Shared a Good Book Lately?

(Johanna Garth is the author of Losing Beauty, a modern retelling of the Persephone / Hades myth. I loved the piece she wrote for today, and she agreed to let me post a teaser on my blog.)

Have you heard about the Amazon Prime lending program?

It works like this. Say, for example, you buy a copy of Losing Beauty, read it and recommend it to a friend. In this example your friend also has a Kindle. You can then, with a click of a button, lend Losing Beauty to your friend. From that point on the friend has fourteen days to read it (anecdotal evidence leads me to believe most readers of Losing Beauty take about three days to finish so fourteen days could almost be called excessive) ;) At the end of the fourteen days the book is returned to you, voila! So simple!!

This new lending program is Amazon's attempt to make books on people's ereaders as lendable as the ones on their shelves. Which, in my opinion, is very cool.

If you want to lend a book that you've purchased here's how to do it in four easy steps:

(Find out the rest at Losing Sanity)

Water

I remember reading a story about the search for the most delicious thing in the world. What would it be? Apple pie with vanilla icecream, roast lamb, carrot soup, a perfect cheese souffle?

The point of the story was that if you can't find it, the most delicious thing in the world is pure water. And for many people out there, they have to faucet, no resource to instant, running, clean H2O.

Samaritan's Purse is one organization that works to bring water to those who don't have access. In Haiti, in Africa, they bring access, wells, and ship bottled water to families and kids who need it.

Try spending a day without drinking, and you'll see just how delicious water can be. Ever been in a car or on a train with no drinks? That first swallow is so sweeeeeet. Now imagine living in a country where you have to walk a mile or two for fresh water, or where you have to line up for bottled water.

Connie J. Jasperson, along with some of the other writers at Fantasy Island Book Publishing, has collected an anthology of stories by the FIBP writers. All proceeds go to the Samaritan's Purse water project to help those in need around the globe. I have two stories in there; one is a horror short and the other is a prequel to The Night Watchman Express.

Find it here: http://amzn.to/StoryAntho

So again, if you have some spare change in the glove compartment, your coat pocket, or behind the sofa cushions, please consider spending it on a collection of shorts. It'll help some people at the same time.

*EDITED TO ADD - THIS COLLECTION INCLUDES MATURE LANGUAGE AND THEMES.*

Jingle Jingle

I heard yesterday on the news that someone popped a diamond ring into one of those kettles manned by bell ringers. This followed the news over the weekend that another generous soul had given them a huge gold coin, a rare one, for the eighth year in a row.

Wouldn't you love to be able to do that? What a wonderful feeling, to stuff all that largesse in a kettle and just walk away. The afterglow has to be superb. Those gift givers must feel like that scene in Ghost, when Oda Mae Brown puts a check worth millions into the hands of a nun.

Alas, I don't have diamond rings cluttering up the place, nor gold coins, nor checks worth millions, so I have to resort to smaller means.


Oh, I just want to support so many good causes. I think that the ability to be able to be able to do some real good for a charity or a group of people is the ultimate luxury. Forget the Neiman Marcus customizable cupcake car.

Don't know if I can quite pull this off...

So, here is what I could do, though: I collected two books and two stories for kids, and put them in one collection, and donated the royalties to Oxfam. One book is by me, and it's about getting coal for Christmas. Except, of course, coal from the North Pole is magic...


The other book is by Shaun Allan, the creator of Sin and Zits n Bits. He donated Rudolf Saves Christmas, a story that is a holiday version of Hoodwinked, where Rudolf is sent to jail. 


Connie J Jasperson wrote the Christmas Tree, a sci fi story about Santa finding a family in space (I LOVE that concept!) 


And Nicole Antonia Carson donated The List, a tale of a girl who has to defend her Goodness in the North Pole court. Nicole does a lot on the stage, so it's no surprise that her story is very visual and very, very funny.


Finally, my cover artist, Lisa Daly, donated the sweet little girl and her toes for the cover:

http://amzn.to/XmasOClock

My thanks to all those authors and to Lisa for their very, very generous donations. They are worth so much more to me than a cupcake car, or even Oda Mae's check.


If you have 99 cents rattling around in your purse, or behind the sofa cushions, will you consider buying this collection of stories? They are all G rated and a lot of fun, and they are available on Kindle. And all of the proceeds go to help families and kids through Oxfam's international efforts.

Now I wish I could ring a bell for you. But I will say: Thanks so very much!