Check out the recent ABC Nightline piece here (http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/story?id=7676659&page=1) about Cindy and her titles When the Heart Cries, When the Morning Comes, and When the Soul Mends. It’s an intriguing look at Amish culture and the time Cindy has spent with Amish friends. 
And don’t forget that Cindy’s new book The Hope of Refuge hits store shelves August 11, and is available for preorder now.
To enter: Send us an E-MAIL (foodfiction AT gmail DOT com) by June 1st with the subject line MAY CONTEST and tell us about your favorite salad/salad dressing. We want to hear what you like! Recipes are welcome!
It’s that time of week again, everyone, and time for the Tuesday Teaser.Again the reminder of what this is all about. We are asked to:
gent Sonia Knight believes she’ll finally take down the illegal operation’s devilish mastermind, Xavier Jones. But when an FBI sting on Jones’s criminal enterprise collides with an ICE stakeout, Sonia is enraged: Her informant’s life and her evidence are in grave jeopardy.FBI agent Dean Hooper has been chasing Jones for years on money-laundering and tax-evasion charges and doesn’t need or want a hot-headed ICE agent second-guessing his every move. When the Bureau is ordered to join forces with ICE, Sonia is just as livid: Her job is to save lives, not money. But their team effort pays off as fierce mutual resentment fades and passion flares–along with risk.For Jones is just one piece of a depraved puzzle, answering to an even more dangerous predator. Denied his expected prey, this pitiless fiend intends to make Sonia and Dean pay with their own blood.
ding uptown. Jack Reacher, plus five other passengers. Four are okay. The fifth isn’t.In the next few tense seconds Reacher will make a choice--and trigger an electrifying chain of events in this gritty, gripping masterwork of suspense by #1 New York Times bestseller Lee Child.Susan Mark was the fifth passenger. She had a lonely heart, an estranged son, and a big secret. Reacher, working with a woman cop and a host of shadowy feds, wants to know just how big a hole Susan Mark was in, how many lives had already been twisted before hers, and what danger is looming around him now.Because a race has begun through the streets of Manhattan in a maze crowded with violent, skilled soldiers on all sides of a shadow war. Susan Mark’s plain little life was critical to dozens of others in Washington, California, Afghanistan . . . from a former Delta Force operator now running for the U.S. Senate, to a beautiful young woman with a fantastic story to tell–and to a host of others who have just one thing in common: They’re all lying to Reacher. A little. A lot. Or maybe just enough to get him killed.In a novel that slams through one hairpin surprise after another, Lee Child unleashes a thriller that spans three decades and gnaws at the heart of America . . . and for Jack Reacher, a man who trusts no one and likes it that way, it’s a mystery with only one answer–the kind that comes when you finally get face-to-face and look your worst enemy in the eye.
op & Die: A Kiki Lowenstein Scrap-N-Craft Mystery by Joanna Campbell Slan ~ All it took was one scone.Tainted icing triggers a rare allergy, and a hobbyist croaks at a scrapbooking crop sponsored by Time in a Bottle, the store where Kiki Lowenstein works. When it comes out that someone swiped the victim's emergency medication, the scrappers realize they have a murder on their hands, and the entire community jumps to point the finger at Kiki and her coworkers. Suddenly, the one anchor in Kiki's stormy life is on the verge of sinking beneath a ruined reputation.But who wouldn't want to kill Yvonne Gaynor? The nasty woman had enough enemies to fill a memory album. Once again, Kiki gets sucked into a mystery that should be left to that dreamy detective, Chad Detweiler—who hasn't tried to kiss her yet. With anti-Semitic threats coming in at the store, a quarrelsome teen daughter at home, and constant financial pressure, Kiki needs to keep her cool if she's going to set things right.
as a serialized Web site, www.hollysinbox.com. The story revolves around Holly Denham, the new receptionist at a London bank, and through her correspondence, readers get to know her daily life. She befriends Trish, the other receptionist, and begins a relationship with James, a charming higher-up. Between organizing meetings at the bank, she trades hilarious, risqué e-mails with her friends Jason and Aisha, assures her parents she’s getting along well, helps her grandmother decipher the Internet, and offers her siblings much-needed advice. Her e-mails even reveal a life-altering event from her past. While the premise can be tiresome—who doesn’t have to slog through enough e-mails of their own?—the story becomes more engrossing as fresh details come to light. The author, a placement-agency owner writing under a pen name, explores a new format with compelling results. A second novel is planned, and Holly’s adventures continue online.
r a new job on Wall Street, they pack up their home in Chicago and move to New York City. He doesn’t want her to work, so she spends her days among the city’s hedge-fund wives. These women are snobby, privileged, and stinking rich, and Marcy doesn’t fit in. John wants her to play nice, though, so she mingles. Marcy wants more than just gobs of cash and designer clothes—a job, a baby, more time with her husband; but John is progressively becoming more distant. He blames his work, but Marcy suspects something else. Is her husband straying with another hedge-fund wife, or is Marcy falling prey to the sneaky, backstabbing behaviors she’s surrounded by every day? It’s hard to feel sympathy for someone dropping $25,000 at Bergdorf Goodman, especially now at a time of financial catastrophe; but Marcy is a strong character who rises above the crowd in Boncompagni’s glitzy and gossipy second novel
After tossing and turning all night, thirty-nine-year-old Lisa Barkley wakes up well before her alarm sounds. With two daughters about to start another year at their elite Upper East Side private school and her own career hitting a wall, the effort of trying to stay afloat in that privileged world of six-story town houses and European jaunts has become increasingly difficult, especially as Manhattan descends into an economic freefall.
As Lisa looks over at her sleeping husband, Sam, she can't help but feel that their fifteen-year marriage is in a funk that she isn't able to place. She tries to shake it off and tells herself that the strain must be due to their mounting financial pressures. But later that morning, as her family eats breakfast in the next room, Lisa finds herself checking Sam's voicemail and hears a whispered phone call from a woman he is to meet that night. Is he having an affair?
When Lisa shares her suspicions with her best friend, Deirdre, at their weekly breakfast, Deirdre claims it can't be true. But how can Lisa fully trust her opinion when Deirdre is still single and mired in an obsessive affair with a glamorous photographer even as it hovers on the edge of danger?
When Deirdre's former college flame, Jack, comes to town and the two couples meet to cele-brate his fortieth birthday, the stage is set for an explosiveT series of discoveries with devastating consequences.
Filled with suspense and provocative ques-tions about the relationships we value most, Best Intentions is a tightly woven drama of love, friendship and betrayal. (From Amazon)
In the next few tense seconds Reacher will make a choice--and trigger an electrifying chain of events in this gritty, gripping masterwork of suspense by #1 New York Times bestseller Lee Child.
Susan Mark was the fifth passenger. She had a lonely heart, an estranged son, and a big secret. Reacher, working with a woman cop and a host of shadowy feds, wants to know just how big a hole Susan Mark was in, how many lives had already been twisted before hers, and what danger is looming around him now.
Because a race has begun through the streets of Manhattan in a maze crowded with violent, skilled soldiers on all sides of a shadow war. Susan Mark’s plain little life was critical to dozens of others in Washington, California, Afghanistan . . . from a former Delta Force operator now running for the U.S. Senate, to a beautiful young woman with a fantastic story to tell–and to a host of others who have just one thing in common: They’re all lying to Reacher. A little. A lot. Or maybe just enough to get him killed.
In a novel that slams through one hairpin surprise after another, Lee Child unleashes a thriller that spans three decades and gnaws at the heart of America . . . and for Jack Reacher, a man who trusts no one and likes it that way, it’s a mystery with only one answer–the kind that comes when you finally get face-to-face and look your worst enemy in the eye. (From Amazon)
Still Life: A Novel by Joy Fielding (ARC) ~
The Night Watchman (Ray Quinn Series, Book 1) by Mark Mynheir ~
About the book ~
An email went out to 90,000 people telling them NOT to visit www.HollysInbox.com because unscrupulous IT hacks had posted a live email account of a fellow employee onto the web in total disregard of our privacy laws.
We said - if she was working for your company it was essential you let her know NOW! Before the world discovered what she really thought about her co-workers.
The site went into meltdown.
Having had no success in my ambition to be a writer I had various jobs in different countries and finally took a position as a recruitment consultant. I met a beautiful woman, we got married and very soon we had set up our own recruitment agency which specialised in Receptionists. The idea for the site came one day when we had to trawl through an ex-employees work email account. The woman in question was single, extremely flirtatious and had always loved us to bits. We discovered she was married with four children, and couldn’t stand the sight of us. The life she was leading was so full of mystery, intrigue, romance (and many many lies) that it made me wonder what it would be like to read a story told in this way.
I began writing, and discovered (to my wife’s initial horror) that I loved writing as a woman. The characters began to talk on their own, and were much funnier than I could ever hope to be (I once tried stand up comedy – I died).
The initial plan for the site was just to attract more candidates to our reception agency, nothing else.
The basic plot had around two email exchanges a day and we launched www.HollysInbox.com . The site’s popularity spurred me on, but it soon became obvious I had grossly underestimated the amount of emails I needed each day to keep people on the site… so I began writing in real-time.
Not many people enjoy criticism, and I had always been particularly scared of receiving feedback. However Holly’s Inbox initially had a LIVE forum, where readers could immediately let off steam if they were unhappy, sometimes before I had even finished a sentence. If it wasn’t funny, they would say so (and the emails miraculously disappeared), if it was too obscure I’d make it clearer, too slow and I’d make it faster… basically they taught me to write and I will be eternally grateful to the fantastic forum fans. Holly still keeps in touch with them on Facebook and twitter.
I continued to run the agency whilst writing Holly’s Inbox but became less and less aware of my surroundings, immersing myself in the characters often giggling and occasionally crying in the process. My wife’s favourite story was when she had been interviewing a candidate while just across office I sobbed uncontrollably. The worried candidate had asked her if everything was ok and she had laughed and said I was only crying because I’d finally discovered she was having an affair, then continued with the interview.
Holly’s Inbox follows the life of Holly Denham a new receptionist on the front desk of an investment bank in
As the story reached it’s climax I began to panic. The site would be over and I had no idea what I was going to do next, so I began emailing as many agents as possible the web link; without knowing what I wanted from them. At last a wonderful fabulous woman replied and told me it would work in a book… and it did. Holly’s Inbox has now been translated into 6 different languages but the one place I had always dreamed about being published was of course the
The site has been re-launched and www.hollysinbox.com is now live with emails being sent and received by Holly Denham, I hope you like it.
About the Author
Bill Surie is the owner of a placement service for receptionists and secretaries in
n assault which resulted in paralysis on one side of her face. After her injury, Evie retreated into the virtual realm, seeking refuge from the public eye by interacting with online friends. Now, with the help of a surgeon, Evie's face is restored and she is ready to return to the real world. However, she remains connected to the Internet for her graduate thesis on using the virtual world as therapy to improve self-esteem. She has become an online shopkeeper who sells faces and bodies to users interested in building a new avatar on a website called "Shadowland." In her new role, Evie maintains "surveillance" over her test subjects to ensure they don't become too caught up in the intoxicating virtual realm.Meanwhile, homicide detective Noah Webster has been investigating a string of suspicious suicides that he believes are connected murders. Noah's investigation leads him to Evie when one of her online test subjects is found dead of apparent suicide, but Evie believes otherwise.Evie is shocked to find herself drawn to someone for the first time in many years and she's reluctant to trust Noah. However, he's the only one who believes her story about the suspicious death of her test subject, and he soon discovers that many of the apparent suicides in his case had avatars in "Shadowland."As murder victims connected to the website begin to appear more frequently, Noah asks Evie to be his virtual guide in the investigation. However, they don't realize that the killer is closer than they think--and that he holds a special grudge against Evie.
g of metal and glass. Caitlin Neuman awakes from this nightmare, wondering if it might be a harrowing memory-she's the lone survivor of a crash that killed her parents and twin sister years earlier. Or could the nightmare be an eerie insight into some family she's never met? Then again, it might just be a bad dream. Caitlin engages retired Detective Paco LeSoto to find out the truth. Paco's clever wife, Molly, tags along, uncovering her share of clues. She spouts her own deliciously skewed English, while Paco suspects her "Mollyprops" are clever contrivances. Their investigation takes them to the Boston family, another set of twins, and a string of suspicious deaths. In a Chesapeake Bay beachside home not far from the Neumans, newlyweds Newton Boston and his blonde bombshell wife, Delylah, grapple with their own family turmoil. Delylah's adult children churn up vicious undercurrents that threaten the entire household. Four deceased husbands lie in Delylah's past. When another family member dies under mysterious circumstances, the clues point to murder. The LeSotos expose the sinister connections. But can they stop yet another killing, bring justice to the culprits and peace to both families?
on watched his four-year-old son tumble from a jetty into the lake outside their Washington home. In a terrible instant, a life all too brief and innocent ended. But it wasn't drowning, the fall, or even some previously undetected internal defect that killed the little boy. Scott Henderson had simply, inexplicably . . . died.Today, John is a different man—divorced, living a solitary existence in a beach house in Oregon, working as a waiter in a restaurant that caters to the summer crowd. Withdrawn from a life and past too painful to revisit, he touches no one and no one touches him. Then one night he receives a short and profoundly disturbing e-mail message from a stranger. It reads: I know what happened.It's enough to pull John back to Black Ridge—the one place on earth he'd hoped never to return to—in search of answers to the mystery that shattered his world. In this small, isolated Pacific Northwest community, populated in large part by descendants of the original settlers, the shadows now seem even darker and more sinister than when tragedy first drove him away—and the wind whipping down out of the primal forest can chill a man to his soul. It seems that bad things have always happened in this town of generations-old secrets—and are happening still.The deeper John digs into his own past, and into local history, the more danger he draws toward himself . . . and toward his estranged and helpless family. And though he doesn't know it, he's not the only one who's been called back to Black Ridge.And that's a very bad thing . . .A twisting, relentlessly thrilling, and consistently surprising novel of psychological suspense, Michael Marshall's Bad Things is a masterwork of chilling brilliance that will keep the reader guessing right to the final page. Bad things don't just happen to other people. They're waiting to happen to you, too.
