BUZZWORTHY – Readers Alley

Category: BUZZWORTHY

Urban Fantasy – Wishful Thinking by Helen Harper

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Muddled magic. Missing faeries. She’s having one spell of a day at work…

Saffron Sawyer aspires to rise from the magical world’s bottom rung. But when her wish to join the renowned Office of Faery Godmothers is granted, bullies make her first day on the job unbearable. And to add to her misery, she discovers that someone is abducting her coworkers one-by-one.

Desperate to prevent another kidnapping, she scrambles to piece together the clues. After teaming up with the handsome and powerful Devil’s Advocate, she uncovers a strange connection between the disappearances and her lowly former gig. But when Saffron learns her promotion was only a ploy, she vows to ruin the devious plan.

Can Saffron muster enough magic to trap the villain before she’s sacked or stolen?

Wishful Thinking is the first book in the refreshingly original How To Be The Best Damn Faery Godmother in the World (or Die Trying) urban fantasy series. If you like determined heroines, enchanting spins on old tales, and clever twists and turns, then you’ll love Helen Harper’s captivating story.

Buy Wishful Thinking to watch a spunky sprite strut her stuff!

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About the Author:

After teaching English literature in the UK, Japan and Malaysia, Helen Harper left behind the world of education following the worldwide success of her Blood Destiny series of books. She is a professional member of the Alliance of Independent Authors and writes full time, thanking her lucky stars every day that’s she lucky enough to do so!

Helen has always been a book lover, devouring science fiction and fantasy tales when she was a child growing up in Scotland.

She currently lives in Devon in the UK with far too many cats – not to mention the dragons, fairies, demons, wizards and vampires that seem to keep appearing from nowhere.

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Stories I Can’t Show My Mother

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Stories I Can’t Show My Mother
By Ann Tinkham
Publisher: Napili Press
Published: March 2019
ISBN: 978-0999015711 (pb)
ISBN: 978-0999015742 (ebook)
ASIN: B07RSQQZ3C
Pages: 235
Genre: Literature, Fiction, Short Stories

In Stories I Can’t Show My Mother, bat girl receives love voodoo from Needle Man, a woman finagles a direct deposit at a sperm bank, a modern-day Lady Godiva triggers a hot police investigation into a cold case, an astronaut plots to kidnap her former lover’s girlfriend, an escort’s famous client falls for her, and a woman recovering from a breakup has a mile-high quickie with a stranger. These flirty, playful stories explore sexuality and sensuality, taking you to places your mother never wanted you to discover.

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About the Author:

Ann Tinkham is a writer based in Boulder, Colorado. She is an anti-social butterfly, pop-culturalist, virtual philosopher, ecstatic dancer, political and java junkie. When she’s not tinkering with words, she’s seeking adventures. Ann has talked her way out of an abduction and talked her way into the halls of the United Nations. She hitchhiked up a mountain in Switzerland and worked her way down the corporate ladder. Ann has flown on a trapeze and traded on the black market in Russia. She cycles up steep canyons, hikes to glacial lakes and mountain peaks, and blazes her own ski trails. As soon as she amasses a fortune, she plans to buy an island and hopes she won’t be voted off her own island.

Her fiction and essays have appeared in All Things Girl, Apt, Denver Syntax, Edifice Wrecked, Foliate Oak, Hiss Quarterly, Lily Literary Review, Short Story Library, Slow Trains, Stone Table Review, Synchronized Chaos, The Adirondack Review, The Battered Suitcase, The Citron Review, The Literary Review, Toasted Cheese, Wild Violet, Word Riot, and others. Ann’s essay, “The Tree of Hearts” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and her story, “Afraid of the Rain” was nominated for Sundress’s Best of the Net Anthology.

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Coming Soon – The Nanny Rules by Melynda Price

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Don’t touch the nanny. It’s one rule I’m most certainly going to break.

Since becoming a single father, I have two things that keep me sane—my daughter Lily and playing football for the NFL. But when my meddling sister hires a nanny without my knowledge, I’m not thrilled to come home and find the woman has taken over my house. Our instant attraction is one more complication I don’t need in my life.

But my daughter loves Amelia, and I will do anything for that tiny munchkin. Even if it means walking around with blue balls most of the time. Why does the nanny have to be so sweet—and drop dead gorgeous? She’s driving me crazy. Never in my life have I wanted a woman more.

I just need to make it through this season. I can do that. Hands free, of course. But then there’s that moment, and I know she’s thinking what I’m thinking and, well, yeah. Screw the rules…

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About the Author:

Melynda Price is a bestselling and award-winning author of contemporary romance. Her Against the Cage series has finaled in many awards such as the RONE, USA Today BBA, Golden Quill, National Readers’ Choice, and New England Readers’ Choice.

What Price enjoys most about writing is the chance to make her readers fall in love, over and over again. She cites the greatest challenge of writing is making the unbelievable believable, while taking her characters to the limit with stories full of passion and unique twists and turns. Salting stories with undertones of history whenever possible, Price adds immeasurable depth to her well-crafted books. She currently lives in Northern Minnesota with her husband and two children where she has plenty of snow-filled days to curl up in front of the fireplace with her Chihuahua and a hot cup of coffee to write.

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Murder in Palm Beach By Bob Brink

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The doorbell rings in the home of a prominent Palm Beach citizen, quickly followed by a shotgun blast that shatters a window, cracking the calm of a cool January night. Rodger Kriger falls to the floor, mortally wounded, leaving a wife and six children.

Murder in Palm Beach: The Homicide That Never Died is closely based on a sensational, real murder that happened in the posh ocean-side town in 1976. In the thin guise of fiction, the book contains shocking new information never before made public. Author Bob Brink, an award-winning journalist, was a newspaper reporter in the locale where the assassination occurred. It made media headlines for 15 years.

An ambitious prosecutor pins the deed on Mitt Hecher, a hoodlum and karate expert. At Hecher’s trial, fellow jail inmates testify that he confessed. He is convicted and sentenced to the brutal and anarchic state prison at Raiford, where a stabbing a day and a killing a week are the “mean” average.

Judges repeatedly frustrate Hecher and several attorneys working without fees to get a new trial, as investigators pursue myriad scenarios. Meanwhile, his wife contracts a deadly disease.

Was Hecher innocent, and if so, who did it? Did the sons of a wealthy Cuban kill Kriger? Were the operators of a gambling enterprise out to get him? Was a love triangle the basis for the shooting? Did a vicious underworld figure do the bidding of a criminal gang? Was a prominent politician behind the slaying? Those are the questions seeking answers amid the exploration of issues of justice and power.

Murder in Palm Beach is the saga of a battle between a man whose swagger has sent him spiraling to the bottom and powerful, sinister forces determined to keep him there. It is a narrative of redemption wrapped in a mystery tale reeking with power, sex, and violence. It also contains a heart-rending love story.

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About the Author:

Bob Brink is a journalist who worked with the Palm Beach Post, The Associated Press in Chicago, Milwaukee Journal, Tampa Tribune, Joliet Herald-News, and Palm Beach Media Group (magazines). His byline has been on thousands of news stories, features, and entertainment reviews.

He has been a freelance writer for several years, and is the author of several books. To promote his current novel, MURDER IN PALM BEACH: The Homicide That Never Died, he has a website, www.bobbrinkwriter.com. From the site, he blogs on three passions: grammar, alternative health care, and socio-political issues.

Brink’s first book, A TALE OF TWO CONTINENTS: Jetting Across the Globe to Have a Baby, is a short memoir that he ghost-wrote for a woman. Almost simultaneously, he authored BREAKING OUT, a coming-of-age novel about a troubled young man. Recently, he compiled a book of short stories titled THE WAY IT WAS: Short Stories and Tall Tales.

Brink has won numerous writing accolades and several awards, including three for Palm Beach Illustrated, which won the Best Written Magazine award from the Florida Magazine Association after he became copy chief and senior writer.

He was a reporter for the Palm Beach Post when the crime that MURDER IN PALM BEACH is based on occurred. It was an enormously sensational event that was featured six years later on a national TV show, and made newspaper headlines for 15 years. A karate expert went to prison for the deed, but many doubted his guilt. A newspaper reporter spent years investigating, and made shocking discoveries about the assassination and the person behind it.

Besides dabbling in short-story writing over the years, Brink immersed himself in learning to play the clarinet and tenor saxophone. He performed many years with an estimable, 65-piece community symphonic band, and played a few professional big band gigs. He relegated music to the back seat after embarking on writing novels. He is a fairly proficient ballroom dancer and a health enthusiast.

A product of Michigan and Iowa, Brink has a bachelor’s degree in English from Drake University in Des Moines and completed graduate journalism studies at the University of Iowa.

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New Release – Contemporary Romance – Moonshine and Magnolias

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Hotel executive Wendy Marsh puts her career on hold when she inherits half of her family’s inn. Her to-do list? It’s simple: teach her spoiled cousin how to manage Fountenoy Hall, then hightail it back to her structured, careful life in Atlanta. Romance has never been part of Wendy’s plan – so what is it about the sexy history professor researching the inn that she finds so tempting?

Rob Upshaw would be enjoying his time at the Inn at Fountenoy Hall if he wasn’t secretly hunting for a family treasure lost during Prohibition. Only a few minor inconveniences stand in his way. His uncle’s old journals are cryptic, he has only a vague description of the loot, and the beautiful, uptight innkeeper with a subtle sense of humor might hold the key to his quest. Even though Rob’s career is built on facts, he accepts he might have to lie to Wendy. But falling for her? That’s out of the question.

Moonshine and Magnolias is a Just Add Peaches novel. Each book in the series is a stand-alone, passionate and playful contemporary romance, but you’ll want more than one juicy bite.

At the same time she marries Kenton, a stroke kills his father. And then before she can tell Kenton she’s pregnant, he dies in an automobile accident. Heartbroken and burdened with the gift of the Chandler Hill Inn and Winery, she’s left with the task of making them a success. Struggling to raise a child alone while working to grow the business, Lettie makes a shocking discovery that changes everything.

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About the Author:

Abigail Sharpe is a Boston-bred Yankee now eating grits and saying “y’all” in North Central Florida. She dreamed more of being a stage actress or joining the CIA than being an author. While she still enjoys participating in community theater productions and singing karaoke, the secret-agent career was replaced by hours at her computer, writing passionate and playful contemporary romance.

When she’s not writing, she can be found wearing a corset and singing bawdy songs with Just Desserts, an a cappella musical comedy act, at places that won’t throw them out.

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Books For Review – Week of June 17th

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Slaved
Last Chance Series, Book 2
By A.L. Long
Published: June 2019
ASIN: B07SK9B414
Pages: 80
Genre: Erotic Romance, Romantic Suspense

“I could feel her heart beat
even though we were miles away”

Rescued from the only life she had ever known, Alannah Jackson learns what it means to be loved and not controlled. Finally able to let go of her past she begins a new life with the man who has shown her what love is. Faced with the truth, Alannah finds she can never escape her past or who she is. She will never love, only serve.

Roman’s love for Alannah is tested when he finds that she has been slaved by a man just as ruthless as Winston Nelson. Against his better judgement, he accepts Martin Holland’s offer to help retrain Alannah and he begins to question the love they shared. After Martin Holland makes it clear of his intentions, Roman stops at nothing to get her back. There is no room for another man in her life.

Contains adult content 18+

Vivi’s Leading Man
Durango Street Theatre, Book 1
By Emily Mims
Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group
Published: April 2019
ISBN: 978-1948029902 (pb)
ISBN: 978-1948029896 (ebook)
ASIN: B07QWRLNMP
Pages: 237
Genre: Contemporary Romance

EXES AND OHS

The marriage was one of convenience. She had status and he had money. But… there was something there, and both of them felt it. After three years of him working long hours and her spending too much time at the Durango Street Theatre, Miguel Abonce and Vivienne Heiser called it quits. One year later, they are forced to work together to save or sell the theater. In the process they discover things they never knew about each other and they learn there’s more between them than burning up the sheets. They might really love each other after all.

Salvation Lost
by Peter F. Hamilton
Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine
Sci Fi & Fantasy
Release Date: October 29, 2019

All the best in humanity rises to meet a powerful alien threat in the sequel to Salvation—part of an all-new trilogy from “the owner of the most powerful imagination in science fiction” (Ken Follett).

The comparative utopia of twenty-third-century Earth is about to go dreadfully awry when a seemingly benign alien race is abruptly revealed to be one of the worst threats humanity has ever faced. Driven by an intense religious extremism, the Olyix are determined to bring everyone to their version of God as they see it. But they may have met their match in humanity, who are not about to go gently into that good night or spend the rest of their days cowering in hiding. As human ingenuity and determination rise to the challenge, collective humanity has only one goal—to wipe this apparently undefeatable enemy from the face of creation. Even if it means playing a ridiculously long game indeed.

But in a chaotic universe, it is hard to plan for every eventuality, and it is always darkest before the dawn.

New Book Release – Women’s Fiction – Change of Heart

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Emerson “Em” Jordan always wanted a Valentine’s Day wedding. But after being dumped by her boyfriend, she spends the holiday at Seashell Cottage on the Gulf Coast of Florida with Devin Gerard, a family friend who has no interest in her or any other woman and is instead concentrating on his pediatric medical practice and continuing medical missions in Costa Rica.

Em, who’s always wanted a large family, doesn’t mind his disinterest. At thirty-two, she’s decided she doesn’t need a husband to have a child or to adopt one. First, she’s going to fulfill her dream of setting up her own landscape design business in upstate New York and has promised to continue to help run her grandmother’s flower shop.

It isn’t until Em and Devin become friends that Em realizes she might want more than friendship from him. But with his work in Miami and Costa Rica and her busy life in New York, it’s out of the question until something happens that changes everything, even a couple of hearts.

Reader Reviews

“I love how so many of Judith’s books are set at the seaside, as it always gives me a holiday feel about them. Its time to return to the Seashell Cottage for another wonderful and emotional story of love and happiness. This is a very sweet and moving story of broken dreams, friendship, family, dreams, inspiration, determination and most of all love. I enjoyed the book but did feel that the story was a little bit slow in the middle and some paragraphs were filled up with un-necessary topics to lengthen the time frame during the book. But in saying all that I did like the fact that the relationship between the two main characters was a natural one that formed over a longer time frame than most books gives us. There were so many other great and wonderful characters in this book from Em Grandmother to the gardener at Seashell Cottage that all had in some way helped in their own way to give the need help and advice to Em.“ – ReadingfortheLoveofBooks

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About the Author:

Growing up, books were always present being read, ready to go back to the library, or about to be discovered. Information from the books was shared in general conversation, giving all of us in the family a wealth of knowledge and a lot of imagination. Perhaps that is why I was drawn to the idea of writing stories early on. I particularly love to write novels about women who face unexpected challenges and meet them with strength.

A hybrid author who both has a publisher and who self-publishes, Ms. Keim writes heart-warming stories of strong women who face challenges and find love and happiness along the way. Her books are based, in part, on many of the places she’s lived or visited and on the interesting people she’s met, creating believable characters and realistic settings her many, loyal readers love.

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