• Blog

    Cover reveal for The China Doll by Deb Nam-Krane (and give-away)!

    December 27, 2019

    2/24/2014


    BOOK THREE
    The China Doll
    By Deborah Nam-Krane
    Genre: Mystery/suspense

    The China Doll

    Hypocrisy, half truths and lies…
    Sick of being treated like she’s going to break, Jessie Bartolome is back to her old ways and calling everyone on their hypocrisy. Sheesh! One little breakdown and even easygoing Martin Shepard thinks she’s too fragile to handle their age difference. Good thing her older and equally yummy teaching assistant Robert Lester thinks otherwise…right?

    After spending so long cleaning up after everyone else, Jessie’s cousin Richard has never had the time to start a life of his own. However had he managed to find his girlfriend Zainab? So what is Richard going to do now that everyone else has grown up? Marry Zainab and start a family? Things have never been that easy for a Hendrickson…just ask his cousin Michael.

    Richard’s mother, Lucy, is one of the most powerful women in Boston… so when is she going to put a stop to the blackmail ruthless Alex Sheldon has been holding over her for years? And if Richard knows more than he’s letting on, why hasn’t he gone after Alex himself? The question is, how much does he- or anyone else- really know?

    Welcome to the Bartolome/Hendrickson family.

    The China Doll is Book Three in The New Pioneers Series

    GOODREADS

    EXCERPT

    ‘My dad drowned. My mom died in her sleep.’
    ‘How old was she?’
    ‘About twenty-six.’ Jessie shuddered just a little bit. ‘Just a little older than Miranda is now.’
    ‘That’s awfully young to die in your sleep.’
    ‘Heart condition, they said.’
    ‘Who’s they?’
    ‘Richard and Lucy.’Jessie shook her head. ‘No. Just Richard.’
    ‘What did your aunt say?’
    ‘Nothing,’Jessie said quietly. ‘She just let Richard do all the talking.’
    ‘How old was he?’
    Jessie sighed. ‘Thirteen, I think.’
    ‘And how old were you?’
    ‘Four.’
    ‘So how do you know you remember it correctly?’
    Jessie looked at him square in the eye. ‘Because you know when you’re that age. When you’re a little kid, you don’t have to go through the apologetic BS you do when you’re older. When you’re eight, even. You just get it. And people think you’re crazy or in the way or rude because you get it and then you say it. So then no one wants to talk to you or they send you to your room. Then you start making up excuses for why they must be right and you must be wrong. Then you grow up, and you realize that you had it right back then, and if your world seems messed up, it’s because you bought into someone else’s lies. So don’t lie anymore, and everything will be just fine.”
    ‘And when did you come to that nugget of wisdom?’
    ‘When I was fifteen,’ Jessie said quietly. ‘And I’ve been very happy ever since.’

    BOOK ONE
    The Smartest Girl in the Room
    Genre: Coming of Age

    Nineteen year old Emily wants her college diploma fast, and she’s going to get it. But when the perfect night with perfect Mitch leads her to a broken heart, Emily is blind to her vulnerability. When the person she cares about the most is hurt as a result, Emily’s ambition gives way to more than a little ruthlessness. She’s going to use her smarts to take care of herself and protect the people she loves, and everyone else had better stay out of her way. But shouldn’t the smartest girl everyone knows realize that the ones she’d cross the line for would do the same for her?

    GOODREADS
    AMAZON
    BARNES AND NOBLE
    SMASHWORDS
    KOBO
    SONY

    BOOK TWO
    The Family You Choose
    Genre: Family Saga

    Miranda Harel has been in love with her guardian Alex Sheldon since she was five years old, and Michael Abbot has despised them both for just as long. When Miranda finds out why she wants both men out of her life for good and questions everything she believed about where and who she came from. Finding out the truth will break her heart. Without family or true love, will her friends be enough to bring her back?
    GOODREADS
    AMAZON
    BARNES AND NOBLE
    SMASHWORDS
    KOBO
    ITUNES
    SONY

    AUTHOR INFO
    Deborah Nam-Krane is a writer living in Boston proper who has been storytelling since she was a little girl and writing those stories down since she was eight. Any given day will find her reading, writing, reviewing, editing and, just for fun, homeschooling her three school-aged children (she’s very grateful the fourth is now college-aged).
    The China Doll is the third installment of the New Pioneers series, the sequel to The Smartest Girl in the Room (March 2013) and The Family You Choose (September 2013). While her long-suffering editor works her magic on the fourth installment Let’s Move On, Deborah is working on the fifth. That book will be set in the world of Boston and Massachusetts politics, and her job will be to tone down the true stories she’s heard so they seem believable.
    Deborah is all over the place on the internet- no, really- but the best way to keep in touch is to follow her blog Written By Deb and subscribe to her newsletter (only publishing news, never spam).

    FACEBOOK PAGE

    GOODREADS PROFILE

    @dnkboston

    GIVEAWAY
    $10 Amazon gift card
    5 copies of both The Smartest Girl in the Room and The Family You Choose

    a Rafflecopter giveaway

    Comments

    Deborah Nam-Krane
    2/24/2014 08:54:49 am

    Thank you so much for posting my cover!
    Reply
    Monique
    2/24/2014 08:59:12 am

    It looks terrific! My pleasure 🙂

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  • Blog

    Sometimes, it’s got to be Christmas – a Holiday guest post from Deb Nam-Krane

    December 27, 2019

    12/3/2013

    Deborah Nam-KraneSometimes it has to be Christmas
    I confess: I can be a bit of a Scrooge. When I was younger, I loved the idea of the magic of Christmas and the rest of the solstice holidays, but as I’ve gotten older it’s become more of an indulgence in crass commercialism. “Buy this, and everyone will love you because they’ll know how much you love them!” or “If you’re a good citizen, you’re going to buy a lot- the economy depends on you!”

    But while I prefer to mark December 25th with the ancient traditions of my people (a movie and Chinese food), I’d have to be living in a hermetically sealed bubble without access to any other people not to notice that “the holidays” are an important part of everyone’s lives, whether they like it or not. If nothing else, they focus the attention on people gathering together and making an effort to show their appreciation of those who are important to them. If that frequently takes the form of sweaters (worn with or without irony) and way too many baked goods, maybe that’s not such a terrible thing.

    Given that the first book in my series The New Pioneers is filled with college students in a famous college town, it would have been foolish not to have taken advantage of the drama that comes with Christmas. The break in classes, the scramble to travel, the young/new adults who are trying to establish new traditions, the return of important characters and, of course, the potential to meet friends of friends: it’s pretty clear why many YA and NA writers would include at least one Christmas scene.

    In The Smartest Girl in the Room, Christmas is a time that my heroine Emily feels unrooted after saying goodbye to both her best friend and her new boyfriend and not having a home of her own to return to. She enters into an unfamiliar situation even though she’s positive she’ll be outclassed. Instead, she’s introduced to a very important character with a surprising connection to some of her new- and old- friends. But clarity is postponed by the return of a prodigal son (or in this case, cousin)- and the “gift” Emily receives is to be rushed out before she can meet him.

    This is a pivotal moment in my story, and if Christmas hadn’t been available I could have worked it into, maybe, Spring Break. But while I would have had a very good reason for getting people out of town, getting important people back into town would have been harder to explain (unless people usually have a good reason to return to Boston in March or Spring that I don’t know about). It also would have meant moving the entire timeline of my story around; instead of beginning in autumn, I would have had to have started in winter, and then I would have had to have changed some of the catalysts for my story. Doable? Yes. But ask any writer what happens to a story you have to massage one too many times.

    So this year, instead of channeling my usual “Bah Humbug!”, I’m going to wink just a little bit when December 25th rolls around- right after I leave a movie theater and head to my favorite Chinese restaurant.

    —

    About Deb and her writing.

    Deborah Nam-Krane came up with the kernel of The New Pioneers series when she was barely a teenager. It only took 27 years, but she’s finally ready to let the world read it. The Smartest Girl in the Room was released in late March of 2013 and The Family You Choose was released exactly six months later in September of 2013. The China Doll will be released (fingers crossed) by the end of December.

    The Smartest Girl in the Room

    Nineteen year old Emily wants her college diploma fast, and she’s going to get it. But when the perfect night with perfect Mitch leads her to a broken heart, Emily is blind to her vulnerability. When the person she cares about the most is hurt as a result, Emily’s ambition gives way to more than a little ruthlessness. She’s going to use her smarts to take care of herself and protect the people she loves, and everyone else had better stay out of her way. But shouldn’t the smartest girl everyone knows realize that the ones she’d cross the line for would do the same for her?

    The Family You Choose

    Miranda Harel has been in love with her guardian Alex Sheldon since she was five years old, and Michael Abbot has despised them both for just as long. When Miranda finds out why she wants both men out of her life for good and questions everything she believed about where and who she came from. Finding out the truth will break her heart. Without family or true love, will her friends be enough to bring her back?

    —

    Please connect with Deborah Nam-Krane on any of the following sites:

    Join her mail list to find out first about new releases

    Written By Deb

    Amazon Author Page

    Smashwords Author Page

    Twitter

    Facebook

    Google+

    Goodreads

    The Family You Choose - CoverThe Smartest Girl in the Room - Cover

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Comment

    Deborah Nam-Krane
    12/3/2013 10:45:10 am

    Thanks for having me Monique!

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  • Blog

    What I’ve learned on my writing journey – guest post by Deb Nam-Krane

    December 27, 2019

    8/8/2013
    Deborah Nam-KraneHere is the second post in my series – what I’ve learned on my writing journey by Deb Nam-Krane
    ***
    What I’ve Learned

    I published my book a little less than six months ago. As far as crafting a story,
    I don’t think I’ve learned anything that you haven’t already heard: Keep
    reading, keep writing and keep editing. I’ll add that it doesn’t matter whether
    you’re going to publish it or not what the genre is- or even if it’s fiction- as
    long as you keep up your job as a storyteller.

    Nothing new there. It’s the business side- just maybe- where I might have learned something.

    I made the decision when I launched to make my book available exclusively through Amazon via their KDP Select program. While I liked the idea of making my book available on multiple platforms, a number of authors I respected talked about the exposure they were able to get via KDP Select. I was also hearing from many that getting the formatting right for Smashwords (the preferred program for non-Amazon booksellers) was a frustrating experience. Most importantly, getting Amazon to match the other platforms’ price didn’t seem to be a predictable process either. That last was very important for me as I wanted to reward some very supportive friends and family (aka my first newsletter subscribers) with the opportunity to download my book for free. With that in mind, I enrolled in KDP Select, in large part to take advantage of the five free days I could offer.

    Mind you, I wouldn’t characterize it as a failure. Over 90 days, courtesy of KDP Select, over 7000 people downloaded my book. Great! Now here’s hoping some of them will read it, a number of those will review it, and- god willing- some of
    them will like it. With just one book out, I’m about where I expected I’d be in numbers, and I’m not expecting a big uptick in sales or ranking until I have more titles out. (That’s just simple Search Engine Optimization!)

    But maybe I could be doing better. The chatter I’m hearing from other authors is that free promotions are not nearly as productive for authors as they used to be. In part this is because the KDP Select program is so much more popular (and
    they’ve changed some of their rules), in part this is because as the ebook (and ereader) market matures, we’re seeing a little more supply and a little less demand. Mind you, there’s still room for growth, but the ease some indies might
    have had a few years ago making sales isn’t there now for their “newer” peers. Also, as attractive as Amazon has made their e-readers, not everyone owns a Kindle. In other words, when my KDP Select period runs out (yes, I re-enrolled),
    I’m uploading to the other formats as well.

    Let me stress: I am NOT expecting to see a huge difference, and for all I know I’ll have even fewer sales because I can’t stoke the Amazon engine as well as I can now. Maybe, but it’s worth a shot.

    So what have I learned? Keep trying new things.

    —

    Deborah Nam-Krane has been writing in one way or another since she was eight years old (and telling stories well before that). The Smartest Girl in the Room, the first book in her series The New Pioneers, was published in late March. Her sequel The Family You Choose will be coming out any day now.

    The Smartest Girl in the Room - Cover
    Please connect with Deborah Nam-Krane on any of the following sites:

    Written By Deb

    Deb In the City

    Adventures in Urban Homeschooling

    Amazon Author  Page

    Twitter

    Facebook

    LinkedIn

    Google+

    Goodreads

    Join her mail list to find out first about new releases.

    Read More