Virtual Tourist 02/23/24
Table of Contents
News/Musings | Story Origin Swap 1 |
Virtual Tourist – Jedi Survivor | Story Origin Swap 2 |
Fabled February Group Promo | The Cost of Magic Group Promo |
Reviewer’s Corner |
Greetings!
I hope you’ve been doing great! Sorry about the blog posts dropping off. Life’s been chaotic and software unhelpful so I was not able to repost the last new newsletters to the blog.
The last two weeks have been super busy. I expected the week before to be, but not this week too! Aiiieeee!
I’ve been wrangling people, software, animals, and myself. Phew. The fun never ends 😝
News/Musings
Wow, I’d been thinking of stuff to share in the newsletter and now that I am finally here, my mind just went BLANK. Nooo!
I’m pretty sure the last half-hour fighting with Outlook didn’t help. Boo! I’d imported mail from my old Outlook to the one in the new computer back in Oct and it’s not worked right since. I dislike the web utility used by my website provider, so I switched to using Microsoft Mail. Well, they’ve decided to discontinue it and force everyone into using Outlook. So when it moved me today, SLAM, same old problem, even though I sent a ticket months ago. (They answered in a chat in Outlook which I of course could not see since I was back to using Mail the last time they shunted me over without a choice.
My life is so glamorous! 🤣
Let’s see if they will email a solution or try to send it through Outlook’s chat again (which I won’t see.) 🤣
If you’ve been following me for a while, you might know that I am a HUGE Carole Nelson Douglas fan. One of my favorite series by her is the Irene Adler series. While Sherlock and Watson make the occasional appearance, they are NOT the main characters. Instead, the books are about Adler’s adventures, as seen from the point of view of Miss Huxliegh, who becomes Irene’s companion. They are awesome!
I saw in her fan group, that the series has been added to Kindle Unlimited. So if you subscribe to KU, make sure to check them out.
The Chinese New Year has arrived and it is the Year of the Dragon! Booyah! Why my excitement? Because that’s my sign under the Chinese zodiac. 🐉 Woohoo!
Writing News
I’m either trying to do too much or am just getting old. I’ve been reviewing the audio book files as the producers upload them to ACX each weekend or sooner. This past weekend, ACX never even entered my mind! 2AM Sunday night, I woke up and realized I’d 100% totally forgotten about them. DOH!
I’ll be playing catchup this weekend. Whee!
For those interested in such things – the five-day free promotion for Black Jade earned 1,600 downloads! Woot! (I did pay a couple of sites/services to spread the free book deal to their lists, so while free to readers, it wasn’t free for me to do, but if enough people actually read book 1, it might entice them to get books 2 and 3 and make up for it, at least that’s the marketing theory. I’ll have to wait and see if anything comes from it or not.
Nut one neat thing to come out of it, was this
Now if I could just get it to do that under the Paid section. 😝
That being said, we’re now mere DAYS away from the release of Music of Death Blues! Woot!
I wanted to give a Special Shout-out to Linda K and Anne K (not related) for their invaluable typo and weirdness-hunting skills while reading their review copies.
THANK YOU for helping to make the book as error-free as possible. 🥰🥰🥰🥰 You guys rock!
Reviews for Music of Death Blues are starting to trickle in!
Extra content today:
1) StoryOrigin Swap 1 (UBL)
2) StoryOrigin Swap 2 (UBL)
3) Fabled February Group Promo
4) The Cost of Magic Group Promo
Scroll on down to get all the deets. 😉
Wild Wolves
StoryOrigin Swap 1 (UBL)
The wolf shifter who broke my heart and his bad boy brother want to share me.
After the death of my mother, I’m a broken shell.
That’s when Hayden reappears.
Tall.
Handsome.
Covered in tattoos.
A player wolf shifter who broke my heart.
I try avoiding him.
But he and his Alpha brother Dante make that impossible.
Tempting me with their strong muscles, their dark eyes.
The intensity of my need scares me.
If I give myself to them wholly, what will be left of me?
How do I know Hayden won’t break my heart again?
When I become the target of a rival pack, the brothers are my only hope.
They got me in this mess.
They’re the only ones who can save me.
I’ve never wanted anyone as badly to rescue me to claim me…
Can the three of us stop fighting destiny, or will our stubbornness destroy us?
Wild Wolves is a standalone Paranormal Romance with a HEA and NO cheating!
Jedi Survivor
Pretty much all of my family knows I am a sucker for all things Star Wars. The last game I played in the universe was Jedi the Fallen Order which I loved!
Jedi Survivor picks up several years later and is centered around Cal Kestis. Cal was also the main character in Fallen Order. So I was very excited when I heard they were doing this sequel.
Unlike a lot of sequel games, they don’t take away everything the character learned in the prior game – YAY! BD-1 even kept some of his upgrades! (BD-1 is one of the cutest droids EVER!)
I felt chills when the intro music played (they kept the intro music from Fallen Order, so it was like coming home!)
Since Cal kept a lot of his hard-earned movements, especially of the parkour variety, it might prove difficult for those who skipped Fallen Order. For me, it again felt like coming home. Awesome!
Mind you, I always pick the story-rich option as I stink at combat, so I can’t say how good or bad that is, though they have made it easier, I think, for the story-rich level or difficulty. Is the satisfaction of drawing an enemy to you with the Force and giving them some lightsaber follow-up. Ah!
To compensate for leaving you a lot of the powers of the last game, your skill points now go to (5 so far) stances – single lightsaber, double joined sabers, two sabers, great sword saber, and blaster with single saber combo. The one detriment is that you can only change your stance at the save points rather than whenever you want. I’m sticking with the double joined lightsabers and putting skill points to two sabers once double is full. 😛
As for pics – F12 doesn’t work for screen pics but I eventually found the photo mode key. Took me longer to find the folder it was putting them in and the fact the Hide UI key meant the photo screen UI. DOH!
You can see all the currently uploaded pics here.
Our story starts on Coruscant! Cal’s pulling a sting to try to get some info from a crooked senator for Saw.
Looking up at the higher levels of Coruscant
Cal looking at a televised advisory about himself. 😛
The Mantis takes a lot of damage leaving Coruscant, so Cal decides to visit his old friend Greez to repair it. Hints start getting peppered around as to why the group of four split up.
This is Cal’s first look at Koboh – a far off mining world.
Koboh has some trippy rock formations, old mining machinery, and even older Jedi ruins. (There are rolling mines that follow anything that moves. You’ll have to maneuver them to open up a few areas. Not easy! Whee!)
Neat pool formations on Koboh.
Inside the ruins of an old forgotten Jedi temple. Crazy force puzzles will ensue. And the first hints of a world beyond the Empire’s reach
A new (old) droid! Zee! She’s got a funky personality, but if I had to be a droid, I’d like to look like her. 🙂
Counting Crows
StoryOrigin Swap 2 (UBL)
On a fog-bound hill, the crows are feasting on the body of a dead man. Lorne Turner has seen more than his fair share of corpses, but never one like this. The markings on the body and the position all lead towards ritual sacrifice.
Just what Lorne doesn’t need, another lost soul keeping him company at night. But he can’t ignore the questions this dead man brings in his wake.
Why here, right on the highest point on Exmoor? What do the occult markings mean? And why do the authorities seem so intent on avoiding the obvious ceremonial element?
One thing he knows for sure is that someone in the police will stop at nothing to prevent him discovering the truth. When those in power are this corrupt, who can he turn to for help? Old friends step up, and new alliances are forged. Lorne and the vicar, Ella Morgan, begin their search for answers by plunging into the evil engulfing their lives.
Driven by the ghosts of his past, Lorne is forced to abandon his new-found peace and follow the trail into a world of occultism, corruption, and greed. Trained for war, he must now fight the darkness of a madman threatening all he holds dear.
What will break first, his mind, or the bodies of his enemies?
Fabled February Group Promo – check out these mythical books before they’re gone!
The Cost of Magic – Group Promo – only a few more days for these magic system and sci-fi tech reads!
🌟 Shout out to Reviewers Corner! 🌟
Thanks this month go to:
Alien Redemption – bookwormbunny and shellyk51’s
Black Jade – Sara Caudell
Charity and Sacrifice – Linda and Kuzlin
Music of Death Blues – Linda, kavab12, my2doxie, ckurimbokus, Pamela Sewell, Anne Kavcic, Carol, and Delphia Von Heeder
The Prince and Dai – Linda and Kuzlin
Romeo’s Revenge – Linda and Kuzlin
The Secret Humankind – Jim Reader and Melissa C
Additional reviews that I forgot to make a note of the book (DOH!) – jennadb, tytanmom23, finnc99, kmturner86, samanthacleaver812, roxsannel, shannlynn, bilberrysweet, allycaat
A great big THANK YOU to all the reviewers!
(Do you want your name in here, too? All you need is to post a one or two-sentence review at Bookbub, Goodreads, Amazon, or send me a link if it’s posted elsewhere and I will add you here next round!)
Have fun y’all!
Until next time!
Gloria
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