A CRIME THRILLER WITH A COMPELLING DETECTIVE WHO WILL STOP AT NOTHING TO AVENGE HER DAUGHTER
THE DETECTIVE DI Nikki Galena: A police detective with nothing left to lose, she’s seen a girl die in her arms, and her daughter will never leave the hospital again. She’s got tough on the criminals she believes did this to her. Too tough. And now she’s been given one final warning: make it work with her new sergeant, DS Joseph Easter, or she’s out.
HER PARTNER DS Joseph Easter is the handsome squeaky-clean new member of the team. But his nickname “Holy Joe” belies his former life as a soldier. He has an estranged daughter who blames him for everything that went wrong with their family.
THEIR ADVERSARY is a ruthless man who holds DI Galena responsible for his terrible disfigurement.
The town is being terrorised by gangs of violent thugs, all wearing identical hideous masks. Then a talented young female student goes missing on the marsh and Nikki and Joseph find themselves joining forces with a master criminal in their efforts to save her. They need to look behind the masks, but when they do, they find something more sinister and deadly than they ever expected . . .
This is an exciting and absorbing crime thriller that you won't be able to put down from start to thrilling finish
THE SETTING The Lincolnshire Fens: great open skies brood over marshes, farmland, and nature reserves. It is not easy terrain for the Fenland Constabulary to police, due to the distances between some of the remote Fen villages, the dangerous and often misty lanes, and the poor telephone coverage. There are still villages where the oldest residents have never set foot outside their own farmland and a visit to the nearest town is a major event. But it has a strange airy beauty to it, and above it all are the biggest skies you’ve ever seen.
DISCOVER YOUR NEXT FAVOURITE MYSTERY SERIES NOW
Perfect for fans of Rachel Abbott, Robert Bryndza, Mel Sherratt, Angela Marsons, Colin Dexter, or Ruth Rendell.
Joy Ellis was recommended to me by a fellow book addict. I had not read any of her books before but went on to read Their Lost Daughters and Guide Star courtesy of Joffe Books, an independent publisher. So I knew that I would love Crime on the Fens and I wasn't wrong.
DI Nikki Galena is a new protagonist for Joy Ellis and a well written character. She works best on her own and is a tough cookie. Now enter DS Joe Easter. I really liked him and knew the pairing would be a good one.
The way the author describes the location is very vivid and it sticks in your mind, bringing both the location and the crime scenes alive. It is great how the author brings everything together, and it's masterfully done. I now need to start on the other 10 books in the series! Joy Ellis has become one of my favourite authors.
BOOKS IN THE SERIES
THE NIKKI GALENA SERIES Book 1: CRIME ON THE FENS Book 2: SHADOW OVER THE FENS Book 3: HUNTED ON THE FENS Book 4: KILLER ON THE FENS Book 5: STALKER ON THE FENS Book 6: CAPTIVE ON THE FENS Book 7: BURIED ON THE FENS Book 8: THIEVES ON THE FENS Book 9: FIRE ON THE FENS Book 10: DARKNESS ON THE FENS Book 11: HIDDEN ON THE FENS
Joy Ellis grew up in Kent but moved to London when she won an apprenticeship with the
prestigious Mayfair flower shop, Constance Spry Ltd. Many years later, having run her own florist shop in Weybridge, Ellis took part in a writers workshop in Greece and was encouraged by her Tutor, Sue Townsend to begin writing seriously. She how lives in the Lincolnshire Fens with her partner Jacqueline and their Springer Spaniels, Woody and Alfie.
SYNOPSIS - From the outside, the house in Lakeview Terrace looks perfect and the Bigelows seem like the perfect family: the respected surgeon father, the glamorous, devoted mother and two beautiful children.
But the perfect facade hides dark undercurrents. Teenager Zane and his younger sister, Britt, are terrorised by their violent father until one dark, brutal night when their father's temper takes a horrifying turn for the worse.
Over time, Zane moves on and builds a new life for himself but a childhood like that can cast a shadow the length of a lifetime. Can Zane ever really be free of his past? Or could those dark undercurrents rise back to the surface, forcing Zane to fight for his life once again...
Do you like romance novels, family dramas or crime novels? Well this book has it all wrapped up in one. This is one of Nora Roberts standalone novels, and the first of her books I've ever read.
Darby, having escaped an abusive Husband, looks for a place to live, somewhere in another part of the country. Preferably a place with a view of trees and lakes. She eventually found the ideal place, a place she had never heard of before, but having checked it out on the internet it suited exactly what she was looking for. So, having sold her house and her business, she packed up all her wordly goods in her car and headed off.
What comes next for Darby is lots of hard work, new friends, a romantic interest and murder. The author has weaved all of this into one extremely well written novel, which was very hard to put down. Her style of writing is very descriptive. I could almost smell the flowers she wrote about, and picture the boats on the lake. I could see all the delightful houses she described and imagine myself being there. I could also picture the characters as if I knew them personally. I really loved how different families lives were weaved together. The murder and intrigue in the book, blended very well with the family drama's and happy times.
This has to be one of the best books that I've read this year. I didn't want it to end, and would love to have seen a follow up to it as I'll miss the characters.
I thoroughly recommend this read, and I will certainly be checking out more of Nora Roberts standalone novels.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nora Roberts was born in Silver Spring, Maryland, the youngest of five children. After a school career that included some time in Catholic school and the discipline of nuns, she married young and settled in Keedysville, Maryland.
She worked briefly as a legal secretary. “I could type fast but couldn’t spell, I was the worst legal secretary ever,” she says now. After her sons were born she stayed home and tried every craft that came along. A blizzard in February 1979 forced her hand to try another creative outlet. She was snowed in with a three and six year old with no kindergarten respite in sight and a dwindling supply of chocolate.
Born into a family of readers, Nora had never known a time that she wasn’t reading or making up stories. During the now-famous blizzard, she pulled out a pencil and notebook and began to write down one of those stories. It was there that a career was born. Several manuscripts and rejections later, her first book, Irish Thoroughbred, was published by Silhouette in 1981.
Nora met her second husband, Bruce Wilder, when she hired him to build bookshelves. They were married in July 1985. Since that time, they’ve expanded their home, traveled the world and opened a bookstore together.
Through the years, Nora has always been surrounded by men. Not only was she the youngest in her family, but she was also the only girl. She has raised two sons. Having spent her life surrounded by men, Ms. Roberts has a fairly good view of the workings of the male mind, which is a constant delight to her readers. It was, she’s been quoted as saying, a choice between figuring men out or running away screaming.
Nora is a member of several writers groups and has won countless awards from her colleagues and the publishing industry. Recently The New Yorker called her “America’s favorite novelist.”
TITLE - Eyes of Darkness AUTHOR - Dean Koontz BUY LINK - Click here SYNOPSIS The Eyes of Darkness is a gripping thriller following a mother's search for her son - a journey that unlocks the deadliest of secrets. It's a year since Tina Evans lost her little boy Danny in a tragic accident. Then a shattering message appears on the blackboard in Danny's old room: NOT DEAD. Is it someone's idea of a grim joke? Or something far more sinister?
The search for an answer drives Tina through the neon clamour of Las Vegas nightlife. The sun-scorched desert. The frozen mountains of the High Sierra.
People face a dreadful danger as a buried truth struggles to surface. A truth so frightening that its secret must be kept at the price of any life - any man, any woman...any child.
With the constant social media posts stating this book predicted the Covid-19 pandemic, I wanted to read it for myself, as I'm sure several others did for the same reason.
The tag line says "A gripping suspense thriller that predicted a global danger" is a bit of a stretch in my opinion.
The story is of a mother who lost her son along with others, in a tragic accident. She immersed herself in her role of putting on a show in Las Vegas. Then she started seeing messages saying "Not Dead". The first one on the blackboard in her son Danny's room.
Along with her lover, partner, colleague, she tried to find out where these messages were coming from. Someone obviously didn't want them to find out as they tried to stop them at all costs.
This is a book that was originally published under the lesser known pseudonym of Leigh Nichols. This is not the normal quality of writing one would expect from Dean Koontz. It was quite slow to get started, picked up in the middle and then a bit far fetched at the end. The story line started off okay but just got a bit bizarre. The mention of Wuhan is right at the end, and very loosely you could fit it in with today's pandemic. However I have heard from some other reviewers that the original book in the 80's did not have mention of Wuhan but was linked to the Russians. I haven't been able to get hold of a copy of the original to corroborate that. If that is true, then I think this is poor on the part of the Author/Publisher to amend the story line on this book, purely for it to be turned into a best seller.
Do I think the author predicted the current pandemic? Most definitely not. Would I recommend this book. It's an okay read but I have read much better and certainly not the quality of a normal Dean Koontz book.
When Laura Chaucer, daughter of a U.S. senator, vanishes from her college campus, celebrated FBI profilers Special Agent Atticus Spenser and forensic psychiatrist Dr. Caitlin Cassidy are called in. Thirteen years ago, Laura and her nanny disappeared from her family’s Denver home. Laura was found alive, but her nanny wasn’t so lucky… and the killer was never caught. Laura could identify him—if only she didn’t have a deep, dark hole in her memory. Now she’s missing again. Did the troubled young woman run away or has the kidnapper returned? As women who look eerily similar to Laura’s nanny begin turning up dead, the Chaucer family psychiatrist renders a disturbing opinion: Laura is unstable, a danger to herself and others. Who knows what terrible secrets lurk in the shadowy recesses of her mind? Cassidy and Spenser must solve one of the most infamous cold cases ever to uncover the answer: Is Laura a killer, or is a monster still out there, waiting to claim another victim?
Book Details:
Genre: Suspense, Thriller Published by: Witness Impulse Publication Date: February 14th 2017 Number of Pages: 352 ISBN: 0062495542 (ISBN13: 9780062495549) Series: Cassidy & Spenser #4 Purchase Links:Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads
JUDGMENT, the first book in my Cassidy & Spenser Thriller series, has been named one of the "BEST BOOKS of 2014" by SUSPENSE MAGAZINE.
Both JUDGMENT & CONFESSION are BOOKSELLERS BEST AWARD Finalists
JUDGMENT is a DAPHNE DU MAURIER AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE IN MYSTERY/SUSPENSE Finalist and a SILVER FALCHION finalist.
Author Bio:
Carey Baldwin is a mild-mannered doctor by day and an award-winning author of edgy suspense by night. She holds two doctoral degrees, one in medicine and one in psychology. She loves reading and writing stories that keep you off balance and on the edge of your seat. Carey lives in the southwestern United States with her amazing family. In her spare time she enjoys hiking and chasing wildflowers.
This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours for Carey Baldwin and William Morrow | WitnessImpulse. There will be 5 US winners of one (1) eBook copy of Stolen by Carey Baldwin. The giveaway begins on February 12th and runs through March 5th, 2017.
Driving home, Margaret Holloway is rear-ended and trapped in the wreckage of her car. Just as she begins to panic, a stranger pulls her free and disappears. Though she escapes with minor injuries, Margaret feels that something's wrong. Flashbacks to the crash are dredging up lost associations from her childhood. And somehow, Margaret knows that it's got something to do with the man who saved her life. As Margaret uncovers a mystery with chilling implications for her family and her very identity, Everything She Forgot winds through a riveting dual narrative and asks the question: How far would you go to hide the truth-from yourself?
Book Details:
Genre: Suspense
Published by: William Morrow Paperbacks
Publication Date: October 6, 2015
Number of Pages: 432
ISBN: 0062391488 (13: 978-0062391483)
Purchase Links:
Critical Praise:
“Ballantyne’s effortless prose took me across the Atlantic and didn’t let me return until its surprising and satisfying conclusion. A tight story that comes full circle and keeps you reading.” — Bryan Reardon, author of Finding Jake
Author Bio:
Lisa Ballantyne was born in Armadale, West Lothian, Scotland and studied English Literature at University of St Andrews.
She lived and worked in China for many years and started writing seriously while she was there. Before being published, Lisa was short-listed for the Dundee International Book Prize.
Her debut novel, The Guilty One was translated into over 25 languages, long-listed for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and short-listed for an Edgar Allan Poe Award. The Guilty One was also the Autumn 2012 Richard and Judy Book-club Winner. She lives in Glasgow.
The book itself is split into chapters where each major character has a chapter to themselves. Some chapters referring to them in the present; some in the past. I often have an issue with books that go backwards and forwards in time, as if you don't pick the book up for a few days it gets confusing and you can forget where you got to. With this book however, because the chapters were named after the characters, I found it an easier read.
Whilst the storyline itself was good, the story surrounding Molly, who was abducted as a young schoolchild, I did find it a little predictive in places, working out where the story was going.
I did get quite engrossed in the book; despising the religious Angus Campbell and loving he lovable rogue "Big George". It was easy to immerse yourself into the story.
I have one "niggle" about the book in that it's a crime story based in the UK, but there are a lot of words; phrases and spellings, that are American and wouldn't be used by British Gangsters, Law Enforcement or Brits in general. E.g Carryall (holdall); Tires (tyres); Pedophile (Paedophile). Just a small niggle.
I would like to have seen the story continue a little longer, especially in relation to Angus Campbell, as I felt (without giving any spoilers) that he needed punishing.
Having said all that it was an enjoyable read and a perfectly believable storyline.
Title - September Sky Author - John A. Heldt Series - American Journey #1 Pages - 409 To Purchase - Click here Synopsis (From Goodreads)
When unemployed San Francisco reporter Chuck Townsend and his college-dropout son, Justin, take a cruise to Mexico in 2016, each hopes to rebuild a relationship after years of estrangement. But they find more than common ground aboard the ship. They meet a mysterious lecturer who touts the possibilities of time travel. Within days, Chuck and Justin find themselves in 1900, riding a train to Texas, intent on preventing a distant uncle from being hanged for a crime he did not commit. Their quick trip to Galveston, however, becomes long and complicated when they wrangle with business rivals and fall for two beautiful librarians on the eve of a hurricane that will destroy the city. Filled with humor, history, romance, and heartbreak, SEPTEMBER SKY follows two directionless souls on the adventure of a lifetime as they try to make peace with the past, find new purpose, and grapple with the knowledge of things to come. My Review I had read John A. Heldt's book "The Mine", which was a time travel adventure. Not my normal read but I really enjoyed it, so when I was offered the chance to read and review September Sky, I didn't hesitate.
The story begins on a cruise ship. Chuck, who used to be a reporter and his Son Justin, haven't had the best of times. They head off on a cruise to Mexico to escape. Whilst on the cruise, they meet Professor Bell who talks to them about time travel and makes them a strange proposition. Before they know it, they find themselves at the professors house and agreeing to take a trip back in time to Galveston, in the year 1900, although this was not their intended destination.
I've been to Galveston before when visiting Texas (I'm actually going next year too!) and the authors depiction of the resort, albeit in 1900, brought it alive for me. He managed to include real life facts about the dreadful 1900 hurricane. It has been called "The worst hurricane in American History". See the video at the end of my review, which shows the devastation the storm caused. I thought this was very well depicted in the book.
I thoroughly enjoyed the adventure Chuck and Justin went on in Galveston and the people they met. Some great characters in the book! I couldn't put the book down as I wanted to see, as the story progressed, if they would ever return to present day, as so many obstacles were put in their way. I thought it was excellent how the author combined the present and the past.
It was very well researched and well written. It certainly shows it pays to expand your mind when choosing what genre of book you read.
I found this a thoroughly enjoyable read.
About the author
John A. Heldt is the author of the critically acclaimed Northwest Passage and American Journey series. The former reference librarian and award-winning sportswriter has loved getting subjects and verbs to agree since writing book reports on baseball heroes in grade school. A graduate of the University of Oregon and the University of Iowa, Heldt is an avid fisherman, sports fan, home brewer, and reader of thrillers and historical fiction. When not sending contemporary characters to the not-so-distant past, he weighs in on literature and life at johnheldt.blogspot.com.
NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Jeff Lindsay mastered suspense with his wildly addictive DEXTER series. Before that, however, there was former cop and current burnout Billy Knight. When a hostage situation turns deadly, Billy loses everything—his wife, his daughter, and his career. Devastated, he heads to Key West to put down his gun and pick up a rod and reel as a fishing boat captain. But former co-worker Roscoe McAuley isn't ready to let Billy rest.
When Roscoe tells Billy that someone murdered his son, Billy sends him away. When Roscoe himself turns up dead a few weeks later, however, Billy can't keep from getting sucked back into Los Angeles, and the streets that took so much from him.
Billy's investigations into the death of a former cop, and his son, will take him up to the highest echelons of the LAPD, finding corruption at every level. It puts him on a collision course with the law, with his past, with his former fellow officers, and with the dark aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement. Jeff Lindsay's considerable storytelling gifts are on full display, drawing the reader in with a mesmerizing style and a case with more dangerous blind curves than Mulholland Drive.
Book Details:
Genre: Thriller, Suspense, Police Procedural
Published by: Diversion Books
Publication Date: August 25, 2015 (Re-Release)
Number of Pages: 256
ISBN: 2940151536677
Series: Billy Knight Thrillers, Book 1
Purchase Links:
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Read an excerpt:
Somebody once said Los Angeles isn’t really a city but a hundred suburbs looking for a city. Every suburb has a different flavor to it, and every Angeleno thinks he knows all about you when he knows which one you live in. But that’s mostly important because of the freeways.
Life in L.A. is centered on the freeway system. Which freeway you live nearest is crucial to your whole life. It determines where you can work, eat, shop, what dentist you go to, and who you can be seen with.
I needed a freeway that could take me between the two murder sites, get me downtown fast, or up to the Hollywood substation to see Ed Beasley.
I’d been thinking about the Hollywood Freeway. It went everywhere I needed to go, and it was centrally located, which meant it connected to a lot of other freeways. Besides, I knew a hotel just a block off the freeway that was cheap and within walking distance of the World News, where Roscoe had been cut down. I wanted to look at the spot where it happened. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t learn anything, but it was a starting place.
And sometimes just looking at the place where a murder happened can give you ideas about it; cops are probably a little more levelheaded than average, but most of them will agree there’s something around a murder scene that, if they weren’t cops, they would call vibes.
So Hollywood it was. I flagged down one of the vans that take you to the rental car offices.
By the time I got fitted out with a brand new matchbox—no, thank you, I did not want a special this-week-only deal on a Cadillac convertible; that’s right, cash, I didn’t like credit cards; no, thank you, I did not want an upgrade of any kind for only a few dollars more; no, thank you, I didn’t want the extra insurance—it was dark and I was tired. I drove north on the San Diego Freeway slowly, slowly enough to have at least one maniac per mile yell obscenities at me. Imagine the nerve of me, going only sixty in a fifty-five zone.
The traffic was light. Pretty soon I made my turn east on the Santa Monica. I was getting used to being in L.A. again, getting back into the rhythm of the freeways. I felt a twinge of dread as I passed the exit for Sepulveda Boulevard, but I left it behind with the lights of Westwood.
The city always looks like quiet countryside from the Santa Monica Freeway. Once you are beyond Santa Monica and Westwood, you hit a stretch that is isolated from the areas it passes through. You could be driving through inner-city neighborhoods or country-club suburbs, but you’ll never know from the freeway.
That all changes as you approach downtown. Suddenly there is a skyline of tall buildings, and if you time it just right, there are two moons in the sky. The second one is only a round and brightly lit corporate logo on a skyscraper, but if it’s your first time through you can pass some anxious moments before you figure that out. After all, if any city in the world had two moons, wouldn’t it be L.A.?
And suddenly you are in one of the greatest driving nightmares of all recorded history. As you arc down a slow curve through the buildings and join the Harbor Freeway you are flung into the legendary Four-Level. The name is misleading, a slight understatement. It really seems like a lot more than four levels.
The closest thing to driving the Four-Level is flying a balloon through a vicious dogfight with the Red Baron’s Flying Circus. The bad guys—and they are all bad guys in the Four-Level—the bad guys come at you from all possible angles, always at speeds just slightly faster than the traffic is moving, and if you do not have every move planned out hours in advance you’ll be stuck in the wrong lane looking for a sign you’ve already missed and before you know it you will find yourself in Altadena, wondering what happened.
I got over into the right lane in plenty of time and made the swoop under several hundred tons of concrete overpass, and I was on the Hollywood Freeway. Traffic started to pick up after two or three exits, and in ten minutes I was coming off the Gower Street ramp and onto Franklin.
There’s a large hotel right there on Franklin at Gower. I’ve never figured out how they break even. They’re always at least two-thirds empty. They don’t even ask if you have a reservation. They are so stunned that you’ve found their hotel they are even polite for the first few days. There’s also a really lousy coffee shop right on the premises, which is convenient if you keep a cop’s schedule. I guessed I was probably going to do that this trip.
A young Chinese guy named Allan showed me up to my room. It was on the fifth floor and looked down into the city, onto Hollywood Boulevard just two blocks away. I left the curtain open. The room was a little bit bigger than a gas station rest room, but the decor wasn’t quite as nice.
It was way past my bedtime back home, but I couldn’t sleep. I left my bag untouched on top of the bed and went out.
The neighborhood at Franklin and Gower is schizophrenic. Two blocks up the hill, towards the famous Hollywood sign, the real estate gets pretty close to seven figures. Two blocks down the hill and it’s overpriced at three.
I walked straight down Gower, past a big brick church, and turned west. I waved hello to Manny, Moe, and Jack on the corner: it had been a while. There was still a crowd moving along the street. Most of them were dressed like they were auditioning for the role of something your mother warned you against.
Some people have this picture of Hollywood Boulevard. They think it’s glamorous. They think if they can just get off the pig farm and leave Iowa for the big city, all they have to do is get to Hollywood Boulevard and magic will happen. They’ll be discovered.
The funny thing is, they’re right. The guys that do the discovering are almost always waiting in the Greyhound station. If you’re young and alone, they’ll discover you. The magic they make happen might not be what you had in mind, but you won’t care about that for more than a week. After that you’ll be so eager to please you’ll gladly do things you’d never even had a name for until you got discovered. And a few years later when you die of disease or overdose or failure to please the magic-makers, your own mother won’t recognize you. And that’s the real magic of Hollywood. They take innocence and turn it into money and broken lives.
I stopped for a hot dog, hoping my sour mood would pass. It didn’t. I got mustard on my shirt. I watched a transvestite hooker working on a young Marine. The jarhead was drunk enough not to know better. He couldn’t believe his luck. I guess the hooker felt the same way.
The hot dog started to taste like old regrets. I threw the remaining half into the trash and walked the last two blocks to Cahuenga.
The World News is open twenty-four hours a day, and there’s always a handful of people browsing. In a town like this there’s a lot of people who can’t sleep. I don’t figure it’s their conscience bothering them.
I stood on the sidewalk in front of the place. There were racks of specialty magazines for people interested in unlikely things. There were several rows of out-of-town newspapers. Down at the far end of the newsstand was an alley. Maybe three steps this side of it there was a faint rusty brown stain spread across the sidewalk and over the curb into the gutter. I stepped over it and walked into the alley.
The alley was dark, but that was no surprise. The only surprise was that I started to feel the old cop adrenaline starting up again, just walking down a dark alley late at night. Suddenly I really wanted this guy. I wanted to find whoever had killed Roscoe and put him in a small cell with a couple of very friendly body-builders.
The night air started to feel charged. It felt good to be doing cop work again, and that made me a little mad, but I nosed around for a minute anyway. I wasn’t expecting to find anything, and I didn’t. By getting down on one knee and squinting I did find the spot where the rusty stains started. There was a large splat, and then a trickle leading back out of the alley to the stain on the sidewalk.
I followed the trickle back to the big stain and stood over it, looking down.
Blood is hard to wash out. But sooner or later the rain, the sun, and the passing feet wear away the stains. This stain was just about all that was left of Roscoe McAuley and when it was gone there would be nothing left of him at all except a piece of rock with his name on it and a couple of loose memories. What he was, what he did, what he thought and cared about—that was already gone. All that was hosed away a lot easier than blood stains—a lot quicker, too.
“I’m sorry, Roscoe,” I said to the stain. It didn’t answer. I walked back up the hill and climbed into a bed that was too soft and smelled of mothballs and cigarettes.
Author Bio:
Jeff Lindsay is the award-winning author of the seven New York Times bestselling Dexter novels upon which the international hit TV show Dexter is based. His books appear in more than 30 languages and have sold millions of copies around the world. Jeff is a graduate of Middlebury College, Celebration Mime Clown School, and has a double MFA from Carnegie Mellon. Although a full-time writer now, he has worked as an actor, comic, director, MC, DJ, singer, songwriter, composer, musician, story analyst, script doctor, and screenwriter.
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Giveaway:
Diversion Books is hosting a Rafflecopter Giveaway for Tropical Depression. Don't miss out! Visit the tour stops & enter so you have a chance! a Rafflecopter giveaway
A woman and her young son flee to a convent on a remote island off the Breton coast of France. Generations of seafarers have named the place Ile de la Brume, or Fog Island. In a chapel high on a cliff, a tragic death occurs and a terrified child vanishes into the mist.
The child’s godmother, Maggie O’Shea, haunted by the violent deaths of her husband and best friend, has withdrawn from her life as a classical pianist. But then a recording of unforgettable music and a grainy photograph surface, connecting her missing godson to a long-lost first love.
The photograph will draw Maggie inexorably into a collision course with criminal forces, decades-long secrets, stolen art and musical artifacts, and deadly terrorists. Her search will take her to the Festival de Musique, Aix-en-Provence, France, where she discovers answers to the mystery surrounding her husband’s death, an unexpected love—and a musical masterpiece lost for centuries.
A compelling blend of suspense, mystery, political intrigue, and romance, The Lost Concerto explores universal themes of loss, vengeance, courage, and love.
Book Details:
Genre: Mystery, Suspense
Published by: Oceanview Publishing
Publication Date: July 1st 2015
Number of Pages: 443
ISBN: 9781608091515
Purchase Links:
Author Bio:
Helaine Mario grew up in New York City and is a graduate of Boston University. She has served on many nonprofit boards while residing in both Connecticut and Maryland.
A passionate advocate for women’s and children’s issues, she is the founder and president of The SunDial Foundation, which is connected to over 30 DC area nonprofits. Helaine and her husband, Ron, now live in Arlington, Virginia, and Sarasota, Florida. The Lost Concerto, her second novel, was inspired by her son Sean, a classical pianist.
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This is a giveaway hosted by Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tours for Helaine Mario & Oceanview Publishing. There will be ONE U.S. winner of a physical book copy of The Lost Concerto by Helaine Mario. The giveaway is open to US residents only. The giveaway begins on Aug 1st, 2015 and runs through Aug 31st, 2015.
Stop by our tour stops too because several of them are giving away signed print copies of The Lost Concerto by Helaine Mario!
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What if the only person you ever loved suddenly disappeared without a trace?
In 1789, Armande, a wet nurse who is known for the mystical qualities of her breast milk, goes missing from her mountain village.
Céleste, a cunning servant girl who Armande once saved from shame and starvation, sets out to find her. A snuffbox found in the snow, the unexpected arrival of a gentleman and the discovery of the wet nurse’s diary, deepen the mystery. Using Armande’s diary as a map to her secret past, Céleste fights to save her from those plotting to steal the wisdom of her milk.
Milk Fever is a rich and inspired tale set on the eve of the French Revolution–a delicious peek into this age’s history. The story explores the fight for women’s rights and the rise in clandestine literature laying bare sexuality, the nature of love and the magic of books to transform lives.
Excerpt:
Armande handed me a book that felt clumsy and stiff in my hands. I pressed it with all the strength I could bring to bear. She said the pages of books were made from cotton and linen rags stamped into pulp, then pressed into paper and hung to dry. I laughed at her for telling such a lie because I thought maybe she was just like my father who told tall tales to make me behave. Rows and rows of lines she called words looked odd to me. Many times I searched hard within every letter, every sound to find meaning. The letters cut my tongue as thorns on a rose bush, each one sticking to me. I could not speak the next letter until the one before it came unstuck. Soon after the word was finally spoken, my lazy tongue quit my mouth.
Months later, the wet nurse asked me to read a passage aloud. The first line was, Bodies gliding on morning’s cloak of dew, lit up as iridescent insect wings they flew. When I came to the word iridescent, Armande said to say it slowly, one letter at a time. She told me it was from the word iris for the flower, and escent for colours of the rainbow that change as a dragonfly in the sun. Finally, when my tongue began working with me and worrying less, she asked me to say other words like deliquescent, effervescence, and florescence. These newfound words were as rare gems dug up by the wet nurse solely for me. She wrote them out with big stokes that filled a whole page. I rubbed my eyes to make the words go away, yet they only stayed there waiting for me to say them.
In the days and months that followed, I learned to read and write well, and I learned first-hand about the miraculous effects of Armande’s milk on babies. Before, I was a mere servant watching from afar as the wet nurse suckled. Then I was part of her life, holding and changing babies, burping them, and rocking them to sleep. Armande cared for three babies during this period yet not all at once. She would also tend to others from time to time, reassuring worried mothers in soothing tones as gentle and sweet as the milk itself. First there was Jacques who she still cared for. His mother died in childbirth and Armande stepped up to nurse him without a thought about payment. Caroline came after, then Héloïse. The first time I watched from up close as Jacques drank her milk was in the drawing room.
Armande was on her favourite oak chair with the sagging blue leather seat and worn arms while I sat on the sofa. Suddenly Jacques stopped sucking, then gazed at me knowingly, his eyes full of light. In that instant, a slim ray of sun gleamed through a crack, lighting up the darkness inside me. My hands shook. Sweat ran down my cheeks and the back of my neck. Just as she said her father sometimes described it, we were entering a new age driven by light. And I, a peasant girl whose father and mother never held a book, would be there to witness the change
Author Bio:
Lissa M. Cowan is the author of Milk
Fever and founder of Writing the Body.
She speaks and writes about storytelling, creativity, work-life
balance and creative spirituality. She is a Huffington
Post blogger and writes regularly for
Canadian and U.S. magazines and newspapers.
She
is co-translator of Words
that Walk in the Night by Pierre
Morency, one of Québec’s most honoured poets. She has been writing
and telling stories in one form or another since she was six years
old and has received awards for her writing from
the University of Victoria’s Writing Department and from The Banff
Centre. She is an alumna of The Banff
Centre and The Victoria School of Writing. She has had some
wonderfully talented teachers along the way such as Nino Ricci, Jane
Rule and Daphne Marlatt who have helped her hone her writing craft.
Lissa
believes that inspiration for writing can come from anywhere and that
lifelong creativity begins by cultivating a deep awareness of
ourselves, and the world around us. She coaches her students to
develop the skills to tune in—rather than wait for the muse—and
to trust their intuition. She believes that true creative work begins
with a loving relationship to self
and spreads outwards to encompass all living beings.
When
she’s not writing or teaching, you can most likely find her in a
cafe working on one of her stories or book ideas. She just started
work on a creative non-fiction book, though it’s too early right
now to spill the beans on that one!
She holds a Master of Arts degree
in English Studies from l’Université de Montréal and lives in
Toronto, Canada.
Lisa Ballantyne was born in Armadale, West Lothian, Scotland and studied English Literature at University of St Andrews.
She lived and worked in China for many years and started writing seriously while she was there. Before being published, Lisa was short-listed for the Dundee International Book Prize.
Her debut novel, The Guilty One was translated into over 25 languages, long-listed for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and short-listed for an Edgar Allan Poe Award. The Guilty One was also the Autumn 2012 Richard and Judy Book-club Winner. She lives in Glasgow.
Jeff Lindsay is the award-winning author of the seven New York Times bestselling Dexter novels upon which the international hit TV show Dexter is based. His books appear in more than 30 languages and have sold millions of copies around the world. Jeff is a graduate of Middlebury College, Celebration Mime Clown School, and has a double MFA from Carnegie Mellon. Although a full-time writer now, he has worked as an actor, comic, director, MC, DJ, singer, songwriter, composer, musician, story analyst, script doctor, and screenwriter.
