Cover Reveal: Three Heart Echo

Three Heart Echo
Keary Taylor
Publication date: September 12, 2017
Genres: Adult, Paranormal, Suspense

The demented thing is that this evolved from the most sickly sweet, heart-wrenching love story you’ve ever heard. I went to Sully because I just couldn’t get over Jack’s murder. I couldn’t deal.

Iona came to me for the same reason most did: because there was no closure. A love cut too short. She begged me to open the gate between the living and the dead.

We should have left it shut.

This. This is not a love story. This is a possession story. A story of lies. A story of two faces. This is a story of death and violent echoes from the other side.

And there will be no happy endings.

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Keary Taylor is the USA TODAY bestselling author of over twenty novels. She grew up along the foothills of the Rocky Mountains where she started creating imaginary worlds and daring characters who always fell in love. She now splits her time between a tiny island in the Pacific Northwest and Utah, with her husband and their two children. She continues to have an overactive imagination that frequently keeps her up at night.

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Release: Uncanny

Uncanny
Sarah Fine
Published by: Skyscape
Publication date: October 3, 2017
Genres: Science Fiction, Thriller, Young Adult

Two sisters. One death. No memories.

Cora should remember every detail about the night her stepsister, Hannah, fell down a flight of stairs to her death, especially since her Cerepin—a sophisticated brain-computer interface—may have recorded each horrifying moment. But when she awakens after that night, her memories gone, Cora is left with only questions—and dread of what the answers might mean.

When a downward spiral of self-destruction forces Cora to work with an AI counselor, she finds an unexpected ally, even as others around her grow increasingly convinced that Hannah’s death was no accident. As Cora’s dark past swirls chaotically with the versions of Hannah’s life and death that her family and friends want to believe, Cora discovers the disturbing depths of what some people may do—including herself.

With her very sanity in question, Cora is forced to face her greatest fear. She will live or die by what she discovers.

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Excerpt from Uncanny:

I did not anticipate the wind. on the sidewalk, it made jackets flap and leaves rustle. Seven stories up, it threatens to throw me right over the edge.

Is that what I want?

I’m not good at knowing what I want—that’s what she said to me, and it turns out she was right. This will be my last decision, and it could be my worst or my best, but I don’t know if it will be something I want.

But wanting isn’t relevant now.

My shoes scrape over cement as i stand on the roof’s ledge. I am battered. Faltering. My arms are out, my fingers splayed. I turn around and face the school’s security cannies, who have formed a semicircle around me on the roof as they slowly approach. outdated, outmoded, neo-plastic skin, expressionless. They are here to stop me, or at least detain me until emergency services reach us, but like me, they are not immune to gravity. If I go over, they can’t save me.

They’re programmed to save me. They won’t feel a thing if they fail, though. They can’t. That’s the difference between us.

Looking at their blank eyes fills me with a sense of the inevitable.

I can’t remember not existing, whatever happened before I became me. I don’t think it hurt, not like this. Perhaps I’m wrong, though. Maybe I’ve been here before.

I crane my neck to see past the machine men, searching for the one face I need, one I know I’ve already seen for the last time. She isn’t here. Of course she isn’t. She can’t be.

I want to see her one last time. After everything I did, she wouldn’t look at me with anything other than sorrow or maybe hate or pity. But still, I want to see her.

There. That’s one thing I know I want. even if it were relevant, it still doesn’t matter. I inch back a little. It would be easier for the wind to take me. I’d prefer that over doing this myself. But the cannies keep getting closer, and the wind is still now. Unhelpful.

“This is my choice,” I say loudly. “I’m doing this of my own free will.”

Is this what she wanted? I think this might be what she wanted.

It’s all tangled up in her, and she’s not here. I’ll never see her again. I’ll never see her again, and it’s because of the choices I made.

Free will.

Want.

I close my eyes. It’s time.

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About the Author

Sarah Fine was born on the West Coast, raised in the Midwest, and is now firmly entrenched on the East Coast. When she’s not writing, she’s working as a child psychologist. No, she is not psychoanalyzing you right now.

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Cover Reveal: The Renegades

Renegades
K. Gorman
Publication date: September 15, 2017
Genres: Adult, Science Fiction

The Shadows have taken over, and she is the only one who can fight back.

Genetically engineered from birth, Karin Makos’s powers have made her the Alliance’s most wanted person. With her sister still missing, and only a cryptic notebook left behind for clues, the mystery of her past is going to take a lot more time and resources than they have to unravel it.

And there’s a bigger problem looming. Keeping their promise to heal Ethan’s stepfather and the rest of the people on the Ozark puts them right past Caishen station and its Alliance allies—and there might be another force on their tail.

After the crew split apart on a wild chase that puts Karin in the hot seat, it’ll take all of their strength and ingenuity to bring them back together. With enemies gathering in the wings, a desperate, heavy-handed station commander hard on their tail, and the Shadows an ever-present threat, they must race against the odds and scramble to fight their way out.

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Don’t miss the release day 99¢ flash sale on Sept 30th!

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Originally from the west coast of Canada, K. Gorman has switched to the west coast of Taiwan, where she broadcasts a steady stream of Science Fiction and Fantasy stories. When not writing, she enjoys long rides through Taichung on U-Bikes, Twin Peaks and Battlestar Galactica marathons, and is slowly turning Final Fantasy VIII’s Squall into a card-playing god before she runs through the rest of the game.

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Guest Post and Excerpt: I Stop Somewhere

I Stop Somewhere
T.E. Carter
Published by: Feiwel & Friends
Publication date: February 27, 2018
Genres: Contemporary, Young Adult

Ellie Frias disappeared long before she vanished.

Tormented throughout middle school, Ellie begins her freshman year with a new look: she doesn’t need to be popular, she just needs to blend in with the wallpaper.

But then, the unthinkable happens, and Ellie is trapped after a brutal assault. She wasn’t the first victim and now she watches it happen again and again. She tries to hold on to her happier memories in order to get past the cold days, waiting for someone to find her.

The problem is, no one searches for a girl they never noticed in the first place.

The Lovely Bones meets All The Rage in a searing, heartbreaking contemporary story of a lost teenager, and the town she leaves behind. T.E. Carter’s stirring and visceral debut not only discusses and dismantles rape culture but also makes you slow down and think about what it is to be human.

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From the Author: The story of the cover design and why it couldn’t be pink

Admittedly, I had very little involvement in the cover design for the novel, since it was handled internally at Macmillan. However, there are so many elements that the cover just got so right about the novel itself, that it’s a really interesting topic of discussion.

My editor did ask during our second round of edits if I had any feedback or specific requests. I didn’t, to be honest, except that I knew the cover shouldn’t be pink. There’s a recurring theme in the novel about what makes a girl and I worried that this would lead a designer to pink, and I don’t like the automatic linking of girls to pink. I don’t mind pink, but Ellie (the main character) doesn’t like pink, and one of the key themes of the book is that defining a girl is about more than stereotypes or this idea of what a girl should be. So pink felt somewhat antithetical to that. At the same time, I then thought maybe pink would be ironic and could be effective, so I wasn’t too useful in providing insight into the design process.

When they first showed me the cover, I fell in love with it aesthetically, but I also found myself a little confused. It was nothing like I had expected. I knew it was a cover that I would be drawn to, and it does make sense for the book when you stop and think about it, but I figured that the primary setting – an abandoned house – would play a role in the design. When there were no houses, I was a bit taken aback.

After thinking about it, though, I realized an abandoned house would have hinted at the book being horror or a thriller, and it’s not. It’s firmly rooted in contemporary realism, so combining a thriller-looking cover with a summary that’s a bit mysterious may actually have worked against getting the book to the target reader.

What I love about this cover is that it’s black, which clearly illustrates that it’s not a light read. It’s not a light or easy story and I like knowing what kind of book I’m getting when I pick up a book. The cover is also symbolic of so many aspects of the story. The leaves are covered in frost, showing that they shouldn’t even be alive. But there are small flowers finding their way through anyway. It’s this idea of life fighting for a way, even when it’s impossible. Plus, it also speaks to the story, which does try to show that even in the darkest and coldest places, there can be small bursts of good.

I also did some research into the plant itself, which is stinging nettle, and discovered that the plant thrives in places where iron has been left to rust. The town where the book is set has seen better days and is full of abandoned factories; it is, in essence, “rusting.” In addition, the plant symbolizes being detached from your body and a lost soul, which is the entire premise of the book. After an assault, Ellie is trapped and trying to find her way back to life before. Stinging nettle also helps heal trauma in youth, especially in situations of low self-esteem, and both of these are key parts of Ellie’s character. According to http://www.beefieldsfarm.com/read/2016/03/stinging-nettle, “[stinging nettle] is also useful for those whose body/soul fusion has been incomplete, or is damaged due to trauma,” and this could not speak more to the novel and its themes!

Finally, there’s the title. It’s so bold and the book is very much about Ellie not having a voice and not feeling like she’s even part of the world she lives in. As the summary says, she was a girl no one noticed, but the title refuses to go unnoticed. I like this, as it’s almost like Ellie screaming from the darkness and demanding to be heard for once.

So, while I had little say in the cover, it really does capture everything about this story beautifully and I think it speaks volumes to what a reader can expect.

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Excerpt from I Stop Somewhere:

Later, I remember how my dad would stand in my doorway, watching me. Trying to reach me across so little space, yet so much. He stared at me like you look at a museum display or a creature in the zoo. I was the coelacanth and he was awed by my strangeness.

“I brought you something,” he said, holding a bag out across the threshold to my bedroom.

My room was an experiment. Posters and magazine pages and images covered the walls and the vanity and my dresser. All the people I wanted to be, wanted to look like. They were the people who mattered. I stared at myself in the mirror, hating how I looked. I hated how the curves made the boys poke me through the back of my chair in class, and how they made the girls call me fat. I hated how far the people in the magazines were from me. I thought I would never count, because I wasn’t them.

“What is it?” I asked my dad, gesturing toward the bag he was holding.

“I thought you might like it.”

It happened every few nights. He’d show up, presenting an offering in a plastic bag. Makeup. Clothes. Hair bands. He tried. He tried and so I tried, but the discount stickers said it all.

They were marked down, because the lipstick was too orange. The tank top wasn’t cut right. The hair pins would have been perfect for a girl my age – ten years ago. But I wore them for him and he smiled, because he didn’t know the difference.

“Thanks, Dad. I love it,” I lied.

“You’re beautiful, Ellie.”

I was a markdown girl.

I did know the difference.

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T.E. Carter was born in New England and has lived in New England for pretty much her entire life. Throughout her career, she’s done a lot of things, although her passion has always been writing. When she’s not writing, she can generally be found reading classic literature, obsessing over Game of Thrones (she’s one hundred percent Team Lannister), playing Xbox, organizing her comic collection, or binge-watching baking competitions. She continues to live in New England with her husband and their two cats.

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Review: Emma in the Night

Wendy Walker. St. Martin’s Press, $27, 320p. ISBN 9781250141439

Into the night suddenly disappear two teenage sisters, Emma and Cass, leaving an empty car on the beach and a single pair of shoes in the surf. Three years later, Cass alone returns to her parents’ home with a story of captivity on an unidentified seven-acre island, and a driving urgency to find her sister who has since given birth. In Emma in the Night, author Wendy Walker carefully weaves a psychological thriller that is even more carefully unwound in a way that reveals only bare hints of resolution until all is immediately exposed.

As the narration switches between Cass’s first-person recounting and a third-person limited overlook of FBI Forensic Psychologist, Dr. Abby Winter, details of Cass and Emma’s home lives before their disappearance come into light. Their mother is revealed to be a pathological narcissist who has spent years competing with her daughters for attention, power, and validation, as her girls have grown in beauty. As the oldest daughter who has realized the threat that she is to her mother, Emma has the stronger love-hate relationship with their mother, and Cass takes refuge in Emma’s shadow as a “bird on the battlefield” with an unrealized, yet growing desire to see her mother defeated.

Cass’s experience growing up with a narcissistic mother is reflected in Dr. Winter’s character, whose mother was also a narcissist. Having investigated Emma and Cass’s disappearances since the beginning, Dr. Winter brings a contrasted, systematic aspect to the novel’s premise of psychosis, while remaining approachable to the reader by her own emotional investment in the case. As Dr. Winter learns of Cass’s childhood, she remembers her own, and is ultimately able to discover Emma’s whereabouts by understanding the dynamic in Cass’s household.

Throughout the novel, Cass is repeatedly put into situations requiring either swift decisions or well-thought-out planning, nothing in-between; Cass is forced to quickly become an adult, and learns that survival in her environment requires rigid observation, manipulation, and sacrifice. Wendy Walker presents the argument that people will believe what they want to believe, and paired with Walker’s working knowledge of the causes and effects of narcissism, Emma in the Night allows its audience to keep guessing at what the truth behind the girls’ disappearance and captivity might be.

Cover Reveal: ISAN

ISAN
Mary Ting
Publication date: May 1, 2018
Genres: Dystopian, Science Fiction, Young Adult

The world has changed.

Scientists warned it would happen.

Meteors devastated the Earth. World Governments developed plans to help surviving citizens. The United States disbanded and salvageable land was divided into four quadrants—North, South, East, and West—governed by The Remnant Council.

Struggling to survive, seventeen-year-old Ava ends up in juvenile detention, until she is selected for a new life—with a catch. She must be injected with an experimental serum. The results will be life changing. The serum will make her better. To receive the serum Ava agrees to join a program controlled by ISAN, the International Sensory Assassin Network.

While on a training mission, she is abducted by a rebel group led by a guy named Rhett, and is told that not only does she have a history with him, but her entire past is a lie perpetuated by ISAN to ensure her compliance. Unsure of who to trust, Ava must decide if her strangely familiar and handsome captor is her enemy or her savior—and time is running out.

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Author Bio:

International Bestselling Author Mary Ting/M. Clarke resides in Southern California with her husband and two children. She enjoys oil painting and making jewelry. Writing her first novel, Crossroads Saga, happened by chance. It was a way to grieve the death of her beloved grandmother, and inspired by a dream she once had as a young girl. When she started reading new adult novels, she fell in love with the genre. It was the reason she had to write one – Something Great. Why the pen name, “M. Clarke”? She tours with Magic Johnson Foundation to promote literacy and her children’s chapter book, No Bullies Allowed.

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Guest Post and Excerpt: Hunger Moon

Brand new from Alexandra Sokoloff comes Hunger Moon, the latest installment in The Huntress Moon Series (which is in development as a TV series!). The Huntress Moon Series is the product of years of screenwriting in Hollywood and wondering why most serial killers are men. Today, Sokoloff shares an excerpt from Hunger Moon, and writes to share what inspired The Huntress Series, and what has molded Agent Roarke’s character. As a fan of true crime and how psychology is involved (and also of small towns with neon hotel signs), I can only begin to try to communicate through my fingers how interesting this series sounds.

Hunger Moon
Alexandra Sokoloff
Publication date: October 24, 2017
Genres: Adult, Mystery, Thriller

“Some of the most original and freshly unnerving work in the genre.”   – The New York Times

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From the Author: Where The Huntress Moon Series came from 

“My motivation for writing the Huntress Moon series is pretty basic. I am sick to death of reading crime novels and seeing movies and TV shows about women being raped, tortured, mutilated and murdered. I’m not too happy about it happening in real life, either.

So, my Huntress series turns the tables. The books follow a haunted FBI agent on the hunt for a female serial killer.

I worked as a Hollywood screenwriter for ten years before I snapped and wrote my first novel, and in that time I worked on several film projects featuring serial killers. One of my core themes as a writer is ‘What can good people do about the evil in the world?’ – and as far as I’m concerned, serial killers are an embodiment of evil. So for several years I was doing research into the subject every way I could think of, besides actually putting myself in a basement with one of these monsters. I tracked down the FBI’s behavioral science textbook before it was ever available to the public. I stalked psychological profilers at writing conventions and grilled them about various real life examples. I went to forensics classes and law enforcement training workshops.

And while I was doing all that research, one thing really jumped out at me about serial killers. They’re men. Women don’t do it. Women kill, and sometimes they kill in numbers (especially killing lovers or husbands for money – the “Black Widow” killer; or killing patients in hospitals or nursing homes: the “Angel of Death”). But the psychology of those killers is totally different from the men who commit serial sexual homicide. Sexual homicide is about abduction, rape, torture and murder for the killer’s own sexual gratification. (And please don’t get me started on books and films that portray serial killers as having an artistic or poetic bent. Ridiculous….)

The fact is, one reason novels and film and TV so often depict women as victims is that it’s the stark reality. Since the beginning of time, women haven’t been the predators — we’re the prey. But after all those years (centuries, millennia) of women being victims of the most heinous crimes out there… wouldn’t you think that someone would finally say, ‘Enough!’?

And maybe even strike back?

I believe my job as an author is to give my readers a thrilling, sensory, gripping adventure that makes them feel — and also makes them think. It’s all about the fight against everyday evil, for me, and about the deep connections people make with unlikely other people when they commit to that fight.

With the Huntress series I finally have an umbrella to explore, dramatically, over multiple books, the roots and context of the worst crimes I know. And at least on paper, do something about it.

Whoever she is, whatever she is, the Huntress is like no killer Agent Roarke – or the reader – has ever seen before. And you may find yourself as conflicted about her as Roarke is.

As one of the profilers says in the book: ‘I’ve always wondered why we don’t see more women acting out this way. God knows enough of them have reason.'”

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Excerpt from Hunger Moon:

A bleak sky, streaked with white, stretches over the desolate South Rim of the canyon. There will be snow tonight.

The grinding of a pickup truck grates through the silence.

A four-door Tundra. Tonneau cover over the bed. Two men dressed in camouflage inside. Fast-food and jerky wrappers litter the wells at their feet. In the back seat, a cooler packed full of beer.

And three rifles, three-inch twelve-gauge magnums, strapped to the padded back-seat gun rest.

Hunters, driving the rim.

The front-seat passenger sets his sights on something moving ahead of them, leans forward greedily. “There we go, there we go.”

The driver follows his gaze, fixes on what he is tracking. Not a deer, but a young girl, shining black hair underneath the hood of her parka. Schoolgirl’s backpack on her shoulder.

On the men’s faces, something crude and capering.

“That’s some tasty-looking pussy.”

“Oh, yeah, that’ll do.”

“Let’s go.”

“Get her.”

The driver swerves the truck over to the side of the road, squealing brakes.

The girl hears the sound, stiffens, is starting to run before she even completes the glance back.

The truck skids to a stop in the snow. The doors fly open; the men are out of the car, grabbing for their rifles.

The girl runs for the rocks, but her pursuers are bigger, faster. Two of them, grown men, against a teenage girl.

They move forward into the strong wind, a military-style formation, heavy boots crunching in the sandy snow.

They pause at the rock outcropping, looking out over the boulders. The girl seems to have disappeared. Then a scrabble on the rocks betrays her. Hearing it, the men grin at each other.

The driver rounds the rock first, his mouth watering. He is already hard in anticipation…

The tire iron bashes him across the face, breaking his jaw. He staggers back, howling inarticulate pain.

The girl kicks him viciously in the knee, crumpling him, then swivels as the second hunter rounds the edge of the rock. She slams the tire iron against the side of his head.

Now both men are collapsed on the ground, moaning and cursing.

She steps forward, no longer feigning that youthful, hesitant gait.

She lifts her arm and uses the tire iron on their skulls. Two, three, four blows, and there is no more moaning. Thick crimson drops spatter the snow. Her breath is harsh. Her face is ice.

There is only the wind, swallowing the sound of her breathing.

Cara stands at the edge of the canyon, looking out at the spires of Spider Rock, the vast open gorge.

Below her is an icy crevasse. The canyon has any number of them, deep splits in the rock wall where whole sheets of the cliff have broken away. Behind her is the hunters’ pickup truck.

Their bodies lie at her feet.

She drags one, then the other, to shove them over the cliff’s edge, stepping back to watch each body hurtle down into the crevasse, tumbling into oblivion.

The snowfall tonight will cover all trace of them. Later, birds and animals will pick the bones clean.

Another offering to the canyon, and the gods and ghosts that haunt it.

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Pre-order today!

PLUS: Books 1-4 are on SALE for $1.99 each for a limited time only!

Previous books in the Huntress/FBI Thrillers Series:

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About the Author

ALEXANDRA SOKOLOFF is the Thriller Award-winning and Bram Stoker, Anthony, and Black Quill Award-nominated author of the Amazon bestselling Huntress/FBI series (Huntress Moon, Blood Moon, Cold Moon, Bitter Moon, Hunger Moon – now in active development as a TV series), and the supernatural Haunted thrillers (The Harrowing, The Price, The Unseen, Book of Shadows, The Shifters, The Space Between). The New York Times Book Review called her a “daughter of Mary Shelley,” and her books “some of the most original and freshly unnerving work in the genre.”

As a screenwriter she has sold original horror and thriller scripts and adapted novels for numerous Hollywood studios. She has also written three non-fiction workbooks: Screenwriting Tricks for Authors, Stealing Hollywood, and Writing Love, based on her internationally acclaimed workshops and blog (www.ScreenwritingTricks.com), and has served on the Board of Directors of the WGA West and the Board of the Mystery Writers of America.

Alex is a California native and a graduate of U.C. Berkeley, where she majored in theater and minored in everything Berkeley has a reputation for. In her spare time (!) she performs with The Slice Girls and Heather Graham’s all-author Slush Pile Players, and dances like a fiend. She is also very active on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. But not an addict. Seriously, it’s under control.

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