Blog Tour: Red Dirt Road by Annie Rose Welch, Teaser & Giveaway!

The Saving Angels Series continues…
A new cast is introduced, while journeys already taken start to merge with the present, leading you down the old Red Dirt Road.
Death has always seemed just one step behind Layla Hill, taking almost everyone she’s ever loved. After she loses the love of her life, Layla vows to never love again—how could she, when she’s a death magnet?
Trying to outrun fate traveling with her uncle Willie and his band, Layla meets Michael Roberts, a beautiful Irish boxer as gentle on the piano as he is brutal in the ring. He proves as relentless in life, fighting for a place in her world even as she pushes him away, trying to protect him from her killer tendencies.
But neither foresees the sinister presence waiting for Layla at the end of the Red Dirt Road.

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     We both knew what he was thinking—Yuma. In Michael’s mind, there was no other way around the situation. “Are you ever afraid?” I said, thinking how frightened I was of them coming together. 

     “Once,” he said, laughing a bit. He reclaimed his spot next to me. 

     “Do tell.” I curled back against him. 

     “The night we met at the bar in Fort Worth. When you walked on stage I was afraid of you.” 

     “You were afraid of me?” 

     “Truly terrified.” 

     “Why?” Why would anyone be afraid of me? If he wasn’t so serious, I would have sworn he was joking. 

     “When I saw you walk on-stage, in the instant that your hair fell around your face, I knew without a doubt that you were the one person I would risk my soul for. I would’ve done anything for you. I knew I would lie, cheat, or die just so one hair on your head wouldn’t be harmed. I would’ve committed an abundance of sins just to make you mine. But lucky for me, you’ve brought balance into my life, so there was no need for me to commit any sin. You were just the opposite; you were salvation.” He breathed deeply, like with the revelation there was release. 

     “Michael, when you were playing the piano, the music faltered when I said ‘husband.’ How did you—”

     “That’s why I rushed off the stage. I begged Andrew to ask Willie if you were married. I didn’t know if you had just said that for the crowd—all those men asking for your hand in marriage—or what your story was, but I was eager to find out. I’m not sure what I would’ve done if you were. I know for sure I would’ve still followed you. I don’t think it was a choice at that point.” 

     “Why did you seem so angry, then?” 

     He laughed, a beautiful melody of a laugh. “I was afraid of you! Afraid of what you could do to me. It’s humbling and frightening to have every bit of your power in the hands of someone you don’t even know.” He brought my hand to his lips, and they were so warm and soft. 

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About Annie

Born and raised in New Orleans, Annie has a habit of shortening her words and telling long stories. She speaks with a southern flair and cooks with it too. At the tender age of twenty- one, she hitched up her wagons (took her first plane ride) and moved out west to the big shake (California). Her writing career began one sleepless night when she imagined a gorgeous woman and a man with maniacal hair floating above her like lightening bugs falling from the sky. Curious about them, their story, and why they were floating around in her head, she sat down and penned (typed) her first novel, Marigny Street. A dream come true for her, she hasn’t stopped writing since. She loves a damn good love story, always has, no matter what the genre. She is particularly moved by imperfect love that in its own unique way is perfect, the notion of love at first sight, soul mates, and things that are generally out of the norm.

When she’s not writing she enjoys dabbling in photography and finding new, inspirational music to add to her collection. She currently (still) resides in the big shake (although her southern roots are calling her home) with her husband, daughter, and their two peculiar dogs, Boudreaux and Tabasco (who, call her crazy, bark with an accent).

For lagniappe (a little extra), a virtual cup of café au lait and beignets, please visit Annie’s website. She can also be found on Facebook & Twitter.

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Book Highlight & Giveaway: The Storm Inside by Alexis Anne!

The Storm Inside by Alexis Anne
Genre: Adult Romance
Published: September 17th, 2013

“The only thing holding me back was my heart. You know, the broken one. It knew if Jake and I got back together we’d make our past relationship look like child’s play. It would be a sweet footnote to this new, torrid love affair. ‘Jake and Eve 2.0’ would be an uncontrolled explosion of sex and adoration.
Uncontrolled explosions were dangerous. Everyone knew that.
And yet, I couldn’t seem to stop myself from playing with the matches…” ~Eve

Loving someone and being in love aren’t always the same thing.

That’s what Eve Daniels is trying to come to terms with when Jake Spencer suddenly returns to her life after ten years of silence. Haunted by a past he had no power to control, Jake left everyone and everything behind in hopes of saving Eve from his demons. His one regret was breaking her heart.

From the moment they reconnect, it is clear to Eve the passion, brilliance, and determination that first attracted her to Jake are stronger than ever. So strong that fighting their pull seems useless. But falling back in love isn’t as easy as letting the walls down. Eve soon realizes the choices they’ve both made come with consequences. Ones that will test how deep her love runs for a man living with a storm inside.

Recommended for ages 17+ due to language and sexual situations.

Purchase:

Amazon (paperback) | Amazon (Kindle) | Barnes & Noble

Jake slammed my back into the wall of the shack, the boards of the wall bending and flexing from the impact.  For a moment I worried we’d punch a hole right in the side of the building, but then Jake nipped my earlobe at the exact same moment he flexed his hips into mine, and I forgot everything I was thinking.

Everything but him. 

I didn’t think about the ten years he’d been gone or how much I hated him.  All I could feel was his hard body pressed up against mine, his rough hands as they desperately roamed over my skin, and the intensity in his kiss.

We’d always made an explosive combination; that clearly hadn’t changed.  If anything, the added experience and time apart made what we’d had in the past look sweet and warm.  Because this—what we were doing now— was off the charts insane.  It was brutal and animalistic in the most fantastic way.

The afternoon thunderstorm was howling outside.  It was my favorite time of day, and Jake knew it.  The thing about Florida’s summertime storms was that you could feel them.  When lightning strikes, the air crackles with electricity moving through everything around you.  The moment it splits the sky, thunder vibrates so deeply it shakes the earth and every molecule in your body.  You feel it everywhere.

Thunderstorms are a full body experience from the light and the vibrations, to the sound of the wind, the pounding of the rain, and the taste of the humidity in the air.

It’s like Mother Nature is trying to sweep you away in a symphony of senses.  And at the moment I was swept away by both the storm and by Jake.  I was completely lost to everything.

It had always been like this with us.  Ten years hadn’t dulled it at all.  If anything, the waiting only made it more intense than ever. 

His hand closed around my jaw, turning my head away so that he could nuzzle my neck.  As his tongue stroked upward along my skin, the muscles in my belly clenched and I squeezed my legs around him tighter.

“Oh god, Eve…” he moaned, pinning my hands to the wall and looking up at me with fire in his eyes as he continued to rock against me.  The intensity with which he wanted me only made me crave him more.  I ground back against his firm waist even harder.

Words seemed to ruin everything between us, so I wasn’t about to start talking now.  I just panted, throwing my head back, and pushing against him with my hips to let him know I wanted to continue.  There was no doubt in my mind how wet I was, my body was practically begging to have Jake back inside me.

Taking my cue, Jake released my wrists and slowly, silently began to undress me, not that it took much.  My bikini was held on by four sets of strings.

His eyes hungrily roamed over my naked breasts with a passion that made me shiver with hot desire.

Thunder rattled the roof as Jake stepped back, pulling me toward him with his hand knotted in my hair.  The tug on my hair follicles hurt in the most fantastic way.  He crushed his lips against mine and I would have cried out in pain if it hadn’t felt so good.

The one thing that kept running through my head, the one thing I couldn’t ignore any longer, was how badly I wanted this man.  Every inch of me wanted to possess him.  I felt like a tigress stalking her prey.  Jake was mine and no one else’s.  Always had been, always would be.

The shack was dank and old: there wasn’t a surface in the place that seemed clean or inviting, let alone suitable for our naked bodies.

Jake’s towel was flung over the back of a folding chair and with a quick flip of his wrist, the towel now covered the seat.  I let him pull me onto his lap, my toes just barely reaching the floor on either side of him.  His warm and sweaty skin against mine was electric and I gasped.  I needed him inside me, now.

Alexis Anne lives in Central Florida with her tall, dark, and handsome husband and their two adorable superheroes. Their crazy lives have taken them from archaeology digs to breaking news as they traversed the worlds of anthropology and television news. When she's not reading or writing, Alexis can be found at the beach or on the water with her family. Her first series, FILTERS, are contemporary romance short stories. The Storm Inside is her first full-length novel.

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Rivulet by Jamie Magee Blog Tour: Guest Post & Giveaway!

Rivulet by Jamie Magee
Expected publication: October 7, 2013

Unfathomable forces have always contested Genevieve Indiana Falcon, known as Indie. The curse of her cold touch entraps her just as the grief ignited in her past torments her. Yet, her mysterious ability to dream while awake saturates her in the belief that she was not always anguished. There is hope that one day a true peace in her soul can be found. 

Foolishly, Indie assumes she has contained her life in an odd balance, and she cherishes the visions she sees of the enigmatic boy that held her in a lost time, but can never reach. She grieves for a life she fears she'll never possess, and that grief is a weapon she uses against her aunt who stands between her and her inheritance. 

Weeks away from her twenty-first birthday, the date where she would assume control over her family legacy, a night terror robs Indie of the balance she was clinging to. Like the dream she had before she lost her family, it predicts a fatal catastrophe on the horizon. The fight between life and death, good and evil, began the moment her thundering heart awoke her. 

Everything changed after that dream. The one thing that keeps her curse at bay is stolen, and then the enigmatic boy arrives in the flesh. Face to face with her fiery born-again lover Indie realizes that the only way she can prevent the tragedy before her is to surrender everything she was, is, and could be. 

Can she bend the laws of nature and fight the improbability that fire and ice could ever be one? As far as Indie is concerned, there is not a myth, spoken fate, or curse that is stronger than her stubborn desire to have it all ... including him.

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GUEST POST

I think every creative soul has a method for searching for inspiration, and let’s be honest, life itself, more times than not, is full of the inspiration we need to bring to existence that little voice we hear whispering to our souls.

One of my favorite ways to drift into my mind is music. So, often late at night when the chatter of Facebook and Twitter has quelled, I click my way to YouTube. I always have hand full of screen shots that I have taken from Shazam. The songs are ones I heard in the background of movies, in commercials – anywhere really. I will find my way to a song and decide if I like it or not, and usually from that point I click on one of those awesome little suggestions You Tube likes to give you.

If I find a song I really like, I always pin it. I like to keep Pinterest boards for stories I have written or ones I’m building in the back of mind. Every once in awhile Pinterest will tell me that someone else pinned said song and show me their board, and somehow I lose track of YouTube and lurk on Pinterest for awhile. This process always leads me on a blind path of discovery, and somehow shapes ideas or thoughts.

Rarely do I find anything that seems to encompass it all, something that sums up what my end game is all about—because to be honest, I don’t even know my own end game!

Yet, the other night after chasing a song, I landed on a board that had an image of Jim Morrison with a great little catchphrase that I liked. Because I was curious, I Googled him and read about his life, his wins and losses. There were countless quotes (I love quotes), the first one I read stopped me in my tracks.

This is the quote:

People are afraid of themselves, of their own reality; their feelings most of all. People talk about how great love is, but that’s bull****. Love hurts. Feelings are disturbing. People are taught that pain is evil and dangerous. How can they deal with love if they’re afraid to feel? Pain is meant to wake us up. People try to hide their pain. But they’re wrong. Pain is something to carry, like a radio. You feel your strength in the experience of pain. It’s all in how you carry it. That’s what matters. Pain is a feeling. Your feelings are a part of you. Your own reality. If you feel ashamed of them, and hide them, you’re letting society destroy your reality. You should stand up for your right to feel your pain.

― Jim Morrison

I had to read it a few times because I understood what he was saying, but I also saw how it could be taken the wrong way. In a way I tried to explain his words to myself, and somehow in that thought process I kept going back to the love stories I had written, to the challenges I had witnessed each character face.

Writers would be out of business if we didn’t create conflict. The conflict is what everyone finds familiarity with.

The likelihood of facing the same turmoil in paranormal books or urban fantasy books is near nil (unless there is some obscure portal I am not aware of – and if there is one, show me the way!) but the emotions created in those stories ring true to us. We recognize the silent pain.

Through the words we read, we feel emotions that have manifested in our lives, and on some level we think to ourselves, if they came through that time of consequence unscathed, then I can, too. If they dared to love and fight when there was no way to know if they would find what they were seeking, then I too can face this: I can embrace this side of humanity.

I resonated with that quote so much because more than once my characters have understood that the pain they endure is shallow compared to the reward waiting for them.

Feeling pain is a right; it is a mark of existence. 

The characters in Rivulet face a conflict that I would never want to brush against, but as they embrace that challenge, I find myself envying the depth of emotions they experienced. They knew the pain before the bliss; they experienced an unexplainable path that some how made perfect sense when the story was told.

The lesson I learned the night I found that quote was one that I discover time and time again as I devour the ideas of creative souls. We are all feeling the same emotions, no one is truly alone in this world. We are one.

I can’t wait to share this story with all of you.

About Jamie

Jamie Magee has always believed that each of us have a defining gift that sets us apart from the rest of the world, she has always envied those who have known from their first breath what their gift was. Not knowing hers, she began a career in the fast paced world of business. Raising a young family, and competing to rise higher in that field would drive some to the point of insanity, but she always found a moment of escape in a passing daydream. Her imagination would take her to places she’d never been, introduce her to people she’s never known. Insight, her debuting novel, is a result of that powerful imagination. Today, she is grateful that not knowing what defined her, led her on a path of discovery that would always be a part of her.

Website | Goodreads | Facebook | Twitter 

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One random commenter will win an eCopy of Rivulet! In your comment please include a way for us to contact you, and your preferred format to enter.

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Loving Her by CM Hutton Book Highlight & Giveaway!

Loving Her by CM Hutton
Expected publication: October 15th, 2013
Adult contemporary romance

Boring, but completely gorgeous. That was my first impression of him. My next two thoughts were ‘pompous ass’ and ‘cocky jerk.’ And, I had the glorious pleasure of sharing a table with him for the entire night. He didn’t speak, didn’t grunt….he just nodded and stared. If I weren’t taking my bosses place at this dinner, I’d have found another place to sit and escape Rylan Daniels.

‘Absolutely beautiful’ was what I thought when I found her at my table at the Ad Execs quarterly dinner. She wore a black strapless dress and exuded confidence from every part of her. I nodded to her, but didn’t speak. I really didn’t have much to say anyway.

I couldn’t quit staring and had to excuse myself at one point to stand across the room and watch her. It was a strange, unwelcome feeling I was having about this stunning woman.

It had been five years….five years since Kristen…..and I still couldn’t move on. That kind of hurt you just don’t get over so easily and I wasn’t even sure that I wanted to get over it. But, here I was, completely intrigued and unable to stop thinking about Jen Bailey.

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Jen

“I need to kiss you.  May I?”  Oh, dear lord.  Those words did funny things to me.

A slow smile crept across my face and he had one to match.  “Yeah.”  I whispered as he leaned in and ever so gently swept his lips across mine. It was the sweetest, softest kiss and I wanted more, but he pulled his head back and whispered “Thank you” then quickly turned me around to face out to the crowd leaving my waist locked in this arms.

Rylan

Jen Bailey looked just as beautiful as she did at dinner last night, but instead of a fancy dress, she was in jeans….’sexy as hell’ jeans.  I let my eyes roam her body since she had no idea I was looking at her.  Her long blonde hair was not as smooth as it was last night.  It was a little messy and looked good.  She was curvy where it mattered and not too thin. Pretty damn perfect, actually.

I leaned against the bar and sipped my drink.  I hadn’t really noticed anyone but her until I saw none other than Jack Woods walking right behind her with his hand on her back.  Damn.

I'm a wife, a mom of three, a sister, a daughter, an aunt, a friend and a teacher. Now I can add writer to my list! I've always loved to write and finally found the inspiration and support to put my first novel on display for others to read.

I live near Austin, Texas with my family where I teach school and run around like crazy taking care of my crew. I absolutely love to read and tend to totally ignore my 'near and dear' when I'm lost in a good book. Put me on a beach somewhere with a great story and the whole world just disappears around me.

Loving Her is my second novel. I'm working hard to continually improve my writing; hoping to make my stories better, my characters more loveable and my fans proud!

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Pulling Me Under by Rebecca Berto Book Blast & Giveaway!

Title: Pulling Me Under

Author: Rebecca Berto

Series: Pulling Me Under #1

Genre: Women’s Fiction, Suspense

Age Group: Adult

Cover Designed by: Berto Designs

Paul was Katie’s rock for thirteen years, but then she watched him die.

By day, she is left with her daughter Ella’s questions about where Daddy went, and at night she's consumed with nightmares of the moment he died. It isn’t long before Katie’s mother hints that her volatile lifestyle and developing drinking habits are no way to raise a little girl.

Through it all, her and Paul’s best friend, Liam is there. Grieving the death of both husband and friend, the time they spend together seems more intimate these days, and Katie soon stumbles into taboo territory: Liam might be in love with her.

Torn between Liam’s feelings and losing Ella, one night Katie runs.

Air. Space. Thinking time. That's what she thinks she's getting when she stumbles upon that party. In the morning, in a strange bed, she can’t remember the night before.

Pulling Me Under is raw in its brutality of love and pain, with slow-building suspense to a heart-stopping conclusion.

Purchase Pulling Me Under:
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Download the prequel novella, Precise, for FREE!

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   I wake up in my bathtub.
   Liam is by my side. His arms are tense from holding his weight over the rim. When he exhales, I suck in warm air. His air.
   He sees me wake and falls back against the tiled wall behind him, lacing his fingers as a barrier between the wall and his head. Crunch. He doesn’t react when he hits the wall, as if his hands haven’t protected his skull. Not even a flinch.
   Thankfully, his eyes are closed, which makes me feel less self-conscious. I mean, I don’t remember a period of time without him—my kinder years, primary, secondary school—but it’s easier to think without scrutiny.
   I’m not sure how long it takes, but soon enough I see he’s wearing the blue hoodie. Did he really leave it here or did he put it on . . . to rub something in? His jeans are the worn ones, the ones where his knee pokes through one pant leg. Smirking, I notice he’s still wearing Ella’s Mickey Mouse watch. The one she insisted he use.
   I try to form a memory but all I see are lined-up red plastic cups and me smashing them along a line with the ball of my heel. That’s all that comes to me. As I hit this memory, Liam opens his eyes. He’s breathing heavily, but what worries me are those blue eyes because they seem too wide. Those eyes have seen too much.
   “Wha—” I clear my throat and taste something acidic, half-digested that makes my voice sound like a gurgle. I rinse out two cupfuls of water before I gulp down another two cupfuls. It’s only after the eagerness to wash out the vomit that I realize I have my boy shorts on and one of Paul’s business shirts.
   And that’s it.
   “What happened?” I say to Liam anyway, because I can’t very well ask “Why am I half-naked?” I’m lucky my body is thin enough to hide in this shirt. It would have been a different story otherwise.
   He sits up and searches my face for a long time. His gaze is so still that a shiver runs down my spine. “Seems you had a party, you did.”
   I’m suddenly self-conscious about my gaping shirt. I pull my ankles by my side and the ends of my shirt as tight around my chest as they will go. “Was this your idea?”
   Liam points to my shirt—Paul’s shirt—and suppresses a scoff. “Nah, man. I came here at, ooh,” he checks his watch and clucks, “twelve-forty.”
   “And I was . . . ”
   “Well and truly partied out. I missed it all. I believe you were passed out and curled up with an empty Johnny Walker bottle.” He points over there. To Ella’s bed. Just as I guessed.
   I allow myself to see through the bathroom door, trying to push through the pounding in my head. Ella’s bedroom has her ponies strewn everywhere, in a way she never leaves her precious toys.
   The “why” of Liam’s presence occurs after I’ve looked away. I don’t want him seeing me look back to him. I’ve had enough shame for one day.
   In Ella’s bedroom there’s the suspect Johnny Walker bottle on the floor. I clench my teeth, pushing away memories, pushing, pushing, until all I think about is running.
Looking at Paul in that picture with cascading curls is worse, though, so I refuse to look at the particular section of the wall. I can’t see happy. I took away happy and I want nothing to do with it now.
   I concentrate on keeping my features blank so Liam can’t read any weaknesses. He’s about to suggest I hand Ella over to someone else to for a little while—I can sense it.
   I remember that things changed about a week after what happened with Paul. The first week after a sudden, terrible death is open to all sorts of reactions, but for me there’s been a disconnect. The first week, I would stare right at something as plain as a glass, and thinking back now, I can recall from my fixture on that glass I didn’t even know I was doing it. I’d get asked what I was doing that morning and I’d think it was afternoon because, surely, I couldn’t feel that tired and ready to quit the day before midday. I didn’t even know I skipped meals because hours slipped away like soap in a shower, yet my body had never felt heavier to lug around than it did then, during the first week.
   The first week has never ended for me.
   There are “comforting” lines, like the Do you want to chat about it, Kates? that people repeat.
   Well, what do I say to that? I don’t want to talk about it. Okay?
   Then I can’t remember much.
   What day is it?
   What am I doing in my car?
   Who am I?
   I shouldn’t be surprised. I transformed from a kid, dependent on my mom and dad to being “Paul and Kates”.
   Never have I been just me.

Rebecca Berto is an Amazon bestselling author. She is also a freelance editor.

She writes stories that are full of heart. She gets a thrill when her readers are emotional reading her stories, and gets even more of a kick when they tell her so. She’s strangely imaginative, spends too much time on her computer, and is certifiably crazy when she works on her fiction.

Rebecca Berto lives in Melbourne, Australia with her boyfriend and their doggy.

Author links:

Website/blog | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads | Pinterest | Newsletter mailing list 

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Alchemy by Sheena Boekweg, Melanie Crouse, and Sabrina West - Book Highlight & Giveaway!

Alchemy by Sheena Boekweg, Melanie Crouse, and Sabrina West
457 pages
YA, paranormal 

"Do you want me to be dangerous?" he asked, his voice husky and low.
I gulped, and for a moment I was incapable of speech. But he was quiet, waiting. "No. I don't."
"Then I'm not dangerous at all," he murmured. His gaze moved from my eyes to my mouth. "You've never been safer than you are at this moment." I shivered as his breath tickled my skin. Our lips were mere millimeters apart when the sky shattered in a kaleidoscope of colored light.

We didn’t know how much we had to lose until we were infected with magic. Sam was in love, Juliette was the main caretaker for her siblings, and Ana and her dad planned the best parties in New York. But we lost it all when we were shipped to Chebeague, an exclusive school for newly infected mages.

Everyone knows about the mages, those who survive the infection and end up with magical abilities. We’ve seen the power of magic, the high-paying jobs, and the world fame. But we never saw the cost. We didn’t know we’d be forced to give up everything: sanity, family, even the right to talk on the phone.

We didn’t know mage was just another word for prisoner.

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How we came to write Alchemy: 

Once upon a time, there were some aspiring authors who wrote on a blog called The Prosers. (theprosers.blogspot.com) One day, Sabrina wrote a blog post about a book called Sorcery and Cecilia. Sabrina explained that:  

"The authors wrote the book entirely by sending letters to each other from the point of view of their characters. The picked a setting ahead of time… and then were not allowed to discuss plot at all, just let it develop naturally. And yes, it has to be real letters, or else it's not quite so fun to get the story in the mail."

Sheena was delighted with the idea, and asked if anyone wanted to try it with her. Both Sabrina and Melanie volunteered, and there we hit our first snag. How on earth does one write a cohesive story via letters sent between three people? 

So we got together for a facebook chat where we brainstormed solutions. It took a few weeks, and false starts, but eventually Melanie mentioned a real boarding school for rich, troubled teenagers where they were required to write journal entries to their therapists in exchange for privileges, and everything took off from there.

We each picked a character. Sabrina chose Juliette, an angry, scared girl who just wants to go home. Sheena created Sam, a sexy but broken boy who doesn't know how to function without his girlfriend, and Melanie created Ana, a gracious, yet opportunistic beauty who doesn't have anything worth missing back home.

We added some secondary characters and a rich magical world, and began. For most of the book, we truly did send the letters via snail mail (although thank heavens we knew not to start anticipating them until we got a message on facebook saying they were on their way! How did people survive doing it the other way???) As the action started heating up at the end, we started sending our sections via internet, and that’s when we really hit our stride. 

On the one hand, it is pretty frustrating when you think you know where you are going with a story, and someone (cough, cough, Sheena) careens off the path and turns the whole story line on its head. On the other hand, some of best parts of the book came when we were trying desperately to get the story back on track.The explanations we all had to come up with about why the stories turned out the way they did were so much fun! For example, if Sheena hadn't had the characters try to escape, we would never have realized they were prisoners. Sometimes the ripples created waves that were better than what we had originally planned. It was exhilarating and magical, and it didn't take long before we realized that this book wasn't just fun, it was also going to be awesome enough to share with the world! We hope you love it as much as we do. 

What is Alchemy about?

There are three main characters: Sam, a former baseball player who uses girls as a kind of medicine, Juliette, whose past has made her react to the world with clenched fists, and Ana, who is so normal that there is no way she’ll ever be able to fit in at this school for freaks.

Imagine a cross between Harry Potter, Ender’s Game, and Gossip Girl. Sam, Juliette and Ana have just been sent to a magical school, and have been told they will never see their families again. One of the biggest things that makes our book different from the usual paranormal romance, is that magic isn't a secret. Once they have survived infection with a magical virus, and managed to retain their sanity, they will be used by the government as a weapon, similar to nuclear armament.  Mages aren’t allowed back into polite society. They are too unstable, and definitely too dangerous.  But Juliette, Ana, and Sam are still teens, and none of that is half as important as their friendships and crushes.

Shy, awkward Seb is in love with Ana. Can Sam teach him the right moves to pull Ana’s attention away from the sexy janitor, James? Juliette hates Zach, the snarky leader of the Elite. So why can’t she get him out of her head? Even though Sam will never be allowed to see his girlfriend Katie again, his love for her is unfailing. Except, there’s this girl...

Sheena Boekweg (writing as Sam) is the author of the award winning novel Funny Tragic Crazy Magic. Look for her next novel, Waxling in 2014. She is a mom of three living in West Jordan, Utah. You can find Sheena on Facebook, Twitter, and her website. 

Sabrina West (writing as Juliette) is a writer and wildlife biologist living in San Diego, California. There, she wanders the streets searching for rare shorebirds, quality espresso, and elusive snippets of dialogue and imagery. Her short fiction has appeared in markets such as the Santa Clara Review, Cover of Darkness, and Strange, Weird and Wonderful Magazine. She also has a story upcoming in Kayelle Press's Night Terrors Anthology.

Melanie Crouse (writing as Ana) lives in the gorgeous state of Maine with her (usually) delightful family. She wishes with all her heart that her teenage children weren't so embarrassed that their mom writes "kissing scenes". With any luck, her first solo book, Hidden Magic, will be out in early January, 2015. You can find Melanie on Facebook and her website.

Meet all of us at: 

theprosers.blogspot.com

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