Tuesday 6 October 2015

RELEASE BLITZ - Bad Impressions by Franca Storm @givemebooksblog @FrancaStorm




Title: Bad Impressions
Series: A REVIVE ME Novel
Author: Franca Storm
Genre: Contemporary Romance
 Release Date: October 6, 2015



Blurb

She’s the one girl he never should’ve touched. But she’s also the one girl he’s never been able to forget…

Having escaped a bad situation with an obsessive ex, Sophie Clinton is relieved when she returns to the safety of her hometown to lick her wounds. Until she runs into Brad, the man who took her virginity and broke her heart. The last thing she wants is to deal with him and all the drama of their past. But her older brother’s best friend isn’t easy to resist—or to avoid, in their tiny town.

When his best friend’s little sister returns to town, Brad Marsh knows he should keep his distance this time around. A year ago he crossed a major line with her. He’s been unable to shake the guilt of their drunken, misguided night of passion. He’s not about to make that same mistake again. But the fiery, all-consuming pull between them is stronger than ever. It might not be that easy for him to keep his hands off her.






Links to Buy

AMAZON US / UK






Excerpt

~Sophie~

It had been two weeks since I’d unceremoniously shown up at Brad’s place and broken down like a weak, pathetic mess after asking him to teach me how to defend myself.

Every day since, he’d been teaching me what I’d asked. He was a good teacher. He was good at giving easy-to-follow instructions. He knew how to work up to complicated moves well and he was unbelievably patient.

Until right now.

“You know this,” he chastised me.

He had me pinned to the floor in his living room and I was thrashing about beneath him like an idiot. I didn’t know where the hell my head was at. Actually, I did, but…I couldn’t risk going there.

“Hook my wrist and grab behind my elbow with your other hand. Pull my arm into your chest. Then, use your foot to trap mine, as well as my leg. That’s when you lift your hips and turn hard to regain the dominant position,” he instructed me.

“Okay!” I hissed.

“So, do it. Christ, Soph! You know this. You’ve done it countless times.”

“I know.”

“Yeah? So, what the hell’s the issue now?”

I stopped struggling and collapsed back onto the ground, defeated. “I’m a little distracted, okay?”

“By what?” he fumed, pushing off me and climbing to his feet.

“You.”

“Me?” he asked, not getting it.

“You’re hard. Your…thing was…distracting me.”

He grunted irritably and adjusted his sweatpants. “It’s those fucking shorts.”

“What?” I demanded, getting to my feet, too.

He pointed at my black spandex shorts. “They barely cover your ass and they’re so fucking tight. And that…neon sports bra…it’s not helping the situation.”

“I get too hot in sweats and a hoodie.”

“Fine. I’ll turn up the air conditioning then.”

“You’re being ridiculous,” I said, stomping over to him.

He glowered down at me. “Am I? My dick sure doesn’t think so.” He grabbed his erection through his pants–actually grabbed it, right in front of me.

I quickly averted my eyes. “You need to work on your self-control.”

He stepped into me then, his body pushing against mine. “For the last two weeks, I’ve had you writhing in my arms, dressed in next to nothing and I haven’t laid a hand on you in a sexual way. And you have the nerve to tell me that I don’t have self-control, woman?”

“I’m not a brunette with huge tits, so you shouldn’t have a problem at all.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I saw her. The woman doing the walk of shame from here a few weeks back.”

He seemed surprised that I knew for a few seconds, before quickly brushing it off. He stepped back and turned away. “Let’s take a break. I need some water anyway.”

“I guess that’s the end of that conversation then,” I muttered under my breath, as I followed him into the kitchen area.

He spun around suddenly, catching me off guard. “What conversation? You saw a woman leaving my place. Yeah, I fucked her. And?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “And…nothing.”

“Really? You’re sure? Cuz, from where I’m standing, it sounds like you’re jealous.”

I scoffed. “Do you ever get tired of your own arrogance?”

“It’s not arrogance. Arrogance would be me going around saying that my cock is the be all and end all, ruining every woman I fuck for any other man thereafter, or some shit like that.”

“It did!”

Oh shit. The words were out of my mouth, before I could stop them. I instantly regretted it when I saw the look on his face.

He shifted his weight. “What?”

“I…I didn’t mean it. Forget it.”

He scoffed. “Darlin’, a man can’t just forget a claim like that.”

“Why didn’t you call?”

He blew out a breath and slumped against the fridge. “I was trying to protect you.”

“You said that before. It didn’t make sense then and it doesn’t now,” I pushed.

“You would’ve stayed here, if I hadn’t blown you off.”

“I—”

“I saw it, Soph. That look in your eyes. It was the same goddamn look in mine.”

“You’re saying—”

“I’m saying…it was more than sex to me. Much more.”

Oh my God.

“But you needed to go. You needed to get the hell out of this dead-end town. And…you need to now, too.”

“You don’t protect me. I do. I decide what’s best for me, not you, Brad.”

“You were young and naïve. I had to be the one to make the break.”

“So, it wasn’t about me being Ollie’s sister then?”

“I’m not gonna lie, that was also a factor. But, not the main one. Hell, the damage had already been done at that point. I’d already betrayed him by fucking you.”

“I thought you…I thought I was just another one of your sluts.”

His eyes flashed. In the next second, my back was against the fridge and he was looming over me. “You would never be one of them. Never, Soph.”

I could barely breathe with him so close to me. I don’t know how I managed it, but I eventually found my breath. “I…you were the first.”

I’d never seen him so shocked in all the time I’d known him. “You were a virgin?”

I nodded, biting my lip nervously.

He closed his eyes tightly for a moment and drew in a breath. When he opened them, they were full of pain and regret. “Christ, why didn’t you tell me?”

“I don’t know. I guess, I was worried. I didn’t want you to stop. I wanted you. I wanted that first time to be with you.”

“But…how could you have been a virgin? You were dating that prick, right? And…what about all the guys fawning over you in high school?”

“Jake and I hadn’t done anything at that point. I was…scared, I guess. As for high school, you remember my brother, right? No one dared to get close to me. They were all terrified of him. And you, ironically. The two of you blocked any guy who took an interest in me.”

That made him laugh a little. But it didn’t last long. That pained look was back just as quickly.

“You regret it, don’t you? Now that you know?” I asked.

“I wasn’t gentle, Soph. Hell, I was drunk and fucked up, because of the shit that’d happened that week.”

“You didn’t hurt me.”

“Still…fuck. If I’d known, I would’ve…taken my time with you.”

“Brad, it was—”

“Shit, Soph.”

A flurry of emotions played on his face. They shifted so quickly, that I couldn’t pinpoint any specific one. They all blended together. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Was he mad about what I’d told him? Did he feel betrayed, because he hadn’t known the truth about me at the time? I’d intended to tell him that night, but everything had happened so fast. And, as soon as he’d touched me, I hadn’t been capable of rational thought. The only thing I’d known then was that I hadn’t wanted him to stop; not for anything. I’d wanted him for so long and that night he’d finally reciprocated it. He’d wanted me. There was no way I could’ve walked away from that.

When he finally spoke, I released a stilted breath that I’d apparently been holding in the entire time.

“I need to rectify this,” he declared in an off-putting, matter-of-fact manner.

My brow furrowed. What the hell was he talking about? “How?”

He answered by lunging at me and hauling me off my feet.

Before I knew what was happening, he was carrying me out of the kitchen.






Author Bio


Franca was born in Surrey, England and currently lives in Niagara Falls, Canada with her husband and their labrador, Rocky.

She is a long-time lover of erotica and romance novels, especially those with sexy-as-sin alpha males. She decided to try her hand at writing her own and writing romance is now her obsession and the perfect way to put her dirty mind to good use!

Her writing spans many different sub-genres of romance: contemporary, biker romance, paranormal romance, new adult, romantic erotica and romance suspense. She’s got a ton of stories to tell and many more works up her sleeve.

She loves hearing from her readers, so please feel free to stop by and visit her at the links below:



Author Links

Giveaway

RE-RELEASE BLITZ - Wynn in Doubt by Emily Hemmer @givemebooksblog @emilyhemmer




Title: Wynn in Doubt
Author: Emily Hemmer
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Genre: Women's Fiction/Contemporary Romance
 Release Date: October 6, 2015



Blurb

Wynn Jeffries has wanderlust. Unfortunately, her life stalled somewhere between graduating college and slinging drinks at the local dive bar. Stuck in a one-room apartment with no career, no boyfriend, no…life, she dreams of something more. Something amazing. Something like Oliver Reeves, her high school crush, who’s back in town and reminding Wynn of the way she used to be.

When a forgotten news clipping falls out of a book belonging to Wynn’s grandmother, a well-kept family secret is finally revealed. Is Wynn’s gypsy spirit the result of an overactive imagination or did she inherit it from a woman so determined to live a big life, she gave up everything to have it?


Together, Wynn and Oliver attempt to put together the missing pieces of her family’s past and unravel the mystery behind her great-grandmother’s disappearance. But after so much time succumbing to fear and regret, can Wynn ditch her safe, routine life for the chance at an extraordinary future?





Links to Buy

AMAZON US / UK / AU / CA






Excerpt

I lick my lips and draw a heavy breath through my nose. A bead of sweat clings to his temple, and I wipe it away, then run my fingers through his hair. His mouth is open, his breathing shallow. He moves one arm out from under me, and his fingertips trail from my shoulder down to the back of my hand. I move mine from his cheek to the coarse stubble of his jaw. Oliver Reeves is going to kiss me again, this time on a summer afternoon, and I wonder how life will ever be the same.

I trace his lips with my thumb. They’re full and soft. We meet in the air between, his lips fitting around mine in a light, sweet kiss. I hold his head close. His lips move in lazy indulgence, unhurried in their pursuit to pluck every drop of pleasure from mine.

I open my mouth a fraction and run the tip of my tongue across his bottom lip. I don’t know what possesses me to do it. I don’t know anything right now. Oliver presses me into the grass and dirt and fits his hand around the curve of my hip. He slants his mouth across mine, and I let him taste me. His breathing isn’t shallow anymore. It’s labored and noisy against my cheek.

My hand runs down his back. He always looks so calm, so cool, but I can feel the perspiration beneath his shirt. There’s a satisfaction knowing it wasn’t the heat that finally got to him, but me. My lips. My hips and short dress and the bare leg he’s stroking with strong fingers.

Our kisses become faster, needier. I hold his face in both hands as he touches every exposed part of me. His fingers skim the cotton over my ribs, and I move against him, desperate for the feel of his hand on my breast. He cups me there, groaning quietly against my mouth.

He drags his lips from mine; his forehead drops against my neck. But he doesn’t remove his hand or take his weight from me. I arch back, glimpsing dust in a ray of yellow sunlight behind us. His shoulders move beneath my hands as he breathes in deeply. I bring my eyes back to his and see that they’re full of need.

He doesn’t ask, and I don’t say a word. We stand and walk hand in hand, out of the cemetery and back on the gravel path, the one that leads to my car. I reach for the driver’s-side door when we get there, but he pulls me away, back to him, and kisses me slowly. When we part, and the air conditioning is again crisp and cool on our skin, we drive to the hotel in silence. There are no words for this, for what each of us needs.

The truth is, our paths parted a long time ago. Now he’s looking behind for something he’s lost, and I’m running ahead, trying to find something I’ve never had. It feels like we’ve collided—run into each other at the place between what could’ve been and what can be. I don’t know how it will affect what we’re each searching for, but I’ve always loved him, and he came back for me. It’s enough for now.






Author Bio

Emily Hemmer was raised in the Chicago suburbs before settling in Kansas City in 1996. A huge fan of romantic comedies, Emily was overjoyed to realize her college roommate could recite every word of the movie 'Clueless,' until she realized that was the only VHS tape her roommate owned. Emily dropped out of college and to this day, blames the listless years of her twenties on the words, "As if!" She completed her degree after an extended eleven-year semester break during which time she got married, had kids, and became a published author. Her greatest accomplishment to date is holding the high score in Ms. PacMan at the Pizza Hut in Schaumburg, Il.


Author Links

Giveaway

COVER REVEAL - Winner Takes All by Judy Kentrus @givemebooksblog @JudyKentrus




Title: Winner Takes All
Series: Laurel Heights
Author: Judy Kentrus
Genre: Contemporary Romance
 Release Date: October 27, 2015



Blurb

Preston Reynolds, a former Army Ranger, left a part of himself in the desert from hell. Life as he knew it was over. No woman would ever want to look at or touch him. He never figured on Cindi Pearl Sullivan sashaying in and turning his world upside down. 

Cindi’s personal motto had always been, “do a good deed, for a friend in need.” She’d decided to make Preston understand he was whole. In her sometimes klutzy way, she shows him life is to be lived and he could enjoy the loving caress of a woman.







Available Now


99c

AMAZON US / UK



AMAZON US / UK



AMAZON US / UK






Excerpt

….“How can I repay you for helping me with my problem?” Cindi asked.

Sometimes luck just fell into one’s lap, like now. He needed a date, and she would understand things wouldn’t go any further than a friendly evening. “Have dinner with me.”

“I’d love to. What night did you have in mind?” she quickly asked.

Preston heard the eagerness in her voice, and tried to let her down gently. “I’d better explain. My sister Jennifer is coming to Laurel Heights to interview for the directorship of the new community center. I’d like you to join us for dinner.”

Her fluttering heart slowed from disappointment. She should have known the invitation was too good to be true. “When was the last time you saw your sister?”

“A year ago, when I went home to visit my parents in Oregon for their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary.

“Wouldn’t you rather meet with her alone?”

“Not really.” Stop stalling. Tell her the real reason you are inviting her to dinner. “I better explain. My parents and sister are worried that I am no longer interested in women. Jennifer actually came out and asked if I was gay. I’d like to introduce you as my girlfriend and give her the impression we are lovers.”

His words exploded in her brain. Girlfriend! Lover! Is he out of his mind? “Now, what were you saying about giving your sister the impression we are lovers?” Cindi surprised herself by not getting tongue tied over the word “lover.”

“There isn’t any other woman I could trust to pull this off. You are a good friend and won’t get the wrong idea if I start putting the moves on you in public. I just want to be up-front.”

She jammed her hands on her hips at the insult. “So I’m just a good ole boy—I mean, girl—you need to pass off as your lover just to prove you aren’t into guys!”

“I didn’t mean it quite that way. You are a beautiful, warm, sensitive woman any man would be lucky to call his girlfriend or lover.”

“Just so I understand your deceitful, half-ass invitation. If you get touchy-feely and plant a few kisses during dinner, I should react like it’s perfectly normal since we’re lovers. It would all be for show.”

“Absolutely.”

Cindi tipped her head to the side and decided to toss out a challenge. “You know, it works both ways. I might want to take a few liberties, you know, to make our relationship more convincing. Like you said, it would all be for show.”

“No problem. I’ll do my part.” Maybe this wasn’t a good idea, he thought, but it was too late now to take back his invitation.

“Have you considered what might happen if your sister gets the job and comes to live in Laurel Heights?”

“I’ll worry about that when and if it happens. We can always say things didn’t work out.”

Not if I can help it. Momma didn’t raise a dummy. She needed to give this situation a little more thought, but held out a hand. “We have a deal. You clean up my financial mess and I’ll pretend to be your lover.”
Preston wondered at the designing gleam in her eyes, but then decided it was just his imagination. He could trust sweet, sensible Cindi Pearl.



Author Bio
 
I have always been a romantic at heart and married my high school sweetheart, who is still the love of my life. My characters love to bake and cook, just like I do. Some of my favorite recipes are posted on my website, judykentrus.com. My stories are fun, sexy romances with a hint of suspense that will make you laugh, cry and fall in love. Enjoy!



Author Links

COVER REVEAL - Lie With Me by M. Never @givemebooksblog @MNeverAuthor




Title: Lie With Me
Series: Decadence After Dark #4
Author: M. Never
Genre: Dark Erotic Romance
Cover Design: Cover Me Darling
Photographer: Sarah Eirew
 Release Date: November 27, 2015



Blurb

Tell me a secret...

CJ Carmichael hasn't been able to get the vivacious blonde he spent four delirious days with off his mind. The blonde who was completely off-limits, but he couldn't deny.

Tell me a secret....

CJ had no intention of pursuing her, but Tara Stevens knew what she wanted and it was him. Now six months later, their time together still haunts him. As much as he's tried to talk himself out of seeing her again, the craving is just too powerful.

Tell me a secret...

Tara is more than willing to spend an entire fantasy weekend with CJ. More than willing to hand herself over to him completely and fulfill his every desire. More than willing to pretend he owns her despite their age difference and Kayne's disapproval.

Tell me a secret...

Sometimes fantasy becomes a reality. Sometimes people fall in love before they even know it- before they even know each other- and after it’s too late.

Tell me a secret...


Sometimes, beneath the sweetest secrets are the most deceptive lies.







Available Now


AMAZON US / UK / AU / CA




AMAZON US / UK / AU / CA



AMAZON US / UK / AU / CA
B&N / KOBO / iBOOKS



AMAZON US / UK / AU / CA
B&N / KOBO / iBOOKS






Author Bio

M. Never resides in New York City. When she's not researching ways to tie up her characters in compromising positions, you can usually find her at the gym kicking the crap out of a punching bag, or eating at some new trendy restaurant.

She has a dependence on sushi and a fetish for boots. Fall is her favorite season.

She is surrounded by family and friends she wouldn't trade for the world and is a little in love with her readers. The more the merrier. So make sure to say hi!



Author Links

COVER REVEAL - Believe by Natalie Gayle @givemebooksblog @nataliegayle1




Title: Believe
Series: Oni Fighters #2
Author: Natalie Gayle
Genre: Contemporary/MMA Romance
Cover Design: Letitia at Romantic Book Affairs 
Cover Model: Daniel Pollard 
Photographer: Simon Barnes 
Release Date: December 1, 2015



Blurb

Have you ever hit a point in your life where everything looks good from the outside but there’s this feeling deep in your gut that tells you something is wrong?

Dane Roberts was just an ordinary guy—so he thought. Best friend to MMA fight sensation Xander Todd, and all round decent guy. But now a restlessness surrounds him. Dare he reach for more? Could he too emulate his best friend’s results in the cage?

Arianne Le Flegg was a woman starting over, with her son. Running from a past littered with broken promises, manipulation and violent abuse at the hands of family. Violence terrified her on every level. She longed for an “ordinary life”—safety for herself and her son.

Can there ever be a future for two people who view violence so differently? One embraces it, the other dispels it. One is seeking the extraordinary, the other ordinary. She longs for the type of man he’s trying to leave behind.

For there to ever be a future together, they’ll need to dig deep and decide what really is important to each of them.

To do this, they must first accept—The hardest demons to defeat are the ones inside.

They’ll have to Believe







Available Now


AMAZON US / UK






Author Bio


A confessed readaholic and romantic junkie, Natalie spends her time juggling a busy career as an IT professional and author. In between staring at a computer screen (she spends lot time doing that!) Natalie, enjoys living the Gold Coast life with her very tolerant husband and two school aged children.

She loves spending time with family and friends, hitting the beach, cooking, working out and curling up with a good book. Her pet hates are cleaning and anything else that can be considered “domestic dullness”. If she could have one wish it would be to be able to fit 48 hours into 24.

Natalie is the author of the Centre Games Series. A fast paced, romantic suspense series set on the Gold Coast, Australia. The series tells the stories of the Centre, a quasi government agency established to fight environmental, biological and agricultural threats. The Centre Games books are filled with hot alpha males and the feisty independent females strong enough to capture their hearts. Natalie’s books pack lots of action, hot romance and surprises.


She recently released Brave—the first in her Oni Fighters Series. This series is MMA contemporary romance with inspirational themes. The series is about people overcoming tragedy, pain and circumstances—fighting their inner demons. The next book, Believe, will be released late 2015 with another early 2016.



Author Links

Giveaway