Friday, January 30, 2015

Corsica Gate Blast & Giveaway with Robena Grant


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$20.00 Amazon or B&N eGift Card



A heroine who has stopped believing in fairy tales and happy endings, Dia Sophia Romani, jilted three days before her wedding, has lived with Mama in San Diego’s Little Italy for six months. She’s tired of everything Italian, and is ready to move on…

Enter an unlikely hero. Carlo Antonelli is of Italian descent. He adores Dia, but he’s willing to take his time and not rush her. When he learns she will be vacationing in Italy and Corsica, he must step up his game.

Will a wish made at a magical gate destroy, or strengthen, their newfound love?






“You mean…?” She looked back at the guy.

Nah, impossible. I’ve never been that lucky.


“Yeah, that’s Carlo Antonelli.”

“You don’t want to accept the date, just make up whatever excuse you want.” Tony beckoned.

A jolt of heat spread through her abdomen when Carlo grinned and waved. He ducked through the slow moving traffic and stopped in front of her smiling a crooked smile. Pushing his sunglasses onto his head, white teeth flashing, and mahogany eyes sparkling, he held out his right hand.

My wedding date? Her heartbeat pounded, and her mouth went dry.

“You must be Dia.” He tucked the book underneath one arm and held her hand gently with his other big warm hand. “Carlo Antonelli.”

“Yes.” The word came out on a soft breath. She swallowed hard. “Tony mentioned you wanted to speak to me about Marco’s wedding.” Something inside of her shifted, as if a huge iceberg started to melt in her chest and slide sideways, leaving a pool of cool, blue, bubbling water. She floundered for a minute wondering what to say next, because she couldn’t use the word date. Not while looking into his magnificent eyes. Then she remembered he was Italian, or at least part Italian.

Strike one.

Her shoulders stiffened. She had no interest in Italian men. She hitched up the purse onto her shoulder, and squinted from behind the dark sunglasses.



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Robena Grant writes contemporary romance about ordinary women in extraordinary circumstances. Travel and discovering new places brings Robena great pleasure, and she often includes these discoveries in her stories. She is Australian by birth, lives in Southern California, and has two grown children. Robena may be contacted at her website.

Once Loved Guest Post & Giveaway with Cecy Robson


Once Loved

Shattered Past # 2

By: Cecy Robson

Releasing Jan 20th, 2015

Loveswept: Flirt

 

 


Blurb

 

He’s the campus golden boy. She’s picking up the pieces of her broken past. But in Cecy Robson’s scorching novel of second chances—perfect for readers of Monica Murphy and J. Lynn—their differences only make their connection more explosive.

Every memory Lety Tres Santos has from her childhood comes with a scar—some emotional, some physical. Her father is an abusive drug addict, and her mother enables his destructive behavior. College offers Lety a fresh start . . . until her father finds a way to ruin that, too. Now, after losing her scholarship to kick off junior year, Lety must somehow stay in school, pay tuition, and turn a deaf ear to the whispers that follow her. And she intends to do it all without Brody Quaid’s help.

Brody is a lacrosse star, a 4.0 student—and as a freshman, he fell hard for the beautiful and spirited Lety. But their relationship crashed and burned because he couldn’t break through the walls she’s put up around her heart. With Lety hurting more than ever, Brody strives to win her back and make her believe in real love and true partnership. That will mean opening up secrets locked away in his own past—and trusting someone more than he’s ever dared.

Lety knows how painful it can be to depend on the wrong man. She also knows how much Brody wants to do this the right way. But it takes more than sizzling desire to move on and build a future together.

 


Goodreads Link: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22890017-once-loved

 

Buy Links: Amazon | B&N | iTunes | Kobo





Guest Post:

Five Reasons to get Addicted to the Shattered Past Series

 

5.         Mateo Tres Santos― Lead Bouncer at Club Excess, Underground Mixed Martial Arts fighter, and master of swoon worthy moments:

 

His hazel eyes searched mine, holding me in place. “Want to know something?” he asked, his voice so gruff I could feel it. I nodded, but just barely. “Noelle was right about one thing. I do want to kiss you.” His hand reached in through the car window, gliding along my shoulder . . . “Will you let me?”

 

 

4.         Brody Quaid―College campus hunk capable of making you laugh and relieving of your clothes from one hitched breath to the next:

 

  My knees buckled and we fell back against the small entry table. Brody came up for air, swearing briefly before diving back into my mouth. My legs parted, allowing him between them. It wasn’t a conscious effort. It just happened. Everything in me recognized he belonged against me. His hands swept over my back, into my hair, against my ass, luring my kisses deeper.

Shit. I needed to lie down . . . with Brody on top of me.

Someone cleared his throat, rather harshly and rather threateningly, making us jump. Teo loomed in the archway, arms crossed, exposing the tats inked into his forearms. Evie hurried in, her eyes dancing between him and Brody, who kept his hold tight around me. “Teo, we did just as much if not more when we were dating,” she said.

Teo didn’t move.

Brody grinned. “Hey, man. Sorry about that. I thought I dropped my keys down Lety’s throat and I was trying to fish them out with my tongue.”

 

3.         Killian O’Brien―MMA gym owner and Super Heavy Weight fighter out for the title. All muscle and all heart:

 

A breeze cuffed against my face as Killian hoisted Trey and slammed him down onto the desk by his throat. My laptop screen shattered beneath the weight of his back. Trey’s fist shot in the air toward Killian’s face. But as fast as he swung, Killian was faster.

Killian ducked under him and launched him out into the gym. Trey staggered to a stand, his fists coming up, his body wobbling. He knew Killian wasn’t done with him. And now he was the one in trouble.

Killian stalked forward, every muscle of his back tight against his Celtic cross tat, every bulge in his arms signaling he was ready to act. “You fucking touched my girl?” Killian roared at him. “You fucking touched Sofia!”

 

2.         The humor:

 

“Hello?”

“Where the hell are you? You said you’d be back after the game.”

Mateo covered us with the blanket. “Sorry, Lourdes. I decided to stay with Mateo tonight.”

Her brief bout of silence was followed by, “Holy shitballs. You finally had sex!”

I cupped the base of my phone when Mateo busted out laughing, then removed my hand just to yell at her. “Lourdes!”

“Was he good?”

Mateo smirked, waiting for me to answer. “Well?” he asked.

“Aren’t you going to tell me?” she demanded.

I glanced back at Mateo. “Jesus, Lourdes!”

“I bet he was all rough and shit. He looks like the rough-and-shit type.”

I tried to escape into the other room. Mateo hauled me back, still laughing, and pulled me back into bed. “Lourdes, he can hear you!”

She paused, then got mad. “Evelyn, do you have me on speaker?”

“No!”

“You know I hate being on speaker, Evelyn!”

How the hell did I become the bad guy? “Lourdes, I don’t have you on speaker.”

“Then how did he hear me, Evelyn?”

“Because you’re too damn loud!”

Another pause. “I wasn’t that loud,” she said defensively.

I smacked my hand over my eyes, joining Mateo in his laughter.

 

1.         The heart:

            “You broke like a piece of glass, right in front of me.” He swallowed hard. “And it fucking ripped me apart…”

 

Author Info 

CECY ROBSON is the New Adult and Contemporary author of the Shattered Past series, and the award winning author of the Weird Girls Urban Fantasy Romance series. A self-proclaimed professional napper, Cecy counts among her talents a jaw-dropping knowledge of useless trivia, the ability to make her hair big, and a knack for breaking into song, despite her family’s vehement protests. A full-time writer, registered nurse, wife, and mother living in the South, Cecy enjoys spending time with her family and silencing the yappy characters in her head by telling their stories.

 

Author Links: Facebook | Twitter | Website | TSU | Google+








 

Rafflecopter Giveaway ($25.00 eGift Card to Choice Book Seller & Loveswept Mug with Romance at Random Nail Polish)


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Thursday, January 29, 2015

Blame It On The Snow Blitz & Giveaway with Eva Lilly


Snow CoverBlame It On The Snow by: Eva Lilly

Blurb

When the snowstorm of the decade grinds Atlanta to a halt, it traps three young women in situations that could lead to heartbreak instead of frostbite.

Katherine Sutton must choose between freezing by the side of the road and taking shelter in a former lover’s home. When she sees the changes Charlie McAndrew has made to his life, she wonders what woman could have gotten this perpetual Peter Pan to finally grow up.

Emma Lawrence, attorney-at-law, is snowed in at work with only her hunky paralegal for company. She’s spent many billable hours lusting after Jonas King, even though office policy and a secret past keep her from acting on her atop-the-desk fantasies. When Emma finally lets her heart overrule her head, she finds herself with more than water cooler gossip to worry about.

Rhyan Kilpatrick reluctantly offers shelter to her best-friend’s younger brother, the A-list celebrity Ethan Sutton. The last thing she wants is to be snowed in with the well-known party boy, even if he is panty-melting hot. But when Rhyan sees beneath the superficial role he plays to the hilt, she wishes for more than one snowy night together.

Is it love that pushes these three women to take risks? Or can they blame it on the snow?

Pre-order on Amazon

Quote From Book

“Anyone special waiting for you at home?” Charlie asked, stirring his soup.

I wish. Katherine couldn’t let him know she hadn’t had a date in months when he’d obviously moved on to the future mother of his children. “Barney’s been living with me for a few months.”

He closed his eyes, a pained look washing over his face. After a moment he reached for his glass, taking a long sip. “What does he do for a living?” he asked through clenched teeth. What did he have to be jealous about? He was dating Susie-effing-homemaker. But between his jaw ticking and death grip he had on his spoon, he was sucking all the fun out of her make-believe boyfriend. “He mostly licks his butt all day, when he’s not eating my socks or drinking out of the toilet.”

      Snowteaserblitz  

About The Author

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For Eva, there is no better day than one spent with her laptop writing love stories with a naughty twist. She lives in Atlanta with her very supportive family.

 

Connect With Eva Lilly

Twitter/Amazon/Facebook

 

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The Grown Ups Tour & Giveaway with Robin Antalek


 

 

The Grown Ups

A Novel

By: Robin Antalek

Releasing January 27th, 2015

William Morrow

 

 


Blurb

From Robin Antalek, author of The Summer We Fell Apart, comes an evocative and emotionally resonant coming-of-age novel involving three friends who explore what it means to be happy, what it means to grow up, and the difficulties in doing both together. Spanning over a decade, and told in alternating voices, The Grown Ups explores the indelible bonds between friends and family and the challenges that threaten to divide them. It is the addictive and moving story of these old friends who wind up confronting their past in order to find happiness in their adult lives that make this novel an anticipated winter release.

 

Sam Turner, the summer he turns 15, feels lucky enough to enjoy the unexpected attention of his friend Suzie Epstein, even though it’s only a few secret months. For reasons Sam doesn’t entirely understand—and will never question—the budding relationship is kept hidden from their close circle of friends. But before their summer tans can even start to fade, Sam’s world unexpectedly shatters twice: Suzie’s parents are moving away to save their marriage, and his own mother has suddenly left the house, leaving Sam’s father alone to raise two sons.


Watching as her parents’ marital troubles escalate, Suzie Epstein takes on the responsibility of raising her two younger brothers while simultaneously planning an early escape to college to seek independence. Though she occasionally thinks of Sam, it’s her oldest friend Bella Spade she finds herself missing. Embarrassed by the destructive wake of her parents as they left the only place Suzie could call home, Suzie makes no attempt to reconnect with the one person she needs. Its years later that a chance meeting with Sam’s older brother Michael will reunite her with both Sam and Bella—finally forcing her to confront her friends, her past and what she left behind.

 

After losing Suzie, Bella surprisingly finds her first real love in Sam. But his inability to commit to her or even his own future eventually drives them apart. Watching Suzie and Michael as they seem to have worked it all out, Bella’s only to wonder where she went wrong and how to make it right.

 

 


Goodreads Link:  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21936828-the-grown-ups?from_search=true

 

Buy Links Amazon | Barnes | iTunes | IndieBound





 
 

Author Info

Robin Antalek is the author of The Summer We Fell Apart. Her nonfiction writing has been published in literary journals and in several collections, including The Beautiful Anthology; Writing off Script: Writers on the Influence of Cinema; and The Weeklings: Revolution #1 Selected Essays 2012-1013. Her short fiction has appeared in 52 Stories, Five Chapters, Sun Dog, The Southeast Review, and Literary Mama among others. She lives in Saratoga Springs, New York.

 

Author Links:  Website | Tumblr | Facebook | Goodreads






Excerpt

Mrs. Spade died in the winter of their junior year of college and they all returned home for the funeral.

            Bella had called from Vassar to tell Sam. He’d picked up the phone and heard his name and then nothing, just a rush of air across the wires followed by what sounded like a far away howling.  Bella and Sam had continued, despite distance and any real commitment, to find their way back to each other.  She surprised him first at school, showing up at his door, and they had fallen back onto his twin mattress as if they were starving.   It felt exotic, somehow, to be in a place where no one knew them as a couple. To hold hands as they shared crummy food off Sam’s meal ticket at the dining hall, to drink dollar pitchers at The Rat, to wake up next to each other and have sex without talking, like they had the map of what they liked inked indelibly in their brains.  By the time Sam’s roommate returned from his girlfriend’s place, the weekend ended, the buzz would wear off, and Sam would think they wouldn’t do it again.  Until one of them showed up on the doorstep of the other’s room and it started up all over again.  Sam thought this thing with Bella was casual, comfortable. They had never labeled what they were or talked about where it was going. He thought that was what they both wanted. Or maybe they were just too scared to bring it up.  Sam liked things the way they were until something like this happened, and he had no idea how to act or what they meant to each other. 
 Giveaway (3 copies of THE SUMMER WE FELL APART by Robin Antalek)

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Just for Fun: Playlists for The Grown Ups

When I write, if I’m really lucky, I’m really just transcribing this big movie in my head that unrolls and plays on a loop until I put it on paper. That’s the only way I can describe what happens when I’ve really fallen into the story with a group of characters all clamoring to be heard. The songs I picked for Suzie maps out her emotional territory—and add to her life as only a great soundtrack can enhance a movie and sweep you right back into the moment.

 

Suzie Epstein

 

“Pictures of You,” The Cure

Suzie’s discovery of her father’s shoebox of pictures is the catalyst that sets the summer of 1997 in motion and plays a role in linking this group of friends forever.

“Losing My Religion,” R.E.M.

There are multiple layers of meaning here for Suzie. It’s confessional, it’s about pining for someone, and it’s about losing that last tip of civility. Leaving her friends, moving with her family to “start over” even though the new beginning was doomed, losing her virginity, losing her identity. This song is all tied up in what was happening to Suzie Epstein in the years immediately following the

discovery of those photographs.

“Wonderwall,” Oasis

Suzie is as surprised as anyone when she falls in love with Sam’s brother, Michael. She has been on her own for so long, taking care of it all for everyone, that it takes a while for her to understand that Michael is really there for her. It’s not until she begins to trust him that she would ever allow herself the idea of being saved from herself.

 “Just a Girl,” No Doubt

This Gwen Stefani punk girl anthem seemed to embody the meaning of the burden of femininity that Suzie had pushed against for years. Giving Suzie this song when everything is right—med school, fiancé, friends, a generally fulfilled life—seems like less a fight song and more of a “look how far I’ve come” song.

“Back to Black,” Amy Winehouse

Despite everything, Suzie struggles to have a relationship with her mother, Sarah. Ultimately, every interaction leads them in a circle.

“Cry Baby,” Janis Joplin

Suzie is struggling to cope with her first miscarriage, a demanding medical residency, and her relationships with her husband, Bella, and her mother. That raw scrape of Janis Joplin’s vocal chords as she wails Cry baby, cry baby, cry is the opposite of what Suzie allows herself, but what she desperately needs.

“The Drugs Don’t Work,” The Verve

After Suzie suffers several miscarriages in an eighteen-month period, her relationship with Michael nearly collapses.

“Happy Together,” The Turtles

This song is a sweet retro kind of love song that perfectly captures the bliss Suzie feels when she and Michael finally have their baby boy, Leo.

 

 

Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Hells Ink Blitz & Giveaway with Nicole Reed


 

 



 

 

 



Congrats & Happy Release to Nicole Reed! 

Hell’s Ink is LIVE! 



Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/1t2KqFq

Goodreads Link: http://bit.ly/1t2Ls4f

 



 


 

 

Blurb

 

In this Brotherhood you live or die by the three-piece patch. For Hold Dawson, Vice-President of the Hells Highwaymen Motorcycle Club, it’s not just black ink tattooed on his body, but the religion he worships, and the law that governs his life. Nothing else matters. Family by choice and not by blood. More sacred than a shared name. Bound by respect. Loyal to death.

Unity.  Respect.

Love.   Devotion.

Forever.

 

But there’s another side to this life. One the President, Hold’s own father, lives and regulates by.

 

Merciless. Wrathful.

Murderous.    Dishonest.

Lethal.

 

It’s blood in and blood out and only one man gets to be king.

 

 



 

 


 

 

Excerpt: Meet Hold

He watched her slender artist’s hand caress her taut, tattooed abdomen, instantly jealous that it wasn’t his own blunt fingers that idly drifted across her silky flesh. Her eyes flickered with awareness to where he stood at the end of the bed watching her. It only made his balls draw up tight. His rock-hard erection jutted outward, thick and long. He couldn’t halt his hand from massaging it with slow, steady jerks. His teeth burrowed painfully into his bottom lip. - Hell's Ink

 



 

 



 

Additional Books in this Series

 



 Beautiful Ink (Book One) by Nicole Reed

ON SALE NOW!!!!

ONLY $0.99

 



Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/186eC9y




 

 


 

 

Author Information



Nicole Reed is the New York Times Bestselling Author of Ruining You.  She is a true Southern girl, enjoying life with her husband and three children in the peachy state of Georgia.  As a child, she discovered another world between the pages of a book and that has lead to her dream job as a writer.  In 2012, she self-published her first book Ruining Me, and then followed it with Ruining You, Cake, and Wasted Heart.  Her books have also been listed on the overall Top 100 Amazon and Barnes & Noble Bestselling list.  She is represented by Ginger Clark with Curtis Brown, LTD.

 

Stalk Her: Facebook | Twitter | Email | Website | Goodreads


 

 

 


 

 

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$50 Gift Card & Prize Pack including: T-shirt, hat & Signed Paperback



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