A Taste of Gratitude & Joy: Tried and True Comfort Recipes

                          https://bit.ly/GratitudeandJoy

When Amanda McIntyre asked if I'd be interested in doing a cookbook with her a few months ago, I jumped at the chance! It started with discussing recipes our characters baked or prepared in our books. Then we started talking about recipes we loved, which one of our relatives handed the recipe down to us, traditions, etc.

But we were both immersed in other writing projects and had to put the cookbook collaboration on the back burner.

Then the unthinkable happened, and the COVID-19 became a pandemic. I was not as aware of it at the time because of my husband's health crisis going on at the same time. But I was quickly brought up to speed when I was able to bring him home from the hospital.

Amanda and I started chatting about the changes in our lives during the pandemic, sheltering in place and the differences between what my family was doing here on the East Coast, and what her family was doing in the Heartland. 

One thing was clear to the both of us, the need to draw our families as close as possible, protect them, provide for them...and for us...it all started in the kitchen. My favorite room in the house!

We both knew we had something to offer our Readers...recipes from our hearts, with memories of the strong women who taught us to bake, to cook, and to handle whatever life had in store of us. Because life is not for the faint of heart!

This collection of recipes is our way of thanking our great grandmothers, grandmothers, and our mothers for their lessons in the kitchen and in life. 

https://bit.ly/GratitudeandJoy

They not only passed down traditions and their culinary expertise, but how to survive their generation's crises. For our great grandmothers it was the 1918 Influenza epidemic and The Great War. For our grandmothers, it was World War II, Polio and Small Pox. For our mothers it was the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Measles and German measles epidemic. For Amanda and myself it has been 9/ll and the COVID-19 Pandemic.

We encourage everyone to...

Keep the Faith!

Wash your hands!                          Practice Social Distancing

Keep 6' between yourself and others when shopping for essentials at the grocery store, the pharmacy, and running essential errands.

Be Safe!

Be Well!

Be Happy!

And know you are not in this alone!!!

Amanda and I are praying for you and your families!

A Taste of Gratitude & Joy: Tried and True Comfort Recipes is available today at Amazon in print and e-book, and coming soon in hardback!

Get your copy here:

https://bit.ly/GratitudeandJoy

A PORTION OF SALES GO TO
FEEDING AMERICA.ORG

About Amanda

Published internationally in print, eBook, and Audio, bestselling author Amanda McIntyre finds inspiration from the American Heartland that she calls home. Best known for her Kinnison Legacy cowboys and Last Hope Ranch series, her passion is writing emotional, character-driven small town contemporary western, historical, women’s fiction, and Celtic fantasy. Amanda truly believes that no matter what, love will always find a way.

Connect:

Website: http://www.amandamcintyresbooks.com   

Newsletter: http://bit.ly/AtHeartNewsletter

Amazon Author Page: http://bit.ly/AmandasAuthorPage

Book Bub: http://bit.ly/AmandasBookbubPage

Facebook:  http://bit.ly/AmandasFacebookPage

Amazon UK http://bit.ly/AmandasUKAuthorPage

GoodReads http://bit.ly/AmandasGoodreadspage

 About C. H.

C.H. writes about the things she loves most: Family, her Irish and English Ancestry, Baking and Gardening. Take a trip back in time to Regency England for her new series: The Lords of Vice, coming from Dragonblade Publishing in 2020! Venture back to the Old West with her bestselling Irish Western Series. Fast-forward to the present, stopping at the Circle G Ranch in Pleasure, Texas, before finally landing in Apple Grove, Ohio–Small Town USA–for a slice of Peggy McCormack’s Buttermilk Pie!

Connect:
Website: http://www.chadmirand.com

Newsletter:  C.H.s Newsletter

Amazon Author Page:  C.H.s Amazon Author Page

Book Bub: C.H.s BookBub Page
Facebook: C.H.'s Facebook Author Page
Amazon UK: C.H.s Amazon UK Author Page

Goodreads: C.H.s Goodreads Author Page

Through My Lens at the Rose Garden

It's a weird time for everyone in our country. Life in our home has taken a dramatic turn, as I'm sure it has in nearly every home.

My husband has been traveling for 27 years. And now that he's not, the past six weeks are officially the longest we've been together during that time.

We've had to learn how to live together all over again. LOL



So we've been taking the time for a daily bike ride in this beautiful weather. We stopped by the rose garden which is about a mile from our house. My spirits soared at the beauty and I wanted to share it with you.


I hope you enjoy. 

USA Today Bestselling author ANGI MORGAN writes on-the-run suspense where honor and danger collide with love. Her work is a multiple contest finalist and Publishers Weekly best-seller. She drags her dogs –and husband– around Texas for research road trips so she can write off her camera. They now have a map with highlighted roads they’ve traveled. Every detour somehow makes it into a book. 

Website   Facebook   FB Fan Page   Twitter @AngiMorganAuthr     

Check out my newsletter or follow me on Amazon or BookBub

First Friday's With The Crew..."The First Romance I Read Was..."

Do you remember the very first romance you read? Do you remember where you were and what you were doing? How old were you?

C.H.:

I remember Mom letting me walk to North Island by myself (I was 12 and quite independent) because our public library's Bookmobile would be parked there all day!  Summers were busy around our house with the four of us kids driving Mom crazy most of the time, in between doing our chores and then helping Mom garden or canning peaches, tomatoes, chili sauce or making jam, etc.

I remember the warmth and beauty of the bright summer day changing as I stepped into the bookmobile--library card in hand. It was cooler and smelled faintly of old books. I couldn't have been happier! Searching through the titles, one jumped out at me: Lost Island by Phyllis A, Whitney. Mom was pretty stern about only taking out one book, and leaving the rest for other library patrons on the Bookmobile's stops that day.

My world irrevocably changed that day through the power of Phyllis A. Whitney's words. I fell in love with Lacy and Giles and a new genre for me: Romance. I returned the book on time, but kept thinking about it. My Dad bought me the paperback copy. I still have it and have read it too many times to count and taped the binding at least a half dozen times over the years. I had to take a pic of the cover...check out the price back in 1970...95 cents ;) 

What was the first Romance you read?

AMANDA

My enjoyment of reading stretches back to a summer spent in southern Missouri with my grandmother. Thus, began a life-long love of eclectic reading that ranges from The Boxcar Children to Alfred Hitchcock, from Dr. Zhivago to dictionaries. (Yes, I still love perusing dictionaries for new words and Thesaurus as well- but, that’s another topic) Fast forward to junior high (just after dinosaurs became extinct)) and as an impressionable and shy student librarian,(all through my junior high/high school career) I was also deeply passionate about many things.

I discovered the book Five Smooth Stones, by Ann Fairburn, which by definition today may not have been considered a “romance”-rather an historical fiction. Set during the American Civil Rights movement, it told the story of a young couple, of different backgrounds, struggling with the obstacles of race and prejudice and trying to hold on to a love that, at the time, was not widely accepted at the time. The struggle was real. Their love even more so.

Their passion for each other, their character, and desire to make the world a better place made such a profound impact on me that it inspired the first book I ever penned--pages and pages in a three-ring notebook-a story that would never see the light of day.

This book set me on the path to loving character-driven stories where ordinary people placed in extraordinary situations rise up to overcome their obstacles-internal and external-to achieve their HEA. It was the inception of the belief I carry now in my writing and in my life that #lovewillfindaway.

.

LIZBETH

As usual, I'm breaking the rules a little because I honestly don't remember the very first romance I read. I fell in love with love stories from some of my earliest-ever books. My dad was a HUGE reader--both to himself and out loud to my brothers and to me. He also would bring us books from the library that were not what we would have chosen ourselves but ones he was sure we'd like. And we always did. Any book that  had love and happy endings was my favorite. Then I started falling in love with the heroes of books I read. My first true love met in the pages of a book was Alec Ramsay--hero of Walter Farley's Black Stallion series. 
But...real romance books is what we're remembering! My grandma had a collection of 50 or 60  Grace Livingston Hill books. GLH wrote what we now call inspirational romance, and these were hard and fast "altar call" stories--where the hero and or heroine came to faith in the pages of the very sweet romance! I devoured these like M&Ms! 
The first specific romance I remember in vivid detail is LaVyrle Spencer's "Hummingbird." The story of a spinster who takes in a wounded train robber, who turns out to be the exact opposite of what she expects has THE greatest sex scene ever (a 180-degree change from Grace L. Hill's stories, and a wonderful eye-opening experience) and is romantic from start to finish. I'd been hooked on romance from an early age--but LaVyrle's stories made me a lifelong junkie. And Hummingbird, dated as it is now, was the true gateway drug!