Breakthrough #WritePhoto

 

 

“Check this out,” he crouched over some green stuff poking through the pavement.

“Okay,” I squinted. “I give up. What is it?”

“No clue.”

“Let’s go. I don’t like this. It’s not right.”

“Wait,” he reached out.

I grabbed his arm, “Don’t touch it! What the hell?”

“I’m just wondering…” He withdrew his hand but didn’t move.

“My mum says curiosity killed the cat.”

He looked up. “What’s a cat?”

“No idea,” I admitted. “Point is, you’re too curious. Could get you killed.”

“It won’t.”

“It could.”

“Hey! There’s something else with this green stuff. It’s like a…” He snapped his gloved fingers. “Damn. What are those things we learned about in The World Before class?”

I rolled my eyes. “Jerical…this stuff. It’s wrong. I’m serious. It’ll do something to you.”

He grinned. “You’re right. It will.” He lifted his mask.

 

 

 

 

My attempt at #writephoto, a weekly writing prompt for poetry/flash/short stories hosted by Sue Vincent

 

 

Featured On the Reef ~ Hope Denney

 

 

On the Reef is a series featuring fabulous indie authors from around the blogosphere and beyond. Titles, covers, and blurbs that catch my eye, new releases, great reads… Basically, authors I’d like to highlight and works I’d like to share with my fellow book-loving word nerds. Happy Reading!

 

Featured

 

Surrender at Orchard Rest by Hope Denney

Orchard Rest Series
(Book 1)

A Southern Gothic tale of love, loss, and betrayal in the dark days after the Civil War…

Somerset Forrest, a former Civil War nurse, is expected to live up to the legacy of her mother’s crumbling society family and restore them to their former prestige, but she yearns for independence. She’s never gotten over Eric Rutherford, her first love who disappeared years before in the hills along the Chickamauga. As she struggles to find her place among a family all too adept at keeping secrets and tries to make peace with the past, her fiancé Sawyer Russell reveals a secret that threatens the peace of Century Grove, Alabama.

Joseph Forrest, Somerset’s brother, is recovering from a farming accident when Fairlee, his former great love, returns to Century Grove. Joseph wants nothing more than for the two of them to marry, but Fairlee demands change before she can accept his proposal.

And Blanche Forrest, mother to Somerset and Joseph as well as proud mistress of Orchard Rest, struggles to improve her children’s lives while coping with a haunting family tragedy.

 

You can get your copy here: 🙂

Amazon US | Amazon UK

The first in the Orchard Rest Series.

 

About Hope:

Hope Denney writes character-driven novels with a distinctly Southern Gothic voice.

She is currently at work on the fourth novel in the Orchard Rest series as well as two standalone novels.

When she isn’t arguing with her characters, you can find her in the kitchen trying to outdo her last chocolate cake.

Amazon Author Page (Please check out her other books here)

 

On the Reef: The Shark’s Friday Feature

 

Featured On the Reef ~ Judith Barrow

 

 

On the Reef is a series featuring fabulous indie authors from around the blogosphere and beyond. Titles, covers, and blurbs that catch my eye, new releases, great reads… Basically, authors I’d like to highlight and works I’d like to share with my fellow book-loving word nerds. Happy Reading!

 

New Release

 

Secrets by Judith Barrow

In the Shadows Lurks the Truth

Ashford, home of the Howarth family, is a gritty northern mill town, a community of no-nonsense Lancashire folk, who speak their minds and are quick to judge. But how many of them are hiding secrets that wouldn’t stand up to the scrutiny of others?

Judith Barrow’s Howarth Family trilogy, Pattern of Shadows, Changing Patterns and Living in the Shadows, along with the prequel, A Hundred Tiny Threads, published by Honno Press, is peopled with just such characters. Here are some of their secret stories – the girl who had to relinquish her baby, the boy who went to war too young, the wife who couldn’t take any more…

“Judith Barrow has surpassed herself in writing this great family saga… There is such a wealth of fantastic characters to fall in love with and ones to hate!” (Brook Cottage Books)

 

You can get your copy here: 🙂

Amazon US | Amazon UK

 

Judith has another new release: 100 Tiny Threads, which is available for pre-order now. Out in one week: August 17th.

About Judith:

Judith Barrow, originally from Saddleworth, near Oldham, has lived in Pembrokeshire, Wales, for thirty four years. She has BA (Hons) in Literature with the Open University, a Diploma in Drama from Swansea University and a MA in Creative Writing with Trinity College, Carmarthen. She has had short stories, plays, reviews and articles, published throughout the British Isles and has won several poetry competitions. She has completed three children’s books. She is also a Creative Writing tutor.

Website / Blog
Amazon Author Page (Please check out her other books here.)

 

On the Reef: The Shark’s Friday Feature

 

Family Tree #WritePhoto

 

 

He built it, brick by brick.

Carved from boulders in the valley or stones found weathered by time… He stacked them. Each one a testament to his regrets.

He spent his life there, in those mountains, building walls to shut out the world he regretted not being a part of. The one he left when his wife was murdered.

He taught his son the art of isolation, sorrow, and disappointment. And, together, they worked on those walls.

When he died, his son continued the tradition, creating something so spectacular, it rivaled nearby castles.

He held fast to what he had been taught.

But, unlike his father, he planted a seed of hope which grew into a fine tree. Sturdy and beautiful. Clinging to sorrow, growing out of the pile of regrets. It survived where it should not have. Some say it was magic. Others, that it was simply hope.

 

“Do you want to know what I think?”

“What do you think, grandpa?”

“I think that this magic and hope people talk about when they see my tree…I think they are the same thing.”

 

 

 

 

My attempt at #writephoto, a weekly writing prompt for poetry/flash/short stories hosted by Sue Vincent

 

 

Featured On the Reef ~ Rachael Ritchey

 

 

On the Reef is a series featuring fabulous indie authors from around the blogosphere and beyond. Titles, covers, and blurbs that catch my eye, new releases, great reads… Basically, authors I’d like to highlight and works I’d like to share with my fellow book-loving word nerds. Happy Reading!

 

Featured

 

The Beauty Thief by Rachael Ritchey

Chronicles of the Twelve Realms (Book 1)

It will take much more than a kiss to rescue this princess.

The kingdom of Twelve Realms has known war, but under the current high king’s rule peace has come. Goodness abounds, but on the eve of High Prince Theiandar’s wedding to his beautiful and sweet young bride, Princess Caityn of Taisce, an ancient and forgotten evil brings a new chaos to the realms.

The thief who wields an archaic power is merciless.
In secret and under the light of the moon, through the centuries, he has stolen what gives him new life. In return, he transforms comeliness to haggishness and rips everything beautiful from the soul.

The beloved Princess Caityn is left wretched and bankrupt of all the goodness she possessed. Only the purest, deepest, and most compassionate of souls carry the beauty for which the thief longs. But unless Theiandar can unravel the mystery before the fullness of moon, Caityn will be lost to the curse and their love forever hidden in the depths of the thief’s dark heart.

You can get your copy here: 🙂

Amazon US | Amazon UK

 

About Rachael:

 

The Beauty Thief is the first book in her YA series called Chronicles of the Twelve Realms. While she considers the books fantasy because of some of the elements of the stories, they read more like historical fiction. Book two is on its way to completion. She also has a middle grade book started that she hopes to find time to finish, too!

Rachael is an every day wife and mother who writes books she would want to read; she writes stories she’s proud to share with her kids and you. While her goal is to entertain, she also wants to use her writing to inspire courage and compassion.

Being an author, sharing her stories, is about more than selling books.

Website / Blog
Amazon Author Page (Please check out her other books here.)

 

On the Reef: The Shark’s Friday Feature