Author: Jean M. Grant
Narrators: Caroline Hewitt, Andrew Perkins
Length: 10 hours 32 minutes
Publisher: Jean M. Grant
Released: Mar. 16, 2020
Genre: Women’s Fiction
Day: March 13, 2021
#BookBlitz “Killer Cocktail” by David M. Hamlin
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Mystery, Crime
Date Published: January 2021
Publisher: Open Books Press
Chicago TV reporter Emily Winter is drawn into a complicated and challenging investigation when a women’s health clinic is destroyed and a cherished member of the clinic’s staff is killed. While her skill, talent and contacts lead her to many likely suspects — anti-abortion activists, a wealthy donor to that cause, a disgruntled former clinic employee, a real estate broker — she also encounters stone walls and silence. As her investigation moves slowly forward, Emily relies on her husband Ben and Ben’s street-savvy Uncle Max, her news staff colleagues and a group of women, all of whom have shattered glass ceilings. When two sniper attacks threaten her life, Emily grows even more determined to solve the crime until — over-coming multiple obstacles including a sexist police information officer — she solves the murder and brings the killers to justice.
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Also by David M. Hamlin
Winter in Chicago
Drugs, death and rock and roll on Chicago’s AM radio dial…
Before dawn in January, 1975, Emily detours from her normal route to work in the newsroom of Chicago’s top pop rock station to investigate a crime scene. The police believe the body on the street is a suicide. Emily is stunned to discover that the dead woman is a dear friend since high school. Unable to fathom why Beni Steinart would take her own life, Emily begins an investigation that leads to a trunk-load of cocaine, Federal narcotics charges, abuse of power and a perplexing mystery – suicide or murder?
Emily’s reporting triggers an explosive battle between two men who tower over their city. Cary Chase is Chicago’s most prominent bachelor, a wealthy entrepreneur whose mansion is the epicenter of Chicago’s elite society. United States Attorney Tommy “Tommy Terrific” Jameson is ambitiously determined to rid his city of corruption on his way up to the Governor’s office and perhaps even higher.
Drawing on an eclectic roster of news sources and WEL colleagues and her own considerable talent and determination, Emily uncovers the full story of her friend’s death in a remarkable confrontation which produces front page headlines and restores one life as it ruins another.
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Winter Gets Hot
Winter in Chicago journalist Emily Winter is the first reporter on the scene of a gruesome murder in the offices of CARD, a civic organization that investigates corruption in City Hall. Although she has proven herself to be a skilled reporter with at least one headline making story to her credit, her new TV boss assigns her to a more “ladylike” beat—lifestyle and feature stories.
Determined to overcome the sexism that inhibits her career, Emily works her way into hard news coverage, including the story of the murder at CARD, but she faces major obstacles on all fronts as she pursues the killer.
As the case twists and turns, Emily navigates the city she loves, relishing Chicago’s architecture, neighborhood restaurants, culture and her beloved, if hapless, Chicago Cubs.
Will she uncover the murderer and bring justice for those who depend on hard-working journalists to write the stories that define their lives? Find out in Winter Gets Hot!
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About The Author
Contact Links
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#Excerpt “I Am Home” by Kimberly Herndon
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Self-Help, Spirituality
Date Published: July 10, 2020
My life has been a roller coaster filled with loss, pain, illness, failure,
heartache and suffering. (Life can be so much fun, right?) It has also been
filled with PURE JOY – the joy of spiritual awakening, wonderful people,
world travel, long bike rides, hiking up mountains and the heart-warming
adventures that come from taking the road less traveled. When I was 23 I had
a profound spiritual enlightenment experience and since then my life has
been about exploring how I can wake up to that state more fully and help
others to as well. This book shares my adventurous and ultimately triumphant
story of finding happiness through inner transformation. It explains how
going “crazy” can actually be a good thing and how when things
fall apart, that’s the doorway to something more.I believe that
we’re all in this together. It is my hope that by sharing what I know
others can find joy in the middle of their own difficulties and ultimately
find their way home.
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Excerpt
Note: I don’t use the word God in Chapter 7 to mean an old man in the sky. I use the term God because I grew up with a Jewish mother, but I mean God in a broader sense, like you might use the word Spirit or the Divine. Hope that helps!
Chapter 7
Creating Heaven on Earth
“Be the change you wish to see in the world.” – Mahatma Gandhi
Is heaven on earth even possible? I mean just look at all of the violence, anger, illness and atrocities committed against individuals and whole groups of people. Listen to what’s on the news every day and it can seem like we’re already in hell. The concept of heaven – of light and bliss, peace and joy – just seems too farfetched sometimes. While that is unfortunately true I’m going to use this chapter to start from a dark place and show you that it is possible for each of us to choose heaven and to create it ourselves – even in the midst of darkness.
In 2018 two police officers were shot and killed during an inmate transfer near the Wyandotte County Courthouse in Kansas City, Kansas. My stepmom works at the courthouse and told me that these were two kind, good people and that the shooter could have fled after he shot and wounded the female officer. Instead he walked up and shot her again to make sure that she was dead.
My stepmom is one of the most loving people that I’ve ever met, but she’s struggling right now – and I think rightly so – to not hate this person and to not want capital punishment for him. We all know that feeling. We want retribution. We want bad things to happen to “bad” people. The same sentiment is felt outside of the law enforcement community when someone is wrongfully killed by a police officer. It’s also felt when we feel threatened or we feel that our values are threatened. So often we want to prove that we’re right and others are wrong – to make them feel as bad as they made us feel. It feels good to know that I’m right and I feel right about my being right. I’m right! (Or so I tell myself.) BUT, if we’re serious about wanting to alleviate suffering, then it’s essential that we respond to these everyday, real, crappy situations by opening our hearts and minds as much as we can (as my stepmom is doing) to see the situation from different angles and to work toward justice instead of retribution.
Heaven on earth – that personal and later communal experience of peace, joy, safety and security – doesn’t come from homogeny, from everyone being the same. It comes when we can recognize, accept and appreciate our differences, both the “good” and the “bad.” It doesn’t mean that we forget the wrong that has been done to us or to others. It doesn’t mean that we overlook injustice. It means that somehow we have to find the courage to work toward justice and trust that it will be done in time. It means that we accept the fact that as smart as we are, we can’t see all of the details, all of the ramifications of a decision. What we can do is our best to participate in ways that feel right to us, and then, allow room for that something more to create a better outcome than we could imagine.
When hate seems like the best response, we can pause and remember that “hurt people hurt people.” Most people don’t do horrible things unless horrible things have been done to them. That man that killed those officers deserves justice and he will get it. But perhaps rather than turning hatred on him we can surrender that response and remember that we all have lessons to learn here. Perhaps being sentenced to death is how he learns his, or perhaps not being sentenced to death and being given time to understand the effects of his actions is how he learns them.
How could I know what’s best for him? What I do know is that hate breeds hate and it can spread like wildfire. Nelson Mandela. Eleanor Roosevelt. Ghandi. Martin Luther King, Jr. Mother Teresa. All of these people knew that you can’t make a better world out of revenge and hate. A better world can only be created with forgiveness, justice, love and imagination. It’s not about coming up with a perfect solution. No solution can be perfect in the worldly sense. To the limited view of the mind, compromise doesn’t make sense and it often doesn’t feel like enough. Perfection isn’t possible in the relative world, but by trusting the love that lives inside of us, we can get close.
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About the Author
Kimberly Herndon has traveled the world and studied various spiritual paths to enlightenment to determine what makes us truly happy. Kimberly has a bachelor’s degree in International Studies from the University of Washington in Seattle. She also has a master’s degree in Theological Studies from the
Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado. She is from Overland Park, Kansas, and lives in Denver with her boyfriend, their human baby and two fur babies.
Contact Links
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#Featured “Nobody’s Goddess: A Fantasy Romance Novel (The Never Veil Book 1)” by Amy McNulty
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Winner of The Romance Reviews’ Summer 2016 Readers’ Choice Award in Young Adult Romance. A novel readers are calling “spectacular and heartbreaking.”
In a village of masked men, each man is compelled to love only one woman and to follow the commands of his “goddess” without question. A woman may reject the only man who will love her if she pleases, but she will be alone forever. A man must stay masked until his goddess returns his love—and if she can’t or won’t, he remains masked forever.
Seventeen-year-old Noll’s childhood friends have paired off and her closest companion, Jurij, found his goddess in Noll’s own sister. Desperate to find a way to break this ancient spell, Noll instead discovers why no man has ever chosen her. She is in fact the goddess of the mysterious lord of the village, a man who refuses to let Noll have her right as a woman to spurn him.
Thus begins a dangerous game between the choice of woman and the magic of man. The stakes are no less than freedom and happiness, life and death—and neither Noll nor the veiled lord is willing to lose.
Fans of Tamlin in A Court of Thorns and Roses, Rhys in A Court of Mist and Fury, the Darkling in the Grisha Trilogy’s Shadow and Bone, and Jareth in Jim Henson’s Labyrinth will devour this Beauty and the Beast-style romantic adventure.
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