Essential Winter Reading this Holiday Season

The holidays are here and now is the time to hibernate at home and read a good book. Check out my list for essential winter reading this holiday season and expand your mind and your spirit as we move into a new calendar year.

(I receive a small  affiliate income if you shop using my links)

Align: Living and Loving from the True Self by Harmony Kwiker 

There is a fundamental core within each of us where our true nature resides. Our learned patterns of relating to ourselves and the world cause us to get pulled off our center, coming out of alignment with our True Self. While these conditioned patterns were at one time useful, continuing to live from them prevents us from experiencing the ease and beauty of our own true nature. In this remarkable exploration of the human condition, Harmony Kwiker provides a clear and comprehensive map to rediscovering how to live and love from the True Self, including how to come back to wholeness by accessing your subtle energy body, how to embody your alignment in all of your relationships and how to explore sexual intimacy in a sacred way.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon US; Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
The Anti-consumerist Druid: How I Beat My Shopping Addiction Through Connection with Nature by Katrina Townsend
 
Many of us are coming to terms with the devastating global effects of overconsumption, and for me the desire to quit shopping has led me to explore Paganism, and then to Druidry!
 
This is not a book about Druidry. This is a book about how I stopped overconsumption consuming me, and on that journey discovered a connection with nature that led to me becoming a student of Druidry, and about how those beliefs and practices helped me to rebuild a more authentic, creative, enchanted life.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon US; Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
A Beginner's Guide to Ogham Divination by Ceri Norman
 
Discover the magic, mythology and meaning of the 25 trees of the Celtic Ogham, once the alphabet of the ancient Celts and now a system of divination that is perfect for tree lovers everywhere.
 
This book invites and guides you to forge a meaningful and deep connection with the trees by listening to and learning from them. Each of the trees acts as a wise and insightful guide. By tuning into the energies, magic, and personality of each of the trees, we can come to better understand them and to better understand ourselves.
 
Featuring traditional correspondences, ancient kennings, folklore, divinatory spreads and so much more this book gives you a step-by-step to working with the Ogham as a practical as well as spiritual means of divination.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores

 
 

Dining with Jesus: A Seven Course Bible Study Unpacking the Key Meals Jesus Attended by Kate Jackson
 
This seven-week guide aims to aid Christians, individually or in small groups, to take a closer look at seven of the meals Jesus attended, focusing on what Jesus was trying to communicate through them, either in the food eaten or in the social interactions he had whilst dining. Each session examines set bible passage(s), frequently considering them through the lens of the stories and teachings which bookend the meal. The sessions also prioritise posing questions to support Christians in reflecting upon their own lives and how they can further incorporate Jesus’ teachings into them. This guide brings into one user-friendly volume a range of ideas that these meals explore, including God’s grace, what real purity means, how Jesus equips us to further his Kingdom, the purpose of Jesus’ miracles and the nature of Jesus’ Messiahship, as well as current interpretations of these occasions of commensality and the relevance of their historical and social context, in a language that is easy to understand.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
The Fall of the West: The Story behind Covid, the Levelling-Down of the West and the Shift of Power to the East with the Rise of China by Nicholas Hagger
 
In The Syndicate (2004) Nicholas Hagger described how in the 20th century a Syndicate of élitist mega-rich families levelled down the leading Western countries by promoting revolutions, wars, and independence movements against their empires, and planned a New World Order and world government that would control the earth’s resources for their own benefit. In The Secret History of the West (2005) he traced the Syndicate’s roots back to secret Freemasonic organisations and revolutions that undermined the West from the Renaissance to the early 20th century. In The Fall of the West (2022), the third book in his trilogy on the West, Hagger updates the story to include the pandemic and describes how Syndicate-driven 21st-century events from the War on Terror to Covid have brought the Western financial system to the brink of collapse and shifted power from the West to the East, and China.
 
In this first impartial attempt to assemble all the evidence to date for the origin of Covid (like fitting together available pieces of a jigsaw to reveal the main picture) Hagger, the first to discover the Cultural Revolution in China in March 1966, finds that the three main features of Covid-19 were man-made by American NIAID-funded medics in 2002 and patented 73 times since 2008, and seem to have been surreptitiously used as a bio-weapon in a Syndicate plan to limit the rise of China and its expanding trade. A dangerous new Biological Age has been born, and the West faces being levelled down and a sudden fall. Hagger sees the post-Covid West’s dream of creating a good New World Order - a vaccine-protected democratic, presidential, part-federal world government and World State with sufficient authority to abolish war and solve the world’s post-Covid problems - as being challenged by the self-interested Syndicate’s levelling-down; and to survive, it first has to go along with the Syndicate’s plan for West and East to draw together into an authoritarian world government involving China, and democratise later. This is a thought-provoking work with a prophetic vision of the future.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
The Holistic Guide to Your Health & Wellbeing Today: A Step-By-Step Guide to the Relationship Between Your Physical, Mental, Energetic & Emotional Health
by Oliver Rolfe
 
Have you ever wanted to improve your complete health, both inside and out, and did not know where to start?
 
A decade ago, my life changed forever. Now, using my personal experiences, professional knowledge and scientific studies, this book guides you through the minefield of information available to you and highlights the key aspects that assist complete and holistic health across our four core bodily systems - the physical, mental, energetic and emotional.
 
The Holistic Guide covers everything from how to improve your immune system, nutritional guidance, mental health, the chakra system, numerology, emotional intelligence, advanced body language, deep breathing, meditation and more.
 
Working with psychologist David Moxon, international numerologist Ann Perry, Darren Rolfe from the addiction rehabilitation centre Steps Together and international medium and healer Sara Leslie, we have created a complete guide for your holistic health. Take Action Today!
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores

 
 

Lost for Words: The poetry of mindfulness and non-duality by Martin Wells

 
In the early hours of almost every morning during the Covid lockdown in the months of March and April 2021, these poems began mysteriously arriving - like persistent early morning visitors. Curiously, the author's wife was absent for the whole of this time, and much to her amusement, in her place lay an open notebook, a blank page and a pen. Soon nearly 40 poems filled the notebook - Martin never having written poetry in his life before. Although the pandemic provides the foreground for this collection of poems, they have also been prompted by timeless universal themes, symbolised in a snowdrop, a park bench, or an olive tree; found in conversations about love and life and death, in news items and random images. But most of all arising out of that deep longing for union and freedom at the source of each of us. The poems are about what it means to be alive and deeply connected to the natural world. In so doing, they go to the heart of mindful living and non-dual wisdom.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon US; Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
Love Untethered: How to live when your child dies by Vanessa May
 
Vanessa May gives a moving account of what she went through after the unexpected death of her son, demonstrating that it's possible to survive such a shattering and traumatic loss, even when that might feel impossible. By sharing her personal experience, the author enables others who have gone through a similar loss to feel less isolated in their grief. She also provides advice on supporting physical, emotional, mental and spiritual wellbeing using her experience - not just as a bereaved mother, but as a nutritional therapist, wellbeing coach and now holistic grief coach. She offers the reader various tools for withstanding a devastating loss and for navigating a particularly challenging path. Love Untethered is about holding on to hope when it feels like there isn’t any, and about finding purpose as a means of surviving a devastating and life-changing bereavement.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
The Path to Inner Peace: Mastering Karma by Subhash Jain
 
This book presents the fundamental principles of the Jain karma doctrine through a fictional account of the relationship between a guru and his American student. As the story unfolds, the guru instructs the student on how ‘karmic debt’ is incurred as the result of personal action and how this ‘debt’ can be reduced through behavioural choices. With an emphasis on nonviolent action, Jainism elucidates the path whereby karmic attachment is decreased, leading to inner peace. The Path to Inner Peace serves as an in-depth analysis of which actions lead to karmic attachment, how to avoid karmic attachment and what the consequences of karmic attachment are. The issues of free will versus determinism and good versus evil are also dealt with in detail.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon US; Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
 

Portalism: An Externalist Theory of Consciousness by Jeffrey Laird
 
The mind is not the brain. The locus of our consciousness is in the world. Portalism embraces radical phenomenal externalism and represents a contemporary form of dualism that rejects materialist assumptions of mind/brain identity. As a philosophy of mind, Portalism breaks with traditional thinking in two significant ways: first by holding that consciousness is in fact a fifth fundamental force of nature endowed with behavioural attributes not unlike that of gravity, and second by arguing how consciousness inheres in all living organisms regardless of their biological sophistication. Portalism compels us to reject traditional monist theories about the nature of consciousness and boldly enter into a new way of thinking about our own reality.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
Quaker Quicks - Quaker Shaped Christianity: How the Jesus story and the Quaker way fit together by Mark Russ
 
'What is Quakerism?' can be a difficult question to answer, especially when Quakers today struggle to find a shared religious language. In this book, Mark Russ answers this question from a personal perspective, telling his story of trying to make sense of Jesus within the Quaker community. Through this theological wrestling emerges a Quaker Shaped Christianity that is contemporary, open and rooted in tradition. In reflecting on how to approach the Bible, the challenges of Universalism, and the key events of the Jesus story, this book offers a creative, inspiring and readable theology for everyone who has wondered how Christianity and Quakerism fit together.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
The Tragedy of Madagascar: An Island Nation Confronts the 21st Century by Nathaniel Adams
 
Why has Madagascar failed to make any meaningful progress since independence?
 
A mix of journalism and scholarship, the book is the result of almost nine months spent on the ground in Madagascar travelling and interviewing a wide range of political leaders at the national and local levels, including an unprecedented interview with the country’s former president, Marc Ravalomanana.
 
The book takes as its point of departure the military coup in 2009 that replaced Ravalomanana with Andry Rajoelina, and all of the negative aftershocks that followed, as well as including chapters on the bleak economic prospects of young people across the island, the unsustainable population growth that threatens so much of its future and a unique chapter on the effects of climate change on the southern region of Madagascar, where worsening droughts have left millions in humanitarian peril.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
 

The Ultimate Book on Vocal Sound Healing by Githa Ben-David
 
The concept of The Ultimate Book on Vocal Sound Healing is The Note from Heaven - a condition of bliss, where time disappears and the voice seems to sing you, rather than you sing the voice. The experience of surrendering to The Note from Heaven is overwhelming and leads the singer into a state of Oneness, where present, past and future merge together and energetic patterns and traumas can be transformed, and profound healings happen. Book I: The Note from Heaven - How to sing yourself into contact with Oneness. Book II: Regressive Cell-Singing - How to sing yourself free of traumas and change emotional programming. Book III: Sound Healing - How to sound-scan a fellow being with your voice, plus a Q&A with members from the White Brotherhood.
 
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores
 
Who is in? Beyond Self-image by Avikal E. Costantino
 
Who is in? is for all spiritual seekers who encounter the basic questions of identity: Who am I?, Who is in? or What is the nature of I? Using the Zen Buddhist koan - a paradox to be meditated upon - ‘Who is in’ as a door to discovering the true self and pure subjectivity, this book provides examples and understandings, techniques and invitations to experiment with self-inquiry.
Buy the Book Here: Amazon UK; Other Bookstores

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here. 

#CyberMonday Book Deals for Christmas

Today is #CyberMonday, a day when all the big brands offer more discounts and sales to Christmas shoppers following the excitement of Black Friday. Check out my selection of the best book deals for Christmas, including my very own Redcliffe novels series.

                                                  

I have received a lot of books to review recently, and one that I especially enjoyed was Curse of the Reaper. It is a classic Hollywood horror movie in book form, but you’ll have to read it to find out more. Near the beginning it made me think it was more of a contemporary psychological thriller, but it soon turned the tables and fed my blood lust for horror.  

I would like you to consider my novels for your Christmas shopping list. Perhaps you enjoy reading Gothic stories set in Cornwall? How about sexy vampires and werewolves from Dublin? Then check out Love Hurts (A Redcliffe Novel), book 1 in the Redcliffe Novels series. You can purchase the box set on Kindle for less than the price of a coffee in your favourite coffee shop. Go on, help out a starving author (starving for attention, that is)!  

My local book club read for December is The Lamplighters. This is a book that I suggested having been intrigued with the lighthouse element. I enjoyed reading it, and the bits that were set in the 90s left me feeling nostalgic for my childhood. I was a little disappointed that there wasn't much supernatural action, but I did enjoy the psychological element of this novel. It was enough to hook me in and make me keep reading past bedtime.

Another recent book club read is The Manningtree Witches. Set in medieval England, it gives an alternative perspective on the famous Witchfinder General of history, but it tells us a little from the side of the women he persecuted. I was eager to read this book because it is an element of history that I feel the need to learn more of. I was not disappointed. It was entertaining, the language was colourful, and it provoked emotional responses along the way.

Finally, I suggest a book that I have just finished reading for review. A Rattle of Bones is a crime thriller set in Scotland, and I liked it. I would say it is not the best book I have read recently, but then I’m not generally a fan of crime fiction. I did enjoy reading a story set in Inverness with reference to historical events. This novel connects a miscarriage of justice in the present day with one that happened a few hundred years earlier in the same place, and the content is not pleasant, so be warned! While I would have preferred to read more about the historical criminal case, this novel gets right to the point and doesn’t waste time. You get the story, you get the basic facts, you get the conclusion. It made for a nice, quick read and I liked the short chapters.

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here. 

 

A Vampire Lord Seduces His Wife in Victorian England

What do you know about vampires in Victorian England? I suspect that servants witnessed a lot of strange behaviour inside those grand country homes. And what of the relationship between a gentleman and his wife?

Here is an excerpt from The Darkness of Love where our powerful love rival, Lord Gregory Stockton, snatches an erotic embrace with his pretty young wife, Sarah.

Excerpt from The Darkness of Love

He slid his hands down her sides, smoothing over the rich taffeta, and she stood very still, enjoying his caress despite her embarrassment at his bold behaviour.  Resting his hands on her hips, Gregory lowered his handsome youthful face and tenderly kissed her rosebud lips. His body reacted as it always did to her tenderness. She was delicate, so beautiful, and always so compliant for him. His teeth itched as his fangs fought to free themselves, and it took all his self-control not to bite her white skin, and drink deeply of her sweet blood.

Get the Book Now

Get your copy of The Darkness of Love today from Amazon or from your favourite online bookstore.

 

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here. 

Which Side will you Choose? Vampire vs Hunter in Vampire of Blackpool

Meredith is an old, bored vampire. Her life improves dramatically when a vampire hunter arrives in town offering her a fight she has long been waiting for. But she never planned to fall in love with a witch…

 

Excerpt from Vampire of Blackpool

            Samantha stared at me, her confidence growing.

            “You didn’t answer my other question,” she said, “Why did you attack this man?”
            I inclined my head.

            “I already told you,” I said, “He provoked me.”
            Samantha glared at me and stretched her head to one side so that I could just see the edge of a bandage covering her neck.

            “Like I provoked you last night you mean?” she asked sarcastically, “I suppose I should be grateful you didn’t put me in the hospital. I should have listened to Paul in the first place.”
            I began to feel angry again. It made me defensive.

            “I did not mean to feed on you quite so violently,” I said, forcing myself to remain still, “And for that I apologize.”

            She caught herself and stared at me curiously.

            “You are apologizing?” she asked, “Wow.”
            I stood up slowly, and she stiffened, holding up her hands. Her power flared, and I realised she was preparing for an attack.

            “I will not hurt you here,” I said, “I am fully fed and in control of my instincts.”

            “Shit,” she said softly, “It was you who attacked the doctor downstairs.”

            I nodded once, smiling again.

            “Yes,” I replied, “He gave me what I needed to heal.”

            Samantha frowned.

            “What about this guy?” she asked, waving her hand at Ryan James, “What are you waiting for?”

            My expression hardened.

            “He is a vampire hunter,” I said quietly, “I require answers. We battled last night after I left you. He was hunting along the promenade, near the Pleasure Beach.  He found what he was looking for, but he was not prepared for a fight with such an old and powerful vampire.”

           

Read the Book Now

 

Get your copy of Vampire of Blackpool from your favourite online bookstore or from Amazon and meet the vampires and their hunters in Northern England.

 

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here. 

Lusting After his Brother in Love Kills (A Redcliffe Novel)

Have you ever lusted after a man that was not your boyfriend? Was it his brother? Jessica knows how that feels in Love Kills (A Redcliffe Novel):

 

 Excerpt from Love Kills (A Redcliffe Novel)

            “Jessica, please, I want to help you,” Jack said from the stairwell where he stood in shadow, “You are not weak. Please talk to me.”

            Carrying my glass over to the table, I gulped the cold water and put my glass down, then turned to him. He was naked, and his body seemed to glow in the darkness, tormenting and tempting me at the same time. This was not a man. This was a vampire. I am in love with a vampire. Because of him I was almost killed, and now I am scarred for life, both physically and mentally. Because of him my life will never be the same again, and yet still I can’t leave him. And now, to top it off, I am having erotic dreams about his identical twin brother, a man who has made it clear he wants to sleep with me. What kind of a soap opera is my life right now?

            “Jack, it’s late, or early, whatever, and I need to sleep,” I said moodily, “And I can’t sleep, because I keep having these stupid, ridiculous dreams.”

            “What dreams?” Jack asked gently.

            I swallowed, thinking about my words. I felt anger now, and frustration, but at least the tears were gone. I took a deep breath. If I didn’t tell him, he wouldn’t leave me alone.

            “I keep dreaming about Danny,” I said, heart pounding.

 

Read #TheRedcliffeNovels

Read the Redcliffe novels series now and follow Jessica’s sex adventures with the Mason brothers and their friends.

 

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here. 

 

A Good Night Out Goes Bad in Vampire Horror Story ‘Love Hurts’ #TheRedcliffeNovels

Happy Halloween! Here is an excerpt from Love Hurts (A Redcliffe Novel). This is a scene between Jessica Stone and Marcus Scott (whose story you read in The Darkness of Love), on the evening when they first meet…

 

Excerpt

Marcus reached up to stroke my hair and I was suddenly alert, sobered by this inappropriate behaviour. I tried to push him away. 

“Marcus please, I’m with Jack,” I said in a shaking voice, “I don’t know what you are expecting.”

“Shush Jessica.” he replied, “Jack won’t mind. Trust me.” 

He leaned his face in against me, and his body was firm and heavy. He was too strong for me to move. I tried to struggle but he pinned my arms at my sides. Now I was starting to panic. I raised my voice but was suddenly hoarse, maybe from the alcohol.

 “Marcus stop!” I cried, “Please stop, you’re hurting me!”

I was suddenly in a blind panic as he lifted his head, his face pale, and his eyes wild.  He opened his mouth and I tried to scream. He was going to bite me! 

 

Enter the world of #TheRedcliffeNovels and download the book now.

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here. 

Victorian Vampire Horror Story ‘The Darkness of Love’

Today I share with you an excerpt from my Victorian vampire horror story The Darkness of Love, where we meet Marcus Scott from #TheRedcliffeNovels and hear his origin story.

 

Excerpt

 Marcus stirred slowly. He blinked and opened his eyes, wondering what had happened and where he was. His mind was strangely empty. He did not feel drunk, and he did not feel ill. But he wasn’t sure what these strange sensations were. He was lying on a sofa. He sat bolt upright when he realised it was in Lord Stockton’s study.  He sensed another presence in the room, and his eyes alighted on the still figure of Amelia Richmond, watching him from her seat on the adjacent sofa. She was smiling, and Marcus’ heart skipped a beat and started pounding.

“My Lady,” he gasped, leaping off the sofa, “Why am I here? What happened?”

Amelia continued to stare at him. There was something unnatural about the way she sat, something inhuman. Slowly, Marcus remembered what had happened.

“I drank his blood,” he whispered, touching his lips, “He is a monster.”

 

Buy the book now if you dare to enter the vampire’s lair!

 

Download your FREE copy of It’s Complicated (A Redcliffe Short Story) and meet the werewolves of Cornwall, England.  Click here.