Paperback Giveaway plus Amazon eBook Freebie

Dorlana Vann ♦ November 18, 2016 ♦ Leave a comment

Hi Friends,

I wanted to let you know about two promotions I’m having right now. I’m giving away one paperback copy of The Trouble with Snowmen. And Silverweed: a supernatural fairy tale eBook is free on Amazon.

The Trouble with Snowmen’s paperback giveaway is being hosted by GoodReads. If you are already on GoodReads it is super easy to enter. If you are not familiar with GoodReads and like to read, you should really check it out. (This is open to US, GB, and, CA) Giveaway Ends November 29, 2016.

Enter Giveaway

A Romantic Comedy all about heart-breakers (snowmen), fun shenanigans, fashion, séances, downtown Houston, urban cowgirls, and some of that kissy-kissy stuff.

Snowmen drift into your life like they were sent from above. The relationship is great, rolls right along, and builds. Everything seems perfect … until a little heat is introduced. Then they melt, leaving only their hat, their scarf, something to remind their victims of what they’d lost.

Urban cowgirl Haley Monroe is told that the fabulously hot guy who just dumped her was a snowman. Her friend Maximilian convinces her that the only way she’ll ever stop being played by snowmen is to become one.

Snowmen is also available for Kindle – the eBook is only $2.99 – As well as book 2 The Trouble with Scarecrows.

Silverweed: a supernatural fairy tale eBook is free on Amazon today thru Monday, November 21, 2016.

Silverweed is not a retelling of Little Red Riding Hood. The YA novel was inspired by my short story, Silverweed Muffins, which was inspired by Little Red Riding Hood. I used some of the same background and plot lines as the short story, but when I drafted my novel, I added a theme – a theme that I interpreted from the fairy tale. And to me, Little Red Riding Hood is all about fear, the message being, “Don’t talk to strangers,” and “Don’t stray from the path.” So Silverweed’s theme ended up being: The real monster is fear.

I also added a little fun (as well as discipline) when I decided to use lines from Little Red Riding Hood as my chapter titles and chapter inspirations. And when you read the chapter titles in order, they actually a condensed version of the Grimm Brother’s Little Red Riding Hood. I also used them to kind of guide me through the book.

Superstition Background:

The superstition references in Silverweed are a combination of my grandfather’s stories and a cool little superstitions dictionary, Dictionary of Superstitions by David Pickering.

I’d never really been that superstitious, except for doing things like tossing salt over both my shoulders—yes, both because I didn’t know which one was correct. However, my interest sparked when my mom told me about my grandfather’s childhood stories. Apparently, his mother (pictured on the left – my great-grandmother – I think I kind of look like her) died when my grandpa was five-years-old; it happened the day after she’d told him to stop shooing the birds away that had landed on their front porch, because it meant death.

My grandfather had also told my mom that one day he had watched the devil walking out in his Alabama woods, pitchfork and all (Which I used in the first chapter of Silverweed).

Around the same time my mom was reminiscing (2006), I was writing the rough draft of the short story, and all of these memories set the entire mood for “Silverweed Muffins” which eventually became Silverweed the novel.

Here are a few links:

Amazon US

Amazon.de

Amazon.co.uk

GoodReads Reviews

Love and Laughter,

Dorlana