The Black (and Blue) Friday Woes

http://carrieannbloghops.blogspot.com/

This was a fun post, and as promised, I have used RANDOM.Org to pick my five winners of hand beaded necklaces - but instead of the original plan of thirty inch ones, I have decided my fifty inch ones are much nicer, and not so plain. Without further ado, the five commenters picked through RANDOM.ORG are 

Charlene Raddon (charraddon @....)

Jenn Mathis (meandi09@....)

Yazmin (yazmin593@....)

Joy Harris (joyskidsdidit@....)

Jessiel (JessieL62@....)

Thanks to all who visited, don't be strangers, and congrats to all the winners in the hop.

While the rest of the US is out handling the crowds, 

fighting for their holiday gifts, some of us like to stay 

in, shop online, or just ignore Black Friday all to 

together. This year, join us in our second annual Black 

Friday Blog Hop! It's a ONE DAY hop where we're 

giving away prizes, talking about books we love, and 

most likely eating left over turkey. :-)

The hop is November 23rd and is ONE DAY only.

And while we do that, we are EACH doing a giveaway. 

Yep. There will be over 200 giveaways on each blog 

hosted by that Author or Blogger.

But that's not all....

We have THREE grand prizes. You as a reader can go to EACH blog and comment with your email address and be entered to win. Yep, you can enter over 200 times!

Now what are those prizes?

1st Grand Prize: A Kindle Fire or Nook Tablet

2nd Grand Prize: A $75 Amazon or B&N Gift Card

3rd Grand Prize: A Swag Pack that contains paperbacks, e-books, 50+ bookmarks, cover flats, magnets, pens, coffee cozies, and more!
(All prizes except the Swag are International)

Today is the day when people in the United States go absolutely insane looking for the next big bargain. People have been camping out in parking lots for over a week, just to beat someone else to that 'really cheap' big screen TV, or that brand new gaming system. Well, not me. I have no desire to brave the crowds and the crazies, and possibly suffer bodily harm or, even worse, the emptying of my bank account and my wallet. For those who choose to visit here, you will not hear me rhapsodize over the great bargains I got at five in the morning, or the way I beat out some little old lady for the last plus size Christmas print sweater. Nope, what you will hear from me is book talk. I plan to spend the whole four day holiday just relaxing with some good books from some favorite authors, and for those who drop in to visit, maybe there will be some new to you authors in my list of favorites you'd like to try. And there will be prizes, too, from the organizers of this hop, and from yours truly as well. In my spare time, I make beaded jewelry, and a few of my commenters, chosen by RANDOM.ORG, will be the recipients of beaded necklaces from me - I plan to give five commenters each a lovely one. 

Now, what will I be reading (or rereading, in some cases). I want to spend time with some old and some new books, by favorite authors, and maybe a new one or two.

My first choice will be the Granite Lake Wolves from Vivian Arend. Viv's 'wolfies' are not the scary kind of shifters, and although there is sometimes an element of danger, there is always lots of fun, romance and super hot shifters. Wolf Signs, Wolf Flight, Wolf Games, Wolf Tracks (my favorite, TJ's story) and Wolf Line are the books in this series, and each has a hot hero, a sassy heroine, and lots of warmth and laughter. From Samhain Publishing.

Next will be Sierra Dean's Secret McQueen series. If you haven't read Secret's books, you have no idea what you are missing. Secret is a Vampire/Werewolf hybrid bounty hunter, and she can kick butt with the best of them. Along with her mentor, Holden Chancery (vampire) and her two, yes I said two, soul-bond mates, Lucas Rain (King of the eastern Werewolves) and Desmond Alvarez (second in command, Lucas' right hand man) (its complicated), Secret gets in and out of more trouble than most folks get in a lifetime. Something Secret This Way Comes, A Bloody Good Secret, Secret Santa, Deep Dark Secret, Keeping Secret, and the side trip with The Secret Guide to Dating Monsters: all are worth spending time and energy reading these, and I'm going back over all of these this weekend. From Samhain Publishing.

If I have time after all of these, I plan on reading some Lexxie Couper, some Mari Carr, the Seeds of Dawn series from Jambrea Jo Jones, and the Powertools series from Jayne Rylon. And just because it is the season, I'm loading up my holiday books, starting with White Hot Christmas from Serenity Woods.

So now, I have a question for those who managed to get to the end of this post - for one of my hand-crafted thirty inch beaded necklaces, who are your 'comfort reads'? What author or authors do you turn to when you need that pick-me-up or to just reconnect to a sense of calm. I have many more, but these are just the tip of my iceberg. And please, be sure to leave your e-mail address when you comment, so I can contact the winners about their prizes.