Monday 21 September 2020

#BlogTour :: Along Came a Spyder (The Spyders #1) by @apekshar #YoungAdult #Espionage

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About the Book:

Are your Spidey senses tingling?

At 17, Samira Joshi has only one dream in life. She wants to be a spy. And why not?
Spying runs in the Joshi genes.
Her great-grandmother was famous for sticking her nose in everyone’s business. Her grandmother had a flourishing side-business of tracking down errant husbands and missing servants. Her parents are elite intelligence agents for RAW.
Yet, they want their only daughter to become a doctor.
When she sees a college friend being trapped by a pimp, Samira does some spying of her own, and discovers the existence of a secret sisterhood of teen spies — The Spyders. And, she wants in!
The question is, do they want her?

To find out, read this fast-paced, gripping YA novel by brand new author, Apeksha Rao.

Book links:


Advance praise for Along Came A Spyder:


"A thrilling read with several nail biting moments. Will keep you hooked till the end."

 ~ Andaleeb Wajid, author of The Legend Of The Wolf

"A fantastic spy story, keeps you on the edge and you can't stop till you finish the book. A fantastic debut book. Look forward to reading more from the author."

~ Kanchana Banerjee, author of Nobody's Child and A Forgotten Affair.

"Witty, snarky and a thorough entertainer, Along Came a Spyder is a welcome addition to India's YA genre."

~ Shilpa Suraj, author of Love, Marriage and Other Disasters, Saved by Love, and, Driven by Desire

"Apeksha Rao writes a taut espionage thriller with a twist-a-minute narrative that is sure to get all readers hooked. The language is flawless, the characterization spot-on, and the plot is filled with rich details. It is the kind of story that you'd leave all your other work aside to read. Be warned!"

~ Neil D'Silva, author of Haunted, Yakshini and Maya's New Husband



About the Author:
Apeksha Rao fell in love with words very early in life. 
While other kids of her age were still learning to spell, she was already reading her older brother’s books and comics. 
She wrote her first story at the age of seven and submitted it to Tinkle, a very popular children’s magazine. 
Writing took a backseat, as she established a thriving medical practice.
But Apeksha rekindled her love affair with words, while on maternity leave. 
She would tap away at her keyboard while rocking her twin babies to sleep, as sleep deprivation stimulated her dormant creativity.
She wrote numerous short stories, that she published on her blog. 
Apeksha has been lauded for her taut and gripping stories, that always come with a twist at the end.
In addition to Along Came A Spyder, she has written The Itsy Bitsy Spyder, a prequel novella to the Spyders series.
A Mumbaikar, born and bred, Apeksha comes from a family of doctors. 
At the ripe age of thirty-four, she wound up her practice and moved with her family, to Bengaluru. 
She is now a full-time writer. 
She is also a die-hard foodie, who’s still trying to find the best vada-pav in Bengaluru.
She has twin boys, who keep her on her toes.
Apeksha’s husband is her inspiration to write, as well as her biggest critic.

Apeksha on the Web:

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Saturday 19 September 2020

#BookBlitz :: Anamika Khanna Falls in Love by Shraddha Sahi - @shraddhavs #Romance

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About the Book:

How far would you go in love?

A few missed calls? Liking every post of his on FB? Landing in the hospital when you fall from a tree because you wanted to see into his room?
Anamika Khanna is madly in love with Rahul…
How can someone be so blind? Why can’t she see how much I love her? Will my confession jeopardise our friendship?
Vikram Lobo, the bookworm has developed muscles and lost the soda bottle glass-es. But he can’t stop his heart from skipping a beat when he sees Anamika.
Rahul, the high society Adonis wants nothing to do with the gauche, middle class weirdo who’s following him around. Until she moves into his league…
Laugh out loud at Anamika’s antics and follow her on the roller coaster that is her life!


Book Links:
Goodreads * Amazon


Meet Pammi Khanna


If you had a free day with no responsibilities and your only mission was to enjoy yourself, what would you do?

I would do that course on wedding cakes I’ve always wanted to do! Simple cakes seem too easy now. Maybe it will finally push me to start that small baking business I dream of.

If you could spend the day with someone you admire (living or dead or imaginary), who would you pick?

My Mother - she died when I was only five. My Dadi would tell me so many stories of her booming laughter and crazy antics - I think Anu is quite like her. I wish I could meet my mom just for a day and talk to her, woman to woman.

What is your idea of perfect happiness? And, what is your current state of mind?

It’s not fashionable to say this nowadays, but I’m happiest when Surinderji and Anu lick their fingers after a meal I made and smile at me. 
Right now I’m wondering if Anu’s strange behaviour is the effect of buri nazar (evil eye) Hai Rabba, how I can break this hold that snooty Rahul has on her!

What do you consider to be the most overrated virtue and why? 

Romance is overrated - at least the type they show in movies is! Flowers and chocolates and flowery words aren’t enough to build a future on. Security and trust make for better conditions for a life partner. 

Tell us 3 things about yourself that the readers do not know about

- I had an arranged marriage. I didn’t find Surinderji very good looking, but after my elder sister’s husband ran away with another woman, I was looking for the type of man who didn’t look as if he would do that to me.
- I dream of becoming India’s Nigella Lawson! Blush, blush!
- I’m trying to do all that visualisation stuff like in the book The Secret -I imagine Anu becoming more focussed in life, maybe even deciding to join me in my (till now imaginary) baking empire!


About the Author:

Words have been the centre of Shraddha’s existence for as long as she can re-member. Fed up with her constant demand for books, her parents asked her to write her own. And so, it began!

She’s an ophthalmologist with a specialisation in Glaucoma. She juggles her profes-sional demands with her new label of tennis mom and the larger than life charac-ters that live in her mind, demanding to be manifested.

She has written A Doctor in the House (Partridge), A Great Fall (Juggernaut) and The Case of the Counterfeit Currency (Mango Books) and also has an anthology of poems (F.I.S.T) (Pothi Books)

Shraddha finds herself attracted to stories about women – strong ones, funny ones & kick ass survivors. Her self-deprecating humor tends to stay with you long after you’ve shut the book.


Author Links:
Facebook * Twitter * Instagram * Youtube



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Tuesday 15 September 2020

#ReleaseDayBlitz :: My Heart's Regret by Shilpa Suraj - @shilpaauthor #Contemporary #Romance

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About the Book:
Samaira Reddy, the girl in the big house, the Bade Sahib's daughter, only wants one thing and one person...a life with her childhood sweetheart, her Rags.

Raghav Cherukuri has always been known as the driver's son. And has also always loved his Sam, the girl he can never have and never forget. And so, he leaves her and his life in Hyderabad behind.
But now, Raghav is back. A Chief Officer in the Merchant Navy, he is the success he’s always wanted to be. And yet, he has failed.
Samaira is meeting the ‘perfect groom’ her family approves of…A man whom Raghav can never be.

Can it finally be their time to be together? Or has their happy-ever-after passed them by?

This novella was previously part of the anthology Something Old Something New.


Book Links:




Read an Excerpt from My Heart's Regret:



“So, where does that leave us?” she asked.
“Nowhere, Sam,” he exhaled. “That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“Bullshit.” Anger, hurt, frustration, a whole gamut of furious emotion swept through her. She turned to him and balled her hands in his shirt, yanking him forward. “You have no business giving up on us, this way. You have to give us a chance.”
“Sam,” His voice was gentle and so were his hands as they pried hers from his chest. He cupped the back of her head and pressed a kiss on her forehead. “We never had a chance. Our families would never accept this. I’m your driver’s son, for God’s sake.”
“You’re the man I love.” With a low groan, she grabbed his face and kissed him. 
Raghav froze in her arms.
She poured years of pent up emotion into the kiss and the bloody statue she loved so much still didn’t respond. Humiliated tears pricked her eyes as she wrenched herself out of his arms and stood. There was nothing left to do but accept defeat. Raghav may love her but he didn’t want her in his life. 
Sam forced herself to turn her back on him and walk away.
She’d made it a bare two feet before she was grabbed from behind. He pulled her flush against him, her back to his chest and buried his face in her hair. It took her a moment to realize his tortured breathing and harsh gasps were not desire but tears. 
He was crying. Slow, silent tears that wet her hair and soaked through her shirt.
Her heart breaking, Sam turned and wrapped him in her arms. They held each other, fierce and unyielding, the past and present swirling together to form a protective cocoon around them.
“God help me,” His tortured whisper destroyed her. “But it kills me to let you go.”
“Then don’t,” she whispered back. “Please, Raghav.” 
He kissed her then. His lips melting against hers with a mix of passion, fury and need. A dam burst inside her and Sam rose to meet his kiss with all the love and desire bursting through her. 
Her hands fisted in his hair, pulling him impossibly closer. Soft, mewling sounds escaped her.  He swallowed them as he tilted her head back to deepen the kiss. 
His hand crept up and clasped the soft mound of her breast, just as a distant sound shattered the moment and its poor illusion of privacy. 
They pulled apart, chests heaving, the sound of their harsh breaths mingling and spreading until it felt like that was all she could hear. 
In the distance, his mother appeared on the verandah outside their room. She waved to him frantically, screaming at the top of her voice.
“Raghav, come fast.” Her panicked shout had him running even before she was done. 
Samaira closed her eyes in despair. This nightmare of an evening wasn’t over yet.



About the Author:



Shilpa Suraj wears many hats - corporate drone, homemaker, mother to a fabulous toddler and author.

An avid reader with an overactive imagination, Shilpa has weaved stories in her head since she was a child. Her previous stints at Google, in an ad agency and as an entrepreneur provide colour to her present day stories, both fiction and non-fiction.
Contact the Author:
Website * Facebook * Twitter * Instagram * Newsletter

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Saturday 12 September 2020

#ReleaseDayBlitz :: Along Came a Spyder by @apekshar - #YoungAdult #Espionage

12:30 am 0 Comments

 


About the Book:

At 17, Samira Joshi has only one dream in life.

She wants to be a spy. And why not?

Spying runs in the Joshi genes. Her great-grandmother was famous for sticking her nose in everyone’s business. Her grandmother had a flourishing side-business of tracking down errant husbands and missing servants. Her parents are elite intelligence agents for RAW. Yet, they want their only daughter to become a doctor. When she sees a college friend being trapped by a pimp, Samira does some spying of her own, and discovers the existence of a secret sisterhood of teen spies — The Spyders. And, she wants in!

The question is, do they want her?



Book Links:
Goodreads * Amazon

Read an Excerpt from Along Came a Spyder


Three in the afternoon is such a wrong time to be tailing someone, that too, when you’re stuck in a car that’s getting hotter by the minute. I stared longingly at the McDonald’s across the road. The orange float on the hoarding was calling out to me, but I didn’t have the time to fight my way through the crowd of college students just to join the long queue at the beverage counter.
I turned my face resolutely away from the hoarding and narrowed my eyes at the target — a plump woman with tacky gold highlights and loud makeup, stuffing her face with fries as she haggled over a pair of mojris. Our driver, Ranga, sighed for about the fiftieth time and as usual, I ignored his passive-aggressive sighs. He was just bitter because he was stuck driving around a bunch of girls, instead of some top cop.
“I was the official chauffeur for the Assistant Commissioner of Police, for twenty years. Not once was I in any danger. But in the one year that I’ve been driving these crazy girls around, I’ve been shot at thrice! The third time, the bullet missed my head by just an inch,” he’s been known to grouse.
That was a gross exaggeration. 
We have CCTV footage of the whole incident. The bullet missed his ear, not his head and that too, by a large margin. Also, if he had just kept his big head down like he was told to, the bullet wouldn’t have been anywhere near him.
But no! Catch our macho Ranga taking orders from a chit of a girl, even if said chit of a girl knows fourteen different ways to kill a man!
Yet, according to him, ‘these crazy girls’ are the cause of all his problems. Which is so unfair! It’s not like we go looking for trouble. At least, I don’t. I don’t have to, because trouble comes looking for me.
“Curiosity is one of your besetting sins,” my Baba used to say.
“No Ranjit,” Ma would argue. “Curiosity brings forth information.”
For my Ma, information of any kind was always gold. What she found really sinful, was my tendency to find trouble. Drama was anathema to my parents.
“Yet, trouble and drama follow you like a drone to its homing beacon, Samira!”
A slap on my arm snapped me back to the present.
Debbie was raving about something.
“Sammy ya! Just look at this cheap aunty. I bet she won’t mind dropping thousands in one of her high society card parties, but see how much she bargains for a pair of shoes. He has kids to feed, you mean cow,” she said, shoving a handful of chips into her mouth.
I sighed. It was way too hot for a sociology lesson. Plus, Debbie’s rants were getting a little old. It didn’t take too much to get her revolutionary Bong blood boiling, and she was totally capable of inciting a French Revolution-style riot if you let her go on. But this was neither the time nor the place.
“Debs, I don’t care how much they haggle. I just want her to get on with it,” I said, squirming on the hot car seat. My skin was starting to fuse with the rexine of the seat.
Monica Shah finally walked up to the store and stood looking around.
“Oh, go in already! You’re not fooling anyone with your dawdling. We know you’re going into Pretty Woman,” I grumbled.
“Okay, here she goes. Give her 15 minutes, then, you go in, Debs. If you can, please take some pics of whatever she does in there. Just don’t lose her, and whatever you do, don’t get caught. If they catch you taking pics, deny it outright. Your camera app will upload the pics directly to the server, so, your phone will be clean. Now, don’t look scared, and admit nothing! When you’re done, meet me at the end of the lane,” I said as I sent Debbie off with an encouraging fist-bump.
Then, I sank down in my seat, and whispered to Ranga, “Do you think we’re going to survive Debbie’s outing in the field?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that I don’t want to die so soon,” whimpered the lily-livered Ranga, in response.


About the Author:
Apeksha Rao is a multi genre author from Bangalore.

She is the author of Along Came A Spyder, which is the story of a seventeen year old girl who wants to be spy.

Apeksha has written many short stories based on the same series, The Spyders, which are available on this blog.
She is a voracious reader, and a foodie.

Apeksha's current works in progress: A middle grade book, a chick lit featuring a detective, and a horror novel (the writing of which is giving her sleepless nights).

Apeksha on the Web:



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