“The early part of this story was charming and whimsical, and very, very sexy. What surprised me was how it actually became such a page-turner once the plot started moving, and how deeply invested I was in the resolution. Extremely well-done!” —
Amazon.com: Amelia C. Gormley “Amelia”‘s review of Earthly Desires (Tempting Tales, Book One).
Apparently USA Today is hosting a blog called Happily Ever After and Love’s Nest was featured as a new release. They didn’t provide a buy link, so allow me to provide it for you now!
It might be an associated blog, and it might not be a review, and it might be that many other releases were also featured, but, dude, I’m still excited. *twirl* So, yay! That was super cool! I’ll definitely take it and call it a win.
In other news, this weekend was eaten up by swim team and that’s that. I am making progress on ’90s Coming of Age Novel. I’ve also determined how I want to release it and that has freed me up emotionally to start getting excited about it. Of course, it’s probably another nine months from a release, but slow progress is still progress.
I always look like a woman about to run a bunch of miles in the early morning sun when I’m writing. I’m just that determined and eager and open to the plodding step-by-step that it will take to progress from here to there, and open to the beauty that can be absorbed with each stride forward, too. Okay, so not always, but on a good day, for sure.
Ever since I started writing seriously, I have had a hard time achieving the above referenced state. Even when reading a really excellent book, I tend to find myself picking at the seams of it, trying to figure out just how they wrote it, trying to glean insight into their success from the characters, to the set-up, to the execution, and trying to learn from other author’s mistakes and triumphs. It has been, sadly, an incredibly long time since I read a book where I just let go, and went with the experience, where I might’ve seen the mistakes or trouble marks in my peripheral vision and instead of zooming in to study them with my magnifying glass, I just said, “Screw it,” and lost myself to the world of the book again.
Anyway, I don’t know if you guys noticed that I didn’t make any posts aside from Writer Wednesday last week. But, if you did, the reason is this–I fell into two books and lost myself in them fully. I forgot about the rest of the world while I was reading. I fell in love with the characters to the extent that my heart aches now that the books are over, because I won’t be able to spend more time with them now. I’ve actually started at the beginning of the first one so that I can read them both all over again.
Are these books perfect? No. But they are wonderful. They are inspirational. They made me remember why I love to read and why I love to write. They reminded me of what I love to write, and of the kinds of characters and worlds I want to spend my time building and exploring. These books are on the list of things that I’m most happy to have had come into my life.
BOOK ONE
BOOK TWO
You can buy them at Blind Eye Books or Amazon. They come in e-book and print.
I don’t know what to say about them that won’t possibly spoil the books. I suppose, for the most part, they were a brimming full cup of my very favorite cuppa. I could pick at them, tell you what parts caught my attention in my peripheral vision as I read, because it is so easy to pull things apart, but I won’t. I love them too much to do that. So, I guess I just want to say that I give these books an enthusiastic five-freaking-stars and encourage you to read them, too.
The blurb for Book One:
Kiram Kir-Zaki may be considered a mechanist prodigy among his own people, but when he becomes the first Haldiim ever admitted to the prestigious Sagrada Academy, he is thrown into a world where power, superstition and swordplay outweigh even the most scholarly of achievements. But when the intimidation from his Cadeleonian classmates turns bloody, Kiram unexpectedly finds himself befriended by Javier Tornesal, the leader of a group of cardsharps, duelists and lotharios who call themselves Hellions. However Javier is a dangerous friend to have. Wielder of the White Hell and sole heir of a dukedom, he is surrounded by rumors of forbidden seductions, murder and damnation. His enemies are many and any one of his secrets could not only end his life but Kiram’s as well.
This review by the Jessewave site does a great job praising the book. For what it’s worth, I knew who the baddie was almost from the beginning, but I’ve read plenty of reviews where the reader said the baddie came as a surprise, so…maybe it won’t be obvious to everyone else. The baddie, though, and the revelation of that person, is so incredibly unimportant in the scheme of the experience of the books, that I don’t think you’ll care either way.
And thank you, Ginn Hale, for writing these books. I’m more fired up about writing than I have been in a long time thanks to you.
So, hi! Been awhile. I can’t say that I’m entirely thrilled to be back posting again, because I’d rather there were nine more books in this series that I could lose myself in instead. But, since there aren’t…hi! I’m back! 🙂 Now, you go disappear yourself in those books for awhile and get back to me. We can talk about our feelings over ice cream and shared book love.
Leta Blake 