Sheila's Guests and Reviews

While I was away... Amazon removed some of my reviews and explained in an email that this was "because you received compensation for writing the review." Feeling somewhat disturbed since I have never received any compensation for reviewing books, I pressed the "help" and "contact us" buttons on Amazon and asked what they meant. Amazon were very quick and helpful, and very patient with my repeated requests for clarification. So here, for anyone else puzzling over the mystery of the vanishing reviews, is their answer. "The only form of compensation that Amazon allows is a free copy of the product (provided up front) in exchange for an unbiased review. Refunding of a product or providing funds to purchase the product are considered compensation and not allowed.  Anyone who has received a gift card to purchase a book for an unbiased review will have their reviews removed since providing funds to purchase a product is considered a form of compen...

While I was away... Two houses changed color across the street (were my neighbors trying to confuse me?) Our baby dandelions grew up into teenagers (dandelion lawn... perhaps that's why the neighbors are trying to confuse me?) The freezer magically emptied (grown up son stayed home and didn't starve, much to our delight) Washing baskets overflowed (but grown up son did his own washing. The overflow is just our stuff brought back from vacation) Email accounts tried hard to overflow ("only" 900 facebook , 200 twitter, 400 linkedin and 300 regular emails so I guess I'll survive) and Haunting Obsession ( see my review ) completed it's blog tour; it's free today through Wednesday on Amazon Kindle to celebrate: http://www.amazon.com/Haunting -Obsession-ebook/dp/B008Y2SVS4 Seventh Star Press's Kickstarter campaign for The Writers Workshop of Science Fiction and Fantasy is going well. Go to http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/seventhstarpress/the...

While I was away in England... Divide by Zero came out on Kindle (US: http://www.amazon.com/Divide-by-Zero-ebook/dp/B0090NFH56/ , UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Divide-by-Zero-ebook/dp/B0090NFH56/ ) and in paperback!!! (US: http://www.amazon.com/Divide-Zero-Sheila-Deeth/dp/1600763405/ ). Stonegarden offered me a contract for Infinite Sum, the sequel to Divide by Zero. Husband told me to stop dancing around the room and smiling but I couldn't. I earned a whole $5 from my writing (royalties for the last quarter), which will buy me a couple of coffees if I'm careful. I fell way behind on book reviews but read some really interesting books (will post reviews soon). And Amazon deleted my reviews of Grabarchuk puzzles and games. When I returned... a wasp got stuck in my hair and stung me! I danced around the room again but didn't smile so much. Ouch!

Author Jody Gehman's visiting my blog a month from today and talking about the curious magic of daring to dream. Meanwhile I'm reading her YA novel, Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft. And you can too. It's free from Smashwords in celebration of the dark of the moon, so just go to https://www.smashwords.com/ books/view/177500 and get your free ecopy. Here's a blurb to entice you: Enjoy! Falling in Love, baking a magical cake, fighting an evil necromancer—it’s all in a day’s work for Audrey Oliver, seventeen-year-old witch-in-training. When her mother goes missing and her twenty-one-year-old witchy cousin shows up out of the blue, Audrey knows something’s gone horribly, dangerously wrong. Now it’s up to her to get her own magical powers up to speed before everyone she loves is destroyed by the sorcerer intricately connected to her mother’s secret past.

They used to tell me all writers keep journals, but I never succeeded. We're supposed to write every day they say, filling diaries with tales of events that make up our lives, but I'd rather just live them. We chronicle dreams in our notebooks, record every passing idea, and write stories on napkins during dinner... But that was never me. The stories whisper in my head, or spill into drabbles, or bubble through words to the surface when my fingers tap the keys. So many stories, so little time to write them. Must send that next entry in... And meanwhile I read... More words, more dreams, more stories, more food for the journals I'll never keep. More coffee too. Here are some more book reviews... I really enjoyed E.G. Lewis's religious novels, but Promises by E.G. Lewis , while just as enjoyable, is a different sort of tale, reminding me of Barbara Taylor Bradford's Woman of Substance. A young girl from the coal-towns of the Appalachian hills goes to New York and...

I'm celebrating Divide by Zero's release by re-releasing my Inspired by Faith and Science books on Amazon. So now I've got an author page that makes me look amazingly prolific--if only I had a sales page to justify it! Still, at least being published in print has persuaded me I'll have to confess... I am an author!  A dream fulfilled! I'm also a reader and reviewer of course, so here are some more book reviews as I work on slowly shrinking that to-read list... Starting in the past with Reid Lance Rosenthal's Threads West: Maps of Fate , this one's a surprisingly enjoyable tale of America's pioneers and does a great job of bringing a wagon train to life. Ever wondered how to cross a river with wagons? Or how to jerk beef? Enjoy this book with a well-balanced 3-star cup of coffee. Moving forward to a slightly paranormal version of the present, I just finished reading the final two parts of the Vampire Hunter's Daughter by  Jennifer Malone ...

Lee Strauss's YA novel Perception is due for release on September 12th. It's the first in what sounds like a really intriguing series, set in the not-too-distant future in a world of extreme climate, natural disaster and impending war. The book blurb promises the novel will explore the clash between faith and science, and how differences can separate us as enemies or ally us together, adding "in the midst of betrayal and personal crisis, there's room to fall in love." Sounds good to me. I was lucky enough to be able to interview the author, so grab some coffee, sit back and see what we "talked" about. 1.    From the description of Perception it's clear you have an interest in faith and science. Could you tell me first about your scientific background?  Well, I took science classes in high school, does that count? :) My daughter is a science major in university so she's helpful to have around. However, I'm very interested in science...