Come Back Cover Reveal!

I'm excited to be taking part in the cover reveal for Come Back, the debut novel from Melissa Maygrove. Congratulations, Melissa!!

Without further ado, here is the gorgeous cover:

About Come Back

Sometimes a single choice alters the course of a person's life forever.

Book information:

Title: Come Back

Author: Melissa Maygrove

Genre: Western Historical Romance

Category: Adult / New Adult

Publisher: Truelove Press

Expected release: May 12, 2014

Blurb:

Left behind by everyone she loves...

Rebecca Garvey had the promise of a California future dreams are made of, until the wagon train her family was traveling with left her behind. Now she’s slowly dying in the wilderness, abandoned and stripped of her self-worth. Once the shock of her desertion turns to embittered despair, she doesn’t want to be found. Then a handsome stranger challenges her convictions and changes her mind.

Headed for Texas, chased by the demons of his past...

Seth Emerson knows exactly what he wants. Working to save for a cattle ranch of his own keeps him busy and keeps his pain buried. Rescuing a stubborn woman from the hills of New Mexico Territory isn’t part of his plan—but she’s exactly what he needs.

Making greater sacrifices than either of them could foresee...

Seth and Rebecca set off on a risky journey and a quest for truth, each healing the other’s love-starved soul along the way. Will they give in to their growing attraction?  Or will they honor their commitments when Seth returns Rebecca to civilization... and her betrothed?

Find Come Back on Goodreads

For more about Melissa Maygrove, visit her here. 

Congratulations again and best wishes to Melissa for a great release. For those of you who are taking part in the A to Z Challenge, I'll see you tomorrow! :)

My First Book Signing, Goals, and Friday Celebrations

This week I participated in my first book signing as part of an event for local authors here in my area. The event was held at a neighborhood coffeehouse and I had a great time! I sold five books, including one to a complete stranger, and gave out lots of bookmarks. Best of all, I managed to talk to people about my books without getting tongue-tied or making a fool of myself. If you read my IWSG post this month you know that is a concern for me. :D

It was a big thrill to sit at my table with my books and great to get this event under my belt. I got some ideas for the book festival and other events I have coming up so I'm even more excited for them now.

So for this week's Celebrate the Small Things hop I'm celebrating this event! It was definitely the highlight of my week. If you want to join in the celebrations, visit our wonderful host Vikki at Scribblings of an Aspiring Author to sign up and participate.

Also, the last Friday of the month means it's time to update our progress for Misha Gericke's Do You Have Goals? hop.

My goal is to earn a full-time living as a writer. I didn't have as productive a month this time as I did back in February, but I did make lots of progress on my sequel to Polar Night, entitled Polar Day. I feel like the story has gelled now and I've not only been writing a great deal but I've also been enjoying the writing, so I'm excited about that. I also worked more on my prequel novella that I plan to release on my own and am pleased with how the novella ties in to both Polar Night and to the sequel.

So between the writing progress and my signing event I feel like March was another good month for me. Here's hoping for an even better April.

Have a great weekend, all!

Come Back Teaser & Worlds on Edge Release

Two of my favorite writers/bloggers have new books either on the way or already available and I'm excited to have the opportunity to help spread the word about both of them today.

First up, today is the official launch of the new release by the prolific and mega-talented M. Pax. Worlds on Edge, the fifth entry in the wonderful Backworlds series, is now available! Here is all the info on the book:

The story of the Backworlds continues, and the story of Earth begins.

Worlds on Edge

by M. Pax

Fifth book in the Backworlds series

  

War is coming. A horde of merciless aliens poise just beyond the Edge. In a matter of weeks they will devour the worlds.

Racing ahead of the apocalypse, Craze returns to the Backworlds to warn them and plan a defense. Only he can’t go home. Banned from Pardeep Station, he must wage a more urgent battle. His moon is under siege, and his friends are dying.

Bad things come in threes, and the galaxy is no exception. An old enemy returns, attacking moons and defenseless globes, leaving a wake of destruction. Worse than that, they threaten to join forces with the alien horde.

Defeat seems inevitable. Craze may not be able to stop it. Yet home is worth the fight.

Amazon / AmazonUK / Smashwords / Nook / Other Outlets

Fantasy, science fiction, and the weird beckons to M. Pax, and she blames Oregon for that, a source of endless inspiration. She docents at Pine Mountain Observatory in the summers, teaching the public about the stars and the galaxy. A Bachelors of Science in Journalism, she had former lives in marketing and television before settling down to write. Want to know more? mpaxauthor.com

Congratulations and best of luck to Mary on the latest Backworlds installment!

Next, Melissa Maygrove is releasing her debut novel Come Back soon and will be revealing the novel's cover next week. She is hosting a fun teaser contest all this week in the lead up to the reveal and I am happy to be part of it! Here is the info:

In anticipation of her debut cover reveal on Monday, March 31st, Melissa Maygrove is sharing some teaser images this week. A trivia question has been paired with each one. It’s a contest!

Hop around to participating blogs and collect all 7 answers, then give them to Melissa by Saturday. Your answers don’t have to be correct to win, but you must submit a complete list by the deadline to be entered in the drawing for the giveaway.

The prize is a free e-copy of her book once it’s published and a $10 gift certificate to either Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

‘Sometimes a single choice

alters the course of a person's life forever.’

Come Back
Western Historical Romance
Adult / New Adult
Coming May 2014

Teaser images designed by Carrie Butler,

Forward Authority Design Services

Check Melissa’s blog for links to all the questions. Submit your answers to her email, melissamaygrove(at)gmail(dot)com, or use the contact form found on her blog. *Deadline for entries is Saturday, March 29^th at midnight central time. A randomly drawn winner will be announced in the cover reveal post on her blog on Monday, March 31^st. She’ll list the answers to the questions then, too.

If you’d like to be notified of important events, like cover reveals and releases, consider signing up for Melissa’s newsletter. You can do the on the home page of her website, www.melissamaygrove.com. 

Native Texan Melissa Maygrove is a wife, mother, nurse, freelance editor, and romance writer. When she's not busy caring for her tiny nursery patients or shuttling teenagers back and forth to after-school activities, she's hunched over her laptop, complicating the lives of her imaginary friends and playing matchmaker. Melissa loves books with unpretentious characters and unforgettable romance, and she strives to create those same kinds of stories for her readers.

Huge congratulations and best wishes to Melissa! 

The A to Z Theme Reveal, The Ink Smith Publishing Book Club, and Friday Celebrations

It's time for The Great & Powerful A to Z Theme Reveal hosted by Team Damyanti! To view all of the participants in today's fest and hop around to see their themes, visit the Linky List here.

My theme for this April is an A to Z of the island of Martha's Vineyard. I chose this theme because the island is the setting for my novel The Ghosts of Aquinnah and I had such a great time with my A to Z of Alaska for Polar Night last year that I wanted to do something similar this year.

A big difference though is that I know a great deal about Martha's Vineyard because of family connections and more trips to the island than I can count, whereas I've still never been to Alaska and learned an amazing amount about the state both while researching my novel and while writing the posts for last year's Challenge. I didn't really think I could learn anything new about Martha's Vineyard while writing this year's posts, but I was surprised to find out that I was wrong about that.

So I'm excited to share what I learned and what I already knew throughout April. Anyone who has visited this blog on a regular basis knows I have a great love for the Vineyard, so I am really looking forward to this year's Challenge.

My writing group Untethered Realms is also participating in the A to Z this year, so please stop by our blog here to learn about our theme.

In other news, my publisher Ink Smith has started a new book club which allows members to read featured Ink Smith books for free. After downloading featured books, members can earn rewards points in exchange for reviews. Membership is free with no strings attached, and it's a fun way to discover our books and authors. If you're interested in learning more or signing up visit the club site here.

Finally, we've made it to the end of another week which means it's time to Celebrate the Small Things with Vikki at Scribblings of an Aspiring Author.

I've been hibernating in my writing cave for the past few weeks and today I'm celebrating that my hiding out has paid off and I've made tons of progress on my sequel to Polar Night. Finally! When I wrote Polar Night I had no plans to write a sequel but then I got an idea that kept hopping around in my head and I wanted to run with it. It's been slow going, to put it mildly, but now I finally feel like it's come together. So I'm doing the happy dance and hoping that feeling continues.

Happy Friday and weekend to all!

Over the Ocean Cover Reveal & After the Cataclysm by Inge H. Borg

I'm excited to be able to share two new books by blogger buddies today! 

First up, I'm participating in the cover reveal for Over the Ocean by Georgia St. Mane.

About the book:

When Bree meets Logan, and hears his oh-so-sexy British accent, it's lust at first sight.

Bree thinks Logan feels the same way, especially when they're snuggled up on her couch with his tongue down her throat. But when Logan decides that getting into a relationship when he only has a few months left in the States is a bad idea, Bree agrees to be "just friends."

But every time he flashes his swoon-worthy smile, complete with dimples, Bree has a hard time keeping her thoughts in the "friend zone."

Add Over the Ocean on Goodreads

Teaser:

About the author: 

Georgia St. Mane is married with four kids. She's passionate about writing, reading, and theater. She thinks everyone deserves their own love story. Georgia also writes YA as Rachel Schieffelbein.

Next up, Inge H. Borg has just released her latest title, After the Cataclysm. Here is all the info on the book:

Inge H. Borg’s Book 3 of the Legends of the Winged Scarab series is a dystopian action/adventure that stands alone. However, readers would benefit from having read at least Book 2 - Sirocco, Storm over Land and Sea, whereas Book 1, Khamsin, the Devil Wind of the Nile, is a complete stand-alone with only its artifacts bridging it to its two sequels.

Yellowstone Supervolcano explodes. A ghost ship, the abandoned real Lyubov Orlova, becomes a floating battleground between protagonists from Sirocco, Storm over Land and Sea, Book 2. After the Cataclysm, Book 3 of the Legends of the Winged Scarab series, a dystopian action-adventure novel, plunges straight into this desperate post-apocalyptic world. Egyptologist Naunet Wilkins and her scientist husband Jonathan flee their lawless homeland, accepting an uneasy offer from Egyptian archaeologist Jabari El-Masri, a fugitive from his own country. He was given refuge on Venezuela’s Isla Margarita, owned by the fanatic art collector Lorenzo Dominguez. Did El-Masri barter his Golden Tablets and the expertise of his American friends for his own exile? Once again, Naunet is torn between translating the ancient curses for the ruthless South American billionaire, and saving her future world from the dire prophecies. As another ill-wind blows, she finds her answer.

For a couple of weeks, Inge offers a FREE download of her Book 2 in exchange for an honest review. You’ll also have a chance to win a $10 Gift Certificate from Amazon. Just download Sirocco here.

All of Borg’s books are available in e-book format as well as in print. Read more about them on the following:

Inge H. Borg – Author Pages

Amazon 

Smashwords 

Barnes & Noble 

Goodreads 

Apple

Blogs:

http://devilwinds.blogspot.com/

http://ingehborg.blogspot.com/

Congratulations and best of luck to both Georgia and Inge! 

Night Owl's Spring Fling Scavenger Hunt and Friday Celebrations

I'm really excited to be participating in the Spring Fling Scavenger Hunt at Night Owl Reviews starting on April 1.

I'm one of the Scavenger Hunt sponsors and am offering an ebook bundle prize basket in collaboration with my publishing Ink Smith Publishing. In addition to my books Polar Night and The Ghosts of Aquinnah, the winner of my basket will receive the entire 2013 Ink Smith catalog in ebook format. I'm really grateful to my publisher for taking part in this with me and I'm excited to have the chance to help spread the word about the other Ink Smith authors and their wonderful books.

To win, entrants need to go on a hunt to fill in missing words from the book blurbs in the contest. It's a fun way to learn about lots of new books! To learn more and sign up to play, visit the Night Owl Reviews site here.

This week has gone so quickly that I can't believe it's Friday and time to Celebrate the Small Things again. If you'd like to join the hop, visit Vikki at Scribblings of an Aspiring Author here.

Today I'm celebrating that I finished writing my posts for the A to Z in April Challenge! I know I still have to go back in and proofread them, but it's a great feeling to have the bulk of the work done.

I'm also celebrating what a great time I had co-hosting this month's Insecure Writers' Support Group meeting. It was fun to meet lots of bloggers who were new to me and I am also very grateful for all the advice and support I received about my public speaking anxiety! If I ever need a reminder of how supportive and encouraging this group is all I need to do is look at the comments on that post. Thanks so much to everyone who commented and a special thanks to Liz Blocker, who took the time to e-mail me some public speaking tips she learned while studying acting at Emerson College. If you don't already know Liz, check out her blog here. She totally rocks.

Happy weekend, all!

IWSG: Signings and Panels and Public Speaking, Oh My

It's time for the March meeting of the Insecure Writer's Support Group, hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh, and I am excited to be co-hosting this month! My fellow co-hosts are Tina Downey, Elsie, and Elizabeth Seckman. I'm looking forward to visiting lots of fellow insecure writers today.

In the 1990s Jerry Seinfeld had a joke about a survey of fears which found that public speaking was number one on the list and death was number two. He concluded that if this survey was accurate most people would rather be in the casket than giving the eulogy at a funeral. I guess I wouldn't go that far, but I can't deny that few things bring me more anxiety than public speaking of any kind.

As I mentioned last week in my monthly goals update, I was thrilled to arrange two book signings last month, one in May and another in June, and to be accepted for the Ohioana Book Festival. And I really am thrilled, but I am also a nervous wreck about the presentation that goes along with the June signing and the panel that is part of the book festival.

To say I have a tendency to get tongue-tied when talking to strangers is an understatement. I simply hate speaking in front of people and it almost feels inevitable that I will trip over my words, forget what I was going to say, or somehow make a fool of myself in ways I haven't even thought of yet.

When putting together this post I learned that there is a name for this fear - glossophobia. Apparently "glosso" comes from the Greek word for tongue. Symptoms include:

intense anxiety prior to, or simply at the thought of having to verbally communicate with any group,

avoidance of events which focus the group's attention on individuals in attendance,

physical distress, nausea, or feelings of panic in such circumstances.

I would say that about covers it!

But I'm doing my best to deal with this anxiety and not let it ruin the events for me, and I'm definitely not going to give in to the desire to engage in avoidance of these circumstances. I'm grateful for these opportunities and hope to have more in the future, so I know I need to get control of this fear. Please wish me luck!

Now I'm off to make my co-hosting visits and catch up with the insecurities plaguing my fellow group members. Happy IWSG day, all! :)