Spotlight: The Name of Red by Beena Khan

The Name of Red
Beena Khan
Publication date: May 15th 2020
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, Romance

Two strangers on the same path.
Survivors. Companions.
They will be each other’s salvation.

On a rainy, winter night, a mysterious woman in a red dress seeking shelter comes inside the restaurant Kabir was busy working in —primarily the bar— and night after night, drink after drink, she comes back to the same spot. That is where he sees her for the first time.

Hundreds of patrons around her try to speak with her daily, but she dismisses them. It appears she wants to remain in a blissful peace alone with her booze and books. After seeing the mysterious woman reading a book, and because of his shy nature, Kabir gains entrance into her life by anonymously leaving books with notes for her.

The Name of Red is the story of two strangers, two different personalities who meet on a winter, rainy night who challenge each other. They have a connection which blossoms into a friendship due to their fondness of books. But they both have secrets that can bind them together or threaten their newfound relationship forever.

Goodreads / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords

Book trailer:

—

EXCERPT:

The restaurant Ferdaus was filled with a buzzing crowd.

The smoke around the people twisted and formed curls, illuminated under the bar lights. The atmosphere was a hazy cloud, lingering against their clothes. Several people came in seeking shelter from the pouring rain outside. The customers of the restaurant turned to look at the entrance door- bell jingling. They glanced at the large crowd coming as the glass door was pulled open, and they watched as someone newstepped in behind them.

The woman walked into the bar for the first time in the winter rain.

She didn’t have an umbrella on her; her little sleeveless dress ended at her ankles, fully drenched. Her wet dress clung to her body, showcasing the outlines of her curves. In one hand, she was carrying the skirt of her dress. Suddenly, she let it go, and her long, bare arms moved upwards as she tried to fix her damp hair which had darkened in intensity due to the rain. It fell past her shoulders, the strands sticking to her face. She attempted to comb through the tangles with her fingertips.

The men watched her movements hungrily, their eager faces drawn to her and at the sight of someone new. Their eyes trailed from her face, to her wet body, then back to the movements of her hands entwined in her hair. Under her arm, she carried a book and a trench coat. It appeared strange she wasn’t wearing the coat when it was pouring outside and freezing in the middle of November. Men were left mesmerized by her, and she turned heads as she walked by. Something radiated from within her, drawing the men around her in.

The women who were with some of these men noticed their gaze on the unfamiliar woman. Now they stared at her with jealousy and anger.

Who is she? they wondered.

Author Bio:

Beena Khan lives in a suburb in Queens, New York in her apartment. She's's a Literary Fiction Novelist and Poetess. She is 27 years old and from Azad Kashmir, Pakistan. She's an immigrant who moved to New York when she was five years old. She currently holds a Masters Degree in Developmental Psychology from Cuny School of Professional Sciences. She enjoys reading, writing, and netflixing.

The Name of Red is her debut novel.

Her website is www.beenakhan.com.

Sign up for her newsletter below where you can subscribe for book news, writing tips, and exclusive content such as, upcoming releases, cover reveals, ARCS, giveaways, and book trailers!

Website / Goodreads / Facebook / Twitter / Instagram / Newsletter

GIVEAWAY!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Spotlight: MOM BABBLE: The Messy Truth About Motherhood by Mary Katherine Backstrom

Hope, humor, and inspiration to families in the trenches of parenthood from the founder of Mom Babble.

Mary Katherine Backstrom spends her days mending booboos, conquering the boogie man, comforting heartaches, laughing at knock-knock jokes, cooking pancakes, throwing baseballs, and mopping muddy floors. In other words she spends her days relishing in the beautiful, constant noise that is a life with children.

In MOM BABBLE, Mary Katherine (MK) Backstrom, founder and personality behind the Mom Babble online community, offers up hope, humor, and spiritual inspiration to families in the trenches of parenthood. With laughter, crying, and eye-rolls, MK's oh-so-real essays about raising littles will delight all the not perfect, not always holy, not completely normal, messy, honest and wonderful moms that hear them. MK's conversational approach connects with listeners like dear friends cozied up on a coffee date.

Excerpt

CRYING IN THE LAUNDRY (pp. 76-80)

Have you ever curled up in a pile of laundry because it seemed like a good place to cry? 

Have you ever sobbed in front of a mirror because you were in so much pain and you just wanted to be seen, but the only person around to share your suffering with was, well . . . yourself? 

Have you ever hurt so deeply that you were certain your body would just stop functioning? 

Have you ever cried until your eyes were swollen, your tears ran dry, and your face looked like it was stung by a hive of killer bees? 

Have you ever let the shower run hot to cold as your shoulders shook with the inner sobs that no longer carried any sound? 

If so, you aren’t alone. 

If not, well, this is awkward. 

Here’s the thing:

I have come to realize the depths of my biggest fears and the sting of my deepest pains are little more than fossils of my life’s greatest beauty. 

Maybe I’m sleep deprived. Maybe I need my meds adjusted. Or maybe it’s just that sometimes life is truly hard, and I think we need to share these pains to normalize the fact that people suffer. 

We all do. 

And maybe it’s good that we do, because I believe you can’t truly enjoy the beauty of life if you haven’t experienced the depths of its darkness. 

Pain, you see, is the anchor of joy.

We can’t have one without the other. Pain and joy are two sides of the exact same coin. 

Don’t believe me? 

We are terrified of cancer because it makes us realize how fleeting and precious life is. 

We fear for our children because we’ve never known love as deep as the love we harbor as parents. 

We mourn a romantic breakup because we remember how beautiful love was before the fracture occurred. 

We can’t possibly feel the sting of want without the experience of wanting not.

We can’t possibly know the valley of loss without once standing atop a mountain. 

In short, there is no pain in this life that doesn’t point to something beautiful that once was.

Pain is a fossil of beautiful things.

It’s a footprint of something that left us. 

And when we experience pain like this, friends, we have two choices: 

We can let these ghosts haunt us, or we can turn them into our teachers. 

As this is the eve of my bilateral mastectomy, I found my laundry pile tonight. A few months ago, I was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of thirty-five. Right now, I am scared to death of the scars this surgery will leave on me, physically and emotionally. 

Why did I never appreciate my body when it was healthy? Why did I not relish my feminine shape before it was altered forever by a surgeon’s knife? Why did I feel so shy during intimacy, so embarrassed in a low-cut bathing suit, so ashamed in a formal gown that made me look buxom? 

Today, I ache with sadness over the changes my body will experience. But when I wake up, get through this pain, and heal . . . I can make you a promise: I will do better.

This pain I’m experiencing? I know it points to something beautiful, and I will find that beauty again. 

I will love my body with abandon, relish my health, and allow myself to feel proud of what’s left of my womanly figure. 

My pain will no longer hold me captive. 

My pain will become my teacher. 

Friends, when you find yourself in the darkest times, remember this: you only know what darkness is because you’ve experienced light. 

When you are low, low, low in the valley, let that remind you that you’ve scaled some incredible mountains in your time. 

You’ll scale them again. 

Run your fingers across the scars on your heart and remember the beautiful things that once existed in each crevice. 

Those are what makes life worth living. 

Let lost romance remind you that love is worth chasing. 

Let your sick body remind you that health is worth celebrating. 

Let your broken friendships remind you how deeply you can love and connect with another person. 

When you find yourself curled up in the fetal position in a pile of dirty laundry (literally or figuratively, maybe I’m alone here), just remember there is no hurt in your life that doesn’t point to something beautiful.

Find that beauty, remember it, and cling to it like a cat on a curtain.

Beauty is coming for us again, my friends. Our hurts won’t last forever. 

All we need is a little grace, a little time. 

And perhaps, a pile of laundry

Buy on Amazon | Audible | Barnes and Noble

About the Author

Mary Katherine (MK) Backstrom is an essayist, viral blogger, founder and personality behind Mom Babble, and her social media pages boast more than 92 million views. She has been featured on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and awarded The Today Show Iris Award. Dealing both candor and inspiration, MK has become a well-known presence in the parenting blogosphere. Her publications include The Today Show, Washington Post, Yahoo.com, and Scary Mommy. MK is married to her college sweetheart (Ian), and they currently reside in sunny Florida with their son, daughter, and two golden retrievers.

Spotlight: Pure Frye by KristaLyn A. Vetovich

High-vibe author and astrologist KristaLyn A. Vetovich recently published her latest New Age, fantasy novel: “Pure Fyre.” “Pure Fyre” is a high-vibe, fantasy adventure of free will versus fate in a world where magic picks favorites. 

In the bitter and magic-deprived kingdom of Gaernod, Spyre is an outcast inventor and an embarrassment to his older brother, an officer of the Garenod army. When his brother leads an invasion to steal the magic from the crystal-blessed kingdom of Condel, a strange voice pressures Spyre into restoring Condel's magic before ancient dragons unleash their judgment on the entire realm. 

Soon, Spyre realizes that his brother stole his inventions, which were meant to improve people's lives, and weaponized them to destroy Condel. To make things right, Spyre teams up with the dragons to defeat his brother and finds a place to belong in Condel, but at the cost of the woman he's grown to love.

“Pure Fyre” entertains readers with a mystical, adventure tale and teaches them valuable life lessons. An essential lesson Vetovich teaches readers is finding your place in a world where you don’t feel like you fit in, which is represented through Spyre’s journey. Throughout the novel, Vetovich includes strong female characters to inspire female readers to find their personal strengths. Finally, Vetovich teaches readers to find their inner power.

Buy on Amazon | Barnes and Noble

About the Author

KristaLyn A. Vetovich is a high-vibe author and astrologist. Through her books, she helps readers find emotional healing and inspires them to connect to the lives they want. She is an expert in various healing modalities including reiki, crystal healing, Advanced IET, and Advanced ThetaHealing®, with additional certifications in Hellenistic astrology and chirology. She graduated in 2011 from Susquehanna University with a degree in English literature. She hopes to help authors, specifically those who want to write high-vibe fiction, overcome their writing anxieties and inspire them to become published writers like her. Currently, she resides in a treehouse in Elysburg, Pennsylvania with her husband and corgis, Jack and Zelda. To connect with Vetovich, please visit her website: http://www.kristalynavetovich.com/. 

Spotlight: The Princess and the SEAL by Alana Albertson

The Princess & The SEAL

by Alana Albertson Publication Date: May 16, 2020 Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance

Purchase: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Apple Books

“SHE’S A PRINCESS AND I’M A FROGMAN. IF I KISS HER, I’LL TURN INTO A PRINCE.” A love affair. Two weeks in Normandy. She’s a classy Princess, I’m a dirty SEAL. She’s been promised to another man, I’m married to the Teams. She’s willing to enter a loveless marriage for her country, I’m willing to die for mine. Until I fall in love with her. Nothing will stop me from making her mine. Centuries ago, I would’ve killed my enemies in battle, claimed her, and been crowned king. Who says I can’t turn back the hand of time? I’m a SEAL, the ultimate warrior. No one will stop me from getting what I want. And I want this princess.

About Alana Albertson

Alana Albertson is an award winning Latina author, the former President of Romance Writers of America’s Contemporary Romance, Chick Lit, and Young Adult chapters. She holds a Masters of Education from Harvard and a Bachelor of Arts in English from Stanford. A recovering professional ballroom dancer, Alana currently writes new adult romantic suspense, young adult, and contemporary romance. She lives in San Diego, California, with her husband, two sons, and five dogs. When she’s not spending her time needlepointing, dancing, or saving dogs from high kill shelters through her rescue Pugs N Roses, she can be found watching episodes of House Hunters, Homeland, or Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team.

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest | Bookbub | Amazon | Newsletter

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Spotlight: Breath Like Water by Anna Jarzab

This beautifully lyrical contemporary novel features an elite teen swimmer with Olympic dreams, plagued by injury and startled by unexpected romance, who struggles to balance training with family and having a life. For fans of Sarah Dessen, Julie Murphy and Miranda Kenneally.

Susannah Ramos has always loved the water. A swimmer whose early talent made her a world champion, Susannah was poised for greatness in a sport that demands so much of its young. But an inexplicable slowdown has put her Olympic dream in jeopardy, and Susannah is fighting to keep her career afloat when two important people enter her life: a new coach with a revolutionary training strategy, and a charming fellow swimmer named Harry Matthews.

As Susannah begins her long and painful climb back to the top, her friendship with Harry blossoms into passionate and supportive love. But Harry is facing challenges of his own, and even as their bond draws them closer together, other forces work to tear them apart. As she struggles to balance her needs with those of the people who matter most to her, Susannah will learn the cost--and the beauty--of trying to achieve something extraordinary.

Excerpt

PROLOGUE

1,063 days until US Olympic Team Trials

FINA World Aquatics Championships

Budapest, Hungary

Women’s 200m Intermediate Medley Finals

The water is breathing. At least, that’s how it seems. I’ve always imagined it as a living thing, benevolent and obedient and faithful. A gentle beast at first, like a pony, but over time something faster. A thoroughbred, maybe. A cheetah sprinting across a flat, grassy plain.

But, of course, the water isn’t breathing—it’s rippling, with the echoing wakes of eight elite swimmers as they poured themselves into one last swim, one final chance to grab the golden ring. Now they’re gone, and in half a minute, I’ll be right where they were, reaching for my own shot at glory.

This is my first international competition. I turned fourteen in May, so I’m the youngest member of Team USA. In January, nobody knew who I was, but by my birthday I’d broken the women’s 200 IM record in my age group twice and finished first in the same event—my best—at World Championship Trials. My summer of speed earned me a lane here in Budapest. All I have to do now is not screw it up.

Earlier, in the semifinals, I clocked my fastest time ever in this event, and I’m coming into finals seeded third overall. I have to beat that by almost a second if I want to win.

The announcer introduces me over the loudspeaker. I wave to the crowd but my mind is far away, already in the pool, charting out my swim. I shake out my limbs and jump to get my blood pumping, then climb onto the block. I adjust my goggles, my cap, my shoulders. These little rituals feel solid and reliable. The rest is as insubstantial as a dream you’re aware of while you’re dreaming it.

“Take your mark—”

The signal sounds and I’m in the pool. My mind lags half a second behind my body, registering every breath, stroke and turn only after it happens.

First: butterfly, arms soaring over the water, fingertips skimming the surface.

Then: backstroke, concentrating on the lines in the ceiling while waves boil around me.

After that: breaststroke, stretching, pulling, kicking, gliding.

And finally: freestyle, bursting off the wall like a racehorse released from a starting gate.

I go six strokes without taking a breath and snap into my highest gear for a mad-dash last push, coasting along the razor’s edge of my perfectly timed taper. No thinking, just doing. No drag, only flight.

My hand touches the wall, and my eyes begin to burn. It’s over. Instinctively, I look for my coach. Dave’s on the sidelines, frowning, and I think: I blew it.

He notices me watching and breaks into a rare grin. Hopeful, I turn to the board. I can’t find my name, so I force myself to look at the top spot. There it is: RAMOS. Number freaking one.

I whoop and blow kisses at the people in the stands. They’re on their feet, chanting, “USA! USA!” American flags billow like sheets.

It cost my parents a fortune to fly themselves and my sister all the way to Europe on such short notice, credit cards stretched to their limits. I can’t even see them in the crowd, but I know they’re somewhere in that jubilant crush of people. My heart feels so full it’s like a balloon about to pop.

As soon as I’m out of the water, Dave wraps me in a bear hug.

“How do you feel?” he asks.

“Great!” I sigh and shake out my arms. “Tired.”

“Gold, Susannah,” he says. His voice is tight with something like awe.

Gold. It doesn’t feel real yet—won’t, until that medal hangs around my neck, until I can hold it in my hands while the national anthem blooms through the natatorium speakers with patriotic brio. Maybe not even then. I could have more wins here, but right now, this seems like more than enough.

“You’re a world champion,” Dave says. “Next, I’m going to make you an Olympian.”

Excerpted from Breath Like Water by Anna Jarzab, Copyright © 2020 by Anna Jarzab. Published by Inkyard Press. 

Buy on Amazon | Barnes and Noble

About the Author

Anna Jarzab is a Midwesterner turned New Yorker. She lives and works in New York City and is the author of such books as Red Dirt, All Unquiet Things, The Opposite of Hallelujah, and the Many-Worlds series. Visit her online at annajarzab.com and on Twitter, @ajarzab.

Connect:

Instagram: @ajarzab

Twitter: @ajarzab

Author website: https://www.annajarzab.com/

Spotlight: Innocent Princess by Lauren Helms

A straight-laced princess meets a bad boy is this modern Repunzel retelling. INNOCENT PRINCESS by Lauren Helms is full of first love, music, and just a little illegal hacking. Readers who love road trip romances featuring a good girl falling for the bad boy will adore this opposites attract, new adult romance. The next installment of the Modern Princess Collection is now LIVE! 

Only on Amazon + Read for FREE on Kindle Unlimited! 

♛ Amazon ➝ https://amzn.to/2WWqS9k

♛ Goodreads ➝ https://bit.ly/2QGsWhy

Zella 

This year is all about discovering who I really am.

A roadtrip to a place seven hundred miles away, might not seem like much, but to me it means freedom.

I set out looking for adventure, I never expected Ryker would help me find it. 

Ryker 

I'm no prince charming, but I may just be her knight in shining armor. 

First, captivated by her ridiculously long blonde hair, I soon find out there is so much more to Zella then her hypnotizing locks.

Turns out those hacking skills I've been practicing are about to come in handy.

A straight-laced princess meets a bad boy is this modern fairy-tale retelling full of first love, music, and just a little illegal hacking.

Excerpt 

Copyright 2020 @ Lauren Helms 

 I tug at my favorite blue T-shirt, slightly embarrassed. I'm normally on my A-game when it comes to women, and this one seems to be besting me. "One track mind it seems," I mutter.

"So it seems. By the looks of it, you were doing something you probably shouldn't be doing." She looks almost too innocent to trust, so I can't help flipping the switch on my other skill. A slow grin, one I've been told countless times is sexy as sin, slides across my face. Cocking my head slightly, I wink at her. Lowering my voice, just slightly, I say, "How's your day going?"

She stares. Her eyebrows pinch together, and she cocks her head slightly. "Did you just smolder?"

My face falls, and I feel ... out of place. Am I in an alternate universe? Since when did my smolder not work on the opposite sex? Not only did it not affect the pixie, but she also called me out on it. Is my smolder broken?

My thoughts are interrupted by an amused giggle. "Let me guess, that usually works on the ladies?"

"Yeah, I think I might be broken." I can't keep the pout out of my tone.

More giggles from Blondie.

"How about you try introducing yourself? Maybe I have to get to know you before the smolder is effective on me."

Uh, maybe she's right. I'm going to have to work my magic later on some random chick to ensure I haven't lost my smolder mojo.

Shaking off the confusion, I get my head back into the game. "Hi, I'm Ryker Stone."

About Lauren

Lauren Helms has forever been an avid reader from the beginning. After starting a book review website, that catapulted her fully into the book world, she knew that something was missing. Lauren decided to take the plunge and write her first novel. While working for a video game strategy guide publisher, she decided to mix what she knew best--video games and romance. She decided to take the plunge and joined NaNoWrimo and a month later, she had her first draft. 

Facebook | Goodreads | Amazon | BookBub | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest | Newsletter