Lena Nelson Dooley's Blog, page 131
February 13, 2017
ECHO CANYON - Susan Page Davis - One Free Book or Ebook
Bio: Susan Page Davis is the author of more than sixty published historical romance, mystery, and romantic suspense novels. She’s a winner of the Inspirational Readers’ Choice Award, the Carol Award, and the Will Rogers Medallions, and a finalist in the WILLA Awards. A Maine native, she has lived in Oregon and now resides in Kentucky.
Welcome back, Susan. Why did you become an author?I love reading and telling stories. One day I realized I had a convoluted story in my head that I wanted to tell, so I wrote it down. Of course, writing a book and selling it are two different things. Five years elapsed before I held my first published book in my hands.
My first novel took eight years to be published. If you weren’t an author, what would be your dream job?Since this is a dream, exercising horses.
If you could have lived at another time in history, what would it be and why?I’d love to vacation in the Middle Ages, but then I want to come back here. I’ve always been fascinated by the way of life back then, but I’m sure it was much harder than we imagine.
What place in the United Stateshave you not visited that you would like to?I live in Kentucky now, and I’ve never been to Fort Knox. I think that would be interesting, since Fort Knox in Maineis one of my favorite spots, and they are named for the same man.
How about a foreign country you hope to visit?Switzerland.
What lesson has the Lord taught you recently?I have been through some difficult things, and I keep coming back to Psalm 48:14: For this God is our God forever and ever; He will be our guide even until death. This is what Iris had to learn in Echo Canyon, that God is there, He will not change, and He will guide us if we let Him.
[image error] Tell us about the featured book.In Echo Canyon , Iris Perkins is told she will be married soon to a man she despises. A chance visit by two brothers and a beautiful woman from the other side of Echo Canyongives her hope. For Edward Sherman, venturing into Utah with his brother to buy horses is risky. He only wants to find the livestock they need and get back to Fort Bridger, until he meets a frightened young woman in need. He’ll do anything he can to save Iris, even race against the man determined to marry her.
Please give us the first page of the book.Iris was nervous the day Elder Whipple came home. He avoided looking directly at her when he greeted his family, then spent half an hour in the parlor with his wife, Louise, with the door closed. Iris could hear their low voices as she mixed the biscuit dough for supper, but she couldn’t make out the words. The council had met for three days, and she wondered what decisions they had made for the community.
The Whipples’ daughter-in-law, Annie, kept the churn going steadily on the other side of the kitchen. She and Iris worked in silence. No one spoke much at the Whipples’ house. They just did their work.
Iris wished Annie were more talkative and friendly, but she always looked frightened and tired. When Iris spoke to her, she would answer with as few words as possible. Her husband, young John Whipple, was just as quiet. No one seemed happy here, and Iris thought it was the dry, bleak land that had drained them of life and joy.
Annie stopped churning, and in the brief silence, Iris heard the hum of Louise’s flax wheel begin in the next room. The door to the parlor opened, and Elder Whipple stepped into the kitchen. Iris glanced at him, then turned her attention back to her work.
He walked over to her and stood for a moment, watching her knead more flour into the dough. “You’ll be going to Brother Zale’s place tomorrow,” he said.
Iris found it suddenly hard to breathe. She looked up at his bearded face. His keen hazel eyes focused on her, not unkindly.
“I don’t understand.” Hadn’t she pleased them here? She’d worked hard. She didn’t want to be shuffled off to another family that might not treat her as well. She didn’t know the Zales, and they might be farther from the mainstream of communication within the sprawling community of Saints, making it harder for Iris to seek out news of her own family.
The elder hesitated. “The men who went looking for your father’s outfit returned yesterday. They didn’t find any trace of them. It’s been three months since your father’s party set out, and nothing has been heard from them, Miss Perkins. The council is assuming the party is lost.”
“Lost?” She let that sink in.
“Yes. That’s the conclusion they’ve reached. It could be hostile Indians, or lack of water … It could be anything. The search party traced them about sixty miles southwest, but after that the ground was rocky. They didn’t find any more evidence of a camp or anything like that.”
She gulped and met his level gaze. “Or a struggle?”
“No. Nothing.”
Iris nodded. It was so stark, so unsatisfying. This was her father they were talking about! Her brother, too. They had left with three other men at the end of May, to seek out ore deposits for the good of the community. Lead was needed, and iron, and of course anything more precious. They were to have reported back in a month, with a map of the places they had been, showing the location of any minerals or other features of interest to the Saints.
“The elders discussed the situation. We feel it’s best if we send you to the Zale ranch.”
Alarm ran through Iris afresh. “What for?”
“You need to be incorporated into a family, Miss Perkins.”
“But I—” She hesitated, looking up at him cautiously. “Couldn’t I stay here as part of this family, sir?”
He sighed. “The council feels it’s time you were wed.”
You know I love your books, and I’m eager to read this one. How can readers find you on the Internet?Find Susan at:Website: www.susanpagedavis.comTwitter: @SusanPageDavisFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/susanpagedavisauthorNewsletter: https://madmimi.com/signups/118177/join
Link to Echo Canyonon Amazon: http://amzn.to/2ieuqQ4
On Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/echo-canyon-susan-page-davis/1125434608?ean=9780997230840
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
Welcome back, Susan. Why did you become an author?I love reading and telling stories. One day I realized I had a convoluted story in my head that I wanted to tell, so I wrote it down. Of course, writing a book and selling it are two different things. Five years elapsed before I held my first published book in my hands.My first novel took eight years to be published. If you weren’t an author, what would be your dream job?Since this is a dream, exercising horses.
If you could have lived at another time in history, what would it be and why?I’d love to vacation in the Middle Ages, but then I want to come back here. I’ve always been fascinated by the way of life back then, but I’m sure it was much harder than we imagine.
What place in the United Stateshave you not visited that you would like to?I live in Kentucky now, and I’ve never been to Fort Knox. I think that would be interesting, since Fort Knox in Maineis one of my favorite spots, and they are named for the same man.
How about a foreign country you hope to visit?Switzerland.
What lesson has the Lord taught you recently?I have been through some difficult things, and I keep coming back to Psalm 48:14: For this God is our God forever and ever; He will be our guide even until death. This is what Iris had to learn in Echo Canyon, that God is there, He will not change, and He will guide us if we let Him.
[image error] Tell us about the featured book.In Echo Canyon , Iris Perkins is told she will be married soon to a man she despises. A chance visit by two brothers and a beautiful woman from the other side of Echo Canyongives her hope. For Edward Sherman, venturing into Utah with his brother to buy horses is risky. He only wants to find the livestock they need and get back to Fort Bridger, until he meets a frightened young woman in need. He’ll do anything he can to save Iris, even race against the man determined to marry her.
Please give us the first page of the book.Iris was nervous the day Elder Whipple came home. He avoided looking directly at her when he greeted his family, then spent half an hour in the parlor with his wife, Louise, with the door closed. Iris could hear their low voices as she mixed the biscuit dough for supper, but she couldn’t make out the words. The council had met for three days, and she wondered what decisions they had made for the community.
The Whipples’ daughter-in-law, Annie, kept the churn going steadily on the other side of the kitchen. She and Iris worked in silence. No one spoke much at the Whipples’ house. They just did their work.
Iris wished Annie were more talkative and friendly, but she always looked frightened and tired. When Iris spoke to her, she would answer with as few words as possible. Her husband, young John Whipple, was just as quiet. No one seemed happy here, and Iris thought it was the dry, bleak land that had drained them of life and joy.
Annie stopped churning, and in the brief silence, Iris heard the hum of Louise’s flax wheel begin in the next room. The door to the parlor opened, and Elder Whipple stepped into the kitchen. Iris glanced at him, then turned her attention back to her work.
He walked over to her and stood for a moment, watching her knead more flour into the dough. “You’ll be going to Brother Zale’s place tomorrow,” he said.
Iris found it suddenly hard to breathe. She looked up at his bearded face. His keen hazel eyes focused on her, not unkindly.
“I don’t understand.” Hadn’t she pleased them here? She’d worked hard. She didn’t want to be shuffled off to another family that might not treat her as well. She didn’t know the Zales, and they might be farther from the mainstream of communication within the sprawling community of Saints, making it harder for Iris to seek out news of her own family.
The elder hesitated. “The men who went looking for your father’s outfit returned yesterday. They didn’t find any trace of them. It’s been three months since your father’s party set out, and nothing has been heard from them, Miss Perkins. The council is assuming the party is lost.”
“Lost?” She let that sink in.
“Yes. That’s the conclusion they’ve reached. It could be hostile Indians, or lack of water … It could be anything. The search party traced them about sixty miles southwest, but after that the ground was rocky. They didn’t find any more evidence of a camp or anything like that.”
She gulped and met his level gaze. “Or a struggle?”
“No. Nothing.”
Iris nodded. It was so stark, so unsatisfying. This was her father they were talking about! Her brother, too. They had left with three other men at the end of May, to seek out ore deposits for the good of the community. Lead was needed, and iron, and of course anything more precious. They were to have reported back in a month, with a map of the places they had been, showing the location of any minerals or other features of interest to the Saints.
“The elders discussed the situation. We feel it’s best if we send you to the Zale ranch.”
Alarm ran through Iris afresh. “What for?”
“You need to be incorporated into a family, Miss Perkins.”
“But I—” She hesitated, looking up at him cautiously. “Couldn’t I stay here as part of this family, sir?”
He sighed. “The council feels it’s time you were wed.”
You know I love your books, and I’m eager to read this one. How can readers find you on the Internet?Find Susan at:Website: www.susanpagedavis.comTwitter: @SusanPageDavisFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/susanpagedavisauthorNewsletter: https://madmimi.com/signups/118177/join
Link to Echo Canyonon Amazon: http://amzn.to/2ieuqQ4
On Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/echo-canyon-susan-page-davis/1125434608?ean=9780997230840
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
February 12, 2017
WINNERS!!!!
Patty (SC) is the winner of
Keara's Escape
by Anna Greene.
Connie (KY) is the winner of Abbey's Tale by Katherine McDermott.
Beverly (TX) is the winner of Avalanche by Gayle K Hiss.
Vera (NC) is the winner of Christmas Bells Are Ringing by Tanya Stowe.
If you won a book and you like it, please consider giving the author the courtesy of writing a review on Goodreads, Amazon.com, Christianbooks.com, Barnes and Noble, or other Internet sites.
Also, tell your friends about the book ... and this blog. Thank you.
Congratulations, everyone. If you won a print book, send me your mailing address:
Click the Contact Me link at the top of the blog, and send me an Email.
If you won an ebook, just let me know what email address it should be sent to.
When you contact me, please give the title and author of the book you won, so I won't have to look it up.
Remember, you have 4 weeks to claim your book.
Connie (KY) is the winner of Abbey's Tale by Katherine McDermott.
Beverly (TX) is the winner of Avalanche by Gayle K Hiss.
Vera (NC) is the winner of Christmas Bells Are Ringing by Tanya Stowe.
If you won a book and you like it, please consider giving the author the courtesy of writing a review on Goodreads, Amazon.com, Christianbooks.com, Barnes and Noble, or other Internet sites.
Also, tell your friends about the book ... and this blog. Thank you.
Congratulations, everyone. If you won a print book, send me your mailing address:
Click the Contact Me link at the top of the blog, and send me an Email.
If you won an ebook, just let me know what email address it should be sent to.
When you contact me, please give the title and author of the book you won, so I won't have to look it up.
Remember, you have 4 weeks to claim your book.
February 10, 2017
RUMORS AND PROMISES - Kathleen Rouser - One Free Book or Ebook
Welcome, Kathleen. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters.Thank you for having me as a guest on your blog, Lena. This is a great question. In my first novella, The Pocket Watch, my heroine, Isabel Jones, lacks confidence and is hard on herself. I can relate to those struggles. I guess that there is some little—or big—part of me in each hero and heroine, whether it is a character trait or an understanding of what they’re going through on deeper level. I certainly haven’t based any of my characters on myself as a whole—just bits and pieces.
What is the quirkiest thing you have ever done?Lately? Last fall I was having a day during which I was feeling especially down and I was going to the mall for a computer class at the Apple store. While I was there, I guess wanted to do something fun and childlike too. I went to the Build-A-Bear Workshop and actually had a bunny stuffed animal made for me. I picked out a name and outfit for it also. On the way home, I buckled it into the passenger seat. Just for fun. Really.
When did you first discover you were a writer?When I was around four or five, I learned how much I loved playing make-believe and the stories which I made up to go with the imaginary play. I also learned to love books and enjoyed when my mom read to me. I had it in my head from then on that I wanted to make up stories and someday write a real book.
I had a third-grade teacher, Mrs. Williams, who told me I was a good writer, and it seemed I would occasionally have people tell me that through the years since then. My brother, John, was also a great encouragement to me and took me to my first writers’ conference when I was around 20. I was lost in a sea of professionals and filled with dreams I was never sure would come true. Yet, I’d been bitten by the writing bug and through the years the desire wouldn’t let go of me.
And all your readers are glad that it didn’t. Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading.I enjoy many different kinds of books. I love old classics, historical and contemporary women’s fiction and romance, cozy mysteries, suspense, speculative, and science fiction.
How do you keep your sanity in our run, run, run world?Like most writers, I’m an introvert, though I am usually a friendly introvert. But sometimes I need a day at home to recharge. It’s great to read or watch a favorite movie, and nice when my cat cooperates and sits on my lap, which is a comfort to me. I also like to go out for a relaxing lunch with a good friend to chat about the important things in life.
That being said, Jesus is the One I must cling to through the tough times. Even when I feel like I’m walking through the wilderness, and I have to focus on my head knowledge of God’s word. I might not feel it in my heart, but I must cling to His truth, knowing He will get me through it.
How do you choose your characters’ names?Sometimes they pop into my head. I look up the meaning and if it works, I keep it. Other times I pray and look up names and their meanings to find one I feel fits the character I’m creating. Then there are times I just really like a name for the way it sounds and I keep it.
What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of?I would say that by the grace of God my husband, Jack, and I are still married for more than 35 years. We only knew each other for five months when we got married and then realized we were polar opposites. After quite a few rocky years, God brought a healing to our marriage. He had a plan, knowing that Jack and I would become better people having to work together through our differences and trials. We are both committed to working hard and staying together. Our love and closeness has grown so much over the years. We are blessed to be happily married today!
In the long run, I think the best marriages are the ones where the two people are polar opposites. James and I are polar opposites and we’ll celebrate 53 years in November. If you were an animal, which one would you be, and why?Definitely a cat. They are smart and adorable. I’m a little partial to my rescue cat Lilybits. I’ve sometimes thought if I wasn’t a human, I wouldn’t mind being a much-loved, spoiled cat like she is. After all, she gets to sleep much of the day, play when she wants to, snuggle with the people she loves, eat kibble on demand, and someone else cleans up after her. What a life!
What is your favorite food?There are so many delicious foods in the world, it’s hard to choose. I’d probably say chocolate is my favorite sweet food and homemade spaghetti and meat sauce would be my favorite savory food.
What is the problem with writing that was your greatest roadblock, and how did you overcome it?Fear of failure and perfectionism go hand in hand. They both kept me from writing an entire manuscript for a long time. I’d have all kinds of ideas, but was afraid I wouldn’t be able to write perfectly enough. I still face those issues as I write, but I have to overcome them one day at a time, sometimes one sentence at a time. While I do turn to God for help in this I’ve also had to tell myself the truth. My writing will never be perfect, but if I never put anything down on paper, I won’t have anything to improve on. It’s a learning process.
Very wise words. Tell us about the featured book.
Here is a blurb of
Rumors and Promises
: Sophie Biddle, an heiress on the run with a child in tow, considers herself abandoned by her family and God. Wary, self-reliant Sophie is caught off guard when meeting a kind, but meddling and handsome minister at the local mercantile. In 1900, Reverend Ian McCormick is determined to start anew in Stone Creek, Michigan, believing he has failed God and his former flock. He works harder than ever to forget his mistake, hoping to prove himself a most pleasing servant to his new congregation and once again to God.
While Sophie seeks acceptance for the child and a measure of respect for herself, the rumors swirl about her sordid past. Should Ian show concern for Sophie plight, he could risk everything, including his position as pastor of Stone Creek.
Now the pair must choose to trust God and forgive those who slander and gossip, or run. Will the scandals of their pasts bind them together forever, or drive both deeper into despair?
Please give us the first page of the book.Stone Creek, Michigan 1900 Sophia Bidershem jerked awake as the train whistle blew. Her heart pounded a beat almost in cadence with the wheels upon the track. Prickles traveled up her arm so she wriggled her elbow into a different position around her two-year-old daughter, Caira, who had fallen asleep against her. Outside her passenger window, the pewter sky hung, cold and austere. Snowflakes glided downward, covering any dirt or tracks on the ground and blanketing the leafless trees with a pristine beauty. Could her new identity make her appear as clean?
A figure in a dark coat brushed against Sophia’s seat, the scent of sweet tobacco smoke from a pipe causing her breath to catch. Her eyes swept up toward the tall, masculine figure. His gray derby sat low while the brim hid his eyes. The glove he attempted to put in his pocket fell to the floor. As he bent to pick it up, the train wound around a curve, and he bumped Sophia.
She gasped, covering her mouth and stilling the shivering which threatened to overtake her.
“So sorry, miss.” The stranger tipped his hat, looking apologetic.
Sophia exhaled, leaning as far away as possible from the aisle. No scar slanted across his right cheek. She gave the stranger a slight nod and averted her gaze. Other passengers read, stared out the windows, or spoke to one another in low tones. Her daughter slept, oblivious to her mother’s fear. Sophia sat against the high-backed seat and closed her eyes, trying to reclaim the blissful peace of a catnap.
But the passing figure had reopened a scab on Sophia’s soul. Darkness surrounded her again in her mind’s eye. He appeared, and there was no place to run. She blinked; daylight flooded in.Sophia held Caira tighter and focused outside the window.
Feeling a sheet of paper crinkle in the reticule on her lap, Sophia freed her other hand to fish it out. Unfolding the paper, she searched the information in the body of the letter sent to her by Mrs. Fairgrave.
And we all want to know what’s in that letter. How can readers find you on the Internet?Website: kathleenrouser.comFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/kerouserFacebook Author Page:https://www.facebook.com/kathleenerouser/Twitter: @KathleenRouserPinterest: https:/ /www.pinterest.com/kerouser/
Thank you, Kathleen, for sharing this book with us. I'm eager to read it.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Rumors and Promises[image error] - paperback
Rumors and Promises - Kindle[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
February 9, 2017
HIDING - Katherine McDermott - One Free Book
Welcome back, Katherine. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters.It depends on the book. In Hiding, the main character Teresa, is an artist. I also paint. She paints murals, and I painted a beach scene in the room my grandchildren spend the night in when they come over.What is the quirkiest thing you have ever done? Dressed up like an elf to deliver small gifts to kids in a hospital when I was in high school. A good friend was Santa.
When did you first discover that you were a writer? In the sixth grade when I published poetry.
Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading. I was an English teacher. I love children’s picture books and have written and illustrated one. I also like humor, mystery, nonfiction, romance, historical fiction. I love a good play and musicals. I wrote Song of Susanna, a play about the mother of John Wesley that was performed at two Methodist churches.
What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of? I try to have a devotional time every day and take walks.
If you were an animal, which one would you be, and why? A dolphin because I love to swim and love the beach.
What is your favorite food? fried chicken
What is the problem with writing that was your greatest roadblock, and how did you overcome it? Finding the time to write. Writing in the waiting rooms of doctor offices, when waiting in general, and always carrying a notebook.
Tell us about the featured book. It is inspirational suspense and, as an unpublished manuscript, won a Daphne du Maurier Award for Suspense from Romance Writers of America.Please give us the first page of the book.“Do you see how this shadow falls beneath her chin?” Teresa showed John the shaded area on the model’s neck.
“Yes,” John answered, blending a touch of burnt sienna into the fleshy mixture on his palette before applying it to his canvas.
“You’re doing an excellent job,” Teresa said. Standing behind him, she critically assessed his progress. Beyond the canvas, she saw Alex waiting in the doorway. His eyes dark and glowering. His jaw set. She glanced at her wrist watch.
“I guess our time is up,” she said. “You have real talent.”
“You inspire me in ways I never thought possible,” John said. “I actually see that I’m making progress. I’m sorry the course is ending.” He put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a friendly squeeze.
Her other students, Tim, Janine, Marian, and a sixty-five year old retiree, Stella, took their brushes to the stainless steel sink to wash out the paint. Colors swirled together as they washed down the drain. The airy room on the second floor of the warehouse that had been converted to a community arts center smelled of paint and turpentine from the oils class across the corridor. “Nicole, thank you,” Teresa said to the auburn haired model who had sat perfectly still in the glare of a spotlight while they sketched and painted. “Sure. Call me again sometime when you need me,” she replied flipping a strand of her long hair over her shoulder. How can readers find you on the Internet? www.kmcdermottauthor.wordpress.comorwww.Facebook.com/Katherinemcdermott.Author
Thank you, Katherine, for sharing this book with us.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Hiding[image error] - paperback
Hiding - Kindle[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:
Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
February 8, 2017
BABY BUNCO - Julie B Cosgrove - One Free Book
Dear Readers, Julie Cosgrove is my friend and a fellow Texasauthor. And her books are wonderful.
Welcome back, Julie. How did you come up with the idea for this story?
Baby Bunco
is the second novel in the Bunco Biddies Mysteries series. Each book has a “Buncos theme,” which is a dice game twelve of the senior citizens in their retirement community gather to play every Thursday. A baby Bunco is when a player rolls three of the same number, but not the number in the round. In other words, if you are in the round where everyone is trying to roll as many fours as they can, and you roll three twos, that is a baby bunco, worth five points. If you rolled three fours that round, that would be a regular bunco worth twenty-one points.
So I used that point system to develop a plot involving someone leaving a newborn infant in a bathtub of an abandoned garden home. The unique thing is the home is in Sunset Acres, the retirement community where the Bunco Biddies live. Not exactly an everyday occurrence.
If you were planning a party with Christian authors of contemporary fiction, what six people would you invite and why? Probably Marji Lane, Cynthia Hickey, Lisa Lickel, Sharon McGregor, Vicki Caine, and Nancy Mehl because they all write mysteries and we could brainstorm plot twists.
A very good idea. Now let’s do that for a party for Christian authors of historical fiction, what six people would you invite and why? (Julie’s cheeks turn crimson.) I know you write that Lena, and I have read a few of your westerns, so you are invited anytime. Maybe Anne Greene as well, since she is in our American Christian Fiction Writers Dallas area group. She writes Regency and Victorian novels. Penelope Marquez writes stories set in Revolutionary times, and Rachel James, who lives in England, writes about very early Medieval Anglo-Saxon times. Charlene Havel and Sharon Faucheux teamed up to write Biblical fiction. That would be an interesting group because their writing spans almost all of our human history, don’t you think?
Yes. That would be a good group. Many times, people (and other authors) think you have it made with so many books published. What is your most difficult problem with writing at this time in your career? Marketing them! Often times, I feel as if I am yelling into the wind. There are so many wonderful Christian authors publishing novels out there, I can hardly keep up. No wonder our readers can’t. I hope I can appeal to the group who like cozies. Plus, my cozy mysteries, though faith-based, can cross over to secular reading audiences. One renowned Christian reviewer applauded this series because she said I didn’t awkwardly stick in a sermon in the midst of a car chase. Of course she was exaggerating, but her point was my characters live out their faith. It is a natural part of their personalities so Christianity flows through the plot like a deep underground current in a river.
Tell us about the featured book.
In
Baby Bunco
, the Biddies have just helped to solve a murder case that happened in their retirement community of Sunset Acres (as featured in Book One - Dumpster Dicing.) Janie, their ring leader, suffers from what her paperback mystery aficionado friend, Ethel, describes as mystery-itis. She has become addicted to sleuthing. So when a baby is found abandoned in a vacant home’s bathtub, and a young girl is found dead behind the convenience store across the highway on the same day, Janie immediately suspects it is the birth of a new crime wave in Alamoville. Now if only she can convince her son-in-law, who is the chief detective who is the case—no pun intended.
Please give us the first page of the book.“Did you say she found a baby?” Janie stopped mid-roll, the pink and white dice warming in her clutched fist. “Here in Sunset Acres, a retirement community?”
Babs, seated to her left at the Bunco table, nodded. “That’s what Mildred told me as we were walking up to your front stoop tonight. Right, Mildred?”
“I went to collect a few more of my things since I’m staying with Ethel, and no more than three minutes later the leasing agent pounded on my door. ‘Come see,’ she motioned to me. Her eyes grew as wide as those mega donuts at the Crusty Baker.” She thumped her pencil against her score pad and groaned. “It took every ounce of gumption to follow her into that—ugh!—place next door.” She quivered her shoulders.
Janie shifted her gaze to the woman sitting across from her. “Ethel, you knew about this?”
“I did.”
“And you didn’t tell me?” Her voice elevated to echo-off –the-ceiling volume. She humphed and pivoted to face the storyteller. “Mildred. What happened?”
The other eight ladies halted their Bunco round. Each swiveled to listen in, their eyes fixated on the first card table.
Mildred leaned. “I paused at the steps, determined to not go inside. Only peek in from the front door. Then high-pitched, frantic cries came from the direction of the bathroom. Well, I had to rush to its aid. Every motherly fiber in my being dictated it.”
Murmurs and head bobs filtered through Janie’s living room.
Mildred sniffled. “Poor little thing. Alone, scared and red as a beet from wailing so hard. That house is cursed, I tell you.”
Janie patted her hand. “Now, dear. Just because someone murdered Edwin soon after he moved in there doesn’t mean...”
Mildred shot from her seat and paced, her arms flaying in circles, resembling the duck windmill on top of the antiques barn down the road. “Ever since I relocated into Sunset Acres, it’s been one thing after another. Edwin murdered, then my nephew Bobby arrested, and now an abandoned newborn in a bathtub? This is supposed to be a quiet retirement community.”
“Maybe because you live on Solar Boulevard.” Annie huffed. “Nothing weird ever happens on my street, Sunrise Court, except for an occasional stray golf ball. Then again, if you kept your nose out of everyone’s business...” Her voice trailed off with a smug cock of her head.
“My nose?”
The other ladies mumbled to each other.
Ethel blew a whistle through her teeth. “Okay, everyone calm down. We all lived through the ruckus of one of our neighbor’s brutal murder last month. It’s not Mildred’s fault. Nor mine or Janie’s that this happened...”
Betsy Ann raised her hand, as if her legs once again dangled from under her desk in Ms. Everett’s kindergarten classroom.
Janie rolled her eyes. “What?”
“Well, it is sort of our fault.” She pointed to Janie, Ethel and herself. “We helped solve the case and Bobby did wind up in the middle of all of the commotion. That’s why he threatened you and tried to break into your house.” She folded her hands and gazed down at them. “I’m just saying...”
“Duly noted.” Janie felt the healing, pinkish wound on her neck where his knife grazed her skin. “I must add, my dear son-in-law, Chief Detective Blake Johnson, appreciated all of our...” her hands encircled the room “…research, sleuthing and cunningness. He told me so.” A smile curled along the edges of her mouth. “Besides, it did beat back the doldrums a while, right?”
A few silvery head bounced in agreement as the condo sprinkled with giggles. Annie crossed her arms and harumphed.
Janie eased over to Mildred and led her back to her designated chair. She patted her on the shoulders and scanned the room, making certain every slightly glaucoma-pressed or cataract-corrected eye fixated on her. “Now we must figure out who placed a newborn baby in a vacant garden home bathtub and why?”
Babs cocked an eyebrow. “We do?”
“Absolutely. Let’s face facts. Someone put the little thing in a home in our community so she would be discovered. Therefore it is our responsibility...”
A fun read so far. How can readers find you on the Internet?My website is www.juliebcosgrove.comIt will link you also to my blog, Where Did You Find God Today.
I have an Amazon author page, as well as a Goodreads author page. I’m also on Linked-In, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. Most of my fiction and nonfiction is featured on the Texas Association of Author’s webpage. Just search Julie B Cosgrove and you’ll track me down.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Baby Bunco (Bunco Biddies) (Volume 2) - paperback
Baby Bunco (Bunco Biddies Mystery Book 2) - Kindle[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:
Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
Welcome back, Julie. How did you come up with the idea for this story?
Baby Bunco
is the second novel in the Bunco Biddies Mysteries series. Each book has a “Buncos theme,” which is a dice game twelve of the senior citizens in their retirement community gather to play every Thursday. A baby Bunco is when a player rolls three of the same number, but not the number in the round. In other words, if you are in the round where everyone is trying to roll as many fours as they can, and you roll three twos, that is a baby bunco, worth five points. If you rolled three fours that round, that would be a regular bunco worth twenty-one points.So I used that point system to develop a plot involving someone leaving a newborn infant in a bathtub of an abandoned garden home. The unique thing is the home is in Sunset Acres, the retirement community where the Bunco Biddies live. Not exactly an everyday occurrence.
If you were planning a party with Christian authors of contemporary fiction, what six people would you invite and why? Probably Marji Lane, Cynthia Hickey, Lisa Lickel, Sharon McGregor, Vicki Caine, and Nancy Mehl because they all write mysteries and we could brainstorm plot twists.
A very good idea. Now let’s do that for a party for Christian authors of historical fiction, what six people would you invite and why? (Julie’s cheeks turn crimson.) I know you write that Lena, and I have read a few of your westerns, so you are invited anytime. Maybe Anne Greene as well, since she is in our American Christian Fiction Writers Dallas area group. She writes Regency and Victorian novels. Penelope Marquez writes stories set in Revolutionary times, and Rachel James, who lives in England, writes about very early Medieval Anglo-Saxon times. Charlene Havel and Sharon Faucheux teamed up to write Biblical fiction. That would be an interesting group because their writing spans almost all of our human history, don’t you think?
Yes. That would be a good group. Many times, people (and other authors) think you have it made with so many books published. What is your most difficult problem with writing at this time in your career? Marketing them! Often times, I feel as if I am yelling into the wind. There are so many wonderful Christian authors publishing novels out there, I can hardly keep up. No wonder our readers can’t. I hope I can appeal to the group who like cozies. Plus, my cozy mysteries, though faith-based, can cross over to secular reading audiences. One renowned Christian reviewer applauded this series because she said I didn’t awkwardly stick in a sermon in the midst of a car chase. Of course she was exaggerating, but her point was my characters live out their faith. It is a natural part of their personalities so Christianity flows through the plot like a deep underground current in a river.
Tell us about the featured book.
In
Baby Bunco
, the Biddies have just helped to solve a murder case that happened in their retirement community of Sunset Acres (as featured in Book One - Dumpster Dicing.) Janie, their ring leader, suffers from what her paperback mystery aficionado friend, Ethel, describes as mystery-itis. She has become addicted to sleuthing. So when a baby is found abandoned in a vacant home’s bathtub, and a young girl is found dead behind the convenience store across the highway on the same day, Janie immediately suspects it is the birth of a new crime wave in Alamoville. Now if only she can convince her son-in-law, who is the chief detective who is the case—no pun intended.Please give us the first page of the book.“Did you say she found a baby?” Janie stopped mid-roll, the pink and white dice warming in her clutched fist. “Here in Sunset Acres, a retirement community?”
Babs, seated to her left at the Bunco table, nodded. “That’s what Mildred told me as we were walking up to your front stoop tonight. Right, Mildred?”
“I went to collect a few more of my things since I’m staying with Ethel, and no more than three minutes later the leasing agent pounded on my door. ‘Come see,’ she motioned to me. Her eyes grew as wide as those mega donuts at the Crusty Baker.” She thumped her pencil against her score pad and groaned. “It took every ounce of gumption to follow her into that—ugh!—place next door.” She quivered her shoulders.
Janie shifted her gaze to the woman sitting across from her. “Ethel, you knew about this?”
“I did.”
“And you didn’t tell me?” Her voice elevated to echo-off –the-ceiling volume. She humphed and pivoted to face the storyteller. “Mildred. What happened?”
The other eight ladies halted their Bunco round. Each swiveled to listen in, their eyes fixated on the first card table.
Mildred leaned. “I paused at the steps, determined to not go inside. Only peek in from the front door. Then high-pitched, frantic cries came from the direction of the bathroom. Well, I had to rush to its aid. Every motherly fiber in my being dictated it.”
Murmurs and head bobs filtered through Janie’s living room.
Mildred sniffled. “Poor little thing. Alone, scared and red as a beet from wailing so hard. That house is cursed, I tell you.”Janie patted her hand. “Now, dear. Just because someone murdered Edwin soon after he moved in there doesn’t mean...”
Mildred shot from her seat and paced, her arms flaying in circles, resembling the duck windmill on top of the antiques barn down the road. “Ever since I relocated into Sunset Acres, it’s been one thing after another. Edwin murdered, then my nephew Bobby arrested, and now an abandoned newborn in a bathtub? This is supposed to be a quiet retirement community.”
“Maybe because you live on Solar Boulevard.” Annie huffed. “Nothing weird ever happens on my street, Sunrise Court, except for an occasional stray golf ball. Then again, if you kept your nose out of everyone’s business...” Her voice trailed off with a smug cock of her head.
“My nose?”
The other ladies mumbled to each other.
Ethel blew a whistle through her teeth. “Okay, everyone calm down. We all lived through the ruckus of one of our neighbor’s brutal murder last month. It’s not Mildred’s fault. Nor mine or Janie’s that this happened...”
Betsy Ann raised her hand, as if her legs once again dangled from under her desk in Ms. Everett’s kindergarten classroom.
Janie rolled her eyes. “What?”
“Well, it is sort of our fault.” She pointed to Janie, Ethel and herself. “We helped solve the case and Bobby did wind up in the middle of all of the commotion. That’s why he threatened you and tried to break into your house.” She folded her hands and gazed down at them. “I’m just saying...”
“Duly noted.” Janie felt the healing, pinkish wound on her neck where his knife grazed her skin. “I must add, my dear son-in-law, Chief Detective Blake Johnson, appreciated all of our...” her hands encircled the room “…research, sleuthing and cunningness. He told me so.” A smile curled along the edges of her mouth. “Besides, it did beat back the doldrums a while, right?”
A few silvery head bounced in agreement as the condo sprinkled with giggles. Annie crossed her arms and harumphed.
Janie eased over to Mildred and led her back to her designated chair. She patted her on the shoulders and scanned the room, making certain every slightly glaucoma-pressed or cataract-corrected eye fixated on her. “Now we must figure out who placed a newborn baby in a vacant garden home bathtub and why?”
Babs cocked an eyebrow. “We do?”
“Absolutely. Let’s face facts. Someone put the little thing in a home in our community so she would be discovered. Therefore it is our responsibility...”
A fun read so far. How can readers find you on the Internet?My website is www.juliebcosgrove.comIt will link you also to my blog, Where Did You Find God Today.
I have an Amazon author page, as well as a Goodreads author page. I’m also on Linked-In, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. Most of my fiction and nonfiction is featured on the Texas Association of Author’s webpage. Just search Julie B Cosgrove and you’ll track me down.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Baby Bunco (Bunco Biddies) (Volume 2) - paperback
Baby Bunco (Bunco Biddies Mystery Book 2) - Kindle[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:
Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
February 6, 2017
THE DOG WHO WAS THERE - Ron Marasco - One Free Book
Bio: Ron Marasco is a professor in the College of Communication and Fine Arts at LoyolaMarymount Universityin Los Angeles. His first book, Notes to an Actor, was named by the American Library Association an Outstanding Book of 2008. His second book, About Grief, has been translated into multiple languages, and he is currently completing a book on Shakespeare’s sonnets. He has acted extensively on TV—from Lost to West Wing to Entourage to originating the role of Mr. Casper on Freaks and Geeks—and appeared opposite screen legend Kirk Douglas in the movie Illusion, for which he also wrote the screenplay. Most recently, he has played the recurring role of Judge Grove on Major Crimes. He has a BA from Fordham at Lincoln Centerand an MA and Ph. D. from UCLA.
Find out more about Ron at http://www.thomasnelson.com/the-dog-who-was-there.
Welcome, Ron. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters?I do not consciously put myself into my characters. As someone who is also a professional actor I have learned that the less you think about yourself, the more you have two good things happen. First, when you step aside, you make room for a creative force beyond yourself to come through you. Second, even when you don’t overtly think of using yourself, un-conscious parts of yourself come through and, as most creative people know, the stuff that comes from the un-conscious is the good stuff. I think it’s the God stuff!
What is the quirkiest thing you’ve ever done?To be honest, I think this book, The Dog Who Was There , may be the quirkiest thing I have ever done. If quirky can also be considered somewhat serious. The idea of writing a book about a small dog living in Biblical times whose path crosses with Jesus and who eventually witnesses his crucifixion seemed crazy at first. Until I began writing it. As I worked on it, I could feel myself getting swept up in the story in a way that was different from anything I had experienced. I’ve known the gospels my whole life and had even studied the history of the time period for a long time; but when I began looking at Christ’s suffering through the eyes of a small, scruffy, mangy, hungry, opened-hearted dog, I found myself dissolving into very strong emotion as I worked. I knew—and I know—that the idea of the book is fairly “quirky,” but I felt somewhat “guided” the whole time. I kept hearing a voice—and not a voice that seemed my own—telling me to keep going. It was only after I finished and began to share the book with few friends that I realized the reason for the whole project. It was that people who would never have read the Bible or who would have dismissed the Passion of Jesus as something that “only those Christians would care about,” could be brought to the story of Jesus—because a small dog could lead them to it. I realized that was what the voice was all about. It was telling me to use the story I was writing as a vehicle to bring people to “the greatest story ever told.”
When did you first discover you were a writer?In a way, that’s a little like asking: When did I realize I was speaking English? Writing didn’t start for me, it’s just always was. It’s a way of being in the world. Writing is very holistic—it involves how you imagine, how you formulate words, how you feel, and how acutely you notice. It’s a process that is going on all the time and happening long before one sits down to write a book. I think it’s like singing in a way. People who sing seem to have always sung. They don’t wake up one day as a grown up and start singing. That’s, at least, how it has been for me. Probably, as an infant, I was in the crib looking around thinking, Hmmmm…interesting…I gotta remember this…someday l write the scene about all these annoying relatives looking down at me making funny faces….
That said, I imagine there are people who suddenly discover they are writers. In those cases, I would think they were writing inside all along; they just didn’t know they were. That must be a very exciting thing for someone to discover. I recently read the book When Breath Was Mortal. I recommend it. In the book, you watch a man who is a surgeon literally become a real writer in the throes of writing his first and, sadly, his last book. There is a quote in the book from John Bunyan that I think describe well what a writer becomes a writer. “He’ll not fear what men say/He’ll labor night and day/To be a pilgrim”
Born or made, to be a writer is to labor night and day. Writers are Pilgrims.
Tell us the range of the kind of books you enjoy reading.I read very eclectically, very eclectically. At the moment, I am working on a project that involves a particular period of history, so much of my reading these days is non-fiction/historical. But for fun I read a great variety. I get three newspapers every day and about a dozen different journals and magazines. As to books, I love good biographies the best (I’m reading one now about Jane Jacobs). But my interests are so all-over-the-place that the last three books I’ve read have been: 1) a children book, 2) a book from the Christian fiction genre, 3) a novel written in 1945, and 4) history of the town I recently moved to Stamford, Connecticut. There’s always a wide variety on my nightstand. Maybe it’s because I am also an actor, so I like to jump into different and disparate and worlds and characters and genres and time periods.
How do you keep your keep your sanity in our run, run, run world?First of all, I love that phrase of yours: “our run, run, run world.” Well, here’s what I do: I take a nap every day of my life and I take a bath every night. Anyone who knows me knows that those two things are sacrosanct. Whatever measure of peace and sanity I’ve been able to maintain in this roiling and unforgivingly-demanding world it is because of those two simple, daily rituals. Neither one of those things—the nap or the bath—can be done while multitasking! (Although I do sometimes do the crossword puzzle in the tub.)
How do you chose your characters names?A name is like a song, to me. It has to have a tone, a key, a melody that makes you feel how you want the character to make readers feel. In The Dog Who Was There , for example, there’s the sweet older couple who had raised Barley. The woman’s name is Adah. I wanted a name that was soft, comforting, homey. Adah has a quality of “ahh” in it: the sound we make when we relax and feel comfortable or safe. But there is another character in the book, one of the supporting characters, who is crass, selfish, unpleasant to be around, and a little bit comic. His name is Hog. Now, of course, there is the obvious, visual imagery of that word which conjures a pig. But, more important, to me is the song of the name, that “ugh” sound: the sound we make when we find something repugnant or roll our eyes at the ridiculous.
What is the accomplishment are you most proud of?I did a movie in which I played a wonderful role opposite the Hollywood screen legend Kirk Douglas. He is a great human being and a great actor. And also a man of immense personal spirituality. Playing those scenes with him in that movie was an experience I will treasure forever. On a somewhat less personal level, I am very proud of the book I co-wrote on the subject of grief (About Grief: Insights, Setbacks Grace Notes, Taboos Rowman and Littlefield, 2010, co-written with Brian Shuff). I hear all the time from readers what a helpful companion that book has been to them on their long walk through the rocky desert of grief. The great writer James Baldwin once said, “Suffering has everybody’s number.” And it does. If a book can know that, and be there for somebody when they are alone and in pain—well, that’s a thing to be a little proud of. And I guess I am, now that you’ve asked.)
If you could be an animal what would you be and why?I would want to be a dog owned by me! Because I give my dog steak or organic chicken—every night of her life. And she is totally spoiled and overly adored. And now that she is older and can’t quite jump up on furniture like she used to, I have little ottomans all around the house so she can hop up easily on her favorite comfy chairs and couches—ottomans that I regularly crack my shins on as I maneuver through the house! So, if I had to be an animal, I’d want to belong to someone who cooked me organic chicken and sacrificed his shins for my comfort.
What is your favorite food? I tend to like what food-writer MFK Fisher called “honest food,” meaning simply prepared meals but with ingredients that are as good as each ingredient can be. When ingredients are themselves good, all you have to do is prepare them honestly and the meal is splendid. Just think how sublime a perfect piece of fruit tastes, or fine cuts of meat, or just-right and just-ripe salad vegetables. It’s hard to improve upon nature, and sauces can only compensate so much for lousy core ingredients. Which, in a metaphoric sense, is true for a lot of things in life. In fact, it may not be a bad motto: “Less sauce, better ingredients.”
Tonight, for example, I am having a thin pork chop broiled in sea salt and butter, Yukon potatoes, a salad of tomatoes and yellow peppers, and bread from Arthur Avenue—the street in the Italian neighborhood of the Bronx—a bread well worth the effort it takes to get it. A good ingredient.
What is your greatest writing roadblock and how do do overcome it? This may sound odd, but I think the best thing to do with roadblocks is to ignore them. Or just turn around and, maybe, take another route. Or kind of tip-toe over them, perhaps. Thinking about them too much is not good at all. Obsessing is the work of the mind, not the soul. So I try not to bring up so-called roadblocks. It’s like saying to the pilot of an airliner before he enters the cockpit: “Hey Captain, I hope are thinking about how horrible a crash would be!”
Pros don’t think about crashing, they are too swept up in focusing on the interesting details of flying the plane. That’s what they think about. Further, the feeling that you are at a roadblock can be a sign that you should take a slightly different path. Oddly, as is true of most spirituality, if you are on the correct path, it feels good and flows easier than it does when you are on the wrong path. Of course, even the right path requires our stamina and effort and many Fitbit’s worth of steps on the journey. But it doesn’t require our frustration. The term “roadblock” to me bespeaks frustration. Frustration is not a spiritual force. The proper path is usually not bumpy—just very specific.
In Matthew 7:14 it says, “Small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only few find it.” It doesn’t say the road has roadblocks. And I think this is true for writing. The key is to find the right road, however narrow it may be. That sort of discernment is often more fruitful that trying to power your way through a block. Forcefulness is not talent. In fact, maybe its opposite. Talent is always about grace. And grace to me is the ability to flow freely and smoothly around and over obstacles. When you are writing well it feels graceful as opposed to pushy, if that makes sense.
Tell us about the featured book.
The Dog Who Was There
is rooted in my belief that—sometimes, truth be told—dogs are more virtuous creatures than we human beings are. Thus they have a good deal to teach people about how to love as unconditionally as the Christian message asks us to. A dog doesn’t care if we are good-looking or have money or got a high score on your SATs or are unemployed or physically challenged, or ill, or even just a huge screw-up in a zillion different ways in life. All they know is if we are kind enough for them to approach us. All dogs ask is for a few basic things: some food each day and a person or “pack” of people they can belong and who will accept them into their family or home. To me, that right there is the essence of The Lord’s Prayer. “I need food and I need understanding,” and then life is good. In exchange for that, dogs give to us their loving presence. All people with dogs know how healing that presence is. Anyone who has ever taken a dog to a nursing home or a hospital—as I used to do with my dog—know how transformative a dog’s presence can be for someone who’s sad or broken or needy. Just their presence is all it takes to feel better, to be notionally healed. That’s why the book it’s called
The Dog Who Was There
. The only gift Barley can give to Jesus, as he stands far off and watches this Kind Man (as he calls him) suffering, is just his presence. All he can do is just be there, and stay nearby someone who he likes. As I am writing this, across the room my fifteen year-old dog is snoozing on the couch. She’s had her dinner. She’s happy. She belongs—she to me and I to her, here, in this room as she lay sleeping while her nutty master types. At times like this, those of us blessed with dogs, share end-of-day moments with them that have a quiet solemnity and peace that can be a kind of meditation for us, almost a prayer. Dogs can lead us into a place where we are more open to the prompting of the spirit.
Book Blurb: No one expected Barley to have an encounter with the Messiah.
He was homeless, hungry, and struggling to survive in first century Jerusalem. Most surprisingly, he was a dog. But through Barley’s eyes, the story of a teacher from Galilee comes alive in a way we’ve never experienced before.
Barley’s story begins in the home of a compassionate woodcarver and his wife who find Barley as an abandoned, nearly-drowned pup. Tales of a special teacher from Galilee are reaching their tiny village, but when life suddenly changes again for Barley, he carries the lessons of forgiveness and love out of the woodcarver’s home and through the dangerous roads of Roman-occupied Judea.
On the outskirts of Jerusalem, Barley meets a homeless man and petty criminal named Samid. Together, Barley and his unlikely new master experience fresh struggles and new revelations. Soon Barley is swept up into the current of history, culminating in an unforgettable encounter with the truest master of all as he bears witness to the greatest story ever told.
Please give us the first page of book.Epigraph“Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.” —Mark 10:29–30
Barley was lying with his snout resting on the hearth, looking up with his alert brown eyes, watching Adah cook dinner. She was sitting, as she always did at this time of night, on her small stool and stirring a pot of something that, to Barley, smelled delicious. It was nightfall in the small home that Duv had built, all by himself, when he and Adah first became husband and wife, many years before Barley had come into their lives. The walls of the homey, one-room house were thick, made out of light-colored stone and coarse mud, from the region of Judea they lived in…
How can readers find you on the Internet?I hate to say it, but I’m not too much of a social media person. So I am not on Facebook and rather than Tweeting, I prefer to express my opinions, face to face, over coffee. So, if you want to have coffee with me you can e-mail me. My e-mail is: rmarasco154@gmail.com . Everyone asks what the 154 is. My favorite poetry on earth are the Sonnets of William Shakespeare. And he wrote 154 of them, the rmarasco154. I guess the reasoning behind that makes me a nerd, a wonk, an eccentric, lol. (But also a writer.)
Thank you, Ron, for sharing this book with us.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.The Dog Who Was There[image error] - Kindle
The Dog Who Was There - Audio
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:
Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
Find out more about Ron at http://www.thomasnelson.com/the-dog-who-was-there.
Welcome, Ron. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters?I do not consciously put myself into my characters. As someone who is also a professional actor I have learned that the less you think about yourself, the more you have two good things happen. First, when you step aside, you make room for a creative force beyond yourself to come through you. Second, even when you don’t overtly think of using yourself, un-conscious parts of yourself come through and, as most creative people know, the stuff that comes from the un-conscious is the good stuff. I think it’s the God stuff! What is the quirkiest thing you’ve ever done?To be honest, I think this book, The Dog Who Was There , may be the quirkiest thing I have ever done. If quirky can also be considered somewhat serious. The idea of writing a book about a small dog living in Biblical times whose path crosses with Jesus and who eventually witnesses his crucifixion seemed crazy at first. Until I began writing it. As I worked on it, I could feel myself getting swept up in the story in a way that was different from anything I had experienced. I’ve known the gospels my whole life and had even studied the history of the time period for a long time; but when I began looking at Christ’s suffering through the eyes of a small, scruffy, mangy, hungry, opened-hearted dog, I found myself dissolving into very strong emotion as I worked. I knew—and I know—that the idea of the book is fairly “quirky,” but I felt somewhat “guided” the whole time. I kept hearing a voice—and not a voice that seemed my own—telling me to keep going. It was only after I finished and began to share the book with few friends that I realized the reason for the whole project. It was that people who would never have read the Bible or who would have dismissed the Passion of Jesus as something that “only those Christians would care about,” could be brought to the story of Jesus—because a small dog could lead them to it. I realized that was what the voice was all about. It was telling me to use the story I was writing as a vehicle to bring people to “the greatest story ever told.”
When did you first discover you were a writer?In a way, that’s a little like asking: When did I realize I was speaking English? Writing didn’t start for me, it’s just always was. It’s a way of being in the world. Writing is very holistic—it involves how you imagine, how you formulate words, how you feel, and how acutely you notice. It’s a process that is going on all the time and happening long before one sits down to write a book. I think it’s like singing in a way. People who sing seem to have always sung. They don’t wake up one day as a grown up and start singing. That’s, at least, how it has been for me. Probably, as an infant, I was in the crib looking around thinking, Hmmmm…interesting…I gotta remember this…someday l write the scene about all these annoying relatives looking down at me making funny faces….
That said, I imagine there are people who suddenly discover they are writers. In those cases, I would think they were writing inside all along; they just didn’t know they were. That must be a very exciting thing for someone to discover. I recently read the book When Breath Was Mortal. I recommend it. In the book, you watch a man who is a surgeon literally become a real writer in the throes of writing his first and, sadly, his last book. There is a quote in the book from John Bunyan that I think describe well what a writer becomes a writer. “He’ll not fear what men say/He’ll labor night and day/To be a pilgrim”
Born or made, to be a writer is to labor night and day. Writers are Pilgrims.
Tell us the range of the kind of books you enjoy reading.I read very eclectically, very eclectically. At the moment, I am working on a project that involves a particular period of history, so much of my reading these days is non-fiction/historical. But for fun I read a great variety. I get three newspapers every day and about a dozen different journals and magazines. As to books, I love good biographies the best (I’m reading one now about Jane Jacobs). But my interests are so all-over-the-place that the last three books I’ve read have been: 1) a children book, 2) a book from the Christian fiction genre, 3) a novel written in 1945, and 4) history of the town I recently moved to Stamford, Connecticut. There’s always a wide variety on my nightstand. Maybe it’s because I am also an actor, so I like to jump into different and disparate and worlds and characters and genres and time periods.
How do you keep your keep your sanity in our run, run, run world?First of all, I love that phrase of yours: “our run, run, run world.” Well, here’s what I do: I take a nap every day of my life and I take a bath every night. Anyone who knows me knows that those two things are sacrosanct. Whatever measure of peace and sanity I’ve been able to maintain in this roiling and unforgivingly-demanding world it is because of those two simple, daily rituals. Neither one of those things—the nap or the bath—can be done while multitasking! (Although I do sometimes do the crossword puzzle in the tub.)
How do you chose your characters names?A name is like a song, to me. It has to have a tone, a key, a melody that makes you feel how you want the character to make readers feel. In The Dog Who Was There , for example, there’s the sweet older couple who had raised Barley. The woman’s name is Adah. I wanted a name that was soft, comforting, homey. Adah has a quality of “ahh” in it: the sound we make when we relax and feel comfortable or safe. But there is another character in the book, one of the supporting characters, who is crass, selfish, unpleasant to be around, and a little bit comic. His name is Hog. Now, of course, there is the obvious, visual imagery of that word which conjures a pig. But, more important, to me is the song of the name, that “ugh” sound: the sound we make when we find something repugnant or roll our eyes at the ridiculous.
What is the accomplishment are you most proud of?I did a movie in which I played a wonderful role opposite the Hollywood screen legend Kirk Douglas. He is a great human being and a great actor. And also a man of immense personal spirituality. Playing those scenes with him in that movie was an experience I will treasure forever. On a somewhat less personal level, I am very proud of the book I co-wrote on the subject of grief (About Grief: Insights, Setbacks Grace Notes, Taboos Rowman and Littlefield, 2010, co-written with Brian Shuff). I hear all the time from readers what a helpful companion that book has been to them on their long walk through the rocky desert of grief. The great writer James Baldwin once said, “Suffering has everybody’s number.” And it does. If a book can know that, and be there for somebody when they are alone and in pain—well, that’s a thing to be a little proud of. And I guess I am, now that you’ve asked.)
If you could be an animal what would you be and why?I would want to be a dog owned by me! Because I give my dog steak or organic chicken—every night of her life. And she is totally spoiled and overly adored. And now that she is older and can’t quite jump up on furniture like she used to, I have little ottomans all around the house so she can hop up easily on her favorite comfy chairs and couches—ottomans that I regularly crack my shins on as I maneuver through the house! So, if I had to be an animal, I’d want to belong to someone who cooked me organic chicken and sacrificed his shins for my comfort.
What is your favorite food? I tend to like what food-writer MFK Fisher called “honest food,” meaning simply prepared meals but with ingredients that are as good as each ingredient can be. When ingredients are themselves good, all you have to do is prepare them honestly and the meal is splendid. Just think how sublime a perfect piece of fruit tastes, or fine cuts of meat, or just-right and just-ripe salad vegetables. It’s hard to improve upon nature, and sauces can only compensate so much for lousy core ingredients. Which, in a metaphoric sense, is true for a lot of things in life. In fact, it may not be a bad motto: “Less sauce, better ingredients.”
Tonight, for example, I am having a thin pork chop broiled in sea salt and butter, Yukon potatoes, a salad of tomatoes and yellow peppers, and bread from Arthur Avenue—the street in the Italian neighborhood of the Bronx—a bread well worth the effort it takes to get it. A good ingredient.
What is your greatest writing roadblock and how do do overcome it? This may sound odd, but I think the best thing to do with roadblocks is to ignore them. Or just turn around and, maybe, take another route. Or kind of tip-toe over them, perhaps. Thinking about them too much is not good at all. Obsessing is the work of the mind, not the soul. So I try not to bring up so-called roadblocks. It’s like saying to the pilot of an airliner before he enters the cockpit: “Hey Captain, I hope are thinking about how horrible a crash would be!”
Pros don’t think about crashing, they are too swept up in focusing on the interesting details of flying the plane. That’s what they think about. Further, the feeling that you are at a roadblock can be a sign that you should take a slightly different path. Oddly, as is true of most spirituality, if you are on the correct path, it feels good and flows easier than it does when you are on the wrong path. Of course, even the right path requires our stamina and effort and many Fitbit’s worth of steps on the journey. But it doesn’t require our frustration. The term “roadblock” to me bespeaks frustration. Frustration is not a spiritual force. The proper path is usually not bumpy—just very specific.
In Matthew 7:14 it says, “Small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only few find it.” It doesn’t say the road has roadblocks. And I think this is true for writing. The key is to find the right road, however narrow it may be. That sort of discernment is often more fruitful that trying to power your way through a block. Forcefulness is not talent. In fact, maybe its opposite. Talent is always about grace. And grace to me is the ability to flow freely and smoothly around and over obstacles. When you are writing well it feels graceful as opposed to pushy, if that makes sense.
Tell us about the featured book.
The Dog Who Was There
is rooted in my belief that—sometimes, truth be told—dogs are more virtuous creatures than we human beings are. Thus they have a good deal to teach people about how to love as unconditionally as the Christian message asks us to. A dog doesn’t care if we are good-looking or have money or got a high score on your SATs or are unemployed or physically challenged, or ill, or even just a huge screw-up in a zillion different ways in life. All they know is if we are kind enough for them to approach us. All dogs ask is for a few basic things: some food each day and a person or “pack” of people they can belong and who will accept them into their family or home. To me, that right there is the essence of The Lord’s Prayer. “I need food and I need understanding,” and then life is good. In exchange for that, dogs give to us their loving presence. All people with dogs know how healing that presence is. Anyone who has ever taken a dog to a nursing home or a hospital—as I used to do with my dog—know how transformative a dog’s presence can be for someone who’s sad or broken or needy. Just their presence is all it takes to feel better, to be notionally healed. That’s why the book it’s called
The Dog Who Was There
. The only gift Barley can give to Jesus, as he stands far off and watches this Kind Man (as he calls him) suffering, is just his presence. All he can do is just be there, and stay nearby someone who he likes. As I am writing this, across the room my fifteen year-old dog is snoozing on the couch. She’s had her dinner. She’s happy. She belongs—she to me and I to her, here, in this room as she lay sleeping while her nutty master types. At times like this, those of us blessed with dogs, share end-of-day moments with them that have a quiet solemnity and peace that can be a kind of meditation for us, almost a prayer. Dogs can lead us into a place where we are more open to the prompting of the spirit. Book Blurb: No one expected Barley to have an encounter with the Messiah.
He was homeless, hungry, and struggling to survive in first century Jerusalem. Most surprisingly, he was a dog. But through Barley’s eyes, the story of a teacher from Galilee comes alive in a way we’ve never experienced before.
Barley’s story begins in the home of a compassionate woodcarver and his wife who find Barley as an abandoned, nearly-drowned pup. Tales of a special teacher from Galilee are reaching their tiny village, but when life suddenly changes again for Barley, he carries the lessons of forgiveness and love out of the woodcarver’s home and through the dangerous roads of Roman-occupied Judea.
On the outskirts of Jerusalem, Barley meets a homeless man and petty criminal named Samid. Together, Barley and his unlikely new master experience fresh struggles and new revelations. Soon Barley is swept up into the current of history, culminating in an unforgettable encounter with the truest master of all as he bears witness to the greatest story ever told.
Please give us the first page of book.Epigraph“Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.” —Mark 10:29–30
Barley was lying with his snout resting on the hearth, looking up with his alert brown eyes, watching Adah cook dinner. She was sitting, as she always did at this time of night, on her small stool and stirring a pot of something that, to Barley, smelled delicious. It was nightfall in the small home that Duv had built, all by himself, when he and Adah first became husband and wife, many years before Barley had come into their lives. The walls of the homey, one-room house were thick, made out of light-colored stone and coarse mud, from the region of Judea they lived in…
How can readers find you on the Internet?I hate to say it, but I’m not too much of a social media person. So I am not on Facebook and rather than Tweeting, I prefer to express my opinions, face to face, over coffee. So, if you want to have coffee with me you can e-mail me. My e-mail is: rmarasco154@gmail.com . Everyone asks what the 154 is. My favorite poetry on earth are the Sonnets of William Shakespeare. And he wrote 154 of them, the rmarasco154. I guess the reasoning behind that makes me a nerd, a wonk, an eccentric, lol. (But also a writer.)
Thank you, Ron, for sharing this book with us.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.The Dog Who Was There[image error] - Kindle
The Dog Who Was There - Audio
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
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Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
February 5, 2017
WINNERS!!!
Pam (OH) is the winner of
Eden
by Keith Korman.
Caryl K (TX) is the winner of Covering Love by Caryl McAdoo.
Winnie (UT) is the winner of Skunk in the Shower by Jamie Bryant.
If you won a book and you like it, please consider giving the author the courtesy of writing a review on Goodreads, Amazon.com, Christianbooks.com, Barnes and Noble, or other Internet sites.
Also, tell your friends about the book ... and this blog. Thank you.
Congratulations, everyone. If you won a print book, send me your mailing address:
Click the Contact Me link at the top of the blog, and send me an Email.
If you won an ebook, just let me know what email address it should be sent to.
When you contact me, please give the title and author of the book you won, so I won't have to look it up.
Remember, you have 4 weeks to claim your book.
Caryl K (TX) is the winner of Covering Love by Caryl McAdoo.
Winnie (UT) is the winner of Skunk in the Shower by Jamie Bryant.
If you won a book and you like it, please consider giving the author the courtesy of writing a review on Goodreads, Amazon.com, Christianbooks.com, Barnes and Noble, or other Internet sites.
Also, tell your friends about the book ... and this blog. Thank you.
Congratulations, everyone. If you won a print book, send me your mailing address:
Click the Contact Me link at the top of the blog, and send me an Email.
If you won an ebook, just let me know what email address it should be sent to.
When you contact me, please give the title and author of the book you won, so I won't have to look it up.
Remember, you have 4 weeks to claim your book.
February 3, 2017
CHRISTMAS BELLS ARE RINGING (LOVE AT CHRISTMAS INN Collection) - Tanya Stowe - One Free Book
Welcome, Tanya. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters.Not enough. I think if I explored my own fears in a deeper manner, really touched the deep fears and struggles, readers would recognize the feelings more. But I think I’ve been afraid to tackle my own fears and put them on the page.What is the quirkiest thing you have ever done?Hmmm. Quirky. My friends might say everything I do is quirky. Well … when my children were little, one night a week we stopped at our local fast food place for dinner after our non-stop run from practice to practice. This particular fast food location had classic paintings in frames and I fell in love with one. The picture had a moonlit bay with a sailing ship and fisherman and their wives gathering nets. Beautiful. I wanted it. So I asked the manager who painted it or where it came from. He couldn’t find out so I asked if I could buy another print and trade it out. So … one busy lunch day with a packed house, my husband brought his tools in, took down the painting and traded it out. Of course everyone stared and my husband shook his head the whole time muttering, “I sure love you.”
That print sat on my wall for twenty years and now, since I’ve downsized to a motorhome, it sits on my son’s wall. He’s a writer like me and unusual things tickle his imagination like mine.
I love that story. When did you first discover you were a writer?I was eleven years old. My favorite television show didn’t end the way I thought it should so I sat down and wrote a book with the ending I wanted.
Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading.I read everything but right now, I’m focused on historical mysteries. I love to read about history and how they solved crimes before forensic science.
How do you keep your sanity in our run, run, run world?Who said I was sane? I have four children and twenty-one grandchildren. I run as hard and as fast as everyone else. But while I run, I try to remember Saint Francis’ words. “Preach the Gospel daily and when necessary use words.”
That’s a wonderful quote. How do you choose your characters’ names?Sometimes, they just appear in my head. Other times, I look them up on the Internet baby name sites. Recently I needed some Scandinavian names so off I went to a site that featured European names and their meanings.
What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of?When my family gets together we go to church together. Nothing gives me more pleasure than to look down the pews and see all my children and grandchildren in church. Quite an accomplishment for a former atheist.
That is so cool. If you were an animal, which one would you be, and why?A panther. Even though I’m allergic to cats, I still have an affinity for them. I think panthers are sleek, cool and strong.
What is your favorite food?Italian
What is the problem with writing that was your greatest roadblock, and how did you overcome it?I have a theory. Writers are either storytellers or wordcrafters. A lucky few are both but I’m most definitely a storyteller so I get dragged down with the “how to’s.” How do I get my story across? What words? How do I shape the sentences? I’m most definitely not a wordcrafter and I work on it constantly.
Tell us about the featured book.My good friends Mary Manners, Marianne Evans, and Delia Latham and I wrote a novella series called Hearts Haven for our publisher years back. We loved the process so much, we did four collections in the series. We decided we’d like to do another but this time we decided to self-publish. It’s called
Love at Christmas Inn Collection
. Four novellas in one boxed set. The family name is Christmas so they keep a Christmas theme year round at their inn. We plan to do at least two more collections in the series. Please give us the first page of the book.The first novella in the boxed set is my contribution. It’s called Christmas Bells are Ringing. Here is the first page:Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. ~Deuteronomy 8:2 (NIV)~
The Tennessee countryside rolled out before Ariana Christmas as the highway topped the crest of a small hill, providing a stunning view of Hope Creek. Early October, and the trees had turned. Bright orange, russet and golden leaves created an amazing patchwork of colors on the panorama below.
Beautiful. Even if it was in the back of beyond. She tamped down on the anger and resentment that threatened to raise ugly heads again. Those emotions were useless. When her father first sentenced her to this imprisonment she’d tried sarcasm, rage and finally tears. All to no avail. He’d cancelled her credit cards and her phone account. He’d even taken away her lovely little sports car with its leather interior and told her she had to earn her own way. Her ailing Aunt Lizzie needed help. Ari’s new job was to take care of Lizzie, and oh, by the way, oversee the renovations of the family’s historic Christmas Inn.
So not fair. What did Ari know about running an inn? OK, so she did have a master’s degree in hotel management. But she’d never worked a day in her life. She didn’t need to. Her older brother Ian took his place beside their dad to manage their hotel empire long before Ari left school. Ian was a natural leader and a great asset to the business. Unlike her.
How can readers find you on the Internet?My website link: http://tanyastowe.com/index.htmlMy Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/TanyaStoweReadersPage/My Twitter handle: @TanyaStowe1
Thank you, Tanya, for sharing this new book with us. I’m eager to read it.
Readers, here’s a link to the book. By using it when you order, you help support this blog.Love at Christmas Inn: Collection I[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
February 1, 2017
AVALANCHE - Gayla K Hiss - One Free Book
Bio: Gayla’s writing journey began with her hobby painting landscapes. In her imagination, characters and scenes came to life as she painted beautiful natural settings. Her inspiring novels combine her love for the great outdoors with romance, suspense, and mystery. Gayla and her husband often tour the country in their RV, visiting many state and national parks. She enjoys hiking, camping, and traveling, and lives in the Pacific Northwest. She’s excited to announce her debut novel,
Avalanche
, book 1 of her Peril in the Park series, which releases today, February 1st.
Welcome, Gayla. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters. I intentionally try to make my characters different from myself, but they have some of the same desires and struggles. They are definitely more adventurous and courageous than I am, and they have their flaws, too.
What is the quirkiest thing you have ever done? Does becoming a romance writer count?
Many people would think that is quirky, but to me it is normal. When did you first discover you were a writer? I think the writer has always been in me, but I was a late-bloomer. As a child, I always wanted a diary, but I was much more into art at that time. In my late twenties, I became frustrated with painting because I couldn’t adequately paint the pictures I had in mind, so I started describing them in words. That’s when I realized the images in my imagination were really scenes from a story.
My husband was a late-bloomer, too. It is awesome watching his life unfold during our marriage. Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading. All kinds, really. Romantic suspense and mysteries are my favorite fiction genre, but I love Victorian and Regency romances too, especially romantic suspense from that era. Maybe after the huge success of shows like Downton Abbey and Poldark, they’ll bring back the genre of historical romantic suspense again. I also enjoy other historical fiction and the classics. I’m rediscovering The Pilgrim’s Progress at the moment. I like nonfiction too, including biographies, Bible studies, and self-help books about nutrition and health. All the books in my Peril in the Park series are set in U.S. national parks so there is a wilderness adventure element in them. I find stories about people surviving in the wilderness fascinating.
How do you keep your sanity in our run, run, run world? I tried to stay organized. It’s not always easy, but it really helps me keep on top of things. I like to have a short-term and long-term plan and bind my activities as much as possible within those plans. That’s not to say I don’t change the plans or step outside them from time to time. I also make exercise a priority, whether it’s a walk or working out with weights. It’s a habit I started as a teenager that’s become very beneficial over the years, especially with all the time I spend at my desk writing.
How do you choose your characters’ names? I put a lot of thought into all of my characters names, probably too much. I sometimes make up names to sound different. I want the names to reflect the essence of the character, without distracting too much from the story.
What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of? Being married to my wonderful husband for 32 years.
That’s wonderful. Living the happily- ever-after life takes a lot of intentional work on the marriage. If you were an animal, which one would you be, and why? I’m really glad I’m not an animal, but if I had to choose, maybe a beaver because they have really nice homes on the water and they’re always building/creating something.
This is the first time any author chose a beaver. What is your favorite food? mango-passion fruit sorbet
What is the problem with writing that was your greatest roadblock, and how did you overcome it? I think gaining objectivity with my writing. It’s easy to become myopic about what I’m working on. I’m in a small critique group, and they really helped to open my eyes and see what needed to be fixed. My editor also helps me see those things I’m blind to.
Tell us about the featured book.
Avalanche
is book 1 in a 4-book series set in the national parks of North America, and releases Feb. 1st. All the books in the series are inspirational contemporary romance with suspense/mystery elements.
Avalanche
takes place in North Cascades National Park. When Park Ranger Jenny Snowfeather runs into Deputy Marshal Chase Matthews at her brother's Fourth of July barbecue, she suspects there is more going on in Eagle Valley, Washington, than fireworks. As she joins Chase on a manhunt in the rugged backcountry of North Cascades National Park, Jenny is confronted with her past mistakes. But she soon discovers the greatest threat of all is losing her heart to Chase, who is obsessed with capturing the fugitive at all costs. Risking everything to help Chase find the man who could kill them both, Jenny's faith is put to the test. Will the enemy get away with murder? Will Jenny and Chase reach freedom and safety, or be buried alive? One step in the wrong direction could mean the difference between life and death.
Please give us the first page of the book.Fireworks exploded across the dark sky, but Jenny Snowfeather hardly noticed. The news about the cabin break-in had cast a shadow over her brother’s Fourth of July barbecue. She’d suspected a bear at first, until she learned two hunting rifles and ammo had been stolen, along with food and blankets.
A bright flash startled her.
“Watch out!” a man cried as the stray spark zoomed toward her like a small meteor.
She spun around to escape, slamming right into the man and his plate of barbecued chicken.
He grabbed her, stumbled, and pulled her with him to the ground.
A second later, the blazing miniature rocket whizzed over their heads and crashed into the lawn only a few feet away.
She squeezed her eyes shut at the near miss. When she opened them, Jenny found herself face-to-face with the handsome stranger.
His large, brown eyes stared back in surprise.
Her gaze traveled to his arm, sheltering her body.
Quickly, he withdrew it and rolled over, raising himself to his elbows. “That was a close one. Are you okay?”
She sat up and lightly brushed the grass from her blue sweater and faded jeans. “Other than a few grass stains, I’m fine.” Glancing back at him, she noticed the food plastered to his chest and smiled. “But you’re not.”
When she leaned over to flick the remnant of baked beans from his white cotton shirt, her eyes zeroed in on the holstered Glock beneath his jacket.
That’s a very nice hook. How can readers find you on the Internet? Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/623160321192569/Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15901138.Gayla_K_HissAmazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Gayla-K-Hiss/e/B01N09FMKZ/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1My website is: http://www.gaylakhiss.com/
Thank you, Gayla, for sharing this new book with us. I’m eager to read it.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Avalanche: A Contemporary Romance w/Suspense (Peril in the Park) (Volume 1)[image error]Avalanche: A Contemporary Romance w/Suspense Elements (Peril in the Park Book 1)[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
Welcome, Gayla. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters. I intentionally try to make my characters different from myself, but they have some of the same desires and struggles. They are definitely more adventurous and courageous than I am, and they have their flaws, too.What is the quirkiest thing you have ever done? Does becoming a romance writer count?
Many people would think that is quirky, but to me it is normal. When did you first discover you were a writer? I think the writer has always been in me, but I was a late-bloomer. As a child, I always wanted a diary, but I was much more into art at that time. In my late twenties, I became frustrated with painting because I couldn’t adequately paint the pictures I had in mind, so I started describing them in words. That’s when I realized the images in my imagination were really scenes from a story.
My husband was a late-bloomer, too. It is awesome watching his life unfold during our marriage. Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading. All kinds, really. Romantic suspense and mysteries are my favorite fiction genre, but I love Victorian and Regency romances too, especially romantic suspense from that era. Maybe after the huge success of shows like Downton Abbey and Poldark, they’ll bring back the genre of historical romantic suspense again. I also enjoy other historical fiction and the classics. I’m rediscovering The Pilgrim’s Progress at the moment. I like nonfiction too, including biographies, Bible studies, and self-help books about nutrition and health. All the books in my Peril in the Park series are set in U.S. national parks so there is a wilderness adventure element in them. I find stories about people surviving in the wilderness fascinating.
How do you keep your sanity in our run, run, run world? I tried to stay organized. It’s not always easy, but it really helps me keep on top of things. I like to have a short-term and long-term plan and bind my activities as much as possible within those plans. That’s not to say I don’t change the plans or step outside them from time to time. I also make exercise a priority, whether it’s a walk or working out with weights. It’s a habit I started as a teenager that’s become very beneficial over the years, especially with all the time I spend at my desk writing.
How do you choose your characters’ names? I put a lot of thought into all of my characters names, probably too much. I sometimes make up names to sound different. I want the names to reflect the essence of the character, without distracting too much from the story.
What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of? Being married to my wonderful husband for 32 years.
That’s wonderful. Living the happily- ever-after life takes a lot of intentional work on the marriage. If you were an animal, which one would you be, and why? I’m really glad I’m not an animal, but if I had to choose, maybe a beaver because they have really nice homes on the water and they’re always building/creating something.
This is the first time any author chose a beaver. What is your favorite food? mango-passion fruit sorbet
What is the problem with writing that was your greatest roadblock, and how did you overcome it? I think gaining objectivity with my writing. It’s easy to become myopic about what I’m working on. I’m in a small critique group, and they really helped to open my eyes and see what needed to be fixed. My editor also helps me see those things I’m blind to.
Tell us about the featured book.
Avalanche
is book 1 in a 4-book series set in the national parks of North America, and releases Feb. 1st. All the books in the series are inspirational contemporary romance with suspense/mystery elements.
Avalanche
takes place in North Cascades National Park. When Park Ranger Jenny Snowfeather runs into Deputy Marshal Chase Matthews at her brother's Fourth of July barbecue, she suspects there is more going on in Eagle Valley, Washington, than fireworks. As she joins Chase on a manhunt in the rugged backcountry of North Cascades National Park, Jenny is confronted with her past mistakes. But she soon discovers the greatest threat of all is losing her heart to Chase, who is obsessed with capturing the fugitive at all costs. Risking everything to help Chase find the man who could kill them both, Jenny's faith is put to the test. Will the enemy get away with murder? Will Jenny and Chase reach freedom and safety, or be buried alive? One step in the wrong direction could mean the difference between life and death. Please give us the first page of the book.Fireworks exploded across the dark sky, but Jenny Snowfeather hardly noticed. The news about the cabin break-in had cast a shadow over her brother’s Fourth of July barbecue. She’d suspected a bear at first, until she learned two hunting rifles and ammo had been stolen, along with food and blankets.
A bright flash startled her.
“Watch out!” a man cried as the stray spark zoomed toward her like a small meteor.
She spun around to escape, slamming right into the man and his plate of barbecued chicken.
He grabbed her, stumbled, and pulled her with him to the ground.
A second later, the blazing miniature rocket whizzed over their heads and crashed into the lawn only a few feet away.
She squeezed her eyes shut at the near miss. When she opened them, Jenny found herself face-to-face with the handsome stranger.
His large, brown eyes stared back in surprise.
Her gaze traveled to his arm, sheltering her body.
Quickly, he withdrew it and rolled over, raising himself to his elbows. “That was a close one. Are you okay?”
She sat up and lightly brushed the grass from her blue sweater and faded jeans. “Other than a few grass stains, I’m fine.” Glancing back at him, she noticed the food plastered to his chest and smiled. “But you’re not.”
When she leaned over to flick the remnant of baked beans from his white cotton shirt, her eyes zeroed in on the holstered Glock beneath his jacket.
That’s a very nice hook. How can readers find you on the Internet? Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/623160321192569/Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15901138.Gayla_K_HissAmazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Gayla-K-Hiss/e/B01N09FMKZ/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1My website is: http://www.gaylakhiss.com/
Thank you, Gayla, for sharing this new book with us. I’m eager to read it.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Avalanche: A Contemporary Romance w/Suspense (Peril in the Park) (Volume 1)[image error]Avalanche: A Contemporary Romance w/Suspense Elements (Peril in the Park Book 1)[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
January 31, 2017
ABBEY'S TALE - Katherine McDermott - One Free Book
Welcome, Katherine. Why do you write the kind of books you do? I like family oriented books about characters dealing with real problems with faith and courage.Besides when you came to know the Lord, what is the happiest day in your life?I have been blessed with many happy days that involved being outside in God’s nature with people I love.
How has being published changed your life? I do a lot of typing!
What are you reading right now? The best book I’ve read lately is The First Gardener by Denise Hildreth Jones.
What is your current work in progress? A sequel to Hidingentitled Suspicion.
What would be your dream vacation? I’d like to take a Viking River Cruise.
How do you choose your settings for each book? I use places I have visited.
If you could spend an evening with one person who is currently alive, who would it be and why? Although I’m not Catholic, I’d like to meet Pope Francis.
What are your hobbies, besides writing and reading? Painting, singing, bridge, and ballroom dancing
What is your most difficult writing obstacle, and how do you overcome it?Finding time. I get up early!
What advice would you give to a beginning author? Don’t give up!
Tell us about the featured book. The heroine is blind and becomes a teacher at a school for the blind. The hero is an Irish immigrant escaping the Potato Famine. I’ve been to Irelandand seen the terrible conditions that they lived in. I found the Irish to be friendly, and they love a good story.Please give us the first page of the book.Maine 1869Abigail ran her sensitive fingers over the driftwood figures from the sill of the bay window with sensuous delight. She caressed the leaping dolphin with its smooth side, angled dorsal fin and sloping tail. Her forefinger traced the harlequin-like smile beneath its bottlenose and a smile widened her own lips. She stroked the frolicking sea otter which lay positioned on its back holding a starfish playfully with its front paws. The driftwood gull soared in flight with outstretched wings.
What must the man be like who can carve such beautiful things? Through his work, she’d seen the world as never before. Who is he and why does he so rarely leave the island? Why the self-imposed exile?
She listened to the low hiss of the leaping flames and cheerful crackle of the burning logs from her seat in the gooseneck rocker near the fire.
The yeasty aroma of baking bread drew Abigail back to present. Dropping her wooden treasures into the roomy pockets of her apron, she moved to the cast iron stove where she adeptly withdrew the bread pan with a frayed pot holder. She transported it to the table to cool. Then opening the glass front of the pendulum clock, she felt the position of the brass hands. The smaller hand rested on the raised Roman numeral V. The larger pointed to X. Her father would soon be back from his mail delivery and his monthly trip to Lighthouse Island.
Acutely sensitive to sounds, she heard the clam chowder bubbling on the stove and stirred it. Its salty, fishy aroma was like the sea itself. The topaz-eyed cat brushed gently but insistently against her skirt.
“You’re hungry aren’t you, Charlie?” Abigail took scraps of cod from the pot in the sink and fed the indolent, striped tom.
How can readers find you on the Internet?www.kmcdermottauthor.wordpress.comwww.Facebook.com/Katherinemcdermott.Author
Thank you, Katherine, for sharing this book with us. It sounds intriguing.
Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.Abbey's Tale[image error] - paperback
Abbey's Tale - Kindle[image error]
Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)
Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.
The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.
If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com
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