Showing posts with label Blog Hop. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blog Hop. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

The Greatest Gift #MFRWhooks

Electrifying Poetry Collection


#Poetry #Odes #LoveSongs


A #MustRead for anyone who has ever experienced love, pain, defeat, or joy...


An International Book Awards Finalist -



Blurb:

Flashes of Emotion is a book of romantic poetry, considered both timely and timeless. The selection allows us to tap into the poet’s insights on a wide variety of topics from life and love to death and drudgery. It is contemporary poetry with a classical, electrifying edge, highlighting a lively, refreshing, and innovative style.

Amazon Hall of Fame says the poems glow with musical invention and the manner in which the poet elects to place his words on the page enhances the meaning and the beauty of these works... Liquid flowing music from a poet who understands passion. His eloquent poems speak to each of us as private as a whispered conversation. Brilliant.

And the Kindle Book Review says the poet’s style may take a bit of getting used to, but that voice produced several favorites in my notes. 5-stars it is, and extremely recommended.

The Hook - {Poem Excerpt}


Autumn in Florence
is a mélange of the elements of charm,
a yawn away from the steady shivers lying beyond
At dusk, a wistful stroll along eclectic memoried boulevards,   
with echoes of church bells in tow
unveils a canny sense of things
A nostalgic glimpse of old things,
old people, old places,
bequeathing their secrets unreservedly,
at the end of a tacky, melancholic day

It is autumn in Florence…   
even the blind can tell,
for a whiff of that dry Tuscan air,
disguised as a romantic breath on the cheek
now wafts soothingly, alluringly,
like the caressing whisper of a lover at dawn
The gaiety, the gossip, 
the veritable quality of the decline of the year,
all of it a mishmash of this season of gloom,
and caught in the midst of it, you and me,
‘cause in our souls, a conscious dread had sprung      
                       
It is autumn in Florence…
even a tot can tell
from the inexorable surge of parched foliage and withering flora
now palpable like a beauty queen wilting with the passage of time
as an impotent sun looms
with a staggering degree of poetic frenzy, like a bad omen
over that little piazza that I call lair and you call refuge  
Jaded, like the dream that steered us here
nadir, like our possibilities, and poised to snap,
like the fragile thread holding our sanity together

It is autumn in Florence…
even the inebriated can tell,
for the Tuscan sky is daubed with gray-hued awnings
a kaleidoscope of waning streaks, epitomizing
the artistic finesse of the heavens,
a subtle connotation, a riveting verity that
four times a year the seasons change without fail,
that now leaves must turn sallow and plummet, and flowers must wither
And with them, everything except us,
must leap beyond their prime

It is autumn in Florence…  
Spanish edition
even a troll can tell,
from that lingering mystery of vitality and lethargy,
so exquisite, so sophisticated
which no longer obscures the daunting haze that strains the air
In the flush and bloom of early womanhood, you …
radiant like a new moon on a starlit night
cunningly oblivious of the secrets of my tears
paying no heed to the disheartening dread that swathes me,                  
for in this season, with every leaf that falls,
and every flower that withers, your days are numbered

It is autumn in Florence…
even an obtuse can tell,
from the stunning sight of Fiesole transformed into violet by the magic of twilight
And now, here we are—you and me—ensnared by a dream
unraveled by a foe, invincible and vile
like injured rebels ferried home to roost
Desolate hands too volatile to reach
ardent eyes too doleful to watch
as your frailty eats you up with delicious cruelty 
the way a vulture does a prey
causing every fantasy within the limits of our amorous deeds  
to evaporate, along with the last breath in your lungs

It is autumn in Florence… 
even dreamers can tell, for
the vestiges these bleak nights amass were once stacks of hope
on which now abide memories undimmed 
A better friend than you life never gave  
you were the bloom that autumn failed to erode 
the warmth that winter couldn’t pinch from me
the wind that summer could not smother
the flare that’ll forever be my spring
But more than all this, my love, 
You were life’s
Greatest gift
To
Me.

Buy Links


 
   

Wednesday, April 29, 2020

High Stakes & Scandals in High Places #MFRWhooks


The Conspiracy of Silence

#Mystery #Suspense #Thriller

A depiction of the life-and-death struggle of a gutsy female lawyer who goes to great lengths to save her lover from a murder rap.

Blurb:

The conscience of a town steeped in sexism, vanity, and hypocrisy is pricked by the brutal murder of a mysterious woman in a park in Los Angeles. But the shock is transformed into a steamy, seductive scandal when the body turns out to be that of Susan Whitaker, the flamboyant wife of the governor of California.
Soon, a dazzlingly intricate shuffle of volatile links lead the police to the delicate theory of a secret lover/blackmailer, and to the indictment of Benjamin Carlton, Hollywood’s most influential black celebrity. 
Then curious things begin to happen when Carlton’s ambitious girlfriend, Rita Spencer suddenly unearths the shocking secret that Susan Whitaker did not, in fact, exist. She little realizes however that her discovery of this colossal fraud is a mere curtain-raiser to a chilling world of ugly skeletons dating back to the assassination of a U.S. senator in a Washington hotel sauna, skeletons connected to riveting sex scandals in high places, skeletons the FBI and political king-makers will kill for...

The Hook - {Book Excerpt}


The dim figure lurked in the dusking patch of tangled shrubbery until darkness enveloped him. Then he choked and swore and frothed at the mouth, and went down on all fours. After a while, he clambered out of the shrubbery like a ghost, picked himself up, and wiped his hand across his brow. Tall, with an athletic build, he covered his hands with fleeced gloves and masked his face with a hood. He had a definite presence in spite of the aura of repulsion that swelled around him like foul breath. For a moment, he stood in death-like silence in a navy hooded sweatshirt, a pair of matching pants, and black running shoes. His dark brown eyes studied his environment like a bloodhound determined to unearth a misplaced object without losing its sense of smell.
A short distance away, small cylindrical light bulbs cast an eerie glow over the lush greenery of Glennon Park, capturing its beauty in a halo of kaleidoscopic brilliance. And then a throng of men in fancy tee shirts and short pants intermixed with women in jeans and sleeveless tops whisked into view. The dim figure, hearing their muffled voices over the sound of the fountain’s cascading waters, stiffened. Like him, the fountain stood in an unlit area of the park. Surrounded by luxuriant shrubs, it was the place where randy youths who often exploited the shadows for romantic mischief loved to loiter.

But on this particular night, there were no lovers necking by the fountain, something else had taken their place. A black diamond Cadillac stood beside the fountain. The unusual sight caused the dim figure’s hands to shake with excitement. Cars were not allowed that far into the park, so whatever fantasies within the limits of human accomplishment the Cadillac’s driver had conceived, this was the wrong night for it, he mused. This will be my last murder, he decided, the climax of a long, enterprising career as the greatest hitman of all time. He was a killer so efficient and so elusive that even the FBI nicknamed him Shadow of Death for his uncanny ability to dissolve into a penumbra after every hit.

He looked up and recognized the wonderful head of hair and the slender, sensual neck as the lone occupant of the Cadillac appeared in silhouette against the fountain. His pulse quickened at once. He mopped his brow with a handkerchief and contemplated the lady’s mesmerizing beauty. Thinking of her now as a victim seemed odd to him. He had loved her once; in fact, he still loved her, a reality that put him in a quandary—a lethal clash between his obsession and his survival instinct. The survival instinct, he knew, had to win, for between them now stood the only thing that love could not subdue—a dark secret.
The Shadow of Death moved with stealth in the semi-darkness toward the Cadillac, his hands shaking with excitement with every step he took.  His only accomplice was his own shadow, perceptible to no eye but his. It seemed innocuous even to him, like a specter, only there to see, not to arbitrate. It moved when the killer moved and stopped when he did, like a minion with no initiative of its own, an android programmed to repeat the action of its mentor, as only a ghost would, only to be saddled thereafter with the damning knowledge of the truth, a truth that would elude the rest of the world—an everlasting witness, a ghost that would never die.
There was deafening silence inside the Cadillac. All around it, darkness closed in as slowly and unfalteringly as the approaching evil. The killer’s face was impassive, his heartbeat regular, but his muscles were taut as he strained to open the driver’s door with his gloved hand.
She did not see him, could not see him, because she was leaning face downward on the steering wheel.
Gripped by a morbid fascination with death, he stared down at her, the roaring tension inside him silenced by his cold determination. Everything would depend on this moment, this act, he mulled over, staring around the fountain. He wanted no interruption and there was none. He reached for her throat, giving her no chance to react.
There must be no error, he steeled himself against the guilt he knew was coming. His pressure on her throat was fierce. Time, thoughts, fear, regrets, all ceased to exist as an eternity seemed to roll by in a matter of seconds. And then relief flooded his being.

It was over, he almost smiled. It bore the mark of his usual professional touch—smooth, fast, painless, and very peaceful...

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Wednesday, March 7, 2018

An emotional look into a broken mind 

#Betrayal #Vengeance #MFRWHooks


For this week's Book Hooks blog hop, here's a short excerpt from Take Back the Memory and a teaser: What would you do if you discovered that the man you married is not who you thought he was? 


When you’ve finished with my hook, I hope you’ll visit some of the other authors “hooking” today. You’ll find their links at the end of the post.


Blurb

Paige Lyman, an accomplished psychiatrist, is on the verge of madness but she doesn't know it yet. The madness begins when she gets it into her head to write her memoirs. As her brilliant mind assembles bits and pieces of her life for the book, ugly skeletons, long forgotten in the closet, begin to rear their heads. 

It had all begun with a simple act of love. And love, for her, was a blond-haired Irish boy named Bill, so when Bill abandoned her for priesthood the world around her collapsed. Seized by a different passion—vengeance—she seeks her proverbial pound of flesh in the beds of various priests... 

But that is before she meets Stern W, a medical researcher, who sweeps into her life like a hurricane and marries her, and they live happily ever after until he dies in a helicopter crash and she discovers the startling truth about who he really was. 

Take Back the Memory is the saga of her compelling backward journey through her own life on a psychotherapist's couch. 


The Hook

The door of the consulting studio swung open at 9.00 a.m. and Dr. Wilson, a slender, pipe-smoking clinical psychologist stuck his hoary head in the doorway. His face lit up at the sight of Paige sitting cross-legged in the cozy waiting room.

“Hello Dr. Lyman,” he smiled courteously, “I had no idea you were here already.”

Paige glanced up, her face a frozen scowl, and gazed at him. She had expected them to be on first-name basis this morning; the unexpected formality fazed her quite a bit.  

“Good morning, Dr. Wilson,” she said wryly. “Sorry I’m early, a habit, I guess.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” he said quickly, the smile on his lips waning. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”

She nodded and looked away as he disappeared back into the consulting room. Left alone, she gazed across the lounge. The psychotherapist’s studio was illuminated by the sun’s rays through an opened Venetian blind, and the balmy sunlit ambiance fascinated her.

“Like the cheery whisper of an admirer after a heartbreak,” she said wistfully and rose.

As she did so, echoes of distant traffic momentarily brought her to a state of mental alertness. Palms sweaty, Paige walked to the window and opened it. She gazed, mesmerized, at the sun-drenched avenue on the breezy late September morning and noted the peak time for fall foliage in New York was weeks away yet. She closed the window.

Shrugging, she walked back to her seat and plopped down. Her hand trembled slightly on the black zebra-print clutch bag in her lap.

“Darn,” she mumbled, her thoughts turning to her daughter, who had convinced her to come.

“I shouldn’t be here, Diane,” she whispered savagely. “I just shouldn’t.” 

Buy Links

Amazon US      |      Amazon UK      |      Add to your Goodreads TBR list!


Please take a few minutes to check out the other Book Hooks this week!