The Page Unbound

Walking the Llano: Excerpt and Giveaway!

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WALKING THE LLANO

A TEXAS MEMOIR OF PLACE

Shelley Armitage

Genre: Eco-Memoir / Nature

Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press

Date of Publication: February 15, 2016

Number of Pages: 216

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When American explorers arrived in the Texas Panhandle, they dubbed the region the “Great American Desert.” Its rough terrain appeared flat, dry, uninhabitable. Later, cell phone towers, oil rigs, and wind turbines added to this stereotype. Yet in this lyrical ecomemoir, Shelley Armitage charts a unique rediscovery of an unknown land, a journey at once deeply personal and far-reaching in its exploration of the connections between memory, spirit, and place.

Armitage begins her walk by following the Middle Alamosa Creek thirty meandering miles from her family farm to the Canadian River. Growing up in the small llano town of Vega, Texas, she finds the act of walking inseparable from the act of listening and writing. “What does the land say to us?” she asks as she witnesses human alterations to the landscape—perhaps most catastrophic the drainage of the land’s most precious water source, the Ogallala Aquifer.

But the llano’s wonders persist: colorful mesas and canyons, vast flora and fauna, diverse wildlife. While meditating on the region’s history, Armitage recovers the voices of ancient, Native, and Hispano peoples as interwoven with her own: her father’s legacy, her mother’s decline, a brother’s love. The llano holds not only the beauty of ecological surprises but a renewed kinship in a world ever-changing.

Reminiscent of the work of memoirists Terry Tempest Williams and John McPhee, Walking the Llano is a soaring testimony to the power of landscape to draw us into greater understanding of ourselves and deeper connection with the places we inhabit.

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PRAISE FOR WALKING THE LLANO

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“Both an intensely lyrical and intimate scrapbook of familial history and a uniquely sublime travelogue of the American Southwestern landscape” A Starred review from Kirkus

“. . .an enticing mix of memoir, nature study and the hunting of ghosts. [ Walking The Llano] is a testament to the value of slowing down and watching where you are going.” Ollie Reed, The Albuquerque Journal

“. . .[Armitage] is an explorer, and from her book we learn much about people who settled [the llano] and those who must now make gutwrenching decisions about modern methods of energy extraction. . .a perfectly balanced memoir.” Kimberly Burk, The Oklahoman

“With a cleareyed appreciation for landscape and our place in it combined with uncluttered flowing writing, Armitage establishes her place in the tradition of the best American nature writing.” Mark Pendleton, INK

“Once you’ve ambled into the lyrical, evocative pages of Shelley Armitage’s ‘Walking the Llano’, the Plains will never seem plain again.” William deBuys , Author of A Great Aridness: Climate Change and the Future of the American Southwest

“Shelley Armitage’s prose is as poetic as it is intelligent. She masterfully weaves together her personal story with the narrative of the Llano, and she does so in a way that begs the question of what lies ahead for the people and the land she loves. If literature is a study of the human heart—and it is—then Walking the Llano is a quiet masterpiece.” BK Loren, Author of T heft:A Novel and Animal, Mineral, Radical: Essays

“In Walking the Llano, Shelley Armitage does for the Staked Plains what John McPhee did for the Northern Plains in Rising from the Plains. She carefully mines the history, character, and geology of the Llano Estacado and combines it with a compelling personal narrative to create an account that flows with lyricism, authenticity, and wisdom. A splendid and cleareyed book.” Nancy Curtis – Coeditor of Leaning into the Wind: Women Write from the Heart of the West

“A Habit of Landscape: The Draws”

Excerpt: Part II

This explained the cracked concrete one-lane overpass near that highway. Parallel to what is now the interstate was a one-lane road called the Ozark Trail, starting in St. Louis and running to California, a precursor of Route 66. The overpass must have served as a water crossing. Earlier it had been an Indian trail, the Indians originating the best overland routes. I occasionally found flint from the Alibates Flint Quarry, northeast of Amarillo, suggesting this was a trade route—the red, white, and purple-streaked dolomite highly valued for its strength and beauty. The Ozark Trail was built and used primarily in the l920s. The prehistoric and historic Indians traded from as early as the Clovis period (1500 B.C.E.) to the l880s. Likely the Armitages traveled the Ozark Highway when it was the only roadway from Arkansas west into Vega. On one walk there I leaned over the pipe barrier on top and checked the swallows’ nests underneath. After rains cattle liked to stomp around in the shaded pooling underneath; tracks of antelope and skunk suggested other visitors. I liked to imagine what went on here at night when no one was looking.

Downstream, now that I could imagine it as one, the creek widened and a Civilian Conservation Corps dam, concrete and native stone, hung perilously over eroded banks. Some corpsman had scratched “l936” into the concrete on top. I liked to swab up the Triops that slew in the muddy areas below. Their date of origin: circa 300 million years ago to the present, Jurassic survivors. Dinosaur shrimp some people call them. A living fossil, they hardly have changed since the Jurassic period. Their eggs remain dormant for years, hatching only when there is sufficient water and proper temperature. Pentimento, you remind us that something always lives below, contemporary life a remnant in your twirling tentacles.

Catching and keeping: that’s what folks tried to do with the water. My dad built yet another dam more recently behind the aging CCC one. Part of the reason was conservation for watering cattle, but he also stocked the pond with catfish, building a feeder he could send into the waters, like Moses’s basket into the bulrushes. After my dad’s death, the rusting of the feeder, and droughts that dried the pond for years, I had forgotten the catfish. But after a rain, Triops-like, I saw them flopping over the check dam, resurfacing in a wet season. I tried to catch them with an old fishnet rummaged out of the garage to return them to the now-full pond. When most of them got away, I realized you can’t stop the flow.

And yet the settlers had tried. Dams and fences and corrals and railroads and country roads. I, too, wanted to save something of my father, the emblem of his love of this place, by keeping the catfish from escaping with the water downstream. Tom Green, on the ranch just north, had a one-room camp where he used to escape to nap and read Paris Match. He had cookouts there and sometimes invited us out. The iron cook stove was a beauty and so heavy it took three men to wrestle it into its place. During one of the high rises—Tom’s retreat is on the Middle Alamosa—the iron stove was washed away, later discovered mired in the muddy banks of the Canadian. Water will have its way.

When my father died our family’s relationship to the land shifted. I still ran the roads but touched ground like a worry stone. My mother and I looked at each other and wondered how we would run the farm. My brother was in Omaha and later Houston, far away, and already removed from the necessary knowledge of farm programs, grazing leases, and grain prices. I had only indirect experience. Mother had driven a grain truck during the first harvests in the l930s, grinding the gears in such a way that Dad said she took two inches off the roadway.

Hers was a mostly rosy view of the particulars—sun-baked skin, cow piss, and broken machinery—of running a small farm. When a PBS film crew came to record interviews with local survivors of the Dust Bowl, my mom’s story was not the expected page out of The Grapes of Wrath. Rather than remember dust pneumonia, jack rabbit roundups, and Black Sundays, she told love stories. Her favorite (and mine): to get the farm work done Dad had to plow by the tractor lights late at night, after he had gotten off work from the bank. She lovingly wound herself around his feet on the tractor platform, behind the pedals, to keep him company, sleeping as he wheeled through the dust into the night.

To keep reading and get the full excerpt, click here.

“A Habit of Landscape: The Draws” is an excerpt of Walking the Llano: A Texas Memoir of Place, by Shelley Armitage (University of Oklahoma Press, 2016). It is reprinted by permission of the author and press.

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Dr. Shelley Armitage is Professor Emerita from University of Texas at El Paso where she taught courses in literature of the environment, women’s studies, and American Studies. She is author of eight award winning books and 50 scholarly articles. She resides in Las Cruces, New Mexico but still manages her family farm outside of Vega, Texas.

Armitage grew up in the northwest Texas Panhandle in Oldham County. She owns and operates the family farm, 1200 acres of native grass—once part wheat and milo—bordering
Interstate 40 on the south and near the Canadian River breaks on the north. Armitage shared this landscape from her childhood on, riding with her father and grandfather to check crops and cattle and later jogging and more recently walking the farm roads. Though most of her adult life has been spent away from the Panhandle as a university professor, Armitage has always returned to the “farm” which offered until recently a 360-degree view of earth and sky. Wind energy farms, oil and gas, microwave towers, and strip mining have greatly altered her childhood landscape.

Throughout her distinguished university career, Armitage’s professional life offered her a connection with landscape. Because of senior Fulbright teaching grants in Portugal and Finland, a Distinguished Fulbright Chair in American Literature in Warsaw, a Distinguished Fulbright Chair in American Studies in Budapest as well as research, writing, and teaching in Ethiopia, the American Southwest, and Hawai’i, place has taken on special meanings. As the Dorrance Roderick Professor at University of Texas at El Paso and a Distinguished Senior Professor in Cincinnati, she decided in her most recent book to write about the meaning of home place as connected to the land’s own ecological and human stories.

As the holder of three National Endowment for the Humanities grants, a National Endowment of the Arts grant, and a Rockefeller grant, Armitage nevertheless prizes a recent recognition from the United States Department of Agriculture most highly. Commended for her “commitment to the spirit, principles, and practices” of the Conservation Reserve Program, Armitage has restored the farm to grassland in an effort to heal fragmented landscapes by recreating wildlife corridors and habitat. Like the fragmented narratives of stories lost, she says: “If we could read the land like a poem, we might more intimately learn from it, understand what it says of natural and human cycles—and that sometimes uneasy relationship between them.”

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Membrane Book Promo and Giveaway

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Membrane
by Michele Corriel
Genre: YA Scifi
Release Date: October 10th 2016
Leap Books

Summary from Goodreads:

In the multi-verse people may look familiar, but no one is who they seem.

In a small town in Montana, Sophie lives with her quantum physicist mother, and her equally brilliant, but dangerously obsessed, step-father.

Her father disappeared years ago under mysterious circumstances, but Sophie is still haunted by memories of him that seem so real she swears she feels his presence one night as she drifts off to sleep.

Realizing that somehow her missing father is trying to send her a message, Sophie decides to take a big risk.

With her friend, Eli, Sophie must discover what strange experiment her father did and understand the startling impact it has on her world and another, just across the membrane dividing the multi-verse.

Excerpt:

Eli folds his lanky body into the passenger seat. I can’t read him at all.

“Wait,” Eli puts his hand on mine as I start to shift into reverse. “Don’t head home. Let’s go out west of town.”

I try moving back into the easy, friendly way we were before my feelings got twisted up. “Where are going?”

“Just drive.”

Sunlight glints across my windshield. The little bit of frost laid down overnight is gone. The stubble fields, short stumpy stands of cut wheat, like a rough blank across the hills, fill my visions. I take one dirt road and then another until I’m not even sure where I am.

We’re nearer to the mountains than when we started but it’s still a ways to the hiking trails that intertwine up and down the rock outcroppings and tree lines.

Eli points to a spot on nothing more than a farm road, two tracks worn down to the dark dirt ruts. The road continues for a while, but I shut off the engine.

“Listen,” Eli says, his voice a rustle.

We both sit, attentive to the quiet. It’s so thick it feels like I have cotton in my ears. And then the sharp, low cry of a hawk, or maybe one of those crazy grackles that gather along telephone lines like forgotten clothespins, breaks into the soft afternoon.

“This is where I go when I need to be alone and just feel all the wide open space out there,”

I follow his gaze and find myself hooked by the ragged outline of the crags, of foothills waiting for the next tectonic lift to get them closer to the sky.

My eyes close, imprinting this moment, this place, on my brain. Then I feel Eli’s presence, the soft in and out of his chest, the touch of his hand in my hair. Gentle. Exploring. I turn my face to where I think he is and open my eyes.

I breathe in his skin, a combination of dry and sweet, like pine needles and cut grass filling my head. He settles his lips over mine and I feel a release, an exhale. As if I’d been waiting my whole life for this exact moment. He stops for a second. I don’t know – maybe he’s thinking this is a mistake. But then he reaches around the back of my neck, near my scar, and I let go, allowing him to pull me closer. This time, when our lips meet, our mouths make maps of each other, marking places to discover.

Buy Link:

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About the Author

Michele Corriel lives and works in Montana’s scenic Gallatin Valley, surrounded by seven mountain ranges.

Her work is as varied as the life she’s led, from the rock/art venues of New York City to the rural back roads of the Rockies. With her fourth book just out from Leap Books, she’s also a prolific freelance magazine writer with articles regionally, nationally and internationally. Michele has received a number of awards for her non-fiction as well as her poetry. She also enjoys teaching, presenting writing workshops and speaking on panels across the country.

When she’s not writing you may find her on the golf course, hiking or slogging her way through the snow on what some people like to refer to as “skis.” You might also find her in the kitchen creating exciting new flavors or recreating classics.

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Love Give Us One Death Review

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LOVE GIVE US ONE DEATH

Bonnie and Clyde in the Last Days

By Jeff P. Jones

**WINNER: 2016 Idaho Author Award**

**WINNER: 2015 George Garrett Fiction Prize**

Genre: Historical Fiction

Publisher: Texas Review Press

Date of Publication: October 25, 2016

Number of Pages: 232

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Bonnie and Clyde are the most famous outlaw pair in American history. Frank Hamer, the legendary Texas Ranger, was hired to stop them. Part prose, part verse, with historical artifacts interwoven, the well-researched novel tells the story of their deaths on a lonely Louisiana back road, as well as their bloody and short lives together. Its many voices invite the reader to become a ghost rider along with Bonnie and Clyde, while it also exposes the forces of injustice and greed that created them.

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PRAISE FOR LOVE GIVE US ONE DEATH:

“If you are a fan of historical fiction, you must secure a copy of his debut novel in which Jones ‘added, subtracted and distorted facts’ adroitly and creatively in his re-telling of Bonnie and Clyde’s last days. There are very few writers who can write like Jones — in many voices and in various forms — but he choreographs his work like an award-winning producer, designating him as unique as the members of the Clyde Barrow Gang.” -Idaho Statesman

“Love Give Us One Death delivers not only a knock-out story of brutal adventure, and love, across the heartland of the Great Depression, but a story about the very character of the republic itself.” -Robert Wrigley, Poet

“This is the history of love and destruction you didn’t know you needed. In a time of Public Enemies, we see the last legs of a journey between the violent and manic Romeo and Juliet-like pair. The last public outlaws are riding away into their last sunrise, and this book serves as its journal.” -Atticus Books

“The language is absolutely stunning. Characterization, historical setting, ambience are all accurate and depicted with great clarity. A terrific achievement.” -Mary Clearman Blew, Author of All But the Waltz

“This is historical fiction raised boldly to the level of myth.” -Tracy Daugherty, Author of The Last Love Song

With absolute certainly and no apologies, this tale forces notions both heart wrenching and startling. There are unforgettable scenes and poetry that challenge the reader and will no doubt stretch normal perceptions of writing. There’s an earnest quality to the journey with Bonnie and Clyde. Moments of their love for other another and tragedies they face are capturing. Between the tension of these scenes, are a variety of accounts and verses. It was a much needed change to push the story along.

With the mix of fact and fiction, Clyde and Bonnie’s complexity is legendary and takes so many different outlooks in this book. Love Give Us One Death is intense! It’s natural to suspect it would be with the kind of content and premise of Bonnie and Clyde. Foreshadowing their end to come, there is the brief and life changing events of the people around them. Family and strangers lives are turned upside down and their own accounts are scattered throughout on this duo. There’s brutality and realness in every experience but also beauty and passion.

Jone’s approach to writing was very different and a good change. The writing is very well done and displayed with fierce imagery and symbolism. While it was a bit bleak to read around the holidays, I found it very impactful and memorable.

JEFF P. JONES’s ancestors were sharecroppers in East Texas. He was born in Denver, and was educated at the University of Colorado at Denver, the University of Washington, and the University of Idaho. He’s a MacDowell Fellow, and his writing has won a Pushcart Prize, as well as the Hackney, Meridian Editors’, A. David Schwartz, Wabash, and Lamar York prizes. He lives on the Palouse in northern Idaho. This is his first book.

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The West Texas Pilgrimage Interview and Giveaway

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THE WEST TEXAS PILGRIMAGE
by
M.M. Wolthoff

Genre: Contemporary / Coming of Age

Publisher: River Grove Books

Date of Publication: February 29, 2015

Number of Pages: 220
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Hunter’s friend Ty survived war in the Middle East only to succumb to cancer at home. On a quest with his college buddies and Ty’s father, Hunter journeys from South Texas into the mountains and desert of West Texas to bury his close friend. During this trek, they’ll drink, hunt, party, and encounter unexpected people and enthralling landscapes as Hunter deals with his grief, compounded by his struggle with depression and obsessive–compulsive disorder.

The West Texas Pilgrimage is a love letter to West Texas and the wild culture that defines it. Author M. M. Wolthoff vividly depicts the regional landscape, exploring intriguing stops along the way and the authentic context of music, food, and language integral to this generation of Texans, while frankly and thoughtfully addressing relationships, mourning, and mental illness, with characters as unforgettable as the region itself.

***

PRAISE FOR THE WEST TEXAS PILGRIMAGE:

I laughed. I cried. This is a book that is real, honest and reminds all of us that life is filled with ups and downs. The only way to keep moving forward is to get real with ourselves about whom we are and accept our beauty and our pain. This young author has amazing wisdom that is so articulately shared with readers of all ages.

— 5 Stars, Amazon Verified Purchase

The West Texas Pilgrimage was insightful into the mind of a privileged, pre-adult male who tries to self-medicate his OCD condition with alcohol. While reading, I felt the main character’s vulnerabilities as he struggled with his feelings regarding his career choice, the loss of a good friend to cancer, and the complications of his search for the right female life mate. The book was a quick read…only because I could not put it down! There were several “ah-ha” moments when I thought: oh my, that’s really how a pre-adult male thinks??!? I never knew!!

— 5 Stars Donna J Millon

I read the first half of the book in one night; it draws you in with believable characters and real challenges they face. Could have been written about people you know or have met. It covers some tough topics but is an enjoyable read. — 5 Stars Peter Day

Really nice read. Very detailed description of so many things made me feel like I was right there with them. 2 nights to read for a non reader like me makes for a really easy and entertaining time. Thumbs up.

— 5 Stars Nunya

The book brought me right back to the border towns of my youth. Step outside any bar and be hit with the smell of fajita and sewer. Glorious! — 5 Stars Amazon Verified Purchase

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AuthorInterview

What was the hardest part of writing The West Texas Pilgrimage?

I struggled with the ending. This is a story that doesn’t really have a conclusion, and that is intentional. There are no easy answers to the issues the main character faces, and the only thing that ends is the party. As much as it pains me to admit it, Robert Earl Keen was wrong when he said that “….the party never ends.”

What did you enjoy most about writing the book?

See above about the nostalgia.

Are there under-represented groups or ideas featured if your book?

This story is written from the perspective of a twenty something young man who comes from a privileged background in south Texas. There are a lot of unrepresented groups in the story, but again, that was intentional. I hope that readers from all different backgrounds will appreciate it for what it is and enjoy a look into that perspective.

Are you a full-time or part-time writer? How does that affect your writing?

I’m a part-time writer, at least for now, and I think that is what makes it enjoyable. The little time I do find to write is an escape for me from the crazy corporate world. It’s typically late at night, on weekends, or even better yet on vacation when I can really detach and pour myself into writing.

What do you like to read in your free time?

I go back and forth between military history, biographies, and critically acclaimed novels. In true form, my last three books have been Without Getting Killed or Caught The Life and Music of Guy Clark by Tamara Saviano, Hemingway’s For Whom The Bell Tolls, and Killing Patton by Bill O’Reilly.

What projects are you working on at the present?

I’m currently working on a story based upon a trail of corruption in healthcare in South Texas. One of the few places you might think would be devoid of corruption in South Texas, a not for profit faith based hospital, actually turns out to be the center of it.

What do your plans for future projects include?

I have a few other ideas I would like to get to, but the most developed is a story about a salt water fishing guide. I’ve got to know a lot of them and they all make for interesting characters.

What book do you wish you could have written?

The list is long, but I’ll tell you what, my most recent read, a biography of Guy Clark, would have been an amazing story to put together. I’m extremely jealous of Tamara Saviano to have connected with one of the premier poets of our time. It wouldn’t have been a bad deal to write Old Man and the Sea or Lonesome Dove either.

How important are names to you in your books?

The names were very intentional in this story. South Texans seem to really favor unique names. If you notice, there’s not a lot of common names in this one. The Mexican influence is also apparent. I personally know four “Cuatros,” two “Cincos,” and six “Hunters.” My own kids’ names are Hunter Ann, McCoy Martin, and Kerr Dunkin, while our dogs are Uno, Chula, and Gordo. We wouldn’t stand for a normal name in this household.

Where is one place you want to visit that you haven’t been before?

Cuba; I hear the flats there haven’t been overfished yet. I would travel anywhere to catch a fish on a fly.

What’s your funniest flaw?

I have a little bit of an issue with red wine; I really like it. I probably like it more than I should. I blame my Mom for that one as well.

Matthew Martin Wolthoff lives in McAllen, Texas, with his wife, Lucy Ann, and three children, Hunter Ann, McCoy Martin, and Kerr Dunkin. He grew up in a military family, living all over the world until finding home in South Texas, where he went to high school in San Antonio. He is a graduate of the US Air Force Academy and has a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Texas at San Antonio. His parents instilled a passion for reading and writing in him early in life that grows stronger every day. An avid outdoorsman, he finds his inspiration—and peace of mind—in the shallow waters of the Lower Laguna Madre and the wilderness of the South Texas brush country. His first West Texas pilgrimage was in 2010. It was a life-changing event.

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12/7	Promo	Country Girl Bookaholic
12/8	Author Interview 1	Kara The Redhead
12/9	Review	Forgotten Winds
12/10	Guest Post 2	Byers Editing Reviews & Blog
12/11	Promo	Blogging for the Love of Authors and Their Books
12/12	Review	StoreyBook Reviews
12/13	Author Interview 2	The Page Unbound
12/14	Review	Missus Gonzo

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Hero High Book Promo and Giveaway

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Hero High: Figure in the Flames
by Mina Chara
Genre: YA Mystery Romance/Superheroes
Release Date: October 1st 2016

Summary from Goodreads:

Reality TV meets Superhero High School in this intriguing story about friendship, fame, and what it means to be a hero.

In Icon City superheroes save the day every day on the quarter hour. Led by Captain Fantastic, scores of superhero celebrities do their best to train the next generation. Seventeen year old Friday Fitzsimmons and Jake her childhood friend are their latest starstruck recruits. When Doctor Dangerous returns from the dead and the Figure in Flames decimates the city, Captain Fantastic is betrayed by one of his own.

Torn between Jake, Ashley and her feelings for Doctor Dangerous, Friday must decide if her childhood friend is worth fighting for, and if the worlds most famous super-villain is worth saving, all while learning how to be a hero.

Excerpt:

I ran as fast as I could until I heard the little girl cry. “Mrs Mine!”

I froze, and looked back. “Who’s Mrs Mine,” I asked.

“My bunny,” the little girl replied. As a small child I had a stuffed bear and stupid as it was, I knew how she felt. That bunny was a member of the family. I dropped the little girl and pushed her forward.

“Run!” I yelled. “I’ll get your bunny.”

Lisa scooped up the girl and reached out to drag me back but she was too slow.

“Fitz!” Lisa screamed as I ran back towards the car, blocking out every sound, not letting myself think. I dropped to the floor and grabbed the toy like it was a baton in a relay race with no seconds to spare. I could hear each drop of fuel hit the road like the pounding of my pulse. Something blurry in the sky was speeding towards us and Lisa made a run for me again. Just as my fingers whispered across hers a voice boomed from above.

“Get down!” A man in a super skeleton suit flew down from the sky and wrapped himself round the two of us, deploying a shield from his back. It wasn’t a moment too soon. The car erupted in an awesome display of fire and the crowd oohed and awed at the spectacle as though they were watching New Year’s fireworks. I opened my eyes to the masked, super-suited figure above me.

“Partner Kisaragi, it’s good to finally meet you.” Lisa turned away from his face, only inches from hers, and mumbled something under her breath that might have been “show off”.

On sale this week only (12/12-12/16)!

Buy Links: Amazon | Amazon UK

Advance Praise:

– I think this book will appeal greatly to fans of the Selection. – the dressmaker D’fwan reminded me of America’s maids … The whole TV reality show aspect also reminded me of Hunger Game as well as The Selection.

– I Really Loved The Book
I am so looking forward to book two. I love the world you’ve created and I want to explore it more. I thoroughly enjoyed Friday and her story.

– I Really, Really Enjoyed This Book!
The way that Ashley and Friday’s relationship progressed was amazing. Too often, in books the two main love interests relationships progress way too quickly and it was refreshing to see Ashley and Friday’s relationship develop gradually instead of it being super rushed.

– I Would Give This Book a Full 5/5 Stars!
Like there was just so much to this book and none of the characters are like what you originally predicted. Every chapter keeps adding to the story and making it more and more complex, and it leaves you on the edge of your seat in suspense.

About the Author

Hi! I’m Mina Chara, I’m a student, an artist, a daughter, sister and companion to my two furry friends, Gimli and Gwynne. This blog is here because I’ve just written a book called Hero High: Figure In The Flames.

This is My Story:

Being dyslexic isn’t so much of a problem, the hard part is not letting it dictate what I like, and what I can do. For years I was scared of reading, but then I discovered YA fiction, real books with main characters I could relate to because most of them were girls.

When someone criticizes my writing, I feel like crying, because I feel like that I’m back in English class getting yelled at again, just wanting to go home, but I’m not a kid anymore, I’m an adult, and as an adult, I wrote a book, and you can too.

Author Links:

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SHAY Review and Giveaway

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S.H.A.Y. (Almost #1)
by Christina Leigh Pritchard
Genre: NA Scifi/Suspense
Release Date: August 16th 2016
Limitless Publishing
Rating: 3/5

Summary from Goodreads:

Experiment 318: Gone Rogue

Shay is scientific experiment #318. Science may have created her, but she refuses to allow it to blind her to the difference between right and wrong…

Synthetic Hominid Assumed Youth (S.H.A.Y.) is eighteen years old, which means she has completed Phase One: Developmental. Shay no longer requires the assistance of her Optional Human Parent, Darla, who has guided her in the process of discovering her morality. Shay loves her easy, charming life aboard the marine research facility and doesn’t want it to change.

Phase Two: Experimental. All S.H.A.Y. ages 18-20 will experience loss…
Darla shouldn’t have to die because of an experiment. The thought of losing the only parent she’s ever known is too much. Determined to make sure the scientists at the facility don’t get their way, Shay entraps Darla in a transport device to escape across the Miami Border. There, on the mainland, law enforcement will keep her human parent safe.

Escape Mission: Failed…

Shay crashes into one of the Lone Keys off the coast of Florida, abandoned to all humanity, except for the stranger who drags her ashore. Shay must get Darla to safety or she will die of radiation poisoning trapped inside the Freeze Portal, but Shay can’t do it alone.

The boy who found her, an Ersatz Reproduction Intelligence Clone (E.R.I.C.), is her only hope. He has adaptation skills she needs to complete her mission. Eric was created by the same scientists who want to kill Darla, though. She tries to keep their interaction strictly business, but it’s hard to hate him. He’s flirty, charming and not to mention devastatingly handsome.

Shay must put her trust in Eric’s hands if she wants to save Darla from her fate. It may be worth her heart, but will it be worth her life?

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Review:

S.H.A.Y. is a short novella that gives us a glimpse into the intriguing world of The Almost Series. I think the world building that the author has created is very in depth, well drawn out, and detailed. Though I do think the story starts off a tad bit complex. There were way too many acronyms in my opinion and I got lost with the code names and what they stood for pretty easily, but I think the characters were so sharp, so well defined that it still was a story that pulled me in.

S.H.A.Y. is about a humanoid trapped in a science lab and approaching her termination date. With the help of her artificial mother (Aimee), Shay escapes only to run into her E.R.IC. Desperate to keep her basically adoptive mother alive, Darla, Shay does whatever she can to set her free.

Shay is kind and compassionate, very driven and courageous. As far as characters go, I think she’s my favorite in S.H.A.Y. I also really enjoyed her Aimee, which is her artificial mother. Aimee is an AI, but she appears to have emotions like a human. She cares of Shay and does what she can to help her escape the science labs. When Shay meets Eric I honestly wasn’t so sure about him at first. Shay had crash landed from her escape from the facility and Eric ends up finding her. Eric is a bit insensitive and had no problem raking his eyes from head to toe over Shay (to the point that it kind of bothered me because of the manner in which he did it). I also didn’t like his nickname for her. He called her cream-puff. Another insensitive tally against him. But towards the end of the novella Eric grew on me somewhat. I think he has the potential to be better than what he first appeared to be. I guess I will have to read more in order to find out!

The novella was a little on the short side (I would have preferred it to be a few chapters longer), but it did leave me hanging and wanting more. I think S.H.A.Y. is intriguing and definitely worth checking it out. I think Christina has created a very intriguing and alluring world and I look forward to reading future reads by her.

The Almost Series

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About the Author:

christina-leigh-pritchard
Christina Leigh Pritchard was born and raised in South Florida. Her first stories were written at the age of nine in spiral notebooks and in the various diaries she kept.

Since she’s upgraded to a computer, she’s completed over fifty books, including her ALMOST Series, signed with Limitless Publishing.

Christina Leigh Pritchard is still going strong with many more to come! Her genre’s include science fiction, dark fantasy, young adult, drama, suspense, historical romance, multicultural, comedy, poetry and many more.

Author Links:

Website│Goodreads│Twitter│Facebook

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Moved, Left No Address Excerpt and Giveaway

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MOVED, LEFT NO ADDRESS
by
Vickie Phelps

Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Date of Publication: June 10, 2016
Number of Pages: 328

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Synopsis

Joel Webster’s uncle disappeared forty years ago without a trace. All he knows about his uncle are the stories his mother has told him. Now his parents are dead and Joel is left alone. When he finds some old postcards with his uncle’s name on them, he decides to search for him. His journey takes him from a small town in Texas to Santa Fe, New Mexico. He encounters danger, death threats, and a beautiful woman he can’t resist as he searches for his long-lost uncle.

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Excerpt

Prologue

My uncle, Joel Webster, disappeared without a trace on June 1, 1949. At the time, he lived on the family farm at Silver Creek, Texas, with my parents. I wasn’t around then, but my mom told me stories about him that intrigued me at an early age. Of course, her stories only went as far as the date of his disappearance.

On the day he vanished, Dad invited Uncle Joel to go with him and my mother into Silver Creek. “Joel, let’s go into town and pick up some supplies. While we’re there, we’ll get us something cold to drink and visit with some of the other fellows for awhile.”

Uncle Joel shook his head. “Warner, I think I’m just gonna set on the porch awhile and enjoy the nice weather. We won’t have too many more days like this before the heat sets in. You and Maria go on into town and do your shopping.”

My mom joined in hoping to persuade him. “It’s your birthday, Joel. Come with us. We’ll treat you to an ice cream soda.”

But he couldn’t be swayed. They left him sitting on the porch alone, smoking a Viceroy cigarette and blowing smoke rings into the fresh morning air. When they returned later in the day, Uncle Joel was gone.

To keep reading Moved, Left No Address and to sample Vickie’s book,

Postmark From the Past, click here!

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about the author

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Vickie Phelps writes to encourage, inspire, and influence. She has published articles, devotionals, and essays in more than fifty magazines and contributed to several anthologies. Vickie is the author of the novels, Postmark From the Past and Moved, Left No Address, and a devotional book, Psalms for the Common Man. Vickie is coauthor with Jo Huddleston of the gift book, Simply Christmas, and two books on writing, How to Write for the Christian Marketplace, and Writing 101: A Handbook of Tips & Encouragement for Writers.

Vickie is the founder and director of the East Texas Christian Writers Group in Longview, Texas and a member of the Northeast Texas Writers Organization. She worked for eighteen years as a bookseller for Barron’s Books, an independent bookstore in Longview, Texas.

Vickie is a native Texan and lives in Henderson, Texas with her husband, Sonny, and one very spoiled schnauzer.

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FOUR WINNERS EACH WIN A SIGNED COPY:
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November 28 – December 7, 2016

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CHECK OUT THE OTHER GREAT BLOGS ON THE TOUR:

11/28	Hall Ways Blog
11/29	Forgotten Winds
11/30	Books and Broomsticks
12/1	It’s a Jenn World
12/2	A Novel Reality
12/3	Reading By Moonlight
12/4	Blogging for the Love of Authors and Their Books
12/5	Country Girl Bookaholic
12/6	Missus Gonzo
12/7	The Page Unbound

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Christmas Book Exchange!

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Hey everyone! The rules are simple! Fill out this form. Receive your person and mailing information from me. Send out the book to your person before Christmas. You can pick just a random book off your shelf that you have no desire to keep, or you can send one that’s your favorite and you want someone else to enjoy, whichever you prefer. And then enjoy a book when you receive your own!

This form will close December 14th.

Thanks everyone that wants to participate! And Happy Reading!

US participants only.

For the Record Review

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By Regina Jennings

Genre: Historical Romance / Christian

Publisher: Bethany House

Date of Publication: December 6, 2015

Number of Pages: 336

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Rather Than Wait for a Hero,

She Decided to Create One

Betsy Huckabee has big-city dreams, but nobody outside of tiny Pine Gap, Missouri, seems interested in the articles she writes for her uncle’s newspaper. Her hopes for independence may be crushed, until the best idea she’s ever had comes riding into town.

Deputy Joel Puckett didn’t want to leave Texas, but unfair circumstances have made moving to Pine Gap his only shot at keeping a badge. Worse, this small town has big problems, and masked marauders have become too comfortable taking justice into their own hands. He needs to make clear that he’s the law in this town–and that job is made more difficult with a nosy reporter who seems to follow him everywhere he goes.

The hero Betsy creates to be the star in a serial for the ladies’ pages is based on the dashing deputy, but he’s definitely fictional. And since the pieces run only in newspapers far away, no one will ever know. But the more time she spends with Deputy Puckett, the more she appreciates the real hero–and the more she realizes what her ambition could cost him.

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PRAISE FOR FOR THE RECORD

“Jennings creates a perfect blend of love, mystery, and wit in this 19th-century romance.” —Publishers Weekly starred review

“Jennings’ latest is a delightfully entertaining historical romance featuring charismatic humor, unpredictable thrills, and vigilante justice. The plot is tense and exciting, and the novel sparkles with the wit and charm of its spirited heroine. It is more romantic and less stuffy than your average inspirational, and Jennings uses classic western touches like six-shooters, spurs, and white Stetsons to land readers squarely in the Ozark Mountains of 1885.” —Booklist

“This is such a delightful read with an adorable romance and a fun and entertaining story line. . . The interactions and dialogue between the main characters are sheer perfection. The mystery and drama with the hero’s backstory and the masked marauders keep the momentum of the story going at a nice pace and allows for no dull moments. There is so much to love here in this little gem, it is easily one of Jennings’ best.” —RT Book Reviews

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When I first read the summary for this book I didn’t even realize it was a period novel. It surprised me when I first started and I absolutely loved it. While I mostly read fantasy usually based in the future, it was so refreshing to read something with historical ties. I was hooked by the middle of Chapter Two. I often embarrassed myself in public snorting at the brilliant comedy displayed. Jennings has an excellent sense of timing in her dialogue to really make each character and their humor shine.

Betsy is no-nonsense and all sass. Joel is the smolder with no charm. Honestly just a perfect combination to make you turn those pages so fast you wonder how you ended up halfway with your coffee still hot. Betsy is an aspiring writer for the big city paper but frustrated by the drawer of rejection letters she gets. It seems the vigilante antics of the Bald Knobbers (I giggled the first few times I read it) aren’t relatable enough to the city folk. So what is Betsy to do when handsome Texas Deputy Joel Puckett comes into town, ordered to set things right in little Pine Gap? Well she writes him to be the fictional, swoon worthy, cowboy that saves the day!

The townspeople are colorful and crazy and I really enjoyed reading them. I felt the cohesiveness of this story was really amazing. I can see how it’s something longstanding and with history. Joel’s outside perspective was helpful learning about what makes Pine Gap so unique, especially since this was the first I’ve read in the series. This book was absolutely fun to read! Effortless and wonderfully engaging. I particularly liked listening to guitar music while reading this and definitely recommend doing it as well. I’m going to find it so interesting reading the first two since I’m definitely getting them. Hopefully winning them!

Regina Jennings is a graduate of Oklahoma Baptist University with a degree in English and a history minor. She is the author of Sixty Acres and a Bride, Caught in the Middle, and At Love’s Bidding and contributed a novella to A Match Made in Texas.

Regina has worked at the Mustang News and First Baptist Church of Mustang, along with time at the Oklahoma National Stockyards and various livestock shows. She now lives outside Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, with her husband and four children.