Desiree DeOrto's Blog, page 2

SMASHMOUTH RELEASE BLITZ!

I could not be more excited to feature this new release! Who hasn't rocked out to the music of Smash Mouth?! Now you can go behind the music with a band that carried the spirit of a generation in Walkin' on the Sun; The Official Smash Mouth Biography.


Blurb: Hello. My name is Paul DeLisle. I’m the guy who wrote this book. You've probably never heard of me. That's okay. Most people wouldn't know me from Adam. But, unless you've been living in a cloistered monastery for the last fifteen years, you have heard of my band.
So begins the memoir of the creation, rise, and current state of the multi-platinum recording artist Smash Mouth as told by bassist Paul DeLisle. Well known for their hits “All Star,” “Walking on the Sun,” “Then the Morning Comes,” “Can’t Get Enough of You Baby,” and “I’m a Believer,” the band carried the spirit of a generation, but didn't stop there. Enjoy this behind-the-scenes look from Paul’s unique, there from the start, insider’s view. Excerpt: There's an episode of Cheers where washed-up ball player Sam Malone, frustrated with either Diane or Rebecca, proclaims, "Y'know, most people don't know this ... but I’m famous!" I love that line. I can totally relate. You see, I am a founding and continued member of the band Smash Mouth. Yet I am, proudly and alas, the bass player. I’m not famous. My band is. From the beginning, Smash Mouth was set up as a democracy between four musicians and a manager, each player having an equal voice on band matters. Yet we were all fully aware and accepting of the fact that, as lead singer/frontman, Steve Harwell would be getting a disproportionate amount of attention. Seeing as he is the face and mouthpiece of Smash Mouth, you may be a little disappointed he didn't write this book. But stay with me here. Because as you'll see, I have a unique vantage point: as one of only four original constituents, I’ve been involved in every aspect of the band since day one. Only Steve and I have trod every step of this Smash Mouth journey. Also, while traditionally under-recognized, the bass player himself sees everything. Plus I went to college. Who better to write a book about Smash Mouth? That said, keep in mind this book is solely from my point of view. Steve, Greg, Kevin, and Robert would obviously have different takes on certain events. However, this book is simply intended as a comprehensive account of our rise to fame and continued success. So without further ado ... here’s what happened:EEP!!! How awesome is that! Pick up your copy of Walkin' on the Sun today and get your own "backstage pass" to the world of Smash Mouth! Buy Links: Amazon-http://tinyurl.com/pzojvsdBarnes and Noble-http://tinyurl.com/p4f3n8gSmashmouth-http://tinyurl.com/opy9kgvBrought to you by Subscribe to our NewsletterFollow Us on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram/Web

Home Is Where The Heart Is

I haven't written a blog post since December. I know that I should have kept everyone up-to-date on everything that's been happening, but at times it was too hard to even keep my mind together to form a single coherent thought to express to all of you.

But there's one thing I want to tell you all, and that's this.

I'm safe.


After almost two years of being homeless (living in my van, sleeping on friends couches, a brief moment when I thought things were going to be okay only to end up living in a tent) I am finally safe.

I have an apartment now, and even though its barely furnished, it's home. It's home because I have my kids with me. It's home, because its a safety that I created that NO ONE can take away from me.

The first night I had my children here I broke down crying, watching their beautiful faces as they slept. I had never felt more sure in anything in my life than in that moment. Everything that I had to risk, to sacrifice to get to THIS point, this moment was worth it. And even though two were sleeping on the couch while the other two were sleeping on my blow-up mattress and I still don't know if I'm going to be able to keep everything together from day to day, month to month, I know that I will still keep doing everything and anything I need to to keep my babies with me. To see their faces light up and their laughter ring out throughout the barren apartment as we play. To feel their little arms wrap around my neck and squeeze tightly as they tell me that they love me, or as my son randomly looks at me and smiles while saying 'we're your sweet babies, and you're our sweet mommy.'

I'd go through it all over again just to feel this. Through the pain, the heartbreak, the utter terror of not knowing if I was going to survive another day. I'd live through each moment again just to have THIS outcome. Just to be able to hug them and tell them that I love them. To me, its the entire world. My world. My hope. My dreams all wrapped up in four little bodies.

If there's one thing I can tell you, give you, from my experience with this, it's one absolutely critical thing: Never give up hope.

You have the power within you to achieve everything your heart has ever desired as long as you're willing to release the fear that holds you down and block out the nay-sayers that tell you you can't. You have the ability to overcome ANYTHING that's thrown your way. You may break down. You may feel shattered, torn, worthless. But all of those emotions are fleeting, because at the core of you is a strength that NO ONE can take away.

Never give up, never give in, and always throw your confetti.

Even when you're down to your last dollar and you don't know where your next meal will come from, GIVE. Give hope to others. Happiness. Joy. Those are things that are freely given and that don't cost anything, yet you reap so much from it.

When I had nothing, I gave everything. Now that I have something, let me give something back.

I give to you guys my thanks, even though that doesn't seem like much. I give my thanks and undying loyalty and support to those who gave me strength when all I wanted to do was lay down and die. I give my love to every one of you who showed silent, and not so silent support. Most of all, I give my confetti to you. Through my experience, I hope that you learn. I hope that you take these words, my voice, and grow from it. That you achieve all that you set out to do. Even if the road is hard, broken, and unbearable at times, always know that you have me beside you.

Believe in yourself, and you'll never be held down for long.

With all my love, always,

Your Confetti Queen.

Hanging Onto The Edge

Take a deep breath.Let it out.Still the shaking leg.Stop the counting.You're fine.You're going to be fine.
When the panic hits, that's what I have to tell myself. Trying to calm the raging storm that's just below the surface, making me feel like my skin won't be able to hold me together. Like I'm suffocating, dying internally with so many emotions burning through me that I can't even grab hold of the ashes.
It always starts with something that knocks me emotionally at my feet. Some days the little things don't bother me at all. Other times its like a physical blow, shattering everything that I try to hold on to with everything I have. The depression sets in, and I build up my walls more, trying to cope with it. I tell myself everything will be okay eventually, because it has too, right? Things never stay the same. The world is constantly changing, and the most you can do is either move with it, or fight against it.
After I feel somewhat calmer, then my manic side kicks in. The uncontrollable anger, the rage. Snapping at the simplest comments. It gets to the point where I just want to hit things, throw things. Have the most epic of temper tantrums that would put even my kids to shame. But I don't, even though I want too. I bottle it up, keeping it inside and try to breathe through it. It won't stay forever. Just a temporary set back. I have to remind myself of that, and I have to push through it.
Now, I'm setting into the panic mode, where everything that has happened or could happen hits me at once, completely destroying the facade of calm that I present to even myself. It builds and builds to where I start shaking with it. My leg bounces without me even paying attention. Automatically my hand starts tapping on any surface near me, and I count mentally in my head. Then it becomes overwhelming. The panic. The fear. The drowning sadness. Your body starts to curl into itself, as if placing itself in the fetal position can keep your mind from attacking itself. As if it can stop the memories, the flood of past pain that mixes with current ones until you're deaf to your own screaming.
For those of you who think that depression, anxiety, PTSD, bi-polar or anything else is just a figment of your mind, its just a call for attention or being weak, then I hope that you never have to live with it. I hope that you never have to face the complete horror that has become your own mind, something that you can never escape from.
And to those like me and so many others who are struggling everyday just to stay above the waterline, I want you to do something for me. Just breathe. This too shall pass, and we'll live to fight another day, and over time it will become easier, even if it never does go away.
With love, Always.

Some Things Are Harder Than It Seems

It's terrifying to be in the eye of social media. So many people come to my Facebook page to read my posts, and through me revealing only a little of what I am, and have been going through they find the strength needed to keep pushing forward.

I'm not doing this for glorification. I'm not doing this for pity or gain or whatever else you may think. I'm doing this for those who message/email/write me and let me know about their lives, their deepest darkest secrets, and through that small connection find the strength to continue on.

I'm going to reveal EVERYTHING, and it scares the hell out of me.

I'll start where every story starts, and that's at the very beginning.


My name is Desiree Nicole DeOrto. I was born in Northridge, California, Los Angeles County. At the start, my parents were married, but that didn't last long. My father is a Vietnam Veteran, and through serving his country and almost being killed for it, he became and alcoholic with post-traumatic stress disorder. My mother came from a rather large family, most of which suffer from one form of depression or other psychiatric disorder.

Needless to say, my mom and dad met, fell in 'love', had my brother, then had me. Normally this would be the part where people would talk about how great their childhood was, and how much their parents loved and cared about them. That isn't what happened in my case.

My parents only stayed married for a number of years. My mother didn't turn into an alcoholic until they divorced, but my father was one well before then. I don't remember much about the early years. Maybe its because my brain decided to block a lot of it out to forget, but what I do remember is enough.

I remember the screaming. I remember the yelling, the sobbing. How my mother would always claim that it was everyone else's fault that her life was so f*ed up. I remember the sound, the ferocious base yell of my father as he would call her nothing but a whore.

When they divorced, my mother claimed that my father sexually abused me and my brother. Her family backed it up in court, and while I can't claim whether or not he did, it didn't matter then. Yes, my father was a 'bad man', but I still loved him. He was stripped of almost all parental rights, leaving him with minimal supervised visitation before he finally gave up and moved back to Indiana, leaving my brother and I with our mother, which wasn't necessarily a good thing.

Being free of my father, my mother started drinking, popping pills and quickly became addicted to both and more. She bounced around from man to man, always seeking that ever elusive 'love', until they either didn't want her anymore, or she would up and leave for the 'next-best-thing'. The only problem was that her type of love isn't the normal, safe type.

I almost think that she used to like being hit. That she actually enjoyed having a story to tell, a woe-begone tale of love and abuse, and then everyone would sit around her and say 'poor Susie' and she'd soak it up. So she jumped from bed to bed, from one abusive hand to an even more abusive hand.

When I was six, we lived in a run down apartment complex. My mother and her then-current boyfriend were fighting. About what, I don't know. I watched as he backhanded her into the large dumpster. I remember the sound of her skull hitting the metal, and how he screamed at her, his fists flying. I remember the sound of my brothers voice as he screamed for our mother. And I remember how, even though I knew that I'd be beaten again, that I had to do something.

When the cops came, my mother had a smile on her face, as did her boyfriend. They stood in the doorway with me, their hands digging into my shoulders to the point where I wanted to cry, and how I had to look up at the cops, wanting help, needing them to stop it all, and I had to lie. I had to tell them that they didn't fight. That I just thought they did because he broke my moms necklace. I remember the look in the cops eyes, and how he practically begged me to tell him the truth, but I had to remain silent.

I stayed silent through it all, forced into the perpetual fear that if I spoke up, if I said even one word that it would be worse for me. No one was going to come save me. No one would ever see the truth behind the lies. And no one would care. It went on like that for years.

Finally, my mother married again, this time to a man that, after he quit drinking (which wasn't until years later), I actually loved and considered my dad. He was my best friend in the end, but it didn't start out like that. Bill was a construction worker and a plumber. He had a son named Merle, who was only a little bit older than me. Merle had leukemia, and was in and out of the hospital. We'd get him every other weekend, and I loved those weekends because that was the only time when we wouldn't be hit. It was the only time when my brother wouldn't run away, and would never take me no matter how much I begged him too.

I had to be perfect. In my mind, there was no other way to deal with it all. If I was better, smarter, more beautiful, practiced my singing and my art until my voice and my fingers bled, then maybe my mother would love me. Maybe then she would be the mom, would take care of me instead of Bill having to wake me up in the wee hours of the morning, making me drag my overweight mother to her room to get her dressed while she sang songs that her and my aunts used to sing as a child.

It went on like that for years. Me being silent, being the mother to my mother and my brother. Trying to make sure that everything was clean to my step-fathers ideals in order to not be beaten, but then to know that no matter what he'd always find an issue. He'd always have to 'discipline', and my mother would always be standing there, watching it all with a small smile on her face.

My father began getting visitations with us over the summer. Every summer, my brother and I would fly from California to Indiana and spend almost two months free of it all. Though it never all went away, not always. To say that my father was a 'tough-love' kind of man is like calling a tiger just a cat. There was no half-ways with him. During the day things would be great. We'd be trained to ride equestrian or spend the day from sun-up to sun-down swimming in the local pool. When night came around, the bottle would go up, and I would become my mom in my father's eyes. He never hit me, but sometimes words are the cruelest weapon of all.

I was a whore, a bitch. Just like my mother. No good trash that didn't even deserve the right to breathe. Then he would stumble off to bed, and in the morning we'd both act like nothing ever happened. I stayed silent, and I smiled. I laughed and I played. Pretending to be fine was second nature to me by then, and over time I forgot that I didn't have to be silent.

Years went by much in the same way, until my brother Merle died. That same summer we went to my fathers in Indiana, but we never returned to California.

Bill and my mother separated, and in her drunken brilliance she decided to move to Kansas, where her father lived. When the time came for my brother and I to go 'home', we were driven there to our new 'house', though house isn't what I would use to describe it.

It was run down and filthy with dirty, stained floors, holes in the walls and the unforgettable smell of misuse and decay that almost foretells the sense of hopelessness. I was in fifth grade at the time, and starting a new school. Its not like I wasn't used to it. Through my mothers escapades we had jumped ship so many times that I lost track of how many schools I had actually been too. But Kansas was a lot different from California, so the culture shock of it was something new.

Without my dad to actually keep her somewhat in check, my mom went wild. Binge drinking, partying, drying to 'drown' her sorrows because I didn't know what her life was like and she deserved to drink. She deserved to have that release, and all the while I would have to stay there and take care of her. And by stay there I mean send my brother off to school, and make sure that when my mom upended a bottle of pills, trying in vain to kill herself that I was there to shove my fingers down her throat to make her throw them back up.

After awhile, she started sleeping around. One drunken night she slept with a military man. I don't remember what his name was, but everyone just called him green bean. When the harsh reality of morning came, instead of saying that she was stupid and shouldn't have slept with him, she called rape and had him arrested. She called my father, sobbing on the phone saying that she couldn't take care of my brother and I anymore, that he needed to come and get us, the blizzard that was moving in be damned.

And he did. Right after having teeth surgically removed, bloody gauze still in his mouth, he drove through a blizzard to come get the two of us. When he came up to the door, my mother opened it and punched him right in the face, screaming about how everything was his fault because he abused her back in the day. I don't know if he did anything to her or not at that moment, all I know is that he took my brother and left, leaving me behind. Not even an hour later the cops were at the door, arresting my falling-down-drunk mother while I stood on the sidewalk, freezing in my threadbare clothes and watched it all.

I was taken to the police station where a social worker was waiting for me. My brother was already there, separated from my father. Once my brother and I were in the room together with the social worker, we were given a choice. Either stay in Kansas with my grandparents until my mother was released then go back to California with her, go to Indiana with my father, or be placed into foster homes.

I didn't want to go, but I didn't want to stay. I was almost eleven and I wanted to be free of it all. Except I couldn't be free. I had made a promise to my brother that wherever he went, I would go. We were supposed to protect each other, look out for each other because we didn't have anyone to do it for us. He wanted to go with my father, and nothing I said would change his mind, so I remained silent.

To Indiana we went. The beatings stopped, which was good. We also got to eat our fill, had clean, new clothes for the first time and never had to worry about being eaten by bugs. But that's where the difference stops.

A lot of people don't put much clap into emotional abuse. They say things like 'suck it up' or 'build me a bridge and get the f* over it', but it's never that easy. You can't just STOP caring. You can't just wake up one day and say, 'Oh, you know what? I'll just not give a sh*t about what people say about me, about what my father screams at me.'

That's not how it works. Emotional abuse is a slow poison, silently creeping over your mind until it holds it hostage in its hands. Until the day comes when it's not just people on the outside saying you're fat, stupid, ugly, a whore. It's when those words, so simply cruel, become a part of your thought process. It's when YOU start seeing yourself through the nefarious eyes of others. It's more damaging than being hit, because the effects last longer. Bruises heal, bones nit back together, but the remaining emotional scarring stays with you forever.

Thus began our 'new' life. My brother wasn't really involved with that part. He would go off with his new friends and hang out at different places, leaving me to deal with the downfall. And there was plenty of it. I learned early not to cry around my father. It didn't help, and it made everything worse. So I would stand there, just listening to him. Hearing how much he hated me because I reminded him so much of my mother. He never saw me for me. None of them did. All they saw was a reflection of my mother, even though I was nothing like her.

At that time, when I was going through puberty, is when my manic-depression started to kick in. I was the silent girl, the one easily bullied until I couldn't control my rage anymore. I'd snap, getting into constant fights with guys and girls alike, never being able to control the darkness that was raging within me just below the surface. Uncontrollable, un-tameable. Terrifying.

My father got tired of it, and thought that the problem was because we were in Indianapolis, and thought that we'd be better suited for the country life so moved us down to Southern Indiana.

A new school, a new start. Only some things aren't so easy to sweep under the rug.

My brother started rumors about my. My own brother who I swore to protect, who I had stuck by and saved so many times turned on me because he thought I was my mothers and fathers favorite. He thought that if he told everyone I was a slut, dogged me down until I was nothing more than pond scum beneath his feet that everyone would know that he was the best. That he was far better than his worthless, stupid, ugly fat whore of sister.

I still smiled. Even when I cried I didn't make a sound, and no one could tell the difference. I was 14, and I began self-mutilating.

When I couldn't cry anymore is when it started. The silent tears wouldn't fall. No matter how much I screamed, how much I begged for that numbing emotional relief, release wouldn't come until I made it come. How do you bring tears? With pain.

I started out by beating my legs with a metal pole. The tears would flow, I'd only have a bruise that I could easily dismiss, and I'd feel better for a little while. But it didn't last long. Soon after I began cutting. It didn't matter if it was in school, at home. When the urge for the release came, when I couldn't hold 'it' in anymore I had to cut. It became an obsession, that release. It also became something else to remain silent about, except I wasn't the only one remaining silent. My father and brother remained silent as well. That is, until the day came when my father in his drunken stupor told me that if I was going to kill myself that I shouldn't half-ass it and just cut my throat.

So I went to the kitchen, grabbed a butcher's knife, kissed him softly on his bald spot on my way to my room, and did as he said.

He shipped me off to my mom's, because he couldn't deal with me anymore.

My mom and dad were sober by then. They both found out that they had Hepatitis C, and that drinking would kill them. Wisely, they stopped drinking. But that didn't help my relationship out with my mother. It turned out that drinking actually took the edge off of her worse sickness, her mental sickness. Munchhausen Syndrome.

She had a manic-depressive, suicidal daughter, and it was the perfect topping on her already large pity party to gain the attention and pity that she needed. But it wasn't enough. It was never enough. She started researching different psychological medications, focusing on the side effects. The ones that had the worst, that had the highest rating of teen suicide. And when she found the ones she preferred, she'd find a psychiatrist who was stupid enough to listen to her and prescribe them to me. Over the course of three years, I was hospitalized for suicide twelve times. From the ages of 14-17, I wanted to die.

I didn't want to die because I couldn't 'handle' it anymore. I didn't want to die because I was sad and couldn't get over it, or because I was selfish. I wanted to die because I believed that the world would be better off without me. I believed that everyone I loved, and everyone that I would ever run across in the remainder of my life would be better, happier without my existence. That poison of mental abuse had taken over so much, mixing so perfectly with the PTSD and manic depression that I saw no hope for myself. I saw no hope that I could ever benefit anyone else's life, that I could ever enhance it.

I was toxic. I was poison. I was the reason why my father and mother drank, why my brother hated me, why I was bullied to the point that people put empty pill bottles in my school locker. I was the reason for the suffering of the world, and the world would be a much better place without me.

The psychiatrists and mental institutes eventually caught on to my mother. When I was 17 I committed suicide for the final time by overdosing on 180,000 milligrams of Dilantin. By the time my dad found me in my room, the medicine was so far gone in  my system that they couldn't pump my stomach. They couldn't use charcoal because the medicine had infused with my red blood cells.

They hooked me up to life support, and they waited for me to die.

Only, I didn't.

When I woke up from the coma, I couldn't walk. My equilibrium was so messed up that I couldn't even stand up. It took me 2 months to learn how to walk again, and another month in the mental institute until I was declared fit enough to return to society.

When I got home, I quit taking all of my medicine. When I got home, I also left my mother, choosing to go back to my father.

I won't go into vivid detail about the rest of the time from the ages of 17 until now. Those past ten years are too long to cover all in one post, but I will tell you the gist of it all.

When I was 15 I was given the choice of either dropping out of school, or being expelled because there was no such thing as gang violence or bullying in their school. I dropped out and went to an alternative school to keep going for my high school diploma.

While at the alternative school, I was sexually molested by another student. As my mother and I were on the way to the cops, she thought it was a good idea to tell his best friend where we were going. Even though he admitted it to the cops, they couldn't press charges because by the time they got to the school to interview other students, his best friend had already warned them and they concocted a story. He was later arrested for raping a 13 year old.

No longer caring for school, I got my G.E.D. from the state of Missouri. I was 15.

At 18 I decided to join the Army, and beforehand I went to an alternative school here in Indiana and got the 22 credits I needed to graduate in 2 months, proceeded to join the army, then ended up with a lesion in my L4 vertebrae, which lead to a prompt discharge.

I've been raped 8 times. Because of that I have issues with any form of physical touch. Sometimes I can't even hug my children because of it, which makes me feel like the worst mother in the world.

I have had 4 children, and was a stay at home mom for the majority of five years, going to college at 2 different times in between, but never actually being able to graduate.

Last year, I published my first book, and through it I broke free of all the mental barriers that my family and my so-called friends put on me. For the first time in my life, I wasn't useless. I wasn't pathetic. I actually did something for once (for more details, read here).

Last year, I lost everything just when I thought that I had gained everything. In one moment, not only did I lose my home, my kids and my life, but I also lost my identity (for further explanation, read here and here)

But, through losing everything, I've also gained something equally valuable.

I've remembered who I am. I have remembered that I do have a voice and that I don't have to remain silent any longer. I have not only faced myself and my darkest fears, my most horrendous secrets, but I have learned to love myself for all of it. For the scars, the pain, the past that I will never be able to change. Through it all, and because of it all, I have discovered me.

So who am I to be there for everyone, listening to their histories, their pain while hiding behind my wall, my Confetti Queen image and never revealing my true self to you? How could I, in all fairness, not let you see me. The good, the bad, the terrifying.

Because of seeing others strengths, and watching others grow and become unafraid just because they had someone to listen to them, and someone to understand, I have realized that it doesn't matter how scared I am. It doesn't matter how terrified I am of letting everyone in. Through all of your strength, I have found mine too.

So I will tell you my only secret. The only thing that very few know about.

A few months before I became homeless, before this giant challenge of fate started, I found out that I'm sick. When I was pregnant with my youngest, my urinalyses and blood tests kept coming back irregular. It wasn't preeclampsia or anything else that could go wrong during a pregnancy. It was my white blood cells. There was a thousand milligrams per cc. After I had her safely, even if still early, they ran even more tests. With the blood work and my families history, they discovered that I had cancer. That, in essence, I'm dying.

This past August when I admitted myself to the local mental ward of the hospital because I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to withstand the constant urge to kill myself, I found out that the cells have tripled. They've increased dramatically in just one years time.

But I refuse to die. I refuse to give in, or give up. Right now, not even two days old, I have just gotten out of being homeless, sharing a two-bedroom, run down apartment. I'm finally on my way. Through all of the tears, the pain, the utter fear and petrifying doubt that living through being homeless has given me, I'm finally succeeding.

So I want to leave you all with this one, simple explanation.

My confetti is the small moments of life that make everything worthwhile. Its the purest form of happiness that is always remembered, but too seldom come by.

I throw my confetti to you, to ALL of you, in the hopes that I can impart some measure of happiness.

Why would I want to spread happiness when seldom happiness was shown to me?

Because I know what it's like to hurt.

I know what its like to look into your future, and to see absolutely nothing staring back at you.

I know what its like to wake up every day, forcing a smile when you have been left to die.

And I know what it's like to feel like you're utterly alone, and like everyone you ever met has become your enemy.

I would never want anyone to even feel an ounce the way that I have through my life. I don't want anyone to suffer, to hurt, to feel the unstoppable, all-consuming pain that mere existence can bring.

So, I throw my confetti to you. I fight for you, along side you, and in the shadows with you.

With love, Always.

Soul Journey Tour / Guest Post

Book Title: Soul JourneySeries: Soul Series book 1
Author: Miranda Shanklin
Release Date: August 31, 2014
Presented by: As You Wish Tours




It has been many lifetimes since the cycle began. 
The cycle that still haunts Annisa Lawson. 
A spell cast in desperation to help, which only caused heartache. 
Now, Annisa has found her way out of the varying repeats of her past; only to bring more danger to herself, and those around her. Now she must learn to survive with the help of her friends: Chase, Penelope, and Landon have all gone through each life cycle with Annisa. Sometimes helping, sometimes hindering. Now that Annisa has broken the cycle of their collective punishment, she finds that she needs her friends more than ever to keep their enemies, known, and unknown, at bay. As the group of friends learn of their souls' journeys through their many life cycles, they must also learn to control the magick they have discovered within themselves and each other, in order to defeat the most feared assassin in their world. 




EVANESCENCE – Bring me to Life



How can you see into my eyes like open doors?Leading you down into my core where I've become so numbWithout a soul my spirit's sleeping somewhere coldUntil you find it there and lead it back home
(Wake me up)Wake me up inside(I can't wake up)Wake me up inside(Save me)Call my name and save me from the dark(Wake me up)Bid my blood to run(I can't wake up)Before I come undone(Save me)Save me from the nothing I've become
Now that I know what I'm withoutYou can't just leave meBreathe into me and make me realBring me to life
Frozen inside without your touchWithout your love, darlingOnly you are the life among the dead
All this time I can't believe I couldn't seeKept in the dark but you were there in front of meI've been sleeping a thousand years it seemsGot to open my eyes to everythingWithout a thought, without a voice, without a soulDon't let me die hereThere must be something moreBring me to life
(Wake me up)Wake me up inside(I can't wake up)Wake me up inside(Save me)Call my name and save me from the dark(Wake me up)Bid my blood to run(I can't wake up)Before I come undone(Save me)Save me from the nothing I've become
Bring me to life(I've been living a lie, there's nothing inside)Bring me to life

AMiranda Shanklin resides in Central Illinois with her husband and their two children. When she is not working at her day job as a paralegal, running her children to practices or supporting them at events she is writing. She has been an avid reader most of her life and has always dreamed of writing her own books someday. Now that her children are reaching their teenage years she is finding the time to sit down and chase her dream.Miranda loves to hear your opinions and uses the feedback to improve. You can find her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/mirandashanklinauthoror email her at mlshanklin@gmail.com.

Book Links
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Author Links
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Kissing Trouble Blog Tour @AirickaPhoenix @Morgana_Phoenix

Title: Kissing Trouble (In The Dark Series, #2)Author: Morgana Phoenix Genre: Psychological Thriller RomanceWarning: Strong language and sexual contentHosted by: Lady Amber's Tours



Blurb

Their screams will be his lullaby.
Escaping into the wilderness should have been a piece of cake for a super-babysitter like Julie Brewer. But even she isn’t prepared for the horror awaiting their arrival, or the man who had broken her heart all those years ago to suddenly show up on the doorstep.
Mason Brody has a plan and it is simple: wait for Julie to grow up. Yet in no way is he prepared for the fierce amazon who ambushes him with a baseball bat, or the way the shy fifteen year old has blossomed into a beautiful, passionate woman he can't get enough of.
But there is so much more than just their past between them. There is a dark force lurking in the shadows, waiting for the chance to appease its hunger for death and it will stop at nothing until it is fed.
Can Mason and Julie keep the evil at bay long enough to escape? Or will the monster add their lives to its list?



Author Bio
International Bestselling author Airicka Phoenix lives in a world where unicorns, fairies and mermaids run amok through her home on a daily basis. When she’s not chasing after pixies and rounding up imps, also known as her four children, she can be found conjuring up evil villains, bad-ass heroines and swoon-worthy heroes to play with. 
Airicka is singlehandedly responsible for her greatly anticipated collections, the Touch Saga, The Lost Girl Duology, The Regeneration Series, Games of Fire & Betraying Innocence. She also writes mature paranormal & contemporary romance under the dark guise of Morgana Phoenix. To date, she is responsible for the Sons of Judgment Saga, My Soul For You, & Kissing Trouble.


Author Links:
WebsiteNewsletter LinkedInFacebook: Airicka Airicka Author Page Morgan Author Page Airicka's Mystical Creations The Dark Realm The Touch Saga Page Twitter: @AirickaPhoenix@Morgana_PhoenixGoodreads: AirickaMorganaGoogle+AirickaMorganaBooktropolousBook Pages:Amazon.comAmazon.caAmazon.deAmazon.frAmazon.jpBarns & NoblesiTunesScribdInktera



Buy Links:Amazon

The Parker Harris Series Tour

Cascades of MoonlightThe Parker Harris Series Book 1Pages: 259Publication Date: May 13, 2012FREE
***UPDATED VERSION 07/11/13****Parker Harris was a normal teenage girl with a normal teenage life. That was true until two years ago when she was bitten by a werewolf, forcing her to endure the painful shifting each month during the full moon. She has kept this secret from everyone she loves. One day a stranger enters her small town and knows this secret. Nothing ever happens in the small town of Cascade Idaho, and new people rarely move in, but its Parker's senior year now and two new faces show up in town.  Shortly after their arrival, there is a brutal murder which becomes the first in Cascades history.



Dreams, Spells, and Moonlit Tales The Parker Harris Series Book 2Pages: 278Publication Date: December 18, 2012$1.99
Parker Harris desires a normal life, but it's just not in the cards for her. Parker is a werewolf. She has been for three years now. It’s the summer after she graduated high school and she is preparing for college. If only grades and college classes were her only worries. Parker and Jackie are trying to mend their fractured friendship from her betrayal. Jackie and Mitchell are working on their relationship, fighting jealousy and trust issues of their own. Quinn, a vampire, is the love of Parker’s life. He begins to look into his family’s past and what he finds is not pretty. In fact, it could mean the end for his relationship with Parker. A mistake from Parker's past is revealed and proves to be more enormous than she realized. Dreams—Parker is having dreams and visions of Will. She can’t decipher real from illusion it seems. Spells—Charisma, a new friend to the group, brings magic into the fold. Moonlit Tales—it seems that the full moon is not only a time for Parker to feel the pain of shifting. It’s also a time for unexplained occurrences and secrets being revealed. Can Parker and Quinn's love survive the obstacles they encounter? Is Jackie trustworthy? Are Parker’s feelings for Mitchell becoming too strong for her to ignore? Dreams, Spells, and Moonlit Tales summarize the events of Parker's life in this book.


The Dark Moon The Parker Harris Series Book 3Pages: 251Publication Date: May 5, 2013$1.99
This book picks up from the moment we left off in book two. Quinn received a call from Parker stating Will is alive. Quinn drops everything to rush to her aid. Will he make it in time or will his father stop him? Parker and Mitchell's feelings are not going away and they begin to take a toll on Mitchell's relationship with Jackie. Everyone seems to have a secret they are keeping from Parker and it seems they have feel "there's something she should know" and now is the time. Parker is overwhelmed with all the new information coming her way. Parker's secret life as a werewolf is on the brink of being exposed.





The Cold Moon NovellaThe Parker Harris Series Book #3.5 YA ParanormalReleasing: Aug 22

This is a story told from Mitchell's point of view. This is Book 3.5 in The Parker Harris Series. This novella is broken into three parts: The Change: In this portion we will learn what events happened leading to Mitchell's change into a vampire and how he dealt with it. Lupita and Fangs: The story of how their friendship blossomed into something more. What Happens Next: The lead in to the spin-off series, The Crispin Sinclair Chronicles. We'll learn what happened to the fab four after The Dark Moon ended. We'll also meet a new character who will be pivotal to Crispin's story





The Shimmering PoolThe Crispin Sinclair Chronicles Book #1 (spin-off from Parker Harris) YA FantasyReleasing: Oct
Crispin Sinclair isn't your average teenage boy. He inherited precognitive dreams from his mother who died during childbirth. His other unique quality was inherited from his father; Crispin is a werewolf. Growing up as a supernatural being in a world that doesn't know they exist is difficult to say the least. Crispin's been lucky that his family is made up of supernaturals; witches, vampires, and werewolves. As he begins to obtain his werewolf abilities, his life will be thrown into turmoil placing everyone he loves in danger.
Amytha Roberts feels like the most ordinary girl in the world. She was adopted at age five but not by your traditional idea of parents; her mom's a werewolf and her dad's a vampire. Amytha's best friend Crispin is a werewolf with futuristic dream abilities, while she is a normal sixteen year old girl surrounded by paranormal beings. Stories of Amytha's past begin to surface causing her family to investigate more into where she came from.

Crispin and Amytha take turns telling this story of being in a family that you choose, being abnormal in a normal world, and the importance of friendship. Together they will go on adventures into a faraway place where they'll encounter new creatures and discover truths they never imagined.



Author Bio
Amy McClung was born in Nashville, TN. She is the second oldest of four girls. She married Daniel McClung in September 2005 and they currently reside just outside of Nashville. She graduated from Father Ryan High School in 1996. In 2002 obtained her general certification in medical coding and billing and in 2009 she obtained a specialty certification in Hospital medical coding and billing. Amy and her husband are both fans of fantasy novels as well as avid movie collectors. The Parker Harris Series is the first series of books by this author. Cascades of Moonlight is Book #1, Dreams, Spells, and Moonlit Tales is Book #2, and The Dark Moon Book #3 and The Cold Moon Book #3.5 a Novella from Mitchell's POV. Her second series is a New Adult Contemporary Romance, The Southern Devotion Series, with each book having as a standalone novel with crossover characters. The first book in that series is For the Love of Gracie. Curves in the Road is her newest release as Book 3 in the NA series. Her favorite past times include watching movies, drawing, and reading fantasy novels. Her first book was a means of therapy for her as it enabled her to escape reality for a while during a difficult transition in her life. Her current work in progress is a spin-off of The Parker Harris Series called "The Crispin Sinclair Chronicles" that will be released in October 2014 as a YA Fantasy series. 

Social Links:FacebookBlogGoodReads Author PageAmazon Author PageTwitter


Book Purchase Links:
Curves in the Road on Amazon  
Cascades of Moonlight (The Parker Harris Series Book 1)
Dreams, Spells, and Moonlit Tales (The Parker Harris SeriesBook 2)
The Dark Moon (The Parker Harris Series Book 3)
The Cold Moon: Mitchell's Novella (The Parker Harris SeriesBook 3.5)
The Shimmering Pool (The Crispin Sinclair Chronicles Book 1)

Generation X: The Rising

Hey everyone!As promised, below is the first TWO chapters of Generation X: The RisingAS WELL as the book trailer and a giveaway!I'm so excited about all of this, you have no idea!I hope that you enjoy it, and look forward to seeing your guy's reactions!
xoxo,
The Confetti Queen(aka Desiree DeOrto)



The Elder Race was a story told around campfires. Aliens, monsters, mad men. Those who believed were called insane, but they were right. They came from space, the seas, and below the earth. Turns out they were waiting, patiently waiting all this time. For what, no one knew, until now. They’re coming for what they think is rightfully theirs, the half-breeds that are part human, part Elder.
Once The Rising began, those who were different were gathered. Separated from the life they knew, those they loved, and moved into camps where they were tested and given the choice. But for Elizabeth, there was no choice at all. They meant to make super soldiers out of them. What they discovered instead was something that no one ever expected.
Sometimes monsters aren’t the things you can’t see, but rather, they’re the weapons of your own creation. When you’re part Elder, and part human, it’s hard to see which side of you is the true hero, and which side is the monster.  Everything Elizabeth thought she knew about herself and the world around her is changing, but will she be able to get through The Rising alive? Or will she become what the Government wants her to be: The ultimate weapon.


Chapter One
Green. Startling green shining out of the darkness. A face she couldn’t see no matter how hard she tried, how much she willed it.
A flash of white in the darkness, the beauty and texture reminded her of the silk of a spider’s web. 
Enchanting, ethereal…deadly.
She turned, trying to keep sight of those eyes. Those haunting, beautiful eyes.
The blare of the alarm clock woke her up from her dream, shattering the face that she had almost been able to finally see. Huffing, she turned over and swatted at it. It was the fifth night in a row with the same dream. Sighing, she moved her straggled bangs out of her eyes.
“Great, Mr. Perfect was a no-show again.” She had begun to think of him as that. All she could see in her dreams were his eyes. Shockingly green that seemed to see deep into her, to the darkest parts of her that she didn’t even let herself see. A shiver broke across her skin, raising goose bumps as those eyes flashed through her mind. A pull seemed to gather in her chest when she thought of them, of him. She rubbed her chest wearily and sat up.
“Elizabeth! Get up! You’re going to be late!” She rolled her eyes at the sound of her dad’s voice. He thoroughly dispersed the eyes, his eyes. Laughing, she stomped across the floor in their two story walk up, letting him know that she had already beat him to it. For being a single dad, she didn’t think he was doing a bad job. Sure, he was crazy and annoying, but that was just him. Just Dad.
“You have breakfast ready yet?” she yelled down to him.
“Oh yeah, sure Princess. We have a feast awaiting you!” She rolled her eyes as she sorted through her clothes.
“That mean I’m having cereal again?”
“You bet your pretty butt you are! Now come on! You’ve got to go to school and I’ve got to get some beauty sleep.”
“Beauty. Yeah, that’s the first word I think of when describing you, dad.” She turned the corner into the kitchen and got an eyeful of her dad. A part of her felt bad as she took him in with his bleary eyes and filthy uniform. Her dad had worked a nightshift factory job at the local power plant since she could remember. He was always exhausted, and she knew that if it weren’t for her, that he would have had a hell of an easier time in life. Biting back a sense of self-loathing, she walked over and gave him a short kiss on his dirty hair.
“Come on, now. I’m filthy.” Blushing, he whipped the newspaper up, grumbling under his breath.                       Grinning, she walked to the cabinets, looking for the last box of captain crunch. “You’re always filthy.”
“And you’re always cute, so don’t get dirty by loving on the old man.”
“You’ve got it!”
Her smile fell as she finally found the box she’d hidden in the back of the cabinet. She loved her dad, but didn’t trust him with her cereal. He could go ahead and eat Cheerios, he’d last longer that way.It had just been the two of them since she was born. As Elizabeth got older and understood that her mother had actually been ripped apart by her at birth, she figured that her dad would hate her. He shouldhate her. Because of her, his wife wasn’t here anymore. But to her shock and everyday amazement, he loved her. Adored her. Some of Elizabeth’s friends weren’t so lucky.
Shaking her head, she thought of them. Of her little group of misfits. Of how they used to be. Brian and Micah, the two boys who were raised by single fathers too. All three of them had similar horror stories, and all three shared the same birthday, with Micah’s the only one being a year different. They used to be close, really close while they were young, until they hit middle school. Then everything had changed. The three of them split, each falling into their own categories.
Micah became a jock and turned to football. He was the fastest on the entire team and that was saying something. Since he was one of the ‘popular’ kids, he couldn’t hang out with Brian anymore, who was a nerd for the lack of a better word. It wasn’t just that he was smart, but he was toosmart, almost like his intelligence somehow interfered with how he was socially. He didn’t have any social experience. He didn’t understand how people acted and reacted to each other, and sometimes when Elizabeth would catch him studying people, she thought that he was running some type of mad experiment in his head.
She shivered at the thought, at the intensity that he’d look at people. It was eerily similar to how Mr. Perfect looked at her in her dreams. But where Brian was hard, cynical, Mr. Perfect’s gaze pierced her with a fire that she hadn’t seen anywhere, from anyone.
“Shit!” Milk spilled over the rim of the bowl onto the counter, startling her out of her thoughts.
“Thinking again? I told you, thinking is dangerous.”
“Haha, Dad. I wasn’t thinking, I was just…remembering.”
“Ah, thinking of the boys again?” She nodded as she turned with her too full bowl.
“Yeah. I was thinking of how things used to be.”
“You know, you’re a junior now. You should have forgotten about them a long time ago. It was what, the beginning of sixth grade when it all fell apart?” She nodded and sat at the table, unable to meet her dad’s eyes.
He dropped the paper and leaned forward, resting his head against his hands. “Hunny, friends don’t last forever. It’s been yearssince those boys even talked to you, and you’re still hurt over it. I don’t think that’s a good thing. And, honestly? I’m glad they’re not around anymore. It gives me less to worry about.”
A smile pulled at the corner of her lips. “Yeah, without guys around there shouldn’t be a need to worry about teenage pregnancy, eh?” She raised an eyebrow and stared him down. Without a second thought, his face flushed red as he opened and closed his mouth repeatedly, practically sputtering on the words he wanted to say.
“You…don’t tell me you’re…Elizabeth. Elizabeth, you better still be…” She burst out laughing, practically knocking over her bowl of cereal at his half-horror, half-irate expression.
“Oh, you’re in so much trouble. Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”
“Sorry, Dad. I couldn’t help it. And yes, I’m still a…” With a smirk she stood and rinsed her bowl out in the sink while her dad grumbled behind her. She pecked him quickly on the top of his head where his bald spot was as she hurried past him. “I’ve gotta go, old man.  Get some sleep, okay? You’re looking kind of haggard.”
 “Will do, princess. Be careful out there. Things are starting to get weird.”
“Dad, everything is weird to you.” With a wave she turned away and closed the door behind her. A sense of pleasure hit her as his eyes came back as soon as she closed the door, almost like he was respecting her father. She shook her head and walked to the car. “Weird. If you only knew dad, if you only knew.”
*****
“Don’t you hear that fucking alarm, idiot! Get the hell up before I get you up!”Slapping his hand blearily around the alarm, Micah finally silenced it, and silenced his drunkard of a father in the process. You’d think that being a deputy of the town would make his dad somewhat representable, but as soon as he put the badge down, the bottle went up. Micah rubbed his face as he sat up and looked around the room. He needed to clean. Hell, he needed to do a lot of things, and the first thing he needed to do was to stop thinking and dreaming about her.
Throwing his head back, he nearly smacked it against the wall as he slumped. “God, Lizzie, what have you done to me?” Her smiling face flashed through his mind, haunting him. She haunted him every day, but he’d never tell her. He brushed his hair out of his face and threw his legs over the side of the bed, disturbing dust bunnies as he did. He looked around his ratty room that resided in a ratty house, in a shoddy neighborhood. He hated it. Hated his house, his room, the state. But most of all, he hated his dad for hating him, and hated the fear that he felt every day that he’d turn into exactly what he hated most: his father.
Stretching, Micah stood and shuffled to his closet. There wasn’t much there, but for what was there it was pricey. Micah worked a part-time job just to keep up appearances. He could go naked to school, for all his father would care, but even though Micah couldn’t be friends with Elizabeth anymore, he still wanted to be near her. He smirked as he threw on his clothes and headed out of the house. He didn’t stop to say goodbye to his father, couldn’t stand to. All he cared about was that in about thirty minutes he’d be able to see heragain. And Brian, the brain.
A frown crossed his face as he opened up his car door, ignoring it as it creaked in protest and hopped in. They were always together, the three of them. Until that night when Micah and Brian discovered something about themselves that they didn’t want Elizabeth to know. Couldn’t let her know. It was bad enough that both Brian and Micah were in love with her, but add to it that both of them were special and could kill her made everything impossible. He shook his head and started the car, a grin forming as the engine purred to life.

Chapter Two
The parking lot was slammed full of student loitering around, talking, throwing things with the few odd students actually doing homework.
Elizabeth pulled into her usual spot, and fought back a grin as Micah pulled up beside her. Even though they weren’t technically ‘friends’ anymore and hadn’t said more than a word to each other throughout all the years, the three of them still parked next to each other. A full smile bloomed on her face as she heard Brian’s car pull up on her other side. Ignoring the urge to turn and look at him, acknowledge him in some way, she dug around the passenger side for her backpack and got out, composing her face as she did. She wasn’t the one who ended their friendship, they did, and she still didn’t understand why. Pushing her long, dark brown hair behind her ear, she got out and slung her backpack across one shoulder, nodding silently to Micah, and completely ignoring Brian as she headed toward the school. People called from across the lot, and she forced a smile and waved back to them as she walked stiffly forward. She couldn’t relax until she felt Micah and Brian move away, no longer following her.
She breathed out and pushed the school doors open, almost slamming to a stand-still. Her classmates and other students stopped dead in the hallway, each of them craning their heads up and looking at the TV that was mounted against the wall. She worked her way around them, catching the reporter’s words in the almost silent hallway.
“Reports are coming in from across the world on an almost global natural disaster area. Tycoons, hurricanes, and earthquakes are just some of the terrors that are hitting areas all across the globe from the United States to Malaysia and everywhere in between…”
She slowed down as the words reverberated in her ears. Stopping, she turned and stared at the TV too. Clips were playing at almost blinding speeds of places she’d never been to, but hoped to one day go. They were almost completely destroyed. Families were crying, woman carrying dead infants through rubble that used to be towns. Tears filled her eyes. She could almost feel their pain. Their horror. Her breath caught in her throat as her heart raced in her ears. Her dad was right, something was very, very wrong.
“Incoming reports from Yellowstone and the Arctic Circle report that all geysers are active, signifying that the volcano’s that have laid dormant underneath through the generations are becoming active. Large pieces of the Arctic Circle are breaking apart, causing waters to rise all around the world and Tsunamis to hit. Scientists from across the globe still don’t have any information or reasoning for why this is happening at this time. We’ll report more as more information comes in. God save us all.”
A tremor rocked through the school, making the students bump into each other and pictures to tilt in their frames. Trophies in the schools trophy case rocked, some falling over. It felt like the entire school was holding its breath, waiting for what would happen next. Elizabeth’s blue eyes widened as she felt the panic in the students increase.  She sent a silent prayer up as she backed away from the mass, right before the next wave hit.
Screaming erupted as students were thrown violently around. Walls cracked and pieces of ceiling tile fell as the earthquake rocked through the school, heavy masses of destruction in their wake. Elizabeth’s scream mixed in with the screams of other students as full panic hit the mass, making them run blindly into each other. Her breath was knocked out of her lungs as she was knocked to the ground, pain shooting through her ribs as she tried to catch her breath.
Horror filled her eyes as she saw the mass of students swarm towards her, and they weren’t stopping. Bracing herself, she closed her eyes and waited for the pain of being trampled to hit.Powerful hands gripped her beneath her knees and under her shoulders, easily lifting her up. A small oomph escaped her as she slammed against a chest. Micah’s chest. She didn’t need to look up to know that it was him. She remembered his scent, the feel of him almost more than she remember Mr. Perfect’s eyes.
“Around!” Her head snapped up at the sound of Brian’s voice. That one word seemed to seep into the students, making them scurry, separate themselves like water around them. She stared at him. She knew his voice, knew him just as she knew Micah, but she’d never heard him speak like that. Then again, she’d never known Micah to lift her like she weighed nothing, or to get to her within an instant. The remaining panic showed itself as tears filled her eyes, falling from her horror stricken face. The tremors died down, leaving an eerie silence in the hallways as the last of the students fled to the outside, the sound of sobbing being abruptly cut off as the door slammed shut between them and the outside world.
“Lizzie, are you okay?” Micah’s warm, worried voice shattered her panic. She looked up at him through her mangled hair, tears falling heedlessly unchecked.
“She’s fine. The velocity of her fall wouldn’t harm her more than getting the air knocked out of her, and none of the students got to her so she’s unharmed.” Brian’s almost robotic voice cut coldly through the halls. Elizabeth’s mind swirled as confusion hit her, battling with the remaining emotions from the student body. She could still feel them, as if she was feeling them herself.
“I’m not asking your thoughts, Brian! I’m talking to Lizzie!”
“I’m just stating the facts. If she were to be hurt I’d know in an instant.”
“Yes because you’re so damn smart, right?”
“I don’t comprehend why you’re so angry. You should be elated that she’s unharmed. Your emotional anxiety is unneeded at this point.”
“No, you wouldn’t understand, would you?”
Her head whipped between the two of them, Micah’s building anger reflecting through her, almost as if she was the one that was confused, hurt. “I’m fine. Really, I am.”
His steady blue eyes were laced with worry as he looked down at her. “Are you sure? You’re pale.”
“Of course she would be. That’s a natural reaction to an event of this magnitude.”
“Jesus, Brian, would you just shut the hell up?” Micah’s roar echoed throughout the empty hallways, the sound of plaster falling from the ceiling the only sound to compete with it besides Elizabeth’s almost frantic breathing.
“Fine. Be illogical.”
A burst of laughter escaped her, the panicky sound falling all around them.
“God, Lizzie. You’re not okay.”
She pushed against his chest, making him lower her unsteadily. She paused for a second and made sure that she could stand on her shaking legs. When she knew she could, she let go, stepping forward slowly.
“Am I hurt? No, I’m not. Am I okay? I am the farthest from okay that I can even think of right now. What the hell is going on? How did you get here so fast, Micah? And Brian, what was up with that? You just said a word and parted people like the Red Sea!” Panic mixed with a healthy dose of fear washed over her, a cold sweat broke out across her forehead as bile rose swiftly in her throat. She didn’t understand any of it. Didn’t understand why she was feeling the emotions from other people, how her best friends, her ex best friends could do something so humanly impossible.
“It’s simple really, though I haven’t been able to fully experiment, I do have some ideas.”
“Experiment? Ideas? What are you?”
“Lizzie, you need to calm down.”
“Don’t tell me to calm down! A freaking earthquake just ripped through our school and I just saw something that shouldn’t have been able to happen! Tell me how to calm down! You calm down!”
“Elizabeth, listen. I know that you’re confused and you don’t understand, but if you would just listen…”Fear built through her in rising waves, her thoughts were flowing through her quicker than she could keep a hold of. “No. I don’t want to listen. You guys didn’t explain anything to me in sixth grade. What makes you think that I should listen to you now?” Static built underneath her skin, making her fidget. She couldn’t keep still as she rubbed her shaking hands on her arms, almost holding herself, trying to keep herself together.
“Lizzie, please.” Micah stepped forward, his arm outstretched as if he was going to comfort her. The sight of his hand, his strong hand that had saved her with super human strength pushed her emotional limit over the edge.
“Don’t touch me!” His eyes widened as his body went flying backwards, smacking into the concrete walls, dust and rubble flinging out around him as his body and the force of the hit punched a hole through it.Brian watched it all calmly, a small frown marring his face as he looked back and forth between Elizabeth and the hole that Micah’s body put through the wall. Elizabeth froze, her mind blanking as she shook her head in denial.
“Well, it looks like you’re one of us too.” She looked into Brian’s calm, calculating brown eyes and broke.Sobs built in her chest as she stepped backwards. She killed him. She didn’t know how she did it, but she killed Micah. Her best friend. She couldn’t stop her body from shaking or terror from overtaking her as she walked backwards faster. “No. No, no, no.” The denial burst from her lips even as she heard the sound of Micah moving. She thought her eyes would pop out of her head as a very dusty Micah stepped through the hole, shaking rubble from his hair as he looked at her in complete shock.
“What the hell was that?”
Without a word she turned, sprinting with everything she had to the doors and flinging them open. She squinted into the light and ran blindly out of the school, not even stopping as hands from the other students reached out toward her, trying to see if she was alright. She wasn’t alright, and didn’t know if she ever would be alright again.
Brian and Micah stared after her, looking away only as the doors slammed shut behind her.
“This isn’t possible.” Micah muttered as he stood shocked beside Brian.
“Technically, it is possible, but I would have never guessed that it was probable.”
He ignored Brian’s robotic comment. “Did you see her eyes?” He shook his head, the sight of the almost neon green flashing through his mind. “Our eyes don’t change when we use our powers.”
“That’s because she’s not like us. She’s different.”
“Different, yeah you could say that. But how is she different? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I don’t know.”
Micah looked up at Brian, completely shocked. “You don’t know? How do you not know? You know everything.”
He frowned and moved towards the door, leaving Micah to follow behind. “Obviously not. This is quite a predicament.”
Micah followed, kicking pieces of debris out of his way. “Why is it a predicament?”
He turned around and stared Micah down, his soft brown eyes clashing with Micah’s violently blue ones. “It’s a predicament because we hurt her all those years ago because we thought we’d hurt her. And now we know that she was never in any danger, but we were.”
Micah stood still as Brian walked away from him, muttering under his breath. He didn’t think of that. If she was more powerful than him and Brian in her own way then she could, in fact, be the one to hurt them instead. “I guess we we’re really saving ourselves.”
AND NOW,I present to you the book trailer!Enjoy!



Pre-orders are available HEREIf you would like to sign up for an ARC of Generation X: The Rising,click HERE
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And now for the GIVEAWAY! Good luck!a Rafflecopter giveaway

A Little Tough Love From the Confetti Queen

Dear Authors:
Ya'll know me, and if you don'tYOU WILL.
I'm pissed. Why? Because I'm sick and tired of hearing that what I do is a hobby. That irritates me to no end. What I'm also pissed about is other authors, authors that I admire and look up too, who are QUITTING because they're tired of the fight. They're tired of trying so damn hard and feeling like they're not getting anywhere. They're tired of being bullied by the pathetic people who hide behind a computer. They're tired of being pirated. They're tired of being told by everyone in their 'real' life that it's just a hobby, that writing isn't an actual job. Well I'm here to tell ya'll something:
SUCK IT UP!
Too harsh? Well, here's the thing. In this business, you won't be respected. Until, or even IF, you reach the ranks of someone like Colleen Hoover or Jamie McGuire, you're going to be looked down on. Hell, THEY even get shit for being an author, and look where they're at!
In this business, you're going to be bullied. There will be times where people are going to tear you and/or your book(s) a new one. They'll rip it apart, slam it into the dirt, then set it on fire. And do you know what you have to do?You have to GET THE F* back up, brush that shit off, and move on.Why? Because that's how you move forward. 
It sucks.If anything, the one thing that I've learned in this life is that it f*ing sucks. It's stressful. Some days, you'll want to quit. Hell, I'm a huge inspiration to other authors and to readers because of the hell that I've been through in my life and am STILL currently going through, they look up to me even though I want to quit. 
Yes, you heard that right. EVERY. DAY. I want to quit. I want to throw in the towel and just focus on a regular job and struggle to make ends me that way.I get so tired of the fight. SO tired of having to suck it up and move forward. I ask myself: Why isn't it any easier? Why don't the people who are closest to me, believe in me? Why, why, why, why, why???
For f*cks sake, with my manic depression, sometimes it's all I can do during the day NOT to just end this life. To give in and give up because the darkness in my mind whispers that things will never get better. That this LIFE, this giant bowl of SUCK is just going to keep getting worse and I'll be stuck in this giant void of eternal darkness and pain.
But you know what? I don't give in.I don't give up. I may sit there and be completely unmotivated, hating myself because I need to DO something, anything to keep moving forward. I've broken down, cried my eyes out, held a knife in my hand for TWO HOURS and FOUGHT with myself, restraining myself so I WOULDN'T QUIT.
Then, I find out that one of my friends and fellow authors who is a constant support to me, someone who is ALWAYS telling me things will get better and that it just takes time, that you have to say 'F* IT and F* YOU' to all the nay-sayers who tell me every freaking day that what I do isn't a job and that I'll never get there, is going to quit. 
Yes.She wants to quit. She wants to give up, get a 'real' job, and keep going in the life of SUCK without doing something that she loves ALL BECAUSE her family keeps telling her that she can't do it. That it's a 'hobby' and that she'll never make it. The sad thing? She makes a HELL of a lot more on her royalties that I do. She has a bigger following, and is SO CLOSE to a break through that I can almost taste it!
So, I'm fucking pissed.Here's what I want to say to each and every one of you.Your life WON'T get better until YOU take the steps necessary in order to make it so. This giant bowl of SUCK will keep throwing shit balls at you, trying to drag you down, to make you quit.More often than not, your own FAMILY, the ones that are supposed to love and support you no matter what won't believe in you. They won't believe in your dream, have smiled when you told them you wrote a book or want to become an author and thought to themselves, "eh, let the kid have his/her dream. They'll quit soon enough. After all, no one can make it.".
But you know what?F*CK THEM!That's right, a giant dose of flipping the bird to ANYONE who has ever doubted you or made you doubt yourself.
Writing isn't a hobby. It's a passion. It's a dream.With writing, you have the ability to change someones life. You can transport someone who's in one of their darkest days into a world that you created, having them experience something magical and obtain something that is very hard to find.You have the ability to give them HOPE.
Why would you let someone take that away from you?WHY would you let someone, who more than likely didn't have the balls to follow their own dreams because they were crushed by societies thoughts of success, take away something that isn't just something you do, it's who you are.Authors are not just people that sit there and type until TADA! it's a book!They research, plot, CREATE life where none existed, and they put their hearts and souls into it.Why?Because it's a part of WHO WE ARE. 
WE ARE those characters.Their fears, their dreams, their emotions in the darkest times when there's no ray of hope left. That's ours. The happy endings, or in my case the HOPE for a happy ending?Those are ours too. 
To give into someone who tells you no, who belittles what you do, is like letting them look into your soul, and tell it that it's never enough. That it will never be enough.WHY would you let someone kill that part of you like that?
So here's some tough love for you, and anyone else out there that's having a shitty day and is letting others or their own minds doubt themselves.Suck it up.NOTHING worth having in this life is ever easy. You have to feel the pain, feel the doubts, and somehow manage to find a way to push yourself forward. To keep going and keep the momentum up.No one can do it for you. We can be there as a support, to tell you that yes, we've been there too, and we know what it's like, but at the end of the day, the change has to start with you.
YOU have to decide that you won't believe anyone who tells you you can't.But most importantly, YOU have to decide that you ARE enough. You have to BELIEVE IN YOURSELF, because I believe in all of you.Your words are your voice.Don't let anyone silence you.

With love, Always.Desiree

A Freebie, A New Release AND All The Feels!

I just needed to take a moment to say something.A lot of times, people don't appreciate things the way they should, and we see it happening so often where people aren't sincere in their thanks.
I'm not here to do that.I'm not here to fluff everyone up for doing something that I think is truly wonderful.I'm here, to let you all know, that I truly do appreciate everything.From the support,to the shares,to the tweets.
I'm so overwhelmed with gratitude from everyone's kindness that I can't even.I. CAN'T. EVEN.
Almost a year ago, I lost everything.My home, my children, my life.Somehow, through all the pain and sadness, I managed to make it through,and things are getting better.
I never thought the day would come where I'd break into the top 100 of ANY category.I never thought that I, who just MONTHS ago was living in a van and didn't feel anywhere near safe,could look upon the future and see something bright.But it happened, and I didn't make it happen.
Yes, I fought on, I kept going and kept writing and built my businesses up.I may have lost hope a time or two and just had to stop and break down,but I'm not the one who had the kindness to spread the word.
Through your guy's faith in me and in my work,it has flourished.As a person and an author, I have flourished.You guys have given me hope, and have given me one of the most priceless gifts ever:Your love.
So, thank you.From the bottom of my heart, from the depths of my soul and with everything that I am.THANK YOU!

Thank you for believing in me.Thank you for believing in my dreams.Thank you, for seeing me as I am, and believing that I was enough.And thank you for being there, and taking a chance on me.I don't think I could ever tell you guys how much it means to me, and it's not enough by simply saying:Thank you!

For celebration for the release of The Divine, book two in the Divinity Stone Series, I have put The Prophecy up for FREE!You can pick it up HERE
ALSO!The Divine JUST HIT AMAZON! So you can continue on in the journeyHERE
Thank you, everyone. I feel extremely repetitive, but I don't know what else to say.