BITTWT: Inamorata Day!

Welcome to Blood is Thicker Than Water Thursday’s.

It’s Inamorata Day! Yey!

in•am•o•ra•ta

Inamorata definition:

A female lover or a woman who is loved.

Laura Easter lives in and owns a comic book store in mall. If you asked Laura what she suggests you read. She would tell you the Avengers Sanction; it is a comic book that will lead into the biggest story of the summer, Avengers Vs. X-men. That’s going to be legendary.

 

Laura Easter ~ Inamorata

 

Anna Claire is the immortal house maid to the Sturdevant clan. Over the following months she will share recipes and cleaning tips.

 

How to store your Vampire

 

You need a cool dry place free of clutter and sunlight. This can be either a traditional coffin, an underground box or even a sealed bedroom is okay.

Perhaps one of the first questions asked about vampires is the nature of their sleeping habits.  Where do vampires sleep?  Do vampires have to sleep in coffins?  Are vampires only able to sleep under a layer of dirt?  Must vampires sleep during the day?

 

Do vampires sleep at all?

This is one of those cases where it depends on which variety of vampire to which you’re referring.  If you’re talking about the fictional Twilight vampires then the answer is a resounding, no, they do not require sleep.  This isn’t the case with real vampires.

 

Unfortunately, not every real vampire is a cookie cutter copy of the next so there’s no general rule they all follow when it comes to sleep. 

 

Basically, vampires are just regular people who have an energy deficiency.  Like other living creatures, vampires need sleep, too.

 

Anna Claire~Inamorata

 

 

Complete synopsis

 

Inamorata is the first Novel in the “One Bloody Night Series”.

 

They are supposed to be low key and get their nightly fix from a bag. But what if they could spend a cozy evening eating an old fashioned meal and then when they were done they would simply set the place on fire and walk away—no one would be the wiser?

 

That’s the plan when a group of rogue Vampires has poisoned the entire security staff at a Christmas Eve party at a mall in Chicago and proceed to take over for the evening and feast upon their own kind of tradition, four house keepers, a maintenance man, a girl who lives in the mall, a lonely late night worker and a couple who have escaped to the department store where she works so their spouses wouldn’t be privy to their affair and some other delightfully unexpected guests.

 

Everything goes exactly as they expected until the group leader Lucius Sturdevant, and second oldest Vampire to date, realizes that the woman that lives in the Comic book store that is trying to figure out how to kill him is the reincarnation of Laura, the love of his life, that died in his arms of old age, because he didn’t have the heart to turn her.

 

Coming Late Fall/Winter 2012

 

Comment for a free chance to Win a print copy of Inamorata when it comes out. And walk away with a free ecopy of Bloodbreeders: Living in Darkness, in the format of your choice today.

 

Thank you for stopping by.

Cheers,

Keira Kroft

 

You can find me at:

http://keirakroft.blogspot.com/

http://twitter.com/#!/KeiraKroft66

http://www.facebook.com/keirakroft

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Keira-Kroft/171750936213533

 

P.S. There are a lot of great things happening here on Blood is Thicker Than Water Thursday’s. The home for Vampires.

 

Vampires VS. Zombies

Vampires VS. Werewolves

I hear a rumor that JoAnne Kenrick will be bring by some of her vamps for a visit.

You can always count on Robin Renee Ray to pop up with her Bloodbreeders.

There will be in-depth pieces, interviews, links and deep exploring into all that is Vampire, every Thursday right here on Keira’s Corner. Where Vampires are always welcome.

Why yes, please come in!

 

Magic Monday: The secrets to a sustaining a long relationship.

Welcome to Magic Monday
 

Today is the day of Romance here on Keira’s Corner. Today I would like to talk about the key to sustaining a long and happy relationship.

Some woman look at guys as really hot, and that means they are awesome. Yeah...right! Most women know that it’s more about how the man treats you. The reality is...it all matters. But the key is finding that person that you truly love and are completely compatible with and when you find it you will know it, trust me.

I got together a list of woman that know how to sustain a long relationship read below to see what they have to say.

 

Keira’s Secret

A.K.A. Dawn Binkley
Married since March 31, 2001

Our secret: We are soul mates, and we both know it. We also share many, many mutual interests. We also, have two rules. Rule#1...no pea’s under the bed. Rule#2...no matter how upset we are with each other, we hugs and tell each other that we love each other when we leave each other for any reason. We have the same rule with our daughter. Because you never know when that person leaves, if it’s going to be the last time you see them. It’s horrible to say, but things happen. Do you really want the last thing you say to your husband or child is I hate you?

Sharon’s Secret

Sharon’s Schofield

Married for 32 years.

The secret? For us I think it’s because we are also friends. My hubby is my best friend.

Mel's Secret

Mel Chelsey

Married for  11 Years

The secret to a long relationship? Communication and don't take each other for granted. We talk about everything. The one thing he taught me is that a relationship is not a 50/50 partnership. It is 100%/100%. If one spouse is working outside of the home, the other runs the household and does the usual chores. Doesn't matter if it is the husband or the wife. The responsibility falls to both people, not just one. And don't take advantage of that, either. If there is something you can do to help the other, do it. It also helps that we have a lot in common and just enough differences to make it interesting. I'm sure he and I will still be having great conversations well into our future. :)

Dorothy's Secret

Keira's Sister
Together with Jerry for 4 years

Jerry and I have been together 4 years. Our secret is to "pick our battles" and to always "have each others backs".

Robin's Secret

Robin Renee Ray
Married for 25 years.

Our secret is to "pick our battles" and to always "have each others backs". We have been together for over 25 years and I believe its because we are completely different in every way. Some say you have to have at least a little in common but I disagree...we don't watch the same shows, we don't like the same music and for the most part we don't like doing the same things. But we do have that one thing...Love! And also I love to cook and he loves to eat..LOL
Our secret is to always agree to disagree! To listen even when you don't want to hear it.... I let him think he's right, even when I know I am. :)

Jen's Secret

Jeannette Ratajczyk
Together for nearly 8 years

Live in seperate houses! LOL Okay, seriously, I don't know that there is a "secret" as Rick and I both have previously had marriages that lasted 20 years and then suddenly failed. But, I do know for us what works is honesty, patience, a sense of humor and not being ready to throw the towel in when there's a bump in the road. I think that's a lot of society's problem these days, we give up too easily. And the biggest of all is TRUST.

Have an awesome Monday!
Hugs, Keira

Six Sentence Sunday: The End.

Welcome to Six Sentence Sunday! :D

Here is part four of a four part arc from of Glow in the Dark, on sale now!

He was so consumed with Corey, as usual; it hadn’t sunk in that his best friend was engaged. Jake set down his beverage. He gave Boyd a hug. A real hug. Not one of those man hugs, where you pretend to hug the other guy, but don’t. “I am so happy for you.”

Check out other awesome Teasers :) Six Sentence Sunday.

Look for more from Corey and the gang, next Sunday! :)

Have an awesome Sunday!

Cheers,
Keira

The Saturday Saloon

Welcome to the Saturday Saloon, where we can experiment, drink and have a few laughs. Here are some awesome drink recipes to try this beautiful Saturday in September. I love this time of year, kids are in school, it’s right before Halloween and the frosty end of fall. So of course this makes me think of Apples.

So let’s have our apples Judy Garland style. Oh yeah.

 Poisoned Apple

 Ingredients

 1 cup ice cubes

 1 fluid ounce vanilla flavored vodka

 1 fluid ounce sour apple schnapps

 1 cup lemon-lime flavored carbonated beverage
                                                     
                                                       1 dash grenadine syrup

 

 Directions

1. Fill a large glass with ice, and pour in vanilla vodka and schnapps. Pour in the lemon-lime soda, and top with a splash of grenadine.

 

Awesome Apple Martini

 

Ingredients

 1 fluid ounce apple schnapps

 1 fluid ounce vodka

 1 fluid ounce apple juice

 

 Directions

1. In a cocktail shaker full of ice, combine apple schnapps, vodka and apple juice. Mix well. Pour into glasses and garnish with a slice of Granny Smith apple.

Candy Apple on the rocks

 

 1/2 cup ice

 1 (1.5 fluid ounce) jigger peach schnapps

 1 (1.5 fluid ounce) jigger apple schnapps

 2 fluid ounces cranberry juice

 Directions

1. Fill a glass with ice, and pour in the peach schnapps and apple schnapps; top with cranberry juice.

Announcing the winner...


Drumroll Please....



The winner is PAUL GLENDENING.

Paul, please contact me at dawn@hellfirepublishing.com

Freaky Friday: Edward McKeown

Freaky Friday presents the awesome Edward McKeown.

I've enjoyed a life-long love affair with science fiction. I write believable
people in extraordinary situations, balancing romance, humor, adventure and reasonable extrapolations of science in stories that I believe people will want to return to. Whether it's in the short stories of my "Lair of the Lesbian Love Goddess series" or in the Fenaday and Rainhell novels, classic "Planet" tales of a crews of unlikely companions facing unknown dangers, my intent is to give the reader the sort of page turning, involving adventure that Andre Norton wrote and leaven it with the emotional complexity and ambiguity that CJ Cherryh brings to
the field.

While the experiences of the SF Universe are out of reach of those unable to pay for a rocket ride, I use my own background to try for an underlying verity in my characters. I’ve parachuted, flown in gliders, hang gliders and strapped to the floor of military helicopters. I’ve been rated as an expert shot and carry a black belt in the martial arts. I’ve been paralyzed by fear, exhilarated by love and walked into fights, both literal and metaphorical, that I knew I could not win. I have the good fortune to be married to the talented artist Schelly Keefer.

First Book of the Fenaday/Rainhell Trilogy through Hellfire Publishing in Kindle and trade paperback

Review for Was Once A Hero

Reluctant privateer Robert Fenaday searches the stars for his lost love, Lisa, a naval intelligence officer whose ship disappeared near the end of the Conchirri War . He’s joined by the genetically engineered assassin, Shasti Rainhell, whose cold perfection masks her dark past. Both are blackmailed by government spymaster, Mandela, into a suicidal mission to the doomed planet Enshar. Leading a team of scientists and soldiers, they must unravel the mystery of that planets death before an ancient force reaches out to claim their lives.

The classic Planet Stories of S/F have suffered abandonment,
without a rescuer, until now. Edward McKeown's "Was Once A Hero" combines adventure and romance with the dark humor and human complexities absent from a more black-and-white age. Robert Fenaday and Shasti Rainhell are real people.

They make mistakes, they hurt, they stumble in the dark emotionally, and they save the world. They are flawed, wounded heroes, and they make you realize, as you hungrily turn each page, that the best fiction contains excitement and passion; and the best aspect of life is the possibility of personal redemption. Was Once a Hero provides both." -

Tim McLoughlin, author of "Heart Brooklyn Noir"try" (Movie Title: The Narrows) and Editor of "Brooklyn Noir"

Edwards links
http://www.amazon.com/Was-Once-A-Her...6144528&sr=1-1
https://www.createspace.com/3765878
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/120464
http://www.hellfirepublishing.com/hero.html

Announcements,
review and interviews
SFWA http://www.sfwa.org/2012/02/was-once...dward-mckeown/
SFSCOPE
http://sfscope.com/2012/01/edward-mc...+%28SFScope%29

Flames rising http://www.flamesrising.com/?s=mckeown&.x=0&.y=0
The
Examiner http://www.examiner.com/fringe-artis...as-once-a-hero

Press
release http://www.prlog.org/11771900-join-t...e-romance.html


Radio
http://newscliptv.com/podcasts/books/edwardmkeown1.html
Radio
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/page-re...as-once-a-hero
TMV
Cafe Free Pie Show http://ia600805.us.archive.org/10/it...nEdMckeown.mp3


Interviews and Other
http://hellfireherald.blogspot.com/2....html?spref=fb
http://www.robinreneeray.blogspot.com/
http://www.inspirationforum.co.uk/sh...d.php?tid=2131
http://wredhead.blogspot.com/2012/02....html?spref=fb
http://wredhead.blogspot.com/2012/02....html?spref=fb
http://thereforyoumelissa.blogspot.c....html?spref=fb
http://rueview.moonfruit.com/#/archived/4558190570

One lucky commenter will win a free print copy of Was Once A Hero.

Blood is Thicker Than Water Thursday’s, Mercy Brown

Blood is Thicker Than Water Thursday’s—This day is devoted to Vampires and the like.

 

Do Vampires really exist? What do you think? Wait! Before you answer, read the story of Mercy Brown.

 

Mercy Brown

 

It was January 17th, 1892 in the small town of Exeter, Rhode Island, when Mercy Lena, the daughter of farmer Brown, fell victim to the unfortunate fate of death. The epidemic of Consumption took her life when she was only 19 years old. The cold winter weather made it difficult to bury her in the frozen grave, so she was placed in a crypt, close to the corpses of her mother and sister that had been laid to rest years earlier after their battle with Consumption. Not long after her death, Mercy’s older brother Edwin had succumbed quickly to the same disease that took his family, and claimed that one night he had felt Mercy sitting on his chest, trying to take his life away. Townspeople started experiencing strange sitings of Mercy, seeing her walking around the cemetery and in the farm fields. The town concluded that Mercy must have been a vampire and had returned from the grave to unleash her curse on the rest of her family, taking their life force away one by one.

    Cases of vampirism were taken very seriously, so two months after her death, Mercy’s father had a few town officials and a physician from Wickford, Dr. Metcalf, go to the crypt and put an end to the matter. They dug up Mercy’s dead mother and sister to make sure that they were each not the vampire responsible for the Brown family curse. Their bodies were decaying at the anticipated rate, so it could be concluded that they were not vampires. However, when they opened Mercy’s coffin, they were overcome by shock and fear because of the image that lay before them. She had shifted positions in her coffin and her face was flush, her skin intact, and her nails and hair had noticeably grown. They then sliced her body open and discovered that her heart and other organs were full of liquid blood. These were all telltale signs that Mercy Lena Brown was a vampire, immortalized and determined to kill all of her lasting family members. 

 

    To ensure that Mercy would never arise from her coffin again, they immediately burned her heart on a nearby rock. Some of her ashes were given to Edwin to eat, for it had been said that consuming a vampire’s ashes would cure one of their curse. Only this remedy was not successful for poor Edwin and he died shortly after. Mercy’s lasting remains were then properly buried under a gravestone that still stands to this day. Some say that if you visit her grave at night, you can see her apparition in the form of a glowing orb or, if you are lucky, as a ghostly figure of her human body. Others have experience unexplainable car problems while passing the cemetery were she resides. Even long after her death, her legend and spirit continue to haunt the people of New England.

 

Thanks for stopping bye,

Hugs, Keira

Writer Wednesday:Tamara McClintock Greenberg

 

Author Bio:

Tamara McClintock Greenberg, Psy.D., M.S., a licensed clinical psychologist, works with patients and family members affected by acute or chronic illness. She is an associate clinical professor and clinical supervisor at the University of California, San Francisco Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute. Dr. Greenberg has written three books and numerous chapters and articles on aging, illness, as well as issues pertaining to women. She writes for Psychology Today online and The Huffington Post. She also speaks to medical, psychological, and public audiences on the impact of illness, caregiving issues, and dealing with the modern medical system as a patient or loved one. She is in private practice in San Francisco.

Interview between Keira Kroft and Tamara McClintock Greenberg!

Welcome to Keira's Corner!

Keira: You are here today to promote your book When Someone You Love Has a Chronic Illness. Can you tell us a little about it?

Tamara: I offer hope and practical advice to those impacted by a loved one’s chronic illness. Providing easy-to-understand explanations for complicated feelings and behaviors, this book will help you not just cope, but thrive in your day-to-day life. Learn the important tools you need to help lighten the burden we all feel when someone we love is ill.


Keira: What do you wear, to write?

Tamara: Sweats or pajamas.  I can never write if I am in work clothes. 

 

Keira: Is writing your only talent?

Tamara: I hope not!  I am in private practice as a psychologist and so I hope I am good at helping my patients.  That work means a lot to me.  I also do a lot of supervision of younger therapists and I think I can help most people because I do have an ability to hear about a situation and imagine it as if I were there.  I have always been pretty good at trying to think about things from another’s point of view. 

 

Keira: Where do you find time to write?

Tamara: I write best early in the morning or late in the day.  This is based in part, on my schedule, but I often find that at the end of the day, I am energized and inspired by my work as a therapist and so I try to synthesize what my patients are telling me. 

Keira: Why are you a writer? 

Tamara: A few years ago, I would have said because I had to express my ideas and thoughts in writing as a way to organize what I am thinking. At that time, writing felt compulsive to me.  Now, I am just really interested in using my ideas to help others and to address causes that I think are important. 

Keira: If you could choose anyone, who would you pick as your mentor?

Tamara: I would love anyone who writes for the New Yorker to be my mentor.  All of the writers are so talented!

 

Keira: How many hours a day do you dedicate to writing?

Tamara: I work full-time outside of writing, so a good day is when I can write for four hours. 

Keira: Do you use a particular writing method?

Tamara: I don’t.  I write ideas down when I have them, and trust that I can synthesize the ideas, though I understand I may have to wait until I am ready to put something coherent together. 

 

Keira: What advice would you give to an unpublished writer?

Tamara: Focus on a good proposal and find people who can help you do this.  A good proposal is the foundation for a book.  If you do the work upfront, you have less to do later on.  Think about a novel idea and one you can sell.  Being a successful writer is only partially about how good of a writer you are.  It is often related to a good and catchy idea. 

Let’s get personal…

Keira: What is your favorite food?

Tamara: Grilled cheese sandwich.  There is a place down the street that makes a different grilled cheese sandwich every day. 

 

Keira: What is your guilty Pleasure?

Tamara: Gossip magazines. 

 

Keira: What is your favorite Smell?

Tamara: Lavender.

 

Keira: If you could change one your physical feature? Would you? What would it be?

 

Tamara: My body from the neck down.  I would want to look like my perfect-bodied pilates instructors.  That said, I can deal with my current body. 

 

Keira: What is your favorite color?

Tamara: My favorite achromatic color is black.  My favorite chromatic color is blue. 

 

Keira: What is your favorite day of the week? 

Tamara: Monday. 

 

Keira: What is your favorite favorite animal?

Tamara: Dogs.

 

Keira: Can you tell us a secret? 

Tamara:My biggest pet peeve is people who sing out loud in public.  Life is not American Idol, right?

 

Keira: Do you have pets? 

Tamara: Yes. Charlie is our rescue dog, now 15, who currently eats out pants.  Max is our pug who has no behavioral problems at all and just wants to be loved.

 

Keira: What do you consider a household staple?

Tamara: All natural lavender dish and laundry soap.

 

Keira: What are you reading? 

Tamara: The most recent New Yorker. 

 

Visit the Nurture Virtual Book Tourz™ Blog for the complete tour schedule!

 

One lucky commenter will win an eBook copy of When Someone You Love Has a Chronic Illness!

 

Find & Follow Tamara McClintock Greenberg on:

Website

Psychology Today

The Huffington Post

PsychCentral

Facebook

Twitter

 

Buy the BOOK at:

Amazon.com

Amazon.ca

Amazon.co.uk

Barnes & Noble

 

Thank you so much for joining us today,

Much love,

Keira Kroft

www.keirakroft.blogspot.com

Six Sentence Sunday Part 3 of 4

Welcome to Six Sentence Sunday! :D


Here is part three of a four part arc from of Glow in the Dark, on sale now!

“Nah, he knows better than that. Besides, he knows how I feel about Corey. A true friend would never try to hurt me like that.”

“Let’s hope. I hate to lose him as a friend.” Boyd’s statement made Jake feel like a heel.

Check out other awesome Teasers :) Six Sentence Sunday.


I have seen a huge increase in sales since I started Six Sentence Sunday. Thank you to Triple S ladies and everybody that stopped by and the buyers. I love you :)


Have an awesome Sunday!

Cheers,
Keira