Good morning everyone I’m on the blog tour for Angelica Stone by Susi Osborne today and have an exciting giveawsg to share with you where you can win all four books written by Susi.

The buying links for each book and details of how to win this giveaway are below but first here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

Following years of sexual abuse, Angelica is brought up in care. As a teenager she absconds, living on the streets, before eventually being forced into prostitution to survive. She learns to rely solely on herself and is reluctant to allow anyone to get close to her, until she forms an unlikely bond with Lola. In contrast, Lola is from what appears to be a happy middle-class background – but all is not what it seems…
Slowly, as their friendship grows, cracks start to appear in Lola’s life, and a series of events leave her on the verge of ruin. Can these women break the cycle of their lives? Or will they succumb to the path laid out before them? Angelica Stone is an emotional rollercoaster of laughter and tears as the women embark on a journey of self-discovery, with the support of one another.

Purchase Links :

Angelica Stone – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Angelica-Stone-Susi-Osborne/dp/1911320947/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
Secrets, Lies & Butterflies – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secrets-Lies-Butterflies-Susi-Osborne/dp/1846248914/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
Grace & Disgrace – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Grace-Disgrace-Susi-Osborne/dp/1846244633/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
The Ripples of Life – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ripples-Life-Susi-Osborne/dp/1846241804/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

UK Giveaway!

One Winner will win all 4 of Susi Osborne’s Books (Open to UK Only) as pictured above.

*Terms and Conditions –UK entries welcome. Please enter using the Rafflecopter box below. The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by Twitter and/or email. If no response is received within 7 days then I reserve the right to select an alternative winner. Open to all entrants aged 18 or over. Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties, with the exception of the winners’ information. This will passed to the giveaway organiser and used only for fulfilment of the prize, after which time I will delete the data. I am not responsible for despatch or delivery of the prize.

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/33c69494123/?

About The Author:

Susi Osborne is the author of The Ripples of Life, Grace & Disgrace, Secrets, Lies & Butterflies and Angelica Stone. She lives in Cheshire with her Scottish husband, her actress daughter and their two mischievous little dogs. Susi also has an adult son and a grandson who live nearby. Amongst friends their house is known affectionately (she hopes!) as the Osborne madhouse, for obvious reasons.

Before she became a writer, Susi worked in libraries for many years. She also worked as a classroom assistant in a junior school. In addition to her writing Susi organises Northwich LitFest, which she has been running for the past seven years. Alongside the writing of her latest book, Angelica Stone, Susi has been raising money for Centrepoint, the charity for youth homelessness, and has set up a Just Giving Page for the charity in her name.
Susi is a firm believer in the fact that it’s never too late to do anything. ‘You only have one life – go out and grab it with both hands!’
Social Media Links –
Facebook Susi Osborne – Author https://www.facebook.com/susiwritesbooks
Twitter https://twitter.com/susiosborne
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/susi.osborne/

Good evening everyone I was on the blog blitz for Odyssey In A Teacup yesterday and have a great guest post to share with you.

Odyssey In A Teacup is available now in ebook and paperback, you can purchase a copy of both here.

Huge thanks to Rachel from Rachel’s Random Resources for inviting me onto the blog blitz and to the author for providing me with this guest post.

Before I share my guest post with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

A tut-tutting, big-breasted, modern-day gorgon; a humourless schoolmarm with an unfortunate name and freakishly long, yellow incisors (yeesh)—these are the kinds of people Ruth Roth regularly encounters. Add in daily dealings with an acerbic mother who squawks like a harpy, a father with a dodgy moral compass and a God complex, a bitchy mirror, and Ruth’s existence feels like a Greek tragicomedy.
The idiocy of daily life makes sense to Ruth when she develops a fascination with ancient mythology. She learns that the deviant gods and spectacular monsters of bygone myths are alive and well in the backwoods of our psyche; that there’s always one who escapes suppression and can have the whip hand in our lives. Ruth’s is one of the most unwelcome societal presences—the goddess of obscenity. And talk about ugly!
Ruth can relate to this immortal. Not in looks; Ruth is quite comely. But she feels unwelcome in her own family (she gatecrashed her mother’s womb only two months after her brother vacated it). Despite being labelled the ‘black sheep’, or maybe because of it, Ruth takes on her nemeses, bravely and brazenly (her dirty goddess doesn’t give a rat’s about social niceties). But our heroine is war-weary. And the yearning to fit in somewhere—anywhere—eventually undoes her. We must look on helplessly as Ruth loses her soul.
She wants it back, though!
Just as well the mad characters in her mind and experiences won’t quit. Just as well Ruth never loses her wry wit. And where her nearest and dearest attempt to keep her shrunken into a wholesome package of conformity, Ruth’s two closest girlfriends simply won’t allow it. And then there’s Ralph Brill.
Ruth’s hot-looking, eccentric cousin and best friend, Ralph is her staunchest ally. Also a misfit in his family, he has his share of problems including a st-t-t-tuttering brutish father, and an obsessive-compulsive personality disorder—Ralph needs to do everything twice, twice.
Ruth relies on his repeated encouragement and the support of her girlfriends as she embarks on an odyssey. A good homoeopathic dose of ancient mythology helps her find her way back through the sludgy shame and irrational fears choking her spirit. Then just when all seems well, Ruth faces an apocalypse …

Guest Post:

I love Matt Stone and Trey Parker, creators of South Park. I love their warped humour, their characters—foul-mouthed, politically incorrect bunch of yobs!—I admire their ability to satirise. Apparently, I do a bang-up job of this myself, according to a reviewer. She said it had been a really long time since she’d read good satire, and she ‘simply adored’ my first book.
I was chuffed, but I hadn’t thought of myself as a satirist. I thought I was just writing humour, Aussie style: taking the piss out of everything is one of our favourite pastimes. Then again, when you think that so much about life is stupid, it’s hard to resist sending it up.
Anyway, because most of my characters are parodies, I decided to commission a caricature of myself and add it to the cover images of all my social media accounts. Ha, ha, ha.
But now, it seems, the joke’s on me.
As we get older, our nose supposedly gets wider, our chin gets longer, our ears get bigger. I’m starting to look like that caricature and my Maker is laughing. Oh yeah, ha, ha, ha!
Occasionally, I’ll stand in front of my sometimes-bitchy mirror and push my droopy basset-hound jowls upwards. It reminds me of the way I used to look; makes me ask myself what can I do about this?
Well, there are lots of options. Many involve going under the knife. There’s also a heap of non-surgical approaches like dermal fillers, botox, etcetera. But I dare say none of these procedures is as painful as the process of self-acceptance.
Still, if I do decide to ‘alter’, why not go the whole hog? As above, so below. Top ’n’ tail. Yep. A face lift and a … vaginaplasty?
No way, José!
So, maybe a collagen boost for the lips and lips. An injection for the upper; vontouring for the lower. Vontouring is the treatment du jour for a saggy twat. Non-surgical, laser vaginal tightening?
Nope, again. Should I consider opting for a vajaycial, then—a kind of facial for the vagina?
Nope to that too. No one’s going anywhere near my vajayjay with a vacuum glass, pore cleaner or a micro-exfoliator—I can barely weather a speculum.
Self-improvement is different for everyone. And far be it from me to judge others for wanting to do what makes them feel good. The shift in appearance that comes with getting older is made so much harder for us women with the endless subliminal body-shaming that fills the airwaves. And although I’ve been hostage to social mores at times, there’s no rhyme or reason to much of it.
There was, however, a reason for my rhyming when, as a member of an online writers’ community, I used to submit poetry. Mostly, it was because I was too bloody lazy to come up with short stories. But maybe it was because the power of poetry cuts deeper than a scalpel can.
So, when the body-shaming tries to have its way with me in a weak moment, I can look back on this particular poem I wrote:

Just slide your numbing stent inside my vein,
And knock me out to make me young anew,
As botoxed brow and hoisted chops regain
a mirror casting back a luscious view

Two silicon balloons … augment my chest!
Please liposuck my dimpled thighs and hips.
With tummy tuck, my blubber you’ll divest,
Then give me JLo’s arse and Jolie’s lips

A cougar I’ll still be, but who would know —
my spandexed bod will surely hide the facts?
… Oh wait … inflation tends to reach a low,
And skintight stretching ends up looking lax

On second thoughts, it seems that I’ve been blind:
You have to wear a mask but mine’s not writ.
I’m outta here, I think I’ve changed my mind,
’Cause when it’s lost I’ll hardly give a shit.

At the end of the day, even if I haven’t lost my mind, I’d rather look at a caricaturised version of my younger self in the mirror than a version I don’t recognise.

About The Author:

Paula Houseman thought her life was, well … meh. Until she started fiction writing. What gushed forth onto the page made her realise her existence had not been mundane after all; it had been ridiculous! Sure, she has a serious side. The concept of ‘identity’ had fascinated her for some time, and she exercised it as a graphic designer creating them for others through imagery. Then, at university (majoring in linguistics and sociology), she explored how word usage constructs our identities and realities. Paula applied her findings to an essay on women’s subjectivity, even won the 2007 UNSW United Association of Women Prize. And her honours thesis examined the archetypal significances in the words that shape our collectively authored cancer story. But while she was digging around in ancient mythology where the archetypes live, Paula developed a kinship with a butt-ugly, potty-mouthed goddess, one who embodied a holy kind of dirty, showed her the absurdity of the human condition, taught her about the value of laughter, and is responsible for the bawdiness in her book, Odyssey in a Teacup.

Book Synopsis:

‘Welcome to Ocean View. You don’t know it yet, but you’ll be happy here…’

Julia’s not running away. Not exactly. She just needs a break from Paris and Marc and all the sad stuff that’s been going on lately. A little time to pull herself together.

The job offer felt like a lifeline. But now she’s back in Biarritz, suitcase in hand, she hasn’t the faintest idea what she was thinking.

What Julia doesn’t yet know is there’s more to the odds and ends of Ocean View than meet the eye. Behind the double doors lie broken hearts, lifelong secrets, a touch of romance and an unwavering passion for life. And sometimes it’s the most unlikely of places and people who help you find your way.

How To Find Love In The Little Things is available in ebook and paperback now, you can buy your copy here.

My Review:

This is a book to just fall in love with.  I loved everything about it the setting, the characters and the uplifting story.

The setting of a retirement home is an unusual one but this home is so full of vitality and fun that I found myself wanting to live there.  There always seemed to be something going on, some activity for the residents to do and when there wasn’t there were little social groups forming getting up to all sorts.

The reader gets the chance to know a lot of the residents very well which makes for fascinating but also slightly poignant reading.  I’ve never given much thought into getting old but this book addresses a few harsh realities and some of the residents stories were very emotional.  It definitely makes you want to embrace life and make the most of it while you can.

My favourite character was Julia and I enjoyed following her on the journey she goes through in the book.  It was great to see the effect that working at the home has on her and I did enjoy seeing her blossom throughout her stay there.  She’s a very real, natural character that is prone to making mistakes but is able to laugh at herself and doesn’t take these mistakes too much to heart.  Her brilliant descriptions of the things she gets up to is wonderfully done and often had me in stitches.

This isn’t a fast paced book but it doesn’t need to be as the fantastic setting and characters help to draw the reader in so they feel involved in the story.  I was soon fully immersed in the book reading the book in record time as I wanted to find out what on earth would happen next.

This is the first book I’ve read by this author and I can’t wait to read more from her.  If you like funny, emotional and uplifting books, filled with fabulous characters you’ll love this book.  It’s one I’ll be recommending to everyone!

Huge thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me onto the blog tour and to Headline publishers for my copy of this book.  This one is going on my keep forever shelf!

About The Author:

Good morning everyone I’m on the blog tour for Somewhere Between The Silences by Lydia Kelly today and I have a great guest post by the author to share with you.

Somewhere Between The Silences is available now in ebook and paperback, you can purchase a copy of both here.

Thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me onto the blog tour and to the author for providing me with this guest post.

Before I share my guest post with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

Somewhere Between the Silences is a short, sharp psychological thriller, revealing the sinister truth of what lengths one man will go to, to keep his secrets silenced.

Katy Young was a radiant and out-going young woman in the prime of her life, longing for a new adventure with the man she loved. That was until Katy was involved in a hair-raising accident which caused seemingly irreversible damage to her memory; it now falls upon her adoring husband to revive those absent aspects of her past.

To look at, Ryan Young is a stereotypical man in his thirties, works hard and clearly dotes upon his wife and their only son, Aaron. But, beneath the surface lurks a monster, capable of unimaginable destruction.

Katy is well aware she does not exist in a regular marriage but how much of her past life has her husband repressed to keep control of his wife?

Recommended for 18+ due to mature themes and sexual content.

Guest post by the author:

I’d just like to take this opportunity to thank Over the Rainbow for featuring me on your blog, it’s been a really exciting time recently (if not a little scary) and I thought I’d share with you the ideas behind my ideas as well as why I decided to put pen to paper.
I chose to fictionalise my own experiences because they are easier to convey than starting a storyline entirely from scratch. I remember the first time I sent a friend my entire manuscript for Somewhere Between the Silences, I don’t think I took a breath until I suddenly became aware that I was feeling a tad light headed! Writing around areas of your own life makes you extremely vulnerable, in a way you’re giving anyone who reads the stories the access to your past. Many won’t even realise that the words are more than just stories, but there’s always a select few who read critically into every sentence.
After finishing ‘Somewhere Between the Silences’, my Dad called me and asked if my mind was really that dark or whether it was all fictional. I suppose I hoped that it was entirely the latter but I knew without a shadow of a doubt that there are areas of my imagination which can only be fuelled by experiences that don’t dance in fields of sunshine. I have noted a pattern in how my stories develop, the ones I am currently writing are not entwined with genre but they reflect a part of myself. Since I was a child, the concept of having to ask for something or confess an event was completely horrifying; until I learnt that you could just as easily convey a message in writing without having to babble on at someone because I couldn’t get my words out!
My friends have often commented on how bizarre and time consuming my way of writing is, no matter how hard I’ve tried to rectify this, I can’t help but to write the entire story on paper before typing it up on my laptop. Although this is time consuming, it gives me plenty of opportunity to edit as I go, introducing new ideas as I’m typing the chapters up. I thoroughly enjoy making note of my protagonists, although I usually know exactly what they look like and how the mannerisms will come across throughout the book. Each of my characters is based upon someone either in my life currently or that has been; these don’t necessarily have to have had a major impact upon my life but to me they must have stuck out for some reason. My favourite part is people trying to guess who the character is based on, or sometimes moaning when they aren’t included!
Four years ago my life changed entirely because I decided to move to Tenerife, leaving behind my family and friends was meant to be the hardest thing I would ever do. I was, as we usually are, wrong… At that time a very special and influential person who had been in my life since I was a very small child, sent me an inspirational quote which I have since kept as my screensaver and followed its advice, ‘Life is short. If there was ever a moment to follow your passion and do something that matters to you, that moment is now.’ Since returning to England, the decisions got harder still, becoming a parent was the single most amazing and terrifying experience in the world; choosing to do it alone was probably the hardest. In between each of these incredible moments were events which helped to create my own story, something which I took once as heart-breaking but now see it as material!
Someone asked me once what I hoped to get out of writing and allowing my work to be published. There are only two things which I desire to have achieved through my writing; that I can inspire someone else to follow a dream which they never believed was entirely possible and the most important, that when he’s old enough my son is able to say ‘That’s my Mum who wrote those books, and because of my Mum I know I can be and do beyond what it is than anyone believes I am capable of’.
I have numerous drafts which are currently waiting very patiently to be continued, a mixture of psychological thriller to a rom-com. The most recently written and in the process of being allowed to be named as an official first draft, A single Mum’s guide to life, Dating, Depression and Downright Disasters. I want to continue to write because I believe that a book can honestly change someone’s life, simply because it has mine. The power of a book is to remind us; spark our imaginations, fill us with remembrance of those moments which at times, life pushes aside. To become a character, who in reality, one could never truly be. For a book can be the key to our souls, if only we’d allow it.

Thank you once again for allowing me to share this with you.

Lydia x

About The Author:

Born and raised in Buckinghamshire, favourite book since I was 11 is Pride and Prejudice. Loved to write even as a child.Moved to Tenerife in 2014, came back to England in 2015 and gave birth to my beautiful son in February 2016.

Diagnosed with depression and anxiety in 2017, writing allows an enormous release, almost like slowly combing knots from your hair. Writing gives me a chance to express experiences that perhaps are too challenging to discuss outside of fiction.

Studying for a degree in English Literature, The Arts Past and Present, Spanish and Law, and work in a secondary school, mainly supporting children with special educational needs. Will get out of bed even if it’s 3am just to make n+ot+es of potential plots or character profiles.

Can never write one book at a time, currently in the middle of 4 (all due out by end of 2018):

A Poisoned Apple, The Wolf in Mine, A Single Mum’s Guide to Life (Dating, Depression and Down Right Disasters), Ella’s not-so Fairytale

Good morning everyone and happy bank holiday weekend! I’m on the blog tour for Deepest Wounds by Gordon Brown today and I have a great guest post from the author to share with you.

Deepest Wounds us available in paperback now and you can purchase your copy here.

Huge thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me onto the blog tour and Gordon for providing me with this guest post.

Before I share my guest post with you here is a little bit about the book.

Book Synopsis:

Book 3 in the series that begins with Darkest Thoughts, one of The Reading Agency’s BOOKS OF THE YEAR, 2017. Conspiracy thriller. Book 3 in the mind-bending Craig McIntyre series. Book 1: Darkest Thoughts. Book 2: Furthest Reaches. The past is a dangerous place. Craig McIntyre s mere presence removes people s inhibitions and turns their darkest thoughts into actions. As Craig McIntyre tries to escape bounty hunters from the Dark Web, he discovers that his details are linked to a clandestine government project. Might it hold answers to his past as well as dangers for the present? Back on the run in North America, McIntyre hooks up with some unlikely allies. But can he trust them any more than those who want to use him to shape the future…and to further their personal ambitions? Have those behind Factor really given up on their pursuit of him? Or is McIntyre being reeled in with some politically toxic bait? McIntyre is the key to an explosive secret that could change mankind forever.

Guest Post: The Birth of Craig McIntyre

If there’s one question that you can guarantee to be asked as an author, it’s that age old chestnut ‘Where do you get your ideas from?’ My favourite response is ‘The local corner shop. They sell ideas between 2.00pm and 4.00pm on a Thursday.’ (I admit I nicked that from another author.) 

When it came to my Craig McIntyre series the core idea was born in a Glasgow pub, one Friday night. Craig McIntyre is, shall we say, a little unusual. He has the ability to bring out the worst in people. He can turn people’s darkest thoughts into action. He can’t control what he does. His life is one of constant chaos and he’s always on the run from a clandestine U.S. agency, who see him as the ultimate assassin.
Turn back to that wet Friday night on the southside of Glasgow. A friend and myself were propping up the bar at around nine o’clock. The pub was quiet. A grand total of five people made up the clientele. Two brothers stood in one corner, both drunk as a skunk. A young man sat at a table, head down in a paperback while my friend and I, backs to the bar, chewed the cud. The brothers were arguing. One lost the plot and threw a punch. Being drunk, the punch went wide and the puncher tumbled onto a table. His brother, clearly unhappy at the attempted assault, launched himself on top of his sibling and the table collapsed. What ensued was ten minutes of pandemonium as the two inebriated individuals tried, but failed, to inflict damage on each other. Unable to co-ordinate their attacks due to the excess of alcohol in their systems, they stumbled around the pub, laying waste to the furniture. My friend and I were perfectly placed to watch the chaos unfold. Meanwhile, the young man reading the novel kept his head down, clearly thinking that it was safer to look at the book than risk eye contact with the duelling brothers.
The police were eventually summoned and the brothers lead away. The bartender began to clean up and we helped right some of the chairs and tables. Only then did I notice that the young man was still engrossed in his book.
My friend and I finished up our drinks and headed for another pub.
Later that night, while walking home, I thought about the young man reading his book and asked that classic author question ‘What if?’. What if that young man wasn’t scared? What if he had ignored the brawl and was reading his book because that sort of thing, the fight, happened around him all the time? What if fights broke out with monotonous regularity? What if that was just the soundtrack to his life? I played with a few more ‘What ifs?’ and landed on a cracker. What if he was the reason the fight broke out in the first place? That somehow, he, not the drink, had brought out the worst in the two brothers? That he was the catalyst that set off the violence. And so the idea for Craig McIntyre was born.
In my first attempt to turn it into a novel, Craig was a young lad, just like the man in the pub, living in Glasgow, facing a life where all hell breaks out around him because of his affliction. When I’d finished the initial draft of the book, provisionally entitled Once, I employed an editor and, on their advice (and painful advice it was), I was told the story needed to be much bigger. So, I took a deep breath and began the rework. A completely new novel was born – set in America and now Craig is no longer a young lad from Glasgow but an ex U.S. military soldier.
I’m now three books into the Craig McIntyre series, with Deepest Wounds, the latest instalment, out now published by Strident, and a fourth under way – but there is a small coda to this story. The original draft, Once, the one sitting in my computer, is waiting on that day when the publisher calls and says ‘Gordon, would you have anything to hand that we might be able to release at quick notice?’
Watch this space.

About The Author:

Want to know more – go to http://www.gordonjbrown.com

(Author picture and bio taken from Amazon)

Book Synopsis:

An award-winning picture book that will get little ones excited about science.

While building a unique sandcastle, Cora and Manny spot a rather curious insect.
Soon, the little scientists keep a watchful eye on the insect’s movements, while learning about the natural environment along the way.

A great book for STEM education and home-school projects or just curious little ones who love science. Book extras include fun, printable activities related to science learning and research.

My Review:

The Beedog is a fun, education children’s book that helps to introduce science to young children.  I read this book with my nearly 6 year old who really enjoyed it.  It’s been hard to get Douglas into books as he does prefer non fiction but this book is a fantastic mixture of both which helped keep his interest.

The book subtly introduces science to children providing a few facts into the story but not too many that the young reader would become bored or put off.  More detailed information on the ‘beedog’ is providing at the back and was, predictably, the part my non fiction loving boy enjoyed the most.  There are some drawings of other types of  wasps that I hadn’t heard of before which was really interesting.

The bright illustrations are very eye catching and the added fun of trying to guess what happens or find things in the pictures helps make this book a really fun read.  I liked how the book encourages children to look up things for themselves and to discuss their findings.  I thought this was a great thing to try and encourage!

My only niggle with this book comes from my son who was very upset that it wasn’t obvious that the children had picked up the toilet paper on the beach, calling them very naughty! As the book is about science and nature it might have been good to have added this in as my understanding is that rubbish can harm nature.

This is the first book in this series that I have read and I look forward to reading more from her in the future.

Huge thanks to Rachel from Rachel’s Random Resources for my copy of this book and for inviting me onto the blog tour.

About The Author:

Addie is an avid traveler, and once went on a solo journey to fifteen countries in one year. When she encounters something unique, she writes about it. Her first published picture book, The Beedog, is about a curious insect that she found in southern Portugal.

Addie began her writing journey when she was just nine years old, with a book called Doggienauts. That book has been updated and is set for publication in 2018. Addie is originally from the United States and is currently a full-time traveler. Home is where her suitcase is.

Illustrator Bio:

Joyeeta Neogi

Joyeeta is a children’s book illustrator who has worked with international authors and publishers. Her engagement with worldwide clients and multicultural themes has allowed her to create captivating original animal and child characters. Her art captures the expressions, movements and vibrancy of life within simple compositions to bring the author’s story to life. In her free time, Joyeeta is busy with painting and music. She loves to paint in oil and acrylic, and has also developed a passion for watercolor.

Social Media Links:

Pinterest / Instagram / Twitter / Facebook 

Book resources at https://twoumbrellasplease.com

Book Synopsis:

The Guilty Dead is the ninth book in P.J. Tracy’s addictive and internationally bestselling Twin Cities series.

Gregory Norwood, wealthy businessman and close friend of Minnesota’s leading candidate for Governor, is found dead on the first anniversary of his son’s drug overdose. It seems clear to Detectives Gino and Magozzi that grief drove him to suicide.

Until they realise the left-handed man seems to have used his right hand to pull the trigger.

And they find the second body.

As the seemingly open-and-shut case becomes a murder enquiry, the detectives begin to delve into the dark secrets of one of the city’s most powerful families. It seems the murders are not the first in the Norwoods’ tragic story – and they won’t be the last . . .

My Review:

It’s always great when you find a great new series, even more so when the series is 9 books in and you have lots to catch up on!

The Guilty Dead is a highly addictive, intriguing and plausible read that I really enjoyed.  The thing that made this book for me was the fantastic characters that were really well drawn and easy to like.  The book is told from a variety of points of view and this makes the book very interesting as it helps the reader see the story from different angles.

My favourite characters were the police officers Gino and Magozzi.  I enjoyed the little interactions they had between them and the banter they shared.  They definitely helped provide some light relief at times.

This isn’t a particularly fast paced book, especially at the beginning but I found I didn’t care as I was really enjoying the story and learning more about the characters.  There are a few twists and turns which I didn’t see coming and I definitely didn’t guess the ending which was really nice.  It did take me a llittle bit to get my head around all the characters and I thought maybe a character list or some might have been helpful, but as mentioned before this is the ninth book in the series so the author probably thought people would know them all by now.

This is the first book by this author I have read and I can’t wait to go back and read all the previous books.

Huge thanks to Katie from Michael St Joseph for inviting me onto the blog tour and for my copy of this book.  If you like addictive, plausible stories with some fabulous characters then you’ll love this book.

About The Author:

P. J. Tracy was the pseudonym for the mother-and-daughter writing team of P. J. and Traci Lambrecht. Together P. J. and Traci were authors of the bestselling thrillers Want to Play? (a Richard and Judy Book Club pick), Live Bait, Dead Run, Snow Blind, Play to Kill, Two Evils, Cold Kill and Nothing Stays Buried. P. J. passed away in 2016, but Traci is continuing the series with The Guilty Dead.

Book Synopsis:

In 1973 Chile, thirteen-year-old English schoolboy Charlie Norton watches his father walk into the night and never return. Taken in by diplomat Tomas Abrego, his life becomes intricately linked to the family.

Eleven years later, Abrego is the Chilean Ambassador to London and Charlie is reunited with the Abrego sisters. Despite his love for them, he’s unable to prevent Maria falling under the spell of a left-wing revolutionary, or Sophia from being used as a political pawn by her father.

His connection to the family is complicated by the growing evidence that Tomas Abrego was somehow involved in his father’s disappearance.

As the conflict of a family divided by love and politics comes to a head on the night of the 1989 student riots in Santiago, Charlie has to act to save the sisters from an enemy they cannot see.

My Review:

The Glass Diplomat is a very intriguing, intelligent thriller that I thoroughly enjoyed.

The book drew me in from the start with a intriguing first chapter which immediately piqued my interest and made me want to read more.  The pace of the book starts fast and never really lets go as the reader is drawn further into the seedy, violent world the characters inhabit.  I’m sorry to say that I knew little about Chile’s history before reading this book but this book really helped open my eyes to their violent history.

Charlie was a very interesting main character.  On one hand I liked his drive and courage whilst trying to find out what happened to his father but on the other I wanted to scream at him to stop as I knew things wouldn’t work out well.  I loved reading about his developing relation with the two girls and was very happy to see him find some happiness there.  I do wanted things to go well for him but had a sinking feeling early on that it wouldn’t.

I haven’t read a book so fast in ages and as late! I simply couldn’t put it down as it was so gripping.  I had a bit of a soft spot for Charlie and the girls so wanted to keep reading to check they were ok.

This is the first book I’ve read by this author and I can’t wait to read more from him.

Huge thanks to Rachel from Rachel’s Random Resources for inviting me onto the blog tour and for my copy of this book.  If you like intelligent, gripping thrillers laced with fascinating history then you’ll love this book!

About The Author:

S R Wilsher writes: ‘It didn’t occur to me to write until I was twenty-two, prompted by reading a disappointing book by an author I’d previously liked. I wrote thirty pages of a story I abandoned because it didn’t work on any level. I moved on to a thriller about lost treasure in Central America; which I finished, but never showed to anyone. Two more went the way of the first, and I forgave the author.

After that I became more interested in people-centric stories. I also decided I needed to get some help with my writing, and studied for a degree with the OU. I chose Psychology partly because it was an easier sell to my family than Creative Writing. But mainly because it suited the changing tastes of my writing. When I look back, so many of my choices have been about my writing.

I’ve been writing all my adult life, but nine years ago I had a kidney transplant which interrupted my career, to everyone’s relief. It did mean my output increased, and I developed a work plan that sees me with two projects on the go at any one time. Although that has taken a hit in recent months as I’m currently renovating a house and getting to know my very new granddaughter.

I write for no other reason than I enjoy it deeply. I like the challenge of making a story work. I get a thrill from tinkering with the structure, of creating characters that I care about, and of manipulating a plot that unravels unpredictably, yet logically. I like to write myself into a corner and then see how I can escape. To me, writing is a puzzle I like to spend my time trying to solve.’

Good morning everyone I’m on the blog tour for The Genes Of Isis by Justin Newland today and I have a great guest post to share with you.

The Genes Of Isis is available now in ebook at the bargain price of £1.99, you can purchase your copy here.

Before I share my guest post with you here is a little about the book.

Book Synopsis:

Akasha is a precocious young girl with dreams of motherhood. She lives in a fantastical world where most of the oceans circulate in the aquamarine sky waters.

Before she was born, the Helios, a tribe of angels from the sun, came to Earth to deliver the Surge, the next step in the evolution of an embryonic human race. Instead they spawned a race of hybrids and infected humanity with a hybrid seed.

Horque manifests on Earth with another tribe of angels, the Solarii, to rescue the genetic mix-up and release the Surge.

Akasha embarks on a journey from maiden to mother and from apprentice to priestess then has a premonition that a great flood is imminent. All three races – humans, hybrids and Solarii – face extinction.

With their world in crisis, Akasha and Horque meet, and a sublime love flashes between them. Is this a cause of hope for humanity and the Solarii? Or will the hybrids destroy them both? Will anyone survive the killing waters of the coming apocalypse?

Guest Review:

What drew me to the stories of Ancient Egypt?

I wanted to explore our human origins. Where did we come from? How did we get to where we are today? Why are things as they are? I wanted to conceive a story that offered the discerning reader a different entry point to these age-old questions. Inevitably, it led me to Ancient Egypt, the world’s earliest recorded historical culture.
As the oldest, Egypt civilisation influenced everything that followed: the first in any field always does. That’s why Egypt is known as the ‘Mother and Father of all things’.
The Ancient Egyptians imagined their origins though creation myths, such as the myth of Isis. In it, Osiris, her husband, is murdered and has his dismembered body parts distributed all over Egypt. Isis gathers them together and miraculously brings him back to life. This is a story of life and death, procreation, rebirth and the struggle for power, all archetypal themes. It’s about genesis, because that’s what genes of Isis means.

Where did the Biblical flood fit into the story?

In the Book of Genesis, the flood lasted 40 days and nights. If so, how did all that water get up there in the first place? Here’s an utterance from the Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts:
‘I shall cross the great lake in the sky and return home to my double on the sun.’
Not only does this moot a ‘lake in the sky’ but it suggests the Ancient Egyptians were beings from the sun or sun-folk.
More recently, Old Mother Shipton, a Yorkshire prophetess, coined her answer:
‘Beneath the water, men shall walk. Shall ride, shall sleep, shall even talk.’
What if the waters were already up there in the sky, causing the earth to shrink like a dried prune, leaving the remaining oceans on shallow sea beds?
This gave me the idea for the sky waters, an important element of the world of The Genes of Isis.

What drove you to expand these initial ideas into a full novel?

Legends from other ancient cultures mentioned cross-breeding between species, mixed genetics and hybrids. The apocryphal The Book of Enoch spoke of the Grigori or fallen angels who came to Earth and mated with ‘the daughters of men,’ spawning the Nephilim, an antediluvian race of giants. The Epic of Gilgamesh talked of strange beings such as fish-men who came ashore for the day and returned to the sea at night.
What if these fallen angels were sun-folk who manifested in human form and settled in Ancient Egypt, as suggested by the Pyramid Texts? What if antediluvian genetics were unstable, in that the bindings that prevented successful inter-species crossbreeding had become loosened, spawning mixed genetic creatures and humans with animal heads?
This was the germ of the idea for the novel: an alternative genesis of the human race.
Interwoven with these ideas were esoteric concepts such as the akashic record and the astral body. The akashic record is conceived of as a compendium of thoughts, events and emotions encoded in a numinous plane of existence. From this, I derived the name of the novel’s heroine, Akasha, a Sanskrit word meaning aether or atmosphere. The astral body is a personal spirit entity which can leave a person during sleep, travel through the vast numinous corridors of the akashic record and in so doing re-connect to the history of any person or event from any previous epoch. This is what Edgar Cayce, an American mystic, claimed to have done.
Other sources included Doris Lessing’s Shikastra which speculated on how humans may have lived in the time before recorded history. The name Samlios, where the initial action of the novel unfolds, is taken from Gurdjieff’s Beelzebub’s Tales to his Grandson.
All this nourished my fascination for the supernatural and ancient times.

How did you build a narrative and characters around the ingredients gathered from your knowledge of Ancient Egypt?

With two sources, one Biblical and one Ancient Egyptian, I needed two protagonists, one human, the other angelic or sun-folk, whom I called the Solarii. I envisaged the embryonic human race as blue-blooded, gentle folk whereas the Solarii were drawn as red-blooded and severe. A comparison of opposites yielded a girl and boy, young and old, Akasha and Horque. Thus the main characters took shape.
When I started work on the novel, I began with the idea and a storyline. The characters emerged from the plot. Sometimes my imagination revealed things about them, like what they carried in their pockets, their physical characteristics, their character. I found them crouching behind the plot lines, emerging out of the shadows of the narrative and in the great halls of the unconscious (in dreams).

What haunted you throughout the process?

Looking into pre-history, there was a sense that I was peering into a dark timeless abyss, where sometimes, as Nietzsche predicted, the abyss stared back. That was unnerving, especially as most of what I was researching had no solid facts on which anyone agreed. But it did leave plenty of room for the imagination to roam.
The final word is the haunting saying: Egypt knows you, but do you know the Egypt in you?
If you want to know more, you know where to look.

About The Author:

JUSTIN NEWLAND writes historical, fantasy and speculative fiction with a supernatural bent.
He lives with his partner in plain sight of the Mendip Hills in Somerset, England.

For further author info, see http://www.justinnewland.com/.
Short stories in anthologies include: The Fool of Abbot’s Leigh in Hidden Bristol and Fisher of Men in North by Southwest.
Another short story, Vallum Hadriani, is included in The Dark Half of the Year.
His first novel, The Genes of Isis, is published by Matador.
For more info, see http://www.thegenesofisis.com/.
His second novel, The Old Dragon’s Head, a historical fantasy set in Old China. is to be published by Matador in November 2018. His work in progress is a historical novel set in East Prussia during the Enlightenment in the 1760’s. All his novels deal with war, religion, evolution, and the human’s place in the universe.

Book Synopsis:

The year is 2039.
The setting is the British Isles – but not the British Isles as we know them today.
The brutal economic impact of the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the EU, together with the ever-accelerating effects of global warming have led to a very different environment indeed, in almost every way. Politics, geography and technology are all in flux.
But some things remain the same – greed, murder, conspiracy and corruption among them. When Stephanie Flack, licensed private eye in the Royal Province of Anglia, is asked to track down some missing diamonds, she soon finds the trail leading her into some very unexpected and highly dangerous places, with dead bodies appearing with alarming regularity. Including, very nearly, her own.
R.M. Cartmel’s skilful characterisation, sharp observation and quiet irony provide a glimpse into a future which we can almost recognise. A brilliant, gentle, wry dystopian murder mystery.

North Sea Rising is available to buy in paperback and ebook now, you can purchase a copy of both here.

My Review:

North Sea Rising is a fascinating look at a post Brexit world that is sure to get people thinking.

The world that the author has created is a truly fascinating one that sent a shiver down my spine reading about it.  The thing that most strikes you about it is how real the world seems especially as it’s set in the not too distance future.  I sincerely hope that this isn’t what happens post Brexit as it’s not a world I wish to inhabit!

I loved the main character Stephanie.  She was a really strong, confident woman who wasn’t worried about getting into danger or conflict.  I enjoyed reading about her investigation and how she handled it as she seemed very intelligent, coming to logical solutions.

The mystery part of the story unfolds fairy gently but there is plenty of stuff to keep the reader interested.  I became quickly immersed into the world the author has created and I wanted to keep reading to find out more about it as well as discovering how Stephanie’s investigation fared.

The ending was really good and helped bring everything together nicely.  This is actually the second book in the series which I didn’t realise at first so it works well as a standalone novel as anything you need to know is explained.

Huge thanks to Anne Cater and Crime Scene Books for inviting me onto the blog tour and for my copy of the book.  If you like realistic, dystopia novels that make you think then you’ll love this book.

About The Author:

Following a highly successful career as a GP, RM Cartmel returned to his first love and took up writing again.
Well-known for his wine and crime series set in France, The Inspector Truchaud Mysteries, he also has a second, rather more offbeat series of North Sea Noir, which can be read as stand alone but connected novels, set in Peterborough. North Sea Rising is the second of these.

The Inspector Truchaud Mysteries:
The Charlemagne Connection
The Richebourg Affair
The Romanee Vintage
The German Crossing ( coming 2019)

The North Sea Noir Novels:
50 Miles from Anywhere
North sea Rising (available for pre-order)

For further information, to request an interview or for high resolution pictures etc , please email: candy.denman@crime-scene-books.co.uk