A Recipe and a Read: Strawberry Sour Cream Muffins and a Romantic Suspense compliments of Author Vonnie Hughes...

It’s my pleasure to share a muffin recipe that will become a breakfast favorite with your family. Use room temperature ingredients for best results as they blend into the batter easily and produce amazing muffins and makes your life easier!

If you prefer not to use butter, then an equal amount of vegetable oil or applesauce works. You can also swap out sour cream for plain unsweetened Greek yogurt. Fresh strawberries are perfect in this recipe, but frozen berries can also be used. Thaw and drain the strawberries before adding them to the muffin mix. If your frozen strawberries are whole, dice them first.

Strawberry Sour Cream Muffins

2 cups flour

2 tsp. baking powder

½ tsp. baking soda

½ tsp. salt

2 ¼ cups fresh strawberries

1 cup sugar

1 stick unsalted butter

2 lg. eggs

1 tbsp. vanilla extract¾ cup sour cream

Preheat oven to 375° F. 

Wash berries and remove stems. Dice the strawberries into bitesize pieces. 

Insert paper liners into a muffin pan or mist the pan with baking spray. 

Combine flour through salt in a medium size bowl. Fold in strawberries and set it aside.

In a different bowl, cream butter and sugar together using a hand or stand mixer. Once the mixture is light and fluffy, beat in eggs, vanilla, and sour cream. 

Thoroughly fold in the flour mixture to create a batter. 

Spoon the batter into the muffin cups to the top. 

Bake muffins 20 – 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. 

Cool for 5 minutes in the baking pan. Then remove them to a wire rack to finish cooling completely.

Store your strawberry muffins in an airtight container. They will stay fresh at room temperature for 3 days and can also be stored in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.

Here is a little from my romantic suspense set in New Zealand where a young woman who witnesses the aftermath of a crime is sent to a supposedly safe house.

Inching along the wall, Célie reached the window. She held on to the door jamb, a little island of security in a sea of fear. Then she stretched across and peered out. A featureless face stared back at her.

She screamed and jumped back, bashing her elbow on the laundry tub. 

Peaches lumbered to his feet, shaky and confused. 

The face was still there. No eyes. No mouth. No nose. 

Peaches staggered over to the door and snuffled. 

Mesmerized, Célie kept staring at that distorted face as she backed into a corner. 

Then the face moved, and a hand spread across the glass. The forefinger and thumb rubbed together. 

Flashes of memory seared her mind. 

She gasped, remembering that fearful morning when she’d discovered poor Occy’s disemboweled body. Stunned, struggling not to vomit, she’d been hovering over what was left of Occy when she sensed she was being watched. For a few precious seconds she had stared back at the creepy figure silhouetted in the early morning gloom watching her—just watching her. 

Then he’d rubbed his thumb and forefinger together covetously, as if he were contemplating the best way to eat her alive. 

And she’d bolted. 

And done her best to bury those memories. 

Vonnie Hughes is a multi-published author in both Regency books and contemporary suspense. She loves the intricacies of the social rules of the Regency period and the far-ranging consequences of the Napoleonic Code. And with suspense she has free rein to explore forensic matters and the strong convolutions of the human mind. Like many writers, some days she hates the whole process, but somehow she just cannot let it go.

Vonnie was born in New Zealand, but she and her husband now live happily in Australia. If you visit Hamilton Gardens in New Zealand be sure to stroll through the Japanese Garden. These is a bronze plaque engraved with a haiku describing the peacefulness of that environment. The poem was written by Vonnie.

All of Vonnie’s books are available at The Wild Rose Press and Amazon.

Learn more about Vonnie Hughes on her website and blog. Stay connected on Facebook and Goodreads.

Cover Reveal: Nine Levels by Elana Gomel...

Mirror World Publishing and Sapphyria's Book Promotions present the cover reveal for 

Nine Levels by Elana Gomel.

About Nine Levels:

Waking up on the beach in Greece after a midnight party, Cleo, a British-Greek tourist, sees a stranger sitting next to her. The stranger has a giant spider on his forearm.

So begins an incredible odyssey through the nine levels of the mysterious mountain populated by an odd assortment of monsters, demons, and avatars of dead gods. Still grieving the unsolved disappearance of her twin sister Cora, Cleo is thrust into the world whose rules she does not understand and whose inhabitants confound everything she thought she knew about Greek mythology. Confronted by Woven Women, masked huntresses, sentient graffiti, and Mother of Monsters, Cleo has to make sense of it all. And meanwhile, a mysterious Call reverberates in her brain: You have to go up. You have to find your sister.

A story of self-discovery, courage, and breathtaking adventure, Nine Levels is a highly imaginative, innovative, and engrossing retelling of familiar legends with a twist you won’t see coming.

Release Date: July 17, 2024

Meet the Author:

Born in Ukraine and currently residing in California, Elana Gomel is an academic, an award-winning writer, and a professional nomad. She is well-known for her work on speculative fiction and narrative theory, represented by her academic books, which Beyond the Golden Rule, Bloodscripts, and The Palgrave Handbook of Global Fantasy. Twelve years ago she published her first fantasy novel and has never looked back. She is the author of more than a hundred short stories, two collections, several novellas, and seven novels. She writes dark fantasy, dark SF, fairy tales, and hard-to classify dreamlike stories, some of them connected to her roots in the former USSR. Her stories won several awards, and “Mine Seven” was featured in the Best of Horror 13 edited by Ellen Datlow. Her latest fiction publications are the dark fairy tale Nightwood (Silver Award in the Bookfest 2023 competition) and Girl of Light, an alternative history of the USSR with monsters. Many of her stories and novels have mythological and folkloric overtones, inspired by her travels and her academic research. Having lived in several countries including Israel, Italy, the UK, and Hong Kong, she now resides in the magical – and sinister – redwoods of the Santa Cruz Mountains with her husband.

Amazon Author Profile: https://amzn.to/3z5FHeU

Publisher Website: http://www.mirrorworldpublishing.com/

Author in the Kitchen: A Tasty No-Bake Fun Father's Day Recipe and YA Time Travel Adventure Read...

Looking for a great family snack or gift for the upcoming Father's Day that’s easy to make and soooo addictively wicked you’ll need to lock those ranch-dressed, salty bites under lock and key if you want to make them last until the big day with Dad? Then look no further. I've got you covered with my mouth-watering Pretzel Crack recipe. Seriously. Dad will be hooked with his first nibble.

And guess what? No baking is required. It's the perfect gift your kids can create to give to their fathers on their special day. Plus this recipe makes loads for movie watching later on in the week or if you're attending a barbecue with friends or family throughout the summer. It's a win-win gift all around!

PRETZEL CRACK
32 ounce bag of pretzels
16 ounce bottle of Orville Redenbacher’s Buttery Flavor popcorn oil
1 package of Hidden Valley Ranch dressing mix (dry)
1 teaspoon garlic powder
½ teaspoon onion powder
2 tablespoon dill weed
1 deep foil tray (from dollar store)

Mix all dry ingredients in a medium size bowl.
Stir in popcorn oil.
Add pretzels and coat evenly, then spoon into a deep foil pan.
Air dry pretzels in foil tray, stirring every 15 minutes or so until dry. This can take anywhere from 2 - 4 hours.

Store your freshly made pretzel crack in freezer bags. Voila. Done. Ready for consumption.

Warning: If you find that you or a family member eats a whole bag in one sitting, it’s time for an intervention. Do what you must. Be firm. Then, since the bag is empty, go ahead and make some more. You know you want it.

While waiting for the pretzel crack to dry, might I suggest you enjoy a trip into the past with The Last Timekeepers and the Arch of Atlantis?

Children are the keys to our future. And now, children are the only hope for our past.

When 13-year-old Amanda Sault and her annoying classmates are caught in a food fight at school, they're given a choice: suspension or yard duty. The decision is a no-brainer. Their two-week crash course in landscaping leads to the discovery of a weathered stone arch in the overgrown back yard. The arch isn't a forgotten lawn ornament but an ancient time portal from the lost continent of Atlantis.

Chosen by an Atlantean Magus to be Timekeepers--legendary time travelers sworn to keep history safe from the evil Belial--Amanda and her classmates are sent on an adventure of a lifetime. Can they find the young Robin Hood and his merry band of teens? If they don't, then history itself may be turned upside down.

BUY LINKS
Amazon - Kobo

Sharon Ledwith is the author of the middle-grade/young adult time travel adventure series, THE LAST TIMEKEEPERS, and the award-winning teen psychic mystery series, MYSTERIOUS TALES FROM FAIRY FALLS. When not writing, reading, researching, or revising, she enjoys anything arcane, ancient mysteries, and single malt scotch. Sharon lives a serene, yet busy life in a southern tourist region of Ontario, Canada, with her spoiled hubby and two shiny red e-bikes.

Learn more about Sharon Ledwith on her WEBSITE and BLOG. Look up her AMAZON AUTHOR page for a list of current books. Stay connected on FACEBOOK, TWITTER, PINTEREST, LINKEDIN, INSTAGRAM, and GOODREADS.

BONUS: Download the free PDF short story The Terrible, Mighty Crystal HERE

Guest Post: Thanks, Dad! by Sweet Romance Author Catherine Castle...

Father’s Day is this month. With this holiday comes a rash of blogs about fathers and how they affected their children’s lives. I thought I’d add mine to the mix, but with a writer’s slant.

When I was growing up and working on a school assignment, I often wanted to use a word I didn’t know how to spell. You have to realize that this was way before the advent of computers where misspelled words are often automatically corrected by computer software programs. My available resources were a beat up dictionary and my parents, who didn’t have more than an eighth grade education. I’d usually ask my dad how to spell a word since Mom claimed she never knew. Every time I asked, Dad’s answer was always, “Go look it up in the dictionary.”

“How can I look it up, if I don’t know how to spell it?” I whined.

“Figure it out,” Dad said.

At the time, I thought Dad didn’t know how to spell and he was ashamed to tell me. So, I’d get the dictionary, look up the word using phonetics, and eventually I’d find the correct spelling.

Years later, when my own daughter would ask me how to spell a word, my answer to her was more often than not, “Go look it up.” And it was not because I couldn’t spell.

You see, after years of searching the dictionary for illusive words, somewhere along the way I became a great speller. Thanks to my father.

Today it doesn’t matter whether my father could spell or not. Today I see there was wisdom in my dad’s avoidance of handing me an answer. Instead of relying on someone to give me an answer, Dad taught me to go figure it out on my own. What a great lesson that was for a future writer.

Thanks, Dad.

Where novice Sister Margaret Mary goes, trouble follows. When she barges into a drug deal the local Mexican drug lord captures her. To escape she must depend on undercover DEA agent Jed Bond. Jed’s attitude toward her is exasperating, but when she finds herself inexplicably attracted to him, he becomes more dangerous than the men who have captured them by making her doubt her decision to take her final vows. Escape back to the nunnery is imperative, but life at the convent, if she can still take her final vows, will never be the same.

Nuns shouldn’t look, talk, act, or kiss like Sister Margaret Mary O’Connor—at least that’s what Jed Bond thinks. She hampers his escape plans with her compulsiveness and compassion, and in the process makes Jed question his own beliefs. After years of walling up his emotions in an attempt to become the best agent possible, Sister Margaret is crumbling Jed’s defenses and opening his heart. To lure her away from the church would be unforgivable—to lose her unbearable.

Amazon Buy Link

Multi-award-winning author Catherine Castle has been writing all her life. A former freelance writer, she has over 600 articles and photographs to her credit (under her real name) in the Christian and secular market. Now she writes sweet and inspirational romance. Her debut inspirational romantic suspense, The Nun and the Narc, from Soul Mate Publishing, has garnered multiple contests finals and wins.

Catherine loves writing, reading, traveling, singing, watching movies, and the theatre. In the winter she loves to quilt and has a lot of UFOs (unfinished objects) in her sewing case. In the summer her favorite place to be is in her garden. She’s passionate about gardening and even won a “Best Hillside Garden” award from the local gardening club.

Learn more about Catherine Castle on her website and blog. Stay connected on Facebook and Twitter. Be sure to check out Catherine’s Amazon author page and her Goodreads page. You can also find Catherine on Stitches Thru Time and the SMP authors blog site.