I’m honoured to be taking part in what is one of the most ingenious promotional ideas ever!

Novelist Mark Terence Chapman has started a blog chain! Myself, along with eight other authors, have each posted a part of his nine part story on how he became published.

If you’ve arrived here first, just follow the links back to the start to read the entire story from the beginning. Mark has been on quite the journey to achieve his dream and he’s an inspiration to every writer out there!

So now read on to read Part Eight of his nine part blog chain!

My long, strange road to becoming a published novelist (Part VIII)

(This entry is a continuation of one on author KS Augustin’s blog. Click here to return to Part VII.)

In early May 2007, a Romance novelist and I were commiserating about our respective inability to land an agent to represent our books. Later that day, I came across the url for a small Romance publisher, Shadowrose Publishing, and suggested that the other author try contacting them directly, instead of going through an agent. She agreed and submitted a manuscript.

Several days later, she emailed me to ask whether I knew that Shadowrose had just started an imprint for sci-fi and other genre fiction, called Shadowmere Publishing. I responded that I hadn’t, and thanked her for the information. I submitted my second novel (chronologically first in the series), Lichen or Not, to them and waited.

Three weeks later, the other author emailed me, all excited, and thanked me for pointing her to Shadowrose. She’d just received a contract by email and was elated. Naturally, I was thrilled for her. Then I thought about my own novel. I hoped I’d hear back from Shadowmere as quickly as she’d heard from Shadowrose (and with the same result).

Three days later, I received an email from the editor at Shadowmere, saying that she really enjoyed Lichen, and asking whether I had any other manuscripts to send her. I didn’t know whether that meant the first one wasn’t quite good enough and she hoped the second would be better, or that she did like the first one and might want to publish both, since they were part of a series. So I sent her Tesserene.

I was still nervous about Tesserene. It was my first novel, and while I knew the story was good (probably better than that of Lichen), I wasn’t as sure about the writing. If she didn’t like the writing in Lichen quite enough, she probably wouldn’t like Tesserene either.

I sat back to wait, figuring it would be days, if not weeks, before I heard back about Tesserene. As a result, I was surprised to see a response after only 26 minutes. I figured this had to be bad news. There was no way she could have read more than the first chapter or two of Tesserene.

I opened the email and was stunned to find a congratulatory note with two contracts attached! Wow. I was one happy puppy that day, I can tell you. Talk about a Red Letter Day!

I’ve dragged this tale out long enough (maybe way too long for some of you), but it’s almost done. Click here to read the final segment of the story, on my blog. (422 words)

I’m sure that everyone is familiar with this book by now. Maguire takes on the daunting task of filling in the details that The Wizard of Oz left out: Where did the Wicked Witch of the West come from? What was her life like? Was she born green? Or, more importantly, was she born evil?

Maguire fills in the details nicely and tells his own tale while still being incredibly faithful to the original books. Though Wicked is based off of a children’s novel, this is no kids tale. This is a fairy tale for adults, make no mistake about it.

Maguire is also unafraid to tackle serious issues that other writers would have gladly ignored in their first novels: the issue of prejudice and racism, sexism, religion and faith, the nature of good and the true nature of evil and the human heart.

The novel is a fairy tale, parable, comment on society and its people all rolled into one. There are two kinds of people: the ones who love Wicked and the ones who hate it.

Personally, I love it. I’m reading it again for the fourth time. It’s now out in a new mass market paperback edition that has green edged pages. I feel like I’m reading an old pulp novel.

Even on a fourth go, the book reads as it did the first time. There is so much to read, so much to take in. It’s a tall drink of a book and you may have to take several gulps until you reach the end. But the end will be so satisfying.

So, if you haven’t read it, make sure to pick yourself up a copy. It’s a fantastic read about a fascinating character.

NEXT UP: Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Real Women Wear Red

Kathy Holmes

Lulu Books

2007

www.kathyholmes.net

Kate “Cyn” Francis is in a frump.

Unlucky at love, Cyn wonders if her second chance at love will ever come along. At forty five, it’s been years since she’s had a man in her bed and love in her heart. Her ex, a big fake, turned out to be more lust than love and Cyn wonders if love is possible for women over forty.

At the behest of her close friend Maggie, Cyn decides to take drastic action and change her life. Her old one sure isn’t working for her. She dyes her hair, changes her name and her age and heads out on a Caribbean cruise. On a boat full of men, there’s got to be one Mr. Right among them. Right?

Instead of Mr. Right, Cyn meets two other single women who are also looking for love: the beautiful Sandy Brown is traveling the cruise trying to mend her broken heart. Divorced and self-conscious, she is also looking for love, hoping that she can find someone to make her feel love again.

There’s also Millie Evans. Having sold her publishing empire, Millie is on a succession of one week cruises looking to find her long lost love. A widow after losing her husband, Millie searches for the man she met years ago on a cruise. Even though it is an impossible task, Millie hopes to find the man she loved and walked away from.

When these three women board the S.S. Platinum Queen, they have no idea that their lives are about to change forever. They come together in a time of need for each of them and find each other. Before they can find love, however, they will have to learn to love themselves.

But, thankfully, there is nothing that can’t be accomplished with friendship, more than a few martinis’s and lots of red. A real woman does wear red after all….

I absolutely loved this book. Without a doubt, it was THE best chick lit book that I’ve read in years. It has everything you could possibly need in a chick lit book: girlfriends, a search for love, martini’s, sandy beaches and sexy men.

But, really, Real Women Wear Red is so much more than sandy beaches and sexy men. The novel is about love, loss and the courage it takes to move on with your life. It’s also about the strength needed to look inside yourself be honest with who you are.

What I loved most about Real Women Wear Red is the fact that these women are real. I felt for them, ached for them, laughed with them. I felt like I knew them, like I had known them for years. When I finished the novel, I felt as if these women were my friends, my confidantes. In short, I felt for them.

It’s not every author that can accomplish this. Most chick lit is peopled by cardboard cut out characters that all sound and talk alike. Likewise, the plot is usually the standard girl meets boy, girl loses boy, girl pines for boy, boy comes back to girl. Don’t get me wrong, I love chick lit, but it’s rare to find something that fits in the mold and also goes beyond the genre at the same time.

But Holmes has created three very distinct women surrounded by an incredible plot that will take you on the ride of your life. She has done the impossible: created a chick lit novel that transcends the genre and, instead, becomes something else all its own.

Real Women Wear Red is a fast, fantastic read and I loved every word. You will laugh, you’ll cry and then you’ll laugh again. This is not your average chick lit. Do yourself a favor and read it, won’t you?

Have you ever wanted something so badly you could taste it? Have you ever wished you could travel back in time and erase past mistakes so that you could start fresh? Have you ever regretted something you have done?  

Mike Taylor is a troubled young man.  

Though you wouldn’t know this to look at him. Hard working and down to earth, he is well liked by everyone who knows him. Having achieved high marks at Georgia Tech and athletic success, you would think that Mike is a man on top of the world.  

But secrets, especially those that are deeply buried, will eat away at even the most convincing façade. And they usually have a way of getting out.

Years ago, Mike got one of his girlfriends pregnant. After she had an abortion, things were not the same for Mike. How could he live with himself after letting a human life be taken away?  

Worse still, he is in love with his best friend’s wife. Sarah has no idea of Mike’s feelings towards her and if she did, it would change everything between them. Loving and admiring her from afar, his heart and spirit suffers. He feels guilty for loving his friend’s wife, guilty for all the mistakes he has made.  

Needing a fresh start, Mike moves out to Albuquerque to start a job at the Sandia Labs. Hoping to escape his past, Mike finds himself instead isolated and alone. Away from his friends and family, Mike does nothing but obsess about the mistakes he made in his past and the ones he has made in his present.  

All that changes, however, when he meets Danielle. Her energy and her bright personality bring a spot of light into Mike’s dark life and the two bond quickly. Mike finds himself falling in love with Danielle and the two are married shortly after meeting. Mike feels that nothing can go wrong, that nothing can destroy the relationship they have built. 

But Mike has not counted on the power of secrets. Even if you keep them tightly hidden, they will find a way to break free.  Can Mike find a way to be honest with Danielle and himself? Or will he let past misjudgements ruin what could be the greatest love of his life?  

Simply put, MIKE is amazing. I have fallen in love with Wolfe’s Circle of Friends series since reading the third book and working my way back to the beginning.

Thus far, I’ve read MIKE three times and it’s better every time I read it. For those unfamiliar with the series, never fear! Each book is a stand alone novel but you will meet characters from the other books in the series.  

Wolfe manages to write a novel about difficult situations and still manages to make it light, funny and heart warming. While there is a lot of focus on Christianity and faith, it never comes off as preachy. Most books that involve even a hint of references to Christianity make my skin crawl but Wolfe manages to juggle many storylines, plots and characters all at once and always comes out shining.

Faith is an important part of MIKE but not the central focus. It takes an incredibly talented writer to tackle the subject of faith and religion and not make it sound preachy. 

Another reason that Wolfe is such an amazing writer is her ability to write such well defined, amazing characters. And in MIKE she has sharpened her pen and her inner eye to crystal cut clarity. You know just from reading the beautiful prose that Wolfe loves these characters, that she aches for them. Because she does, you do too. 

I wanted to tell Mike that it was all going to be okay, that he needed to take one day at a time. You KNOW Mike after this novel, you feel for him, you ache for him. Many writers try to accomplish this and even more fail. Happily, Wolfe manages this with flying colours.  

Wolfe’s novels also have a moral or important message to take away from them. This one is important for everyone and I want to make sure you’re reading carefully, that you pay attention to this next line. It’s such an important message and everyone needs to hear it. Are you ready? Here it is:  

Do not let past mistakes determine your future.  

Sounds simple, right? But that theme, that message, is woven through out every word in this glorious novel. It’s such an important message because everyone does this.

Everyone judges themselves so harshly for the things they have done that they never stop to forgive themselves. If you don’t forgive yourself for your mistakes, how can you move on? How can you live your life?

  MIKE is such a powerful, engrossing, incredible, beautiful novel. But it still manages to be light hearted, funny and heart felt. There is real emotion and real people in these pages and I enjoyed MIKE more than any other book in the series.

I know that when the fifth and final book comes out, it will be like saying goodbye.  Do yourself a favour and make some time for this book.

This is a life changing novel and you will look at yourself, and the world around you, once you have finished.   

Normally, I hate travel books. 

 I know, I know. I can hear a lot of you saying: Now wait just a minute! What’s wrong with travel logs? Well, in my opinion, they’re boring, dull and quite often have as much life to them as a day old piece of toast.  

So I will admit that I was a bit weary of Accidental Enlightenment at first. A travel book AND a self help manual? How could such a thing be possible? I opened the cover to the first page and was prepared to be sceptical of anything and everything in the book.  To my chagrin, however, I was charmed and, oddly enough, enlightened.  

From the preface (where Banick makes his own comments about travel books) to the very last page, Accidental Enlightenment was a complete and utter joy.

Imagine, if you will, being discontent with your lot in life. You wonder where you’re going, what you’re meant to be doing. Are the answers to your questions to be found inside you, or out in the real world?  After being offered a high powered job at a software company, Banick decides to drive instead of fly to his destination. This choice starts him on a journey that will change his life.

Along the way, Banick picks up hitch hikers and learns, for the first time, to really talk to people honestly. But more importantly, he learns to listen.  

When he finally arrives at his job, he’s able to listen to his heart and he knows that his heart and soul aren’t in the job; that he no longer wanted the confining walls of an office building.

So than what is a man to do? Banick decides to continue the travels he started with that innocent road trip and, like so many before him, go exploring.  But what he explores is different from so many others.

While he travels across many different lands and places in Canada, the United States and countries all over the world, what Banick explores is the different cultures he encounters, the different people.  

And still he listens. While he listens, Banick learns and begins to discover things about himself he never thought possible. By listening and learning about others, he learns hidden truths about himself that shake his world and reform it into something wonderful…. 

Accidental Enlightenment is an amazing book from start to finish. My small summarization of the plot does not even come close to describing the wonders that Banick encounters in his fellow human beings. Humanity and the world around him are present in all of Banick’s words and I believe that this is what is missing from so many other travel books.  

While other authors give us an account of what they saw, Banick gives us an account of what he felt, what he sees and hears. We are with him on his many travels, breathing in the truths of others. What is so incredible about this book are the truths, the tid bits of wisdom and knowledge that you pick up while reading it. 

 I found myself quite often reading what I thought was a simple conversation only to have parts of what I read come back to me later once they had sunk in. The truths, the power of the human spirit, is right there; we just have to keep our eyes open while reading.  

Banick’s approach is fun, simple and light. It’s never preachy, never heavy handed and as we learn about Banick’s discoveries we can’t help but learn about ourselves. Accidental Enlightenment is an absolute joy. Banick should be applauded for sharing his journey’s with us.  For as the world changed him, he has changed me and my view of the world around me.

This is an incredible book and I know I won’t ever look at my surroundings in the same way again.  

I am pleased to be featuring an article by the multi-talented Sandy Lender, author of the incredible high fantasy novel Choices Meant for Gods.

I met Sandy about a year ago and now it’s hard not to picture having her in my life. Not only is she an immensely talented writer, she is also an incredibly strong woman and a wonderful friend.

Recently, Sandy went on a two month long virtual book tour to promote her novel Choices Meant for Gods. Two months! Just the thought of that is mind boggling for me, but she did it. She had a post almost every day for two months. In fact, I hosted her at two spots on her tour and I was honored to do it!

So how thrilled am I to be hosting Sandy once more on the last day of her virtual book tour? Extremely. The following is an article that Sandy wrote on the joys of writing, of following your dream and sticking to it.

It’s for any writer or anyone who wants to be a writer and is just about to head out on that dream. So read the article and enjoy.

And Sandy? Great job on the tour! I raise my glass to you!

Cheers,

Jamieson

  Sandy Lender Doesn’t Recommend Quitting Your Day Job

Or…the joy and insanity of being a writer 

By Sandy Lender, fantasy author 

Northeast Missouri State University, now Truman University, prides itself on offering a liberal arts education to graduates. I got out in four years with a degree in English and a liberal arts education that has garnered me a 15-year career in magazine publishing and public relations/marketing, but my true passion, the “career” I’ve nurtured since I was about six years old, is writing. And I don’t mean journalism. Yes, journalism and editing are what have paid the bills the past 15 years (and will continue to do so), but fiction writing…oh…fiction writing is what has kept me alive. 

It’s probably going to be the death of me. 

Let me explain. If you’re visiting this site, you’ve probably been drawn here by an interest in books or authors or a writer’s lifestyle or something along those lines. Let me give it to you straight. All writers have a touch of insanity about us (this is normal). We usually carry a muse around with us, but this is not always by choice. We complain about characters fighting for their rights, refusing to conform to our wishes in a scene. We go on writing binges that keep us up until 3 a.m. before collapsing next to our computers just to get up and start typing again when the sun blazes in to wake us around 7, skipping meals, showers, potty breaks and phone calls until some aspect of reality forces us out of the writing cocoon. We will tear a room to shreds looking for a pen if an idea has just struck us. And woe to the fool who gets between us and a piece of paper when we get hold of that pen… 

Because I’ve experienced the insanity described above, I’ve been lifted up by hearing stories of people who have enjoyed my first published novel, Choices Meant for Gods. Now I get to read comments on my Amazon.com page of people claiming Nigel Taiman is “by far” their favorite character, or “I want to be just like Chariss when I grow up,” and I feel this lump of pride in my darlings rise in my throat. 

That’s the joy and insanity of being a writer. You pour your heart and soul into the work; and pray that someone out there likes it, too. Now here’s the hard part. People have to read it to like it. They have to know it exists to read it. So you have to get it to them. 

Enter the marketing and promoting aspect of the new author’s job. I attended the ArcheBooks Publishing’s Professional Novelist Workshop about two weeks before receiving my contract for Choices Meant for Gods, and had attended the Naples Press Club Writers Workshop the week before that, so I thought I had a pretty good idea of the marketing nightmare new authors faced. I was ready. Lay it on me, I thought. 

Now I’m on the last day of a two-month online book tour I organized myself, contemplating repeating a moderately successful instore book signing at the local Barnes & Noble that I organized myself, and managing six blogs (including www.todaythedragonwins.blogspot.com) for the promotion of my fantasy novel that I’ve organized myself, preparing a spate of press releases I’ve written myself that I’ll spew forth like water from an erupting sprinkler next week, etc. Do you see a trend there? 

New authors are on their own. Unless you have the few thousand dollars it takes to hire a publicity firm/PR agency to send out press releases for you, you’re on your own. I don’t have a few thousand stray dollars and I don’t trust people who charge less than professional rates to do a professional job. 

I take hope in the fact that even J.K. Rowling was once in the same boat I’m in now. She was down to her last food stamp as the story goes when that fateful call came: Her little story about a boy named Harry Potter had been picked up. I’ve already had my call. Choices Meant for Gods is published and out there. Now I need my lottery winning event to propel me into J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter status, but, for right now, I’m going to just keep writing deep into the night and reading those fabulous e-mails that praise Nigel and Chariss. Because making a living at this would be nice, but, truly, the writing binges that result in someone singing Chariss’s praises are the real joy and insanity of being a writer.  

I’d like to thank my host today for posting this guest blog article. And I’d like to thank everyone who made the CMFG Online Book Tour the raging success it’s been. You know that paragraph above where I said new authors are one their own? I’d like to correct that. We actually have each other.

Without each of you, the name Sandy Lender wouldn’t be all over the internet right now, and readers wouldn’t be one click away from http://www.amazon.com/Choices-Meant-Gods-Sandy-Lender/dp/1595071652/ref=dp_return_1/104-9089752-5140754?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books&qid=1175821346&sr=8-1 to pick up my epic fantasy novel. And new author Sandy Lender is grateful to every one of you. 

“Some days, I just want the dragon to win.”

Blood Red

Heather Graham

Mira Books

July 2007

Genre: Paranormal/Romance

Lauren Crow is not having a good time.

After accompanying her friends Heidi and Deanna on a trip to New Orleans to celebrate Heidi’s upcoming wedding, she receives bad news: her life is in danger.

The giver of this news is Susan, a fortune teller in Jackson Square. She stares into her crystal ball and tells Lauren to leave, to take her friends and go. Something stalks her, something wants her and she is in danger.

As if that weren’t bad enough, she is being followed by a man named Mark Davidson. After finding Lauren in a New Orleans bar, he doesn’t want to let her out of his sight. She is the spitting image of Katie, his first love, who was killed so many years ago by a murderous vampire.

Mark knows that if he lets Lauren out of his sight for one moment, Stephan will claim Lauren for his just like he did Katie. Lauren, however, is having none of this. She doesn’t believe in vampire mumbo jumbo and won’t accept the truth.

Until the vampire starts to hunt one of her friends. Suddenly the danger they are all in is very real and Lauren must rely on Mark for help. She must also try to ignore the growing passion that sparks to life between them.

But some things don’t always go as planned…

Blood Red manages to breathe new life into the tired genre of vampire fiction and it does it extremely well. Having never read a book by Heather Graham before I wasn’t sure what to expect; I didn’t know if I was in for a bodice ripper with fangs or a book with fangs with a touch of fire. Thankfully it was the latter. 

What makes Blood Red so successful is the characters. Lauren is no cardboard cut out heroine. She is tough and stands well on her own two feet. Mark Davidson, vampire hunter, isn’t the rough and ready macho man that so many hero’s end up being. In short, they aren’t caricatures. They feel like living, breathing people.

Graham also manages to throw a new twist on vampire lore that works beautifully. They’re still harmed by holy water but Graham has a few new twists up her sleeve. I love when an author take a paranormal element that’s already been done to death and makes it his or her own. Graham excels in the paranormal and it never comes off feeling hokey or fake. You will honestly believe, even if for an instant, that vampires exist.

In short, I loved this book. I was hooked from the first page and couldn’t stop reading. It’s the perfect cure for a case of the blues or to make your summer night red hot. It has something to please everyone: suspense, romance, thrills, and paranormal elements. Graham manages to be deft at juggling all her balls and never drops a single one.

If you haven’t fallen under Graham’s spell yet, what are you waiting for? Blood Red is an absolute flat out fantastic book and you’ll love every bloody moment of it.

Imagine This

Sade Adeniran

www.imaginethisthenovel.com     

Imagine this: being taken away from all that you cherish, all that you love and being thrust into a landscape that is frightening, bizarre and so incredibly different from all that you know.  

This is exactly what happens to nine year old Lola Ogunwole. Born in London to Nigerian parents, her world is torn apart when her mother abandons Lola and her brother Adebola.  They find themselves in a foster home until their father comes to claim them.  Lola thinks that her troubles are over; but they have just begun.

Rather than lose both his children, he takes them from London to Nigeria to live with family members. Lola and Adebola are separated from each other for the first time in their lives. Adebola goes to live with an uncle in the small town of Lagos and Lola finds herself living with an aunt in  Idogun.  

Idogun is unlike anywhere that Lola has lived before. Poverty is rampant in the village and there is no electricity, no indoor toilets, and no conveniences. Only a hard life and a world so removed from civilization that Lola feels like an outcast. Her one constant, her brother Adebola, removed from her, Lola feels more alone than ever.  

Her family does not make it easy for her either. For no reason that Lola can think of, her aunt hates her. She is made to walk miles and miles every morning for water. She has to learn to adapt herself to a life of hardship; a life of difficulty and a father that seems to be cutting himself off from her.  

But like all things, time passes and hardships increase. Lola starts to change and mature. No longer is she the spoiled little girl from London. Lola starts becoming a woman. But when she is tested, when something so earth shattering happens that Lola does not speak for days, something inside her changes.  

She knows that she must fight to get where she wants, otherwise her heart and her spirit will perish…. 

My brief summary of the plot does not do the scope of this novel justice. Told in diary format, we are really reading Lola’s journal; her inner thoughts, her inner demons are poured out onto the page for all of us to read. Because of her words, I find myself changed forever.  

I can’t express how good, how utterly amazing, this novel is. The fact that this is Adeniran’s first novel is astounding. There is so much depth here, so much feeling and emotion that it is hard to believe I’m not reading the work of a seasoned writer. Imagine This is pure, unadulterated storytelling and the power of it is incredible.  

Because it’s told in a diary format, we see into Lola’s head and her thoughts a lot more clearly than if the novel was told in first person or third person. Indeed, we get to read her private wishes, dreams and aspirations for the future.

After a while I forgot I was reading a novel and could picture Lola scratching away in her diary. I felt I could reach out and touch her.  

Few authors are able to render a character so completely. Lola becomes not just a character on a page or words on paper. She lives and breathes alongside you as you read her story.  I can honestly say I was blown away.

Few books have affected me as strongly as Imagine This and I know that my spirit carries a piece of Lola with me where ever I go now.  I am haunted by her; by the sound of her voice in my head, her words on the page it’s hard to believe that Lola does not really exist. It’s hard to believe that I can’t reach out and touch her. This is the power of Adeniran’s amazing first novel.

Imagine  This is not just a story, not just a novel. It’s about having the courage to face obstacles head on. It’s about finding the strength to survive and succeed that you didn’t know you had inside of you. But most of all, Imagine This is about the triumph of the heart.  

If you read one good book this summer, make sure that it is Imagine This. Your heart will thank you for it.

Have you ever stopped to wonder who God truly is?

Is he a man or a woman? Is he black or white? Maybe she’s purple or yellow? Would he be wise? Would she be menacing? What if we could sit down with God and ask those questions we all have burning a fire inside of us. What if we could actually interview God?

D’Arbeloff gets to do just that. In a series of comic strips, first featured on Natalie d’Arbeloff’s highly popular blog Blaugustine, her alter ego Augustine gets to interview God and ask him those burning questions. It might be interesting to note that God is a balding black man who is sometimes deep and sometimes evasive.

The God Interviews is flat out incredible. Augustine asks God some difficult questions: How do we know that God exists? Why does he allow hate? Why is there evil in the world? What is the most accurate portrayal of God? Why does God allow horrible things to happen?

You would think that a collection of comics dealing with such questions would be dark and morose fodder for evangelists everywhere, but d”Arbeloff manages to transcend religion and brings The God Interviews to another level entirely. The book is bright, fun and thought provoking and I found myself awed in quite a few places.

The focus in the comics isn’t religion. Instead, each comic focuses on something different and forces us to look within ourselves to view our personal reactions. In reality, each short strip (fourteen in all) is really a short piece of wisdom delivered through pictures and words. Each strip is so subtly simple you don’t realize that it’s affected you until much later.

I was charmed by The God Interviews. I was moved, awed and impressed. Is it good? No; it’s incredible. I had wondered at the start whether or not a comic strip about God could work and, in d’Arbeloff’s hands, it does. Her simple but colourful art is the perfect compliment to such simple and wonderful wisdom.

I’ve read the book three times already and each time, the fourteen comics just speak to me and touch something in me. d’Arbeloff has given us a comic strip with a soul and one I love very, very much.

If you haven’t had the chance to be charmed by The God Interviews, get yourself a copy, won’t you? It’s a beautiful, lyrical look at life and the world. It will make you laugh, think and you won’t be able to stop thinking about it. That is the real power of d’Arbeloff’s work.

It stays with you days after the last page has been turned. Truly wonderful and very inspirational and incredibly enjoyable. Don’t believe me? You’ll just have to get your own copy and find out for yourself.

Details of “The God Interviews” are on this page of Natalie’s website:

http://www.nataliedarbeloff.com/interviewgod.html

and can be ordered from:

http://www.lulu.com/content/610429

Things are jumping at the New York Museum of Natural History.

When a mysterious package arrives addressed simply to The Rocks and Minerals Curator, it sets off a chain reaction of events so stunning that no one could have predicted it. The package is leaking a small amount of brown powder that looks strangely like Anthrax. It isn’t Anthrax.

It is diamond dust.

A mysterious criminal known only as Diogenes Pendergrast was kind enough to return the diamonds he stole previously; albeit not in their original form. Suffering in jail for the crime is FBI Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast. With Diogenes free to continue his spree of terror, he sets in motion his most diabolical plan yet.

Posing as a museum employee, he gains access to The Tomb of Senef. To counter-act the bad press from the diamond heist and their subsequent return, the New York Museum of Natural History decides to re-open an old exhibit long since closed.

The decision causes some outcry. There are some who say that the exhibit, a complete Egyptian tomb including sarcophagi and Mummies, is cursed. There are some who say that any who come in contact with the old tomb are doomed.

Diogenes plans to use this to his full potential to kill as many people as possible. The only person who can stop him is his brother, FBI Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast. There are those coming to his aid but they may be too late.

By the time he is released from prison, the whole world may be in jeopardy….

I really wanted to enjoy this book more than I did. Being that I’m a huge fan of Preston and Child’s books (especially when they write together) I really wanted to delve into The Book of the Dead and be swept away by a fast paced story line and a fantastic race against time.

That didn’t happen.

Though the usual well developed characters appear in The Book of the Dead, and the plot has been thought out down to the last detail, everything just kind of fell flat for me. Characters that before seemed so full of life now seemed like nothing more than talking heads. The plot, which before had been planned to such perfection, now seemed silly and asinine.

I really wanted to love this book. In fact, I had been looking forward to it. It is the last in what is an unofficial trilogy, the previous two books being Brimstone and Dance of Death. Though many reviewers insist that you can read The Book of the Dead on its own, you can’t. I found myself flipping through the other two novels so that I could remember what the authors were referring to in The Book of the Dead.

That’s not to say that it wasn’t a good book. It was. It just wasn’t a great book. While a little flat and a lot dry, it’s a good book to read if you’ve read the first two books and want to know how everything ends. Other than that, though I wouldn’t waste your money on this one in hardcover and would wait for the paperback.

It’s an unfortunate end to what could have been a fantastic trilogy. Don’t take my word for it, though. It’s still a good read, just not as good as it could have been. Here’s hoping that, for their next book, Preston and Child try something new instead of dusting off the same old characters.