Vocal Expressions

This is the first time I am reading anything by Michele Arris. Catch Me is the contemporary interracial love story about the sexy yet stubborn Tabitha Seils and the sexy yet stubborn Dominic Balaska. Tabitha is a custom pastry chef and part owner with her friends Evie and Kennedi of a Washington D.C. boutique bakery (Chase Confections) reopening in a new location.  Tabitha likes things her way and constantly bumps heads with Dominic who is overseeing the project of the new location. Dominic is also Trenton’s brother who is engaged to Kennedi. So, everyone wants Tabitha and Dominic to get along because they have to work together.  Now, these two are thrown together for a week on a promo opportunity to market the bakery out on the West Coast (Las Vegas) at Shaw’s signature restaurant, Pearl Fine Dining. Dominic is Shaw Enterprise’s COO and would arrange for meetings to get Tabitha interviewed and to drum up business. While there, tension eases between the two of them and they ...

Author’s Bio: André C. Wade was born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada. After graduating from the University of Nevada Las Vegas with a degree in psychology, he moved to Los Angeles where he began writing. After moving back to Las Vegas, he was later named a Champion of Pride by The Advocate magazine. His writing credits include articles for several magazines and newspapers where he advocated for the LGBTQ community. Seven Ways to Disappear: The Book within the Book is his first book.  Deliah Lawrence: What inspired you to write your book? André C. Wade: A good place to go to find out a little bit of background and context for me writing the book is the blog that I created: www.7waystodisappear.com . Specifically, the entry on the origins of the ‘book within the book’ is a good blog entry to get a sense of the inspiration.   The thing to keep in mind when reading this book is that it’s a work of fiction by a fictional author inside of a larger story.   DL: What ...

This is my second time reading a novel by Lauren Blakely and The Sexy One delivered on the genre of single dad/nanny romance. So, let’s meet Simon Travers, the single dad to Hayden, his five-year-old daughter. He’s handsome, sexy, thoughtful, successful, and focused on being the best dad since divorcing his cheating wife. He hires Abby Becker as his daughter’s nanny. Abby is beautiful, adventuresome, into nature and fluent in a few languages including Spanish which she teaches part time.  These two kept their attraction under wraps for the past seven months since Abby became the nanny for fear of being a cliché not to mention there is an eight-year age difference. Simon feels he’s too old to hang with Abby’s friends when she simply wants him to have fun with her. Their respective friends just want them to admit their true feelings and be happy. Well, all it takes is a little light flirting over cake and nature documentaries to reveal it’s more than a crush between them.  ...

Author’s Bio: Matilda Young (she/they) is a poet with an M.F.A. in Poetry from the University of Maryland. She has been published in several journals, including Anatolios Magazine , Angel City Review , and Entropy Magazine’s Blackcackle . She enjoys Edgar Allan Poe jokes, not being in her apartment, and being obnoxious about the benefits of stovetop popcorn. Deliah Lawrence: What inspired you to write your book? Matilda Young: This spring, I was selected as one of Yellow Arrow’s 2022 Writers in Residence. I had the privilege of collaborating with three amazing writers and the great team at Yellow Arrow. The chapbook came together around the theme of Catrice Greer’s fabulous poem “I Want to Love You, Baltimore.” I think of our book as a complicated love letter to a complicated, lovely city. I’ve learned so much from Catrice, Arao, and Amy. It was such a joy to be part of this true fellowship of writers, and I am so grateful to Yellow Arrow for the opportunity.   DL: How do you...

This is my first time reading anything by Louise Bay and it won’t be the last. The title, sexy book cover, the setting in London, and the synopsis pulled me in. The storyline delivered on the elements of a contemporary romance novel sprinkled with some intrigue.  Meet Nathan Cove, a self-proclaimed playboy and the youngest CEO of Astro Holdings, an insurance company. The paparazzi caught him meeting with Audrey Alpern (married to his friend Mark) at 3 am at a drinking spot and started the gossip he was having an affair with a married woman. The company’s board is concerned about his image and hires Gretel (PR professional) to fix his image. Gretel tells Nathan that she has reached out to a reporter at the Post to write an “in-depth profile with all-access pass—no questions or parts of your life or business off-limits.” Nathan reluctantly is onboard.  He then attends the wedding of a friend and meets Madison Shore. They hooked up at the wedding. Madison goes to work on Mon...

Author’s Bio: Eileen Haas was a writer, editor, copywriter, and creative director at the likes of House Beautiful, The Sharper Image, J. Walter Thompson, Wells Fargo Bank and more. Then along came a stroke, and everything changed. It was a long, hard, road to sort of recovery, but she had lots of good epiphanies along the way, as well as lots of adventures. The stroke turned out to be a blessing in disguise in a lot of ways. Including some discoveries about how to recover that no one ever tells you. Except Haas does in her book.   Deliah Lawrence: What inspired you to write your book? Eileen Haas: So many things inspired me. The realization that what doctors tell you to expect isn’t necessarily what will happen, but other things will pop up that you have absolutely no idea how to deal with. Also, the notion that a stroke is an opportunity to have a new life, even if you liked the old one.   DL: What is your writing process? EH: Many people have asked me how I w...

Author's Bio: As a kid, I loved the bad guy cartoon characters Natasha Fatale and Boris Badenov on the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. So, when I grew up, I decided to learn Russian and land a job with the U.S. Federal Government. All kidding aside, at various times in my career I’ve earned a living as a translator, language teacher, reporter, editor, and intelligence analyst.  Nowadays, I spend most of my time on my small horse farm, which I share with my husband, a failed barn cat, and a Jack Russell Terrorist…err, Terrier. Besides the novels, my work has appeared in Baltimore magazine and the Chicken Soup for the Soul series.     Deliah Lawrence: What inspired you to write your book? L. R. Trovillion: I wanted to explore this issue: The theme of how to get past the big, traumatic obstacles in one’s past that keep you from living a fulfilling, happy life in the present. How to just move on and get past it? The main character has endured trauma the same as the ...