Review Tour: Widow 1881 by Sara Dahmen

Widow 1881

by Sara Dahmen

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GENRE:   Women's Historical Pioneer Fiction

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BLURB:

Boston widow Jane Weber moves to the Dakota Territories to save her respectability but finds her
proper views challenged every step. Rooming with the last Blackfoot Sioux in Flats Junction and
navigating a mercurial friendship with the fiercely independent town grocer leaves Jane reeling as
she stumbles to understand the town folk and the unwritten rules of the west in 1881. Everyone has a
story, including Jane herself and her unpredictable physician employer.

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Excerpt Two:

Suppose it is not real. I have not yet felt the quickening. It is early yet – too early to really discuss it.
For this employer to know, when my lover had not and my husband could not, feels as if I am exposing
my private bedroom to a stranger.  

Terror shoots into me. I hadn’t wanted him to find out! Not so soon and not like this! Damn the Widow!
I’d asked her not to speak! Now he will send me back home to be a widowed mother alone in the
quietness of my parents’ house and the sharp stigma of the loose widow. No one back east will truly
believe the child is Henry’s. They might think I went wild in the west.

No one knows me here. There is some safety in it, and I must convince him to let me stay. And I must
tell him the same lie. There’s no other way. Everyone here in Flats Junction must think I was as
married and settled as I say. And the Doctor too – what would he think having hired such a loose
woman? The shame of my brief, quick desire for Theodore, and the self-loathing I carry rises up and
tries to choke me. The Doctor walks away from me, fuming and vibrating with anger and I feel I must
follow him to hear my fate.

My heart is beating slowly, pulsing with each step. Will I faint? Will I be able to hold my head to his
and beg him? Can I spit out the story I’ve told myself so often that it almost feels true? And will he
believe it?

My Review: 5*
I really enjoyed this book. It is not what I normally read but maybe I should change that. The book to me read almost like a diary. It was written in first person. You really got to know Jane Weber, all of her thoughts and feelings were really laid out. A few times I even had a tear in my eye. Sara Dahmen has done a wonderful job with this story. It really jumped off the pages. Her descriptions were very lifelike but yet there wasn't so much description that I got bored or skipped paragraphs. I really enjoyed the book and the setting.

Bostonian Jane Weber is recently widowed at a young age. Her marriage was not one filled with love or lust, it was more like a quiet friendship. After her husbands passing Jane wanted to get a taste of passion and during that brief moment she later finds herself to be pregnant. With her husband being dead and the father of the child being out of the picture, Jane decides to take a job as housekeeper to a Doctor in the Wild West to keep her secret. 

After loosing her baby, nearly dying, falling for the Doctor then convincing to court another woman, Jane decides to head back east, and deal with her broken heart. Now the questions are: Will she change her mind and go back West? Will she meet someone new and start a new life? Will the Doctor come after her? Read the book and find out!!

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Sara Dahmen is a metalsmith of vintage and modern cookware and manufactures pure metal
kitchenware in tin, copper and iron. She is the owner and operator of House Copper &
Housekeeper Crockery: American-made cookware created with pure and/or organic materials
featured in Food and Wine and Root + Bone magazines, among others. She has published over
100 articles as a contributing editor for Veil Magazine and writes for many book and review blogs.
She has spoken at TEDx Rapid City in 2016, speaks across the country at multiple writer conferences
such as the Writer’s Institute and RWA Nationals, and co-chairs the Port Washington Literary Festival
since its inception in 2013. Prior to her writing gigs, Sara was a print, radio and TV producer before
owning and operating a nationally award-winning event planning company for ten years. When not
writing or sewing authentic clothing for 1830’s reenactments, she can be found hitting tin and copper
at her apprenticeship with a master tinsmith, reading the Economist or hanging out with her husband
and three young children.

Websites:

www.flatsjunction.com

www.saradahmen.com

www.housecopper.com

Blog:

http://www.housekeepercrockery.com/housekeepers-notebook/

Twitter: @saradahmenbooks

Instagram: @housecrockery

Buy link unavailable but can be found through websites above

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION :

Sara Dahmen will be awarding a set of American-made pure maple wooden spoons from the author's
kitchenware line (www.housekeepercrockery.com), valued at $60 (international) to a randomly drawn
winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

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Follow the tour here: http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2017/11/review-tour-widow-1881-by-sara-dahmen.html

Stripped Down: A Naked Memoir by Stacey Keith

Stripped
Down: A Naked Memoir

by
Stacey Keith

Genre:
Autobiography, Memoir

STRIPPED
DOWN: A Naked Memoir is a look back at a surreal world kept carefully
hidden from public view. This chronicle of life in the skin trade
follows the meteoric rise of Stacey Keith, a girl scarcely out of her
teens whose eye-popping assets launch her from wet T-shirt contests
to the catwalks of Houston, strip bar capital of the world.

Almost
overnight, she is discovered by a famous porn star, who Svengalis her
onto the pages of Playboy, Penthouse, and dozens of other men’s
magazines. While strutting her stuff onstage and across the country,
Stacey makes the fateful decision to head to Hollywood. She’s got
everything a girl could want: fame, attention, endless piles of
cash...but no idea what awaits her. 

With
Internet porn overtaking men’s magazines, everyone from her
Mafia-boss road manager to her smarmy talent agent pressures Stacey
to do more than just flash her flesh. Uber-boob filmmaker Russ Meyer
verbally abuses her; rocker Don Henley tries to use her. Yet through
it all, from the warped misogyny of Playboy to the S&M dungeons
of the Pacific Palisades, Stacey’s dark, self-deprecating humor
will leave you laughing, crying and rooting for her at every step of
the way.

**Only
.99 cents!**

Goodreads
* Amazon

Excerpt 2

Mobsters are to gambling what junkies are to speedball. It’s the entire mobster mindset encapsulated in a pair of dice: ego, testicles, luck, and an extra dose of superstition. I realize this when Ralph takes me to an Indian casino in Ledyard, Connecticut. I’ve never seen anyone more excited. The casino is the gift-strewn Christmas tree and Ralphie the little boy who comes war-whooping down the stairs.

I’m wearing a crushed red-velvet cocktail number that looks as though it’s been sandblasted to my skin. Ralph’s got on his best banded-hem golf shirt. And as outrageous a cliché as we are for mobster and mistress, we actually blend in with the clientele at the casino: boobs, bling, and peroxide blondes repeat like a pattern on the carpet.

The casino is a Disney version of Monte Carlo. Boat-sized crystal chandeliers shimmer from the ceiling. Shiny new concept cars slowly rotate on platforms in the lobby. Waitresses in fishnets and flouncy rumba pants hustle to provide free, watered-down alcohol to the dice-rattling alcoholics. The sounds are the same as a pinball gallery—clinking, rolling, slapping. The endless pumping of canned air onto the game floor does nothing to dispel the staleness of cigarette smoke. Nearly everyone looks tired and washed-out and unnaturally alert.

Ralph rubs his hands together and looks around. “I’m heading to the blackjack tables. Where are you going to be?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been to a casino before.”

“What?” Ralph seems genuinely shocked. “Do you ever pull your fucking head out of a book?”

“Only when I’m having an orgasm.”

“Christ. Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do.” He snaps his fingers at me in a way that I interpret to mean ‘get your wallet.’ I pry out one of Sammy’s hundreds. I don’t particularly want to part with it, seeing as how I had to sit by the creep to get the thing.

“I got no time to explain how you play blackjack, so you’re going to take that fuckin’ C-note there, give it to the broad at the counter, and she’s gonna give you some quarters. Then you’re gonna take the quarters and play those fucking slots.”

I look at the slots. I look at Ralph.

“Okay, Christ, lemme show you.” He marches me to the counter, pushes my hundred at the lady behind the Plexiglas deflection shield. In exchange, I receive a Big Gulp full of quarters. Ralph calls them “qwahtahs.”

He herds me to the nearest slot machine, one halfway down a row of similar machines that look like huge gleaming jukeboxes. Impatiently, he feeds the thing quarters and then pulls a handle. We wait. Wheels spin inside a window. Nothing. He does it again.

“Got the idea now?” he says.

“Uh. Yeah.”

He turns to leave.

“Ralph?”

“Yeah?”

“What combination wins?”

“You want three of a kind.”

For a moment I watch Ralph haul ass to the blackjack tables. He goes straight to the ‘Invitation Only,’ which must be one hell of an invitation. They probably harvest your organs if you can’t pay. I feel a little unprotected without Ralph. He’s so big and strong and sure of himself.

I feed the machine. I pull the lever. An unmistakable clatter of coins. What do you know—maybe fifty dollars’ worth lay in a pile on the metal tray. I scoop out the coins, then feed the machine again. On my third try, I win another twenty, then fifty. I’m on a roll.

The old lady next to me, wearing a glen plaid tam o’shanter and smoking a cigarette, rasps, “I get first dibs on your machine if you go to the can. I’ve been here since four o’clock and I’m down by a hundred.”

Since four? Just pulling that stupid lever? I glance around. Everyone else seems engrossed in their respective addictions. I feed the machine.

This time the quarters fall so copiously and noisily, I don’t know where to put them all. Apparently sensing my distress, the old lady hops off her stool and then returns with four more Big Gulp cups. The machine is still belching out quarters.

“What the hell, honey,” she says, “are you speakin’ French to the thing?”

“I don’t know—it keeps giving me money,” I apologize. Using my hand as a slide shovel, I coax the coins into three of the four cups. I have no idea how much money I’ve won.

My heart’s beating faster as I line up the cash-heavy cups beside me. I’m worried that somebody might steal them. I wonder if Ralph will be proud of me. Maybe this is chump change compared to the stakes he plays for.

I quickly fall into a rhythm: feed the machine, pull the lever, wait for the wheels to stop spinning.

Stacey
Keith is the award-winning author of the Dreams Come True series
(Kensington Books), DREAM ON, SWEET DREAMS and DREAM LOVER, in
addition to A WEDDING ON BLUEBIRD WAY with New York Times Bestseller
authors Janet Dailey, Lori Wilde and the talented Allyson Charles.

Twice a
Golden Heart finalist, Stacey has won a Maggie, two Silver Quills, a
Jasmine, a Heart of the Rockies, and over fifteen other first-place
finishes in Romance Writers of America contests. 

An
avid writer of fiction, nonfiction, poetry and short stories, Stacey
doesn’t own a television, but reads compulsively—and would, in
fact, go stark raving bonkers without books, which are crammed into
all corners of the house. She now lives in Civita Castellana, a
 medieval village in Italy that sits atop a cliff, and spends
her days writing in a nearby abandoned 12th century church.

The
two things she is most proud of are her ability to cook pasta alla
genovese without burning down the kitchen and swearing volubly
in Italian with all the appropriate hand gestures. 

Website
* Facebook *
Twitter * Instagram
* Pinterest *
Amazon
* Goodreads

Follow
the tour HERE
for exclusive excerpts, guest posts and a giveaway!

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Dire Cravings by Tigris Eden

Dire Cravings 

(Arctic Wolves Series, Bk #2)
by Tigris Eden

Blurb:

Olivia Esmerelda Vasques has always been in control—in the boardroom, in the bedroom, and in her life. But when her partner/ex-husband insists she needs a vacation, Olivia is reluctant to give in until the board of directors issues an ultimatum: take a vacation or don’t bother coming back. 

So hiking Mt. McKinley it is. Not her idea of fun, especially after she stumbles into something she can’t quite explain and doesn’t really understand. All she knows is that the sexy warrior she meets has promised to keep her safe. The problem is, she doesn’t know if she can survive him.

Bödvar (Blue) Varangian never expected to have his ass handed to him by the saucy firecracker that barrels into him in the woods. Scared out of her mind, and just a bit moody, she’s now his responsibility. However, she doesn’t take kindly to him telling her what to do, even though she’s been thrust into a world of shifters and vampires and is obviously in way over her head. He knows her type, yet he can’t help wanting to tame her.  But his cravings run dark; something he suspects will have her running faster and farther than the threat she currently faces.

Can two people from two different worlds find a way to navigate their journey of friendship, love, and their darkest desires?

Available for purchase at 

Kindle | Nook | Kobo | iTunes 

Excerpt

Excerpt #1

I did not see a monster drain a man dry of blood. Not possible. The images played on a loop in Olivia’s mind as she ran.

Three days.

That’s how long she’d been running nonstop.

Olivia’s legs carried her forward, but not fast enough. She kept going, suspecting that the creatures who’d attacked her camp were not far behind. The altitude alone slowed her down. Every sound made her skin crawl, and her heart race. The silence made her hyper-aware. The forest slept while she attempted to evade the men chasing her. You are not in a slasher flick, Liv. Keep moving. The erratic beat of her pulse served as a reminder that she still lived.  With every breath, her chest burned. The weather grew colder, wetter. The damp air hindered her movements and made her clothes stick to her skin. The combination of icy sweat against her overheated body exhausted her limbs. Her dry mouth and swollen tongue only served as an annoyance and a reminder of things she took for granted. Like water. Food. She was parched for water yet soaked from exhaustion. That show with the dude who got dropped in remote locations to survive…he would probably tell his viewers to drink up the sweat or drink their own urine. But time wasted meant certain death in Olivia’s mind. And what was considered safe? What constituted her life no longer being in danger?  Dead in the forest on a forced vacation posed a serious problem for Olivia.

What the hell were those things back there? Not vampires. Vampires didn’t exist. They had to be crazy drugged-up men. Yeah. Psychos. Because anything else would make her certifiable, and Olivia Vasques was not crazy. The men back at the camp had killed the Moores—a nice husband and wife. The Chesters—newlyweds who only wanted an adventure, had their throats ripped to shreds. The photographer, Ben—strung up by his feet from a tree limb while still alive, his blood seeping into the ice-cold ground beneath him to mix with the snow and mud. And their guide, Art. She hadn’t seen his body. There was too much blood and chaos for her to truly digest what her mind took in.

Thank God, she hadn’t screamed. A lot of good it had done her. The moment Olivia stepped foot inside the camp and witnessed the carnage, they sensed her. Blood dripped down the sides of their mouths as they hunched over the prone bodies of her fellow travel companions. Their heads snapped up. Eyes lit up like red lasers were eerie and devoid of sanity zeroed in on her. They followed her every movement, like the scope of a sniper’s rifle. One may have even called out to her.

No, thank you. She was not that girl. The one who died within the first five minutes of a slasher flick. Fuck that shit.

There’d be no dying today. She had a company to run. An ex-husband and board members to murder. This had been their idea, after all. Issuing an ultimatum and forcing her into a vacation she didn’t need nor want. Because of them, she was now running for her life. Her lungs burned, and all the cardio and spinning classes she took did absolutely nothing to help with her endurance. Not while in the mountains. The air was thinner, and her body felt like two tons of brick. 

Her legs, now boneless, would give at any minute. Olivia’s feet throbbed in places she hadn’t known existed, and the blood in her veins felt thick and sluggish. With every inhale and exhale of breath, her ribcage protested with sharp slices of torment.  I’m too loud. They would hear her. She needed to slow down, backtrack and find shelter to rest for the evening. Grab some sleep before her body no longer supported her. If she slept at night and ran during the day, it would buy her some time. The idea made sense to her shattered mind. If she hid and slept while it was dark, and ran during the day, those things wouldn’t find her. She hadn’t seen one while the sun was out. Though she hadn’t really seen one at night either.

They’re playing with you.

Toying with their food in hopes of wearing her out. Or maybe it didn’t matter what time of the day she slept or ran.

Animals sensed fear and anxiety. But those monsters were men. Escaped lunatics from a local hospital surely. But in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness? There wasn't a hospital for hundreds of miles, least of all a mental facility. Would anyone even look for her? No. They wouldn’t. A forced two-week vacation that the board deemed non-negotiable. If she so much as answered an email, her employment ended. Fuckers.

She knew their plans. They didn’t like the way she ran things. Wanted to shove her out, start recruitment for her replacement. They had another thing coming if they thought to toss her aside. She’d helped make Madds, Parsons, and Goldberg the best insurance agency in the business. She'd bled for them. What a coincidence it would be if she died because of them. I am not going to die.  

The sound of something ahead drew Olivia up short. Had they found her? Ducking behind a moss-covered boulder, she plastered herself against the stone, hoping to become one with it. She tried to hold in her breath, the act impossible as her heart beat loudly, broadcasting her location.

The moist ground smelled of wet vegetation. Her water-resistant boots protected her from the cold and wet of the mud but did nothing for the agony in her feet.  Her body fought against her will to live. On the inside, the temperature burned. A toasty one hundred and two degrees if she had to guess. Which in turn made her sweaty—the reason her clothing clung to her skin. Hiking was not a part of her regular vocabulary or on her list of things to do before she died. She worked at an insurance agency, in a corner office. She ordered espressos with petit fours. Where were those two guys from that show when you needed them? You are not a survivalist, Liv. This felt more like a movie she’d seen where people hunted people. I gotta find a way to get out of here. The mountains well within her sight fueled her objective. It had been her target for the past three days. Her mind supplied the illusion that if she somehow made it to the mountain, she may come out of this horrible ordeal alive. 

Mud!

She’d cover herself in mud like Arnold had in that movie with the alien. Then, she wouldn’t be seen. At least, she prayed that was the case. Because if it wasn’t. She was screwed.

Will it work, Vasques?

It had better work, running any farther would be next to impossible. Olivia slid down the boulder and began coating her clothing, face, and hair with mud. She wouldn’t focus on all the bacteria, or the possible infections she could get. Or how cold and slimy it felt as she caked it on. Nope. She would imagine all the health benefits a mud bath offered. Your only free spa day, and you’re rubbing mud into your skin to save your life.

Olivia had to face reality. Death could be a real possibility for her. She didn’t know if the mud would work. She didn’t know anything at this point, except that she wanted to live. Survive to run another day, get off the mountain, go back to civilization, and when she returned from her forced vacation, she’d sue the ever-loving shit out of the company for emotional and mental stress.

That’s exactly what I'm going to do.

Exhaustion set in fast as she slumped against the boulder. Adrenaline left her body by the gallons, replaced by irrational fear. Her eyes darted around the forest every second, her ears pricked at every sound. In the brush in front of her, she heard growling. Her limbs wouldn’t move. But her stomach rolled, and her mouth filled with saliva as a wave a nausea overtook her. Frozen in place, she waited. Exhaustion had zapped what little strength she had left.

Dig deep, Vasques. Pull that last burst of energy from your gut and move your ass!

The mental pep talk didn’t do her any good. Her vision blurred and the loud rushing of blood between her ears, gave her an massive headache. Unable to make out what animal hid in front of her, Olivia cringed. She heard the growl again. It was enough to get her heart to pump more blood into her system, giving her the strength and willpower to move. She made it to her feet within seconds, focused in on the mountain, and took off as fast as her boots would carry her.

As she ran, she heard the distinct sound of something chasing after her. She didn’t want to look back. If she did, she’d fall. It happened in every movie that ever involved a vampire. Turn around, you lose your footing, and then you die. Nope, it wasn’t going to happen to her. But her stupid, stupid mind told her there was no such thing as vampires, so it must be something else that pursued her. A bear? An elk? Are there even elk in Alaska? Whatever was chasing her, she wanted to know. Needed to know. She couldn’t not know.

Olivia chanced a quick glance over her shoulder and found that it wasn’t vampires. It was something much worse. A large, black beast of a wolf was trailing her, and its ice-blue eyes did not appear in the least bit friendly. The wolf looked pissed. It was also the size of a fucking pony. Holy mother of God! I promise to go to confession every Tuesday night if you just get me out of this. Please! Now, she was praying to the Virgin Mother. She was officially screwed. But then, the last pocket of energy she needed kicked in, and she knew outrunning the beast was absurd. Even if she tried to confuse it by zig-zagging in a jagged path. Wait. Don’t they travel in packs? Wolves weren’t solitary creatures. Stop thinking and run, Liv. Fucking run.

Her legs felt gelatinous, but she didn’t stop. The idea of climbing up a tree to save her life held appeal. But her arms probably wouldn’t hold her weight due to exhaustion, and the idea of lifting her bodyweight seemed altogether impossible—and dangerous. If she stopped, the wolf would pounce. There was no true clearing in the woods, only tree after tree after tree. The closer she got to the mountain, the colder it became. Olivia tried to focus in on the brush in front of her but failed. Everything was a blur. The sound of paws pounding the ground in pursuit of her had gone silent. But she knew the wolf was there, somewhere, waiting to attack. Her nerves calmed slightly at the idea that the wolf had given up its chase. But then her mind supplied the soundtrack, and she freaked out all over again. Hopefully, muddy human wasn’t on the menu, and the wolf simply wanted her out of its territory.

It didn’t matter. Olivia wasn’t about to slow down. But what she did do was turn her head to double-check her suspicions. Which was why, when her body collided with solid steel, she was knocked flat on her ass. She ached all over. There was a chance she’d broken said ass during the fall, but as she looked up, way up, she found a mountain of a man standing in front of her. She had to be dreaming. No, because you only dream of tall, dark, and handsome. Not tall, light, and… Her train of thought was lost when the stranger with the long, blond hair and ice-blue eyes peered at her, his savagely rugged beard outlined a face that belonged in an epic poem. Not just any tale, but a Viking eulogy, or an Icelandic saga complete with a ship burial as flaming arrows danced across the sky and embedded in their targets. In other words, she was imagining a tall sexy as sin blond male, instead of a beast of a wolf, hellbent on killing her. Because none of it was real. It was Olivia’s last coherent thought before darkness claimed her.

The Arctic Wolves Series

About The Author

Tigris is a military brat who's done her fair share of traveling, thanks to her Army father. She's married to the infamous LL and has three boys. She currently resides in Houston and is actively seeking a book-buddy for the end of the world.

You can connect with Tigris at

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads | Follow On Amazon 

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