Book Link

From Amazon:

This is a magical journey through a year in the life of a poet, presented in the format of haiku. Be entertained,and enlightened as you enjoy the worlds of reality and imagination are combined artfully. Dreamers will love this book. Writers will enjoy this book. Readers will enjoy this book. Even those who think they could never appreciate poetry, will enjoy this book. Come and be enchanted by the verbal imagery of A Haiku Perspective 2018.

My Review:

This book is chock full of poetry from chocolate to soft skin, from a new dad to the wonders of life itself, and in every way. She has included or covered most aspects of human life, including cancer and “they got it all” to young love. Five shiny gold stars!

Book Link

From Amazon:

Brady and the Bombii Bumblebee is an endearing account of one of nature’s creatures,presently,on the endangered list. It is an environmentally based story that,not only, illustrates the need for Bumblebee preservation,but also, encourages children of ways, in which, they too can help protect it.

My Review:

I just finished this book, and I found it sweet and endearing for children. Some kids can read it on their and younger kids need it read to them. Children learns about different Bees and the flowers they need for pollination and nectar. The illustrations show kids how Bees build their homes, and encourages plating of flowers to help the Bees so they don’t die out.

Book Link

From Amazon:

Encouraging words raise the spirit and provide strength. Find some encouragement when you need it in this book. You ARE SPECIAL! You ARE WONDERFUL! You ARE A TERRIFIC PERSON! So, GO YOU!!

My Review:

I loved this book! Each poem/phrase is full of positivity which we all need every day. Encouraging others gives positivity to each and, in turn, HOPE! I trulu believe that giving that HOPE, support, and confidence. in turn makes any day a successful day! Essentially, GO YOU! Five shiny gold stars.

Book Link

From Amazon:

“Housie Mousie and Ratty Rat, two adventurous rodents living in a barn boot, embark on a thrilling journey to participate in The Big Cheese Race, a prestigious event in the Cotswolds. Along the way, they befriend a cast of animal characters, including beavers and a mischievous dog, while uncovering a plot to steal the coveted Big Cheese. With courage and teamwork, they thwart the thieves and share their winnings with their newfound friends, ensuring a happy ending filled with friendship and cheese.”

My Review:

I read this book, and it’s a sweet book for kids, whether they read it or it is read to them. The story is entertaining, and kids learn all about animals, rodents, and people at the time of The Big Cheese roll down a hill. From the beginning, adventures start with one mouse and a rat. They figure out a way to make a raft for them to take down the river so they can be at the cheese roll. Ingenious ideas are used for paddling, a ship sail, and so much more in each chapter. A happy ending does happen, even with potential thieves planning to steal the cheese ball and make more cheese balls with chefs in France. Those would be crooks found a way to turn their evil into good, and that’s important as a concept for kids.

Book Title: The Sight of Heather

Author: Ally Stirling

Publication Date: September 15^th, 2023

Publisher: Author Ally Stirling

Page Length: 338

Genre: Historical Women’s Fiction / Scottish Folklore

Twitter Handle: @authorAllyS @cathiedunn

Instagram Handle: @authorallystirling @thecoffeepotbookclub

Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #WomensFiction #ScottishFolklore #BlogTour #CPBC #TheCoffeePotBookClub

Tour Schedule Page:  https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2023/08/blog-tour-the-sight-of-heather-by-ally-stirling.html

Book Title and Author Name:

The Sight of Heather

Ally Stirling

Blurb:

For centuries, the fae folk and spae women of Scotland were feared – and persecuted.

Life in the 1800s countryside, with its unforgiving climate, was both magnificent and harsh – testing cultures, beliefs and the loyalties of crofters.

The first in this series, The Sight of Heather, begins a journey of allegiance, sacrifice, and fortitude in a land of bold, resilient women.

Jessie’s ideal life spirals when she learns she is a first daughter in a biological line of ‘spaes’ endowed with unique gifts of spiritual sight and healing, aided by powerful ancestral stones.

Backed by a vindictive priest intent on charging Jessie with murder and witchcraft, the new owner of the Cruachan Manor plots to rout the spaes and destroy their beloved forest.

Despite grave warnings and family conflict, Jessie determinedly pursues her skills and powers, plunging her family and village into danger.

Resolute in uplifting her fellow women, Jessie consults her stones.

Faced with those who deem her evil, she must choose to relinquish her craft, or sacrifice herself to protect her culture and kin – and Lily, the next first daughter – the future of the spaes.

Snippet 2:

Charles folded his arms and a smirk crept out from under his moustache. He cocked his head. “Why do people live here if they struggle to make a living?” 

The vice returned, squeezing the strength from Angus’s voice. “We’ve lived here for centuries … we have no desire to live anywhere else, this is our home.” 

The words floated over Charles’s head, missing his ears by a country mile. “Why would the previous owners be happy with such an unprofitable arrangement?” 

The words escaped from Angus’s mouth before he could arrest them. “Because they were Scottish.”

Buy Links:

Universal Link: https://mybook.to/The_Sight_Of_Heather

Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CFVV28FV

Amazon US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CFVV28FV

Amazon AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0CFVV28FV

Amazon AU: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0CFVV28FV

Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/books/1144046886?ean=2940167577664

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/fr/en/ebook/the-sight-of-heather

iBooks: https://books.apple.com/fr/book/the-sight-of-heather/id6465249946

Author Bio:

Ally Stirling is a Fiction writer of Scottish origin, currently living in Cape Town with her Braveheart husband, awesome children, the happiest dog in the world, and her menacing cat (aka ‘Devil Cat’).

An unexpected gift resulting in a prophetic message prompted Ally to give her passion for writing the time it demanded, and in 2018 she joined Cathy Eden’s Working with Words writers group. She credits the love, support, and inspiration of this group of talented women, her ‘writing tribe’ for encouraging her to put words on paper. She also joined (ROSA,) and while Romance is not her genre, this association has been an invaluable source of knowledge and insight into the indie publishing world.

Allowing her imagination freedom to roam resulted in various short stories, before one in particular rooted itself, evolving into her first full-length novel. This book has now become first in a series, with the second and third ready to follow, four and five in the planning stage. Who knew her characters would be so demanding.

Her love of writing fiction stems from her belief that it transports us to magical places when life gets too real.

Addicted to her friends, coffee, every colour of wine, and any type of chocolate, she describes her clan as the family and friends who have built her castle and keep her sane, without whom she’d be short on humour and drinking games.

Author Links:

Website: https://www.authorallystirling.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/authorAllyS

Facebook: https://facebook.com/authorallystirling

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authorallystirling

Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/books/the-sight-of-heather-a-journey-of-loyalty-sacrifice-and-fortitude-in-the-face-of-persecution-by-ally-stirling

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Ally-Stirling/author/B0CG6TJT5T?

Goodreads: https://bit.ly/3P9HmWl

Book Link

From Amazon:

Life has been rough for Abby. Then, just as her bills start to pile up, she finds a diamond necklace on the floor of her local market. What seems to be a solution only adds to her troubles as Abby struggles with doing what she thinks is right or doing what she needs.

My Review:

Bravo! In my opinion, this short story is a perfect read for anyone age 12 and up, especially women. Not only is book about great love and great loss, it’s chock full of wonderful sentimental moments and memories, and more. The ending came aa a truly pleasant surprise. Five shiny gold stars!

Book Link

From Amazon:

When Amanda Garrett stumbles across a strange artifact in the woods, she has no idea of the dangerous secret it holds. The teen soon discovers that she has unwittingly released Erol, an imprisoned jinni, and whether she likes it or not, they are bound together until death. Amanda’s life soon begins to spiral out of control and she finds herself orphaned, kidnapped, and thrust into a terrifying reality. Her captor is convinced that Erol knows the whereabouts of a powerful relic which has been hidden from him and he wants the pair to retrieve it. Still reeling from her loss, and hoping to be spared further pain, Amanda agrees. As the pair set off on their journey and Amanda learns more about the existence of the realms and the magical beings which reside within them, the clearer it becomes that nothing is quite as it seems. After Amanda discovers the power of the relic that her captor seeks, the only thing she knows for certain is that her true suffering has only just begun, because no matter how great the sacrifice, she can never allow the relic to fall into her captor’s hands. Rise is a fast-paced introductory novel to an alternate world where mundane humans are oblivious to the existence of the realms that separate them from other magical races. When she feels, the darkness closing in around her, Amanda is not sure if she can hold onto a single speck of light, and soon she comes to understand that some secrets are better left buried. (YA Dark Fantasy)

My Review:

This book is great for those who like reading dark young adult books. This is not my own preference to read, but I buy and read many genres of books as I prefer to be well-rounded in the books I read. This book has multiple realms or planes of different beings. One girl, a human, ends up in more than one realm after her father dies in a house fire. She must remain strong throughout the narrative and be willing to open her eyes to the different environments and beings that reside in them. Examples are human plane, arcane plane, Jinn plane, dark and more. Some beings can be trapped in a bottle, and others can handle large black diamonds, which gives strength and power to those allowed to hold them. Included in this novel, book one of four, are a myriad world’s unseen by most. Goddesses created planes from clay and added their own preferred beings. Not all beings like each other, and the Goddesses try to outdo each other during creation. The book is chock full of unimaginable beings and their powers, or lack thereof. Five shiny gold stars.

Book Link

From Amazon:

An exciting story of love, romance and tear-jerking reality, from international bestselling author, Lizzie Chantree.

Have you ever felt invisible?

Working as a stationery supervisor and a sitter to a pair of internet famous, delinquent dogs, wasn’t how former cyber-specialist, Olivia, imagined her life turning out. Sitting in a tiny cubicle with a decrepit computer and being overlooked had suited her for a while, but now she was fed up, lonely and determined to make the world ‘see’ her again.

Heartbreaker, Darius, wants to fill Olivia’s days with romance and adventure, but their love of technology has taken them on very different paths, forcing her to leave her past behind.

Gorgeous undercover policeman Gabe, is steadfast in finding out if Olivia is part of an online scam. Someone is stealing money from high profile men, but something doesn’t feel right and he suspects someone else is manipulating her life. But why?

Can true love blossom from the most deceptive of starts? Can someone who feels lost, find a way to flourish against all odds?

My Review:

This novel is truly an unusual romance, which is a good thing. Not one, but several romances going on amid a delicious and compelling narrative filled with hackers, police, dogs, millions of dollars, and did I say it’s also rather salacious at times? I loved the way the use of computers was used for both good and bad. IT has come a long way, yet oftentimes, IT think they have everything covered, only to find out that it wasn’t and their companies ripe for hackers. The story is hilarious as well. Five stars.

Media Kit

Book Title: The London Forgery

Series: A Fabiola Bennett Mystery

Author: Heidi Eljarbo

Publication Date: 29^th August 2023

Publisher: self-published

Page Length: about 252

Genre: Historical Mystery / dual timeline historical fiction

Twitter Handles: @HeidiEljarbo @cathiedunn

Instagram Handles: @authorheidieljarbo @thecoffeepotbookclub

Hashtags: #TheLondonForgery #fabiolabennett #DualTimelineMystery #BlogTour #TheCoffeePotBookClub

Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2023/07/blog-tour-london-forgery-by-heidi-eljarbo.html

Book Title and Author Name:

The London Forgery

A Fabiola Bennett Mystery

Heidi Eljarbo

Blurb:

1973. Art historian Fabiola Bennett sees herself as a prudently observant deer who becomes a daring and even mischievous lioness if the situation calls for it. And that’s exactly what’s required when greedy criminals steal, forge, and tamper with treasured artwork. When the crooks add murder to their list of crimes, the chaos is complete.

A mysterious note is delivered anonymously at the door of the National Gallery in London, and the director immediately calls Fabiola’s office in Oslo and pleads with her to come without delay. The message is confusing, but it seems one of her favorite eighteenth-century portraits is in trouble.

Fabiola hops on the first plane and meets up with her vibrant side-kick Pippa Yates and the ever-loyal Detective Inspector Cary Green from New Scotland Yard. But she is not naïve enough to think untangling the purpose and meaning of the mysterious note will be as simple as a walk in Hyde Park. These things never are.

1750. Newly married Robert and Frances Andrews, members of the landed gentry of Suffolk, England, hire young and talented Thomas Gainsborough to paint their wedding portrait. Their desire is a lovely conversation piece showing their wealth and class, an artwork to remember them by for generations to come.

Little do they know the gifted artist portrays their personalities exactly how he perceives them, and the artistic symbolism is not as flattering as they’d hoped for. Even the looming clouds in the distance promise a troublesome future.

This is the first book in a new dual timeline series by Heidi Eljarbo—an intriguing spin-off from the much-loved Soli Hansen Mysteries.

Fans of Lucinda Riley, Rhys Bowen, Kathleen McGurl, Kate Morton, and Katherine Neville will love this cozy historical art mystery, which takes the readers back to the nostalgia of the groovy seventies and the classical Georgian era of the eighteenth century.

Guest Post – The London Forgery

Dual timeline novels are a lot of fun to read. Most often, they fall into the historical fiction category…or at least one of the stories does. Many dual timeline books have one part in the present and the other part in a chosen time in history. My books’ main story is often set in the past, and the second story even further back in time.

For me it’s a win-win situation. I love history; art history, clothing history, how people related to each other in a different time, social life, superstition, beliefs, habits, politics between countries, the difference between aristocrats and poor people, and good and bad… The list is endless.

Imagine walking into a village two hundred years ago. What would you see, hear, taste, feel, and smell? Horses’ hooves clip-clop on the street, a young boy shouts the news from a corner, a woman stirs a pot of pea soup, another has a pan with fried fish to sell. A dog runs down the street with a string of sausages in his mouth, the butcher after the hound, and a group of young boys after the butcher. Church bells peel, and garbage in the back street stinks. The novel should grab you and take you on a journey into that world as if you were there, living the story.

When I research, I read original books from the era I’ve chosen, peruse countless articles, study old paintings, read historical fiction, and look up details about anything from potatoes and hats to the political status of the country.

The London Forgery’s main story takes place in 1973. Fifty years or more is considered historical fiction. I was a young teenager in 1973. Does that make me historical? The fun thing is that I can remember much from that time. I often wore long skirts and dresses and loved my orange platform shoes. The music was fabulous, and some of my favorites were Petula Clark, Cliff Richard, and Glenn Campbell. Back then, my bedroom had green walls and sported a bright-orange plastic lampshade. A small transistor radio tuned to Radio Luxembourg sat on the windowsill. Still, I researched many things to make sure I nailed the feeling of that decade.

Our protagonist is a Norwegian art historian called Fabiola Bennett. With her art expertise and knack for solving mysteries, she is called upon by the director of the National Gallery in London to help him understand why someone has left a mysterious, anonymous note at his doorstep. A famous Georgian painting from 1750 could be in trouble.

The second story in The London Forgery takes the reader back to the talented painter Thomas Gainsborough at the time when he was asked to paint a portrait of newlyweds Robert and Frances Andrews. There’s much information about both Gainsborough and the sitters. I listened to lectures and discussions about the artist and the painting named Mr. and Mrs. Andrews. I was touched to learn about how gifted he was, and the great love he had for his wife Margaret.

So, The London Forgery’s double plot has two parallel storylines that intersect. They may differ in time periods, characters, and settings, but they become unified through Thomas Gainsborough and his painting. Fabiola jumps in with both feet, starting a chase to find out what happened to the painting. Beside her are her two best friends, the vibrant Pippa and Cary, who happens to be a detective inspector at New Scotland Yard. Fabiola is quick, clever, and spontaneous, but sometimes ridiculously courageous…in fact, too much so for her own safety.

Happy reading!

Buy Links:

This title is available to read on #KindleUnlimited

Universal Link: https://books2read.com/u/3LjPX1

Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0C53S311M

Amazon US: https://www.amzn.com/B0C53S311M

Amazon CA: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0C53S311M

Amazon AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0C53S311M

Author Bio:

Heidi Eljarbo is the bestselling author of historical fiction and mysteries filled with courageous and good characters that are easy to love and others you don’t want to go near.

Heidi grew up in a home filled with books and artwork and she never truly imagined she would do anything other than write and paint. She studied art, languages, and history, all of which have come in handy when working as an author, magazine journalist, and painter.

After living in Canada, six US states, Japan, Switzerland, and Austria, Heidi now calls Norway home. She and her husband have fifteen grandchildren—so far—in addition to a bouncy Wheaten Terrier.

Their favorite retreat is a mountain cabin, where they hike in the summertime and ski the vast, white terrain during winter.

Heidi’s favorites are family, God’s beautiful nature, and the word whimsical.

Author Links:

Website: https://www.heidieljarbo.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/HeidiEljarbo

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorheidieljarbo/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authorheidieljarbo/

Pinterest: https://no.pinterest.com/heidieljarbo/

Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/heidi-eljarbo

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Heidi-Eljarbo/e/B073D852VG/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16984270.Heidi_Eljarbo

Book Link

From Amazon:

Darcie Quinn

I don’t date. I don’t need to date. Tis something I’ve believed my entire life. After escaping from my past and my hometown, I didn’t think I’d meet anyone who could change that but I didn’t bank on coming face to face with an Adonis in a suit either. I’m supposed to resist him but with his sparkling ocean eyes drawing me in, I don’t think I can.

Denny Blanc

No commitments, no feelings and no complications – rules I’ve sworn by my whole life. Rules that help to keep my shadows at bay.

Until an Irish siren calls to me and makes me want to break free from my rules and make her mine, always.

One word fills my thoughts, makes me feel whole and terrifies me at the same time: MINE!

Author’s Note: A steamy, love at first sight story, with a few unexpected twists thrown in along the way.

*Trigger warning – This book contains discussions of violence, depression and panic attacks. It also has parental abuse – parent to adult and past parental abuse as well. There is a guaranteed HEA though.

My Review:

I expected some sort of love story, and I did find that, and much more. Attraction at first sight does happen with some couples. Try thinking this story has multiple love stories throughout the narrative. Ugliness rears an ugly head here and there throughout as well. With huge love comes huge loss. No, that is left for the next reader to find out. Toss in a bit of Irish, and I’m a bit Irish, a madman, crazy lunatic of a father who never was (a bit of mystery here for you). Right now, I’m yearning for some new baby sniffs. The past is hard to let go of, but you will read how that past is overcome. FYI: The f word is used throughout, so that is added for those who don’t like reading books with that word. Five shiny gold stars!