Charmed, I'm Sure

Charmed, I’m Sure

by Lynda Simmons

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BLURB:

Laugh Out Loud Funny...With Just a Touch of Magic

One minute Maxine Henley is the happy bride-to-be and the next she’s the girl who gets dumped over the phone. Max has never believed in magic and fairy’s tales, but if wearing a love charm can warm her fiancé’s cold feet, she’s happy to stuff that little wooden heart next to her own and wait. The charm came with a promise that the right man will find her, guaranteed, but how can that happen when her teenage crush Sam O’Neal keeps getting in the way!

EXCERPT:

“Excuse me, miss,” a male voice said. “I seem to have lost my phone number. Could I have yours?”

Max smiled. She’d know that voice anywhere. She just hadn’t expected to hear it in Schomberg. “Your lines don’t get any better with age, O’Neal,” she said, stuffing the charm into her back pocket as she turned around.

“I’m a little out of practice.” He grinned and stepped from the shadows. “How are you, Max?”

 “Better now,” she said, meaning it.

 Sam O’Neal had been the boy next door, her older brother’s best friend and the one voted most likely to get out of Schomberg. She’d had a crush on him once, the kind of heart-pounding, breath-stealing obsession that fifteen year-old girls do so well. Watching him come toward her now, she wondered if it was her imagination or perhaps some trick of the light that made him look even better than she remembered.

Max moistened her lips even as she felt the faint shift in her shoulders, the tiny flicker of awareness that was as unexpected as it was inappropriate. This was Sam, after all. The one who didn’t think twice about taking her baby-sitting money in a poker game, or daring her to steal peaches from the Jenkins’s’ orchard, and turned out to be the best friend she’d ever known.

“I can’t believe you’re here,” she said, rising up on her toes to wrap her arms around his neck. “And without even a hint of elf anywhere.”

 “I hid until they ran out of size eleven curly toes.”

She looked up into his eyes and for the first time was glad she’d made the trip. “I have missed you,” she said softly.

 “Me too,” he said, kissing her on the cheek, the way any friend might, and pulling her close for a hug. She held on tight, feeling the strength of his hands on her back, the hard wall of his chest against her breasts and a warmth from both that reached through her fine cotton tank top, making her shiver. She started to step back and wondered for one brief moment if he would stop her, maybe hold on a moment longer, and what she would do if he did.

MY REVIEW:
I offered to review this book because I'd read a previous book by this author and liked it very much. Ms. Simmons didn't disappoint me this time either. I like the cozy little world she created, and I could see why even though people left the small town, they eventually were drawn back to it. Not that everything is perfect, though. The strong emotions and tragedies that sent both the hero and heroine running for the city are still there, and of course in a little town, everyone knows everyone's business.

The heroine Max must be the most stubborn woman in the world. Once she made up her mind nothing could change her even though it was obvious to everyone that she was making some bad choices. 

The hero Sam was my kind of man. I loved the way he dealt with Max and the pain of the past. 

I also liked the other characters in the book, but let's just say that Max's mother was almost as stubborn as Max. Like her daughter, she threw happiness away with both hands.

Don't worry, though. Toss in a little magic, and the book has a positive, upbeat ending that I loved. I can recommend this book without reservation. 5 out of 5 stars.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Lynda Simmons is a writer by day, college instructor by night and a late sleeper on weekends. She grew up in Toronto reading Greek mythology, bringing home stray cats and making up stories about bodies in the basement. From an early age, her family knew she would either end up as a writer or the old lady with a hundred cats. As luck would have it, she married a man with allergies so writing it was.

With two daughters to raise, Lynda and her husband moved into a lovely two storey mortgage in Burlington, a small city on the water just outside Toronto. While the girls are grown and gone, Lynda and her husband are still there. And yes, there is a cat – a beautiful, if spoiled, Birman. If you’d like to read the legend of Birman cats click here. If you’d like a link to allergy relief, click here.

When she’s not writing or teaching, Lynda gives serious thought to using the treadmill in her basement. Fortunately, she’s found that if she waits long enough, something urgent will pop up and save her - like a phone call or an e-mail or a whistling kettle. Or even that cat just looking for a little more attention!

Website www.lyndasimmons.com

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pages/Lynda-Simmons-Author/149740745067442

Twitter @LyndaMSimmons

Amazon Link http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=charmed%2C%20i'm%20sure%20lynda%20simmons

The author is giving away a $50 B&N/Amazon gift card via rafflecopter. Use the link below to enter. 

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Elf Hills

Elf Hills

by S.S. Dudley

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BLURB:

Something strange, something magical, is going on in the dusty hills behind the small town of Villaloma. Yet each time Linda Peters puts on her running shoes and sets out to find the enchanted kingdom she imagines—full of dancing elves, unicorns, and more—something stops her. And with school starting soon, she only has a few more chances to really search the hills.

While Linda’s frustration and doubt grow, her cousin, Nugu, looks for answers in his books and wonders if maybe, just maybe, Linda’s stories are for real.

The day finally arrives when Linda can run far, the day she is sure she will find her magic city. But when she and Nugu feel their goal must lie just beyond the next hill, they only find more hill.

Is it all a figment of an over-active imagination; a wistful fantasy?

Or is there truly something magical in those hills that only the strong of heart—and leg—can discover?

EXCERPT:

From the Prologue:

This fairy tale, as you might have guessed already, takes place on a hill. Or, rather, on many hills and a mountain or two in Northern California, near what people call the Great Valley. One hill in particular stands out, though, because that is where everything started. It was a nice hill; well rounded, not too high, not too low. It was distinctly a hill, snuggled up against a mountain like a nursing cub to its resting mother. For the most part this hill was well-dressed with dark green oak trees and tall grasses, usually yellowed and dry except for the four or five wet months of the year. Along one side, a seasonal creek slipped out and down into the plain. Here the vegetation—red-stemmed manzanita, prickly blackberry bushes, and other shrubs—was thick and difficult to move through.

From afar, the hill was not remarkable; it had many siblings stretching to the north and south as far as the eye could see. This hill was special, though. For one, a strange—some said magical—copse of trees stood near the base of the hill where the creek emerged. These trees were short, had long, dark-green leaves, and bore bright yellow fruit that, if eaten, were said to imbue a person with the strength of ten men. For another, the hill was haunted. On certain nights of the year a white light would shine from the very top of the hill. It was brighter than the brightest star; brighter even than a full moon, perhaps, and it cast long shadows across the plain. The first people that lived in the area told many stories about that hill, the light, and the spirits that lived there.

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

S. S. Dudley grew up in Wyoming, USA, an avid reader and lover of the outdoors. He studied at the University of Wyoming and the University of Illinois. He started his first book (an epic fantasy hand-written in with a blue fountain pen…) when he was 13, but never finished it. At some point (as his mother recently reminded him), he decided that he needed to go do something (like get a job) for a while before he could, or should, write. He did, and spent time in Colombia, Panamá, Antarctica and the dark recesses of large science buildings on college campuses. That done, he now writes, lives and runs in Northern California with his wife and two children. He can be found at:

http://www.ssdudley.com 

http://www.facebook.com/author.ssdudley

twitter at @SS_dudley.

http://amzn.to/160KY4j

 The author will be awarding a $25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Use the rafflecopter link below to enter. You can find his schedule at
http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2014/11/book-blast-elf-hills-by-ss-dudley.html

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