Harmony Kent's Blog, page 129
August 17, 2016
The Scorpion’s Empress
Hello everyone and welcome to my blog today. Please, help me give a huge, warm welcome to author Yoshiyuki Ly and her Erotic Romance Fiction, the Scorpion’s Empress. Yoshiyuki will be offering one randomly chosen winner via rafflecopter a $50 Amazon/BN.com gift card. For her other tour stops and more chances to win, please click on the banner above, which will take you to her tour page over at Goddess Fish 
After years of serving a corrupt government, Ser Videl, an idealistic paladin, learns that her younger sister is tangled in a dark scheme against Raj Mangala, the compassionate yet troubled Empress of the city’s oppressed lowtown; the two women meet and are deeply drawn to one another, finding a shared sanctuary in their violently-divided city. The Scorpion’s Empress is intimately written through the eyes of both twenty-seven year old women.
Videl’s loving devotion is just what Raj craves, but Raj is wary of letting her guard down while protecting her throne. Determined to prove her worth, Videl chases after Raj and works to unravel the mystery of the plots against the Empress. Raj wants Videl to serve her emotional and sexual needs, and the two explore a meaningful relationship of dominance and submission that delves fully into their deepest wants. When the conspiracy against Raj comes to a head, Videl’s loyalties are tested when she is forced to choose between her past and her Empress.
Excerpt:
This promise of adventure—I hadn’t felt it properly in years. Women for me have come and gone, literally. The beginnings were never like this. They hadn’t looked at me with such controlled, respectful want. Like a gentleman. Like a knight—a true paladin. They hadn’t held their hand out to me, not giving a damn about everyone staring at us. They hadn’t asked me to dance as Satya sang such a haunting, romantic song about uncertain longing.
And then she spoke again: “I’m assuming another rule is that I don’t get to learn your real name.”
That was way more than anyone else had managed to do.
I leaned in to whisper in her ear, “The name’s Raj. You’re not allowed to tell no one. Promise me.”
“I won’t betray your trust. I swear that on my honor. I really like your name. It suits you, all the power you have. Tell me whenever I have permission to call you that. I’d like to earn it.”
She guided me over to the dance floor. The crowd parted to make room for us. They whispered to each other as we passed by; they saw how entranced I was, no matter how hard I fought to hide it. I watched the seriousness turn over as shadows across Videl’s beautiful face. Serious, but soft, somehow—she had a perfect balance of the two almost all the time.
About the Author:
Yoshiyuki Ly was born in San Diego, CA. She lived there until moving away to college. In high school, she began writing fanfiction as a serious hobby. Her pen name is representative of her multiracial heritage and a unique, diverse outlook that is reflective in her work. While pursuing an undergraduate degree in philosophy, she spent her free time reading the works of Virginia Woolf, Soren Kierkegaard and Simone de Beauvoir. She then spent the next years honing her craft to become a published author.
myBook.to/thescorpionsempress
Author.to/yoshiyuki_ly
http://yoshiyuki-ly.livejournal.com/
https://www.fanfiction.net/~yoshiyukily
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City of Hope and Ruin
Hi everyone! Today, I have not one guest but two: please, give a warm welcome to authors Kit Campbell and Siri Paulson with their Fantasy Fiction book, City of Hope and Ruin, which also offers some LGBTQ Romance. The authors will be awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. For more tour stops and more chances to win, please click on the banner above
City of Hope and Ruin:
Every night the monsters hunt.
A city that is the whole world: Theosophy and her companions in the City militia do their best to protect the civilians from the monsters, but they keep crawling from the Rift and there’s nowhere to run. Theosophy knows she’ll die fighting. It’s the best kind of death she’s seen, and at least she can save lives in the meantime.
They say the Scarred carve you up while you’re still alive.
A village in the shadow of a forest: Refugees from the border whisper about the oncoming Scarred, but Briony can’t convince her brother to relocate his children to safety. Briony will do anything to protect them. She owes them that much, even if it means turning to forbidden magic.
When Theosophy and Briony accidentally make contact across the boundaries of their worlds, they realize that solutions might finally be within reach. A world beyond the City would give Theosophy’s people an escape, and the City’s warriors could help Briony protect her family from the Scarred. Each woman sees in the other a strength she lacks—and maybe something more.
All they need to do is find a way across the dimensions to each other before their enemies close in.
Excerpt:
The spirit was beautiful, a tall, statuesque woman who had a hard glint in her eyes. Her hair was short, indigo blue through the glow and tightly curled, her skin a lighter shade over wiry muscles. One hand clenched a smallish item made of metal, the other a long tube with some kind of blade on the end. Briony had never seen anyone like her. Though she glanced around and held her body like someone expecting danger, her bearing was proud and strong, and every inch of her spoke of power and competency. A warrior. Briony had heard stories of them, left over from the Great War, but had never seen one herself.
Was that when this woman was from? The War?
“The trio—the monsters—where am I?”
Briony realized she hadn’t responded, and that perhaps this spirit had been looking for someone to talk to for a very long time, and maybe she would assume Briony couldn’t see or hear her either. “Don’t be afraid,” she said.
The spirit’s eyebrows rose. “That’s a…never mind. What is this place?”
“Well,” Briony started, taking a step forward. But her ankle buckled and she stumbled, managing to catch herself before she fell.
“You’re injured,” said the spirit. “Were you attacked?”
“Yes—you see, there was a Fracture back there, and—” Confusion crossed the spirit’s face. Maybe she was even older; maybe she didn’t know about the War.
From the authors: How to Deal With Writer’s Block
First of all, I’d like to thank Harmony for hosting our tour stop today! Siri and I are very pleased to be here! I’ve been asked to talk about dealing with writer’s block, oh, the dreaded writer’s block.
Picture this: it’s writing time. You sit down at your computer, go about getting everything ready to go, open your story (or a new document), and…nothing. Nothing feels right. Or worse—nothing comes at all.
What’s a writer to do?
Well, first let’s look at writer’s block as a whole. The thing is, there’s not a single cause of writer’s block. Oh, sure, you’ll find people that say there is. Some people claim that writer’s block stems from fear. Fear of success, fear of failure, fear of disappearing into the void without making a ripple. And sure, there probably is some writer’s block that comes from that. Personally, I feel that most writer’s block comes from a lack of planning, from not knowing how to get your characters from where they are to where you want them to be, or from not being able to figure out how to do something in a way that makes sense and/or is interesting. But I brought up that theory with my local writing group, and we ended up coming up with a whole list of potential writer’s block reasons.
So, unfortunately, writer’s block is a personal sort of thing. People get it for different reasons, and the same person may have it for different reasons at different points in time.
Therefore, I postulate that the first step of dealing with writer’s block is: figure out what the source is.
Do you need to write a story to match a theme (say, for an anthology) and can’t figure out anything that interests you?
Have you written yourself into a corner that you can’t see a way out of?
Does the character that was supposed to be the love interest hate your main character?
Have you spread yourself too thin and are too tired to make any progress?
Are you afraid that you’ll put a story out there and get crickets—or nothing but negativity?
Once you identify the problem, then you can work toward solutions. If you can’t get going, it won’t hurt to check your normal inspiration. If you’ve made lists of potential story ideas, maybe you can go through that and find something to mix in. You can brainstorm what you like in a story and figure out how to add those elements in. If you’ve written yourself into a plot hole, stepping back and looking at your overall plot and story might reveal a way out—or a way to do it better. If your characters aren’t working, throw them out and try other ones, or introduce someone else.
The nice thing about writer’s block is that it’s not some huge, unmovable thing that you can’t get past. It shows up for a reason, and normally that reason can be worked through. And the good news is that, generally, once you’ve worked through it, you come out the other side with something better than you had before.
About the Authors:
It is a little known fact that Kit was raised in the wild by a marauding gang of octopuses. It wasn’t until she was 25 that she was discovered by a traveling National Geographic scientist and brought back to civilization. This is sometimes apparent in the way that she attempts to escape through tubes when startled.
Her transition to normalcy has been slow, but scientists predict that she will have mastered basics such as fork use sometime in the next year. More complex skills, such as proper grocery store etiquette, may be forever outside her reach.
Kit can be found cavorting about the web at her blog (http://landsquidattack.wordpress.com) or website (http://kitcampbellbooks.com), on Pinterest (https://www.pinterest.com/campbell1091/), and even occasionally on Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/KitCampbell).
Siri Paulson writes all over the fantasy and science fiction spectrum, including (so far) secondary-world fantasy, urban fantasy, steampunk, Gothic, historical paranormal, and YA with spaceships. She is also the chief editor at Turtleduck Press (http://turtleduckpress.com/). Siri grew up in Alberta, Canada, but now lives in an old house in Toronto. By day, she edits non-fiction for the government. Her other current passion is contra dance, a social/folk dance done to live Celtic and roots music. Her favourite places in the world are the Canadian Rocky Mountains and a little valley in Norway.
Siri’s short fiction and the anthologies she has edited can be found on Turtleduck Press, at http://turtleduckpress.com/wordpress/... . She blogs at https://siripaulson.wordpress.com/ and tweets at http://twitter.com/Siri_Paulson.
Multi-region buy link for ebook: http://authl.it/B01DYSR7QE
by
August 15, 2016
Soulless
Hi guys! I do love a good YA Dystopian read, and so it gives me especial joy to welcome author Jacinta Maree to my place today with her YA Dystopian novel, Soulless. On this blog tour, ONE randomly chosen winner via rafflecopter will win a $50 Amazon/BN.com gift card. For Jacinta’s other tour stops and more chances to win, as usual please click on the banner above
Soulless:
Welcome to Soulless.
We are the generation that laughs at death.
Reincarnation; what was once considered a gift of immortality has become an eternity of nightmares.
Nadia Richards lives in a world plagued by reincarnation, a system of recycling souls where all past memories, personalities and traumatic events are relived daily in disjointed sequences. Trapped within their own warped realities, not even the richest and most powerful are saved from their own minds unraveling. Madness is the new human nature, and civilizations are crumpling beneath themselves trying to outrun it.
Within a society that ignores death, Nadia appears to be the one exception to the reincarnation trap. Born without any reincarnated memories and with printless eyes, the hot tempered 19 year old quickly becomes the ultimate prize to all those wishing to end the vicious cycle, or for some, to ensure they could evade death forever.
Readers discretion: Adult language, violence and some adult scenes. For mature audiences only.
Excerpt:
His top lip curled, as it always did in his half smile. “I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“About what?”
In his hands, he fiddled with the hunting knife. “You.” He twisted the blade and flicked out, clearing the dirt under his nails. “You were going to leave me. You said it was better this way, for the both of us.” The rasp of his accusing voice felt like a guillotine above my neck.
I uncomfortably shuffled back but didn’t speak.
“You were right. Your life without me would be better. Easier. Safer.” Every word strained from his lips as though he was pushing air from the pit of his stomach. My eyes widened and my heart picked up speed. Diesel lightly shook his head. “But this isn’t about making things easier. You’re with me now and you won’t leave no matter how hard it gets.”
“That’s not for you to decide,” I said with a cringe.
“Because if you leave me—”
With an anguished sign, I turned my head away. “Let me guess, you’ll always find me? And if I try to run you will break my legs and chop off my fingers and remove my eyes-”
“No. If you leave me, I will vanish… and I don’t want to vanish, Nadia.”
Surprised, my jaw went slack. Without even blinking, Diesel stilled his fumbling and tightened his stare, looking at me in a way I felt penetrated to my very core.
“You don’t know what it’s like living in this hell. I’m drowning under black water and I can never surface. You remember what it feels like to have your body shut down only to wake up not knowing which reality is real. It would’ve been easier to fade into a drifter, to stop the fight all together and just crumple into the purest of insanities. In my darkest moments I almost allowed it to happen, but then I met you. The girl with no reincarnated memories. The one without a soul imprint. It’s you, and only you, who can save me. But then you came into my room with that story about how everything would be better if we were separated. You left me tied to a bed, and for hours I thought I had lost you. Do you know how that feels? To have everything you’ve ever wanted just walk out? I came to realise just how dangerous you are to me. Just how easily you can break me in half. That’s why I can’t let you leave.”
About the Author:
Born in Melbourne Australia, Jacinta Maree considers herself a chocoholic with an obsession with dragons, video gaming and Japan. She writes a variety of genres including YA paranormal, steampunk, horror, new adult, dystopian and fantasy. Winner of 2014 Horror of the year and bestselling author, Jacinta writes to bring enjoyment to others while fulfilling her own need to explore the weird and the impossible.
You can find her here:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/jacinta.maree.10
Deviant art: http://jacintamaree.deviantart.com/
Twitter: jacintamaree6.com
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6448929.Jacinta_Maree
Amazon buy link: http://www.amazon.com/Soulless-Immortal-Gene-Trilogy-Book-ebook/dp/B014ONKO9K/
by
August 14, 2016
Monday Musings Part Twelve: Dying to Live
Dying to Live
How happy we are with ourselves, directly influences how happy we are with the world around us.
If we dislike ourselves, then we will be equally dissatisfied with the things and folks in our lives.
Without first loving ourselves, we cannot ever love anyone else. Not truly. It will always have strings attached—conditions. We will always need something from the other person, or the world at large. That isn’t loving (or living) in its truest sense.
Inadequacy makes us needy. Nothing is ever enough. The trouble is, that’s a bottomless pit that we can never fill. And, in turn, we behave selfishly—usually unintentionally.
Inadvertently, in our neediness and inadequacy, we push away the very thing that we want. In my early twenties, I used to live in such a pit. And if I didn’t receive the love I felt I needed, I became angry. In behaving angrily much of the time, and never feeling satisfied, I pushed away the very thing I craved: Love. Ironically, I lived my life simultaneously pulling toward me and pushing away.
Much of the time, it felt like I had a red-hot iron ball stuck in my throat that I could neither swallow nor spit out. No wonder my life felt uncomfortable and like a bad fit.
At first, I believed that the world had to change. It was the world that was this big, nasty, uncaring place. Only after a couple of years of Zen monastic training, did I realise that, in actual fact, I had to change.
The only way to change my world was to change myself.
In my early life, the ridicule had come from without. However, quite unwittingly, I continued that ridicule into my young-adult life. I turned from victim to perpetrator. What a shock I had when I first realised that. No longer did the people around me bring me down, undermine me, or belittle me. No, I did that all to myself with the things I told myself constantly. I had become my own worst critic.
No way to live.
Only I could change that. Only I could make that choice: Judge/jury/executioner OR Love of my life? Remember, we make our own world, and then we live in it. (See Monday Musings Part Two.)
Change comes from self-love not self-loathing.
Before I could make any progress, I first had to let go of all the negativity I fed myself each and every second of every single day. This involved seeing it, then learning to see it without adding judgement (more negativity, which would just feed the inadequacy), and finally to just leaving it be. I didn’t need to deny it, or smother it, but just accept it without believing it. I learned to live with a new perspective.
What a life-changer.
In effect, I had to die (to my old life) so that I could live life new.
In the wise words of Zen:
‘You, as much as anyone in the universe, deserve your love and respect.’
If you’ve missed my previous Monday Musings, you can find the links here: http://www.harmonykent.co.uk/category/monday-musings/
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The Lost Bow Blog Tour
Hello everyone! It gives me great pleasure to host author PH Solomon on his Lost Bow blog tour today!
Take it away PH!
Haunted by his past. Hunted in the present. Uncertain what is real.
Athson has seen things that aren’t there and suffered fits since being tragically orphaned as a child at the hands of trolls and Corgren the wizard. When a strange will mentioning a mysterious bow comes into his possession, he’s not sure it’s real. But the trolls that soon pursue him are all too real and dangerous. And what’s worse, these raiders serve Corgren and his master, the hidden dragon, Magdronu, who are responsible for the destruction of his childhood home. Athson is drawn into a quest for the concealed Bow of Hart by the mystic Withling, Hastra, but Athson isn’t always sure what’s real and who his enemies are. With Corgren and Magdronu involved, Athson must face not only frequent danger but his grasp on reality and the reasons behind his tragic past.
Introduction
The Bow of Destiny is, at its heart, an adventure quest to find a special bow. Where is it? Who has it? Why is truly special? Is the main character meant to possess it and, if so, to what end?
Few people know anything certain about the bow. The Lost Bow Tour leads you on the path to begin finding out all the secrets that lie in The Bow of Destiny. The world of Denaria is open to everyone to begin discovering answers to the questions and enjoy the adventure of this fantasy quest.
I took my daughter to Harry Potter World earlier this summer for her senior trip. I had a great time watching her have a great time since she’s such a huge fan of the books and movies. With the idea of amusement rides in mind, I thought I’d take readers along for some of the adventures in The Bow of Destiny. And much like the 3D animations on the amusement rides, you can experience how some of these events feel as a participant rather than a reader (though with less visual).
One such event occurs early in the book where a character (no spoilers for those who haven’t read The Bow of Destiny yet) ends up on an unexpected ride. Let’s read how it really feels as you take a similar ride!
A Windy Ride
You stand on a precipice at night where a fire defies wind-gusts that stagger you. Waves break with distant booms far below where you stand.
An old woman rises from fireside, her hair waves a wild dance and she tosses you a package wrapped in burlap. She cackles and leaps about exclaiming, “Done it! Zelma’s done it!”
You are confused and try to hand it back since you don’t know what the package is. It could be anything and you don’t really want to find out. This woman could be crazy!
This Zelma points to you. “This one needs to see!”
Thunder snaps around you and you take step back, suddenly mindful of a sheer drop of hundreds of feet into the night.
You turn to see a vast woodland stretching away from the sea, dappled with the silver light of a full moon and night shadows. With the wind pushing at your body, you take a step back from the breath-stealing edge. After all, this ride has no safety features!
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Merciless talons snag you and snatch you into the air. Zelma’s wild laughter fades into the roar of wind that scours any of your exposed skin. You realize you are screaming and clutch the legs of the massive eagle carrying you.
What is it you see as your legs flail in the empty air? I can’t say what you might see as your life flashes before your eyes but in this tale several images race past you.
A knife-blade flashes in dim light. Once! Twice! And you see it hover, dripping blood before it fades.
You see another old woman peering at you from her fire in the night. Next, there’s a young woman riding into the night and you’re not quite sure but she seems sad.
Then shadow sweeps over the land like storm-clouds. Yet within the approaching shadow’s edge a prick of fire gouges the night and shadow, larger with each burst.
The eagle screams and banks from the fire at the last moment.
Tattered wings snap beneath you. In that passage of a moment, with the writhing tail disappearing you realize that was a dragon! Really a dragon! With fire!
Eyes shut, you scream into the heedless wind. Enough of this! This ride has nothing to keep you from falling let alone being scorched at best or eaten alive at worst!
Then the eagle releases you!
You hardly drop any distance but do take a hard fall. Should have kept your eyes open. You stand and brush yourself off only to find there are no eagle and no dragon. There’s just the wind, surrounding trees and the pinnacle of rock soaring into the moonlit sky.
I hope you enjoyed the ride. I mean REALLY enjoyed the ride because when it happens to a character it’s wild and dangerous. But when it really happens to you, well, as they say, it’s all fun and games…
Where You Can Get It
Book 1 of The Bow of Hart Saga: The Bow of Destiny can be found at these online retailers: Barnes & Noble, , iBooks, Amazon – Kindle & Smashwords. See the book trailer.
About the Author
H. Solomon lives in the greater Birmingham, AL area where he strongly dislikes yard work and sanding the deck rail. However, he performs these duties to maintain a nice home for his loved ones as well as the family’s German Shepherds. In his spare time, P. H. rides herd as a Computer Whisperer on large computers called servers (harmonica not required). Additionally, he enjoys reading, running, most sports and fantasy football. Having a degree in Anthropology, he also has a wide array of more “serious” interests in addition to working regularly to hone his writing. The Bow of Destiny is his first novel-length title with more soon to come.
Contact
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Wattpad | Amazon Author | Email
Sign-up to receive my free ebooks today.
This tour hosted on behalf of 4Wills Publishing
by
August 8, 2016
The Grass Sweeper God
Please help me give a warm welcome to author Doug Howery and his Historical Fiction novel, The Grass Sweeper God. Doug will be awarding a $25.00 Amazon GC and an autographed copy of the book to one randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Please note geographical restrictions apply. United States only for the physical prize. For his other tour stops and more chances to win, please click on the banner above, which will take you to his Goddess Fish tour page
Sixteen-year-old Smiley Hanlon is a young woman tethered to a young man’s body. In the 1950’s Appalachia coal fields of Solitude, Virginia, Smiley is placed in the “Mentally Retarded Class” because he is effeminate and wears a blouse and saddle shoes to school.
Smiley is backed by his best friend, Lee Moore who protects Smiley from a father and many townspeople who hate him. Smiley has dreams of becoming an entertainer. Raised by his aunt in a juke joint, as a child Smiley sings and dances on the Formica bar top into the wee hours. Chosen as the female lead, Dorothy, in a new town production called Dorothy of Oz Coal Camp, his dream is being realized. The triumph of the play and his dream is sabotaged by his father and classmate bullies culminating in a tragic and horrific moment that changes both Smiley and Lee, forever.
Smiley and Lee flee to NYC. They learn that prejudice is prejudice whether in the coal fields of Virginia or on the streets of NYC. Smiley suffers at the hands of his real mother who is a religious zealot. She tries to change who Smiley is because he is a boil on the body of Christ. Lee suffers at the hands of psychologists who practice Aversion Therapy-electric shock treatment to cure his homosexuality.
What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Both Smiley and Lee become forces of change as do countless others. In 1969, Smiley Hanlon and his friend, Lee emerge as leaders of a gay revolution, the historical Stonewall Riots. The riots are vicious but the real battle will be won or lost on another continent: Solitude, Virginia.
The Grass Sweeper God is a force of nature that flows through all things…straightens out that which is bent…which is sick…
From the author:
My Novel, “The Grass Sweeper God” Book Discussion
It may be clichéd to state this, but prose is our baby, our child that we send out into the world. We wait around to see if we’ve raised that child right. And what comes back to us in the form of rejection or acceptance does affect us on so many different levels. It does speak to the core of our being.
As an author, I will never forget my very first Amazon book review. The perceptive, insightful and thought provoking review literally brought me to tears as I read it.
I gasped and immediately choked up as I read the very first lines:
‘“The Grass Sweeper God” is a hard book to read, harder still to imagine someone living it. Ripped from the heart of what can only be an echo of personal experience and pain, this account speaks of unsinkable souls, lost identities and struggling to be who you are meant to be…”’
Heather had nailed it. She went straight to the core of the story, straight to the core of the premise. I knew she had actually read the book. I knew it had affected her in more than a precursory way. Up and until that point, my story had never been validated by the public.
I’ve often wondered what if my very first Amazon review had been negative as I later experienced. How would that have affected me? I like to think that I am strong with a thick hide. However, after my initial reaction to her beautiful review, I discovered just how vulnerable I am to critiques when it comes to my prose. I’d like to say I’m vulnerable to emotion because the story is so personal to me because of my mother’s suicide. The story is based upon her suicide in 1982.
The following is an excerpt of my book, “The Grass Sweeper God” that reflects and parallels the visceral feelings of “acceptance” and, or “rejection” when we send our children out into the world in “book” form or real life:
Exceprt:Lettie sat on the twin bed with the gun and the letter in her lap. She noticed Brac’s graduation picture sitting on the nightstand. She turned it face down. She placed the love letter from Brac’s lover on top of his graduation picture. She placed Ted’s bankbook, her letter to Ted, her cat-eyeglasses and dentures beside Brac’s turned-down picture. She lay down on the bed. She stretched out and placed the gun at her side and stared at the ceiling. She thought about her children. She had never owned them, never owned herself, and now they could choose their own road in life. But she could choose when to exit this world and how. She had to get out of her head, out of her heart. Tears like the mistakes she had made in life flowed down her face. She put the gun under her ribs and pulled the trigger.
About the Author:
DOUG HOWERY has been writing both fiction and essays since 1990. His essays and familial stories have appeared in The Blue Ridge Lambda Press.
In many of his stories, as in “The Grass Sweeper God,” Mr. Howery’s true lode, his font of inspiration is in the passion and suffering he has experienced.
Author, Doug Howery penned the novel with insight into his own struggle for sexual identity and personal tragedy. His mother committed suicide in 1982, blaming her two sons’ sexual identity in a letter and declaring herself a martyr for intolerance and social bigotry. She referred to her own sons as “Gutter Rats that Could Rot in Hell” and represents the hate and mistrust that have plagued society.
Suspense author, Maggie Grace, with the North Carolina Writers’ Network writes about her cohort Mr. Howery: “What I like is the riskiness, the cutting edge of the narrative voice we hear. The moments when he lapses into descriptions of the moon, of the horse, etc. are true poetry that offers some relief from the coarseness of the story, and he places them well. He has an ear for the rhythm of the story, a natural sense of when to end–hangs fire with a new way of looking at someone or something, turning the entire chapter on its ear. I like the way he makes it impossible for the reader to stop reading at the end of the chapter.”
Mr. Howery lives in Virginia with his partner of 34 years where he is at work on his next novel.
Links:
Buy @ Amazo n: https://www.amazon.com/Grass-Sweeper-God-Doug-Howery-ebook/dp/B00JMVE036?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0
Twitter:
https://www.twitter.com/@dhowery1
Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8087260.Doug_Howery
Facebook:
Book Website:
Book Video Trailer:
Linkedin:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/doug-howery-90bb975a
by
August 7, 2016
Monday Musings Part Eleven: Reining in Rage
Reining in Rage
Each of us has ground rules for living. And when those rules get broken, we become angry. The level of our anger depends wholly upon our perception of how unreasonable the rule breakage is; or, put another way, on our perception of how things should be. Not only that, but our response comes from our perception of the disparity between the ideal and the actual.
The trouble is, not everyone plays by the same rules, and the universe most certainly doesn’t. Funnily enough (and this may shock some of you), in this context, optimism works against us. If we expect something to go wrong (for example, we expect it to rain and ruin the barbeque) then we are unlikely to get angry; most probably we will feel saddened or let-down but not too surprised.
However, if we feel optimistic about something and yet it doesn’t pan out, then our disappointment will be all the greater. And, the stronger the original emotion, the more likely we are to become angry.
Why is this?
Well, anger is only ever a ‘masking’ emotion. Don’t get me wrong, it is very real. What I’m saying is that it never comes in isolation. Anger needs a companion. So, whenever you feel angry, try to see what the underlying emotion is … are you hurt? Disappointed? Feeling hard done by? Etc.
While in some situations, you may get punished for your anger, your anger will always punish you.
And, when we get down to the brass tacks (the bare bones), our suffering comes down to us. It is totally based upon our perception and conditioning. From the perspective of the brain and its neurons, which in turn will release a chemical cocktail into the bloodstream, we have a simple formula: If they fire together, they wire together.
What does this mean for us?
In simple terms, if we continually react to a certain stimulus (fire together—A+B), then over time, those connections (A+B) will wire together (giving us C). We will always respond to the same thing in the same way because that has become a hard-wired habit. Once they’ve wired together, it can feel almost impossible to un-fuse them. So, the sooner we break the cycle, the easier it is to achieve change.
As with any habit or addiction, though, it isn’t impossible. Difficult, for sure, but not insurmountable.
The next time something annoys you, stop and look at it. Look at the external that has provided the trigger. Then, turn your gaze within and see what the story is that you’re telling yourself. It will be there, just that you may have to dig a bit to see it. It’s hard work seeing our own stuff, and far easier to observe other people. Stick with it.
Once you’ve identified your thought patterns, try a little experiment. Change your story. Try viewing the situation from a completely different viewpoint. How does that change your emotions? Your reaction?
As a writer, I change ‘reality’ all the time. I take an image (whether imagined or real) and make up as many different scenarios as I can about that image. It’s a great exercise for fuelling my creativity, but also, the knock-on effect is showing me how many other possible stories are out there, other than just my individual perspective.
Just as important as seeing our thought-patterns and changing them, is allowing the original emotion. Often, it is easier to drown in the anger because it prevents us from having to face the hurt, despair, betrayal, pain, etc. If we can sit with the trigger emotion, we will have more chance of keeping a rein on our anger.
Also, it is valuable to keep one eye on the bigger picture, which keeps things in perspective. How important is it in comparison to world events? Will it affect the life of your neighbour, for example? Or is it much smaller than that?
Within that picture, notice your imperfections. Not a single one of us is perfect. Rather than wasting time looking for faults in others, do something useful with your time by seeing and correcting your own.
In the wise words of Zen:
‘Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.’
If you’ve missed my previous Monday Musings, you can find the links here: http://www.harmonykent.co.uk/category/monday-musings/
August 4, 2016
Clementina
Hi folks! It gives me great pleasure today to introduce author Simon Cann and his Crime Thriller novel, Clementina. During this tour, ONE randomly chosen winner via rafflecopter will win a $50 Amazon/BN.com gift card. For more chances to win and for Simon’s other tour stops, please click on the banner above, which will take you to his Goddess Fish tour page
Leathan Wilkey has been hired to babysit Clementina, a seventeen-year-old whose rich daddy is going through a messy divorce and is over-compensating.
Leathan soon tires of her spending habits, her selfie obsession, and her social media preoccupation as his ward drags him from shop to boutique to jeweler, approaching each with the self-possession that comes from a lifetime of getting her own way and never once having to worry about money.
But when Clementina snaps her fingers and her boyfriend doesn’t come running, something is up. He doesn’t appear because he’s been murdered.
When Leathan investigates, he finds that the boyfriend has no background and met Clementina through a connection made by daddy’s business partner.
Daddy’s business partner who has been slowly and progressively putting daddy in a vice, grabbing more of the business, and who is now menacing Clementina directly to manipulate daddy.
Excerpt:
Johnson McElroy and Orville Michael Mallet seemed pleased to have fixed a problem. A problem where I was having trouble understanding what really made it a problem.
The two men—one groomed to look like a logical and rational arguing machine; the other determined to display his individual creativity, which looked exactly the same as everyone else’s individual creativity—shook my hand at the door.
“You know the way out,” I said, as if I had a clue. I only knew how to enter and leave if I was driven by Reece.
The two headed for the elevator and I made my way through the cavernous entrance hall back to the open living space and the kitchen area. The kitchen area, which had more floor space than most apartments I had lived in.
“I should have a word with Clementina,” I said to Angeline Bautista, the housekeeper who had remained invisible while the two company men had been present.
“She’s gone out,” said the housekeeper.
“When?”
“While you talked.”
“Where?”
She shrugged.
“What did Reece say?”
She looked confused.
“Reece—the driver. What did he say?”
The confusion remained. “Nothing.”
“But he must have said something when he came up.”
“He didn’t come up,” she said.
“She went to him?” I could feel the hesitation in my speech as my brain tried to catch up with the situation and make sure my language was unambiguous for the non-native English speaker.
“No. She went out on her own,” said Angeline.
“When?”
“While you talked,” she said with greater emphasis.
“How long ago?”
She tilted her head from side to side. “Ten minutes?” she said. More a question than a statement.
I pulled out my phone and called Reece. “Does Clementina go out on her own?”
“Nope,” said Reece. “Daddy says no.”
“Well, she has.”
Reece swore under his breath. “I’ll be up.”
About the Author:
Simon Cann is the author of the Boniface, Montbretia Armstrong, and Leathan Wilkey series of books.
In addition to his fiction, Simon has written a range of music-related and business-related books, and has also worked as a ghostwriter.
Before turning full-time to writing, Simon spent nearly two decades as a management consultant, where his clients included aeronautical, pharmaceutical, defense, financial services, chemical, entertainment, and broadcasting companies.
He lives in London.
Website: http://simoncann.com
The book will be free on Amazon from Monday 25 July to Friday 29 July (inclusive).
B/N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/clementina-simon-cann/1123925440
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Clementina-Leathan-Wilkey-Book-1-ebook/dp/B01FZJEDW6/ref=sr_1_6
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/simoncannauthor
Twitter: http://twitter.com/simonpcann
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August 1, 2016
RRBC Back to School Book & Blog Block Party!
Hello, and welcome to Harmony’s place! Wow, what a blast we’re having this whole month! Come and join the party … RRBC Back to School Book & Blog Block Party all through August! That’s right, we’re partying for a whole month. Links for the other party places are on the RRBC website
On today’s stop, you’ve landed in Cozy Cornwall in the UK
Prizes I’m Giving Away Today!!!
ONE Amazon Gift Card of $10.00 (or £10 if in the UK!)
ONE free copy of winner’s choice of one of my e-books!
Your Blog/Website advertised in the back of my next book!!!
Number of winners for this stop: 3!
To be in it to win it, be sure to leave a comment!
Okay, so you all know me as a nice girl, right? Until you read my books, that is, lols!
The things in my head scare even me sometimes
Yep, I’m afraid I’m not the sweet little thing you all thought … I’ve killed people (plenty, in fact), brought evil to the tranquil Forest of Dean, and gotten up to all sorts in some sexy Interludes!
If I haven’t scared you off yet, you can read on for a quick peek at each of my books and where to find the murder, sexy times, and general mayhem!
You will find two of my books on upcoming Kindle Countdown Deals!
Interludes
My latest book
A collection of short erotic fiction that will tickle more than your taste buds and wet more than your appetite.
With a range of genres and styles, this book has enough steam for everyone.
GREY MANCHESTER—contemporary romance in 1000 words. Will Nadine choose to drop her knife or her knickers?
DOUBLE TROUBLE—ménage a trois in 2000 words. After a dry spell, Sophia gets more than she bargained for with a solicitor and a teacher.
DRAGON KISSED—shifter romance in 3000 words. Jenna’s life is fairly run of the mill until she has a flying accident. With a dragon. All is not as it seems in this fiery romance.
TRYST—contemporary romance in 4000 words. Polly pushes the boundaries on a workplace night out.
LOVE ON THE CORNISH LINE—contemporary romance in 5000 words. Becky falls flat on her face, and madly in love. Her weekly commute home proves to be anything but routine.
THE INLAW—contemporary romance in 6000 words. At 43, amputee Carla never expected in her wildest dreams to be called a MILF by a hot young stud. Trouble is, he’s her son in law’s brother. And young enough to be her son. Sparks fly when she’s caught with her hands in the biscuit tin.
NIGHT NURSE—contemporary romance in 7000 words. Denise has only weeks left to live. What constitutes life, though? What fills the yawning hours of empty days? Who are you once the chemo and the cancer have stripped you bare? What to do?—Go out on a slow fizzle, or with a big bang?
OVERBOARD—contemporary romance in 8000 words. When Stella falls overboard in the middle of the Pacific, she gets more than she bargained for. Sharks and storms not withstanding.
ALIEN LIAISON—alien romance in 9000 words. When the military transport, Lunas Two, crash lands on Zorth, Jay is given the job of liaising with the locals. She’s seen plenty of aliens in her four years of service, but never one as finger licking good as Lemo. How far will she have to go to keep the peace?
SAVING FACE—historical romance in 10,000 words. Non-related step brother and sister, David and Annalise, break all the rules in this steamy historical romance. Forced to live apart from the love of her life and into an arranged and loveless marriage, Annalise has to grow up fast. When all is lost, will she be able to save face?
READER ADVISORY: This book contains explicit sex scenes and language hot enough to melt your Kindle. For mature readers only.
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
Interludes will be on a Kindle Countdown deal at just 0.99 from 26th August through to midnight 28th August!
Slices of Soul is a collection of contemporary poetry from author Harmony Kent that will both delight and call for deeper reflection. ‘Phantoms’ gives a gritty account of pain that you can never catch. ‘Enough’ expresses the contentment of Zen. ‘Diamonds’ shows the beauty to be found on a drab and rainy day. While ‘The Alchemist’ shows you how a guitar can turn lead into gold. This wonderful arrangement of fifty poems takes you from the abstract of Zen to the melody of music, and will reach into your mind, your heart, and your soul.
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
Finding Katie
I killed someone, you see. I killed the girl, who used to be me.
I’m Kate … Kate Charlesworth. I’m seventeen, and self-harming. This time I cut too deep, and I’m in hospital. I hadn’t meant for it to be so bad—it just sort of happened. I needed a lot of distraction that day.
You’ve had bad days, right? Days it hurts too much to think. Days you just wanna stay in bed. Days when the world needs to go away for a while. Right?
What do you do when you’ve hit rock bottom? When there’s nowhere left to turn?
This one little mistake lands me back on a psych unit—the last place I wanna be. Only this time, the nurse I end up with isn’t content to stick on a band-aid and send me home. She wants me to face my demons. But to do that, I’ll have to face who I am … who I used to be … I’ll have to find Katie.
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
Polish Your Prose is a powerful guide that gives essential editing tips for authors. Lots of books have been written on the art of writing, and here—at last—is a guide that will teach you the essential techniques of 
editing your own book. This will help you turn a promising manuscript into a published novel. And, it does this without the jargon. You don’t need to know all the grammatical terms in order to make use of this book. You don’t need to know the definition of a split infinitive, a comma splice, or a ‘to be’ verb, as this manual explains these in detail in easy to understand terms, and a lively and engaging style.
Chapters on Passive Writing, Tense, Point of View, Dialogue, and other techniques take you through the same processes an editor would go through to polish and perfect your manuscript. Good writing is nothing without good editing. Learn the secrets of good editing and writing with this essential author reference, which offers so much more for so much less.
Harmony Kent is an award winning author, and accomplished editor and proofreader. Her passion is helping Indie Authors to successfully achieve their goals and dreams.
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
Polish Your Prose will be on a Kindle Countdown deal at just 0.99 from 5th August through to midnight 8th August!
Elemental Earth
(The Mysteries:
Book 1)
YA Fantasy Fiction
“You turned the god of gnomes into a garden ornament?”
Sarah looked closely, but couldn’t tell if her dad was annoyed or amused—perhaps he was both …
Whilst 15 year old Sarah may be struggling to regain her feet, after being ripped from her everyday mundane life and ending up in a whole new dimension, she still knows how to have a bit of fun along the way. The Earth Elemental isn’t the only one whose feathers she manages to ruffle, and it’s only been four days. Meanwhile, her best friend is missing, and big trouble is brewing. She soon has a lot more to worry about than what happened to her phone or iPod, or even how much of an idiot Caleb obviously thinks she is.
Elemental Earth is the first book in The Mysteries series, and is aimed at Young Adults. Even if you’ve already reached an age where the young ones might call you ‘old enough’, if you’re still young at heart then you’re bound to enjoy these books just as much as the next—err—younger adult.
Age aside, perhaps we should be more worried about what further havoc Sarah’s antics might be about to wreak on the universe as we know it? We’d probably all be sleeping a lot more soundly if she’d only stuck to applied maths and the odd pillow fight. But no, sadly the lure of the proverbial rabbit hole proved just a tad too much. And now she’s taken the plunge, there’s no turning back.
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
The Glade
“Readers who like to curl up during the long winter evenings and feel the delicious chill of fear running up and down their spines need only turn to The Glade to have all their expectations fulfilled.
The Glade is a horror story in the mould of Stephen King, and rendered the more so by its faint echoes of Pet Cemetery and the even stronger resonance of the pervasive malignancy of It.” —Review by Brian O’Hare
This gripping, edge-of-your-seat mystery/thriller will have you thinking twice about booking that idyllic cottage in the country. Nothing in this woodland paradise within the Forest of Dean is what it seems.
The Wenstrops have it all: health, wealth, and happiness. Until everything falls apart. Helen gets arrested for murder, and yet is either unable or unwilling to give a defence. During her detention, vital evidence goes missing and tensions run high.
Meanwhile, in the woods, malignant forces gather power.
This sensational second novel by acclaimed author Harmony Kent will have you alternately laughing, crying, and gripping the edge of your seat as this roller-coaster ride of a plot unfolds. It will keep you guessing through its many twists and turns, and hijack your attention right up until you turn the final page. This book has it all: murder, intrigue, the supernatural, a broken marriage, a love affair, courage against impossible odds, suspense, and high drama.
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
The Battle for Brisingamen
My first book
There is a World not too Far Away …
Beneath the north sea a land of magic lies undetected. The lives of many are drawn inexorably closer together in a race against time, as both energy companies and evil beings attempt to destroy the magic which is protecting not just this land but all worlds. The unwitting protagonists have no idea of how suddenly and irrevocably their lives are about to change.
It is a race against time to try and recover the lost necklace, Brisingamen, which holds the ancient power of the Goddess Freya, and to prevent the undersea drilling from taking place. Are Aart, Matthias, Gemma and Dirck up to the challenges they now must face?
Here there be Dragons, and all manner of Creatures …
AMAZON US and AMAZON UK
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July 31, 2016
Code 3: Finding Safety
Hello and welcome to Harmony’s place today. Please, give a warm welcome to author V E Avance and her Romantic Suspense novel, Code 3: Finding Safety. V E Avance will be awarding a $20 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. For her other tour stops and more chances to win, please click on the banner above, which will take you to her tour page over at Goddess Fish
Leanna Dixon has had enough. She no longer wants to be a punching bag for her husband, Mark. Without a word, she packs her bag and flees from her hell.
Arriving in her new home, things begin to go wrong from the start. Through all the bad she meets James, an Austin Police Officer, who helps her pick up the pieces of her shattered life.
***
Mark Dixon rules his women with an iron fist. When he arrives home and finds his wife has left him, his anger begins to build to dangerous levels. He knows he needs to find her and teach her a lesson, just as his father had done to his mother.
Will Leanna survive or will she become another statistic?
Excerpt:
Leanna slowly begins to stir. Her head feels fuzzy and her body aches. What the hell happened, is the first question that swims through her foggy mind. Her eyes begin to flutter open and she takes in her surroundings.
She’s hung up on a ceiling and just ahead of her is a rotted work bench with whips and chains with branding irons lying across it. Her heart races as she tugs on her bindings only to discover that they are firmly attached to her wrists.
“Well, well, well, look who decided to join the land of the living,” Mark’s voice rings from a corner chair—a chair she missed when she assessed her situation. He rises from the chair and walks toward her, a knife in one hand and a piece of wood in the other. The bastard and his fucking whittling, Leanna thinks to herself with disgust and contempt spreading across her face.
“What are you doing, Mark? Why did you kidnap me?” She shakes her hands trying in vain to get free.
“I didn’t kidnap you. I only took what was rightfully mine. When you married me, you became my property. Only I can rid myself of my property. You,” he gets up in her face, eyes dancing with fury, “don’t get to decide when I’ve had enough of you.”
About the Author:
V.E. Avance lives in California with her husband, 2 kids and 2 fur babies. She graduated from Brandman University with a degree in Psychology. In her free time, she loves to write and read books.
Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/V-E-Avance/e/B00JMLDOEC/
Website:
FaceBook:
Code 3: Finding Safety buy links:
US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B016XEYKEI
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B016XEYKEI
CA: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B016XEYKEI
AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B016XEYKEI
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