Content FREE (and bargain) books for the Kindle - August 2011

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Free indies/backlist books:

Play Dead by Anne Frasier

Product Description
Her USA Today bestseller, SLEEP TIGHT, was called "compelling and real - a great read," by Andrea Kane. "Guaranteed to keep you awake at night," raved Lisa Jackson. With her newest novel, Anne Frasier will really take your breath away... Watch your back, Elise. No one understands the dark side of Savannah better than homicide detective Elise Sandburg. As an infant, she was thought to be the daughter of a famous root doctor-and was abandoned in an ancient Low Country cemetery. Growing up, she was haunted by her possible connection to the local Gullah culture-with its spells and voodoo. Now, however, there's a twisted killer on the loose, and the city is gripped by terror. Someone is using a substance that leaves its victims in a state that mimics death. As their bodies slip into an irreversible paralysis, their minds remain fully, shockingly awake. Before you wake up dead. Step by step, Elise's relentless chase for the killer draws her straight back into the world she most fears. And now, to stop a murderer, she must confront the truth about her own past in ways she never could have imagined...

Hush (crime fiction, police procedural) by Theresa Weir and Anne Frasier

Product Description

Theresa Weir writing as Anne Frasier, Originally published by Penguin/NAL 2002, Hush was RITA finalist and USA Today Bestseller

Hush
What's your greatest fear?

It's criminal profiler Ivy Dunlap's job to unravel the psyches of the most dangerous men alive. None haunts her dreams more than the killer who took her son's life sixteen years ago, then silently disappeared into the dark. Now an urgent request for help from the Chicago police has reawakened Ivy's greatest nightmare. The Madonna Murderer has returned to fulfill his calling. This time Ivy understands the killer and will face her greatest fear to stop him from killing again.

Sally Boy by P. Vincent DeMartino (Silk Daddy Publishing)

Product Description
Set in the Bronx’s Little Italy, Sally Boy tells the story of Salvatore Scalise and his bloody rise to power in the New York underworld. As a youth, Sal was a member of the Golden Guineas, a feared street gang made up of the sons of Italian immigrants. He learns how to fight, to value a trusted friend, and to respect the sacred code of the streets. Sal’s journey is passionate and dangerous, leading him from the bedrooms of the most desirable women to the perilous jungles of Vietnam.

Back in New York, Sal reaches out to a childhood friend who has graduated to Mafia soldier. Impressed with Sal’s fighting skills, the Mirragio crime family embraces him. However, when ordered to murder his best friend, Sal has no choice but to commit the unthinkable. Consumed with rage, Sal rebels, resulting in his humiliating expulsion from the Mirragio's ranks. In retaliation, Sal forms his own crew and seeks revenge. Using his military training and a savage capacity for killing, Sally Boy sets out to slaughter the Mirragio family and seize control of the Bronx drug trade.

The Women of Tenacity by Shanna Hatfield

Product Description
Welcome to Tenacity! Meet the stubborn, independent women who live here and the wild, rugged men who love them.
Callan Matthews lives a hectic life balancing a demanding job as she works to start her own business. Her husband Clay, the consummate prankster, decides it is up to him to get Callan to lighten up and have a little fun.
Jenna Carver is a confirmed city girl even if her husband Josh conveniently forgets that fact as he drags her from one farm adventure to another.
Laken Johnson loves her two kids, but when her husband Tyler unexpectedly drops them off at her gift shop, she doesn't know if she or the store will survive.

B. Quick by C. S. Laurel

Product Description
It was a night of triumphal activity for the Society For The Elimination of Good Looking Blonds. By sheer chance, middle-aged literature professor Bill Yates interrupts a murderer in the act of dumping an unconscious young man into the local river. Bill surprises himself by rescuing the young man and unwittingly plunges into a maelstrom of murder, psychoanalysis and Shakespeare. Falling in love with the young man he rescued is either fitting punishment or just reward for his trouble, and it will be a long time before Bill knows which.

I Got Some Bad Muse For You by Michael Angel

Product Description
Many artists wait for inspiration to strike. Few know that it does so with a clenched fist.

Broke, drunk, and depressed, the young William Shakespeare suffers from a bad case of writer's block. The good news? His muse has arrived to inspire him. The bad news? She's the muse of *boxing*.

And she's going to help Shakespeare out, even if it kills him.

Included with this story are preview chapters of Michael Angel's latest epic fantasy, Shards - The Darkfell Saga, also available on Amazon.

Novellas/ Short stories:

Fox Chase by Jeff Young

Strangelets with a Side of Grilled Spam by Michael Angel

Liberal vs. Conservative: A Novella by Scott Reeves

Tournament at Bergum by Chris Turner

Blue Ink: A Short Story by Nancy Fulda

In Heaven/Let Down by M.E. Purfield

The Rebirth of Veronica Draper (Sketches from the Spanish Mustang) by Benjamin X. Wretlind

Hexes and Tooth Decay: A Short Story by Nancy Fulda

Phineas (Ordinal) by Joseph Gellene

Traditional Publishing Is My Bitch! (and other inflammatory remarks) by Mike Cooley

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Bargain books from Macmillian

Dying Bites: The Bloodhound Files by DD Barant ($2.99)

Book Description
Introducing the bold new Bloodhound Files series—and a novel that will knock you out of this world…

Her job description is the “tracking and apprehension of mentally-fractured killers.” What this really means in FBI profiler Jace Valchek’s brave new world—one in which only one percent of the population is human—is that a woman’s work is never done. And real is getting stranger every day…

DYING BITES

Jace has been ripped from her reality by David Cassius, the vampire head of the NSA. He knows that she’s the best there in the business, and David needs her help in solving a series of gruesome murders of vampires and werewolves. David’s world—one that also includes lycanthropes and golems—is one with little knowledge of mental illness. An insane serial killer is a threat the NSA has no experience with. But Jace does. Stranded in a reality where Bela Lugosi is a bigger box office draw than Bruce Willis and every full moon is Mardi Gras, Jace must now hunt down a fellow human before he brings the entire planet to the brink of madness. Or she may never see her own world again…

Captured by the Highlander by Julianne MacLean ($2.99)

Product Description
Lady Amelia Sutherland would rather die than surrender to a man like Duncan MacLean. He is the fiercest warrior of his clan—her people’s sworn enemy—and tonight he is standing over her bed. Eyes blazing, muscles taut, and battle axe gleaming, MacLean has come to kill Amelia’s fiancé. But once he sees the lovely, innocent Amelia, he decides to take her instead…

Stealing the young bride-to-be is the perfect revenge against the man who murdered Duncan’s one true love. But Lady Amelia turns out to be more than a pawn of vengeance and war. This brave, beautiful woman touches something deep in Duncan’s soul that is even more powerful than a warrior’s fury. But when Amelia begins to fall in love with her captor—and surrenders in his arms—the real battle begins…

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Bargain:

Promised Land by Robert B. Parker (Rosettabooks) $0.99

Product Description

Spenser is back. The fourth novel featuring the wisecracking boxer-turned private-detective finds him investigating a marriage in turmoil, a shady business deal, a nefarious loan shark and, of course, a murder.

The real charm of the book, however, is Spenser himself, his inimitable wit, his keen grasp of human nature, his love of food and good beer, and his reluctant but capable fists.

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Elizabeth Street by Laurie Fabiano ($1.99) is the Kindle Deal of the Day (Aug 26) *Wait for price to reflect discount before 1-clicking

Product Description
Based on true events, ELIZABETH STREET is a multigenerational saga that opens in an Italian village in the 1900's, and crosses the ocean to New York's Lower East Side. At the heart of the novel is Giovanna, whose family is targeted by the notorious Black Hand -the precursor to the Mafia. Elizabeth Street brings to light a period in history when Italian immigrant neighborhoods lived in fear of Black Hand extortion and violence-a reality that defies the romanticized depiction of the Mafia. Here, the author reveals the merciless terror of the Black Hand-and the impact their crimes had on her family. Giovanna is based on Fabiano's great-grandmother, and the book's heroes and villains - such as Lieutenant Petrosino, the crusading cop and "Lupo the Wolf," a cold-blooded criminal - are drawn from real life in this thrilling tale. While set in a dynamic historical context, Elizabeth Street is, above all, the dramatic story of the heroine, Giovanna, and how she triumphed over tragedy.

About the Author
Laurie Fabiano loves her family and all things Italian. She has dedicated her career to marketing and event production for non-profit organizations empowering others to share their life stories and raising hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of those in need. This book, her first, is her story. Laurie lives in Hoboken, New Jersey with her husband Joe and their daughter Siena.

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The $3.99 discounted books by Kurt Vonnegut now total 18 - Amazon Link

The newly discounted ones:

Welcome to the Monkey House
Timequake
Deadeye Dick
Fates Worse Than Death

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Untouchable by Scott O'Connor (Adams Media)

Product Description

In his first novel, UNTOUCHABLE, Scott O'Connor speaks softly and somehow manages to make something beautiful of unspeakable matters--like the gruesome mop-up after someone has taken a gun to his head. These are the matters that fall to David Darby, a strapping fellow with an armful of tattoos and a sensitive attitude toward his job as a trauma site technician. If Darby's profession has made him something of an untouchable, his young son has become a pariah at school because he refuses to speak, a self-imposed punishment after the death of his mother. ("He had," he's convinced, "made her sick and sad.") O'Connor tells a wisp of a story, but in a voice so insistently stirring, you want to lean in close to catch every word.--New York Times Book Review

It is the autumn of 1999. A year has passed since Lucy Darby's unexpected death, leaving her husband David and son Whitley to mend the gaping hole in their lives. David, a trauma-site cleanup technician, spends his nights expunging the violent remains of strangers, helping their families to move on, though he is unable to do the same. Whitley – an 11 year-old social pariah known simply as The Kid – hasn't spoken since his mother's death. Instead, he communicates through a growing collection of notebooks, living in a safer world of his own silent imagining.

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Mutiny by Artist Arthur

Product Description
What did I do to end up in this nightmare?

One minute Franklin Bryant is a normal teenager in school with his girlfriend, Krystal. The next, a reaper leaves him in Trance, the place between worlds where his destiny will be decided. Franklin has been summoned by the demon Charon to help destroy the Mystyx, a group of classmates including Krystal, with supernatural powers that can defeat Charon.

Franklin loves Krystal, but he faces an impossible choice: join Charon and be rewarded with powers beyond his dreams, or refuse and die....

A Mystyx series novella.

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The Leak by K'wan (Macmillian)

Product Description

The Leak is a complimentary short prequel story that leads into K’wan’s hit novel, Welfare Wifeys.

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Between the Panels: An Inside Look at the Making of Eleven Exciting New Graphic Novels by Various Authors (Macmillan)

Product Description

Have you ever asked yourself what goes on in comics between the panels and behind the scenes? Now, you can get an inside look at the making of eleven exciting new graphic novels and learn more about how they're put together.

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The Do's and Don'ts of Holiday Parties: From International Etiquette Expert Jacqueline Whitmore by Jacqueline Whitmore

Product Description

This special digital e-book contains an excerpt from Jacqueline Whitmore's forthcoming book POISED FOR SUCCESS: MASTERING THE FOUR QUALITIES THAT DISTINGUISH OUTSTANDING PROFESSIONALS, on sale November 8, 2011.

How To Entertain With Elegance And Ease.

Rest assured: in today’s fast-paced world, where most of us are short on time and resources, there are no absolute rules about parties. But the best rule to keep in mind is the five Ps: prior planning prevents poor performance. After all, the purpose of entertaining for business or pleasure is to show your guests a good time without getting too stressed out. In The Do's and Don't of Holiday Parties, Jacqueline Whitmore serves up ten tips to help you get started.

How To Be The World's Best Guest.

To ensure that you stay in the good graces of others this holiday season, Jacqueline Whitmore gives you a few simple yet often forgotten tips, covering everything from when to show up, how to ask permission to bring an uninvited guest, to what to bring, how to dress, what to discuss, and how to thank your host.

Whitmore, using her 15 years of experience as a protocol and etiquette expert, will arm you with the skills to become more self-aware, more confident and comfortable in your own skin, and better able to communicate with others in a credible, authentic manner.

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Food Inc.: A Participant Guide: How Industrial Food is Making Us Sicker, Fatter, and Poorer-And What You Can Do About It by Karl Weber from PublicAffairs ($1.49) is the Kindle Deal of the Day (Aug 27) *Wait for price to reflect discount before 1-clicking

Product Description
Food, Inc. is guaranteed to shake up our perceptions of what we eat. This powerful documentary deconstructing the corporate food industry in America was hailed by Entertainment Weekly as “more than a terrific movie—it’s an important movie.” Aided by expert commentators such as Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser, the film poses questions such as: Where has my food come from, and who has processed it? What are the giant agribusinesses and what stake do they have in maintaining the status quo of food production and consumption? How can I feed my family healthy foods affordably?
Expanding on the film’s themes, the book Food, Inc. will answer those questions through a series of challenging essays by leading experts and thinkers. This book will encourage those inspired by the film to learn more about the issues, and act to change the world.

About the Author
Karl Weber is a writer and editor based in New York. He collaborated with Muhammad Yunus on his bestseller Creating a World Without Poverty and has edited two previous Participant Media Guides, Food, Inc. and Cane Toads and Other Rogue Species.

[blue_skies]

Originally Posted by koland

Wanderlust , by Kate Morton and Annia Ciezadlo, is free to pre-order in the Kindle store. I have no idea what this is, other than that the description the publisher has added isn't correct it's from a sampler book that features several authors, but neither of the ones listed for this one). No mention of the book on either author's websites (which are not updated frequently).

I had to sign in and give a credit card even though it says the price is $0.00. Has anyone pre-odered a book that's listed for free? Any problem with getting charged a fee later when it's released?

[koland]

Originally Posted by blue_skies

I had to sign in and give a credit card even though it says the price is $0.00. Has anyone pre-odered a book that's listed for free? Any problem with getting charged a fee later when it's released?

I pre-order them all the time. It does require a credit card to be on file (I suspect more due to lazy programmers than anything else), but I've never seen a charge for one of these.

You can confirm your order details after placing it online and you can also see it in your pending deliveries on the Manage My Kindle page, along with the price you'll be charged (free books say $0.00). You can cancel any before they are released and won't be charged, even for non-free books.

[blue_skies]

Originally Posted by koland

I pre-order them all the time. It does require a credit card to be on file (I suspect more due to lazy programmers than anything else), but I've never seen a charge for one of these.

You can confirm your order details after placing it online and you can also see it in your pending deliveries on the Manage My Kindle page, along with the price you'll be charged (free books say $0.00). You can cancel any before they are released and won't be charged, even for non-free books.

Thanks. I was just taken aback because I didn't expect to have to give my credit card for a free book. And I just ordered from Amazon yesterday (using the KSO coupon) so they have a current credit card on file.

I pre-ordered two more free books a little while later and it didn't ask for my credit card those times. Go figure.

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FYI, currently just free for those in the UK

The Oak Leaves by Maureen Lang (Amazon Main, Amazon UK) (Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.)

Product Description
Two time periods—Regency England and contemporary Chicago—are woven together when Talie Ingram finds an old journal belonging to her great-great-great grandmother, Cosima Escott. Through Cosima's entries, Talie learns that her family was once considered cursed with feebleminded offspring, the result of a genetic disorder (Fragile-X) that may have been passed down to Talie and her sister. Unwilling to face the implications their discovery might have on her own life, Talie tucks the journal back into secrecy, until she begins to see signs of developmental delay in her son.