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Kendra’s Pearl















About the author

K.L. Lewis is from Madisonville, KY. She has been writing for many years, but recently decided to publish her work. She is an Army Registered Nurse and has served in the Army for about 15 years. She is married and has a son. K.L.’s other projects include a poetry book Pure Thoughts that she is waiting to promote and other novels that she is working on. She currently resides with her family in Harker Heights, TX.















About the book

Kendra’s Pearl is about one little girls struggle through childhood abuse, dealing with the emotional, mental, and physical abuse from her mother after the death of her father. Kendra struggles to maintain through the years of abuse, and extreme pressures of caring for her siblings and trying to please her mother Pearl. Soon Kendra begins to rebel and fight back. Will she self destruct or will she find the strength to turn a bad situation into something positive as a young adult? You will have to read to find out…
More about K.L. Lewis:
http://www.booksbykllewis.blogspot.com/

Livin’ My Life












About the author

Phyllis “Adair” Robinson- Artist, Poet, Author, Fashion Designer, Actress, Master Barber/Natural Hair Stylist and Community Activist. A native of Portsmouth, Virginia, she has been a residence of Atlanta since 1989. Phyllis is very excited to be apart of the LGBT progressive movement within the visual arts community that is now taking place. She is motivated and inspired to create Our Art…Our Story…Our Lifestyle…utilizing her god-given talents to promote her visual art utilizing multi-mediums. She personally describes her work as Urban and Hip Hop mostly symbolizing Women in Many Moods.

Her comment: ” My work is expressive, emotional, provocative, simple, imaginative and basically life’s experiences.” She states: I want people to experience my art through emotions and have their own interpretation for themselves. Also, she continues to promote her self-published book entitled:1st book “Livin My Life” A book of her Art, Poems and Words. Currently, Phyllis is working on two books titled: “Deep Changes within me” which is about… Self-Image, Relationships and Urban Politics. 3rd book “Adair’s Secrets” which will have more of her Erotic Art, Drama and Poems. Phyllis continues to be driven with passion to donate a portion of her sales from her art and books to the following charitable organizations: National Aids Educational Services for Minorities, SisterGirls, and Foster Care Kids of Atlanta inner city youth.

Presently, she is the owner of AdairArt Studio’s LLC company and Master Barber/ Natural HairCare Stylist. Her major goal is to own AdairArt Cultural Center 4 Youth within the Historical District of Auburn Ave. the home of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Atlanta, Ga. Also, to teach Youth, Women Incarcerated and Women in The Military basic Life Skills to adjust within a Global World. Her motto “Live, Laugh, most of All Love…”










About the book
A book of her Art, Poems and Words

Contact for more Information:
adairartstudio@yahoo.com

Journey To Surrender














About the author

Author Hazel Mills knew that she wanted to be a writer from the moment she penned the first words of a poem titled “A Tree” when she was in the third grade. As a college student, Hazel majored in business but writing continued to be her first love.

Hazel’s short erotic fiction can be seen in Playgirl Magazine’s Erotic Encounters (January 2007 issue) and in Best Lesbian Love Stories: New York City, edited by Simone Thorne (Alyson Books, November 2006). Hazel also has an essay published in Jolie Dupre’s series in The Blushing Ladies Journal.

Hazel is also launching PassionScape, a monthly column published online by EDC Creations and the Sankofa Literary Society. PassionScape seeks to explore all things relating to the genre of erotic romance including thought provoking essays, informative articles and intimate interviews with some of today’s hottest authors.















About the book

Ahmad and Nikki Jacobs are the picture perfect couple. They began their love affair as college sweethearts. Now, they are married, live in the biggest and most beautiful home on their street, and drive the finest cars money can buy. Ahmad is the most successful attorney in the state and Nikki gave up her career as a teacher to become a stay at home mom; raising her daughters and lunching with her girlfriends several times a week.

But what appears to be picture perfect from the outside of this three- story brownstone is very different from the real drama that is happening on the inside.

Nikki’s painful past and Ahmad’s irresponsible behavior has led them down a road that takes many tragic turns. Shannon, Nikki’s younger sister, has her own plans for Ahmad. Lies, deception and murder all take their toll on this already struggling marriage.

Can this couple get to a loving and trusting place in their relationship or has the collateral damage ruined it for life?

Meet the characters:

Nikki is the quintessential girl next door with brains, beauty and a big heart. She leaves Mobile, Alabama for college life far away from home on the campus of Georgetown University. But no matter how hard she tries, she can’t get away from her painful past. Nikki wants to love and be loved but is afraid that if she lets anyone in, she’ll be hurt again.

Ahmad has it going on at every level and has his pick of women. He is one of the rising basketball stars for the Georgetown Hoyas but his time on the court is cut short by an awful tragedy. Ahmad is a good guy who constantly makes irresponsible choices that at one point, almost cost him everything.

Shannon, Nikki’s emotionally damaged younger sister, also moves to the nation’s capital to further her education at nearby Howard University. Both sisters share the same twisted family secret but deal with it differently. Shannon is on a mission to get as much as she can, by any means necessary. Her destructive behavior leaves everyone in her path shell-shocked.

More about Hazel Mills
http://www.hazelmillsstories.com/

INTERRUPTION THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO: CRYSTAL JUSTINE

a novel by Tracey Michae’l Lewis

Reviewed by Maricia D. C. Johns












Maricia D. C. Johns is a published journalist, published poet, editor, motivational speaker and educator. She is a proud graduate of East Texas State University, which is now Texas A&M University Commerce where she received both her Bachelor of Science and Master of Science Degrees. She is a columnist for one of the leading Black owned newspapers in Texas, The Fort Worth Black News. Maricia’s favorite topics are lifestyle issues, humor and education. Her columns have been published in an array of publications including The Longview News Journal and The Christian Index. Her editing credentials include works by Andre Johnson, Yolonda White, and her most recent editing work can be seen in the recently published novel by Hikia entitled “Shifted”. In addition, she is the proud owner of johnswriteme, a writing/speaking bureau. She has spoken at many different venues including, Jarvis Christian College, Tarrant County College, Black Retired Educators Association, East Texas Writers Guild and many more.


Maricia is a former business educator having taught students whose age’s range from 13 to 75. She is a certified AdvancED National Chair and was recently a grant reviewer for the Department of Education in Washington, DC. Her teaching does not stop there; she is a proud member of Carter Metropolitan C. M. E. Church where she teaches the Upper Junior Class. She is an active member of her community where she volunteers for such activities as the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure, the Cowtown Marathon, Fort Worth Library fest, the Victory Over Violence Walk and others. Maricia is a former member of the Forest Hill Library Board. She is also an active board member of the Tarrant County Aids Interfaith Network and the MORE Life Committee.

Maricia is an East Texas girl, who now calls Fort Worth, Texas home. She and her husband Leslie are the proud parents of two beautiful daughters. Maricia is an avid exerciser, and she sometimes even enjoys this activity. She has finished her one and only marathon. She is an avid traveler, and does enjoy this immensely.

Maricia would like to give a shout out to her former students, Velone Curley, Dr. Monica “Moe” Anderson and her friends Marvinell Johnson and Diane Rhodes. They encourage her with their words “Just Do It” and with her daily walk with Christ.














Review

Pastor Jerome B. Price, Sr. of the Carter Metropolitan CME Church tells his congregation that “each morning when you wake up, the devil is standing at the foot of your bed trying to figure out how to kill you”. Ms. Tracey Michae’l Lewis goes a bit further in her interpretation of this. She allows us to see to what extremes he and his army will go to in order to conquer the soul of those that are weak and not in the word.

Having not read her previous novel, The Gospel According to Sasha Renee, I thought I would be a little lost, but Ms. Lewis seems to be a master at story telling in flashbacks and conversations that allow the reader to get the full storyline of her previous book. From the prologue, the reader will begin to wonder just what is about to happen to the main character—Crystal Justine. This book stands along, it is no sequel.

Crystal Justine or CJ as her friends call her could be anyone of us. You know the one that is always looking for love in the wrong places, or even the one that never wants to be like their mother. The one whose idea of true beauty is dictated by what the media says is beautiful. The one who never feels that she is good enough CJ takes us on a journey that allows us to see that we must be dressed in full armor 24 hours a day. CJ lets us know that we cannot have an Achilles Heel because he and his army know just what it is and will seek to destroy us by penetrating it.

Ms. Lewis gives us a tasty gumbo of a story. She has a dash of laughter, a tablespoon of sentimentality and a half a cup of fear. She then adds a half a cup of doubt to the gumbo with a little too much guilt and lets it simmer for a while. The aroma that the simmering gumbo puts out awakes our senses so that we began to want the story to cook faster than the chef (Ms. Lewis) wants. Our hunger for the story is increasing at the turning of each page.
As we see the gumbo start to bubble again, we see CJ attempting to find herself without any help from anyone. We see CJ each time pushing away those that truly want to help. We see the seed of doubt that he and his army put inside each of us when we forget to put on all of our armor. Ms. Lewis allows us to see growth in others in the story. She shows us how the pain that we sometimes carried can be eased if we let those who truly love us know of it. We see how others react when they are attacked—we are allowed to see if they have dressed for success and protection or just dressed for the world.

As the gumbo continues to simmer, we find that Ms. Lewis has added some unforgiveness and about a cup and half of love to the mixture. She lets us taste the story and enjoy it, not knowing that it will get even better.
The reader may wonder if Ms. Lewis has left out an ingredient that will complete the gumbo, but luckily for us, she hasn’t. As the master chef of this novel Ms. Lewis keeps this story going and the reader on edge, and just when you think you’ve read it all or know it all she adds the final ingredient to complete the story. She looks into the cabinet and adds one single mustard seed.
All of our lives have been interrupted, but it’s the journey that we take that determines just how much of an interruption we allow. Tracey Michae’l Lewis has made a gumbo of a story that has all of the ingredients of a tasty book. You will find yourself not putting the gumbo in a bowl to eat; you’ll just eat from the pot—it’s that good.


More about Maricia D. C. Johns:
http://www.johnswriteme.net/

Girl Come & Get Your Blessings













About the author

Born January 24, 1975 in Saint Petersburg, Florida to Katie Mae Smiley, Shalona was the last of twelve children. She was often sick as a child and her illness caused her to be separated from the rest of the kids. After being isolated for years she began to get bored with watching television so she began to write. She wrote anything that came to mind and anything that rhymed. Shalona’s writing was first noticed in the fifth grade when she won a poetry contest for grandparent’s day. She touched the lives of many grandparents that day. However, she never had any grandparent’s of her own. Her grandmother was poisoned when her mother was just six weeks old and her mother never knew her father. Her teachers all saw something in her that she was too young at the time to understand.

When entering middle school she continued writing hiding her work under her bed.

As the years passed Shalona went on to high school finishing in her tenth month of pregnancy. By the time she graduated she was already the mother of a 2 year old little girl then later gave birth to her second child ten days after her graduation. She was just eighteen years old at the time. Two days after bringing her new child home from the hospital the devil tried to take her joy. Her first child’s father had showed up to her door with the police after filing an emergency ex parte motion. He was accusing her of abusing her child. After thirty days without her child custody was returned to her. Her child was finally able to return home but the incident scarred her daughter for life. It didn’t take her long to notice that the daughter that had left her wasn’t the same one that returned.

She was in college when she conceived her third child and later dropped out to help her mother who was caring for eleven children that were placed in her home by the court system. In 1994 she gave birth to her third child a baby girl. Three years after giving birth to her daughter she gave birth to her last child and only son. Ten months later she buried him after he died from Myocarditis a heart condition. One month later she closed on her first home, she was only 21 years of age. Shalona went on to work at a well known company for the next four years doing telemarketing making no less than nine hundred dollars a week. She realized that if she could make the company she was working for money then she could make money starting her own company. At the time she had three little kids and really didn’t know which way to go so she did the thing that she knew how to do she kept working.

In 2006, Shalona began to focus more on her writing. She began submitting her work to different sites and was even featured on a couple of them. Her work has been featured on Invisible Verse and also Kuma 2.net under the pseudonym Shaylove. Not long after she received news that her mother’s kidneys were failing. She put everything on hold to take care of her. After a year of caring for her mom and attending college full time her sister took over and in 2008 as she began writing an empowerment book for women. When she told people that she was writing a book many of them laughed at her. The laughs didn’t discourage her instead they empowered her. With God’s blessing she started her company Soul on Fire Publishing in October 2008, and then she met a sex addict. Just Years earlier she had started to write diary entries entitled Diary of a Sex Addict hoping one day to write a book. She then put the empowerment book on hold and in a week in a half wrote the true story of a sex addict from Tampa Florida. After getting positive feedback on part one she decided to give the readers what they were asking for part two which will be out in December of 2009. In October 2009 Shalona will publish Girl, Come & Get Your Blessings: An Inspirational Book for Women. After reading her first book, the readers asked her to write a book based off her letter to readers in her debut novel. Shalona has several other projects that she is also working on. All of them will be published under her publishing company Soul on Fire Publishing. She also has a new author Lovelle, the author of Raw & Uncut: An Erotic Street Anthology who will have a book released in November 2009. She’s not interested in being signed with a major publishing company or working for someone else.

While marketing her books, Shalona returned to the same place where she had experienced hard times. She was shown so much love and today her books are in the hands of many that she met years ago. She began feeding the homeless at Thanksgiving and in 2008 and will feed them every year for many years to come. She believes that when she’s blessed she should give back to those that are in need. She knows what it’s like to go without and she also knows what it’s like to be homeless.

Shalona resides in Pinellas Park, Florida with her three teenagers. Her future plans include starting her own magazine and an organization for kids of single parents or with no parent. She would also like to start an organization that helps grandparents that are raising their grandkids also. Her goal is to see her books made into movies. Until then she will keep writing and giving her readers what they want, good writing.












About the book

Girl Come & Get Your Blessings is an inspirational and empowerment book for women. We learn about Gods love for us and how we as women should love ourselves. We also learn how to develop that relationship with God and how to deal with hurt and pain from the past.

This book also covers just how important it is to change your mind set and surround yourself with positive people and things. For those of you who are going through things in life and wondering…where is God when I need him? Turn the pages and you’ll find the answer to your question.

You will find true stories of women, these women allow us into their lives so that we as readers can see exactly what they went through and how they overcame these things. One of the women in the book that tells her story tells us how she was addicted to drugs, a victim of incest, and how she saw angels. She goes on to tell us how the Holy Spirit spoke to her and guided her through the streets of Miami Florida.

This book is very deep and real and there is something that all women can take from this book. My story is included in this book as well. Many of the stories in this book will touch you in many different ways; many of you may be going through or may have gone through many of the same things. My family has never known the things about me that I have included in this book about myself. When they turn the pages it will be the first time they too will read my story, life’s lessons are truly our blessings.


Her books are available on:
http://www.soulonfirepublishing.com/
http://www.booksamillion.com/
http://www.amazon.com/
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/