Bestselling author Lara Adrian (writing as Tina St. John) tops today’s Buffet with Heart of the Hunter, Book 1 of her “Dragon Chalice” paranormal medieval series. The series, originally published in paperback a decade ago, has been out of print for several years but has been revived for the Kindle. A vividly detailed setting, bold and adventurous protagonists, and a compelling plot laced with passion, danger, and a bit of mysticism all come together brilliantly in this bewitching novel, according to reviewer John Charles.
Lara is also author of the #1 internationally bestselling “Midnight Breed” vampire romance series.
All of Lara’s books, no matter their settings or time periods, feature strong alpha heroes who are dark and dangerous on the outside, but loyal and true when it comes to the woman who eventually scales his forbidding emotional walls and conquers his heart.
As usual, each book listed here has gone FREE within the past 24 hours, except for the Bargain books in the yellow section below. Warning: Kindle book promotions can end without notice, so before downloading click the link “See Kindle price at Amazon” to verify that the book is still free. (Prices and availability may differ outside USA.)
Heart of the Hunter (Dragon Chalice)
Historical Romance > Paranormal > Werewolves & Shifters
Author: Lara Adrian
Ariana of Clairmont would risk anything to save her kidnapped brother, a quest she knows is fraught with peril. Her only ally is Braedon le Chasseur, a formidable knight with a mysterious past, whose scarred face and brooding nature mask a soul filled with pain. Ariana fears this dangerous man and the secrets he strives to conceal–but Braedon’s touch is pure seduction, his kiss a potent lure that tempts her into a passion she is powerless to resist.
Once known as The Hunter, now haunted by a dark legacy he struggles to deny, Braedon lives in a world of shadow and isolation–until he is thrust together with an innocent beauty in need of his protection. Embarking on a journey that will lead them to a legendary treasure, Braedon will be forced to confront old enemies and the stunning secret of his true nature–or risk losing Ariana and the only happiness he has ever known. . . .
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Freeman
Literature & Fiction > African American > Historical
Author: Leonard Pitts
This story takes place in the first few months following the Confederate surrender and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Upon learning of Lee’s surrender, Sam–a runaway slave who once worked for the Union Army–decides to leave his safe haven in Philadelphia and set out on foot to return to the war-torn South. What compels him on this almost-suicidal course is the desire to find his wife, the mother of his only child, whom he and their son left behind 15 years earlier on the Mississippi farm to which they all “belonged.”
At the same time, Sam’s wife Tilda is being forced to walk at gunpoint with her owner and two of his other slaves from the charred remains of his Mississippi farm into Arkansas, in search of an undefined place that would still respect his entitlements as slaveowner and Confederate officer.
The book’s third main character, Prudence, is a fearless, headstrong white woman of means who leaves her Boston home for Buford, Mississippi, to start a school for the former bondsmen, and thus honor her father’s dying wish.
The Woman in the Photograph
Biographies & Memoirs > Women
Author: Mani Feniger
What if a secret photograph and a property stolen by the Nazis unlocked the door to your mother’s buried past and to a family history you knew nothing about?
Mani Feniger steered a deliberate course away from her mother’s German-Jewish roots. But with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, she found herself swept up in a flood of startling revelations from her mother’s earlier life. As she pored through old photographs and documents, she began to ask questions about secrets and omissions. The answers she found both shocked and inspired her, and would irrevocably transform her view of her mother, herself, and the meaning of family legacy.
From Berkeley, California to New York City, to Leipzig, Germany, this compelling memoir takes you across continents and lifetimes.
No Human Involved
Mystery > Women Sleuths
Author: Barbara Seranella
Munch Mancini is trying to get clean and get her act together, but when she becomes the prime suspect in a murder case, sobriety may be what gets her killed.
A former junkie-turned-auto mechanic, Miranda “Munch” Mancini just wants to make an honest living. But nothing in life is easy, and Munch’s hopes for a new life are dashed when her abusive father turns up murdered, and Munch is the main suspect. Staying clean is one thing, but staying off Detective Mace St. John’s radar, especially when a series of gruesome murders all point to Munch as the culprit, may prove impossible. Her only hope is to cut a deal with the detective, putting her own life on the line to catch a killer. But trust doesn’t come easily for ex-junkies, or for cops. The impulse to betray this precarious alliance may be too strong for either to resist – and may get both of them killed.
The Gauguin Connection (Genevieve Lenard)
International Mystery & Crime
Author: Estelle Ryan
Murdered artists. Masterful forgeries. Art crime at its worst.
As an insurance investigator and world renowned expert in nonverbal communication, Dr Genevieve Lenard faces the daily challenge of living a successful, independent life. Particularly because she has to deal with her high functioning Autism. Nothing – not her studies, her high IQ or her astounding analytical skills – prepared her for the changes about to take place in her life.
It started as a favour to help her boss’ acerbic friend look into the murder of a young artist, but soon it proves to be far more complex. Forced out of her predictable routines, safe environment and limited social interaction, Genevieve is thrown into exploring the meaning of friendship, expanding her social definitions, and for the first time in her life be part of a team in a race to stop more artists from being murdered.
A Stubborn Sweetness and Other Stories for the Christmas Season
Short Stories > Christmas
Author: Katherine Paterson
A collection of modern-day short stories by Katherine Paterson, award-winning author of Bridge to Terabithia and The Great Gilly Hopkins–both loved by children and adults for over 20 years.
This compilation includes stories of real-life people such as a shopping mall’s night watchman, a lonely widower, a pregnant teenage runaway, a political prisoner in China, a grieving mother, and a privileged American, who have forgotten the true meaning of Christmas because of loss, pain, greed or circumstances. Through unexpected and uplifting ways, each is reminded of the first Christmas story and the vision of hope and peace it offers the world. They realize that even in the darkness, the light and song of Christmas can be seen and heard.
Jenny Pox (The Paranormals, Book 1)
Fantasy > Paranormal & Urban
Author: JL Bryan
Eighteen-year-old Jenny Morton has a horrific secret: her touch spreads a deadly supernatural plague, the “Jenny pox.” She lives by a single rule: Never touch anyone. A lifetime of avoiding any physical contact with others has made her isolated and painfully lonely in her small rural town.
Then she meets the one boy she can touch, and her life begins to change. Jenny feels herself falling for him, but first Jenny must learn to use the deadly pox inside her to confront her new enemy, a girl who secretly wields the most dangerous power of all.
Dancing Tides (Pelican Pointe, Book 3)
Romance > Paranormal > Ghosts
Author: Vickie McKeehan
From darkness comes light … and a second chance.
For marine biologist Keegan Fanning, the grief of losing her grandparents is too painful to bear. As if battling her own demons is not enough, she discovers that saving a total stranger from committing suicide forges an unlikely bond that will bring them together in ways they could never imagine–a bond of trust and love that is quickly put to the test at the hand of a psychotic killer who has them in his sights.
Thanksgiving, Simple As Pie
Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Baking > Pies
Author: Sara Winlet
One of the best parts of Thanksgiving dinner is dessert. With these great pie recipes, you will be able to find that perfect pie to complement your perfect Thanksgiving dinner. Here I include many old family favorite recipes, some of which have been enhanced with a few new twists. For example, I love cream pies, but I don’t like eating raw eggs in meringue. So, I use my recipe for cream pie and make a topping that is out of this world. This Cookbook includes recipes for both great dessert pies and a bonus section with delicious savory pies, where you could replace the chicken with leftover turkey.
The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke: The Star, Volume III
Science Fiction > Anthologies & Short Stories
Author: Arthur C. Clarke
Regular Price $8.99, Today $1.99
In the title story of this outstanding collection, a group of cosmonauts discovers the remains of an advanced civilization in a remote star system-destroyed when their sun went supernova. They find that the civilization was very similar to Earth’s-and that its people knew of their coming doom centuries before it occurred. What they find leads their chief astrophysicist-also a Jesuit priest-into a deep crisis of faith, sparked by a shocking revelation that has implications not just for history-but for religion.
This collection of short stories demonstrates not only Clarke’s technological imagination-but also a deep poetic sensibility that led him to ponder the philosophical and moral implications of technological advances. These stories demonstrate the range of his vision as an author-based on both our scientific potential and the deeper aspects of the human condition.
The Advocate’s Conviction (The Advocate Series)
Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
Author: Teresa Burrell
Regular Price $2.99, Today $0.99
Sabre Orin Brown’s clients keep disappearing. With seemingly no connection between the cases, Sabre enlists the help of her southern PI friend, JP, and her best friend, Bob, to find each of them–before it’s too late. In her race against the clock, Sabre must determine whether contemporary horrors are being buried in the shadow of dark traditions–or if it’s something else at work. A conspiracy years in the making, secrets hidden for decades, and the twisted work of a mysterious society have all come together in the ultimate test of the strength of Sabre’s conviction.
Priceless: A Rylee Adamson Novel (Book 1)
Romance > Paranormal > Witches & Wizards
Author: Shannon Mayer
Regular Price $2.99, Today $0.99
“My name is Rylee, and I am a Tracker.”
When children go missing, and the Humans have no leads, I’m the one they call. I am their last hope in bringing home the lost ones. I salvage what they cannot.
I’m on the FBI’s wanted list. I have a werewolf for a pet, a Witch of a best friend, and I have no need for anyone else in my life.
But when a salvage starts to spin out of control, help comes from a most unexpected direction. One that is dangerously dark, brooding, and doesn’t know a thing about the supernatural.
One whose kisses set me on fire.
The Frog Prince
Romantic Comedy
Author: Elle Lothlorien
Regular Price $5.99, Today $2.99
It was his pheromones that did it. With one sniff, sex researcher Leigh Fromm recognizes that any offspring she might have with the mysterious stranger would have a better-than-average chance of surviving any number of impending pandemics. But when Leigh finds out that the handsome “someone” at her great aunt’s wake is Prince Roman Habsburg von Lorraine of Austria, she suddenly doubts her instincts–not that she was intending to sleep with the guy. The royal house of Habsburg was once completely inbred, insanity and impotency among the highlights of their genetic pedigree. (The extreme “bulldog underbite” that plagued them wasn’t called the Habsburg Jaw for nothing.)
It doesn’t matter that his family hasn’t sat on a throne (other than the ones in their Toilette) since 1918, or that Austria is now a parliamentary democracy. Their lives couldn’t be more different: Roman is routinely mobbed by paparazzi in Europe. Leigh is regularly mocked for having the social skills of a potted plant. Even if she suddenly developed grace, charm and a pedigree that would withstand the scrutiny of the press and his family, what exactly is she supposed to do with this would-have-been king of Austria who is in self-imposed exile in Denver, Colorado?
No Words Alone
Romance > Science Fiction
Author: Autumn Dawn
Regular Price $6.99, Today $1.99
Stranded on a hostile alien planet, a beautiful young translator is forced to choose between trusting her own crewmates or the noble commander of the very alien race that shot down her spacecraft.
… See the rest of today’s Editor’s Picks here on page 2