
Serena Vailean is alone in the world and quite frankly that's how she likes it…
At least until she finds a way to bring back her dead lover, Devon Thomas. 
Unfortunately for her, plans have a nasty way of changing and she finds herself thrust back into the world she's been trying so desperately to escape. Her only hope is to seek help from the very people she has gone to great lengths to avoid.
As an epic battle approaches, Serena and Zane must rely on each other and overcome their personal demons if they plan to survive. Unfortunately, caging a demon makes them all the harder to control.