Today's Featured Books

Countdown to Love

Dani has until New Year's to polish Donnie's dating skills in this clean, lighthearted romantic comedy.

Donnie’s been busy co-partnering a business for the past decade, but now that he has more time to invest in romance, he’s not sure how to start. Social graces are definitely not his strong suit. He's grateful when his best friend, Dani, agrees to coach him.

Dani knows she can turn Donnie into a gentleman just in time for the New Year’s work party. But when her desire to help Donnie turns into a desire for him, how can she continue to give him dating advice? And more important, what will happen to their friendship when sparks fly between them in this countdown to a new year?

Praise for Countdown to Love

The Accidental Relationship

Kaida is a newspaper journalist whose career advancement depends on getting the hottest story of the year: Dakota Roberts, the CEO of a highly reputable company, is being sued. There's only one problem: Dakota is a hard-nosed, pompous jerk who won't give her the time of day.

Dakota is sick of the media and just wants to get back to his private life. When an accident causes him to have amnesia, he has to relearn his own business. Thankfully, his new personal assistant turns out to be helpful, delightful, and strangely familiar.

When Dakota asks Kaida out, she’s taken aback. She can do this fake dating thing, for her career. After all, she's already pretending to be his assistant to get the scoop. But then she sees an endearing side of him she didn't think existed. How long can she pretend to be somebody else? And what will happen between them, and to her big story, when he gets his memory back?

Praise for The Accidental Relationship

About the Author

Amazon bestselling author Cristina Ryan lives with her Marine Corp. veteran husband and an entertaining clan of children and pets. Cristina also writes YA Christian Suspense as Krista Wagner. You can follow Cristina online on Goodreads and via her Amazon Author Page. 

1968 – the most pivotal year of a pivotal decade. The assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy...Tet, the North Vietnamese incursion into the South...LBJ’s decision not to seek a second term...the riots at the Chicago Democratic Convention...the election of Richard Nixon... 

Today, LitNuts is shining a spotlight on two historical novels from acclaimed author Libby Fischer Hellmann. Both novels are set in 1968, and both capture the emotions, conflicts, and consequences of that time. You’ll see, smell, feel, and taste the tumult, hope, and despair in Set the Night on Fire and A Bend in the River. 

Historical note: Set the Night on Fire takes place in Chicago during the time of the 1968 Democratic Convention. With the 2024 Democratic Convention set to take place in Chicago August 19 - 24, now is the perfect time to read a novel set against the backdrop of the historic events of the 1960s.

Set the Night on Fire

Someone is trying to kill Lila Hilliard. During the Christmas holidays she returns from running errands to find her family home in flames, her father and brother trapped inside. Later, she is attacked by a mysterious man on a motorcycle—and the threats don’t end there.

As Lila desperately tries to piece together who is after her and why, she uncovers information about her father’s past in Chicago during the volatile days of the late 1960s—information he never shared, but information that now threatens to destroy Lila.

Part thriller, part historical novel, and part love story, Set the Night on Fire paints an unforgettable portrait of Chicago during a turbulent time: the riots at the Democratic Convention…the struggle for power between the Black Panthers and SDS…and a group of young idealists who tried to change the world.

Praise for Set the Night on Fire

• “A tremendous book—sweeping but intimate, elegiac but urgent, subtle but intense." ~Lee Child, author of the Jack Reacher Series
• “A top-rate thriller that taps into the 1960s… Hellman’s insightful, politically charged whodunit explores a fascinating period in American history.” ~Publishers Weekly
• "A brilliantly-paced thriller, transitioning seamlessly from modern-day Chicago to the late '60s. First-rate characterization... Best to start early in the day, as it is easy to stay up all night reading it." ~Foreword Reviews

A Bend in the River

In 1968 two young Vietnamese sisters flee to Saigon after their village on the Mekong River is attacked by American forces and burned to the ground. The only survivors of the brutal massacre that killed their family, the sisters struggle to survive but become estranged, separated by sharply different choices and ideologies. Mai ekes out a living as a GI bar girl, but Tâm’s anger festers, and she heads into jungle terrain to fight with the Viet Cong.

For nearly ten years, neither sister knows if the other is alive. Do they both survive the war? And if they do, can they mend their fractured relationship? Or are the wounds from their journeys too deep to heal? In a stunning departure from her crime thrillers, Libby Fischer Hellmann delves into a universal story about survival, family, and the consequences of war.

Praise for A Bend in the River

• "A stunning piece of historical fiction." ~William Kent Krueger, author of This Tender Land
• "This gripping international saga illuminates the complexities of politics and loyalty and love, and is a powerful testament to the strength of women." ~Sujata Massey, The Perveen Mistry
• "Hellmann smoothly integrates into her harrowing narrative such aspects of the conflict as guerilla warfare, spying, Agent Orange, reeducation camps, and boat people. This passionate story of survival has staying power." ~Publishers Weekly
• Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award Winner, 2020
• Winner, Book of the Year - Indie Fiction, Chicago Writers Association
• Finalist, IAN Books of the Year, Historical Fiction
• Finalist, Indies Next Generation Book Awards, Historical Fiction

Get a Free Gift!
Sign up for Libby's monthly newsletter and get a collection of seven short stories intended to help you get to know Libby's style and voice as a writer—which will help you decide which novel of hers you will want to read next!

About Libby Fischer Hellmann

Libby Fischer Hellmann is a critically acclaimed crime writer loved by readers the world over for her compulsively readable thrillers and strong female characters. Her fast-paced crime fiction spans 17 novels and 25 short stories. She also writes historical fiction standalones and edited the evergreen crime fiction anthology Chicago Blues. Doubleblind, her newest PI Georgia Davis thriller, #6 in the series, was released in March 2022.

Libby's richly varied novels have won numerous awards, and Libby has also served as the National President (2005-2006) of Sisters in Crime, a 4,000+ member organization dedicated to strengthening the voice of female mystery writers.

Libby started out in broadcast news, beginning her career as an assistant film editor for NBC News in New York before moving to DC to work with Robin MacNeil and Jim Lehrer at N-PACT, the public affairs production arm of PBS. Retrained as an assistant director when Watergate broke, Libby helped produce PBS's night-time broadcast of the hearings. She moved to Chicago to work for public relations firm Burson-Marsteller in Chicago, and then later created Fischer Hellmann Communications.

Originally from Washington, D.C., Libby earned a BA in History from the University of Pennsylvania, and then a Masters Degree in Film Production from New York University. She's lived in Chicago more than forty years now, has two kids and a cat.

Learn more at LibbyHellmann.com, get seven free short stories by signing up for Libby's newsletter, and be sure to follow her online:
 

               

Free online: A Place for Lost Things, a workshop that combines visual and literary art to help people find comfort in art. Presented by the Arts & Healing Resiliency Center, an organization that supports mental health well-being by nurturing creative expression in a caring community. Sunday, August 11, 3-5 PM CDT. 

"We never completely lose the things we love. They become a part of us, hidden away in the deepest corners of our soul." ~from The Keeper of Lost Things by Ruth Hogan

Today, LitNuts is shining a spotlight on the work of Debbie Burke, author of the Tawny Lindholm Thrillers, a series that features quirky characters, witty dialogue, and breakneck plot twists. 

Get Book 1 FREE!
Get a free copy of the Kindle edition of Instrument of the Devil, Book 1 of the Tawny Lindholm Thrillers series (4.3 stars, 194 ratings on Amazon, 4.3 stars, 76 ratings on Goodreads). "Fast-paced and well-plotted." ~Leslie Budewitz, Agatha Award Winner 
 

Instrument of the Devil

Book 1 of the Tawny Lindholm Thrillers
4.3 stars, 194 ratings 
Paperback: $13.99
Ebook: FREE!



Dial T for Terrorist. Kahlil Sharivar can destroy the electrical grid with only a few keystrokes on a smartphone. His target: Montana’s Hungry Horse Dam. Who will be blamed? Seasonal employee Tawny Lindholm, a lovely widow he seduces.

Once Sharivar places the incriminating device in Tawny’s hands, her life spins out of control. Soon the feds are chasing her, and her family is in peril. Can Tawny turn the instrument back on the devil who set her up? If not, the lights go out and she dies.

Stalking Midas

Book 2 of the Tawny Lindholm Thrillers
4.5 stars, 36 ratings 
Paperback: From $10.93
Ebook: From $3.99



At six foot, seven inches tall, charismatic attorney Tillman Rosenbaum owns any courtroom he enters. Tillman is brilliant, successful, and doesn’t trust anyone except his lovely new investigator, Tawny Lindholm, who has an intuitive gift with people. Tawny's honesty and integrity have opened Tillman’s soft underbelly. When Tillman suspects his wealthy, estranged father, Moe, is a victim of elder fraud, Tillman knows only one person who can break through to the stubborn, secretive man.

Meanwhile, Tawny is broke from her late husband’s medical bills and desperate to keep her job—even though her boss is the rudest, most arrogant man she’s ever met. But with his James Earl Jones’ voice, he’s also sexy as hell, and Tillman’s loyalty to his father touches Tawny.

But as Tawny digs deep into the case, she begins to wonder if Moe is the victim of a million-dollar scam or the villain behind it. Neither Tawny nor Tillman realize the danger Tawny is in until it's too late!

Eyes in the Sky

Book 3 of the Tawny Lindholm Thrillers
4.7 stars, 29 ratings 
Paperback: From $13.99
Ebook: From $3.99



Investigator Tawny Lindholm loves her boss, renowned criminal attorney Tillman Rosenbaum, but his troubled teenage children scare her. But when Tillman's honor student daughter overdoses and Tawny saves her life, Tawny's resolve to keep her distance goes out the window.

Meanwhile, someone is out to destroy Tillman Rosenbaum by targeting his family. Will Tawny pay the ultimate price to protect him and the children she has come to cherish?

About the Author
Debbie Burke writes the Tawny Lindholm Thrillers with Passion series. She is a regular blogger at The Kill Zone, a popular website about crime writing. Her nonfiction articles have won journalism awards and appear in national and international publications. She is a founding member of Authors of the Flathead and helps to plan the annual Flathead River Writers Conference in Kalispell, Montana. Her greatest joy is mentoring young writers. Learn more at debbieburkewriter.com. 

Free online: Author Talk with Erin Bartels. Award-winning author Erin Bartels presents an informative talk about obstacles women artists have faced in the past and present, and about how her research on women artists made its way into her latest novel, The Lady with the Dark Hair. Thursday, August 8, 11 AM CDT.

“Change happens when the cost of keeping things the way they are is too high.” ~Erin Bartels

Romantic fantasy. Anda always knew she was different. Little did she know how that difference would change her life. Dagsbrun knew he was a monster...he had been called that since birth. And yet, as he raged against his immortality, he dared to dream of finding peace. Enter the world of the Vale, ruled by elves and vampires and destined for destruction unless a prophecy can be fulfilled...a place where two individuals who are polar opposites can find something in common. From $9.99 SHOP NOW / 

The heir to a Civil War-era plantation is forced to almost kill his best friend, unconsciously bringing about the demise of his beloved home. Seeking redemption, he must traverse time in order to save his family and the love of his life all while battling himself, Yankee troops, nature’s elements, and a nemesis that has followed him through time. 4.4 stars, 400+ ratings. FREE - SHOP NOW / 

 

Keeper of the Sword

Book 1 of The Alex 9 Saga
4.5 stars, 42 ratings
Paperback $8.99
Ebook: $0.99 (Free via Kindle Unlimited)


It’s the 22nd century, and the Corporate Wars rage through our Solar System. Alex 9, an elite commando on a crucial mission, finds herself in Deep Space. Something went wrong with her ship, and she ends up on a planet much like Earth—a world at war where Humanity is still in the Middle Ages. Armies of knights, bowmen, and spearmen clash as empires fight to the death and alliances are stretched to the limit. But is Alex there by accident?

A mysterious prophecy seems to have predicted her coming. And why is she in possession of the deadly Japanese Sword of the Dragon, once the prize of the Takahashi-McNamara Corporation? What secret powers are at work? In this new world, she will have to find a new family, a new mission and her own destiny.

Mission from the Past

Book 2 of The Alex 9 Saga
4.4 stars, 17 ratings
Paperback $8.99
Ebook: $2.99 (Free via Kindle Unlimited)


Stranded on a new planet with the Sword of the Dragon King, Alex 9 is taken to King Gobbiel III of Brodom and Prince Jikard, amid a deadly invasion of assassins and rogue tribes, while Prince Dael and the army of Brodom are away on a campaign against the relentless forces of the Tshiu. Is this the time for Alex to rise to her place in history?
 

Crown of the Gods

Book 3 of The Alex 9 Saga
4.2 stars, 11 ratings
Paperback $8.99
Ebook: $2.99 (Free via Kindle Unlimited)


Alex 9 has a new mission. But it’s not just Prince Jikard and King Gobbiel III who are in peril. The whole Kingdom of Brodom faces multiple threats. Back on Earth, Clayton 5, Kaoru, and Pierre Bach are faced with surprise after surprise as they start to reveal the role of Alex in the grand scheme of things. They will have to deal with a large enemy plot to undermine them. And Dael returns to Brodom. Will he be able to defend the Crown of the Gods?

Warrior Queen of Brodom

Book 4 of The Alex 9 Saga
New release: July 31, 2024
Paperback $8.99
Ebook: $2.99 (Free via Kindle Unlimited)


As Brodom is falling to enemies from all sides, Alex 9 is once again propelled into a new life. A life she had never imagined. But first she must survive. And protect the princes of Brodom—Jikard and Dael. She still doesn’t know why all these forces are after them all. Who are these mysterious Brothers of the Blood Night? How is it possible they are so strong and powerful? And how can she stop them?

About the Author
Bruno Martins Soares has written fiction since he was 12 years old. In 1996, he won the National Young Creators Award for Writing, representing Portugal at the 1997 Torino Young Creators of Europe and the Mediterranean Fair. He published a collection of short stories in Portugal in 1998, and published Keeper of the Sword, the first book of The Alex 9 Saga, in 2012. Many of his works have been translated from his native Portuguese into English and other languages.

Learn more about Bruno and his work at BrunoMartinsSoares.com and be sure to also follow him online:
 

        

Free online: Barnes & Noble Book Club. Barnes & Noble welcomes Liz Moore for a live, virtual event to discuss The God of the Woods, BN's July Book Club selection. Tuesday, August 6, 2 PM CDT. 

“Kissing someone—someone you want to kiss, I mean—is like living inside the best song you ever heard. It's the same feeling.” ~Liz Moore, The God of the Woods

Embark on a journey of bravery, loss, and redemption with Gerald, a forgotten old warrior determined to save a kingdom on the brink of war. Stripped of everything he holds dear, he becomes a reluctant hero, battling danger at every turn to secure the realm's future. "An amazing story that begins a legendary series, full of danger, battle, and hope." First three books in a series of 14. 4.5 stars, 749 ratings. FREE - SHOP NOW / 

When New York City's most famous man dies suspiciously, homicide detective John Keegan must follow a trail of corruption that may just lead to the top of city government...and the end of his career. Ronald Mullins had it all...money, power, and a happy family. Suicide seemed an unlikely end for him. Partnered with Rick Calhill, a rising star in the NYPD, Keegan must battle his partner's aspirations and corruption in city government. 4.0 stars, 663 ratings. FREE - SHOP NOW / 

Our modern world needs some reverence for our daily lives in trying times. Some of our norms have been swept away from a good and healthy life. We can bring back a life of honor and joy. This lovely coffee table book incorporates poetry and illustration, and is about all of the caring, hard work, and thoughts still felt by an aging population. "I hope this book will be a keepsake on a bookshelf to read when someone needs some inspiration or comfort." -Arlene Kinnavy. From $22.02 SHOP NOW / 

In this YA high and dark fantasy, children are vanishing in the night. Miraden has always been in love with Ceychell, but Kyradel (Ceychell's sister) is vying for Miraden's attention. When Kyradel is abducted, Miraden has a chance to prove himself and win Ceychell's heart. But he finds that the treachery of the abductions runs far deeper than he ever imagined. 4.8 stars, 19 ratings. From $0.99. Free via KU. SHOP NOW /