Giveaway ~ Composed: A Memoir

Composed: A Memoir
Author: Rosanne Cash
Publication date:  August 10, 2010
Publisher: Viking Adult

This work is a rare treat, as Cash, firstborn to country music legend Johnny Cash, is not only a hereditary celebrity musician, having made scores of albums and #1 singles, but a terrific writer in her own right. Indeed, her memoir is an intensely reflective, carefully hewn chronicle of her coming-into-her-own as a writer. Born in 1955 to Johnny Cash's littleknown first wife, Vivian, just at the breakthrough of her father's music career with the hit "Cry, Cry, Cry," Cash describes herself as a "pudgy, withdrawn girl" already aware that she was "a counterfeit with a strange, hidden life." That included an anxious mother, three younger sisters, and a father who was frequently absent and erratic, due to his abuse at the time of amphetamines and barbiturates. From growing up in Southern California to visits to her father's house in Hendersonville, Tenn., Cash idolized her father and rarely questioned his authority, such as sending her off to work at CBS Records in London at age 20. At Vanderbilt University, she studied with Walter Sullivan; toyed with Method acting in L.A.; then recorded four demos in Munich, Germany, for Ariola Records, away from the scrutiny of comparison with her father. Cash depicts pensively her early delight in analogue recording and honing her writing craft. Despite an inordinate preponderance of funeral eulogies and some odd structuring toward the end, Cash's memoir sheds clear light on her talent and drive. (from Publishers Weekly)


Today, Penguin Group launches a new monthly radio series called The Literary Life. Completely written, produced, and hosted by Penguin employees, The Literary Life features literary fiction and nonfiction from bestselling, critically acclaimed authors and fast-rising newcomers. It’s hosted by Jake Morrissey, Executive Editor at Riverhead Books. Each episode will debut on the last Tuesday of the month.

In addition to candid interviews with authors, regular segments on The Literary Life include: Inside Publishing, featuring a publishing personality giving a behind-the-scenes look into the book industry; Writer’s Rant, where authors are given the floor to vent; and Penguin Mix Tape, featuring interviews and performances by musicians-turned-authors.

The debut episode of The Literary Life is now available for listening HERE and is downloadable from iTunes. In this episode, singer-songwriter Rosanne Cash, author of the new bestselling memoir Composed, answers questions and performs “The World Unseen.” Maile Meloy, author of the bestselling collection Both Ways is the Only Way I Want It, and Doug Dorst, author of The Surf Guru and Alive in Necropolis, discuss the art of the short story. Sloane Crosley, author of the bestselling essay collections I Was Told There’d Be Cake and How Did You Get This Number, rants about punctuation.

To celebrate this launch, Penguin has provided me with a copy to give away :)

GIVEAWAY - Rules for entering:

This contest is open to residents of USA residents only!

You MUST complete the form below - do not leave information in the comments - it will not count!

The contest will end on September 2, 2010 at 11:59PM EST; 1 winner will be selected and contacted thereafter.

No PO Boxes - UPS will not deliver to PO Box

Still Missing

Still Missing
Author ~ Chevy Stevens
Publication date ~ July 6, 2010
Publisher ~  St. Martin's Press


On the day she was abducted, Annie O’Sullivan, a 32-year-old realtor, had three goals—sell a house, forget about a recent argument with her mother, and be on time for dinner with her ever-patient boyfriend. The open house is slow, but when her last visitor pulls up in a van as she's about to leave, Annie thinks it just might be her lucky day after all.

Interwoven with the story of the year Annie spent as the captive of a psychopath in a remote mountain cabin, which unfolds through sessions with her psychiatrist, is a second narrative recounting events following her escape—her struggle to piece her shattered life back together and the ongoing police investigation into the identity of her captor.

Still Missing is that rare debut find--a shocking, visceral, brutal and beautifully crafted debut novel.

I'm FINALLY getting to this book. I'll be back soon with my review.

FTC Full Disclosure ~ I received this book from the publisher in the hopes that I would review it. 

Contest WINNERS

WINNERS - Congratulations - WINNERS

A Bad Day's Work

Lynn M.

Starting From Scratch

Joy H.

Acck....What Should I Read Next

Still Missing ~ Kerri M 

The winners have all been contacted. They have 48 hrs to confirm that they would still like their books or other winners will be chosen. If you didn't win the book, simply click on the title and you can order it directly from Amazon.

Giveaway - Happy Hour by Michele Scott (4 copies)

Happy Hour
Author: Michele Scott
Publisher:  Createspace
Publication Date:  October 2009


Four friends working in Napa Valley, Sundays are for fellowship, good food and wine. Jamie is editor-in-chief at "Wine Lover's Magazine," and a single mother. Before her husband died, she lived a fairy tale life. Guilt from his death keeps her from moving forward. Kat is a sommelier, and co-owner of a restaurant with her chef husband Christian. Although deeply in love they deal with a myriad of issues, including ex-spouses, Kat's teenage sons and her new age mother Venus. Danielle is a vintner who finds herself entrenched in both an identity and family crises when her eldest daughter returns home from college with a bombshell of a secret. Alyssa is an artist and gallery owner. When a tragic past event catches up with her, she must face the skeleton in her closet and rely on her friends to see her through her darkest hours. These women discover that friendship is the right prescription to get through the hard times as well as for enjoying the wonderful moments together.

Check out my review HERE

Giveaway: 

 I have four (4) copies of this book to give away!

Want to double your chances of winning? Head over to Crazy For Books. Jen is also giving away 4 copies of this book.

Rules for entering:

This contest is open to residents of USA residents only!

You MUST complete the form below - do not leave information in the comments - it will not count!

The contest will end on September 11, 2010 at 11:59PM EST; 4 winners will be selected and contacted thereafter.

 Once the winners are contacted, they will have 48 hours to respond to my e-mail or another winner will be selected.  Make sure you check your spam filters!

 NO P.O. Box Addresses!

 Book will be shipped directly from me. 

Book Blogger Hop - August 27th ~ 30th

In the spirit of the Friday Follow, the Book Blogger Hop is a place just for book bloggers and readers to connect and find new blogs that we may be missing out on!  This weekly BOOK PARTY is an awesome opportunity for book bloggers to connect with other book lovers, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books!  It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs that they may not know existed!  So, grab the logo, post about the Hop on your blog, and start HOPPING through the list of blogs that are posted in the Linky at Crazy-For-Books!!

The Hop lasts Friday-Monday every week, so if you don't have time to Hop today, come back later and join the fun!  This is a weekly event!

Your blog should have content related to books, including, but not limited to book reviews.

Make sure you hop on over to Crazy-For-Books so that you can find some great blogs like I have done!  You won't be disappointed.

This week's question comes from:
Books Are A Girl's Best Friend

Do you use a rating system for your reviews and if so, what is it and why?

 

I do use a rating system (see my right side bar when) when I remember to add them on :)  I'm mixed on them though. I think if a person reads your review they are going to know whether or not you liked a book. They don't need to see a graphic as well.  On the Flookie flip side (as my 5 yr old niece likes to say), if a person knows and trusts your reviews, but doesn't necessarily have time to sit and read through them, a quick glance at your graphic can tell them whether or not you liked the book.  

 

VENOM - WINNERS

Congratulations

Anita

Angela

I've sent an email confirming they still want the book. If I don't hear back in 48 hrs, I'll choose another winner. Thank you to those that have entered :)
For those that didn't win, you can pre-order the book on Amazon~  Venom: A Novel of Suspense

Guest Post/Virtual Tour ~ Margo Candela

Tea, Writing and Writing about Tea

I’ve been a diligent fiction writer since 2003 when I dropped my kid off at the door of a very good pre-school. It was also around this time that tea became especially important in my life. I was never a coffee drinker and had long stopped guzzling any type of soft drink and a cold glass of water in the morning wasn’t always the best way to start my day. With time to enjoy sipping something instead of having to gulp it down, I decided to give tea try and started out with a very basic box of Celestial Seasonings chamomile tea I picked up at the supermarket.

At first, I didn’t even have a designated mug and would just grab whatever was clean. In fact, I didn’t even have a kettle. For the first few months of my life as a tea drinker I would heat water up in the smallest saucepan we owned and pour it into the cup with mostly non-scalding results.

My husband, being somewhat perceptive and in need of a gift idea for my birthday, surprised me with a teakettle, mug and gourmet tea sampler. And that’s when I took my tea drinking to a new level. Meeting with friends? Let’s have tea! Dinner out? What kind of tea is on the menu?

At home, I have a whole shelf for my tea mugs (both ceramic and glass, tall and short) and a more than of bit of our small pantry is taken up by my many types of tea (from loose to tea in ‘handcrafted’ silk pouches). When I unpack from vacations, it’s not tourist T-shirts or refrigerator magnets, but tea. Sometimes its tea I can get at home, but it’s reassuring when I find it in an unfamiliar city or country.

Tea has also worked its way into my four novels. All of my characters have had at least one cup of tea and one was even a coffee and tea heiress. With my latest book, Good-bye To All That (Touchstone, July ’10), I tried to switch it up. Raquel, the main character is a hardcore diet coke and coffee drinker, but by then end she’s sipping green tea.

I can’t help but include tea in my novels; it’s such a big part of writing routine. I start my writing day with tea, break in the afternoon for another cup and end most nights sipping a cup before bed. Of the many habits I could have, I think this is one of the nicer ones and one I look forward enjoying for the rest of my life.

About the author 

I was born and raised in Northeast Los Angeles and moved to San Francisco to attend college. I ended up staying there for a decade before moving back home in 2005. My first three novels, More Than This (Touchstone, Aug. 2008), Life Over Easy (Kensington, Oct. 2007) and Underneath It All (Kensington, Jan. 2007) are set in San Francisco. More Than This was a Target stores Breakout Book and an American Association of Publishers national book club selection at Borders Books with Las Comadres. My current novel, Goodbye To All That (Touchstone, July 13, 2010) is my first novel set in Los Angeles and is the only novel picked by Los Angeles Magazine for it's 2010 Best of L.A. list

Friend her on Facebook

Follow her on Twitter

Subscribe to her RSS Feed

Her Good Reads page

Check out her interview on Wow! Women on Writing.

HER LATEST RELEASE

Good-bye To All That: A Novel

Getting ahead in Hollywood poses a challenge for Raquel Azorian, a lowly marketing assistant at a major production company, and while she has ambition, energy, and smarts, the heroine of Candela's wry latest doesn't have a mentor or even a boss who can hold it together. Determined to chart a course that will save her job and yield a well-deserved promotion, Raquel goes Working Girl, calls on her few friends, and begins making big plans. When a sexy superior takes an interest in her, there's equal potential for success and disaster; meanwhile, her parents and brother have plenty of problems and lean on Raquel for help. Candela (More Than This) combines a cunning wit with a deep understanding of the office politics specific to the entertainment industry to create a frantic atmosphere and a near breathless momentum as the story barrels toward an ending that's anything but your focusgrouped happy fade-out. 

Other books by Margo

Life Over EasyMore Than This: A NovelUnderneath It All

Diana Raab ~ Guest Post & GIVEAWAY

On more than one occasion, journaling has saved my life. The first time was when at the age of ten, my grandmother committed suicide in my childhood home. In an effort to help me cope, my mother handed me a red leather journal to pour my grief out onto it pages. The journal not only became my lifeline, but it also became my best friend and confident. Writing in my journal transformed me from a broken-hearted, shy ten-year-old to someone who was able to pour her profound pain and sense of loss onto the pages of her journal. For many years after my loss, I turned to journaling during turbulent times, such as coping with the angst of adolescence and other losses, such as the loss of friends and parents.

In 1983, when pregnant with my first daughter my obstetrician prescribed bed rest and during my seven months in bed, I chronicled my journey in a journal. This resulted in my first book, Your High Risk Pregnancy, which evolved into a self-help book for other women encountering similar experiences. Last year it was updated in collaboration with Dr. Errol Norwitz from Yale University, under the new title, Your High Risk Pregnancy: A Practical and Supportive Guide. 

When diagnosed with early breast cancer (DCIS) in 2001, I once again turned to my journal to pour my feelings. Then in 2006, when diagnosed with yet another seemingly unrelated cancer, I again turned to writing down my feelings in my journal. In fact, my second memoir, called Healing With Words: A Writer’s Cancer Journey was just born on the pages of my journal. It’s not only a memoir, but also a self-help book with blank journaling pages for others to share their story.

Keeping a journal has many advantages, but I think the most important advantages is that the journal listens and doesn’t talk back. Sometimes when we’re not feeling good, we might not even want to talk to other people, but we can always turn to our journal to pour our feelings. Regular journaling also brings us answers as we write through our problems. If I’m not feeling up to par, I typically begin I by writing the words, “I feel,” and then see where my words go. The best thing to do is to go with the flow of your words.

Learning to open up about issues does not happen over night, but it’s all a part of the healing process. Whether affected by trauma, change, loss or pain, finding the time to write is vital for our mental health. I have found journaling and writing down my feelings to be liberating and empowering. 

Just in case you are still not sure about the reasons for keeping a journal or notebook, here is a summary:

• it is a companion and best friend
• it is a place to work through an illness
• it witnesses the healing process
• it increases awareness
• it is empowering
• it clears the mind
• it builds self-confidence
• it improves communication skills
• it improves mental health
• it is a safe place to vent bottled up emotions
• it is a vehicle for letting go of cloudy thoughts
• it encourages reflection

Good luck and may you be inspired to write!

About Diana ~

Diana M. Raab, MFA, RN was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1954 and received her undergraduate degree in Health Administration and Journalism in 1976. A few years later she received her RN degree. After 25 years as a medical and self-help writer, she’s directed her creative energy towards nonfiction and memoir writing. In 2003 she earned her MFA in Writing from Spalding University’s low-residency program. 

She is the author of eight books. Her most recent release, Healing With Words: A Writer’s Cancer Journey (2010) is a memoir/self-help book which includes reflections, experiences, journal entries and poems all emphasizing the healing power of writing. In addition to extensive appendices, each chapter finishes with blank pages and journaling prompts for the reader to write about their own experiences.

Her first memoir, Regina's Closet: Finding My Grandmother's Secret Journal (2007) is the recipient of the 2009 Mom’s Choice Award for Adult Non-Fiction, and the 2009 National Indie Award for Excellence in Memoir.

Diana’s has been writing since a very young age. Currently, she teaches creative journaling and memoir in UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. She facilitates workshops in journaling and writing for healing around the country. She is a frequent moderator for panels on writing.

She's editor of the anthology, Writers and Their Notebooks (USC Press 2010), a collection of essays written by distinguished writers who journal, including Sue Grafton, Kim Stafford, Dorianne Laux, John DuFresne, James Brown and Michael Steinberg, to name a few. The foreword is written by world-renowned personal essayist, Phillip Lopate.

After experiencing three successful, but high-risk pregnancies, she wrote a comprehensive guide for other women. The award-winning Getting Pregnant and Staying Pregnant (1989) which was recently updated and revised in collaboration with Dr. Errol Norwitz of Yale School of Medicine under the new title, Your High Risk Pregnancy: A Practical and Supportive Guide (2009).

Raab's award-winning work has been published in numerous literary magazines and is widely anthologized. She has one poetry chapbook, My Muse Undresses Me and two poetry collections, Dear Anais: My Life in Poems For You winner of the 2009 Next Generation Indie Award for Poetry and the newly released The Guilt Gene.

You can find Diana at the following sites ~ 

WEBSITE

BLOG

FACEBOOK

TWITTER

Red Room 

She Writes

Weekly blogger for Blogging Authors  

BiMonthly blogger for Dolce Dolce



GIVEAWAY

Thank you to Wow - Women on Writing  for providing me with one (1) copy of this book to give away.

This contest is open to residents of USA residents only!

You MUST complete the form below - do not leave information in the comments - it will not count!

The contest will end on September 9, 2010 at 11:59PM EST; 1 winner will be selected and contacted thereafter.

 Once the winner is contacted, they will have 48 hours to respond to my e-mail with their mailing addressor another winner will be selected.  Make sure you check your spam filters!

 NO P.O. Box Addresses!

 Book will be shipped directly from Wow - Women on Writing

A FANTASTIC new book notification service for all of you book lovers out there

I saw this over at Daisy Chain Book Reviews and had to pass it on

This is just what I've been looking for!  Like many book bloggers I spend a lot of time checking out book catalogues, author blogs and various other sources trying to keep up with the latest book releases. So, how happy was I when I received an email from this great new site last week? Yes, you guessed it, I was very happy!

Any New Books is a new service where you can sign up to receive weekly email updates about new release books. Best of all, it's totally free! I just signed up and I'm eagerly awaiting my first email updates.  There are lots of categories to choose from (42 in all).  I'll be getting updates on new releases in Entertainment, Horror, Literature and Fiction, Mystery and Thrillers,and Teen genres, amongst others.

So, if you want to sign up (it's quick and easy), just do so at this link:

http://anynewbooks.com/

Twitter:

http://twitter.com/anynewbooks

Patricia Rockwell ~ Interview

An Interview with Patricia Rockwell

Patricia, this is your first book. What made you want to write a mystery?

Lori, I spent my entire career as a teacher--the last thirteen of those years as a Communication professor at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Part of my responsibilities (part of all college faculty members’ responsibilities, actually) included conducting research in my area of expertise. My particular specialty was vocal behavior--sound, if you will--and one of the primary ways I examined human voices was with acoustic technology. Human voices are quite unique--much like human finger prints--and acoustic equipment is often used by police and crime labs to identify various individuals when officials have a voice sample but no actual suspect. I’ve always felt that a heroine who uses such technology would make for a really interesting detective series and I resolved that when I retired I would try to create such a heroine and such a series.

Are there any similarities between college teaching and writing mysteries?

Well, writing is a very solitary activity and teaching is a very social activity (except for grading papers, of course). But there are similarities. In my career I did a lot of writing. When I conducted my research, I would be expected to report on my results, usually in a very dry academic article that I was expected to get published in an equally dry academic journal. I managed to produce quite a few such papers--and even a book. I also spent about eight years as an editor of a regional academic journal, so I have experience both writing, editing, and publishing.

Why a mystery?

Mysteries, particularly cozy mysteries, have always been my favorite light reading. I always seem to be able to “get away from it all” when I’m reading a mystery. But, with a mystery, I love the element of suspense and trying to figure things out. I prefer “cozy” mysteries to regular mysteries because they seem to have a more gentle quality--less blood and gore. That’s something I don’t like in mysteries I read, so it’s something I left out of Sounds of Murder and will leave out of any subsequent Pamela Barnes’ acoustic mysteries.

You say “subsequent mysteries.” Do you have a second Pamela Barnes’ book planned?

Lori, it’s not only planned, it’s finished. It will probably be out next summer. I’m still agonizing over a title. The working title is Radio Murder, but I’m considering Murder on the Radio or Murder on Air. I’d like to maintain the use of the word murder in all of my Pamela Barnes’ books. This second book is about a radio disk jockey who is killed while on the air but he’s alone at the station and no one seems the killer. The police ask Pamela to assist in the investigation by examining the audio tape of the disk jockey’s final program and she if she can learn anything about the killer from the sounds on the recording. I also have a third book planned, tentatively entitled Voice Mail Murder. This one is really in the early stages.

I see your book is published by Cozy Cat Press.

Yes, Cozy Cat Press is the brain child of me and my colleague Diane Morlan, also a cozy mystery writer. We are focusing on cozy mysteries only--starting with our own, but hoping to branch out to other cozy mystery authors when we find them. If any of your readers write cozies, please contact us at: www.cozycatpress.com. You can find purchase information about our books at our website too.

Sounds of Murder

Patricia Rockwell’s new cozy mystery Sounds of Murder tells a tale of academic intrigue and death. At Grace University, a small southern college, no one in the Psychology Department likes Charlotte Clark, so no one is particularly upset when she is found murdered in the department’s million-dollar computer lab. But because she discovered the body, Associate Professor Pamela Barnes feels obligated to find Charlotte’s killer, and when she discovers a recording of the murder that was accidentally produced during Charlotte’s struggle with the killer, she begins her own investigation. Along the way, Pamela agonizes with her own conscience, fights her growing fear, attempts to understand her mysterious Department Chair, keeps her curious colleagues informed, placates her protective husband, and avoids antagonizing a local rube detective who belittles her efforts--all while she struggles to make sense of the sounds on the recording. As she gets deeper and deeper into her analysis—trying to connect what she hears in the recording with sounds from people (and potential killers) around her--she gets closer and closer to the killer, who unbeknownst to her, is observing Pamela’s efforts to find the killer, and resolving to prevent her. When Pamela finally identifies the one sound on the tape that positively identifies the killer, she works with the detective to trick the killer into a confession.

Visit Pamela at Cozy Cat Press

Follow her on Twitter

Check out her blogs ~ Subjective Soup & Communication Exchange

Giveaway ~ Buzz Off by Hannah Reed

Buzz Off (A Queen Bee Mystery)
Author ~ Hannah Reed
Publisher ~ Berkley
Publication date ~ September 7, 2010


It's September - National Honey Month - in Moraine, Wisconsin. After her mentor in the honey business is found suspiciously stung to death in his apiary, beekeeper Story Fischer must sort through a swarm of suspects, including her ex-husband.

Giveaway: 

Thanks to the author I have four (4) copies of this book to give away!

Want to double your chances of winning? Head over to Crazy For Books. Jen is also giving away 4 copies of this book.

Rules for entering:

This contest is open to residents of USA residents only!

You MUST complete the form below - do not leave information in the comments - it will not count!

The contest will end on September 6, 2010 at 11:59PM EST; 4 winners will be selected and contacted thereafter.

 Once the winners are contacted, they will have 48 hours to respond to my e-mail or another winner will be selected.  Make sure you check your spam filters!

 NO P.O. Box Addresses!

 Book will be shipped directly from the author

Trust - WINNERS

Congratulations

Laura G

Martha L

Colleen T

I've sent an email confirming they still want the book. If I don't hear back in 48 hrs, I'll choose another winner. Thank you to those that have entered :)
For those that didn't win, you can pre-order the book on Amazon~  Trust: A Novel

Don't Cry by Beverly Barton

Don't Cry
Author: Beverly Barton
Publisher:  Zebra Books
Publication date:  August 17, 2010



Nowhere To Run

The crime scenes are horrifying: the victims arranged with deliberate care, posed to appear alive despite their agonized last moments and the shocking nature of their deaths.

No Place To Hide

Chattanooga grief counselor Audrey Sherrod moonlights for the local police. It-s clear to her, and to Special Agent J.D. Cass, that the murders are the work of a deranged serial killer. At first, the only link is the victims- similar physical appearance. But then another connection emerges, tying them to a long-ago series of horrifying crimes Audrey hoped would never resurface-crimes that hit all too close to home

No Time To Cry

Each grisly new discovery proves the past has not been forgotten, and the worst is yet to come. Audrey went looking for the truth and she-s about to find it-and it will be more twisted and more terrifying than she ever imagined.

FTC Full Disclosure ~ I purchased this book from Amazon

Crazy Cozy Box GIVEAWAY 2

It's a CrAzY CoZy Box giveaway.

 The box will be filled with all of the book listed below for one lucky winner to claim!

Roast Mortem (Coffee House Mystery)  (ARC) by Cleo Coyle

Deadly Daggers by Joyce & Jim Lavene

Deeply, Desperately: A Lucy Valentine Novel  by Heather Webber
Chapter & Hearse (A Booktown Mystery) by Lorna Barrett
Saddled With Trouble by Michele Scott

Sink Trap (A GEORGIANA NEVERALL MYSTERY) by Christy Evans

Murder on Lexington Avenue (Gaslight Mystery) by Victoria Thompson

Diva Las Vegas: A Soap Opera Mystery by Eileen Davidson

Burn Notice: The Giveaway by Tod Goldberg

Psych: A Fatal Frame of Mind by William Rabkin

Toast Mortem (A Hemlock Falls Mystery) by Claudia Bishop

Mrs. Jeffries Speaks Her Mind by Emily Brightwell

Ghost Sudoku (A Sudoku Mystery) by Kaye Morgan

Expose! (A Vicky Hill Exclusive!) by Hannah Dennison

Tomb with a View (Pepper Martin Mysteries, No. 6) by Casey Daniels

Devil May Ride (Ghost Dusters #2) by Wendy Roberts

GIVEAWAY - Rules for entering: 

 This contest is open to residents of USA residents only!

 You MUST complete the form below - do not leave information in the comments - it will not count!

 The contest will end on September 3, 2010 at 11:59PM EST; 1 winner will be selected and contacted thereafter.

Once the winner is contacted, they will have 48 hours to respond to my e-mail or another winner will be selected.  Make sure you check your spam filters!

 Book will be shipped directly from me (via UPS).

  No PO Boxes - UPS will not deliver to PO Box