Writers by Frances Caballo - Book Blitz and Giveaway

About the Book

You wrote your book and sold copies to everyone you know. But you have goals that extend beyond a few dozen copies sold.

How do you achieve your dream of selling books around the world? With social media, you can build your platform and reach readers in locales you never imaged possible before.

In this book, you’ll learn how to:

• Create a Facebook fan page and actively engage with your readers.
• Optimize your LinkedIn profile.
• Tackle Instagram, Tumblr, and Snapchat.
• Build and optimize Pinterest pinboards for SEO to maximize exposure of your books, blog, and other landing pages.
• Improve your blogging.
• Excel on Twitter.
• Create images for your blog and social media posts.

The second edition of Social Media Just for Writers is both a primer for authors new to social media and an advanced study of platforms that weren’t widely known four years ago. Whether you write romance, historical fiction, young adult, or steam punk novels, you’ll find help in reaching your online audience of new and dedicated readers.

Excerpt

Chapter 1

Not Sure How to Approach Social Media? CARE about Your Readers

Among all the rules you’ll find online – the 80/20 rule (only 20% of your posts should be about your books or blog posts while 80% of your posts should contain content from other sources), the admonitions against using social media as a bullhorn, the warnings about over automating – there’s also an unspoken tenet.

This tenet isn’t a rule that comes up on the blogosphere. Instead, it’s more of a system of approach and an acronym that I created while preparing for the San Francisco Writers Conference.

If you follow the approach I’m about to explain, you can be sure that the time you spend on social media will generate the type of engagement with readers that you want to have.

Once you start to use social media, be prepared to CARE about people. I know that it seems evident to care about people online but give me a moment to break down the acronym.

• C - Communicate with your readers.

• A - Answer your readers’ questions.

• R - Relate to your readers.

• E - Educate with stellar content.

And most of all simply care about people.

Joanna Penn devised the term social karma. As she explains it, if you want book sales, buy books. If you want book reviews, write reviews for all of the books you read. If you want people to like your Facebook page or follow you on Twitter, like your readers’ and friends’ Facebook pages and follow them on Twitter.

Reciprocate actions. And just as you might offer money to a homeless stranger, smile at a person walking down the street, or invite a new family from your church over for tea or dinner, take the types of actions online that will help you to get to know the people who follow you and want to connect with you.

In other words, be kind online. Be inquisitive. Be responsive. Be open to meeting people and revealing parts of your life.

Let’s look more closely at CARE.

About the Author

Frances Caballo is an author and social media strategist and manager for writers. She’s a regular speaker at the San Francisco Writers Conference. In addition, she’s a contributing writer at TheBookDesigner.com, and blogger and Social Media Expert

for BookWorks. She’s written several social media books including The Author’s Guide to Goodreads and Social Media in 30 Minutes a Day. Her focus is on helping authors surmount the barriers that keep them from flourishing online, building their platform, finding new readers, and selling more books. Her clients include authors of every genre and writers’ conferences.

Author Links:

Website / Facebook / Pinterest / Twitter

Giveaway

Frances Caballo will be awarding a $50 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

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The Devil Orders Takeout by Bill A. Brier - Book Blast and Giveaway

About the Book


A tax attorney with integrity...a powerful mobster determined to bend his will...

Grayson Bolt isn't about to compromise his integrity to help a notorious crime boss escape the cross-hairs of the IRS. But there's a steep price to pay for defying The Man--Grayson's beloved wife and older son.

There's only one way for Grayson to prevent his younger son, Jim, an innocent golf prodigy, from also being taken out: play a dangerous game of cat and mouse. And what will Jim be forced to do when the woman he loves gets ensnarled in a web of betrayal and deceit?

Excerpt

“I’m afraid you’re going to get it hard, Mr. Bolt.” Costanzo had that fatherly tone of this will hurt me more than you. “Did you ever stop to think that there’s only one way of being dead, but many ways of dying?”

Grayson felt something cold touch his spine, all the way down. “I don’t follow.”

“Take your man Stockard. He killed two of your beloved family members, wife and eldest son. Isn’t that right?”

A strangling tightness gripped Grayson’s throat. “That— that’s right.”

“Wouldn’t you say a part of you died too?”

“What’s your point?” Grayson’s voice erupted in suppressed panic.

“You don’t have to die to feel dead. I’m going to kill your other son. That’ll be your punishment.”

The blood drained from Grayson’s face. Just like that. Most people held the basic principle that no man should be punished for the deed of another. Costanzo was not one of them. Grayson would be cut right to the bone, and his son would be the sharpest knife Costanzo could use. Costanzo had spelled out the thought in invisible brushstrokes. It was there and Grayson had tried not to see it.

About the Author

Bill grew up in California and went to Hollywood High School, then served in the Air Force as a combat cameraman.

After hiring on at Disney Studios as a film loader, he soon advanced and moved on to other film studios.

He earned a master’s degree in psychology. A big help when working with Trumpish Hollywood producers. You're fired!

During his more than twenty-five years in the movie business as a cameraman, film editor, and general manager, Bill worked on everything from the hilarious, The Love Bug, to the creepy, The Exorcist, to the far out, Star Trek and Battle Star Galactica.

Eight years ago, Bill switched from reading scripts to writing thriller/mysteries and driving racecars. After completing three award-winning novels, he signed with Black Opal Books. His first novel, The Devil Orders Takeout, is about a devoted father and husband who makes a deal with a real-life devil to protect his golf-prodigy son after his wife and older son are killed in a mysterious accident — and pays hell for it.

Bill’s second mystery, The Killer Who Hated Soup, is Book One in the 1950s The Killer Who series, and it launches this Summer. The Internet? Never heard of it. Smart phones? Who you kiddin’?

Energetic and eager to make his mark on what Time magazine called the next great boom town, Bucky Ontario leaves his daddy and little sister in Louisiana and rides a bus to Defiance, Oklahoma, a town not particularly adverse to murders, just the embarrassment of them when committed by high officials.

Book Two, The Killer who Wasn’t There, will be on bookshelves this fall.

Bill writes every day and golfs infrequently (that damn right knee!). His five children and eight grandchildren keep him busy going to birthday parties, and he never misses a one!

The Brier Patch is Bill’s wildly entertaining blog about his shameless early days in Hollywood. It’s on his website, billbrier.com, along with a contest linked to The Devil Orders Takeout, which will award the grand prizewinner $1,000.

Bill is a member of Mystery Writers of America.
Bill’s USA Today revealing interview.

Author Links:

Website / Facebook / Twitter

Giveaway

The author is awarding a randomly drawn commenter a $25 Amazon/BN GC.

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The Call House by C.P. Stiles - Book Blast and Giveaway

About the Book

A war on vice In Washington, DC—a city constantly awash in scandals? Hard to believe, but it really happened.  Only not exactly the way it’s told here.

All Mattie Simon knows is that she wants adventure and her hometown doesn’t have any. She wants independence, maybe some romance.
All Andrew Stevens wants is to do his job as a newly-elected congressman.

But Washington has a way of changing people—even when they get what they want.

Fast-paced and funny, The Call House takes you back to a time of relative innocence, when people flocked to the nation’s capital to do good works and instead got caught up in sex, money, and politics. What else would you expect?

Excerpt

BETTY Prince gently tugged on the frayed cord from the Venetian blinds. If she pulled too hard, the blinds would slip off their brackets and crash to the floor, startling the Congressman awake. She only wanted to let in the sunlight, to let Congressman Stevens know his long night of working in his office was over. It was the third time this week she’d found him asleep on that cracked leather couch. He was working too hard.

Andrew Stevens kept his eyes shut against the sun. He could feel the stiffness in his neck from sleeping without a pillow. His legs felt tight from trying to fit his six-foot-two-inch frame onto a couch four inches too short. He could tell he needed a shower. But he wasn’t ready to face the day and he wasn’t ready for another one of Betty’s lectures. She meant well, but the last thing he needed in Washington was another woman watching over him.

Too many of his colleagues’ wives had already overwhelmed him with kindness. His small refrigerator held more casseroles, more congealing dishes of Welsh rarebit, than he could eat in a month. Plus, all the dinner invitations. Always to meet some eligible niece in town visiting. Some dear female friend.

The wives embarrassed him by saying they were sure he’d be one of the brightest stars in Congress. They insisted he needed a good woman behind him to help him get ahead. His own mother, back home in Michigan, wrote him weekly to say the same thing.

About the Author

C. P. Stiles is a fiction writer living in Washington, DC. This is her first novel

From the Author

I've been writing all my life.

When I first heard the story about the best-known, high-priced call house on the East Coast located right in the middle of a nice residential neighborhood - I was intrigued. I'm still not sure why. Even after spending a few years researching and many more years writing. Maybe it's the idea of having something sort of shady going on right down the street and none of the neighbors had the faintest idea. (Warning: No sex or even steamy scenes)

Author Links:

C.P. Stiles / The Call House / Twitter / Bacon Press Books

Purchase Links:

Amazon

Giveaway

The author will be awarding a $15 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Kasper Mützenmacher's Cursed Hat by Keith R. Fentonmiller - Book Blitz and Giveaway

About the Book


Berlin hatmakers threatened by a veil-wearing Nazi known as the “stealer of faces” must use the god Hermes’ “wishing hat” to teleport out of Germany during Kristallnacht. They won’t be safer in America, however, unless they break the curse that has trapped them in the hat business for sixteen centuries. Set in the Jazz Age, Nazi Germany, and World War II Detroit, Book One of the Life Indigo series is a family saga about the fluidity of tradition, faith, and identity. It will appeal to fans of Everything is Illuminated and The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay.

Excerpt

Klaus circled behind her chair. Isana set down the glass and sat stock-still. Only her growling stomach and the electric whine of the overhead lights broke the silence. Suddenly, an empty leather glove landed on the table. Seconds later, cool fingertips touched her neck and gently worked into the base of her skull.

“You are tense.”

“I wonder why.”

Klaus pressed harder into Isana’s flesh. His fingertips warmed, radiating heat into her muscles. As much as Isana resisted, she couldn’t deny his deft touch felt good. The stiffness in her neck melted in seconds.

No, she told herself. Don’t relax. Don’t let your guard down.

Isana tried to clench her muscles, but Klaus’s heat had already penetrated deep into her spine. He seemed to have latched onto her nerves, holding them like a marionettist would grasp puppet strings. Isana should’ve felt panic, relinquishing her volition to this monster, but his touch had suppressed that reaction as well. She was sleepy and light. Her body had lost substance. She had dissolved into the hot, stale air, or evaporated into the overhead lights. She was nothing at all.

When Klaus unhanded Isana, her corporeal nature returned. In her bewilderment, she momentarily worried her chair might give way under the weight of her body.

About the Author


Keith is a consumer protection attorney for the Federal Trade Commission in Washington, D.C. Before graduating from the University of Michigan Law School, he toured with a professional comedy troupe, writing and performing sketch comedy at colleges in the Mid-Atlantic States. His short story, Non Compos Mentis, was recently published in The Stonecoast Review and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. His short story Exodus was just published in the Running Wild Anthology of Stories.

Author Links:

Website / Facebook / Twitter / Goodreads

Purchase Links:

Amazon US / Amazon UK / Barnes & Noble

Giveaway

Keith R. Fentonmiller will be awarding a $50 Amazon or Barnes and Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Ascended by Maggie Mae Gallagher - Book Blast and Giveaway

About the Book


War. It’s here. The last war of mankind. The winner takes Earth as its prize.

My name is Alana Devereaux. I am an elite Cantati Forces Lieutenant from Earth’s desolate future. I was sent back through time to save your world. My mission to stop the Mutari faltered. Demons infiltrated our world when the walls between Earth and Infernus fell. Millions died in the first volleys.

The Mutari changed me on an elemental level and my new powers scare the bloody daylights out of me. Formorian Hunters are closing in on my trail with a singular goal, to enact the death warrant placed on my head by their Queen. Now I am running for my life, on a quest to discover a way to kill an immortal on a power trip, stuck between mortal enemies, and everyone else wants me dead.

Excerpt

The Mutari changed me, contorted my abilities into something new. I felt stronger, had a keener sense of the elements, and noticed that the barriers normally locking my magic ability in place had been blown off their hinges. 

My supercharged abilities scared the bloody shit out of me. 

A flick of my wrist, and the wind outside bellowed and roared. I shuddered at the writhing mass snaking within me. The flavor stained with the dark. It was why I had detested Cade. A part of me had known he could help unearth these latent feelings. Dig them up from the grave I sank them into as a child. Yet the Mutari resurrected them with the force of an atom bomb to my system. 

It’s why I excelled at killing demons. Why I alone could find them better than anyone else in my squad, because I was drawn to them just as demons were inherently drawn to me. It made me wonder if they had used my inner demon to track me to the Densare Compound. Maybe I should have taken exile in the Desert. Then maybe my guys would still be alive. 

Was I something to be feared? Something that needed to be killed? 

My father, and the rest of my squad, would be so disappointed. It made me sick just thinking about it. Almost like it was an affront to their memories. Darkness held sway across the globe for another forty-eight hours as Earth traveled through the galactic axis as the planets created an eclipse blocking out the sunlight. 

Would my new powers help me defeat Drystan?

About the Author

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Maggie grew up listening to Cardinals baseball and reading anything she could get her hands on. She remembers her mother saying if only she would read the right type of books instead binging her way through the romance aisles at the bookstore, she’d have been a doctor. While Maggie never did get that doctorate, she graduated cum laude from the University of Missouri-St. Louis with an M.A. in History.

Maggie is a bestselling and award-winning author published in multiple fiction genres. She also writes erotic romance under the name Anya Summers. A total geek at her core, when she is not writing, she adores attending the latest comic con or spending time with her family. She currently lives in the Midwest with her two furry felines.

Author Links:

Website / Facebook / Twitter

Purchase Links:

Barnes & Noble / Amazon

Giveaway

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

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Stay After Class by A.C. Rose - Book Blast and Giveaway

About the Book

A passionate professor. A smitten student. An attraction that cannot be denied.

Amanda Slade has a major crush on her sexy art professor and wants his help with an important extracurricular activity: Project VirgEnd.

Professor Jem Nichols knows falling for his beautiful student is a bad idea but he just can't say goodbye as the semester ends. But the professor refuses to hastily take her virtue. Instead, he wants to slowly teach her the most important lessons of lovemaking. As she experiences first-time pleasures and passions, love blooms.

By the time they're done, he'll know every inch of her body. But as her deadline for deflowerment looms, will the professor be the one to take Amanda all the way? This is a sweet yet steamy love story.

THE BOOK IS $0.99 DURING THE TOUR

Excerpt

Amanda Visits the Professor At The Gallery

By A.C. Rose ©2017

When I arrived, the interior of the gallery looked dark and deserted, but he stepped to the door to let me in. He wore a black button-up shirt, the tails hanging over his well-worn jeans. His sleeves were rolled up, showing those strong, muscular hands. His eyes were dark and mysterious, yet his smile said he was happy to see me. 

Ushering me in, he locked the door behind us and took me into his arms. It hit me how big he was, in comparison to my small frame. My head was within the reach of his chin when in his arms, and his body towered over mine. I felt small, but safe in his arms.

“I’ve missed you,” he said, kissing the top of my head, pulling me closer. 

“You have? I thought it was just me, missing you.” I nuzzled into his chest.

“Were that the truth, things would be a lot easier,” he said with a sigh. “Then this would just be a student crush to contend with as opposed to both of us having, um, feelings. But—”

He paused, and pulled away a few inches, stopping himself.

“But what?”

“I am afraid I am going to lose my resolve to not ravish you, so tonight, this calls for a new sketch.”

“What if someone comes in this time?”

“They won’t. I have a contractual agreement with the gallery that no one can be in this space or come in the door after eight p.m. while I am working on the installation. So it’s all ours.”

About the Author

A.C. Rose is a sex and love journalist who also loves to write very steamy romance books.

As a former editor of an iconic women’s magazine, sexy stories and beautiful men have long been her beat.

She has written extensively on sexuality, relationships, female desire, and the “kissing book” industry.

Has real life provided fodder for her fictional worlds? She’ll never tell.

She is a member of the Romance Writers of America (RWA), Passionate Ink (PI), and the Author’s Guild (AG).

Author Links:

Website / Blog / Facebook / Twitter / E-mail

Subscribe to my newsletter here and join my VIP list.

Giveaway

The author will be awarding a $20 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Daughter of Aithne by Karin Rita Gastreich - Book Blast and Giveaway

About the Book

Betrayed by her own prodigy, Eolyn stands accused of treason. As power-hungry nobles dismantle her life's work and honor, the desperate queen forges a risky alliance with the ruthless and cunning Mage Corey. Determined to defend her son's claim to the throne of the Mage King, Eolyn prepares for her last and greatest battle, this time against her own sisters in magic.

Across the Furma River, Taesara of Roenfyn is drawn out of seclusion and into an ever-more vicious game of intrigue and war. Subject to the schemes of a shrewd uncle and the mysterious ambitions of the wizards of Galia, Taesara struggles to assert her own destiny, even as she takes up arms to defend her daughter's inheritance.

In the climactic finale to The Silver Web trilogy, threads of love, honor, betrayal, and vengeance culminate in a violent conflict between powerful women, opposed to each other yet destined to shatter a thousand-year cycle of war.

"A tale of female oppression, prejudice, and even deadly seduction, EOLYN touches on issues that are deeply relevant to our own society." -Apex Reviews review of EOLYN, Book One of the Silver Web

“The story's greatest triumph is Gastreich's prose, a consistent blend of lyrical verse and dark imageray....Lush, evocative descriptions carry readers through an unforgettable journey.” –Kirkus Reviews review of SWORD OF SHADOWS, Book Two of The Silver Web”

The first book of the series, EOLYN, will be a FREE download on Kindle only on May 1

Excerpt

“Speak plainly, my Lord King,” Eolyn said. “I will not be subject to this cat-and-mouse game. If you do not trust me, if you do not believe me, then say so.”

“I trust your heart, Eolyn,” Akmael replied, “but your heart has led you to ill-advised decisions in the past. For this reason, I am not always inclined to trust your judgment.”

“For the love of the Gods! I am not the confused and frightened girl I was when my brother took up arms against you.”

“No, but you must understand the dilemma you have put me in.”

“The dilemma I have put you in?”

“If you knew of Ghemena’s plan and did not inform me, you were party to treason. If you did not know, then your authority over the magas is uncertain. Either way, the magas must remain bound and imprisoned until this conflict is resolved.”

Eolyn blinked and stepped away. “The magas have lived in peace in Moisehén for more than a decade. You cannot let the action of one woman—”

“Three women. The blatantly treasonous act of three women, all devoted students of yours. They have brought war upon us, Eolyn. Who knows how many others among your followers support them?”

“The magas who remain in my service have done nothing to merit suspicion.”

“All magas merit suspicion.” Akmael hesitated at her stricken look. He let go a slow breath and softened his tone. “There is a history here that we have not yet overcome, Eolyn. You, of all people, must understand that. Too many of our subjects still remember the war against my father.”

“And the purges that followed?” she shot back.

“The violence that tore this kingdom apart,” he conceded. “Right or wrong, the magas were left with the blame. We must manage this situation carefully, to protect you and your daughters. To see that justice is done.”

About the Author

Karin Rita Gastreich writes stories of ordinary women and the extraordinary paths they choose. She lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where she is part of the biology faculty at Avila University. An ecologist by vocation, Karin has wandered forests and wildlands all her life. Her pastimes include camping, hiking, music, and flamenco dance. In addition to THE SILVER WEB trilogy, Karin has published short stories in World Jumping, Zahir, Adventures for the Average Woman, and 69 Flavors of Paranoia. She is a recipient of the Spring 2011 Andrews Forest Writer’s Residency.

Author Links:

Website / Twitter / Facebook

Giveaway

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

a Rafflecopter giveaway