Childrens Book Review of Fly Fly Away

Fly, Fly Again

By Katie Jaffe and Jennifer Lawson

32 pp

Children’s book

See an interview with the author here

Greenleaf Press, January 2020

Ebook $7.99

Print $15.95

Part of the proceeds go to UNICEF and Buzz Aldrin Ventures

Buy on

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Google Books

About the Book

Fly, Fly Again is a clever and charming story about Jenny, a child who dreams of flying. After years of tinkering in makeshift laboratories and studying the mechanics of flight with her pet Hawk, Jenny builds a plane—only to crash into the yard of her skateboarding neighbor, Jude, and his pet cheetah. Working with Jude, Jenny successfully learns how to control and fly her plane. This unique story includes lessons about problem solving, teamwork, and determination as well as family-friendly information about the basics of aeronautical engineering like lift, drift, and more!

My Review

This children’s picture book has a charming rhyme scheme to introduce concepts of flight in a fanciful manner. Jenny acts on her interest in flight by observing nature, learning facts, and teaming up with her friend to design and create a flying machine. The authors have used simple, memorable language and cooperative characters to promote the lessons described above. The illustrations are bright, colorful, and attractive and show the story along with the words.

Jenny watches a hawk to see how natural flight works in birds, and then experiments with craft materials and toys to devise a flying machine. As she continues to figure out what makes flight work, she “falls” into her neighbor boy Jude’s yard. Jude shares her interest and together they work on a controlled flight and even bigger dreams of space.

Charmingly illustrated with exotic animal friends, Fly, Fly Again is a good story to introduce basic flight vocabulary and teach young children the importance of dreaming big, teamwork, and persistence.

About the authors

Katie Jaffe: As Creative Director and Design Consultant of Aviation for Spectre Air Capital, Katie has aided in the design of several high profile aircraft.  Currently, she is leading the marketing and design effort of an overseas airline. She also has a passion for children's causes, and has committed herself to helping several charities for children around the world.  She lives in Austin, Texas, with her husband and three children.  

Jennifer Lawson: Lifelong educator and advocate of the Childrens Literacy Program, Jennifer seeks to bring knowledge to students through creative curriculum and technology on a global level.  As Owner and President of Decision Tree she is currently endeavoring to teach using technologically advanced solutions that excite today's students. She lives in Austin, Texas, with her family.

Good Old Summertime in the Gilded Age by Tam May

Photo Credit: Terrasse à Sainte-Adresse, Claude Monet, 1866-1867, oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY: Crisco 1492/Wikimedia Common/PD old 80

Much of my historical family saga, the Waxwood Series, takes place during the summer months. Our modern mentality regarding summer is not only about hot weather, swimming pools, and summer camp, but it’s also about fun, leisure, and rest. 

But this wasn’t always the case. In the 19^th century, only the privileged (like my Alderdice family) could afford both the time and the money to go away on vacation. In fact, up until the middle of the 19^th century, taking time off during the summer was only for the affluent, teachers and kids. Working people did not take time off in the summer and certainly not for fun and leisure. There were several reasons for this. First, a tension existed between work and play in America then, as it does to some extent now (though we’re much more appreciative of the fact that taking time off from work when the kids are out of school is necessary to recharge our batteries). Second, doctors and ministers and other authorities were suspicious of vacation time, believing it led people into vice and unhealthy behaviors. And, also, most people just couldn’t afford to take time off and go somewhere for the summer.

What changed? Our awareness that being the constant workhorse was, in fact, unhealthy, more so than the sort of vices vacation destinations could offer, for one. Another thing was a rising middle class in the Gilded Age that could finally afford to take the time off from work during the summer to have a good time. And, too, as with much of American life in the Gilded Age, there was the question of commerce. The travel and hospitality industries (like hotels and restaurants) figured out they could make a lot of money by encouraging Americans to take time off and play.

In my Waxwood series, the affluent Alderdice family and other characters end up in the resort town of Waxwood during the summer months. Resort life was growing in the Gilded Age among the wealthy and upper middle class, as evidenced in Charles Dudley Warner’s book, Their Pilgrimage. These wealthy people used to take summer vacation very seriously, spending months lounging in resorts, meeting new people, and participating in all sorts of summer activities and events. Such is the case with the Alderdices, the Paynes (a niece and aunt who appear in Book 3 of the series), and Harland Stevens ( a father figure to Jake in Book 2, False Fathers, and who makes another appearance in Book 4). 

To find out more about my series, you can go to this page. Book 1, The Specter, is available here. 

Sometimes no father is better than a false father.

In 1898 California, Jake Alderdice comes of age as a shy and contemplative youth who is passionate about art. On vacation in Waxwood, now a fashionable resort town, he meets Harland Stevens, who takes an interest in the young man's artistic ambitions. Stevens seizes upon the fatherless young man to counsel him toward a path to manhood inspired by Teddy Roosevelt and Thoreau. He introduces Jake to The Order of Actaeon, a secret society built upon Roosevelt’s ideals of masculine virility and virtue.

But the path to maturity is a complex thing in the Gilded Age. Will his journey free him from the Alderdice family illusions, half-truths, and lies that have kept him a child? Or will it lead him into the world of Actaeon, where the hunter becomes the hunted?

Available at the following online retailers:

Amazon Universal Link

B&N

Apple iBooks (iTunes)

Kobo

Tam May grew up in the United States and earned her B.A. and M.A in English. She worked as an English college instructor and EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teacher before she became a full-time writer. She started writing when she was 14, and writing became her voice. She writes fiction characters who examine their past in order to move into their future and are influenced by the time in which they live.


Her first book, a collection of contemporary short stories titled Gnarled Bones And Other Stories, was nominated for a 2017 Summer Indie Book Award. She is currently working on a Gilded Age family saga. The first book, The Specter, came out in June of 2019, and the second book, False Fathers, is also now available. Book 3 (The Claustrophobic Heart) and Book 4 (Dandelion Children) will be out in 2020. She is also working on a historical mystery series featuring a turn-of-the-century New Woman sleuth. Both series take place in Northern California.

She lives in Texas but calls San Francisco and the Bay Area “home”. When she’s not writing, she’s reading classic literature and historical fiction, watching classic films, or cooking up awesome vegetarian dishes.


For more information on Tam May and her work, feel free to check out her website at www.tammayauthor.com.

Brooke Williams and Mamarazzi

Mamarazzi

Brooke Williams

Audio book

Print: 171 pp

Romance

Pelican Book Group, 2015

Ebook $3.99

Audio $19.99

Print $12.99

Buy on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Audible, Publisher

About the Book

Danica Bennett isn't sure what she hates more...her job or the fact that she's good at it. As one of the many Hollywood paparazzi, she lives her life incognito and sneaks around trying to get the best shot of the latest star. When she is mistaken for an extra on a new, up and coming TV show, her own star rises and she becomes the one in the photographs. Add that to the fact that she's falling for her co-star, Eliot Lane, and Danica is in a whole heap of trouble.

My Review

Secrets layered on secrets layered on rumors and the glitter of Hollywood greed frame this story of a young woman trying to make her way in the world. As a photographer after her mother's fame, Danica Bennett bides her time and talent while building an undercover reputation as a paparazzi, one of the insidious interlopers who would do anything to get a candid photo to sell to the public. When she wandered onto the backstage of a new television show, she's mistaken for an extra, and one thing leads to another, including a mutual attraction and growing relationship with the megastar of the show. Danica's agent is the only one who knows the truth of her identity as the popular paparazzi nicknamed Mamarazzi and demands a photograph that would rock even Hollywood. When Danica learns a dearly-held secret, misunderstandings begin to weave a cruel web.

Danica's naiveté and innocence is the only thing that keeps her from falling into the depravity she abhors. As Danica's star rises and even her cousin crawls out of the woodwork to ask for favors, Danica comes under pressure from her agent who will spill her secret if Danica doesn't come through. As Danica learns what it’s like to be the one who's stalked by paparazzi, she realizes the enormity of the damage paparazzi can do. Coming clean has a high price. She wonders what could be left if she tells the truth.

About the Author

Brooke Williams is a former radio announcer/producer and script writer turned freelance writer and author. When Brooke's first daughter was born in 2009 she left her full time radio career to stay home. Eventually, she realized she could fulfill her lifelong desire to write while her daughter napped and she then entered into the freelance writing world. As her business grew, she took on clients from all over the world and began to dabble in fiction writing once again. Brooke has several books on the market including romance, thrillers, and romantic comedies. Get details on all of Brooke's releases on her website: AuthorBrookeWilliams.com

Fly Fly Again new childrens book

Fly, Fly Again

by Katie Jaffe, Jennifer Lawson

Childrens book

Ebook $7.99

Print; $15.95

Greenleaf Book Press

32 pp

Buy on

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Google Books

About the Book

Fly, Fly Again is a clever and charming story about Jenny, a child who dreams of flying. After years of tinkering in makeshift laboratories and studying the mechanics of flight with her pet Hawk, Jenny builds a plane—only to crash into the yard of her skateboarding neighbor, Jude, and his pet cheetah. Working with Jude, Jenny successfully learns how to control and fly her plane. This unique story includes lessons about problem solving, teamwork, and determination as well as family-friendly information about the basics of aeronautical engineering like lift, drift, and more!

A brief interview with the author

Where did you grow up /live now?

I grew up in El Paso, Texas and moved to Austin to attend UT.  I currently live in Austin with my husband and three children.

When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer?

Since I was very young, I have always loved to write.  I have also had a passion for children’s causes from a very young age, and writing this book was a great way to give back to children’s education with our proceeds benefiting UNICEF and Buzz Aldrin Ventures.

What inspired your story?

Our story was inspired by my husband Jordan who has had a love of flight since he was a child.  Our family is in the aviation industry and our 3 children have also developed a love for flying.  We are constantly teaching them the basics of flight in our day to day life, and this book was the perfect way to do so for all kids that may be interested in flying.

About the Authors

Katie Jaffe:
As Creative Director and Design Consultant of Aviation for Spectre Air Capital, Katie has aided in

the design of several high profile aircraft.  Currently, she is leading the marketing and design effort of an overseas airline. She also has a passion for children's causes, and has committed herself to helping several charities for children around the world.  She lives in Austin, Texas, with her husband and three children.

Jennifer Lawson:
Lifelong educator and advocate of the Childrens' Literacy Program, Jennifer seeks to bring knowledge to students through creative curriculum and technology on a global level.  As Owner and President of Decision Tree 

Uncharted Promises by Keely Brooke Keith

Uncharted Promises, book 8 in the Uncharted series

Keely Brooke Keith

January 1, 2020

191 pages

Edenbrooke Press

Ebook $4.99

Print $13.95

Buy on Amazon 

Barnes and Noble - coming

About the Book

Sybil Roberts uses the warmth of delicious meals to lift the spirits of road-weary travelers at The Inn at Falls Creek. Her life at the inn would be perfect if she could just get her brothers and mother to move back home.

And if she could see Isaac Owens again.

He visited the inn once when he interviewed for the farm manager job, and she’s dreamed of his return to Falls Creek ever since.

Isaac Owens knows how to run a farm. His family might not have faith in him, but if he succeeds at Falls Creek, he’ll prove them wrong. He arrives at the inn thinking the job is his, but the inn’s senile owner offered the position to another man too. Isaac must spend the winter competing if he wants to win the job… and Sybil’s heart.

It will take more than warm meals on cold nights for Sybil and Isaac to find love while working at the isolated inn.

My Review

The more readers immerse themselves in Keith’s near future world, the more at home we feel. Returning to Falls Creek, not quite a community but more than a crossroads, is a comfortable place to be, even if the residents and guests sometimes cross over the lines between friend and foe. A parent sadly slipping further into dementia causes an uproar when he makes an apparent mistake in offering the same farm managerial position to two different people. This confusing order results in overriding his oldest daughter’s authority in running the family inn, and his youngest daughter Sybil’s future happiness, not to mention the young man in question, Isaac’s, sense of self-worth and desire to test his ability to make and stick to a plan for the future.

Guests both purposefully visionary and with criminal intent come and go to the inn at Falls Creek. One decision by the elders of the Land to declare the resident families a village and accept an overseer, a stranger to the area who will serve as leader and pastor, pushes many to face their anxieties as they defend their way of life.

Keith’s latest addition to her series explores the hopes and fears of the family of innkeepers in the Land; from the patriarch who must pass along the inheritance and break with tradition, to his youngest daughter who must grow out of her idyllic schemes to force everyone in her life to live up to her childish memories of perfect happiness. When Isaac must leave to attend to a family matter, he promises to return. But Sybil only knows that those who leave Falls Creek rarely return.

Told in alternating personal viewpoints between Sybil and Isaac, Uncharted Promises reunites old friends and new in this slice of life of people struggling to create and maintain a perfect, peaceable society. Fans of the series, and those who like a blend of near-future romantic inspirational tales with a twist will enjoy Uncharted Promises.

About the Author

Keely Brooke Keith writes inspirational frontier-style fiction with a futuristic twist, including The Land Uncharted (Shelf Unbound Notable Romance 2015) and Aboard Providence (2017 INSPY Awards Longlist).

Born in St. Joseph, Missouri, Keely was a tree-climbing, baseball-loving 80s kid. She grew up in a family who moved often, which fueled her dreams of faraway lands. When she isn’t writing, Keely enjoys teaching home school lessons and playing bass guitar. Keely, her husband, and their daughter live on a hilltop south of Nashville, Tennessee.

New Waxwood story from Tam May

False Fathers, Waxwood Series book 2

Tam May

December 28, 2019

Dreambook Press

$11.99 Print

$.99 Ebook

Buy on Amazon

Buy on Barnes and Noble 

About the Book

Sometimes no father is better than a false father.

At nineteen, Jake Alderdice is shy, contemplative, and passionate about art. With the death of his grandfather, shipping magistrate Malcolm Alderdice, he becomes the new family patriarch and heir to Alderdice Shipping and Alderdice Luxury Liner. After two years of mourning, he is ready to add to the family honor just as all the Alderdice men have, but as an artist, not a shipping magistrate. His plans are delayed with his mother announces the family will be retreating to Waxwood, now a fashionable resort town favored by the San Francisco elite, for the summer, fulfilling her father's dying wish to "go back.” 

On the train, he meets Harland Stevens, an enigmatic but charming older man, who has come to Waxwood as chaperone and guide to his college-aged cousin Roger and Roger's friends. Mr. Stevens, or, as he tells Jake, "just Stevens", takes an interest in the young man's ambitions, and introduces him to the town's most prominent gallery owner. But when Jake takes his paintings for appraisal, the man delivers a fatal blow — Jake's mythology-inspired paintings are too original for the market of realistic landscape paintings favored by Gilded Age patrons.

Stevens seizes the devastated and wandering Jake and counsels him toward a more aggressive but moralistic path to manhood inspired by Teddy Roosevelt and Thoreau. Jake proves himself to be more studious and serious than Roger and his friends. Impressed with the young man's determination to take over his grandfather's business, Stevens introduces him to The Order of Actaeon, a secret society built upon those ideals favored by his idols.

But the path to emotional maturity and masculine identity is, Jake learns, a complex thing in the Gilded Age. Will his journey free him from the Alderdice family illusions, half-truths, and lies that have kept him a child, just as it did his sister Vivian's six years before? Or will it lead him into the world of Actaeon, where the hunter becomes the hunted?

My Review

Gilded and Privileged age slice of life

Tam May knows her stuff, and skillfully weaves a tale of, by today’s standards, a coming-of-age story near the early days of the twentieth century in America.

Once the reader gets past an expected but not always practiced two-year mourning period of a family member, the adventure begins. Genteel to the maximum, False Fathers is not an action adventure, but a thoughtful commentary on the last principled era.

After the lengthy period of withdrawal from society, the Alderdice family of San Francisco, shipping magnate, takes to the country for the summer. The male heir to the Alderdice business, Jacob, has reached, or nearly so, his majority, and must decide his future. He is a thoughtful, torn young man who would like to practice painting, to seek a profession as an artist instead of stepping into his familial shoes of business. His strong-willed mother, Larissa, is willing to let him explore this fancy. Jake’s older sister, Vivian, had her adventure some years earlier when she visited a friend of her late grandmother. With his mother and sister always in contention, Jake slides away from the tension and encounters a strangely compelling man chaperoning a group of university boys on a summer lark. Jake and the man, Stevens, begin a mentoring relationship which ends in a sobering, fate-changing reality in an otherwise unassuming summer.

Jake was raised by his late grandfather, and is subconsciously seeking another father figure who will guide him on his decisions for his future. What he learns is that everyone has secrets and failings. Even his family history is built upon secrets and failings and it is up to him to live up to his own principles.

Written primarily from Jake’s point of view, False Fathers is recommended for those who appreciate a little-explored period in American history. Those who love the story of Margaret Brown (“unsinkable” Molly Brown, without the music) or the era of suffrage, will enjoy Tam May’s Waxwood series.

About the Author

Tam May grew up in the United States and earned her B.A. and M.A in English. She worked as an English college instructor and EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teacher before she became a full-time writer. She started writing when she was 14, and writing became her voice. She writes fiction about characters who find their future by exploring their personal past influenced by the time in which they live.

Her first book, a collection of contemporary short stories titled Gnarled Bones And Other Stories, was nominated for a 2017 Summer Indie Book Award. She is currently working on a Gilded Age family saga. She is also working on a historical mystery series featuring a turn-of-the-century New Woman sleuth. Both series take place in Northern California.

She lives in Texas but calls San Francisco and the Bay Area "home". When she's not writing, she's reading classic literature and historical fiction, watching classic films, or cooking up awesome vegetarian dishes.

Write Now Literary tour with Sonja Nwajei

 

Write Now Literary is pleased to be organizing a book tour for 26 Ways to Inspire Yourself by Sonia Nwajei. The tour will run November 18- December 18, 2019. Book your own tour here. 

Genre: Self Help/Non-Fiction

ASIN: B07DZS4JQF

                      MEET SONIA

            

Sonia A Nwajei is the author of this wonderful book. She began her writing career only two years ago and had since published three non-fiction titles (including 26 Ways) to her credit. 

She is currently working to publish her first fiction, a murder mystery, which she hopes will captivate lovers of fiction/detective novellas. 

Sonia lives in Brisbane, Australia.

       

             ABOUT THE BOOK

26 Ways To Inspire Yourself - is a powerful self-help book, written with the sole purpose to motivate readers with ideas that'll enable them make positive changes in their lives. The book is packed full of insightful and encouraging messages for those seeking to improve themselves, rebuild their lives and achieve set goals. It's your ultimate self-guide to a Better New You. Get it now.

EXCERPTS

Chapter 9-Letter I-Inspiration:

Inspiration leads us to a course of action that tends to showcase a different and more creative side of us that people may not have noticed before.

Chapter 10 -Letter J-Jealousy:

Jealousy is an unpleasant feeling of low self-esteem mixed with insatiable desire to acquire the same material possessions as some else.

Chapter 13-Letter M-Mother:

Every child feels safe and happy when their mother is around. Every child craves the affections and support of their mother. Even adults run to their mothers when they experience difficulties in life. 

Connect Socially

Website: http://sanpublishing.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Sonia_N_A

Purchase Links

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Tour hosted by wnlbooktours.com