Spotlight: Alaska Blaze by LoLo Paige

(Blazing Hearts Wildfire Series, #3)
Publication date: April 30th 2023
Genres: Adult, Romance, Suspense

Synopsis:

Can an Alaskan firestorm lead to true love under a midnight sun?

Alaskan firefighter Raynie Atwood thinks she know what she wants—until a walking encyclopedia disguised as a hotshot firefighter storms into her life. Grieving loss and betrayal by the man she once loved, Raynie sets her sights on a top command post for wildland fire. But when an extended drought, a high heat, and beetle-killed forests add up to the perfect firestorm, Raynie’s leadership is put to the test.

To add fuel to the fire, Cohen Tremblay tests Raynie at every turn as she works to save sled dogs and Iditarod mushers dog kennels in a deadly Alaskan conflagration…and to make matters worse, a deadly threat from Raynie’s past has her fearing for her life.
But when Raynie’s world goes up in flames, Cohen may be the only one Raynie can rely on…hard to do when she no longer trusts any man, let alone a bullish co-worker. Instead, she constructs a rock-solid containment line around her heart. But fire is unpredictable, and so is love. Will their chance for love be snuffed before it ignites?

Romance, fire, and betrayal…another deadly mix!

Excerpt

She sensed what was coming and was powerless to stop it—nor did she want to. But conflicted panic hit and she pushed him away, breathless. “We can’t do this. It’s the wrong time…the wrong place. We’re on a fire and…I don’t look good.” 

She ran out of reasons as a divine revelation hit her—she was exactly where she was meant to be—with the person she was meant to be with. She gazed into his eyes, grateful for this man who’d found his way into her life. When she read what was in his eyes, she understood her life would never be the same. 

“No. You don’t look good.” Cohen undid her messy bun, letting her hair drop. “You look absolutely beat-the-wall beautiful.” He combed her hair with his fingers, then brushed his lips up the side of her neck. 

“Cohen…” She gasped at the sensation he delivered to girl parts she hadn’t been aware of.

He drew back. “We don’t have the luxury of time. You and I both know one year is like eighty in firefighter years.” He slid his hand under her robe and eased it off one shoulder, nibbling it. “All the more reason to make love with you, Fire Chick.” 

 Goosebumps sprung up on her skin like fireweed. “Now? What if…what if I, um, say no?” Coherent thought went on vacation and word formation hitched along for the ride.

He brushed his thumb over her lips. “Then I won’t.” 

“You’d give up that easily?”

“No.” His definitive answer and the lip action on the side of her neck drove her insane.

“I can’t think when you do that,” she whispered, lust short-circuiting all logic. Her heart ricocheted somewhere in between. 

“What do you want, Raynie?” he breathed in her ear.

All the doubts and fears about him that had swirled around in her mind promptly vanished, replaced by a sense of clarity and purpose. A sense of calm streamed through her. “You.”

“Good, because I can’t stop.” He plunged his tongue into her mouth, and she welcomed the sweet taste of pizza and soda and Cohen. His body was solid as titanium. She’d not smoothed her hands over titanium that she could recollect—but this body had to be as strong. She’d always admired the ripped physiques of male firefighters, but this was the first time she’d experienced the tactile sensation of one up close and personal. 

Her brain drove away on vacation while her heart jumped into the driver’s seat.

Cohen held her face in his hands. “You’re trembling.”

“It’s just…I’m not sure about this. Haven’t done it in a while.”

“Do I look worried?” He tilted her face toward his. “There’s no reason to be nervous.”

“I’m not,” she lied, hoping to convince herself. “I’m just…you’re so…and I loathed you…”

“Not anymore, I hope.” Cohen kissed her while his hands sneaked inside her robe, leaving a trail of fire on her skin.

 She closed her eyes. “It’s too soon for this. We haven’t known each other that long…” she trailed off, his touch igniting every cell in her body.

“Not too soon. Not with you. This isn’t a one-night stand, you know.” His chocolate voice drifted through her, like sweet, viscous music. He lifted to peer into her eyes. “I’ll stop if you want me to. The last thing I want is to pressure you.”

She was so strangled with desire she could hardly form a sentence. Voices screamed in her brain. Yes! No! Yes! No! Do it—you want him—you know you do. Decide, dammit! 

She found her voice. “You realize this is our point-of-no-return, right?” 

Cohen brushed her hair away from her face. “We’re risk-takers. That’s why we fight fire. If you step into this fire with me, I promise you won’t regret it.”

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About the Author

LoLo Paige is an award-winning author and former wildland firefighter whose debut novel, Alaska Spark, has received several awards for best indie romance. Her second book, Alaska Inferno, was a finalist for best indie romance in the 2022 Kindle Book Review Awards.

LoLo writes strong female firefighters and hunky smokejumpers who battle wildland fire in Alaska. She loves writing about the trust, friendships, and pitfalls of falling in love in the action-packed, perilous world of wildfire in her action adventure romances in The Blazing Hearts Wildfire Series. The characters in her stories are battling more than just fires, they're struggling to stay alive—and they're willing to risk it all for love. 

Alaska Spark and Alaska Inferno have ranked No.1 on the Amazon Bestseller Lists for action adventure and romantic suspense in the U.S., Canada, and Australia. The true story about LoLo’s fire crew escaping a runaway wildfire won an Alaska Press Club award and inspired her debut novel, Alaska Spark. The third book in her wildland fire series, Alaska Blaze, drops this spring.

In addition to her action-adventure romance firefighter series, LoLo also writes romantic suspense thrillers and romantic comedies. Other books under her romance umbrella are, Hello Spain, Goodbye Heart, a recently released travel romance, and Irish Thunder, to be released later in 2023, by The Wild Rose Press.

Connect:

https://www.lolopaige.com/

https://twitter.com/LoloPaigeAuthor

https://www.facebook.com/LoLoPaigewildlandfire

https://www.instagram.com/lolopaige/

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/20305632.LoLo_Paige

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Spotlight: Salty Kisses by Judith Keim

Sanderling Cove Inn Series, Book Three

Romantic Women’s Fiction

Date Published: May 2, 2023

Publisher: Wild Quail Publishing

Salty Kisses might be the sweetest of all…

Olivia “Livy” Winters agrees to spend the summer at Sanderling Cove on the Gulf Coast of Florida with her two cousins, Charlotte “Charlie” Bradford and Brooke Weatherby to help manage The Sanderling Cove Inn while their grandparents take a long road trip in Europe. Livy hopes a summer away from her past surroundings and her job as the owner of a bakery in Virginia will help her forget a traumatic incident there.

Unknown to her and her cousins, the five grandmothers at Sanderling Cove have invited their beloved grandchildren to spend as much time as possible this summer at the cove, hoping that romance might flourish among them.

Livy is delighted to discover other childhood friends there. Though running the inn with her cousins keeps her busy, Livy realizes she needs to find someone she can trust to help her with her issue. Austin Ensley is spending the summer at the cove visiting his grandmother while he decides what he wants to do after selling his successful IT business. As a teenager Livy had a crush on him, and while she has no interest in dating any of the men at the cove, they form a deeper friendship. And when Livy can no longer keep her secret, she turns to him for help. Together they help one another through past troubles and discover tears can bring happiness too.

Grandmothers can be very determined when it comes to seeing their grandchildren happy. A family saga full of love. Be sure to read all the books in the series – Waves of Hope, Sandy Wishes, Salty Kisses.

Another of Judith Keim’s series books celebrating love and families, strong women meeting challenges, and clean women’s fiction with a touch of romance—beach reads for all ages with a touch of humor, satisfying twists, and happy endings. Be sure to check out her other delightful books and series that readers adore.

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About the Author

Judith Keim, A USA Today Best Selling Author, is a hybrid author who both has a publisher and self-publishes. Ms. Keim writes heart-warming novels about women who face unexpected challenges, meet them with strength, and find love and happiness along the way, stories with heart. Her best-selling books are based, in part, on many of the places she's lived or visited and on the interesting people she's met, creating believable characters and realistic settings her many loyal readers love.

She enjoyed her childhood and young-adult years in Elmira, New York, and now makes her home in Boise, Idaho, with her husband and their two dachshunds, Winston and Wally, and other members of her family.

While growing up, she was drawn to the idea of writing stories from a young age. Books were always present, being read, ready to go back to the library, or about to be discovered. All in her family shared information from the books in general conversation, giving them a wealth of knowledge and vivid imaginations.

Ms. Keim loves to hear from her readers and appreciates their enthusiasm for her stories.

To sign up for her newsletter, go here: https://BookHip.com/RRGJKGN

Connect:

Website: http://www.judithkeim.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100043321043934

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/judithkeim

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/judithkeim

BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/judith-keim

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2999038.Judith_Keim

Spotlight: Dioramas by Blair Austin

In this hybrid novel—part essay, part prose poem, part travel narrative—Blair Austin brings us nose to the glass with our own vanishing world, what we preserve and at what cost.

In a city far in the future, in a society that has come through a great upheaval, retired lecturer Wiggins moves from window to window in a museum, intricately describing each scene. Whales gliding above a shipwreck and a lost cup and saucer. An animatronic forest twenty stories tall. urban wolves in the light of an apartment building. A line of mosquitoes in uniforms and regalia, honored as heroes of the last great war.

Bit by bit, Wiggins unspools the secrets of his world—the conflict that brought it to the brink, and the great thinker, Michaux, who led the diorama revolution, himself now preserved under glass.

After a phone call in the middle of the night, Wiggins sets out to visit the Diorama of the Town: an entire, dioramic world, hundreds of miles across, where people are objects of curiosity, taxidermied and posed. All his life, Wiggins has longed to see it. But in the Town, he comes face to face with the diorama’s contradictions. Its legacy of political violence. Its manipulation by those with power and money. And its paper-thin promise of immortality.

Excerpt

Excerpted from Dioramas by Blair Austin. Copyright © 2023 Dzanc Books. Reprinted with permission from Dzanc Books. Ann Arbor, MI. All rights reserved.

Whales

A cloud of blood glows red. Our movement along the glass disperses the light. Never, were it not for the explanatory matter, would we guess that this display began long ago, someplace else, at the bottom of the rubble.

A shard of wood: a split oar, the oarlock still attached, drifts toward heaven’s reverse, turned ’round for darkness. This clue of a boat, once above, cannot be seen from the other observation windows of the Whale Diorama. Here (lower third window, floor seven), there is simply a vast undersea, a lightening of the green going upward, a darkening going down (we felt we floated), an orange glow as well, as of a sunset or, as some have said, a burning vessel or the furnaces of the whale oil extraction process, or the furnace of the wider world itself, which evoke the familiar sense of the sentries and symbol, “decline”—declension rather than outright, slope and y-intercept at the midway point of the parabola. Why, then, do we not know for sure?

This diorama, you may be aware, dating from before the early city, is over four thousand, six hundred years old, dated by the usual means. It was discovered under the iron and beams, the reinforcing bars like little trachea with a case of the scales, basemented by a catastrophe, and when discovered at the crystalline, southeast corner, glowing, or it seemed to the discoverers—and to thousands of pilgrims, who, earlier prayed to the strange, cubelike structure—they did not know it stretched on and on, both under and far, could not have known. Could not have known. Everything is “Could not have known.”

As you know, there are but three such ancient dioramas in existence, one of which contains the hind leg of a dog and the other of which was intended more as an encyclopedic bestiary with all sorts of species displayed on a “mountain side.”

The conservation of the Whale Diorama ran the usual track, save the fact that, being encased in that resin (so pervasive, so peculiar to the time before and enabling no picking-over, so air and watertight), everything was perfectly preserved. The worshippers found simply a blue and green projection, like glass, that would warp the light. Little did they know the great diorama that deepened under the rubble. No, it took the South River Flood, and more, to eat away the ground and expose this giant—and to us, quaint—museum as a lens of worship. That fascinating resin, that cool, clean substance that one can say is the very essence of the time before.

The excavation was the work of years done under a temporary roof out of the weather until, one by one, in great slices the diorama of the whale came into the light. To be taken to the warehouses, studied and conserved, restored and reassembled, at last, in the museum.

The seams of the reconstruction had to be flawless. 

Each piece, when lifted out and reassembled, is quite smooth. Think of an aspic or the seamless room of an insect in amber (who were indeed the first prisoners of the diorama) or a lovely ordinance gelatin, cut with a wire pulled smooth—no stutters—then placed near as can be to the original before the final fitting of the holding-resin (made of locust gum) like honey that dries clear.

There were hollows where creatures had been dissolved over time. Great cracks, as from some cataclysm, ran through some of the resin, you see. A concussion sudden and total it must have been, and the rainwater trickled down through the collapsed structure. The conservators, to get the outline and detail of what had once dwelled there, filled these voids with dental plaster, which, when set, gave the shape of the creatures whole, every outline and hair, even the divots on the tongue of this individual. And then the great block of resin was sawn through and opened as if on hinges, like a sarcophagus, the whale in dental plaster hoisted out and transported with great care to the workshops. Following this, a selection of the likeliest dye brought out the details on the plaster, which was then painted, and the entire creature took skin, looking exactly as it might have done in the original. The two halves of the resin block were then refitted around the animal and sealed with a twinning-resin, exactly specified to blend so that no evidence of the repair can be seen.

Conservation is an act of despair and also an act of faith. The finished diorama, Window Six. The strained distances, the flecks of the watered world in their cloud-removes. As buildings of murk and passage, growing narrower, the now burgeoning corridor of the balloon’s interior, wet with breathing, has gone on, independent. “The sense that some localized portion of the world burns above ice.” These are Michaux’s, the great dioramist’s, words.

Our earlier ship on fire, our furnaces, perhaps, for whale oil. One isn’t sure. Some of the charm and the unease comes from the light itself, avoided, yet also coming toward us in the murk, through the timbre, if you will, of the smoke, the unintentional air trapped in these microscopic bubbles like white fleas.

Amateur

On my desk is a diorama of two theen finches, a female and a male, yellow with a brown cap. I finished the diorama—to my dissatisfaction—a week ago and sealed it in a glass box to keep  out the dust. But the dust got in anyway, settling on the moss, which I’d intended to be wet. After taking it apart and cleaning the moss, I decided I could spare the materials for a second glass box, to nest the first, sealing the edges of the wood frame with wax, which I smoothed with a piece of wood I’d carved for that purpose.

I had found the female finch near W Station on my way to the museum when I still worked there. I wrapped the creature in my handkerchief and stored it in my lunch box.

She has pinned a hazelnut under one foot while pecking. Her head is raised, beak toward breast, for a powerful, downward thrust. Other hazelnuts, some still in their haired husks, are placed on the moss. I found them, too—in the woodlot near my apartment. But then on a whim I changed my mind. I wanted two birds. So I bought a premade male of the same species at a supply shop, colored blue-yellow, with a black cap. I took the boxes apart again and put him in.

Dioramas are an expensive hobby.

The theen finch is a ground-dwelling bird, and the male stands on the moss, its blue sometimes yellow, its yellow sometimes blue. Head tipped, he scratches the top of his head with a claw. He is an exemplar, unusually slender in his lines, while the female I tried to prepare is somewhat lumpy, as if the two had been twins separated at birth and released in different wood lots. In low light, they smear. It is difficult to tell which is which, save by their posture, but as morning comes and my room fills with sunlight, the birds go into themselves, like into a glass of water. Yet when the light is off, and I am near sleep, they are there in the dark.

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About the Author

Blair Austin was born in Michigan. A former prison librarian, he is a graduate of the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan where he won Hopwood awards for Fiction and Essay. He lives in Massachusetts. Dioramas is his first novel.

About Dzanc Books

Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization not only committed to producing quality literary  works but providing creative writing instruction in public schools through the Dzanc Writers-in-Resi dence program, and offering low-cost workshops for aspiring authors. For more information, please  visit www.dzancbooks.org.

About Pacific & Court

Pacific & Court is a Brooklyn-based boutique publicity and digital marketing company specializing in promoting independent authors and book publishers. Together, the P&C team has over 30 years of experience publishing, promoting, and marketing best-selling books. Focusing on heavily tested and proven PR and marketing methods, P&C will reach the exact audience that will be receptive to your unique book. Follow P&C on social media @pacificandcourt.

Spotlight: Escape to Aswan by Amal Sedky-Winter

On a brief visit to Cairo to support an investigation her fiancé, a Jewish American journalist, has undertaken, Salma is caught up in the machinations of a new, radical Islamist group with a vendetta against her father, a man with his own dark side. A former lover and Islamist, kidnaps her. He forces her to flee with him from Cairo to Aswan in the far south of Egypt. As they navigate the  backroads, Salma, a privileged Egyptian-American, finds herself hiding under a burqa, running desert sandstorms and relying on the goodwill of poor villagers.

A page-turner, Escape to Aswan is not only a political thriller but a dramatic telling of the clashes of culture and class in the Arab world. 

Read an excerpt from the book here.

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About the Author

Amal Sedky-Winter is a strong, bi-cultural, Egyptian American woman with a foot in both worlds. Her life experience and her training and work as a psychologist enables her to compare and contrast them from both inside and outside both cultures. Her professional experience includes being a clinical psychologist in private practice, a court appointed evaluator, mediator and special master, and a professor in three graduate programs that she helped establish—the last being at the American University in Cairo to which she bi-located from Seattle for seven years.

Website: https://www.amalsedkywinter.com/about

Spotlight: Not So Perfect Strangers by L. S. Stratton

One fateful encounter upends the lives of two women in this tense domestic thriller, a modern spin on Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers On A Train that flips the script on race and gender politics.
 
“I’m a big believer that women should help each other, Tasha,” she says. “Don’t you think?”

Tasha Jenkins has finally found the courage to leave her abusive husband. Taking her teenage son with her, Tasha checks into a hotel the night before their flight out of D.C. and out of Kordell Jenkins’s life forever. But escaping isn’t so easy, and Tasha soon finds herself driving back to her own personal hell. As she is leaving, a white woman pounds on her car window, begging to be let in. Behind the woman, an angry man is in pursuit. Tasha makes a split-second decision that will alter the course of her life: she lets her in and takes off. 
 
Tasha and Madison Gingell may have very different everyday realities, but what they have in common is marriages they need out of. The two women want to help each other, but they have very different ideas of what that means . . .
 
They are on a collision course that will end in the case files of the D.C. MPD homicide unit. Unraveling the truth of what really happened may be impossible‒and futile. Because what has the truth ever done for women like Tasha and Madison?

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About the Author

L.S. Stratton is a NAACP Image Award-nominated author and former crime newspaper reporter who has written more than a dozen books under different pen names in just about every genre from thrillers to romance to historical fiction. She currently lives in Maryland with her husband, their daughter, and their tuxedo cat.

Spotlight: Mentors and Tormentors: On the Journey to Self-Respect by Tim Jones

During a span of four inquisitive years, Wendall, an overly curious teen, has his view of the world transformed by a colorful cast of small-town characters. Some are mentors; others are tormentors. However, each one thoroughly comprehends a specific facet of human nature: happiness, manipulation, and saying no, just to name a few.

But Wendall isn't just a passive student. He gets his hands dirty when his father transplants the family to a rundown farm and soon finds himself up against a sadistic psychopath, a con man, and a close friend who has attempted suicide.

Wendall's adventures add some fun and entertainment, which balance and reinforce the seriousness of the lessons being taught throughout the story.

Read an excerpt from the book here.

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About the Author

Tim Jones, M.D.  is a board certified family physician currently practicing full-time ER medicine in rural Texas. He is happily married with four grown daughters and five grandsons. He and his wife also have a toy poodle, who has more followers than Tim on his Facebook account. He enjoys fine art acrylic painting, but it has recently taken a back seat to his pursuit of writing. 

Website: http://www.MentorsAndTormentors.com