Saturday, December 30, 2017

REVIEW... Purrfect Santa by Jessie Lane & Chasity Bowlin

Title: Purrfect Santa: Howls Romance
Author: Jessie Lane & Chasity Bowlin
Genre: Paranormal Romance Novella
Release Date: December 12, 2017

A woman afraid to love …
Nikki knows what it is to lose those you love. With her focus on her orphaned sister, she hasn’t given herself the chance to process her own grief over the loss of their parents. Life is chaos and the last complication she needs is a mate.
A lion alone for too long …
Joe Miller knows chaos. Being orphaned as a child, he’s never had a family to call his own. Crashing with a friend for the holidays, he’s hoodwinked into playing Santa Claus at a local mall. The last thing on his mind is finding a mate.
A love worth the risk …
With her baby sister on her hip, sadness in her eyes, and a longing in her heart, Nikki waits in line with her sister to see Santa. From the moment he scents her, Joe is in deep. It’s going to take everything he has to convince Nikki the love outweighs the risk to her heart. Luckily for Joe, he has fate and Nikki’s adorable baby sister on his side. After all, who can say no to the Purrfect Santa at Christmas?





Purrfect Santa is a hot, steamy, fun novella.      I have read other books in the Howls Romance series and this one is a perfect addition to the group of books.    

Jessie Lane and Chasity Bowlin have managed to take a short story and making it seem longer, more depth to the story, and more fun that some longer books that I have read.     I always think that it can’t be easy to write a novella, yet these two have it figured out.   There was just enough depth and development to not feel that anything has been left out or that any of the story is missing.    I felt like I was able to get to know the characters enough to be invested in their lives.   I could feel the heat between Nikki and Joe, I could feel the love, and I could feel their relationship grow, becoming real and steady.     Of course, I’d love more just like I should after any good book is over but I was happy with the entire book.


I’d recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a fun, sexy, hot shifter novella.    Purrfect Santa is a great quick holiday read.  

Chapter One

If one more kid tried to pull his beard, he was going to roar.

Joe looked at the small spawn of Satan currently sitting on his lap and held in the urge to growl. The kid was maybe five years old, had blonde hair, blue eyes and dimples galore. His first thought was she was adorable. Now, after she’d pulled on his Santa beard during the picture, he knew better. She was nothing but trouble. If he really were Santa, he would give her coal in her stocking and a letter advising her parents to put her in the naughty corner.

“Smile, Santa!”

The photographer’s words were more of a warning than a cue to get ready for the second picture. So Joe played his role, ho ho ho’d, and smiled for the camera while the brat on his lap asked him for a pony.

There had been a time when Joe hadn’t dreaded Christmas so much. Back when he was a kid and everything about Christmas had still seemed so magical. Not so much anymore. It sucked when you spent the holidays alone. To say he was a bit bitter about the holiday season was an understatement.

Which was part of the reason he couldn’t believe he was here at The Mall of the Smokies, being the damn Santa. How had he gotten wrangled into this position again?

His buddy Sam. Buddy. So much for never leaving a man behind, he thought. There he sat, covered from head to toe in red velvet that was none too fresh and none too clean, thanks to the boozy sweat of the previous wearer. Of course, he’d also had more than one kid with a leaky diaper on his lap that day.

And Sam, where was Sam? Nowhere to be seen.

Joe and Sam had served together in the Marine Corps, but once Sam had completed his term of service, he’d come back home to help run the family business, a lodge in the mountains of East Tennessee. Joe, having nowhere to go after getting out of the service himself, had taken Sam up on his offer to crash at the Bearadise Lodge.

There was just one catch. The Lodge was sponsoring Santa’s Workshop at the local outlet mall, and they were short one Santa. Apparently, the old Santa had been fired for drinking on the job.

Damn that Sam!

After only one day of being Santa, Joe could see why the previous hire had been driven to drink. These kids were hell on his nerves. Like the blonde brat who was once again pulling on his beard. He was just about to give her a little growl when she hopped off his lap and ran giggling to her mother, who gave him an unapologetic glance before dismissing him entirely.

This job would have been so much easier if he were in a shifter-run community. Then he could growl all he wanted. Instead, he was dealing with humans and had to keep his feline traits under wraps.

As the next kid, a little boy about the age of four, climbed on to his lap and proceeded to fart, Joe did his best not to cringe. Bullets and bad guys he could deal with. Snot-nosed kids were apparently his downfall. He’d only been at this for a day and he was thinking of telling Sam he could shove this Santa job where the sun didn’t shine. Joe didn’t even want to think about doing this until Christmas Eve. Three days away. Three long, miserable, endless days of bratty kids, droopy diapers, and disaffected parents more interested in their phones than their kids.

In fact, as the next kid proceeded to sneeze all over him, Joe considered walking out right then.

But then something happened that kept him glued to his seat. His sharp lion senses caught a new smell among the crowd. Peppermint and sugar cookies.

Mate, his lion roared inside his head.

The one person that was cosmically meant for him and him alone. The woman that Mother Nature deemed his. He scanned the crowd until he finally saw her at the end of the line, waiting to come see him.

Short, with generous curves that would fill his hands, she had black hair pulled to the top of her head in a messy bun. He wondered what color her eyes were, being too far away to see them. Scanning the rest of her body, he suddenly stopped when he came to the thing that shocked him the most.

A kid on her hip.

Was it her child? From this far away, he couldn’t scent the small one. Had someone already laid hands on his mate? His lion roared again, only this time it was in protest. No one should touch his mate but him! He would slaughter the man who had dared give his mate a cub.

“SANTA!” the elf behind the camera shouted.

Joe snapped his attention back to the man he was going to eviscerate for taking his concentration away from his mate, only to find a scared human staring at him. It was then he realized the child on his lap was shaking in fear.

The elf inched forward to whisper so the others in line couldn’t hear. “You growled at him, Santa! Say you’re sorry.”

His stomach sank. To say he felt like a colossal piece of shit was an understatement. He had been so wrapped up in his emotions that he had let his lion slip out a little in public, which was a big hell no in the shifter rules. Joe looked at the little boy on his lap and gave the kid a big smile, trying to play off what had happened. “How would you like a stuffed lion for Christmas? They go grrrrrrr.”

The little boy looked at him with wide eyes that slowly turned from fear to curiosity. “You can make a stuffed lion that growls?”

Joe nodded. “Sure can. I can put the elves to work on it right away if that’s what you want.”

The little boy scrunched his face up in thought but then shook his head no. “I really want a bike for Christmas, Santa. Can I have that instead of the lion?”

Relieved that the boy was no longer scared, Joe gave him a big grin and a wink. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Yippee!” The boy squealed as he jumped off Joe’s lap and ran to his mother, who was waiting for him next to the photographer.

Joe watched as the boy happily walked away, then quickly turned his attention back to his mate, who was watching him from the back of the line with big wary eyes. The mating scent was too strong. He couldn’t tell whether or not the child was hers, but that didn’t matter.

She was his.

And if that meant he had to accept another man’s cub into his home to claim his mate, then that’s what he would do. Although he would take great pleasure in rubbing his scent all over both woman and cub every chance that he got. Just to make sure that everyone knew that they were now his and his alone.



Jessie Lane is a best-selling author of Paranormal and Contemporary Romance, as well as, Upper YA Paranormal Romance/Fantasy.
She lives in Kentucky with her two little Rock Chicks in-the-making and her over protective alpha husband that she’s pretty sure is a latent grizzly bear shifter. She has a passionate love for reading and writing naughty romance, cliff hanging suspense, and out-of-this-world characters that demand your attention, or threaten to slap you around until you do pay attention to them.
She’s also a proud member of the Romance Writers of America (RWA).
Chasity Bowlin lives in central Kentucky with her husband and their menagerie of animals. She loves writing, loves traveling and enjoys incorporating tidbits of her actual vacations into her books. She is an avid Anglophile, loving all things British, but specifically all things Regency. She also writes steamy contemporary and paranormal romance. 

Growing up in Tennessee, spending as much time as possible with her doting grandparents, soap operas were a part of her daily existence, followed by back to back episodes of Scooby Doo. Her path to becoming a romance novelist was set when, rather than simply have her Barbie dolls cruise around in a pink convertible, they time traveled, hosted lavish dinner parties and one even had an evil twin locked in the attic.
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Friday, December 29, 2017

COVER REVEAL & GIVEAWAY ... Standing Sideways by J. Lynn Bailey


It’s cover reveal day for J. Lynn Bailey’s STANDING SIDEWAYS. Check it out and be sure to grab your copy January 30th!
Title: STANDING SIDEWAYS
Author: J. Lynn Bailey
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Day: January 30th
About Standing Sideways:

When Livia Stone suddenly loses her twin brother, Jasper, she must learn to navigate her new life alone. As she faces tragedy and starts down a road toward self-destruction, Daniel enters Livia’s life—at a moment when she needs it most.

Standing Sideways is a poignant, relevant, and touching story of survival, courage, and compassion that will have readers crying, laughing, and most of all, debating the issues affecting the lives of parents and teens alike on a journey of hope and forgiveness.

Exclusive Excerpt:

Simon James is your normal-looking boy with moments of clarity, which, I think, has kept him in a good position not to go to prison. And I think Jasper helped him stay on the right path—until now.

Every time we touch, I feel like he needs this as much as I do.

First, in the beginning, it was just our tongues that became entangled. It was simple and easy. And comforting. But, for some reason, we just needed more. Then, things progressed quite quickly.

Fingers pushing.

Arms squeezing.

Tongues everywhere.

And, now, we meet here four times a week to have sex.

I feel him harden against my stomach, and I look into his eyes. He’s been crying. Since Jasper died, I’ve never seen the evidence that Simon James, resident bad boy/not bad boy, cry, but I’ve seen the aftermath. I don’t ask if he’s all right because I know he isn’t.

I’d gladly give up my therapy appointment for Simon. I’d give up my therapy appointment with Dr. Elizabeth for him if I knew he would go. If I knew it would help. I’m not even sure his parents have come out of their drug-induced coma long enough to know that Jasper is dead.

His dull blue eyes, plagued with bad memories, prove the bright blue is sitting back, hidden behind the bruises that he carries underneath his clothes. The ones I see. And the dull blue tells a different story than what comes from his mouth. The darker story. The one he pretends Jasper and I don’t know, the one he doesn’t want us to know.

Simon would have an excuse.

I fell down the stairs.

I burned myself.

I ran into the wall.

About the Author:

J. Lynn Bailey has loved to write since she learned to read, around the second grade. When she isn't running after her children, watching COPS, or on the hunt for her next Laffy Taffy joke, you can probably find her holed up in her writing room feverishly working on her next book. She lives in Northern California with her family.




Enter J. Lynn’s Giveaway:
 

Thursday, December 28, 2017

SALE BLITZ...Bad Neighbor by M. O'Keefe

Today we are sharing the sale for BAD NEIGHBOR by M. O'Keefe! This is the first book in Bad Boy Romance series. BAD NEIGHBOR is currently .99 cents (for just a few days!) or you can read it for FREE on KindleUnlimited.

Bad Neighbor by M. O'Keefe (Bad Boy Romance, #1)

ON SALE FOR A VERY LIMITED TIME!

Purchase it for 99¢ or read it for FREE on KindleUnlimited!

BOOK BLURB:

He's sexy... He's dangerous... He's right next door.

I gave up everything to save my sister from a monster, and now I’m lying low in this rundown apartment so I can stay out of danger. Hiding from everyone. Except for the guy in apartment 1A. He’s rude. Silent. Muscled, mysterious, and hot as hell. I don’t know if he likes me or hates me, but the more time I spend with him, the less it matters. I want him. And for the first time in my life I'm going to go after what I want.

She doesn’t belong in my world.

From the second 1B moves in, I know she’s keeping secrets. She doesn’t belong here, much less with a street fighter like me. But that doesn’t stop me from craving her. Her softness and sweetness. She’s a drug, and suddenly I’m addicted. I know someone is going to try and hurt her and I can’t let that happen. But unless I push her away and get her out of my world, that someone could be me…

----------------------------

AUTHOR INFORMATION:

  Molly O'Keefe has always known she wanted to be a writer (except when she wanted to be a florist or a chef and the brief period of time when she considered being a cowgirl). And once she got her hands on some romances, she knew exactly what she wanted to write. She published her first Harlequin romance at age 25 and hasn't looked back. She loves exploring every character's road towards happily ever after. Originally from a small town outside of Chicago, she went to university in St. Louis where she met and fell in love with the editor of her school newspaper. They followed each other around the world for several years and finally got married and settled down in Toronto, Ontario. They welcomed their son into their family in 2006, and their daughter in 2008. When she's not at the park or cleaning up the toy room, Molly is working hard on her next novel, trying to exercise, stalking Tina Fey on the internet and dreaming of the day she can finish a cup of coffee without interruption.    

AUTHOR LINKS: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads | Instagram

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Wednesday, December 27, 2017

SPOTLIGHT...The Apprentice by Rick Pullen

Author of Naked Ambition

THE APPRENTICE
By Rick Pullen
Blair House; December 26, 2017
$14.99 trade paperback/$2.99 e-book; 189 pages
ISBN: 978-0-9994910-0-3



Tish Woodward is on a roll—her investigative reporting of a horrific crime has catapulted her into the national spotlight. But is it talent or just dumb luck? The rookie newspaperwoman dreads that the world will wake up and realize she lacks the depth and experience to take on her new assignment— President-Elect Derrick Templeton, a billionaire oil and real estate baron with no political experience.

Woodward navigates the labyrinth of Washington’s political world getting ever closer to the truth about Templeton, yet she doesn’t know whom to trust. This is Washington, of course, where motives are always suspect and allegiances change like the weather—all in pursuit of raw power. In this fast-paced, gripping tale of deception and deceit, Woodward realizes she is way over her head with nowhere to turn for help. She has taken on the most powerful and vengeful man who will ever occupy the White House—and he now has his sights clearly set on her.

Add to your MUST-READ list on Goodreads

Purchase your copy at AMAZON or BARNES AND NOBLE




RICK PULLEN is a novelist, award-winning investigative reporter and magazine editor. His 2016 thriller, Naked Ambition, about a reporter investigating a corrupt presidential candidate, became a bestseller. The Apprentice is his latest release. In 2018, newspaper reporter Beck Rikki returns as she sets out to discover the Naked Truth, the sequel to Naked Ambition. Pullen is a member of the Folio 100—the 100 most influential people in magazine publishing—and was a finalist for Editor of the Year. Learn more about his books at rickpullen.com.






“Pullen has written a solid, descriptive thriller that shows that he is well-informed and savvy about the newspaper business and the political world...and in Pullen's hands the shady and sometimes judicious relationships among government, business, and journalism are shown in a penetrating and astute manner.”

— Kirkus Reviews

Naked Ambition is a funhouse mirror whose witty distortions reveal a terrifying truth. What a story: surprising, engaging, and wickedly smart. That sound you hear as the pages whip by—it's laughter. Your own. Rick Pullen, with impressive insider knowledge, unfailing humor, madcap plotting, and a touch of reckless romance has opened the door to a Washington we might prefer not to know. But this time it's knowledge, not ignorance, that's bliss.”

— David Corbett, Award-winning author of
 The Mercy of the Night

Naked Ambition draws you in early and won't let go until you've devoured every last page. Pullen has crafted a masterful narrative that casts post-Citizens United abuses of power in nuanced layers of suspense and intrigue”

Steve Giegerich, author of Body of Knowledge



Tuesday, December 26, 2017

RELEASE BLITZ... Bear's Shadow by Desiree L. Scott

  

 ️AVAILABLE NOW

Bear’s Shadow (Vendetta Series Book 2)
Author Desiree L. Scott
Genre:  Paranormal
Kindle Edition, 140 pages
Published October 2nd 2017 by Lavish Publishing, LLC

Blurb:

Nikki Calhoun is on the run, fueled by terror of the shadowy world she had married into. Desperate to survive and nowhere to hide, Nikki turns to the wolf shifter pack of her childhood but it’s hard for her to trust anyone, even the people closest to her.

Enforcer and bear-shifter Bret Axel receives a call from his cousin who manages his Portland nightclub about suspicious activity. After obtaining the approval of his Alpha, he travels to Portland. Two nights later, screams of a woman shatter the silence of the dock and with the help of his cousin, they save her from being killed.

A twisted tale of hunter and prey, two worlds collide as Bret falls for the human and then struggles to convince her that they are meant to be together. It’s up to him and the Crescent Ice Pack to get to the bottom of the brutal acts of one man. Will Nikki survive the wrath of her estranged husband or will the murky world of Edward Calhoun destroy her and any who try to help?


Crescent Vendetta - Book 1 of the Vendetta Series



Desiree L. Scott has been writing since she was sixteen years old. There have been many influences within her life that has set her on the path that she cannot help but walk. A few of those influences consist of Karen Rose, Lisa Gardener, Nora Roberts, Cynthia Eden, Catherine Anderson, Laura Griffin, Andrea Kane, and Lisa Jackson, just to name a few. This list by no means defines my own writing but they have indeed influenced her desire to live outside of her own world and to create the thrill of her dreams.
Desiree lives on 40 + acres in the SHOW ME state with her ten-year old daughter, with the wonderful addition of four dogs. The weather is unpredictable, but the surrounding beauty of the country helps her creativity as she sits on her top deck with her laptop and coffee close by.

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