Are you ready?

At VBS this year, the kids learned about Noah and the flood. Many people believe Noah and the flood is just a children’s story. It isn’t just a story. It really happened, but I’m not writing this post to debate the evidences for or against a worldwide flood.

What I am here to write about is Noah. When God looked down on the earth and saw that the heart of man “was only evil continually,” He also saw that Noah stood against everyone else. Noah stood up for righteousness, he did good rather than evil.

Instead of destroying His whole creation, God had Noah build an ark so He could save the animals as well as Noah and his family. Why was this so amazing and hard for Noah to do?

“Now no shrub of the field was yet in the earth, and no plant of the field had yet sprouted, for the Lord God had not sent rain upon the earth, and there was no man to cultivate the ground. But a mist used to rise from the earth and water the whole surface of the ground.” Genesis 2:5-6 (emphasis added)

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Meet Eve Collins

Faith Blum’s newest novella is available! This one is double trouble! Not only is it about twins, but these twins have reckless and adventurous spirits. When they go against their family, they run into more trouble than they bargained for.

About the Book

Just as I am, without one plea
But that Thy blood was shed for me
And that Thou bidst me come to Thee
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Eve and Evangeline Collins are adventurous twins who decide to take a risk and head west as mail order brides. Their parents are less than pleased, but do nothing to stop them. Eve and Evangeline don’t realize their danger until they stop just outside Cheyenne. Will they ever see their family again?

Playing the Part: Review

 Introduction:

What happens when an ardent “lover” meets the gambling happy step-father of an actress who is less than interested in him admirer? Drama, disaster, daring escapes, and a…haunted castle? Lucette was the perfect heroine for this book. Although she wasn’t my favorite character, her sensitivity and moral uprightness were inspiring. This was my first book by Jen Turano. The only complaint I had about it was that this was the third book in the series and I didn’t realize it until about halfway to three-fourths of the way through when some details were missing that I didn’t know. A series name on the cover somewhere would have helped me a lot. Or a few extra details.

Characters:

1/1

Lucette was wonderful, as was her patroness. But Bram was my favorite. Not just because of his eccentricities, but because of other things I can’t say for fear of spoilers. I loved how real his character was and how clueless he could be at times.

Dialogue:

1/1

The dialogue was perfect. I loved how every character had different ways of saying things throughout the book.

Plot/storyline:

.75/1

As I mentioned earlier, there were a few plot details that appeared to be missing, but then I found out this was book 3 in a series. That being said, there were a few other plot points that made the story a little unbelievable at times. Overall, however, the plot and storyline were well executed and captivating.

Overall writing quality:

1/1

Jen Turano has a way with words and I will certainly be looking up more of her books again.

Un-put-down-ability:

.75/1

There were a few times when there was too much going on in the book and I had to put it down for a short time. However, I did have a hard time doing it even then.

Conclusion

4.5/5

I always love a good mystery and this one had me very interested. I did have a few guesses as to some of the twists and was correct each time, but even with that, it was a good book and one that I’m sure I will read again at some point.

Note: I received this book free from Bethany House Publishers in exchange for an honest review.

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Tips on Promoting Your Books, part 2

 Last week, I wrote some tips on how to decide when to promote your books and a few ways to do so. This week, we’ll go through a tips on deciding what price, how to get into the big sites, and more. If you need any help in your publication process, check out my page For Authors or send me an email. If I don’t know the answer, I probably know someone who does.

Choosing the discount

If you are new to book promotions, this may sound backwards, but if you have more than one book published, the best way to promote it, get more reviews, and promote your other books, is to put one book on sale for free and then promote it heavily. It works, trust me. If you are going to do this, though, I suggest you leave your other books full price. That way you should easily earn back any money you spend to promote the book and then some.

If you have published only one book and sales have stagnated, keep writing and editing the next book and then run a Kindle Countdown. But please don’t make a rookie mistake and only discount it to $1.99. I highly recommend doing a 1 price increment change starting at $0.99. It might not make as much money for you per book, but you’ll get more sales which will get you more money. $1.99 seems to be the dead price for books. People are more willing to spend $0.99 or $2.99 than $1.99 on an eBook.

No Other Will Do: Review

Introduction:

I have read almost all, if not all, of Karen’s books so far. This one is one of my favorites for a very specific reason. The hero and heroine knew each other longer than one week to a month before developing feelings for each other. I won’t say more for fear of spoiling too much.

Characters:

1/1

Malachi and Emma were some of the more realistic characters I have read about in quite some time. I loved the growth they both went through in the book. My favorite character, though, was Andrew. He was barely in the book, but when he was, he stole the show.

Dialogue:

1/1

Every piece of dialogue was perfect in No Other Will Do. It was historically accurate, witty, serious, and well-paced.

Plot/storyline:

1/1

I found the plot of this book original, creative, and exciting. The plot twist at the end was as unexpected as it was terrifying. There were just the right amount of subplots to make the side characters more interesting and also be good setups for sequels. I’m especially looking forward to a sequel about a certain storekeeper.

Overall writing quality:

1/1

They say there are few things that get better with age, unless it is a fine wine. Well, I beg to differ. Writing quality can also get better with age. Or maybe that’s experience. Either way, this book was very well-written and I’ll likely be reading it again. Probably more than once.

Un-put-down-ability:

1/1

First of all, I wasn’t feeling super well when I read this book, so I didn’t have a lot of motivation to put it down. BUT, even if I had been 100%, I definitely wouldn’t have wanted to put it down for any reason except extreme necessity. This book starts out fast and keeps on that breakneck speed to the very end.

Conclusion

5/5

If you like Westerns, romance, fights to the death, strong women, strong men, action, or stories with people of strong faith, this book is for you. Even if you only like one of the things listed.

Note: I received a free copy of this book from Bethany House Publishers in exchange for an honest review.

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The Old River Road

Today, we have a special guest. She’s a debut author and has written a wonderful book, The Old River Road. I’m excited to be part of her tour and hope you enjoy reading a bit about her book. There’s also a review, giveaway, and author interview.

About the Book

1885

When seventeen-year-old Clara Boutwell married her dashing coworker, William McDonald, she was convinced her life was near perfect. The journey before them as newlyweds in the great city of Chicago was promising and exciting. But a frightening disease soon takes William in its grip, forcing them to the clean air of the western frontier in a desperate attempt to save his life. But pioneering doesn’t prove to be easy, with miles between neighbors instead of fences. On the eastern Washington prairies, the McDonalds face hardships and trials in a new world where everything is tested, from physical endurance to emotional strength—down to their relationship and faith in the Lord.

This novel tells the incredible true story of Clara and William, the great-great grandparents of the author, in a sweet narrative full of laughter, tears, and the struggles of an early pioneering family. Prepare yourself to share in their experience as you read this account of a pioneer family in Washington state, and see their lasting legacy that has endured into the fifth generation.

Available now in paperback and ebook on Amazon

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Tips on Promoting Your Books, part 1

An author friend recently asked me for advice on promoting books on promotion websites. As I wrote up my response to her, I thought, What about other authors? Could they possibly benefit from this advice as well? So, I decided to write up a blog post with some of my tips on promoting your books. This will expand on the advice I gave my friend as well as adding in a few other areas. And then, the link to this post will be added to my page For Authors.

My book is ready to publish, now what?

One of the best ways I have found to promote my books right pre-publication and shortly after publication is to do a blog tour. Not only will you be more likely to get a good number of reviews (which will help in future promotions), but it also gets the word about your book out to audiences you may not be able to reach any other way.

I didn’t do a blog tour for one of my recent releases and am regretting that decision. I could still do one, though, even though it has been almost a month, so blog tours can be done whenever. A friend of mine recently did a blog tour for a book she had released in 2011. She had a free promo of the book going on at the time and used that as the launch point for the tour. If you are unsure of what a blog tour is, you can see this blog post which is the first one for a blog tour I organized. If you would prefer to have someone else organize your tour for you at least the first time, there are three options listed on my For Authors blog page.

Tour Wrap-Up

Thank you to everyone who was involved in my blog tour whether it was posting on their blog, sharing a post, of entering the giveaway. I had a lot of fun with it. In case you missed any of the posts, you can find the direct links to them here: