A PAGE STRAIGHT FROM GINGER SIMPSON #apagestraightfrom

White Heart, Lakota Spirit

by

Ginger Simpson

 Her gaze dropped to examine her hands. Her once-manicured nails were now jagged from hard work, and scraping countless

animals hides had calloused her palms. Gone was the naive and helpless Cecile, and in her place, Green Eyes, a woman who decorated clothing with beautiful quills, made moccasins from softened hides, and even erected tepees.

During their trip to the village, Lone Eagle had kept assuring her she would be safe, but the Sioux’s reception made her question his promise. Curious at first, then angry, the villagers demanded to know why he had brought a white woman to their home. But, little by little she gained their acceptance, and found peace and contentment with the very people she thought hated her.

A few loving faces crossed her mind—Rain Woman, her Un`ci

or grandmother, the tribe’s beloved medicine woman, with her

leathery complexion and toothless grin. And Little Dove, petite and delicately featured, a treasured friend and sister-in-law. Both had been among the first to offer their friendship. Spotted Doe,

Green Eyes’ only real enemy, was dead because she couldn’t accept that Lone Eagle chose a white woman over her. In a pursuit to find where Spotted Doe had hidden Green Eye’s son, the frantic

woman lost her footing and fell to her death. Where had the past eight years gone?

Somewhere in the village another sorrowful cry drew her thoughts back to present–the irony struck her. Today, amongst all the grief, came a reason to celebrate. Lone Eagle would become

the new chief.

This book was published by Eternal Press and is available on my Amazon page in both download and print.  If you know about history between the red and whites, then you will understand  this book is in no way sexist, and I certainly don't see how someone could compare my beautiful cover to something from Fredericks of Hollywood.  These are just some of the comments made by trolls on Amazon, so if you like what you read, I'd appreciate a REAL review.  I'm so pleased that Amazon has changed the review process so that people actually have to READ the book in order to leave comments.

A Page Straight from Juliet Waldron #apagestraightfrom

Black Magic

by

Juliet Waldron

. 
Goran, the now grown son of Red Caterina and Christophe (as told in Red Magic) encounters a shocking destiny when he returns from years of soldiering to the Heldenberg.

  From Book 2 of the Magic Colours series:          

With an unearthly scream, Count hurled himself forward. For an instant Goran froze, watching as a green miasma flared, as the eye teeth extended. The Count’s long handsome face lengthened; his mouth became a forest of gleaming ivory, his breath an opened sepulcher.

            “Despair and Die, poor fool!”

            Blood beat in Goran’s forehead, in his loins, in his chest. The horns exploded, and he towered over the Count, his body a rippling, muscled mass. Flames shot from his eyes and spat through cracks in his black sinewy hide. He raised an arm, made a fist and roared with such rage that the stone walls of the Raptor’s Nest rocked. 

            “Corpse! Be gone! 

            The Count fell back, raised a hand to ward off the blow. The green orb protecting him wavered. Surprise twisted his features. His pale lips moved rapidly; he cowered. For an instant, he seemed only an elderly gentleman, dressed in shabby, antique clothing. As Goran reached, wanting nothing more than to grasp and crush him, when the green orb changed to black. It coalesced and fell, leaving only a heaving, crackling sooty mass upon the floor. 

            “Mary is mine!” The Count’s last words hung in the air.

             Goran blinked. The spot where the vampire had stood was marked only with a glowing pillow of creosote, like the oily residue of a chimney fire.

             Goran turned around and around in the great room. He was alone, with only the neatly covered furniture and expensive hangings for company. Furious, he threw back his horned head and roared, then stamped and stamped again. The Italian mosaic fractured; the ground beneath the floor shook. He stamped harder, crashed his giant frame into the painted walls till they cracked. A chunk of ceiling fell. He raised his arms and bellowed, called to the over-looking Heldenberg.

             The ground beneath his feet groaned and then swayed. Glass shattered as the great row of eastern windows blew out, but that only served to fuel his fury. He threw furniture through the opening and pulled down the priceless hangings. As his claws grazed wood and fabric, it burst into flame.

             Finally, he hurled himself through the broken windows, and changed again, without so much as an instant’s forethought, into a Langenmeier, long wings spread across the void. Black clouds swirled and boiled down from the heights like an avalanche of darkness. Lightning struck the roof again and again, blasting away slates.

             Below, something enormous moved on the mountain, a huge boulder parting from a stone outcrop directly uphill from the mansion. Slowly, shearing, grinding, and then gathering speed, it bowled toward The Raptor’s Nest.

             Goran exulted when he recognized it—not a boulder at all, but a squat troll, like the one he’d seen on the day he’d rescued the baby Steenbock. Misshapen and gray, bracken waved upon its knobby head. It sometimes rolled and sometimes waddled, thick legs angled wide. With a thunderous crash, it struck the side of the building. Bricks flew into the air; the many-turreted roof began a balletic inward collapse.

             With a deafening roar, the storm arrived, saturating the air with icy water. Goran stretched his wings and pushed away into the rain, aiming for a distant clear line. Studded with twinkling stars, it lay due west.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Coming soon--(I hope October) from Books We Love.
 
 http://yesterrdayrevisitedhere.blogspot.com/

See All my historical novels @
http://bookswelove.net/julietwaldron.php
http://www.julietwaldron.com
 
 

A Page Straight From Joan Donaldson-Yarmey #apagestraightfrom

The following is from the first chapter of my novel Illegally Dead, the first book of my Travelling Detective Series. All three books of the series come in a boxed set.

  

After scouting the yard Dick backed his truck into the driveway, trying to maneuver as close as possible to the septic tank. He grabbed the handle on the concrete lid and pulled. It didn’t budge. He gritted his teeth and tried again. This time he was just able to raise it and then drop it on the grass. Dick caught his breath. In his younger days he would have lifted it off easily. Peering in, he immediately noticed the crack in one wall, not big enough to allow the liquids to dry up but probably the reason the other tank had been installed.

       Dick grunted as he unraveled the hose. It seemed to get heavier every day. He dropped it in the solids before starting the suction motor. The hose vibrated slightly as it sucked up the sludge.

       Letting the machine do its work, Dick took refuge in the shade beside the house and breathed in the fresh air. He'd been in the business for a total of thirty‑seven years, first with his father and then on his own, and he still hadn't grown used to the smell. As he waited, he thought again about retiring. It was time. But if he wanted a change he'd have to sell. Unlike his father, he had no son or daughter to carry on the business, and he'd never married. The only love of his life had rejected him many years ago.

      Ben Drummond's offer to purchase his truck might be the best way out. It was a fair price, since the truck was an older model but Ben wasn't interested in paying for the customer base. After all, as he said, there were no signed contracts. Dick knew Ben could set up his own business and quite competitively too if he wanted. Retaining his customers would be a fight and he didn’t have the desire to do that anymore. So he might as well get what he could for the truck and be finished with it.

       As he walked over to check the progress of the pump, something leaning at an angle in one corner of the tank caught his eye. He stopped in mid-stride then scrambled to shut off the motor and went back for a closer look.

       A bone. Only the whitish, knobby end showed but by judging the remaining depth of the tank, he could tell that it was long. Probably a leg bone. However, it wasn’t as thick as cow bones he’d seen and looked sturdier than deer bones. He tried to remember the X-ray he’d been shown of his own broken leg many years ago. Didn’t it have a knobby end something like this one?

       A chill ran down his back as Dick straightened up and moved away from the tank. His mind began to race. If it was a human leg bone, what was it doing here? Whose was it? Even more disturbing, who had put it here?

  

 Bio

Joan Donaldson-Yarmey was born in New Westminster, B.C. and raised in Edmonton, Alberta. She married soon after graduation and moved to a farm where she had two children. She has worked as a bartender, hotel maid, cashier, bank teller, bookkeeper, printing press operator, meat wrapper, gold prospector, warehouse shipper, house renovator and nursing attendant. During that time she raised her two children and helped raise three step-children. She also had travel and historical articles published in magazines.

       Between 1990 and 2000 Joan researched and wrote seven Backroads Series books about Alberta, B.C., the Yukon and Alaska that were published by Lone Pine Publishing in Edmonton, AB.

       Joan has now switched to fiction writing and has written and had published three mystery novels, Illegally Dead, The Only Shadow In The House, andWhistler's Murder in what she calls her Travelling Detective Series. She has also had poems and short stories published.

       Joan loves change so she has moved over thirty times in her life, living on acreages and farms and in small towns and cities throughout Alberta and B.C. She now lives on an acreage in the Port Alberni Valley on Vancouver Island with her husband, four female cats, and one stray male cat.

http://thetravellingdetectiveseries.blogspot.com/

http://www.facebook.com/writingsbyjoan

Books of The Travelling Detective Series boxed set:

Illegally Dead

The Only Shadow In The House

Whistler's Murder

To buy the boxed set of The Travelling Detective Series click on the link below.

http://amzn.com/B00KF07FQM

A Page Straight From Anita Seymour #apagestraightfrom

The Rebel's Daughter

by

Anita Seymour

The rebel soldier raised his musket slowly, but before he could take aim, Bayle lunged, both hands clamped round the man’s throat.

Helena gasped as together, they tumbled onto the road, with Bayle’s full weight on top of the soldier, who had no chance to cry out.

In the instant it took for his companion to register what was happening, without thinking, Helena leapt down from the cart and swept the second musket from the ground.

The soldier froze, both hands held up in surrender, his eyes going from her face to the gun and back again.

Aware she could never work out how to fire the weapon in time, even if it was loaded, anger and desperation gave her strength as she swung it in a wide arc, catching the butt on the side of his head.
The soldier hit the ground with a dull thump, and stayed there.

With no hand on the rein, the startled horses crabbed sideways, the rear wheels threatening to crush Bayle and the soldier beneath him.

Dropping the musket, Helena ran to the front of the cart and grabbed the reins, stilling the horses.
Bayle’s superior weight pinned the officer to the road, though he flailed uselessly with both arms. Bayle scrambled to his knees, pulled his arm back and punched the man squarely in the face. The flailing stopped as the man lost consciousness.

Torn between trying to help and keeping the cart still, Helena could only watch with growing horror as the soldier she had hit stumbled to his feet and pulled a knife from his belt. He must have still been stunned as he swayed, and staggered towards Helena.

She opened her mouth to shout, but just then Bayle yelled, “Helena, Move!”

Instinctively, she threw herself sideways away from the cart, hit the ground and lay still just as a shot echoed across the fields, sending up a flock of crows in a nearby tree, dying away quickly into the afternoon quiet.

She rolled over, in time to see the soldier’s eyes widen in shock. He crumpled to his knees as a crimson bloom spread over the front of his shirt. The knife fell from his hand and with a final grunt, he fell forwards onto the road.

Shaking, Helena scrambled to her feet and staggered toward the cart, grabbing at the reins just as the wheels began to turn again. A groan came from the man on the ground behind them. Helena was about to call out in warning, but in two strides, Bayle raised the musket he had just fired and brought the wooden butt down on the man’s temple with a sickening crack.

Helena thrust her fist into her mouth to muffle a scream, transfixed by the unnatural dent in the man’s skull. She looked down at her skirt, where spots of blood soaked into the fabric.

The metallic tang of blood filled the air. The horses snorted in panic and strained against the reins, taking all Helena’s strength to keep them from bolting. When she could bring herself to look, Bayle was dragging the shot soldier toward a deep ditch at the side of the road.

“There should have been six of them,” Bayle grunted as with a final heave, the body rolled into the ditch, flattening the long grass on the incline.

“Help me,” Bayle instructed, indicating the second man.

Her chest heaved and she widened her eyes in shock, but bracing herself, she gripped the end of the soldier’s long buff coat and with Bayle bearing most of the weight, they inched toward the ditch.
Helena closed her eyes as the body disappeared over the side, though it made no sound.

“They are visible if one stands here,” Bayle said, “Though I doubt they can be spotted by a casual observer from the road.

“How long before they find them, do you think?” Helena asked.

“The others, if there are any, could be back at any time.” Bayle jerked his head toward the road ahead. “They are always in packs, like dogs.” He collected the other musket and threw both guns in after them.

“What about their horses?” Helena nodded toward the docile animals grazing a few feet away.

“We’ll get rid of anything which marks them out as soldiers” mounts, then turn them out in that field over there.” Bayle nodded to a meadow beyond the hedge.

While Bayle removed the saddles, Helena grabbed the trooper’s hats, knapsacks and cooking utensils, which joined the bodies in the ditch.

By the time she had finished, her chest burned with the effort and the emotional toll of what they had done. What she had done.

The soldier’s knife lay where he had dropped it, but she couldn’t bring herself to return to the ditch, and instead, tucked it into the pocket of her skirt. A skirt with blood on it, which she intended to burn at her first opportunity.

Bayle helped her back onto her seat and climbed in beside her. ‘Now let’s go home.’

Helena nodded, her hands thrust between her knees to stop their shaking, her bottom lip gripped between her teeth, but she could not get the image of the dead soldier’s battered skull out of her head.
“We-we killed two men, Bayle.”

He flicked the reins against the flank of the nearest horse, his gaze straight ahead. “Forget them, and tell no one what happened today. Ever.”

Buy Link 
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A Page Straight From Nancy Bell #apagestraightfrom

Laurel’s Quest

by

Nancy Bell

Laurel looked at Aisling, who had been strangely quiet through the whole conversation. Aisling was staring intently at the bottom right square of the rainy kitchen window. She narrowed her eyes trying to see what her friend was looking at. All Laurel could make out was the black rain running down the panes of glass like tears. Suddenly, Aisling sat up, and her face brightened. She jumped out of her chair and headed for the door into the back garden. Laurel looked around the room and met Sarie’s inscrutable gaze.

“Where are you going in such a hurry, Aisling child?” Sarie asked quietly.

“There’s someone in the garden I need to talk to,” Aisling said over her shoulder, as she opened the door on the wet windy night.

“Won’t you need a coat?” Laurel got to her feet and grabbed Emily’s heavy shawl from the back of a chair. She hesitated, uncertain whether she should follow. Aisling was already out of the door, leaving a waft of cool wet air in her wake as the door shut behind her.

Should I go out with Aisling, or is this something I have no right to interfere with? Sarie shrugged and raised her eyebrows. “Go if you like,” she said.

Laurel wrapped the shawl around her shoulders before she opened the door into the dark night. Just out of the patch of light from the big kitchen window, Aisling knelt on the wet grass. Her hair lay still and dry on her back, while Laurel’s was already wet and flying about in the wild wind.

Trepidation slowed her steps. This was too weird and way out of her league. Were all her new friends engaged in some kind of supernatural game? The light from the kitchen faded, and the air around Aisling shimmered with rainbow lights. She was only a couple of feet away from the girl, but the shimmer separated them, and somehow it kept the wild night away from Aisling and her secret friend. Laurel peered through the coruscating rainbow shimmer to see who it was Aisling spoke with. There was a twiggy-looking brown man about the size of a small child holding Aisling’s hand.

There was an impression of a tiny wrinkled face with a long sharp nose and bright black eyes. Her stomach jumped into her throat as those eyes fastened on hers, and the thin lips stretched into a smile. The small man made a funny gesture, and there was a sudden streak of lightening across the sky. Laurel blinked, and then there was only Aisling kneeling in the wet grass.

Nancy M Bell has publishing credits in poetry, fiction and non-fiction. Nancy has presented at the Surrey International Writers Conference and the Writers Guild of Alberta Conference. She is currently working on Book 3 of her series The Cornwall Adventures.

Please visit her webpage http://www.nancymbell.ca

You can find her on Facebook at http://facebook.com/NancyMBell

Follow on twitter: @emilypikkasso  

A Page Straight From Sheila Claydon #apagestraightfrom

Pathway to Tomorrow - Pathway Trilogy Book 1

by

Sheila Claydon

Marcus glanced up from his computer as the trailer door opened, expecting to see his site manager. Instead, a leggy blonde wearing too much make-up and too few clothes confronted him.

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded.
“Nice!” she said. “With a few tweaks it would make a good headline.”
“So would journalist thrown out for trespassing on private property!”
“It would if it were true,” she conceded, pushing the trailer door shut behind her and leaning against the wall.

Marcus sighed. A groupie! That was all he needed. He’d spent months searching for the right place to build his house, looking for somewhere close enough to the main arterial roads that led to airports and big cities to make travel easy, but isolated enough to give him the peace and space he needed to concentrate on his work. Isolated enough, too, to protect Luke from the outside world that so distressed him now he was growing older.

The search, the negotiations, the meetings with architects and builders had eaten into the hours he needed to complete his latest project, but he had considered it worth it until the girl with the large chestnut horse had disrupted his plans. And now this! He hadn’t even considered fans, and if he had he would have dismissed them, sure they would be few and far between in such a small, tucked away village.

He stood up. “Who let you in?”
“Nobody. I climbed the gate.”
“Didn’t you see the no trespassing sign?”
“Oh that!” she waved a hand as if the red and white board was a mere inconvenience. “I didn’t take any notice of it. I knew you’d talk to me.”

“Really! I’d be interested to know when you figured that out. Was it as you were climbing over the locked gate, or was it when you walked past the sign?”

She grinned at him and for a brief moment he was pierced by a sense of bewildering familiarity.

“It wasn’t any of those. It was because you talked to Jodie.”
He frowned. “Jodie, as in small, dark and irritating? Jodie as in permanently attached to a large chestnut horse?”

“That’s the one,” she agreed, her grin stretching wider. “And you’re right, she can be very irritating, but it’s only because she cares.”

“So you’re not a fan. You’re here about that damned bridleway.”
Yes...no...I mean...yes I am a fan, and no I’m not here about the bridleway...well not

specifically anyway.”
He shook his head. “How about you just tell me what you are here for...specifically...and then you go.”

Ignoring his sarcasm she pushed herself off the wall and stood upright in front of him. As she did so her grin faded and she suddenly looked very serious.

“I want you to give me music lessons.”
Whatever he had expected, it wasn’t that. For a long moment he stared at her, then he burst into genuine laughter. She had nerve, he had to give her that. And if she was aiming at a stage career then she had the right equipment too. Tall and willowy with legs that went on forever, she looked good.

His laughter died when he noticed the desperation in her eyes. She wasn’t anywhere near as confident as she looked. Underneath the provocative clothes and the make-up she was frightened to death, but there was a hunger there he recognized from his own past. Against his better judgment the musician in him was intrigued.

“You’re not joking are you?”

She shook her head and for a moment he thought he saw the glitter of tears. 

Buy Link:  Pathway to Tomorrow

PATHWAY TO TOMORROW (BOOK 1 THE PATHWAY TRILOGY) by Sheila Claydon

When musician Marcus Lewis buys the derelict farmhouse next to Jodie’ Eriksson's riding school he doesn’t know whether to be amused or irritated by her angry reaction to his plans. Then her sister Izzie visits him and makes things a whole lot worse…or is it better…because now he has an excuse to see Jodie again. Although, when he sees her, it’s not exactly a meeting of minds, they do discover they have one thing in common; they both believe they know what’s best for Izzie, and for Marcus' son Luke. 

It turns out they’re wrong. The children they thought they were protecting need to be set free. It’s Jodie and Marcus who have the problem; but can two broken hearts make one whole one? The battle lines that were set when they first met have long since been breached but the war won’t be over until Jodie learns how to trust again, and until Marcus allows himself to believe in his son.

A Page Straight From Alison Sky Richards #apagestraightfrom

A Fine Line:  Herrick's Tale

by

Alison Sky Richards

“I’ve been paying all my life; just add it to the tab.”

The ghost screamed out and charged again, but this time Herrick was ready. He knew a soldier lost their skill when they were angered. By staying calm, he would finally get the upper hand. As the soldier charged, Herrick saw his chance. He brought his sword up and under the chest of the soldier, aiming to catch him in his ribs, and make a straight cut across his stomach.

The soldier saw that cut coming, but too late. The sword entered his semi-transparent body, then whet straight through it. He collapsed on the ground, holding his stomach in pain.

Herrick pointed the sword at the downed soldier, who had turned to look up at Herrick. “A curse on your family, for as long as you trust the elves, you are just as bad as they are.”

“It isn’t what you are that makes you evil.” Herrick responded. “It’s who you are and how you live your life.”

“Believe that and you are a bigger fool that I thought.” the soldier stated, and he started to cough up more of the clear blood. Herrick turned his face away, but he could not help but listen to his dying words. “You will see that trusting those who are different is the way to pain.”

Herrick bit his lip. He was about to give a reply when he heard Price scream out in pain.

Price stood a few feet from Cairan, holding his side in pain. Cairan held his sword, the tip now dark red from blood, in a position ready to lash out at the young half-elf again. “You are dead, elf,” Cairan stated and he swung once more.

 Cairan’s sword met another as Herrick placed himself between the red-haired soldier and Price. “Not tonight he isn’t.”

“Stand down, boy; this is not your fight.” Cairan lowered his sword and stared at Herrick straight in the eye.

“He is my friend.”

Here's the buy link for it.  I link through Amazon Smile because if people use that version of Amazon, they can select a non-profit to have a portion of eligible sales donated to that charity.  My default is for Legal Aid of Middle Tennessee since that is also my employer.    http://smile.amazon.com/A-Fine-Line-Herricks-Tale/dp/1491272775/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1400861956&sr=8-1&keywords=a+fine+line+herrick

A Page Straight From Margaret Tanner's New Release @apagestraightfrom

Allison's War

by

Margaret Tanner

BLURB:

In 1916, on the French battlefields, a dying soldier’s confession has the power to ruin the woman he loves.

Meanwhile, on the home front, Allison Waverley has to battle shame, loss and betrayal. Can she overcome the dark secrets in her past and find happiness, or will it always elude her?

http://amzn.com/B00JF4YA9E

The war news went from bad to worse. The French, outnumbered and outgunned, retreated towards Paris. Belgium had fallen and was occupied by the Germans, but for her, Allison shuddered. It was spring, a time for new life, and a new life grew inside her, callously put there by Phillip.

Rolling up newspapers to start the fire, pure chance had her staring at the social pages. Blood pounded through her veins as she read the few devastating lines: “Queensland society wedding of the year. Phillip Ashfield, only son of Lord and Lady Ashfield of Yorkshire, England, married Miss Isobel St. John, only daughter of Colonel and Lady St. John formerly of Herefordshire, England, now residing in Queensland.”

The room tilted, and she clung to the table until it righted itself again. She stared at the wedding party. Six attendants. What did she care that the bride wore a white silk gown adorned with imported French lace? The bridal couple was returning to England immediately, as Phillip Ashfield, a graduate from Sandhurst, was anxious to join his father’s old regiment.

Well, Miss St. John was welcome to him, but the sheer vileness of it overwhelmed her. Even as he forced himself on her, he had planned to wed another woman. How could a man be so heartless?

It was terrible being so desperate and alone, Jim and Tommy away, her father hardly home and then never sober. She rode recklessly, moved and lifted heavy objects, took scalding hot baths, but nothing happened.

Maybe she should go to the police and tell them what Phillip had done, but who would believe her now? What good could it do? Would the minister know of a place where girls in her predicament could go? Visions of slaving away in some terrible workhouse rose up like pictures on a canvas. Abortion? The word gave her the shudders. Some backyard butcher? Vomit rose up in her throat.