Tag Archives: thursdays-on-first
I Belly Dance Because…
The Transformative Power of Dance
The purpose of this book is to celebrate the transformative power of belly dance. The contributors have opened their lives and hearts to share their passion. Their stories of healing, compassion, joy, community, connection, and self-expression await you. As the idea for this book began to take shape, I placed an open call to belly dancers all over the world to submit essays for this book. The only guideline was that submissions should share how belly dance has transformed and enriched their lives. I hope that you will appreciate the courage of those who choose to dance and who have shared their stories. They have done so because they, too, believe in the transformative power of belly dance!
Purchase information
I Belly Dance Because... is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle or Paperback.
- Barnes & Noble in Nook or Paperback.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
Terri Allred lives in Rochester, Minnesota with her sons and husband. She is the owner of Rochester International Dance Studio. She is a certified FatChanceBellyDance Sister Studio and Instructor. Although she began her career studying and teaching Egyptian cabaret belly dance, she now focuses exclusively on American Tribal Style Belly Dance. She is also the Business Manager of FatChanceBellyDance in San Francisco, California.
Climbing the Mount Everest of Depression
Climbing the Mount Everest of Depression is a memoir, inspirational book and self-help book all in one. Laurie Jueneman started her struggle with depression when she was 35 years old and continues to struggle at times today. During the course of her treatment, she experienced many hospitalizations, many medication trials, over four-hundred electro-convulsive treatments and two neuro-surgical surgeries. Her story provides hope to those suffering from depression and to their families and friends.
Purchase information
Climbing the Mount Everest of Depression is available from:
- Amazon in Paperback.
- Barnes & Noble in Paperback.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
Laurie Jueneman is a registered nurse with a graduate degree in nursing education from the University of Minnesota. She worked in a variety of areas of nursing in Minnesota and Washington. She states it is not her education that qualified her to write her book, Climbing the Mount Everest of Depression, A Story of Hope, Recovery and Inspiration, but her experience of living with depression for almost thirty years.
Peace in an Age of Metal and Men
Metal and Men #2
Something ain’t right in the town of Swallow Hill.
A boy’s cold-blooded murder yanks J.D. from his life of peace. Guilt at past failures drives him, but soon the problem in Swallow Hill proves to be too much to solve alone. Problem is, there’s nobody he can trust: not his old war buddy, not the sheriff, and definitely not the good-looking gentleman from the city. Seems everyone around wants him to shoot someone else.
J.D. has to decide: is he going to go in guns blazing or is there a better way? Can there possibly be Peace in an Age of Metal and Men?
Purchase information
Peace in an Age of Metal and Men is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
About the Author
Anthony W. Eichenlaub was born in Red Wing, Minnesota in 1975 and got his undergraduate degree in Computer Science from the faraway Iowa State. He since collected a Masters of Agriculture in Horticulture from the University of Minnesota. He spends the bulk of his free time brewing beer, painting models, running, and writing. For nearly a decade he has been writing on his blog, which was originally started to record his experiences as a new father. Ever since, he has written science fiction and fantasy as well as for freelance roleplaying game magazine Kobold Quarterly.
How to Ditch Dead Guys
The Witches Handbook #2
After everyone that Emma Roberts raises from the dead sinks back into the river, she longs for a purpose. A schedule. Something to accomplish. Then Officer Walker leaves a message on her voice mail: “There’s been another murder, and I need your help.”
With a bag of witchcraft supplies slung over her shoulder, Emma performs a séance for Walker at the site of the murder. But nothing happens until Emma gets back home. Black smoke swirls inside the bathroom. An invisible force slams her head onto the tiled floor. A golden snake slithers across her legs, then impales her wrist with its icy teeth.
As the smoke clears and the images fade, the truth becomes clear. This time around, Emma won’t just watch what happened. She’ll live it.
As Emma helps Officer Walker solve murder cases, she relives the horror of each victim’s last moments of life. From the edge of the river to the underground lair of the gang who murdered Steve, she endures it all.
As Emma weakens, both the victims and the murderers who killed them fight for control of her body and mind. She’s possessed, and the voices inside her head won’t let her ask for help.
Even the Book of Shadows can’t save her now…
Publisher
Published by: Curiosity Quills
Purchase information
How to Ditch Dead Guys is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
About the Author
My to-do list dictates that I try to cram 48 hours of living into a day instead of the usual 24. I’ve chosen a life filled with animals. I train for marathons with my dog, then go to work as a small animal veterinarian, and finish the day by tripping over my pets as I attempt to convince my two unruly children that YES, it really IS time for bed. But I can’t wait until the house is quiet to write; I have to steal moments throughout the day. Ten minutes here, a half hour there, I live within my imagination.
Like all busy American mothers, I multi-task. I work out plot holes during runs. Instead of meditating, I type madly during yoga stretches. I find inspiration in everyday things: a beautiful smile, a heartbreaking song, or a newspaper article on a political theory. For example, a long drive in the dark listening to an NPR program on the SMILEY FACE MURDERS theory made me ask so many questions that I wrote HOW TO DATE DEAD GUYS to answer them to my satisfaction.
I’d love to have more time to write (and run, read, and sleep), but until I find Hermione Granger’s time turner, I will juggle real life with the half-written stories in my head. Main characters and plot lines intertwine in my cranium, and I need to let my writing weave the tales on paper so I can find out what happens next.
A Necessary Act
Can you stop a serial killer before he starts? If so, should you? How far would you go?
The students at Lake Mills Community High School knew there was something wrong with Scott – but what David saw firsthand was more than they could ever imagine. He and his best (only) friend Matt were content to keep their suspicions to themselves until a simple trip to the library sets them on parallel trajectories where even the most careful plans have unexpected consequences that can rock a community and reverberate long after they're gone.
Fifteen years later, Matt loses his high-profile reporter gig and is forced to return to the town he did everything he could to leave behind. He gets a shot at redemption with the small-town weekly where he started and quickly discovers a community that has moved on from the past. Well, everybody but David. He remembers everything and doesn’t buy a thirty-something Scott’s “normal” act. There's a madman hovering inside. After all, some people never change, right?
Something the entire town is reminded of when the first dead girl turns up.
Purchase information
A Necessary Act is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
I got my first taste of publication in first grade, when my essay on Airplane II: The Sequel appeared on my elementary school’s Creative Courier.
Seriously.
Questionable parental movie supervision notwithstanding, seeing something I had written in print was invigorating. So after spending my formative years running around a small town in rural Iowa, I enrolled in the University of Iowa and eventually picked up degrees in Journalism and Communication Studies. During that time I also spent three years writing for the Daily Iowan.
After graduation crossed over to the media relations world in the University of Iowa Sports Information Department, where I spent nine years on the road, running stats and frantically writing post-game stories before the team bus left.
I only got left behind once.
Marriage and a baby made road trips an impossibility, so I thought the life of a stay-at-home dad would be the perfect way to finally write that novel that had been bouncing around my head for years.
How cute is that?
Needless to say, caring for a 6-month-old leaves precious little time to breathe, let alone write. I was barely able to keep up with the fake blog I decided to make for her at 3 a.m. the day she was born.
But despite being parented by me, the kid got older and my novel idea poked its head out from under an avalanche of dirty diapers. I was ready to start writing.
Just in time to find out we were having another kid.
This time I knew what I was getting into, however, and I hustled to get whatever I could down before the next avalanche arrived. It was about 14,000 words, and it wasn’t good, but it was the seed from which A Necessary Act grew.
That was six years, six drafts and a move to Minnesota ago. There were plenty of detours along the way, including a stint writing opinion pieces as a member of the Rochester Post-Bulletin’s Editorial Advisory Board, but I finally got the book done.
I can’t say if it’s good or not—that’s your job—but it’s full of the things I like. Creepy bad guys, twists and bad decisions made for good reasons.
Hope you like it.
The Smart Kid
The Chrysalis Chronology #1
Michael Shale looks like a sixth grader.
On the outside.
Inside, he holds a biological secret, that could change the world.
Senator John Perkins, the head of a committee on military development, covets the genetic secret that Michael hides and will not stop pursuing until he’s captured— again.
Charleen Therry, the school counselor, befriends the mysterious sixth-grader and uncovers a history of lies, false identities, and a relentless pursuit by a shadowy government organization that covers a thousand miles and the colorful decades of the sixties and seventies.
If the Senator captures Michael again, a god-like power may be granted to greedy men who would only abuse it.
And Michael would rather die than let that happen.
When he's discovered, Charleen and a special person from his past convince Michael to stop running and to start fighting. If they fail, Michael just may get his death wish.
The Smart Kid is a mystery/thriller with the heart of a son who just wants to find his way back home.
Purchase information
The Smart Kid is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
Bob Miller (b.1960) has lived in Minnesota his whole life. His interests include science fiction, computer programming, and magic tricks. A professional magician for 20 years, he has created tricks, DVDs, software and books for performers.
The Smart Kid is his first novel. Four more books are planned in the series.
Nobody’s Angel
It's hard to be a Munson in Harmony, Montana. Even harder, being an Indy in Ma Sue's house where margaritas, cigarettes, and microwave meals reign. Independence Angel Munson lucks her way out of both Harmony and her grandma, Ma Sue's house when her dad brings his girlfriend Lydia home for a visit.
After her mom passed on, her dad left town for the open road. On occasion, he'd stop on home with stories of his adventures. Indy couldn't wait to get out into the world and live some stories of her own. Indy's dad and Lydia invite her to join them on the road, she jumps at the chance. Her days become filled with pool hustling, magazine and romance novel reading, and boy meeting.
Out on the road, Indy learns that some stories cost more than others. In order to get by and make a life, there are some things she'll have to abandon.
"I'm ready to leave his too long glances and the broken tiles of Hotel Bradenton behind."
Purchase information
Nobody's Angel is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
Melissa McNallan is a columnist for the Post Bulletin and a journalist for several publications. Her short stories and poems have appeared in The Green Blade and The YellowJacket Review. In 2010, she earned a Minnesota State Arts Board Grant in Prose for an early draft of Nobody's Angel (then titled I.A.M.). She was a finalist in the 2015-2016 Loft Mentor Series in Poetry and Creative Prose.
The Cartographer of No Man’s Land
The lauded masterpiece about a family divided by World War I, hailed as “brilliant . . . altogether a remarkable debut” (Simon Mawer, author of The Glass Room).
From a village in Nova Scotia to the trenches of France, P. S. Duffy’s astonishing debut showcases a rare talent emerging in midlife.
When his beloved brother-in-law goes missing at the front in 1916, Angus defies his pacifist upbringing to join the war and find him. Assured a position as a cartographer in London, he is instead sent directly into battle. Meanwhile, at home, his son Simon Peter must navigate escalating hostility in a town torn by grief.
Selected as both a Barnes & Noble Discover pick and one of the American Bookseller Association’s Debut Dozen, The Cartographer of No Man’s Land offers a soulful portrayal of World War I and the lives that were forever changed by it, both on the battlefield and at home.
Purchase information
The Cartographer of No Man's Land is available from:
- Amazon in Kindle or Paperback.
- Barnes & Noble in Nook or Paperback.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
P.S. Duffy lives in Rochester, MN. She was born in mainland China to American parents who were part of the Anglican mission there, returning to Massachusetts in 1950. She spent 35 summers sailing in Nova Scotia, where her family roots go back to 1754. She has a degree in history from Concordia University in Montreal and a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. Following a 25-year career in neurologically based communication disorders, she now balances writing in the neurosciences for Mayo Clinic with creative writing and is the author of flash fiction, creative non-fiction and a graduate textbook on right brain damage. The Cartographer of No Man's Land(W.W. Norton), is her first novel.
Nick Meets the Man in the Wheel Chair
What would happen when a young old boy goes to the book store and is surprised to meet someone ...someone his height? ...someone unique? ...someone disabled? Nick thought he knew a lot about the real world, but when he crosses paths with Sam, who is disabled, Nick learns a big lesson and makes a new friend.
Purchase information
Nick Meets the Man in the Wheel Chair is available from:
- Amazon in Paperback.
- Directly from the author
Not ready to purchase?
Go to Goodreads and add it to your to-read list!
Other books by this author:
- No other books are currently registered for this author.
About the Author
Hello my name is Rich Noll. I am 37 years old. I have been in a wheelchair my entire life as I was born with a birth defect called Spina Bifida.
Additionally, I was hit by a drunk driver while returning to campus while at college in Marshall, MN. Consequently, I received an brain injury from that incident.
Nonetheless, I am married and we have two beautiful girls age 6 and 4 and a half months old. I have lived most of my life in Rochester, MN.
I am a big sports fan; NBA, college basketball and football, tennis. I love to fish.
I of course love to write stories, most of my story ideas come from my own personal experiences in life.