Linda Nightingale's Blog, page 73
October 1, 2014
Royalties by Andy Marx
The author will choose one random commenter to win a $50 Amazon/BN.com gift card. a Rafflecopter giveaway
BLURB:
America has never seen anything to match the innovation, energy, romance, and excitement of the 20th Century. And the embodiment of all this is Eve Solomon, a young woman who embraces the vitality of the times with a fervor. Determined to make a name for herself in the fledgling music business of 1908, she ultimately becomes wildly successful. But the same steely determination that takes her to the heights of the entertainment world cannot bring her the one thing she wants more than anything: the love of her life, Alex Getz, a struggling Vaudeville comic who becomes one of Hollywood’s biggest stars. As their careers and lives intersect across the years, there is a price to pay—a royalty for true love that can never be measured.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpt:
The ring was dazzling.
Square cut, about two carats, Eve guessed, as she looked down at the diamond. Set in ornate Victorian silver and resting perfectly on a black velvet cushion, she could picture it on her finger…even imagine the looks of envy on her friends’ faces as she waved it in front of them. There was no doubt she loved the ring, but not the man who had given it to her.
When Ben had called her earlier in the day and announced he had a surprise, Eve never suspected he planned to propose. Smiling at him, while a myriad of conflicting thoughts ran through her mind, she could only conjure one clear idea. What am I going to tell him?
“Say something,” Ben said, breaking her reverie. “I’ve never known you to be at a loss for words before.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“Try it on. I want to see if it fits.”
Slipping the ring on her finger, Eve thought about how many times she had imagined this moment. But up until two months ago, before she finally decided to stop waiting for Alex, she had always imagined him, not Ben, doing the proposing.
“I guess I’m a little surprised,” Eve said.
“I’m doing pretty well,” he said. “I moved Ma and my sisters into a bigger apartment. I’ve got a nice place. I figured it was time to start thinking about a family. And I couldn’t think of anybody I’d rather start a family with than you.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Andy Marx is an award-winning writer and photographer, whose work has appeared in Variety, The Los Angeles Times and Entertainment Weekly, among others. He is also the co-founder of the comedy website, Hollywood & Swine, known for its lampooning of the entertainment industry. His paternal grandfather was the legendary comedian, Groucho Marx, and his maternal grandfather, the renowned songwriter, Gus Kahn. Marx lives in Beverly Hills with his wife and three children.
Website: http://www.andymarx.com
Blog: http://www.hollywoodandswine.com
Twitter: @andymarx
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/andymarx?fref=ts
Amazon: http://amzn.to/1mD2XTR
Goodreads: http://bit.ly/1oVSIJO
For more entertaining excerpts and more chances to win, follow Andy:
http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2014/08/virtual-book-tour-royalties-by-andy-marx.html
The Orange Moon Affair (a Thomas Gunn Thriller) by AFN Clarke
The author will be awarding a $15 Amazon GC to a randomly drawn winner during the tour. a Rafflecopter giveaway
BLURB:
Thomas Gunn (ex-Special Forces) and his partner Julie are running for their lives. Who are they running from? And why? It all starts when Thomas decides to investigate the mysterious murder of his billionaire industrialist father. He’s shocked when his every move is blocked, especially by top levels of the UK government. But when his attempts to track down an elusive American business partner of his father’s turn lethal, he and Julie become moving targets, racing to outwit those who clearly want them dead. The danger rapidly escalates when Thomas is reluctantly compelled back into working for British Military Intelligence, exposing an international conspiracy that puts the freedom of the western world at grave risk.
But who are these ruthless conspirators that wield such unimaginable power? How are they connected to his father? And what dark secrets from the past will Thomas uncover in his relentless quest for the truth? This action-packed thriller spans the UK, USA and Europe and keeps you guessing to the very last page!
“The Orange Moon Affair” and “The Jonas Trust Deception”, the second in the series, have been hailed by the San Francisco Book Review as “fast-paced books you won’t want to put down and you won’t want them to finish.”
Available from Amazon (ebook and paperback).
Excerpt:
Nightmares crowded my sleep and I woke in a sweat, some twelve hours later, 
gasping for air and thought that Julie’s death was just a nightmare, a figment of my imagination. But I knew it wasn’t.
I needed air and crawled to the door leading out onto the patio that overlooked the beach and the Sea of Cortez. It felt similar to Gozo, but it was subtly different; the smell of dry sage tinged the slight breeze and somewhere close by, lingering smoke from a mesquite barbecue blew lazily across the beach. Bile rose in my mouth and I dry retched onto the sand as the image of Julie, bloodied and broken in the helicopter, blasted into my mind.
The moment passed and I sat at the water’s edge as small wavelets ran up the beach and sank into the sand.
Julie’s death killed something in me. Something I thought I had recovered from after my last tour in Afghanistan. She gave my life a soul that had been destroyed, and now with her death, my soul was as dark as it had ever been.
De Costas would pay for her death.
All that was left in me was the instinct for survival and revenge; the only emotion, pure hatred for the man that had caused all this. It was this that had kept me alive when I should have been dead. It was this that created the desire to fight back to full health.
An hour later I hobbled slowly back to the bedroom, lay down and fell into a dreamless sleep.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
AFN Clarke is a full-time author, screenwriter, the son of a British MI6 operative, 
former officer in Britain’s elite Parachute Regiment, pilot, sailor, racecar driver and father of four who’s lived in Hong Kong, India, Libya, Iran, Europe, the UK, USA, and Australia. He’s written seven books of fiction and his bestselling memoir, CONTACT, was serialized in a British newspaper and made into an award-winning BBCTV film.
This rich background allows Clarke to bring his own unique and eye opening experiences to his latest Thomas Gunn thriller series that are fast-paced, thought provoking and frighteningly real and have captured the imagination of readers world-wide. As he says: “For me, good books are a great way to shut out every day life, suspend normal ways of thinking, and allow yourself to be captivated by another world. That’s what I continually strive to deliver to my readers.”
Books include: The Orange Moon Affair and The Jonas Trust Deception (Thomas Gunn thrillers), Contact, An Unquiet American, Dry Tortugas, Dreams from the Death Age and Armageddon (The Book of Baker Satire Series), Collisions, with more coming soon. Available from Amazon; coming soon to Nook, iBooks, and Kobo.
Connect with AFN Clarke:
Subscribe to AFN Clarke’s Email List: http://www.afnclarke.com/Email_Us.php
Author Website: http://www.afnclarke.com/
Twitter: @AFNClarke
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/AFNClarkeInc?fref=ts
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/AFNCLARKE
Purchase “The Orange Moon Affair”:
Buy from the Kindle Store at Amazon.com:
FOR MORE INTRIGUING EXCERPTS AND MORE CHANCES TO WIN FOLLOW AFN CLARKE:
http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2014/08/blurb-blitz-orange-moon-affair-by-afn.html
September 29, 2014
Charlesgate by Dina Keratsis
Dina will be awarding a $25 Amazon GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.
BLURB:
Ever since Zylla Berry first saw the dilapidated mansion in Boston’s Back Bay, she’d become enchanted. When she walks by one day to find that someone is renovating the old beauty, she walks through its open door and meets Jabe Thayer.
Determined to restore The Charlesgate to its former splendor, Jabe is thrilled to meet Zylla, who shares his passion for the building and knows its history. As they get to know each other, they find that their love for The Charlesgate is not a coincidence and as supernatural forces intensify, they begin to uncover a sinister secret that will threaten their future.
From the piratical seas of the seventeenth century, to Boston’s Gilded Age to the present, The Charlesgate is a haunting novel of ancestry, fate, and the unfailing power of love.
E
xcerpt:
Zylla trotted up the steps into the cool darkness of the alcove and lovingly gazed at the gold-green ceramic tiled walls. Along the ceiling, the glossy tiles sported figures of knights, cherubs, flowers and heraldic crests. She ignored the chunks where tile was missing, just as she overlooked the broken lantern that hung from the ceiling on a rusted chain.
Instead, she turned to the iron-barred glass double doors, barely glancing at the yellow and black “No Trespassing” sign taped across them, or the thick chain and padlock wrapped around the door handles.
As always, Zylla wrapped her fingers around one grubby brass handle, closed her eyes, and pulled. And as always the padlock didn’t magically fall off to allow her entry into the Charlesgate’s realm.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
About Dina and Links:
Dina Keratsis is an award-winning author of romance fiction in which all roads lead to illumination and magic is found in the mundane. A New England girl, she has a penchant for punk rock, Scottish tea rooms and a mad crush on Sirius Black. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband and two children.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dina-Keratsis/128401957254964
https://twitter.com/dinakeratsis
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6983309.Dina_Keratsis/
http://www.amazon.com/Dina-Keratsis/e/B002BLU538
Amazon: www.amazon.com/Charlesgate-Dina-Keratsis-ebook/dp/B00L94GYM4
Page Foundry: http://www.inktera.com/store/title/43c183cf-56a9-4e8d-8566-0523c3ec8134
Scribd: http://www.scribd.com/book/240469215/Charlesgate
Kobo: http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/charlesgate-1
Apple: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id921386227
For more excerpts and chances to win:
http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2014/07/virtual-book-tour-charlesgate-by-dina.html
September 26, 2014
New Book Video for Sinners’ Obsession
The multitalented author, Noelle Adams, produced another Academy Award winning video for Sinners’ Obsession (check out the Sinners’ Opera page for that video)!
September 24, 2014
Tangled Vines by Melissa Collins!!!
Synopsis
Fate has a funny way of twisting together the lives of people who are destined to be connected, but just don’t know it yet.
One phone call.
That’s all it took to change Owen Carmichael’s life forever.
One meeting.
That’s all it took to turn Elle Blackwell’s life around.
Tangled, like the vines of the winery they both seek to control, will they realize they work better together than as enemies?
Buy Now
AMAZON/iTUNES/B&N/KOBO
About the Author
Melissa Collins has always been a book worm. Studying Literature in college ensured that her nose was always stuck in a book. She followed her passion for reading to the most logical career choice: English teacher. Her hope was to share her passion for reading and the escapism of books to her students. Having spent more than a decade in front of a classroom, she can easily say that it’s been a dream.
Her passion for writing didn’t start until more recently. When she was home on maternity leave in early 2012, she read her first romance novel and her head filled with the passion, angst and laughter of the characters who she read about it. It wasn’t long before characters of her own took shape in her mind. Their lives took over Melissa’s brain and The Love Series was born.
http://www.melissacollinsauthor.com
https://www.facebook.com/MelissaCollins.Author
@mcollinsauthor
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September 22, 2014
Cardinal Desires on sale at Amazon for $2.99!
The publisher has reduced the price of my award-winning paranormal romance, Cardinal Desires, on Amazon to $2.99, but only through 9/24, at which time it will return to its normal price of $5+.
Take a look at the Cardinal Desires page here on the blog and see if you’d like to take advantage of this opportunity while it lasts!
Katy and Sterling are waiting to meet you…
August 31, 2014
Silent Partner by Stan Schatt
This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Stan will be awarding a $25 Amazon GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.
Silent Partner is a paranormal mystery, a police procedure novel with a female detective that will remind you of Harry Bosch, a ghost story that suggests what lies beyond death, and a comic look at a tabloid where the “truth” is whatever sells.
Enjoy an excerpt:
“Duh. Of course I am, but I’m also the one who tripped you. Give me some credit for that. I think it’s like a hundred years of bad karma if you let the person you’re protecting get killed.”
“You’re protecting me? How come you didn’t keep me from being shot?”
“Give me a break. I told you that I’m new to this. The bullet only nicked your butt; so don’t make a federal case out of it. If I hadn’t tripped you,
you’d be paralyzed. You should be grateful to me.”
Josh felt a cold shiver run up his spine.
“Then you’re dead?”
“We don’t refer to it that way. We like to say that we’ve moved to another plane.”
“How come I can see you?”
Andy smiled thinly.
“You Harrells have a gift. Everyone has a guardian angel, but only certain people can see us. It’s easier in a way for us if you can’t see us.”
“You’ll keep anything bad from happening to me?”
“There’s such a thing as free will, my dear. I can only help you so much.
If it’s your time, then it’s lights out. Now that you’re thirty, things are going to get a lot harder.”
“What do you mean?”
Josh had a sinking feeling in his stomach, and it wasn’t the alcohol.
“A lot of things are going to change for you now. As I said, you Harrells are gifted, although some of your relatives thought of it as a curse.”
“I don’t believe this. You mean my father really did see someone? He wasn’t crazy?”
“Of course he saw someone. I hope you don’t throw your full glass of whiskey at me the way he threw his at his guardian.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“You’re asking too many questions. Just take my word that everything’s relative, including time.”
“What do you want?”
About the Author:
Stan Schatt grew up in Phoenix, Arizona and now resides in Carlsbad, California. He has written thirty-five books on a wide variety of subjects ranging from fiction to technology. He is co-author of Journey to a Different Dimension, an Amazon bestseller. He also authored Egypt Rising, a YA novel focusing on a teen’s experience in Egypt at the time of the Egyptian revolution of 2011. This novel contains paranormal elements including a secret buried under the Sphinx. The paranormal mystery Silent Partner is Schatt’s latest novel.
He has led several careers including futurist and executive for many of the world’s leading technology market research firms, police department administrator, autopsy assistant, software trainer, Telecommunications Department Chairman, and English professor. He taught at Tokyo University as a Fulbright exchange professor. His non-fiction includes books on such diverse topics as strategies for changing careers for a green industry job, studies of Michael Connelly and Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., network and data communications technology, telecommunications, computer programming.
http://www.pen-l.com/SilentPartner.html
http://www.twitter.com/stanschatt
August 28, 2014
Bianca Swan’s On Wings of Desire gets Great Review – 4.5 Roses!
Great review for Bianca Swan’s erotic romance, On Wings of Desire: http://forwhomthebookstoll.blogspot.com/2014/08/review-for-on-wings-of-desire-by-bianca.html?showComment=1409225272430#c9214273802421542027 – Ms. Keller gave 4.5 roses and rated the heat level as scorching. “The plot is unique and mysterious enough to keep the reader turning the pages and very hard to put down.”
Available on Amazon and from Double Dragon Publishing
Congrats Bianca! 
August 17, 2014
Sinners’ Obsession, Sequel to Sinners’ Opera Released
Double Dragon Publishing released SINNERS’ OBSESSION last week as a ebook. Soon, it will be released in print. I am excited about this book because it follows Isabeau and Morgan’s love affair then introduces Lucien into a head-over-heels love interest with many, many obstacles. As unlikely as a wholehearted love affair for the Chief Councilor of the Vampyre ruling council is, Lucien is trying to recreate the guardian angel role with his love that Morgan played with Isabeau.
Soon, I’ll have another dynamic video by author Noelle Adams, this one for SINNERS’ OBSESSION. I’ll post it on the Sinners’ Obsession page here as soon as the ink is dry.
Here is the buy link on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Sinners-Obsession-Linda-Nightingale-ebook/dp/B00MGW0AP0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=undefined&sr=8-1&keywords=Sinners+obsession
August 11, 2014
To Tempt an Angel (Book 1, Douglas Series) by Patricia Grasso
This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Patricia will be awarding a free eBook from Lachesis Publishing to a randomly drawn winner via the rafflecopter at the end of this post during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.
NOTE: this book is FREE everywhere! Buy links are at the end of this post — why not download your own copy today?
Angelica Douglas has no idea that she’s the Countess of Melrose. What she does know is that she needs to support her family as a card shark, while finding a way to seek revenge on the men who ruined her father and sent her family spiralling down into poverty.
Robert Campbell, Marquess of Argyll, heir to the Duke of Inverary, has no idea who Angelica truly is. He just wants to watch over her and make her his mistress.
Angelica thinks Robert is simply a dashing rogue who is far too dangerous for her peace of mind. Robert thinks Angelica is an angel except when she’s being a pain in the behind.
When Robert finds out that his own father may have been one of the men who ruined Angelica’s family, he vows to keep a careful eye on her. When Angelica finds out that Robert’s father may have been one of the men responsible, she vows to stay as far away from Robert as possible. But when danger threatens, both Robert and Angelica must face the truth and let fate take the upper hand.
Enjoy an excerpt:
“I knew someone would try to steal your money,” Robert said, helping her rise. He lifted the wreath of flowers off the ground and placed it on top of her blond head, adding, “You look like a flower fairy again.”
“What makes you think the assassin was aiming at me?” Angelica countered. “He didn’t stop to steal my money. Perhaps he’s one of your enemies.”
Robert snapped his brows together. She knew from the expression on his handsome face that he thought she made sense.
“I’m an excellent markswoman,” Angelica said, pulling her dagger from the sheath strapped to her leg. “If you hadn’t thrown yourself on top of me, I would have taken him down. Then we could have questioned him.”
Robert burst out laughing. “A knife wielding angel? Next time I’ll let you rescue me,” he said, helping her onto his horse.
“I should walk the rest of the way,” Angelica said when he mounted behind her. “Being attacked twice in one day is statistically impossible.”
“You are the sweetest gambler I’ve ever encountered,” Robert said. Then, “What’s your full name?”
“Angelica Douglas.” His body pressing intimately against hers made her feel weak. To mask her nervousness, she asked “What is your full name, sir?”
“Robert Roy.”
“Are you joking?” Angelica glanced over her shoulder at him. “Your name is really Rob Roy?”
Robert shrugged. “My father had a keen sense of humor.”
“I agree,” Angelica said with a smile, “but the joke is on you.”
Robert inhaled deeply of her scent, lavender and water lily. She reminded him of a spring day. “Your smile shames the envious sun, angel.”
“I love this moment in the year’s cycle,” Angelica told him. “Sunshine, flowers, and freedom fill the days.”
“Do I detect a philosophical gambler?” Robert asked, amusement tingeing his voice.
Angelica shrugged. “I am philosophical by choice and a gambler by necessity.”
A connoisseur of beautiful women, Robert enjoyed the feeling of the angel in his arms as they started down Hampstead Road. She exuded seductive innocence, an aphrodisiac to his senses.
I’m a dog person. Who lives with 10 cats. Get the picture?
My first brush with the romance genre happened in my high school junior year. I discovered Gone With the Wind and hid it behind my American history book to read during class. (The Civil War is American history.) The ambiguous ending left me dissatisfied, though. Rhett and Scarlet needed a happily-ever-after. Believing in happily-ever-afters positively screams romantic-at-heart.
On the other hand, I love murder and mayhem as much as happily-ever-after. My usual television fare is fiction and nonfiction crime shows, not love stories. Which accounts for the mysteries I sneaked into my historical romances. Now I’m trying my hand at writing a humorous mystery, sans historical and sans emphasis on the love interest. I even prepared for my mystery-in-progress by attending the local NRA’s Pistol School. Shooting pistols is great fun. I adore the .22 semiautomatics.
After graduating from high school without distinction, I earned both Bachelor and Master degrees at a state college. Again, without distinction. I held several part-time jobs during my college days: file clerk in an insurance company, long-distance telephone operator, kimono-wearing waitress in a Japanese restaurant.
And then I began my teaching career, eighteen years in the eighth grade and thirteen years at the high school. Weary with the same old routine, I decided I needed a creative outlet. So I decided to write a romance novel but only managed to talk about writing one. After five years of listening to me, a friend said to stop talking and start writing.
So I did.
I made every mistake known to man. Blunder would be a more appropriate word, but I did learn using the trial and error method. As well as studying the works of authors I admired.
After five years of writing for nothing but love, I sold my first novel. Since then, I’ve sold eighteen novels and won several awards— National Readers’ Choice Award New England Readers’ Choice Award, Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice and KISS Awards, B. Dalton and Bookrak Awards for best-selling author. My novels have been translated into fifteen languages and sold in twenty countries.
If I had my life over, would I become a writer? Nope. I would enjoy being a Victoria Secret model. Perhaps in my next incarnation I won’t be too old, too short, or too unphotogenic.
https://www.facebook.com/patricia.grasso.902
BN http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/to-tempt-an-angel-patricia-grasso/1005102935?ean=9781927555071
Kobo http://store.kobobooks.com/en-CA/ebook/to-tempt-an-angel-2
iBooks https://itunes.apple.com/ca/book/to-tempt-angel-book-1-douglas/id576045599?mt=11
