Archive for the 'Author Friend Promo' Category

CHRISTMAS DRESSING

December 7, 2022 | Author Friend Promo, Cooking

from Emma Lane

This year seems to have zipped by much too fast. Our family is already hinting for me to cook their favorite dishes for Christmas dinner. One wants a ham with gravy from drippings. Another is pleading for green bean casserole, while another wants fresh asparagus spears and dinner rolls. Me, I have a sweet tooth and am looking forward to a home baked apple pie, of course ala mode, for dessert. 😊 One thing the entire family is looking forward to is my special dressing. Here’s the recipe for you.

CRAISIN-WALNUT DRESSING
1 bag seasoned breadcrumbs, or mixed breadcrumbs
1½ cup chicken stock, just enough to moisten breadcrumbs
2 tbsp. butter
1 onion, chopped
¼ cup celery, chopped
⅓ cup dried craisons, dried cranberries or raisins
¼ cup chopped walnuts
Salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven 350° F.

Soak craisins, or raisins, in warm water to soften for fifteen minutes.

Melt butter in a frying pan. Sauté celery and onion until opaque, about 7 minutes.

Drain craisins. Combine all ingredients in a medium size bowl, then season with salt and pepper. Pour chicken stock to moisten ingredients and mix lightly.

Grease an oven safe pan them scoop in mixture.

Bake 25 – 30 minutes.

Merry Christmas,
Emma

Here’s a peek at Emma’s Regency Christmas collection to put you in the holiday spirit.

A Wild Wicked Duke
After a cruel family betrayal, Caroline Engelson vows the wicked duke will never regain her love unless he first earns her respect, no matter how fervently she longs for his kisses.

A serious accident delivers the wicked duke into Caro’s care, but she is shocked and hurt when he refers to her teen years as the ‘brat with tangled curls.’ Caro is all grown up now when the wicked duke tries to take advantage of her emotions, even as he turns the orderly household into total chaos with his ducal roars. To his astonishment, his best friend’s sister is made of sterner stuff. The situation changes drastically when Caro learns of a shocking family secret..

A Duke Finds Love
Young love is disrupted and the couple parted, but their unsympathetic parents fail to extinguish the strong bond between the two.

Roseland, left pregnant by the duke’s son, weds a neighbor, mistaking that her lover has been forced to marry another. A war and five years later, the two face a second chance, but despite their deep love for one another, impediments must be faced before happily ever after will be theirs at long last.

Beloved Soldier Returns
A wounded British soldier faces amnesia and frustrating dreams, but is finally well enough to reclaim his fiancée and his heritage when a gypsy woman arrives to share an important secret.

Robert Cooper-Hanton, a soldier who fought against Napoleon at Waterloo, is seriously wounded and suffers amnesia but survives in a gypsy camp for three years. Pockets of memory are still missing, leaving him with dreams of people with no names, when he makes the decision to begin his journey home. He has no conscious remembrance of a fiancée he left behind but is not surprised to learn that a cousin has usurped his property. When neighborhood friends reveal the fact of his engagement to Lynda Clarington, his memory of her returns in a flash and he recognizes the woman of his dreams.

Lynda had struggled without much success to accept her loss and is overjoyed to learn that Cooper is alive. She has loved him since childhood, but can she adjust to a man who seems irrevocably changed? When a gypsy woman shows up searching for Cooper, Lynda is plagued with doubt. Will Cooper manage to reunite with his old life and the woman he loves or will he remain lost in his hazy memories, dreams and a changed reality?

Dark Domino
Sarah Louise and Ethan have loved each other all their lives, but a war and time apart may have jeopardized their relationship.

Ethan has been away at war for six long years—without a single letter to the young girl he left behind. He is certain she has forgotten him, but he is still drawn to her. Dressed for a masquerade in a dark domino, he leads her to the garden and tries to steal a kiss. Sarah does not know why the man in the dark domino is so familiar, and why a stranger should give her a feeling of home. When Ethan reveals his identity, Sarah’s anger and hurt overwhelm even her love. Can a new life be built on the foundations of a first love? Or will the Dark Domino remain alone forever?

BUY LINK

Emma Lane is a gifted author who writes under several pen-names. She lives with her patient husband on several acres outside a typical American village in Western New York. Her day job is working with flowers at her son’s plant nursery. Look for information about writing and plants on her new website. Leave a comment or a gardening question and put a smile on Emma’s face.

Stay connected to Emma on Facebook and Twitter.

Six and a Half Tips

November 30, 2022 | Author Friend Promo, Cooking

and a Recipe for Perfect English Muffins

by Helen Carpenter

You don’t have to be British to enjoy hand-made English muffins. This recipe is an easy menu addition for Sunday morning brunch or a special breakfast. English muffins are a snap to prepare, require only an hour to rise, cook quickly on a griddle or frying pan (no heating the oven!) and taste great, either plain or with butter, jam, or your favorite topping. An added bonus is the delicious, yeasty scent of fresh bread that fills the kitchen.

Here are tips to help you make perfect muffins.
1. While the yeast is dissolving, fill a 13” x 9” pan with hot water and place it in your unheated oven. Muffins rise best in a warm, humid environment.

2. If your recipe calls for honey, spritz your measuring spoon with cooking spray. The honey will slide right off the spoon.

3. Instead of using a rolling pin and cookie cutter to form your muffins, divide the dough into even parts. Then press out the dough pieces in your hamburger patty mold. You’ll get just-the-right-size, perfectly round muffins.

4. Once your muffins have risen, hand-transfer them to the heated griddle. They’ll keep their shape better than if you try to slip a spatula beneath them.

(Bonus tip: Prefer using a spatula? Dip the edge in cornmeal so it slides easily under the muffins.)

5. To test for doneness, lightly tap the top of the muffins with your fingertip. A hollow sound means your muffins are cooked.

6. When you’re ready to toast, split the muffins with a fork instead of a knife. Your toppings will fill the resulting nooks and crannies.

And here’s the perfect recipe for Perfect English muffins.

What you’ll need:
2-3 quart bowl
Standard-size cookie sheet
Griddle or frying pan
1 package yeast
1 cup warm water
3 cups flour (all-purpose or whole wheat)
3/4 cup shortening
2 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon salt
Cornmeal

Dissolve yeast in bowl in warm water for five minutes. While yeast is dissolving, sprinkle cookie sheet with a light coating of cornmeal.

Add flour, shortening, honey and salt to yeast-and-water-mixture to form dough.
Coat dough with flour; knead until elastic.

Divide dough into 12 equal balls. Use a hamburger patty mold or the flat end of a glass dipped in flour or sprayed with cooking spray to flatten each ball into a 3-inch circle. Put the muffins on the cookie sheet as you form them.

Cover the cookie sheet and let the muffins rise for an hour.
Heat the griddle or frying pan to 375 degrees (no oil necessary).

Cook the muffins, turning once, until golden brown on both sides.

Split with a fork, toast, and enjoy with your favorite topping.

Once upon a time there was a mother/daughter author duo named Helen and Lorri, who wrote as HL Carpenter. The Carpenters worked from their studios in Carpenter Country, a magical place that, like their stories, was unreal but not untrue. Then one day Lorri left her studio to explore the land of What-if, and like others who have lost a loved one the magical place lost much of its magic. But thanks to family, plus an amazing group of wordsmiths named Authors Moving Forward (AMF), the magic is slowly returning.

Helen Carpenter loves liking and sharing blog posts from other authors. She lives in Florida with her husband of many years and appreciates every day, especially those without hurricanes.

Stay connected on her blog and Facebook .

NOVEMBER IS NATIONAL CAREGIVERS’ MONTH

November 21, 2022 | Author Friend Promo

Let’s say thank you!

from Anne Montgomery

Forty-eight million Americans serve as caregivers for friends and family members in need.

I have always considered myself strong and quite capable of taking care of myself, but life has a way of swatting our perceptions away. I came to this conclusion when I was stricken with Covid-19—despite being fully vaccinated— a broken leg that rendered me unable to walk for two months, and an eye infection that affected my vision. (No, I never do anything halfway.)

I admit that I rarely thought of caregivers before, but as I stared up from my bed—broken and sick— at the face of my masked sweetie pie, I was struck by my utter helplessness. In the beginning, I was too sick to consider how much work I’d become. Nor did it register that I wasn’t the only person in Ryan’s care. His prime caretaking responsibility is his 85-year-old mom who is losing her eyesight and suffers from dementia.

So, Ry was now faced with two of us. When the Covid started to ease, I jokingly called Ryan Ethan Frome, the title character in the 1911 novel by American author Edith Wharton. For those who are unfamiliar with the story, poor Ethan, who has a disabled shrew of a wife, falls in love with a pretty young woman. Then, with no way out, they decide to commit suicide together, however the plan goes awry. They both live, but the woman becomes disabled, so Ethan now has two sickly people to care for.

Ryan, as my caregiver, had to do everything when I was sick and broken.

According to the AARP, “Every day, some 48 million Americans help parents, spouses and other loved ones with medical care, meals, bathing, dressing, chores and much more. They do it out of love, not for pay.”

When I was well enough to notice, I realized the enormous pressure Ryan faced. He had to feed his mother, monitor her medications, and tend to grocery shopping and medical appointments, as well as weather her constant confusion and memory issues. Then he had to come to my house and care for all my needs, as well.

As you can imagine, caregivers are suffering. “Family caregivers now encompass more than one in five Americans,” says the research series Caregiving in the US.  “The study also reveals that family caregivers are in worse health compared to five years ago.” Caregivers spend a whopping 13 days each month “on tasks such as shopping, food preparation, housekeeping, laundry, transportation, and giving medication.”

These constant demands force caregivers to push their own lives and needs aside, often causing burnout. Between 40 to 70% of caregivers are said to suffer from depression, with those attending to patients with cognitive decline being the most likely to be affected. Also, chronic illnesses like diabetes, arthritis, high blood pressure, heart disease, and immune system disorders can worsen.

Ryan stepped up and became a caregiver when I needed him. I will always be grateful.

What can caregivers do? First, ask for help, if you’re feeling overwhelmed. There are agencies all over the country that offer services to caregivers that can help lighten the load, so check the Internet and your insurance company to see what’s available. Do the best you can but forgive yourself when days don’t go as planned. And carve out some time out for yourself.

Every Tuesday, Ryan goes to lunch with his long-time buddies. The gathering is his one time of respite during the week when most of his efforts revolve around me and his mom. He always seems more energized when he returns from these get-togethers and happily tells me what’s new with the boys.

November is National Family Caregivers Month, so I’d like to give a big shoutout to those who shoulder the responsibilities for others. Caregiving is an exhausting, often overlooked effort. So, thank you to all the folks who support those of us in need.

And, of course, I’m especially grateful for Ryan who jumped in with both feet when my health failed, never getting angry, and doing his best to cheer me up when I was down.

Thank you, Ry. I love you!

Here is a look at one of my thrillers for your reading pleasure.

Ancient ruins, haunted memories, and a ruthless criminal combine with a touch of mystic presence in this taut mystery about a crime we all must address.

Maggie, a National Park Ranger of Native American descent, is back at The Castle—an ancient pueblo carved into a limestone cliff in Arizona’s Verde Valley. Maggie, who suffers from depression, has been through several traumas: the gang rape she suffered while in the Coast Guard, the sudden death of her ten-year-old son, and a suicide attempt.

One evening, she chases a young Native American boy through the park and gasps as he climbs the face of The Castle cliff and disappears into the pueblo. When searchers find no child, Maggie’s friends believe she’s suffering from depression-induced hallucinations.

Maggie has several men in her life. The baker, newcomer Jim Casey, who always greets her with a warm smile and pink boxes filled with sweet delicacies. Brett Collins, a scuba diver who is doing scientific studies in Montezuma Well, a dangerous cylindrical depression that houses strange creatures found nowhere else on Earth. Dave, an amiable waiter with whom she’s had a one-night stand, and her new boss Glen.

One of these men is a serial rapist and Maggie is his next target. In a thrilling and terrifying denouement, Maggie faces her rapist and conquers her worst fears once and for all.

Available at Amazon and all major vendors.

Anne Montgomery has worked as a television sportscaster, newspaper and magazine writer, teacher, amateur baseball umpire, and high school football referee. She worked at WRBL‐TV in Columbus, Georgia, WROC‐TV in Rochester, New York, KTSP‐TV in Phoenix, Arizona, ESPN in Bristol, Connecticut, where she anchored the Emmy and ACE award‐winning SportsCenter, and ASPN-TV as the studio host for the NBA’s Phoenix Suns. Montgomery has been a freelance and staff writer for six publications, writing sports, features, movie reviews, and archeological pieces.

When she can, Anne indulges in her passions: rock collecting, scuba diving, football refereeing, and playing her guitar.

Learn more about Anne Montgomery on her website and Wikipedia. Stay connected on Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter.

ABUNDANCE FILLS THE OPEN MIND

November 14, 2022 | Author Friend Promo

From Linda Lee Greene Author/Artist

Outside the kitchen window of our home on Long Island, New York, it was a cold and windswept November morning of 1970. Thanksgiving Day was approaching, and I missed my family back in Ohio sorely. Oh, how I wished I could be with them; but it wasn’t to be. I needed a distraction and decided the best way to accomplish it was to lose myself in a painting. I gathered fall deco items I had placed around the house and set them up on my kitchen table in a composition I deemed worthy of a still life. A sheet of watercolor paper taped to my board, and with my simple little pads of watercolor paints, a couple of brushes, and a stick of charcoal to rough in the initial shapes, I got to work.

The charcoal shapes came together easily. As is typical of the way I tackle most jobs, I touched my paint-loaded brush to the item on the paper that I thought would be the most difficult to render—which was the stem of the pumpkin. My first attempt was a total bust, as was my second and my third. By then, my heart was galloping in my chest with utter fury at myself. I pushed away from the table and paced the floor—across the length of the kitchen, into the hallway, into the living room, and back again and again…pace, pace, pace…and then a voice sounded ‘round my ears. “Empty your mind of what you ‘think’ a pumpkin stem looks like and paint only what you actually see!” I had heard the instruction from my teacher in a painting class I had taken years before, but obviously it had failed to register in my brain. I returned to the table, emptied my mind, and painted only what I saw with my eyes. Voila! In no time at all, the still life painted in a primitive style I had hoped to execute appeared with what seemed very little further effort on my part. It was almost like magic.

I learned a big lesson that day, not only related to the art of painting, but also to the art of living. Our preconceived notions (opinions, prejudices, attitudes, and so many other absolute doctrines we hold in mind) blind us to the truth of things.

With my humble painting titled, CORNUCOPIA, I wish all of you an open-minded, a clear-eyed, and a very happy holiday season.

Linda Lee

Here’s a peek at multi-award-winning author and artist Linda Lee Greene’s novel, Garden of the Spirits of the Pots, A Spiritual Odyssey. It is a blend of visionary and inspirational fiction with a touch of romance. The story unfolds as ex-pat American Nicholas Plato journeys into parts unknown, both within himself and his adopted home of Sydney, Australia. In the end, the odyssey reveals to him his true purpose for living. The novella is available in eBook and paperback.

Driven by a deathly thirst, he stops. A strange little brown man materializes out of nowhere and introduces himself merely as ‘Potter,’ and welcomes Nicholas to his ‘Garden of the Spirits of the Pots.’ Although Nicholas has never laid eyes on Potter, the man seems to have expected Nicholas at his bizarre habitation and displays knowledge about him that nobody has any right to possess. Just who is this mysterious Aboriginal potter?

Although they are as mismatched as two persons can be, a strangely inevitable friendship takes hold between them. It is a relationship that can only be directed by an unseen hand bent on setting Nicholas on a mystifying voyage of self-discovery and Potter on revelations of universal certainties.

A blend of visionary and inspirational fiction, and a touch of romance, this is a tale of Nicholas’ journey into parts unknown, both within his adopted home and himself, a quest that in the end leads him to his true purpose for living.

AMAZON BUY LINK 

Multi-award-winning author and artist Linda Lee Greene describes her life as a telescope that when trained on her past reveals how each piece of it, whether good or bad or in-between, was necessary in the unfoldment of her fine art and literary paths.

Greene moved from farm-girl to city-girl; dance instructor to wife, mother, and homemaker; divorcee to single-working-mom and adult-college-student; and interior designer to multi-award-winning artist and author, essayist, and blogger. It was decades of challenging life experiences and debilitating, chronic illness that gave birth to her dormant flair for art and writing. Greene was three days shy of her fifty-seventh birthday when her creative spirit took a hold of her.

She found her way to her lonely easel soon thereafter. Since then Greene has accepted commissions and displayed her artwork in shows and galleries in and around the USA. She is also a member of artist and writer associations.

Visit Linda on her blog and join her on Facebook.

Garden of the Spirits of the Pots is available in eBook and/or paperback on Amazon.

 

DOWN HOME THANKSGIVING DRESSING

November 9, 2022 | Author Friend Promo, Cooking

From Emma Lane

We’re from the South so my family loves corn bread stuffing with a variety of meals. Below is our family’s favorite recipe that is only served at Thanksgiving. Make your holiday dinner complete by serving giblet gravy with sliced turkey and cranberry sauce, steamed broccoli, and dinner rolls. Don’t forget the pumpkin pie with dollop of whipped cream for dessert!

Corn Bread Stuffing

Preheat oven 350° F.

Bake corn bread mix according to box directions.  Allow to cool then crumble.

Melt butter in a medium size frying pan. Sauté celery and onion to opaque stage, about 7 minutes.

Combine all ingredients in bowl. Turn mixture into a greased pan.

Bake 30 minutes.

Place three whole walnuts on top for garnish.

Happy Thanksgiving,

Emma and Family

Here is a brief intro to the cozy mystery series Emma writes as Janis Lane.

MURDER in the JUNKYARD sees the demise of a man no one likes, a romance, and plans for a wedding as Detective Fowler and his friends keep their small-town America free from danger.

Detective Kevin Fowler is furious that low life has targeted his town where people live in blissful safety. Brenda Bryant is out junkn’ for good things when she stumbles over the grotesque body of a man beloved by no one. Suspense heats up when large sums of money are found in two different places. Drug money is suspected, and Brenda targeted by someone who wants the money returned. Detective Fowler faces surprise after surprise as he peels back the surface of Hubbard, New York and deals with its shocking underbelly. Meanwhile romance infiltrates the group of friends with a wedding in the making.

AMAZON BUY LINK

Emma Lane is a gifted author who writes cozy mysteries as Janis Lane, Regency as Emma Lane, and spice as Sunny Lane.

She lives in Western New York where winter is snowy, spring arrives with rave reviews, summer days are long and velvet, and fall leaves are riotous in color. At long last she enjoys the perfect bow window for her desk where she is treated to a year-round panoramic view of nature. Her computer opens up a fourth fascinating window to the world. Her patient husband is always available to help with a plot twist and encourage Emma to never quit. Her day job is working with flowers at Herbtique and Plant Nursery, the nursery she and her son own.

Look for information about writing and plants on Emma’s new website. Leave a comment or a gardening question and put a smile on Emma’s face.

Stay connected to Emma on Facebook and Twitter. Be sure to check out the things that make Emma smile on Pinterest.

 

GOOD MORNING BREAD

November 2, 2022 | Author Friend Promo, Cooking

from Helen Carpenter

During the editing of one of our books, commas turned into a major topic of discussion. Yes, well, my daughter and I were writers, what did you expect? We liked commas and we also liked to slice commas from our writing, so we have a conflict of interest. For example, in the first two sentences of this paragraph (and this sentence too), we used commas. We could have used a comma in the third sentence before the “and,” though we chose not to. Either way would have been correct.

Another example is the title of this post. A comma would change the entire meaning. By omitting it, we imply (or say) the recipe below is a good (delicious) morning bread. Had we included a comma (Good morning, bread) we would be saying good morning to our bread. That would also fit, since the bread is definitely worthy of salutations.

Like bread, commas have lots of uses. You can splash them around in personal and geographic names, in numbers, before quotations that indicate speech such as “she said,” and in lists. If you’re the user of a certain word processing software, you can make your commas curly or straight and either style gets the job done.

We don’t claim to be experts on commas and we would be happy to hear your take on this very important punctuation. Let’s eat breakfast while we have the discussion. If you’re not hungry, then we’ll say, “Let’s eat, breakfast.”

Breakfast Bread

1½ cups dried mixed fruit (we used one 5-ounce package of mixed cranberries, cherries, blueberries, strawberries, and raspberries, and filled in the remainder with dried cranberries)
½ cup warm tea, any flavor
1 package regular yeast
½ cup warm water
2 tbsp. butter
½ cup coconut milk
3 tbsp. sugar
2 tbsp. honey
1 tsp. salt
1 egg
1 tsp. cinnamon
3 cups all-purpose flour
¾ cup nuts of your choice (we used pecans and pistachios)

Spray 2 loaf pans with cooking spray or line with parchment paper.

Soak dried fruit in bowl with warm tea. Set aside.

In separate bowl, add yeast to warm water. Set aside in a warm draft free location.

Melt butter.

Mix coconut milk, sugar, honey, salt, and egg. Add melted butter and stir. Next, add yeast and water mixture and stir.

Mix cinnamon and flour. Add to liquid ingredients and mix well.

Drain fruit. Add fruit and nuts to dough. Use your hands to mix, adding additional flour by tablespoons if necessary.

Let dough rise 1 hour. Punch down, divide in half, and shape into two equal loaves. Put loaves in prepared pans and let rise 40 minutes.

Heat oven to 350° F. Bake loaves 30 minutes. Cool in pan 5 minutes and remove to rack.

Serve warm or cold with butter or topping of your choice.

Once upon a time there was a mother/daughter author duo named Helen and Lorri, who wrote as HL Carpenter. The Carpenters worked from their studios in Carpenter Country, a magical place that, like their stories, was unreal but not untrue. Then one day Lorri left her studio to explore the land of What-if, and like others who have lost a loved one the magical place lost much of its magic. But thanks to family, plus an amazing group of wordsmiths named Authors Moving Forward (AMF), the magic is slowly returning.

Helen Carpenter loves liking and sharing blog posts from other authors. She lives in Florida with her husband of many years and appreciates every day, especially those without hurricanes.

Stay connected on her blog and  Facebook .

This Treat is No Trick

October 26, 2022 | Author Friend Promo, Cooking

from Tina Griffith

I used to make these Pinwheels for my kids when they were in elementary school.  The recipe is pretty easy and quite versatile.  By that I mean, you can flavor and add color to both layers.  Example: add cinnamon or almond flavoring to the chocolate dough, and add peppermint flavoring and pink food coloring to the white one.  Can you imagine eating a purple and green spiral cookie on somebody’s birthday?  Or how about a black and orange cookie on Halloween?

And just before you put them in the oven, you can also top them with sprinkles, candy shapes, or just plain sugar.  Use your imagination to make the most interesting of cookies for any holiday or celebration, because  experimenting is part of the fun with this dough.

Grama Tina’s Spiral Cookies

¾ cup of softened butter

1 cup of white sugar

1 large egg

2 teaspoons of vanilla

2 ½ cups of all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon of baking powder

cocoa powder, peanut butter or Nutella – optional

rainbow sprinkles or candy shapes – optional

5 drops of food coloring – red, yellow, pink, orange, black – optional

1 teaspoon of cinnamon, almond, or nutmeg – optional

3 or 4 drops of flavoring – peppermint, lemon, etc. – optional

Preheat oven to 375° F.

Lay parchment paper on 2 large cookie sheets or grease well.

In large bowl, beat butter with sugar until fluffy.  Then beat in the egg and vanilla.

In a separate bowl, whisk flour with baking powder. Add to butter mixture in 2 additions, stirring until it becomes a soft dough.

Divide dough in half.  Add cocoa powder (and/or cinnamon, peanut butter, Nutella, or mint flavoring).  Mix and set aside.  Now move to the other ball of dough.  Leave this white and add mint or a cinnamon flavoring or any flavoring you like and coloring. Remember – both the colors and flavors should go together well.

Roll each ball out flat, and then place one on top of the other.  Take one end and slowly roll this up into a log.  Length-wise or width-wise determines how large your cookies will be.

Once you’ve completed rolling the dough, wrap it in plastic and place in the refrigerator until chilled.  This could take up to 2 hours, but you can leave it in the fridge for up to 3 days.

When you’re ready to bake, take the log out and remove the plastic covering.  Beginning at one end, slice the cookies about ¼” thick and place them on the prepared cookie sheets.

Bake for about 10 minutes – you want them to be a lovely golden brown.  Let cool and serve.

**HINT – using a piece of thread instead of a knife, makes it easier to cut the dough.

Ophelia’s Curse is a suspenseful and intriguing novel from start to finish. The story will give you goose bumps and have you sitting on the edge of your seat. In short, this story will tickle your senses on a level that you’ve not known before. The thin line between witchcraft and terror is remarkable and written as if Tina Griffith had the gift of pure magic. This is an hypnotic and provocative book. And just when you think you’ve got it all figured out, the twists and turns prove you wrong.

On Hallow’s Eve, as the veil between the two worlds was thinning, the face of the full moon was lit up like a Christmas tree. The dead would soon come alive, the alive would dress up as the dead, and witchcraft had a way of piggybacking off other spells. This was the ideal night to be a witch, for the effectiveness of all incantations, divinations, and other avenues of magic, was perfect.

Jayla is a clever witch, who had been cursed in her teens by her friend, Ophelia. Since then, she has had to retrieve dark souls from shrewd men in order to survive. While she has taken hundreds of souls in her lifetime, this story is about her trying to take the one which belongs to Roger Casem – the man she accidentally fell in love with.

Could she kill him, as she had done with the others? If she wanted to continue living, she must. But today, when his eyes skimmed her body with unbelievable passion, she began to recognize her own needs. As she blushed and turned her face away from him, Jayla did the only thing she could.

AMAZON

 

Tina Griffith, who also wrote twenty-seven children’s books as Tina Ruiz, was born in Germany, but her family moved to Canada when she was in grammar school.

After her husband of 25 years passed away, she wrote romance novels to keep the love inside her heart. Tina now has eleven romance novels on Amazon, and while all of them have undertones of a love story, they are different genres; murder, mystery, whimsical, witches, ghosts, suspense, adventure, and her sister’s scary biography.

Tina has worked in television and radio as well as being a professional clown at the Children’s Hospital. She lives in Calgary with her second husband who encourages her to write her passion be it high-quality children’s books or intriguing romance.

Stay connected with Tina (Griffith) Ruiz on her Facebook group Tina Speaks Out.

Scary Things or Imagination

October 24, 2022 | Author Friend Promo

by C.D. Hersh

Years ago, a teaser news story from Huffington Post popped up in Catherine’s email about a mysterious “star jelly” found in the RSPB Ham Wall nature reserve in Somerset, England. Being paranormal buffs (which, for us, includes sci-fi), naturally, Catherine looked up the article. There are a lot of theories out there, but not much positive proof about what this substance is. Some people postulate that the jelly is slime mold, a form of cyanobacteria, the remains of regurgitated amphibians, or frog spawn. Personally, all of the above are too ordinary. As paranormal fans, we like the more supernatural of the explanations that says the “star jelly” is related to the sighting of a strange meteor like object seen over the reserve last week—an extraterrestrial substance dropped to earth from the meteor shower.

This isn’t the first time “star jelly” has been found. Records dating back to the 14th century mention finding this gelatinous material after meteor showers. It’s been called star jelly, astral jelly, star rot, star shot and astromyxin. Non-paranormal believers say it’s coincidental that people find star jelly after meteor showers. Curiosity about finding a meteor rock leads them to places they wouldn’t normally go, and they find the substance, which has been there all along. In other words, they want to believe it’s this baffling substance from outer space.

Star jelly has been a part of several fiction stories. Sir Walter Scott’s novel The Talisman, and H.P. Lovecraft’s short story The Colour of Space.

Putting words and stories on paper is second nature to co-authors C.D. Hersh. They’ve written separately since they were teenagers and discovered their unique, collaborative abilities in the mid-90s. As high school sweethearts, and husband and wife, Catherine and Donald believe in true love and happily ever after.

Their paranormal series is titled The Turning Stone Chronicles.

They are looking forward to many years of co-authoring and book sales, and a lifetime of happily-ever-after endings on the page and in real life.

Follow C.D. Hersh on social media:

Website

Soul Mate Publishing

Facebook

Amazon Author Page

Twitter

A WARM BREAKFAST TREAT

October 19, 2022 | Author Friend Promo, Cooking

From Stella May

This is a wonderful recipe my family enjoys with breakfast or as a snack. Not only are the muffins nutritious, but they’re also easy to prepare, taste great, and freeze beautifully. I hope you enjoy these oven gems as much as we do.

Preheat oven to 350° F.

Mix eggs with sugar, then add all ingrediencies through baking powder.

Stir in almond flour. The mixture is supposed to be a consistency of sour cream. Add chocolate chips and nuts if you choose to use them.

Prepare a cookie sheet with lightly oiled baking cups. Spoon mixture into cups.

Bake 30-40 minutes, depending on your oven. Muffins are ready when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. You can also use this recipe in a loaf pan to make Banana Coconut Bread. Bake at the same temperature for approximately 55 – 60 minutes. Either way, cool completely then enjoy.

Here’s a little to intrigue you on Stell May’s latest time travel romance.

After months of working like a woman possessed, Nika Morris kept her promise. Coleman House is finished. It’s gorgeous. Spectacular. Brilliant.

It’s breaking her heart.

Because once the new owners move in, she’ll be cut off from the time portal to 1909, where she met and fell in love with Eli Coleman. Now stranded in her own time, she’s waited months for the key to reappear in its hiding place. Only it hasn’t. Which means Eli must have believed the terrible things she was accused of.

Back in 1909, Eli is stunned at his best friend’s deathbed confession of a shocking betrayal. Nika—his Daisy, his time-traveling wonder—was innocent. Once he finds the key, he wastes no time stepping through the portal, determined to make things right.

But the moment Eli stumbles into her shiny, noisy, confusing future, he realizes reconciliation won’t be simple. There is more than one emotional bridge to rebuild before he and Nika can return to the time their love was born—and live their destiny out to the fullest.

AMAZON BUY LINK

Stella May is the penname for Marina Sardarova who has a fascinating history you should read on her website.

Stella writes fantasy romance as well as time travel romance. She is the author of ‘Till Time Do Us Part, Book 1 in her Upon a Time series, and the stand-alone book Rhapsody in Dreams. Love and family are two cornerstones of her stories and life. Stella’s books are available in e-book and paperback through all major vendors.

When not writing, Stella enjoys classical music, reading, and long walks along the ocean with her husband. She lives in Jacksonville, Florida with her husband Leo of 25 years and their son George. They are her two best friends and are all partners in their family business.

Follow Stella on her website and blog. Stay connected on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

 

RAIN ON A METAL ROOF

October 17, 2022 | Author Friend Promo

By Linda Lee Greene, Author/Artist

Opening onto the sliding glass doors of the bedroom of my previous house was a three-season room. I called it my solarium because it was a space of windows more than of walls, a lovely and light-filled area facing due south—ideal for potted plants tucked among wicker chairs and wrought-iron pieces in warm weather but scorching hot for human beings and other mammals. The windows were single-paned, drafty, and ill-fitting, and the walls and roof were slabs of Styrofoam clad in aluminum sheets. In winter it was a freezing space suitable only for hanging slabs of beef, if I had been of a mind to use it for such a purpose. In fact, the months of April and October were the only times of year during which it was fit for living beings of any species. All the other months of the year, it was either too cold or too hot to be functional.

Despite its negative aspects, my solarium had a vital redeeming quality: it gained me access to the rain. Actually, the inspiration for much of my writing came from the sound of rain that washed the sides and battered the roof of my metal solarium. As I stretched out on my bed with my laptop astraddle my thighs, the sliding glass doors were open to my solarium, open to the sound of the rain, a sound that carried me back to the rains of my childhood, rains that are the source of my love of rain, and one of the most enduring connections to my past.

The sound of rain on the metal roof of the porch below the window of my room in our West Second Avenue house in Columbus, Ohio often pulled me to a joyful waking when I was a child. If it happened to be a Saturday morning, my family and I would pile into our car and drive eighty-five miles south to the farm of my maternal grandparents for the weekend. Featuring a red barn, whitewashed chicken houses, and raw-wood pigpens, the saltbox farmhouse rose to two-stories within its whitewashed clapboard sides and pitched metal roof.

The farmhouse sat on the south rim of the star-wound crater in Peebles, Adams County, Ohio, which is the bedrock of the world famous “Great Serpent Mound.” The metal-roofed front porch of the farmhouse offered an unfettered view of the crater as well as its backdrop of the Appalachian Mountain foothills, preferably taken in while sitting in the front porch swing.

From the porch one stepped into the parlor of the farmhouse, its focal point a chugging wood-burning stove in winter. Adjacent to this central room were two bedrooms, a kitchen, and at the back, a summer kitchen. A door from the summer kitchen opened to a long path that terminated at a gelid in winter and malodorous in summer outhouse.

Tucked behind the front entrance of the farmhouse was the door to the steep staircase to the upper floor, and at the head of the stairs was a small bedroom that housed a full-sized bed and a mirror-topped chest of drawers. I recall some of my younger cousins being folded cozily into the spacious bottom drawer of that chest in lieu of a bassinette when they were babies. A doorway in this first bedroom opened to the largest room in the house, a sleeping room set up with several beds in dormitory fashion, all of them topped with feather-stuffed mattresses. The enormous collection of feathers had been plucked over the years from the farm’s chickens before they were fried to a crisp in my grandmother’s enormous iron skillet. In that dormitory bedroom, my mother, my aunts, my brother, my baby sisters, our young cousins and I were crooned to sleep to the sound of rain dancing on the metal-capped roof of the farmhouse.

The farm featured in the above essay forms the backdrop of Guardians and Other Angels, multi-award-winning author, Linda Lee Greene’s novel that chronicles the story of two heroic families played out against the bad and the good of the early to mid-twentieth century, years of worldwide economic depression and war, as well as the spawning of the “Greatest Generation.” Firsthand accounts of the times in authentic letters written by members of the families are peppered throughout the book.

 

Available in paperback and eBook on Amazon

Multi-award-winning author and artist Linda Lee Greene describes her life as a telescope that when trained on her past reveals how each piece of it, whether good or bad or in-between, was necessary in the unfoldment of her fine art and literary paths.

Greene moved from farm-girl to city-girl; dance instructor to wife, mother, and homemaker; divorcee to single-working-mom and adult-college-student; and interior designer to multi-award-winning artist and author, essayist, and blogger. It was decades of challenging life experiences and debilitating, chronic illness that gave birth to her dormant flair for art and writing. Greene was three days shy of her fifty-seventh birthday when her creative spirit took a hold of her.

She found her way to her lonely easel soon thereafter. Since then Greene has accepted commissions and displayed her artwork in shows and galleries in and around the USA. She is also a member of artist and writer associations.

Visit Linda on her blog and join her on Facebook.