The Story Behind CHARLIE AND MAMA KYNA by Diana Rumjahn

Charlie and Mama Kyna is an award-winning charming book with beautiful illustrations for children. The story and illustrations are based on my internationally acclaimed film, Going Home, which was shown worldwide, including 45 film festivals and London Film Festival.

The story is about a little stuffed animal frog, named Charlie who runs away in fear after accidentally breaking his mother’s favorite vase. Charlie makes his way to the city and meets a stuffed animal Lion, named Leo and a stuffed animal giraffe named Joe outside Mrs. Cupcake’s Bakery. The three become best friends and live inside a little orange tent outside the bakery.

After awhile, Charlie becomes homesick, misses his mother, Kyna, decides to go home and invites Leo and Joe to live with them. On the next sunny day, Charlie, Leo and Joe, journey to find Mama Kyna’s home.

The book was written because I received so much positive responses for the film, Going Home. My passion is to tell you this story.

My inspiration for writing the book comes from my love of animals and stuffed animals. They are so cute! In addition, when I am listening to new age music especially music by Enya, I am so inspired to be even more creative.

Diana Rumjahn received her bachelor’s degree in social science from San Francisco State University and has worked at the university for over the past two decades. She is currently an administrator at College of Creative Arts, where she received the “Star of the Month Award.” She wrote, directed, filmed, produced and edited the international award-winning film Going Home, which has been shown worldwide. This is her first book.  You can visit Diana on the web at www.dianarumjahn.com.

The Story Behind Football for Lovers by Bob Brooker & Kaye O’Doughtery

Funny.  The inspiration for Football is for Lovers was a disaster.

Not the content: we’ve always loved football, and thought it was too bad that so many couples seemed to be missing out on the fun, and ended up fighting over the TV clicker instead.  So the opportunity to suggest a new way of looking at football (intimacy, romance, sex and M&Ms is how we like to put it) seemed like a pretty neat thing to do.

It was writing a book at all that called for inspiration.

We’d been ‘active words’ people for most of our lives.  That is, we wrote words that would be sung, or spoken by actors.

Bob traveled all over the world as a singer, and recorded for RCA Victor and Capital back in the day.  He has been the onstage part of our duo, the entertainer.  Kaye has always preferred to do her creative work from behind the scenes.  Together, we wrote songs, videos, TV and radio scripts, stage and screen plays, even musicals.

The thing is, our words back then were about sound, voice, movement . . . performance.

A few years ago, we decided to take a break and go back to school.  Kaye was graduated from St. Peter’s in Englewood Cliffs, NJ in 2003, Bob magna cum laude from Montclair State in May of 2004.

The plan, then, was to get back to work.

In August of 2004, Bob had just done a gig at a local nightspot, and we were scheduled to go into a recording studio on the following Tuesday to finish up a new album.

That Sunday, Bob had a stroke.

His left side was paralyzed.  Including his left vocal chord.

Walking and talking was something we would have to work on.  Performing . . . well.  It looked like we needed a Plan B.

And that was Football is for Lovers. We’d still be creating, but we could do it sitting down with our mouths shut.  Just what we needed!

So I guess you could say Football is for Lovers was inspired by a stroke.  Like Bob’s Dad used to say, “Out of every bad comes some good.”

And this was so good, we’ve started work on our second book, He’s Not the Guy (God Didn’t Do It!)

This sitting down stuff ain’t all that bad!

***

Bob Brooker and Kaye O’Dougherty have been adventuring together for a lot of years now. They first met at a recording studio on 42nd Street. Yes, that 42nd Street. They recorded a commercial for E.J. Korvette’s, who went out of business soon thereafter.

Bob is an old saloon singer who, as Bobby Brookes, recorded for Victor and Capital back in the day. Kaye has trouble carrying a tune in a bucket. Nevertheless, over the years, as Brooker and O’Dougherty, the two have collaborated on a variety of theater projects, performing, writing, directing, managing, and producing. In keeping with the changing times, they have even created a cyber alter-ego named eBobb.

Recently, Bob and Kaye both took long-overdue turns at being rather mature college kids. Kaye now holds a Bachelors Degree in the Humanities from St. Peter’s College in Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Bob was graduated magna cum laude from Montclair State University with a BA in Theater, and is a member of Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society.

You can visit their website by going to FootballforLovers.com

RETURN TO YOUR FIRST LOVE by Teresa R. Jones: “…readers will be compelled and encouraged to seek a loving relationship with Jesus Christ.”

Ten years ago my husband and I were hit with very disturbing news.  We noticed that our two-year-old daughter’s left eye would drift uncontrollably, and we took her to the doctor.  She was diagnosed with a rare eye disease called Retina Blastoma, which is a malignant tumor that forms in the eye, and causes the retina to detach.  At the time, only 100 people in the United States, per year are diagnosed with the disease.  We were told that the only cure would be to remove our daughter’s eye.

My husband and I were devastated, but we were not going to give up.  We sought the opinion of several other doctors, and they all gave us the same prognosis.  Our pastor, who is also a pediatrician, arranged for us to meet with an ophthalmologist at the hospital where he worked.  The ophthalmologist examined our daughter and told us that he believed that our daughter had Retina Blastoma.  He also told us about another disease called, Coats which looks just like Retina Blastoma, but it is benign.  Strangely, Coats usually occurs in boys, and it is extremely rare for girls.  The ophthalmologist only knew of one other case where a girl was diagnosed with Coats.  Most ophthalmologists cannot distinguish between the two diseases until the eye is removed.

The ophthalmologist told us about a conference for ophthalmologists that take place at the hospital twice a year.  One of those conferences was scheduled that day.  He also informed us that there was a world renowned retina specialist attending the conference, and he was sure that specialist would examine our daughter.  The specialist could determine that our daughter had Coats.  Miraculously, our daughter’s eye would be saved.

One day while I was home alone, I reflected on the ordeal and many other challenges I have had to triumph over in my lifetime.  In my spirit, I told God that life has been rough for me, but I could clearly see how He has been there to help me through it all.  I began to think about other women I knew who were still trying to battle life on their own.  I then told God that it is ashamed that more women won’t turn their lives over to Him.  I then heard a still small voice say, “Tell them.”  I asked, “Tell them?  Lord, how?”  The same still small voice said, “Book!”  This moment was the conception of Return to Your First Love.

Return to Your First Love is the assignment God gave me to tell my testimony.  Throughout my life, I have gone from walking with God zealously in my youth, inconsistently in my early adulthood, and maturing to a steadfast walk with Him in my latter years.  My story is a tale of overcoming the struggles of family dysfunction, low self-esteem, rejection, forgiveness, financial hardship, sexual immorality, challenges in the work place, to winning in marriage and living a victorious life.  Over the past four decades of my life, I have learned valuable lessons that have been both beneficial as well as costly.  I trust my life experiences would speak to any woman no matter what stage she is in life.  Return to Your First Love is a timely message that edifies, exhorts and encourages in times of uncertainty.  Readers will be compelled and encouraged to seek a loving relationship with Jesus Christ.

Teresa Jones is a writer for the Neighborhood Writing Alliance (NWA), which publishes the award-winning Journal of Ordinary Thought (JOT). Teresa is a member of Toastmasters International and the National Association of Female Executives (NAFE). Teresa is faithful member of the Apostolic Faith Church, where she serves as a prayer counselor for the Prayer Line Ministry. She and her husband, Alexander, have been married for 16 years and have two children. You can visit Teresa R. Jones website at www.teresarjones.com. You can contact Teresa at teresa.jones@revelation2-4.com.

MAGNIFICENT MAN by Randall Lang “…sometimes a story begins as a hero in search of a story.”

Sometimes a story doesn’t begin as a idea, sometimes a story begins as a hero in search of a story. So it was with Magnificent Man. My personal idea of a hero is not only someone who performs rescues, saves lives, or fights for his ideals, my idea of a hero is someone who does good as a part of his daily life. As if to compound that, I feel that a hero should stand by his values and beliefs even when they are considered outdated and anachronistic by others. Throw in a dash of gallantry, a little chivalry, a dose of nobility and you have a pretty good hero. But since this is a romance novel, we dare not create a trite ‘bigger-than-life’ superhero. Better we should make him complex and, in the case of Coyote, the hero of Magnificent Man, slightly damaged.

Now that we have this hero, what can we do with him? Let’s put him in the big city and make him a crime fighter. No, that would not work. He’s damaged and a bit limited, the street thugs would eat him alive. What if he were a soldier who saves the heroine from enemies? Not bad, but soldiers tend to work in groups and Coyote really is not a team player. Would he make a good cowboy? Picture him riding a horse through the American southwest in the 1870’s in search of adventure. Close, but not quite the exact time for him. Oh yes! There it is! The contemporary American southwest and not on a horse, but rather on a motorcycle, the ONLY real way to see the southwest other than on a horse. Now we have an anachronistic hero with the mind of a medieval knight who travels the southwest on a motorcycle helping forgotten people in a desolate land. That’s my guy, that’s Coyote.

Every story needs a heroine and Magnificent Man is no exception. We need a good, tough-as-nails heroine to link up with Coyote and change both of their lives. ‘Tough-as-nails’ really won’t work, let’s create a heroine who has been kicked by life a few times, and who just wants to improve things for her family.

Cassandra is a former beauty queen from Shreveport, Louisiana. At the peak of her life, things start to fall apart until, fourteen years later, she finds herself as a struggling single Mother supporting her teen-aged daughter and her aging Mother. She takes a chance by answering an ad in a Hollywood fan magazine and makes a hope-filled trip to Los Angeles only to be disappointed. On the trip home, things go steadily downhill until she is rescued from a band of murderous thugs by Coyote. She is confused when he calls her “my lady’ and treats her as a knight would treat a queen. He agrees to take her back to Louisiana, but first he must complete several missions throughout the desert southwest. It is during this journey that she realizes what a truly noble and magnificent man is Coyote. Although she resists, she becomes inescapably bonded to him.

Coyote is a man beloved by the people he visits, and he is very content with his solitary lifestyle. He has no desire to become involved with a woman, but Cassandra brings a new type of fulfillment into his life and irreversibly changes him. It is during their journey of adventure through the stark yet beautiful desert landscape that a bond of love develops. A love that puts both of them in an intolerable situation.

I invite you to join Coyote and Cassandra on this journey of love and adventure through the contemporary American southwest.

Randall Lang grew up in the tough coalfields of southwestern Pennsylvania where nothing comes easily. It is a world of limited opportunity and few roles to follow. Dreams are quickly vanquished in the shadows of necessity and creativity is usually buried beneath an avalanche of cynicism.  However, epiphanies come in all shapes, sizes, and in a wide range of locations. In the dark and quiet world of the underground worksite, the stories within him began to take form. Years later, Randall Lang is the author of eight books of erotic stories published by Renaissance E Books, has contributed to two erotic anthologies, and the recently released Magnificent Man, an erotic romance published by Midnight Showcase. Randall’s erotic works include the five volume Trailer Park Nightshttp://shop.renebooks.com/SearchResults.asp?Cat=120. His newest release, series and three books of erotic short stories. These are available at Magnificent Man, is available from Midnight Showcase at http://www.midnightshowcase.com/MagniMan.htm. See the book trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fv3T4zXq_Lo.  Visit Randall’s website, The Worlds of Randall Lang, www.randalllang.com.Or his blog, The Mind of Randall Lang, www.randalllang.blogspot.com. It’s a strange place to be. Randall now lives historically on an historic island in historic Wheeling, West Virginia.

Editor’s Note: Randall Lang will be on a virtual book tour throughout September.  If you’d like to pick up a copy of his book, Magnificent Man, click here!

Meggie Remains’ Joanne Sundell “My first heroine would have to be a woman trying to make it in the rugged west.”

Meggie’s Remains, my first completed manuscript and fourth sale, is near and dear to my heart.  The title changed from Columbine Captive—for obvious reasons—to Day Dreams ~ Haunted Nights, but at the end of the day, became Meggie’s Remains.   You might ask what this means, and well you should.  Is Meggie dead, buried six feet under, never to take another breath, or is Meggie so shattered, it’s hard to take the next step in life?  Number two is closer to the truth.  My focus and interest rests solely in the nineteenth century, the Victorian Era.   For the average romance heroine, life wasn’t easy.  I can’t imagine the challenge to have lived and tried to love during such a restrictive, repressive time.  When I first thought of writing romance, I thought of Jane Eyre and its classic romantic themes, wanting to pay tribute to this quintessential romance novel.  What makes us root for Jane?  Why do we care about her, and about Edward?  How did the pair overcome impossible obstacles and find their happy ending?

Living in the West, in the Colorado Rockies, I realized the beauty all around me was a character befitting any romance novel.  My first heroine would have to be a woman trying to make it in the rugged west.  I decided to bring Jane Eyre to the American West and see what might happen if I took Jane’s situation and made it worse … and then worse.   Ever curious about how a nineteenth century heroine might have dealt with sexual trauma and upset, I wanted to peel away the pretty layers in classic romantic theme and character, and show the not-so-pretty events that can happen—the dark, complex, emotional path a heroine’s life can take, suddenly, without warning, and with no guarantee of survival.  In Meggie’s Remains, Meggie’s life mirrors Jane’s in many respects, but the mirror shatters when Meggie’s life takes a turn away from romantic conflict, toward dangers that Jane Eyre never faced.  Beyond the suspense, I wanted to capture the romance, the moment when passion ignites between heroine and hero.  Such is the stuff of which romance novels are made!

My love of old-fashioned theme and character led me to create my heroine, Meggie McMurphy, and her hero, Ethan Rourke, stumbling upon each other on the streets of Denver, Colorado Territory, October, 1874.  Their path to find true love is most definitely not an easy one.  Let’s take a closer look at the pair, to perhaps find out why.

Meggie is complex and I wanted to do justice to her character in the writing of Meggie’s Remains.  I wanted to show how she must walk that fine line between day dreams and nightmares, between what is real and what is not—forced to run for her life when the fiend so long stalking in her nightmares, surfaces in the light of day.   Meggie is a pretty young woman, twenty-five when the story opens, slender, five foot two, with a full, rosy mouth, violet eyes that can turn passionately dark, a peaches and cream complexion, and long rusty-red hair.  But she’s forced to hide her good looks, not wanting to gain any man’s attention after the painful, sinful episode in her past.  No one must find out, no one!  Tainted by her past, she’s deathly afraid of men, so much so pulls her hair up to the point of pain, wears baggy dresses, her only adornment a nun’s cross, hides behind spectacles, and steps away when any man comes near.   In times of upset, Meggie turns to her most trusted companion and friend, Jane Eyre, treasuring the worn pages of her favorite novel above all else in her pitiable life.   Escaping into its pages, Meggie can become Jane, falling in love with Edward Rochester over and over again, imagining that moment of passion when Jane and Edward first meet, when they first touch, imagining such a moment for herself . . . such sweetness . . . such desire . . . such impossible bliss—  Quickly checking herself, Meggie throws off such wild imaginings and does her best to deny her buried desire for love and happiness, knowing she’s not destined to live any kind of a normal life.  She doesn’t desire any man.  When the handsome, formidable westerner, Ethan Rourke, stumbles upon Meggie on a snowy Denver street, it’s as if he’d stepped right off the pages of Jane Eyre! Safe to encounter such a man on the page, it is certainly unsafe, even deadly, for her to encounter such a man in the flesh.  Men belong . . . six feet under, six feet away . . . where to stay safe, the devil must stay!

Ethan is handsome all right—tall, dark, and handsome—standing six foot four, well-built, with dark hair cropped at the shoulders, and intelligent, slate eyes that can seduce with one look.  Though perhaps better looking than Edward Rochester, Ethan is the classic brooding hero, wealthy, with society at his feet, yet given to dark introspection, silent on the things that matter most, keeping his true feelings buried deep.  Haunted by his past, Ethan isn’t interested in committing to another woman, and finds satisfaction enough in the arms of his mistress of five years.  Save for his mistress, he keeps women at a distance.  In his lifetime he’s already seen enough rejection, death, and dying—enough to kill any Faith he once had—and won’t let any woman close.  The moment he stumbles over the odd baggage fallen at his feet on the snowy Denver street, he’s struck through by the curious female; no woman ever looked at him like that before.  He wants to turn away . . . but can he?

Joanne Sundell’s first sale was in 2005, to Five Star, Gale, Cengage Learning.  The prime market for Five Star Expressions is the library market, but Five Star’s books are also available on-line at Barnes & Noble and all bookstores.  The Five Star Expressions line is a combination of romance and women’s fiction.  Joanne’s particular interest is in historical romance with suspenseful elements.

To date, Joanne’s sales to Five Star include:  MATCHMAKER, MATCHMAKER (06), A…MY NAME’S AMELIA (07) also out in Large Print, THE PARLOR HOUSE DAUGHTER (08) also out in Large Print, MEGGIE’S REMAINS (09), & THE QUAKER AND THE CONFEDERATE upcoming series (5/10, 9/10).   Joanne’s first sale was reviewed nationally by Booklist, her second by Library Journal and Publisher’s Weekly, and her third by Publisher’s Weekly and Booklist.  A…MY NAME’S AMELIA garnered a top 4&1/2 star rating from Romantic Times Magazine.

History is always a strong character in Joanne’s books, with her first four stories set in colorful, turbulent Colorado history and her next, a two-book series set in Civil War Virginia.  As important as it is for Joanne to convey a strong, credible, historical flavor of the time, it is equally important for Joanne to portray strong, credible heroines and heroes.   A strong, determined heroine deserves an equally strong and determined hero.   Joanne grew up reading romance, historical and contemporary, falling in love with heroes and heroines from Regency England to the American West, from London’s pubs to Colorado’s ski slopes, loving that moment when the hero and heroine meet and fall in love.  That moment to Joanne is the moment when Jane Eyre meets Edward Rochester, when Elizabeth Bennett meets Mr. Darcy … that’s the heart-stopping, passionate moment for Joanne in romance.  That moment is what led her to attempt traditional, old-fashioned historical romance.

With her three, Colorado-mountain-raised-children grown and off on their own adventures, Joanne lives part-time in Colorado and California, with her husband and their entourage` of felines and huskies.

Joanne is a member of Colorado Romance Writers, Romance Writers of America, Women Writing the West, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, and Los Angeles Romance Authors.

e-mail Joanne:  author@joannesundell.com

www.joannesundell.com

www.joannesundell/blogspot.com

www.myspace.com/joannesundell

Editor’s Note: Pick up your copy at Amazon here!

FREEDOM OF PRESS: THE SITTING DUCK by Balthazar Rodrigue Nzomono-Balenda

Freedom of Press: The Sitting Duck

Freedom of press the sitting duck is about express myself by using poetry about situation journalists face in the connection with their reporting. In this book, I talk about journalists being kidnapped, imprisoned, tortured and in the worse case they even get killed by politicians, criminal groups and religious organizations who are also politically motivated. In every poetry, I talk about different events from Human Rights violations to other frustrations, journalists can deal with when they report in countries that are hostile to an independent press. Like in all my books, I use poetry to criticize religion and its promotion of bigotry around the world. I end my book with a conclusion where I talk about the insecurities of those who are hostile to the free press and their desire to promote violence crime because they don’t know anything about the principles that makes a decent human being decent. I put things into perspectives by also talking about others who are trapped in the same situation like: authors, Human Rights activists, Greenpeace activists, freedom fighters, aid workers, movements for democracy and others. My message to the readers is that the CPJ is starting to take care of these cased and my hope is that justice gets served because much of these criminal acts are ignored and the criminals and those who employ them walk with impunity.

Balthazar Rodrigue Nzomono-Balenda is not only an author and a poet, but also a student, multimedia designer and translator.  His previous books include The Depth of My Soul and The Struggle for Power and the Fight for Survival.  Balthazar became interested in poetry by accident in 2003 when he wasn’t satisfied with the way things were going in his early studies and in the Danish society.  His latest book is Freedom of Press: The Sitting Duck.  You can visit Balthazar on the web at http://www.redroom.com/author/balthazar-rodrigue-nzomono-balenda.