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Sugar & Other Luxuries - Book Tour & Giveaway

4/30/2016

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 Title: Sugar & Other Luxuries
By: Everly Scott
Publication Date: April 5, 2016
Cover Design: Mayhem Cover Creations
Genre: Romantic Comedy/Chick Lit
Katherine Humphries wants to find the love of her life. As a recovering perfectionist who hasn’t been on a date in five years, finding love is harder than she thought. Faced with beginning her twenty-sixth year of life insecure and living in Los Angeles where men and women either ignore or insult her curvy existence, Katherine decides to make dating her bitch. She’s not changing her curvy body. She won’t put down the dessert. And she isn’t going to apologize for any of it. Her first night out ends nothing like she’d planned. When a flirty and rugged New Yorker asks for her phone number, Katherine freezes. She’s ready to give up before heartbreak happens. That is, until she meets a polyamorous, fairy-godmother-wanna-be, Hunter. The self proclaimed Queen of Pleasure coaches Katherine on badass, dating etiquette. Hunter’s first rule? Don’t fall in love. The second rule? Perfection doesn’t exist. But when a bet with a sexy and sensitive music teacher changes her perspective on the dating game, Katherine learns that breaking badass rule #1 before loving every inch of herself might spell trouble. On the other hand, breaking rules might be exactly what Katherine needs to discover the true power of a woman’s body, the sugary sweetness of indulgence, and whether saying yes to her dream life against the wishes of advice-slinging friends will lead to heartache or harmony.
Amazon US - http://amzn.to/1QyY5ZO
Amazon UK - http://goo.gl/0YNGGA
Amazon CA - http://goo.gl/8x4AoU
Chapter One
I spent the first half of my twenties accusing myself of being a feminist fraud for wanting a boyfriend who thought I was perfect. I had been a good girl, a maniacal, career-focused, intellectually stimulated woman who leaned-in, took a seat at the table, and made my voice so heard I had become hoarse. But none of that seemed to matter in the Los Angeles dating world. Looking for love had led me into the defined biceps of guys who thought I might turn into an acceptable companion if, and only if I changed something about myself. If I lost fifteen pounds. If I didn’t say “fuck” so much. If I made more money. Less money. Had a smaller nose. Didn’t always want to eat pasta. If I didn’t have a belly. At some point between learning how to flirt in high school chemistry class and stumbling furiously toward the eve of my twenty-sixth birthday, I had given up. Stopped dating completely. Packed away the dresses, heels, and the innuendo. Vowed to focus on myself. Sharing a chocolate chip cookie sundae with a guy who wouldn’t be afraid to caress an arm, thigh, or hip bigger than a size two, five, or eight only happened in my imagination. A male sundae-lover definitely didn’t exist in a Los Angeles gym. I went to the gym once. My childhood best frenemy, Jenna, convinced me that the gym helped women burn energy, melt fat, and meet men. The entire experience mirrored meditation, she’d told me. “Don’t complain about being fat. Complain about things you can’t change.” I went alone, without telling her that I had decided to test out her theory. Bad idea. With my phone, tiny polka dotted towel, and headphones in hand, I entered the world of adult, organized, physical activity. It smelled like stale water. I flashed my electronic guest pass at the laser scanner, kept my focus towards the back of the big square room, and moved quickly past the cardio machines, knowing that if I tried to run or elliptical or spin bike myself, I’d be exposing my newbie status. A tsunami of terror hit me, hard. I had no idea what to do in a place like this. I quickly looked for a place to fit in, a place to disguise myself. A group of women crowded around one weight machine like it was a pan of brownies and they had PMS. It seemed like the magic potion. It was the Miss Universe of the gym, and if they had to have it, so did I. Jenna’s directions echoed in my mind. “Stretch first. You don’t want to pull a muscle. Touch your toes or something.” So I leaned against the wall and touched my toes. Except touching my toes was more like leaning my elbows against my bent, trembling knees. I bent over a little farther, and the back of my thighs burned. A couple of bones crackled, but I had a good view of the magical machine. “Totally worth it,” I whispered to myself, rubbing my hamstrings. A woman in a full face of makeup, with boob-length blonde hair taught me how to use the contraption without knowing it. I continued touching my knees. Step 1: adjust the weight on the machine. Step 2: pull the level that makes the thigh pads fly apart. Step 3: sit down. Step 4: clench thighs together. Step 5: Repeat. A lot. It seemed easy enough. The blonde sitting on the machine made it look like thigh clenching was a way of life. Real women learn to walk, talk, read, and thigh clench. So when she was done, and the crowd of women had busied themselves with other gym work like butt extenders, and arm pumpers, I approached my machine like we had an intimate relationship. “Looking good,” I said, patting the seat. I adjusted my weight and assumed my clenching capacity would be 50 pounds. I didn’t want to look like a complete wimp. I pulled the lever, sat down, and tried to squeeze my thighs together. Nothing moved. The more I tried to pull my knees toward each other the more everything stayed in place. At that moment, I understood why the weight lifting men grunted. I closed my eyes and pressed my knees against the pads. A grumble vibrated inside of my stomach. Roar like you’re a queen. Queen of the fucking jungle, I thought. My best attempt at roaring resulted in a throat clearing sound, a thankfully silent fart, and yet again, a complete lack of movement. I lowered the weight down to twenty-five pounds and did two of rapid squeezes. The weights slammed together, alerting everyone within ten feet of me that I worked hard. I pumped iron. Made my body fat cry. A woman with a bright orange towel draped around her neck walked back and forth in front of me. Sighing and pacing. Her orange shoes squeaked each time she spun to walk in the opposite direction. She was hunting me. Staring. My knees hovered in mid-thrust, incapable of meeting in the center, already too shocked by this new range of motion. Orange bang and I had been subjected to watching my shameful attempts at exercise long enough. My inner thighs tingled, and damp sweat bubbled under my butt. I would sacrifice my time on the clencher before Orange Bang threw me to the floor in an exercise-induced rage. I rubbed my inner thighs before getting up. “She’s all yours,” I said. Orange Bang looked at me, her head now between her legs because she could actually touch her toes, and mouthed thanks. She wiped down the seat before she took her turn. I stood in the middle of the gym, scanning to find my next work out option. A thick film of steam covered the floor to ceiling windows of the gym. Bathroom mirrors after a hot shower had nothing on these shining beauties. Men were everywhere. And only one of them had a belly that hung over his shorts. He was diligently at work, doing squats all the way across the length of the gym floor. Squat. Step. Squat. Step. I was relatively inexperienced when it came to exercise protocol and gym etiquette, but I was pretty sure squats could be done in one location. A trainer, dressed in the gym’s collared uniform shirt, stood in the corner scribbling on a clipboard. The squatter smiled through open teeth, and kept his eyes glued to the clipboard – his finish line. A man, who could have been a football player, or model, or a professional Hulk impersonator, fumbled with the weight control on a machine that looked like a horse and carriage. Right next to me. He set his desired weight, somewhere way at the bottom of the weight stack, and then jumped into the empty space fit for a human’s body – the horse section of the horse and carriage. He rested in a squatting position, his legs bent at an awkward angle. It already looked painful to me, and he hadn’t moved yet. He placed the handles on his shoulders, and unbent his knees, until they were completely straight. He let out a guttural sound that, to me, suggest he tore something. I squinted, but couldn’t look away. He pressed his chin into his chest, took a deep breath, and bent down again. This was it. My next victim. It seemed simple enough, as long as I stuck with what I had found to be my twenty-five pound limit. The man, finished with his grunting and growling, stepped out of the machine, and looked my way. “You next?” he asked, wiping the sweat from his forehead. “Yeah. I do these all the time,” I said, not moving from my spot in-between the thigh clencher and the horse and carriage. “I’ve got a couple sets left. Let’s rotate.” He patted the machine, raised his eyebrows, and then poured water into his mouth from a water bottle he held a foot away from his face. I had no idea what he was talking about. Rotating sets sounded more like baking cakes than exercising. Instead of being clueless and admitting it, I was clueless and nodding. “Yep,” I said. “Rotations.” I cracked my fingers on my right hand one by one. I assumed he would simply move on to the bigger and better things this place had to offer, maybe returning to the horse and carriage when he was done with a different machine. Pulling the levers down to rest on my shoulders turned out to be impossible. I leaned against the back of the machine looking for switches or hooks or buttons that would make it do what I’d seen happen for the Hulk a few seconds ago. I refused to read the instructions. No one at the gym read the instructions on anything since I got there, and I wasn’t going to be the first one. You are a lion, I thought. A lion goddess. Jenna will be jealous because you will look like a fucking lion goddess. And then I roared at myself. Out loud. While the levers of the machine were still in the air and I, stood there, obviously not lifting weights. “Get off for a second. I’ll adjust it for you,” the hulky-man said. And then he laughed softly. My face felt like it had caught on fire. I had been discovered. “Why are you still here?” My undercover mission was prematurely aborted. I got off the machine. “You didn’t happen to hear any roaring, did you? Cause, if you did, I think it was that lady over there with the orange towel.” He shook his head. “If you did these all the time,” he said, “you’d probably know that you gotta pull this handle back here. It raises the height and loosens the shoulder rest.” He rattled the metal, pulled what had to be fifteen different handles, and slapped the machine. “We’ll just have to adjust it again when it’s my turn.” “Thanks,” I said. I needed to make a quick recovery if I was going to survive this encounter with any dignity. “I meant, I come here a lot, but I never use this machine,” I said. He dropped the weight from twenty-five to ten. I adjusted the underwire in my sports bra. “You know, if you want to lose weight quickly you have to focus on your diet more than exercise,” he said, as if he were talking through me. I got off the machine, made some excuse about having to use the bathroom, and walked to the water fountain near the entrance. We were separated by half a wall, a couple of mirrored pillars, and hundreds of sweaty people, but what he said felt like it lodged itself in between my ribs. Jenna had been so wrong. No one designated wanna-be Hulk as the king of the gym universe. He didn’t know if I was there to lose weight. He didn’t know what I ate on a regular basis, if I was actually healthy or not. He didn’t know anything about me, and yet, out of his mouth came an ice cold dagger. But neither the Hulk or Jenna could know that the gym had gotten under my skin. So I stuck around. I played with a strange arm contraption, choked back tears of embarrassment, waved some free weights in the air, and accidentally hit the max speed button on my archenemy the treadmill before I ran out of the gym basically screaming. When I came home sticky and red skinned, I looked in my own mirror for an entire hour. Sat and stared. It seemed like I had grown larger than I was when I left for the gym. I removed my faded white shirt and saw rolls of flesh that had in no way been taught a lesson by an ab-ripper. Without the support of my sports bra, my breasts were sagging and young, a complexity I still can’t understand. And under my yoga pants there were seas and valleys, mountains, craters, and hills that were either created by nearly twenty-six years of a delicious diet, or a poor genetic makeup. I sat for the entire hour, inspecting my body, centimeter by centimeter, wondering how anyone could unveil me, explore me, and touch me without seeing this history of a rebellious body. At the end of the hour, I was naked and alone and unchanged. I texted Jenna. Me 7:05 PM: Liar! Meditation does not exist at the gym. There are no magical fixes. I have boobs and thighs and arm bulges and cheeks and I hated the entire experience. Keeping my body the same. Thanks. Jenna 7:10 PM: Hahaha, you actually went? Okay chubs. If you say so. I knew my best frenemy was an asshole, but the longer I sat in front of the mirror, the more I solidified my belief that someone out there could love a stomach that wasn’t the countertop, washboard, six pack, bikini ready bombshell type. Jenna had to be wrong. Somewhere, there’s a single guy who would love a woman even though she despised the gym. He would probably have three sisters and would adore his mother. He might eat large portions of healthy lettuce wraps and protein shakes when in public, but at home would nurture gnocchi in pesto creams, butter sauces, and béchamel toppings. He’d indulge in garlic breads and steaks and brownies and ice cream cakes. When entertaining a lady, he would not stare at her disapprovingly if she went back to the kitchen for a second taste. And he certainly would not recommend that she accompany him on his next trip to the gym. I wasn’t so desperate for designated exercise time that I was willing to justify paying hundreds of dollars a month to attend the sweatiest, most judgmental place on earth at four in the morning on a Thursday. I didn’t want to go running at four in the morning on a Thursday either. And doing crunches to an online workout video wasn’t my idea of an enthralling way to spend a Friday night. I wouldn’t have wasted a Monday night on that. I’d rather paint, or browse make up blogs, or learn how to play an instrument. Anything other than the gym, honestly. I hoped that I could find a man willing love the naked woman sprawled exhausted and overwhelmingly bootylicious on the floor of her bedroom. I had only encountered the opposite of him. Then again, I didn’t bother to spend time in many different places – I went to my makeup studio, I went to the mall, to the bank, to buy groceries, the park– but surely the most enticing and rare of the male species must have gone to places like these too. If he did, he must have been hiding from me. I was absolutely against the online dating world – if not for any larger reason than that upon meeting my initially two-dimensional friend, he might have found that my picture didn’t accurately portray who I was in person. Maybe he would expect my body to be similar to a nutritionist or a gymnast instead of a hardcore foodie or a self-proclaimed pizza connoisseur. I was always in the mood for a good, thin crust, fresh mozzarella covered pizza. Anyway, the body-type mix up was possible despite video chatting and selfie-sending. Honestly, no one ever looks like themselves on Skype. And so, on the eve of my twenty-sixth birthday, in a gym induced state of fatigue, I threw both middle fingers in the air. Fuck Jenna, Orange Bang, the Hulk, and the gym. “Victory,” I screamed. I stood in front of the mirror, middle fingers still up, swaying, spinning, and posing for no one but myself. After many years of contemplation and in the face of all the things that men and women might have considered my cosmetic deal breakers, I decided to find new public places to spend some time, places that embraced bodies like mine. A place where I could find my person. My tribe. I committed to participating in a new social activity every weekend, even if I was uncomfortable or terrified. Promised myself I would stay for at least an hour. Pinky swore I would talk to or maybe even flirt with at least one guy during that time. One place, one hour, and a couple of weekends to find the love of my life. Or maybe to find a couple of men who showed potential. At least, that was the plan.
Chapter Two
I walked into the cooking class alone on the first Saturday evening in February. My twenty-sixth birthday. The day I had casually titled Find My Soul Mate Date. It was raining outside, a cruel and unusual punishment for Angelenos. The windows of the corner restaurant speckled with condensation. A sign informed the public that the restaurant was closed for a private event, but it was written on a chalkboard positioned inside the closed door. Helpful, right? As I got farther into the room, the door behind me opened and closed, and hungry groups of people hummed and grumbled while retreating back into the damp night. I brushed past empty tables for two or four, and targeted the ten people already in the back of the restaurant, not including the chef who wore a floppy, white hat covering the very top of what could only be a charmingly bald head. I wondered how many people in the group already knew each other before that night. It definitely crossed my mind that all ten of them came in a huge party bus, and that I would be the intruder, the odd woman out, the one oblivious goldfish in a pond of stunning family of koi. Initially, I thought a cooking class would be a perfect event to find a man who appreciated a curvy body. But as I pried each foot off of the ground and then forced one in front of the other, I saw that of the ten people, only two males were present. One of them attached his pinky to the brightly polished pinky of a woman in a short black dress. Taken. Under no circumstances should a woman attempt to attract a man who obviously operates under the spell of another woman. Even I knew doing that brings bad dating karma. So I immediately diverted my attention to the other male. He was surrounded by a group of three women, and none of them looked particularly attached to him. I was interested, and terribly sweaty. I made it my mission to sneak into a conversation with the only seemingly single man in the room. With about ten minutes until eight, we had time to mingle. The ten people were standing in subgroups of six and four, and I turned slightly to the right to angle myself at the single man. The more I focused, the more clammy my palms got. There was no ring on his left hand, and he had very nice facial hair - the kind that required special grooming tools and more time to perfect than the amount traditionally expected for a man to spend. I approved. When I was about five feet away, I made eye contact with the woman standing next to the single man. I smiled. The extra fat on my stomach wiggled up and down with each bang of my heel against the floor. Looser clothes were on the list of necessary items for my next night out. While draping my coat over my right arm and sliding it in front of my stomach, I continued smiling. Looking friendly had to give off good vibrations. Standing just slightly outside of the circle their bodies had formed, I leaned forward, glancing at each person’s face. “Hello,” I said, which sounded way too professional and not at all fun. Who ruins saying hi? I waved, hoping it would lighten up my manly hello. Sweat formed in my armpits, lubricating my skin in the most unpleasant way. I made sure that my hand was the only part of my arm that moved. “I’m Katherine,” I said through a forced smile. The woman standing next to the single man grabbed the hand I waved with and shook it. My arm flailed wildly as she pulled it up and down. Mission accomplished. Sweat droplets fell from my armpit and slid down the side of my torso, settling somewhere near my belly button. Pull yourself together. You’re not meeting the fucking President. “My name is Mindy, and this is my brother Zander,” the woman said as she pointed to the single man. All signs pointed to Zander’s potential. He had a sister, and she was friendly. Progress. I moved to shake Zander’s hand and I made a quick but complete once over. Brown eyes. Trimmed mustache. Crooked bottom teeth. Tousled black hair. Tight green shirt. Black suit jacket. Dark jeans. Converse. Maybe twenty-eight. Skinnier than the average guy. Cute. “Nice to meet you,” he said. It looked like he was winking but I didn’t know for sure so I acted like he wasn’t and decided that I needed to say something interesting to Zander. That was my self-imposed requirement before meeting the other two people in the circle. “So what brings you here on a Saturday night?” I said and then immediately regretted. It didn’t get any cheesier than that. No, the first thing out of my mouth was even worse than cheesy, it was strangely forward. Not even cute-forward. Just bizarre. No one says that tired line except cougars who know they sound like an extra from a one season sitcom. I continued picking myself apart for asking that question while Zander made conversation. “My sister loves cooking. I live on the east coast so we don’t get to spend much time together. While I’m visiting I try to hang out as much as possible. Quality time, you know?” He grinned. His sister was chatting furiously with the other two women from the original group of four. I told myself to go for it. It. Zander. Flirting for the first time in five years. Because I had already been cheesy and strange, so I thought the night had to be up from here. “And,” he hesitated a little, leaning forward, “I don’t ever turn down good food.” He smiled a one-sided grin. And we have a winner, everybody! That was all I needed him to say. Before I had the chance to convince myself that I totally wasn’t Zander’s type I was blurting out things like, “I could show you around sometime,” and “Maybe I could take you to see the Hollywood sign?” Determination goes a long way, I guess. He stared straight at me as stupid words fell out of my mouth. I stood there squeezing my arms into my sides, feeling shocked at my ability to be bold, and worrying that in about two seconds I’d be shot down. I wasn’t worried because I’d be getting shot down from Zander in particular, but because I didn’t want to be shot down at all. No one likes to be told they suck. The possibility of rejection, of someone saying right to my face that they didn’t want to get to know me, or even have a one night stand with me (not that a one-nighter was the goal, even though hell, it might be nice) was enough to make me run straight out into the rain and down the street to the closest gym. Really, any kind of rejection, even a remotely polite one, might as well scream “You’re not good enough,” or “You don’t look like that girl on T.V. and you probably eat a lot so taking you out to dinner would be too expensive.” I worried that if someone told me that I might want to change myself. I resisted the sudden urge to bat my eyelashes and flip my hair because I wanted this guy to like me for me and not for whatever horrible impression of a runway model I could come up with on a fifty-four degree winter night in the back of an empty restaurant on Pico Boulevard. “That’s nice, really. But, no need to show me around,” he says confidently. I knew it was coming. There was no chance that we had made a connection in the first place. I should have walked right back out into the rain when I saw there were only two guys here. I could have pretended I was a hungry customer turned away by the chalkboard announcement. I wanted to break eye contact with him but he smiled and then I couldn’t look away. “I’m from here originally. Born and raised. I work in New York now, but I’ll always be a California boy at heart. Actually, I could probably show you a thing or two about L.A.,” he says. He nudged my arm and walked over to his sister who had joined the pinky partners’ group. I touched the spot on my arm where his elbow brushed my skin. I had become a giddy teenager in less than ten minutes. “Everyone find your kitchen companion,” the man with the chef hat said. “It’s going to be a delicious night.” He walked around to the front of the kitchen where his counter top was, and explained in a thick Italian accent that the class would be making Fettuccini Alfredo. “Pasta and sauce from scratch,” he said, “because that is the only way.” After everyone was paired up, Zander with his sister of course, myself and the second half of the pinky partners were the only two people standing alone. Her male companion found himself partnered with a woman with giraffe legs. He drooled and stood there staring, right at eye level with her breasts. I looked at him, and then back at the woman he came with. I sighed. “Men,” I said under my breath. The kitchen assistant dropped a ball of dough on my work stand, slapping the dough once on its puffy top before she moved to the next pair of amateur cooks. My partner’s name was Hunter and the pinky partner was her husband. She told me they have an open relationship, and patience is not in his nature. It was going to be a long night. We began rolling out our own sections of pre-kneaded dough just like the chef instructed. “So,” Hunter said, moving her rolling pin in short bursts, “Anyone special in your life? A lover, I mean, not a best friend or a sassy grandma or anything.” Her eyes fixed on me, expectant. I told her I didn’t, and that I was in the market for a six-foot-two businessman who had a thing for bigger women. “Oh please. You’re not a bigger woman,” she said, almost too quickly in my opinion. I laughed it off and put more pressure on the rolling pin. “Honestly Hunter,” I said, putting too much upper arm strength into the task, “you and I both know that out here anything bigger than a size 5 is a bigger woman these days.” Holes began to peek through my dough, which looked more like lace than like pasta. Hunter rolled her eyes. “It’s true,” I continued. “ They call size eights plus sized models, and if any woman dares to call herself curvy but has a little extra stomach, then she’s not the hot kind of curvy she’s just fat.” “Honey,” Hunter said, throwing a flour-covered hand in the air. “A little confidence goes a long way.” “Do you know how long it took me to get into this dress?” I asked. “Same amount of time it took me to get into this thing,” Hunter said, pushing her breasts together with her arms. “Impossible,” I replied. “I’m a 10, the dress says it’s a 10, but it wanted to act like a 5 tonight,” I said, pulling the dress down at my thighs. Smudges of flour polka-dotted along the hemline. “My dress has multiple personalities.” Hunter shook her head. “Poor thing,” she said while laughing. “All the best ones do.” The chef spun around quickly in our direction. “All the best what?” he asked. He peered down his nose at our workstation, and held my dough up for the class to see. It hung in the air; the weight of the mass opened the holes up even more. “Attention class! This dough here, is not the best. Don’t. Do. This.” I could have sworn it wasn’t that bad stretched out on the counter. Even though there were only ten other people there, my face went red as he explained that my lack of technique resulted in a poor product. “Stop all the talking. You are not focused,” he added. I glanced around the room to gauge everyone’s reaction to the chef’s tirade and there he was. Zander. He looked at me and mouthed the words: I like it. He shrugged his shoulders. I felt sweat seep from the pores in my hands. The rolling pin slid easily against my palms. The chef handed my dough back to me, and I crumpled it up to start over. The chef shook his head. “You are not a natural. It will take more work,” he said. Zander watched and laughed silently. With my crusty ball of dough in hand, I swung it through the air in a halfhearted attempt to hurl it at Zander’s head. I quickly slapped it back onto the counter, and blew him a small kiss. Zander held up his flattened dough and swirled it in the air like a pizza. “The biggest and most important rule of my kitchen, this kitchen, or any kitchen is: do not play with the food,” the chef said as he wandered over to Zander’s station. He said something directly to him that I couldn’t hear. I was staring long and intently enough that I should have been able to read their lips, but I couldn’t. The chef walked away and Zander whispered in his sister’s ear. In that instant I was already jealous of their relationship. If he were that interested in me, wouldn’t he have looked at me first? After all, we were having an across the room food fight when he got busted. His attention should have been directed at the last person of contact before the interruption. And there I went. My imagination exploded in a fury of fake memory montages: my first date with Zander, quickies before work, meeting the family, Thanksgiving dinners. We had absolutely no relationship and I was already acting like we had to decide which set of parents to visit on Christmas. If Zander would have shown up here alone like me, maybe then we could have been partners. Maybe I could have practiced this flirting thing without adding in the complications of jealousy. I was still watching him when Hunter began to tell me about how she and her husband met. She mentioned something about Palm Springs in the summer time and a business trip to get away from his ex-wife who was adamantly against the open relationship lifestyle. But when Zander’s eyes met mine and I had absolutely no idea what Hunter was talking about anymore. He winked. I was sure of it. “After going through all of that,” Hunter said, “I knew for sure he was supposed to be my husband. If we could get through something like that and still be in love. And I mean he really supported me through it all, then I could explore a non-traditional relationship for him.” “Definitely,” I said, pretending to be completely up to speed with the conversation. “Who knew I would love it so much?” Hunter burst into laughter. “Well, honey that’s life.” I nodded, the other half of my consciousness sill across the room lost in whatever Zander was doing with his hands. My hands had given up on rolling my useless crumbly ball of dough into anything edible. So Hunter made the fettuccini. I asked Hunter if she thinks she has found true love. She handed me a hand held pasta cutter and a sheet of dough. “Do that.” She pointed to the screen at the back of the class, magnifying the intricate work of the chef. Hunter slipped her section of dough through the slicing machine as she looked at me and asked, “is dough only pasta after you cut it?” “Not sure,” I said. Hunter raised her eyebrows, and plopped the long noodle into a pot of boiling water. “So you’re the type who likes to speak in riddles?” I asked. “A little bit.” We dropped the fettuccini into boiling, salted water, and the chef taught everyone how to make Alfredo sauce with butter, Parmesan cheese, and a little heavy cream. “No garlic or onion or any extra seasoning. Not authentic,” he said. I let Hunter do most of the work. My job was to stir. Wooden spoon in my hand, I stirred and stirred to meld the ingredients into one united sauce, and to keep it from burning. My hand sweat made the spoon slide around in my grasp. The damp hands could have been a result of nerves or a product of the sauce’s tiny sauna. Both were equally possible. I stirred while I looked at the back of Zander’s head wondering if he was too handsome. I wondered if he lived too far away, or was too skinny, or too rich, or too smart to be interested in someone like me. I consoled myself with the idea that he could simply be a nice guy. The nice guy who said nice things to the sort of chubby girl who came to the cooking class alone. I laid the spoon handle against the side of the pan and then wiped my palm against my shirt. “I’m sorry if I’m being too intrusive,” I said to Hunter, who still hadn’t told me the status of her belief in one true loves. “I thought we were sharing stories.” “I haven’t heard very much about your story yet.” “Well,” today’s my birthday-“ “And you’re by yourself?” She looked surprised. “That’s usually a thirty-something thing to do.” “How do you know I’m not thirty-something?” “Honey, because I’m thirty-something. You’re still a baby.” “I’m twenty-six today, thank you.” “Exactly.” “I’m twenty-six today, and I’m-” I lowered my voice. “I’m trying to meet people, kind of the old fashioned way. I felt like I needed to do it on my own. Be responsible for my own happy ending.” I tapped the top of the sauce with my spoon. “So here I am.” Hunter directed her attention to Zander, and then back to me. Then she did it a couple more times, raising her eyebrows the whole time. Hunter asked if I was interested in the guy with the black suit jacket. “You know, the guy who likes to play with his food,” she said. “I know you want to go talk to him. In my opinion, he’s a little immature for you, but if that’s what you like…” I stirred the sauce again, my eyes fixed on the pot. “Oh come on, you’ve been staring at him the entire time. I thought you were going to slip your fingers into the pasta machine.” The pasta machine was highly frowned upon by the chef, but was there in case anyone was inadequate with slicing by hand. “Practice. Practice. Practice.” The chef clapped after every pause. He stopped to hover over every station, inspecting the sauce’s aroma. An intense heat flooded my cheeks and I wondered if I had in fact been that obvious. “Look, Zander seems alright but I think I’ve embarrassed myself enough for one night,” I said. “I just want to eat this pasta and head home.” The chef stopped at our station, adjusted his hat, and yelled with a wide-open mouth. “Practice!” He clapped twice. Hunter dropped the freshly drained fettuccini into the alfredo sauce and inhaled deeply. “Sweetie, don’t be sorry when that cutie walks right out of here and you never see him again. Mine likes to be curious and all,” she said, gesturing to her husband who was chatting with the giraffe girl and not even attempting to learn about making fettuccini alfredo, “but I know who means the most to him.” She smiled and dropped fresh pasta into boiling water “True love?” I asked. “Our own kind of true love.” At the end of the class everyone was sitting around eating fettuccini with slices of bread and drops of olive oil and the scent of Italy rising from the pots seated on multiple stoves. I shoved my elbow into Hunter’s side when I saw that Zander was walking over to our station. “Oh my God,” I said as I shoved a forkful of pasta into my mouth. “Swallow that pasta! You don’t want to look like a pig, do you?” She giggled after asking and I assumed it was to take away the sting of calling me a pig. “Asshole,” I muttered to her. She ignored me. I swirled the fettuccini around my fork and asked Hunter if she thought it was pasta or dough now. “Both.” She shrugged and I swallowed. I shoveled in another bite hoping I would still be chewing when he reached our station. He started talking before he made it all the way to where I was sitting. “How’d yours come out? Mine was a little dry,” he said, attempting to replicate the chef’s accent. All I could manage with my mouth fully occupied by creamy starch and cheese was a clumsy head nod. “I take it that nod means your food was molto magnifico,” he said with some kind of waving hand gesture. “Your horrible job on the rolling must have been the secret.” “Did you have too much wine or do you always speak in tiny spurts of Italian?” I asked. Hunter butt-bumped me from her spot at the counter, and then cleared her throat. I took another bite of the fettuccini, a little smaller this time, hoping that having something to do with my mouth would excuse any moment of silence in case the small talk grew stale. As I looked up from my plate, I noticed Zander’s eyes weren’t focused on my face. He wasn’t even staring at my chest like I expected. His eyes were glaring at the area directly underneath my chest, and I couldn’t be sure what his conclusion about that area was. I had a feeling it could be something like: This girl should really stop with the forklift of cheese and cream ‘cause I can see right where it’s headed, and it’s not pretty. I stood up immediately to help disguise the bounding rolls. I smiled and took another bite. Bigger this time. “My sister and I are leaving now, but I thought maybe I could get your number,” he hesitated, for what I could only explain as an attempt to read my reaction. “In case I forget something about L.A. and need a tour guide or something.” He smiled and his eyes traveled from my face back down to my stomach, and all the way to my feet. I didn’t know if he was intrigued or appalled. “I think its sweet that you’re asking, really, but you really don’t have to do that,” I said. I put my plate down and wondered if his sister put him up to this. She probably said, “Zander, that poor girl looks so lonely. And I can tell she likes you. She could have a fun time with a successful, attractive guy for once. Show her a good time and then go back to New York. No harm done.” I could just imagine it happening. If I could read lips I probably would have recognized the exact moment it happened too. “Don’t have to do what?” Zander asked as he fumbled with his cell phone. I pressed my tongue into the corner of my lips and wished I was still chewing so I could buy myself some time to respond without having to tell him the ugly truth. I couldn’t tell him that I was too afraid to give him my number because if he never called all of my fears would be staring me in my big, hope-filled face. I couldn’t tell him that I didn’t want him to call out of pity, or because he just wanted a girl he wasn’t attracted to for a friend so that the relationship would never get messy and complicated. I must have stood there thinking for too long because he shifted his weight to his left side and asked, “So do you have a boyfriend or are you just not interested after all?” His gaze stayed on my face this time. All at once I could see my heart breaking before it happened. If we actually started a relationship his friends would ask him when he started being into bigger chicks. They’d tell him he could do better. His mother would disapprove. His sister would tell him she didn’t mean for us to actually date, she just wanted us to have a little fun. He would go back to New York and would decide that he’s too nice of a guy to dump me. So we would have a long distance relationship, and then he would run into a model on her way to a photo shoot. He would cheat on me and they would fall in real love. And it would all be because I was never meant to be with someone that far out of my league anyway. “Its none of that Zander. I actually have to go. It’s getting so late. Great job on the dough though!” I turned around, grabbed my coat and my plate of pasta, and ran out of the kitchen and into the cold, sprinkling night.
Everly Scott loves Italian food, yummy candles, and love stories. She recently made the switch from teaching college writing to hogging all of the writing time for herself. But, when she’s not writing, you can find her hanging out on Twitter, Instagram, and her website, or learning how to powerlift, kind of. Eventually. 10 Random Facts About Me: 1. I am the proud owner of Bachelors Degrees in Honors English Literature and Creative Writing and an MFA in Writing. 2. Sunny (and dehydrated) Los Angeles has been my home base since birth. I’ve never lived anywhere else. 3. I love dogs, especially my own fuzzy Shih Tzu baby, but I am not the biggest fan of dog beaches. 4. I am utterly in love with my high school sweetheart. Not in a creepy, still crushing on him kind of way, but in a we-are-married-and-more-in-love-than-ever kind of way. 5. I may or may not be addicted to pasta. 6. I also may or may not be addicted to Dateline, 20/20, and Investigation Discovery. Don’t judge me. 7. Beyonce is #lifegoals. 8. I used to sing. A lot. In choirs, at weddings, and funerals, and football games. And in the shower. Actually, I still sing. Mostly in the shower. 9. When I was a kid I wanted to be a veterinarian. Then I realized I was allergic to cats, hated science and really sucked at math. Dreams crushed. 10. Tattoos. I love them. I have three, and if I could be covered from head to toe in beautiful art, I would! Okay, maybe not head to toe. Maybe just from collar bone to toe.
Social Media Links
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/EverlyScottWriting Twitter - @EvWriting  Website - http://everlyscottwriting.wix.com/everlyscott Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/evwriting/
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Starr Valentine - Book Tour, Excerpt, Review & Giveaway

4/28/2016

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                        Starr Valentine
                                                    By Wende Dikec
                                    Genre: Young Adult/Sci-Fi
                                 Publisher: Inkspell Publishing
                            Date of Publication: March 10, 2016
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What happens when the beautiful swan becomes the ugly duckling?


Starr Valentine has a perfect life in Middleton, Ohio. She was named captain of the cheer squad, her mother finally allowed her to get highlights, and the cutest boy in school asked her to homecoming. But everything comes crashing down when she finds out her parents are actually monarchs in exile from a mysterious planet called Vega. Starr doesn’t want to leave, but loves the idea of being a princess, and decides moving to an alien world might not be so bad. When she gets there, however, she discovers that something is terribly wrong.


Starr has always been the winner of the family, but now everyone is fawning over her chubby older sister, Astra. And everyone, even a handsome and annoying young duke named Julian, seems to hate her. That is when she realizes the awful truth. Astra is now the pretty one. Astra has all the friends. Astra gets all of the attention. And Starr Valentine, voted Miss Perfect, is now the ugly duckling. Her biggest fear is…will she be able to turn back into a swan, or is she doomed to be a loser forever?


                                                                Amazon BN Kobo iTunes ARe
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We all met in the captain’s lounge just after the transport ship had safely landed. My father wore some sort of military uniform, and he was completely dashing, as always.
“Girls, you both look lovely.”
I smiled up at him. “So do you, Daddy,” I said, and he patted my cheek.
My mom fluttered up to us in a cacophony of lime green lace and feathers. A large gold medallion was pinned to her breast and she had on the crown she’d worn for the nightly news. She reached for our hands, tears swimming in her eyes.
“I have something for you,” she said, her voice trembling. Captain Augustus stood behind her, looking just as handsome as my father. He held open a wooden box. Inside were two small, yet perfect, tiaras.
I gasped. “Diamonds.”
“These are not your true crowns,” my mother explained. “Those went missing during the confusion when we were trying to escape. These are just a substitute until we can find something better.”
I couldn’t imagine something better. The tiaras seemed perfect. I leaned over slightly so my mom could slip it onto my head, glad I’d decided to wear my hair up in a French twist. The tiara was beautiful. I admired myself for a few minutes in the mirror before looking at Astra. She and my mother stood side by side, their hair a riot of dark curls, their dresses positively painful to the eyes, and I sighed. I really hoped they didn’t humiliate themselves too much at the ceremony. They looked like clowns from a circus performance.
My father, of course, didn’t seem to notice. He bowed and kissed my mother’s hand gallantly before linking it through his arm and leading her out the door. I could tell it was a very emotional moment for both of them. They were returning to the home they loved after being exiled for so many years. Even I could feel my throat tightening up.
Astra walked up and took my arm. “Are you ready?” she asked, and I nodded. It was time to face the music, or the Vegonians, as the case may be.
We stepped out into a warm, sultry evening on Vega. Lights had been set up all around the landing bay, and we followed my parents to an elevated platform near the ship. People waited as far as the eye could see, and as soon as my parents stepped up to the podium, the crowd roared.
I stood arm in arm with Astra, taking in the moment. The city of Celesta glittered in the light of the fading sun, just beyond the crowd of people assembled before us. It sparkled like it was made of glass. I could see what must have been the royal palace on one side of the city on top of a small hill, and it made me think of Aladdin’s castle, all gilt and white marble. I decided I could definitely get used to living there.
As I stared at the people in front of me, I started to notice something odd. The women here were not at all what I’d expected. Supposedly the most beautiful women in the universe, they all looked a lot like my mother and sister, with short, oddly shaped bodies and large behinds. They also dressed just like my mother and sister, in a riot of colors and patterns.
A quick assessment told me that I was the only pretty girl around, other than Maya, and definitely the best dressed. Maya had been forced by her parents to wear some sort of Vegonian monstrosity made out of a hot pink iridescent fabric. Torture. I, on the other hand, felt like an elegant swan dumped into the middle of a bunch of plump, gaudy, peacocks.
I heaved a sigh of relief. I’d been a little teeny tiny bit worried when I’d heard about how beautiful Vegonian women were. It was good to realize those rumors had been pure exaggeration. No one in this crowd could hold a candle to me.
Another quick look around told me that there wasn’t a single bad looking guy here. I was completely devoted to Adrian, of course, but I couldn’t help but admire and appreciate male beauty when I saw it. The boys were all works of art. It was as if I’d been dropped into a huge candy shop full of the most delicious boys I’d ever seen, and knew I could have my pick. Of course I would never cheat on Adrian, but it felt like a candy shop here, nonetheless.
My joy proved short-lived. None of the boys even looked at me. At first I thought that several of them stared at me, which made me happy, but soon realized it wasn’t me they stared at. They had their eyes locked on Astra with the same sort of enraptured expressions boys usually reserved for me.
A cold wave of shock crawled over my entire body. Boys never looked at Astra like that, especially when I stood right next to her. Something was very wrong here.
I smoothed my hair, which was perfect and didn’t need smoothing. I stuck out my chest and turned my body so they could see my best angle, but none of them even noticed me. Astra had suddenly become the center of attention.
My mother gave a very lovely and heartfelt speech, which I barely paid attention to. The crowd roared and screamed her name, but I hardly even heard it. People waved and cheered with tears streaming down their faces, but I felt numb to everything.
When we were introduced to various dignitaries, everyone said “lovely,” and “a vision,” when they met Astra. When they saw me, they looked a bit confused and then mumbled something boring like “nice to meet you.” Something very strange was going on, and I had to figure it out.
I searched the crowd for Adrian, but he was nowhere to be seen. One sexy, appreciative look from him might have been enough to restore some semblance of balance and order to my universe. But he wasn’t around and I’d been cast adrift in a sea of beautiful boys to whom I was invisible.
“Art thou okay, Princess Starr?” asked Captain Augustus. “Thou art pale.”
I blinked as I digested his words. The Vegonians spoke English, but a weird form of archaic Elizabethan English mixed with modern slang. The only people who had spoken like that on the transport ship were the captain and the crew. All of the Vegonians who been on Earth for the last fifteen years spoke standard, modern English, although I’d heard a few “thou’s” and “thee’s” begin to slip into the language of the older passengers, including my own parents.
“I’m fine. Thank you.”
As the captain bowed and turned away, I realized I wasn’t fine at all. I stared around at the sea of happy, glowing, faces, including those of my parents and my sister, and understood that suddenly, and without any explanation, I had become the outsider.
“Thou art in hell, Starr Valentine,” I murmured to myself.


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  I thoroughly enjoyed this spunky book! I have to admit that at first, I completely hated Starr and her self-absorbed petty airhead attitude. The author does a spectacular job of exposing the mind of a bubblehead teenager. However, it was very interesting to enter the world of Vega and experience their different standards of beauty and culture. The complexity of the society was very intricate and appealing to me! It was very intriguing to slowly see Starr get a much needed attitude adjustment! With a complex, unique storyline, well written dialogue and a splash of romance, I had an absolute blast reading this book! I loved that it was kept light-hearted and spunky all throughout!
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Wende Dikec has spent her life traveling the world, and collecting stories wherever she visited. She writes in several romance genres, and her books are quirky, light, and fun. Fluent in several languages and married to a man from Istanbul, Wende is a trekkie, a book hoarder, master of the Nespresso machine, and mother of three boys. A puppy named Capone is the most recent addition to her family, and she blogs about him as a way of maintaining what little sanity she has left.


http://www.wendedikec.com

https://www.facebook.com/wendedikecwriter

https://twitter.com/WendeDikec

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14735786.Wende_Dikec

https://www.pinterest.com/wendedikec/

http://wendewrites.tumblr.com

https://www.instagram.com/wendedikec/
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                        $25 Amazon Gift Card to a Newsletter Subscriber,
                                        to be awarded June 1, 2016.

                               Subscribe to Wende’s Newsletter Here:                                                                 
http://madmimi.com/signups/177092/join

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A Mended Man - Tour and Excerpt

4/28/2016

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Title: A Mended Man
Series: The Men of Halfway House #4
Author: Jaime Reese
Genre: M/M Contemporary Romance
Release Date: April 28, 2016 Photographer: wagnerLA Photography Cover Artist: Reese Dante
Detective Aidan Calloway is rock-solid strong. He's a man of justice—loyal to his friends, family, and job—even if it requires bending a law…or two. He shields himself behind an abrasive, fearless facade, until a phone call one night chips his armor and throws his perfectly planned, hollow life into a tailspin.
Jessie Vega is the epitome of optimism. His carefully crafted attitude of hope and positivity protects him from a past filled with too much pain. When a ghost from a dark time resurfaces and nearly breaks him, he must tap into his inner strength or risk losing everything he's worked so hard to build.
But Jessie can't do it alone. He must fight to break through Aidan's ironclad defenses to reveal the heart of the man hiding beneath the tough surface and mend his damaged spirit. Only then can they truly heal and become strong enough to battle the demons that haunt them and threaten their chance to finally be together.
——--
***This book contains scenes and subject matter some readers may find distressing.***
——--
Although part of a series, this book can be read as a stand-alone.
“This book is wonderful and beautifully worded. Jessie has a gift with words.” - Reader Review
“This story is not only an emotional roller coaster but it is full of action and mystery as well. There are several different stories all coming to a proverbial head in this book, and the outcome is excellent.” - Alpha Book Club
(This is taken from a scene between Aidan and Jessie.)
"You don't give up, do you?"
"Not when it comes to you. No."
"Jess, I'm not easy. I have more baggage than the underbelly of a cargo plane."
"Then I'll set my bags right next to yours."
He shook his head. No one had ever been this relentless to be with his miserable ass.
"I've got one last question for you," Jessie said.
Aidan turned his head slightly toward him but refused to make eye contact.
"Do you…" Jessie hesitated and rubbed his hands on his thighs again, revealing a hint of that introverted, vulnerable side others usually saw when they looked at him. "Do you want to be with me?"
Point-blank. That was the million-dollar question that determined how this conversation would end. Even if he did have enough energy to erect his shield, he couldn't lie to Jessie. He exhaled heavily. "More than anything."
"Then that settles it."
"Jess…it's not that easy."
"Don't make it harder."
Aidan sighed. "I'm not used to this," he said, gesturing between them with his hand.
"Talking or having a relationship?"
"Either. Both. Fuck if I know."
"Okay. Well, you've never had a problem talking to me before, so we'll work up to the big stuff. One detail a week. I'm not going to stress you out with a one-a-day quota. One detail we wouldn't share with anyone else."
One a week. Aidan forcefully rubbed his hands together. He could handle that. Maybe. Sorta.
"And as far as the whole relationship thing, I'm not an expert. But, we kinda already have something. Don't you think?" Jessie looked over to him with a hint of a smile playing in his expression, cocking his head.
He definitely wasn't an expert in relationships, but if Jessie thought this defined a relationship, then maybe he could totally handle this.
Jessie bumped his shoulder. "We're just missing out on all the fun stuff."
Aidan groaned. It drove him nuts when Jessie teased him.
"I'm not saying it'll be easy. I know…" Jessie hesitated and rubbed his thighs again. "I know we're both very different from each other and from what other people usually see when they look at us. But…I see you, not the guy you want everyone else to see. And you're worth it, Aidan. It bothers me that you don't recognize how amazing you are, but I'm willing to give this a shot. I just…I hope you think the same of me." He quieted for a few moments then subtly nodded, concluding some internal conversation. "You work at things so you can appreciate the success at the end."
Aidan shook his head and scoffed. Jessie and his inspirational poster lines…too fucking cute to deny. His ability to take a mountain and turn it into a few pellets of dust always amazed Aidan. Jessie was bossier than people could imagine and far more of a control freak than anyone suspected.
"Jess."
"Yeah?"
"You're totally worth it."
Jaime Reese is the alter ego of an artist who loves the creative process of writing, just not about herself. Fiction is far more interesting. She has a weakness for broken, misunderstood heroes and feels everyone deserves a chance at love and life. An avid fan of a happy ending, she believes those endings acquired with a little difficulty are more cherished.
The Men of Halfway House A Better Man A Hunted Man A Restored Man A Mended Man …More to come…
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Above the Flames - Book Tour, Review & Giveaway

4/27/2016

1 Comment

 
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​                                            Above The Flames 
​                                           by Cassandra Fear 
                            Published by: Limitless Publishing
                              Publication date: April 19th 2016
                            Genres: Paranormal, Young Adult

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Jasmine’s sixteenth birthday was the worst ever…
All in one day, her dad died, she met a demon, and her mother rejected her existence forever. After all, the demon who killed her dad was there to take her, and all because of her stupid powers—the ability to conjure blue flames.
Two years later, she’s happy. But happy never lasts…
After moving to Idaho to live with her grandparents, Jasmine has a new life. Almost nobody knows about her powers, and she’s just a normal teenager with normal problems. Then comes her eighteenth birthday—and the earthquake that changes her world forever.
An army of demons rise from Hell. And Jasmine is right in the middle of the battle…
When demons claw their way to Earth, Jasmine is surrounded by hundreds of fire-eyed beasts. Worse, she is captured by a big-shot demon named Bael. He’s a tricky foe with a chip on his shoulder—and the desire to make Jasmine use her powers for evil.
Amon is a fallen angel with an attitude—and everything to lose.
Successfully escaping the underworld undetected, Amon is on a quest to regain God’s grace when he rescues Jasmine from the clutches of a particularly nasty demon he knows all too well. The attraction between him and the not-entirely-human captive is instantaneous. Heavenly sparks fly, but ideas of romance will have to wait. First they have to stop the demon race from wiping out the mortal realm. Humanity’s fate rests in their hands.
Can two troubled angels rise above the flames to ensure a future for mankind? Or will Jasmine and Amon’s souls be bound together—in hell?
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  This was an absolutely enrapturing book! I absolutely adore angel/demon books and this one did not let me down! I was immediately drawn in and was feverishly reading as fast as I could to find out what would happen next! The storyline was unique and complex, the dialogue was well rounded and the characters were intricate and enthralling. With plenty of intrigue, a dash of romance and enough paranormal to satisfy my needs, this book fulfilled all my late night reading needs. I completely loved this book and can't wait to check out the sequel!!
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Cassandra Fear lives in Ohio with her husband, two kids and two dogs. Hiking, taking care of her fish tank and reading are her favorite hobbies. She loves chocolate, hates driving in the snow and could eat macaroni and cheese every day. In her spare time, she loves to write, and has always dreamed of becoming an author. Her dreams will become reality with her first book, Above the Flames.

Author links:
http://cassandrafear.com/
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14953008.Cassandra_Fear
https://www.facebook.com/Cassandra-Fear-1695712740647863/
https://twitter.com/CassieFear
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Capturing the Captain - Book Tour with Excerpt

4/27/2016

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                                             Capturing the Captain
                                           American Pirate Romances: Book 1
                                                          Author: C.K. Brooke
                                    Genre: Historical Romance, Sea Adventure
                                                 Publisher: Limitless Publishing
                                                      Release date: 4/26/2016

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In 1720, it’s a pirate’s life for Abigail Clear, daughter of a notorious colonial pirate captain…


But when a rival crew invades Abigail’s ship, she is taken prisoner. Now aboard the enemy vessel, she must contend with its formidable captain. But who is the real captive?

Locked away in the belly of The Indomitable is no place for a woman…

Captain James Morrow is more than displeased to discover his sole captive to be none other than an untamable young lass who will earn him no bounty. Yet if he can soften the little rogue, she just might switch her loyalties to him, and reveal the whereabouts of the infamous thief who sired her—and his stolen treasure. But two can play that game, as Abi is equally inclined to charm the dogged sailor off her father’s tail.


Might she and Captain Morrow run the risk of falling for their own charades?

They dance about their disguises as genuine developing emotions clash against deeper motives, and suspicion runs high. When the captain finally steals a first kiss, Abi decides it’s high time to make her escape—fleeing not only his vessel, but her fondness for the man who intends to see her father hang.

The high seas heat up as Captain Morrow’s quest to recapture Abi is halted by her pirate father, Captain Clear. Will James succeed in pursuit of his captive love, or will his desires conspire to make him a captive himself?


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 “Well, don’t just stand there, gaping like a codfish,” snapped the captain, the corner of his mouth twitching. “I want my decks shining by noon.”
  If Abi had been gaping before, now her jaw truly dropped. “You want me to wash your decks?”
  Morrow stepped in. Nearby, more sailors looked up from their labor to watch. “Scrub it spotless,” he growled.
  Abi rested her hands on her hips. “I’m no one’s swabber. I did no such task on my father’s ship, and I sure as hell ain’t doing it on yours.” She shook her head. “Clean an enemy vessel,” she scoffed, turning back.
  A large, cool hand gripped her arm, just above her elbow. Abi had to stop. “Excuse me.” The captain reeled her in, speaking under his breath. “But do ye notice anyone absent here? None of my crew is above maintaining the cleanliness and orderliness I expect. Least of all, you. Pirate.”
  Abi knew he must have meant it as an insult, the way he spat the last word. And yet, her pride couldn’t help but inflate. “You’re right.” She looked him square in the eye. “I am a pirate. Which means I’m not part of your crew.” She whipped her arm out of his hold.
“And I don’t have to answer to you.”


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C.K. Brooke grew up in the coastal state of Maryland. She began writing books when she was six years old. Her debut novel,
The Duchess Quest (48fourteen, October 2014), received a five-star editorial review from Readers’ Favorite Book Reviews & Awards Contest and was selected as a Shelf Unbound Top 100 Notable Indie Book of 2015. Since its publication, she has authored seven more fantasy and romance novels, including Capturing the Captain, the first book of the American Pirate Romance series.

Today, C.K. resides outside of Detroit in Washington, Michigan with her husband and young son. When not haunting the local library or blissfully buried in her eBooks and manuscripts, she enjoys blogging, singing, and playing the piano by ear. For more, visit her at
www.CKBrooke.com.

Links


Capturing the Captain on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Capturing-Captain-American-Pirate-Romances-ebook/dp/B01E82IVQA/
Website:
www.CKBrooke.com
Facebook:
www.Facebook.com/CK.Brooke
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Owned - Blog tour with Review and Giveaway

4/26/2016

16 Comments

 
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                                                        Owned 
                                      (Decadence After Dark #1) 
                                                    by M. Never 

                          Publication date: September 29th 2014
                                       Genres: Erotica, Romance

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​***Content Warning***
Owned is a dark erotic romance. Please pay close attention to the use of the words dark, erotic, and romance. It has intense sexual situations, a Master/slave relationship, mild abuse, and some violence. Reader discretion is advised.
--

“I like you collared, baby. I like you naked, I like you mine.”
Ellie Stevens has lusted over Kayne Roberts since he first walked into the import/export company she works for a little over a year ago. As Expo’s most important client, Ellie has always kept a safe distance from the man with the majestic blue eyes – until temptation finally gets the better of her. Impulsively, Ellie invites Kayne to one of Expo’s infamous company parties her flamboyant boss is notorious for throwing. Unbeknownst to Ellie, the god in the Armani suit isn’t just the suave entrepreneur he portrays himself to be. Underneath the professional exterior is a man with a secret life, dark desires, and nefarious contacts.
In a hidden corner of a trendy New York City lounge, the spark kindling between the two of them ignites. Unable to resist the sinful attraction, Ellie agrees to leave with Kayne, believing she is finally bedding the man of her dreams. Little does she know when she walks out the door, she’s about to be Owned.


Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25503200-owned

Purchase:
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Owned-Decadence-after-Dark-Novel-ebook/dp/B00O1GUO6E
Amazon UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Owned-Decadence-after-Dark-Novel-ebook/dp/B00O1GUO6E
B&N http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/owned-m-never/1120421213?ean=2940046332209
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  This is one smoking hot read! Meow! From the very beginning, you immediately feel a connection to Ellie and the smoldering sparks that fly between her and Kayne. Then, you get whisked away into an ultimate BDSM fantasy that made my toes curl and had me steaming up my kindle! With an underlying thread of mysterious dark happenings, the suspense escalates into a surprising finale with a big bang! The storyline is original and unique, the dialogue was perfect, and the characters were complex and believable. Did I mention the romance is hot, Hot , HOT!! Purrr!! I was up reading until 2 am just to finish this book because I just couldn't put it down- at all!! With one heck of a cliffhanger at the end, I can't wait to get my hands on the sequel!! 
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​M. Never resides in New York City. When she’s not researching ways to tie up her characters in compromising positions, you can usually find her at the gym kicking the crap out of a punching bag, or eating at some new trendy restaurant.
She has a dependence on sushi and a fetish for boots. Fall is her favorite season.
She is surrounded by family and friends she wouldn’t trade for the world and is a little in love with her readers. The more the merrier. So make sure to say hi!

Author links:
Website www.Mneverauthor.com
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8415462.M_Never
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/M.NeverAuthor?ref=hl
Instagram: http://instagram.com/m.neverauthor
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MNeverAuthor 
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/MNever21/
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16 Comments

Something More Than This - Book Tour, Excerpt & Giveaway

4/26/2016

1 Comment

 
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                         Something More Than This
                                                By: Barbie Bohrman
                                                      Releasing April 26, 2016
                                                          Montlake Romance

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Katy Lewis has it all: a sports reporting job she loves, a great roommate, and two brothers who, while nosy, always have her back. But when Conner Roberts, Katy’s unrequited first crush, suddenly shows up—and shows interest—after nine years, she reverts to a sweaty, panicked sixteen-year-old once more.
And if trying to read Conner’s signals isn’t tough enough, Katy’s heart is sending some mixed messages of its own. When a beautiful blonde coworker starts pursuing Katy’s boss, Dylan Sterling—her longtime mentor and friend—she realizes she may have a problem with that. A reunion with Conner is what she’s dreamed of for so long…so why can’t she stop thinking about Dylan?


For the first time ever, Katy must fact-check her heart. Should she go after the guy she thought she always wanted or see if there’s something more with the one who’s been there all along?




Link to Follow Tour: http://www.tastybooktours.com/2016/03/something-more-than-this-by-barbie.html
Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20849958-something-more-than-this
Exclusive to Amazon
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Something-More-Than-Barbie-Bohrman-ebook/dp/B0184ZLSOO

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Dylan stays completely still and quiet. If I couldn’t see the steady beat of his pulse on the side of his neck, I would swear that he was dead. It’s bad enough that my heart is jackhammering away inside its cage in my chest, making it nearly impossible to stay as calm on the outside as
I’m trying to be in front of him.
It’s a test, that’s all this is. Get it over with so you can move on.
I’m thinking this while reaching out to take Dylan’s hands in mine. He doesn’t resist, so that’s good. Then he lets me position them on my waist, leaving them there when I take my hands away. I feel a charge of excitement run through me at the warmth of his hands against my body. And it frightens me a little. So I keep my eyes trained on his throat and watch in fascination as it bobs up and then down, as if he is swallowing a breath. Not having to look in his eyes is enough to propel me an inch forward and loop my arms around his neck.
“Katy?”
He says this so quietly that I can’t tell if it’s a plea or a question. So I move closer until our bodies are pressed together, like we’re about to start a slow dance. I’ve finally been able to clear my mind of all stray thoughts and focus on this moment, right here, right now, that I know will change everything. But I still can’t gather the nerve to look up at him, because if I do, I already know I won’t be able to stop.
In a voice so low, I ask, “If you were this close to me, like you are now, would you want to kiss me?”
He doesn’t answer, but I can tell that his breathing is becoming more rapid by the way his chest rises and falls. So I ask him again.
It’s then he moves his hand off my waist and underneath my chin to tip my face up to look at him. He skims over my features with his eyes until reaching my lips, where he holds them in his gaze for a moment too long to be considered merely friendly.
Then quietly, he says, “Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, I would kiss you.”
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Born and raised in Miami, Florida, Barbie Bohrman dreamed of becoming an author. Long after she had given up, a book club’s prologue contest encouraged her to give it one more go. What emerged were the beginnings of her debut novel, Promise Me. Now she’s living her dream and writing stories that entice readers to escape and break away from reality. When she’s not writing, you can find her trying to get through the books on her Kindle (more than a thousand at last count) or watching Sherlock or Homeland. She resides in New Jersey with her husband and two children.


Author Links: Website | Facebook | Twitter | GoodReads
Website: http://barbiebohrmanbooks.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Barbie-Bohrman-Author/170019943145037
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/BarbieBohrman
GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6875784.Barbie_Bohrman ​
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1 Comment

Falling Star - Release Day Blitz

4/26/2016

0 Comments

 

FALLING STAR by Brandy L Rivers
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Combustible #2 - Standalone
– SYNOPSIS –
One day of hell changed her forever.

Ella Cross wanted to bury her on-screen persona even before her abduction. Being in the spotlight grew worse after the ordeal. She left Raven Star behind to find herself again.

A fresh start.

No ties to her past.

In a small town where only her oldest friend knows who she was, she believes her secrets are safe. But secrets never stay hidden forever. Sooner or later the past always resurfaces.

Then she meets him.
br />
Trent Ward can’t resist his new neighbor. Ella is familiar, but he can’t place why. He knows she’s running from something. As much as he wants to protect her, he wants to unravel her mystery.

Between his demons and her past, Trent may not have the strength to explore the growing connection to Ella.

Will he save her from her worst nightmare?

– PURCHASE –
AMAZON | GOOGLE PLAY | iTUNES | B&N | KOBO






– ABOUT THE AUTHOR – 
Brandy L Rivers is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author. Her two main series are Others of Edenton and Others of Seattle. She has also written a couple contemporary stories. An avid reader, Brandy has always loved writing. She became serious about it as a stay-at-home-mother. Her secret lair, guarded by a pint-sized pound puppy who imagines himself a hellhound, contains a file full of manuscripts she plans to edit and put out with new creations she is constantly dreaming up. Living in rainy Western Washington with her husband and three kids, Brandy is already working on future stories in each of the series, and several other projects. 

–  social media links – 
TWITTER | FACEBOOK | WEBSITE | GOODREADS


0 Comments

Demigods and Monsters - Book Tour with Reviews and Giveaway

4/25/2016

1 Comment

 
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                                                   Demigods and Monsters
​                                                              (Sphinx #2)
                                                          by 
Raye Wagner
                                              Release Date: April 25th 2016

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Can Apollo’s curse be broken?
Seventeen-year-old Hope Nicholas is done running. Apollo’s curse has ruled her entire life, limiting her choices and robbing her of the things that matter most. But she refuses to live in fear any longer. In fact, she’s ready to do whatever it takes to break the god’s power over her existence.
When the goddess Artemis instructs Hope to impersonate a demigod and infiltrate a conservatory to get access to the Olympian library, she doesn’t hesitate. As she sees it, there’s nothing left to lose.
But once inside, Hope discovers the only way to get what she needs is to work with her sworn enemies. As the lines between demigod and monster are crossed again and again, Hope has to dig deep for the courage to accept her fate or fight for the freedom to save herself.


Demigods and Monsters is the second book in the Sphinx series.

Add to Goodreads
Buy Links:
Amazon


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  This awesome series continues! The second book picks up right where the first ended and just flawlessly moves on with this intriguing adventure. The writing style is slightly different, as a result I enjoyed this book even more than the first one! With more twists and fast-paced action, I was left trying to devour this book as quick as I could to find out what would happen next. The characters are even more complex than the first book and the storyline develops even more in this sequel. There's still a cliffhanger with more unanswered questions at the end, and now I'm practically foaming at the mouth to get the third book in this series now! I'm absolutely loving this series! It's in my top 5 list right now!

About Book # 1 - Curse of the Sphinx

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                                           Curse of the Sphinx
                                                  (Sphinx #1)
​                                              by Raye Wagner
                                      Release Date- August 9, 2015

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​An addictive young-adult fantasy based in a realm of Greek mythology, sure to please fans of Percy Jackson and The Sweet Evil Trilogy.

In a modern world still ruled by the Greek gods, being a monster is more than a curse. It is a death sentence.
Seventeen year-old Hope Nicholas has spent her entire life on the run. But no one is chasing her. In fact, no one even knows she exists. With her mom, she's traveled from town to town, barely staying long enough to meet anyone, let alone make friends. And she'll have to keep it that way.
It's safer.
When her mother is brutally ripped away from her, Hope's life shatters. Is this the fulfillment of Apollo's curse? Have the demigods discovered them? Is Hope, too, being hunted? Orphaned and alone, Hope flees again.
In a universe still ruled by the Greek Gods, mythology is more than just a course in high school. Demigods, monsters, and shadow-demons from the Underworld are realities that threaten Hope's very existence.
When the handsome Athan Michael comes to her aid, she must decide what she values more- safety or love.
Can Hope find a way, or will Apollo's curse rob her of everything she's every wanted?

Origin of the Sphinx (Sphinx #0.5) on Goodreads
Origin of the Sphinx Buy Link:
Amazon


Curse of the Sphinx (Sphinx #1) on Goodreads
Curse of the Sphinx Buy Link:
Amazon

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 I loved this book! I'm a huge fan of mythology and this book was awesomely unique and kept me completely captivated! I loved how it integrated old mythology with teenage trials. The storyline was amazingly complex, the dialogue was flawless and the characters were complex and well developed. With plenty of twists, fast-paced action and a small flare of romance peppered throughout, all my Urban Fantasy needs were fulfilled with this awesome book! There was a nail-biting cliffhanger at the end that left me fumbling to get to the second book now!  I absolutely loved this book and can't wait to dive into the sequel now!
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Raye Wagner grew up in Seattle, the second of eight children, and learned to escape chaos through the pages of fiction. As a youth, she read the likes of David Eddings, Leon Uris, and Jane Austen. Inspired by a fictional character, Raye pursued a career in nursing, thinking to help the world one patient at a time.
One summer afternoon, when her then young children were playing in the pool, a plot dropped into her head, and she started writing. 
She enjoys baking, puzzles, Tae Kwon Do, and the sound of waves lapping at the sand. She lives with her husband and three children in Middle Tennessee.

Origin of the Sphinx, a novella detailing the story leading up to the creation of the mythological creature, is her first publication. It is the beginning of the Sphinx series. 


Curse of the Sphinx, the first book in the series, is completed, and set to be released in August 2015.



Author Links:
Website│Twitter│Facebook│Goodreads
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                                                                                  Book Tour Organized by:
  ​                                                                                   YA Bound Book Tours
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The Young Vampire's Survival Guide - Tour and Review

4/25/2016

1 Comment

 
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                           The Young Vampire’s Survival Guide
                                             by Lucy Eldritch
                Genre: Vampires / Urban Paranormal / Horror

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Within a month of being bitten, it cost the life of Robert James’ best friend. Within a year, hundreds had died. All because of him.
Until Robert was bitten, he was a regular college student. Now he seems to be the reluctant future of vampire kind and his world has been turned upside down. Pursued by the Dawn Warriors – a group dedicated to cleansing the world of evil – Robert’s survival is at stake. Literally.



Kobo: https://store.kobobooks.com/en-us/ebook/the-young-vampire-s-survival-guide
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01DL2DP96/
iBooks: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id1098001903
Nook: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-young-vampires-survival-guide-lucy-eldritch/1123610817?ean=2940153180762


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 I absolutely loved this book! Fast-paced and packed with action, this book sunk it's fangs into me and wouldn't let go until the end - then it gave me a good shake! The complexity of the vampire society is very intricate and detailed. The storyline was awesome, the dialogue perfect and the characters were very complex and entertaining. I loved that while this book was stuffed with action, it was still light-hearted and wildly entertaining with tons of twists! There's quite a cliffhanger at the end that left me biting my nails and I'm frantically awaiting the sequel now! 
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I’m Lucy Eldritch and I write paranormal-horror-urban-fantasy-vampire fiction set mainly in Manchester (the one in the UK, not the one in New Hampshire) and London. I also love red wine, but I suspect that’s not really something I should mention. Not professional. Something like that. So, consider it un-mentioned.
You can find me here:
http://www.vampirebookseries.com
https://twitter.com/lucyeldritch.com
1 Comment
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    About Me

    I'm a Texas gal with a wonderful husband, an amazing six year old son, and an adorable newborn baby boy!
    ​My blog is about the best things in life - cooking, books, giveaways and reviews of everyday products! 

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