Hump Day Books from Robyn DeHart, Elaine Grant, Julie Kenner, Anna Markland, Kourtney Heintz, Zoe Dawson, Tracy Deebs, and some yummy fat fast dishes!

Hump Day Reads Robyn DeHart, Julie Kenner, Anna Markland, Elaine Grant, Zoe Dawson, Tracy DeebsLots of great books this week to help you get over that mid-week hump!


The Secrets of Mia Danvers: A Dangerous Liaisons Novel (InterMix)

I’m excited! I’ve been looking forward to this Jack the Ripper centric book from Robyn DeHart for forever! And now it’s out, and at a great price! Snap it up folks! And learn all about Robyn here!



The Caverns (Tennessee Mountain Home Series)

Here’s a new release from Elaine Grant that looks absolutely awesome! Already raking in the 5 star reviews!

California Demon: The Secret Life of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom
In anticipation of Demons Are Forever FINALLY coming back to digital format (should be by this weekend sometime!), I lowered the price on California Demon! Enjoy.

Learn more at www.DemonHuntingSoccerMom.com

Doomed

Don’t miss the sale! Doomed for $2.99 … and I think today is the last day, so hurry!

Fat Fast Cookbook: 50 Easy Recipes to Jump Start Your Low Carb Weight Loss

I’m not doing a fat fast, but I have scoped out and tried a number of recipes from this book, and can I just say: YUM. You’ll want to beware if you’re not a low-carb eater (fats and carbs do not play well together in the keeping-pounds-off department) but if you tend to eat low-carb, you really should treat yourself!

Want your book listed on the Hump Day Reads blog post? Click here for submission info!


P.S. - If you enjoy romance with a magical twist, my award-winning THE CAT'S FANCY is currently on sale for only 99 cents!  And it's also in the top 10 of several of the Kindle romance charts!  Woot!

And as a cool bonus, it's the prequel to my fun series of superhero romances that began with the USA Today bestseller Aphrodite's Kiss!  

I hope you check out The Cat's Fancy!

P.P.S. And why not scroll down and share the post? After all, sharing is sexy! XXOO

--J.K.


Writing the Supernatural: Kourtney Heintz’s Research and Discoveries in Telepathy (plus a contest!)

If you’ve ever read my Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom series, you’re no stranger to paranormal fiction. Today Kourtney Heintz gives us a taste of her own kind of paranormal – the telepathic. Keep reading for a chance to win a copy of her breakout book The Six Train to Wisconsin and my own Release Me!


Where Research and Reality Collide

Big thank you to Julie for having me on her blog! I met her during the 2010 Brenda Novak Charity auction. I won her feedback on the first chapter of my manuscript. She told me she thought I had something there. Her belief helped me stick with it for the next 3 years. Thank you so much Julie!

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When I decided to write a telepath, I knew I needed to explore the supernatural more. To learn how it worked and then create my own version of it.

I read a bunch of books on witchcraft. Trying to understand the rules that governed different magical systems. Some books weren’t that helpful. Some didn’t make any sense to me. Then I stumbled on Laurie Cabot’s Power of the Witch.

The way she explained things just clicked in my head. Every other book had confused me, but using her technique I taught myself how to meditate in a few days. To slow my thoughts down and visualize things. To relax my body and reach a calmer state.

This was really cool stuff. But I wanted more. I craved an actual lesson. So I signed up for a week-long workshop with Laurie Cabot “The Official Salem Witch” in Salem, MA.

She taught us about the concept of alpha brain waves. That when you slowed down your mind you could tap into something deeper. More intuitive. A universal consciousness if you will.

Over the course of the week we did several meditations. We learned how to craft a protective shield, do a past life regression, and to see other people’s illnesses from miles away.

That last one was the coolest experience. We did this exercise where we each wrote down the names, locations, ages, and illnesses of 3 people we knew. Then we were randomly assigned a partner and given the name and location and age of one of their people. Using meditation, we visualized the person and diagnosed their illness.

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Each of us experienced it differently. I tended to be very visual. So I saw a woman with a big head and a bony brittle body. I didn’t understand what it meant. So I talked through the image. Until I arrived at osteoporosis. I was right.

Sounds impossible, but we all got most or all the people’s illnesses correct. Without ever meeting them or seeing them.

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It was an otherwordly experience and made me believe that the mind is capable of some awesome stuff when it’s trained to do it. And when you believe you can do it.

The idea of a telepath and a dreamwalker no longer seemed so far outside the realm of possibility.

Here’s your chance to win a signed copy of The Six Train to Wisconsin by Kourtney Heintz and Release Me by J. Kenner!  Just fill out the Rafflecopter on this link and you’re entered to win!


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Kourtney Heintz writes emotionally evocative speculative fiction that captures the deepest truths of being human. For her characters, love is a journey never a destination.

She resides in Connecticut with her warrior lapdog, Emerson, her supportive parents and three quirky golden retrievers. Years of working on Wall Street provided the perfect backdrop for her imagination to run amuck at night, imagining a world where out-of-control telepathy and buried secrets collide.

Her debut novel, The Six Train to Wisconsin, was a 2012 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Semifinalist.

One Sentence Summary of Novel:

When Kai’s telepathy spirals out of control, her husband Oliver brings her to the quiet Wisconsin hometown he abandoned a decade ago, where he must confront the secrets of his past to save their future.

You can download the first chapter of the Six Train to Wisconsin as a pdf file.

Connecting with Kourtney on her website, Blog, and Facebook page!

Find The Six Train to Wisconsin at Amazon and Barnes and Noble!


Wow, what an awesome experience, Kourtney! What do y’all think about the superpowers of the mind? Don’t forget to fill out the Rafflecopter for your chance to win The Six Train to Wisconsin and Release Me!


P.S. - If you enjoy romance with a magical twist, my award-winning THE CAT'S FANCY is currently on sale for only 99 cents!  And it's also in the top 10 of several of the Kindle romance charts!  Woot!

And as a cool bonus, it's the prequel to my fun series of superhero romances that began with the USA Today bestseller Aphrodite's Kiss!  

I hope you check out The Cat's Fancy!

P.P.S. And why not scroll down and share the post? After all, sharing is sexy! XXOO

--J.K.


Still time to grab Doomed by Tracy Deebs for a great price!

Doomed by Tracy Deebs Young Adult dystopian gamer fictionI’ve mentioned Doomed on my blog before, but that was when it first came out.  Now, it’s on sale.  Woot!  Grab it while you can for $2.99 before it kicks back up in price!

Pandora’s just your average teen-glued to her cell phone and laptop, surfing Facebook and e-mailing with her friends-until the day her long-lost father sends her a link to a mysterious site featuring twelve photos of her as a child. Unable to contain her curiosity, Pandora enters the site, where she is prompted to play her favorite virtual-reality game, Zero Day. This unleashes a global computer virus that plunges the whole world into panic: suddenly, there is no Internet. No cell phones. No utilities, traffic lights, hospitals, law enforcement. Pandora teams up with handsome stepbrothers Eli and Theo to enter the virtual world of Zero Day. Simultaneously, she continues to follow the photographs from her childhood in an attempt to beat the game and track down her father-her one key to saving the world as we know it. Part The Matrix, part retelling of the Pandora myth, Doomed has something for gaming fans, dystopian fans, and romance fans alike.

 

And, of course, there’s my daughter’s review:  ”Loved it!”


P.S. - If you enjoy romance with a magical twist, my award-winning THE CAT'S FANCY is currently on sale for only 99 cents!  And it's also in the top 10 of several of the Kindle romance charts!  Woot!

And as a cool bonus, it's the prequel to my fun series of superhero romances that began with the USA Today bestseller Aphrodite's Kiss!  

I hope you check out The Cat's Fancy!

P.P.S. And why not scroll down and share the post? After all, sharing is sexy! XXOO

--J.K.


How Marijuana May Follow in the Footsteps of Condoms: Colleen Gleason on Legalization

Here’s a post that’ll make you think–pot, condoms and a touch of controversy to kick off your weekend! Please help me welcome Colleen Gleason to the blog!


 How marijuana could follow in the historical footsteps of condoms…

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My latest release, Roaring Midnight, is the first in a historical urban fantasy/romance series set in 1920s Chicago. The trilogy will tell the story of Macey Gardella, vampire hunter.

I love the era of the Twenties (The fashion! The hats! The music!… And of course the intrigue of the speakeasies and clubs). I had so many fascinating things to research about this time period, and one of the most interesting things I had to investigate was the issue of birth control.

We all know that The Volstead Act (The 18th Amendment) made illegal the sale, distribution, and manufacture of alcoholic spirits. But to my surprise, liquor wasn’t the only item outlawed in the early 20th century that is in common use today.

I’m talking about condoms.

Of course my characters in Roaring Midnight had to practice safe sex–and so I had to find out what options were available. To my surprise, I learned that condoms were already being manufactured out of rubber, and were plentiful in Europe–where they weren’t illegal.

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This was not the case in the US. In and around 1873, thirty states made the sale and manufacture of condoms illegal. And during the same time, The Comstock Laws made it illegal to send condoms through the mail anywhere in the US. Which pretty much made condoms impossible to come by.

But while fighting overseas during World War I, US soldiers had been accustomed to having condoms readily available. In fact, they were distributed like candy to the GIs in order to keep them healthy–and happy.

It was only after our men came home from the Great War, bringing with them an increased number of syphilis cases, that the laws were changed to allow the prophylactic to be sold legally in the States.

Even then, however, the Moral Majority had their way. Condoms could only be sold as protection from STDs. Not as contraceptive devices. That restriction controlled how their uses were advertised as well.

Many people might feel the restrictions on marijuana sale, possession, and use–currently limited in most states to medical use only–is eerily similar to the situation with condoms. As we know, condoms were eventually able to be sold as contraceptives as well…one can only wonder whether, some day, the same will be said for marijuana.

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In the mean time, many casual pot users are surely doing their best to get legal access to their favorite weed…just as those conscientious men (and women) of the early 20th century, who didn’t want to start a family quite yet, were finding legal ways to acquire the illegal contraceptive device known as a rubber.

Visit Colleen on her website!


Wow! Who else didn’t know that condoms were against the law until after the 20s? What do you think about the direction marijuana’s going towards legalization?


P.S. - If you enjoy romance with a magical twist, my award-winning THE CAT'S FANCY is currently on sale for only 99 cents!  And it's also in the top 10 of several of the Kindle romance charts!  Woot!

And as a cool bonus, it's the prequel to my fun series of superhero romances that began with the USA Today bestseller Aphrodite's Kiss!  

I hope you check out The Cat's Fancy!

P.P.S. And why not scroll down and share the post? After all, sharing is sexy! XXOO

--J.K.


A steamy #StarkOnSaturday excerpt from Complete Me (Stark Trilogy book 3) and a sexy pic!

Reading is My Breathing Complete Me graphic

Thanks to Reading is My Breathing for another awesome graphic!

Here’s a sizzling #StarkOnSaturday as we come closer to the release of Complete Me - Stark Trilogy book 3!!!

I recently learned that Claim Me has gone back to print for the fifth time!  And Release Me went back to press again recently, too!  I’m so thrilled that new readers are discovering Nikki and Damien!

I hope you enjoy this snippet from the upcoming Complete Me, book three in the Stark Trilogy that began with with Release Me, continued with Claim Me, and will conclude with Complete Me!Complete Me by J. Kenner Stark Trilogy book 3 erotic romance  - Stark On Saturday excerpt

I can only moan. Words are impossible, the power of speech obliterated by the violence of the emotions raging through me.

He leans over and punches the intercom button, then asks the driver how close we are to the hotel. We’re just a few blocks away, and I don’t know whether to be relieved or frustrated when Damien tells the driver to circle the block until he says otherwise.

Then he clicks off, smiles at me, and pours himself a shot of whiskey over ice. His eyes never leave my face as he tilts the glass back and takes a long, deep swallow before moving back to my side, the glass still in his hand.

“Open,” he says.

I open my mouth, and he takes out a cube of ice, holding it between two fingers and his thumb. He brushes it gently over my lips, and I open wider, reaching out with my tongue to taste the smooth liquor. It’s gone too soon, though. Because he eases down until he is holding the ice cube over my belly, and three fat drops fall from the cube to land upon my over-heated flesh. The sensation is electrifying, and I arch up, gasping. Wanting. The droplets swirl on my skin with the motion, leaving a cool trail down to my pubic bone. My skin quivers, my need like a palpable thing.

Damien meets my eyes, then slowly—too damn slowly—trails the cube between my thigh and the sensitive skin of my sex. My body bucks, and I’m not certain if I’m trying to escape because it is too much to bear or if I am desperate for more. All I know is that I cannot escape. I am bound, tied down, and right now, Damien can do with me whatever he wants.

“Oh, god. Damien, what are you doing?”

“Unless I’m doing it wrong, I’m getting you very, very worked up. And, my dear,” he adds, as he tosses the tiny shred of ice that remains back into the glass, “I think I’ve succeeded.”

 

Want more? You can pre-order Complete Me from Amazon or from Barnes and Noble! On-sale July 30!

And if you missed Release Me, you can snag your copy from your favorite retailers here:

Random House
Amazon (print)
Amazon (kindle)
Amazon United Kingdom
Barnes and Noble (print or Nook)
Books-A-Million
Kobo
iBooks
Indie Bound
And, of course, you can get Book 2, Claim Me, from these great retailers:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Books-a-Million
Random House
your favorite independent bookseller
in the U.K. from Amazon
 in the U.K. from Waterstones
 in the U.K. from WH Smith

More soon,

XXOO


P.S. - If you enjoy romance with a magical twist, my award-winning THE CAT'S FANCY is currently on sale for only 99 cents!  And it's also in the top 10 of several of the Kindle romance charts!  Woot!

And as a cool bonus, it's the prequel to my fun series of superhero romances that began with the USA Today bestseller Aphrodite's Kiss!  

I hope you check out The Cat's Fancy!

P.P.S. And why not scroll down and share the post? After all, sharing is sexy! XXOO

--J.K.