Rochelle Campbell's Blog: The NoteBook Blogairy, page 20
September 23, 2014
Fury From Hell: Blog Tour Stop #6 Kate Rothwell’s Blog
Hi again guys!
It’s my mission to keep all of the blog tour stops done to date on my blog so if you want to hop along with Fury From Hell all over the inter-netting-world you can! :-)
Our next stop is on Kate Rothwell’s blog. Kate and I met some two years ago when I read and fell in love with her book Someone to Cherish which I reviewed!
Find out in Kate’s interview why I wanted to be a writer, what genre is Fury From Hell really and what genres I most love.
Thanks Kate!
Fury From Hell: Blog Tour Stop #5 – Quanie Talks Writing
Hi Guys!
My newest blogger friend, Quanie Miller, has me in a dither with excitement about her new book The New Mrs. Collins. It is a Southern paranormal novel with the most fabulously beautiful cover!
The New Mrs. Collins is due out in October 2014. Let’s all be on the lookout!
In the meantime, Quanie took the time to interview me about Fury From Hell for her writing blog and you can find her interview here.
Wishing you all the best Quanie!!
Fury From Hell: Blog Tour Stop #4 – Francine Howarth’s Romancing the Blog
As we delve deeper into the third week of Fury From Hell being released I have many people to thank and to applaud for helping me spread the word. Francine Howarth is one of the people I must thank. Francine, author of Love Walked In, a British Spy love story, hosted my book on it’s second day of ‘birth’ — Wednesday, September 10th, 2014.
Please find Francine’s most excellent Q & A with me here.
September 22, 2014
Fury From Hell: Blog Tour Stop #3 on Digital Inspirations
Abel is a writer from Nigeria who has inspired me time and time again with his wisdom and blogger-ificness. (Yeah, I know. It’s not a word. Sue me.) Abel wrote an inspirational post on this blog last year which you can read here.
Without further ado, please visit Abel’s blog to read all about Fury From Hell on this 3rd blog tour stop!
Abel’s Blog Stop – Fury From Hell Launches Today!
Fury From Hell: Blog Tour Stop #2 – Kim Richardson’s Blog
I wanted to make it easy for you to see all of the blog stops on the Fury From Hell book blogs tour!
If you’re wondering, Book Beaver (UK) did the cover for my book!
Kim Richardson, author of the Soul Guardians, hosted me on her blog on launch day — Tuesday, September 9th, 2014! Thank you Kim!
If you’d like to read the review I wrote for the first book in the Soul Guardians series Marked please click here.
Please find the link to Kim’s excellent blog post here!
All the best,
NB
Grammies Jambalaya By Way of Melissa Bess Reed (Gluten Free Lifestyle Series)
So I needed food that would be tasty after a long tiring day, right? I figured I might as well jump right into some comfort food that would (hopefully) warm me up on this brisk early Fall evening and make my mouth sing.
I picked up my Kindle and swiped my way to Melissa Bess Reed’s Gluten Free Lifestyle Series: Silly Yaks Favorite Recipes. I swipe past several yummy sounding entrees but am stopped by Grammies Jambalaya which promises to only take 30 minutes to cook. I have practically everything except a couple of the veggies and the instant rice. I pick them up and race home excited to try it.
I chopped up the veggies — a green pepper, a yellow pepper, a yellow onion, parsley, garlic, celery and butter (I used non-GMO margarine made from pea protein). I saute the veggies as I chop up the apple chicken sausages and prep the ground turkey (no seafood for us as we’re allergic).
I line up all my other ingredients so it will be a snap to add to the cast iron pot. Then, after 3 minutes of sauteing, I add the two proteins and let it cook down for a few minutes. Added the water and the rest of the ingredient and lowered the flame to allow it to simmer for 30 minutes.
Then, WALLA — JAMBALAYA TIME!
Everyone in the house loved it! The apple chicken sausage was a huge hit! (I used that instead of the smoked sausage the recipe called for. Why? Had the apple chicken sausage in the fridge and wanted to try the sweet savory thing. You can find out more about this great gluten free cookbook here. I wrote a review about it.
Author Melissa Bess Reed
Gluten Free Lifestyle Series: Silly Yaks Favorite Recipes
September 20, 2014
Book Thoughts: Gluten Free Lifestyle Series Silly Yaks Favorite Recipes by Melissa Bess Reed
First and foremost, I *met* Melissa Bess Reed online via Twitter shortly after I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease earlier this year. We met during a Twitter gluten-free spontaneous event and have become fast friends. Why? She’s a wonderful person and secondly, she has great ideas and recipes that can help a neophyte Celiac like myself.
However, after reading her book Gluten Free Lifestyle Series: Silly Yaks Favorite Recipes, I gained a new respect for her and her gluten-free journey. She has been gluten-free for over 15 years and is a Certified Medical Assistant as well as a graduate of the Harvard Medical School CME Certification for Celiac Disease Education. Melissa is the real deal when it comes to good solid information about Celiac Disease.
This book contains recipes for appetizers, sides, salads, soups, entrees and my personal favorite — desserts! Melissa even shares a gluten free Hollandaise sauce with readers. The recipes are easy-to-read and well laid out. Wherever possible, she includes pre-packaged items in her recipes. At first, I felt this was a negative as I like to make everything ‘from scratch’ however think of the book’s title — Gluten Free Lifestyle. When you have a full life (with children in my case!), it behooves you to shave time off prep time whenever you can. By utilizing something that is already prepared and adding to other fresh ingredients you can create a delicious gluten-free meal without the much longer prep times I’ve come to now expect on my new diet. This is why Melissa’s line of cookbooks are great of the the lifestyle of a person who is choosing to remove gluten from their diet.
Some of my favorite recipes are: Chili Relleno Bake, Grammies Easy Jambalaya, Easy Fish Tacos, Gluten Free Red Velvet Cake, Gluten Free Pumpkin Cheesecake (OMG!!) and the Pecan Pie (complete with a GF pastry crust recipe!). I did not realize that there was such a thing as coconut flour and because of this book I went out into the world to my neighborhood health food store and there it was just sitting there waiting for me to up my gluten free culinary game!
Many of the recipes in this book are our collective favorites, except these are the Gluten-free versions — potato salad, coleslaw, veggie melt, French Onion Soup, Cobb Salad, Corn Dogs, Cheesy Garlic Biscuits and I could go on. This is a virtual gluten-free primer one that I will keep very close to me so that I can eat foods that I love but now those foods will love me back!
This is a great resource in your gluten free arsenal!
Rating: 5 Blogairy Notebooks
September 17, 2014
Cajun Casino Heist and Lesbian Romance (Belinda Y. Hughes)
Belinda Y. Hughes, author of Confessions of a Red Hot Veggie Lover 2 and blogger at Café Belinda, is here to share a character Q&A from her work in progress, Jean Be Gone, an LGBT romance and crime novel set in her native Southwest Louisiana. Today she interviews Camille Sallier, the main character.
What or who is the greatest love of your life?
That would be my new stud, the detective investigating my case. Belinda hasn’t named her yet. She smokes, eats meat and thinks I need a keeper, but cher, she is THE keeper! National champion in martial arts and marksmanship, chiseled physique, confident, poetry in motion. I can sit and watch her teach and spar for hours. She loves my animals and they adore her. She’s helping me remodel the house with her carpentry skills and I’m teaching her veganism. My new hottie is also tutoring me in basic self-defense, karate and T’ai Ch’ih. Our feelings are definitely mutual, but we’ve both been badly burned in previous relationships and she’s more afraid of committing to a new relationship than she is of getting shot in the line of duty.
What is your greatest fear?
My greatest fear is that my ex and her ex will kill my new lover, me and/or my animals in their quest to recover the money they stole from their former employer, a casino chain with locations in Nevada, Montana, New Jersey and Louisiana. Every time I turn around, gunfire and explosions are tearing up my safe places.
What is your greatest regret?
Without a doubt, that would be getting together with Jean, my ex, in the first place, back when we were in a blues band together. I’m only a beginning vocalist, but Jean, like Steven Tyler, can play any instrument you hand her and sing circles around everyone else. It’s confusing, because I learned so much from her, and we really did love each other. She was my first lesbian lover. These days, she’s a thief, a wife beater and, with her ex, is endangering my new partner, my fur kids and me at every turn. I should have known better than to hook up with a butch who came from a Mafia family and never let me dance with anyone else, not even our mutual friends.
What is your current state of mind?
A mix of deeply in love, terrified out of my wits and pissed off, wanting to get this crime solving mess over with. I want to fix my home, replace my SUV, get back to work, meet my new lover’s family and plan our wedding. I only know one detail so far. It won’t take place in Louisiana, because same sex marriage is still illegal here. Fortunately, we now have several other states to choose from.
Tell us about yourself.
Belinda Y. Hughes is the author of Confessions of a Red Hot Veggie Lover 2: Lacto Ovo Vegetarian Recipes. In addition, she blogs on food, natural health, writing, editing and social media. Belinda is currently working on her first collection of erotic poetry, an LGBT romance and crime mystery and the third edition of her cookbook. She enjoys gardening, cooking, hiking, meditation, yoga, reading and country living with her labradachs and wildlife friends.
Where can readers find you (author site links)?
Author Pages
Blogs
Writing, Editing & Social Media Blog
Guest Blogs
Adventures in Book Marketing (The Write Way)
Yellow Ribbon (Unknown Poetry)
Seniors Don’t Sit Well (PenPaperPad)
Bringing Food to Life (Writing in the Modern Age)
Author Interviews
Social Media
Where can readers purchase your book? (purchase links)
Jean Be Gone is an LGBT romance and crime mystery work in progress. Confessions of a Red Hot Veggie Lover 2 is available on Amazon.
September 14, 2014
Book Thoughts: Grandma You’re Dead!
We meet Deena Doon, a 13-year-old girl who lives in Jamaica, West Indies. Deena lives with her mother and her brother, Peter, who is the bane of her existence. (He calls her Stinkin’ Toe.) Deena lived a typical, if not idyllic childhood. That is, until Deena’s maternal grandmother shows up. The visit would not have been so unusual if her grandmother had not been buried two years earlier.
Deena’s reaction to her grandmother’s ghost borders on the comical. The author of Grandma You’re Dead!, Sharon O. Tai, walks the fine line between childhood impressionist behavior with an eye to the gravity of the situation. Even I, as an adult reader, felt a few ripples of tension whenever Grandma made an appearance.
The driving force of the story is that the ghost of Deena’s grandmother needed Deena’s help. The help was the bizarre request for this 13-year-old to find her grandfather’s grave; he died two years before Deena was born. The catch? Deena could not tell anyone including, and especially, not Deena’s mother. Little did Deena know there were more requests to come!
As the story unfolds, Deena had to tell someone and she chose her BFF Cheryl who became her confidante and partner in crime throughout the rest of the book. Denna and Cheryl’s relationship is depicted very well. You can feel the loving comraderie that is woven into their interactions throughout the book.
I refuse to give any spoilers but this is a wonderful book written by a Jamaican author who will either remind you of your childhood, or introduce you to some Caribbean delicacies that you just have to try for yourself!
Deena has some big problems to solve in Grandma You’re Dead! Read this book and found out for yourself what else Deena’s ghostie grandma requested!
4.5 stars Blogairy Notebooks
September 12, 2014
Schar’s Gluten Free Expo – Sat, 9/6
I have no words to describe the week I’ve experienced. For starters, my week began last, Saturday 9/6. This was the day before my new book, Fury From Hell, was supposed to be released on Amazon. However, the formatting was not completed. And my 1 year-old daughter was extremely active that day only napping for short periods of time. Did I mention that I had scheduled myself to go to a Gluten-Free (GF) Expo that same evening? Talk about pressure!
I knew I wanted to go to the GF Expo simply because I was recently diagnosed with Celiac Disease. For the past few years, when it began to surface that gluten may be the issue, I’ve been experimenting with food and trying to change my choices by trying new things. I knew that going to the Schar Gluten-Free Blogger Expo would be an important milestone in my gluten-free journey! So, I gave myself a deadline stuck to it — and was still late!
I was so nervous when I arrived at Chelsea Piers for this event. I didn’t know what to expect. In my mind, the image of an open vendor type space with samples and the like were dancing around my mind. I also noticed that the e-invitation gave the hours of 5pm – 11pm which seemed to reinforce my mental image.
Was I wrong! The Schar GF Blogger Expo was held in the Golf Building at Chelsea Piers in a duplex loft-like space. There were about 22 bloggers present — gluten-free bloggers. SERIOUS gluten-free bloggers! Did I want to bolt? Yep. Yes, I did. I felt like a fake from the moment my daughter and I walked up the stairs.
I came in during the introduction phase where the bloggers were sharing about themselves, their GF journey, and their respective blogs and GF related businesses (most of them had one, or several). The feeling of being a fake generally faded because as I focused in on the stories of each blogger, I heard a retelling of a number of different experiences I’ve had over the years. I found myself nodding vigorously time and time again which allowed the feeling of otherness to recede.
Picture this, me listening raptly while crawling around after a very busy (wet!) 1 year-old girl who wanted to sit in everyone’s lap. (Yes, yes that is exactly what happened.) Do you know everyone was understanding? Shortly after the introductions, I took her downstairs to the lower portion of the loft space to change her (and reduce the sound of her chirping!).
Downstairs was where the barman had set up gluten-free drinks including wines, sodas and…BEER! It was Damm Daura beer which is made from barley malt and is below the gluten threshold. I never acquired a taste for beer (Wow, how smart was my body!?) but I decided to try this one. It was actually pretty good! It tasted like beer. I was a vegan in the past and had near-beers (Ugh! But that is a story for another post.) and those ‘vegan’ beers were simply awful to my palate. Not Damm Daura! Even hubby was suitably impressed. He said he could drink Daura even if there were other beer choices available.
Now, here is where I am supposed to pull out my journalism skills and get all the names, blogs, people and stories. Right? Okay, not so right. My hands were literally full with baby girl making networking and fact-finding quite problematic. You can see me one hand raised the other is holding my daughter.
Picture taken by Schar Staff. This picture is posted on Schar Twitter feed.
I managed to speak with four of the bloggers present:
Lauren Landgrebe – Blog: The Fit Gastronome – http://thefitgastronome.com/food-sensitivities/
Elizabeth Gavino – Website: http://elizabethgavino.healthcoach.integrativenutrition.com/
Dana – Twitter: https://twitter.com/ABCGlutenfree
Erin Smith – Blog: Gluten_Free Fun – http://glutenfreefun.blogspot.com
My goodness — I didn’t tell you about the buffet! It was lovely! Of course, it was all Gluten Free and there were some vegan options as well. There was pizza (and beer!), breaded chicken, meatballs in tomato sauce, antipasti, bruchetta and a lovely tomato relish to top it off. Normally, I take pictures of the food first but my little one wanted to eat the pizza and lots of it!
I learned so much. There were so many stories! Diagnosis of one blogger happened when she was 2 1/2 years old! Another happened when she was 12 — right at the age where food and social events go hand-in-hand. Celiac-related illnesses were mentioned and how some of the bloggers present had lost good friends and family to these illnesses because they were diagnosed late in life (after 40). My head fairly exploded with the information!
Fertility is something that can also be affected when you have celiac. I came to understand that my having had children was a very minor miracle and a blessing. It now makes total sense the challenges I had surrounding my pregnancies.
If I continue, this post will end some time next week! I will leave you with the few pictures I was able to snap off in the moments my daughter was entertaining another blogger. :-)
The GF Bloggers as we listened to the Schar Staff speak about new GF drink and food recipes.
Erin Smith during her keynote presentation.
Schar Goodie Bag for those who did not win raffled off baskets.
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