Sunday 31 December 2017

Blog Tour & REVIEW ***Purrfect Santa by Jessie Lane & Chasity Bowlin***

Title: Purrfect Santa: Howls Romance
Author: Jessie Lane & Chasity Bowlin
Genre: Paranormal Romance Novella
Release Date: December 12, 2017








A woman afraid to love …
Nikki knows what it is to lose those you love. With her focus on her orphaned sister, she hasn’t given herself the chance to process her own grief over the loss of their parents. Life is chaos and the last complication she needs is a mate.
A lion alone for too long …
Joe Miller knows chaos. Being orphaned as a child, he’s never had a family to call his own. Crashing with a friend for the holidays, he’s hoodwinked into playing Santa Claus at a local mall. The last thing on his mind is finding a mate.
A love worth the risk …
With her baby sister on her hip, sadness in her eyes, and a longing in her heart, Nikki waits in line with her sister to see Santa. From the moment he scents her, Joe is in deep. It’s going to take everything he has to convince Nikki the love outweighs the risk to her heart. Luckily for Joe, he has fate and Nikki’s adorable baby sister on his side. After all, who can say no to the Purrfect Santa at Christmas?






                                                                                         

Chapter One

If one more kid tried to pull his beard, he was going to roar.

Joe looked at the small spawn of Satan currently sitting on his lap and held in the urge to growl. The kid was maybe five years old, had blonde hair, blue eyes and dimples galore. His first thought was she was adorable. Now, after she’d pulled on his Santa beard during the picture, he knew better. She was nothing but trouble. If he really were Santa, he would give her coal in her stocking and a letter advising her parents to put her in the naughty corner.

“Smile, Santa!”

The photographer’s words were more of a warning than a cue to get ready for the second picture. So Joe played his role, ho ho ho’d, and smiled for the camera while the brat on his lap asked him for a pony.

There had been a time when Joe hadn’t dreaded Christmas so much. Back when he was a kid and everything about Christmas had still seemed so magical. Not so much anymore. It sucked when you spent the holidays alone. To say he was a bit bitter about the holiday season was an understatement.

Which was part of the reason he couldn’t believe he was here at The Mall of the Smokies, being the damn Santa. How had he gotten wrangled into this position again?

His buddy Sam. Buddy. So much for never leaving a man behind, he thought. There he sat, covered from head to toe in red velvet that was none too fresh and none too clean, thanks to the boozy sweat of the previous wearer. Of course, he’d also had more than one kid with a leaky diaper on his lap that day.

And Sam, where was Sam? Nowhere to be seen.

Joe and Sam had served together in the Marine Corps, but once Sam had completed his term of service, he’d come back home to help run the family business, a lodge in the mountains of East Tennessee. Joe, having nowhere to go after getting out of the service himself, had taken Sam up on his offer to crash at the Bearadise Lodge.

There was just one catch. The Lodge was sponsoring Santa’s Workshop at the local outlet mall, and they were short one Santa. Apparently, the old Santa had been fired for drinking on the job.

Damn that Sam!

After only one day of being Santa, Joe could see why the previous hire had been driven to drink. These kids were hell on his nerves. Like the blonde brat who was once again pulling on his beard. He was just about to give her a little growl when she hopped off his lap and ran giggling to her mother, who gave him an unapologetic glance before dismissing him entirely.

This job would have been so much easier if he were in a shifter-run community. Then he could growl all he wanted. Instead, he was dealing with humans and had to keep his feline traits under wraps.

As the next kid, a little boy about the age of four, climbed on to his lap and proceeded to fart, Joe did his best not to cringe. Bullets and bad guys he could deal with. Snot-nosed kids were apparently his downfall. He’d only been at this for a day and he was thinking of telling Sam he could shove this Santa job where the sun didn’t shine. Joe didn’t even want to think about doing this until Christmas Eve. Three days away. Three long, miserable, endless days of bratty kids, droopy diapers, and disaffected parents more interested in their phones than their kids.

In fact, as the next kid proceeded to sneeze all over him, Joe considered walking out right then.

But then something happened that kept him glued to his seat. His sharp lion senses caught a new smell among the crowd. Peppermint and sugar cookies.

Mate, his lion roared inside his head.

The one person that was cosmically meant for him and him alone. The woman that Mother Nature deemed his. He scanned the crowd until he finally saw her at the end of the line, waiting to come see him.

Short, with generous curves that would fill his hands, she had black hair pulled to the top of her head in a messy bun. He wondered what color her eyes were, being too far away to see them. Scanning the rest of her body, he suddenly stopped when he came to the thing that shocked him the most.

A kid on her hip.

Was it her child? From this far away, he couldn’t scent the small one. Had someone already laid hands on his mate? His lion roared again, only this time it was in protest. No one should touch his mate but him! He would slaughter the man who had dared give his mate a cub.

“SANTA!” the elf behind the camera shouted.

Joe snapped his attention back to the man he was going to eviscerate for taking his concentration away from his mate, only to find a scared human staring at him. It was then he realized the child on his lap was shaking in fear.

The elf inched forward to whisper so the others in line couldn’t hear. “You growled at him, Santa! Say you’re sorry.”

His stomach sank. To say he felt like a colossal piece of shit was an understatement. He had been so wrapped up in his emotions that he had let his lion slip out a little in public, which was a big hell no in the shifter rules. Joe looked at the little boy on his lap and gave the kid a big smile, trying to play off what had happened. “How would you like a stuffed lion for Christmas? They go grrrrrrr.”

The little boy looked at him with wide eyes that slowly turned from fear to curiosity. “You can make a stuffed lion that growls?”

Joe nodded. “Sure can. I can put the elves to work on it right away if that’s what you want.”

The little boy scrunched his face up in thought but then shook his head no. “I really want a bike for Christmas, Santa. Can I have that instead of the lion?”

Relieved that the boy was no longer scared, Joe gave him a big grin and a wink. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Yippee!” The boy squealed as he jumped off Joe’s lap and ran to his mother, who was waiting for him next to the photographer.

Joe watched as the boy happily walked away, then quickly turned his attention back to his mate, who was watching him from the back of the line with big wary eyes. The mating scent was too strong. He couldn’t tell whether or not the child was hers, but that didn’t matter.

She was his.

And if that meant he had to accept another man’s cub into his home to claim his mate, then that’s what he would do. Although he would take great pleasure in rubbing his scent all over both woman and cub every chance that he got. Just to make sure that everyone knew that they were now his and his alone.

 

 
 
Review by: Jennifer
(4 stars)

When Joe plays the part of Santa at the mall as a favor for his friend, he doesn't expect to meet his mate in the process. The last thing Nikki wants at the moment is her mate. Sure its nice but she has her baby sister to take care of, and if there is anything Nikki knows its that loving someone means losing them at some point and she will do anything to spare herself and Sarah that pain again. As is the way with mates, Nikki finds that she can't say no to Joe, even though her brain is telling her to let him down easy. Will she end up following her heart and saying yes to everything that Joe is promising?

This was a cute shifter novella, that gives us a bit of drama, some three year old cuteness, a quick sexy time, and some major Christmas spirit. I give this 4 stars.
 








Jessie Lane is a best-selling author of Paranormal and Contemporary Romance, as well as, Upper YA Paranormal Romance/Fantasy.
She lives in Kentucky with her two little Rock Chicks in-the-making and her over protective alpha husband that she’s pretty sure is a latent grizzly bear shifter. She has a passionate love for reading and writing naughty romance, cliff hanging suspense, and out-of-this-world characters that demand your attention, or threaten to slap you around until you do pay attention to them.
She’s also a proud member of the Romance Writers of America (RWA).











Chasity Bowlin lives in central Kentucky with her husband and their menagerie of animals. She loves writing, loves traveling and enjoys incorporating tidbits of her actual vacations into her books. She is an avid Anglophile, loving all things British, but specifically all things Regency. She also writes steamy contemporary and paranormal romance. 

Growing up in Tennessee, spending as much time as possible with her doting grandparents, soap operas were a part of her daily existence, followed by back to back episodes of Scooby Doo. Her path to becoming a romance novelist was set when, rather than simply have her Barbie dolls cruise around in a pink convertible, they time traveled, hosted lavish dinner parties and one even had an evil twin locked in the attic.
 



 
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Friday 29 December 2017

Release Blitz & REVIEW ***Bad Dad by Sloane Howell***































My son is my life. Nothing on earth matters but him.

Soon, I’ll have to send him out into society. The cruel machine that gnashes innocence and spits out the hollowed remains of a child’s imagination. It’s a place I know all too well, considering my past. I’ve worked hard to separate myself from it, but it looms in the back of my mind—waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

My son, Logan, wants to have birthday parties, make friends, play at the park—all the normal things that seven-year olds want to do. All the things I want to do with him.

I’ve put up walls around our life to shield us from danger. Giant barriers to ward off possible threats.

Cora Chapman crashes through them like a wrecking ball. She’s intelligent and hilarious with soft curves and a spark that ignites a flame deep inside of me.

There’s only one problem—she’s Logan’s teacher.

When my past wraps its tentacles around my throat and threatens to strangle the breath from my lungs, I’m given an option—fight for my family’s freedom, or die as they’re stripped away from me.

I can’t lose. I won’t lose.

My name is Landon Lane and I am a warrior. 








The door at the entrance to the school, down at the end of the hallway, slammed shut like a shotgun had fired. I jolted and tried to catch my breath. Logan grinned a little wider, which still wasn’t much.
“This place is so loud.” I inhaled a deep breath and brushed off my own embarrassment. Anything was worth it to set him at ease a little.
Footsteps pounded in my ears as whoever came through the door approached in a hurry.
Logan’s head tilted up and he leaped from his seat. I barely leaned out of his way in time. He took off in a dead sprint. My head craned around to the man’s shoes first—ordinary Nike cross trainers. Nothing special.
But the way they traversed the ground—Montague soles pounded the Capulet tiles.
My gaze roamed to the jeans—Levi’s, boot-cut, regular denim, frayed at the seams—worked in and worn.
Damn.
My stare tilted up and drank the scenery. A charcoal-gray hood dipped down and cast a shadow over his eyes.
A breath cut too short and some sound I’d never made in my life escaped my lungs and dissolved into the tension saturating the room.
Logan’s father (I assumed) dropped to a knee, and Logan sprinted straight into his massive arms. His hoodie remained pulled up over his head. It’d probably been to shield him from the rain outside. I’d never seen Logan move so fast. He disappeared into the giant thunderhead biceps that engulfed him in a hug.
“I didn’t do anything wrong.” Logan sobbed into the man’s shoulder.
A giant hand wrapped around the back of his head and pulled him in tight. The hood dipped down and nuzzled up next to his cheek then turned and whispered in his ear.
I stood up about twenty feet away and noticed myself leaning toward them, trying to get a better view or hear what was said. I’d only met an older woman named Janet who usually brought Logan to and from school. She rarely spoke to anyone, but she was always polite.
“How long are they going to make us wait in here? Jesus Christ!” Charles Hastings’ voice roared once again from the office. Principal Williams was still nowhere to be found.
The hood-covered head popped up and turned in the direction of the words, but I still couldn’t make out his eyes.
God, what I would have given for a peek at his face.
The dark shadow under the hood turned to me. My heart threatened to explode out of my chest and my lungs stopped functioning. I still couldn’t see his eyes, couldn’t see his stare. Somehow, he managed to make my palms sweat. My palms never sweat.
Why’s he staring at me?
“Fucking ridiculous!”
My head whipped to the door.
Hastings.
I inhaled a deep breath and stomped toward the office. I’d learned long ago that if I didn’t set a certain tone with unruly parents they’d walk all over me.
Throwing the door open, I glared at the short balding man of maybe fifty. “It will be a few more minutes. Watch your language, please. This is a school. Not your living room.”
I slammed the door shut before he could get out another word.
Where the hell is Principal Williams?
I wasn’t one to shirk duties or get out of responsibility, but I really could use some back up. Parents had fought over pettier things than the words Hastings was slinging left and right, in front of his son no less. Maybe if I’d been at this school longer I’d have a better idea of how they handled these situations.
I froze in front of the door for a quick second and schooled my features. Could I go back out and face the enigma comforting his son in the hall? I had to. It was my job.
I walked back out to make sure Logan was okay, each step with a pair of concrete bricks attached to my feet.
“My son didn’t hit that little shit out there! We shouldn’t even be here!”
I paused and gritted my teeth. The moment now took a firm seat at the top of the podium as the number one awkward situation of my career, and I’d taught at a low-income New York City elementary school.
Jesus.
Other teachers had warned me about Hastings. The general consensus was that the guy was a raging jerk with little-man syndrome. I had no choice but to concur.
The man in the hood squeezed Logan once more into a bear hug, seemed to whisper something else, and then released him.
Hastings railed off even more expletives and threats from the office.
Logan’s father didn’t take off his hood, just advanced straight toward me. Logan stood in the hallway behind him.
He was not a small man by any means. The closer he came, the tighter my stomach twisted into a knot. The walls closed in on me and the thunder seemed to rumble with each of his footsteps. I gulped when he was about five feet away.
His shoes squeaked against the tile when he stopped and crossed his arms over his chest. It stretched the fabric across his shoulders and I realized just how large he was. It was one hundred percent muscle. I tried to keep my thighs from squeezing together and nearly failed.
Compose yourself.
My father named me Courage—even though I went by Cora—when I was born, but I was not living up to it at that moment.
I stretched out a hand toward him. “Hi, I’m sorry we’re meeting under these circumstances. I’m Cora—”
I barely made out two eyes in the shadow of his hood. He sized me up and down, and gestured like he might actually reach out for my hand. Hastings belted out more empty threats from inside the office. The hood turned in that direction and left my hand abandoned mid-air.
I’d never had trouble speaking in front of a parent before, but something about Logan’s dad was just—I didn’t know what it was, to be honest—scary, exciting, mysterious.
I lowered my hand to my side. My mouth was drier than the Sahara. “I, umm, there was an incident, on the playground.”
I tried to keep my voice down. If Hastings knew Logan’s father had shown up there was no telling what might happen. Looking at the man in front of me, it wouldn’t be much of a fight, and I was definitely in no position to stop him if things escalated beyond a discussion.
My eyes strayed to the Levi’s again for a split-second before I caught myself. I had certainly missed Montana men and their jeans. Some might’ve called it a weakness of mine.
He turned back to me, slowly. I watched every move. He took in every piece of information the scene had to offer and actually listened before speaking. People didn’t do that anymore, and I silently appreciated it.
“What happened?” His baritone voice vibrated through me like the encroaching thunder outside.
I stood there, blood pounding through my veins, heart racing down a quarter mile track with no parachute or brakes. His voice demanded an answer, but it didn’t seem coercive. There was a hint of concern laced in it.
“Logan didn’t do anything wrong. Like I said before, there was an incident. We just called both—”
The sound of a chair shuffling and footsteps from the office cut me off. I froze. Hastings must’ve heard me talking.
A tingling sensation radiated through my limbs and goosebumps pebbled down my arms. I had to force a slight smile from my face and mashed my lips into a thin line.
Logan’s father took a few commanding steps toward the door and made sure he’d be the first thing Hastings would see. He put himself right between us and his shoulders were so broad I couldn’t see around him. My thighs tried to squeeze together again. I cursed them silently and stepped out to the side so I could at least see Hastings’ face.
“I’m not waiting for this bullshit any—” The door to Williams’ office burst open. Hastings froze right along with his sentence when he saw Logan’s dad.
His voice went down an octave, barely noticeable. His chest deflated a little too and he tried to recover. “You the dad of the little shit making up stories about my kid?” His words were shaky, and he nodded up the hall toward Logan.
Uh oh.
The hood turned to Logan and looked right through me. “Wait in the car.”
I glanced back. Logan didn’t dare question him. Hell, I don’t think anyone would’ve. I nearly took a step toward the parking lot and caught myself. Logan turned on a dime and took off.
I wasn’t about to stand by and let a dick measuring contest happen on my watch. Both of my hands found my hips and I side-stepped farther so that Hastings could see more than just my face. “Mr. Hastings, get back in the office. Now!”
He ignored me, as expected. I wasn’t a threat to him. The ballsy bastard took a couple of steps toward Logan’s dad until he was a few feet away from him.
Where is Williams? Probably peeking around a corner somewhere, watching.
“Mister Hastings, that is enough.” I started toward him.
Hastings sneered at Logan as he walked toward the door, then he turned to me and his chest puffed out a little more. “You fucking people have—”
Where the hell are you, Williams? Help!
A single finger.
I stopped in my tracks.
He held it up. The man in the hood.
One powerful index finger in the air.
It was just a finger.
That index finger stole the words from Hastings’ mouth and the breath from my lungs.
One gorgeous, forceful finger commanded everything in the room and even the storm outside seemed to shut the hell up.
His left hand balled into a fist at his side.
And we’ve now reached the ‘Oh shit’ portion of the night’s show.
Complete silence fell on the school.
I swear I couldn’t have made it up if I tried. The door closed behind Logan and he walked to the car. Lightning cracked overhead, and the immediate thunder seemed to pick up the building and shake it at the same time the man in the hood dropped his finger.
I shuddered. Freaking thunderstorms.
Logan’s father closed the small gap between him and Hastings. Hastings’ eyes widened like saucers, then his brows narrowed into a V.
Then he did possibly the dumbest thing I’d ever seen a man do. He poked Goliath in the chest. “Listen here—”
The hood tilted down to the finger, and then back up to Hastings’ face. Hastings tried to look tough, but his face was pale as a ghost, and sweat beads formed along his hairline.
The hood glared lasers at Hastings. “Don’t touch me.”
Hastings’ hand dropped like it might fall through the floor.
“D-dad?” Cory Hastings eased open the office door.
The hood shot to Cory for a quick second. He glanced at Hastings and then back to me and then back to Cory. His voice softened a hint while he looked at the boy. “Sorry.”
He turned and headed toward the exit, but stopped at my side. He looked straight ahead. Straight where his son sat in the car, waiting. “Logan won’t be back.” He paced down the hallway.
I turned and watched him leave. I stood there, mouth wide open, catatonic, brain short circuiting all over the place. Logan’s father disappeared through the double doors, and I blew out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding.
Oh my God.
Maybe Desire, Montana wouldn’t be so bad after all.
“Okay, we ready?” Principal Williams strolled up from the other end of the hallway.
You’ve got to be shitting me.






REVIEW

Review by: Jennifer

(4 Stars)

So this was my first read by Sloane Howell, and I was not disappointed. This played like an action movie in my head and was totally not even what I was expecting when I started reading. Landon is a bit of an over protective father, but there are reasons that he is this way. There are only a few people that Landon has let into his small world, and he knows that he should keep his son's teacher, Cora, as far away as possible. That is until Cora puts herself right in Landon's way, then he has no chance at ignoring her. But the thing with Cora is, she is a runner, so when Landon's past comes back, she runs at the first sign of trouble. Will Landon welcome her back with open arms, or is this a sign that she isn't cut out for a life with him?

This book has so many freaking layers, its like Shrek. We start out thinking this is going to be about one thing, then another layer is exposed, and so forth. I can't even begin to give you all the details as this would be spoiling the fun for you. Just know this is action packed, with a side of romance. Loved the Jana Aston reference, had me laughing up a storm! This gets 4 stars from me.









Enter HERE











Sloane Howell lives in the Midwest United States and writes dirty stories. When not reading or writing he enjoys hanging out with his family, watching sports, playing with the dogs, traveling, and engaging his readers on social media. You can almost always catch him on Twitter posting something goofy.

Visit his web page www.sloanehowell.com to sign up for his mailing list to get updates on new releases, promos, and giveaways. Thanks for reading.













Sunday 24 December 2017

Blog Tour & REVIEW ***Heartbreak Hotel by Kenya Wright***

 
  Title: Heartbreak Hotel
By: Kenya Wright
Publication Date: December 4, 2017
Genre: Romance
 
#heartbreakhoteltour
Yasmine’s world breaks apart, when she finds her fiancĂ© in bed with another. Shattered, she flees LA and escapes to her second home—her sister’s Key West bed and breakfast. She bumps into her childhood friend Hawk, who went from the chubby boy-next-door to a certified millionaire hottie. Her instincts tell her to run. Even Hawk warns her. 
 All grown up, they’re now opposites—light and darkness, fire and ice, sunshine and cold shadows. She’s on a voyage to heal her heart with yoga and google spells, while Hawk battles his demons with art and meaningless sex. Years ago, he discovered that his wife was a murderer and his marriage a lie. For Hawk, there’s no hope for a normal life. His mind is too broken. His faith in humanity as dead as his ex-wife’s victims.
 Heartbreak is like death. Both strip away the soul and leave the body as an empty shell. 
But the universe has its surprises, and as breezy days go by, Hawk and Yasmine’s kinship in pain shifts from friendship to hungry lust. And although they battle against it, there’s an intense passion bridging between them that they can’t ignore. 
 
Along a sparkling blue ocean and white sandy beaches, HEARTBREAK HOTEL unfolds into a steamy story about the beautiful ways love can repair the soul. 
 
 
 
 

REVIEW

Review by: Jennifer

After finding her fiancé in a compromising position with his assistant, Yasmine runs back home to Key West to lick her wounds and figure out her next step. Hawk, who has just finished dealing with the fact that his wife is a cold blooded killer, has also decided that going back home to Key West would be a good next step in his life. The two were childhood friends, but now they make that leap from friends to lovers. But Hawk only wants the physical side (who can blame him), while Yasmine wants more than just sex. Will the two come to a compromise?

So TBH this was a bit boring. I got tired of the back and forth between Yaz and Hawk. This has some drama, some parts that were just a bit weird, and when the sexy time was described it was hot. Hawk is completely destroyed from the actions of his wife, Yaz I didn't really feel bad for, fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me... there had to be a third time?  I give this 3 stars.

 
 
 
 
Kenya Wright wrote her first novel during her third year at UM Law school. She dropped out a month after the release and never looked back.   Words are power, and Kenya wants to be the greatest wizard that ever lived.   It's an audacity to inspire and teach the healing of love through arousal.   It's this crazy idea that love can not only help a reader escape, but the story can also teach the person about being human, while making them laugh, cry, and hot for more sex.
 
You can FOLLOW me Here on Amazon and you will be notified of new releases, or subscribe to my new release mailing list. http://eepurl.com/AcDbj
 
Social Media Links
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/KenyaWrightAuthor/ Goodreads - https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5402447.Kenya_Wright Twitter - @KenyaWrightBook Website - http://kenyawrightbooks.com/ Instagram - @kenya_patra Mailing List - http://eepurl.com/AcDbj