Valentine's Day Books with Love Hop

Congratulations to our winner:
Brenda Demko
brendem7 [at] comcast [dot] net

Enter to win the latest young adult ebook release from Tribute Books.

1) Become a Google Follower of this blog.
2) Leave a comment with your email address.

***

Until Next Time:
The Angel Chronicles, Book 1
by Amy Lignor

How does a girl choose between the one who steals her heart and the one who owns her soul?

Matt and Emily were created for a specific job. Raised and trained as the ultimate angel/warrior team, they are sent down to save, defend, judge and forgive, depending on the 'life' they've been assigned. What they don't realize is that the power of human emotions, such as love, anger, passion and fear can take over even the best of souls, causing them to make mistakes and follow paths that lead to confusion and heartache.

When the reason for their training is finally revealed, the angel/warrior team find themselves thrust into a world they know nothing about. Matt takes over the life of Daniel, a young man with a great deal of baggage. Emily becomes Liz, a girl living in a remote village who relies on nothing more than her own strength to survive. A violent storm erupts one night, and framed in the window of Liz's establishment is a frightening face. Let in by the soul of a Good Samaritan, the two visitors bring with them a past full of secrets that could literally change an angel's path and a warrior's plans.

From murder to redemption, this angel/warrior team must find a way to keep the faith they have in each other in a world that's ripping them apart.

http://www.the-angel-chronicles.com

Fiona Ingram - The Secret of the Sacred Scarab - Author Interview

Author Interview

1. Who is your favorite character?
This is a really hard question because I have grown to love all my characters, even the bad ones. I guess my number one favorite is my young hero, Adam Sinclair, although he shares the limelight with his cousin Justin in The Secret of the Sacred Scarab.

2. Why is he/she your favorite?
I created the book from a short story I wrote for my nephews. The story was based on a family trip we made together to Egypt. I took my 2 nephews, then aged 10 and 12. I felt a particular affinity with my 10-year-old nephew, possibly the result of lots of babysitting when he was small. We did most of our sightseeing together so I experienced closely all that he felt during our trip. In my young hero I found many of the wonderful characteristics of my nephew: Eagerness to absorb every second of the trip; excitement and wonder when faced with the massive monuments of an ancient civilization; an unswerving belief in the possibility of amazing things happening to them while on the trip. I saw the magic and adventure though my young nephew’s eyes and it really moved me. I remember how I had felt at that age, when any and everything was possible. You just had to believe!

3. How did you come to create him/her?
My nephews both displayed the most incredible enthusiasm one usually finds in that 10-12 age group, when kids are off on the most exciting escapade of their lives. It seemed a natural progression when writing the short story (that became the book!) to base the adventure and the characters on the people who had shared the trip with me: Mom, my nephews and the people we met along the way. As I wrote I found the idea of two young boys merging with my two nephews, and the character just grew.

4. When did he/she first enter your mind?
I think right away because I had always intended the short story to feature the boys themselves. It was going to be something they could show their friends at school.

5. Where was he/she given life in the creative process?
That was not very difficult because as I wrote the adventure I kept seeing my nephews and imagining how the youngest one particularly would react when he found out he was to undertake a task of monumental proportions and in so doing save the world!

6. What do like the most about him/her and what do you dislike the most about him/her?
I love Adam’s fervent belief in the magicality of life, his unswerving faith in the fact that they were going to have an adventure because in Egypt anything could happen. He is also an honorable character, and will do the right thing because that’s the way he has been brought up, even though he might be very afraid, or place his own life in grave danger. However, he can also be a bit of a Moaning Minnie in that he gets easily despondent, sometimes feels he cannot do what is required of him, and after having asked to be someone special then thinks he actually just wants to an ordinary boy. Of course, by then it’s too late… the adventure has begun, the die is cast, and the only way is forward, whatever the future holds!

About The Secret of the Sacred Scarab

A 5000-year-old mystery comes to life when a scruffy peddler gives Adam and Justin Sinclair an old Egyptian scarab on their very first day in Egypt. Only when the evil Dr. Faisal Khalid shows a particular interest in the cousins and their scarab, do the boys realise they are in terrible danger. Dr. Khalid wants the relic at all costs. Justin and Adam embark upon the adventure of a lifetime, taking them down the Nile and across the harsh desert in their search for the legendary tomb of the Scarab King, an ancient Egyptian ruler. They are plunged into a whirlpool of hazardous and mysterious events when Dr. Khalid kidnaps them. They survive terrifying dangers in a hostile environment (such as a giant cobra, as well as sinking sand), pursued by enemies in their quest to solve the secret of the sacred scarab. They must translate the hieroglyphic clues on the underside of the scarab, as well as rescue the missing archaeologist James Kinnaird, and their friend, the Egyptologist Ebrahim Faza, before time runs out. They must also learn more about the ancient Seven Stones of Power and the mysterious Shemsu-Hor. With just their wits, courage, and each other, the boys manage to survive … only to find that the end of one journey is the beginning of another!

Young explorers will enjoy an interactive journey through Egypt, following Justin and Adam’s exciting adventure on www.secretofthesacredscarab.com. Readers can also browse the first chapter of the book. Those who survive the journey and manage to translate the Curse of Thoth will be able to read the first chapter in Adam and Justin’s next adventure—The Search for the Stone of Excalibur—as they hunt for the Scroll of the Ancients.

The Secret of the Sacred Scarab has received the following awards:

• Book Award Nominations & Wins:
• Finalist Children’s Fiction USA Next Generation 2009 Indie Book Awards
• Finalist Juvenile Fiction USA National Best Books 2009 Awards
• Winner Pre-Teen USA 2009 Readers’ Favorites Awards
• Number 2 in the USA Children’s & Teens Book Connection Top Ten Favourite Books of 2009 for Kids, Tweens & Teens
• Winner Silver Medal Teen Fiction 2010 Nautilus Book Awards
• Finalist Children’s Fiction 2010 International Book Awards
• Winner Bronze Medal Pre-Teen Fiction 2010 Moonbeam Book Awards
• Finalist 2011 Rubery Book Awards
• Winner Gold Award Mystery Pre-Teen 2011 Children’s Literary Classics Awards

Book Details:

• price: soft cover $17.95; Hard cover $27.95; e-book $2.99
• number of pages: 270
• Genre: middle grade/juvenile fiction
• Publisher: iUniverse
• release date: December 2008

Buy Links:

• Amazon: (Kindle) http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Sacred-Scarab-Chronicles-ebook/dp/B005CRRU5E/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1311106921&sr=8-3

• Amazon (hardcover & paperback) http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Sacred-Scarab-Fiona-Ingram/dp/0595457169/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322830100&sr=1-1

• All other purchase sites listed: http://www.secretofthesacredscarab.com/purchase.asp


About Fiona Ingram

Although Fiona Ingram has been a journalist for the last fifteen years, writing a children’s book—The Secret of the Sacred Scarab—was an unexpected step, inspired by a recent trip to Egypt. The tale of the sacred scarab began life as a little anecdotal tale for her 2 nephews (then 10 and 12), who had accompanied her on the Egyptian trip. This short story grew into an award-winning children’s book, the first in the adventure series Chronicles of the Stone. The author has already completed the next book in the series—The Search for the Stone of Excalibur—a huge treat for young King Arthur fans.

Although Fiona Ingram does not have children of her own, she has an adopted teenage foster child, from an underprivileged background who is just discovering the joys of reading for pleasure. Fiona’s experiences in teaching her daughter to read has resulted in her interest in child literacy and in creating ways to get kids more interested in reading, as well as helping parents to instill a love of reading in their children.

Naturally, Fiona is a voracious reader and has been from early childhood. Her interests include literature, art, theatre, collecting antiques, animals, music, and films. She loves travel and has been fortunate to have lived in Europe (while studying) and America (for work). She has travelled widely and fulfilled many of her travel goals.

Fiona’s latest book is the middle grade adventure novel, The Secret of the Sacred Scarab – Book 1 in the Chronicles of the Stone series.

Connect with Fiona:

• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Secret-of-the-Sacred-Scarab/104933012497

• Twitter: http://twitter.com/FionaRobyn

• web site: http://www.secretofthesacredscarab.com

• blog: http://fionaingramauthor.blogspot.com

• video book trailer links: http://www.facebook.com/search/results.php?q=the+secret+of+the+sacred+scarab&init=q#!/pages/The-Secret-of-the-Sacred-Scarab/104933012497?sk=videos

Trish McCallan - Forged in Fire - Author Interview

Author Interview

1. Who is your favorite character?
My favorite character in Forged in Fire is Commander Jace (Mac) MacKenzie.

2. Why is he/she your favorite?
I’m not sure actually. The guy is a serious ass. He’s a misogynist, with a huge chip on his shoulder and nasty temper, but he intrigues me. He’s intensely loyal to the people he cares about and would do anything for them. He’s highly intelligent, bluntly honest, and politically incorrect. All of which makes him an interesting character. He is in a position of authority, one that requires a certain amount of kiss-assery—which he refuses to do—which puts him in constant conflict with someone.

3. How did you come to create him/her?
He was supposed to be a throw-away character. I needed the hero of the book, Lieutenant Commander Zane Winters to call his Commanding Officer and lie about something, something that would eventually come back to haunt him. Mac was only supposed to be the vehicle to bring in this lie. But the scene needed to be shown in Mac’s POV, and from the minute I started writing it, Mac just burst to life.

4. When did he/she first enter your mind?
Mac showed up in the fourth chapter. From the moment he burst onto the scene he just took over. His voice and personality were so strong from the first paragraphs his scene seemed to write itself, from that point on I couldn’t keep him out of the book. He ended up being a major player and the character that gets the most fan mail.

5. Where was he/she given life in the creative process?
He came to life in the first draft, but I had to rein him in and ease him back during revisions because his first draft scenes were even more obnoxious than the heavily edited scenes that made it into the book. LOL. I remember emailing his first polished (and edited) scene to my critique partners and getting these immediate emails back from them. They all agreed that Mac was incredibly well drawn, very realistic, but that he was such a jackass there was no way I could ever redeem him to the point readers would accept him as a hero and want to read his story.

6. What do like the most about him/her and what do you dislike the most about him/her?
I liked his loyalty, his honestly, his refusal to play games or take short cuts. I hated his attitude toward woman and his foul mouth. All the heroes in the Forged series swear, but Mac takes swearing to an entirely new level. If there was a degree in creative swearing, Mac would have a PHD. This is going to play an interesting roll in his romance, because the woman that Mac falls for will not accept his mouth and will make no allowances for him.

Book Summary

Beth Brown doesn’t believe in premonitions until she dreams a sexy stranger is gunned down during the brutal hijacking of a commercial airliner. When events in her dream start coming true, she heads to the flight’s departure gate. To her shock, she recognizes the man she’d watched die the night before.

Lieutenant Commander Zane Winters comes from a bloodline of elite warriors with psychic abilities. When Zane and two of his platoon buddies arrive at Sea-Tac Airport, he has a vision of his teammates’ corpses. Then she arrives—a leggy blonde who sets off a different kind of alarm.

As Beth teams up with Zane, they discover the hijacking is the first step in a secret cartel’s deadly global agenda and that key personnel within the FBI are compromised. To survive the forces mobilizing against them, Beth will need to open herself to a psychic connection with the sexy SEAL who claims to be her soul mate.

Author Bio

Trish McCallan has been writing for as long as she can remember.

In grade school she wrote children’s stories, illustrated them with crayons and bound the sheets together with pencil-punched holes and red yarn. She used to sell these masterpieces at her lemonade stand for a nickel a book. Surprisingly, people actually bought them. Like, all of them. Every night she’d write a new batch for her basket.

As she got older her interest shifted to boys and horses. The focus of her literary masterpieces followed this shift. Her first full length novel was written in seventh grade and featured a girl, a horse and a boy. At the end of the book the teenage heroine rode off into the sunset . . . with the horse.

These days she sticks to romantic suspense with hot alpha heroes and roller-coaster plots. Since she is a fan of all things bizarre, paranormal elements always find a way into her fiction. Her current release, Forged in Fire, was the result of a Black Dagger Brotherhood reading binge, a cold, a bottle of NyQuil and a vivid dream.

You can find Trish at www.trishmccallan.com.

Website | Blog | Twitter | Facebook | Amazon Kindle

Follower Love Giveaway Hop

Congratulations to our winners!
Valerie
redfearnv [at] gmail [dot] com
&
Lexie
lexie.bookbug [at] gmail [dot] com

Enter to win the latest young adult ebook release from Tribute Books.

1) Become a Google Follower of this blog.
2) Leave a comment with your email address.

***

Until Next Time:
The Angel Chronicles, Book 1
by Amy Lignor

How does a girl choose between the one who steals her heart and the one who owns her soul?

Matt and Emily were created for a specific job. Raised and trained as the ultimate angel/warrior team, they are sent down to save, defend, judge and forgive, depending on the 'life' they've been assigned. What they don't realize is that the power of human emotions, such as love, anger, passion and fear can take over even the best of souls, causing them to make mistakes and follow paths that lead to confusion and heartache.

When the reason for their training is finally revealed, the angel/warrior team find themselves thrust into a world they know nothing about. Matt takes over the life of Daniel, a young man with a great deal of baggage. Emily becomes Liz, a girl living in a remote village who relies on nothing more than her own strength to survive. A violent storm erupts one night, and framed in the window of Liz's establishment is a frightening face. Let in by the soul of a Good Samaritan, the two visitors bring with them a past full of secrets that could literally change an angel's path and a warrior's plans.

From murder to redemption, this angel/warrior team must find a way to keep the faith they have in each other in a world that's ripping them apart.

http://www.the-angel-chronicles.com

Rebecca H. Jamison - Persuasion: A Latter-Day Tale - Author Interview

Author Interview

1. Who is your favorite character?
My main character, Anne.

2. Why is he/she your favorite?
Anne is the classic doormat, living her life for others and letting life happen to her. She dreads answering the phone because she knows someone else is going to ask her to do something she doesn’t want to do. She’s not really living, just surviving. She spends time thinking about her past instead of living in the present.

I’ve been where Anne is. I think a lot of women have. One of the fun parts of writing the book is getting Anne to a place where she’s in control of her life and enjoying it.

3. How did you come to create him/her?
A few years ago, I read Jane Austen’s Persuasion for the first time. Then I read it again, then again, then again. I was totally obsessed. It just seemed natural to bring Austen’s Anne Elliot--with her money problems, marriage fears, and crazy family relationships—into the modern world.

From the start, I had a really strong image of Anne running her very first garage sale because her father was in over his head in debt. I saw her wearing sloppy clothes without any make-up on. Of course, that’s when she runs into her ex-fiancé for the first time in eight years.

4. Where was he/she given life in the creative process?
My first draft was written in the third person, but I decided to do the second draft in first person. When I let Anne tell her own story, her voice really came through and she came alive for me.

5. What do you like the most about him/her and what do you dislike the most about him/her?
I like that Anne is really compassionate and calm. What I don’t like is that she’s so afraid to take any risks and lets her negative inner voice dictate her choices.

Book Summary

When Anne broke off her engagement seven years ago, she thought she’d never see Neil Wentworth again. But when Neil’s brother buys the house she grew up in, it seems fate has other plans in store. Anne is unprepared for the roller coaster of emotions that come when Neil returns and starts dating her younger friend.

Convinced that Neil could no longer have strong feelings for her, Anne pushes away all thoughts of the past. But when the handsome man she’s been dating decides he can’t live without her, Anne must come to terms with her past.

Fans of Jane Austen’s Persuasion will enjoy this modern version of her most romantic story.

Price: $15.99
Number of pages: 240 pages
Genre: Romance
Publisher: Bonneville Books (Cedar Fort)
Release Date: Feb 7, 2012
To buy: http://www.amazon.com/Persuasion-Latter-day-Rebecca-H-Jamison/dp/1599559471/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1326255452&sr=8-1


Author Bio

Rebecca Jamison met her husband on a blind date. His first words to her were, "Do you want to get together and play spin the bottle?"(He was trying to avoid another bad blind date, but she went out with him anyway.) Rebecca grew up in Vienna, Virginia. She attended Brigham Young University, earning a BA and MA in English. In between college and grad school, she served a mission to Portugal and the Cape Verde islands. Rebecca and her husband have six children. She enjoys running, dancing, making jewelry, reading, and watching chick flicks. You can learn more about her at www.rebeccahjamison.com

Connect with Rebecca:

Blog: www.rebeccahjamison.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/#!/RebeccaHJamison

Youtube book trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKgM9tuCzSo

Dorothy James - A Place to Die - Guest Post

My thanks to Dorothy James for stopping by The Character Connection for a guest post during the blog tour for her book, A Place to Die.

Guest Post

Developing Characters in A Place to Die

When I write a novel, I do not sketch the characters and plot the events ahead of time. I do have to know the setting and the viewpoint from which I will look at the place and at the events.

I thought of writing a murder mystery set in a retirement home when I was visiting a friend’s mother in a home, and so one important angle of observation became that of a woman visitor, Eleanor, to my House in the Vienna Woods. I gave this angle another dimension by adding sections seen through the eyes of her husband. And then of course there was the Viennese detective, a third quite different angle on the events of the novel.

These three characters were in my head from the beginning, and they all have something of me in their thoughts, their observations, their foibles. But each of them grew in the course of writing into an independent character. People who know me might think that Eleanor is most like me, and yet Inspector Büchner, a character of whom I am very fond, certainly incorporates some of my own thoughts, hopes and disappointments.

These three, as observers, cannot also be murder-suspects. I peopled the House in the Woods with a disparate group of characters, all of whom are suspects, from the porter and doorman through various employees of the House, such as the handyman and housekeeper, to the Director and to one visiting doctor in particular—and of course, the residents. For all of these, I would first have a physical type in mind—I visualized them, sometimes based on people I know, but usually only on people I had seen, and then imagined.

Sitting in the café of the retirement home where I first had the idea, I jotted down notes on the people I saw there: e.g. “thick waistline and hips, thick stockings, carefully guiding the wheeled Zimmer-frame,” or “elderly, well dressed gentleman, drinking a schnapps, with him an elderly animated lady, looking at him” . . . and then from these notes I imagined the person, and out of the person came pieces of the plot. Thus a whole variety of characters gradually peopled my House: a retired lady psychiatrist, a one-time opera singer, a former art-dealer . . . and so on. Through conversations, in this case often interrogations by the detective, they gradually grew into living beings, at all events they lived for me.

The hardest thing was to find out which was the murderer. I cared about each character, and I did not want any of them to have murdered someone. But this was a whodunnit, after all, and I had to find out who did it. By the last but one chapter I could see the one who had to be the culprit. Then the end was inevitable. I hoped it would be this for reader—inevitable, in terms of character, but not predictable.

About the Book
A Place to Die

Book Details:
Price: $34.99 hardcover, $23.99 paperback, $3.03-$9.99 ebook
Format: hardcover, paperback, ebook
Published: April 2010
Pages: 436
ISBN: 9781450082709, 9781450082693
Genre: Murder Mystery
Buy Links: Amazon, Barnes & Noble,
Kindle, Nook, iBookstore

Blurb:
Eleanor and Franz Fabian arrive from New York to spend Christmas with Franzs mother in her sedate retirement home in the Vienna Woods. Their expectations are low: at best, boredom, at worst, run-of-the-mill family friction. But when the wealthy, charming Herr Graf is found dead in his apartment with an ugly head wound, the Fabians are thrust into a homicide investigation.

Some residents and staff have surprising connections to the dead man, but who would have wanted to kill him? Inspector Buchner tracks down the murderer against a backdrop of Viennese history from the Nazi years to the present day. Witty, suspenseful, lyrical, this is a literary whodunit that will keep you guessing till the last page.

About the Author
Dorothy James

Dorothy James was born in Wales and grew up in the South Wales Valleys. Writer, editor, and translator, she has published short stories as well as books and articles on German and Austrian literature. She has taught at universities in the U.S., England, and Germany, makes her home now in Brooklyn and often spends time in Vienna and Berlin.

She wrote A Place to Die in her attic apartment on the edge of the Vienna Woods. She has traveled far from Wales, but has not lost the Welsh love of playing with language; she writes poems for pleasure as does Chief Inspector Büchner, the whimsical Viennese detective who unravels the first mystery in this new series of novels.

Connect with Dorothy:
Web Site
Facebook
Twitter
Blog

About the Tour

Tribute Books Blog Tours

A Place to Die Blog Tour Site

Tour Participants:

February 6 (guest post)
Proud Book Nerd

February 6 (guest post)
Bibliophilic Book Blog

February 6 (author interview)
You Gotta Read

February 7 (guest post)
vvb32 reads

February 8 (guest post or author interview)
The Character Connection

February 8 (author interview)
I Am a Reader, Not a Writer

February 9 (review)
Kritters Ramblings

February 10 (review)
A Lovely Shore Breeze

February 10 (guest post or author interview)
The Plot Thickens

February 13 (guest post)
Book Dilettante

February 13 (review)
Books and Needlepoint

February 13 (review)
Tic Toc

February 14 (review)
Reviews by Molly

February 15 (guest post or author interview)
City Girl Who Loves to Read

February 15 (review)
The Book Connection

February 16 (review)
Book Dragon's Lair

February 16 (guest post)
Books-n-Kisses

February 17 (review)
Simple Wyrdings

February 18 (review)
Lesa's Book Critiques

February 21 (review)
Words by Webb

February 22 (guest post)
Mama Knows Books

February 23 (guest post)
Fighter Writer

February 24 (review)
Minding Spot

Young Adult Giveaway Hop

Congratulations to our winner:
Shawn Kirsten Maravel
ShawnKirstenB88 [at] gmail [dot] com

Enter to win the two latest young adult ebook releases from Tribute Books.

1) Become a Google Follower of this blog.
2) Leave a comment with your email address.

***

Until Next Time:
The Angel Chronicles, Book 1
by Amy Lignor

How does a girl choose between the one who steals her heart and the one who owns her soul?

Matt and Emily were created for a specific job. Raised and trained as the ultimate angel/warrior team, they are sent down to save, defend, judge and forgive, depending on the 'life' they've been assigned. What they don't realize is that the power of human emotions, such as love, anger, passion and fear can take over even the best of souls, causing them to make mistakes and follow paths that lead to confusion and heartache.

When the reason for their training is finally revealed, the angel/warrior team find themselves thrust into a world they know nothing about. Matt takes over the life of Daniel, a young man with a great deal of baggage. Emily becomes Liz, a girl living in a remote village who relies on nothing more than her own strength to survive. A violent storm erupts one night, and framed in the window of Liz's establishment is a frightening face. Let in by the soul of a Good Samaritan, the two visitors bring with them a past full of secrets that could literally change an angel's path and a warrior's plans.

From murder to redemption, this angel/warrior team must find a way to keep the faith they have in each other in a world that's ripping them apart.

http://www.the-angel-chronicles.com



***

The Priest and the Peaches
by Larry Peterson

Historical fiction novel set in the Bronx in the mid-1960s

Take a seven day journey with the five, newly orphaned Peach kids, as they begin their struggle to remain a family while planning their dad's funeral.

They find an ally in the local parish priest, Father Tim Sullivan, who tries his best to guide them through the strange, unchartered and turbulent waters of "grown-up world." A story that is sad, funny, and inspiring as it shows how the power of family love and faith can overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

http://www.ThePriestAndThePeaches.com