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Author Insights

Your Vote Is Kindly Requested

You may click image to vote.

My soon to be re-released book Eternal Curse: Giovanni’s Angel has qualified me for a chance to be included in The Author Show.com “50 Great Writers You Should Be Reading” publication under the category of Christian Fiction (I thought it was Faith-based fiction, but who can keep up with these labels?). I wasn’t excepting this opportunity, but it’s here and I’m very excited. Please consider giving me your vote. If you need more convincing, simply take a few moments to read the essay I’ve written about my writing journey. After you’ve read the essay, go to where it says “Click here to vote” if you would like to show your support.

Voting ends November 1, 2013.

Thank you all for the support you’ve shown me so far. I hope to make you all proud.

This is an unofficial Author Insights post.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post. If you like it let me know and share it with others. See you next time, Toi Thomas. #thetoiboxofwords

Categories
Books

Review: Embrace

Embrace (The Gryphon Series, book 2) by Stacey Rourke

I give this book a 5.

LoveIt

This second installment of the Gryphon Series was so good; I’m still kicking myself for taking so long to finish it and even longer to review it. I had to go back and refresh myself on the story because so much time had passed, but life happens and things don’t always work out the way you want, something the heroine of this story knows all too well.

Celeste is busy going to school, working a job, training and fighting demons, and being a loving family member. So why would romance even be on her mind? Maybe because she purred at a guy, yea. The underworld has a new leader and a new battle is starting. In the midst of this, apparently, romance is in the air and not just with her…Oh and she has a whole new set of powers that are driving her crazy as well as new “friends” to help or hurt her cause.

I like that this book started right where the other ended and didn’t waste a lot of time trying to catch the reader up on what happened in the first book. I get the feeling, however, that even if I hadn’t read the first book, I would still have been entertained by this one.  I like the Garret family more and more. Even with all their powers, they are still just an average family doing the best they can, but the battle with evil is beginning to take its toll in this tight-knit group. The punches, the laughs, and the tears keep on rolling in this series. I can’t wait to see what happens next.

See my review of book 1 in this series: The Conduit.

This review has been posted to GoodReads.

If you’d like to obtain a copy of this book, try this link.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post. If you like it let me know and share it with others. See you next time, Toi Thomas. #thetoiboxofwords

 
Categories
EC: Giovanni's Angel Tea & Conversation

Tea and Conversation 02: This story?

teaNtalk

Today I’m sharing a picture of a green tea set from Pinterest. This is from my personal collection.

Please do not copy this image. Click image to share on Pinterest.

Today in my meditation on the Eternal Curse, I’m writing about: Why this story?

There are a number of reasons why I wrote Eternal Curse: Giovanni’s Angel, but the one that’s the most honest and accurately reflects my mood and motivation at the time I was writing it, would be “stress relief.”  After having a reoccurring dream about a gray man who turned into an angel, I began to write down all that I could remember of the dreams and compile a new story. I found the whole process of taking notes, rearranging ideas and information, and actually typing up the words to be quite relaxing, which also provided me a bit of mental escapism.

So why was I so stressed out at the time I began writing this book? Let’s see, I was living in a very small space, commuting a very long distance to my day job, dealing with chronic health issues, and dealing with family issues. As much as I love my family, and I really meant that, it’s difficult sometimes to be around them too much. Eternal Curse came to me just when I need it. There is so much of myself and even my family in between the lines of this story.

I was never raised to believe that my family was poor or impoverished in anyway, but I also knew that we weren’t wealthy. I think that writing the characters and settings of Eternal Curse the way I did, helped me come to terms with my own issues of balancing social, financial, and family demands. Speaking from the stand point of a U.S. consumer, relationships come with any number of issues to be overcome or dealt with that have nothing to do with fiancés, but when finances are an issue it does add additional unnecessary pressure. In this story, I wanted to show how people who have no financial worries are still normal regular people with issues and problems. Having money doesn’t make them happy; it’s all the “other stuff” that ends up bringing them joy and peace.

Writing this story also helped to come to terms with many other issues that I still sometimes find myself struggling with such as: social interaction; technology misuse or over usage, romantic interactions, family dealings, faith and spiritual beliefs and tolerances, and so much more. If no one other than myself were to ever read this book, all the time and effort I put into it would still be worth it.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post. If you like it let me know and share it with others. See you next time, Toi Thomas. #thetoiboxofwords