Cindy Thomson tops today’s Buffet with Grace’s Pictures, the first installment in her new “Ellis Island” inspirational historical fiction series. Set at the turn of the 20th century in New York City, the series follows the lives of new immigrants as they struggle to find their place in America. Along the way they will find friendship, love, and renew their faith in God. Each book in the series focuses on an important icon introduced at that time, and Grace’s Pictures involves the Brownie camera, which opened photography to the masses.
Cindy also writes magazine articles, mostly on the topic of genealogy, and she’s a mentor in the Jerry B. Jenkins Christian Writers Guild. She writes from her loft office in her home in central Ohio.
As usual, each book listed here has gone FREE within the past 24 hours (except for the “Bargain Books” at the bottom of this page). 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.
Grace’s Pictures (Ellis Island)
Christian Fiction > Historical
Author: Cindy Thomson
Grace McCaffery hopes that the bustling streets of New York hold all the promise that the lush hills of Ireland did not. As her efforts to earn enough money to bring her mother to America fail, she wonders if her new Brownie camera could be the answer. But a casual stroll through a beautiful New York City park turns into a hostile run-in with local gangsters, who are convinced her camera holds the first and only photos of their elusive leader. A policeman with a personal commitment to help those less fortunate finds Grace attractive and longs to help her, but Grace believes such men cannot be trusted.
Spread thin between her quest to rescue her mother, do well in a new nanny job, and avoid the gang intent on intimidating her, Grace must put her faith in unlikely sources to learn the true meaning of courage and forgiveness.
Freefall: Custom Culture #1
Romance > Contemporary
Author: Tess Oliver
After leaving high school, with a hard won diploma and the title of most likely to break hearts, Alexander “Nix” Pierce has left his wild, out of control years mostly behind him. A small inheritance from his grandfather has given him the funds to open up his tattoo shop, Freefall, and he has started to pull his life together. Aside from trying to keep his best friend, Dray, from killing himself in the fight ring, and his slight obsession with a pin-up model he’s never met, Nix’s life is going smoothly . . . until Scotlyn James, the object of his obsession, walks into his shop.
Ever since a tragic accident killed her family and left her alone in the world, Scotlyn James hasn’t spoken one word. Up until now she didn’t care that she had no way of talking to people. Her awful aunt would never have listened, and Lincoln Hammond the arrogant, selfish man who pulled her from the streets of Los Angeles wouldn’t hear her words if she could speak. But when Lincoln insists she get a tattoo to cover up a scar on her side, Scotlyn meets the artist, Nix Pierce. And now she longs for her voice. Now she has found someone who will hear her.
Innocent in Las Vegas (Tiffany Black Mysteries)
Mystery > Humor
Author: A.R. Winters
Cupcake-loving croupier Tiffany Black is determined to leave her job at the casino for good. She’s one small step away from acquiring her Private Investigator license, and has her eye on the prize.
Accepting her first real case – investigating the murder of casino-mogul Ethan Becker – should be exciting. Instead, things spiral out of control and Tiffany finds herself in over her head, as she confronts secretive suspects, corrupt casino henchmen and her mysterious, ex-Special Forces bodyguard.
Tiffany’s poker-hustling Nanna and pushy parents want her to find a nice man and settle down, but Tiffany just wants to track down the real murderer before he finds her first…
The Hospital
Horror
Author: Keith C Blackmore
“Mountain Man” Augustus Berry is a survivor in undead suburbia. He scavenges what he can from what’s left over. He is very careful in what he does and where he goes, taking no chances, no unnecessary risks, and weighing every choice… until he decides to visit the hospital at the edge of town, and experiences terror the likes he’s never encountered before.
How to Sell a Business
Business & Money
Author: Jacob Orosz
Written by a certified business broker and leader in the field of selling a business, this comprehensive workbook explains how to sell a business in seven simple steps. Avoid legal pitfalls and sell your business faster using these up-to-the-minute tips from an expert with years of real world business experience from preparing your business for sale to closing the deal.
The Korean Word For Butterfly
Historical Fiction > Asian
Author: James Zerndt
Set against the backdrop of the 2002 World Cup and rising anti-American sentiment due to a deadly accident involving two young Korean girls and a U.S. tank, The Korean Word For Butterfly is told from three alternating points-of-view:
Billie, the American looking for adventure with her boyfriend who soon finds herself questioning her decision to travel so far from the comforts of her old life;
Moon, the ex K-pop band manager struggling to maintain his sobriety in hopes of getting his family back;
And Yun-ji , a secretary whose new feelings of resentment toward Americans may lead her to do something she never would have imagined possible.
Shoveling Snow
Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
Author: Brett Sills
Ben and Caroline barely recognize each other any more. Their once solid relationship now broken and beaten by unfathomable events, leaving only a shell of past promise. When pressure cracks the last vestiges of their bond, Ben hastily leaves their Southern California home, pointing the car east to what he hopes is the edge of the Earth. After driving until he can no further, he settles in the small, coastal town of Swintonport, Maine to lose himself in quiet and anonymity, renting the quaint guesthouse of Maggie and her ten-year-old daughter, Smoof. But when tragedy strikes his landlord’s family, Ben is confronted with a sobering truth reminiscent of the one he left behind.
Your Next Big Thing: Ten Small Steps to Get Moving and Get Happy
Self-Help > Success
Author: Ben Michaelis
Have you ever woken up in the morning feeling unsure of where your day–or your life–is going? You wonder what else might be out there. You know you deserve more fulfillment from your life. You think to yourself: What’s next?
We’ve all felt that way at one point or another, but have you ever considered it to be your opportunity to create a life that will leave you more fulfilled? It’s an exhilarating prospect to attain that life you desire. But you can’t get there alone. Dr. Ben Michaelis’s life-changing wisdom will give you the tools and confidence you need to take that chance–and live your life with purpose.
Throughout this guide, he provides visionary yet practical strategies, quizzes, and exercises to teach you about your true self. He’ll help you pinpoint exactly what you need to realize your purpose and progress toward your goals. Whether you’re in need of business or personal guidance, this ten-step plan helps you look forward without fear–so you can achieve joy, passion, and the enriched life you never thought possible.
Combat and Other Shenanigans: Tales of the Absurd from a Deployment to Iraq
Biographies & Memoirs > Military
Author: Piers Platt
War is hell…but sometimes it’s also funny as hell.
Combat and Other Shenanigans is Lieutenant Piers Platt’s firsthand account of his year as a cavalry platoon leader in Iraq. Wry, action-packed, and poignant, Combat and Other Shenanigans is the absurd-but-true story of the antics the world’s finest soldiers get up to when no one high-ranking is watching.
TODAY’S BARGAINS……………What’s this?
Just One Kiss
Romance > Contemporary
Author: Susan Mallery
Regularly $7.99, Today $1.99
He won’t hesitate to put his life on the line…but will he ever risk his heart?
Falling for Justice Garrett was a high point in Patience McGraw’s otherwise awkward adolescence. Even after he disappeared, Patience never forgot the boy who captured her heart. Now he’s back in Fool’s Gold, California, and her passion for him is as strong as ever. But how can she trust that he won’t abandon her again—and her daughter, too?
When bodyguard Justice Garrett was a young man, witness protection brought him to this idyllic town and he never forgot its warmth, or the sweet beauty of his childhood friend. He’s returned to open a defense academy, and the Patience he once knew is all grown up. He can’t resist her smile, or her curves. But Justice’s past doesn’t make him husband, or father, material.
Slapstick (Kurt Vonnegut Series)
Science Fiction & Fantasy > Classics
Author: Kurt Vonnegut
Regularly $8.99, Today $1.99
Perhaps the most autobiographical (and deliberately least disciplined) of Vonnegut’s novels, Slapstick (1976) is in the form of a broken family odyssey and is surely a demonstration of its eponymous title. The story centers on brother and sister twins, children of Wilbur Swain, who are in sympathetic and (possibly) telepathic communication and who represent Vonnegut’s relationship with his own sister who died young of cancer almost two decades before the book’s publication.
Vonnegut dedicated this to Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. Like their films and routines, this novel is an exercise in non-sequentiality and in the bizarre while using those devices to expose larger and terrible truths. The twins exemplify to Swain a kind of universal love; he campaigns for it while troops of technologically miniaturized Chinese are launched upon America. Love and carnage intersect in a novel contrived to combine credibility and common observation; critics could sense Vonnegut deliberately flouting narrative constraint or imperative in an attempt to destroy the very idea of the novel he was writing.
Slapstick becomes both product and commentary, event and self-criticism; an early and influential example of contemporary “”metafiction.”” Vonnegut’s tragic life–like the tragic lives of Laurel, Hardy, Buster Keaten and other exemplars of slapstick comedy–is the true center of a work whose cynicism overlays a trustfulness and sense of loss which are perhaps deeper and truer than expressed in any of Vonnegut’s earlier or later works. Slapstick is a clear demonstration of the profound alliance of comedy and tragedy which, when Vonnegut is working close to his true sensibility, become indistinguishable.
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Author: Samuel R. Delany
Regularly $9.99, Today $1.99
In a universe where information flows freely, lack of knowledge can be cataclysmic.
With a burst of radiation to the brain, an angry young man is transformed into a dim-witted slave—suitable only for the most brutal work. But the tragedy of Rat Korga is the prologue to the story of Marq Dyeth, an “industrial diplomat,” who travels from world to world in this exciting, sprawling future, solving problems that come with the spread of “General Information.” The greatest fear in this future is Cultural Fugue, a critical mass of shared knowledge that can destroy life over the surface of an entire world in hours. In this dizzyingly original novel, information is perilous, but without it a human is only a rat in a cage.
This is the book in which, a decade before the fact in 1984, Delany predicted the Internet.
Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School
Behavioral Sciences > Cognitive Psychology
Author: John Medina
Regularly $15.95, Today $1.99
Most of us have no idea what’s really going on inside our heads. Yet brain scientists have uncovered details every business leader, parent, and teacher should knowlike the need for physical activity to get your brain working its best.
How do we learn? What exactly do sleep and stress do to our brains? Why is multi-tasking a myth? Why is it so easy to forgetand so important to repeat new knowledge? Is it true that men and women have different brains?
In Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina, a molecular biologist, shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work. In each chapter, he describes a brain rulewhat scientists know for sure about how our brains workand then offers transformative ideas for our daily lives.
Medina’s fascinating stories and infectious sense of humor breathe life into brain science.
The Noticer: Sometimes, all a person needs is a little perspective.
Self-Help > Personal Transformation
Author: Andy Andrews
Regularly $9.99, Today $2.99
Orange Beach, Alabama is a simple town filled with simple people. But like all humans on the planet, the good folks of Orange Beach have their share of problems – marriages teetering on the brink of divorce, young adults giving up on life, business people on the verge of bankruptcy, as well as the many other obstacles that life seems to dish out to the masses.
Fortunately, when things look the darkest – a mysterious man named Jones has a miraculous way of showing up. An elderly man with white hair, of indiscriminate age and race, wearing blue jeans, a white T-shirt and leather flip flops carrying a battered old suitcase, Jones is a unique soul. Communicating what he calls “a little perspective,” Jones explains that he has been given a gift of noticing things that others miss. “Your time on this earth is a gift to be used wisely,” he says. “Don’t squander your words or your thoughts. Consider even the simplest action you take, for your lives matter beyond measure…and they matter forever.”
… See the rest of today’s Editor’s Picks here on page 2