This week's blog book giveaways

To enter, go to the blog links below and post a comment there.
Embrace Me by Lisa Samson
Leave It To Chance by Sherri Sand

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Faithchick

Captain's Log, Supplemental

I’m blogging at Faithchick about how my dog keeps eating my knitting lint. (No joke!)

Book giveaway – LEAVE IT TO CHANCE

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.22.2008

Get free short stories and info on exclusive book giveaways when you subscribe to my newsletter!

The winner of
Healing Promises
by
Amy Wallace is
judygann
Congratulations!

Blog book giveaway:

To enter to win today’s book, leave a comment on this blog post, giving your name and saying you want to enter. International readers are welcome to enter!

Please leave an email address or website where I can contact you (please use this format--you [at] yourmail.com--or something like that to prevent spammers from trolling for your email address). It is the winner’s responsibility to check to see if you won and to email me if you haven’t yet heard from me.

I always email the winner and give them a week to reply, but if I don’t receive an answer, I will pull another person to win the book. I am not responsible for a lost opportunity if you leave an email address you don’t check frequently.

You have a week to comment--I'll pick a name out of a hat on Thursday, May 29th. (BTW, you can post a comment and NOT enter, too.)

Leave It To Chance
by
Sherri Sand

Single mom of three, Sierra Montgomery is desperate to find a new job to keep from having to move back home and be smothered to death by her mother’s good intentions and overbearing love. So when Sierra inherits Chance, a quirky old gelding she doesn’t have a clue what to do with, she thinks her best bet may be to sell the horse to cover another month’s rent—a decision that devastates her children.

Enter Ross Morgan, a handsome landscaper who just happens to have an empty barn and fenced pasture…perfect for an old horse to live out his days as the pet of three wounded kids. Ross develops a soft spot for eldest child Braden…and he just might have one for Braden’s mother. But what he doesn’t have is time for distractions—he’s got a landscaping business to run.

But Sierra has a secret. She’s terrified of horses and—thanks to her past—wary of attractive men. Yet seeing the way her angry son idolizes Ross and adores that old horse forces Sierra to confront her fears. Will she remain distrustful and self-reliant, or will she seek help from God and those who love her?

Read more about this book and the author at Sherri's website.

Becoming Jane

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.21.2008

I’m catching a cold, so I took time off from writing my proposal to watch the movie, Becoming Jane with Anne Hathaway and James McAvoy.

It was ... okay.

James McAvoy is my new favorite actor. Oh my gosh he was so good. So charming, so intense, so handsome.

Anne Hathaway was good, as usual. My problem was her lines. I think the writer failed Jane Austen in the dialogue.

In Miss Austen Regrets, the dialogue fitted Jane Austen to a T. The character spoke the way Jane wrote in her letters and her books.

In Becoming Jane, where was the biting wit, the quirky observances, the understated irony? Anne Hathaway had all these earnest lines. All this drama and romance.

In reading her writing, I thought Jane always came across as a bit cynical. Maybe it’s just my perception, and really, a writer can’t be understood only from her written word, much less her fictional works.

But Jane’s character came alive for me in Miss Austen Regrets (although I have to admit some parts of that were a bit more melodramatic than I think Jane’s real life character was). In Becoming Jane, it was a nice, entertaining story about a heroine named Jane.

Now, I know tons of you have seen this movie and loved it. So speak up! What did you like or didn't like about it?

Book excerpt - BROKEN ANGEL by Sigmund Brouwer

This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
Broken Angel
(WaterBrook Press (May 20, 2008)
by
Sigmund Brouwer


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Sigmund Brouwer is the author of eighteen best-selling novels for children and adults. His newest book is Fuse of Armageddon and his novel The Last Disciple was featured in Time magazine and on ABC’s Good Morning America. A champion of literacy, he teaches writing workshops for students in schools from the Arctic Circle to inner city Los Angeles. Sigmund is married to Christian recording artist Cindy Morgan, and they and their two daughters divide their time between homes in Red Deer, Alberta, Canada and Nashville, Tennessee.




ABOUT THE BOOK

Her birth was shrouded in mystery and tragedy.
Her destiny is beyond comprehension.
Her pursuers long to see her broken.
She fights to soar.

A father's love for his daughter…a decision that would change both their lives forever. But who is she really─and why must she now run for her life?

Caitlin's body has made her an outcast, a freak, and the target of vicious bounty hunters. As she begins a perilous journey, she is forced to seek answers for her father's betrayal in the only things she can carry with her─a letter he passes her before forcing her to run, and their shared memories together.

Being hunted forces Caitlyn to partner with two equally lonely companions, one longing to escape the horror of factory life in Appalachia and the others, an unexpected fugitive. Together the three will fight to reach a mysterious group that might be friend or foe, where Caitlyn hopes to uncover the secrets of her past...and the destiny she must fulfill.

In the rough, shadowy hills of Appalachia, a nation carved from the United States following years of government infighting, Caitlyn and her companions are the prey in a terrifying hunt. They must outwit the relentless bounty hunters, skirt an oppressive, ever-watchful society, and find passage over the walls of Appalachia to reveal the dark secrets behind Caitlyn’s existence–and understand her father’s betrayal.

Prepare yourself to experience a chilling America of the very near future, as you discover the unforgettable secret of the Broken Angel.

In this engrossing, lightning-paced story with a post-apocalyptic edge, best-selling author Sigmund Brouwer weaves a heroic, harrowing journey through the path of a treacherous culture only one or two steps removed from our own.

If you would like to read the first chapter, go HERE.

Book excerpt - HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS by Robert Liparulo

It's May 21st, time for the Teen FIRST blog tour!(Join our alliance! Click the button!) Every 21st, we will feature an author and his/her latest Teen fiction book's FIRST chapter!

Robert Liparulo

and his book:

House of Dark Shadows: Dreamhouse Kings, Book #1

Thomas Nelson (May 6, 2008)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Robert Liparulo is an award-winning author of over a thousand published articles and short stories. He is currently a contributing editor for New Man magazine. His work has appeared in Reader's Digest, Travel & Leisure, Modern Bride, Consumers Digest, Chief Executive, and The Arizona Daily Star, among other publications. In addition, he previously worked as a celebrity journalist, interviewing Stephen King, Tom Clancy, Charlton Heston, and others for magazines such as Rocky Road, Preview, and L.A. Weekly. He has sold or optioned three screenplays.

Robert is an avid scuba diver, swimmer, reader, traveler, and a law enforcement and military enthusiast. He lives in Colorado with his wife and four children.

Here are some of his titles:

Comes a Horseman

Germ

Deadfall

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

“A house of which one knows every room isn't worth living in.”

—Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa






Prologue


Thirty years ago

The walls of the house absorbed the woman’s screams, until they felt to her as muffled and pointless as yelling underwater. Still, her lungs kept pushing out cries for help. Her attacker carried her over his shoulder. The stench of his sweat filled her nostrils. He paid no heed to her frantic writhing, or the pounding of her fists on his back, or even her fingernails, which dug furrows into his flesh. He simply lumbered, as steadily as a freight train, through the corridors of the big house.

She knew where they were heading, but not where she would end up. In this house, nothing was normal, nothing as it appeared. So while she knew in advance the turns her attacker would take, which hallways and doors he would traverse, their destination was as unknowable as a faraway galaxy. And that meant her taking would be untraceable. She would be unreachable to searchers. To would-be rescuers. To her family— and that realization terrified her more than being grabbed out of her bed. More than the flashes of imagined cruelty she would suffer away from the protection of the people who loved her. More than death.

But then she saw something more terrifying: her children, scrambling to catch up, to help. Their eyes were wide, streaming. They stumbled up the narrow staircase behind her attacker, seeming far below, rising to meet her. The thought of them following her into the chasm of her fate was more than she could stand.

“Go back,” she said, but by this time her throat was raw, her voice weak.

The man reached the landing and turned into another corridor.

Temporarily out of sight, her son yelled, “Mom!” His seven-year-old voice was almost lost in the shrillness of his panic. He appeared on the landing. His socked feet slipped on the hardwood floor and he went down. Behind him, his little sister stopped. She was frightened and confused, too young to do anything more than follow her brother. He clambered up and started to run again.

A hand gripped his shoulder, jarring him back.

The boy’s father had something in his fist: the lamp from his nightstand! He past the boy in the hallway. His bare feet gave him traction.

Thank God, she thought.

He reached her in seconds. With the lamp raised over his head, he grabbed her wrist. He pulled, tried to anchor himself to the floor, to the carpeted runner now covering the wood planks. But the brute under her walked on, tugging him with them. The man yanked on her arm. Pain flared in her shoulder. He might as well have tried pulling her from a car as it sped passed.

She caught a glimpse of the bizarrely shaped light fixtures on the corridor walls—mostly carved faces with glowing eyes. The bulbs flickered in time with her racing heart. She could not remember any of the lights doing that before. It was as though the electrical current running through the wires was responding to a disruption in the way things were supposed to be, a glitch in reality.

“Henry,” she said, pleading, hopeful.

His grip tightened as he stumbled along behind them. He brought the lamp’s heavy base down on her assailant. If the man carrying her flinched, she did not feel it. If he grunted or yelled out, she did not hear it.

What he did was stop. He spun around so quickly, the woman’s husband lost his grip on her. And now facing the other direction, she lost sight of him. Being suddenly denied her husband’s visage felt like getting the wind knocked out of her. She realized he was face to face with the man who’d taken her, and that felt like watching him step off a cliff.

“Nooo!” she screamed, her voice finding some volume. “Henry!”

His hand gripped her ankle, then broke free. The man under her moved in a violent dance, jostling her wildly. He spun again and her head struck the wall.

The lights went out completely . . . . but no, not the lights . . . her consciousness. It came back to her slowly, like the warmth of fire on a blistery day.

She tasted blood. She’d bitten her tongue. She opened her eyes. Henry was crumpled on the floor, receding as she was carried away. The children stood over him, touching him, calling him. Her son’s eyes found hers again. Determination hardened his jaw, pushed away the fear . . . at least a measure of it. He stepped over his father’s legs, coming to her rescue. Henry raised his head, weary, stunned. He reached for the boy, but missed.

Over the huffing breath of the man, the soft patter of her son’s feet reached her ears. How she’d loved that sound, knowing it was bringing him to her. Now she wanted it to carry him away, away from this danger. Her husband called to him in a croaking, strained voice. The boy kept coming.

She spread her arms. Her left hand clutched at open air, but the right one touched a wall. She clawed at it. Her nails snagged the wallpaper. One nail peeled back from her finger and snapped off.

Her assailant turned again, into a room—one of the small antechambers, like a mud room before the real room. He strode straight toward the next threshold.

Her son reached the first door, catching it as it was closing.

“Mom!” Panic etched old-man lines into his young face. His eyes appeared as wide as his mouth. He banged his shoulder on the jamb, trying to hurry in.

“Stay!” she said. She showed him her palms in a “stop” gesture, hoping he would understand, hoping he would obey. She took in his face, as a diver takes in a deep breath before plunging into the depths. He was fully in the antechamber now, reaching for her with both arms, but her captor had already opened the second door and was stepping through. The door was swinging shut behind him.

The light they were stepping into was bright. It swept around her, through the opening, and made pinpoints of the boy’s irises. His blue eyes dazzled. His cheeks glistened with tears. He wore his favorite pajamas—little R2D2s and C3P0s all over them, becoming threadbare and too small for him.

“I—“ she started, meaning to say she loved him, but the brute bounded downward, driving his shoulder into her stomach. Air rushed from her, unformed by vocal chords, tongue, lips. Just air.

“Moooom!” her son screamed. Full of despair. Reaching. Almost to the door.
“Mo—“

The door closed, separating her from her family forever.




1


Now

Saturday, 4:55 P.M.

“Nothing but trees,” the bear said in Xander’s voice. It repeated itself: “Nothing but trees.”

Xander King turned away from the car window and stared into the smiling furry face, with its shiny half-bead eyes and stitched-on nose. He said, “I mean it, Toria. Get that thing out of my face. And turn it off.”

His sister’s hands moved quickly over the teddy bear’s paws, all the while keeping it suspended three inches in front of Xander. The bear said, “I mean it, Toria. Get that—”

At fifteen years old, Xander was too old to be messing around with little-kid toys. He seized the bear, squeezing the paw that silenced it.

“Mom!” Toria yelled. ”Make him give Wuzzy back!” She grabbed for it.

Xander turned away from her, tucking Wuzzy between his body and the car door. Outside his window, nothing but trees—as he had said and Wuzzy had agreed. It reminded him of a movie, as almost everything did. This time, it was The Edge, about a bear intent on eating Anthony Hopkins. An opening shot of the wilderness where it was filmed showed miles and miles of lush forest. Nothing but trees.

A month ago, his dad had announced that he had accepted a position as principal of a school six hundred miles away, and the whole King family had to move from the only home Xander had ever known. It was a place he had never even heard of: Pinedale, almost straight north from their home in Pasadena. Still in California, but barely. Pinedale. The name itself said “hick,” “small,” and “If you don’t die here, you’ll wish you had.” Of course, he had screamed, begged, sulked, and threatened to run away. But in the end here he was, wedged in the back seat with his nine-year-old sister and twelve-year-old brother.

The longer they drove, the thicker the woods grew and the more miserable he became. It was bad enough, leaving his friends, his school—everything!—but to be leaving them for hicksville, in the middle of nowhere, was a stake through his heart.

“Mom!” Toria yelled again, reaching for the bear.

Xander squeezed closer to the door, away from her. He must have put pressure on the bear in the wrong place: It began chanting in Toria’s whiny voice: “Mom! Mom! Mom!”

He frantically squeezed Wuzzy’s paws, but could not make it stop.

“Mom! Mom! Mom!”

The controls in the bear’s arms weren’t working. Frustrated by its continuous one-word poking at his brain—and a little concerned he had broken it and would have to buy her a new one—he looked to his sister for help.

She wasn’t grabbing for it anymore. Just grinning. One of those see-what-happens-when-you-mess-with-me smiles.

“Mom! Mom! Mom!”

Xander was about to show her what happened when you messed with him—the possibilities ranged from a display of his superior vocal volume to ripping Mr. Wuzzy’s arms right off—when the absurdity of it struck him. He cracked up.

“I mean it,” he laughed. “This thing is driving me crazy.” He shook the bear at her. It continued yelling for their mother.

His brother David, who was sitting on the other side of Toria and who had been doing a good job of staying out of the fight, started laughing too. He mimicked the bear, who was mimicking their sister: “Mom! Mom! Mom!”

Mrs. King shifted around in the front passenger seat. She was smiling, but her eyes were curious.

“Xander broke Wuzzy!” Toria whined. “He won’t turn off.” She pulled the bear out of Xander’s hands.

The furry beast stopped talking: “Mo—” Then, blessed silence.

Toria looked from brother to brother and they laugh again.

Xander shrugged. “I guess he just doesn’t like me.”

“He only likes me,” Toria said, hugging it.

“Oh, brother,” David said. He went back to the PSP game that had kept him occupied most of the drive.

Mom raised her eyebrows at Xander and said, “Be nice.”

Xander rolled his eyes. He adjusted his shoulders and wiggled his behind, nudging Toria. “It’s too cramped back here. It may be an SUV, but it isn’t big enough for us anymore.”

“Don’t start that,” his father warned from behind the wheel. He angled the rearview mirror to see his son.

“What?” Xander said, acting innocent.

“I did the same thing with my father,” Dad said. “The car’s too small . . . it uses too much gas . . . it’s too run down . . . ”

Xander smiled. “Well, it is.”

“And if we get a new car, what should we do with this one?”

“Well . . . .” Xander said. “You know. It’d be a safe car for me.” A ten-year-old Toyota 4Runner wasn’t his idea of cool wheels, but it was transportation.

Dad nodded. “Getting you a car is something we can talk about, okay? Let’s see how you do.”

“I have my driver’s permit. You know I’m a good driver.”

“He is,” Toria chimed in.

David added, “And then he can drive us to school.”

“I didn’t mean just the driving,” Dad said. He paused, catching Xander’s eyes in the mirror. “I mean with all of this, the move and everything.”

Xander stared out the window again. He mumbled, “Guess I’ll never get a car, then.”

“Xander?” Dad said. “I didn’t hear that.”

“Nothing.”

“He said he’ll never get a car,” Toria said.

Silence. David’s thumbs clicked furiously over the PSP buttons. Xander was aware of his mom watching him. If he looked, her eyes would be all sad-like, and she would be frowning in sympathy for him. He thought maybe his dad was looking too, but only for an opportunity to explain himself again. Xander didn’t want to hear it. Nothing his old man said would make this okay, would make ripping him out of his world less awful than it was.

“Dad, is the school’s soccer team good? Did they place?” David asked. Xander knew his brother wasn’t happy about the move either, but jumping right into the sport he was so obsessed about went a long way toward making the change something he could handle. Maybe Xander was like that three years ago, just rolling with the punches. He couldn’t remember. But now he had things in his life David didn’t: friends who truly mattered, ones he thought he’d spend the rest of his life with. Kids didn’t think that way. Friends could come and go and they adjusted. True, Xander had known his current friends for years, but they hadn’t become like blood until the last year or so.

That got him thinking about Danielle. He pulled his mobile phone from his shirt pocket and checked it. No text messages from her. No calls. She hadn’t replied to the last text he’d sent. He keyed in another: “Forget me already? JK.” But he wasn’t Just Kidding. He knew the score: Out of sight, out of mind. She had said all the right things, like We’ll talk on the phone all the time; You come down and see me and I’ll come up to see you, okay? and I’ll wait for you.

Yeah, sure you will, he thought. Even during the past week, he’d sensed a coldness in her, an emotional distancing. When he’d told his best friend, Dean had shrugged. Trying to sound world-wise, he’d said, “Forget her, dude. She’s a hot young babe. She’s gotta move on. You too. Not like you’re married, right?” Dean had never liked Danielle.

Xander tried to convince himself she was just another friend he was forced to leave behind. But there was a different kind of ache in his chest when he thought about her. A heavy weight in his stomach.

Stop it! he told himself. He flipped his phone closed.

On his mental list of the reasons to hate the move to Pinedale, he moved on to the one titled “career.” He had just started making short films with his buddies, and was pretty sure it was something he would eventually do for a living. They weren’t much, just short skits he and his friends acted out. He and Dean wrote the scripts, did the filming, used computer software to edit an hour of video into five-minute films, and laid music over them. They had six already on YouTube—with an average rating of four-and-a-half stars and a boatload of praise. Xander had dreams of getting a short film into the festival circuit, which of course would lead to offers to do music videos and commercials, probably an Oscar and onto feature movies starring Russell Crowe and Jim Carrey. Pasadena was right next to Hollywood, a twenty-minute drive. You couldn’t ask for a better place to live if you were the next Steven Spielberg. What in God’s creation would he find to film in Pinedale? Trees, he thought glumly, watching them fly past his window.

Dad, addressing David’s soccer concern, said, “We’ll talk about it later.”

Mom reached through the seatbacks to shake Xander’s knee. “It’ll work out,” she whispered.

“Wait a minute,” David said, understanding Dad-talk as well as Xander did. “Are you saying they suck—or that they don’t have a soccer team? You told me they did!”

“I said later, Dae.” His nickname came from Toria’s inability as a toddler to say David. She had also called Xander Xan, but it hadn’t stuck.

David slumped down in his seat.

Xander let the full extent of his misery show on his face for his mother.

She gave his knee a shake, sharing his misery. She was good that way. “Give it some time,” she whispered. “You’ll make new friends and find new things to do. Wait and see.”

eBooks

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.21.2008

I admit, I have Kindle envy.

Lots of my friends have got Kindles. I haven’t even seen one yet, but everyone says the screen is amazing.

Now, my love of ebooks comes honestly. I’ve loved ebooks ever since I could download them from Fictionwise.com, and I’ve gotten PDAs specifically so that I could read books on them and never be without something to read.

In fact, I will confess that one reason I don’t want an iPhone is because I can’t read ebooks on it.

But Captain Caffeine always advises (and quite rightly, most of the time) not to buy the first version of any piece of technology because there are always first generation bugs.

So another reason not to even put the Kindle on my Amazon wishlist is because there might be a second version in another year and it will probably be even better.

(Another reason is that price tag—yowzers! Uh, no, I’d like to be able to afford groceries this month ...)

So I’ve been continuing to buy my ebooks, but from Fictionwise (which has great prices, by the way, especially if you’re a Club Member), and reading them on my computer or my Palm PDA.

In fact, I prefer reading my Steeple Hill and other Harlequin books on ebook rather than hard copy.

(1) I can make the font REALLY BIG.

(2) I can get the books instantly rather than waiting for shipping.

(3) They’re a little cheaper than buying a hard copy.

(4) In being able to read them on my computer, I can actually knit while reading an ebook, since all I have to do is hit a button to turn the page. Laugh if you dare, but I enjoy being so efficient with my time! LOL

Have any of you bought Kindles? Do any of you like ebooks?

Crrrrrrrazy about lace

Captain's Log, Supplemental

I am in looooooooooooooove.

My local library happened to have a copy of Victorian Lace Today, a book of Victorian lace knitting patterns, mostly shawls. The photography is stunning, and the shawls are absolutely gorgeous.

The knitting ranges from beginning lace to experienced lace, and they’re all amazing, knit in different yarns in brilliant colors.

I am completely hooked on lace now. I want to knit every single pattern in this book, they’re all so beautiful.

And think of the fashion statement I could make—like French women, I can dress up a simple outfit with a contrasting scarf or shawl in some stunning color.

My first project is this, the faggoted shawl or scarf. I knit it in some fingering weight sock yarn from Knitpicks.com (the pattern called for “fine” or “sport” weight, but I didn’t have any and I thought the shawl would look good with this hand-dyed colorway in the discontinued Memories line).



It looks rather good with the colorway, don’t you think? You can’t really see, but it’s a mix of reds, pinks, and orange-reds with shots of grass-green.

The shawl was actually quite easy, although it looks complicated. The hard part was the border, but even that was a very simple 6-row repeated pattern that was easy to memorize.

The shawl is actually shorter than the pattern calls for because I didn’t have quite enough yarn, so I just made the body shorter and left enough yarn for the border.

I wish I could afford the hazy mohair yarn the original design called for. Maybe if I get another contract, I’ll splurge on some expensive yarn.

Book giveaway – EMBRACE ME

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.19.2008

Get free short stories and info on exclusive book giveaways when you subscribe to my newsletter!

The winner of
Scoop (The Occupational Hazards series, book 1)
by Rene Gutteridge is
Jenny (saubleb)
Congratulations!

Blog book giveaway:

To enter to win today’s book, leave a comment on this blog post, giving your name and saying you want to enter. International readers are welcome to enter!

Please leave an email address or website where I can contact you (please use this format--you [at] yourmail.com--or something like that to prevent spammers from trolling for your email address). It is the winner’s responsibility to check to see if you won and to email me if you haven’t yet heard from me.

I always email the winner and give them a week to reply, but if I don’t receive an answer, I will pull another person to win the book. I am not responsible for a lost opportunity if you leave an email address you don’t check frequently.

You have a week to comment--I'll pick a name out of a hat on Monday, May 26th. (BTW, you can post a comment and NOT enter, too.)

Embrace Me
by
Lisa Samson

Biting and gentle, hard-edged and hopeful...a beautiful fable of love and power, hiding and seeking, woundedness and redemption.

When a "lizard woman," a self-mutilating preacher, a tattooed monk, and a sleazy lobbyist find themselves in the same North Carolina town one winter, their lives are edging precariously close to disaster...and improbably close to grace.

Valentine, due to her own drastic self-disfigurement, ahs very few friends in this world and, it appears as if she may be destined to spend the rest of her life practically alone. But life gives her one good friend, Lella, whose own handicap puts her in the same freakish category as Valentine. As part of Roland's Wayfaring Marvel and Oddities Show, a traveling band of misfits, they seem to have found their niches in an often curiously cruel world.

Residing in a world where masks are mandatory, Valentine has a hard time removing hers, because of her disfigured face but more so because of her damaged soul. It is much easier for her to listen endlessly to different versions of a favorite song, Embraceable You, and escape reality. Yet, life has more in store for her when she meets Augustine, replete with the tattoos, dreadlocks, and his own secrets. With his arrival, Valentine's soul takes a turn.

If you would like to read the first chapter, go HERE

Book excerpt - DAWN'S LIGHT by Terri Blackstock

DAWN'S LIGHT

Restoration Series—Book 4

Terri Blackstock

Book 4 in Terri Blackstock's popular Restoration Series is in stores now!

As the Pulses that caused the massive global power outage are finally coming to an end, thirteen-year-old Beth Branning witnesses a murder. Threatened by the killer, she keeps the matter to herself. But her silence could cost her life. Will technology return to normal in time to save the Brannings from their worst crisis yet?

To read an excerpt of these new titles go to Chapter-a-Week, and to join our deeper discussion of these titles go to Chapter-a-Week Chat at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CAWChat/ where authors and readers discuss new titles together.

If you enjoy Chapter-a-Week take the time to tell a friend how to sign up. It's easy and free and a great way to find books that fit each person's particular reading style.

Book excerpt - ANATHEMA by Colleen Coble

Anathema

By Colleen Coble

Welcome to Parke County, Indiana,

land of peaceful farms and covered bridges,

Amish quilts and horse drawn buggies . . . and murder.

After years of running, Hannah Schwartz has finally built a life for herself. Far from the insecure husband who bullied and abused her. Far from the close-knit Amish community who raised her, then shunned her. Still haunted by nightmare memories of her parents' murder . . . and the guilty secret that made her an anathema—a true outcast—from her friends and family.

Only love can bring her home again. Love for a child she had feared was lost forever.

And love for the peaceful people who shaped her life. But can love heal old wounds . . . or keep the community safe from a deadly danger?

To read an excerpt of these new titles go to Chapter-a-Week, and to join our deeper discussion of these titles go to Chapter-a-Week Chat at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CAWChat/ where authors and readers discuss new titles together.

If you enjoy Chapter-a-Week take the time to tell a friend how to sign up. It's easy and free and a great way to find books that fit each person's particular reading style.

Tricia Goyer meme contest

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.16.2008

Today, I’m participating in Tricia Goyer’s blog tour featuring her Treasure Meme!

The blog tour is to promote her new book, A Whisper of Freedom.

Battles heat up... not only those being waged by the soldiers on both sides fighting for Spain, but in the hearts and minds of the men and women who must sacrifice more than their dreams in order to save the lives of their loved ones. In this meticulously researched novel, brave and idealistic Sophie, Philip, José, and Deion realize their only hope for freedom is escaping Spain's borders. By continuing the story of this band of volunteers during the Spanish Civil War, A Whisper of Freedom proves that courage and commitment don't always result in outward victory. But there are whispers of hope and freedom that resonate through even the darkest night.

Read an excerpt

During the tour, you can enter to win one of FIVE signed copies of A Whisper of Freedom by signing up for Tricia's newsletter here!

Books one and two: A Valley of Betryal and A Shadow of Treason

Tricia is hosting a meme contest! Three brave "players" will be selected at random to win their own lost gold (Gourmet chocolate coins and all three books in the Chronicles of the Spanish Civil War series). To enter all you have to do is answer the MEME on your blog and then leave a comment on Tricia’s blog tour post here http://triciagoyer.blogspot.com/2008/03/whisper-of-freedom-meme-sticky-post.html that you’ve posted your MEME. Easy.

1. List three things you would do with a chest full of gold (assuming you got to keep it!)

--I would buy a cottage in England. What better place to write? The English air agreed with Jane Austen, why not me and my writer friends (who would of course be welcome anytime)?

--I would buy an alpaca farm. That would be so awesome, to raise and spin my own yarn. Or maybe pay someone else to spin it, depending on how lazy I was.

--I would take the church high school kids on a trip to the Holy Land (pending terrorist attacks).

2. List three charities/missions/organizations you support (and why).

--Zoe International, which works to save high-risk children from the sex slave trade in Thailand. God really laid this organization on my heart. I don’t know why this one out of the tons of others, but it doesn’t really matter as long as this is where God wants me to spend my money.

--Angel Tree, which serves and supports the children of inmates. I’ve been donating to them since my college days, because I really believe in what they’re doing to try to stop the cycle of prisoners’ children also getting into crime.

--Campus Crusade for Christ, specifically a friend of mine who is a long-term missionary in China. The underground church in China really needs our support and prayers.

3. List three ways you have volunteered your time/services.

--I have been working with my church youth group as a staff worker for almost 12 years.

--I lead a worship group for the Sunday service.

--I hold a writers’ group meeting at my house once a month (this is totally fun, not work at all)

4. List three things you keep "hidden" when company comes over.

--The corner storage room door is always CLOSED (assuming there’s enough room to close it—oy!)

--Our bathroom door is always closed, mostly because we’ve locked the dog in there, but also so no one sees the unmade bed and clothes all over the floor.

--I do my best to clean up my scrapbooking stuff from the dining room table so people can actually sit there.

5. List the last three things you've lost.

--My credit card (I’m such a lame-o)

--My digital voice recorder (luckily I found that a day later)

--My tapestry needles for knitting (I still don’t know how I could lose two entire sets!)

6. List the last three things you've found.

--My digital voice recorder

--My Japanese cookies, which had fallen behind my heating pad

--A delicious pair of high heel Anne Klein sandals that I found at Marshall’s—I got the last pair in my size and they were super cheap!

Girls, God, and the Good Life

Captain's Log, Supplemental

Today I’m blogging at Girls, God, and the Good Life about BAGS!

Book giveaway – HEALING PROMISES

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.15.2008

Get free short stories and info on exclusive book giveaways when you subscribe to my newsletter!

The winner of
The Warriors
by
Mark Andrew Olsen is
katy
Congratulations!

Blog book giveaway:

To enter to win today’s book, leave a comment on this blog post, giving your name and saying you want to enter. International readers are welcome to enter!

Please leave an email address or website where I can contact you (please use this format--you [at] yourmail.com--or something like that to prevent spammers from trolling for your email address). It is the winner’s responsibility to check to see if you won and to email me if you haven’t yet heard from me.

I always email the winner and give them a week to reply, but if I don’t receive an answer, I will pull another person to win the book. I am not responsible for a lost opportunity if you leave an email address you don’t check frequently.

You have a week to comment--I'll pick a name out of a hat on Thursday, May 22nd. (BTW, you can post a comment and NOT enter, too.)

Healing Promises
by
Amy Wallace

Facing a new threat.
When FBI Agent Clint Rollins takes a bullet during a standoff, it might just save his life. But not even the ugly things he’s seen during his years working in the Crimes Against Children Unit could prepare him for the overwhelming powerlessness of hospital tests revealing an unexpected diagnosis. If only Sara weren’t retreating into doctor mode…he needs his wife now more than ever.

Frozen in fear.
Sara Rollins is an oncologist with a mission–beating cancer when she can, easing her patients’ suffering at the very least. Now the life of her tall Texan husband is at stake. She never let the odds steal her hope before, but in this case, the question of God’s healing promises is personal. Can she hold on to the truth she claimed to believe?

Faith under fire.
As Clint continues to track down a serial kidnapper despite his illness, former investigations haunt his nightmares, pushing him beyond solving the case into risking his life and career. Clint struggles to believe God is still the God of miracles. Especially when he needs not one, but two. Everything in his life is reduced to one all-important question: Can God be trusted?