Sunday Post #202

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer ~ It's a chance to share news ~ A post to recap the past week on your blog, showcase books and things we have received and share new about what is coming up on our blog for the week ahead.

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Busy week. Dog to vet, hair coloring, free concert (every Thursday for summer).  So, I didn't get to visit as I'd hoped. Ugh. This week will be my week. I'm going to make it happen.

I had the great pleasure of going to hear an amazing author speak. Beverly Jenkins.

Oh she was wonderful. I loved hearing her story and journey. She has a presence that holds your attention, and a great sense of humor. I had to pick up a few books of hers as I loved how she talked about them. And I have to meet Cletus, the hog. lol. If you heard her talk about him, you'd understand.

And Seton Hill had an alumni author room where I could meet and pick up their books. Of course I had to stop! And get a few books. Here are a few photos of people I got to talk with.

I always have a great time with the amazing speakers Seton Hill brings in and the people there. I look forward to these days.

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The Fit Booker:

Goal:  Workout in any form of exercise (or on Wii Fit) 2x's a week. (to feel better and hope to drop a few pants sizes)

How did I do last week... Nope. Nada. Darn that back. But I did push mow the grass. I know I shouldn't but it needed done. Badly.

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What's Happening in Books:

Current Read:

Siren's Tide by Philippa Ballantine
Editing work.


Current Audiobook:
Marines by Paul E. Cooley
Helios by Jeremy Robinson & Sean Ellis

Current Podcast Book Listen:
Nothing new.

Finished Last Week: 

Books:
Embracing the Dragon by K.L. Bone

Audiobooks :

Tracing Shadows by Alex Lidell

Frostbite by E.J. Stevens

Finished Podcast Book Listen:

Nothing new yet.

DNFed:

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Last Week on the Blog:

Cover Reveals: (click titles to go to post & learn more)

Guest Posts:

Posts:

Spellbound in a Flash:
Spellbound in a Flash now has a Facebook Page!

Have you seen Aubrey Burchell in the early stages of American Idol? She went to Hollywood but didn't make the top for the show. I got to hear her sing locally! And photograph her. She's a local gal.

Challenged Writers:
April Update - How Camp NaNoWriMo went & a little on my re-write process.

Around the Internet...

Reviews:

Children of Blood and Bone

"The story was powerful. It started strong and drew me in."

Agent Prime

"One thing I'm learning about Jake Bible. He can write many different styles. Wow."

Podcast Review:

Mama Bitchstress Reviews:

GIVEAWAYS:

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This Week to Come on the Blog:

I will finished up two reviews for you this week.

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Received For the Last Month:

(Note: Links to Amazon are buy links where I could earn commission, in case you are interested.)


For Review Consideration:

Audio Books Requested for Review:

Frostbite by E.J. Stevens
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
This prequel short story is the perfect introduction to the award-winning Ivy Granger Psychic Detective urban fantasy series.

Everyone knows that there's no such thing as ghosts, but when a client claims that her house is being haunted, Ivy tries to keep her mind open and her weapons handy. If her psychic gifts and recent cases have taught her anything, it's that you're better off arming yourself for the unexpected.


Will our favorite psychic detective face down murderous ghosts? Anything is possible in Harborsmouth.

War and Wind by Alex Lidell
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
A cowardly captain. An incompetent crew. A mission she can't fail. 

Nile and her small band of loyal midshipmen saved the ship, and Captain Rima might just kill them for it . . . one young officer at a time. No one and nothing on the Aurora is safe anymore, least of all Nile’s explosive secrets or her connection with Domenic, which vibrates between them like a cutlass speared into the deck.

When the shifting tide of war suddenly turns Aurora’s backwater outpost into a vital battleground, Nile faces an impossible choice between duty and freedom. In a cascade of violence, gunpowder, and lies, Nile will soon discover who has her back and who wants to stab a dagger in it. To save the ones she loves, Nile may have to sacrifice everything.




Purchased/Winnings/Gifts:

Book:

Bring on the Blessings by Beverly Jenkins
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
On Bernadine Brown's fifty-second birthday she received an unexpected gift—she caught her husband, Leo, cheating with his secretary. She was hurt—angry, too—but she didn't cry woe is me. Nope, she hired herself a top-notch lawyer and ended up with a cool $275 million. Having been raised in the church, she knew that when much is given much is expected, so she asked God to send her a purpose. 

The purpose turned out to be a town: Henry Adams, Kansas, one of the last surviving townships founded by freed slaves after the Civil War. The failing town had put itself up for sale on the Internet, so Bernadine bought it.

Trent July is the mayor, and watching the town of his birth slide into debt and foreclosure is about the hardest thing he's ever done. When the buyer comes to town, he's impressed by her vision, strength, and the hope she wants to offer not only to the town and its few remaining residents, but to a handful of kids in desperate need of a second chance.

Not everyone in town wants to get on board though; they don't want change. But Bernadine and Trent, along with his first love, Lily Fontaine, are determined to preserve the town's legacy while ushering in a new era with ties to its unique past and its promising future.

Tempest by Beverly Jenkins
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
What kind of mail-order bride greets her intended with a bullet instead of a kiss? One like Regan Carmichael—an independent spirit equally at home in denims and dresses. Shooting Dr. Colton Lee in the shoulder is an honest error, but soon Regan wonders if her entire plan to marry a man she’s never met is a mistake. Colton, who buried his heart along with his first wife, insists he only wants someone to care for his daughter. Yet Regan is drawn to the unmistakable desire in his gaze.

Regan’s far from the docile bride Colton was expecting. Still, few women would brave the wilds of Wyoming Territory for an uncertain future with a widower and his child. The thought of having a bold, forthright woman like Regan in his life—and in his arms—begins to inspire a new dream. And despite his family’s disapproval and an unseen enemy, he’ll risk all to make this match a real union of body and soul.

High Lonesome Sound by Jaye Wells
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
In the sleepy mountain town of Moon Hollow, Virginia, there is a church with a crooked steeple. No one will say for sure how it got that way, but it’s the reason the whole town gathers every Decoration Day to honor the dead.

But this year, there are two fresh graves up on Cemetery Hill, a stranger’s come to town, and the mountain’s song is filled with dark warnings.

The good people of Moon Hollow are about to learn that some secrets are too painful to bear, and some spirits are too restless to stay buried.

The Empress Game by Rhonda Mason
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
One seat on the intergalactic Sakien Empire’s supreme ruling body, the Council of Seven, remains unfilled, that of the Empress Apparent. The seat isn’t won by votes or marriage. It’s won in a tournament of ritualized combat in the ancient tradition. Now that tournament, the Empress Game, has been called and the females of the empire will stop at nothing to secure political domination for their homeworlds. Kayla Reinumon, a supreme fighter, is called by a mysterious stranger to battle it out in the arena.

The battle for political power isn’t contained by the tournament’s ring, however. The empire’s elite gather to forge, strengthen or betray alliances in a dance that will determine the fate of the empire for a generation. With the empire wracked by a rising nanovirus plague and stretched thin by an ill-advised planet-wide occupation of Ordoch in enemy territory, everything rests on the woman who rises to the top.

Marked by Light by Heidi Ruby Miller
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
This is the first book in the Ambasadora science fiction adventure series. This space thriller contains elements of space opera, science fiction romance, cyberpunk, military science fiction, a galactic empire, anthropological science fiction, and exploration.

If everyone told you love wasn't real, would you still be willing to die for it?

Sara Mendoza and Sean Cryer are.

In their multi-partner, caste-ruled society, love and jealousy are considered emotional fallacies, nothing more than fleeting moods and sentiments biased by hormones. Relationships and conceptions in this world obsessed with celebrity, beauty, and power are based on DNA and lineages...or should be. But not everyone believes in the ruling traditions of the all-powerful Embassy. A quiet rebellion prowls the dark underground of this shiny world where techno-militants calling themselves fraggers grow in numbers and bravado. The Embassy intends to silence the fragger movement before the heresy of equality spreads throughout the system.

Sara Mendoza is part of the Embassy's plan. Captured, tortured, and falsely accused of treason, she is given a chance to win back her freedom. She only needs to charm information from one of the fragger leaders, then kill him. But by the time she figures out the Embassy's intel is flawed and that Sean Cryer is her true mark, she's already in love with him.

Sean knows why Sara is on his ship from the start, but as a lonely, anti-social doser, he doesn't value his life, only his ideology within the fragger organization. Against his better judgment, he becomes her protector, each day caring more about a future he was always afraid to hope for.

Starrie by Heidi Ruby Miller
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
In this caste-ruled society, where multiple partners are the norm, celebrity, beauty, and power mean everything. Love and jealousy are considered emotional fallacies, nothing more than fleeting moods and sentiments biased by hormones. But sometimes people just fall in love…and that can be deadly.

Ben Anlow and his team embark on a revenge mission to bring down serial murderer and rapist, Liu Stavros, at his fortress in the inhospitable mountains of Tampa Three. But contractor Naela Starrie already has her own kind of vengeance planned for Stavros. Even as a battle-hardened soldier, Ben’s not prepared for the darkness he sees in the female assassin, nor the way she challenges his prejudices about her people when she makes a sacrifice to save to his life. 

Greenshift by Heidi Ruby Miller
PICK UP AT AMAZON
Goodreads Synopsis:
Greenshift is a tale set within the world of Ambasadora.

Mari’s rare eye color makes her a pariah within Upper Caste society, which is why she prefers plants to people…except David, the former Armadan captain who shuttles scientists around on a refurbished pleasure cruiser.

But someone else is interested in Mari and her distinctive look—an obsessed psychopath who tortures and murders women for pleasure.

When the killer chooses Mari as his next victim, the soldier inside David comes alive, but it is Mari who must fight for her own life and prove she isn’t as fragile as the flowers she nurtures.



Audio:

Free Ebooks:
(On my Kindle and Nook App) Links to books under title. They may or may not be free at this time.

Free Audio Books/Stories:

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Reviews to Come:

Soulless by Skyla Dawn Cameron

The Sentinel by Chris Lester

The Muse by Chris Lester
Metamor City: Making the Cut by Chris Lester
Metamor City: Whispers in the Wood by Chris Lester

Lex Talionis by Starla Huchton

Spark by Starla Huchton
Heir to Kale by K.L. Bone

Tales from the Archives Vol 4 #5 - Old Sinner's Bones

The Death of Dulgath by Michael J. Sullivan

Danger's Halo by Amanda Carlson
Alone by Scott Sigler

Power of Five by Alex Lidell

Tracing Shadows by Alex Lidell
Frostbite by E.J. Stevens

Sunday Post #89

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer ~ It's a chance to share news ~ A post to recap the past week on your blog, showcase books and things we have received and share new about what is coming up on our blog for the week ahead.

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The week has gone by in a flash. I like that when it comes to work. ;) What's helping make it faster? Audio Books! Yep. I've been listening to audio books all week at work. I've gotten through two books and half of a third. (which I CAN'T WAIT to get back to.)

BIG NEWS!
I got to listen to CHUCK WENDIG speak last night! Yes! He was at Seton Hill, a local university, speaking to the Writing Popular Fiction students. This was open to the public as well. So I went!

Chuck is as inspiring and funny as he is on his blog. Even better in person listening to him talk. He shared his journey to getting published, his years of writing things that are set aside and buried away. That his journey and everyone's journey for their book is different. He did share a few things that he's tell his younger self though, which was inspiring to hear.

I was thrilled to make this event as I got to meet friends and new people.

The first person I saw is one I've been talking books for many years. I chatted with him long before I started blogging thanks to Barnes & Nobles forums. It's Paul Goat Allen.

Then I meet several people. Authors Todd Moody and Rebecca Drake. Wonderful, kind people.

I also got the pleasure of meeting Jaye Wells. She's a kind woman. I was hoping she'd be there and she was! I took along with me four of my unsigned Sabina Kane books. :) I'm proud to say they are signed now.

I got to talk with Nicole Peeler, who I haven't seen in almost a year. Life has been happening for us both and haven't had time to catch up. So it was wonderful to see her and talk for a bit.

I had a picture taken with Nicole and Jaye. Thank you ladies! And look who the photo bomber is!! Yep, Chuck himself! I think that's one of the best photo bombs I've ever had.

But before that photo bomb I did get to meet Chuck and have him autograph my copy of Blackbirds (where he predicts my demise). He is a great person.

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The Fit Booker:

Goal:  Workout in any form of exercise (or on Wii Fit) 2x's a week. (to feel better and hope to drop a few pants sizes)

How did I do last week... I got one day of push mowing the grass. (I think this is more than enough for one day of exercise.) And, surprise, surprise! I got on the treadmill for 40 minutes! Woot woot! Two days down. I jogged/fast walked about 2.7 miles. Sweet! And to top it off, I did 20 jack knives too. I feel good about this week.

Zombie Run app:
Season 1 Mission 2:
I was to divert the zombies while they fixed the gates as they were stuck.

It's fun to add this app with my Spotify of workout music. They come in every so often and talk. It's like a little community that I just can't talk to. lol. But when they say to speed up, I do try to speed up (for a minute or two as that's all I can handle, and it's not that much faster). It's something to take my mind off the dreaded jog.

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What's Happening in Books:

Current Read:

Dirty Magic: New Orleans edited by Charlie Brown


Current Audiobook:
Chasing the Star Garden by Melanie Karsak

Current Podcast Book Listen:
The Horde by Patrick Scaffido

Finished Last Week: 

Dirty Magic: New Orleans edited by Charlie Brown

Audiobooks from Audible:

From Gods by Mary Ting
The Harvesting by Melanie Karsak

Finished Podcast Book Listen:

I've been listening to Audible books.

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Last Week on the Blog:

Cover Reveals: (click titles to go to post & learn more)

Posts:

Around the Internet...


Reviews:

Witch for Hire by N.E. Conneely

Ghost Light by E.J. Stevens

Podcast Review:

Mama Bitchstress Reviews:

GIVEAWAYS:

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This Week to Come on the Blog:

Two reviews are scheduled for next week:
  From Gods
  The Harvesting

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Received Last Weeks:

Review & Review Consideration:

Audio Books Requested for Review:

Chasing the Star Garden by Melanie Karsak
Goodreads Synopsis:
An opium-addicted beauty.
An infamous poet living in self-imposed exile.
An ancient treasure about to fall into the wrong hands.

Melanie Karsak's Chasing the Star Garden takes readers on a thrilling adventure from the gritty opium dens of gaslamp London to the gem-colored waters of the ancient world. Lily Stargazer, a loveable but reckless airship racer with a famous lover and shattered past, reluctantly plunges into a centuries-old mystery in a romantic adventure best described as Dan Brown meets Mary Shelley.

It all begins on one of the worst days of Lily’s life. She just lost the London leg of the 1823 Airship Grand Prix. To top it off, a harlequin fleeing from constables shoved a kaleidoscope down her pants, told her to fly to Venice, then threw himself from her airship tower. What’s a girl to do? For Lily, the answer is easy: drink absinthe and smoke opium. 

Lily’s lover, Lord Byron, encourages her to make the trip to Venice. Lily soon finds herself at the heart of an ancient mystery which has her running from her past and chasing true love and the stars along the way.

*Due to steamy scenes and depictions of drug use, this novel is intended for mature readers.

Purchased/Winnings/Gifts:

Won:

Free Ebooks:

PDF

Midway by Melanie Karsak
Goodreads Synopsis:
Midway: A Harvesting Series Novella (Book 1.5 in The Harvesting Series) is a tie-in novella that compliments The Harvesting, Book I in The Harvesting Series. 

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen, for the beginning of the end. 

Carnie. Ride jockey. Roustabout. White trash. Tilt girl. Gypsy. Cricket has been called a lot of things, but she never thought survivor of the zombie apocalypse would be one of them. One day she’s barking on the midway, and the next day, the world is eating itself alive. 

Cricket, along with Vella, a tarot reader, and Puck, Cricket’s mangy mutt, find themselves running for their lives, but where can you hide when mankind has fallen? Cricket will need help if she hopes to survive. 

Luckily for her, we were never really alone, and apparently, magical forces want to keep this tilt girl alive.


(On my Kindle App)

(On my Nook)

Free Audio Books/Stories:

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Reviews to Come:

Soulless by Skyla Dawn Cameron

The Sentinel by Chris Lester

The Muse by Chris Lester
Metamor City: Making the Cut by Chris Lester
Metamor City: Whispers in the Wood by Chris Lester

Danube Waves by Katharina Bordet

Rhune by Michael J. Sullivan

Heartstealer by K.T. Bryski

Lex Talionis by Starla Huchton
7th Son: 7 Days anthology by J.C. Hutchins

House of Grey 6 by Collin Earl
The Secret World Chronicle: World Divided by Mercedes Lackey, Cody Martin, Dennis Lee, Veronica Giguere
The Secret World Chronicle: Waiting On by Mercedes Lackey, Cody Martin, Dennis Lee, Veronica Giguere
The Secret World Chronicle: Revolutions by Mercedes Lackey, Cody Martin, Dennis Lee, Veronica Giguere
Heir to Kale by K.L. Bone

Tales from the Archives Vol. 4: #2 The Mummy of Barnsley

Tales from the Archives Vol. 4: #3 The Black Empress
Into Thin Air by Val Griswold-Ford
The Hidden Institute by Brand Gamblin

Club Nexus by E.J. Stevens (Audiobook)

From Gods by Mary Ting (Audiobook)

The Harvesting by Melanie Karsak (Audiobook)

Dirty Magic: New Orleans edited by Charlie Brown

Book Signing at SHU

Last week while on Twitter I saw a link from one of the staff at Seton Hill University for a Fiction Authors Sign Books at Wine Reception.  So, I checked out the list of authors and about it on their information page.  It sounded wonderful!  And some amazing authors where listed.  So, I tweeted to me friend Nicole Peeler as she was one of the authors mentioned in the alumni listing.  And found out she was going to be there too.  Thanks for Nicole as she talked me into going. (I couldn't find any tag along among my other friends.)  So I went!  And had a wonderful time!!

I showed up shortly after 7 and walked around looking at the books and meeting the authors.  :) Always fun for an addict like me. ;D  I was thrilled to be able to add to the list of authors I meet....

Maria V. Snyder.  And I purchased the first book in her new Young Adult series, which I've been wanting to get and was soooo Excited to see she had some for sale here,  Inside Out.  I've been hearing great things on this one and if sounds right up my alley!  Maria was so kind and wonderful. :) I did get my new book signed as well.

Then in my pacing around and drooling I found another book I have on my want list and was so surprised to see it and the author here.  Well, I was surprised to see all the authors here actually.  But sometimes my brain doesn't always function completely and I miss associating names and books.

Any way, I got to meet Lucy A. Snyder as well!  Too cool.  And I can't wait to read her book, which I bought the first of the series; Spellbent.  And yes I did get this book signed as well. :)

So then I strolled around fawning over all the amazing books here at the signing.

Then Nicole Peeler showed up and I hung out with her talking life in general.  Sorry, I don't have a picture of Nicole.  I didn't think about it to tell you the truth.  I was happy to sit and chat with a friend that I didn't even go into book blogger mode.  Sorry.  I know that is such a terrible thing, but she is a wonderful person to talk with.

I'm really hoping Seton Hill University does this again in the future and I'm able to hear about it as it was a wonderful event.  I got to chat with many students going to school here and authors too.  Wonderful fun for a few hours one night.