TANGLED HONOR by Philip McBride, a book review.

There are more than enough accurately depicted battle scenes in TANGLED HONOR to satisfy the Civil War buff, but it’s also a compelling family story.

While Captain John McBee ably commandeers his men through bloody horrors, he also fights against his attraction to a beautiful woman he accepts shelter from one frightful night. Add to that his growing respect for his slave Levi, who has become indispensable to him as his aide, and is most likely his son.

TANGLED HONOR starts with a riveting bit of back-story from after the Texas Revolution when Comanche tribes were a major foe: The Battle of Plum Creek. Then the action jumps forward to Texas’ involvement in the Civil War where main character Captain John McBee fights for what seems at the time to be the upcoming victory of the South over the North.

No reader who enjoys realistic battle scenes will be disappointed in this historical novel. No reader who enjoys historical fiction from the Civil War era will be able to put this book down.

DISCLAIMER: I am part of the same critique group as Philip McBride, the author, and saw many chapters of this book as it was being written. Follow his blog at  

http://mcbridenovels.blogspot.com

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  Revival by Stephen King.

Photos by Roxanne Rix

You can find my books at

http://amazon.com/author/gretchenrix and http://barnesandnoble.com/c/gretchen-rix

THE TEN BOOKS I ENJOYED BEST IN 2014

I got this idea from Julia Tomiak’s Favorite books of 2014 nblo.gs/12dc9t blog. I’m going to share with you the 10 books I read in 2014 that I most enjoyed.

Here’s Darwin telling me to put my book down and pay attention to her

THE SEVENTH MAN by Max Brand. It’s a western like no other, where the bad guys are the viewpoint characters. It will take your breath away.  

THE WALK by Lee Goldberg. Wildly entertaining catastrophe novel that should be a movie. I’ll re-read this book forever.

DEAD MONEY by Dean Wesley Smith. A thriller set in the world of gambling and high politics. I bet you can’t put it down once you start reading it.

GRAVE INDULGENCE by William Doonan. Loved it, loved it, loved it. An octogenarian private detective solving murder mysteries on cruise ships. I wish I’d written it.

MEDITERRANEAN GRAVE by William Doonan. Another splendid and rip-roaring cruise adventure that will have you falling out of your chair.

QUICKSILVER by Toni Dwiggins, one of her Forensic Geology thrillers. It’s absolutely riveting.

COCKTAIL HOUR UNDER THE TREE OF FORGIVENESS by Alexandra Fuller. The memoirs of a girl growing up in post colonial Africa. What a life!

REPUBLIC by Lindsay Buroker. The latest in the adventures of The Emperor’s Edge gang of Amaranthe, Maldynado, and everyone’s favorite conflicted assassin Sicarius. Fantasy/science fiction steampunk.

STREET JUSTICE by Kris Nelscott. Hard-boiled mystery from the steamy side of the street.

BROOD OF BONES by A.E. Marling. You’ve never read a fantasy like this one.

Someday I hope to see one of my  books on a list like this. The books above are what I strive to achieve with my own.

PHOTOS by Roxanne Rix

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  The Before by Emily McKay.  Tangled Honor by Philip McBride.

My newest book Tea With A Dead Gal.  

A Boo Done It Mystery

LIFE WITHOUT POETRY

LIVE FROM LA PRYOR: The poetry of Juan Manuel Perez, a Zavala County native son, volume I

Big Disclaimer. I don’t read poetry, nor do I often enjoy it. I’ve got a book of the complete Lord Byron poems (never opened), ditto Shelley, and I’ve got the complete works of Edgar Allan Poe as well, and at best I read a couple of poems for Halloween before I give up.

But I read LIVE FROM LA PRYOR, The Poetry of Juan Manuel Perez, cover to cover.

It helps that the poetry is short. It really helps that the poetry’s really short. He uses small words, he writes about everyday experiences (and not in a flowery way). This is almost a book of poems for people who don’t like poetry.

Don’t mistake me, though. Some of his writing is quite angry. Combative. A lot of it is funny. It’s all offbeat. I can see what we used to call beatniks reading Juan Perez poems out loud at nightclubs. With music. But in this case it’d be mariachi music. Much of what he writes about comes from his experiences as a Mexican-American facing various sorts of barriers.

But then there’s that poem about lovely food, and then about comic books. He mentions Taco Bell in here somewhere, too.

This is volume I. I’m wondering if any of his Hooter’s poetry is in volume II. 

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  Live From La Pryor: The Poetry of Juan Manuel Perez, A Zavala County Native Son, Volume I edited by Dr. Malia A. Perez.  Want It Bad by Melinda DuChamp.

Find my books at

http://amazon.com/author/gretchenrix and http://barnesandnoble.com/c/gretchen-rix and at Smashwords.

Photos by Roxanne Rix

Ghostoria, Vintage Romantic Tales of Fright, is my friend Tam Francis’s first published short story collection, and I had a hand in it. (Aside: Though primarily a ghost story collection, it also contains horror stories. My hand is not literally in any of the stories, I promise you.)

Tam wasn’t anyone I knew when she started writing these stories. She submitted to the Scare The Dickens Out of Us ghost story contest my sister and I started and were preliminary judges for in 2010, then 2011, and then in 2012 when I thought she might actually win the thing. That story, Mrs. Franklin’s Night Out, is in this book.

We met finally through the Gaslight Baker Theatre where she’s an actress, and then when I joined her writer’s critique groups more than a year ago we became friends. I made editing suggestions to almost all the stories in this book (some of which I see that she ignored).

Enough of my disclaimer.

About three or four of the twelve stories in this volume are stunning ghost stories that I hope make it to a wider audience. I am so extremely proud of Tam Francis for these, and the rest of her tales are entertaining. (I’m proud of her for those, too). Many are stories of a more polite and refined era she’s calling vintage, and most of them have women protagonists.

They’ll send chills down your spine, or make you cry. They’ll while away the hours and take your mind off the nightly news. And to pay tribute to the United Kingdom’s Christmas ghost story tradition, I’ll remind everyone that Ghostoria would make a great Christmas present for someone.

WHERE TO BUY

Kindle           Paperback          Nook

You can find my books at

http://amazon.com/author/gretchenrix

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  Ghostoria by Tam Francis.

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK: Smith’s Monthly # 6 (includes the novel Kill Game) by Dean Wesley Smith.

http://amazon.com/author/gretchenrix

Following in the steps of The Passive Guy, I occasionally actually read my Spam. Here are a few of the charmers that caught my attention.

the shoe by itself is assemble it stand up to the shock of routinely hitting the floor which implies fewer harm to your feet and decrease legs.

 (I’d like to see those decreased legs. Sounds dangerous to me.)

I personalized manboobs my own self. 

(I thought manboobs were things men didn’t want!)

I have certainly picked up anything new from proper here.

(Wonder what I wrote that brought on that comment?)

The Cowboy’s Baby 

The Cowboy’s Baby Goes To Heaven 

Talking To The Dead Guys 

Arroyo  

The Safari Bride

Available for Kindle, Nook, and just about everything else

Twisted Rixter

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn.

MY NEWEST–THE SAFARI BRIDE

Available for Kindle, Nook, and just about everything else

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  Judgement by Lee Goldberg.  Sea of Gold by by Nick Elliott.

Get it at Amazon.com

http://amzn.com/B00PUVCBGK

Get it for the Nook

http://barnesandnoble.com/c/gretchen-rix

Amtrak’s got a grant program for writers.

Yes, I’m a writer.

Didn’t expect that, did you? They pay the way of a writer to ride the rails, with several stipulations: They have to write while on the train. Not sleep, not watch the scenery, not play cards, but write. And they have to Tweet about the experience or put it on Facebook or otherwise publicize it.

Well, I’m never going to win that grant. And for the most part, my fellow Romance Writers of America friends aren’t going to, either. But the idea enchanted us.

So we did it ourselves. This past Saturday and Sunday. It was a blast! Nineteen of us made the round-trip from Austin to Dallas, staying at the Hyatt Saturday night. Our goal was to write going up there, to write coming back home, and to write at the hotel that night. I did  all that, and more.

I started my second short romance novel THE CIMARRON BRIDE. I made great progress. I’d decided to go low tech (as in pen and paper) because I wasn’t sure how to handle my heavy laptop on the train. Turned out it was the right decision, even though I now have to type my novel into a file. The train ride was not smooth like a car ride, but more like a carnival ride (not all the time, but enough). Many of the writers moved from the traditional train seats to the observation car where there were tables.

Warning. The toilets are smaller than on airliners. The stairs leading up from the lower to the upper levels of the train are claustrophobic.You have to pay close attention there, and as you’re walking down the aisle, and especially if you go from one car to the next.

Would I do it again? You bet! It’s a hell of a lot safer than driving. And a lot more fun. Maybe even cheaper.

Plus I wrote the beginning of my novel that way.

And I didn’t even mention what it’s like to have another train pass about two inches from your window, going the other way, and all you see of it is a shape rushing by. Or the tunnel of trees the train glides through out there in the farm and ranch lands. Or what it’s like passing through people’s backyards, and mainly through the poorer sections of big cities. Or that our train ran its horn most of the trip, and sometimes people waved at us. Or that the passengers often lurched down the aisle as if they were drunk and holding onto the seats to remain upright.

To my utter surprise, I loved it. The train ride worked really well to concentrate my attention on the book.

You see the most amazing things sometimes.

WHAT I’VE READ THIS WEEK:  NOS4A2 by Joe Hill.

Check out my mystery novel TALKING TO THE DEAD GUYS  http://amzn.com/B0094FBA8S.

I write short stories too.

My most ambitious story.

My favorite color.

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK:  Scavengers by Steven F. Havill. When the Duke was Wicked  by Lorraine Heath.  Chez Stinky by Susan C. Daffron.

http://amazon.com/author/gretchenrix

You should see these shoes now.

Literature for Halloween?  You Bet! 

By Tam Francis

An Invitation

Gretchen has graciously invited me to hawk my new book on her blog. But, besides telling you what a fun and spooky read it is for Halloween and what it’s about, I wanted to share something special with you. I’d like to reveal the mystery of how one person can make a difference, or in this case two. If it wasn’t for Gretchen, and her sister Roxanne these stories never would have been written.

I had just moved from San Diego, California to the small town of Lockhart, Texas. I had no friends yet, and although Texans are friendly, fun and talkative, it sometimes takes a while to be invited in. I was desperate for something to distract me from my lonelies.

I had just finished writing my novel, The Girl in the Jitterbug Dress, when we moved, and I was looking for something else to sink my teeth into while I queried the novel.

The Impetus

That wish came true in the form of a flyer posted on our local library door. Our local library is not your run-of-the-mill indifferent kind of municipal library. It’s the oldest continuously operating library in all of Texas, built in 1899 with pressed tin ceiling, heavy dark wood trim, and a mezzanine with curling staircases.

The building is one of those spaces that oozes mystery, possibilities and a cosmic connection to the past. It exudes the same feeling you get when you discover a new author, or run your hand across the spine of a beautiful leather hand-bound book, or the delight of discovering someone else loves and had read your favorite novel twelve times. It’s a book-lovers library and I knew the flyer on the library must be a gift from the universe.

Scare the Dickens Out of Us

The flyer was for the Scare the Dickens Out of Us Ghost Story Contest sponsored by the Rix sisters as a fundraiser for the library. I went home and started writing. I entered with my first story, The Tour which has a specter-like character, but more of a Twilight Zone twist.

The next year I entered Haint Blue which was inspired by a friend asking me if we were going to paint our 1908 porch ceiling blue, a tradition in the south. That innocent comment led me on a research quest where I unearthed an interesting history of the tradition of blue paint relating to ghosts or haints, as there were once called. My turn-of-the-century home provided the backdrop and Texas supplied the colloquialisms.

The year after that, I entered again. This time with my, Mrs. Franklin’s Night Out, a ghost story rich in vintage style description about a woman going to a Mozartian Masquerade dance, her lonely desperation at missing her husband, and the life and death choices she must face.

Lockhart Writers Group

Shortly thereafter a group of writers, Gretchen and I included, got together and formed a critique group. Out of this group, came the other nine stories that complete the Ghostoria collection.  I could not have refined the stories and I guarantee they would not be as good if not for my writing cohorts. They each have their favorites and the diversity in which their tastes run is fascinating. We all have our darlings. One of mine is: Dressing the Part, a unique story of ghostly possession with a bit of romance, vintage fashion, and a 1940s jitterbug vibe. Check it out now on loan in the Goodreads library for your sample. Don’t forget to enter and WIN A FREE COPY of Ghostoria on Goodreads!

What’s Ghostoria about? 

GHOSTORIA: VINTAGE ROMANTIC TALES OF FRIGHT

Do you like scary stories with a little romance and a vintage twist?  Welcome to Ghostoria.

• What happens when a WWII secretary is trapped in the office with a ghost and the only way out is to make an unwelcome choice?
• Drive-in movies, hot rods, and jitterbugs populate Long Way Home; can one young man survive a bloody night in a historic cemetery with his girlfriend?
• Young residents of a cursed Texas town grapple with what they’re willing to sacrifice in order to save their crops, animals and loved ones.
• Can a kindergarten teacher silence the talking doll that has frightened her students by solving a fifty year old mystery?
• A lone lady hitchhiker hops a ride in a 1959 El Dorado Cadillac by a roadside grave. Who will be alive at the end of the drive?
• A turn of the century jail that housed murderers, liars, and thieves for over a hundred years is taken over by six teenagers on Halloween. What happens when a childhood chant turns deadly?

Those are just a few haunts and haints that populate this world of unrequited love, woe and mystery. Ghostoria will gnaw the corners of your mind and challenge your ideas about life, love and death long after you leave.

Where to Buy

Kindle           Paperback          Nook

Books make great party favors, fun door prizes and thoughtful gifts.

PLEASE SHARE and PLEASE DO A REVIEW ON AMAZON OR GOODREADS!::

What are some of your favorite ghost stories? Do you have any personal experience with unexplained phenomena? What comes to mind when you read the subtitle Vintage Romantic Tales of Woe? If you like the vintage time era 1920s-1950s stop by my blog and check it more fun posts, stories and freebies!  

~~~
Tam Francis

The Girl in the Jitterbug Dress

WWII~ Vintage ~ Lindy~ Swing ~ Dance ~ Sewing ~ Lifestyle ~ Novel &  Blog

http://www.girlinthejitterbugdress.com ~  Join my list ~ Facebook page

THANK YOU TAM FRANCIS. Now, back to me.

WHAT I READ THIS WEEK: Parables & Ponderings: When God Speaks to us Through Everyday Items and Incidents by Lia London. Republic by Lindsay Buroker.  King City by Lee Goldberg.