Hold Your Breath by Katie Ruggle

Blurb:

In the remote Rocky Mountains, lives depend on the Search & Rescue brotherhood. But in a place this far off the map, trust is hard to come by and secrets can be murder…

As the captain of Field County’s ice rescue dive team, Callum Cook is driven to perfection. But when he meets new diver Louise “Lou” Sparks, all that hard-won order is obliterated in an instant. Lou is a hurricane. A walking disaster. And with her, he’s never felt more alive—even if keeping her safe may just kill him.

Lou’s new to the Rockies, intent on escaping her controlling ex, and she’s determined to make it on her own terms—no matter how tempting Callum may be. But when a routine training exercise unearths a body, Lou and Callum find themselves thrust into a deadly game of cat and mouse with a killer who will stop at nothing to silence Lou—and prove that not even her new Search and Rescue family can keep her safe forever.

About the Author:

A fan of the old adage "write what you know," Katie Ruggle lived in an off-grid, solar- and wind-powered house in the Rocky Mountains until her family lured her back to Minnesota. When she's not writing, Katie rides horses, shoots guns (not while riding, although that would be awesome), cross-country skis (badly), and travels to warm places where she can scuba dive. A graduate of the Police Academy, Katie received her ice-rescue certification and can attest that the reservoirs in the Colorado mountains really are that cold. A fan of anything that makes her feel like a bad-ass, she has trained in Krav Maga, boxing, and gymnastics.

You can connect with Katie at http://katieruggle.com/, https://www.facebook.com/katierugglebooks, or on Twitter @KatieRuggle.

Review by Rochelle:

Hold Your Breath is a fast-paced book with well-drawn characters, and a heroine who is no fainting flower. Louise “Lou” Sparks can hold her own with or without the guys on the ice rescue team she’s joined in her new home, Field County, Colorado—both in and out of the icy waters of Colorado’s reservoirs.

During a routine training exercise, Lou has difficulty orienting herself with the unfamiliar gear, and kicks something loose under the ice. That something turns out to be a headless corpse. Feeling responsible for “HDG” (Headless Dead Guy), Lou sets out to find out who he was, who killed him, and why. Team leader Callum Cook, in an effort to keep her out of trouble, decides to help. But, they get sidetracked—someone’s stalking Lou, trying to kill her, and the stalking started before she dislodged HDG.

So why am I only giving Hold Your Breath two roses? It was a five-rose book right up to the very last page. Hold Your Breath isn’t just a cliff-hanger. Ms. Ruggle never solves the mystery of who killed HDG or why. Leaving room for a sequel is one thing. Even ending on a cliff-hanger would have only lost a book this good one rose. In fact, I’d have given Ms. Ruggle thorns if Lou hadn’t been such a strong heroine.

I’m really torn about recommending this book, because the original mystery has no resolution. That's not good marketing; it's bad writing, and as an editor I would never let an author get away with it. Ms. Ruggle had 386 pages in which to solve the mystery. I knew who Lou's stalker was right away. I'm not telling, in case anyone reading this review actually wants to buy a book with no ending. But I still don't know who killed HDG, and it makes me angry.

Author Website:  http://katieruggle.com/

Heat Rating:  R

Length:  386 Pages

Prices:

Print:  $5.99

Digital:  $3.99

Buy Link:  http://www.sourcebooks.com/store/hold-your-breath.html

You’ll notice we always include the publisher’s buy link. That’s because authors usually receive 40-50% of the net proceeds from the publisher. Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%. When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left. So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40-$2.99. If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $1.70-$2.10.

Download the file from the publisher onto your computer as you would any other file. I’ve created a folder for books on my computer, with subfolders by source (Marketing for Romance Writers, Net Galley, Authors who find me on Kindle lists, etc.). That way, if there’s a glitch with your Kindle, the books are on your computer. Some publishers send books in all digital formats. If my Kindle breaks and my kids buy me a Nook, I won’t have to replace all of my books. If you have a Kindle and your hubby has a Nook, you won’t have to buy separate copies, so buying directly from the publisher can save you money.

Moving the file from your computer to your e-reader is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive. Plug the larger USB end of your e-reader charging chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from the folder into which you’ve downloaded the book to Documents/Books directory on your e-reader. You can move the file by highlighting it and dragging it to the documents directory in you Kindle you want to move it to. Or right click on it, and then left click copy or move. Or hit Control/C for copy, Control/X for cut, and Control/V for paste.

Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Thanks for visiting.

The Golden Mouse by Mike Dixon

 Blurb:

Vultures gather around creatures in distress: old Aboriginal saying.

Kate Bromley worried about her parents and the strange people that had gathered around them. Being a member of a banking family is hazardous when the bank is on the skids. There are rich pickings and it is difficult to tell friend from foe.

When she was a little girl, Kate was told that money grew on trees. That was a way of hiding the truth. Money is created by banks and floats around in cyberspace as trillions of dollars are traded every day.

That leaves room for a lot of skulduggery.

Money can be created and destroyed at the click of a mouse: a computer mouse. Her father talked about his. He called it the Golden Mouse and said it could work wonders. Kate thought he was joking. Then she realized it was no joke. Father was clicking away furiously and putting the entire family at risk.

One day, she was on a survival trek in the Scottish Highlands with her university friends. The next, she was fleeing for her life.

Hansen Files: The Golden Mouse is the third book in the Hansen Files series and can be read without reference to the others.

About the Author:

I either started off on the wrong foot or I'm the legendary rolling stone. Normally, a degree in astrophysics does not lead to a stint in Parliament House, public relations and the diving industry but that's what happened to me.

My varied life has provided a lot of background material for my novels.

Review by Rochelle:

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in return for an honest review. First, I’d like to thank Mr. Dixon for writing a series in which each book can stand alone. As many of you know, I hate cliff-hangers.

The Bromley family once owned one of the largest banks in England, but went out of business except for one branch in the Cayman Islands, and a few loyal business clients. As Kate Bromley learns when her father abruptly calls her to join him in Australia, not all of those clients are exactly, um, squeaky clean. Now she and her father are running for their lives across the Australian Outback, and she’s not sure whether the MI-5 agents chasing them are there to help her dad or arrest him.

This book would make a great movie. I could almost envision the wonderful sun-rises and –sets, and the great underwater diving scenes, spanning both Britain and Australia. It has action, adventure, alpha heroes and feisty heroines in two generations. The pacing is great. It was a page-burner that kept me up all night. A movie audience would forget to breathe. There were even details about Aboriginal tribes that live in remote valleys in Papua, New Guinea and still respect ancestral practices.

Heat Rating:  PG

Length:  300 Pages

Prices:

Print:  $9.50

Digital:  $0.99

Buy Link:  http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Mouse-Hansen-Files-ebook/dp/B00DNU2A6Q/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1450133869&sr=1-1&keywords=The+Golden+Mouse+%2B+Mike+Dixon

Thanks for visiting. Donna, Julie, & Rochelle

Alive at 5 by Linda Bond

Blurb:

TV news reporter Samantha Steele is one panic attack away from losing her job. Future on the line and cameraman in tow, she follows her mentor on an exhilarating adventure vacation. When he dies while skydiving, her investigative instincts scream “murdered”, and lead her to gorgeous thrill-seeker Zack Hunter.

Zack is an undercover police officer investigating his uncle’s death through the same adventure vacation company. Samantha is a thorn in his side the moment they meet. Not only is she investigating the same case, but the emotionally wounded loner doesn’t want another partner, especially one whose goal is to splash evidence all over the evening news. But Samantha’s persistence is quite a turn-on, and Zack’s overpowering desire makes it harder for him to push her away.

When the killer turns his attention to Zack, Samantha might be the only one who can save him, forcing the anxiety-riddled correspondent to finally face her greatest fear.

Review:

As Editor-in-Chief of the Marketing for Romance Writers Newsletter, I get inside information on what’s coming out each month. Linda Bond was our Featured Author for August, 2014. One of the first things I noticed about Alive at 5 was the fact that Ms. Bond’s name appeared above the title. That’s rare enough for seasoned authors. You have to be a Tom Clancy, a James Patterson or a J. K. Rowling to get your name above the title. Most mid-list authors’ names stay firmly below their titles. Next, I tested the link for Ms. Bond’s website and found myself watching her book trailer. I thought I was pretty clever narrating mine. All of the other book trailers I’ve seen have simply been a collection of stock photos accompanied by music. Ms. Bond’s trailer is live, with actors, dialog, soundtrack music and even out-takes at the end. It helps to be an Emmy-winning broadcaster and have access to a news crew, equipment and video studio. All of that, however, means Ms. Bond has a really good agent and friends in the right places. So, you’ve got my attention. Can you write?

Well, of course! You don’t get the kind of agent who gets your name above the title by writing a dull, slow-paced story with characters no one cares about! Alive at 5 lived up to its promise and then some. If it weren’t for the help of her mother’s former lover, Maxwell Wentworth, Samantha Steel would not be able to keep her mother in an expensive nursing home after a plane crash leaves her in a coma. Furthermore, if Maxwell hadn’t allowed Sam to accompany him on and cover his adventure vacation, she’d be out of a job. She’s had anxiety attacks every time she’s had to deliver a live broadcast ever since her mother’s accident. Covering Maxwell’s adventure vacation is her last chance—until his parachute fails to open in the first phase. When fellow vacationer, Zack tells her the chute’s been tampered with, Sam decides to follow him on the rest of his tour, and find out who tried to kill Maxwell and why, not realizing Zack is there to track the person who killed his uncle a year earlier on the same tour.

Alive at 5 grabbed me on the first page and held my attention all the way through. I truly did not know who did it or why until Sam and Zack figured it out, and regular readers know how rarely that happens. I’m excited for Ms. Bond. I think we’ll see a lot more of her. I really hope so. Oh, and watch for the hunky actor in her book trailer elsewhere. He’s a soccer player in an Adidas commercial.

Length:  309 Pages

Prices:

Print:  $14.99

Digital:  $0.99

Buy Link:  http://www.entangledpublishing.com/alive-at-5/

You’ll notice we always include the publisher’s buy link.  That’s because authors usually receive 40% of the book price from the publisher.  Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%.  When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left.  So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40.  If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $0.83.

Downloading the file from your computer to your Kindle is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive. Plug the larger USB end of your chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from your “Downloads” box to your Kindle/Documents/Books directory. You can download your books onto your computer using “Save As” to a “Books” file you create and sort them into sub-folders by genre, author, or however you wish before transferring them to your Kindle. That way, if there’s a glitch with your Kindle, the books are on your computer. Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Thanks for visiting. Rose, Julie & Rochelle