About Ivory Dawn:

Ivory Shepard didn’t want to be a pirate when she grew up but she didn’t plan on being orphaned and alone at thirteen with her three cousins either.
After a Spanish raid in Charles Towne left them with nothing, Ivory held her cousins together, trained them to fight for their lives and led them to a life of quiet refuge on the banks of the Ashley River. Believing they were out of reach of the hands of unscrupulous men, they found life on the farm a tolerable substitute for the traditional alternatives life would force onto them—until the night the pirates showed up.
Unfortunately for the pirates, these handy young women were ready, and they weren’t going anywhere without a fight.

This novella is a prequel to DEMONS & PEARLS.

Learn more about the author, buy the book, or follow them on social media:
Visit the Author’s Website.
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Author Bio:
Award winning author, P.S. Bartlett, was born on Valentine’s Day many moons ago in South Baltimore, Maryland, less than a mile from Fort McHenry and Federal Hill.

Her first novel, “Fireflies,” was published with GMTA Publishing in 2013 and the prequel to “Fireflies,” entitled “Hope From the Ocean,” was published in March of 2014. She loves history and historical fiction. She gets her history fix via movies, television and of course, books although she enjoys reading almost every genre.

Her motto is:

“I’m taking a fantastic voyage. Won’t you join me?”

Ivory Dawn is a post from Awesome Gang

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
SUMMER OF RAGE AND CONFUSION is the first work of fiction I’ve completed for publication. I’ve written several technical manuals, but no one cares about them.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
SUMMER OF RAGE AND CONFUSION was heavily influenced by the pornographic paperbacks I found hidden in my dad’s closet when I was a kid, violent hard-boiled detective pulps, science fiction adventures of the cheesiest variety, every comic book in the world, and a fascination with freaks, gore, sexual experimentation and transgressive, squirm-inducing cinematic entertainment such as early John Waters films and countless splatter movies such as TOKYO GORE POLICE.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Probably not. I outline the major events of a book, create a list of major sequences that nail the book down, and complete from 1000 to 5000 words a day. I go over the book three or more times to refine and clarify, and then hire an editor to iron out any major remaining problems.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
(In no order) Early Dean R. Koontz (his weird, sexy science fiction before he became a Stephen King imitator), Piers Anthony, Roger Zelazny, Mickey Spillane, early Clive Barker for the gore sequences, Harlan Ellison, late era dirty-old-man Robert Heinlein, and too many others to list.

What are you working on now?
SUMMER OF RAGE is the first in a series. There is one prequel outlined, one sequel currently being written, and two more sequels outlined.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I am just now tackling that part of the job, so I’m not sure yet. Awesomegang is, of course, very helpful.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
As a new author myself, that would be pretentious of me.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
The truth hurts, so keep away from it.

What are you reading now?
Bone: The Complete Cartoon Epic in One Volume by Jeff Smith, and the Mike Allred Silver Surfer comics from 2014-2015

What’s next for you as a writer?
The sequel to SUMMER OF RAGE AND CONFUSION is now being written. It will take place in Hollywood! Lots of Hollywood things will happen, including gooey sex and gooey murders. Bring your throw-up bag! It will be cool and super-realistic like the first book.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Can I take a tablet and a hand-crank generator instead? I have about 3000 books on my tablet. That would be way better than just three or four books.

Author Websites and Profiles
Jericho Carny Website
Jericho Carny Amazon Profile

Jericho Carny’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Jericho Carny is a post from Awesome Gang

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
After decades as a newspaper editor, reporter, newscaster, and disc jockey, I had some stories piled up that I wanted to tell. That led to the first of six books that I have on Kindle. My most popular work is based on my real life experience of seeing and talking with a hairy swamp creature one dark night. I blogged about it and that led to me being featured in the award winning film, The Bridgewater Triangle Documentary. Discovery channel interviewed me in a featured segment of Monsters and Mysteries in America, Season two, Episode one. Eventually I wrote a brief account of the eerie sighting as part of the book, The Creature From the Bridgewater Triangle.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Jimmy Catfish – The Beginning and The End, was born after I wrote the novella, Swamp Tales – Horrors from the Hockomock Swamp and the Marshes of Cape Cod. The most popular story in the book was the tale of an unfortunate boy that people called ‘Catfish’ for his uncanny resemblance to the bottom dwelling, stinging scavenger fish. I felt compelled to flesh out the yarn, so I took the 4,000 word short story and called it The End, and then wrote a 45,000 word prequel leading up to the original short story.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I don’t really write as much as observe, and then tell about what I saw, or imagined. In my book, “Crossing the Musical Color Line”, I share details of great musicians, some famous and some not, that I was lucky enough to know or have met during a long broadcasting career. The subjects include one of the first men to break the color barrier in 1940s jazz; ‘The Human Juke Box'; ‘The King of the Malls'; and the story of a gangly man who showed up at my studio one morning in the Northernmost town of the 48 states, with a trunk full of 45 rpm records that he had self financed. I was the first DJ to play his song and it went on to become one of the top selling ‘trucking’ tunes of all times. The singer just kept peddling those 45s out of his trunk ’till he got all the way to Nashville.

For my ‘Creature’ book, I merely told what I saw. Since I still am not really comfortable speaking about the scariest moment of my life, I started to detail stories of imagined creatures. I found that I was much more at ease with imaginary bad things, than real ones!

What authors, or books have influenced you?
‘Black Like Me’, was one of the most powerful books that I read as a young man and it gave me a perspective that has helped me navigate successfully through nearly all 48 adjacent states as well as a few countries.

If I could literally take over and inhabit the body and mind of a great author, who would it be?

The answer is either Stuart Woods or Lee Child. I like Lee Child’s books slightly more than Stuart’s; but between the two, it seems that Mr. Woods had the more adventurous and exciting life.

What are you working on now?
I was going to do a prequel to the prequel of Jimmy Catfish. But one cloudless morning, I was daydreaming at the top of the prison like, stone tower on Scargo Hill in Dennis. It’s the highest point on Cape Cod. As I was peering across the ocean, able to see Provincetown more than 20 miles distant, my mind began to link the landing of the Europeans there in the 1600s to a mythical princess from Dennis who filled a dried up lake, with just her tears. The idea began to expand to thoughts of telling the stories of four legendary women who lived 100 years apart – from 1600 to 1900. Three of the women are ghosts. The fourth; the Indian (Native American) Princess is not a haunt, but a gentle spirit. The lake she filled with tears still exists in Dennis on Cape Cod. Tourists and locals alike have been known to to say they have felt a warm, loving presence when they at at Princess Scargo’s Lake. I hope they will get the same feeling when this book of legendary women is published.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I have not yet begun promoting my books. I believe that people who have seen me on Destination America or in the Bridgewater Triangle Documentary are the purchasers of my work.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Read.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Read.

What are you reading now?
Max Brand – an absolute genius from the early 1900s who wrote Westerns at a blistering pace.

What’s next for you as a writer?
When I was younger I wondered how ideas came to writers. Now I have more ideas than time available. So, just as in walking, I will simply put one foot (book) forward and then the next.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
I would certainly take one book by Stephen King, not that I like them all that much; but they are so long that I’m pretty sure I would be rescued before I finish the book. (That comment was intended to be humorous and should in no way be construed as any kind of a slam, slight, or disrespect to Mr. King.)

But…..just in case it’s going to be a long, long time before I get rescued; I think I will take four books by Mr. King!

Author Websites and Profiles
Bill Russo Website
Bill Russo Amazon Profile

Bill Russo’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile

Bill Russo is a post from Awesome Gang

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Just finished with Book #27 in 31 months! I am slowing down though, too many too fast. My head is spinning. LOL!

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Parallel Adventures – Secrets Revealed is an adventure of twins traveling to Parallel worlds and is part two of a series.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I write everything longhand and write all the time.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
anything and everything, as a reviewer, I have read over 1000 books in 2 years. A good story is what matters and I have read so many.

What are you working on now?
I am working on taking a break! I have been editing the 27 already written, trying to decide if I want to write more.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I use twitter and Facebook along with good reads for promotion, which I should add is the worst part of being an author.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Write what you love and how you want to, You will get a lot of input, but when it comes down to it, you are the one writing and if you are loving that, then keep it up.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Don’t give up! Also have a great support team behind you.

What are you reading now?
Anything I can find, sometimes I read 4 books a day and by the time I say what I am reading, I am done and reading something else.

What’s next for you as a writer?
I just want to write, but take it slower, maybe only 2 or 3 books a year for awhile.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Something long, but mostly a blank notebook. That way I can write my own and keep myself busy. I think a Stephen King Novel, a dictionary and of course, that blank notebook.

Author Websites and Profiles
P.S. Winn Amazon Profile

P.S. Winn’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account
Pinterest Account

P.S. Winn is a post from Awesome Gang

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
This is my first book, but I have published three. ‘Inheritance’ came out in 2009, and has been revised for Kindle.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The full title is ‘Inheritance and other Stories.’ I’m always inspired by my own life, as all writers are. The problem is I don’t realize it until I’m at the editing stage and see protagonists that are these boys and young men in this sort of tortured arrested development. Sometimes I think I need a new schtick, but it’s not something I do on purpose.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I was just having this conversation with another writer. In fact, I’ve had this conversation several times. As I’m writing, I consume the most low-brow pop culture trash you could imagine. If the TV’s on, it’s ‘Real Housewives,’ or even a daytime talk show – you know those talk shows with endless paternity tests? If music’s playing, it’s always pop or country, which I’m not a fan of. It’s noise, but it’s not distracting noise, because I’m not interested in it except in an ironic way. It’s also a great way to psych yourself up, if you need to feel really bad about humanity in order to write.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Surprisingly few. Junot Diaz is my idol, though we aren’t similar writers at all. If I’m blocked, I’ll read Saul Bellow’s “Herzog” to knock the cobwebs out. That usually does the trick. I admire the motifs and themes that authors like William Faulkner and Toni Morrison work with, and have found myself working with them, as well. I’ll never be half the writers they are, but it’s fun to pretend.

What are you working on now?
I’m also a filmmaker, so that takes up a lot of my time. I’m working on – I think – 5 scripts right now? More if you include script doctoring. I’m in pre-production on my next short film, and I’m supposed to be co-directing a feature film in Toronto this September with a famous Bollywood director. I’m also working on my next novel, ‘The Healer.’ I ghostwrite novels, and I’m working on my own Kindle Single. This is a dangerous question you’ve asked. You should see my work space. You’d be horrified.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Nothing beats word of mouth. Nothing! If you have the money to spend, Facebook sponsored posts do pretty well. But yeah, word of mouth, first and foremost.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Things have changed so much since even I started, and that wasn’t so long ago. I don’t think new authors would take advice…they seem pretty confident in themselves, if you know what I mean. Hashtag, ‘Kids these days.’ But it’s true! We’re surrounded by special snowflakes, I’m sorry. Plus, everyone’s self-publishing now. I’m eager to see what the next gatekeeper is going to be. I suppose the general public has a way of doing that if they absolutely have to. Sometimes, they even pick the right thing. My advice to new authors is, don’t listen to anybody but your editor and your creative writing professor. They’ll save your life.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
To not take advice. Everyone’s doing it, no matter what ‘it’ is. Be innovative. Observe the beaten path, but if you know it’s going to be agony for you (and for me it usually is), be your own man and don’t follow it.

What are you reading now?
I’m reading the Best American Short Stories 2014 right now. There’s this one story I love by Callum Wink, called “Breatharians.” You ever read a story so perfect you want to vomit? That’s the only way I can describe it for you.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Hopefully a great big check, and some respect.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
1. “The Brief And Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,” by Junot Diaz

2. The Fran Lebowitz Reader

3. “Light In August,” by Faulkner

4. “Sula,” by Toni Morrison

Author Websites and Profiles
Jarod Powell Website

Jarod Powell’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Jarod Powell is a post from Awesome Gang

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I was brought up in Africa and lived in South Africa, Swaziland, Zimbabwe and Nigeria, as well as Canada, Spain and the UK.

Author of DAWN OF DECEPTION and THE STASH, my love for thrillers started at an early age due to the lack of any TV. I currently live in Wiltshire with my partner Clare and our 6 children.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Dawn of Deception is a book that I spent years researching and writing, it delves into the world of international poaching syndicates and political corruption in Kenya. The historical background of ethnic cleansing and the criminal methods employed are accurate and well documented.

David Nbeke and the other characters are fictitious, although the evil mastermind Maliki is based on someone I met in Nairobi who had failed the lion hunt, bore the scars, and been ostracized from his tribe – unlike Maliki he was a warm and gentle soul. Although the history gives the characters more depth and motivation this is in essence a high-octane thriller as David Nbeke fights for justice and his own survival.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I immerse myself totally in a book whether I am reading or writing it. Sometimes when I am writing I stay awake for 3 days on end when the words won’t stop pouring out and have to remind myself to eat and drink. I often have dreams where I am one of the characters, usually David, and wake up with fresh ideas to be developed or disregarded.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
The first books I remember reading are Enid Blighton’s Famous Five series & The Hardy Boys, which got me interested in reading and the escapism it offers – not that I had anything to escape from, I just enjoyed the adventures.

When I was about 11 years old I moved on to Wilbur Smith, loved the Courtney and Ballantyne books as we lived in South Africa and Zimbabwe where they were based. Also read all of Terry Pratchett’s, Alistair Maclean, Agatha Christie’s and Stephen King’s books as a teenager.

Other authors that I love to read and have influenced me in one way or another are; Eric Van Lustbader, Frederick Forsyth, Ian Rankin, George Orwell, Jean Jaques Rousseau, Robert Ludllum, Jack Higgins, James Douglas, Leon Uris, James Patterson, & Lee Child to name but a few.

What are you working on now?
I’m editing the first draft of DIVIDED THEY FALL, the sequel to DAWN OF DECEPTION, and hoping to have the book ready for release this summer.

The sequel develops David’s character as he accepts Director Tanui’s invitation and moves from the Kenyan Wildlife Service to the General Service Unit, a paramilitary wing of the Kenyan police. David teams up with Clarissa May of the CIA in a hunt for Al-Qaeda terrorists in the run up to the 1998 embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salam.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Blog and keep blogging, the more places you post your work the more people you reach.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
A great tool for me was a website called youwriteon where authors upload the first 3 chapters of their book and have it critiqued by other writers. This gives you excellent feedback at the development stage and the advice and experience of other authors helped to develop my writing. As part of the process you review other writers work and learn techniques from them.

My main advice would be to have a long break once you have written the first draft – I become so immersed in the project that I can’t see the woods for the trees and need 6-12 months to be able to recognise the mistakes.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Always trust your own integrity – if you think it’s a bad idea then it probably is.

What are you reading now?
ANOTHER MAN’S WAR by Barnaby Phillips

What’s next for you as a writer?
Completing the David Nbeke series is top priority, after that I have 2 spin off series in mind – one starring Clarissa May, David’s partner in DIVIDED THEY FALL & SWAHILI SUNSET (the final book in the trilogy) – the other starring CIA Agent Sean McGuire, another character from DIVIDED THEY FALL.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
I’m practical and there is only so many times you can read the same book, no matter how good it is, although I’m an experienced camper I would take;

Ray Mears: Outdoor Survival Handbook

Patrick Moore – Navigating the Night Sky

SAS Survival Guide: How to survive in the Wild, on Land or Sea (just in case I want to build a raft as well!)

Author Websites and Profiles
Dan Fletcher Amazon Profile

Dan Fletcher’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Dan Fletcher is a post from Awesome Gang

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Charlie is a British author who has written a series of mystery and suspense novels which span a period of time from 1855 – 1906 each based upon a real life curiosity in the history of the world. His stories are noted both for their darkness and their historical accuracy.

Born in Essex and raised in Cornwall, Charlie found his true home in Bristol – a city which will feature as the backdrop to a future series of books to begin later this year.

I’ve written 5 books in all

The Devils Walk

The Monster of Berkeley Square

1888 – A Jack the Ripper novel

The Ruins of San Francisco

and the first in what I hope will be a series of for “Bristol Mysteries”

Gallows Humour

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Gallows Humour was be released on the 10th of April, 2015 and is the first in an ongoing series (four books have been plotted so far, with an option to go on if they prove popular with readers.) In many ways this is entirely new territory for me, not least of all because this is the very first novel I have written set in modern times; and the first one set entirely in my home city of Bristol.

I had been thinking about creating an amateur detective character for some time, mostly because crime fiction is a genre I have always enjoyed but also because there is something about the structure of crafting a mystery that greatly appealed to me. Of my past four books, three at least are at their heart murder mysteries (1888, being the most obvious, of course) so it wasn’t entirely breaking new ground to go for the all out traditional detective route but In a world full of amateur sleuths, I wanted to try for something different that while not entirely breaking the mould, might at least give it a little dent.

The idea for Franklin Gallow came to me one afternoon last year when I was going for a walk along the harbour side in Bristol as a break from finishing the final chapters of The Ruins of San Francisco. Whenever one book is coming to a close, I am always on the lookout for a different story to tell – my brain has always worked like this for as long as I can remember being able to think; at any one time I am tossing an idea about in my head and trying to give it some shape and if I have no ideas, I go back to one of the multitudes of old stories that I have been playing about with since my teenage years. This time it felt different though; I had simply never been struck by an idea as vividly and as fully formed as Franklin Gallow as I was that afternoon; as if the man himself had taken up residence inside my head and had started unpacking his suitcase after saying to me, “I suppose I shall be living in here from now on.”

At first I didn’t know him as Franklin, but his surname was always Gallow to me and admittedly, when he first appeared he was a crime scene photographer; it would take another couple of hours before he had become an undertaker (or a funeral director, as he would be quick to correct you) and it was by that time I knew where he lived and how he dressed; I knew he had red hair that was turning a touch grey and above all else, I knew that as he turned forty, he was reevaluating his life and realising that he had spent too much of it solely among the dead.

Franklin was soon accompanied by a teenage apprentice named Rowan (after a girl in my college Drama class, whose name I had squirreled away in hopes of using one day – just as “Kendrick” was nabbed from a friend of mine for The Ruins of San Francisco.) it was quickly apparent that Rowan Kaplan would be just as important to the story as her boss and would prove every bit his equal in smarts and nosiness; in fact, if I were to tally up chapters that had one or the other as their focus, Rowan Kaplan, the resourceful, constantly underestimated assistant to Franklin Gallow could well have ended up owning the majority of the story. Initially she was to be a kind of semi-goth with pale skin, raven hair and an unhealthy preoccupation with death, but I quickly learned that such a stark looking person would be essentially unemployable at a funeral home where morbidity is to be hidden at all costs.

Rowan therefore became a very different kind of girl. Instead of pasty white of skin, she became black (a fact which plays very little role in the first book, but is almost central to the second one.) Instead of being fascinated by death, she is a young woman who once lived a very comfortable upper working/lower middle class life that was torn asunder by such a huge tragedy her family has yet to even begin recovering from it – a crime that would be solved in the fourth book of the series (yes, I have been doing a lot of planning!)

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I love to write perched on the dockside in Bristol watching the World and the boats go by. Bristol is a wonderful city – the second largest in the south of the UK after London – and is vibrant, exciting and a perfect backdrop to my new novel.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
It probably goes without saying that I love Bristol, but I shall say it nevertheless, I LOVE Bristol. I first arrived here in 2000 to attend UWE (The University of the West of England) and despite my first reaction to stepping out of the car and into this new city was to vomit into a hedgerow with utter terror at leaving home, I very quickly learned that it wasn’t just city living that worked for me, but this city worked for me. For a boy who grew up in rural Cornwall, I had always imagined myself to be a country mouse but it was only after moving here that I discovered that I was truly a town mouse at heart. I love this city for its architecture, its strange shape means a gorge rips the city in two and how seven hills shape the terrain of this urban sprawl.

What are you working on now?
I’m working on the second book in the “Bristol Mysteries” series

Author Websites and Profiles
Charlie Revelle-Smith Website
Charlie Revelle-Smith Amazon Profile

Charlie Revelle-Smith’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Charlie Revelle-Smith is a post from Awesome Gang