Wednesday, 30 March 2022

BOOK SPOTLIGHT!!! The Feathered Nest (The Thornton Mysteries, Book 4) by Ellen Read #BlogTour #HistoricalFiction #CoffeePotBookClub @ellenreadauthor @maryanneyarde


 Blog Tour



Murder comes to Norfolk Island, but is the killer after Alexandra Archer’s Tahitian black pearl or a lost illustration of the rare Green Parrot?

The Thorntons, along with a small team of people, mount an expedition to Norfolk Island, a small island in the South Pacific, to study the Green Parrot and set up research programmes to help protect it and other endangered birds.

As a birthday surprise, Alexandra’s father tells her she is to be the official photographer for the expedition. Her father gives her a black pearl brooch that Alexandra’s great-grandfather had bought off a merchant in Hong Kong in the 1850s. The pearls are Tahitian black pearls.

Before they depart Melbourne, they learn that Norfolk Island has had its first murder. It sends ripples of unease through Alexandra. She hoped she could escape murder on this small island paradise.

Alexandra is astonished to learn that the main inhabitants of Norfolk Island are descendants of the Bounty mutineers and their Tahitian wives. Once on the island, she wonders if this is why her Tahitian black pearl brooch causes such interest.

A chain of events is set in motion, commencing with a threat on the life of one of their expedition members, followed by intrigue surrounding bird smuggling and a lost illustration of the Green Parrot. Then two of their team are murdered.

Alexandra is determined to find the answers and nearly loses her life in the process.

If you would like to read this novel you can find it at the follow bookstores:
This novel is available on #KindleUnlimted.

 Ellen Read


Ellen Read is the author of The Dragon Sleeps, The Inca’s Curse and The Amber Trap—historical murder mystery romance novels.

Ellen was born in Queensland, Australia. 

She loves to read fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. She particularly loves history and stories of ancient myths and legends. Authors such as Edgar Allan Poe, Agatha Christie, and Victoria Holt, the latter of whom wrote gothic mystery/romances, have influenced her own work.

Other interests include photography, painting, music and musical theatre, and dance. Ellen was a ballroom dancing teacher for many years and has also worked in Performing Arts administration. 

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Monday, 28 March 2022

Book Review!!! Waking Up Lost – A Mystical Fantasy Adventure (The Adirondack Spirit Series) by David Fitz-Gerald #CoffeePotBookClub #BlogTour

 




Waking Up Lost – A Mystical Fantasy Adventure
(The Adirondack Spirit Series)
By David Fitz-Gerald

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I have read one book in this series, The Curse of Conchobar, and it was a prequel to the series. After reading this book, I am wondering whether there are multiple different books and settings in this series, for I could find no correlation between that book and this one. Both books seem to stand alone, as separate books, as if they are connected by their link to the supernatural and nothing else. And while I agreed to read this book based on my views on The Curse of Conchobar, the fact that the two books are unalike is not going to affect my review in the slightest. In fact, I am incredibly glad I agreed to read this book.

Noah comes from a family of people gifted with supernatural abilities, but he does not have one himself. That is, he didn’t, until he woke up in the middle of the woods, miles away from home, with no explanation other than he must have walked there in his sleep. Noah has struggled his entire life, trying to fit in with his family, and trying to find his place in the village, but perhaps he does not truly belong with either. Perhaps his life lies elsewhere, deep in the woods, living as a mountain man, like his father had.

Noah certainly goes through a lot in this novel, and the reader cannot help but fall in love with his character. I read with my fingers crossed that he would find a happy ending. This book is packed full of action, adventure, and the big question – why does Noah travel in his sleep, and how can he stop it, or at least, make sure he’s safe?

This book introduced to me a cast of new characters, and, having taken a look at the author’s list of books, I can see several that I would very much like to read, as they are about characters mentioned in, or featuring in, this book. The world that is contained inside these pages is one that I thoroughly enjoyed my time in, and I cannot wait to go back!


Traveling without warning. Nights lost to supernatural journeys. Is one young man fat-ed to wander far from safety?

New York State, 1833. Noah Munch longs to fit in. Living with a mother who communes with ghosts and a brother with a knack for heroics, the seventeen-year-old wishes he were fearless enough to discover an extraordinary purpose of his own. But when he mysteriously awakens in the bedroom of the two beautiful daughters of the meanest man in town, he realizes his odd sleepwalking ability could potentially be deadly.

Convinced that leaving civilization is the only way to keep himself and others safe, Noah pur-sues his dream of becoming a mountain man and slips away into the primeval woods. But after a strong summer storm devastates his camp, the troubled lad finds his mystical wanderings have only just begun.

Can Noah find his place before he’s destroyed by a ruthless world?



You can pick up your copy on Amazon. This novel is available on #KindleUnlimited

David Fitz-Gerald 

David Fitz-Gerald writes fiction that is grounded in history and soars with the spirits. Dave en-joys getting lost in the settings he imagines and spending time with the characters he creates. Writing historical fiction is like making paintings of the past. He loves to weave fact and fiction together, stirring in action, adventure, romance, and a heavy dose of the supernatural with the hope of transporting the reader to another time and place. He is an Adirondack 46-er, which means he has hiked all of the highest peaks in New York State, so it should not be surprising when Dave attempts to glorify hikers as swashbuckling superheroes in his writing.

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Wednesday, 23 March 2022

BOOK SPOTLIGHT!!! The Virgin of the Wind Rose: A Conspiracy Thriller by Glen Craney #HistoricalThriller #HistoricalMystery #BlogTour @glencraney @maryanneyarde

 


The Virgin of the Wind Rose: A Conspiracy Thriller
By Glen Craney

A Templar cryptogram has confounded scholars for centuries.

Is it a ticking cipher bomb just hours away from detonating a global war?

Rookie State Department lawyer Jaqueline Quartermane was never much good at puzzles. But now, assigned to investigate a ritual murder of an American in Ethiopia, she and a shady stolen-art hunter must solve the world's oldest palindrome—the infamous SATOR Square—to thwart a reli-gious conspiracy that reaches back to the Age of Discovery and an arcane monastic order of Portu-guese sea explorers.

Separated by half a millennium, two espionage plots dovetail in this breakneck thriller, driven by history's most elusive mystery....

... the shocking secret that Christopher Columbus took to the grave.

Praise

"If you love Steve Berry, Dan Brown or Umberto Eco, you may have a new author favorite in Glen Craney." -- BESTTHRILLERS.COM

"An exciting journey across time, with more twists and turns than a strawberry Twizzler." -- QUARTERDECK MAGAZINE

If you would like to read this novel you can find it at the following bookstores:

A graduate of Indiana University School of Law and Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, Glen Craney practiced trial law before joining the Washington, D.C. press corps to write about national politics and the Iran-contra trial for Congressional Quarterly magazine. In 1996, the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts and Sciences awarded him the Nicholl Fellowship prize for best new screenwriting. His debut historical novel, The Fire and the Light, was named Best New Fiction by the National Indie Excellence Awards. He is a three-time Finalist/Honorable Mention winner of Foreword Magazine’s Book-of-the-Year, a Chaucer Award winner, and a Military Writers Society of America Gold Medalist. His books have taken readers to Occitania dur-ing the Albigensian Crusade, the Scotland of Robert Bruce, Portugal during the Age of Discovery, the trenches of France during World War I, the battlefields of the American Civil War, and the American Hoovervilles of the Great Depression. He has served as president of the Southern Cali-fornia Chapter of the Historical Novel Society.

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Thursday, 17 March 2022

BOOK SPOTLIGHT!!! The Scribe (The Two Daggers, Book 1) & The Land of God (The Two Daggers, Book 2) by Elizabeth R. Andersen @E_R_A_writes @maryanneyarde

 



The Scribe (The Two Daggers, Book 1) 
By Elizabeth R. Andersen

All Henri of Maron wanted was to stay with his family on his country estate, surrounded by lemon groves and safety. But in 13th century Palestine, when noble-born boys are raised to fight for the Holy Land, young Henri will be sent to live and train among men who hate him for what he is: a French nobleman of an Arab mother. Robbed of his humanity and steeped in cruelty, his encounters with a slave soldier, a former pickpocket, and a kindly scribe will force Henri to confront his own beliefs and behaviors. 

Will Henri maintain the status quo in order to fit into a society that doesn’t want him, or will fate intervene first?

The first book in The Two Daggers series, The Scribe takes readers on a sweeping adventure through the years and months that lead up to the infamous Siege of Acre in 1291 CE and delves into the psyches of three young people caught up in the wave of history.

You can pick up your copy on your favourite online bookstore!




The Land of God
(The Two Daggers, Book 2)
By Elizabeth R. Andersen

Pain. His sister’s screams. And a beautiful face in the jeering crowd. When Henri of Maron woke, he had only a few memories of his brutal flogging, but he knew the world had changed. He had changed.

Now, as he grapples with the fallout from his disastrous decisions, war with the Mamluk army looms closer. To convince the city leaders to take the threat seriously, Henri and the grand mas-ter of the Templars must rely on unlikely allies and bold risks to avoid a siege.

Meanwhile, Sidika is trying to find a way to put her life back together. When she is forced to flee her home, her chance encounters with a handsome amir and a strangely familiar old woman will have consequences for her future.

The Land of God weaves the real historical figures with rich, complex characters and an edge-of-seat plot. Readers who enjoyed the Brethren series by Robyn Young and The Physician by Noah Gordon will appreciate this immersive tale set in the Middle East in the Middle Ages.

Trigger warnings:
Torture, violence, sexual assault, sexual content.

You can pick up your copy on your favourite online bookstore!





Elizabeth R. Andersen's debut novel, The Scribe, launched in July of 2021. Although she spent many years of her life as a journalist, independent fashion designer, and overworked tech em-ployee, there have always been two consistent loves in her life: writing and history. She finally decided to do something about this and put them both together. 

Elizabeth lives in the Seattle area with her long-suffering husband and young son. On the weekends she usually hikes in the stunning Cascade mountains to hide from people and dream up new plotlines and characters. Elizabeth is a member of the Historical Novel Society and the Alliance of Independent Authors.

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Tuesday, 1 March 2022

BOOK REVIEW!!! The Prisoner of Paradise (The Paradise Series, Book 1) By Rob Samborn #BlogTour #CoffeePotBookClub @robsamborn @maryanneyarde

 



⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

This is a hauntingly beautiful novel about love lost in time. The novel begins with a very ordinary couple, Nick and Julia, who are very much in love. However, when they take a trip to Venice, things take a sudden unexpected turn. 

Julia loves the art and culture of the country they are visiting, Nick, however, enjoys the food and drink more than he enjoys the artwork! That is, until he begins to hear the voice of a woman who is seemingly trapped inside a painting. When Nick tells Julia about the voice, she is understandingly concerned and implores him to see a doctor, fearing a recent head injury is a cause for the voice. However, Nick is convinced that the voice he is hearing from the painting, the voice of Isabella Scalfini, is real. 

The story continues in the sixteenth century, where we are introduced to Angelo, who so happens to know a woman named Isabella Scalfini. There are not many chapters from Angelo’s perspective, but he provides backstory and an insight into the workings behind how the mysterious group, the Order, seems to be trapping souls inside Paradise. Between Nick and Angelo, we get a rounded story of how Isabella ended up where she did, and while Angelo does not get a chance to do anything to help her, Nick has an opportunity to do something. The only issue is that the Order is fiercely protective of Paradise, and there is no way they are going to simply let Nick figure out how to free the trapped souls.

Filled with mystery and non-stop action meant that this book was utterly compelling from beginning to end. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of this novel. My only complaint is that I would have liked to have spent a little more time in the sixteenth century, but that aside, this is certainly a book I would recommend.



The world’s largest oil painting. A 400-year-old murder. A disembodied whisper: “Amore mio.” My love.

Nick and Julia O’Connor’s dream trip to Venice collapses when a haunting voice reaches out to Nick from Tintoretto’s Paradise, a monumental depiction of Heaven. Convinced his delusions are the result of a concussion, Julia insists her husband see a doctor, though Nick is adamant the voice was real.

Blacking out in the museum, Nick flashes back to a life as a 16th century Venetian peasant swordsman. He recalls precisely who the voice belongs to: Isabella Scalfini, a married aristocrat he was tasked to seduce but with whom he instead found true love. A love stolen from them hundreds of years prior.

She implores Nick to liberate her from a powerful order of religious vigilantes who judge and sentence souls to the canvas for eternity. Releasing Isabella also means unleashing thousands of other imprisoned souls, all of which the order claims are evil.

As infatuation with a possible hallucination clouds his commitment to a present-day wife, Nick’s past self takes over. Wracked with guilt, he can no longer allow Isabella to remain tor-mented, despite the consequences. He must right an age-old wrong – destroy the painting and free his soul mate. But the order will eradicate anyone who threatens their ethereal prison and their control over Venice.

Trigger Warnings.
Violence, a rape scene, a torture scene.

If you would like to read this novel you can find it at the following bookstores:


In addition to being a novelist, Rob Samborn is a screenwriter, entrepreneur and avid traveler. He’s been to forty countries, lived in five of them and studied nine languages. As a restless spirit who can’t remember the last time he was bored, Rob is on a quest to explore the intrica-cies of our world and try his hand at a multitude of crafts; he’s also an accomplished artist and musician, as well as a budding furniture maker. A native New Yorker who lived in Los Ange-les for twenty years, he now makes his home in Denver with his wife, daughter and dog. 

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NEW RELEASE!!! Escape the Choice (The Choice Series, Book 1) by Ellie Yarde #YoungAdult #ContemporaryRomance #YARomance @readingalnight



 

Escape the Choice
(The Choice Series, Book 1)
By Ellie Yarde

How do you make a choice when you don't want to choose?

Oliver's friendship may be important to Ali, after all, she's the only friend he's got, but that's all they will ever be – friends. When it comes to Noah, she can't help but hope their friendship will become something more. Her heart flutters when he is near, and her eyes always seem to find his.

Unfortunately for Ali, Oliver would make things very difficult if anything were to happen be-tween her and Noah, and while Noah has never told her not to be friends with Oliver, his dis-taste for the man is quite clear. For Ali to resolve the ongoing dispute, she will have to choose between them. But how can Ali choose between the two men when her decision will mean she has to cut one of them from her life?

A quick read filled with friendship, love, and a deep adoration of coffee and muffins.

If you would like to read your novel you can find it on Amazon UK
This novel is available to read with #KindleUnlimited subscription.

Ellie Yarde is primarily a reader and blogger. She writes short stories, which are published on her blog, Reading All Night, where she also shares her reviews. Escape The Choice is Ellie’s debut novel, and the first in The Choice Series. 
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#BlogTour - The Yanks are Starving: A Novel of the Bonus Army by Glen Craney @glencraney @cathiedunn

  The Yanks are Starving: A Novel of the Bonus Army By Glen Craney Two armies. One flag. No honor. The most shocking day in American history...