Sunday, March 17, 2019
SUPERNATURAL SUNDAY: The one about medium Katharine Grace and the ghosts at the Dunbar
Hello and welcome to Sunday. This week, we have medium Katharine Grace's take on the ghosts she encounters at the Dunbar Theatre in Vancouver, B.C. It's interesting that some of them don't know they're dead. She'll tell you all about it.
Thursday, March 14, 2019
EMERGE and SUBMERGE: MER CHRONICLES by TOBIE EASTON
Emerge
Mer Chronicles
Book One
Tobie Easton
Genre: Fantasy
Publisher: Month9Books
Date of Publication: April 19th, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-944816-32-2
ASIN: B01CC3C47E
Number of pages: 312
Cover Artist: Beetiful Book Covers
Book Description:
Lia Nautilus may be a Mermaid, but she’s never lived in the ocean. Ever since the infamous Little Mermaid unleashed a curse that stripped Mer of their immortality, war has ravaged the Seven Seas.
So Lia has grown up in a secret community of land-dwelling Mer hidden among Malibu’s seaside mansions. Her biggest problems are surviving P.E. and keeping her feelings for Clay Ericson in check. Sure, he’s gorgeous in that cocky, leather jacket sort of way and makes her feel like there’s a school of fish swimming in her stomach, but getting involved with a human could put Lia's entire community at risk. So it’s for the best that he’s dating that new girl, right?
That is, until Lia finds out she isn't the only one at school keeping a potentially deadly secret. And this new girl? Her eyes are dead set on Clay, who doesn't realize the danger he's in. If Lia hopes to save him, she’ll have to get closer to Clay than ever. Lia’s parents would totally flip if they found out she was falling for a human boy, but the more time she spends with Clay, the harder it is for Lia to deny her feelings. After making a horrible mistake, Lia will risk everything to stop Clay from falling in love with the wrong girl.
Teaser
Excerpt Book 1:
As I swim back up, I angle my
face just right. When I hit the surface, I flick my head back so my hair flips
in a perfect cascade, sparkling with thousands of water droplets that catch the
sunlight at every angle. Maybe it’s unfair to use a classic Mermaid move
against Clay.
Submerge
Mer Chronicles
Book Two
Tobie Easton
Genre: Fantasy
Publisher: Month9Books
Date of Publication: September 12th, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-945107-84-9
ASIN: B071SFBG13
Number of pages: 392
Cover Artist: Beetiful Book Covers
Book Description:
Lia and Clay's love has broken the Little Mermaid's curse, but their ever after may not be as happy as they planned. Lia is adamant about staying on land with Clay for her senior year despite her family's opportunity to move to the new, sparkling capital city below the waves. Before any decision about the future can be made, her family must endure Melusine and her father's trial, where new revelations will have far-reaching consequences that threaten what Lia holds most dear.
The verdict will shake Lia's whole world, calling into question her future with Clay, her feelings for Caspian, and the fate of all Merkind. As she wonders whom to trust, Lia sets out on a treacherous path that will lead her away from her sheltered Malibu home to a remote and mysterious school for Mermaids—Mermaids who may hold the secret to ancient magic Lia can use to either get back all she's lost or embark on a thrilling and dangerous journey where only she can define her fate.
About the Author:
Tobie Easton was born and raised in Los Angeles, California, where she’s grown from a little girl who dreamed about magic to a twenty-something who writes about it. A summa cum laude graduate of the University of Southern California, Tobie hosts book clubs for tweens and teens (so she’s lucky enough to spend her days gabbing about books). She and her very kissable husband enjoy traveling the globe and fostering packs of rescue puppies.
Wednesday, March 13, 2019
BLOOD LUST with L.M. MOUNTFORD
Blood Lust
Thirst Series
Book One
L.M. Mountford
Genre: PNR
Date of Publication: 24 March 2018
ISBN: 9780463624593
ASIN: B07BPH233T
Number of pages: 45
Word Count: 12,000
Cover Artist: The Author
Tagline: The Thirst always wins…
Book Description:
Sooner or later, the thirst always wins…
After a thousand years, Lucian had given up any interest in the world. His only concern that night was finding his next drink, preferably from a flavoursome twenty-something with loose morals and no expectations. Then he saw her…
Kate is just a girl from the country, who came to the city with her brother to find a life away from their parents’ car crash. That is until the police came knocking on her door one morning and ripped her new life apart. Now she has nothing and no one, with only one on her mind. Revenge.
When these worlds collide, and the things that go bump in the night come calling, can these two mend the rifts in each other and give them what they need?
Excerpt:
It was time.
The last light
of dusk was slipping into inky black and high overhead, through the canopy of
clouds and pollution, the heavens have come alive with all the magnificence of
the celestial sphere. Thousands of sights no human eye could ever see.
The hour of the
wolf, the time of the vampire, had come. The time to hunt, to feed...
I inhaled the
backstreet in a breath and a shiver slithered down my spine at the heavy
perfume of things that didn’t bare contemplating. Needless to say, it was rank.
Human cities often carried a certain pungency about them, so much waste and
body odour, pressed together in such tight quarters, left its mark. They had
gotten use to the stink and given enough time, even a vampire could adjust. But
that place…
Its particular
ripeness was absolutely foul.
I pressed on
regardless. Lured by that single overpowering aroma that clung to this place.
Beneath the stink of shit. Blood. It lead me like a carrot dangling in front of
a donkey, teasing my fangs, my mouth watering.
Sooner or later,
the thirst always won.
And I’d left it
too long.
The way was dark
but up above and all around, the city burned bright. False light. Humanity’s
instinctive terror of the dark and all that lurked within, cloaked by darkness,
had driven them to harness the power of the sun and turn night into day.
Edison’s great folly. The old man had sought to create a warm light for all
mankind, warmth and safety for every home. Instead, his invention had made them
arrogant. Naive.
Man had grown
careless, wrapped in their protective cocoon. So they’d forgotten the perils of
the night, the hunters in the shadows and all the things that fed on them when
the sun went down.
And had allowed
darkness to creep back into their world.
I paused
mid-stride. The trail swung off the beaten path and down the mouth of an alley
a few meters ahead and i felt the instinctive thrill. I was getting close.
Men. Four of them.
All in leather and denim. Huddled so close together that to any passers-by,
they looked just like any other a bunch of dudes out smoking, drinking, and
whiling away a night on the town. But the smell was on them. Blood and fear. It
was old, maybe weeks dry, but they were rank with it. And their eyes were all
fixed on the mouth of the alley, waiting.
They’d do. A
small smirk tugged irresistibly at the corner of my mouth. It would be so easy.
Though they gave
no outward sign of noticing me, their hearts quickened as I walked into the
open, the palpitations pulsing through their clothes. Then they all turned and
the biggest of the group, a brute of a man with a face like a bulldog and a
spider web tattoo etched across his shaved pate, stepped forward. “Hey man!”
Spinning round,
I did my best to look surprised as he pushed himself forward and walked towards
me. The others fell into step, spreading to his left and right. “H-hi, can I
help you?” I said, my voice shaky.
“Yhea,” Spider
Web’s stride quickened, moving in for the kill. “Gotta light?” His hand was in
his jean’s pocket. No doubt a ploy to make me think he was reaching for his
cigarettes. Idiot. He had something there. Its outline was clearly defined
against the denim, but it was too long and thin to be anything like a carton of
smokes. A flick knife probably. Knife crimes had been on the rise over the last
couple of years. Easier to conceal than a firearm, with a considerably lower
criminal sentence for carrying one if caught.
They were out of
the alley and encircling me, closing in. I pivoted right then left, making a
show of trying to watch them all at once, of being afraid to have my back to
even one of them. “E-excuse me?”
Just a few steps
closer.
About the Author:
A self-confessed tiger fanatic, L.M. Mountford was born and raised in England, first in the town of Bridgwater, Somerset, before later moving to the city of Gloucester where he currently resides. A fully qualified and experienced scuba diver, he has travelled across Europe and Africa diving wrecks and seeing the wonders of the world.
He started writing when he was 14. Under the pseudonym Dark Inferno, he has written more than thirty fan fiction stories. When he was 21, he started publishing independently through KDP and Smashwords, continuing Erotica, before switching to dark and contemporary romance.
Sign up to his newsletter and receive weekly updates about his writing progress, cover reveals, public appearances, reviews, and a FREE eBook. That's right, a free book in every email. And, sometimes even chances to win advanced copies of his next book before anyone else. So, subscribe to his mailing list today, and keep up will all his new releases and special deals, exclusive to his inner circle.
Newsletter Sign Up: https://www.subscribepage.com/lmmountford
Twitter: https://twitter.com/RealDarkinferno
Sunday, March 10, 2019
SUPERNATURAL SUNDAY: The one about Bill Hauser
There were some audio glitches on last week's upload of Supernatural Sunday. Here it is again for those who are interested.
Thursday, March 7, 2019
PHOENIX FALLING by LAURA BICKLE
Phoenix Falling
A Wildlands Novel
Book Five
Laura Bickle
Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Harper Voyager
A Wildlands Novel
Book Five
Laura Bickle
Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Harper Voyager
ISBN-10: 0062567357
ISBN-13: 978-0062567352
Release Date: February 26, 2019
Genre: Urban Fantasy, Horror,
Dark Fantasy, PNR, Paranormal Fantasy
Book Description:
Laura Bickle, the critically acclaimed author of Nine of Stars and Witch Creek, returns with a fiery new chapter in her celebrated Wildlands series.
In the Yellowstone backcountry, a merciless source of evil carries a torch for the past…
Petra Dee and her immortal husband, Gabe, have been trying to gain a toehold in what passes for ordinary life in Temperance, Wyoming—
a wickedly enchanted land founded generations ago by the alchemist, Lascaris. Petra may be adept when it comes to the uncanny, but as a reasoned geologist, Petra still can’t fathom the wildfires suddenly engulfing Yellowstone National Park, or why Gabe claims to have seen the sky explode in flames. The answers could lie in the past.
It was a dreadful night in 1862 when Lascaris went harvesting for souls, only to be set upon by townsfolk determined to eliminate the root of all evil in a trial by fire. Petra can’t help fearing that Lascaris has crawled out of the ashes of history to wreak vengeance—and to complete his mission by claiming every vulnerable soul in Temperance.
With the help of Gabe and her coyote sidekick, Sig, Petra must now venture into Lascaris’s shadow before he turns her world into an inferno burning out of control.
“Bickle is well on her way to establishing her work as a cornerstone of her genre.”
—Publishers Weekly
Excerpt:
For the first time in
centuries, he stood frozen in shock.
A black shape as big as
a car splashed out of the maw of the underworld. It bellowed a roar that
rattled Gabe’s teeth and shook sparks in the air, plunging into the field
toward the phoenix. It took him a moment to register that the interloper was a
toad, black and roiling like thunder.
And the toad was not
alone. Dozens of white shapes stampeded from the river behind it. They were
pale as bone with oozing black eyes, crested spines undulating in the
half-light and hooves pounded like war drums in the half-light. The bones were
partially covered in skins that resembled rotting leaves, the legs spattered in
black ichor to the knee. Horns were lowered to the grass as they charged, jaws
open in rictus grins. They were buffalo, Gabe realized. Or what remained of
buffalo, reformed and reanimated in some deadly familiar alchemical process.
Whatever they were,
they were heading right for him.
Gabe swore. He had to
get out of the way or be trampled. He pocketed the mirror and ran as fast as he
could through the burning grasses, perpendicular to their approach. He’d almost
succeeded in getting clear of them when a buffalo clipped him and he bounced,
hard, into a ditch. He dragged himself,
gasping, to his feet, to find a wretched stench washing over him and a black
eye staring at him—the eye of the black toad. The toad smelled of putrified
meat in a forgotten slaughterhouse in the summer, and its loose skin sloughed audibly
as it moved.
“What are you?” Gabe asked,
though he was afraid to know.
“I am death,” the toad
reassured him. It flicked its tongue out at him, and the black slime slipped
down Gabe’s face. The toad burbled in laughter. “And you. You will belong to me
when the phoenix is defeated. You will be one of my footsoldiers when this is
through, when death rules this land.”
Gabe’s eyes narrowed. He
had seen great evil before, many times. But this thing was beyond a facile
explanation of evil. It was a living personification of the fermentation process,
the spirit of rot and dismantling living things to their core. The phoenix
might burn everything it touched with the purity of fire, but the toad would
rule it in slow decomposition. Gabe’s fingers slid to his pocket, to the
mirror.
The toad turned away,
plunging after the buffalo. The phoenix descended from the sky, lighting in the
field with a contentious shriek. Buffalo raced toward it. Like a toreador, the
bird flicked its wings toward them, blackening bones that charged it, sizzling
ichor, until the buffalo paled to ash and disintegrated. But there was a herd,
and they kept coming. The reanimated buffalo made no sound as they assaulted
the fire, splintering and stampeding toward the bird that flitted just out of
reach, taunting them with the veil of its wings.
Gabe pulled out the
mirror. Now that the embodiment of death was on the field, he should plunge in
now, while the bird was distracted, and the glitter of the mirror might catch
its eye.
The phoenix drew itself
into the air with two powerful beats of its wings, out of reach of buffalo
horns. But that didn’t deter the toad. It leapt up into the air and clamped its
jaws down on the phoenix’s burning tailfeathers, dragging it back down to earth
and the hooves of the buffalo. The toad and the phoenix fizzled sharply as they
wrestled, and the air shimmered with the smell of burnt rubber.
Now was his chance.
Gabe had taken two steps toward the fray when he heard a plaintive coyote howl,
back from the direction of the tree and wrecked vehicles. The howl was full of
eerie sorrow, as if it petitioned the heavens for mercy.
Sig. And Petra.
Heart hammering in his
chest, Gabe turned and ran toward the howl.
About the Author:
Laura Bickle grew up in rural Ohio, reading entirely too many comic books out loud to her favorite Wonder Woman doll. After graduating with an MA in Sociology – Criminology from Ohio State University and an MLIS in Library Science from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, she patrolled the stacks at the public library and worked with data systems in criminal justice. She now dreams up stories about the monsters under the stairs, also writing contemporary fantasy novels under the name Alayna Williams.
Her work has been included in the ALA’s Amelia Bloomer Project 2013 reading list and the State Library of Ohio’s Choose to Read Ohio reading list for 2015-2016.
Website: http://www.laurabickle.com/
Newsletter sign up: http://eepurl.com/cOxHJr
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Laura_Bickle
Sunday, March 3, 2019
SUPERNATURAL SUNDAY: The one about Bill Hauser and his ITC equipment.
Today I'm sharing the first of what will hopefully be a series of shorts where people get to share their supernatural stories. I will upload as they come available. If you have a story to share, you can comment below and I will be in touch.
SS1 The one about Bill Hauser and his ITC equipment.
Blll Hauser has several years experience using what is commonly referred to as a "ghost box" or a "spirit box". A quick explanation is that there is a theory that entities can communicate using the frequencies between the AM/FM dial.
Bill has been exploring this theory for several years and has modified his own equipment in a manner that he believes produces better results.
Monday, February 25, 2019
INTERVIEW WITH KIRA SHAYDE (Primal Shifters)
Time flies. Here we are at the final Monday in February already. That weekend just flew by. Lucky for us, there's a knock at the virtual door and Kira Shayde is here to answer our three fave questions.
SC: Tell me a little
bit about your main character of this book.
KS: There are three novellas in the Primal Shifters Box Set,
and each novella features a different main couple, so I will limit my response
to the first novella, Bane of Her Desire. Although a first-caste daughter of
Parliament, lion shifter Holly Ainran is a strong and independent woman, keen
on eliminating the caste hierarchy in lion society and the lion-hyena conflict.
Bane Ojore, shunned by Parliament for his rare fur color, is a hard and distant
commander of a paramilitary force that he formed after losing his family and
village to a hyena attack. While searching for her AWOL brother, Holly
confronts the commander, yet Bane is convinced her brother is the traitor
selling weapons to the enemy hyenas. These two definitely knock heads.
SC: Do you believe in
the paranormal and if so, do you have an experience you can share?
KS: We can’t rely on
what we can see or hear as evidence (or conversely, lack of evidence) of
paranormal activity, because human visual and auditory ranges are actually
quite limited. But unfortunately, no legitimate scientific experiments have
proven the existence of ghosts or psychic abilities. Yeah, bums me out too.
SC: We'll have to
agree to disagree on that one. What titles are you working on now that you can
tell us about?
KS: I’m debating
working on a fourth novella in the Primal Shifters series. There’s a secondary
character from book three who needs his happily ever after. He’s a clan hyena
who lives in the chairman’s palace. She’s a rogue hyena fighting to eliminate
the clans. I love the opposites attract trope in romance. As for projects I’m
currently working on, I have a Young Adult fantasy book (under my other pen
name), which I hope to have finished and edited this year. I also have a
non-romance Sci-fi on my to-do list. I’ve written an outline and the first
three chapters and I’m really looking forward to getting back to it.
SC: Thanks for stopping by. Let's take a look at your novel
now.
Primal Shifters Box Set
Kira Shayde
Genre: Paranormal Romance
Publisher: Kira Shayde
Date of Publication: February 25, 2019
ISBN: 9780999018378
ISBN: 9780999018354
Number of pages: 315
Word Count: 105,500
Cover Artist: Kira Shayde
Book Description:
Three novella-length romances in one overarching story. Equal parts romance, urban fantasy, and social/political commentary.
Available in erotic version and tame version. Tame version has no graphic sex scenes.
Book Trailer: https://youtu.be/AVY3EcPi6zM
BANE OF HER DESIRE
When Holly Ainran’s brother goes AWOL from an elite military force in Tanzania, she confronts Commander Bane Ojore, a rare melanistic lion shifter. Sparks ignite, but Holly finds a challenge in taming this brooding, hostile beast. Bane does not expect the daughter of a high-ranking parliamentary executive to be a smart, code-breaking expert adamant about abolishing the lion caste hierarchy and ending the lion-hyena conflict. Nor does he expect such a stunning lioness to fall for him. But Bane’s job is to find the traitors supplying weapons to the hyenas, and all signs point to Holly’s brother. Holly won’t give up on her brother though…or Bane. As their passion escalates, so do the risks, the danger, and ultimately, their love.
DESIRES AT WAR
Months as a POW leaves lion shifter Fix Ainran struggling to recover, but he can’t get the curvaceous Caryn Plumar out of his mind. Yet the beautiful daughter of the hyena chairman only torments the disabled former soldier with heated trysts before pulling away. No matter how much she desires Fix’s touch, Caryn’s obligations involve more than fighting for an independent hyena state in a land ruled by lions and fraught with war. She must sacrifice any chance of happiness and freedom by marrying within the clan to ensure her safety. Unable to stay apart, Fix and Caryn defy societal rules and risk their lives as they battle enemies, search for the truth about his captivity...and fall in love.
COOL BLUE DESIRE
When Alina Van der Stel agrees to spring an imprisoned lion shifter in southern Africa and hand him over to the rebels in return for information about her birth parents, she doesn’t expect the man to capture her mind as much as he does her body. Falsely accused of conspiracy, Kipper Lumbwi has no intention of allowing the icy blonde to sell him to the very traitors who landed him a stint in prison. Yet her ethereal blue eyes reflect years of sadness as a snow leopard trapped in a land of lions, and he understands her need to find her true kin. Except she’s not the only one targeting him. With a bounty-hunting hyena and the Defence Force in pursuit, Kipper and Alina agree to an alliance…one that leads to her finally experiencing the joys of desire. Can their passion earn them the trust they’ll need to survive?
Erotic Version
Non-Erotic Version
Excerpt:
According to legend, the gods warned humankind that if they insisted on behaving like animals, they would become animals, permanently. The humans didn’t listen, and their fate was sealed. But the gods weren’t done with their machinations. While the humans became prey, the animal predators became humans. Shape-shifting humans.
The African lion, the pinnacle of hunters in the wild, replaced man as overlord in the Serengeti and quickly implemented a system to ensure their supremacy in the new world. The disparaged spotted hyena, often the more tenacious and successful predator on the savannas, was the lion’s natural enemy. Becoming human didn’t change that. It only made it worse.
Chapter One: Bane of Her Desire
Holly Ainran opened the box her father had received from the Alpha Elites paramilitary base. She tossed her brother’s faded fatigues and worn military boots aside and sifted through the contents of his safe-deposit box—some banking papers, a data chip, and a pocket watch from their great-grandfather.
She sat back on her heels. If only there were something among Fix’s personal effects to give her a clue as to why he had dropped off the face of the earth. Was he having an affair with a married woman? Involved in some shady drug deal?
Months ago, he’d been reported AWOL, yet he hadn’t reached out to her. It ticked her off. Maybe she was no more than his kid sister, but she’d thought they were close. At least they had been before he joined the Elites. Another possibility flitted through her mind, and she shoved it away angrily. His body hadn’t been found, and she just knew he was alive. Felt it somehow. Whatever it took, she’d find him.
She popped her brother’s data chip into her laptop and scrolled through the directories. Nothing more incriminating than saved game scores, innocuous e-mails to his on-again, off-again girlfriend, and pictures of his Alpha Elite buddies relaxing by their campsite. She was about to remove the chip when she spied a seemingly gibberish file name and smiled. Gotcha.
Holly double-clicked the file and received a system error. Encrypted. Damn. Now she was definitely intrigued. What was Fix hiding? She ran through various computer algorithms and within minutes bypassed his encryption. But it wasn’t a text file as she’d expected.
A video appeared on her screen, and she recognized the Alpha Elite base. Out of camera range, a man spoke, his deep voice imposing, almost threatening. A tremor coursed through her. The man strode into view, the camera focusing on his face, and her breath caught in her throat. His amber skin glowed, and his black eyes were like bullets beneath a strong brow ridge. A dark shadow of stubble colored his square jaw.
Her gaze riveted to his mouth. Holly no longer listened to his words, imagining only for a moment how it would feel to have those commanding lips pressed against her skin. The muscles in his jaw flexed, and the low timbre of his voice vibrated through her veins. This man was evocative, combustive…primal.
Uneasiness crept over her, and she pushed the wayward thoughts aside. There was a coldness to his face, a tightness around his eyes. This was a man who didn’t reveal secrets, who wouldn’t share himself. A man who clearly reveled in danger and control. This had to be the elusive Bane Ojore, leader of the Alpha Elites paramilitary force.
He shifted to lion form, and Holly gasped. She stared at the video, mesmerized by the sight of an almost unheard-of melanistic lion, his fur as black as a thundercloud, his mane the color of charcoal and fuller than any other she’d seen. When he let out a ferocious roar, she shuddered. But from fear…or something else?
About the Author
As a paranormal romance author, Kira Shayde writes about animal magnetism and intrigue, where the heroes bring the heat and the heroines save the day. She explores somewhat atypical pairings and settings and can’t help adding a twinge of societal awareness to her works, but the focus is always on the developing romance, passion, and happy endings. While some of her books are erotic romances, you won’t find any hard-core BDSM. Kira prefers the hero and heroine to share the power and share the love. On a personal level, Kira is devoted to animal and ecological conservation, loves devil’s food cake, and sings when no one is around.
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