Monday 17 February 2014
Saturday 15 February 2014
Fantastic February Blog Tour - Tempest
We must overcome and
prevail ...
King Raemon of
Medeisia is slaughtering tattooed scribes and mages, forcing them
into hiding. All marked and those
associated with them are destroyed. The people are desperate. Months
after challenging Raemon,
the marked rebels of Medeisia must rise against their bloodthirsty
king or chance being annihilated.
Sixteen year-old
Drastona Consta-Mayria is the prophesied phoenix of peace, desperate
to be a leader for her people
despite her reservations. Following the lead of a scarred and
forgotten prince, Drastona will embark on a
journey with an unlikely band of rebels and a dragon across a cursed
desert to bring down a king and save
a kingdom.
Thursday 13 February 2014
Fantastic February Blog Tour - Tolomay's World and The Pool of Light
NEW ADULT/FANTASY/ROMANCE FANTASY 17+
Excerpt
“Peace of life,” said the chideman as he poured the blue water from the glass urn into the pool. It was surreal.
“Peace of life.” My response was automatic.
My heart pounded. For thirteen years I’d trained for this. Still I was not ready. The machine’s copper pipes gave off a warm smell that drifted to my nostrils as if precious biscuits were baking in the eating room. The calming scent only made it worse. I was leaving.
On display before every citizen in the community, my bare feet stepped the few inches further to the edge of the pool. Fear haunted my mind. Shivering from head to toe caused my short golden dress to tickle at the tops of my thighs. I brushed away the itch. Goose bumps peppered my arms and legs. I was freezing. For a moment, the massive musics and sounds on the stage overwhelmed me. I was small in comparison to everything here, all present and to this wondrous event.
Through dazed thoughts, my focus returned and I remembered to count to three before placing my foot in the shallow liquid.
With eyes watering, my every heartbeat echoed in my ears. Never again would my father’s eyes look upon me.
Never again would I feel his warm embrace. I would so miss his gentle, loving voice. How would I bear it? I fought my great desire to turn and dart to him, or steal a look as he sat in his chair upon the stage. Instead, I kept my step.
There would not be another last goodbye. We already said it, and he wanted just the one. It would be my greatest honor to him to leave with the dignity, respect, and position he bestowed upon me, to act older than my meager thirteen years. I had to be brave and pave the way for the others, as he had instructed.
The tears nearly choked me as I quietly sniffed them back. I could scarcely see, but chose not to rub the wet away. Everyone would notice. More would only follow and my eyes would be closed soon enough. The time had arrived. This was no longer wholly my choice. I was being led by my duty and so had to control my emotions for these last few seconds.
The immaculate stage held static, causing the miniscule hairs on my head to stand on end. They reached toward the beautiful colored glass of the cathedral roof in the pod community’s grandest room, as if they too wanted to stay. The urge to run, to escape, consumed me, yet I betrayed my heart, followed my learned directions, and kept my course.
No matter the logic and knowledge in my head, nothing had prepared me for this feeling of claws tearing me apart from the inside out. I fought off the nausea.I could not be ill, not in front of the community while representing my father.
The crystal and copper Pool of Light lay before the five of us, with solar panels running from floor to ceiling as the toner’s chorus continued to sing behind us. The brilliant round majesty beneath my feet, only six inches deep, held the key to our futures and to what would become the whole of humanity.We were taking these steps for everyone. Once we left, we could never return home.
Tarron had ordered that we space ourselves just two paces separated, one behind the next. The four older candidates followed behind me, the taste of anticipation mingling with the hum of energy that filled the great room. My mind whirled.
‘Keep walking forward… do not turn around,’ father’s words echoed in my head.
I was horrified. Chills took residence up and down my spine, causing me to shake further. How would my days unfold without him by my side? How could I leave him alone? My heart was dying.
Author Bio
twitter @MichaelLorde
facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AuthorMichaelLorde.
Tolomay's World Website: http://paperairplanespublis.wix.com/tolomaysworld
Author website: http://paperairplanespublis.wix.com/authormelorde
Blog: http://michaelordeauthor.blogspot.com/
Author central: https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/profile
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/6929833-michael-lorde
Publishers website: www.paperairplanespublishing.com
Author Bio
Author
M.E. Lorde grew up in the rural community of Victor, NY, surrounded
by farms, orchards, vineyards in neighboring towns, and beautiful
scenic views of lakes, mountains and canyons. Her great grandmother
was Iroquois Indian, whose family was deeply rooted in the Great
Seneca Nation, upstate New York. The author’s great-great
grandfather, whose family was from Great Britain, was a major
contributor toward the ‘Statue of Liberty’s’ pedestal in New
York City. A man and a woman from two different worlds met, fell in
love and married and a family was torn apart. But alas, life goes on.
M.E.’s great grandmother and great grandfather married. An
interesting tidbit- at one point they became great friends with and
then great friends and confidants with author Zane Grey, who from the
early to mid 1900’s wrote dozens of books, many Historical and
Western. Rumor has it that you will find the author’s great
grandmother in at least one.
An
avid reader since childhood (as well as an artist), M.E. has been
writing since she could hold a pencil. She wrote and bound her own
book by hand at the age of ten. Though books have always been a
passion, Lorde put writing on hold to raise four children while
working in other fields which include a career in law enforcement as
well as a director position at a technical college. With much
encouragement from friends and family, she finally decided to follow
her real passion and pursue writing full-time. With her newest
release of the Tolomay’s World series, she has found her audience,
hitting Amazon’s best sellers list in adventure/romance and
adventure/fantasy in December of 2013 as #1 Action &
Adventure/Romanceand #3 Action & Adventure/Fantasy(Tolomay’s
World and The Pool of Light- the first novel in the seven Novel
series).
Her
time is currently divided between quality time with her daughter,
writing, and activities with Indie authors, artists and a civic
theatre. She loves to travel and has seen thirty nine states up close
and personal, and lived in four. While M.E. enjoys the excitement and
bustle of city life, she remains a country girl at heart.
facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AuthorMichaelLorde.
Tolomay's World Website: http://paperairplanespublis.wix.com/tolomaysworld
Author website: http://paperairplanespublis.wix.com/authormelorde
Blog: http://michaelordeauthor.blogspot.com/
Author central: https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/profile
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/6929833-michael-lorde
Publishers website: www.paperairplanespublishing.com
Tuesday 11 February 2014
Guest Post: The Battle for Time by Natalie Rivener
As a stay-at-home mom
(of a toddler), it’s really a serious challenge to find the time to write. If
my (adorable) little girl isn’t awake and demanding time/food/love/a change of
diaper, I need to do the laundry, make dinner, pack away toys and projects,
feed the cat, feed myself, prepare my dance classes for the week (I teach), get
in some exercise…or at least a little yoga, spend a few minutes with my husband
(usually, we just lie semi-comatose in front of the TV) and then catch a few
winks before the next day comes around.
You’re probably
thinking that it can’t be that bad. You do a lot of these things after a full
day at work. But, let me tell you this, trying to do everything on that list in
the few moments that your little bundle of love actually takes that one golden
nap in the afternoon is no picnic. When your child is awake, you have to stop
the little monster from maiming themself, you have to get food into them, get them
clean, supervise as they eat some dirt in the garden, keep the cat from mauling
them, get in some educational time (learning words and all that), play with
them and battle with the little squirt to get them down for a nap.
So, how do I get
anything done? It’s all about learning how to use the time you’re already using
for something else.
While my little
toddling disaster is actually playing on her own, I get out my notepad (no, not
a little laptop, I mean old school paper and pen – toddlers just love insisting that typing aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
is much more important than whatever you had in mind). I plot, I plan and I try
and think through all the brain-twisting logistics of my stories. If I can
concentrate for long enough, I even start full on writing. If you use this time
effectively, you’re ready to make some serious progress during nap time.
During the golden (aka
silent) hour that toddlekins is napping, I have to decide whether I’m doing what
I’m supposed to in order to keep the house functional or whether I’m sneaking
off to my computer to type as fast as my fingers can go. Right now, I’m not
preparing dinner…or watering my garden or taking out that nappy that’s brewing
up a smell storm by the front door or tidying up the living room.
At the end of the day,
when I put my little girl down for the night, it’s prioritizing, round two. Do
I get in some decent sleep for once? Or do I “quickly” update my various social
platform statuses/tweets/posts and try and get my word count over 500 for the
day? “Quickly” tends to take around two hours. But you’ve got to keep your fans
interested, right?
About the author
Natalie Rivener is a member of the Pretoris Writers' Group. She is taking part in the STORM anthology project. Her fantasy story, BEYOND, will be published as part of STORM Vol I in June 2014.
Twitter @NatalieRivener
Natalie's Facebook Page
Natalie's Facebook Page
Saturday 8 February 2014
Fantastic February Blog Tour - Velvet Rain
Remember to enter the give-away! Click here
HE
WAS BORN A MIRACLE. IT WILL TAKE ONE TO SAVE THE WORLD.
Velvet
Rain
is a dark thriller of suspense, horror, and drama.
[Contains graphic violence and profanity.]
[Contains graphic violence and profanity.]
Kain Richards is the last of his kind--and a man on the run. So when this mysterious drifter falls for a
Excerpt
Now
the cheating prick had drawn a knife.
Probably
shouldn’t have kicked him in the balls,
the drifter thought. Especially since his large friend here had him
tied up in the stranglehold of a full nelson. It hurt like hell, but
it was nothing compared to that spike of static driving right through
that splitting headache he had. It felt as if it were cutting into
his brain like some impossible electric blade.
“Hold
him, Cal.”
It
wasn’t the fat man. One of Cal’s buddies had piped up. All of a
sudden, the place was just crawling with rats.
The
fat man met him squarely, still wincing from the throb in his jewels.
The heady mix of bar smoke and brew had him swaying a little, and
just when you thought he might rethink this madness, he returned the
favor with one solid shot from his steel-toed boot. Pain rippled
through the drifter’s groin and into his skull. Still, he’d
endured far worse than these boys could dish out, and he wasn’t
about to give them the satisfaction. He swallowed the agony. His lips
slid into a cockeyed grin.
Outside
the packed roadhouse—this stinking pisshole that stank like all the
others—the thunderstorm raged. Somewhere down that cold and lonely
road that had brought them here, lightning struck a power line, and
the lights flickered.
“No
more tricks,” the trucker told him, uncertain as the lamps. Clearly
he was
rethinking
this; trying to get a grip on just what the hell had happened here
tonight. Trying not to lose that grip.
An
attractive redhead, sculpted nicely in a white top and a flirty black
skirt, sat in a booth beside the coin-op pool table. All by her
lonesome, the forty-something was ashen, her head down, a hand cupped
to her abdomen. She’d been drinking heavily, and while it was
possible her bouts of nausea were a result of overindulgence, the
drifter knew better; how well he did. She’d fought the good fight
twice in the last thirty minutes, first throwing up in the ladies’
room, only to go down in the second round, right here at the edge of
her seat. A waitress was on her knees cleaning the mess. The fat man
had slipped in it, his cue almost, but not quite, breaking his fall,
and when he had hit the floor in that little spiral the way he had,
looking like some overweight stripper round a pole, half the place
had exploded in drunken laughter. His big butt was slick with vomit.
He was ripe.
Sweat
beaded the man’s forehead. One tiny bead broke rank and slipped
along his sunburned skin. Skin that had, until tonight, been utterly
pasty. His puzzled eyes—yellowed and bloodshot, like so many of the
others now—lingered on the strange thin scars on the drifter’s
temples. You could almost hear the wheels of confusion spinning in
his head.
“Cut
him,” someone said. It wasn’t Cal, but what did it matter.
The
fat man hesitated. He didn’t want to do it, that much was clear.
Some guys had it in them. This one didn’t. Returning serve on that
swift kick to the nuts was one thing. Any one of these fine gents
would have reacted that way. But this? This was lunacy. If Cal hadn’t
egged him to pull it, the knife would still be tucked away in his
back pocket. No, the poor bastard wasn’t thinking about cutting
him. He was all messed up, wondering how things had gotten so crazy,
so quickly. Wondering what was real anymore. What was real.
“Do
it,” Cal said.
Despite
the nelson driving his head down at an insufferable angle, the
drifter could see Cal’s bulging forearms plainly enough. Sunburned.
Like the fat man’s face; like the fat man’s hands. Like most of
the others. He supposed he should have been thankful for dim lights
and drink. Either no one noticed, or no one cared.
Still,
he should have known better. The bitch of it was, he did.
The
fat man looked to Cal and considered his play. Cal, a man of few
grunts, drove him to the edge with another Do
it.
It would take but a nudge to push him over.
The
man drew closer. Close enough to suffer the fist of his stale
beer-breath. He was breathing laboriously. Trembling. He looked like
he might have a heart attack.
Slowly,
most unwillingly, he brought the tip of the blade to the drifter’s
chin.
The
fat man swallowed. “. . . I want what’s mine, sir.”
Author Bio
David
C. Cassidy--author, photographer, half-decent juggler--spends his
writing life creating dark and touching stories where Bad Things
Happen To Good People. Raised by wolves, he grew up with a love of
nature, music, science, and history, with thrillers and horror novels
feeding the dark side of his seriously disturbed imagination. He
talks to his characters, talks often, and most times they listen. But
the real fun starts when they tell him to take a hike, and they Open
That Door anyway. Idiots.
David lives in Ontario, Canada. From Mozart to Vivaldi, classic jazz to classic rock, he feels naked without his iPod. Suffering from MAD--Multiple Activity Disorder--he divides his time between writing and blogging, photography and photoshop, reading and rollerblading. An avid amateur astronomer, he loves the night sky, chasing the stars with his telescope. Sometimes he eats.
To learn more and connect with David, you can follow him on Twitter and Facebook, or visit his blog:
Blog Facebook Twitter
David lives in Ontario, Canada. From Mozart to Vivaldi, classic jazz to classic rock, he feels naked without his iPod. Suffering from MAD--Multiple Activity Disorder--he divides his time between writing and blogging, photography and photoshop, reading and rollerblading. An avid amateur astronomer, he loves the night sky, chasing the stars with his telescope. Sometimes he eats.
To learn more and connect with David, you can follow him on Twitter and Facebook, or visit his blog:
Blog Facebook Twitter
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