Tiger's Promise Blog Tour

Today on my blog I have the Tiger's Promise Blog Tour. On my stop there is a spotlight, review, 5 Random Things about Colleen, and a giveaway.

 Before the curse, there was a promise. 

A prequel to the bestselling Tiger’s Curse series, this much anticipated novella recalls the beginning of Ren and Kishan’s story. Before Kelsey there was a girl, raised by a villain, whose love for a hero changed the course of history.

Trapped under the thumb of her abusive and powerful father Lokesh, Yesubai struggles to keep her own magical abilities secret while evading his dark powers. When Lokesh promises Yesubai to the prince of a neighboring kingdom, she becomes the central pawn in his plot to destroy the ruling family and take power for himself. Yesubai is trapped by her father’s threats and desperate to protect the man she comes to love, but she knows that any decision she makes will have dire consequences. As dark forces gather around her, Yesubai must decide if she’s willing to reveal that somewhere deep within her she has the power to change everything. 

Review:

I love this series so I was so excited when I heard we would get to know more about Yesubai and her cruel father who put the curse on Ren and Kishan.

Yesubai was a beautiful little girl whose mother was dead and lives in fear of her father who is mentally, physical, and emotionally abusive towards her. But that little girl grows up into a gorgeous woman who hides her powers from everyone especially her father.

I knew that Lokesh was a cruel and evil man from the later books but it really shows in this novella and what lengths he will go to get what he wants even using his own daughter to pit brother against brother. Which I knew from the retellings in the books but to see it from Yesubai as she is experiencing it puts a whole new feel to the story which I just loved. Reading this novella has made me want to read this series all over again my only complaint is I wish it was the first time so I can have that feeling of meeting new characters and falling in love with them for the first time.

I highly recommend this novella to anyone who is looking for a great adventure to get lost in. But trust me when I say you will want the whole series to read along with it.

5/5 Bloody Fangs 

Book Links:

Amazon 

B&N 

Book Depository  

New York Times Bestselling author Colleen Houck is a lifelong reader whose literary interests include action, adventure, paranormal, science fiction, and romance. When she’s not busy writing, she likes to spend time chatting on the phone with one of her six siblings, watching plays, and shopping online. Colleen has lived in Arizona, Idaho, Utah, California, and North Carolina and is now permanently settled in Salem, Oregon with her husband and a huge assortment of plush tigers. 

5 Random Things:

Random Thing #1-I am an avid reader. Have been all my life. My mom got me started when I was a kid. She’d take us all to the public library at the beginning of summer break and we’d go back every week to load up on books. It was like a book shopping spree all summer long.

Random Thing #2-I am a food addict. I love watching the Food Network and the Cooking Channel. I enjoy learning all about the various things that go on in restaurants and imagining I’m going to take the time to actually flambé something someday. My secret indulgence when I go on tour is to find celebrity chef’s restaurants to try out.

Random Thing #3-I have a huge crush on Hugh Jackman. I love him in everything. How on earth could Jean Grey have turned down Wolverine when he confessed his feelings? I love him even more because he’s a good dad and a devoted husband in real life. So impressed with the guy on so many levels.

Random Thing #4-I absolutely believe in Happily Ever Afters. I’ve always been a romantic at heart and I spent my young teen years daydreaming about who was going to come along and sweep me off my feet. There may or may not have been horses and armor involved. I’m happily married in real life to a fabulous guy who loves everything about me. He even bravely ate my first and only attempt at goulash the first year we were married. 2014 marks our twentieth anniversary and each year just gets better.

Random Thing #5-I have a koi pond. My first major purchase when I sold my books was doing my backyard the way I’d always wanted and that included a water feature. When I found out I could have fish, I promptly bought twelve beautiful but tiny koi fish. They are all about a foot long now and they know who I am. Though some of them look similar, I know them all on sight. Their names are Flash, Citrus, Lemon, Tang, Romulus, Remus, Streak, Licorice, Luna, Ginger, Clove, and Comet. 

Stalker Links:

Website 

Twitter 

Facebook 

Goodreads 

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. I would also like to say Thank You to Colleen for letting me review your book and say Thank You to Book Nerd Tours for letting me participate in this tour. Don't forget to enter the giveaway below. 

~Sabrina 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Losing Logan Blog Tour

Today on my blog I have the Losing Logan blog tour. On my stop there is a spotlight, review, guest post, excerpt, and giveaway.

“What if the one thing you never meant to hold on to, is the one thing you can’t let go of?”

Normally finding a hot guy in her bedroom wouldn’t irritate Zoe so badly, but finding her childhood friend Logan there is a big problem. Mostly because he’s dead.

As the only person he can make contact with, he convinces Zoe to help him put together the pieces surrounding his mysterious death so he can move on. Thrust into his world of ultra popular rich kids, Zoe is out of her element and caught in the cross-hairs of Logan’s suspicious ex-girlfriend and the friends he left behind, each of whom had a reason to want him dead. The deeper they dig to find the truth, the closer Zoe gets to a killer who would do anything to protect his secrets. And that’s just the start of her problems because Zoe is falling for a dead guy. 

Excerpt:

“Something interesting?” I ask, tossing the damp yellow towel across my chair.

He doesn’t turn to look at me.

“I’m just bored. I never realized how boring being dead could be.” He sighs deeply, his shoulders slumping as he exhales. “Still, could be worse.”

“Worse than being dead?”

He glances over his shoulder, his blue eyes piercing from across the room. “I could be dead and alone. At least I have you.”

I feel a blush creep up my neck and I try to shrug it off. “Yeah, I’m sure you’re just dying to hang out with me.” Then I force a weak chuckle.

“I mean it, Zoe.” He turns, walking toward me slowly, stopping just a few inches away.  My heart skips in my chest. Even dead he’s the most beautiful boy I’ve ever seen. From the sharp slope of his nose to the curve of his jaw, from his broad shoulders to his dirty blonde hair is that perfect-messy that only movie stars seem to be able to achieve.

“If I didn’t have you to talk to—if you couldn’t see me—I’d have gone crazy days ago.” He reaches out and for a second, and idiotic, unrealistic heartbeat in time, I think he’s going to touch my face. But before he gets close he drops his hand to his side and the corners of his mouth turn up just a little.

At which point I realize that I’m standing there like a moron.

“Maybe I should start a business.” I fan out my hands in front of me. “Zoe Reed. Therapist to the dead.”

“You could have business cards with coffins on them.”

I snap my fingers, “And my tag line will be, Just because you’re dead doesn’t mean you’re not crazy.”

He laughs and it rolls through the room and across my skin like a cold breeze. I shudder and grab a light denim jacket from my closet.

 “What’s first on the agenda today, General?”

He points to my phone. “First text Carlos about taking you shopping.”

 I stand up tall and salute him. “Yes sir.”

As I’m texting Logan goes over and starts looking through my closet.

“Carlos has one thing right. You are entering a combat zone. You need a first day battle outfit.”

“Ooh, leather and stilettos?”

He looks over his shoulder, frowning.

“The point is to make you look less like…”

“Me?”

“Like you might rip someone in half just for saying hello.”

I put a hand on my hip. “So no leather then.”

“No. I’m thinking a dress. Something feminine.”

Oh sure. Pick the one thing I don’t own.

My phone vibrates. “Ok, Carlos is in, and judging by the amount of happy faces in this text, he’s a little excited.”

It vibrates again.

“He wants to take me to Potomac Mills, to the designer outlets.”

“So?”

“And how shall I pay for those expensive garments? With my good looks and winning personality?”

He frowns. I take a deep breath and go to my dresser, pulling open the top drawer. Pushing aside the underwear I grab the small black wallet.

“I didn’t want to have to do this.” I open the billfold and remove the one lonely card from the slot.

“What’s that?”

“My debit card to my college fund.” I clutch it tightly. What little inheritance I’d received from my dad’s insurance policy went into his account. I’ve never used a penny of it, not until now. It always felt like blood money.

“Do you have enough?” he asks.

 I glare at him.

“You owe me for this, Logan. Big time. When you get up there, you had better give me a damn good recommendation. I mean it.”

He grins, “Deal.” 

Review:

OMG! I absolutely loved this book! From the dedication which is just the best one I have ever seen to the ending. It’s just amazing and heart breaking all at the same time.

Zoe and Logan were best friends for years but once they entered high school everything changed and they no longer talk. It’s now a few years later and Logan has died, but Zoe can still see him which leads her to think this is all some big joke. But once she realizes that Logan is in fact really dead and she can see and talk to him she is heartbroken and thinks she is crazy. But who wouldn’t think that? Soon Zoe starts to help Logan with his unfinished business but getting thrown into his crowd of popular rich kids which is not her element at all, she needs to find out which of them killed him before she not only risks her life but her very heart to Logan.

I loved this book so much that I literally read it in one sitting. I just could not put my kindle. The whole story from the plot to the characters is so well written that I couldn’t help but get lost in this story.

Zoe is a great heroine. I connected to her on so many levels and really felt as if I was in the book right along with her experiencing everything with her. Which shows just how well Sherry has written her.

Logan what can I say about him except he is swoon worthy and just perfect well except for being dead and all but still I loved him. He had so much growth in this book for being a dead guy that I enjoyed every minute of the story he was in.

The ending well I won’t give anything away except it’s just perfect even though Sherry had me ugly crying which doesn’t happen very often from books. 5/5 Bloody Fangs  

Book Links:

Goodreads 

Amazon 

B&N 

Sherry D. Ficklin is a full time writer from Colorado where she lives with her husband, four kids, two dogs, and a fluctuating number of chickens and house guests. A former military brat, she loves to travel and meet new people. She can often be found browsing her local bookstore with a large white hot chocolate in one hand and a towering stack of books in the other. That is, unless she’s on deadline at which time she, like the Loch Ness monster, is only seen in blurry photographs.

She is the author of The Gods of Fate Trilogy now available from Dragonfly Publishing. Her previously self-published novel After Burn: Military Brats has been acquired by Harlequin and will be released in 2014 with a second book in that series to follow. Her newest YA steampunk novel, Extracted: The Lost Imperials book 1, co-written with Tyler H. Jolley is now available everywhere books are sold and her newest YA novel, Losing Logan, is due for release in 2014 from Clean Teen Publishing. 

Guest Post:

Mature Content in YA books

For me, writing always begins with a spark, usually it’s the voice of a character in my head. Losing Logan was no exception. I knew Zoe’s ‘voice’ long before I knew her story. I’ve gotten several complements on how I managed to so accurately and honestly “capture a real teenager’s voice.”

It’s not a secret. Zoe is a blend of several girls I knew as a teenager. A bit like me, a bit like my friends, she sounds real because everything from her language to her mannerisms is how we spoke, how we moved at that age.

And that’s part of the reason I got the mature rating.

It’s funny that Losing Logan got picked up by Clean Teen Publishing, because it is by far the rawest, most unfiltered book I’ve ever written. Their thing isn’t censorship of content, it’s more about disclosure. Each of their books is read and rated based on things like violence, language, sensuality, and adult situations—so readers know what they are getting into up front and can decide for themselves. When they sent me my ratings, I laughed out loud. I think I scored 4s and 5s on each category.

Did I make the book mature on purpose? Not really. I mean, things like underage drinking, homosexuality, and teen pregnancy were just facts of life in my high school. I never considered not including them. I didn’t add them for shock value, they are in the book as they are in life, a small part of a much larger story.

And as far as language, Zoe has a very colorful dialogue. Again, that’s because that’s how my friends and I talked. Like sailors on a three day pass. I didn’t hold back, but I didn’t add anything for the sake of pushing the limits either.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a parent of teenagers. I always tell them not to cuss. But at the same time, I accept that they probably do, at least around their friends.

Doesn’t make it GOOD. Just makes it REAL.

And at the end of the day, that’s what I want to write. Yes, I have lots of teen books where there’s no swearing at all. It’s especially hard for me, because of my religion, I feel a lot of pressure to uphold those standards in my writing. But I also have discovered that not every character will have the same standards I do, so why on earth would they all speak and act the way I do? So when I write a character who doesn’t swear, it’s because that character, for whatever reason, wouldn’t swear. But for Zoe, her acid tongue is a vital part of who she is, and there’s a reason she does what she does and says what she says. It’s true to her character.

I realize that some people are going to have an issue with it. I decided a long time ago that what other people think doesn’t define me. So love it or hate it, you can’t say it isn’t honest. 

Stalker Links:

Goodreads 

Amazon Author Page 

Facebook 

Twitter 

Stalker Links:

Website 

Blog 

Facebook 

Twitter 

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. I would also like to say Thank You to Sherry for letting me review your book and say Thank You to Jaidis for letting me participate in this blog tour. Don't forget to enter the giveaway below. 

~Sabrina 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Cinderella & The Fairy Secret Book Blitz

Title:  Cinderella & the Fairy Secret

Series:   Queerky Tales 4

Author:   Rhys Christopher Ethan

Published:  May 21st, 2014

Word Count:  10,000

Genre:  Fairy Tales, LGBT

Synopsis:

The story of Cinderella, a timeless classic, the one every boy and girl have heard and grown up with, about a girl in distress finding her happy ever after.

Meet Fiorella. Young, beautiful and magical. You might think she has it all, and you’re right. She has a big house, a beautiful garden, a loving father. She also has a wicked step-mother, who hides no empathy and a step-brother whose arrogance is intolerable.

Fiorella wants to escape and she has the means to do it, to run away and reunite with her long lost mother. But then she meets Sogna, the palace princess, and her whole world is changed. Leaving is no longer an option.

What is she willing to sacrifice for the princess of her heart?

Cinderella and the Fairy Secret is the fourth installment in Ethan’s series of classic fairy tale retellings and is suitable for all ages.

GoodReads

Excerpt:

“You're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen, Fiorella. And the nicest one. Tolerating your wicked stepmother for your father's sake. I think I might be in love with you,” Sogna confessed, making Fiorella redder than before. “And you're the nicest princess I've ever met. Which doesn't really say much since you're the only princess I've ever met,” Fiorella stuttered and Sogna giggled. “What I'm trying to say is, I think I feel the same.” They both smiled and gazed at each other in silence.

About the Author:

Rhys Christopher Ethan is by no means a scientist, but he is an architect of his own fantasy worlds; an illustrator of emotional and multi-dimensional characters; a doctor of creativity and inspiration and a chemist of genres; mixing two or more, to find the perfect fit for his creations. He lives in a small, dusty lab he calls Home in London and works hard to bring his experiments out into the world. His companions (for now) are his pet-Laptop and his coffee-Booster and a bunch of notes, digitized and paper-wise. He voices his obsessions on his website www.rcethan.com, rants on twitter @Rhys_Ethan shares messages on facebook.com/rcethan1 and pins his muses on pinterest.com/rcethan. You can contact him at rhysethan@hotmail.co.uk, or if you’re telepathic, he will probably meet you in your dreams.

Amazon Author Page | Facebook | Twitter | GoodReads | Blog | Website

 Thank you for stopping by my blog today. I would also like to say Thank You to Jaidis for letting me participate in this book blitz. Don't forget to enter the giveaway below.
~Sabrina 

Giveaway Details:

There is a tour wide giveaway. Prizes include the following:

• Ecopy of  Cinderella & the Fairy Secret

Giveaway is International

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Chasing Love's Wings Cover Reveal

Title: Chasing Love’s Wings

Author: Zoey Derrick
Series: Love's Wings (#2)

Genre: Contemporary Romance 

Publisher: Self Published 

Release Date: May 27 2014

Formats: eBook & Print 

Blurb/Synopsis:

Everything in Cameron Enders' life feels like a dream since she took a trip to a remote island where she met Tristan Michaels, Hollywood's hottest man. Tristan never imagined that his get-away vacation would change his life and his heart.
But everything isn't perfect in paradise once Cameron and Tristan return to Phoenix. When Cami discovers a dark secret, her dream becomes a living nightmare. She slips back into old habits, turning to alcohol to hide her pain. As the woman he loves becomes more a stranger by the day, Tristan’s world is rocked again. He’s a helpless witness to Cami’s self-destructive cycle - until she pushes too far, testing the limits of his love. Their love is far from perfect, but he will stop at nothing, chasing it all until she has everything she deserves.
Cami’s withdrawal could strengthen or destroy everything she hopes to have with Tristan. Can Cami trust him enough to give him everything or will she cling to her secrets and their pain, tearing them apart forever?

Amazon Best Selling Angels, Demons & Devils and Paranormal Author of Give Me Reason - The Reason Series Book One comes from Glendale, Arizona. Zoey, was a mortgage underwriter by day and is now a paranormal, romance and erotica novelist full-time. She writes stories as hot as the desert sun itself. It is this passion that drips off of her work, bringing excitement to anyone who enjoys a good and sensual love story.
 


Not only does she aim to take her readers on an erotic dance that lasts the night, it allows her to empty her mind of stories we all wish were true.
 Her stories are hopeful yet true to life, skillfully avoiding melodrama and the unrealistic, bringing her gripping Erotica only closer to the heart of those that dare dipping into it. 
 


The intimacy of her fantasies that she shares with her readers is thrilling and encouraging, climactic yet full of suspense. She is a loving mistress, up for anything, of which any reader is doomed to return to again and again, again and again.

Author Media Links

Blog

Facebook Author Page

Facebook Personal Page

Goodreads

Twitter

Book Links 

Goodreads

Shelter Blog Tour

Today on my blog I have the Shelter Blog Tour. On my stop there is a spotlight, review, and giveaway.

 A young teen comes of age in an abusive home

Miguel’s dad is at it again—physically abusing his mom and sister and terrorizing Miguel for no good reason. But when Miguel’s mom and sister, who have been whispering to one another for some time, decide to stand up to the abuse and decide to move to a women’s shelter, Miguel’s life begins to take turns he never expected. After the family moves out, it isn’t long before Miguel’s dad promises to change his ways before once again becoming abusive; leaving Miguel to summon the courage to stand up to the man he thought he loved. This emotional and stirring novel is told from the point of view of a young man who is torn between the love he feels for his abusive father and the responsibility to protect his family. 

Review: 

Sometimes a book comes along and makes an impact not only on your heart but your very soul itself and Shelter is one of those books.

This is one of the hardest books I have ever read. It deals with physical and mental abuse and the author doesn’t shy away from showing you the harsh reality that many families face from this. I knew what this book was about going into it but I had no idea just how much of an impact the story would have on me. I’ve never had to deal with this in my life but I had a close friend as a kid whose father was a lot like Miguel’s is in this book so it gave me a glimpse into her life and what she and her mom went through.

This book is real life and I’m sure as hard as it was to read it was equally hard on the author to write. But she does a good job with the sensitive subject of showing how the families deal with domestic violence. 4/5 Bloody Fangs  

Book Links:

Amazon 

B&N 

Goodreads 

Pat Aust’s life revolved around helping other people. She recognized that for as many children as there were in the battered women’s shelter where she volunteered as a children’s counselor, there were many more that still were being abused. This book was accepted for publication just before she passed away from cancer on June 12, 2012. Her hope was that this book might help victims of domestic violence to break the cycle.

After she retired from a career in child welfare and specialized foster care, and working for more than 20 years as a public school social worker, she served on various boards of mental health and learning disabilities as well as the Connecticut Task Force on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. She belonged to the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, played in her church’s bell choir, and edited Circuit, the newsletter of the Learning Disabilities Association of Connecticut. What she loved most, though, was writing middle-grade and young adult novels. A portion of the royalties from the sale of SHELTER will be donated to the women’s shelter where she volunteered.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. I would also like to say Thank You to Book Nerd Tours for letting me participate in this blog tour. Don't forget to enter the giveaway below.

~Sabrina 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Finding Love's Wings Cover Reveal

Title: Finding Love’s Wings

Author: Zoey Derrick

Genre: Contemporary Romance 

Publisher: Self Published 

Release Date: May 15 2013

Word Count: 102,000

Approximate Pages: 262

Formats: eBook & Print 

Blurb/Synopsis:

CAMERON ENDERS seems to have it all: a brand new condo in a city she loves, a top executive position at an international entertainment firm, an insane amount of money, and a gorgeous boyfriend. But when Cami catches the boyfriend in the act with another woman, it triggers all the anguish from years of neglect by her parents, and she realizes she never learned how to love or be loved. Cami flees to the remote tropical island of Tarah, but she can't avoid facing her problems any longer when she meets the man of her fantasies...

TRISTAN MICHAELS, one of Hollywood's hottest new stars, has come to Tarah to ride out a storm. His girlfriend of five years has been caught on camera cheating, and she's determined to make Tristan stop the story from breaking. But Tristan's done cleaning up her messes. He needs to escape all things Hollywood for a while--and especially the firm that represents him--until the whole thing blows over. What he doesn't count on is meeting an irresistibly beautiful woman, a woman who just so happens to be the CEO of the firm he's trying to avoid.

Can Tristan and Cami help each other learn to trust and love again, or will their histories of betrayal tear them apart?

Amazon Best Selling Angels, Demons & Devils and Paranormal Author of Give Me Reason - The Reason Series Book One comes from Glendale, Arizona. Zoey, was a mortgage underwriter by day and is now a paranormal, romance and erotica novelist full-time. She writes stories as hot as the desert sun itself. It is this passion that drips off of her work, bringing excitement to anyone who enjoys a good and sensual love story.
 


Not only does she aim to take her readers on an erotic dance that lasts the night, it allows her to empty her mind of stories we all wish were true.
 Her stories are hopeful yet true to life, skillfully avoiding melodrama and the unrealistic, bringing her gripping Erotica only closer to the heart of those that dare dipping into it. 
 


The intimacy of her fantasies that she shares with her readers is thrilling and encouraging, climactic yet full of suspense. She is a loving mistress, up for anything, of which any reader is doomed to return to again and again, again and again.

Author Media Links

Blog

Facebook Author Page

Facebook Personal Page

Goodreads

Twitter

Book Links 

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Books A Million

Book Depository

Goodreads

Voodoo Vows Cover Reveal

Title: Bred by Magic 

Author: Diana Marie DuBois 

Series: Voodoo Vows

Genre: Paranormal

Publisher   Three Danes Publishing LLC

Release Date:  Feb 4, 2014?

Blurb/Synopsis:

Rosie Delacroix returns to New Orleans after her mother’s disappearance, is pulled into an unimagined world and gets more than she bargained for. 

Ensconced in the life of magic and voodoo, she’s surrounded by unlikely allies.

 Julian Quibodeaux, an old flame, re-enters her life and their love is once again reignited like dry tinder to a flame. However, he’s been cursed and unaware he holds a terrible secret…One that could destroy their relationship. 

She’ll be tested in many ways, to save the man she loves. Will her friends, and an unusual new-found gift, be enough for her to survive her journey?

As a young girl, Diana Marie DuBois was an avid reader and was often found in the local public library. Now
you find her working in her local library. Hailing from the culture filled state of Louisiana, just outside of New Orleans; she lives with her three Great Danes and four spunky mutts.  Her biggest inspiration has always been the infamous Anne Rice and her tales of Vampires. It was those very stories that inspired Diana to take hold of her dreams and begin writing. She is now working on her first series, Voodoo Vows.



Places to find Diana

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter

Website