Fair Dinkum Crime Baker’s Dozen

Image courtesy of Pat at Lost and Found



Fair Dinkum Crime is a must-follow blog for all fans of Australian crime fiction. Hosted by Adelaide-based book bloggers, Kerrie and Bernadette, the site is a treasure trove of book reviews, author interviews, news, award updates and anything else relevant to Australian crime fiction.

One of Fair Dinkum Crime’s regular features is the Baker’s Dozen interview – their version of the author interview. Instead of the standard questions, the authors are provided with thirteen sentence beginnings. So far, they've "interviewed" Aussie authors:

1. Felicity Young
2. P M Newton
3. Sulari Gentill
4. Leah Giarratano
5. Brian Kavanagh
6. Phillipa (PD) Martin
7. Michael Robotham
8. Michael Duffy
9. Rosanne Dingli
10. Vicki Tyley

I'm both honoured and humbled to be in such esteemed company – I'm a big fan of many of them. If you enjoy good crime fiction, you can't go past any of these authors. (Unfortunately, not all are available in digital format... yet.)

Q&A and Giveaway at The Frugal eReader

The Frugal eReader is a site dedicated to featuring Frugal Finds Under Nine for the Kindle, as well as author interviews and giveaways.

I'm delighted to be featured as this month's The Frugal eReader's author. To celebrate, 5 Frugal eReaders will win a gifted Kindle copy of Brittle Shadows. PLUS, 3 Frugal eReaders will win an advance reader's copy of my upcoming novel, Bitter Nothings.

I also answer the following (and more) questions:

When did you first know that you wanted to write? What inspired you to start?

How would you describe the style of your writing?

How would you describe Brittle Shadows to someone who has not read any of your previous novels?

As I have a strong relationship with my sister, I am always intrigued by novels with sister relationships as part of the premise. How did you come up with the premise for Brittle Shadows?

What was your creative process for determining the final title and cover for your novel?

What were the challenges of writing this novel? Your favorite part of writing Brittle Shadows?

Any advice to those who hold the dream of becoming an author?

Are you working on anything new that you’d like to share?

NEW – Broken: A Paranormal Romance by David H Burton

Three days before her twenty-fourth birthday, Katherine Gregory receives a letter from her deceased mother. It details a faery curse in which the eldest child in each generation will die in their twenty-fifth year.

Three days before her twenty-fourth birthday, a new love interest comes knocking, and her first love has returned - neither men are what they seem, and Katherine may have to choose between them.

Three days before her twenty-fourth birthday, Katherine must decide if this is all real, or if the strange visions she's been having are just a figment of her imagination.

The race to unravel the mystery begins, and Katherine must solve it - for any day after her birthday could be her last.

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE VISIT DAVIDBURTON.COM

The Power of Words

Do You Judge a Book by Its Cover?

Maybe not judge, as such, but get a feel for the tone and style of the story? I only ask because when I picked up Catch an Honest Thief by Maria Schneider recently, I was pleasantly surprised to find that instead of the light-hearted cozy depicted on the cover (or at least that’s how I interpreted it), it was a taut, pacy hi-tech mystery – my sort of reading. Now, if it hadn’t been recommended to me, I probably wouldn’t have looked at it twice. I’m very glad I did.

Today, I received a message from Maria to say she’d redesigned the cover. I love the new look and think it fits the story much better. See what you think – old cover on the left, new one (design by Razzle Dazzle Design) on the right:



An Indiana Jones-style caper across the desert of New Mexico; high-tech gadgets, a mystery and a romance.

Alexia is trying to protect the crystals that power the city of Haven. Going undercover and stealing the crystals seemed like a great idea--until a real thief showed up.

Bait and switch is suddenly cat and mouse--but who is the real thief? And why is the new security chief spending so much time looking into her background?

Confessing her secret plans to protect the crystals might help the security chief narrow in on the real culprit, but it would cost Alexia her job, her freedom, and her status. Of course, if she keeps standing in the way of the real thief, it will cost her a whole lot more.

READ AN EXTRACT:

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Maria Schneider grew up in New Mexico where the desert environment required that she embellish the landscape with her imagination. After working in the computer industry for twelve years, she decided technology moved too slowly, and again put her imagination to work, creating messes and then inventing characters to handle all the clean up. She currently resides near Austin, Texas.

For more information about Maria and her books visit: http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/

AVAILABLE FROM AMAZON, SMASHWORDS, AND B&N

Q&A at Maureen Miller's Place

The delightful and talented Maureen Miller, the author of the newly released ENDLESS NIGHT (Carina Press) [see trailer below], posed me a few questions.

Please join me at Maureen’s place and check out her romantic suspense novels – highly recommended, especially if you’re like me and don’t enjoy over-the-top “romance.” With both the mystery and the romance aspects, the focus is on suspense.

AVAILABLE AT CARINA PRESS AND AMAZON

TRAILER: