"Scary Good" ~ Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake

Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.

So did his father before him, until he was gruesomely murdered by a ghost he sought to kill. Now, armed with his father's mysterious and deadly athame, Cas travels the country with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat. They follow legends and local lore, destroy the murderous dead, and keep pesky things like the future and friends at bay.

Searching for a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas expects the usual: track, hunt, kill. What he finds instead is a girl entangled in curses and rage, a ghost like he's never faced before. She still wears the dress she wore on the day of her brutal murder in 1958: once white, now stained red and dripping with blood. Since her death, Anna has killed any and every person who has dared to step into the deserted Victorian she used to call home.

Yet she spares Cas's life.

Binge worthy ~ Kindle customer

I LOVED every aspect of this book ~ Misty

Super creepy ~ Amy T.

Buy Anna Dressed in Blood at Amazon

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Halloween Flash Fiction: 'Til Death Do Us Part? by Jax

Dear John,

                I know I said I couldn’t live without you. I know I was the one to find the voudoun priestess. But really, I think it was the shock and grief talking. Honestly, I couldn’t stand picking up your dirty underwear and wet towels. How did I possibly think I could handle the bits of body parts that you leave all over the place? I’d happily deal with the smell of those nasty cigars over the rotten, reeking stench that permeates the house now. I actually miss slaving over the deplorably greasy food you insisted on eating. I can’t cook for you anymore. It’s not even cooking! I’m sure the neighbors have begun to realize their juvenile delinquents didn’t all just run away. We haven't had a decent conversation since you lost your tongue. And our sex life...

You’re not the man  I married.

It’s over.

I'm sorry.

Sincerely,
Mary



About the Writer

Jax writes book reviews at Bea's Book Nook, fiddles with yarn, string and needles to create all sorts of silliness, and occasionally dips her toes into writing fiction for fun. 

 blog


Writers were asked to submit a Halloween themed original story that was up to 300 words in length. Each Friday until Halloween, a new story will be featured. Please give these brave individuals applause by leaving a comment.


photo credit: Zombie Beard via photopin (license)
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Getting things done

by Donna Huber

For many of today's writers, writing is not their full-time focus. Even those who write for a living may have some "pet" projects that they enjoy but can't devote a lot of time to. This means that not everything gets done.

For writers who run their own sites, like bloggers, all the time they have day to day is to create the content for the site. However, there are a number of other tasks that need attention too. It's important to set aside time occasionally for these tasks as well.

I've talked about setting up content calendars and making editorial plans to make it easier to keep up with the writing. But making plans to attend to other tasks are necessary. Keeping a running "to do" list will help you accomplish these goals when you find yourself with a few extra minutes.

There are also events throughout the year to help you set aside time for accomplishing "blog maintenance". I love Bloggiesta though my schedule doesn't always work out to participate.

I'm planning to take some time off next week and there are a few things I would like to do with the blog then. Namely, I'm looking for a new theme for the site. I've had this them for a while and a lot of things have changed in website design during that time. There are smaller things like updating some of the pages.

Will I get to it all next week? Probably not. But I can tell you that having a list of things I want to do does make it more likely to accomplish something.

What blog maintenance do you need to do?

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Roger Herst: Canada and the US Are Missing the Boat in the Arctic

Focus seems terribly important in charting a future. Canadians and Americans are fond of warm sunny beaches and tropical cocktails. But while these North American neighbors have been spending their winters basking in southern sunshine the Russians have not.

We tend to look upon the Arctic as Nature's undeveloped wilderness and, as good conservationists, we want to keep the North that way. Yes, we have conceded to a limited oil development on the Northern Slope of Alaska, but we have insisted that we don't want to despoil one of the planet's last wildernesses. During the Cold War we lined the Arctic with airbases and listening posts figuring that the best access to the South was over the Pole. Well, such military vigilance is no longer necessary.

The Russians see things differently. They see the Arctic as a natural land growth of Mother Russia. Russian populations have settled along the northern rim of their homeland. In cold climates they have built cities with massive industries. Shipping has been developed along the northern shoreline and 41 icebreakers force passage for their ships to travel through ice year round.

Whatever one's views about preserving Nature in the North, it must be granted that the Arctic will become more rather than less important in the future. Global warming is opening up nautical passageways that were once blocked. And with this, comes the exploitation of natural resources.

I wrote the thriller novel Nunavut to draw attention to what this Canadian territory offers, and, of course, it raises debate between industry and conservation. The time is now for this debate. And while we talk, the Russians are developing.

Buy Nunavut: An Arctic Thriller at Amazon

About the Author

ROGER HERST is the author of Nunavut: An Arctic Thriller and the Rabbi Gabrielle Series.  A native of San Francisco, he has written nine novels, a series of scholarly articles and lectured extensively in academic and non-academic circles. He is an ordained Reform Rabbi with a doctorate in Middle Eastern History, holding undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of California Berkeley, the University of Chicago, Johns Hopkins University and the Hebrew Union College. His home for the past 30 years has been Washington, DC where he lives with his physician wife.

website  *  Twitter

photo credit: Antarctica 2013: Journey to the Crystal Desert via photopin (license)
The views, opinions, and beliefs expressed by guests writers are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Girl Who Reads. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Review: High Maintenance by Lia Fairchild

by Donna Huber

Lexy wasn't sure she could handle much more. She wanted it for sure, but it was going to take effort on her part. Why was it so much easier for men anyway?
"It's just so big...and so f****** hard," she breathed out as she took hold of the thick shaft. A fine sheen of sweat beaded along her smooth olive skin. It was the eighth day in a row of the record-breaking August heat wave that took hold of Houston and had many of its citizens behaving in ways they weren't accustomed it.

The Review

Let's start at the beginning... the opening of High Maintenance by Lia Fairchild was not a winner for me. I thought the double entendre that Fairchild was going for at the start was too forced and easily seen through. Unfortunately her next attempt a little bit into the story fell flat for me as well. However, the third time was a charm and I fell for it with the whole jaw drop and "no he didn't!" running through my head.

Though the story got off to a bumpy start for me I thought Fairchild did a great job of setting up the dynamics of the "love" triangle well and very early on. I really commend Fairchild on how quickly she developed the characters without having to come right out and tell us.

Everything about Julian screamed cold (even the comment about the air conditioner in his condo played well into his character development) and controlled. While a rich alpha male is usually hot, Julian could have been a slab of marble. While I could understand the initial attraction Lexi had to him, why she stayed so long with him is a bit of a mystery.

Were her family and her business the only reason she'd continued to stay with him?

Then there is the hot flower shop owner slash handy man, with his warm jokes and easy going mannerisms. Definitely the polar opposite of Julian in every way. The reader was immediately rooting for Tate.

Some of the easily come by dynamic was probably due to the predictability of the story line. There wasn't really much originality. If you are looking for a bit of mindless fluff while curled up next the fire, then High Maintenance would be a great choice.

Buy High Maintenance at Amazon

book info:
available formats: ebook
published: April 2015
genres: romance
target audience: adults
source: author
read: October 2015



A free ebook was provided for this review. Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small commission is earned when purchases are made at Amazon using any Amazon links on this site. Thank you for supporting Girl Who Reads.

Why Wonder Woman Must Die #MondayBlogs

by Katrina Dierking

Christian. Wife. Mother. Daughter. Sister. Friend. Author. Leader. Firefighter. Paramedic. Homeschooler.

The hats I wear topple sometimes. I wear most of them at once, balancing them and rearranging them according to priority.  I imagine most of us are the same. As wives and/or mothers, many of us work outside the home and those of us who don't are up to our eyeballs in errands, chores, internal and external commitments. We spin in circles taking care of everyone else – always putting ourselves last. Putting our dreams and passions on the back burner to do everything else we do.

Who told us we had to have it all – to do it all? Who convinced us that without all these hats, our lives are incomplete? When did we buy into this lie? How long will we allow it to continue? What will be the breaking point before we face facts – Wonder Woman must die.

“A study at the University of London showed that subjects who multitasked while performing cognitive tasks experienced significant IQ drops. In fact, the IQ drops were similar to what you see in individuals who skip a night of sleep or who smoke marijuana.”

Think about that for a minute. While we wear our hats and juggle all our tasks, we are as effective as if we were smoking marijuana. When we do so many things, every thing we do suffers. Nothing gets our full attention.  This leads me to believe: You and I weren't called to be Wonder Woman.

So if you weren't called to be Wonder Woman, what IS your calling? What were you created to be? It's different for us all but we must find our passion and give everything we have to do that passion. Not that we can't have more than one but we shouldn't strive to have it all.

For me, I was working 24-36 hours at a time as a Paramedic, trying to be a wife, a mom (to 3 teens and a 3 year old), and all the things I listed above. My house was falling apart. I was too exhausted to spend time with any of my children or my husband, I hadn't attended church in months. Everything was suffering as my cape flapped in the wind. I hadn't even touched on my passion – writing fiction as well as non-fiction to help women overcome abuse and find their potential.

I had a choice to make. I had to choose my priorities. How ironic that my passion is to help women reach their potential yet there I was burning the candle at both ends and in the middle without ever finding time for my passion. My health began to crumble and nothing was getting done.

I left work and never looked back. I spend every day with my precious 3 year old and now live my passion – helping women find hope and healing while moving toward their passion. I put away my cape and in doing so, I can finally be the woman God created me to be.

So I  ask you – what is your passion? What are you giving up in order to do everything else? What have you been called to do and what is standing in your way? Less is more and Wonder Woman must die. In order for you and I to be the women we were created to be, we must bury the notion that we must do it all to have it all. I'm not saying you can't have a career and a family. I am saying – if you aren't following your passion and living your calling, you aren't where you are meant to be and everything is suffering.

I am in the process of putting together a book/ workbook/ and online University for women who are lost in transit trying to find their true selves. If you'd be interested in knowing more, be sure to sign up for my newsletter at www.KLDierking.com . Until then, hang up the cape. Take a deep breath. Take a look around and put your priorities in place. Ask yourself – who am I? Why am I here? What am I meant to do? Then take steps to be the woman you were created to be and believe it or not – it isn't Wonder Woman.

photo credit: Wonder Woman, London Super Comic Con via photopin (license)
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Bookish Gifts: Bookworm earrings

Want to show off your book love? These lovely bookworm earrings are a subtle way to tell others you are a girl who reads.

Get them for yourself or another bookworm in your life. Available at Amazon.



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