The Art to Online Dating by Fleur Lamot – Spotlight and Giveaway

 

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Fleur Lamot will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

A step-by-step guide to navigating dating and finding love on the World Wide Web, written by someone with firsthand experience on the topic, and who has also tested the theory on a number of case studies and through research. Authored from a female perspective, directed to a female audience, although potentially an eye opening and helpful read for a male reader too.

This book is not about making you a better person, nor is it a self help book. It is about changing your mindset when embarking on singledom and internet dating to not fear it, by equipping you with the understanding of people’s actions and motives.

Throughout the book you will be guided in setting up your online profile, picking your match, the all important art and the do’s and don’ts through every step of courting someone, all the way to going forward with your ultimate love match!

Reading this book will bring you confidence and or at least clarity. It will make you think about your past experiences and open your eyes to see where they may have gone wrong, and more importantly to ensure the same mistakes don’t happen to you on future experiences.

Read an Excerpt

This is a firsthand guide to using internet dating as a tool to its best outcome: to find love online. It is unemotional and it is a practical handbook. It worked for me, and it has since been tried and tested over and over, successfully working on the majority of people I interviewed. You will note a few of their cases documented, referred to as test cases later in the guide. There is no guarantee this will work for you, but it will give you an opportunity, and the more opportunities you get in life, the more chances you will have at succeeding. If this doesn’t work for you, at least you gave it a go and you will definitely have learnt something about yourself along the way.

This book is a step-by-step guide to navigating dating and finding love on the World Wide Web. It is written by someone with firsthand experience on the topic who has also tested the theory on a number of case studies and through research. The book has been written from a female perspective and is directed at a female reader/consumer. In saying this, a male reader would also find this book interesting, and potentially eye-opening and helpful. This book is not about making you a better person, nor is it a self-help book. Although there are a number of psychologists’ viewpoints here, I am not a psychologist; I am an ordinary person who has a successful career I am married, and I am a mother I am a businesswoman, and I built a very successful business from the ground up. This was achieved through my networking and relationship management experience as well as the professional mentoring and coaching that I was lucky enough to receive. I found love online using historical human principles, understanding people’s motives and actions, listening to the right people, as well as trusting my own instincts.

About the Author: I successfully found love online using historical principles, understanding people’s motives and actions, listening to the right people, as well as trusting my own instincts. I am now married and a mother. I am a business woman with a very successful business, built from extensive networking and relationship management experience. I have received professional mentoring and coaching, which has helped me achieve all of this.

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A Killer Whisky by Susan Calder – Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Susan Calder will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

The 1918 influenza pandemic strikes Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The Great War rages overseas. While her husband fights in Europe, Katharine works in a doctor’s office to support her children and her brother, a wounded veteran. One night their neighbour suddenly takes sick and dies. The attending doctor concludes the man died from influenza, but Katharine suspects someone laced his whisky with a drug that mimics the deadly flu’s symptoms.

Katharine convinces the police to investigate. Worried about her brother’s involvement with a suspect, she delves into his secrets and comes to fear he’s connected to the murder. She grows disturbingly attracted to the investigating detective who returns her affections. He’s convinced her brother or someone else close to her is a killer and risks his career to pursue the crime. Katharine must discover the truth so she can move forward in a world that has changed forever.

Enjoy an Excerpt

Katharine’s fingers slid over the piano keys. Her daughter strummed a toy banjo, and her son banged pots and pans. They drowned out her brother, John, on the alto saxophone. “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” blared through the living room. Katharine turned to the next page of her sheet music. She struck a wrong note then a sour chord. The song stumbled to a merciful end.

She swivelled the piano stool to face John. “I haven’t played that since before the war.” She remembered the merry evening in this room with her husband and their friends. By the following month, all the men who had been there had enlisted. One had since died in the mud of Passchendaele.

“With a little practice, we’ll be playing the dance halls,” John said.

“Really, Uncle John?” Lillian’s eyes lit up.

“Absolutely.” John raised his saxophone. “What’s our next tune?”

“Bedtime for Henry and Lillian,” Katharine said.

“Why?” Henry bolted up from the floor. “We don’t have school tomorrow.”

“Uncle John will teach you.”

John smirked at Henry. “I’m sharpening my ruler for when you misbehave.”

Henry jumped onto the davenport and clapped his wooden spoon “drumsticks.”

“You go change,” Katharine told him. “Lillian and I will clean up.”

He pointed the spoons at his sister. “There’s a Hun. Pow.”

“I’m not a Hun,” Lillian said. “I’m an Ally.”

“A dirty Hun. Pow, pow.”

“An Ally.” Lillian held her banjo to her chest in defence. “Tell him, Mama.”

“We’re all Allies,” Katharine said. “Canadians.”

“Huns. Pow, pow.” Henry aimed a spoon at them both.

Lillian squealed and ducked between the davenport and piano.

“Pow.”

“Stop it, Henry,” Katharine said, firming up her tone. “If you don’t get into your nightshirt now, Lillian and I will walk in while you’re getting dressed.”

About the Author Susan Calder lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. She is the author of five novels published by BWL Publishing Inc. A Deadly Fall, Ten Days in Summer, Winter’s Rage and Spring Into Danger are part of her Paula Savard Mystery Series. The books follow the adventures of Paula, a Calgary insurance adjuster who works with the police to solve insurance-related crimes. Susan’s standalone suspense novel, To Catch a Fox takes a troubled Calgary woman to Southern California on a quest to find her missing mother. In December 2024, BWL will release Susan’s first historical novel, A Killer Whisky. The story is set in 1918 Calgary and will be the 12th and final book of the BWL Canadian Historical Mystery Series. Susan has also published non-fiction articles. Her short stories and poems have won contests and appeared in numerous anthologies and magazines. She is a member of Crime Writers of Canada, Sisters in Crime, and the Writers’ Guild of Alberta.

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Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge for February 26, 2025

Each Wednesday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly “blog hop”. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

My favorite hobby, and why.

Thank you for joining our Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. George L Thomas  8. Stephen @ Reading Freely  
2. Lydia Schoch  9. Kristin @ Lukten av trykksverte  
3. Kathy Allen  10. Aymee  
4. Judy Thomas  11. Bob Mueller  
5. Cheryl @ The Book Connection  12. Michael Mock  
6. M | RAIN CITY READS  13. Sandra's Book Club  
7. M | RAIN CITY READS  

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Movie Review: 28 Days Later

28 Days Later by Writer Alex Garland
Director: Danny Boyle
Starring: Cillian Murphy, Naomie Harris, and Christopher Eccleston
Publisher: Fox Searchlight Pictures (through 20th Century Fox)
Genre: Science Fiction, Horror, Contemporary
Rating: 4 Stars (8 Stars on IMDB)
Reviewed by Astilbe

Four weeks after a mysterious, incurable virus spreads throughout the United Kingdom, a handful of survivors try to find sanctuary.

In anticipation of 28 Years Later being released later on this year, let’s see if fast zombies are scarier than the slow ones.

The opening scenes were among the scariest ones I’ve ever watched in this genre. Imagine waking up in the hospital, meeting a zombie a short while later, but having no clue what you’re dealing with! I was grateful to have started watching while the sun was still shining brightly outside because my heart was pounding as Jim had to outrun something that still didn’t make any sense to him. This is a theme that has been repeated multiple times in other zombie flicks, and yet it still grabs my attention every time.

One of the things I liked the most about this film was how clearly the origins of this outbreak were explained in the beginning. No, not every twist and turn was revealed, but there was more than enough information to understand what sort of illness the characters were dealing with and how it managed to spread so fast when the source of it was under such tight surveillance…or so the authorities thought.

Take note of these early moments because the information in them might very well come in handy later on. That, too, was exciting because it gave me something to puzzle over while also watching the characters run from one danger and, sometimes, straight into yet another situation that isn’t exactly what it appeared to be at first glance.

I would have liked to see more attention paid to the character development. No, I didn’t need monologues or anything, especially given how action-packed this was, but I found myself accidentally blending the main characters together in my mind because of how similarly they reacted to the same threats. Knowing more about the backstories of protagonists who aren’t named Jim would have helped me to keep them separate and connect to them on a deeper level.

The ending fit the characters and plot nicely, and that’s something I’m saying as a viewer who was a little confused by it at first due to how much the storyline needed to slow down in order for things to pan out. After an hour and a half of adrenaline surges, I needed a little time to adjust and try to figure out what might happen to the characters next. With that being said, it was worth the wait and made me eager to see 28 Weeks Later next which I will be reviewing here in the near future.

28 Days Later breathed fresh air into this genre and it something every zombie fan should watch.

Finding His Wyoming Sweetheart by Virginia McCullough – Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Virginia McCullough will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

When it comes to his seven-year-old son, new lodge owner Mack Fisher has a lot to make up for. Fortunately, the small Wyoming town of Adelaide Creek provides the perfect fresh start—that is, if he can avoid the distraction of Erin Hunnicutt’s warm brown eyes. The free-spirited musician has a way of bringing out the best in everyone—especially Mack. When they’re thrown together unexpectedly to help their town, sparks fly and a dangerous secret is uncovered. But searching for the answers only leads them to fall deeper for one another…and starts Mack wondering if there’s room for one more in his new family.

Enjoy an Excerpt

Mack grinned at Erin. “Admittedly, an awkward introduction. But you’ll have to overlook it.” He put his hand to the side of his head. “I can barely think straight.”

Erin frowned. What did that mean?

“I’m awestruck,” he explained, his grin widening. “It’s not every day I come face to face with a woman who’s a talented musician and also a restoration expert who brings battered and charred wood back to life.”

Without thinking, Erin returned the smile. “Now you’re making me blush.” It was true what he said. She’d built her work life around wood restoration, but making music was her favorite hobby. Although those things weren’t making her cheeks heat up. That had more to do with Mack’s deep, smooth voice and how her stomach fluttered looking into those amused blue eyes. She’d always had a soft spot for a neat—but not too neat—beard.

“As I recall, Mack, you don’t live in Adelaide Creek, but here you are, celebrating the grand opening of the restored town hall with the rest of us. And on Valentine’s Day, too.”

“We do too live here.” Liam stood up a little straighter and lifted his chin a notch. “In a bunkhouse. Real cowboys lived there a long, long time ago.”

“That’s right, kiddo.” Mack spoke to Liam with a laugh in his voice before turning to Erin.

About the Author: Award winning author, Virginia McCullough writes romance for the Harlequin Heartwarming line, and FINDING HIS WYOMING SWEETHEART is Book 4 of her Adelaide Creek series. She also writes women’s fiction and nonfiction on a variety of topics. Virginia’s characters could be your family, friends, or neighbors, and all her stories offer hope, healing, and plenty of second chances. Drawn to water, she almost always sets her stories on a body of water, from oceans, lakes, rivers, and the winding Adelaide Creek.

A ghostwriter, book doctor/editor, coach, and experienced workshop presenter, Virginia is a wanderer, but currently lives in Northeastern Wisconsin. When she’s not writing, she’s walking on trails near her home or in some faraway place. She reads, streams series, hangs out with other writers, and daydreams about her next adventure.

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Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge for February 19, 2025

Each Wednesday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly “blog hop”. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

Fictional Worlds I’d Rather Not Visit

Thank you for joining our Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. George L Thomas  6. M | RAIN CITY READS  
2. Tanith Davenport  7. Sandra's Book Club  
3. Lydia Schcoh  8. Kate Hill  
4. Cheryl @ The Book Connection  9. Priscilla King  
5. Michael Mock  

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Bitroux: High Country by Jordan Harcourt-Hughes – Interview and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. A randomly drawn winner will be awarded a $25 Amazon/BN gift card. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Are you a big listener of podcasts?

I love everything about podcasts. I listen to them, make them and teach others how to create podcasts as well through my creative courses. And I also love audio books – I listen to them whenever I’m on the road.

Tell us about the podcast that you created as part of the process of creating artworks for the book.

I thought it would be really interesting to create a podcast that explores the process of starting and finishing a creative project in six months; hence the name of the podcast (168 Days of Magic). The podcast has three thematic pillars – creativity, wellbeing and meaningful productivity.

What were the creative goals that you set out to achieve, and talk about during your podcast, as you were working on the artworks for Bitroux: High Country?

As an artist and a writer, I wanted to create an illustrated book for adults, but I’ve always struggled to find anything like what I wanted to create. So, I just had to create my own framework. The goals I set for myself included creating a distinct style of visuals for the book, integrating my paintings and my ideas about language, and actually getting the book over the line! And, of course, I wanted to improve as a writer and an artist in the process.

Are you a fan of project management frameworks for writers?

I’m more about the value and benefit of creative projects just for the fun of it. I don’t think the size of the project matters. It doesn’t have to be a novel. It can be journaling, gardening, painting; anything really.

But in my professional life working in marketing and communications, we use project management frameworks a lot. And they’re useful for really asking good questions. What are you doing this for? Who are you doing it for? What do you want to get out of it? Who will benefit?

As much as anything, those kinds of questions can really help us to define our own creative, personal and life goals. And that’s fun and it’s healthy and it allows us to add our own meaning to our work, which is important.

What would you recommend to other artists, writers and creative practitioners?

I think that all artists – writers, designers, painters –whatever creative profession you’re in, the question of why you are doing the work is helpful. You don’t have to tell anyone else, but you should at least be able to answer that question for yourself. Why is this meaningful an important to me? Why am I investing my time and energy into this work? I often encourage people to write their own creative manifestos because if you know your why, it helps you get through the parts of the work that are more challenging.

If Merouac ever thought his life’s work would culminate in leading the metal workshops of the Transcontinental Railroad Project, he was sorely mistaken.

Now, his true challenge lies in navigating the other-worldly abilities he’s only beginning to understand—abilities that allow him to tune metal to interdimensional frequencies.

While trying to be a guardian to his niece, Evra, he’s realising she may have more to teach him than he ever expected. At the same time, his decision to help an interdimensional race find refuge underground puts him at the centre of an even deeper mystery.

As reality reshapes itself around him, Merouac faces a growing realisation: the world of Ahm is on the brink of a profound transformation, and everything he thought he knew may soon be shattered.

Enjoy an Excerpt

There was something about that zone of quiet concentration. It was always somewhere in the middle of those quiet moments where the blue light of the Top Hats had started to appear at the edge of his gaze. It had always been hard to see the things directly in his sight; they shifted and moved and always seemed hazy and insubstantial. He wondered if, in those moments, he had drifted into the Maolfi state without realising it.

He kept working. The surges of static came and went, heating his body, and then leaving, giving him a sense that his whole body was buzzing, vibrating. He kept moving, concentrating only on the wood. And things started to shift, but not in the way he had anticipated.

Soon, two piles had been moved and Merouac was starting to feel a welcome feeling of tiredness. He contemplated leaving the last pile of wood for the morning but kept moving instead. Then, something sounded.

He looked up. Nothing. Had anything made a noise at all? He felt sure he had heard something. All was still. What was it that he thought he had heard? Like someone or something was crashing through the trees, perhaps. He shook his head. Nothing unusual stirred, the flickering lights continued and below he could see hummers and their fluorescent markings shimmering in the trees.

Then he realised. He hadn’t heard it. He’d felt it.

He closed his eyes, tried to make his way to the place the Faurin called the Maolfi state. Kii had wanted him to find a place of deep listening. And perhaps what he was just starting to understand was, that you could listen with all your body, and feel sound in other ways than just noise.

After a time, he opened his eyes again and saw spheres hovering in the air, full of something he couldn’t quite comprehend.

Reaching out to touch them, they felt full and weighty and yet his hand could partially pass through them. They were not solid, and yet they were full. Like bubbles being blown by some invisible child, they formed and hung in the atmosphere.

They grew larger, then fuzzier, then collapsed from their own weight, dripping a strange sentience that dispersed back into the atmosphere. Often, they formed again straight away, the same spheres, the same size and colour, the same weight, only to burst and disperse once again.

Some of the smaller ones were only as large as his hand. Others, twice the size. And then hovering at greater height, larger spheres his whole body could have walked through. They shifted and mutated, formed and faded, pulsed and glowed. They were magical.

‘This is different,’ he said out loud, and grinned.

About the Author: Jordan Harcourt-Hughes is an abstract painter, writer and communications professional. She’s passionate about all aspects of creativity, life-long learning and personal wellbeing. Over the last fifteen years she’s led, coached and developed creative professionals across the Asia-Pacific region.

Jordan’s books, studio workshops, courses, coaching and resources are an invitation to explore the rich landscape of creative experiences open to all.

High Country is Jordan’s second novel set in the world of Bitroux.

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Inn the Dead of Winter by Rhonda Blackhurst – Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Rhonda Blackhurst will be awarding a free e-book of Inn the Dead of Winter or book one, Inn the Spirit of Murder to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Welcome to Spirit Lake in the dead of a Minnesota winter, where the brutally cold temp isn’t the only thing to fear.

Andie Rose Kaczmarek, a six-year sober life coach and owner of the haunted Spirit Lake Inn, has learned the hard way that the living are far more dangerous than anything in the spirit world.

When a controversial guest fails to return to her room on the same night a body is discovered in a fish house on Big Spirit Lake, Andie Rose teams up with her sponsor and sidekick, Sister Alice, and her emotional support red retriever, Aspen, to solve the case.

After Andie Rose discovers illegal activity on the inn’s property that ties to the murder, the investigation shifts into high gear. As she uncovers shocking secrets of those she thought she knew, someone is intent on keeping her quiet at any cost.

Can the inn’s resident ghost save her from impending harm when it seems the ones closest to her pose the greatest threat?

Enjoy an Excerpt

We were in the dead of winter in Spirit Lake, Minnesota, a town dubbed the paranormal capital of the nation. I gazed through the frosted windowpane at the ominous fog that hung low over Whisper Lake.

I crossed my arms in front of me, briskly rubbed my biceps, and shivered. It was a brutal cold that seeped deep into the bones and seemed to even send the inn’s resident ghost into hibernation.

The library’s gas fireplace clicked off by itself, the dancing flames disappearing. I guess I wasn’t in the room alone after all. I shuddered and glanced down at my feet where Aspen, my red retriever emotional support animal, stretched lazily on his side, eyes half closed, unfazed.

Since the 1940s, guests of the Spirit Lake Inn, home to the famous apparition, have heard a woman’s whispers on the lake, earning its name, Whisper Lake, the fireplace in the library turned off and on by itself, the espresso machine in the coffee bar hummed to life, and many other unexplainable incidents, all while no one else was present.

The old grandfather clock in the corner of the room ticked methodically as the pendulum swayed back and forth. When the clock’s St. Michael chime announced the top of the hour—and fifteen minutes until teatime downstairs—Aspen rolled onto his stomach and pushed himself up onto all fours.

“Come on, boy,” I said, ruffling the fur on his neck. “Snack time.”

Abut the Author: Rhonda is an avid reader, writer, coffee and dark chocolate connoisseur, and certified life coach. She has 10 independently published novels: The Inheritance, a contemporary fiction novel; seven books in the Melanie Hogan Mysteries; and Finding Abby and Abby’s Redemption in the Whispering Pines Romantic Suspense duology. She was awarded the 2022 Master of Literary Arts Award from the Brighton Chamber.

Website | Personal Facebook | Author Facebook | Instagram | BookBub

Buy the book at The Wild Rose Press.


Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge for February 12, 2025

Each Wednesday, Long and Short Reviews hosts a weekly “blog hop”. For more details on how to participate, please click here.

What to Read to Learn about (X subject)

Thank you for joining our Weekly Wednesday Blogging Challenge! Please put the direct URL to your blog post here so other participants can visit your post. Thanks!
1. George L Thomas  5. M | RAIN CITY READS  
2. Stephen @ Reading Freely  6. Priscilla King  
3. Snapdragon Alcove  7. Kate Hill  
4. Lydia Schoch  8. Margaret G. Hanna  

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These are Not My Words (I Just Wrote Them) by Donovan Hufnagle – Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. One randomly chosen winner via rafflecopter will win a $25 Amazon/BN.com gift card. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Echoing Chuck Palahniuk’s statement. “Nothing of me is original. I am the combined effort of everyone I’ve ever known,” this collection explores identity. These poems drift down rivers of old, using histories private and public and visit people that I love and loathe. Through heroes and villains, music and cartoons, literature and comics, science and wonder, and shadow and light, each poem canals the various channels of self and invention. As in the poem, “Credentials,” “I am a collage of memories and unicorn stickers…[by] those that have witnessed and been witnessed.”

Enjoy an Excerpt

Refurbished

Susan taught me that poetic energy lies
between the lines, white noise scratching
and clawing between images, ideas,
things…

And like a poem,
the chair was molded by my Tio’s hands,
an antique wooden upholstered desk chair.

My Tio moved from Durango, Mexico
to Forth Worth in 1955.

He became a mason and wood worker.

He bricked the stockyards

He built the signs

He died in 2005.

Now,
matted. Worn. Faded floral design. Wood
scarred like healing flesh.

The arms torn, ratted by the heft of his arms
and the stress of the days. The foam peeks
out.

The brass upholstery tacks rusted. I count
1000 of them. With each,
I mallet a fork-tongue driver under its head.
A tap, tap, tapping until it sinks beneath the tack,
until the tack springs from its place.
I couldn’t help but think of a woodpecker.
A tap, tap, tapping into Post Oak,
a rhythm…each scrap of wood falling to the ground
until a home is formed.
Until each piece of wood like the tacks removed
shelter something new.

I remove the staples, the foam, the fabric,
the upholstery straps
until it’s bones.
I sand and stain
until its bones shine.

I layer and wrap its bones with upholstery straps,
foam, fabric, staples and tacks.
New tacks, Brass medallions
adorning the whole, but holding it
all together—
its bones
its memories,
its energy.

About the Author: Donovan Hufnagle is a husband, a father of three, and a professor of English and Humanities. He moved from Southern California to Prescott, Arizona to Fort Worth, Texas. He has five poetry collections: These Are Not My Words (I Just Wrote Them), Raw Flesh Flash: The Incomplete, Unfinished Documenting Of, The Sunshine Special, Shoebox, and 30 Days of 19. Other recent writings have appeared in Tempered Runes Press, Solum Literary Press, Poetry Box, Beyond Words, Wingless Dreamer, Subprimal Poetry Art, Americana Popular Culture Magazine, Shufpoetry, Kitty Litter Press, Carbon Culture, Amarillo Bay, Borderlands, Tattoo Highway, The New York Quarterly, Rougarou, and others.

Website | Instagram | Facebook

Buy the book at Amazon.