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Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Smuggler by Nicholas Fillmore - Book Tour - Guest Post - Giveaway - Enter Daily!


Hi lovelies!  It gives me great pleasure today to host Nicholas Fillmore and his new book, “Smuggler”!  For other stops on his Goddess Fish Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the images in this post.

Be sure to make it to the end of this post to enter to win a $10 Amazon or Barnes and Noble Gift Card!!  Also, come back daily to interact with Nicholas and to increase your chances of winning!

Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you lots of luck in this fabulous giveaway!


Smuggler
by Nicholas Fillmore

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GENRE: Memoir/True Crime

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BLURB:

When twenty-something post-grad Nick Fillmore discovers the zine he’s been recruited to edit is a front for drug profits, he begins a dangerous flirtation with an international heroin smuggling operation and in a matter of months finds himself on a fast ride he doesn’t know how to get off of.

After a bag goes missing in an airport transit lounge he is summoned to West Africa to take a voodoo oath with Nigerian mafia. Bound to drug boss Alhaji, he returns to Europe to put the job right, but in Chicago O’Hare customs agents “blitz” the plane and a courier is arrested.

Thus begins a harried yearlong effort to elude the Feds, prison and a looming existential dead end…. Smuggler relates the real events behind OITNB.

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EXCERPT ONE:

At the other end of the terminal was another set of steel doors—simple double doors leading right out to the street, daylight and fresh air strobing through each time someone exited; cabs lined up and waiting, freedom lingering out there.

I hoisted my bag over my shoulder, bypassing the baggage carousels where a cop was walking around with a dog, and headed towards the doors. A single Customs Agent was perched on a stool to the far right, reading a magazine. As I got about a third of the way there, he seemed to stir. I changed direction ever so slightly.

He roused himself. A small group was moving toward him from the right, but he seemed to ignore them.

I looked out the corner of my eyes for someone, anyone I could fall in behind, but everyone seemed blissfully out of reach—and I imagined this is what it must feel like to drown: to take one last desperate look at help swimming strongly away.

Then the agent sauntered ever so slowly out into the middle of the room. My heart raced. Then he looked up. I saw it coming, could feel it coming. Oblivious to the rest of the herd, he’d singled me out; and for a second I felt I might just swoon right there. Then some sort of instinct kicked in. I resigned myself to being questioned and headed right at him.

For some seconds he hung back as I did my best to play the part of the unassuming traveler.

“Where are you coming from, sir?” he asked, at an angle.

“Paris,” I said.

“Can I see your ticket?”

I handed him my ticket.

“How long were you in Paris?”

“A week.”

“What were you doing there?”

“Business.”

“What kind of business.”

“Magazine. Publishing.”

“What magazine?”

And here I faltered. Nun Civa Orcus. What the hell was that? My mind raced for all sorts of explanations. For a second I considered making something up. But that would only mean trouble. You tend to say stupid things when you veer from the script like that. Someone might ask your name, for instance, and under duress you might say Peter Rabbit or Dick Nixon, who the hell knew? Had he detected my hesitation? I had to speak.

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GUEST POST:

Five Reasons You Should Read My Book

(1) It’s real. The character’s joy and suffering is real. Not to sell the imagination short, but I get the feeling sometimes that the novel is merely voyeuristic, cannibalizing other people’s lives and emotions, or else contriving to order its own experience in such a way as to make easy sense of it … rather than fully grappling with the profound ambiguity of our lives. I don’t mean this in a post-structuralist sense; I still believe in meaning.

(2) It’s relevant to you. Smuggler struggles with timeless personal contradictions: the need to reconcile oneself with one’s friends, family and peers, while suspecting all along that society is a conspiracy against the individual. You don’t have to go to jail to learn this. (It helps.) As such, I think that it brings together emotions and the intellect in the best possible way.

(3) It’s fast and scary and cool.

(4) You travel around the world: West African rhythms with French je ne sais quoi.

(5) I really believe in this book. Both the experience and the writing have been earned at some personal cost. Smuggler grows out of a literary canon: Camus, Orwell, Babel, Nabokov, Chandler, etc. You know, 40, 50 years of study. I may have been a precocious poet, but I’ve been thinking about the prose form for a long time. And I worked on Smuggler over a ten year period. So, it’s not something that’s just thrown together, or a happy accident. Read it and see!

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AUTHOR BIO:


Nicholas Fillmore attended the graduate writing program at University of New Hampshire. He was a finalist for the Juniper Prize in poetry and co-founded and published SQUiD magazine in Provincetown, MA. He is currently at work on Sins of Our Fathers, a family romance and works as a reporter and lecturer in English. He lives on windward Oahu with his wife, his daughter and three dogs.

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CONNECT WITH NICHOLAS:

Website:

Blog:

Email:
nfillmore@hawaii.rr.com

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BOOK BUY LINKS:

Amazon Kindle eBook:

Amazon Paperback:

Barnes and Noble NOOK eBook:

Barnes and Noble Paperback:

Kobo eBook:

The Book Depository Paperback:

BAM! Books-A-Million Paperback:

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GIVEAWAY INFO:

Nicholas will be awarding a $10 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.


**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a purchase is made, I may receive a small commission to help support this blog.  This does not cost you anything, it just helps pay for all those awesome giveaways on here.**

This contest is sponsored by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish Promotions.  Prizes are given away by the sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.

Tuesday, January 29, 2019

For Her Honor by Holly Bush - Blurb Blitz - Giveaway - Enter Daily!


Hi lovelies!  It gives me great pleasure today to host Holly Bush and her new book, “For Her Honor”!  For other stops on her Goddess Fish Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the images in this post.

Be sure to make it to the end of this post to enter to win a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble Gift Card!!  Also, come back daily to interact with Holly and to increase your chances of winning!

Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you lots of luck in this fabulous giveaway!


For Her Honor
by Holly Bush

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GENRE: Historical Romance

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BLURB:

1873 –
Adam Gentry, heir to the celebrated Paradise Stables in Virginia, is haunted by the visions of his lost love. Feeling cursed by fate, he slips deeper into grief, shrouded in a cloud of liquor and depression, and neglects his duties and responsibilities. But when Adam is forced to accept that there’s nothing he can do to change his past, he knows he must move on.

And he accepts his own destiny: that he will never love again.
Emmaline Somerset finds herself in the worst possible position any unmarried woman can be in. She will have to abandon all of her plans, hopes, and dreams for an independence using her own talents. The only viable solution is to move to a distant relative’s home and reinvent herself as a widow with an infant. No one will ever be the wiser.

Adam, now determined to secure the Gentry legacy, plans to save longtime family friend Emmaline from her embarrassment with an offer of marriage. But what Adam didn’t plan on was how his unexpected attraction to her would stir something inside of him, something he's kept locked deep within.

Can love finds its way between two troubled souls, one driven by duty, the other by honor, both determined to find their way home?

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EXCERPT THREE:

Adam thought that she really did need some rest as it seemed to him she was holding herself upright by sheer will alone. He stood at his place. Everyone turned their heads to him as if he would be giving another toast like Matt had done, making everyone chuckle, and then Jim, whose wishes for them had everyone in the room misty-eyed, including him. But his mother and Mrs. Somerset, his mother-in-law, strange as that sounded, both looked at Emmaline and stood.

“Come along now,” Louise said to Jane and Phillip and Betsy and motioning to Edwin to help her from her chair. “This has been a long day and I am exhausted.”

“Yes. I am as well,” Eleanor said. “And these children have near worn themselves out.”

Everyone drifted to the front hallway, gathering wraps and kissing children. Jim had Nettie’s two in his arms, carrying them outside to their carriage. Adam helped Louise into her seat and kissed her cheek as Edwin gathered the reins and nodded at him.

“See that Emmaline lies down, won’t you, Adam? I’m so worried for her,” Louise said.

“Of course. It’s been a trying week, but I think it was a beautiful and memorable day.”

She nodded and looked at him with watery eyes. “It has. Thank you.”

Matt and Annie were walking home, and he waved at them after kissing the children and thanking them. He went back inside and found Emmaline hurrying to the door.

“Tell mother to wait,” she began and then looked at him, her face going scarlet. “I don’t live there anymore, do I?”

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AUTHOR BIO:


Holly Bush writes historical romance set on the American Prairie, in Victorian England, and recently released her first Women’s Fiction title. Her books are described as emotional, with heartfelt, sexy romance. She makes her home with her husband in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.

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CONNECT WITH HOLLY:

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Email:
holly@hollybushbooks.com

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Amazon Author Page:

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BOOK BUY LINKS:

Amazon Kindle:

Barnes and Noble Nook Ebook:

Kobo Ebook:

Apple iBooks Ebook:

Google Play Ebook:

The Book Depository Paperback:

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GIVEAWAY INFO:

Holly will be awarding a $25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.


**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a purchase made I may receive a small commission to help support this blog.  This does not cost you anything, it just helps pay for all those awesome giveaways on here.**

This contest is sponsored by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish Promotions.  Prizes are given away by the sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.

Monday, January 28, 2019

Tailwinds Past Florence by Doug Walsh - Book Blast - Giveaway - Enter Daily!


Hi lovelies!  It gives me great pleasure today to host fellow Pacific Northwesterner Doug Walsh and his new book, “Tailwinds Past Florence”!  For other stops on his Goddess Fish Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the images in this post.

Be sure to make it to the end of this post to enter to win a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble Gift Card!!  Also, come back daily to interact with Doug and to increase your chances of winning!

Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you lots of luck in this fabulous giveaway!


Tailwinds Past Florence
by Doug Walsh

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GENRE: Contemporary Romance

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BLURB:

After getting blacklisted from the venture capital industry, twenty-nine-year-old Edward Vaughan will do anything to avoid telling his wife what happened. Even if it means agreeing to her dream of bicycling around the world. Kara, tired of being married to a workaholic, was readying for a divorce. Now, she’s packing bags of a different kind. Together, they pedal away from Seattle, headed east on the open road across America, Europe, and beyond.

Theirs is a decision that reverberates across centuries, shattering a continuum that bound their souls throughout time, and traps Edward in a battle with a past life over an eternal love.

As the miles roll by, and the couple's sordid secrets begin to surface, the couple encounters several men plucked from history, each one a vessel of Edward’s soul in a prior life. Of them, a 19th century art dealer proves dangerous, believing Kara is his ticket back to the past.

Tailwinds Past Florence is a contemporary love story with a magical twist, landing readers in the saddle of a global bicycle adventure.

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EXCERPT TWO:


Kara clutched her chest as her breathing returned to normal. It was one thing not to know why he wasn’t at work, it was another for him to be hiding behind the door. What the hell, Edward. She bent to pick up her dropped keys. “You’re home.” It came out more statement than question.

“Long story. Why didn’t you cover your eyes?”

She raised her hands in answer. They held a gym bag, purse, keys, and an envelope she’d somehow forgotten about in the commotion. “You didn’t give me any time,” she said. Then, noticing the map—her map—and the champagne, asked, “What’s all this?”

“This,” he said, grinning like a schoolboy about to receive his first kiss, “is a change of plans.”

Her mouth fell open as she processed what she was hearing. Kara spent months asking him to take time off, hoping he’d see how important the trip was to her, practically begging. She tore the map down after the holidays, after diplomatic overtures had failed. She’d been holding a bomb ever since, delaying the inevitable. Now, with her self-imposed deadline having come and gone, he wanted to do it.

Today? You’ve got to be kidding me, she thought, clutching the envelope, dumbstruck.

“I thought you’d be excited.” His smile drooped.

“I … I am,” she stammered. “I think. You have to admit, it’s a lot to swallow.”

“You still want to go, right?”

Did she? It’d be an incredible adventure, a badge she’d wear the rest of her life. But, to Kara, cycling around the world was a means to an end. Her gaze drifted to the map, the promise held within its Sharpie itinerary. The promise of change, of resurrecting the man she married, her best friend and lover. For three years, it’d be just the two of them, reforging their bond against the anvil of the open road. And if her plan didn’t succeed, if he returned to his workaholic ways when it was over, she’d at least know she tried.

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AUTHOR BIO:


Doug Walsh made his fiction debut with Tailwinds Past Florence, a road-tripping love story with a magical twist, inspired by the two years he spent cycling the world. The novel was a prizewinner in the PNWA Literary Contest. He's also authored One Lousy Pirate, a travel memoir, and over one hundred officially-licensed video game strategy guides. Travel guides to fictitious places, as he likes to call them. Originally from New Jersey, he now lives and plays in the mountains of western Washington.

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CONNECT WITH DOUG:

Doug’s beautiful dog, Juniper, ready to play!

Website:

Blog:

Newsletter:

Email:
doug@dougwalsh.com

Facebook:

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BookBub Author Page:

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Amazon Author Page:

Doug’s gorgeous furbaby, Juniper, enjoying a lovely walk through the leaves!

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BOOK BUY LINKS:

Amazon Kindle:

Amazon Paperback:

Barnes and Noble NOOK eBook:

Barnes and Noble Paperback:

Kobo eBook:

The Book Depository Paperback:

BAM! Books-A-Million Paperback:

IndieBound Paperback:

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GIVEAWAY INFO:

Doug will be awarding a $25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.


**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a purchase is made, I may receive a small commission to help support this blog.  This does not cost you anything, it just helps pay for all those awesome giveaways on here.**

This contest is sponsored by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish Promotions.  Prizes are given away by the sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.