Camp NaNo and Trying for Lucky 7 while marketing my 6th book

On February 5th, the third Duffy Barkley adventure in Uhrlin, Duffy Barkley: the Third Charm, was published. Now it is being offered on Goodreads with a chance to win one of three autographed paperbacks.

https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/177180-duffy-barkley-the-third-charm-tales-of-uhrlin-3?utm_medium=email&utm_source=giveaway_approved

If you are interested in the other books in the series, they are available on Amazon, or can be ordered by your local bookstore. http://www.amazon.com/Dixie-Dawn-Miller-Goode/e/B004458ES2/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1457742536&sr=1-1

Sometimes my Heart Recognizes a Story it could only love

     I can't remember where I first heard of this book, but I found it on my own Amazon page wish list and had obviously thought about it at one of those times when even a kindle book was outside my price range.  But I got an Amazon gift card as a birthday present recently, and right before I went to buy a copy of Two Loves Found, a sequel to a book I had just read by Sandy Graham - I found a copy of that book arriving in my mailbox as an unexpected gift.











my review of that here https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/976807623?book_show_action=false





 So anyway, I actually had book $$ and nothing in mind to spend it on, and found that I had saved The Ruby Brooch to my wish list - So on a whim, I ordered it.  I didn't even check to see what it was about, trusting my own taste even though I could obviously no longer trust my memory.

http://www.amazon.com/Brooch-Travel-Romance-Celtic-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B007QMSONK/ref=la_B007QP1I12_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407433619&sr=1-1

I have never been more grateful that I had waited to get a book.  Yes, I enjoyed it a lot, and yes it was a blend of many of my favorite things, but it really was way too close to my own middle grade novel, Double Time On The Oregon Trail, for me to have been comfortable having to say I had read it before I wrote my own.  In fact, I'm pretty sure I never could have written my book if I had read this first, how would I ever have know for sure that my ideas were not lifted from this story?

So what we have here is a young woman, in 2012 who has recently lost her family in a horrible way, and then finds a letter telling her, that they are not her birth family, but that she was a baby, found on a doorstep, wrapped in a bloody, monogrammed shawl with a ruby brooch that, by the way, transports people and things through time.  When she learns this, she understands why her Dad has raised her with a ton of outdoor skills, and taken her on Oregon trail reenactments. She makes her plans to find out who she is, and uses the brooch to place herself at the start of the Oregon Trail in 1852.

I love time travel and the Oregon Trail, which is why I had a girl from 2002 communicating with a girl from 1850 in my novel - and traveling the highways that retrace the trail now it is always fun to compare my swimming pools and air conditioning to their dust and drought and campfires but Ms. Logan has so many different comparisons to think about that I was immediately hooked into her novel and couldn't put it down.  It was also interesting to see that even in the ten years between my modern 2002 and her 2012, there were changes such as my girl had a phone card, but her woman had a iPod, mine had printed pictures but hers had a digital camera.  I did have to wonder about one thing, I get that she could use a solar charger and charge the iPod, and show saved information on it back in 1852, but I'm wondering how they managed to get hooked in to see you-tube videos?

I'm not usually one to read romances, but her novel also had a few wonderful characters who felt real, and when I realized that her next book has one of them involved in a romance, non time travel, I still had enough of a balance on my card that I bought this sequel as well. I really wanted to know that this person was ok after seeing where The Ruby Brooch left him at the end.  I guess caring about the characters so much means that yes, I am recommending this book.

http://www.amazon.com/Double-Time-Dixie-Miller-Goode-ebook/dp/B008G3JZB8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1407433466&sr=8-1&keywords=double+time+on+the+Oregon+trail

and just above is the link to my own.

Thanks for reading.