Today's Featured Books— Events

LitNuts is cosponsoring a new Reader Central Giveaway: Enter for a chance to win a $150 Amazon.com gift card and books signed by the authors—including the award-winning A Girl Like You by Michelle Cox. Earn entries simply by connecting with authors on social media. Enter by March 30. 

Also, last call for the Beth Gibbs Book Giveaway. Enter by March 4 for a chance to win signed books and a $25 coffee shop gift card.

And don't miss out on the Help Yourself Giveaway and a chance to win $75 in books. Enter by March 10.

"March is the month of expectation." ~Emily Dickinson

Free online: Women Filmmakers Festival at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Virtual screenings and conversation with artist and filmmaker Alison O’Daniel (including her Sundance Film Festival feature, The Tuba Thieves) on March 1 at 5:30 p.m. EST, and with filmmaker Vivienne Dick on March 8 at 5:30 p.m. EST. 

"There's this understanding that there are these rules about how you make films. I do not believe in rules for films at all." ~Alison O'Daniel

Free online tonight: What's New in Historical Fiction. Join this regular panel series featuring historical novelists with new and upcoming titles. Tonight's line-up includes Janie Chang, author of The Porcelain Moon; Ciera Horton McElroy, author of Atomic Family; Heinz Insu Fenkl, author of Skull Water; and Dora Levy Mossanen, author of Love and War in the Jewish Quarter. Moderated by History Through Fiction editor Colin Mustful. February 27, 7 p.m. CST.

“History is not the past but a map of the past, drawn from a particular point of view, to be useful to the modern traveller.” ~Henry Glassie

Today is the last day of the February LitNuts Deals Giveaway. Enter by 11:59 p.m. CST today for a chance to win $100 in books!

Also, be sure to enter the Beth Gibbs Giveaway for a chance to win a signed copy of Enlighten Up! or Soul Food, plus a $25 coffee shop gift card. 

"Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy." ~Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh (courtesy of BethGibbs.com)

Free online lit event: Join bestselling author Jessie Keane to celebrate her latest gangland thriller, Never Go Back. Learn about the inspiration behind her many popular novels, including encounters with shady characters in London's East End and Soho. Presented by Cambridgeshire Libraries. Thursday, February 23, 19:00 GMT (1 p.m. CST). 

"The truth, however ugly in itself, is always curious and beautiful to seekers after it." ~Agatha Christie

It's Presidents Day in the United States, a national holiday. And what better way to celebrate than with Rogue Reads, a free online literary event? Authors Deborah Crombie, Sean Doolittle, Carlene O’Connor, and E. A. Aymar will read from their brand-new mysteries, answer questions, and divulge their writing secrets. Monday, February 20, 7 p.m. EST.

"Don't join the book burners. Don't be afraid to go in your library and read every book." ~Dwight Eisenhower

Today is Random Acts of Kindness Day, an occasion intended to help make kindness the norm at school, home, and work. Here are 50 fun ideas for sharing kindness.

We would also like to "kindly" remind you to get in on two great giveaways:

• LitNuts Deals Giveaway: Enter for a chance to win $100 in books. Deadline February 24.
• Reader Central Giveaway (cosponsored by LitNuts): Enter for a chance to win a $150 Amazon.com gift card. Deadline February 28. 

"Kindness extended, received, or observed beneficially impacts the physical health and feelings of everyone involved." ~Dr. Wayne Dyer

A friendly reminder...that one of the best free online literary festivals of the year is currently in process...now through Friday, February 17. The University of California - Riverside (UCR) Writers Week Festival brings together the most celebrated authors and the best up-and-coming writers in America. It's free. It's online. And it's open to the public! 

"All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” ~J.R.R. Tolkein

Free online today: A virtual event celebrating the release of Wanting: Women Writing About Desire. In this daring collection, award-winning and emerging female writers share their innermost longings, in turn dismantling both personal and political constructs of what desire is or can be. Presented by Women & Children First, an indie bookstore in Chicago and one of the largest feminist bookstores in the United States. Monday, February 13, 12 p.m. CST. (Also available 1-2 weeks after the event on the Women & Children First YouTube Channel.)

“Sometimes the most dangerous thing of all in matters of love was to be granted your heart’s desire.” ~Alice Hoffman, Practical Magic

The University of California - Riverside (UCR) Writers Week Festival is the most diverse and longest-running free literary festival in California. It brings together the most celebrated authors and the best up-and-coming writers in America. It's free. It's online. And it's open to the public! February 13-17. 

“It's okay to love something bigger than yourself without fearing it. Anything worth loving is bigger than we are anyway.” ~Percival Everett, Wounded

The Rockland (NY) Arts Festival is underway with a combination of in-person and online events this week across multiple disciplines, including Art Demonstrations (Feb. 6), a Writers Roundtable (Feb. 7), and a discussion with Indie Filmmakers (Feb. 8). These free online events begin at 7 p.m. EST each evening and are open to the public.

“Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” ~Andy Warhol

Todays Featured Books include great deals on indie books—including five freebies! Scroll down to learn more. 

Last call for the Woodson Falls Mystery Series Giveaway: Enter by midnight central time tonight for a chance to win signed books and a coffee shop gift card!

"Don't compromise yourself. You're all you have." ~John Grisham

New Giveaway: LitNuts is cosponsoring the Amazing Adventures Giveaway. Enter for a chance to win a bundle of 50 young adult sci-fi and fantasy novels plus a new eReader (a $550 value). Open to readers worldwide.

“A book, too, can be a star, a living fire to lighten the darkness, leading out into the expanding universe.” ~Madeleine L’Engle

Today's Featured Books include three "freebies" and nine more great indie books priced under $5! You can see all of our Featured Books at LitNuts.com. 

Also free: The Downtown Writers Center / YMCA of Central New York presents poets Suzanne Frischkorn and Alessandra Lynch. Friday, January 27, 7 PM EST.

"A poet’s work … to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it from going to sleep." ~Salman Rushdie

Today's Featured Books include three freebies and books from authors appearing in LitNuts for the first time. Visit the LitNuts website to see all of today's Featured Books. 

Also today, a friendly reminder to check out FOUR giveaways:

• A World of Dinosaurs Giveaway from author Daniel Arenson
• Woodson Falls Mystery Series Giveaway from Andrea O'Connor
• Bundle of 45 Literary, Historical & Book Club Fiction (last day!)
• Bundle of 38 Cozy Mysteries

“I was amazed that what I needed to survive could be carried on my back. And, most surprising of all, that I could carry it.” ~Cheryl Strayed

LitNuts is cosponsoring a new giveaway! Enter for a chance to win a bundle of 38 Cozy Mysteries + a new eReader (a $450 value!). This giveaway is open to readers worldwide. 

“When someone is mean to me, I just make them a victim in my next book.” ~Mary Higgins Clark

It's "last call" for the current LitNuts Deals Giveaway ($50 in Books, Coffee, or Cash to three winners). Enter by January 21 for a chance to win—and be sure to enter these fun giveaways as well:

• Woodson Falls Mystery Series Giveaway
• A World of Dinosaurs Giveaway
• Literary, Historical & Book Club Fiction Giveaway

“Surprise is the greatest gift which life can grant us.” ~Boris Pasternak

New Giveaway: Enter the Woodson Falls Giveaway for a chance to win signed books from author Andrea O'Connor, plus a $25 coffee shop gift card. Enter by February 2. 

While you are waiting to win a signed book, get a free copy of the ebook edition of 18 Lakeview Terrace, Book 1 in the Woodson Falls Series, and begin following the adventures of Gaby Quinn as she tackles mysteries in her small New England town. 

“Never be afraid to sit a while and think.” ~Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun

Free online tonight: Dr. King and the Legacy of Non-Violent Direct Action. Join the Interfaith Round Table and First Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Ann Arbor, Michigan, for a panel and community discussion on how we might draw on Dr. King’s legacy of non-violent action in service to social justice and building a Beloved Community. Monday, January 16, 7 PM EST. 

“The time is always right to do what is right.” ~Martin Luther King, Jr. 

Free online this weekend: What's New in Historical Fiction featuring Gabriella Saab, author of Daughters of Victory; Brynn Barineau, author of Jaguars and Other Game; and Peter Blauner, author of Picture in the Sand. Sunday, January 17, 7 PM CST.

One week to go on the LitNuts Deals Giveaway: Enter by January 20 for a chance to win $50 in books, coffee, or cash! 

"Summer friends will melt away like summer snows, but winter friends are friends forever.” ~George R. R. Martin

Free online tonight: An evening with Ross Gay, author of Inciting Joy. Presented by Illinois Libraries Present, best-selling essayist and award-winning poet Ross Gay will discuss the joy we incite when we turn our attention to what we love and what brings us together. Wednesday, January 11, 7 PM CST. 

"The more stuff you love the happier you will be." ~Ross Gay

This month, LitNuts is cosponsoring a new giveaway: Enter for a chance to win a bundle of 45+ literary,  historical, and book club fiction plus a brand new eReader, a $500 value! Open to readers worldwide. Deadline January 26. 

"Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Welcome to the January 2023 issue of LitNuts Deals: highly rated indie books PLUS the LitNuts Deals Giveaway.

This month, we're giving away $150 in books, coffee, and cash. Three winners will each choose a $50 gift card for books (from Bookshop.org, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, etc.), a $50 coffee shop gift card (from any coffee shop or café that sells gift cards online), or $50 in cash (payable via PayPal). Enter by January 21 for a chance to win! 

 

Lowcountry Boil by Susan M. Boyer
Genre: Cozy Mystery
4.4 stars, 1,440 ratings
$0.99

Private Investigator Liz Talbot is a modern Southern belle. She blesses hearts, takes names, carries her Sig 9 in her Kate Spade bag, and her golden retriever, Rhett, rides shotgun in her hybrid Escape. When her grandmother is murdered, Liz hightails it back to her South Carolina island home to find the killer. She’s fit to be tied when her brother—the chief of police—shuts her out of the investigation, so she opens her own. When her long-dead best friend pops in things really get complicated. Book 1 in the Liz Talbot Mystery Series.

"A simmering gumbo of a story." ~The Huffington Post. 

Edgewood by Karen McQuestion
Genre: Teen & Young Adult Thrillers & Suspense
4.4 stars, 1,472 ratings
$0.99

"Such a gripping story! I couldn't turn the pages fast enough." ~Five-star Goodreads Review. Wandering the dark streets at night is Russ Becker's way of dealing with his relentless insomnia and the angst of life. But that changes forever the night he witnesses a strange astronomical event, then discovers he's developed incredible superpowers. And he's not the only one...

"I devoured it in one sitting!" New York Times Bestselling Author Lesley Kagen ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

"Edgewood was mind-blowingly amazing." Olivia at Fictionally Obsessed ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 

 

Kingdoms of Sand: Books 1-3 by Daniel Arenson
Genre: Epic Fantasy
4.2 stars, 137 ratings
FREE

Game of Thrones meets Spartacus in an epic saga of sand and splendor. This bundle contains the first three novels of Kingdoms of Sand, a fantasy series from a USA Today bestselling author. That's over 1,000 pages of battles, intrigue, and magic.

Sweeping from snowy forests to cruel deserts, from bazaars of wonder to fields of war, here is a tale of legionaries and lepers, priests and paupers, kings and crows. Here a girl travels across endless dunes, seeking magic; a cruel prince struggles to claim a bloodstained throne; and a young soldier fights to hold back an overwhelming host. As the empire spreads, the fate of one family—and of all civilization—stands upon a knife's edge, for under the storm of war, even the greatest nations are but kingdoms of sand.

The Prodigal Returns by Miranda Rose Barker
Genre: Cozy Mystery
4.4 stars, 41 ratings
$0.99

Holly owns a small-town café. Her curiosity is piqued by the rich and powerful Montgomery family, who control the town. When the family patriarch dies, the police view it as murder, and the estranged son of the deceased who recently returned is a suspect.

Holly meets this young man at her café and tries to help solve the case to exonerate him. One thing is for sure—Holly will do whatever it takes to learn who killed the family patriarch…and, in the process, uncover any other secrets the family is hiding.

Book 1 of the Near-to-Home Mystery Series.

My Mother's Secret by Alina Adams
Genre: Historical Fiction
4.4 stars, 47 ratings
$0.99

New York Times Bestselling author Alina Adams draws on her own experiences as a Jewish refugee from Odessa, USSR, as she provides readers a rare glimpse into the world's first Jewish Autonomous Region. My Mother's Secret: A Novel of the Jewish Autonomous Region is rooted in detailed research about a little-known chapter of Soviet and Jewish history while exploring universal themes of identity, love, loss, war, and parenthood. Readers can expect a whirlwind journey as Regina finds herself and her courage within one of the century's most tumultuous eras.

"An eye-opening family saga...both exotic and chillingly familiar." ~Kyra Davis, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author

Blue Hydrangeas: An Alzheimer's Love Story by Marianne Sciucco

Genre: Fiction
4.6 stars, 227 ratings
$0.99

What if the person who knew you best and loved you most forgot your face and couldn't remember your name? In Blue Hydrangeas, a pair of retired Cape Cod innkeepers encounter Alzheimer's disease. 

"Blue Hydrangeas traces a couple's struggle with Alzheimer's in an effective story that doesn't pull its punches, but remains compassionate and absorbing." ~IndieReader

"By far the most tender love story I've read in a very long time." ~Story Circle

What's Not Said: A Novel by Valerie Taylor

Genre: Women's Domestic Life Fiction, Family Life Fiction 
4.2 stars, 193 ratings
$0.99

Kassie O’Callaghan’s meticulous plans to divorce her emotionally abusive husband, Mike, and move in with Chris, a younger man she met five years ago on a solo vacation in Venice, are disrupted when she finds out Mike has chronic kidney disease—something he’s concealed from her for years. Once again, she postpones her path to freedom—at least, until she pokes around his pajama drawer and discovers his illness is the least of his deceits.

But Kassie is no angel, either.  As she struggles to justify her own indiscretions, the secret lives she and Mike have led collide head-on, revealing a tangled web of sex, lies, and DNA. Still, mindful of her vows, Kassie commits to helping her husband find an organ donor. In the process, she uncovers a life-changing secret. Problem is, if she reveals it, her own immorality will be exposed, which means she has an impossible decision to make: Whose life will she save—her husband’s or her own?

"Highly recommended for readers who look for not just stories of marital relationships, but the unexpected revelations that revolve around life purpose and the immortality of love.” ~Midwest Book Reviews

A Conjuring of Ravens by Azalea Ellis
Genre: Fantasy
4.5 stars, 316 ratings
$0.99

In a world where magic is a science, Siobhan is a genius. But even geniuses need schooling.

Siobhan has just been banned from the country's only magic university. As the unwitting accomplice to the theft of a priceless magical artifact, she has suddenly become a wanted criminal. There are fates worse than death, and if caught, she will face them. Unwilling to give up on her dream of becoming the world's most powerful sorcerer, she resolves to do whatever it takes to change her fate—even if it means disguising herself as a man and indebting herself to a gang of criminals to pay for University tuition.

With the coppers after her, the pressure of trying to keep her spot in the devilishly competitive magic classes, and the gang calling in favors to repay her debts, Siobhan will need every drop of magic she can channel. Book 1 in the A Practical Guide to Sorcery series. 

One & Done by Kelly Jayne
Genre: Steamy Romance
4 stars, 62 ratings
$0.99

He's hot. Like smoldering on a 98-degree day hot! He looks like a man I could enjoy all night long!

When she looked into the camera, it felt like she was looking straight into my soul, and a jolt of electricity pulsed through me like I haven't felt in years.

Holly doesn't believe in love. She saw what it did to her parents and she wants no part of it.

Morgan had true love once and doesn't believe he will ever find it again.

Will they find in each other what they never thought possible? Or will their fears and flaws keep them apart? Book 1 in the United Front series.

Outrageous: Rise to Riches by Neal Katz
Genre: Historical Fiction 
4.3 stars, 89 ratings
$0.99

Women empowerment, overcoming adversity, social change, and hope were the cornerstones upon which Victoria Woodhull (1838–1927) and her younger sister Tennessee Celeste Claflin built their incredible lives in Victorian America. 

Winner of 12 literary awards, Outrageous: Rise to Riches, Book 1 of The Victoria Woodhull Saga, sets the psychological verity and traces Victoria from childhood poverty and horrific abuse to becoming one of the wealthiest women in America, founding the first women-owned brokerage firm on Wall Street, and the first women-owned newspaper. Victoria would stop at nothing to achieve her destiny.

"A compelling page-turning story that cleverly unfolds history while providing a wonderfully entertaining ride." ~Midwest Book Review

A Ring of Truth by Michelle Cox
Genre: Historical Mystery, Mystery/Romance
4.1 stars, 517 ratings
$2.99

“Downton Abbey meets Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries!” 

In this second book of the series, Henrietta and Clive delightfully rewrite Pride and Prejudice—with a hint of mystery. Newly engaged, Clive and Henrietta now begin the difficult task of meeting each other’s family. “Difficult” because Clive has neglected to tell Henrietta that he is heir to the Howard estate and fortune, and Henrietta has just discovered that her mother has been hiding secrets about her past as well. When Clive leaves his new fiancée with his wealthy family to return to the city, Henrietta stumbles upon a servant whose ring has been stolen. What begins as an innocent investigation quickly becomes very dangerous. 

“Henrietta and Inspector Howard make a charming odd couple in A Ring of Truth, mixing mystery and romance in a fizzy 1930s cocktail.” ~Hallie Ephron, New York Times bestselling author

Free online: The Blanche Ely House Museum sponsors Zoom Story Time for children the first Saturday of each month. This month, they are celebrating Chinese New Year with "Dragon Dance" as the main story. Saturday, January 7, 10 AM CST. 

"Always try to be a little kinder than is necessary." ~J.M. Barrie, The Little White Bird