New Bern AUTHOR EVENT Sept 12, 2015

I’ll be one of several authors at the Craven Country Library in New Bern, NC, this coming Saturday from 1-4 PM. If you’re in the area, I hope you’ll stop by to meet and chat with us about our books and maybe pick up a copy or two.

When my auntie, Sara Meadows, drove the bookmobile to outlying communities (oh, the stories she could tell), the library occupied the John Wright Stanley House. I used to run my fingers along the spines, taking in the smells, the sounds of boards creaking, the joy of rooms filled with worlds that beckoned.

The Old Library
The Old Library in the John Wright Stanley House

 

And now the library has a fancy entrance, more books, and a lovely meeting room. Do join us. They’ll be serving refreshments.

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The new library is located at

400 Johnson Street
New Bern, NC 28560
Phone: (252) 638-7800

Summer at Hideaway Key by Barbara Davis

Breaking my I-don’t-post-reviews-here rule once again. Obviously, it’s a silly rule, meant to be broken when the urge comes upon me–as it did this morning when I finished reading Summer at Hideaway Key.

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Barbara Davis has done it again. She told me I’d love Lily-Mae. What she didn’t tell me was that I’d become so emotionally entangled with this wonderful character that I’d want to climb into the story and shake some sense into her, then turn around and pull Lily-Mae into my arms to soothe her. I wanted to promise that it would all work out. Surely, it would all work out.

Thank you, Barbara, that it did. Not perhaps as I would have preferred, but the deeds had been done already and couldn’t be undone. And isn’t that the gift of great storytelling? That the author can draw the reader so deeply into the narrative that she totally suspends disbelief? I was there. I was rooting and crying and laughing right beside Lily and Lily-Mae, beside Dean and Roland. (And I wanted to throttle Caroline, who became the perfect example of choices gone bad.)

Barbara dealt with some hard topics here—abuse, jealousy, lies, and betrayal. She made us think about the meaning of love, the gift of forgiveness, and the choices we make to follow love or to follow anger, to risk our heart or to run and hide from the possibility of pain.

Oh, and let’s not forget the setting. Barbara may have shown the horrors of a poor farm, but she also gave us Hideaway Key, the Gulf coast, and a gorgeous white beach. She tossed in pink drinks and pink flip flops, a tightly knit community, and the comfort of friends. I wanted to sift through Lily-Mae’s jar of shells, to sit on the deck and count blessings as I watched the sunset with my beloved, waiting every night for the green flash and rooting for happy endings all around.

Buy on Amazon

And make sure you collect all three of Barbara’s books. I can’t wait for number four.

Who Doesn’t Love to Read Accolades?

I mean, really? You don’t? 

I get it. Maybe you don’t like to read accolades about other people’s books.

I do. They let me know what a reader (at least one reader) thinks — and they usually prompt me to zip over to Amazon to see for myself what all the hoopla is about.

I hope that this reviewer’s words will have that affect on you. (Of course, I do. I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t hope that.)

Here’s what the blogger with this delightful signature had to say

Empress-DJ-signatureon Books and Bindings.  She read my book for a blog tour (with TLC Book Tours). Et voilá!

“Five Stars is not a high enough rating for this marvelous book – quality writing of this caliber calls for at least a double rating of 10.  It was breathtaking.  I adored every sentence of this meticulously crafted story, and there was not a wasted word on the 403 superbly written pages.  The narrative was so descriptive and enthralling, I could hear the dog’s bark, see and feel the lightning in the sky, and smell the water in the bay…”

She picked out her favorite quotes and just kept on going. I savor her choices and am so very grateful that my words touched her enough that she could speak of it so. Thank you, thank you.

Click here to read the Full Review on Books and Bindings

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