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Secrets in the Pines #2

Murder and Memories #3

Buried Truths #4

Footnotes of a Felony #5

Ledger of Lies #6

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Book Tour + #Giveaway: Scenes From a Song by Susan Sloate @Susan_Sloate @RABTBookTours

4:30:00 AM Book Tour, Giveaway, Music Fiction, Reading Addiction Book Tours, Scenes From a Song, Susan Sloate No comments

Music Fiction

Date Published: 09-30-2025

Publisher: Covfefe Press

For anyone who's ever said, "They're playing my song!"

On Halloween Eve, 1961, in his dingy Bronx walkup apartment, seventeen-year-old Jimmy Welton hears the opening notes of a song in his head. Jimmy’s still mourning his firefighter father, who taught him to play the guitar but recently died in a house fire, leaving his family destitute. Jimmy takes this song, about all he misses from his life now, to the New York amusement park where he works after school. There, he meets Mark Morgan, a rebellious teen with his own band, who eventually invites Jimmy to join them. And the rest is rock'n roll history...

The GooseBumps become a worldwide phenomenon, and the songs they write and sing together become the backbone of rock musical history. And the song Jimmy first heard on Halloween, "Wrapped in Gauze", becomes the song that not only comforts him in that terrible time but also comforts others: Victoria, recently divorced and dealing with an unthinkable family tragedy; Carolyn, whose final flippant words to someone in pain can't be taken back; and Jack, battling back from unimaginable loss with the help of his cheeky therapist and a song he thinks he hates.

SCENES FROM A SONG is the story of a song that makes us smile, that breaks our hearts, that stays with us forever, and the very special band that started it all.

Interview with Susan Sloate

What is your favorite part of the book?

What I enjoyed writing the most were the three vignettes after the main story of the band, because it allowed me to show the effect of the song on the lives of people in pain and make my point about how healing the right music is.

Does your book have a lesson? Moral?

Pretty much that music heals. It starts with us in youth and it stays with us throughout our lives and makes us feel better at the oddest of times, when we surely need it.

Are your characters based off real people or did they all come entirely from your imagination?

The band members are entirely fictional; I just started writing them for the 2018 Nanowrimo and they started talking and acting for themselves! The characters in the vignettes, though the vignettes are not entirely fictional, were people I made up in my own mind. I needed people who would behave as they did, and fortunately, they just came to me and I started working with them.

Of all the characters you have created, which is your favorite and why?

My two favorite characters of all time are Cady Cuyler in FORWARD TO CAMELOT—she doesn’t think she’s brave or adventurous, and yet when the chips are down, that’s exactly what she is—and Amanda Harary in STEALING FIRE. Amanda is a pretty exact version of me at that age (she’s 25 in the novel, and the novel is based on something that happened to me), and it’s hard to hate a character based on yourself. Of course, given that I was writing about myself, I naturally made her smarter, more efficient, prettier and more talented than me.

What character in your book are you least likely to get along with?

The character I think I’d clash with most is Mark Morgan, the leader of the band in SCENES FROM A SONG. He’s tough and vulnerable and gets angry easily; I don’t think I’d enjoy trying to get along with him, without tripping over his sensitivities and starting a fight.

What would the main character in your book have to say about you?

To my great surprise, I found out after the novel was finished that the main character in SCENES FROM A SONG is THE SONG, “Wrapped in Gauze”! It’s in every important story beat in the novel, and though the band members are the people you’d think are most important, I have to admit it’s the song that ultimately matters the most.

That said, I’d like to hope the song would tell you I was a pretty good lyricist (I wrote the original song lyric for the book, as well as all the lyrics in the text of STEALING FIRE, my autobiographical love story).

Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?

My books are so different from one another that I can’t see many connections between them, except that most take place in or around New York or L.A., and I’ve lived in both places. I’d definitely like to see them stand on their own, though I’d like to think if a reader has read, say, FORWARD TO CAMELOT and liked it, they’ll want to read more of my work as well.

I’m in the middle of writing a sequel to CAMELOT (there are three books planned for that), which gives me more time with Cady, who’s a really extraordinary character. But as far as books intertwining, like Thomas Hardy did with his own literary universe, that’s not something I do. Each new work should stand on its own… I hope.

About the Author

SUSAN SLOATE is the author or co-author of more than 25 published books. This includes 3 editions of Forward to Camelot, a time-travel thriller about the JFK assassination that became a #6 Amazon bestseller, was honored in 3 literary competitions and was optioned by a Hollywood company for film production. She also wrote the autobiographical Broadway novel Stealing Fire, which became a #2 Amazon bestseller and Hot New Release, and Realizing You (with Ron Doades), for which she invented a new genre: the self-help novel.

Susan has also written young-adult fiction and non-fiction, including the children’s biography Ray Charles: Find Another Way, which won the silver medal in the 2007 Children’s Moonbeam Awards. Mysteries Unwrapped: The Secrets of Alcatraz led to her 2009 appearance on the TV series MysteryQuest for The History Channel. She has also been a sportswriter and a screenwriter, edited the popular Kyle & Corey young-adult book series, managed two political campaigns and founded an author’s festival to promote student literacy in her hometown outside Charleston, SC. She has appeared in multiple volumes of WHO’S WHO IN AMERICA, WHO’S WHO IN ENTERTAINMENT and WHO’S WHO AMONG AMERICAN WOMEN.

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Book Tour: Class War Then and Now by Chris Wright @ChrisCWright1 @RABTBookTours

4:00:00 AM Book Tour, Chris Wright, Class War Then and Now, Political Nonfiction, Reading Addiction Book Tours No comments

Political Nonfiction

For nearly fifty years, America’s working and middle classes have been under relentless attack. Wages have stagnated, inequality has soared, and the vast majority now lives paycheck to paycheck—while trillions of dollars flow upward into the pockets of the wealthiest few. Class War, Then and Now is both a searing indictment of this economic and political order and an impassioned call to arms for a new left rooted in class struggle, solidarity, and socialist values.

Drawing on a decade of essays and articles originally published in outlets such as Dissent, New Politics, CounterPunch, Socialist Forum, Truthout, and Common Dreams, historian Chris Wright examines the deep roots of capitalism’s crises and the failures of the contemporary left to confront them. In sharp, accessible prose, Wright tackles:

The centrality of class struggle in building a movement that can unite working people
Why identity politics, while important, must not overshadow the fight against capitalism
The overlooked necessity of nuclear power in addressing climate change
Lessons from labor history, from Jimmy Hoffa to modern union battles
The catastrophic consequences of American imperialism and endless war
How organized labor remains humanity’s most universal force for justice

With the urgency of a manifesto and the depth of historical scholarship, Wright argues that only a rational, international, and truly Marxist left can stop the United States—and the world—from sliding into neofascism and ecological collapse.

If you care about economic justice, social reform, and the future of democracy, Class War, Then and Now will challenge your thinking, sharpen your arguments, and inspire action.

About the Author

Chris Wright is a U.S. historian, author, and lecturer at Hunter College, City University of New York, specializing in labor history and radical political theory. His work explores the history of capitalism and social movements, with a focus on building an international left capable of confronting economic inequality, rising authoritarianism, and ecological collapse.

Wright is the author of multiple works of political nonfiction, including Worker Cooperatives and Revolution: History and Possibilities in the United States and Popular Radicalism and the Unemployed in Chicago during the Great Depression. His newest release, Class War, Then and Now: Essays toward a New Left, compiles a decade of essays originally published in respected left-wing and independent outlets such as Dissent, New Politics, CounterPunch, Socialist Forum, Compact, and Common Dreams.

Over the years, his analysis and commentary have appeared in publications ranging from the Washington Post to Truthout, earning him recognition for his Marxist-informed, historically grounded critiques of capitalism and his advocacy of a democratic socialist movement.

In addition to his academic work, Wright has written philosophical essays, fiction, and poetry, reflecting a lifelong interest in art, music, and the human condition. His current research and writing center on the labor movement, anti-capitalist strategies, and the urgent need for systemic change to address economic, political, and environmental crises.

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Review: Spirit and Earth (Cymraeg Tales #3) by TC Marti

3:30:00 AM Cymraeg Tales, Elemental Magic, Epic Fantasy, Review, Spirit and Earth, Spirit and Fire, Spirit and Water, Sword and Sorcery, TC Marti No comments

Spirit and Earth

Cymraeg Tales #3

by TC Marti

Published: October 17, 2025

Publisher: Phoenix Rising

Genre: Epic Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, Elemental Magic

Blurb:

She confessed to a crime she didn’t commit. Now the empire is turning her into a symbol of obedience.

Broken by torture and paraded as a traitor, Mali LaSalle is promised healing, food, and fame—right before they execute her. But deep inside, something is shifting. The truth she forgot is clawing its way back, and it’s not coming alone.

Caer Cymraeg, torn between his bloodline and his conscience, abandons his title and turns to vengeance. As Mali’s fate tightens under palace control, Caer’s secret war pushes the empire closer to collapse.

And while kings plot and rebels bleed, an ancient force watches from beyond. One that has chosen Mali for something far more dangerous than survival.

Perfect for fans of Shadow and Bone and An Ember in the Ashes, this dark young adult fantasy blends psychological warfare, elemental power, and cosmic prophecy into a pulse-pounding rebellion.

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My Review:

Mali LaSalle has been taken captive and is facing punishment for offenses she did not commit. Following her ordeal, Mali becomes uncertain about distinguishing between truth and falsehood. She is being coerced into accepting a reality that is untrue. However, the more she contemplates it, the more the reality emerges.

Meanwhile, Caer is making his way to the castle to rescue Mali. He is conflicted between his heritage and what is morally right. Caer is resolute in his mission to save his beloved Mali from the clutches of the king.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Spirit and Earth just as much, if not more than, Spirit and Fire book 1, and Spirit and Water, book 2, in the Cymraeg Tales. I am captivated by the universe crafted for the Cymraeg Tales. I adore witnessing the characters wield magic as it emanates from within them. It's as if I am experiencing it firsthand.

The world-building is among the finest I have encountered in a long time. The imagery is so beautifully articulated that I can vividly picture it all in my mind, like an enchantment. I eagerly anticipate what the next installment will reveal for us all.

I wholeheartedly recommend Spirit and Earth to all enthusiasts of magic, swords, and sorcery! Be sure to get your copy of Spirit and Earth today for another thrilling adventure into a fantastical realm!

Check out all the books in the Cymraeg Tales I’ve read.

Spirit and Fire #1

Spirit and Water #2

Spirit and Earth #3