COVER REVEAL: Love, Marriage, and Other Disasters by Shilpa Suraj

~ Cover Reveal ~
Love, Marriage, and Other Disasters
by Shilpa Suraj

About the Book:

She believes in love, family and…squiggles!

Alisha Rana is not your typical single desi girl. For one, she is on the wrong side of 30.  For another, she is divorced. And last but definitely not least, she is still, gasp, a virgin!

Alisha doesn’t want much. But what she does want is that elusive thing all women search for – A man who gets her…but a man who gets her hot! She calls it “feeling the squiggle.”

Enter Dr. Vivaan Kapoor, cute, hot, squiggle-worthy. The younger brother of her cousin's prospective groom, he’s got the squiggle factor in spades. The only catch? He's never been married and is years younger than Alisha. Basically, completely off-limits.

And then there is Arjun. Widowed, older than her by the right number of years and a genuinely nice guy. He's Vivaan’s cousin and a so-called perfect match for Alisha. The problem is, Alisha’s squiggle-o-meter refuses to budge for him.

What will Alisha choose? A lifetime together with the 'right' man or a chance at happiness with the 'wrong' one?

About Shilpa Suraj:

Shilpa Suraj wears many hats - corporate drone, homemaker, mother to a fabulous toddler and author.

An avid reader with an overactive imagination, Shilpa has weaved stories in her head since she was a child. Her previous stints at Google, in an ad agency and as an entrepreneur provide colour to her present day stories, both fiction and non-fiction.

Shilpa on the Web:

Website * Facebook * Twitter * Instagram

COVER REVEAL: Murder in the Chowdhury Palace by Sharmishtha Shenoy

~ Cover Reveal ~
Murder in the Chowdhury Palace
by Sharmishtha Shenoy

About the Book:

What if someone you loved... was murdered? How far would you go to bring a killer to justice?

Orphaned in her childhood, Durga has always longed for wealth, security and, above all, a sense of belonging. She finds it all when she marries Debnarayan Chowdhury, heir to an immense, multi-crore estate. But the Chowdhury family has been under a curse that dates back to the British era. The first-born of each generation dies young, purportedly killed by the spirit of Kadambari, a young woman murdered by the notorious Shankar Dakat, the founder of the Chowdhury family and their Zamindari. When her father-in-law Birendranath dies unexpectedly, Durga and Debnarayan come down to the ancestral home in Kakdihi, a small village near Kolkata. The moment Durga enters her new palatial home, she crosses a threshold of terror. She loses her husband within a month of her marriage and finds herself a widow in a house full of strangers. Are Debnarayan’s and Birendranath’s deaths accidental? Everyone in her new family and the neighborhood appear to be friendly. Most of them have a motive to kill her. A well-meaning neighbor tells her, ‘Run from this place. You have no friends here.’ Is she, the current owner of the estate, now on the murderer’s radar?

Read an Excerpt from Murder in the Chowdhury Palace

The trees were denser beyond the pond on the northern side, and the area was unkempt and full of thorny bushes and nettles.  Debu remarked, ‘Not many people venture into the northern part of the woods from this point because the haunted house is less than a mile from here. So this part of the estate is in a rather wild state.’

‘Yes, I can see that nature has completely taken over this part. But still, let’s go there.’ I said excitedly.

‘Some other day…,’ Debu murmured. His face was slightly pale.

‘Debu! You really seem to believe in these ghosts and all that nonsense…,’ I said rather incredulously.

‘No… no… of course not!’ Debu exclaimed.

‘Then prove it! Let’s go and visit the house.’

‘Look… it won’t be very safe. The walls are crumbling, and I am sure that bats have made their home there.’

‘Please, Debu, let’s go, I have never seen a haunted house,’ I said, cajolingly. I gripped his hand and almost dragged him towards the house.

We came upon the abandoned temple first. The plaster was coming off the walls, and the aerial roots of a huge banyan tree had encroached upon the temple and gone in through the walls causing rainwater to leak into the walls and damage them further. The house was located a further quarter kilometer away.

There was a strange, sinister silence all around. Even the birds did not twitter in this part of the woods. The house with its closed shutters and peeling walls was a one-storey medium-sized building. It was dark and uninviting, steeped in shadow due to the jungle of trees that had flourished around it. Darkness echoed and folded upon itself. I walked resolutely to the main door, only to find it locked. 

‘Where is the key to this door?’

‘I don’t think anybody has it.’

I was in a naughty mood. ‘Then let’s break it open. I really want to see what’s inside.’ 

In spite of Debu’s protests, I picked up a heavy rock and hit the rusty lock with it. The lock broke easily.

We stepped inside a large hall. It was full of cobwebs and broken dilapidated furniture. Suddenly, a bat swept past my face. I let out a startled cry and drew back. I would have fallen to the ground had Debu not caught me.

‘Let’s get out of here. You shouldn’t be so adventurous in your present condition. The baby might get hurt,’ he said in a quavering voice. 

‘Oh come on... please Debu…let’s explore a bit more.’

I went further in and switched on the torch of my mobile to see better. At the center of the hall, were the remains of a havan done a long time back. The bricks used for the havan were blackened, charred and crumbling with spiders spinning their webs over the layers of dust. There was a portrait of Shankar Dakat and another of a woman on a wooden platform near which the havan had been performed.

‘This is, of course, Shankar Dakat’s portrait. And this must be Kadambari…,’ I said. ‘Who painted this?’ The painting of Kadambari mesmerized me. She was little more than a young girl in a green sari, worn without a blouse in the traditional fashion. Her big eyes were strangely life-like and sad and her long, thick, curly hair cascaded down her bare shoulders like a cloud.

‘I don’t know who painted this, nor do I care. Let’s go, Durga. I feel really uncomfortable here.’ Debu said a little impatiently. I started coughing because of the dirt. ‘Durga, you know you are allergic to dust. Come away now. I don’t want our baby to get hurt.’ He clutched my hand in a death grip, and almost dragged me out of the house.

The fear in his voice was contagious. Also, to be honest, the life-like painting had spooked me. We hurried back towards the pond. As we almost ran back and neared our home, there was a shout from the ground-floor east-wing balcony. It was Kanak. She shouted, ‘Who goes there?’

About Sharmishtha Shenoy:

Sharmishtha Shenoy is the author of the Vikram Rana Mystery series. The books under the series are “Vikram Rana Investigates,” “A Season for Dying,” “Behind the Scenes” and “Fatal Fallout”. She has also published a book of short stories, “Quirky Tales.”

Her short stories have been published in efiction magazine and Woman’s era. She loves writing murder mysteries, the kind of books that she likes to read. Her favorite authors are Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie. She also likes the work of Satyajit Ray – especially the Feluda Series. 

Before starting to write, she had been an IT professional and had worked in TCS, Satyam, Infosys, and Microsoft. 

She is a big foodie and enjoys Biriyani (both Hyderabadi and Awadhi versions) and rasgullas like most Bengalis. She is also a lusty singer of the bathroom singing variety.

Though she is happily married to Mr. Shenoy in real life, in her fantasy world she is wedded to her creation Vikram Rana.  You can get to her blog by typing the word “Sharmishtha Rana” into Google. No, seriously, try it.

She was born in Calcutta. She is an M Tech from the University of Reading, Great Britain and had received a 100% British Government Scholarship to study there. She lives in Hyderabad.

Sharmishtha on the Web:

Website * Facebook * Twitter * Instagram * YouTube 

Art Journal 2020: Found Poetry (a guest post)

According to Wikipedia, found poetry is a type of poetry created by taking words, phrases, and sometimes whole passages from other sources and reframing them. I spent 2 days exploring this in my art journal, using random pages from a book bound for the recyclers. As a journal, I use a recycled, stitched and bound hardcover fiction book. I glued 3 pages together with acrylic gel medium as I was afraid that the black markers would bleed through. 

I used Dala acrylic gel medium. I usually gesso the pages, but this time, I needed the text. I used Stabilo coloured pencils in the colours pictured above. They are wax based and have excellent blending abilities. Artline 725 and a fine Sharpie were used for the design and the zentangles. Silver washi tape, married the two pages stylistically. Any HB pencil and putty eraser is a must for planning a design. The white pencil depicted is a blender. 

Step 1: Choose the poetry from the text of any book page. You need to know a bit about poetry, especially rhythm. Highlight it by drawing a thick, dark box around it. Next, I drew a leaf design in pencil on the page. I divided the leaf into 7 separate sections, you can choose more or less if you like. Now you are ready to choose zentangle patterns. There are literally millions of patterns with their step outs available on the internet.

Step 2: Draw your zentangles with your Sharpie and fill in the black areas with the Artline pen as they are much cheaper to use in large areas. Make sure that you have no tiny, white areas that are left open, for this you need good lighting.

Step 3: Colour the area around your design with coloured pencils. I used an underlayer of yellow in certain areas and to darken, I used the dark blue tone to depict shadows. The blender was used throughout when I went from darker to lighter areas. Avoid overworking a recycled book art journal. The pages are not high quality, it simply cannot handle too many layers. 

Step 4: Apply Washi tape around the upper and lower edges to marry the two pages. I stencilled the wording on the side of the page. The opposite page was done in exactly the same manner, I merely used coloured pencils within the design itself, as the found poetry got a bit lost. A word of advice- use zentangle patterns with black areas, this will make the found poetry pop. 

The important thing is to have fun with your designs and colours. There are no rules, just your creativity which has no bounds.

Hope you join me next month, when I will be painting a Koi in watered down acrylics, paired with a zentangle whale.

“The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul."

Have a super creative month!

💚 Vanessa

To see more of Vanessa's art follow her on Instagram

Until next time!

💜 Linzé

Guest Post and Giveaway: Francis H. Powell on his latest release

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By some freaky coincidence, a theme that runs through my latest book is happening for real in the world, with the news centered on this dreadful coronavirus outbreak.

My book is called Adventures of “Death, Reincarnation and Annihilation.”

The theme of world annihilation is covered obviously, with the idea of one human or being surviving catastrophic events.

Somebody recently asked  me “why write a book about death”

I suppose it is something that has always fascinated me as well as frightening me.

In my first book, Flight of Destiny, I had a story called the Duke, about a man condemned to death, but treating his own impending demise , with disrespect. I have often had thoughts about the death penalty. It is unmanageable to think your life is due to end at an appointed time. The clock ticking until your life is switched off like a light.

If an author or anybody reads the news, or watches the news on TV they can find themselves thinking the world is facing impending doom.

In 2017 people could imagine the end of the world was upon us as Planet X was to due crash headlong into the world according to "Christian numerologist" David Meade, amongst others.

Thankfully this never came to pass. There must have been some people looking through their telescopes however. It makes me recall the film “Melancholia” by Lars Von Trier.

This Rumanian Baba Vanga, was a woman who got into the news and scared the living daylights out of me. A woman who disappeared in a storm returning blind as well as full of predictions about forthcoming events Brexit, 9/11, the rise of ISIS and the Boxing Day tsunami. 

The world according to Baba finally coming to a sticky end in 2341, as the earth becomes uninhabitable. I think 2341 might be a bit optimistic. The human race is incredibly destructive and in one of my stories in my book The “world there after” talks about a world that is so polluted it is uninhabitable.

 The world was on its final journey towards being obsolete, humans with bodies were now an unnecessary inconvenience in President Tube’s eyes. The world had become unsustainable.

 A vast catastrophic event had seen a previously undetected “super volcano” erupt and now a dense cloak of ash shrouded the world. Large areas were bereft of sunlight, causing an eternal winter. Nothing grew now. All animals had died, in a short period of time. Famine and disease had spread and the world was now the most meagre of existences, threadbare and barren.

In my book, I make the point that world is fragile and needs looking after.

All of this kind of thing in newspapers and on web sites can play heavily on an author’s mind.

My book is not all doom and gloom, there are also elements of wit and there are plenty of quirky happenings and bizarre characters to stop the reader falling into some melancholia.

Somehow despite crack pot leaders, megalomaniacs, unethical businesses, pollution, weapons of mass destruction, the world keeps on turning. Long may it do so.

About the Author

Born in 1961, in Reading, England Francis H Powell attended Art Schools, receiving a degree in painting and an MA in printmaking. In 1995, Powell moved to Austria, teaching English as a foreign language while pursuing his varied artistic interests adding music and writing. He currently lives in Brittany, France writing both prose and poetry. Powell has published short stories in the magazine, “Rat Mort” and other works on the internet site "Multi-dimensions." His two published books are Flight of Destiny and Adventures of Death, Reincarnation and Annihilation

Website * Facebook * Twitter * Amazon * Goodreads

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Book Feature: SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW (an anthology)

Something Old, Something New
- A DRA Production

Seven bestselling authors. Seven incredible second chance romances. One epic anthology. 

What would you do for another chance with the one you love? 

Something Old, Something New - a unique novella anthology - tries to answer this question with fantastic, different, desi dramas. 

Whether it is shapeshifters or shifting interracial relationships, single moms in small towns or rich alpha heroes, friends-to-lovers or passionate ex-husbands; this anthology has something for everyone. 

Something Old, Something New explores the many different facets of love, forgiveness, fated mates and more in seven, distinctly Indian tales!

My Heart's Regret by Shilpa Sure

All they had was love...would it ever be enough?

Samaira Reddy, the girl in the big house, the Bade Sahib's daughter, only wants one thing and one person...a life with her childhood sweetheart, her Rags. 

Raghav Cherukuri has always been known as the driver's son. And has also always loved his Sam, the girl he can never have and never forget. And so, he leaves her and his life in Hyderabad behind.

But now, Raghav is back. A Chief Officer in the Merchant Navy, he is the success he’s always wanted to be. And yet, he has failed. 

Samaira is meeting the ‘perfect groom’ her family approves of…A man whom Raghav can never be.

Can it finally be their time to be together? Or has their happy-ever-after passed them by?

Read an Excerpt from My Heart's Regret

“Why did you leave?” The question shot out of her taking them both by surprise. They stared at each other, a wealth of memories flooding the space between them. Years of hurt, months of pain and a million unspoken words crowded around them.

“Don’t.” He turned away from her, shaking his head. “Don’t do this.”

“Why not? You don’t think I deserve any kind of explanation?” 

He opened the rear door of the car in response. “Are you ready to go home?” 

“Home?” She laughed, a bitter sound that floated in the air. “Is that still home to you?”

“Are you ready to go back to your home?” The slight emphasis felt like a slap across her face.

“And that’s the truth of it, isn’t it?” She watched his face for a clue to his feelings. She found none. He was as stone-faced as ever.

“You don’t think of it as home anymore. When you left, you didn’t just leave to study and start your career. You left everything behind. Your home. Your past. Your…”

“Yes.” His acceptance cut her off mid-rant. “I left it all behind. The poverty. The insults. The humiliation. I left my life here behind.”

“Is that all you left behind?” The words sliced through the night like a knife.

Raghav just stared at her, his eyes a cauldron of bottomless emotion. On a growl of frustration, she slid down from the car and stomped towards the door he still held open. Yanking it from his hand, she slammed it shut. Then she walked around the front of the car to the passenger door and got in.

A storm was coming. A loud rumble of thunder could be heard and the wind was picking up outside the car. It blew a lock of his unruly hair into his eyes. 

He didn’t notice but she did. Even through the tears stinging her eyes, she noticed everything about him. 

Raghav continued to stand, motionless by the rear door, his tightly clenched fists the only evidence of the emotion raging inside him. The first drops of rain started to pelt down drenching him in seconds.

Finally, he moved towards where she was sitting. Leaning down, he rapped on the window to get her to put it down.

Samaira obliged, arching an eyebrow in challenge.

 “Get out.” The words were gritted out through clenched teeth.

“No,” she snapped the word out.

“Go sit in the back seat.”

“No,” she said again as she settled more comfortably into the seat. 

“Sam, if someone sees…”

“Let them.” She couldn’t care less.

“Sam, please.” The plea was quiet, but it sliced through. “For my father’s sake.”

Her heart broke at the words. She swiped at the tear that escaped and rolled down her cheek. Without looking at him, she stepped out of the car and got into the rear seat. 

Raghav slid into the driver’s seat and put the car in gear.

They drove home in silence, each lost in their own tortured thoughts. It wasn’t long before her house loomed in front of them. 

They were almost at the gate when she spoke, “Are you happy?”

His hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Are you?”

She laughed. The mirthless sound echoed between them as Ahmed Chacha waved them through the gates. “You’re not going to answer any of my questions, are you?”

Raghav sighed. “What’s the point of this conversation? Discussing the past is going to bring us nothing but more pain.”

“Alright. Let’s talk about the present. Why did you come back?”

Raghav brought the car to a halt outside her front door. “I came back for my parents.”

“Never for me,” she murmured. “You left me without a second thought.”

Raghav, who was holding her door open, froze at the soft words. She stepped out of the car and around his still form. She wasn’t going to beg him for answers anymore.

“The thing is, Sam,” the whisper reached her through the violent noises of the stormy night, “You left me first.”

About the Author:

Shilpa Suraj wears many hats - corporate drone, homemaker, mother to a fabulous toddler and author.
An avid reader with an overactive imagination, Shilpa has weaved stories in her head since she was a child.
Her previous stints at Google, in an ad agency and as an entrepreneur provide colour to her present day stories, both fiction and non-fiction.

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Art Journal 2020: Amor Fati

This week is the second in the series #JournalArt2020 dealing with the theme of stoicism. This week my entry is about Amor Fati - to love your fate.

1.  Start again with a blank spread, but this entry involves a third page (kept single). There two outer pages were glued together again with gel medium, but there is no painting involved in this entry, so you don't have to glue to outer pages.
I used gel medium, because the pages in this particular book bleeds with the markers and I didn't want that to spoil the other pages.

2.  This entry uses two stencils. The primary design use this tree stencil, but you can use any tree stencil that you like. It just needs to be wide enough to cover at least half of the two pages in the spread.

The second stencil is shown further down.

3.  Use a waterproof pen and draw the stencil outline on the spread close to the middle.
Mark the edge of the stencil (shown here with the green and purple arrows) in pencil.

Cut around the tree but leave enough space at the bottom to cover the tree and tree trunk when the single (middle) page is turned over.

Flip the stencil and draw the tree on the other side.

4.  Here you can see the flip side of the page. 

The pencil marks on the page were used to align the stencil to ensure the overlap is as close as possible. It does not have to be perfect though.

The tree on the left-hand side of the spread is not visible.

The stencil outline was flipped with the tree trunk now leaning the other way.

5.  I used ink and a dry art sponge to colour the pages around the tree, also in between the branches. But I made sure not to cover the lines of the tree itself.

You can also use a dauber or your finger to get the same effect with the ink.

6.  I couldn't get enough coverage with the ink and sponge and decided to use a colour pencil as well. It is a soft pencil and I made sure to hold it fairly horizontal so that it didn't make obvious lines when I used it to fill in the background.

The pencil is almost the exact same shade of green as the ink I used. I was lucky because I didn't plan on using coloured pencils for this entry. I was however, very pleased with the final outcome. Will definitely consider using coloured pencils again.

7.  I used Lyra brush markers in light colours to colour in the tree on the green side of the entry.

The tree trunk was done with a brown marker, and I used the same brown marker on the other side of the page.

This side symbolises the lighter (happier) side of life.

8.  I made the right-hand side of the design in purple. Using ink on the edges with the dry sponge, and then used two coloured pencils for the colouring in the rest of the pages around the tree.

Then I coloured the tree with dark colours from the Lyra brush marker set.

This side symbolises the heavier (difficult or challenging) side of life.

9.  The pencils: Koh-I-Noor Hardmuth Progresso Yellowish Green, French Pink, and Bordeaux Red.

The inks: Distress Ink Twisted Citron, and Seedless Preserves.

10.  Add the text "Amor Fati" to the green side with a waterproof pen.
I drew circles in random sizes around the green side and coloured them with the same light coloured Lyra brush markers you saw in (7).

The circles were done with a stencil (11).

11.  Repeat the circles on the purple side of the design and colour with the darker brush pens shown in (8)

I did not colour all the circles in the purple entry, to add to the symbolism of emptiness or difficult times in life.

The stencil is shown here.

The words "love your fate" is added to the purple side and shown in (10)

The final design with two quotes from Epictetus added with the

black UniBall waterproof pen (0.8mm nib)

"Don't seek for everything to happen as you wish it, but rather wish that everything happens as it actually will--then your life will flow well." ~Epictetus

"It is easy to praise providence for anything that may happen if you have two qualities: a complete view of what has actually happened in each instance, and a sense of gratitude. Without gratitude what is the point of seeing, and without seeing what is the object of gratitude?" ~Epictetus

Until the next instalment in this series!
Be creative and love your life, just the way it is.

💜 Linzé

Managing ideas: a new method for me

  This year I have been trying new things, and that includes managing those new ideas. I have often read and heard people say to you should carry a notebook with you to jot down that "idea" that pops into your head at the oddest times. To be honest, I have done and said the same thing for many years. My problem is, that most of my ideas strike when I am writing in my journal and then those ideas get lost because I don't make the effort to rewrite them in that ideas notebook of mine.

Notebook, pen and bag

  About two weeks ago I came across a website about this very thing, but it is a touch more comprehensive than keeping a notebook. It is called the Zettelkasten method and it uses cards for noting down those ideas. I have tried cards in the past too, but they have never quite worked for me. What I liked about this method, is that the system caters for follow-up ideas and notes, without having to use bigger cards, or more notebooks to keep your notes together.
  Since I have been trying it for only about two weeks, I have not yet found anything not to like about it, but to be honest have not used it that much either. Not for because I lack ideas, but I am focused on #inktober52 mostly and immediately sit down to sketch my idea(s) since the deadline is a week away and there is not time to waste if I want to keep up.
  More on this method as I use it, but give the Zettelkasten method a try, it might just be thing you have been looking for.
  Speaking of new things. It is Valentines Day this week, and if the blog host sends me the info in time, there is a new book for you to explore this Friday. 
  Also a new #JournalArt2020 post on Thursday, and my next newsletter is out tomorrow with something special for subscribers.

But now it's time for me to go see to a few chores in preparation for the week ahead.

Until next time!
💜 Linzé