Wishing Everyone a Warm and Safe, Happy New Year!

Book Tour + Giveaway | Fall Into Fantasy Anthology

 

Fall Into Fantasy: 2020 Edition

Genre: Mixed Fantasy Anthology

Cover Reveal | In Your Eyes by Jayne Townsley

 

In Your Eyes
Jayne Townsley
(Seasons of Love, #2)
Publication date: January 5th 2021
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance

Crystal Davis got her wish for the Crew’s long-awaited post-graduation trip. Sun and fun before focusing on her new career as a pediatric RN at St. Francis’ Children’s Hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was just what she needed. Bonus? She met Troy Bennett, and she realized she wanted less frivolity in her life and a little more serious.

Troy Bennett is a man fighting the demons who tell him he is worthless every day of his life. Demons his mother conjured. He quiets them with alcohol and casual relationships, never allowing any woman to get close enough to him so he will never have to disappoint one. Then on the spur of the moment trip to Panama City Beach with his Ranger buddies, he sees the future he’s always been afraid to pursue exit a Jeep Wrangler at a local donut shop.

Just as Troy and Crystal are finding their footing, she gets the call she never thought she would earn: Crystal Davis is going to Hollywood to be a contestant on America’s Next Chart Topper. What started as a way to honor her murdered friend has now become her dream. Chasing her dream means leaving Troy behind for a bit, and she wonders if her absence will cause what they’ve built so far to come crashing down.

Chasing her dream also means she’s put herself in a place where she’s vulnerable to the side of Hollywood that no one wants to acknowledge. A place where people only care about her and Troy’s story for the audience while behind the scenes, evil, selfish people work to tear them apart.

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Author Bio:

Jayne Townsley lives with her multi-generational family in Northeast Oklahoma’s aptly named Green Country. A transplanted Okie from the Chicago suburbs, she has grown to love this state and its people with a passion, happily calling it home for the past 15 years.

Jayne shares her home with a rescued Shollie named Maui and two cats called Gamora and Nebula.

Jayne enjoys old-fashioned road trips and is in the process of planning one to tour Oklahoma’s Route 66. She is also something of a Disney World addict.

You can find her on the web at the following places:

Website / Goodreads / Facebook / Twitter / Pinterest / Instagram

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Cover Reveal | The Ghost of Hidden Lake by Kimberlee Dodge

The Ghost of Hidden Lake is 99 Pennies in Preorder or Free in Kindle Unlimited!

Book 2 of The J Club will release on Tuesday, January 5th, 2021.

Avery isn't your average 14-year old girl.

For as long as she can remember, Avery has been able to see, hear, and know things others don’t. Like her imaginary friend, who is not exactly imaginary. To Avery, he is simply Cousin Ricky. To others, he's known as The Ghost of Hidden Lake.

Having gifts doesn't make life easier. In fact, whenever her secret gets out, everything in Avery's life becomes that much harder, which is why she prefers to keep her “woo-woo” hidden in the shadows. With her mom working two jobs, they barely see each other. Even more rare are the visits with her dad since IT happened and tore the family apart. IT, being that thing the family doesn’t talk about. To make matters worse, her mother's boyfriend lives to make Avery miserable. 

When a well-meaning police officer accidentally shares Avery's secret to the media, her world is flipped upside down. Will things ever get better? 

According to Grandma Millie, nothing lasts forever.

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Merry Christmas!

From our family to yours, we wish everyone a safe, happy, and Bright Holiday! 

With Love, The Dodge's

Announcing New Book Release!!!

 

 

 

30 years ago, a magically wonderful series of fortunate events led me to a moment that changed my life forever.

 It was a Christmas Wish come true. I genuinely believe it was. The details are a little scattered and lost over time, but there are some things I do remember vividly. Like being 22, unhappily married, living in Chicago’s utmost southern suburbs. I had just had my second child, another baby boy, who was all of four months old when these particular events took place.

I’d been in Illinois for almost two years, and at that point, I still only knew my husband’s family. Making friends or making time to make friends had been very difficult for me. I felt very cut off and isolated. Phone calls were expensive, so were trips home. My family lived a thousand miles away, so I virtually had nobody. I remember being very lonely. I also remember thinking to myself on many occasions that if I had just one friend, things would be different.

Then, a flyer on a store window led me to visit a spa that had just opened in town. It was a free session, so I said, why not? During that session, I met a chatty lady who invited me to a group that she belonged to. I never did that sort of thing, but she was so encouraging, and I just happened to have the car that day- which back then was a miracle in itself. And when I got to the group, a chance encounter with one of its members led to an invitation to bake Christmas cookies. Back then, I was so socially awkward and shy, it amazes me that I said yes. Up to that point, no matter how badly I wanted a friend, I couldn’t get over my shyness long enough to make one.

But the important thing is that I said yes! I didn’t know it at the time (no one ever knows it at the time) that my prayers and wishes were being answered in that one little yes.

Because I met my person. She was the one who invited me to bake with her. I think we realized we were absolutely meant to be friends on that day. And she’s been my person ever since. Through several more children, a dozen moves, 4 states, 2 divorces,  it’s 30 years later this December, and she’s still my most amazing person. And I was right! From that moment on, everything in my life was completely different! Everything changed for the better!

We always say we met by divine appointment. It’s so true. I don’t know if she had been looking for me, but I had been praying for her, and I’m convinced that I was led down a path that would lead to her. I can’t imagine what my life would be like right now if I hadn’t.

So, Merry Christmas! Believe in Miracles. Believe in Christmas Wishes! Believe in the magic!

Blog Hop | Dashing

 

Hosted by Mama the Fox

A Glimpse of Last Christmas

 

That's a picture of my youngest, taken one year ago today. She is my last "Little" in a sea of adult children. 

When I woke her up this morning, the first thing she wanted was for me to look at the school Dojo. She insists we check for announcements all the time, to see if there's anything fun going on. I'm glad she reminded me to look today. I've been so busy lately, I'd barely noticed we were in our second week of December. Today was, "Dress in Red & White Day."  I almost panicked. Where the heck was I going to get a red and white shirt for dress up day at 6 am on a Monday morning?

That's when her sharp little memory kicked in and she told me her Christmas dress-up outfit was still hanging in her close from last year. I crossed my fingers and took a peek.  To my relief, not only was it still there, but it still fit! My bottom was saved, and she looked so stinking cute after I put her hair in pigtails with red hair ties.

I spoke too soon. I thought my bacon was saved. Until her ever so sharp memory started working over time, and my little monkey starts asking me when are we going to see Santa so she can sit on his lap and make another gingerbread house. 

Oh. Snap.

She never forgets a thing, does she? And neither does FB, because the second I logged in, I was reminded CLEARLY that a year ago on this very day, my Little was wearing this same outfit. Her big eyes were glowing from all the Christmas Magic being spread around the Clubhouse when we indeed, took her to sit on Santa's lap. She had such a great time, having breakfast with Mommy, Daddy, Mr. and Mrs. Clause, make her gingerbread house while drinking all the hot cocoa she wanted.

And you know what? Trying to explain to a little five year old bright eyed munchkin that Covid was just going to make it impossible for Santa to do that this year- well it just plain sucked. There, I said what I said. It absolutely sucked and I felt mean and Grinchy for having to tell her that. 

I promised that we would still decorate a gingerbread house together. And I will keep that promise. She asked if we could see Santa next year. That's a promise I couldn't make, but I told her I would try very hard. 

I hope she enjoys today, and I'm glad they made this week festive at school. Not just because it might be the only holiday fun some of these children have, but because it may be the last time they all see each other for awhile. Our school, like many across the country, will be going virtual again after the holiday break. It kills me that life is so interrupted for these Little's. They are only small for a short time.My adult kids certainly prove that. It saddens me that as much as her memory retains, she won't have those charming memories to look back next year like she did today.      

      

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12.11.20

 

Lately, I’ve been thinking about the upcoming Holiday Season, knowing full well how hard this time of year can be for many people.

This year, to sum it up in a word has been, Brutal.

I know that we all have different reasons for being down in the dumps. For the last several years, I’ve had all the everyday holiday stress, plus a little extra. And as 2020 does it’s worst, I know that there are so many people out there facing this year without someone they love. I know the hurt and dread that comes with living with grief through the holidays.

The first Christmas after my daughter's passing was a huge blur. I was still numb. The holidays caught me off guard then, and every year since. I didn’t have the heart to even put up the Christmas tree. Instead, I outlined a tree on the wall with garland and called it a day. The second year, I had to fight with myself to put up a tree. We still had a toddler in the house. I had to force myself to snap out of it for her sake. By the third year, something in me had changed. I actually wanted to put up the tree.

However, after opening the Christmas box, the memories swiftly began to pull me down back into the depths of sadness. I couldn’t allow myself to fall in after I'd just climbed out of that dark hole. Instead, we came up with a new plan. We got a new tree and all new ornaments to honor my daughter. I would never have thought in a million years that I would be sporting a PURPLE Christmas tree in the middle of my living room, but here we are. This is the second year we’ve done this, and I actually like it now.

Getting back to the reason I started writing all this in the first place, I was thinking this morning, how bad this Christmas will be for a lot of people out there this year. Some of them are people I know, people I love. This year will be their “Blur” year, and my heart aches for them.

And the thing is, you sometimes can’t tell who is having a “Blur” year. It looks like different things on different people. It doesn’t necessarily mean someone’s openly crying and mopey and looking depressed. It can look like moodiness, irritability, irrationality, numbness, apathy, or insisting they are OK when you know they aren’t. You can’t tell what a person is going through just by looking at them. And with that thought in mind, I wish everyone could be just a little kinder to each other. To borrow the phrase, everyone is fighting a battle you know nothing about.

This year, so many of us are fighting a battle of some kind. The shutdowns and social distancing alone make it difficult for so many. Top that with suffering the loss of loved ones, a parent, a husband, wife, a best friend, a beloved pet, it’s no wonder it’s a “Blur” year this Holiday Season.

If this is your "Blur" year,  you have my sympathy and love and my full understanding. I hope next year is kinder to us all, but more importantly, I hope that people begin to be kinder to each other every day.

Edward, Joanie, Ephraim, Hector, Jackie, Peanut, Kim R, Christopher Glenn, and all those lost this year, we miss, remember, honor, and love you all.   

It's so much more!

I thought writing a book was going to be hard. I'm talking about the actual writing part. The outlines, the ideas, getting everything to line up the way I wanted it to. The edits, the re-writes. Etc...

Turns out, that was the easy part.

I have published my first book, I'm getting ready to release it's sequel, and I'm on chapter 6 of the next story. And guess what? It turns out that writing the story is the easy part! It's everything that follows that becomes the real work. Everything is still new, everything is subjective, and when I'm in the weeds I just want to go back to the writing, the dreaming. The creating! The stuff I think I'm good at.Who knew there was so much more to this?  <Insert wink here.>

But I suppose that at the end of the day, if someone has liked my book, it was worth all the effort it took to put it on the shelf. 

This morning became one of those days.  My husband finished reading the draft to my second book, and he loved it.  You might automatically think to yourself, well of course he loved it, he's your husband, he's supposed to love it. But when I tell you that this is high praise coming from him, I mean it. Because if it stunk, he'd be the first one to tell me how bad it was.

So from my perspective, it feels like I'm heading into December on a very positive note, and I'm just hoping it gets better from here. So, even though November was full of frustration, I'm pressing on and expecting good things.

I also hope that I don't get so bogged down with everything I'm doing at the moment, that I forget the other 99 things I'm supposed to be doing. I can operate in complete tunnel vision mode if I'm not careful. I had aimed at getting the Christmas tree up after Thanksgiving dinner, and it's still sitting in the box staring at me. But before I can think about setting up the tree, I need to finish emails, and this blog, and some left over chapter 6 edits, and then....What was doing again? Oh yes! I was enjoying the victory of making one person happy with my story!