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Wednesday, August 20, 2025

The Rebellious Countess by Helene Matheson - Book Tour - Book Blast - Giveaway - Enter Daily!

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Helene Matheson will be awarding a $10 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card (Winner's Choice!!!) to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Society may be run by the men of the ton, but six scandalous sisters are determined to take it by storm one gentleman at a time.

Máira Blair married for love, her honeymoon trip with the Earl of Dorset is a dream come true—until reality turns it into a nightmare. Máira wakes up to discover her husband isn’t an earl, but the captain of a pirate ship and what was supposed to be her honeymoon, is a voyage bound for war-torn France. If that isn’t enough to disparage her husband’s character, he abandons her in the middle of a French port where she must find a way to survive as she defends her virtue and her life. Just when she’s convinced of what kind of rogue she married, the pirate transforms into a hero on a quest to save her and the missing Earl of Astley.

Sir Elias Drake married for convenience, he needed a Scottish bride to complete his mission. He can resist his desire for his beautiful wife, especially after she discovers his true identity. Except Máira Blair was more than he bargained for. He needs her skills, cherishes her compassion, and is tormented by her passion, which only makes him want her and the life their marriage represents more.

It will require both of their talents to rescue the Earl of Astley, and it will take more than a war to defeat their hard-won love—if they can escape.

EXCERPT THREE:


“Máira…” He took a step toward her, wanting to take her into his arms and erase the horrors she’d experienced in the hours since he saw her last. The way she quickly moved to keep distance between them, nearly gutted him and he stopped before he made her run out the door she’d just entered.

“You look as if you fought off the demons of hell and somehow won. Are you alright?” He asked.

The noise she made was decidedly unfeminine and nothing like the woman he knew. Somewhere between a snort and a growl, it was attached to a sneer that only hatred could form. “I’m breathing, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Breathing?” Holy, bloody hell. What had he done? He was going to kill Peter and every one of his crew for not looking out for her. “I meant, do we need to fetch a surgeon?” He spoke softly, as if that would keep their conversation private in the middle of a tavern with every eye and ear observing them with avid curiosity. If he were lucky, only the barkeep and her henchman, and spoke English.

“Are you worried about my reputation? My virtue? My life? Or are you worried that I still stand on this green Earth?” Her hand rose to her chest in a display of mock distress. It succeeded in drawing every eye in the place to her damned feminine curves.

He glared at the men around him, some looked away sheepishly, others didn’t care. They would look their fill unless he challenged each and every one of them.

AUTHOR BIO & LINKS:

Helene Matheson writes steamy regency historical romance novels with intelligent, unstoppable heroines who don’t require an alpha male to save them—having one in their bed is another story.

Helene moved south for fun in the sun after she retired from public service and began pursuing her life-long dream of writing. She wrote the Amazon best-selling mystery series The Book Barn Mysteries for Lyrical Press and has written multiple award-winning romantic suspense novels under Kym Roberts.

In her spare time she can be found woodcarving by the pool or blogging for The Cozy Corner on Fresh Fiction. To contact her on social media, you can find her under KymRoberts911 on FaceBook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest. Her books can also be found on her websites.

Helene Matheson:

Thursday, August 14, 2025

Ghosted by Lori Matsourani - Book Tour - Book Blast - Giveaway - Enter Daily!

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Lori Matsourani will be awarding a $20 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card (Winner's Choice!!!) to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour. Also, the author has organized a Goodreads giveaway for the book: https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/418301-ghosted.
When her fiancé’s infidelity prompts Bethany Hendren to map out a new path forward, her plans are disrupted by an unexpected encounter with Nick Dorsey, who convinces her to help search for the remains of a troubled eighteenth-century ghost. Nick is the handsome summer boyfriend who ghosted her years ago, and now he wants to rekindle their relationship.

Despite her reluctance to trust him, Bethany discovers he’s still the funny, caring person who captured her heart as a teen, but giving him a second chance is risky—it could lead to love and happiness or result in another devastating heartache.

Although Bethany wants a happily ever after with Nick, does she have the courage to trust him with her future?
EXCERPT TWO:

The fountain that night was magical. Spotlights positioned at the edges of the narrow brick patio lit the cast-iron maiden as she filled her goblet from an urn with a never-ending flow of water.

Nick stopped and retrieved his dime. Bethany fished a penny out of her pocket, and they counted to three before flinging their coins into the pool.

After settling on a nearby bench, he drew her into his arms. Was this it? The moment she’d wondered about, waited for? She looked up into his eyes and inhaled, filling her lungs with the scent of sunscreen and salty air. His scent. Then he leaned down, touched her cheek with his index finger, and brushed his mouth against hers. His lips, spiced with traces of red pepper flakes, were softer than she had imagined. Without thinking, she lifted her face to his, hungrily snatching more kisses until she’d spent her last breath.

“My wish came true,” he’d murmured, tightening his arms around her as his mouth rested on hers.

She’d whispered back, “So did mine.”

The memory dredged up the old ache, now muted by time. Nick thought they were still friends, although he’d been the one who ended their relationship. Was it possible he still thought about her, and his heart still pounded with the chemistry that had pulled them together so long ago?

AUTHOR BIO & LINKS:
Author Lori Matsourani is a romance addict. Give her stories with a touch of heartbreak and a spark of joy, and she’s happy. Throw in characters with a huge helping of heart and soul, and she’s up reading all night in romance heaven! While currently a Texas resident, Lori grew up near Baltimore and often draws on the historical flavor of Annapolis and Maryland’s Eastern Shore to inspire her story settings. She authored her first fiction story at twelve and has been hooked on writing ever since. Early on, her writing career focused on articles for magazines and newspapers before shifting to her first writing love—fiction. For Lori, connecting words to tell a story is like assembling a jigsaw puzzle, and she loves the challenge of creating every piece.

Website: https://lorimatsourani.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lori.matsourani
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lori.matsourani/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/lori_matsourani
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/lori-matsourani.bsky.social
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@lori.matsourani
X: https://x.com/LoriMatsourani
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@alloriannam

BOOK BUY LINKS:

https://books2read.com/lorimatsourani
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F9XCPLYD/thewildrosepr-20
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ghosted-lori-matsourani/1147463084
https://books.apple.com/us/book/ghosted/id6746414091
https://wildrosepress.com/product/ghosted/

GIVEAWAY:

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Wednesday, August 13, 2025

I Have A Story by Colleen L. Donnelly - Book Tour - Exclusive Excerpt - Giveaway - Enter Daily!


I Have A Story
by Colleen L. Donnelly

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GENRE:   Historical Romance

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BOOK BLURB:

Jim Turner writes crime but doesn’t live it. He respects his grandfather’s tales of heroes but doesn’t believe them. When his failing grandfather sends him to a remote peninsula to write the end of his own heroic love story, Jim includes a war criminal interview to maintain his edge.

Chastity is an anomaly, a misfit in pre-WWII culture as well as in Jim’s life. Her spritely charm and endearing features turn Jim’s world upside down, especially when she reveals his grandfather’s peninsula as the site of her upcoming wedding.

Do good journalists flee when their interviewee is murdered? Do heroes write fiancés out of another’s story and themselves in? “The End” become the hardest words for Jim to write.

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EXCLUSIVE EXCERPT:

Author's Note: Boy meets Girl. Can he set his writing career aside to help plan her wedding…to another man?

“We have so much to do. You know how much work weddings are.” She pinched her lips. “Well, you probably don’t know. But you will.”

Now it was my turn to blush. She probably hadn’t read my books, but she certainly exhibited an uncanny knack for reading me. “If you mean because I’ve never married…” Or even dated with any frequency…

“It’s okay.” She came close. She smelled like her home, a wash of fresh breezes with a swirl of soft color.

I wanted to cup that pretty face in my hands and stare at it forever.

She patted my arm, more maternally than passionately, sending my fantasy out the window. “You can follow my lead. I know what to do. And… Wait. You’re not in the middle of writing a book right now, are you?”

I was. This one. Everything else could wait. “I’m available,” I lied to her worried expression and to myself. “Just tell me what to do.”

“Wonderful!” She bounced on her toes, long legs exposed beneath shorts far too short for current fashions. Pink shorts, instead of the bland fabric most often available due to a predicted war, dangled half hidden below a billowy shirt I could almost see through. “To start with…” Her voice broke my search for what I couldn’t see. “We need to choose a place for the ceremony, design and send invitations, write an announcement for the newspaper, decide on cake and food, pick and arrange loads of flowers, finish my dress…”

“Wait. All of that? In three days?” I didn’t know a thing about weddings, but I knew a well-executed assassination took more than three days to plan and pull off.

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AUTHOR BIO:

Colleen L. Donnelly put her science education to use for years and then put it behind her to pursue other passions. Her first love is writing and her second is hunting—hunting for that next good story, hunting for relics and antiques, hunting for the next good author to read. An avid believer in work hard/play hard, Colleen splits her time between indoors and out, always busy at something.

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CONNECT WITH COLLEEN:

BookBub Author Page:

BookBub Book Page:

Website:

Facebook:

Goodreads Author Page:

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Instagram:

Amazon:

Twitter:

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BOOK BUY LINKS:

Amazon US Kindle eBook:

Amazon CA Kindle eBook:

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GIVEAWAY INFO:

Colleen will be awarding a $15 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card (Winner's Choice!!!) to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter at the end of the tour.




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Wednesday, August 6, 2025

Blood in the Shadows by Hawk MacKinney - Book Tour - Book Blast - Giveaway - Enter Daily!

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Hawk MacKinney will be awarding a $20 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card (Winner's Choice!!!) to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

When marine buddy, Gulfport, Mississippi Sheriff asks Craige Ingram for help, Ingram and Buckingham Parish patrolman ‘Badger’ Thomas Boback find themselves in the summertime dogdays of the humid Gulf Coast. With crowded beaches and an undermanned staff, a routine investigation soon becomes anything but routine when indescribable body parts start showing up along the surf, in beachfront cabins, half-buried in bayou wetlands, stashed under freeway bridges, and across county lines. Craige’s search for answers to identifying victims and killer among the crowds of tourists and skin-and-sun partygoers soon makes it obvious the victims have no connection with one another—until conflicting DNA results and haunting premonitions resembling the warnings Craige’s grannie often had become part of the investigation. The jigsaw of abandoned cross-kin offspring begin a horrifying Gordian Knot tangle that threatens anyone who approaches the shadowy ancient wreck of an old mansion - an asylum from a lost time.

EXCERPT TWO:


Romona Cowan stepped back and looked at her handiwork. Black goop, flaxseed, and smelly oil-based paint dripped from the brush in her hand. With two fingers she gingerly propped the framed sign against the rusty decorative iron corner post. The sign canted off-center on the post, a singular reminder of the elegance of the iron fence that once stood around the small postage-stamp of a front yard. She took another look. Fingers, hands, one sleeve of her work shirt, and yard jeans were paint-smeared. Days ago, when she brushed the leaf litter off the fallen sign, the lettering was hardly visible, and she thought she might have to buy wood for a new sign. Penny-wise Ramona decided on a can of paint instead. The paint had peeled, left the frame bare in spots, but it hadn’t rotted. For someone who’d always been told she could never do nothing right, her Gran’mère Nana’s fixed-up sign come out looking nice and bright. The letters came out wobbly in a couple of places, but from the street no one would notice. She gave it a last here and-there touch-up.

Madame Nana Rowena
PALMISTRY READINGS by appointment

She said to herself, “Nana doesn’t want to do readings anymore. I’ll tell anyone that comes in I’m her granddaughter, Mademoiselle Ra mona.” With a soft mumble, “No point changing what ever’body expects.” She’d put the sign out in the sun and take it inside at night. Let it dry a couple or three days, then stick it out in the front yard where Gran’mère Nana first put it up. Right out there where folks driving along the beach in their fancy cars could see it real clear. The sign looked almost brand new. It would make those prissy rich kids that snobbed her in school because she was different jealous all over again. Besides, school was boring; a good enough reason to drop out.

AUTHOR BIO & LINK:

Hawk MacKinney has authored several award-winning works of fiction that include THE MOCCASIN HOLLOW MYSTERY SERIES and THE CAIRNS OF SAINCTUARIE SCIENCE FICTION SERIES. His historical romance MOCCASIN TRACE was nominated for the prestigious Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the Writers Notes Book Award.

Cross-genre character-driven plots reflect Hawk MacKinney’s southwest upbringing along the Texas and Oklahoma borders. With postgraduate faculty positions in several medical universities, Hawk MacKinney has taught graduate courses in both the United States and Jerusalem.

Website: