Sunday, June 30, 2013

Fight For Your Write reviews Hunger Moon by Melissa Snark


Book Review: Hunger Moon by Melissa Snark

Guest Review by Lisa Lester



Werewolf Victoria Storm knows all about duty.  Alpha to a dwindling pack decimated by war with the Barrett family, and with new pups on the way, she must find safe harbor away from the pursuing human hunters that have sworn to wipe her pack from the face of the Earth. After praying to her goddess Freya for guidance, Victoria is led to Sierra Pines, California to find an Alpha to protect and shelter her pack.  Arik Koenig, a powerful alpha male with a murky past, promises to be the protector her pack so desperately needs, and agrees to be Victoria’s mate.  Yet nothing is ever easy, and Victoria soon finds that the wickedly handsome Arik comes with his own baggage; his murdered wife’s spirit cries out to Victoria to protect her son, Logan, who has been rumored to be his mother’s killer.  Can she trust the attraction she feels with Arik, despite the rising contention between father and son?  Or will the mystery of his wife’s death lead to the destruction of her pack?  She has to find the answers, and fast, to keep herself and her pack safe.
book review hunger moon by melissa snark
This book was literally a page turner for me.  This was one of those books where I would look at the clock, groan aloud at how late it was, and move on to the next chapter, until I finished it in one sitting.  Melissa’s concise writing style keeps up a good pace without slowing down, and the characters are alive and seem to leap off the page.  I also loved the inclusion of Norse mythology into the story; the world and mythos building here is just enough to be immersive without bogging down in the details.  Another aspect of the book I liked was that even in their human forms, the shifters in this world still have characteristics of their animal counterparts, such as showing submissiveness to a dominant pack leader.  I particularly enjoyed the snappy dialogue between Victoria and Logan, as well as the sparks that fly between her and Arik.  Let me tell you, parts of those interactions were definitely hot! While I missed the first book in the series, that is definitely a mistake I will have to rectify.  I’m intrigued to see where Melissa takes Victoria and her pack, and to learn more about the role she plays as a Valkyrie and the dynamic between her and her goddess Freya.  A definite must read for anyone who enjoys urban fantasy.


Read the rest of the original review here.

Friday, June 28, 2013

Valid Thoughts From Validation Publishing...

 
VALIDATION PUBLISHING is having a contest and you, and yes, we do mean YOU, can be the WINNER.
To Enter:
Spend countless months, perhaps years, submitting short stories to obscure genre or literary magazines, with your only reward being a copy of said magazine.
    Once five or six of the hundreds of stories you've sent out finally becomes accepted, then you're ready for the next step.
    To proceed, simply send out numberless query letters to innumerable agents and wait long months, sometimes even years for them to get back to you, and hey, don't forget to make sure that those queries are to each agent's exacting specifications, after all, they have their standards.

 *****

   That's all you have to do to enter, and once you've won, once we have reached down into the gutter of mediocrity and plucked you out of the muck, you'll be an honest to God author.
    Just think, it's that easy!
   So enter today, and maybe someday you'll join the elite ranks of  VALIDATION authors and be able to say -I'VE BEEN PLUCKED!


*Contest void where prohibited. Such as to persons with an IQ over 60, anyone not living in the past, self-starters, and person or persons who intend to someday make a decent living.

Validation Publishing is a subsidiary of MegalomaniaCorp Inc.

*****

Original article found here

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Book Review: Mothers and Other Strangers



Family is supposed to be a safe haven, an island holding back a sea of pain, regret, and troubles. Yet, sometimes, the sharks circling you are the very family that is supposed to protect you. A mother, father, sister—or even grandma---with sinister intentions can rip your heart apart, turning home into a nightmare.

Be careful where your eyes roam in Mothers & Other Strangers. The stories and poems inside may resonate in your own heart and make you reevaluate just what family really means.


***Some stories contain adult material.***


This eBook contains eleven short stories and five poems for your reading pleasure. .


Free on Amazon


Review:

"Mothers and Other Strangers" is an anthology that includes a range of eclectic stories from the heart-warming to the surreal. I browsed the collection rather than reading from cover to cover, enough to verify that the content is well written and thoroughly edited. In particular, I enjoyed "One Last Request" by Theresa Leschmann.
And "The Honeybees" by Amy Browne brought tears to my eyes. This definitely seems to be a great collection of shorts and poems put together by a talented group of writers.


At the author's request, I am focusing my review specifically on one story in particular--"The Butterfly" by Robert Arend. To quote the author: "The story itself is homage to one of the greatest horror writers of all time: H.P. Lovecraft."

For the benefit of the uninitiated, H.P. Lovecraft is a classic horror novelist known for his works written in the early 20th Century. He has been highly influentially within the genre.  Wikipedia article.

Without giving away any spoilers, "The Butterfly" is told from the perspective of a non-human protagonist. The story takes a swift turn for the surreal when the main character is called home by his mother and given the news that his father has "reincarnated" as a caterpillar. 

The story begins with the protagonist trapped in the basement of a decaying house while a monster rampages above, and then he goes on to tell the tale of his mother and "father". The author created immediate empathy for his hero in the reader's mind and then used that reaction as the platform for the telling of past events. My initial reaction  swiftly transformed from curiosity to distress and then revulsion. So far as horror tales go, the story was evocative and definitely delivered. 

Horror is not my favorite genre but I definitely recommend this macabre tale to readers interested in horror with a Lovecraft twist.


Author Bio:

Robert L. Arend (known by his many (12 or fewer) Facebook friends as “The Robert” is the editor and one of a number (8 or less)of contributing short story writers for the Circle 8 Writers Group short story/flash fiction/poetry anthologies. Born before fan fiction (bff), Robert grew up in a household where his needs were meant far more so than his wants, causing him to suspect he’d been kidnapped when an infant from parents who would have given him everything he asked for. He never was reunited with those parents, but he wants them to know (if they are still alive) that he loves them and to get in touch via Facebook so he can let them know what he wants for Christmas, and all those other Christmases and birthdays they missed because he was kidnapped.

Where to find The Robert:

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Author Spotlight: Robert Arend



Robert, please tell us about yourself and your writing.

I am very old, yet not as old as a lot of other people, but not as young as those school pictures of me I have posted all over my laptop desktop. I sometimes wonder if I am an old man dreaming of being the boy in those photos, or if I am the boy peering into his own dreams, longing to be as old as the old guy looking back at him, though considering the possibility that both the boy and the old guy are nothing more than avatars in some video game being manipulated by some methhead living in Wisconsin. I write short stories.

What does your writing space look like?

My lap is my writing space, parked on my overstuffed recliner with DVD episodes of “Lost in Space” playing on my big screen TV. That June Lockhart was a real hotty.

How long have you been writing?

I started writing in my mother’s womb to pass the time. Life was pretty boring in there.

Do you have a process for coming up with character names and book titles?

I am both editor and short story contributor for the Circle 8 Writers Group Anthologies: a group of fiction and poetry writers from all over the United States. We collaborate on titles. As far as the characters in my stories, I usually give them the first names of famous sitcom characters and last names that don’t rhyme with yogart.

What inspired your current book? How do you come up with your book titles? How do you name your characters?

Hunger. Needing to pay the cable bill. Having to choose whether to continue buying my cat, Merlin, expensive cans of food or push him outside to fend for himself. The problem is that myself and most of my fellow writers at Circle 8 have individual short stories for sale on Amazon, Smashwords and Internet hell that do not sell enough unless they are free. I suppose 99 cents for a short story (No matter how pretty the book-like covers) is a bit steep for 15 pages or less. So, we are presently at work combining a lot of those single stories, others previously published in the C8 anthologies, and new stories into what we presently refer to as “The Big Monster Anthology”, figuring our readers will appreciate the value of thick. I am too old to write a novel with odds of dying before chapter 12.

Name one person, living or dead, you'd most like to meet.

The inventor of the indoor flush toilet. I’d just like to thank him personally.

What is your favorite book genre? Who are your favorite authors?

Sci-Fi and horror are my favorite genres, but I do appreciate those writers who eschew genre limitations to merge all into one great read. My favorite authors are the late Gore Vidal (my favorite), the late Truman Capote, author of “The Thorn Birds” Colleen McCullough, Joyce Carol Oates and Joyce Maynard. Oh, and that other late dude, Ray Bradbury.

Has anyone in particular been an influence on your writing?

Besides my great, great, great, great, a thousand times great grandfather Ludwig Von Arendt, who invented beer, I have to say the greatest influencer on my writing was my 8th grade English literature/composition teacher Ann Evangelisto, who singled me out as a marked boy (teacher’s pet) for my other classmates to hate by always reading my compositions aloud as examples of what all in the class should strive for in their own work. She privately counseled me that I was already a good enough writer to go professional, but I wanted to be a cartoonist, then, so it was years before the writing bug bit me so hard I actually skipped some episodes of Barbara Mandell’s TV variety show to work on a novel—and Barbara was so hot, but so was Mrs. Evangelisto in an unglamorous sort of way. Junior high school boys didn’t date their teachers back then, though.

Do you have a favorite character from your books? Who is it and why?

Yes, the gothic mother in my short story “The Butterfly”—free to read via C8’s only FREE anthology “Mothers & Other Strangers” who falls in love with a butterfly she believes is the reincarnation of her dead husband. The love scene will knock your socks off.

Tell us something strange or interesting about yourself.

I have a scar over the left side of my chest from a scalding tea accident since I was four. It’s in the shape of a flaming cross. When I’d go shirtless, I’d impress other kids with the story of a crazy religious aunt who babysat me one afternoon and, because I did something that annoyed her, decided I had Satan in me. So out of her purse she extracted a rod with a cross on one end, heated it in the flames of the gas stove until it glowed, then straddled me and branded the cross over my heart. Sure it was a lie, but it was an early sign I was born to be a fiction writer, for the best fiction writers are the best liars. Lying—it’s what writers do.

Who is the sexiest man/woman alive and why?

There are no sexy men, only sexy woman. Barbara Mandrell is still the sexiest, but Jane Fonda is just a quark away.

Is there anything else you'd really like our readers to know?
Heaven is a peanut butter, jelly and mayonnaise sandwich.

Quick quiz:
·         Favorite food? Peanut butter, jelly and mayonnaise sandwich
·         Favorite color? I’m colorblind
·         Favorite animal? Merlin, my cat
·         Biggest pet peeve? That Gore Vidal is dead. He really disappointed his fans by doing that.
·         Dream car? George Jetson’s
property of Hanna Barbera

Author Bio:

Robert L. Arend (known by his many (12 or fewer) Facebook friends as “The Robert” is the editor and one of a number (8 or less)of contributing short story writers for the Circle 8 Writers Group short story/flash fiction/poetry anthologies. Born before fan fiction (bff), Robert grew up in a household where his needs were meant far more so than his wants, causing him to suspect he’d been kidnapped when an infant from parents who would have given him everything he asked for. He never was reunited with those parents, but he wants them to know (if they are still alive) that he loves them and to get in touch via Facebook so he can let them know what he wants for Christmas, and all those other Christmases and birthdays they missed because he was kidnapped.






Where to find The Robert:

Monday, June 24, 2013

Meow's Meowifesto


Meow meow murm meow meow mrr mew Meow's Meowifesto.

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  • Meow meh-meowlogical meow meh meow or meow meh meow mewwn. Meh meow meows, meow MEOW mrroow meow mew mewl mewl mrr meow meow meowlogical meow meh, mrrm meowly meow pmeows meh meow mew meow meow mewy mehful meow mrr cmurms meow meowly meh murm mew mewo mrr meowingly meow meow mehs meow mmeow meow meh murmms meow meowed mew meow meow meh meh mew murmc meh. Meow, meh mew meow meows, mew meow meow meow meh meowable: Meow murm mewl mrr meowmeh mehr meowify meh mew meow murm meow meow meow meow meow meh humans mrr meowy meow meownomy. 
  • Meh mew meow meows mew mew meow meow meow meow mewy mehful. Mrrm mew meow mew meow meow mew meow murm meow murms mew meow mrr meow meow mew meow meow, murm meh meow murm meow meow mewwn meow meow meow meow mew murm meocw meow meow meow. 
  • Murms meow mewl Meowlution meow meh mew meh murm meow. Murm Meowlution meow meh mor meh meow make murm mrr meow: meow meh meow meow or meow meh meow me meow meow meow meowing mew meow meows. Murms mrrr mrrr meow mrr meow. Mrrm murms mew meh meh mew mewy meow mewl mew meows meow mewmew meow murm mew meh murm meow mewl meow meh meow meow meow mew mewl mew me Meowlution meow meh meow meow mrr humans. Murm murm meow meow meow me MEOW Meowlution meow. Mews meow meow meow meow meow meow meow mrrm mew meowomic meow meowlogical meow murm mrr mew meow humans.

MEOW!

MRRR-WOW-WOW

Lady Lion
Rawr
Lady Lion
Meooow
Lady Lion
MROAR

Goddess Fish Cover Reveal: Christine Wenrick's Someone Else’s Skye

SOMEONE ELSE'S SKYE
Men of Brahm Hill, Book 1

Coming October 1, 2013

Kane, Brethren Guardian and one of the few Natural Shape-Shifters left in existence, survived the bloody battle of Brahm Hill but lost two of his closest friends. For all of his good-natured sarcasm and eye-popping good looks, Kane finds himself unable to completely forget about that night, so he seeks comfort in the one thing he is truly good at . . . sex!

This shape-shifting bad boy believes in having a good time—a very good time, usually involving some mingled heavy breathing with a sexy Dhampir in a tiny closet somewhere. But when he’s sent into the freezing tundra of the Northwest Territories to investigate a troublesome supernatural being on the loose, he ends up crossing paths with a woman who almost instantly drives him insane with want . . . because she doesn’t seem to be falling for the shifter’s charms.
It’s completely inexplicable.

Skye Matthews has a job to do, and she needs to be focused on that, not spending all her time rebuffing the advances of this way-too-cocky and handsome stranger. Yet, there is something irresistible about this self-involved playboy that Skye can’t seem to stay away from. And when the unidentified Kane is sent to investigate takes an unnatural interest in her, protecting her becomes the Guardian’s top priority.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Christine is a graduate of Washington State University where she received a BA in Interior Design. And true to form of using mostly her ‘right brain’, she splits her time between her commercial design career and her imaginary world of writing. She lives in the scenic Pacific Northwest where she enjoys hiking, camping and photographing many of the wonderful places that served as inspiration for her Charmed Trilogy. Her biggest reward in life is any given day when one of her books connects with a reader because she herself is such a lover of reading. Some of her favorite authors include Lisa Kleypas, Julia Quinn, and Kimberly Derting.

To keep up on all the latest information about Christine and her books, visit her website or you can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads.