Dreamland Book Blog: March 2015

Hi guys!

2015 will be a different year for me and I am determined to be more active in blogging as part of my Blogger's New Years Resolutions. Instead of the usual reading and reviewing, I decided to come up with my own features to make my blog more interactive and fun!

So what is Blogger of the Month all about?

Every month, I will invite a favourite blogger friend of mine to do a guest post about a topic that includes everything under the sun!
This feature will run for the entire month.
Feel free to ask any questions - remember this is an interactive post!
If you have any interesting topics you would want the blogger to discuss about, feel free to leave a comment down below or send me a private email at natshane94aa@gmail.com.

For the month of March, I am so excited to have a fellow blogger who I enjoyed working with. She organized the best blog tours I had ever participated in, and she is so very efficient! (Okay, I admire this trait). Conversing with her through emails have been fun and lovely!

I'm an avid reader and I've been in love with the printed page since I was child. My devotion has only increased as I've gotten older. My reading frenzy began with my Grandmother and her collection of vintage Nancy Drew books. I now have my own almost-complete set of hardcover books and about 75% of the Nancy Drew Files paperbacks. I love a good mystery.

Along the way I discovered my absolute love for anything vampire, which then lead to dragons, demons, ghosts, and other paranormal entities. I thank my sister for introducing me to Charlaine Harris, J.R. Ward, and Stephanie Meyer. Some of my other favorite authors are Katie MacAlister, P.C. Cast (House of Night rocks!), Richelle Mead (Vampire Academy also rocks!), and Barbara Bretton (Sugar Maple series rocks!), and Jana Oliver. Do you see a theme here? I've searched and found other authors like Merrie Destefano, Kerrelyn Sparks, Christine Warren, Kim Harrison, Tracey O'Hara, and Amber Scott and I can't wait to get lost in their stories.

Saturday, March 28, 2015 5 comments

Title: The Daring Assignment

Author: Victoria Bright

Publication Date: March 17, 2015

Series: A Curvy Assignments Novel

Publisher: BookTrope

I didn’t mean to hurt anyone, especially him…

I was living the dream. I had a great career as a romance author, a successful boyfriend, and am the daughter to a New York power couple. With my standing, my family groomed me to be perfect. Despite having it all, something was still missing.

In an attempt to break away from my privileged, suffocating life, I was in pursuit of finding my own path to happiness. After my literary agent gave me a risky writing assignment, I set out to write a best-seller that took me completely out of my comfort zone and into the arms of another man. He was only supposed to be a research toy, falling in love wasn’t a part of the plan. As I become tangled into a huge web of lies, I quickly find out that I have a life changing decision to make. Do I choose to continue living a life of comfort, stability, and misery or do I take a chance on the unknown to preserve my happiness?

Goodreads | Amazon

Victoria Bright is from a small town in North Carolina and currently resides in Greenville, South Carolina. She has been writing since she was in the eighth grade, starting with small short stories. As her classmates began showing interest in her work, she began to write longer stories, filling multiple spiral notebooks with her thoughts. During her freshman year in high school, her English teacher encouraged her to enter a writing contest in which she won local, region and state levels. She has entered many writing contests since and have won a few. Figuring out she had a passion to share stories with anyone who would listen, she set out to write her first book Love Unbroken.

Victoria is very versatile in the genre of books she likes to read. Her bookchoice mostly varies on her mood, but she is particularly interested in crime stories, romance, teen fiction, sci-fi, and is now venturing a little in paranormal fiction. As for her own writing, she doesn't really put it into a category or genre. She just writes whatever is on her mind and lets it create itself!

Author Links:

Goodreads | Facebook | Website

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Top 10 places you’d like to visit in Europe:

1. Paris (I definitely would like to see the Eiffel Tower at night)

2. Berlin (Seeing the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe would be informative)

3. Barcelona (It just seems romantic)

4. Rome (SO much history to be immersed in!)

5. Prague (Its architecture would probably make me feel as if I were sucked into a historical romance or something)

6. Venice (To go on a gondola ride down the Grand Canal!)

7. London (To view the city from the Tower Bridge)

8. Verona (Just so I could make Romeo and Juliette references lol)

9. Florence (To indulge in classic art)

10. Amsterdam (To visit the Anne Frank House)

Top 10 Favorite Things

1. Gatorade (preferably Cool Blue!)

2. Mac & Cheese

3. The Sims

4. Call of Duty

5. The beach

6. Writing (duh lol)

7. The color pink

8. Peanut butter

9. Cooking games

10. Learning/Researching

Top 10 Favorite Movies

1. The Great Gatsby (2013 version)

2. Bring It On

3. My Sister’s Keeper (although it makes me super sad)

4. Saw (all of them)

5. Halloween (all of them)

6. Nightmare on Elm Street (all of them)

7. The Interview

8. Olympus Has Fallen

9. The Other Woman

10. Transformers (all of them)

One look at the cover, and yes, I'm taken away, just like how Arianna was taken away by her "subject" or "specimen" as I like to call him.

To be stuck in a loveless marriage, or to love without freedom.

That is a question that always had me pondering. The Daring Assignment had beautifully woven a story that perfectly fits into the question, and I was more than excited to see how the story unfolds! Set in Arianna's POV, it was a journey of self discovery as she try to build her confidence and expand beyond her comfort zone - I mean, I can't write an erotic romance without using bananas to describe a man's genitals! -

Julius is an a**, a few chapters into the book and I would just like to kick the guy in the never-mind-where. I absolutely despise a guy who would ridicule a woman's looks just because she wasn't perfect, but it completely baffles me to learn that despite all that, Ariana still loves him, of course until Zane appears.

I love the book from the very beginning, besides its amazing supporting characters ( I would totally love a friend like Gia!), Arianna is a strong character who is able to find it within herself to break free and find happiness, and nothing is more important than finding the that one thing in life. Happiness fuels life! :)

It was not a happy ending, but a perfect one indeed! Can't wait to read the sequel!

If you are looking for a good book to curl up with, you have just found the right one!

This tour was organized by Good Tales Book Tours.

Wednesday, March 25, 2015 2 comments

A word, a single word defines a moment for Anne. She needs to find a new one when her spouse leaves her at the age of 47, coming out of the closet literally in a closet. She finds herself back in her hometown amongst her high school friends which she left behind in her past.

An inheritance from a friend leaves her with the means to meddle and spy on the lives of some of their mutual acquaintances. In an attempt to run from her reality Anne gets engrossed in a game of "fun" and "flirtation" with her friend and fellow sufferer Connie at her side. Anne however did not read all the files and what to her is fun games turns into a deadly reality. It is no longer a game.

Life, death and not even a defining word can stop the reality of manipulation.

Buy Links:

Goodreads I Amazon

~ Character Sketches ~

The characters in Defined by Others are predominantly women. They are all flawed and for the most part very superficial. Some of their flaws are surprising and others are logical.

I chose women born in the year 1965, I did this to work with a play on Chinese Astrology. I made them 47 years old as the book takes place in 2012, one of the characteristics of female snakes according to Chinese Astrology is that they are all very beautiful.

I wanted characters that were superficial and very worried about their physique and how others see them; thus being defined by the opinions of others.

The women have a connection as teens from growing up in the same affluent town in the American Northeast. The story is fueled by who they are at 47 and who they were at 17.

ANNE is one of the main characters and the story is told from her point of view, in her voice. She is fluent in many languages and loves words. She likes to define every moment with just one word. Her husband recently left her, and he left her broken and confused. Divorce is hard at any age, but divorce because the man you shared almost two decades with realizes he is gay must be brutal

Anne has a nice side, she is forgiving of her husband, she tries to get into his skin and appreciate that his confusion, she is still however so confused and vulnerable that when life presents her with a way to make other’s suffer as she has, she is pretty quick to grab it.

She has adolescent twins, she is however a very detached parent, as the story evolves she identifies that she continued the family pattern with which she was raised.

In the course of the story she has to make numerous life changing decisions. Anne is in a journey of self-discovery and she has likable and dark traits.

CONNIE is also a main character, she is curiously linked to Anne because her respective husbands have fallen for each other and left them. Connie has been carrying the pain and confusion longer than Anne. She is broken and lonely and in Anne she sees the possibility of a friend, ally or at the very least fellow sufferer.

Like Anne she does not blame the man who left her, and respects that as the father of her children, she needs to wish him nothing but the very best.

She loves to nurture and to cook. She goes completely against her nurturing nature as the story evolves, because she is so hurt, confused and unbalanced.

As much as Connie chooses to also manipulate those she sees as her foes, there is a very tender and likable side to Connie. She loves her children very deeply and is very lost when the main focus of her life changes; she was born to be the quintessential mom.

AMANDA is dead, during the entire story-line she manipulates with her legacy from the very grave. She was ravaged by an illness that magnified her negative traits, and if the other characters are to be believed there was nothing positive about Amanda.

As the story progresses I do give Amanda a background a reason to be so dark, I did so because otherwise the character would be too flat or cartoon like as an image of pure evil.

During her illness she devices away to be cruel and most involved with the women in her past and present. Upon her death (not a spoiler this is the opening of the book) she leaves her “game” to Anne, it is a game of manipulation and deceit through social media.

ALLISON is mean, she identified as Amanda’s mean girl side-kick but she too is a victim of the manipulation game. I have had readers contact me, and it is indeed Allison they seem to dislike the most, I did not feel a need to give her as much depth or an excuse for her nastiness, as she is a secondary character. I just wanted to show that although she is vulnerable, she is also a natural leader.

She is clever and assumes she is far cleverer than she really is. As I wrote Defined by Others I did want Allison to be a sort of live walking continuum to Amanda’s nasty side.

PETER is the only male in the story who is very present, the husbands are in the sidelines. Peter is a lawyer, he connects with Anne at the beginning of the book as Amanda’s lawyer.

He is kind and understanding, he falls for Anne and he falls hard, he is also divorced and as such looking for a new way to fit in. He is not privy to Anne and Connie’s machinations, but he does suspect they are up to no good.

I wanted Peter to be a very easy man to love, intelligent, successful, and vulnerable. I had to make him vulnerable by having his ex drop him in a cruel and hurtful way. I made him Amanda’s reluctant lawyer so that he would be aware that Anne had inherited something odd and questionable from Amanda, I did not want to turn him into a detective, he needed some level of awareness to make him believable.

I also had him fall in love with Anne, but fall in love with Connie’s cooking and thus forming a strong bond with both women.

MRS. G. (Anne’s mother) is a character that is as much represented by her dialogue and appearances throughout the story as she is by her “secret room”. Mrs. G. was a liberal adventuresome lady who is also defined by others, and as such she pretends to be as conservative as those who surround her world.

She has a special room, full of New Age Books and other secrets, she is as such very present throughout the story.

M.C.V. Egan is the pen name chosen by Maria Catalina Vergara Egan the author of The Bridge of Deaths and Defined by Others. Catalina is originally from Mexico City, Mexico. She has lived in France, Sweden and various parts of the U.S.A.

She has called South Florida her home for the last twenty-five years; she is a writer, a mother a wife and a pretty good cook.

Her first book The Bridge of Deaths is available in two different versions, her book Defined by Others is the first in a series Defining Ways exploring what makes us flawed and human.

Book two Climbing Up The Family Tree; Defined by Pedigree will be released in November 2015.

Contact the Author:

Website I Defining Ways Blog I Facebook I Twitter I Goodreads I Google+ I LinkedIn I Youtube

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UPDATES:

I sincerely apologize for the delay in my posting! I was supposed to post yesterday as scheduled in the tour but my computer broke down and it was being repaired for the past week so I couldn't have access to my blog! And I had been busy with my oratory competition last weekend that made life
so hectic (will be blogging about the experience end of this week! Till then, have a great week!)

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Wednesday, March 25, 2015 2 comments

Title: The Core

Series: Equilibrium Series I

Author: Kate Thomas

Release Date: February 12th

Publisher: Patchwork Press

There’s something strange about David, something that goes beyond the way he makes Ellie feel. He’s wealthy, poised, and a complete enigma. With nothing to lose but her heart, Ellie goes in search of the truth — a search that leads her down an eye-opening path that reveals secrets about the world she thought she knew.The world’s order is held in careful balance, the essence of good and evil tilting the scale. When the fabric of reality is stripped away, Ellie is forced to make a decision to follow the path David’s constructed before her or simply walk away. The Core is missing and someone must step up and stand between the light and darkness, holding each back and maintaining equilibrium.

Goodreads | Amazon

“You do realize that there is absolutely no chance of us actually getting away with this, right?” Ellie whispered loudly in the small confines of the car.

“There’s no need to whisper. We’re in a car by ourselves, Elle.” Jacob kept his eyes on the car in front of them, the large figure of his sister’s boss moving languidly from the Lincoln to cross the busy street. “Besides, it’s the holidays, and it’s far too busy in this neighborhood for Mr. Kelley to notice us.”

A soft sigh resounded beside him, and sounds of fidgeting filled the air. Ellie was rarely the type to be nervous or overcome with emotion of any sort. If anyone was capable of a stakeout operation, it was most certainly his twin sister. She was only a few minutes older than him, but years ahead in maturity and intellectual curiosities, to be sure. He smiled as he felt the overwhelming heat of her stare. Paying her no attention would be more fun than giving in to her well-founded fits of worry.

“I know you know I’m looking at you, Jacob.” Her punch was much too light to be anything but playful.

He glanced her way only briefly, a smirk on his mouth his only response. He was used to responding non-verbally.

“It’s not me you should be watching, but your illustrious boss. I didn’t come out in the freezing cold to spend my night in a car, hanging out with my bratty older sister. I came to see if I could help you get a few answers. Pay attention!” He turned the heater up, and the previously fogged window cleared, showing a row of beautifully decorated mansions.

Christmas was in full effect on Ebert Street, and the wealthy citizens of the neighborhood spent loads outdoing their friends and family. Their study for the evening was a Mr. David Kelley, Ellie’s boss for the last two years. He was an investor of other people’s money, a financial advisor by some standards and a bookie by others.

“I am paying attention, but I don’t know what you expect to find by sitting outside of a luxurious home in the middle of winter. It’s the holidays, so yes, David goes to parties and wines and dines the rich and famous. What did you think we would find tonight?” She added softly, “I didn’t even ask you to come.”

Jacob turned to face his sister. “You most certainly did ask me to come. You’ve been bitching for the last two years about your boss’s oddities, and it was you that wanted to start looking into his personal life.”

“Not his personal life, but I wanted to see what it is that he does with his time.” She turned to face him as well, a defiant look spreading across her features. “How does someone make more money than God and never really DO anything? Besides, you’ve been wanting a reason to see the Christmas lights in Westchester for years.”

“Christmas lights, pff …” He rolled his eyes. “I want to hear it or I’m leaving.”

“Hear what?” Confusion spread across her features.

“I want to hear that you asked me to come, and that this is your operation.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Jacob.”

He turned to face the windshield and moved to put the car in reverse before her hand clamped down on his shoulder. “Fine. Fine. You’re such a child, but if I need to say it, I will. I wanted you to help me figure out who my boss really is and what he’s up to. There, I said it.”

Jacob put his hands in his lap and looked back at his sister. “Why?”

“Why what?”

He sighed before continuing. “Why did you want me to help you? You’ve been with Mr. Kelley for the last two years. Why now?”

Ellie began fidgeting again, her eyes moving from his face to focus somewhere in her lap as her fingers brushed by one another. She didn’t speak for a minute, and he didn’t give her comfort or afford her any alternative besides answering him. He’d been pulled into this unfounded operation, and he deserved a reason for the sudden change in her behavior. She glanced at him and then exhaled loudly, as if realizing that she was, in fact, going to have to share some information that she must’ve wanted to keep to herself.

“Fine. I wanted to know what he was doing because he’s so mysterious, and I’ve yet to figure out what it is that he does. Not to mention that every time I see him I’m reminded of how unbelievably attractive he is. Maybe my only motive is that I just wanted to sit here and stare at him.”

“Liar. Sell that crap to someone else. Tell me the truth or my car and I are outta here.”

“What? He’s hot!” She paused and received a look from her brother that pushed her to continue. “God, you’re so difficult at times. I would totally do this with you if you asked, and I wouldn’t give a rat’s ass why you wanted me to.”

“That’s a lie too. You’d never do this in a million years with me, and you’d most likely call me creepy for wanting to do it. Enough … why are we here? What did you see? Or did you hear something?”

“Both. A few days ago I came in an hour early, and the smell of Clorox hit me in the face like nothing you’ve ever smelled. I dropped my things quietly and walked down to Mr. Kelley’s office, peeking in to see if everything was alright.” She paused and looked at Jacob and then back toward her hands, her large chestnut gaze filled with foreign emotion. “He was only in his slacks, and parts of his chest and back were covered in what looked like blood. There was blood on his floor and a bit on the walls.”

“Good God, Elle. Did you call the police? Was he hurt, or did someone get hurt?”

“That’s the weird part. I never saw anything but the blood and, being a bit overwhelmed by it, I simply left and called in sick that day. I wasn’t sure what to do about it. I can’t imagine him hurting someone, since he’s such a pillar of the community and such. Besides, what if it wasn’t blood, or what if he’d cut his finger or something?”

“Cut his finger? Don’t you think the amount of blood or whatever would be slightly less than what you’re describing from a papercut? Just because he gives to the people around him doesn’t mean he’s not a monster underneath all that Daddy Warbucks stuff.”

She nodded and sunk down in her seat as the large figure jogged back from the house toward his car. The man stopped before getting into the back seat of the Lincoln and focusing for a minute on Jacob’s car, the tilt of his head and bend of his neck telling Jacob one thing—he wasn’t looking at Jacob, but at Ellie.

“We need to go,” she whispered and covered her face with her small hands.

L.A. Starkey is the author of the upcoming Soul Keeper Series, a supernatural young adult series, and The Liarus Detective Series, a supernatural middle grade series.

She is a CPA by trade, a church planter and entrepreneur at heart; however, writing and reading are passions she just can't help but indulge in. With more ideas than one person should be allowed, she is blessed to have a muse that doesn't seem to take a vacation and more energy that one might consider healthy.

She writes under the following pen names:

L.A Starkey - YA/MG Paranormal

Kate Thomas - NA/Adult Paranormal

Isabella James - Sci-fi/Fantasy

Lauren Elizabeth - Adult Contemporary Romance

Author Links:

Goodreads | Twitter | Website

This tour was organized by Good Tales Book Tours.

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Wednesday, March 18, 2015 1 comments

Title: Travel Glasses

Series: The Call to Search Everywhen

Author: Chess Desalls

Publication Date: May 7, 2014

Calla Winston’s mobile devices sit in a corner of her room, covered in dust. Weeks ago, she shared photos and laughs with her best online friend. Now, after having felt the sting of betrayal, she prefers being hidden and friendless. She equates privacy with security and technology with pain.

Then she meets Valcas, an otherworldly time traveler who traverses time and space with a pair of altered sunglasses. When an ethereal being knocks Calla to the ground near her family’s lakeside cottage, Valcas uses the Travel Glasses to help her escape. He offers his further protection in exchange for a promise. Intrigued by Valcas and the possibility of time travel, Calla accepts. That is until she learns that his search for her was no mere coincidence.

Calla sets off on her own, taking the Travel Glasses with her. Torn between searching for her estranged father and reuniting with the rest of her family, she tracks down the inventor of the Travel Glasses in hopes of discovering more about Valcas’ past and motivations. The Travel Glasses take Calla’s mistrust of technology to all new levels. But without them, she’ll never make it back home. With Valcas hot on her trail, Calla hopes to find what she’s looking for before he catches up.

Goodreads | Amazon

THE FIREPLACE glowed and crackled behind me as the light of the flames reflected off of Valcas’ lenses. I sipped tea while sitting cross-legged on a sleeping bag.

“Time travel is possible and has been in operation for a long time,” he began. “There are at least two known methods of travel. This,” he said as he removed his glasses and handed them to me. “Is my way.”

Valcas’ sunglasses did not look extraordinary. They were large enough to block light from the front and sides. Both the frames and lenses were of a similar black opaque material, light and smooth like plastic. The tops and sides of each rounded rectangular lens were shuttered. I turned the glasses in my hands, looking them over, expecting to see a power switch and control buttons. There weren’t any. Still holding the glasses in my hands, I looked up at Valcas—I was finally going to see his eyes. When I did, I froze.

“Calla?”

Transfixed, my eyes locked onto his. I couldn’t move them away no matter how hard I tried. Green and brown were both wrong. Valcas’ eyes were of the palest blue I’d ever seen, a milky silver-blue, with an iridescent shimmer. Too eerie to be beautiful, they appeared fake, unnatural, like holographic images fixed onto his face.

Valcas grabbed the glasses out of my hands and covered his eyes. “I’m sorry. I should have warned you first.”

For some reason it bothered me when he sounded pained.

“How am I supposed to help you?” I asked.

His brows furrowed. “I’m not sure how to explain it, but I need someone to pose as my betrothed. It would be purely ceremonial. I’m in a tight situation.”

I frowned. “And that thing that was after me?”

“It means that you can never go back home to the lake. It could find you there again. If you come with me, I can make sure you’re protected from it.”

At this point my eyes burned and head ached. It was getting late, and I had a lot to think about. “I…well, I need some sleep.”

“Of course,” Valcas replied as if he’d decided the matter. “There will be plenty of time to discuss the specifics tomorrow morning.”

Exhaustion set in quickly once I got settled in the sleeping bag. I didn’t dream that night, but before I fell asleep, my thoughts wandered back to the dark glasses and those eyes.

Hi! I recently authored the first two installments of the YA time travel serial series, The Call to Search Everywhen. I'm a longtime reader of fantasy and sci-fi novels, particularly classics and young adult fiction. There's nothing quite like a good fairy tale or fable. When I'm not writing I enjoy traveling, reading and trying to stay in tune on my flute.

Author Links:

Goodreads | Twitter | Website

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This tour was organized by Good Tales Book Tours.

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