BEA'S BOOK NOOK "I can't imagine a man really enjoying a book and reading it only once." C. S. Lewis “If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.” ― Oscar Wilde

Showing posts with label Harte. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Harte. Show all posts

Friday, February 3, 2017

Spotlight on Zero to Sixty by Marie Harte & A Giveaway!


To celebrate Marie Harte's new release, "Sixty to Love", the publisher is giving away a bundle of the first two books in the "Bad Boy Body Shop" series. The giveaway is at the end of this post.
 
Caffeine addict, boy referee, and romance aficionado, Marie Harte is a confessed bibliophile and devotee of action movies. Whether hiking in Central Oregon, biking around town, or hanging at the local tea shop, she’s constantly plotting to give everyone a happily ever after. Visit www.marieharte.com and fall in love.

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

Excerpt from Roadside Assistance by Marie Harte & A Giveaway

Excerpt, Roadside Assistance, Marie Harte, Giveaway, romance, Bea's Book Nook
 
Welcome to the Nook! Grab a drink, move the cat out of your way, and get ready to read an excerpt from a new contemporary romance and then there's a giveaway at the end. Enjoy!

About Marie, From her site:

"I’ve been writing as far back as I can remember. Interest in the written word, no doubt spawned by my English teacher father, continues to this day. I’m a voracious reader, gobbling everything from romance to horror to fantasy and more. I’m in love with the art of storytelling.

I majored in English from Penn State University, earning a B.A. in Liberal Arts, as well as a commission in the United States Marine Corps. Five years later, after serving as a communications officer, I left the service to focus more on family. After going through an assortment of jobs–the Marine Corps Reserve, IT representative, middle manager for a Fortune 500 transportation company–I stopped working to raise my children. During this period, I decided to stop dreaming and start seriously writing. In December of 2004 my first story was published, and I haven’t looked back since. I currently have over a hundred titles with several publishers to include: Ellora’s Cave, Fated Desires, Loose Id, Samhain, Sourcebooks, and Totally Bound. I’ve hit both the USA Today and New York Times bestseller lists and am always on deadline.

I currently live in Central Oregon with my family, writing like a woman possessed and loving every second of it."

Saturday, November 17, 2012

Review of Deadly Valentine by Jenna Harte

Publisher: Moxie Vie
Series: Valentine series #1
Format Read: PDF
Release Date: August 5, 2012
Buying Links:  Amazon   Barnes & Noble

Book Blurb (from goodreads): 

Tess Madison walked away from her two-timing fiancĂ©, a multi-million dollar trust fund and a cushy corporate law job to pursue the single life indulging in chocolate and fancy French underwear. But her newly reordered life comes unraveled when she reluctantly accepts an invitation to a dinner party and stumbles upon the host’s dead body. Now Tess is in the middle of a murder investigation pitting her wannabe-boyfriend police detective against Jack Valentine, a man from her past with blue-green eyes and sinful smile that causes her to rethink her self-imposed celibacy. Tess has many reasons to avoid Jack including the fact that he’s the prime suspect in murder. But Tess doesn’t believe Jack’s the murderer and with an honest attempt to keep her hormones in check, she agrees to represent him. With Jack’s help, she uncovers a 30-year-old secret someone is killing to keep hidden and discovers sensual delights that don’t include chocolate or French underwear. But when her professional and personal relationship with Jack threatens to ruin her career and end her life, Tess has to decide if Jack, is worth the risk.


Reviewed By: Bea

Bea's Thoughts:
 
I love romantic suspense, and I love chocolate, so I was excited to read this book. Unfortunately the book did not live up to my expectations. The mystery was okay; it wasn't hard to figure out, and several of the twists I saw coming miles in advance, particularly the one about Jack's family. 

My main problem with the book though was the romance. I found Jack to be overbearing and condescending and Tess had a distressing tendency to be a doormat. I noted this several times in my status updates and Kindle shares, such as this one at 25% in: "He's still overbearing and she's still not standing up for herself. " Jack delights in making Tess uncomfortable, ignores her repeatedly when states what she wants, and is absolutely convinced that he knows better than she does what she needs and wants.

There's a mystery of sorts for the first third of the book about why Tess left the big city, Washington DC, and moved to a small rural town and Harte is coy about why Jack and Tess broke up several years ago. Jack acts all confused and hurt about why Tess left and why she wants nothing to do with him now, and Tess is confused about Jack's interest in her, she doesn't believe its real, and I was confused about what they saw in each other. Tess doesn't want to be attracted to Jack, and tries to deny that she is while Jack smugly, gleefully rubs her face in the fact that she is attracted and he really does know best. By the time Harte reveals the details of their past together, I was past caring. 

One aspect of the story that I enjoyed was Tess's interactions with the Worthington family. Her own family has been very hurtful to her over the years but the Worthingtons, who are at the center of the mystery, took her in as a teen. Daniel, who is a police officer, loves her but she doesn't love him. Her relationship with Daniel and his parents becomes strained when Jack is the prime suspect and she signs on as his defense lawyer. Harte deftly shows us their relationships and brings it to life. 

Harte also has a knack for evocative phrases: 
To Tess, February in Jefferson Tavern was like a month full of Mondays. It was dark, cold, and endless despite its being only 28 days.
Sleet, she determined, was like Slurpees falling from the sky, only without color or taste.   

Interested? Want to try it for yourself? Click here to read an excerpt.


I received a PDF from Reading Addiction Book Tours for review. 

Excerpt From Deadly Valentine by Jenna Harte & Giveaway of Endangered by Jenna Harte


Do you like romantic suspense? Want to curl up and get caught up in a story? Today I have an excerpt from "Deadly Valentine" by Jenna Harte, and as you have no doubt realized, it's a romantic suspense. I also reviewed it if you want to see what I thought of it. 

Jenna was a wannabe mystery writer, who like many other writers who had good feedback from agents and publishers but no contract, decided to publish her stories herself. It’s terrifying and exciting, and thankfully, people have enjoyed her books! Here are some interesting (or maybe not so interesting) factoids about her:
1. Writing always terrified her, so she's baffled as to how she got here.
2. She first started writing fiction in sixth grade by writing about characters on her favorite television show (the term fan fiction hadn’t been invented yet. Neither had the Internet.)
3. Her favorite fiction involves mystery and romance, but she prefers a mystery with romance as opposed to a romance with mystery, if that makes any sense.
4. Her favorite authors are J.D. Robb, Janet Evanovich, Sandra Brown and Carl Hiaasen. She also loves Jane Austen, but tends to stay away from literature unless she knows it will end well.
5. Currently, she's finished book one in the Valentine Mysteries and has rough drafts of books two and three.
6. Both the Valentine and Delecoeur Mysteries pay homage to one of her favorite movies, "The Thin Man" and to Nick and Nora Charles’ more modern day (if the 1980′s can be considered modern-day) counterparts, Jonathan and Jennifer Hart.
7. She has another series idea rattling around in her head that pays tribute to another favorite old movie, "Topper".
8. She's not as old as jer love of old movies would suggest. She is as old as her love of "Hart to Hart" suggests.
9. Like her character Tess, she loves good chocolate and old R&B tunes. She's still working on getting some Carine Gilson underwear to see if she’d love them as much as Tess does. A set can cost several hundred dollars so she has to wait until more books sell.
10. Jenna Harte is not her real name. When she's not making up stories that put happy couples into danger, she lives in the “real world” using her “real name” working as a freelance writer and blogger.

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Excerpt

Chapter One

I think I'm going to puke. Tess studied her face in the nineteenth-century Louis XV style mirror in Asa Worthington's foyer. Pale but not green. Still the rolling in her stomach told her things could get worse. Why she'd let Daniel Showalter talk her into attending his uncle's dinner party she didn't know. It had disaster written all over it even before her stomach threatened to embarrass her in front of the town's most elite family.
Recently, Daniel's actions suggested he wanted more than friendship. Not that Daniel was a bad guy. He was handsome, down to earth and Tess loved his parents as if they were her own. But she was as committed to celibacy as one could get short of joining a convent. She'd given up on the idea of love ever after, preferring the sensual delights of chocolate, Marvin Gaye tunes and couture French underwear instead.
But it wasn't Daniel's affection for her that threatened to ruin the night. It was his uncle. Asa Worthington was a volatile, intolerant, self-serving man whose gatherings usually involved patronizing or humiliating everyone in attendance. Even Asa's sister, Helen, found him so distasteful that she hadn't been to a family function in over twenty-years.
The night was proving worse than Tess anticipated when Daniel's cell phone rang calling him back to duty as a police detective just as they arrived. So she stood abandoned and stranded in the foyer hoping her lunch didn't reappear and mess up the beautiful Italian marble floor. The things one did in the name of friendship.
She pushed a tendril of chestnut hair out of her face and hoped that the glass of water the butler was bringing would settle her stomach until she could figure out how she was going to get home.
"You look beautiful."
Tess lifted her gaze to find a pair of brilliant blue-green eyes reflecting back at her through the mirror. She hadn't thought the night could get worse. She'd been wrong.
Was it too much to hope to go through the rest of her life never seeing those eyes again or anyone else from her old life? After all, Jefferson Tavern, Virginia was a long way from Washington, D.C., not so much in distance as in social importance. There was no reason for him to be so far from home. Perhaps the man whose reflection she watched move toward her was an apparition. Maybe the mirror was one of those commonly found in historic homes in which ghosts appear through the reflection. The only problem with that idea was that most ghosts in Virginia were from the revolutionary or civil wars. This man was very modern. 
So maybe her brain was as addled as her stomach and conjured up the vision. Her head was feeling a little foggy. The only way to find out for sure was to turn around and face him.
Gawd! He was even more stunning than she remembered. "Jack."
He grinned displaying a single dimple. "I was beginning to think you forgot who I was."
That was laughable. No one ever forgot Jack Valentine. Particularly women. Even a woman like Tess who'd given up on men. He was a romance novel's alpha male come to life; gorgeous, rich, arrogant, and yet somehow endearing. There was a time she would have liked to indulge her attraction to him. That time was long gone.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
His brows drew together. Clearly he expected a different reaction. He probably thought she'd throw herself at him like she did the last time they were together. She wouldn't make that mistake again.
He gave her an affable smile. "I'm doing well. Thanks for asking. You look good. Really good."
"Still a charmer, I see."
"You don't believe me?"
She smirked at him. He should have been a politician the way he could talk and make you feel it was genuine. She didn't look good compared to when she last saw him nearly three years ago. Aside from the fact that she felt like the crypt keeper, she'd also put on ten pounds, which on a five foot three inch frame was significant. "I think you're being nice to an old friend."
"I'm glad to hear you still think of me as a friend. I was worried you were still mad about the last time we -"
"What are you doing here?" she asked again impatiently.
She saw a flash of annoyance on his face. It was so fast that she would have missed it if she wasn't staring at his mesmerizing eyes.
"Asa invited me."
"I didn't know you knew Asa.”
“I don't very well. It's business.”
“You're doing business with him?”
"Not yet. I probably won't." He shifted, moved closer. "Are you here alone?"
"No...Yes..."
One dark brow lifted.
"I came with someone, but he was called away," Tess clarified.
"Too bad for him."
"He'll be back."
"Too bad for me."
He was standing close, too close. He was studying her and she did her best to hold his gaze without giving away her unease. Or worse, blushing. He didn't need to know that after all these years he still made her insides flip-flop.
"There you are!" Asa Worthington’s booming voice echoed through the foyer followed by his immense body. "Appointed yourself the official greeter of beautiful women, eh?"
"Only this one," Jack said maintaining his gaze on Tess.
Asa laughed and like everything else about him it was large and loud. His blue eyes twinkled with delight as he reached out and slapped Jack on the back. "That’s what I like about you. You see what you want and you go after it."
"Tess! You’re here. Good. Where's Daniel?" Tom Showalter asked of his son as he came to stand next to Asa. The two men were complete opposites. Asa’s presence in a room remained even after he left while Tom could go unnoticed in a crowd of two. He was average in every way from his lackluster mud-colored eyes, to thinning brown hair. It always struck her as odd that as different as they were, Asa and Tom were good friends. Perhaps Tom being married to Asa's sister, Helen helped. Or maybe it was that Tom was Asa's lawyer.
"He got called away as we got here," she said.
"Oh. Well hopefully he won't be long. I see you’ve met Jack Valentine," Tom said.
"Jack is thinking of expanding his business in this area in anticipation of a joint venture we’re negotiating," Asa said. "He’ll certainly want someone local to represent him when he does. If Ms. Madison is as good a lawyer as you say she is Tom, perhaps she’d be up to handling Jack here.“
"I’d enjoy being handled by Ms. Madison," Jack said, his gaze still on her.
Tess' eyes grew large, then narrowed with suspicion. It wasn't unusual for Jack to be brazen. What was disturbing was that it was directed at her. "Have you ever been handled by a woman, Mr. Valentine?" she said with bravado she didn’t feel.
A wicked smile spread on his face. "Not one like you."

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Author: Jenna Harte
Publisher: Moxie Vie
Genre: Romance, Mystery
Format: ebook, paperback
Length: 622 KB, 334 pages
Release Date: August 5, 2012
Buying Links:  Amazon  Barnes & Noble 
Twitter @Jenna_Harte

Jenna is giving away an ecopy of her novella, "Endangered" to a lucky commenter. Enter using the rafflecopter widget  below.

"Endangered" is 21,000 words, approximately 50 pages. It's perfect for someone wanting fast, sexy, suspenseful entertainment. Max and Madeleine are happily married and do what happily married couples sometimes do, which means the story contains strong romantic elements including mild sex scenes.