“Bittersweet Truth is a captivating portrait of secrets, lies, and unfailing love - a beautifully rendered love story.” - USA Today bestselling Author L.J. Shen
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Thursday, October 1, 2020
Bittersweet Truth by RG Angel
Gatekeeper: Book One in the Daemon Collecting Series Alison Levy
Fantasy novel mixes mythology and alternate dimensions for page-turning adventure
GREENSBORO, North Carolina – Author Alison Levy crashes onto the fantasy scene with the first installment of The Daemon Collecting Series, Gatekeeper (Spark Press, October 6, 2020). Using her writing to cope with anxiety, Levy expertly weaves a page turning story full of action, alternate universes, and heroism. Her vivid world building and unique characters show readers what it looks like to fight for survival while standing up for what is right, even if it’s risky.
In Gatekeeper, Rachel Wilde comes from a dimension that exists adjacent to ours. The people there have structured their society around daemon collecting: they locate, catch, and repair malfunctioning daemons (creatures out of phase with our world that tempt people to do good or evil). Now Rachel has been given two unusual assignments: 1) find a person who has been trying to break down dimensional barriers, and 2) track down a missing line of gatekeepers, human placeholders for a daemon that was too badly damaged to repair.
Authorities of Rachel’s world believe the missing gatekeepers are descended from a girl who went missing from West Africa hundreds of years ago, likely sold into slavery. With no leads to go on, Rachel seeks help from Bach, a raving homeless man who happens to be an oracle. Bach does put her in the path of both of her targets—but he also lands her in a life-threatening situation. Rachel must stop the criminal, reunite a gatekeeper with her stolen past, and, above all, survive.
ALISON LEVY lives in Greensboro, North Carolina with her husband, son, and variety of pets. When she’s not writing or doing mom things, she crochets, gardens, walks her collies, and works on home improvement projects.
Can you tell us a little about how you started writing and what led you to this book now?
I wrote a story for an English assignment in 6th grade, a time in my life when my anxiety was particularly bad. My English teacher, Mrs. Webb, pulled me aside to praise my story and tell me what a good writer I was. It gave me a desperately needed shot of confidence. I’ve been writing ever since.
I’ve actually been trying for years to write this story the way I imagined it. I started and discarded two previous versions that I just wasn’t feeling. This time, I think I got it right!
How has writing impacted your life and your struggles with anxiety?
Living with anxiety, for me, is like having a tiger in the house: the tone of my day is dependent on the tiger’s mood. If the tiger is active, everything I do revolves around it; I can still get things done but if I do the wrong thing, it bites, and then I’m incapacitated. Some days the tiger sleeps or wanders out of the room, but I’m always conscious of its presence and waiting for it to strike. Writing is hugely therapeutic for me. When I write, I can tune out the real world and dive into my creation. When my mind is fully engaged in creating, the tiger disappears.
What was the process of creating the world that your characters live in? Where did this story start?
This story started with my main character, Rachel Wilde. Rachel sometimes feels like the embodiment of an anxiety-free me; she’s brazen, resilient, sharp-tongued, and hard-headed. Throwing her into a difficult situation that would turn me into a pile of jelly and imagining her working through it is very empowering for me.
Your undergrad education was in anthropology — how did that influence your writing?
Anthropology teaches that we as human beings are products of the society we live in. Our day to day activities are not a universal experience; what is normal and mundane to us is exotic or bizarre to others depending on where we come from. I love inventing new cultures that are exotic and bizarre to the reader but normal and mundane to my characters.
What do you hope readers take away from this book?
I really hope my writing challenges readers to look at their own lives and cultures with new eyes. Being able to turn a critical eye on the day to day things that we usually take for granted is a crucial part of walking a mile in another person’s shoes. If we could all do this more, the world would be a better place.
“Gatekeeper: Book One in the Daemon Collecting Series”
Alison Levy | October 6, 2020 | Spark Press | Fantasy
Paperback | 978-1684630578 | $16.95
E-book | B083XM9M5Q | $9.95
Dying to Confess by DL Jones
Jacqui the Cat Mysteries by Alexis Duran
Wednesday, September 30, 2020
The Birds Sang Eulogies by Mirla Geclewicz Raz
Date Published: November 2019
Publisher: Gersten Weitz Publishers
Three generations tell an incredible story of survival in the poignant Holocaust memoir The Birds Sang Eulogies.The survivors Anna and Danny Geslewitz tell of their harrowing wartime experiences. Danny’s began in the Lodz ghetto in Poland, then continued in Auschwitz, then in a series of forced labor camps. Anna’s journey took her from the horrors of the Lvov ghetto to a flight into Germany to avoid death in the ghetto. The end of the war, while it ended their years of agony and deprivation, found Danny barely alive and struggling to regain his health and Anna dealing with the post-war chaos as she tried to locate family. The book then follows Anna and Danny’s daughter and granddaughter years later when they travel to Poland and record their reactions to the sites of their family’s suffering. These riveting accounts close with moving poetry written by Anna. Readers will share the sorrow and terror the poems express as they marvel at the bonds of these three generations.
Excerpt
In this poignant memoir, The Birds Sang Eulogies, Anna and Danny Geslewitz's incredible stories of survival are told by them, their daughter and their granddaughter, three generations affected by the Holocaust. Danny's agonizing story began the moment the Germans invaded Lodz, Poland in 1939. His harrowing story of survival begins in the ghetto where starvation and death were rampant. When the Germans liquidated the ghetto in 1944, Danny and his remaining family members were sent to Auschwitz. Danny's description of hell on earth leaves the reader horrified. After enduring Auschwitz for three weeks, Danny and his brothers began nightmarish journeys to seven forced labor camps were they endured inconceivable deprivations. After witnessing two brothers perish, Danny is near death when suddenly the Germans disappear. Living in the eastern Polish city of Lvov, Anna vividly describes life and death in the Lvov Ghetto. When it becomes clear that the Germans will kill every remaining Jew in the ghetto, she and her sister flee into Germany. There, Anna works as a maid in German household. She lives a life of constant terror fearing that her Jewish identity will be discovered. The mayhem of liberation brings its own challenges to Anna and Danny. Barely alive, Danny struggled to regain his health. Anna scrambled to find a way to survive in the chaos and find her sister from whom she had been separated. As Danny and Anna worked to find their place in life, they meet in Germany. Together, they begin a memorable new chapter. Years later, their daughter and granddaughter travel to Poland. Their personal accounts of their trips are riveting. Anna Geslewitz was a poet. One can feel her sorrow, terror and angst as one reads her poems. The poems are included in The Birds Sang Eulogies: A Memoir.
About the Author
Ms. Raz is a retired speech pathologist and the author of the popular Help Me Talk Right books How to Teach a Child to Say the “R” Sound in 15 Easy Lessons, How to Teach a Child to Say the “S” Sound in 15 Easy Lessons and How to Teach a Child to Say the “L” Sound in 15 Easy Lessons and Preschool Stuttering: What Parents Can Do. Ms. Raz is also a contributing author in other publications.
Ms. Raz is a past president of the Phoenix Holocaust Survivors’Association. She is a member of the Board and the Education Chair for the Phoenix Holocaust Association. Ms. Raz newest publication is The Birds Sang Eulogies: A Memoir. The book recounts the harrowing experiences of her parents during WWII as they struggled to survive the Nazi’s attempted extermination of the Jews.
Ms. Raz is married to Zohar Raz. They are the proud parents of two daughters and two grandchildren.
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Mine To Keep by M.C. Cerny blitz
Mine To Keep
M.C. Cerny
(Love By Design #7)
Publication date: September 29th 2020
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Remington Kennedy was out of “bless your hearts” to give. She moved North for a chance at something better. Her compass to success was getting an education and getting out of tornado alley. A failed scholarship led her to tending bar. A lie drove her into the arms of the town football star filled with hopes and dreams. A year later, she found herself with a baby on the way, more lost than ever, alone, and terrified.
Evan Rooney was nobody’s hero. As a good cop in a small town, he felt the daily weight of responsibility. Known as the Preacher’s son, he struggled to keep his faith…but secrets have a way of finding the surface and Evan finds himself drawn to the red headed barmaid with a bun in the oven like a moth to it’s flame.
Both need a little saving…both need love, and a baby needs a family made of more than just DNA.
Book seven in the Love By Design series of contemporary romantic comedies.
Mine To Keep is written to be read as a standalone, but many readers prefer to read the series in order.
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Author Bio:
M.C. Cerny is a USA Today Bestselling author of fresh sexy books. She experienced her first real ugly cry reading, Where The Red Fern Grows, and never looked back. She lives with a menagerie of human and feline fur-babies in rural NJ. When M.C. is not writing, you'll find her lurking in Starbucks, running stupid marathons, and eating all the tacos.
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