Tracking Magic Cover Poll

Help Choose the Perfect Cover at Bear Mountain Books

"Get Smart" meets "Ghostbusters!"

Tracking Magic, a collection of short stories by Maria E. Schneider is due out soon in ebook form (Kindle, Nook, Sony, iPad, iTouch, iPhone, laptop, PC, netbook and so on)! As with Executive Lunch, please help the author choose the perfect cover!!!

The first Max Killian Investigation was published at The Town Drunk (http://www.towndrunkmag.com/2007/schneider_clues.aspx) back in March 2007. Since then Max has taken on a few even more difficult cases. Tracking Magic includes the first case, Haunting Clues and four new tales of investigative genius. Or luck, as the case may be!

You're welcome to click on the link above to read Haunting Clues in its entirety before choosing the cover (it's a free read) or just vote for the one that you like best. Here's the back of the book blurb for Tracking Magic:

Five case files from Max Killian Investigations:

Haunting Clues - Max is hired to expel a ghost from a mansion. To deal with the dead, though, he must first uncover the secrets of those still alive.

Curses! - Some days you curse, some days the curse gets you.

Dearly Departed - Max investigates a graveyard, but when it comes up empty, it's his job to find the body-dead or alive.

Roadkill - Max can smell the dead long after they are gone. Of course, it's not too hard to smell the ones that just died, but it could prove to be more dangerous.

Privy to Secrets - Some secrets are worth dying for. The trick is to know which ones make life worth living.

Without further ado, here are the covers to choose from:



"Go vote! at www.BearMountainBooks.com"

If you absolutely *cannot* wait until the cover is chosen, Tracking Magic is on sale exclusively at Smashwords for $1.99 in all formats: .mobi is for Kindle, HTML is for reading on your laptop, .ePUB is for Sony and Nook. There are also formats in PDF and one for the Palm device.

- If you buy a copy now, keep in mind, the cover may change! You'll be able to download the new one when it comes available in about two weeks when voting is concluded and the "chosen" cover is uploaded.

Look Again by Lisa Scottoline

Genre: Suspense

Single mom, reporter Ellen Gleason’s world is turned upside down when she receives a card in the mail asking “Have you seen this child?” The missing child, Tim Braverman, had been kidnapped a couple of years ago. He bares a striking resemblance to her adopted son, Will. Fear grips Ellen, but she tries to convince herself that it was nothing more than a coincidence. When the people involved in her adoption proceedings turn up dead, she realizes this could be something much more than a mere coincidence.

Scared to tell anyone about this, Ellen takes a leave of absence from her job to conduct her own investigation. As it is, her company is considering major layoffs and her sudden unexplained need to leave for even a short period of time is not met well. Her boss, Marcello, puts himself on the line to protect her. His concern goes much deeper than an employer/employee relationship, but Ellen cannot deal with that now. Her number one concern is getting to the bottom of Will’s adoption. There’s always a chance that Braverman’s kidnapping has nothing to do with her or her son.

I listened to the audio version of this book and it was quite gripping. I couldn’t turn it off. There were many twists and turns. Readers will find Ellen’s story both scary and captivating. It tugs at your heartstrings as Ellen’s plight begins to rip apart her life and takes one emotional turn after another. I definitely want to check out Lisa Scottoline’s backlist for more books.

A-Rod by Selena Roberts

Genre: Non-Fiction

This is a synopsis from Barnes & Noble...

Synopsis

Alex Rodriguez is the highest-paid player in the history of baseball, a once-in-a-generation talent poised to break many of the sport's most hallowed records. In 2007 he became the youngest player, at 32, ever to hit 500 home runs, solidifying his status as the greatest player in the modern game, and months later he signed a contract that would keep him with the Yankees through the end of his career.

His reputation changed drastically in February 2009 when Selena Roberts broke the news in Sports Illustrated that A-Rod had used performance-enhancing drugs during his 2003 MVP season with the Texas Rangers. Her report prompted a contrite Rodriguez to admit illegal drug use during his 2001–2003 seasons with the Rangers, who had signed him to the most expensive contract in Major League Baseball history.

Although he admitted to three seasons of steroid use, the man teammates call "A-Fraud" was still hiding the truth. In the first definitive biography of Alex Rodriguez, Roberts assembles the strands of a bizarre and extraordinary life: from his boyhood in New York and the Dominican Republic through his near-mythic high school career and fast track to the big leagues, the whole of A-Rod's career mirrors the rise and fall of the steroid generation.

Roberts goes beyond the sensational headlines, probing A-Rod's childhood to reveal a man torn by obligation to his family and the pull of his insatiable hedonism, a conflict—epitomized by his relationship with Madonna and devotion to Kabbalah—that led to the end of his six-year marriage. Roberts sheds new light on A-Rod's abuse of performance-enhancing drugs, a practice he appears to have begun asearly as high school and that extended into his Yankee years. She chronicles his secretive real estate deals, gets inside the negotiations for his latest record-breaking contract with the Yankees, and examines the insecurities that compel him to seek support from a motivational guru before every game.

In A-Rod, Roberts captures baseball's greatest player as a tragic figure in pinstripes: the man once considered the clean exception of the steroid generation revealed as an unmistakable product of its greed and dissolution.

My thoughts....

It's an interesting book, but I always have a problem with "tell all" books as I'm never sure how much true information the author really has. It's a well written and fast-paced book and I wouldn't be surprised if the things in the book are true, but I also wouldn't be surprised if they weren't. I guess my belief with "tell all" books are that the truth is somewhere in the middle.

I'm going to give this one a rating of three little kitty cats :)



For reading challenge:

A to Z Reading challenge

A-Z Wednesday

This is a fun meme hosted by Reading at the Beach

Welcome to A-Z Wednesday!!

To join, here's all you have to do: Go to your stack of books and find one whose title starts with the letter of the week.

Post:

1~ a photo of the book

2~ title and synopsis

3~ link(amazon, barnes and noble etc.)

4~ Come back here and leave your link in the comments.

If you've already reviewed this book you can add it also.

Be sure to visit other participants to see what book they have posted and leave them a comment.

(We all love comments, don't we?)

Who knows? You may find your next "favorite" book.

THIS WEEKS LETTER IS: "I"

My book this week is........



This synopsis is from Fantastic Fiction:

Murder is easy-on paper.

Book restoration expert Brooklyn Wainwright is attending the world- renowned Book Fair when her ex Kyle shows up with a bombshell. He has an original copy of a scandalous text that could change history-and humiliate the beloved British monarchy.

When Kyle turns up dead, the police are convinced Brooklyn's the culprit. But with an entire convention of suspects, Brooklyn's conducting her own investigation to find out if the motive for murder was a 200-year-old secret-or something much more personal.

I haven't read this one yet, but it looks like a great cozy mystery.

Teaser Tuesdays - April 6th

If you'd like to play along on Teaser Tuesdays, just click the button above.


Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

* Grab your current read
* Open to a random page
* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

I'm reading "The Moon Looked Down" by Dorothy Garlock.

As she approached, Sophie could see the man's hands tighten on the stock of the rifle and she began to brace herself for the blow she would certainly receive. There was nothing she could do to stop them, to hurt them like they had hurt her family, but she didn't care. Her father was defenseless, and he needed someone, needed her, to protect him.