Ebooks At Low Prices, Even Free!

I am constantly on the lookout for free ebooks. Even if I have so many unread titles in my Kindle for iPad, I still download ebooks. I really hope to read more books this year. I even have a little challenge for myself on Goodreads to read 10 books for the year. I dare not be ambitious given my erratic schedule. But, so far, I have already finished three books. 

Do you like ebooks? What are you reading now?

I have recently discovered a site where I can download free ebooks. And I want to share it with you. 

https://www.bookbub.com/home/

Click on the link, enjoy downloading and reading!

The "Mother is sitting" phenomenon by Aunt Erma

From Aunt Erma's Cope Book by Erma Bombeck:

"The "Mother is sitting" phenomenon is probably one of the reasons meditation never really got a foothold on mothers when they were the ones who needed it the most."

Do you agree? This happens to me sometimes. And it's not just sitting, it also applies to when I thought I had the chance to stretch my back, or close my eyes for a while, or read, or blog, or daydream.

"At that moment the doorbell will ring, children will appear holding vital parts of their anatomy, the dog will dig his paws insistently into a leg, a husband will call impatiently for help, a phone will register its fifteenth ring, a pot will boil over, a buzzer will sound, or faucets will go on all over the house, and a loud voice will shriek, "I'm telling.""

In my case, my baby will cry or shout for me, my eldest will tell me "Caleb hurt me!" or "Please draw this and that." or "Where are the scissors?", my only boy will want to sit on my lap or be carried. Of course, I welcome all their attention but then, there will be meals to plan (I do wish I could get myself to do weekly, if not, monthly meal-planning), a space to declutter, and a missing something that needed finding.

source

From all Aunt Erma had been able to gather, a message goes out over an invisible network that flashes to the world "Mother is in a sitting position. Proceed and de-sit."

Silver Smoke Blog Tour and A Kindle Giveaway!!!

To celebrate the release of a new novel to the Seven Halos series, author Monica Leonelle is doing a Kindle Fire giveaway for Silver Smoke, the first novel in the series! Silver Smoke is the highly-rated (4.8 stars on Amazon) debut novel about the Hallows and the Nephilim, the descendants of archangels and humans. Here's a description of the book:

Brie van Rossum has fame, fortune, and beauty, but there’s one thing she doesn’t have–the name of her mother’s supernatural killer.

The Hallows, descendants of the archangels, don’t think Milena was murdered.. but can Brie trust them when their government, the New Order, wants her dead?

She’d better figure it all out soon…

… because when Brie finds out who she really is, the hunt will begin.

And Milena might not be the only casualty.

Like mother, like daughter…

We'll get to the contest details in a minute, but first, Monica gave us an exclusive excerpt of the book for the blog tour:

“Do you—“ Brie started. “You just—“ she tried to think of the nicest way she could explain things. “You really don’t know my father that well if you actually believe that. James wants me to go to therapy because it’s a solution that he can pay for. That’s the extent of his ‘caring.’”

Rykken folded his arms across his chest. “From someone who has never known his biological parents, count yourself lucky that you still have your dad.”

“He’s not my dad! He left us when I was born.”

“There might be a good explanation for why he left.”

“Aside from selfishness?” Anger boiled inside Brie, causing her to rise. “You know what, Rykken? You can’t give me advice. You assume that you know me because you and Pilot are best friends, but you don’t know a single thing about me.”

Rykken flinched. “You’d be surprised how much Pilot confides in me.”

Brie barely resisted the urge to ask what Pilot had told him. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Here’s what I know: your foster parents are nice and have spent more time with you in the past few years than James has spent with me in my lifetime. Yet you spend all your time over here, ignoring them and trying to be a part of my family.”

Rykken stood up, facing Brie. “Do you think it’s easy growing up in foster care? You have everything here—every opportunity in the world to create a great life—“

“No,” Brie interrupted. “This may seem like a castle, but this isn’t a fairytale. Money means nothing when you’ve moved across the country because the only parent you’ve ever had is dead.”

“You know that’s not how I meant—“

“My friends have sold my story to stupid, trashy celebrity magazines. The entire country is watching my every move, hoping to catch me falling apart.  And now I have a whole lot more to worry about.” Brie walked to her bedroom door and turned the knob to open the door. “But you don’t know or care about any of that. You only see the upsides. You wish you had this money or fame or whatever you think is so great about us, and your friendship with Pilot gives you your daily hit.”

Rykken walked toward her, his eyes electrified, forcing her to take a few steps back. Immediately, she knew she had taken it too far—she wanted nothing more than to erase the last minute of her life and pretend it never happened. Not that she didn’t believe it could be true—lots of people had screwed her family over in the last couple months—but saying it out loud wasn’t going to go over well with Pilot, who genuinely trusted his friend.

Rykken leaned one forearm against the wall Brie was standing against, cornering her. “Is that really what you think of me?” His face contorted with anger, but there was a hint of sadness in his umber eyes.

“I’m not sure what to think,” Brie admitted. His hot breath emanated over her face. He smelled like peanuts and spices and rain.

Rykken balled his fists, ignoring her question. “James may be a bad parent, but he’s right about one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“You do need therapy.”

CONTEST DATES:

December 20th thru December 31st (12 days long)

EASY WAYS TO ENTER:

• (3 entries) Blog about this contest and forward a link to monicaleonellecontests@gmail.com (see copy + paste instructions for the contest below)
• (3 entries each) Share a sentence about the book with your Facebook or Twitter followers, and include a link to the book on Amazon or Barnes and Noble (you pick). One entry per social media account per day during the contest. Forward a screenshot or link of your sentence+link to monicaleonellecontests@gmail.com. The links are available below:
  • Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Silver-Smoke-Seven-Halos-ebook/dp/B004MMERZ6/ref=sr_1_2
  • B&N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/silver-smoke-monica-leonelle/1103721670?ean=2940012105332&format=nook-book

• (10 entries each) Write an honest Amazon and/or B&N review of Silver Smoke and send a link to monicaleonellecontests@gmail.com

PRIZES!!!

• Grand Prize Winner: Kindle Fire (or cash-equivalent Amazon gift card)
• 2nd Place (two winners): Kindle Touch (or cash-equivalent Amazon gift card)
• 3rd Place (three winners): Kindle (or cash-equivalent Amazon gift card)
• Special Bloggers-Only Winner* (for blogger entrants – must enter via the web form): Kindle Fire (or cash-equivalent Amazon gift card)

Winners will be selected using Random.org on January 1, 2012 and announced on How To Be An Author by January 2, 2012.

*To enter the Bloggers-Only drawing (in addition to the regular drawing), you must forward a link to your post to monicaleonellecontests@gmail.com AND add your name to this bloggers-only email list (not for promotional purposes… just an easy way to distribute promised items): http://forms.aweber.com/form/99/1958024899.htm

Love, Charleston by Beth Webb Hart

The story revolves around the lives of sisters Alisha and Anne, their cousin Della and a priest named Roy. Alisha has always wanted a happy family, but it seems his husband's ambitions are getting in the way. Anne had heard God tell her to wait in Charleston for the love of her life to come. But she's getting impatient, and Alisha and Della are encouraging her to find it elsewhere. Della's former fiance returns and she doubts she had made the right choice when she married her talented yet unemployed husband. Roy, a widower, had been ministering to a country church when God calls Him to serve at a prestigious church in Charleston. He couldn't help but wonder why...

Love, Charleston is a fitting title as the book centers on love in several aspects - romantic, familial, and spiritual, which take place in a historical city called Charleston and how the characters relate to it. I find the book quite riveting and as a Christian and a married woman with kids of my own, I could relate to the characters on different levels. It made me think of making decisions in life. Are they for selfish reasons? Or are they centered on God's will? And children, even if they are still young, play a vital role in the family. The insights they unknowingly let our hearts see are amazing. Though I get distracted by the unnecessary actions and mannerisms described in the book that accompany dialogues, the progress of events made me unable to put the book down sometimes. The author did not create perfect characters, which is great, but I think Anne and Roy seem too good to be true. I would recommend this book as it made me appreciate, look unto God, and hope.

I received this book free from Thomas Nelson through Booksneeze.com. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

An Exciting Book Blog Tour and A Giveaway

I have some great news to share with you! This September, I will be participating in a huge blog tour put on by Cynthia Roberts, author of the upcoming romance novel Wind Warrior!

 

There are some pretty exciting prizes for everyone involved - Cynthia is giving away $600 dollars worth of wonderful items! YOU could win one of five fabulous prizes! There will be something romantic, something succulent, something exquisite, and two others that will offer you lots of choices... Curious? Check out what you could win on the official blog tour giveaway website, here! You can also learn more about how this giveaway will operate.

I'm looking forward to being a part of this great blog tour, and I hope you are, too!

Get launched into Nick's world

Are you into books? Are you into fictional paranormal books? Are you into Dark-Hunters? Are you into Sherrilyn Kenyon? Who is Sherrilyn Kenyon, you might ask? Well, she is the #1 New York Times bestselling author for the past two years. Currently, her series includes The Dark-Hunters, The League, Lords of Avalon, BAD Agency and the forthcoming Nevermore and Chronicles of Nick. Since 2004, she has placed over 50 novels on the New York Times list. Her Lords of Avalon novels have been adapted by Marvel and her Dark-Hunter novels are now a New York Times bestselling manga published by St. Martins. A new series of hers is coming out. It's called the Chronicles of Nick. For fans of Dark-Hunters, this series is about Nick's real and true past. First of the books is entitled Infinity, you can read excerpts from it. Here's the summary from the site:

At fourteen, Nick Gautier thinks he knows everything about the world around him. Streetwise, tough and savvy, his quick sarcasm is the stuff of legends. . .until the night when his best friends try to kill him. Saved by a mysterious warrior who has more fighting skills than Chuck Norris, Nick is sucked into the realm of the Dark-Hunters: immortal vampire slayers who risk everything to save humanity.

Nick quickly learns that the human world is only a veil for a much larger and more dangerous one: a world where the captain of the football team is a werewolf and the girl he has a crush on goes out at night to stake the undead.

But before he can even learn the rules of this new world, his fellow students are turning into flesh eating zombies. And he’s next on the menu.

As if starting high school isn’t hard enough…now Nick has to hide his new friends from his mom, his chainsaw from the principal, and keep the zombies and the demon Simi from eating his brains, all without getting grounded or suspended. How in the world is he supposed to do that?

I think that's quite interesting. See the book trailer here:

If you like, you can also download the song from the trailer. There's even a game called the Zombie-Me application where you can take a sneak peek of what you'll look like if you became a zombie, which I hope not! There will be a next book release already, called Invincible, in the next 250 days from today. He he!

On Books and Pinching Pennies

These rough times, we mommies need to do everything we can to lessen our household's expenses. When my daughter Elle starts school, I need to be on the lookout for cheap textbooks. But, it all depends on the school, of course. Some schools provide their own textbooks, which cannot be bought outside.It would be nice if there is a place or online store that has used textbooks for sale. That would be a great help for mommies, I think. It also is a great way to help save the environment, as less trees would be cut down in making books if we reuse them. Another thing is that it would be helpful for college students who are looking for books not found in the library, which they'd need in making projects. I know I had this dilemma before. Someone I know befriends other mommies of kids that go to the same school as her children, then she solicits hand-me-down books from them. My guess is that she passes it onto other mommies with kids in lower batches afterward. It is also like sharing used pocketbooks, or selling them online if they do not want to read them again, so other people could be benefited from that, too. They might find a title they've been looking for all along, or see something old but still catches their interests. It's a win-win situation!

 

 

Mommy Is A Child

Beauty and the Beast

Tale as old as time
True as it can be
Barely even friends
Than somebody bends
Unexpectedly

Just a little change
Small, to say the least
Both a little scared
Neither one prepared
Beauty and the Beast

Ever just the same
Ever a surprise
Ever as before
Ever just as sure
As the sun will arise

Tale as old as time
Tune as old as song
Bittersweet and strange
Finding you can change
Learning you were wrong

Certain as the sun
Rising in the east
Tale as old as time
Song as old as rhyme
Beauty and the beast 

I have always loved fairy tales! I love reading them from books and watching them on TV. I love how the heroines end up with the cute guys who absolutely adore them. I love how the characters could sing a song of just about anything. I love how the animals could talk and make the characters' lives more colorful. I love the happily ever afters.
There was a time I thought that I have outgrown these fairy tales. When I went to college, when I fell in love, when I started working, when I got married, I didn't really get the chance to rediscover my love of fairy tales, of children's stories, of reading, of singing the beloved songs.
Until now. One of the things I love about being a mommy is that I could watch kiddie shows and fairy movies and cartoons, and get away with it. My hubby gets bored with those kind of shows and he smirks when I sing along to some of the songs. With the help of Disney channel and the Internet, we were able to get hold of animated fairy tale movies that we let our daughter watch. Like me, she loves them too. She even finds Cinderella funny!
The most recent one that we watched was Beauty and the Beast. It still brought tears to my eyes. And I still love the songs! I think it's still my favorite Disney animated movie of all.   

Discovering Private Iris

Wow! It's September already! Soon, Christmas holidays will be here and then there's the list we have to make.

But, before I start with that and begin imagining what to buy for who, I consulted with our financial planner friend on some money matters and he introduced me to Private Iris. She's a character from a comic book for kids with the same title, written by Jamie Bautista with art by Arnold Arre. He gave me the first issue as a starter and I found it interesting. I will be sure to keep it and let my daughter read it when she's older. It's a special kind of comic book as there's a card number and PIN inside which when encoded in its site, sort of opens an account for the child with a balance of PhP100. And it really earns an interest! It was made to teach children how to save their money. Plus, they also get to be insured under Pioneer Insurance until they turn 14 years old. I really look forward to reading the 2nd issue. And, adding another PhP100 to my daughter's savings.

All Aboard!

We emerged from the ship hot, sweating and thirsty. I don't know if I would like to go back or not. I bought a souvenir ID lace, a Christian book and a Care Bear book for my daughter. I didn't want to have difficulty navigating through people and bumping with them anymore just to look for nice books. They even ran out of Photography books which were aligned with my hubby's interest. The prices were reasonable, though.

The staircases of the ship were not the usual rise and run. It's like a diagonal plank with evenly spaced half tube protrusions. I guess you'd know if you've been on one. It was harder going down. Whew! The crew on board were mostly foreigners. Before one buys a ticket priced at Php10, there were two mime performers there for entertainment.

It was a couple of hours after lunch when we arrived. The sun was shining brightly so I had Elhaym wear a cap and a pair of sunglasses. It's good that I brought a folding umbrella to shield us from intense sunlight as we queued a good long way from the ship. From the end of the line, we could see so many silhouettes of people milling on the deck. We almost backed out.

The ship's name is MV Doulos. It is docked on Manila shores until the end of March.

7 Parenting Principles

I just finished reading the book entitled God Said It, Don't Sweat It. Hop over to my multiply for the review. Neil Clark Warren, a psychotherapist and the author of this book, presented seven parenting principles that I want to share with you.

Principle #1: Your child is a separate being.
Principle #2: You have been entrusted with the sacred task of helping your children become everything they are capable of becoming.
Principle #3: Vital to your children's development is a consistent experience of being loved unconditionally.
Principle #4: Parents must carefully determine and consistently maintain limits for their children.
Principle #5: Parents must decide how to discipline their children in the most effective way.
Principle #6: Parents should help their children dream a big dream for their lives.
Principle #7: Parents must help their children develop strong character and healthy values.

Note: I got the image from Amazon.

A book lover's haven

I got this notification in my email and decided to go with Rix and Elhaym.

It's a good thing the entrance was inexpensive - 10 pesos for each adult. But then we availed of the valet service and had to pay 80 pesos + tip.

The place was packed with so many booths I didn't know where to start. I thought we had visited all, but we missed Fully Booked. The fair doesn't end 'til the 16th, catch it if you can, you'd get plenty of good finds.

There were inspirational books, references, specialty books, classics, fiction and many, many children's books. I think children's books really sell nowadays, especially to young couples, who are starting to get the feel of the family thing, and are looking for good stuff to teach their children, something that even a yaya can understand. We even saw an interesting set of books that come with a sort of Walkman with a special type of pen. The pages of the book have little circles where you should point the pen, then additional information or trivia on the subject will blare from the Walkman. Cool, huh? Cool price too, at around 48,000 pesos. What the...!? Never mind!

What I bought: Jesus, Entrepreneur by Laurie Beth Jones
What Rix bought: Two Photography books
What we bought for Elhaym: A set of electronic learning materials that teaches the ABC, phonetics, writing letters, and has assessments