A Page Straight From J. E. Lowder - #apagestraightfrom

Tears of Min Brock (Epic YA Fantasy)

by

J.E. Lowder

  Gundin did not remember how he got to the middle of Hetherlinn. Nor did he recall Quinn yanking him from cottage Number 7 or how they made their way past screaming women and terrified children. Even the thundering hooves of their enemy entering Hetherlinn did not stir him from his delusions.

It was no wonder that he stared glassy-eyed at the Ebonite cavalry that encircled the villagers. Wihin his mind, he was back in the Dark War, leading a charge of men toward an Ebonite stronghold. This dissolved into a vignette in which he sat with his men around a campfire sharing pipes and stories. 

Amidst his fantasy, he felt the ground shake. He tried to make sense of it, but could not, for the rumbling was coming from somewhere beyond his illusions. 

The ground shook again followed by what sounded like a thunderclap. The foreign effects became shards of recall that pierced his fantasyworld like lances.  

He battled to discern fact from myth, truth from fantasy. He fought to regain control of his thoughts and center them once again in reality, something he had not done since the Dark War.

As if awakening from a dream, he found that he was with the other villagers near the fire. Some were ghostly pale, others wept, but he had no idea why.  

Gundin continued to piece his strange experience together, trying to make sense of the earthquake and thunder. Memories flashed like lightning, and within the heat of its light, he remembed the March of Reeds shaking the ground followed by the Ebonite cavalry thundering out of Hetherlinn.

A man moaned. A quick glance at the ground revealed Quinn wounded.

Buy Link

A Page Straight From Lisabet Sarai - #apagestraightfrom

Exposure (An Erotic Mystery)

 by

 Lisabet Sarai







 We’re shy afterwards. We hardly talk on the way back to my house, but his kiss when we arrive is heated and fervent. “Do you want to come in for a while?” I ask, wondering how it will feel to have a man in my bed after such a long time.



He shakes his head. “I’m done in,” he says with a mischievous grin. “Somebody really put me through the blender.” He kisses me again, more gently. “And maybe now you’ll get a good night’s sleep. I’ll call tomorrow.”



“Thanks, Jimmy. For everything.”



“Anytime,” he laughs, then turns toward his car.



I’m careful to lock the door behind me, but I’m still high from the evening’s events. Only when I come out of the shower do I notice anything strange. I open my lingerie drawer to get out my silk kimono, and find that all my lovely things are jumbled together, without any order. I was nervous and fussy while dressing, I remember, but I can’t imagine that I would have left my underwear in this state.

I check the other drawers. They are equally muddled. Most of the sweaters and jerseys are folded, but clumsily, and my usual organization by color and season is totally upset. Whoever rummaged through my clothing tried, without success, to disguise that fact.



Someone was in my house, while I was out with Jimmy. An intruder into my personal space. My haven! I sink down on the bed, shaking with mingled anger and fear at this violation. After a moment, I regain control of myself.



Someone had been here. Someone might be here still. I fish around in my purse for my Mace. I retrieve my haircutting scissors from the bathroom. Donning my terry robe, I creep into the hallway, a weapon in each hand.



Across the upstairs hall is my den and office, formerly my father’s bedroom. I stop and listen outside the door. All is silent. Reaching inside, I flick on the light. The room is empty. There’s no closet, nowhere to hide. But there are signs of disturbance. My desk drawer is open. My checkbook is on the writing surface as if someone had been reviewing the register. And my yellow pad, with my attempts at analyzing the events around Tony’s murder—I know that I left it on the desk. Now it’s gone. I search the rest of the desk, the cubbies and the file drawer. It’s simply not here.



Somehow I’m not surprised. I feel cold, cold and clear as arctic ice. Someone was here, someone who knows something about Tony’s death. Someone who thinks I know something, or have something that will lead me to the truth.



Shivering, I inch my way downstairs and check the front parlor. All is quiet and empty, though the burglar left his mark here, too. Knickknacks misplaced on the mantel. My father’s humidor left half-open.



Finally, I make my way to the kitchen. Here, there’s the clearest evidence: a tumbler with remnants of scotch, and a cigarette butt snuffed out in a saucer. By this point, it seems, my unwelcome guest didn’t care if he left traces.



The back door, I discover, is unlocked. I’m one hundred percent certain I didn’t leave it that way.

Carefully, keeping my body behind the door, I scan the yard. The light filtering from the kitchen windows is bright enough for me to see that there is no one in my little square of turf. It also shows me crushed tomato plants and bean vines torn from their trellises, clearly marking the intruder’s escape route.



At that point, my rage finally overwhelms my fear. I pour myself a finger of scotch and sit at the kitchen table, simmering in helpless anger and vowing some kind of revenge.



Then a horrible thought crosses my mind. Jimmy knew I would be out tonight. He was the only one who knew. Was it possible that he was involved in all this, somehow? Is it possible that smiling Jimmy might have betrayed me?



The balance shifts again. Shudders shake my body. Sitting alone under the fluorescent lights, gripping my drink, I am paralyzed by the realization that I don’t know who I can trust. If anyone.



Buy Links:

http://www.amazon.com/Exposure-Books-Erotic-Mystery-ebook/dp/B00BGTQS14/

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Exposure-Books-Love-Erotic-Mystery-ebook/dp/B00BGTQS14/

A Page Straight From Jennifer M. Shaw-Dockery - #apagestraightfrom

A Blessing Is In Sight (A Poem from)

by

Jennifer M. Shaw-Dockery

Broken
I was broken into pieces
My life was positively upside down
I was confused and twisted
I didn't know what I had found
My heart was wounded
I couldn't feel no love
And
I prayed for help from above 
I didn't know which way to turn
I had been treated so badly
I didn't want to keep getting burned
I couldn't feel anything
I couldn't even cry
I didn't know where to go
I didn't know why
Then Jesus stepped in to show me the way
Leading me through my troubles
Helping me start another day
I've been broken so many times
I couldn't shake that kind of pain 
I couldn't show anyone how I felt 
I didn't know what I would gain
I've been broken 
Now I'm back together again 
I knew I could escape it 
I didn't know when
I'm so glad Jesus seen my hurt
And
He came to rescue me at that time
Because without His help I couldn't have lived
I would have been lost in my confused mind.

Book can be purchased at:

East Side Story
1108 Woodland Street
Unit B
Nashville TN 37206

A Page Straight From David M. Harris - #apagestraightfrom

A Poem from The Review Mirror

by

David M. Harris

TOBY

Lying there, on his last day,

dreaming, perhaps, of rabbits

or the days he dodged the leash,

borrowed freedom for an afternoon.

Or of those three days in the new neighborhood

chasing squirrels and adventure

but glad to see me when I collected him

after he drifted onto a stranger's porch,

lost and tired and hungry.

His legs, in dreams still strong

and under his control,

speed him through the woods                                                

scattering the turkey

gaining on the deer--

I wake him, lift his head

and carry him off

to where I tell myself

he will dream forever.

Buy Link

A Page Straight From Rudy Thomas - #apagestraightfrom

Journeys

by

Rudy Thomas

“Home is not necessarily where you belong,” Cry said, “but where you were born, the faces you first saw around you, and the place where you only cry when you are hurt, physically or emotionally.
Tell me a story, Alyx. Tell me your story.”
“My father owned a farm in Kentucky,” she began. “It joined my
grandfather’s farm and our house fronted the Green River. My mother was a slave; bought at auction. Her father was white. Her mother had a white father. All my grandmothers going back to 1733 or 1734
when there were slave uprisings in Jamaica—four, maybe five generations back had white fathers.”
“That would have to make you white, then…”
“It makes me a slave,” she said. “Five, six, or seven generations back or maybe even before that, my mother said I had a grandmother’s family and they were found living east of the Shannon river when Cromwell invaded Ireland. His quest was for the Irish Revolutionaries and their families who dared oppose the British. The English had seized Jamaica to set up British plantations. The punishment for my family’s crime, living where they pleased, was either death or slavery for
women in the West Indies and death, banishment, or imprisonment in New Zealand or Australia for the men. I don’t know the woman’s name, but she was Irish. The masters on their island, English plantations made white Irish female servants like her sleep with a black to get pregnant or marry one so she and her children would become black Irish slaves.
He looked at Alyx. Even in the dress they had given her at the slave market before the sale that never happened because Nathan Bedford Forrest bought every slave, horse and mule, she was beautiful. Guilt flooded through him again like a river out of its banks. He could not imagine how she must feel knowing she was neither black nor white—knowing she had no possessions of her own except the dagger…




Journeys is a novel about a young man who goes to Nashville before the Civil War to buy a horse for his father. It is also a story about the horse and a young slave woman. The young man, Cry, gets recruited by General George Thomas. As a member of General Thomas' intelligence network, Cry gives the reader an accurate, historical account of one of the most successful Generals of that conflict.

 Amazon.Buy Link

A Page Straight from MayAnn Kempher #apagestraightfrom

Forever Doomed

Jack watched Marni leave, torn. Did he think she’d killed Pam? No, but she was keeping something from him, something to do with Pam’s murder. He looked down at his arm, seeing her small hand. His heart was still beating hard. It had taken real effort to hide his feelings when she’d touched him. After a few minutes, he started walking, and was soon standing outside Marni’s cabin door. He hesitated. He told himself he was just going there to talk to her, to try to make her tell him what he sensed she was holding back. But that was a lie. He reached up and knocked. She opened the door wearing a towel.

“I was about to take a shower,” she said.

Jack didn’t respond. He walked into her room, shoving the door shut behind him. He took hold of her towel and pulled her tightly against his body, his mouth covering hers, his tongue searching for hers, his hands yanking the towel off and tossing it to the floor. He easily picked up Marni and carried her to the bed. She pulled his shirt up over his head, her hands running themselves through his thick chest hair. She reached for his belt buckle, undoing it slowly, her eyes watching his. Then she pulled his pants down and gasped.

Oh my.

Here is the buy link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00H0OFCDY

• “

  It will keep you guessing until the end. ”
  Lurie Twist| 6 reviewers made a similar statement
• “

  I highly recommend this book I am looking forward to see what she writes next. ”
  jane123| 5 reviewers made a similar statement

 

Mocha, Moonlight, and Murder can be purchased at http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00CDNQ37Q. Remember, please write a review. Thank you.

  

A Page Straight From Sydell Voeller #apagestraightfrom

Free to Love

She needed plenty of space tonight. Time alone. Yes, tonight was the night. If she didn’t take off her wedding rings while she still had the nerve, she might change her mind. 

“I have a better idea. How about taking in a flick at the cinema down the highway?”

“No thanks. I really should turn in early.”

“All right. Then I’ll settle for the TV.” He jerked his head to one side. “I’ll go get it right now.”

A few minutes later, she held open the front door and watched him leave, carrying the TV across the lawn. “Good-night,” she called, struggling to keep her voice even.

“See you tomorrow.”

Shutting the door, she bit her lip and heaved a sigh. Yes, tomorrow. Tomorrow would be a brand new day. But right now she had all she could do to deal with the remainder of tonight.

She wandered into her bedroom and switched on the wall lamp near the doorway. Soft light flooded the room. On top of the bureau was her burgundy velvet jewelry box.

Kyle. Her gaze drifted to his photo next to it. His image smiled back at her, the smile that always flashed in her mind whenever she thought about him. She must’ve had a dozen or more pictures of Kyle situated around the duplex, she thought with a pang. But this one had always been her favorite. Balling her hands into fists, she pulled her eyes away.

Through the bedroom walls, from the other side, she heard the muffled tones of the TV. Cheerful sounds. A sitcom, perhaps. Canned laughter.

Slowly she lifted the lid of the jewelry box. In the uppermost compartment, nestled in the plush layer of velvet was the simple gold band she’d given Kyle on their wedding day. Seeing it, her heart seemed to turn inside out. What was she doing, taking off her rings too? she wondered desperately. Was she turning her back on everything that they’d shared? The good times, and sometimes not so good? Their hopes and dreams? Their plans for the future?

“Oh, Kyle,” she murmured, tears springing to her eyes. “You do understand, don’t you? This . . . this is something I’ve put off, but now I must do it. The time is right. But please know, I’ll cherish your memory always. I’ll always love you.”

She swallowed hard. It felt as if an ice cube was lodged in the throat. The tears fell, one after the next, tracking salty trails down her cheeks as she twisted the rings over her knuckles and then slipped them completely off.

In the lamp light, the diamond sparkled, flashing prisms of light. She traced her finger over it, then for a moment held it up to her lips. Blinking rapidly, hands trembling, she placed it in the jewelry box next to the gold band, shut the lid, then turned and walked away.

Through the bedroom walls, she could still hear the sounds of canned laughter.

Buy link:  http://amzn.com/B008GTHB36

My personal website:  <www.sydellvoeller.com. 
Publisher's website:  <http://www.bookswelove.net>