The digital clock on your Kindle doesn’t tick and tock in an audible way, but you can hear it in your head, marching off the seconds, minutes, and hours since you finished the last sentence of the last book you read.
Maybe it’s been three minutes and you’re chomping at the bit for a new story to suck you under like a whirlpool teeming with sirens ready to devour you.
Maybe it’s been three hours and you’re starting to feel the heady buzz of the perfect ending wane away, leaving behind the empty desperation that calls you, inevitably, to your next fix.
Maybe it’s been three days and that thing Tom said to Bess is still haunting you, making you wonder if you will ever ever ever ever love again?
The only way out, my friends, is to dive back in again. I’ll help you. Check out these titles from independent authors.
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OPPRESSION (Children of the Gods) by Jessica Therrien
Elyse knows what it means to keep a secret. She’s been keeping secrets her whole life. Two, actually. First, that she ages five times slower than average people, so that while she looks eighteen years old, she’s closer to eighty. Second, that her blood has a mysterious power to heal. For Elyse, these things don’t make her special. They make life dangerous. After the death of her parents, she’s been careful to keep her secret as closely guarded as possible. Now, only one other person in the world knows about her age and ability. Or so she thinks. Elyse is not the only one keeping secrets. There are others like her all over the world, descendants of the very people the Greeks considered gods. She is one of them, and they have been waiting for her for a long time. Some are waiting for her to put an end to centuries of traditions that have oppressed their people under the guise of safeguarding them. Others are determined to keep her from doing just that. But for Elyse, the game is just beginning – and she’s not entirely willing to play by their rules.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jessica Therrien is the author of the young adult paranormal fiction series Children of the Gods. Book one in the series, Oppression, was published by ZOVA Books in February of 2012 and became a Barnes & Noble best-seller shortly after its release. The second book in the series, Uprising, will be available in May of 2013.
Aside from her Children of the Gods series, Jessica’s work can also be found in a published collection of flash fiction stories called Campaigner Challenges 2011. Out of over 350 submissions her story, The Soulless, won first place for people’s choice and fourth place in the judging round of Rachael Harrie’s Writing Campaign Challenge. Her story, Saved, is also available as part of the anthology.
Jessica spent most of her life in the small town of Chilcoot, California, high up in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. In this town of nearly 100 residents, with no street lights or grocery stores, there was little to do but find ways to be creative. Her mother, the local English teacher, inspired her to do all things artistic, and ultimately instilled in her a love for language.
In 2003, Jessica attended California State University Long Beach where her passion for language found her studying Chinese, and in 2005 she moved to Taiwan to study abroad. From 2005 to 2006 Jessica was fully immersed in the Chinese language as she attended National Taiwan University, and in 2008 she graduated from San Diego State University magna cum laude.
Jessica currently lives in Chula Vista with her husband and is working on book three in her Children of the Gods series.
Pick up your copy of OPPRESSION here (click, click)!
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SHOW AND TELL (The September Day Series) by Amy Shojai
The 3rd installment of Shojai’s dark, female-driven domestic thriller series featuring pet-centric plots:
An animal behaviorist and her service dog race a deadly storm to expose a treacherous secret others will kill to protect.
A BLACKMAILER returns to sell a deadly cure.
A MOTHER’S DENIAL dooms millions of children.
AND A DOG shows true loyalty…when he runs away.
With her stalker finally caught, animal behaviorist September Day’s PTSD has abated and she’s begun to trust again. She dares to hope Detective Jeff Combs might become more than a friend, until his investigation into a dogfighting ring leaves her reeling.
Shadow wrestles his own demons. A German Shepherd autism service dog before losing his-boy to a health crises, Shadow found love and his true purpose working with September. Now his-boy is back–but changed–and Shadow fears he’ll be forced to choose.
When a desperate mom demands help, and Combs’s son disappears with his dog, September and Shadow must find the children before a devastating storm hits. But the children have a secret plan of their own. Only when September shows true courage, and a good-dog tells the truth, can they find their way home again.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Amy Shojai is a nationally known authority on pet care and behavior, a certified animal behavior consultant, a spokesperson for the pet products industry, and the author of 30 nonfiction pet books. She also writes THRILLERS WITH BITE! which includes the dog-viewpoint thrillers LOST AND FOUND and HIDE AND SEEK. Find out how to join Amy’s Audacious Allies (Triple A Team) at http://shojai.com/amyshojai-street-team/
Click here to grab SHOW AND TELL!
Enjoy this week’s reads, bookiemonsters!
Loads of love,
Myndi Shafer 
PAW-some! Thanks so much!
These are cool, Myndi! I haven’t really been into fantasy lately other than time travel, but I think Oppression is going to reel me back in. Except I wish her bio said she grew up “high in the Sierra Nevadas,” not the “Sierra Nevada Mountains!” (Okay, yes, I”m picky that way. )
Thanks for the heads up on some books I didn’t know about, here and in your last post.
I think it looks like a great book too!