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Snarkology Halloween Hop Winners!
Hi Guys! I can’t believe Halloween is over and it’s November 1st, but the calendar doesn’t lie. Thanks so much to everyone who participated in the blog hop, authors and readers alike. We all had a lot of fun with it.
The grand prize winners have been chosen and announced. You can find their names on the rafflecopter, if you’re curious.
The winner for my drawing for a $5 gift card is Anne, who I’ll be emailing as soon as I finish this blog.
Thanks again guys! I hope you all had a safe and fun Halloween!
Friday Five: Leela Lou Dahlin
This week’s guest for Friday Five is Leela Lou Dahlin. Thanks for visiting the blog, Leela!
What kind of books do you read for fun?
I’m an all romance kind of woman but I like all kinds. Every once in a while I’ll add a little Sci-fi in there just for kicks.
What’s the one thing you can’t live without?
My family but if you’re talking about an electronic device I’d say my iPhone
If a genie granted you three wishes, what would they be?
A genie, huh? My next story involves a genie…well…sort of. Wishes if I could have three they would be.
1. A beach house in North Carolina all furnished and paid for of course.
2. I’d wish everyone really did treat people like they wanted to be treated
3. An abundance of health, wealth and happiness
I guess I could have used the abundance of wealth to get the beach house but hindsight is 20/20. LOL
What is best writing advice you can give?
The best advice I can give is in two parts-
1. Write. I know it’s been said a million times before but if you don’t do that one part all the other parts don’t matter. Make it a priority.
2. Get into a group of other writers in real life or the internet variety—it doesn’t matter it’s just nice to have like minded people to bounce things off of. You’ll quickly figure out that authors are in a league of their own and I’ve never met such helpful people.
Can you share a little about your current release with us?
My current release is called Rumor Has It and was my NaNoWriMo 2012 so I was really happy that it was coming out at this time of year. Here’s the blurb
Raina Gibson is an event organizer who’s planned a family of her own ever since her mother passed away. The idea was to be married by age twenty-six, and have two children by thirty. She’d had everything in place, but one thing kept getting in her way: her best friend Liam Prescott. She’s attracted to his sexy confidence and intrigued by his daring spontaneity. Rumor has it this committed bachelor is phenomenal between the sheets, and since she’s never known anything but ordinary she figures that has to be the draw. So she decides there’s only one thing to do: get him into her bed and out of her system then get herself back on track.
Liam’s a Lieutenant Fire Chief who’s never forgotten what it feels like to have the most important woman in his life walk away without looking back. But there’s still something about Raina that makes him want to keep her close and protect her. So when Raina propositions him he’s torn. They’re thrown together for the Annual Fire Ball and the more he has her the more he wants.
“Out of their systems” isn’t working out as planned. So they’ll have to decide whether to keep the fire between them burning or hose down these new behaviors and go back to what’s always worked for them.
ARe- https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-rumorhasit-1658066-149.html
Loose Id – http://www.loose-id.com/rumor-has-it.html
Facebook – Leela Lou Dahlin
Twitter – LeelaLou_2
Email – [email protected]
Blog – LeelaLou.wordpress.com
Snarkology Halloween Hop
Hi all! For the next few days I’m participating in the Snarkology Halloween Hop. There are a ton of authors involved (there’s a complete list below) and prizes galore for everyone to win. The grand prize is a $100 gift card to Amazon or Barnes and Noble. You can enter to win that by using the Rafflecopter below. In addition to the grand prize, each author is also giving away something on their own site. More on my giveaway in a second.
First I wanted to talk a little bit about Halloween. Without a doubt, this is my favorite holiday and has been for as long as I can remember. I love fall, the leaves changing, and the cooler temperatures. More than the season, I love adore the history, the creepy atmosphere, and (of course) the horror connection. I glut myself on horror novels and scary movies during October. This year I’ve been binging on erotic horror and re-reading my favorite zombie romance novels.
Some of my favorite movies include George Romero’s Dead series, Night of the Demons(original), Fright Night(original), Night of the Creeps, and The Descent. These movies are so good. I will definitely be watching them at some point on Halloween. I might have to find a few sites (such as https://hellhorror.com and alike) to binge-watch them. I might have to look into the different options of streaming the movies if the aforementioned sites are not available. One of my friends had mentioned in passing about an open-source media center software called Kodi and how it can integrate various streaming platforms on it as add-ons! Maybe, I could give it a shot if it is available in our region (and if not, use a kodi vpn maybe?)!
Also, my friend did suggest that we watch these movies outside. She said we could build a fire and sit outside to watch these movies. We’d just have to purchase an outdoor projector from somewhere like Kohl’s, and then we’d be able to sit outside. My friend even said that we should use some Kohl’s coupons to get money off too. Then, we wouldn’t have to spend as much. We might also want to think about whether or not our internet would be able to reach as far as outside and, if not, look into the various isp in my area to see whether we could upgrade ours ready for our outdoor Halloween viewing.
The list of books I love is much, much longer. However, some of the books I re-read year after year include Haunted by Tamara Thorne, Phantoms and Twilight Eyes by Dean Koontz, Mort by Joseph Duncan, and Dead Tropics by Sue Edge.
So with that thought in mind, I’d like give away a $5 gift certificate for Amazon so whoever the lucky winner is can buy a book or rent a movie of their choice. To enter, just leave a comment sharing your favorite creepy book or movie. I’ll choose a winner at random on November 1st and announce it here on the blog. Please leave your email address or check back here on that date to see if you’ve won.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Don’t forget to check out all the other participants in the hop!
Friday Five: Lynley Wayne
This week’s guest for Friday Five is Lynley Wayne. Thanks for visiting the blog, Lynley!
So, Lynley, what kind of books do you read for fun?
These days I don’t have a lot of time to read. When I do find the time, I read whatever catches my interest. Mystery. Romance. Fantasy. Science Fiction. Suspense.
What’s the one thing you can’t live without?
Books, obviously! Outside of books though, I’d have to say my chai tea. Without it I wouldn’t be able to function.
If a genie granted you three wishes, what would they be?
1. To be able to download my thoughts directly to a computer. (would make writing so much easier)
2. To be able to travel anywhere with a thought.
3. To be healthy and in shape.
What is best writing advice you can give?
Be true to yourself. This is assuming you’ve already taken the most common advice writers give, and that is to write. You have to write the story you want to write and not the story you think you should write. If you don’t care about your story or your characters, it will show in your writing.
Can you share a little about your current release with us?
Facing Demons, book three in the Scars series, just came out on Oct. 3rd. This story is about Seth and Cam. They’ve known one another since they were kids. Cam’s life isn’t ideal by any means. His father is abusive and drags him into a life of motorcycle gangs, drugs, and guns. While Seth knows about some of what Cam has to deal with, he doesn’t know it all. Seth begins to have feeling for Cam, but Cam is determined to stay just friends. It takes awhile but Seth eventually convinces him to give them a chance. However, circumstances out of their control cause them to go their separate ways. Fast-forward eleven years. Cam’s in trouble so he turns to the one person he knows he can trust…Seth. It’s a story of drug cartels, dirty law enforcement officers, love, and facing the demons of the past.
Blurb:
At the age of fifteen, Seth Dempsey gave his heart to Cameron Reyes. Three years later, Cam shattered it when he walked away. When Cam blows back into Seth’s life years later, Seth knows he will do whatever it takes to ensure Cam doesn’t slip away again. Even if it means going up against a corrupt DEA agent and a drug cartel.
Cameron Reyes was born on the wrong side of the tracks. He fell in love with Seth, but knew the only way to keep him safe was to leave, no matter how much it hurt. Eleven years later, when his life implodes, he knows the only person he can trust is the boy whose heart he broke all those years ago.
While they fight to stay one step ahead of everyone and clear Cam’s name, can they learn to work together in order to face down the demons of the past and find the happily ever after they have dreamed of?
Author Bio:
Lynley Wayne is the pen name of a thirty-something female living on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. When not writing, she can usually be found reading and thinking up creative ways to avoid housework. She is married to a very understanding man who doesn’t complain when she spends hours in front of the computer, or talks for hours about whatever story she’s working on, or asks random off the wall questions. He also keeps her fed on those occasions when her muse has taken over and she loses days at a time. Yeah, basically he’s vying for sainthood.
Lynley strongly believes everyone is entitled to their own version of happiness, no matter how it may differ from the norm. She writes characters she wants to read and hopes others like reading about them as much as she enjoyed writing them.
It is her hope that one day society will be able to look past the labels and see the person behind them. That they will realize we are all the same. Until that time comes, she will continue telling stories of a love others may believe is wrong, but she thinks is nothing short of beautiful.
You can find Lynley online at:
Website: http://www.lynleywayne.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/@LynleyWayne
Facebook: www.facebook.com/lynley.wayne.1
Facebook Author Page: http://www.facebook.com/LynleyWayne
Friday Five: Thom Lane
This week’s guest for Friday Five is Thom Lane. Thanks for visiting the blog, Thom!
So, what kind of books do you read for fun?
…Wait, what? There are kinds of books? There are categories, and people think some are more fun than others…?
No, sorry, I will be serious: but I read all kinds of books, me. Anything in English. History – for research, yes, but who says research can’t be fun? – and biography, science for simpletons, all the varieties of fiction that there are, from kids’ books to serious literature. What I love best is genre: science fiction and fantasy and historical fiction and mystery and and and. I’ve written all of those, in various combinations, but I read them before ever I was a writer.
What’s the one thing you can’t live without?
Ask me first thing in the morning, it’ll be coffee: brewed hot and black and very strong. Ask me five o’clock in the evening, it’s alcohol: beer or wine or a cocktail, depending. Ask me at six o’clock in the evening, it’s my favourite kitchen knife. But ask me once for all time, and it’s books, reading, the ability to read. If I couldn’t read – well, I dunno, but I’d probably just cease to exist. In some absolutely concrete way, I think I probably am text rendered flesh.
If a genie granted you three wishes, what would they be?
Heh. I’d find it hard not to wish for eternal youth, because I’m insatiably curious and I really, really want to know what happens to humankind in the far far future; and I might well wish that I’d been into bitcoins in the very early days, because an awful lot of money would make things so much easier, for myself and all my friends. Digital currency is such a mysterious concept that it’s still intriguing me to look into it and perhaps look at how to Bitcoin kaufen Paypal. Then, of course, I’d wish for three more wishes, because I’m not a fool, y’know.
What is the best writing advice you can give?
Probably my favourite single line is “Don’t get it right, get it written.” Bad drafts can be made better, but nothing can help a story that’s not actually made it onto paper. But that’s a quotation; my own personal best advice is not to get hung up on anyone’s advice, let alone a mantra like “less is more”. Sometimes that’s true, but sometimes less is just less. Every story has its own voice, and some of them need to be tight, and some of them need to be extravagant. Write everything you can: every genre, every style. If you don’t tell your stories, nobody else is going to tell them for you.
Can you share a little about your current release with us?
I can! For some years now I’ve been writing the “Tales of Amaranth” series for Loose Id, set in a fantasy empire where slavery is an accepted part of life. These are m/m stories, some told from a slave’s point of view, some from a master’s. People who are strict about such things say they’re not properly BDSM, and they’re not romances either. Me, I just shrug: I’m not good at definitions and they are what they are, which is stories about young men learning how to live and be happy in a fairly ruthless environment. Some of the stories feature magic (there’s a recurrent couple of characters, a master mage and his body-slave), some don’t.
(cover art by Anne Cain)
The new one, Heart’s Hunt, is a long short story, a good entry-point for anyone who hasn’t met the series before. It’s set in a neighbouring kingdom, where revolution has overturned the social order. A bounty hunter is chasing down a runaway prince, but his big score doesn’t turn out the way that he was hoping. According to the publisher’s blurb (actually, I think I might have written this): “When he rides into the charcoal-burner’s clearing, he doesn’t find a depraved young aristocrat hiding out with his loyal servant. Rather, he finds a displaced old man doing the best he can with only a slave to help. A willing, beautiful, poorly trained slave. From their first encounter, Martel can’t keep his hands off the boy – and sees no reason to, when the master doesn’t care and the inexperienced boy is sullen and frightened and eager all at once. This is the last thing he was looking for – but can one hot night change the course of a life, of two lives…?”
You can read more (and buy the book!) here: http://www.loose-id.com/tales-of-amaranth-heart-s-hunt.html
