Saturday, September 29, 2012

When We Touch (A Whiskey Creek Novella) by Brenda Novak




You're invited to a wedding in Whiskey Creek, Heart of the Gold Country

Unfortunately, it's the wrong wedding. Olivia Arnold is arranging the festivities—and it's the hardest thing she's ever done. Because she should be marrying Kyle Houseman. They were together for more than a year…. But her jealous sister, Noelle, stole him away—and now she's pregnant.

All their friends in Whiskey Creek know as well as Olivia does that Kyle's making a mistake. His stepbrother, Brandon, knows it, too. But Kyle's determined to go through with it, for his child's sake.

Olivia's devastated, but surprisingly Brandon—the black sheep of the family—is there to provide comfort and consolation. The intensity between them, both physical and emotional, shows Olivia that maybe Kyle wasn't the right man for her…

But is Brandon?


Every family seems to have a good kid and a bad kid.  Obviously, Olivia and Kyle are the good kids in their families while Noelle and Brandon are the bad kids.  Well, not horrible—they don’t rob banks or do drugs, but Noelle steals Kyle from Olivia and gets pregnant and Brandon’s a ski bum.  That’s what his father calls him.  Actually, he’s a champion skier with corporate endorsements—the whole nine yards.  But all his family sees is that he jets around skiing.  They think the logos on his clothing are just for decoration.

When she breaks down on the way into town for the wedding and has to pull over to the side of the road because she can’t see through the tears, Brandon is one of the last people she wants to see.  He dated her once in high school and then moved on, reinforcing her Plain Jane self image and his own ladies’ man reputation.  She doesn’t need him hitting on her when she’s down.  But his suggestion they attend the wedding as a couple just to shake people up is an intriguing one…

This was a pleasant read.  Maybe it’s unfair, but I guess I’m holding Ms. Novak to a higher standard since she’s a best-selling author contracted to a major publisher.  I suppose I expect to be dazzled more.  Maybe it’s because I’m writing this the morning after reading another book by a debut author at a small publisher that kept me up all night because I couldn’t put it down.  However, When We Touch is  worth the price, and I do recommend it.


Length:  102 Pages
Price:  $1.99 Free Right Now

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Down Home by Gail Roughton




Everybody knows everybody else’s business in Turkey Creek. The town knows Maggie Kincaid hasn’t spoken to her father in twenty-five years. It knows Billy Brayton was killed in basic training after Big John Kincaid railroaded him out of town and into the army. Nobody was surprised. For sure, Big John wasn’t going to let his daughter keep time with the local bad boy. Not for long. But the town’s missing a few pieces of the puzzle. Billy Brayton’s not dead. He’s back. He’s home. And it’s payback time.


I don’t normally review two books in a row by the same author, but this book came out last week and the author just sent it to me, so I made an exception, and I’m glad I did.

I usually get to bed around two a.m., which is bad enough when I have to be at the veteran’s hospital in the morning for some sort of appointment.  It kills me when I fall asleep around four or five a.m. and I have to get up for an appointment—which happened twice this week.  Thanks, Ms. Roughton.  I kept telling myself I needed to put the book down and go to sleep, but I just couldn’t!  And I usually figure out who did it at least half-way through.  Not this time.  I didn’t figure out all the twists and turns until the very end.  Ms. Roughton actually surprised me.

Billy Brayton’s home and he’s no longer the bad boy.  In fact, he’s a lieutenant in the Sheriff’s Department with an impressive resumé as an MP in the Army, which includes K-9 duty and medals for bravery on the front lines in the Middle East.  He could probably have written his own ticket with any law enforcement agency in the country, but he chose to return to Turkey Creek.  That resumé never included a wife.  He never got over the girl whose wedding announcement he received four weeks into basic training.

Maggie Kinkaid has never married.  She adopted her college roommate’s son after his parents were killed in a car crash and has raised him, regaling him with stories of the man who would have been his adopted father, had he lived.  So while Jake is just as shocked as anyone when Billy comes home, he has no problem accepting the man as the father he never had—which is a good thing, since Maggie marries him the day after his return.

Turkey Creek appears to be a normal, quiet Southern town.  You know, the kind of place where you sneeze at one end of town and someone at the other end yells, “Bless you.”  Meanwhile, everyone in between debates whether you have a cold or if it’s just your allergies acting up again.  But there’s more to it than meets the eye.  It has a haunted cemetery that serves as a transfer point for drugs coming into the country from the Florida coast and making their way to destinations north.  Someone in town is a major drug dealer.  Billy Brayton isn’t just home to get revenge on Maggie’s father, he knows about the drug cartel and he’s determined to take it down.  He also believes the cartel is responsible for a few unsolved murders, and he plans to solve them.  Turkey Creek will not be the same when Billy gets through with it.

I highly recommend this book.  Just don’t read it at bedtime if you have to be anywhere in the morning.  I need a nap!

Length:  285 Pages
Price:  $5.95

You’ll notice I always include the publisher’s buy link.  That’s because authors usually receive 40% of the book price from the publisher.  Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%.  When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left.  So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40.  If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $0.83.

Downloading the file from your computer to your Kindle is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive.  Plug the USB end of your chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from your “Downloads” box to your Kindle/Documents/Books directory.  I actually download my books using “Save As” to a “Books” file on my computer that’s sorted by my publisher, friends, and books “to review,” and then transfer them to my Kindle from there.  That way, if there’s a glitch with my Kindle, the books are on my computer.  Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Resurrection, War ‘n’ Wit, Book 2 by Gail Roughton





Resurrection. A secret society. Not everyone can join, just the elite few who remember their past lives. Only the Seer knows if those memories are truth or fabrication. There’s just one problem. The new Seer is missing in action. War-N-Wit’s new assignment is a blast from the past! But whose past?


The mark of a good writer is the ability to keep up the suspense, continue to develop the characters, and keep the audience wanting more when writing a series.  Ms. Roughton is, indeed, a good writer.  Resurrection is the second book in the War ‘n Wit series and it did not disappoint.  Starting where Witch, Book 1 left off, Resurrection can easily stand alone.  For those of us who read Witch, however, it picks up the lives of Chad and Ariel seamlessly and plunges us right into their next adventure, introducing new characters and satisfying us that the details of this story are sewn up, yet leaving us craving more, hoping Ms. Roughton will hurry up and write the next chapter in this ongoing saga.  It’s clear she’s not finished with this magical couple, nor are we.  I was magically mesmerized as I devoured each word.

Length:  109 Pages
Price:  $2.99


Saturday, September 8, 2012

Norman by Craig Gehring


 
Journalism student Clayton East is hot on the trail of a multi-billion dollar hoax - a research project into artificial intelligence authored by a scientist-turned-exile.

He’ll risk his career, his friendships and his love to get the scoop of a lifetime.

But when Clayton finally discovers the truth, he gets much more than he bargained for.


I mostly skated through gym class on the strength of clean, well-pressed gym suits, except the semester my gym teacher got pregnant.  The woman who replaced her thought we all actually needed to be athletes, and unfortunately she overheard me kvetch to a friend that I didn’t see why a nurse needed a good batting average.  She told me it was so I would have a “well rounded” education.  Maybe she was a drill instructor somewhere, because I’m not sure I’ve quite gotten over the jogging she made me do.  So, I’m afraid I sympathized with Clayton when he wrote his feature story asking why a Journalism student had to take Computer Science.  Somehow I dodged that bullet and I do quite well using Word, Excel, Publisher, etc. without knowing a thing about ones or zeros.

Clayton, however, has to take Computer Science and when he writes his feature article saying it’s a waste of time, his professor reads it and gets rather angry at him.  Then Clayton finds out the prof has a multi-million dollar research program that apparently is not showing any results and is not expected to do so for at least a hundred years. He sets out to expose the man for a fraud.  He does not, in a million years, expect to meet Norman.  Nor does he expect to feel the things Norman makes him feel.  I highly suggest you read this story and see how Norman makes you feel.


Length:  64
Price:  $3.50

You’ll notice I always include the publisher’s buy link.  That’s because authors usually receive 40% of the book price from the publisher.  Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%.  When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left.  So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40.  If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $0.83.

Downloading the file from your computer to your Kindle is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive.  Plug the USB end of your chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from your “Downloads” box to your Kindle/Documents/Books directory.  I actually download my books using “Save As” to a “Books” file on my computer that’s sorted by my publisher, friends, and books “to review,” and then transfer them to my Kindle from there.  That way, if there’s a glitch with my Kindle, the books are on my computer.  Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.